Forgery League

I’m a frickin’ spaz today. So far I have lost (or discovered missing):

• my glasses
• a shock mount for a microphone (later found)
• a bodhrán
• my Metropass
• my wallet

The good news is, Midsummer Night’s Dream is looking awesome. I’ve got a lot of work to do. And between rehearsals, an open stage, and our Friday gig, this is going to be one busy week.

Saturday’s gig (‘twas Nigel‘s CD release) rocked. Packed house, great crowd, awesome openers. I’d never seen David Celia before, and he and his cohorts Joan Besen and Mike Celia were an absolute treat to watch). The rest of the band played a terriffic show - especially considering three of them had had only one rehearsal with us. Really great to play with such an experienced crew. And Don Kerr played cello! I’m thinkin’ his Gas Station studio might be a place to record our upcoming CD…

Well, it seems the only thing that can get me out of bed at a civilized hour is construction outside our door. I woke up from a dream where I was watching someone ride around a neighbourhood on really noisy moped at 2 in the morning… to find that the noise was real.

At first I thought it was our neighbour, cutting down plants along the fence between our two properties at 7:30 AM just to spite us. (We like letting things grow as they like, which I presume is bad for property values.) But no, it was a dude from the city with a concrete saw. They’re fixing the sidewalk. Sweet jeezus.

(Edit: Oh! I missed the notice, somehow. They did give us warning.)

Can they do that at this hour? Yes, apparently - something I didn’t know until just now, when I found a PDF of the city’s noise bylaw online courtesy NoiseWatch. (Hmm. Wonder if there’s an alliance to be made between them and the Public Space Committee.)

And now they’re on to the pneumatic paving smasher, which is even louder. I can even feel the floor shake, at the opposite end of the house. It’s like living in a cartoon. I might be angry if it weren’t so funny. :D

Hmm. This means there’ll be wet concrete later. Maybe I’ll draw a flower or something on it.

We have moved in.

Thursday we got up at 7ish (J and M having slept over) and Sean went out to fetch the truck from the ass end of Etobicoke while the rest of us packed up a few last things. M and our friend Pete ran back and forth with a car ferrying cats and computers and musical instruments. I stayed on in the loft while the rest took off for J’s place.

Lots of poignant moments of letting-go… of belongings, and finally of the whole apartment - orange as ever, but now empty and echoing, containing only a few stray scraps of wood, the requisite stacks of surplus coat hangers, leftover paint for our successors, and lonely tumbleweeds of cat fur and dust. Thank you, 545.

J’s place was easier, but for the first time we began to worry that a 24-foot truck wouldn’t be enough. It looked like a complete yard sale and art show taking place on the lawn in front of the apartment building… We arrived at M’s place as night fell - and the looming clouds chose that moment to break, as we frantically tried to rearrange the truck to fit as much junk in it as possible. In the end, M had to leave a few things behind. Kind of sad that all our belongings take up more than 1200 cubic feet of space.

We got to the house at around 10:45, backed the truck up the back alley (much to the delight of our neighbours, I presume) and spent the next three or four hours unloading. By that time our other helpers had gone home - and I wouldn’t have wanted to inflict the unloading on anyone else. I could have kissed the back of the truck when we finally reached it.

The past weekend has been a total blur. I only know it’s been four mornings because I can remember four distinct breakfasts - oatmeal, tofu scramble, blueberry pancakes and raisin toast. We actually have most of our rooms in reasonable order - i.e. there are boxes everywhere, but you can get around without deadending at a huge barricade of them.

The cats are actually being quite civil to one another. I am incredibly grateful.

Now off to make soup.

Went to Pride on Sunday. It felt good (I got teary-eyed as always; this time it started with all the ‘just married’ couples)... and perhaps a little less commercial this year. Either it was the way they’d grouped things, or the fact that a number of sponsors couldn’t come through, but the floats-to-marchers ratio seemed to be down. We ducked out a bit early and had an amazing lunch at Biryani House - it relocated to a great big location on Wellesley about a year ago from its little hole-in-the-wall on Roy Square and it’s still kickass. Which makes a grand total of one restaurant along the entire Yonge Street that Sean has deemed worthy of eating at. :D

People seemed less freaky this year - fewer people in drag, fewer people in outlandish outfits. I felt a little isolated, but glad to do my part in upping the oddness quotient (faux-leather skirt, fishnets and heels, and no makeup - no attempt whatsoever at ‘passing’ like last year). Walking toward Buddies we passed a couple of high-school looking kids, one of whom muttered “Faggot” behind our backs. I didn’t feel threatened, not in that environment, and I didn’t feel hurt at all… just sad for him.

One of the signs that I’m getting older: a growing tolerance and empathy for an age cohort I never used to be able to stand. With some distance between me and the age I’ve left behind, it’s getting easier to forgive things like that, and see both my behaviour and the behaviour of other people with a lot more perspective. That kid? I doubt he’d have said anything if he’d been alone - it was merely to impress upon his friend that, fuck no, he wouldn’t have anything to do with some fag who wears a skirt; how disgusting! If it’s true that such sentiments arise from fear of one’s own desires, that kid’s setting himself up for a hard coming-out. And even if he isn’t gay, he’s got a lot of mental untangling to do. Ah, well.

Kelly’s show was a bit of a fiasco, through no fault of his or the bands. Great pre-show interview with him; they’re are all swell folks. And then, minutes before they were set to go on stage and plug in, the rain that had been threatening all day hit with gale force, leaving everyone huddled under tents. Nevertheless, they played a great four tunes before the rain started up again, and the audience really got into it, especially during the ska-inflected take on “Ball And Chain”. Heart-stopping moment mid-song as the wind caught a tarp and dumped a bathtub-load of water right onto the bass amp. No one was electrocuted, thankfully.

We headed home from there, as I was absolutely freezing and regretting my choice of footwear. We didn’t get to hang out with anyone besides the band, or go dancing or drinking… but it was pretty satisfying all the same.

Big news on the housing front - we handed in our letter of intent to blow this joint come August first. We won’t be buying right off the bat. Instead we’re looking at renting an entire house for the four of us, and it seems there are plenty out there in our price range. Yeah, we’ll miss this place… but I think it’ll be worth it: slashed rent, no need to slog crosstown to visit one another, shared cooking, shared appliances, more room for the cats, more room for the recording studio.