“Pack it up, pack it in, Let me begin…”
-Jump Around, House of Pain

Yay! I’m back at work! That means regular blog updates! And pictures!

So my New Years started out with a bang. Literally. But first, a recap.

After a drunken night out at Lee’s Palace, where I ran into my former nemesis, Eve spent the night at my place. We hung out all day on New Years Eve, shopping, eating, drinking, and looking at pictures of Japan at Eve’s mom’s house. After lots of snacks and pizza, we headed out to My Apartment (the bar, not my actual apartment) via taxi. It was fun, and at $30, a Hell of a lot cheaper than anywhere else in the city. And it included champagne, party favours, and free snacks at midnight. And also cheap beer. And unlike Lee's Palace, it wasn't pushy and I didn't shove anyone or give them the Tim Robbins. Maybe like Eve and Rusty said, I am getting nicer and less jerk-like. Or maybe it was just an off day for me.

The last song I heard in 2005 was "Take Me Out" by my beloved Franz Ferdinand. And the New Year got off to a good start with "Jump Around" by House of Pain as the first song I heard in 2006. And then, at 12:26 am on January 1st, 2006, it happened: I heard Sir Mix a Lot’s "Baby Got Back." Happy New Year indeed. And Eve was dancing with this funny, crazy guy. Or more precsely, the crazy guy was dancing in a corner near Eve, kind of putting on a show for her with his rhythm skillz and some horns. That's him on the left.

It was all fun and games until we decided to leave.

The 4 of us caught a Beck Taxi from King St. from a girl who told us that the driver was really mean. And she was right. As we were quietly discussing how we never have good luck with Beck Taxis, we turned down Adelaide St, a one way street. We were driving along in the left hand lane and all was well. In the right hand lane was a yellow school bus. Next thing you know, the bus decides to make a left hand turn from the right lane. I remember thinking that the bus was awfully close to our cab. And sure enough, the bus totally scrapes up against us as we hit it head on because we were going straight. The cabbie turned the wheel and we scraped along beside it. No one was hurt but the cab was pretty damaged- ripped the side mirror off, knocked the front light out, crunched the hood and dented the side doors in.

Cabbie gets out to yell at the bus driver without turning the meter off. We’re yelling at him to turn the meter off. He’s fighting with the bus driver. Dude turns the meter off and we tell him that we’re going to pay him and get another cab. He keeps asking us whose fault it was and telling us to stay. I get the $10 out of my purse and throw it to him as he yells at us saying we’re ungrateful because he saved our lives. Sure buddy. He keeps yelling that he saved our lives and we should be grateful. Dude, I gave you a 75 cent tip. He was still yelling at us as I told everyone to get out of the cab and we hopped into a new and better taxi. Exciting (not in the right way) start to 2006.

In the aftermath of New Years, Rusty and I saw Breakfast on Pluto yesterday. And I liked it even more the second time. I have to read the book because I really liked Patrick McCabe’s other book, Mondo Desperado. And I bought what I think is the ugliest magazine cover of Bono. Ever. Even uglier than that Rolling Stone circa 1988 that I own. I complained about that Time magazine cover for nothing. Ugh. Q Magazine, what were you thinking. I almost didn’t buy it because it was so ugly, but then I discovered that it came with a book of lists related to music. And the lists won me over for my $12.95.

And I need to give a shout out to my new Napoleon Dynamite pen and my ND “My lips hurt real bad” chapstick that I got for Xmas.
And Eve also brought me a nice assortment of Hello Kitty products from Japan. Like Hello Kitty toilet paper. That one is a keeper. It’s top shelf.

OVERRATED: Non-Hello Kitty toilet paper.
UNDERRATED: The fine art that is Baby Got Back.

“Word to your mom…”