Blake is back home, and the Mommy Clock has resumed. I can't say that I maximized my time, although I did buy a lot of crafting supplies that weren't yarn (and also bought yarn) and I did go to the gym until it made me violently ill. I shall have to complete the remainder of my marking in the dim hours after Blake goes to bed and before I collapse, which – hey! – makes my life exactly the same as it is when I'm working. Except I don't have to wear keys around my neck or pack a lunch, I suppose.

New Year's Eve was low-key, as befits the end of a decade that began in such fear and hope. When I showed up to Stacy's house ahead of the crowd in 1999, I was wearing a green velvet evening dress, a month-old engagement ring and a prominent hickey. When I showed up to Stacy's house ahead of the crowd in 2009, I was wearing a BSS t-shirt and my rings were at home, awaiting refinement to become some more relevant piece of jewelry. I left Mason sick in bed, but there was very little guilt; I was pretty sure that nuclear silos weren't about to malfunction and separate us forever. I limited myself to one beer, so that I could get home to hold hands for the countdown. And I brought knitting.

New Year's Eves in the new normal are a mixed blessing. I always have Blake until Christmas, but lose him on Boxing Day until the next year. I appreciated the chance to "cut loose" or whatever, but I still miss Blake in the midst of it all. Especially when I'm around other parents who have babysitting for the night, and didn't have to wait a full week to see their children.

(I'm not even going to get into how depressing it is to see all of my friends from ten years ago with or expecting a second baby. I can forgive the Boy many things, but I still have trouble forgiving the shuck-n-jive of so many years before he admitted that he never wanted kids in the first place. He's not the only reason why I still have just one kid, but he's a very convenient scapegoat.)

I wouldn't have left the house at all if it weren't Stacy's birthday the day before NYE, and if I hadn't spent the better part of two days working on her present. A last-minute inspiration really elevated this; who wants a regular elder god when they can have Cthulhu Bride? Behold!!

(We went to my grandfather's for lunch yesterday, and I was sewing on limbs as we visited. Everyone but Mason was puzzled by the project but I decided not to explain; what is it? is a better question than why would you bother? Stacy understands, I'm sure.)

The feature no one was asking for: a decade in review! Let's begin.

2009 was all about getting healthy. Lots of exercise with my brother, taking vitamins and oil of oregano (which for us was a game-changer). Lots of dancing in the fall, our troupe moving on from one-performance wonders. Lots of good food and cutting back on all the great beer. Greatest teachers: Valizan & Nic.

2008 was being single, really single. A single mom with a mortgage and a full-time job. Turns out I liked it a lot. Started bellydancing in January, discovered ATS, met Juuki, fell into her troupe. Started dating Mason in May; the summer was a whirlwind of late-nights, early mornings, new music, incredible food, and kissing. Visiting his condo was like taking a vacation from my suburban life. I fell in love with a current band, then all the associated bands. Lots of concerts, taking advantage of new custody agreements. A dance performance that didn't suck. New, local friends with common interests. Greatest teachers: Mason & Juuki.

2007 was splitting up with the Boy and fighting it with every particle of my being. Therapy, self-help, biting my tongue, lowering the bar, going to bed right after dinner, starting depression meds again. Bought a new house and had two months to enjoy being out of the fucking basement before everything else fell apart. Helping with Poppy's twins, trying to get pregnant to forestall the separation. Lots of crying. Greatest teacher: the Boy, who made me find myself again.

2006 was a new job in the best school I'd ever been in. Feeling like a good teacher again, being in love with my department and my job, meeting people who were more than colleagues and became friends. Camping with Blake & the Boy at StanFest. Social knitting for the first time, and getting hooked on monthly get-togethers. Greatest teachers: all the other knitters I met, celebrity and otherwise.

2005 was my first year as a working mum. Redefining work and home time, learning how to parent a person and not an inarticulate doorstop. And tonnes of knitting, once I learned how. Oh my god, the knitting. Greatest teacher: Debbie Stoller, via her books.

2004 was one word: mother. Making and losing friendships with Toronto mothers, trying hard to connect despite my new basement address. Trying out local mothering groups and feeling lost. Seeing old friends and being the first with a baby. Lots of frustrations, lots of love, very little sleep. Greatest teacher, again: Blake.

In 2003 I was adrift. I was recovering slowly from the previous year, but not losing weight or feeling happier. Got pregnant and went to Holland, in that order. Got off the depression meds and then spent the rest of the year reading up on parenting and getting used to the idea of living with my parents while my husband finished his undergrad degree. Greatest teacher: Blake.

2002 was the worst year of my life. Starting in November 2001, my teaching degree started to shake as my host teacher and evaluator treated me like an idiot for completely opposite reasons. Help appeared from every direction, but I barely squeaked through to the spring with my sanity intact. My new job in Ontario seemed heaven–sent, but after our exhausting August move cross-country, the Hosgboro administration in my new job made my host teacher look like Glenda, the good witch of the North. The camel's back being broken, I tried therapy and finally lots of drugs to get through the day. The new drug took away some of the depression and gave me twenty extra pounds in return. Started exercising, stopped eating meat and tried to turn it around. At the same time was trying to fit ourselves back into the social scene by clubbing with the young kids who now surrounded the Boy in university. But also there was Convergence 8, the last great dress-up, travel, punk rock bender of my youth. Greatest teacher: Theresa, who made me feel normal.

2001 was all about church. Fell in love with Wolfvegas and built a social life around the local United Church. Halifax visits for fun and sushi. Returning home, we were showered with love and glory for days. Discovered that the train was truly the best way to travel after 9/11 cancelled the planes. Slowly becoming a wife. Greatest teacher: Rev Robyn.

2000: Prepping for the big day, living in my parents and taking extra courses so I could go to teacher's college. Going to the city on weekends, living in the Boy's increasingly-shitty apartment. Married two weeks after my birthday and moved to Nova Scotia two weeks after that. Intense loneliness and even more intense bonding with the Boy. Slowly discovering the local community, and how supportive it could be of outsiders. First student-poverty, then the Boy's new job, and his days away on the back roads of New Brunswick. Missing pizza, clubbing and all of our friends. Greatest teacher: the Boy.

Labels: angst, blake, family, friends, nostalgia, the boy, triumph

I have the afternoon off while Blake is decorating my parents' tree, which allows me to get caught up on my digital tomfoolery. I'm glad he's doing it for his own sake; I thought that boy would explode with the need to decorate. We bought our tree on Thursday, which meant that it needed at least a night to relax. His first question when he woke up on Friday: "can we decorate the tree?" No, son. I'd love to know the code for calling in Festive, but it's a closely guarded secret. So yesterday, despite spending most of the day booting around downtown until Mason & I were thoroughly wrung out, we got out the precious red tote and started the tinselling.

Why were Mason & I so spent? It might have something to do with the fact that we were in pubs from school's end to well past midnight. It was a perfect storm of bar-crawling, starting with a staff function, sailing on through Brampton Drunken Knitting (with a brief dinner visit by Blake & my dad before they went off to see the Olympic torch in a nearby park), and finishing off at the Artful Dodger for a res reunion. It would have been even more difficult to get out of bed on Saturday if I had been able to put down the car keys at any point, but that's the problem with an inter-city booze expedition: there really can't be all that much booze if I don't want to have my car towed to some nearby, put-upon friend. So I watched the old crowd get loaded instead of participating.

(I'm really not sure that I could have stood back from this 12 years ago, put-upon friends or none. I suppose that means that I'm growing up. Or? Really tired.)

Everyone was feeling cozy and sentimental, and my ancient velour Christmas dress went over well, as the later it got no-one could stop petting my arms. (People love that dress. It is by far the most popular thing I've ever worn. Maggie M in particular thought it was worth building a time machine so that she could do as my mother had, and order it from the Sears catalogue in the early 90's.) I spent time catching up with Pete, Cranly, Steven, Seth & Kat, without wondering too much about when I would see anyone again. That may be the other thing about not drinking: I was able to appreciate seeing everyone without getting anxious about the fact that we never ever see each other any more.

I also found it interesting how easy it was to talk to Cranly, as I had to literally corner him to talk to him 6 ½ years ago, and I haven't been able to keep in touch since. Now he frequents the Dakota (for bluegrass), nearly joined the Peace Corps and has had a parallel experience with being seduced by bands in the BSS family. When I was younger I used to think that my friends then would like the same things as I did pretty much forever; now that I'm older my biggest surprise is that sometimes, they do.

No pictures, because I never went home for my camera. And also, I was talking too much. But to know what it looked like, you just have to picture everyone in my photos from the first days of the journal, only with beards. Yes, even the ladies.

Especially the ladies.

Labels: blake, christmas, friends, nostalgia, outfits, outings, res

The week before WorldCon sort of sucked; somehow I contracted an inner ear infection, so one part of my brain would say one thing and the other, another. It wasn't painful, but it gave me dizzy spells and it couldn't really be medicated, so I spent the week staying still and losing all the good effects of July's boot camp program. But I managed to get everyone packed and ready for Montreal, where I would be attending my first World Science Fiction Convention, Blake would be tagging along for free and Mason (who wasn't that interested in sf or, as we came to call it, "convention-nerd-ing") came along to keep us company and do some food tourism.

And I had no need to pack my most important asset: on the day Teija got married, I followed a dream about her wedding I had in June and dyed the front part of my hair blue. It's been the most fun hair I've had in years, and it was the perfect no-stress accessory to take to my first WorldCon...if I wanted people to remember me. And I did.

We got into the car on Thursday. I had tried to get everything packed the night before, but there are always 7000 things to do at the last minute, including cleaning up the stacks of dirty dishes so that I don't return to a toxic waste dump, packing the books and toys Blake will need on a 6 hour car-ride, and making sure that the adults are sufficiently caffeinated for the voyage. So we were a few hours late. Still, I'm proud of myself for getting out the door and only forgetting one thing (extra balls of yarn, which wasn't a problem because I had a second project. Of course.)

We had lunch in Trenton, at The Blue Room, a restaurant we picked in tribute to my hair. It was a lucky lucky find: an old school diner with real milkshakes and jukeboxes at each booth. Blake tried to use our juke to call his dad, which would have been more effective if his dad were Conway Twitty. And when we got change for the box, we found that the numbers gave up random selections, and we got a huge kick out of hearing the single the juke would deign to pop up. No, you don't really want to hear that, do you? Here's this instead.

"Blakey don't dial that number / It's a jukebox, not a phone…"
- random FM radio meets our lunch time memories

We zipped into Montreal at great speed, thanks to the prescience of Google Maps and a happy soundtrack of Apostle of Hustle. I was thrilled to discover that the expensive hotel I'd booked at the last minute was a posh pagoda-clad Holiday Inn on the borders of Chinatown and kittycorner from the convention building. (I didn't realize then that the Palais de Congrès is enormous, and I would spend most of my time in there walking from one end of it to the next and up and down floors in search of something vital: food, bathrooms, my child, an exit. Having an entrance close to the hotel was just a statistical likelihood, given its size. Still, it came in handy on the one night when I was alone.)

As soon as we got the car stowed and luggage hauled up, Blake & I went across the street to get registered. The first cool thing was the Voodoo Message Board system, which entranced the both of us. In brief: everyone who paid for a membership is listed alphabetically. When you check in, you circle your name. If someone has a message for you, they write it on the slips of paper provided, file it in a small box with eccentric alphabetic divisions, and put one of the red push pins next to your name. It's great fun to walk by and scan for red pins; as much fun as I've had since we used General Delivery to get our mail in Wolfvegas. Blake wanted to add his name, so I did on the second day. On the third day, he got a pen long enough to re-write his own name, which pleased him enormously. I only really needed this system for a couple of days, as I was able to find Souzan that first night walking through the hallway to a bellydance costuming panel. Juuki left us a message on the second day that let us find her in a steampunk panel (that took itself far too seriously, by the way; they shushed Blake so aggressively whenever he whispered to me that I was ready to start a fistfight by the time we got out. One, it's not church; two, if it were, people would treat him better. Argh.)

All of that being in the future, we left messages for both ladies and went to the desk to get checked in. Blake is only five years old, which means that he got in free and got his own "Kid in Tow" badge, which identified him both as belonging to the convention and entirely my responsibility; next year he will be theoretically able to roam free. Shudder. His biggest thrill came when they told him that he could pick his own name for his badge. He wanted "Winona" after the Rubbadubbers whale, but he was persuaded into an alternate: "The Batman." This is actually a terrifically sensible idea, as his real name was hidden from any potential abductors and he was at least twice as excited about attending WorldCon as a superhero.

We stared walking the halls; our first attempt to exit the conference hall with any sort of speed was frustrated, but at least we got to people-watch. A first day impression of WorldCon included surprise that there were so many nerds there. Hee. We met Souzan in a hallway, tried out the bellydancing panel, and then quickly went home to investigate our hotel room. In theory I could have ordered up a cot, but I decided to establish a one-off decision as a genuine family tradition: as the third person in a suite booked for two, Blake slept in a sleeping bag behind a chair, and thus Fort Sensible was re-established.

Fort Sensible! I honestly didn't see this coming, although in retrospect it's obvious. Technically it should have been Mason who slept in the Fort as the last person to join the expedition, but Blake genuinely enjoys the sleeping bag and this way Mason would be free to explore the city instead of spending the day trying to work the kinks out of his body from a night next to the air-conditioning unit. The second Fort was smaller than the first, and its occupant had to fall asleep without the benefit of toxic amounts of alcohol, but once again it did its job and Blake remained un-trod-upon the whole weekend.

On Friday Blake got up very very early, but I chalked that up to the novelty of the Fort and the delightfully unclose-able curtains. Besides, I planned to run him ragged: there was no way that the next day he'd have the energy to read aloud from Land of Nod: Rockabye Book at 5:45. I hoped. So we got dressed; him as a normal kid and myself as a girl who fully expected to meet Neil Gaiman at a signing that afternoon. (That meant that I wore my Scary Trousers shirt over a flowered skirt and makeup. I also wear the band shirt when going to the concert, and is that a problem for you?) To be up front: although there were many interesting and humbling writers attending WorldCon, when wrangling Blake all day I had energy for exactly one other thing: panels with Neil Gaiman on them. So if this account seems a little Neil-centric to you, well, so was my weekend. Imagine what it's like to be Mason, who had to hear all these stories, plus panel highlights, every day for 4 days.

We wandered a few blocks into Vieux Montréal and found an open café where I was able to get a full meal for Blake and myself. Getting Blake to eat a whole piece of quiche was important to me; I wasn't sure if we'd have the time or ability to get a good lunch, but I figured that if we had a solid breakfast and met Mason for a big dinner that we'd be in good shape for the evening. I was smug as we breezed past the long line of Tim Hortons postulants in line for their morning communion: I had eaten a proper Montréal breakfast in the Old part of the city, and I wouldn't have to depend on the local fastfooderies later as my boyfriend was going to suss out the best/cheapest places for supper. Ah, the smugness. If only comeuppance wasn't waiting in the wings.

Mason walked us to the signing ticket line before going off to experience the best of local breweries. The line was long. It was nowhere near the lengths I have navigated for a Gaiman autograph, but I've never done this with a small one in tow and I was anxious about getting a ticket. Fortunately, a signing lineup is an excellent place in which to meet people of similar temperament, and Blake immediately made friends with a woman behind us while I struck up a conversation with the mother-and-daughter in front.

(Blake's ice-breaker was "why are you in that [wheel]chair?" and the rest of the conversation was based on a mutual love of Strongbad, who was spending the day with us. Sometimes he amazes me in his ability to inspire love from random strangers with nothing but pure energy and random child charm. On the other hand, when I put it that way, it's hardly amazing at all.)

After we had successfully gained the magic ticket, we headed off to find what would become Blake's favourite place in Montréal, let alone WorldCon: the Children's Playspace. (He had difficulty understanding that if we ever came back to Montréal, this room would not be set up for him; that he was participating in a global gypsy caravan that had as much physical permanence as his own Fort Sensible.) I flopped down in a chair next to Andy, pulled out my baby sweater and thought about our next move. I stopped knitting to break up a scary fight between kids that threatened to erupt into fisticuffs between parents. (The solution? Take away the wooden train tracks. Without track the territory opens up and everyone can make up their own circles. I had to let kids use my legs as a train tunnel, but it was a small price to pay to keep the screaming and crying to a minimum.)

I also stopped knitting to herd Blake away from the toys and into the activities: he got his face painted as JetCat, and joined me in learning how to write our names in hieroglyphics. But mostly, I knit.

I was told that Free Food was available to everyone in some magical land called the ConSuite, and all I had to do was walk three measly blocks to the Delta to claim my free lunch. Despite Heinlein's sensible approbation, our free lunch was pretty good: bread and coldcuts, with some excellently sour pickles and acres of stale sheet cake from the previous night's birthday celebrations. I felt ridiculously ahead of the game by the time we wandered back to the convention. Nothing like free food to bolster one's morale.

We got back in time for me to settle Blake on the floor at the back of the room for a panel called "The New Media." There I was able to hear several delightful people including Neil Gaiman (who composes his books using "joined-up writing"), Cory Doctorow (who figured out a way to track changes in ever-malleable manuscripts and managed to drop the Six-String Nation Guitar into the debate, which made me feel like I was back in a folk festival), and Melissa Auf der Maur (who fetishizes vinyl as much as Mason & I seem to, a sentiment that made me break the listening silence with a whoop of appreciation.) Blake did the absolute best thing he could: he read Nod to himself until he fell asleep, and I was able to drag him to an empty chair near Souzan about ¾ of the way through the panel. The panel ended while he was still sleeping, and I was able to use Souzan as temporary babysitting so that I could go to the front and introduce myself to Cory Doctorow.

I read his book Little Brother this year for a library program at Bat Masterson (somehow I always end up reading the sf-fantasy book; last year it was Ysobel by GGK) and was absurdly charmed when I finished the book, looked him up and found out that he orbits the earth in a hot-air balloon in goggles and a red cape. (Or, you know, not.) He was pretty thrilled with the how and why of knowing him through the library program. And yet, "people keep giving me goggles and capes," he confessed to me. "I have six of them now." "Your daughter will enjoy them," I assured.

I went back to the seats, where Blake was just waking up somewhat disappointed to still be in a grey conference room. This is what apple juice is for, so I gave him some, and then we went back to the Children's Room so that Blake could learn to be a Jedi. This, of course, is geek double-speak for "a bunch of boys will try to whack eachother's heads off with paper weapons," which I should have anticipated. Nevertheless, Blake did have a lot of fun even though Mommy had to speak to a boy about his salty language and keep the same boy from blinding Blake with a paper sword. Ah, childhood.

At two we headed down to get in line for the Gaiman signing. Later I was glad that we got this out of the way on our first full day, as two hours of watching me inch around a linesnake while making grownup friends was just barely doable. He does find ways to amuse himself, though: first he read more of the Rockabye Book (Godsend. That book was a godsend. Dav gave it to me for my birthday exactly 10 years ago, declaring that it would change my life. Instead it SAVED my life; I could never have made it through the weekend without it. I owe you 1000 thank you's, Dav.).

Then he lay on the ground on the red carpet in the vendor hall. Then he made friends with other little people whose parents were helping to co-ordinate the line. So by the time I was at the front of the line, he was deeply involved in cleaning up by carrying plastic stanchions to the corner. But I insisted that he come over to meet Neil, as he always wanted to and never has. This will most likely be his only opportunity until he's old enough to have a personal distracting device; it's clearly nonsensical to expect a five-year-old to stand with me in line and I could only pull it off without bloodshed once in a lifetime, and only by stretching the definitions of "standing" and "in line" to the point of meaninglessness. But meet him Blake did; and I was proud of his manners.

Also: I got Neil to sign my copy of Vanity Fair, as I have often felt the need to redeem Todd McFarlane's 12 year old signature on the back of it. (This is also known as the "you're not Marilyn Manson, but you'll do" autograph.) This makes me happy.

Next! Dinner & staggering drunkenness! Angry silences! And using the con to balm my spirits. Read it all and more in tomorrow's installment: "Fifteen Samples?? As in, One Five?"

Remember the part when I was smugly counting on my epicurious boyfriend to suss out a cool dinner spot? The part when I almost felt sorry for my friends who had rented a hotel room with a kitchen, because they weren't as free to sample the beautiful bounty of Montréal cuisine? You must have realized that there was a smackdown in the wings. I didn't, and thus was totally surprised when Blake & I got back to the hotel to find Mason the worse from a day of beer tasting. He did not have any idea of where to go to dinner, but he did want to tell me about the hibiscus beer he sampled. He wanted to tell me about it many many times.

I must point out that it was not totally his fault. He went to a brew pub that, after 5 samples, ordered him to go to a different brewery because it was "so much better." At the second pub, when he wanted to stop drinking, they egged him into "finishing all the testers." So I blame the brewers, filthy sots that they are. Regardless, my dinner was effectively ruined, so I dragged both boys out to a local plaza where we ate a functional but unimpressive cafeteria-style supper and then returned Mason to the hotel to sleep it off.

I took Blake back to the con so that he could build a pig puppet in honour of Wolves in the Walls, and so that I could sulk in peace. Thanks to his nap, he was still in great spirits and not particularly tired. So we crafted, and he played, and we watched a bit of Yellow Submarine while I improvised another geektopus out of free convention yarn.

I had put him in his pj's before we left the hotel, as they were showing Coraline in the auditorium and I thought it would be a good place to pretend that we were in a drive-in theatre. Unfortunately, problems with the Blue Ray system delayed the movie for at least a half hour; this plus the long introduction to the movie by Neil himself meant that by 10, the Blake's head was in my lap and the movie still hadn't started. So we left. I had been able to ask a question about the Coraline Boxes during the Q & A period which made me happy; I didn't think it was worth sticking around so Blake could fall asleep five minutes into the movie. It's not like we'll never watch Coraline again.

Next!! A late morning! Photographs both flattering and not! A summer-weight cape! Noodles in the park! Losing underwear for the novice con-goer! A regularly scheduled Neil Gaiman naptime! Crazy Hair and the promise of glory! All this and more revealed in tomorrow's installment: "The Littlest Nerd Has His Day."

The next morning was our first late rising of the vacation, but no one felt rested. Blake & I ate a couple of snacks, then headed into the con building to scrounge up breakfast. Our first stop after finding Blake a smoothie and checking the voodoo boards (oddly addictive) was Kyle Cassidy's set-up in the hallway. Kyle is the principle photographer of Who Killed Amanda Palmer?, which features pics of dead Amandas and text by Neil Gaiman, and he was taking pictures of convention-nerds. I love a good picture, so I decided to get in on this. Unfortunately, wrestling with Blake, who was (as usual) fixated on my breasts, didn't leave me a lot of attention left over for presenting myself in a flattering light, and my half of the portrait is not attractive. Also, he refused to give up the empty smoothie cup, which adds another random unflattering element. So that wasn't the sop to my vanity I had craved. But the next moment made up for it.

As I was slinging our possessions about my body, I realized that K82 & Andy were coming by for their picture. Blake immediately grabbed K82's hand and refused to let go, talking a mile a minute. So when she went to her mark, he came with her, and they made the picture of the previous entry, which may just stop your heart with cuteness. What the hell, here it is again:

DSC_2036
Originally uploaded by kylecassidy

Once that was done, we all went back to the children's room to see if Blake could get in on some kamikaze koztuming. But we were late to the party, and all the black cloth and adult helpers were spoken for. I spent some time trying to figure out how to piece together two black jean legs before giving up in disgust, finding a short length of cosmic-printed cloth, and tying it around Blake's neck.

"It's sort of short," Mason commented at lunch.

"That's all the material they had," I replied. "So I figure it's his summer-weight cape." It was more durable than the facepaint of the day before, which transformed from Jet Cat to raccoon to chimney sweep before I washed it off entirely before dinner. And unlike a dramatic, sweeping cape it wasn't a danger to its wearer. Take that, kamikaze koztuming.

We met Mason at the registration desk for a picnic. One thing that Montréal definitely has over Toronto is the proliferation of small parks with fountains. After one and a half days walking the labyrinth of the convention, I was desperately in need of some time outdoors, with the soundtrack of water and birds instead of people. We got endlessly-customizable noodles from a restaurant in the convention, and went across the street to the first park we could find. Of course, Blake was about 10 spoonfuls into his soup before he announced his need of the bathroom. So Mason took him – where else? – back to the convention to find a bathroom, as I couldn't handle going back in that building so soon after leaving it.

They were gone for such a long time that I began to worry. What if Blake ran off? Or they got mowed down by an aggressive driver and no one knows that I'm over here? This is the thing about being in a strange city with your son glued to your hip: you crave a break from constant vigilance, but a break makes you all the more paranoid. They came back eventually, of course, a victim of Blake's tendency to take off half his clothes and relax whenever he spends time in the bathroom. He sees no need to rush himself; we wait by the sinks, bored, for him to emerge in his own sweet time. Later we would wish that we'd paid more attention.

At two we went back to the convention for a Gaiman reading (me) and a nap (Blake). The nap was not without its cost: before falling asleep Blake had to be shushed from reading his comic book out loud, then we had a whispered fight about using up my notebook to draw pictures. Finally, worn out by my infuriating attitude, he passed out. Thank heaven. It freed me up to listen to the reading, and it made everyone smile and sigh over his sleeping body when the reading ended and they all filed out. This time I had him in my lap, having learned the hard way the day before that he would be kicked and tripped over if he wasn't protected. There are, um, a few mobility issues at that convention, let's say. And people aren't always sorry when they boot your baby across the room. So in the interests of avoiding a punching match, I kept him safe. Everyone wins.

When he woke up, we went (where else?) back to the children's room for some playtime. By this point I was getting seriously buggy with the children's room, a windowless warren of 4 rooms where kids 6 and up seemed to be abandoned, free to form nasty cabals and wage war on other factions. So we tried some time in the dealers' room, but that was a bit of a no-go as there were too many collectables to be handled while my attention was distracted with nerdy t-shirt slogans.

Eventually we gave up and headed back to the Children's Room, where we could both be satisfied by a reading and re-enactment for 5-12 year olds of Crazy Hair, Neil Gaiman's semi-autobiographical poem of tonsorial confusion. Neil himself was to be there to read, answer questions, and set us up to create our own crazy hair collage. Needless to say, I was pretty excited about this, so when I was immediately challenged as to my qualifications, I got a little pissed off. "I'm with him," I pointed to my son, and muttered "just because I have blue hair doesn't mean I can't read the signs." After all that time in that windowless quad breaking up fights between kids and their parents, not to mention lolling around bored in the chairs, it was a little much to have someone get in my face about my right to be there. Fortunately, this anecdote, as with all my WorldCon anecdotes, did not end in a brawl.

(Apparently I have issues.)

Neil introduced himself as the writer of Coraline, and asked if anyone there had seen it. Hands shot up. Then he asked who had been scared. Blake immediately volunteered his experience, and at Neil's urging, showed how much he had been scared. Already weakened from the Kyle Cassidy photo, I was dying from the cuteness.

Neil read the story, then left with a cloud of interviewers so that we could create the collage. I worked feverishly for an hour: knitting tiny things with q-tips, gluing a sock onto the centre, drawing the Tick's floating hypnotized head, and encouraging Blake to draw and glue at top speed. The sock was a particularly divine inspiration; it drew so many comments that I was forced to pretend modesty. Blake & I also collaborated on a tableau that dramatized my own entrapment in the hair, and his diligent rescue attempt. By the time Neil came back, we were exhausted. I was, however, thrilled to overhear Neil & the woman who had challenged me in conversation about my crappy art.

Woman: what is that?

Neil: (insert charming English accent) It looks like the Tick.

He knew it was the Tick! This pleases me more than I can say.

While he was making his way around the table and talking to a few of the kids, a woman approached me from the cloud of interviewers. She introduced herself as from the NY Times, and flattered me all to hell by saying that she'd noticed my interesting question the night before and how I kept popping up at the events. I took a second at this point to send Blake over to Neil with his copy of Coraline. And really, I should have been taking pictures of Neil & Blake, but I was too dazzled by the idea of being in the Times to pay attention to my child meeting my favourite author for the second time in two days. Clearly, I need to rearrange my priorities.

Next!! Unusual shepherd's pie! Handicapping Neil's dinner! And the Accident that ended the Night to the Relief of All! All this and more revealed in tomorrow's installment: "Fireworks Should be Heard and Not Seen."

When the Crazy Hair excitement had subsided and I was able to remember my responsibilities, Blake & I packed up our stuff and went across to the hotel to meet Mason for supper. Abandoning completely the idea that dinner decisions would be made for me thus sweeping me into the fabled heaven of Montréal cuisine, I picked up a con-generated restaurant guide and used it to narrow down our choices. Restaurant Vallier looked interesting, and it would allow us to make another foray into Vieux Montreal, so that's where we went.

It turned out to be an excellent choice. Their specialty is retro food with gourmet twists; I had the duck comfit shepherds pie, Mason had the lamb burger and Blake had the mac n' cheese n' bacon. (Halfway through, Blake asked when he'd be getting a cookie. "This isn't the kind of mac n' cheese that comes with a colouring menu and a cookie," I warned.) Dinner went a long way toward calming us all down. The rift caused by the beer tasting day was starting to close, and the strain of caring for Blake all day in an unfamiliar environment was easing in the presence of another adult I could trust. I was cautiously optimistic that we would make it to the Masquerade that night.

I hadn't counted on Blake's tendency to underestimate how much clothing he needs to remove when using the facilities. He emerged from the stall soaked, and I decided to take him home to change before dragging him back across the street to see the costumes. It was at this moment, when we were figuring out the cheque and getting our stuff ready to go that Neil Gaiman walked in with his group and sat down at the table next to us. I was starting to feel creepy; the reporter had noticed me at "every" event, and would she think that I was discreetly following them at a distance? It was even weirder to realize that I could successfully guess what he would be eating, based on his widely-publicized love of sushi and my memories of the menu. Sure enough, I overheard him ordering the salmon tartare. It was time to go.

Blake started acting weird, though, and we tried to figure out what was up. Did he want to go say hi to Neil? Kind of but no. He decided that he wanted to wave from outside the window, which was self-defeating because the window was set just above his head. He did manage to attract the attention of the party, who waved back, and I saw the reporter whispering to the person next to her. Dammit, I was not stalking him! We were there first!

I did kinnear him, though. I felt that both Steph and Amy would want me to.

I had a moment of clarity back in the hotel room when I changed Blake. I never let him stay up past 7 when we're at home; now I was thinking of dragging him out to a 2-hour even that started at 8? This was when I discovered that - cue dramatic music - he wasn't wearing underwear, and he couldn't tell us why. Or where. Or - anything useful, really. I gave up on the night then, and concentrated on getting Blake into the bath instead, wondering if it would be worth it to bother the Palais staff trying to find a lost pair of Curious George underpants.

The three of us fell asleep to the noise of a fireworks competition, which lucky convention-nerds could watch from a balcony. I felt luckier to be sleeping.

The alarm went off surprisingly early the next morning. Unlike most days at WorldCon, today we had something to do that couldn't be missed: morning mass in Notre Dame Basilica. We'd been using the Basilica as a navigation point all weekend, counting down the days until we could experience it as it was meant to be: ringing with French, scented with incense. It was a charming ceremony and pretty straightforward. When I couldn't understand for blocks of time, there was more than enough to look at. I even respected the traditions of the building and didn't accept communion. (The last time I was in a Catholic church I deliberately flouted the wishes of the hard-line Sri Lankan priest and took a wafer into my un-shriven, un-penitent mouth. If Agamemnon can't make me behave, what chance did that bozo have?)

When mass was over, we took a short tour through the church and lit a few candles. That was most likely Blake's favourite part, little firebug that he is. My favourite part was the stained glass depictions of life in New France and the life-size wooden statues of the prophets. I'm not sure if Mason had a favourite part; he was born into Catholicism and visits to these churches are both deeply satisfying and unsettling.

We walked back to the hotel for our car so that we could drive to an authentic wood-oven bagel breakfast. This was our first chance to eat proper bagels as we'd been walking everywhere and the good bagel places are far from Old Montréal. I have to say: it was worth it. If you're going to be a tourist in Montréal, you might as well stack up your church visits and your bagel sampling as close as possible so as not to lose the buzz.

We got back to the convention for our regularly scheduled Neil Gaiman panel, a conversation with Gary Wolfe. (You think this is repetitive to read? Try looking back on your weekend with dismay, knowing that you're never going to find a fresh way of introducing attendance to yet another Gaiman event and that's pretty much all you did. Oh well. At least this was the last day.) I'm trying to remember: was this the one where we had seats? Yeah, it was. For a change, Blake & I got to sit in metal seats instead of putting our legs to sleep on the floor. So that was good.

We returned to the playroom in high spirits, still full of bagels and rest. In fact, we were so full of bagels that Blake & I were able to share a single order of noodles for lunch. Blake wanted to know when Neil would be in the Children's Area; he had explained his shyness at dinner the night before by explaining that "[Neil] would be in the playroom tomorrow anyway." We smiled at his naïveté. Then we read that there would be a young person Q&A with Neil on Sunday, and we had to apologize to Blake for doubting him. But when that was cancelled, it was back to the regular business of the playroom: forming tribes, squabbling over train tracks and denying the need for bathroom breaks. I was glad to get out of there again at 2, for the "Private Passions" the Many Interests of Neil Gaiman" panel.

("Is this going to be about how much he loves having sex with his girlfriend?" Mason cracked, when I mentioned it the night before. "I hope not," I said. "The cutie love notes on Twitter are more than enough for me." Oh Amanda, you'll never love him like we do, i.e. too starstruck to speak, in 30-second bursts, 2 years apart. It's a forbidden love affair, or rather a non-existent one.)

I was counting on Blake having his usual 2 pm nap at the back of the auditorium, but with K82 holding his hand he was considerably more worked up. First they decided that they wanted to sit on the front, leaving Andy & I scrambling to catch up. Then they decided to leave. Andy offered to take them back to the children's room, leaving me with a blessed free hour. I slunk back to the front of the room and sat, knitting and listening, until my hour was up. It was glorious. But the effect on Blake was not as good: without his nap he became more and more difficult until I was ready to leave him at one of the public fountains. He would have amused himself: he was forever ignoring my orders and sticking his hands into the dirty water, then his mouth. In a city with as many public fountains as Montréal, this is a real problem.

Next!! Visits to hotel rooms! A birthday dinner w/excellent soundtrack! The Hugos! A girl who suffers fools, if not gladly! The dismantling of Fort Sensible! Our final day in la belle province (cue the smoked meat)! All to be detailed in the ultimate edition: "Those fountains are finally good for something."

I thought I could do some more time in the children's room, but I when we got back after the panel, I was pretty much done with the place. Also, I was hungry and there were car trip snacks in our hotel room, so I convinced Souzan to bring K82 to see our room. This turned into a lot of jumping on the bed and screaming, so we walked a few more blocks to Souzan's suite, which was bigger and could muffle their raucous play. I was really having trouble shaking my headache, and greatly looking forward to dinner.

We used the guide to find a highly recommended Polish prix-fixé restaurant in Old Montréal, which was exactly what I wanted for my birthday dinner. I don't often crave Eastern European food, but there is Russian and Ukrainian in my mongrel past and there are days when pierogi is exactly what my peasant heart demands. The atmosphere was also pretty spectacular: the first person to greet you was a pianist who spent the evening cranking out a variety of schmaltzy standards and unexpected pop songs (Björk? Really?) with plenty of sentimental flourishes. We were seated at a table for six, on big wooden benches that allowed Blake to squirm around to his heart's content. He and I split some of everything, which turned out to be just the right amount of food for both of us (in my admittedly limited experience with prix-fixé, I've never seen so much food in three courses. It was just this side of overwhelming.) We also split my almondy-licious birthday cake, which arrived with a candle and a piano song but without the lockstep dead-eyed waitstaff to make me feel self-conscious. Trust me, if you're going to be publicly feted, have it done at a piano bar. It's so much classier.

Mason agreed to take Blake back to the hotel for the night so that I could watch the Hugo presentations. (We had agreed on a big birthday present when we got home, but this was easy and free.) So I trotted back to the convention, entirely Blake-free for the only time that weekend. There was one seat next to Andy & Souzan, so I was able to totally relax in my folding chair: take my shoes off, knit on something screamingly orange, and make occasional witty remarks to Andy. (As in when Frank Wu was nominated for the Fan Artist Hugo. "Are they saying whoo or wu?" Andy shrugged. But when he won, we could say both at the same time.)

It was interesting to see who showed up to claim their Hugo. Pixar and Joss Wheedon both won awards, and both sent proxies; I have to wonder if they take ComicCon more seriously than WorldCon. The Hugo itself is drop-dead gorgeous this year, and the aforementioned Frank Wu did exactly what I would have done with it: run around the stage with his Hugo in the air, making rocket noises. Zoom!

I had left my camera in the hotel room before dinner, so my birthday dinner and the Hugos were the only events at WorldCon that I couldn't directly record. This paradoxically made the awards better: after the ceremonies, all of the winners and presenters get up on stage and the fans get a solid five minutes to take pictures of the group. In lieu of a camera, I just stood around with a goofy grin on my face, sneaking looks at the trophy up close and enjoying the good spirits. It was exactly like the moments that follow a wedding ceremony: with the important part over, everyone milled about smiling, taking pictures and feeling good. With my own camera in hand, I may have missed that moment.

I sort of wanted to go to one of the convention parties that I had missed all weekend, but I thought that would be poor return to a boy who was patiently watching my son so that I could enjoy myself on my birthday. 'Sides, that was the whole point of dragging him along to Montréal: to be together on my birthday. So I pointed myself toward the hotel, and was crossing the courtyard when I heard my name. I had been so focused on being responsible that I'd completely missed Mike & Juuki, who were standing in their steampunk gear and waiting for a ride. I started to tell them about my Polish birthday dinner when Juuki's…um…corset…reeled in a passing man as if by magnetism. He spent the next twenty minutes telling us about his life, his alcoholism, his desire for a family, and what he had been told by a palm reader. "Why can't I have a family? I'm a good lover."

"I was a good wife and my husband still left me," I replied, my hand creeping into Juuki's.

I'm not sure if we had a conversation, or if we just contributed comments to his monologue. He was also greatly impressed by my 100% fake palm reading. And why is it that I have so much trouble making eye contact with people I like, but when I'm on the streets at night I'm able to look directly at the rambling addicts without pause? Maybe it's a dominance thing. Maybe I just feel safer paying full attention to someone unpredictable. Maybe I'm just contrary.

When he finally wandered away, Juuki started laughing and kissing me on the cheek. "You. Are an Angel."

"Remind me to tell you about the cracked out prostitute who put an earring on me," I said shakily.

Monday was our packing up day, our "oh my God, look at the hotel bill" day, our "what do we need to do before we leave this city?" day. I had been planning to do a couple of non-Neil Gaiman panels and some shopping before we left, but I really had no energy for panels at this point, so we went shopping. I had hoped that they would let Mason into the Dealer's Room without a badge, but that was a no-go; instead we did the Taster Membership thing so that he could experience the con for $20. Granted, there wasn't all that much to experience, but we bought some cool t-shirts and Mason got to see the children's room with our collaborative Crazy Hair banner. Also, I was able to show him the bi-lingual sign that proved I had married Neil Gaiman, and that he had taken my name. (Suddenly French is my favourite language.) Mason seems cautiously interested in con life, so I may have a male friend the next time I dip back into the oldest of my fascinations. That was very worth $20.

After we did that, we tried very hard to see a museum that Mason had visited the previous day, but it was closed when we got there. Of course, this was also the hottest day ever, so we had the fun of struggling through broiling Vieux Montreal with an angry and hungry kid, only to tell him that we couldn't deliver on the spooky crypt as promised. So we had ice cream instead, and Blake got so messy that I – drumroll – had to rinse him off in the fountain. I knew those damn things were useful for something.

We took the car to the Main, my little slice of Montréal heaven, where we introduced Blake to proper smoked meat and the most delicious pickles in the world (sorry Toorshi). Whenever I go to or through Montréal, I need to stop at the Main and it's usually on the last day so that I don't want to eat there every single day. (That's my Canso Lion's Club Fish n' Chips Protocol, there.) And with our smoked meat quota met, we wandered out of town in the most inefficient way possible, on the highway home.

"Goodbye Fort Sensible."

"Blake, that corner isn't where Fort Sensible lives. Do you know where Fort Sensible will always be?"

"Yes." (he points at the sleeping bag.

"No! In your heart. In all our hearts."

"Uh huh." The 'whatever' is implied.

Labels: birthday, blake, books, comics, friends, nerd, vacation

One of the best – and most ironic – gifts this new training has given me is my reduced need for sleep. Summers are the time for me to really clock those bed hours, especially when Blake is somewhere else. Yesterday I got up after seven hours, because my feet hurt too much to sleep (more on that later). I expected to zombie through the day, but I did much better than normal, and although I went to bed early, I wasn't exhausted, just done. Cut to this morning, when I opened my eyes at 5:15, unable to get back to sleep.

When I was working, it was a constant trial to get up before 6:30. Granted, I always sleep less when the days are longer, and the constant dusk-till-dawn squirrel fights are incredibly noisy. (They're my most obnoxious neighbours, and I often find myself screaming at them to shut up.) And I did manage to fall asleep for a few more hours, after much tossing and turning.

If I can keep this up in some form during the school year, I'm going to be unstoppable.

So, why did my feet hurt so much on Wednesday night? It was a combination of sudden inexplicable muscle twinge and too much walking during the day. I got up early to get Blake out the door with his annoying, annoying father, and right away, I felt sore deep in my heel. So, although I was going to a funeral in the morning and shopping all day, I skipped the cute wedge sandals and opted for a pair of Fluevog boots that have never given me any trouble. Except, I guess that if you walk for 6 hours, you're going to get a different kind of trouble. In this case, I took off my socks at the end of the night and a layer of skin went with them. Ouch.

I was shopping with Scherezade & her friend Leah. It was a dumb route, all things considered: I had promised to meet Mason in Kensington at 6, after which we would have dinner, knit and proceed to the Dakota for a show. So, in the spirit of redundancy, I shopped at Kensington for 3 hours, then we went to Ossington for another 2, before I went back to the Market to start the whole thing over. I even went to Lettuce Knit twice, as I have the habit of using their bathroom whenever I'm in the Market. Redundant. And skin-peeling, apparently.

I did find some cute things at Good Egg, a store that is almost never open when I'm in the neighbourhood. In addition to a cool insulated lunchbag (I threw away my old blue one during camp week after it developed holes), I splurged on Kafka's Soup: A history of literature in 14 recipes & an eraser shaped like a peanut. The clerk even threw in a cool apple-spinner, which made me laugh because usually I don't get free things unless Blake is there charming the pants off everyone. We also visited Kid Icarus, where there is a pillowcase screen printed with a BSS logo that I visit from time to time. (For the rest of the day, I was heard to say, "that seems a lot of money for something that doesn't have 'Broken Social Scene' on it and come with a pillow.")

My lowest point came during an extended visit to Monkey's Paw, a bookstore on Dundas that I surely would have appreciated under different circumstances, but. My feet hurt, my stomach hurt, and the piles of carefully bagged literary detritus reminded me too strongly of the things we had only just recently liberated out of my late grandmother's closet. She would have hated that bookstore. Dirk, if he hasn't already been, would have loved it.

Soon after this, I backtracked to the Market for supper. Mason and I spend so much time together that 9 hours apart seems like a lot, and we were happy to be eating burritos together again. We ended up at the Dakota far too early, although we did have our pick of seats and were able to spend the next two and a half hours comfortably ensconced in barchairs, knitting and sipping on draft beer. We were so early that we were able to watch the headliners interviewed by some media organization. We were so early that we were just ahead of a loud, obnoxious quartet who refused to pay the cover and refused to leave. We were so early that the arrival of Stuart McLean went largely unnoticed (although it did make us wonder if we should recruit him to help us kick out those four louts. I was still seething from my conversation with the Boy that morning, and in the mood to take it out on some big loud jerks. We figured that if Stuart called down Rex Murphy, we'd be an unstoppable juggernaut, plus we'd end up in a heavily-disguised anecdote on the Vinyl Café. Sweet.)

Now that we're going to clubs to see the young kids play, we're running into some weird things. Our big puzzlement on Wednesday was seeing Labatt 50 fly off the shelves. Apparently shitty dad beer is a hipster thing? I don't know. Maybe it's a price thing. Maybe they really don't drink beer for the taste. Maybe they're reacting against the implied pretentiousness of local craft beer – delicious, delicious local craft beer I love you so much. My thought is, I own a house in a subdivision with a backyard and a young child. I don't need to pretend that I'm my parents; I pretty much am my parents.

Your thoughts on the 50 thing? It's making Mason nutty.

Despite our perhaps curmudgeonly focus on the beer-drinking habits of our fellow patrons, we did enjoy the music. For seven bucks we got to dance right in front of Gentleman Reg in his black "onesie", then get blasted out by Zeus. For the record, Gentleman Reg truly is a gentleman, as he caught my eye while packing up his gear, and thanked me for dancing. Aww. Both acts were pretty awesome, but 1 a.m. is late to be standing in the front row of a balls-out rock show, and I had tinnitus for hours. (During the encore I tried to wuss out. "I can't take it anymore," I whimpered. "Yeah, you can!" Mason grinned.) Ultimately, I think I enjoyed Reg more. But I'm just contrary lately. Don't mind me.

Labels: friends, music, outings

This hasn't been a good week, and I'd like to write it off and try again. Can't, though. It started going downhill on Tuesday and hasn't really recovered. Or maybe it has, and I'm just sulking.

But! Saturday was awesome. Some months ago Souzan told me about a medieval fair to which she brought her K8 every year. Blake's obsessions include, in no particular order: knights, lego, dinosaurs, Rubbadubbers, the Tick, Batman, Spiderman, small animals, cooking, crafts and the jokes on the back of Chirp Magazine. Since his father had already taken him to Medieval Times, I figured this was my best chance to enjoy his hobby with him (bonus: I don't have to go to Medieval Times). So we went. And it was awesome. The drive was really long and we started quite late, but we made it by lunch time and were sufficiently distracted by the various goings-on that we didn't even stop for lunch for a solid hour. Sage was in an excellent mood, and Blake bounced from distraction to distraction with hardly any pause. It was an excellent way to spend a Saturday, and I didn't even think about the TTC Knitalong. Not having pegged myself as the renfaire type, this is high praise.

only those of honour bright shall click through for more...

On Monday I benefited from Stacy's amazing foresight with the chance to attend a Neil Gaiman reading at Luminato. When she asked a few months ago, I was typically vague, as my ability to make future plans is usually undercut by parenting or work (in that order). She went ahead and got a ticket anyway, which I was grateful for at the time but much more so when we were told in the introduction that the event had sold out in 3 minutes. I've heard Neil read before and I've stood in a signing line before, but never have I had such an intimate experience as this reading. Five hundred of the faithful filled the theatre and you could hear a pin drop (as evidenced by Stacy asking me to stop knitting because the clicking of my needles was disproportionately loud). I was glad that I'd finished my beer before the reading began. (Also: beer in a theatre? Where was the hotdog cannon? The Morpheus-themed plush mascot to get the crowd going? The scorecard? And most importantly, the collectible bubblegum cards? There is some money being left on the table here.)

It was probably good that the theatre was so focused, as nobody noticed me grey out when he announced that he and Amanda Palmer were dating, had, in fact, been dating for almost a year. Since I don't regularly read his blog, excellent though it is, I assumed that everyone else knew. Turns out that this only broke in a national way on Saturday, so I'm still on some part of the curve and not behind it yet. I don't have an opinion of the Dresden Dolls, really, but it's probably not fair that my first impression of Amanda is "try not to hate her because she is a) dating the hottest author ever and b) the innocent beneficiary of a breakdown of a marriage in whose solidity I had taken an apparently fatuous solace." That can't bode well for an unbiased listening, although she gets points for writing an upbeat song about abortion.

The signing afterward was long, but nothing close to what you can reasonably expect at another Gaiman gig. I'll have to look this up, but the first time I waitied in line I was seven months pregnant and it took the better part of the afternoon. The second time, the Boy & I went home when it became obvious that we were never going to see the front of the line before the two of us crashed (that night's signing is reported to have lasted until 2:30am). This past experience makes it seem that 1 1/2 hours in line is a positive treat, a zip through the signing autobahn. It was so comfortable that I didn't even get nervous when I got up there, and was able to tell the story of Blake demanding a personalized book without stuttering or getting weird. (We have a copy of "Wolves in the Walls" that is signed to "Sprout." Blake takes exception to this, as he denies ever having been a Sprout. "You should get it signed 'to Blake,'" he insists, and last night I got a copy of "The Graveyard Book" inscribed to appease him.)

The other neat thing about the book line was bellowing a conversation across the loop to Amy, who was patiently waiting for her first encounter with The Neil. I spent a good deal of my stay in line making up for lost auditorium time by knitting my February Lady sweater, which is huge and unweildy and if I want to knit it standing up I have to wad up the sleeves and yoke and keep it in my armpit while I work the bottom section. A few knitters in the crowd asked me about the pattern and the yarn, then showed me their own knitting projects which were all small and discrete. By the time Amy and I were within shouting distance, I had worked up a good head of steam and was more than ready to talk and knit and stand and wait at the same time.

Now. Amy has...this item. It is a rare and beautiful item that was a generous gift from some wise marketers who clearly know the value of viral, grassroots marketing. Amy is a wonderful person, a fabulous knitter, a fun lady, a smart cookie, and more than generous in her own right. But when I found out, via her blog, that she had received a box of antique doll-making props used by the Other Mother in Coraline...well, I had to iris-shut my heart like an airlock. I refuse to covet what is my sister's. I refuse to curse the fate that made her the receiver of such a present. I turn my back on generations of my relatives who would, at the very least, gossip about her shoe choices (impeccable, by the way). I was so sure that I had this under control that I was even willing to let myself ask to see it, to open such a fetishistic delight and gently touch the scissors, sure that I wasn't going to burst into tears or snatch it and run away to start a new life in Venezuela. I had not thought about what it would mean to uncover such a thing in the middle of people who have been waiting for going on two hours to see the author that invented Coraline. People who had run out of things to say to their companions. People who were trying not to think about how late it all was. Bored, focused people.

There was a tiny little riot.

I shooed them away by hurriedly closing up the box, my pleasure evaporated in a mist of "oh God I promised her I wouldn't hurt it what if they break the box??". Photographers sighed, frustrated. People began to question Amy, and a knitter came out of the woodwork and started a conversation about Fetching. I was suddenly relieved that I was not in charge of The Box. Too much responsibility for a girl of my temperament.

Labels: angst, blake, books, friends, outings

I'm all stuffed up today. I had a lot of marking to do this weekend, but when I got tired last night at 7:30, I decided to put it off until this morning. Gah. I am not suited to waking up at 5, no matter what the motivation. I've been sniffly and sneezy all day, which I hope will be cured when I go to bed early tonight. My biggest problem is that I already go to bed at nine; if I want to push my bedtime back, eventually I'm going to have to start taking my pj's to work.

The reason I was so tired was because I planned too much this weekend, which isn't at all typical of me except on days that start with S. During the week I'm as slack as a sack; it's only on weekends that I try to transform into a superachieving hero. This was the first weekend of the Brickworks, so we planned to start the vegetable garden on Saturday with all of our new seedlings. But after the glorious return to the market, a quick trip to the Distillery District, and a few stops on Queen West, we were all burnt out. Instead of planting, we spent Saturday afternoon recovering...which is sort of ironic, when you consider that this set us up for a Sunday of extrabusyness.

It was a good morning, though. There is actual food at the market, which is a wondrous change from a long winter of dwindling root vegetable supplies and various preserves. In addition to a bunch of seedlings, we got lettuce, buns and wild leeks for a glorious burger barbeque. Blake made friends with every dog he saw, and he was overjoyed to see the Cloud 9 soap lady again (we've been counting the baths until he gets to buy his favourite soap.) She was so impressed with his enthusiasm that she gave him a free bath bomb with his honey ginger soap; a lovely transaction and I was proud of him. I didn't really mean for him to spend his treat money on soap when I would have bought it for him, but they were both so pleased with themselves that I thought it churlish to interfere.

Also notable: Blake discovered that he likes empanadas. This was supposed to be a depth of field shot, but while I was taking it he went after the empanada like a land shark.

There was also a book table, which greatly simplified my birthday party shopping for the weekend. (Hey, I'm a nerd. I give nerd gifts so as to propagate my species.) As much as it could be simplified, I mean: our first party was for a girl I didn't know, and when asked, Blake told me she wanted a donkey toy. What? No further sense could be extracted from Blake. Imagine my surprise when the book table included cute wooden animal toys. We got our donkey, Blake got a new kids' cookbook with illustrations by Jay Stephens, and our birthday girls got beautifully illustrated books on seeds. Blake took his book to a table to read, meanwhile, Mason & I spent many happy minutes seriously considering which seedlings to buy. We left loaded up, just as the place started to get uncomfortably crowded.

We stopped by the Distillery so that Mason could give a bartender friend of his some of the beer we'd bought in Watertown. As the Distillery was in the middle of a craft fair, this turned into a longer visit than we'd expected. Blake made friends with a crafter who admired his knit Tick; he then thought it was hilarious to run away and go talk to her while Mason & I fanned out and tried not to panic. I suppose since her business card is pinned on his bulletin board, this counts as his first pick-up.

After this, the day got progressively less fun by degrees. We went to Fresh Collective for a new shrug; while I sorted through the various offerings, Blake (emboldened by his romantic success) dived under the sewing table in the back and flirted shamelessly while Mason tried to keep him from making a mess. Next was a disappointing trip to Rotate This for the new Apostle of Hustle & Years albums, which meant a detour to Soundscapes (buying music has become more complicated since we decided we preferred vinyl.) And then one more stop for yarn to fix the sweater Blake ripped last week, and we were on our way home. Once there, we discovered that the shed key was missing, meaning our plants would be staying in flats for at least a night.

I think we gave up then. Dinner was lovely, but tired. I decided to plant in the morning, before the first of the two parties. It didn't seem likely, but it was worth a shot.

Imagine my surprise when I was up at 7:30 the next morning, and ready to plant by 8. We got all the seedlings in the ground and started a few of the seed packets (there are still about a half dozen packs to be planted). Blake helped as best he could (i.e. when he remembered what he was doing) and my dad was there to drill holes in my stump. I've got this stump in my front yard, and this year I got the crazy idea that I would make it into a rock garden. The only thing was, the wood wasn't co-operating. I had envisioned a rough, pocketed surface, but my dad kept bringing in power tools that weren't very precise, and he kept forgetting that I didn't want the whole centre removed. Tempers frayed. I can't remember whose idea it was to bring rocks from the back and pile them on the stump, but it was brilliant. I added compost and my sad, dried out little rock garden plants. Voila! Instant rock garden. I just wish I'd thought of it before all the chipping and sawing and yelling.

I cleaned up and changed myself and Blake, and we were on our way to party #1. It was a small party, just a half dozen kids and that many adults. I'm pretty shy, so I hadn't expected to talk to anyone but Mason, but I surprised myself by being really outgoing and having a blast. Blake also had a blast, running around, playing with his new car toy (a bingo prize) and telling secrets.

Blake: "Daddy moved out because Mommy was mad at him all the time."
Me: "Hey! You don't have to tell everyone that. Just say that he moved out because he hated birthday parties."

Everything moved along quickly and soon it was time to go to party #2. We thanked our hosts profusely and walked back through to the park on the way home. Our second party was in the city, so after grabbing the second present, we were off to see Gamers, Former Gamers and Gamers v2.0. Sometimes I wish I didn't only see this crowd at birthday parties, but I suppose I should be grateful that I see anyone at all, stuck in the suburbs as I am.

Eaten: two hotdogs, two burgers, three allergy pills, three Diet Cokes, two pieces of birthday cake, various chips and snacks. Will my stomach ever recover? Maybe…but today I have a craving for pink streamers and pointy hats that mere food won't satisfy.

(As always, click through the pictures for more.)

Labels: blake, friends, garden, health, outings

Spent the weekend in Watertown. Now that it's over, I'm having trouble remembering how it all fit together. I've had a cold for a week, which isn't too serious but comes with a runny nose and perpetual headache, both of which slow my thinking and scrub my memory.

I know it started with a dead mouse. When I came home from work on Friday, I found a mouse in the kitchen trap, its back half hanging out the side. Awesome, I thought. (You wouldn't be sentimental either if you knew that they were using your son's highchair to get to the counter or if you had to wash shit out of your pots every time you wanted to cook.) For some non-psychotic reason, I wanted to take a picture (vindictiveness?) which was when I discovered that my autofocus was busted and my latest point n' shoot was useless right before a vacation.

This was not the worst part, though. That came a few minutes later, when I emptied the trap in the park right behind my house as a gift to the scavengers and it started to twitch. Traumatic. I watched in horror as its convulsive twitching brought it a centimeter from where it was dropped; then my courage broke and I fled to the house, locking the gate behind me. Mason ended up using a garden shovel to put it out of my misery, which surprised me because I was the one who had to deal with the skinned squirrel that appeared in the backyard last summer.

Getting out of the city was a hassle. Mason couldn't find his passport, I had That Headache, and what with anxiety and irritation the packing took twice as long. We didn't get out of town until 6:15, which sucks when you have a four hour drive ahead of you. But we were fed, watered and walked, so we were able to go straight through. We got there at 10:30 or so, Blake sleeping in back and the two adults singing along to the radio to stay awake.

Preacher & Martha were waiting up for us, and we quickly initiated Mason into the Watertown diet, which relies heavily, if not exclusively, on beer and cigarettes. The only downside to the diet is that, by the time we were all ready to pack it in, it was unconscionably late for two sets of adults with very young boys. Blake proved this to be true just before 6 the next morning, when he arrived at my side, wet and repentant from soaking the bed. I let him dress himself, which was amusing, and it was about 10 before I was able to drag myself out of an allergy-swollen sleep to join the party.

It was Saturday morning, showing Mason the newly-restored historic downtown with the boys in a wagon, that I noticed Preacher & Martha's boss camera. I got my tax return last week, and after the car repairs got whacked off and I decided to put off a tattoo yet again, I found in me a deep desire for a spanking new camera. Preacher explained the awesome pictures that could be taken with this model; Martha poured fuel on the fire by extolling the bargains to be found at Sam's Club, and it didn't take much convincing before I resolved to take the plunge.

As we brought Mason from site to site and I looked at the ready-to-go wrought iron fountain, the still-crumbling Masonic lodge (my future home) and the Tiffany stained glass window that was completely blocked off before the library's restoration, I found myself calculating the views as one who would soon return with an awesome camera. Watertown's epic combination of the glorious and the crumbling are the photographic subjects of the gods, the exact thing to make my heart go pitter patter with voyeuristic lust.

Lunch was at the Crystal, where Mason confirmed my faith in him by falling as deeply in love with it as I. But poor Blake was sleep-deprived from his late-night arrival and early morning bedwetting, and a chocolate milk to one unused to such luxuries was not the best balm to his spirit. When he ran out before the food arrived, he demanded another, and by the time my tuna melt had arrived he'd had a little meltdown of his own. I spent a fair amount of time at lunch trying to coax him back inside the restaurant, asking him to sit down, reminding him to eat, hugging him when he cried and fending off his attempts to relieve his bruised feelings by throttling me. Preacher made a big deal about how slowly I finished my sandwich which earned him a caustic reply softened by a smirk; yes, I'm a slow eater, but if anyone else at the table wanted to hug Blake and risk the sudden choking, I didn't see any hands go in the air.

It was at some point at lunch when the subject of my mouse-ridden house came up. Preacher & Martha offered me their cat, a sweet tempered blue who has been unhappy ever since the puppy moved in. At first this was a joke: ha ha, an allergic couple is bringing a cat across the border! Then Martha offered a new litter box and the chance to return her in a month if it didn't work out. "Ok," I said cautiously, "but if I want to give her back, I don't want to hear any sassmouth."

"With us there's always sassmouth," Preacher replied. He picked up the cheque, and the deal was sealed.

Our gorgeous morning turned grey as we ate, and we hurried home to avoid the rain. Martha & I left the various boys to their various devices & went off to buy a camera. At Sam's, the only D60 left was the display. Not being particularly snobby about getting a product pre-smirched by little fingers, I asked about a discount. What they knocked off the sticker price was enough to pay for a carrying case & a smoking memory card. I was ecstatic. I floated through the rest of our errands, buying sheets and allergy meds but dying to get to an outlet and begin The Charging. After The Charging would follow The Insertion of the Memory Card and then! The Taking of Many Pictures.

But. My beautiful new (slightly sticky) camera would only take two half-pictures before the shutter quit completely. I was crushed. I walked out to the backyard, where Preacher and Mason were in the early stages of a bbq.

"My camera is defective," I announced. "I need a beer and a cigarette."

There were many consoling hugs, and promises that it would all get sorted out tomorrow after church. We decided that I would do a straight-up return/refund; later Martha offered to check out the Sam's Club near her church. These things being tomorrow's problem, I shoved aside the disappointment and we concentrated on getting supper into the boys with a minimum of spray, crumbs, dawdling and breakaways to fetch small toys. After dinner we piled into the cars and went to Sackett Harbour for ice cream cones, the final element in my comfort triumvirate (tri-comfor-ate?). And also, when the boys were put to bed, I had the added joy of the fire pit, a perpetual memorial to Preacher's mom that, not un-coincidentally, gives light, heat & primal soothing.

The next morning, still vaguely smelling of woodsmoke, Mason, Blake & I got ready for church. My original plan had been to walk, but it was cold and wet and Mason appeared to have sprained his ankle the day before. I didn't push it. Since we were a half-hour early, we decided to drive around and see if we could find any more fun features of Watertown. We managed to stumble across Thompson Park, which was worth it (if terribly chilly), and got to church – ta da! – two minutes late. Blake consented to visit Sunday School (which I thought terribly brave), and this was the best Mother's Day gift I could get, as it freed me to sit next to Mason and soak up Preacher's rather uncharacteristically casual sermon in peace. Breaking the usual rule of polite distance, I found us some kickass seats near the front and I could laugh, snort and gesticulate in response to Preacher's storytelling. I caught hell for it during the Peace, of course.

"Don't ever laugh at my sermon again," he warned me as we hugged.

"I was laughing with you!" I protested. (And I'm sure he wouldn't be able to handle complete humility from a girl who once went after the wafer with not so much as a by-your-leave.)

After church (and the obligatory snacks), I went off to return my first camera. We met back at the house, all of us more than ready for a late diner lunch at Sh(hhh)orty's (I told Blake & Good Hank that the extra 'sh' is to remind you to be quiet; this isn't Yellington's, you know.) I packed as quickly as possible, knowing that we'd still have to come back for the cat. Preacher and Sally looked at each other, clearly figuring out who was going to break the news. Uh-oh, I thought. They've finally decided to stop letting us come visit. But it was the cat; they'd had a moment with her the night before and decided to keep her. I was both relieved and crushed: no worries about allergies, but who was going to chase my vermin? It's probably better this way. I guess.

At the diner Blake managed to soil two shirts with his spaghetti & meatballs, and was taken to Best Buy with a hand-knit wool sweater zipped up to his neck. My new camera was the next model down, as it was on sale and still more expensive than my pre-smirched Sam's Club special. I resolved to be patient and not think about how long it would be until I was home and my battery charged up.

It wasn't until we were home, catless and yet laden down with much NY pale ale, new sheets, Ontario fudge and enough dirty clothes to choke a fish, that I realized my lovely new camera case (and my even lovelier unused memory card) were still in Watertown. And I cried.

Still, I hear that cases can be mailed, memory cards can be purchased locally, and Watertown will still be there when I have all my ducks in a row. It was a wonderful weekend, full of old favourites and the joy of introducing them to a new love. It was a rollercoaster of camera elation and crushing camera disappointment. It was Blake's joy in a new pet, and then the reality of saying goodbye to a cat we'd never really had.

Good thing the kids have tomorrow off; I'm just not ready to lead the youth of today in useful pursuits. As I said in September when I pulled in the parking lot on the first day of school, "I'm just coming here to come down."

Labels: blake, friends, mason, photos, vacation