I like naming my things.
I don’t know when it started, but let’s try to trace it back, shall we?
Like most children, my stuffed animals, dolls, and action figures all had personalities, names, feelings and a favourite side of the bed.
But, I think I went a little further than the average child. At least this is what my friends and family have led me to believe. Or maybe they just enjoy watching my neurosis act itself out. It’s like watching the exact opposite of Steven Wright on catnip, fertilised with speed, laced with the mysterious fairy dust the Gilmore Girls’ producers sprinkled in the set’s communal coffee pot.
But I digress.
When I was a child, my things didn’t need to have beads as eyes for me to give them a name, an identity, or a “good morning how did you sleep?”
My pencils (Rosey, Orangina and Blacky McBlack Black), my shoes (Sandalina, Runny and Tipsydoodle), my hair scruntchies (Schrunchalina, Schrunchette and Schruncharoon), were as personable as Barbie, Mr. Bear and Polly Pocket.
So my stuff had names, birthdays, favourite colours and phobias. My pencils all had personalities of their own: Orangina was funny, Rosey was shy, and Blacky… well… Blacky was a prick. Also, my patent black shoes had a debilitating fear of tuna. Not me though. Just the shoes. However, I do always think twice before trusting the word of a tuna melt.
As I discovered the objects around me has quirks, I began to feel attached to them. For example, I felt bad when I had to pick one shoe from the other (a sign of things to come?) … unless they pinched me, then they had it coming.
Or there was the day I forgot my backpack at school: I came home crying because I couldn’t imagine her having to spend the night alone.
I’m going to go ahead and blame television for my unnatural desire to name things and my constant need to please inanimate objects… what was that Mr. Thomas the Tape Dispenser? You say you’re feeling a little breezy in that corner?
It may have started when Grover asked me through the television set one day, “Have you said hello to your elbow today?”
That’s right. Jim Henson made us talk to our elbows. The 80s were a hell of a decade.
So I thought to myself, “Well, no… I haven’t!” So I bent my arm and said, “Hi Tim.” Then I bent my other arm, “Hi Earl.” Then, I saw this.
THE DUDE LOST HIS ELBOWS.
And come to think of it, half the time, Grover doesn’t have any elbows!
Now, not only do I name my belongings, I check inventory of my elbows and other extremities regularly.
This includes the bendy bit on the other side of both my elbows, Tom and Pearl, and both sides of each knee, Eric, Camille, John and Abdul. My dad was watching a TV special on the Middle East that night. That same night I named my right pinky toe, the one next to Jeremy, Samir.
And so, my stapler is Steve, my monitor is Helga, my mouse is Jimmy and my scissors, Billy. I’m not allowed leaving Steve and Billy together or they conspire to take down Patrick, the Post-It pad.
And finally, for those of you who are wondering: Righty McBoob and Lefty McGee.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Why I like breaking the seal in public bathrooms
Bathroom stalls are today’s greatest underrated anthropological treasures. Besides an endless source of wisdom and phone numbers where one could potential have a good time, it captures the essence of humanity.
Not only is bathroom graffiti positive due to the historical benefits of record-keeping, but also, anonymous secrets feed my incessant pornographic need for gossip.
I have a favourite bar that I am compelled to go to just for the writing on the stalls. It’s a little dirt pub called the Cock ‘n Bull. It’s frequented mostly by a rotating group of college students, a handful of regulars dating back from 1972 and one to two people with questionable hygiene which I believe to be homeless.
The floors are sticky, the beer is cheap, and the pool table is 100 years old. It has the strangest, most delicious vibe I’ve ever encountered in a public place. People are genuinely nice to everyone, without ulterior motives. The tables are close together just enough to encourage you to swap drinking stories with your neighbour. The bar has managed to find the perfect balance of people to floor tiles, encouraging conversation without claustrophobia. And of course, the owner is the epitome of the perfect bartender – surrogate mother and shrink rolled into one.
Even the second hand smoke is nothing but a hazy inviting cloud of love…
So maybe I inhaled a little too deeply…
Still, it’s a magical place where bonding abounds, where people sing along to the amateur tempting his hand at Billy Joel’s Piano Man, where each Monday is Craft Night and we gather round the rickety tables and use paste, dry macaroni and sparkles to design a new avant-garde paper hat.
But the most special thing about the entire pub experience is the bathroom stall.
Before exercising your bodily functions, you are forced to stand with five other people, in a place meant for two. But no matter how uncomfortable and antsy you are, you must be nice to them, for you may soon be asking them to spare a square.
After sharing intimate feelings about which beer is less likely to induce hangovers, you arrive at your destination. A little bathroom stall complete with a cornucopia of delicious human moments which give you something different to raise your glass to.
“Here’s to 1-888-55- BAMBI.”
“Cheers to enhancing poetic ability through the smell of poo.”
“Here’s to rhyming ass with class!”
Personally, I like to sort the scrawling on the walls into three basic categories. (Why? Because my mind wanders on the can.)
1) I’m too drunk to spell
Where people, usually with questionable penmanship, misspell obscenities across the wall. If you’re angry enough to bring yourself to deface private property, the least you could do is spell the generic obscenity correctly. People would have taken you more seriously if you hadn’t spelt it “tird,” “asswhole,” or “hore.” But maybe that’s just me. I also don’t join Facebook groups that have misspelled titles. Decorum is important. As is taking inventory of your extremities – two things people should really be paying more attention to.
2) I need to teach others
This is where people leave little bits of wisdom for you to pass on. From the basic “don’t eat yellow snow,” to the lesser known “your hair can also be makeshift dental floss in a sticky situation.”
3) I need to share with others
My absolute favourite category is “I need to take something of my chest, so I’m going to write it in the same place 100s of people drop a deuce.”
That’s the category where you learn about people’s desires, fears, and unusual pass times. But the absolute most glorious part of this category is when you’re lucky enough to find dialogue. Even more fulfilling than reading someone’s weird fascination with toenail clippings is reading “Me too!” scrawled underneath in foreign handwriting.
While my pants hang around my ankles and I’m trying to hover over the toilet seat to avoid cross contamination, I can’t help but smile.
Sometimes it’s just nice to know that we’re all a little depraved.
Not only is bathroom graffiti positive due to the historical benefits of record-keeping, but also, anonymous secrets feed my incessant pornographic need for gossip.
I have a favourite bar that I am compelled to go to just for the writing on the stalls. It’s a little dirt pub called the Cock ‘n Bull. It’s frequented mostly by a rotating group of college students, a handful of regulars dating back from 1972 and one to two people with questionable hygiene which I believe to be homeless.
The floors are sticky, the beer is cheap, and the pool table is 100 years old. It has the strangest, most delicious vibe I’ve ever encountered in a public place. People are genuinely nice to everyone, without ulterior motives. The tables are close together just enough to encourage you to swap drinking stories with your neighbour. The bar has managed to find the perfect balance of people to floor tiles, encouraging conversation without claustrophobia. And of course, the owner is the epitome of the perfect bartender – surrogate mother and shrink rolled into one.
Even the second hand smoke is nothing but a hazy inviting cloud of love…
So maybe I inhaled a little too deeply…
Still, it’s a magical place where bonding abounds, where people sing along to the amateur tempting his hand at Billy Joel’s Piano Man, where each Monday is Craft Night and we gather round the rickety tables and use paste, dry macaroni and sparkles to design a new avant-garde paper hat.
But the most special thing about the entire pub experience is the bathroom stall.
Before exercising your bodily functions, you are forced to stand with five other people, in a place meant for two. But no matter how uncomfortable and antsy you are, you must be nice to them, for you may soon be asking them to spare a square.
After sharing intimate feelings about which beer is less likely to induce hangovers, you arrive at your destination. A little bathroom stall complete with a cornucopia of delicious human moments which give you something different to raise your glass to.
“Here’s to 1-888-55- BAMBI.”
“Cheers to enhancing poetic ability through the smell of poo.”
“Here’s to rhyming ass with class!”
Personally, I like to sort the scrawling on the walls into three basic categories. (Why? Because my mind wanders on the can.)
1) I’m too drunk to spell
Where people, usually with questionable penmanship, misspell obscenities across the wall. If you’re angry enough to bring yourself to deface private property, the least you could do is spell the generic obscenity correctly. People would have taken you more seriously if you hadn’t spelt it “tird,” “asswhole,” or “hore.” But maybe that’s just me. I also don’t join Facebook groups that have misspelled titles. Decorum is important. As is taking inventory of your extremities – two things people should really be paying more attention to.
2) I need to teach others
This is where people leave little bits of wisdom for you to pass on. From the basic “don’t eat yellow snow,” to the lesser known “your hair can also be makeshift dental floss in a sticky situation.”
3) I need to share with others
My absolute favourite category is “I need to take something of my chest, so I’m going to write it in the same place 100s of people drop a deuce.”
That’s the category where you learn about people’s desires, fears, and unusual pass times. But the absolute most glorious part of this category is when you’re lucky enough to find dialogue. Even more fulfilling than reading someone’s weird fascination with toenail clippings is reading “Me too!” scrawled underneath in foreign handwriting.
While my pants hang around my ankles and I’m trying to hover over the toilet seat to avoid cross contamination, I can’t help but smile.
Sometimes it’s just nice to know that we’re all a little depraved.
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