Lonita
Kilimanjaro  
06 June 2011 @ 04:14 pm

Two weeks ago a 16 year-old boy summited Mt. Everest and became the youngest person to complete the Seven Summits challenge, and good on 'im! Looking at those photographs of him made me feel very lazy, but in a good way.

It inspired me.

No, I am not going to climb Mt. Everest. Spending 70 days camping in the snow I do not consider to be a good use of my time.

However, I've set myself a five to ten year plan, to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro.

I'm not a mountaineer, nor enthralled by mountains (I'm a desert and desolate places fan, really), but I feel this urge to conquer something. Possibly I will change my mind, and for a great many reasons this plan is not likely to come to fruition - money not being the least of them. While it's not expensive, per se, to do this climb, it's still not cheap, and definitely a hardship when you get paid the sort of shit money I get for my labours.

Kili is not a technical climb, making it the easiest of the Seven Summits to ascend. You do not require any mountaineering or rock climbing experience in order to do it, as it is a walk. It's not an easy walk, requiring that you be reasonably fit, as about half the people who attempt it don't make it. Part of that is due to them attempting the faster and more steep climbs, which are much harder on the body and more likely to cause the things that are most likely to kill you on Kili - like altitude sickness and the effects thereof. There is a gentler, if less scenic climb, that takes about two more days to complete, but it allows for far more acclimation to the altitudes. It's got an extremely high success rate. That's the route I'd go. So what if it's less scenic? I've got rotten eyesight and will be almost six thousand metres above sea level - what am I going to see from up there, really? Rocks, snow, rocks, snow, crater, rocks, snow.

All drawbacks aside, including my impaired vision, I figure that if they can get a blind man and an amputee up Everest, they can get me up an African hillside.

 
 
Lonita
Communion  
15 May 2011 @ 11:35 pm
sounds like: The White Stripes - Offend in Every Way | Powered by Last.fm
I have just returned (a few hours ago, at this point) from the First Communion of my oldest friend's daughter. A simple ceremony in a comfortable church, and a large dinner reception after at a local restaurant that specialises in Eastern European cuisine.

I have seen some of the people that were there, my friend's family, off and on at various functions for the past twenty some-odd years - including adults that were small children when I first met them. That's a bit disconcerting, in a pleasant way, to see these people with their own children, their own adult lives, when your remembrance of them is so different.

I have no real contact with most of my own family - for reasons of choice, circumstance and proximity. Some of them are just too far away to see, and the ones that are not are people I'm just not close with. So, as I ate dinner today, I was thinking about that - thinking about how enjoyable it is, however infrequent, to have these family events, to have people come together to celebrate something, to eat together, and to be included.

 
 
Lonita
Types &Toms  
10 May 2011 @ 02:03 pm
After 42 years I have finally figured out what my blood type is: I asked my mother what hers was. I figured that since one or both of us would be dead if mine were different from hers, knowing hers would mean knowing my own.

I can't believe it took me 42 years to come up with that one.

I won't tell you how long it took me to remember which animal was Tom out of the Tom & Jerry cartoons, and how I finally managed to remember it.

 
 
Lonita
Dear Fellow Canadians  
07 May 2011 @ 08:46 am
You know I love you, but let me take this opportunity to take a verbal strap to your deserving backsides.

It is neither charming, nor funny, nor intelligent for you to spend so much of your time in your revilement of the American population. Your arrogant detractions are spiteful, juvenile, unsoundly based and racist.

You embarrass me, you shame this country, and you debase yourselves.

If you think the US are a pack of savage ignorants without the sense the universe gave a moose, consider how you sound when you talk of it - and reconsider who you claim as your objects of admiration and heroes, because I bet most of them weren't born on this side of the 49th parallel.

And, for the love of all that's sainted, holy, and made of maple sugar, Shut The Holy Fuck Up.




Addendum: Dear Co-worker: re: the above: Next time you spout off on this topic, try to at least make an attempt to keep your opinions to yourself until the co-worker who's married to an American has left the room ... you know, the co-worker you consider to be your second-best buddy in the office.

 
 
Lonita
Perception  
07 May 2011 @ 07:53 am
Media_httpwwwjeffbrid_ndehk

Washington, DC Metro Station on a cold January morning in 2007. The man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time approx. 2 thousand people went through the station, most of them on their way to work. After 3 minutes a middle aged man noticed there was a musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried to meet his schedule. read the rest


Thanks to my friend Diane for the link.

 
 
Lonita
Bingo  
07 May 2011 @ 07:52 am

Let's see, I've got transvestite (his name was Dave/Wendy - looked better in a dress than most women do), human feces, having obscenities yelled at you (happens at work all the time), passing by a smell that triggers your gag reflex, drug deal, spare change (happened twice within 30 seconds on my way to work today), unrecognisable stain on sidewalk, "massage" parlor (we pick people up - in a literal fashion, taxis you see - from them all the time), bum passed out in middle of sidewalk, used drug paraphanalia ...

I see I still have some work to do here.


read all

 
 
Lonita
Splendor in the Grass  
03 May 2011 @ 03:02 am

I really enjoy the film Splendor in the Grass, but so many parts of it are about as frustrating as parts of Rebel Without A Cause, and sometimes about as painful as A Taste of Honey (a movie I'll never watch again, because it's just too painful. It's so good, and so painful, I just can't put myself through watching it again).

These poor, frustrated teens trying so desperately to figure themselves out, and deal with the emerging storm of hormones in an era when women weren't even supposed to admit (or even know) they had them. "No nice girl has those feelings," and a girl who lost her virginity before marriage was considered "spoiled".

They struggle to communicate to their parents, to get answers, to talk to them about what they want and what they feel (about love, sex, future plans, current feelings, education, work, etcetera), and their parents cut them off, brush them off, treat their concerns lightly or not at all, talk over them, talk at them. These unfortunate kids come of age with no information except the consequences of actions they don't truly understand because of the simple fact that their parents didn't parent. They came looking for answers, got none, and ended up getting into all sorts of mad trouble that they get blamed for, when the fault is truly with the people who failed to give them a foundation.

But this was an era of girls didn't, boys did, and you didn't talk about it (any of the "its") with anyone at all. As sad as I am to see the eroding childhood now, the flapper era must have been a horror to the parents of the time - the first real era of open sexuality, alcohol consumption, and female liberation. This emerging culture must have been unbalancing in the extreme, with personal questions coming to the fore in an era that barely had any answers.

Warren Beatty and Natalie Wood are fabulous in this film, and Elia Kazan got some very realistic emotion out of them - particularly Wood. Mind you, the trick he played on her during the filming wasn't funny then, and sure as hell wasn't funny given the circumstances of her death. There's a scene where Natalie's character tries to commit suicide by walking out into the water. Natalie was terrified of the water, terrified of drowning. Kazan told her that as she was walking out on the platform that was not visible under the surface of the water, there'd be someone there holding her hand so she wouldn't fall. He lied. There was no one there, so that utter look of terror on her face during that part of the film is quite real.

If I'd been her, I'd have kicked Kazan in the yarbles for that one.

 
 
Lonita
Overlooked Portions of Popular Songs Which, When Taken Out of Context, Gain Gravitas As They Are Rep  
23 April 2011 @ 05:40 am
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag?
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag?
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag?
– Katy Perry, "Firework"

via mcsweeneys.net

No, but any more surgery and you're going to be one - or is it too late for that?

 
 
Lonita
And Now, For No Particular Reason, a Rant About Facebook  
23 April 2011 @ 04:55 am

Facebook is what happens to the Web when you hit it with the stupid stick. It’s a dumbed-down version of the functionality the Web already had, just not all in one place at one time. Facebook has made substandard versions of everything on the Web, bundled it together and somehow found itself being lauded for it, as if AOL, Friendster and MySpace had never managed the same slightly embarrassing trick. [...] But the idea that it’s doing something better, new or innovative is largely PR and faffery. Zuckerberg is in fact not a genius; he’s an ambitious nerd who was in the right place at the right time, and was apparently willing to be a ruthless dick when he had to be.

via whatever.scalzi.com

 
 
Lonita
Earth Day leader killed, composted girlfriend - msnbc.com  
23 April 2011 @ 04:33 am
Ira Einhorn was on stage hosting the first Earth Day event at the Fairmount Park in Philadelphia on April 22, 1970. Seven years later, police raided his closet and found the "composted" body of his ex-girlfriend inside a trunk.

via msnbc.msn.com

And a Happy Earth Day to you, too. At least he stuck to his principles - although you'd think he'd have done a better job of it.

 
 
Lonita
30 Day Song Challenge - Day 9 - A song that you can dance to  
23 April 2011 @ 03:43 am
Now there are many songs one can dance to, of course, yet I prefer the living room fun of T Rex's Mambo Sun; and, as a side note, exercising is much more enjoyable when one does it to Hall and Oates' I Can't Go For That.

 
 
Lonita
30 Day Song Challenge - Day 8 - a song that you know all the words to  
23 April 2011 @ 03:31 am
sounds like: Nails - 88 Lines About 44 Women | Powered by Last.fm
Oh come on - where do I even start or stop with this one? The entire Beatles back catalogue? Most of The Who? A fair portion of James, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Stranglers, AC/DC, The Guess Who, Pixies, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera?

I'll go for an easy one, because I know a fair portion of you will have fun singing along to it:

88 Lines About 44 Women - The Nails

o/~ Gloria, the last taboo was shattered by her tongue one night,
Mimi brought the taboo back and held it up before the light o/~

 
 
Lonita
Hornby Uintotherium located in Hornby Island, Canada | Atlas Obscura  
22 April 2011 @ 05:52 pm
sounds like: Mink DeVille - Let Me Dream If I Want To | Powered by Last.fm
The plaque on Canada's Hornby Island concerns a remarkable creature known as the Hornby Uintotherium. It is one of the smallest of the Uintotheria and usually quite docile, although occasionally a stubborn one can do some damage. Uintotheria look a bit like rhinoceros, according to lore, but they have the strangest knob and protrusions on their heads. Some people say they are shy because of how they look.

via atlasobscura.com

I wonder if it's related to the House Hippo?

Secretly, or not so secretly now, I wish House Hippos were real.

 
 
Lonita
Arc de Triomphe - Logo Tourist  
21 April 2011 @ 01:21 pm

via logotourist.com

"Logotourist.com presents an art project by Risto-Jussi Isopahkala. Logotourist mixes iconic landmarks and commercial logos. It features logos from the hundred most valuable brands."

Interesting project, but completely disturbing at the same time. The world, now, is becoming more ad-covered and ad-sponsored every day.

 
 
Lonita
30 Day Song Challenge - Day 6 - A song that reminds you of somewhere  
20 April 2011 @ 12:38 pm

Not single songs, but an album: Rumours by Fleetwood Mac. That always reminds me of the first time I was in France, the summer I was 16.

I spent a lot of time going through the vinyl belonging to my mother and her husband, and that was one of the albums I found - that, and John Lennon's Shaved Fish. I listened to them a lot - even (a few years later) bought myself copies.

So there I was, in that very house pictured below (middle row of windows), with the Mediterranean before me, dancing around the place alone, singing along to Fleetwood Mac.

House in Marseille

 
 
Lonita
White Desert Of Brazil  
20 April 2011 @ 12:37 pm
Media_httpplanetoddit_fjegq

Encompassing about 1000 square kilometres of Brazil, this white desert is a protected park sporting a lot of lagoons in the rainy seasons, but very little vegetation. Because it's an environmentally protected area, none but approved vehicles are allowed inside. People do fish here: fish eggs are brought to the area by migratory birds.

I have a fascination with desolate places, and this is gorgeous. So pristine and perfect to the casual eye.

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
20 April 2011 @ 12:00 pm
scattergories: 

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
19 April 2011 @ 12:00 pm
scattergories: 

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
18 April 2011 @ 12:00 pm
scattergories: 

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
17 April 2011 @ 12:00 pm
scattergories: 

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
16 April 2011 @ 12:00 pm
scattergories: 
  • Fri, 14:52: Gawd I hate when my hands smell like rubber gloves.

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
15 April 2011 @ 12:00 pm
scattergories: 
  • Fri, 05:02: "fly-blown hag" Greatest epithet ever, from the 1997 BBC/A&E production of "Ivanhoe".
  • Fri, 10:32: Soundtrack for "Saturday Night Fever" makes excellent cleaning music! ........ I heard that.

 
 
Lonita
My tweets  
14 April 2011 @ 04:20 pm
scattergories: 
  • Wed, 16:25: I'm guessin' that when you breathe, your chest isn't actually supposed to creak.
  • Wed, 19:01: Can PI be expressed as a fraction? http://post.ly/1tUex
  • Wed, 22:10: Have found new motto! "If you want sanity, you can have mine. God knows I'm not using it." - Hawkeye, M*A*S*H

 
 
Lonita
Hess Village  
11 April 2011 @ 10:13 pm
Those of us who are old enough, can romanticise and reminisce about Hess Village "back in the day"; the whole giant beer tent, drunken summer fun of it all. This situation no longer exists, and a lot of folks don't believe me when I tell them just how much it's changed.

As an adult looking for a night out, it is no longer in any way the place for you (on weekends), unless you vacate it prior to any of the skeezey dance clubs opening up. Live music is no longer a mainstay of this part of town. I'm of the opinion that were it to revert to that, to live music, the problems it faces now would dissipate and maybe disappear.

Oh, and by "adult" I mean anyone over the age of 25. I have friends in their late 20s who now won't go anywhere near Hess on the weekends after dark.

What's Hess become? A place where the street needs to be blocked off by the police on weekends and mounted officers brought in - because the drunken children are completely unable to control themselves, or watch out for themselves (or each other), in any way, shape, or form. There is a higher incidence of date rape from doctored drinks; higher incidence of petty violence, fighting, and theft; girls that need to be locked up by themselves in bar back rooms to keep them safe until the bouncer is able to get them out the door because they are that intoxicated; etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. And, despite the road being blocked off repeatedly, it still escapes the notice of people who spend every weekend evening in the village, including people who work there.

Hess used to be fun. It used to be beer, the odd brawl, live bands, nothing that I recall being in any way this debauched and uncontrolled.

Times change, I know, and I miss the comfortable beer+band fun of it all, but I don't think the way it is now is anything to reminisce in a friendly way about.

 
 
Lonita
1940s promotional video for the city of Hamilton  
11 April 2011 @ 04:22 pm

Portrait of a City from Brian Potstra on Vimeo.