Why I Love You

I did a Google search on the phrase "why I love you" this morning and am compiling a list of good reasons to love people because I am having such a gosh-darn good day and am really grateful to have all my people in my life. Here are the best reasons I found:

I can be myself when I am with you.

Thinking of you, fills me with a wonderful feeling.

Your love gives me the feeling, that the best is still ahead.

Your terrific sense of humor.

You are my theme for a dream.

Your love for me is a natural anti-depressant.

I love to hear your voice.

You always make me feel that you are by my side no matter what.

I love the way you keep your cool when I do something stupid.

You are so beautiful to me.

I don't have to vacuum before you come over.

Even when I'm grumpy, you still like me.

We both know that together we can work out anything.

You never say, "Are you going to tell that story AGAIN?"

You always seem to know when things aren't going great.

You never intimidate me.

You know how to bring a smile to my face.

When you listen, I know you're really listening and not just waiting for your turn to talk.

Sometimes you call just because you're thinking about me.

I love your smile...I really do. =)

You understand if I forget something worth remembering.

You always say what I need to hear.

You're so cuddlesome.

You're someone I can be goofy with.

I can ask you a dumb question without feeling dumb.

How you tell me long stories that have no meaning, but you know I'll listen anyway.

How you forgive me when I do wrong.

I can fight against the world because I know you will be by my side always.

You understand that I need not just a coffee, but a good coffee.

And those reasons are for all of my friends. To finish, I'll give you the best love song ever written (isn't Meg so adorable in that movie?).

Broke Again - What a Crying Shame!

It's that time of the month again. All the bills and rent are due. Money feels in very short supply and poverty is a really dirty feeling.

Our society makes being poor a crime. Most of our public spaces of gathering are consumer spaces. Laws against loitering enable businesses and police to discriminate against the poor. Businesses in Victoria generally only allow "customers" to use their washrooms, but if you look like a customer, they will generally allow you to use their facilities - even if you don't buy a thing. Likewise, laws that claim to be for the purposes of keeping our streets safe simply enable police to harass the poor and homeless.

If that's not enough, people who need help feel dirty about it - like there is something wrong with them for being in a position of need. It's as if being poor means that you have somehow been irresponsible. I mean, you must have had money at some time. Look at that iPod. Look at that computer. Where did all your money go? Why weren't you saving for a rainy day?

If you are poor, that doesn't mean you are irresponsible. Just like the old saying: you don't need to be smart to be rich, you just need to have a lot of money. You don't need to be irresponsible to be broke, it just means you don't have any money. In honour of poverty, here's some good old Fountains of Wayne (the video quality sucks, but that too seems appropriate somehow).

A Mandate for Change

I have been dealing with non-profit organizations for a while (and not just because most of the organizations I work with are broke) because I like to feel like I am doing good work. And I found the best organizational mandate that I have ever read this morning through the Zuckerman Family Foundation.

Most mandates are really specific and based on how difficult the world is or how difficult it has been or what we've had to overcome. The Zuckerman Family Foundation mandate is so simple that it seems brilliant. It reads:

Mandate

CHANGE (V)

accommodate, adapt, alter, convert, diverge, diversify, evolve, make innovations, make over, merge, metamorphose, modify, reform, regenerate, remake, remodel, renovate, reorganize, replace, resolve, restyle, revolutionize, shape, shift, transfigure, transform, translate, transpose, vary, veer.

How perfect is that? It's like the mandate each person should have to live their life by. If I could go to sleep every night saying I did anywhere near half of those things, I'd be a Happy Cupcake.

Jerks

Are you a jerk?

A jerk is pretty easy to spot once they get going, so it stands to reason that if you are a jerk - it shouldn't be too hard to tell.

Quite simply, if you enjoy the feeling of intimidating your inferiors - the kid working at the coffee shop, the new guy at work, your neighbors dog, then you might be a jerk.

If you refuse to tell someone when they are doing a good job, but jump on the opportunity to tell them their fly is down or they have a booger hanging from their nose or they forgot to wish a mutual friend happy birthday, then you might be a jerk.

If you are unnecessarily loud - slam the door every time you go into your house, wear heavy footwear on hardwood floors, honk the horn in your car when you see a friend walking up the street, or talk louder on your cell phone in crowded spaces because it is harder for the person who is calling to hear you, then you might be a jerk!

If there is nothing negative that you could say about so-and-so that you couldn't say in front of everybody, then you might be a jerk!

If you will bend the truth to make your life easier and justify it by criticizing those you are lying to, then you are probably a jerk!

If you are a jerk, stop it!!!

You are pissing every one else off!

Instant Pleasure

The only video (online mode of listening to music for free without filling up your hard drive) of this song that I could find features the Little Mermaid. Click to listen and then keep reading or just check out the lyrics.

Rufus Wainwright - Instant Pleasure

I don't want somebody to love me
Just give me sex whenever I want it
'Cause all I ask for is instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure

You in the traffic for all eternity
How could that speed be where you want to be?
Said don't you really want instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure

Think that all these folks get laid?
Do it cause their pain is great?
What you thinkin' anyways?

If drinkin' coffee's your idea of really cool
You can't expect no crazy chick to notice you
Just sittin there dreamin' instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure

If you want someone a friend to be
Guess you'll have to win the lottery
But till then repeat after me

I don't want somebody to love me
Just give me sex whenever I want it
'Cause all I ask for is instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure
Instant pleasure, instant pleasure

I don't want somebody to love me
I don't want somebody to love me...

It's a pessimistic song, but at the same time there's something reassuring about it. I like to call it the anti-Buddhist anthem - not because I'm anti-Buddhist, but because it's about seeking the direct opposite of happiness in Buddhist ideology. At the same time, it's not a hedonistic song. A true hedonist wants it all: sex, love, fast cars, friendship... That's what's so pessimistic about it - like you can't have both pleasure and happiness at the same time.

I don't want to believe that. Happiness is surely harder to achieve than pleasure. Maybe that's why it's the focus of the Buddhist quest for enlightenment, but maybe enlightenment happens when you attain perfect happiness and realize you can have pleasure as well.

What's wrong with that thinking? Pleasure is wrapped up in desire: "All I want is instant pleasure..." Unfulfilled desire is supposed to operate counter to happiness, but it doesn't have to. Oscar Wilde was the one who said:

"In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it. The last is much the worst; the last is a real tragedy!"

And the Dalai Lama himself is a notorious internet addict. I'm not questioning his state of enlightment, just saying... Well, the internet is really good for immediate self-gratification.

Grumpy Cupcake

You might have never guessed this, but sometimes I get really grumpy. Sometimes, I have so much to do that I don't know where to start. This causes a panicky sensation somewhere around the solar plexus, undetectable to most other people - and I get grumpy fast at unsuspecting friends and relatives.

I don't know if this has ever happened to you, but if it does... a heartfelt apology is in order. Oddly enough, saying sorry rarely gives me the desired feeling of relief from guilt. It usually just makes me feel more guilty - even when my loved ones are very forgiving. In cases like these, I think presents and or a bigger apology are required.

As you may be suspecting, a situation like this may have happened to me very recently and your Cupcake started combing the internet for good apologies.

I found some quotes I like:

In some families, please is described as the magic word. In our house, however, it was sorry. ~Margaret Laurence

Never ruin an apology with an excuse. ~Kimberly Johnson

Keep your words soft and tender because tomorrow you may have to eat them. ~Author Unknown

Then I read about apology notes and discovered that some people have been far worse than this Cupcake!

EDMONTON - An Edmonton couple whose home was firebombed two weeks ago say they found a surprise apology note in their mailbox three days later.
"I'm sorry for the inconvenience," someone wrote on a piece of looseleaf paper. "The wrong house was targeted ... we believed that someone else lived there. There is no need to worry for any future attacks." ~ A Real Newstory

And some have even been far weirder than Cupcake!

"I want to apologize for the past incedent with the umbrella, I was preparing a character for a possible movie role where the husband doesn't play his part so they swap places. Unfortunatly I didn't get the part. I'm sorry I got all carried away with my role! [sic]" ~ Britney Spears

I didn't throw a bomb through a window or beat anyone with an umbrella, but a simple present might still be in order.

Teenage Sex

There is no feeling more patriotic for a Canadian than feeling like we did something better than the Americans. That's what I felt this morning when I read the CBC news headline: Fewer Teenage Girls Report Having Sex: StatsCan. However, this glowing moment of patriotism was only because I know Americans have been talking about how their abstinence-only sex education program has been failing miserably.

Patriotism has to be one of the stupidest things to feel happy about - especially the Canadian egotistical kind. It is not good that the American sex education program is failing. It is not good that their kids know less about how to protect themselves from S.T.Ds or S.T.Is (as some people like to call them now). Not just because as human being we should be filled with a benevolent love for all other human beings (that will only happen when we achieve world peace and all the children of the world join hands to sing together in unison), we should be concerned because Americans have always been the largest source of immigration to Canada!

But for the grace of God, here they come - unwashed and uncertain how to put a condom on!

Also, the States is the number one travel destination for Canadians! And everyone knows Canadians are kinky.

So... here's the low-down on where Americans are going with sex ed now. And what makes me happy about our news headline is that it stands in positive contrast with the stupid abstinence-only program and can deter the geniuses who supported it from saying that there was no level of sex education that could have worked better than the nit-witted one they were using.

In the Event of a Zombie Holocaust

Would you be ready? Here's a quiz you take to find out if you're a survivor or Zombie food.

I can see why the Zombies are headed for the mall. People in malls and subway stations often look like zombies - it would be easier to blend in because none of the people around them are making any sort of decisions or having any sort of enthusiasm at all about life. They are the walking dead.

So why do they appeal to the living so much?

Unlike vampires, they're not especially sexy. They are not articulate and (considering I got a high score of Z+ on that zombie quiz) they can't be that difficult to beat. Actually, zombies operate a lot like vampires - except that their mindless and rotting.

Zombie popularity mirrored the rise in the popularity of voodoo and with the first Zombie movie Night of the Living Dead (1968), based on the Richard Matheson novel I am Legend. Both make different types of social commentary - much like vampire movies do.

The monsters in movies are supposed to be the characters that are not you, especially the mindless monsters, like zombies. Loads of people want to be vampires, but who wants to be a zombie? Hence everyone wants to share their score when they take their zombie quiz.

Zombies represent the people we see as a waste of life (most of the time) - wasted because they don't think for themselves, don't enjoy their opportunities, moan a lot and move slowly in large groups. A lot like my friends and I in ninth grade.

It was a dark and stormy night...

The woman in the dark trench coat and thick red lipstick realized that Jack Layton didn't have enough money to buy the document from her. All that planning - an entire ten minutes - was gone to waste. "Let it go, baby. Let it go," Rich consoled her.

She threw the brown paper envelope to the ground and held her breath in for a moment as she watched Rich wipe the raindrops from his forehead before kissing her. "Let's blow this joint."

The real way that the NEMESIS Risk Assessment Report actually wound up on a rainy street in Ottawa couldn't be much stupider than that.

If you don't know what I am talking about, here's the story. Someone found a report detailing just how hackable an Environment Canada environmental enforcement database is just lying on the street and handed it over to the CBC.

Now, I am thinking that if I were really a spy the best cover wouldn't be trench coats and sexy evening dresses, but as a bum on the streets of Ottawa because this isn't the first time this nonsense has happened. Remember the anti-terror unit blueprints "someone" found in a dumpster?

A Poopy Week

Maybe I shouldn't be talking about how poopy the week has been when it is only Thursday. One should never say things could never get worse... but I am detecting a theme.

First, UPS lost Mr. Floatie Number Two - they are still trying to find him but in the mean time one has to wonder how it is possible to lose a seven foot turd costume.

If you don't know, Mr. Floatie is the mascot of sewage treatment in Victoria BC. Check him out! His prodigy: Number Two was on his way to New York State and expected to arrive in early August, but disappeared en route. We suspect he might have never left the province or has been abducted by U.S. National Security. At any rate, that's shitty!

Next (and I am not making this up), a house-sized dog poopy was carried on a massive path of destruction in Berne! Ok, maybe the path of destruction wasn't massive, but it was indeed unfortunate - it knocked out a window at an orphanage! I imagine there were three unfortunate looking kids in there because it sounds like the climax to a Lemony Snicket novel.

Poop gone missing and poop gone wild.

I wonder if the two are connected? Maybe National Security started chasing Number Two and he escaped!!! Then fled to Switzerland and disguised himself - but when Americans started crowding around the inflatable poop he was hiding in, he had to run - suspecting one of them could be a spy. Maybe UPS should just hurry up and find this friggen costume already! - Cupcake