I have a new blog!

I don't know if anyone ever checks in here anymore, or if new people ever stumble upon this relic when they hit the "new blog" post, but obviously poor old Katie's Brain has been neglected for some time.

I've had a crazy year. So crazy that this blog seems like a lifetime ago. But I'm embarking on a new life, after months of absolute chaos (the good kind). So, please, feel free to check out the new place, leave comments, make yourselves at home. I have a feeling the chaos is going to continue for a while!

The new place is over here...http://reluctantsoccermom.blogspot.com/

Hope to see you soon!

I'm getting married!

Last night, Sean and I were coming home after having a few drinks. I was wearing this ridiculous red bobbed wig that I'd bought earlier in the day, and we were holding hands and just talking and laughing and I was desperately trying to flag down a cab so we could avoid walking the whole ten minutes to his place. We'd had a really great day together, just drinking each other in, and I felt so completely happy. We were walking along the harbour, right across from Victoria's Parliament Building, which is beautiful at night because it's all lit up and it reflects on the water. We kissed a bit on the corner and told each other how much we love each other, and suddenly Sean said, "I had this whole big plan but..." and the rest is a blur. He got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I'm pretty sure I said yes. I think I asked him if he was serious two or three times. I told him to ask me again the next day so I'd know it wasn't the drinks. He asked me as soon as I woke up.

I'm so happy. I love this man so much. I am feeling so grateful to the universe for introducing me to my best friend, and I can't wait to start the rest of our lives together.

Update from the invisible woman!!!

I know...I've disappeared. I've probably lost all of the regular readers I had, but if some of you still check in from time to time....I'M SORRY!!!!

So...maybe I'll try writing more frequently soon. I feel a bit like I've been caught up in a tornado. A tornado of LOVE ;-)

Yes, still deeply in it. It's a miracle, I know. Who'da thunk that little old permanently single and cynical me would finally meet my match? I sure as hell didn't. But, despite all of my weird and annoying quirks, this man seems to really, really like me. I feel like Sally Field on Oscar night. He's funnnnnnnnnny...smart, kind, cool, interesting, patient, handsome, communicative...and a whole lot of other things I'm not going to discuss on a public site, but allllll good. I'm having fun. We're in love. We're moving in together in April and then heading to Mexico for a week as soon as the furniture arranging is complete. My son and he get along. No weirdness...nothing. Well, nothing between THEM.

The kid...well, he is still a source of much happiness and hilarity....maybe not so much happiness today, but definitely hilarity. I got called into the principal's office this afternoon and told by him, in the kind of grave voice one uses to tell someone her house burned down or her husband has run off to Cuba with his secretary, that my beloved angelic 7-year old child is suspended for two days.

What, you ask, could a seven year old boy possibly have done to merit such a severe punishment?

He MOONED his class.

I know.

You try not laughing when someone tells you that with an expression normally reserved for funeral parlours . But apparently, this is a VERY SERIOUS MATTER that the principal is VERY, VERY CONCERNED ABOUT.

So, the kid and I will be home for the next two days. Fortunately my boss has a sense of humour and laughed when I told him, and I can work from home. I will be mocked for months over my juvenile delinquent.

The tv, the Gameboy, the portable dvd player? All off limits, indefinitely. I'm not excusing the behaviour, but I'm trying to keep it in perspective. I hate to be too "boys will be boys" about this, but ummmmm....I knew some boys like this when I was a kid, and a few of them actually became reasonably productive members of society. I'm not quite ready to throw in the towel yet.

Tomorrow my pride and joy will be working on the mountain of homework that we were sent home with. On Friday morning I have an 8:30 appointment to discuss the boy's inappropriate behaviour. The school counsellor will be joining us. Anyone envious NOW? I called my mom for some sympathy and she dropped the phone because she was laughing so hard.

Aye yi yi. I'm too old for this shit.

Blogger Technical Help Needed!

Hey guys--does anyone know how I can fix my page? A few weeks ago I noticed all of my information and links were bumped down to the bottom of the page, but they used to be on the top right hand side, which is where I want them. I haven't messed with my template at all, so I don't know what's happening. I've checked the blogger frequently asked questions page to look for an explanation, but they didn't have an answer for this one, and my emails to the blogger help people have gone unanswered.

If anyone can give me an answer here, I would really appreciate it!

It's Fate

So, nothing on tv was pleasing me tonight, and I got bored and started scrolling through a dating website that I haven't logged into in months, because I'm wondering if my recent contemplation about giving up men might be premature, and TA DA!

Angels sing, choirs in the background, picture the heavens parting....

Lo and Behold, there is a picture that makes me stop and look. It's someone I know. Not KNOW KNOW, but whose face I know, because he was an actor in a cult tv show that I was nuts for a few years back. The cancellation of that show, and the subsequent cancellation of the next show by the same producers (Blast you NBC and Fox) sent me spiralling into a depression for months. I mean it. I wept when those shows were cancelled. I joined fanclubs and went all fan geeky and wrote to the networks and swore I'd never watch any of their shows or buy any of their advertisers' products if they cancelled those shows.

Of course, I am suspicious. This actor/writer is doing reasonably well in Hollywood these days and has been in some very successful movies recently. Ok, he's not the leading man in them, but he's funny! And smart! So what would he be doing on a website like this? Why would he need a dating site to meet women? And what kind of guy would imitate him...as I said, he's not a leading man, and he's not a traditional beefcake (I have never used that word before in my life) sort. But he has appeal...he IS from near my area, and I hear he still lives there part time, so maybe it's possible.

At any rate, right this minute, I am going to believe it's really him. Ok, sure I'm way too old for him, and sure it would take a ferry for me to see him, and sure, his screen name at the dating site is the sort that would make me scroll right past him if he weren't someone I recognized, but the fact is I DID recognize him, because people, this is FATE.

I am going to marry him, and he and I are going to spend our lives collaborating on scripts and showing up unannounced at small town improv shows and we will laugh our heads off until we grow old.

Because that's the way it's meant to be.

P.S. Don't think for a second I'm going to post which site this is or what his screen name is. I found him FIRST!

November

We were drinking. Next to each other, leaning over the deck of an enormous house, both watching the stars and smiling into the dark sky. And he said something and I laughed, and then I said something, and pretty soon we had a lot to say to each other, even though we'd only met 5 minutes ago. And I was drunk from wine and fresh night air and nervousness, and I started to talk (and talk and talk) about every thought that passed through my brain and I could feel my cheeks were burning, despite the fact that the rest of my body was shaking from the cold, and I couldn't stop grinning and talking and grinning and I was in mid-story and he grinned back and leaned in and kissed me and then leaned back and grinned again.


And I fumbled for the railing behind me and stared at him and then laughed in shock, and he laughed back and said, "I had to do SOMETHING to get you to breathe!"

And I was done for.

But I sure didn't want him to figure that out right away, so I laughed again and said, "I like you. You want to know why?"

And he nodded, so I said, "Because there's nothing I like watching more than a man who gets turned on by a woman's brain."

And I kissed him back.

A is for Apple, B is for Baby, C is for Cookie...

Ok, the kid has been a very unpleasant little man to be around this week--VERY unpleasant--and I was steeling myself this afternoon for whatever his mood would be like when I picked him up after work, but thank God, he seemed to be in a very cheerful mood and tired out from swimming at his summer day-camp today. So I bought him a bag of pretzels on the way home. When the kid eats pretzels, he likes to hold up individual pretzels that have been broken or whatever, and he'll say, "Look mom--this is the shape of a D! This is an E! L for lucky!" and so on while I drive, and I'll nod at him in the mirror and say things like, "wowwwww--that's great honey!"

I've been very frustrated with the kid because of the sense of entitlement he's developed recently--all week he's been begging for more things, complaining about what his friends have that he doesn't, and just generally being a whiny pain in the ass, and I've been pulling my hair out trying to get it through to him that we are very lucky and there are many people in the world who aren't as fortunate as we are. It's been really exhausting to reason every minute with a pissed off 7 year old, and I'm almost at the end of my rope.

So, anyways, we're driving along and suddenly he says, "I think from now on I want to give all of my allowance to poor people."

I nearly careened off the road, I was so shocked. Is this the same kid whose recent battle-cry has been "gimme, gimme, gimme!"? So I say, "wow, that would be a wonderful thing to do. What made you want to do that?" and he says, "Well, because poor people sometimes don't have houses or any money or anything to eat and I wanted to share." And I'm feeling so proud and relieved that he really isn't the little monster he's been impersonating recently and I say, "You're right--and that's a very nice thing for you to think about doing."

More driving along, more pretzel eating, and then he pulls out a pretzel, holds it up and says, "Mom, look! A P!" And then, with the most somber expression I've ever seen, he says, "P. For Poor People."

I just about died.

True Romance

I've told this story about a thousand times to my friends (including the new one I just had lunch with today) and they're tired of it, so now I'll foist it on you.

After my first winter in the Yukon, I found myself single and bored out of my skull. The population in the town I was in is limited in the winter, and the men had all taken a pact not to shave until the river thawed. Apparently they had also made a silent pact to eat nothing but fat and not exercise, and needless to say, romantic prospects were slim.

Then one day in March, the ice in town began to melt. Spring fever was upon me, but there was still a very limited supply of men. Depressed and lonely, I went to drown my sorrows at the local tavern. Suddenly the doors opened and in walked the finest example of the male species that I'd laid eyes on in months. I looked at my friends, whose jaws were dropping, and said, "Dibs." Everyone knows that when you call dibs it is set in stone. Hot man would soon be my man.

Jacob was French Canadian and younger. He didn't say much, but he laughed at all of my jokes and loved playing pool and drinking free draft beer all day in the bar where I worked. And he was good in bed. Other than the sexual attraction thing though, I began to realize we didn't have much in common. But he was SO pretty. All the women in town were jealous. If only they knew how hard it was to pretend I was interested in anything he had to say. And he was always around. Always. Just sitting there, smiling and drinking and playing pool looking pretty.

Jacob hadn't found housing in town yet--there was a shortage for summer employees--and so he was literally living in a van by the river. I'm not kidding. Because of that, we spent our evenings at my place. Usually we would do something mellow, since by 5 or 6 pm, Jacob was full of draft and my shift at the bar was over. We rented a lot of videos. Well, actually, I rented a lot of videos, because I was the one with the house and the job. And I rented a lot of things that made Jacob's pretty eyes glaze over.

Finally I realized that Jacob's taste in movies might not be the same as mine, and I felt a bit bad. So I said, "Honey, tomorrow night, why don't YOU choose a movie you would like to watch, and you can come over, have a hot shower, I'll make a good dinner and we can have some wine and watch YOUR movie." Jacob seemed very happy. Oh hell, he always seemed happy, but maybe a little happier than usual.

So, the next night came. I cleaned up the house and lit candles. Jacob came over and got in the shower while I did something crazy like season a ham or something. I was so pleased with myself, pottering around in my kitchen in an apron like June Cleaver, making a man meal with meat and potatoes. Jacob, now fresh and clean, settled into the living room and I called, "Just go ahead and start the movie without me, dinner will be ready soon!"

Suddenly he shouted urgently, "CATTY! CATTY!" That's how French Canadians say Katie. "CATTY--You ave to come ere!" It sounded so important that I nearly dropped the lemon meringue pie I'd pulled from the oven. I rushed to the living room in a panic, wondering what the problem could be.

There sat Jacob, bare feet on the coffee table, bottle of Kokanee in his hand. He leaned forward and pointed to the television set, and said forcefully, as if he was telling me the most important thing he'd ever uttered:

"DAT is da raison I grow my air long!"

I was confused. He was watching Highlander. HIGHLANDER. Highlander changed his life.

Oh my God.

And then I felt sad. Because at that moment I knew that I had to break up with him, no matter how pretty he was, and I was going to be stuck with an entire ham to myself.

The gauntlet has been thrown down, or whatever the expression is

That's it, Egan--tomorrow I am writing stories. Ha!

The new neighbourhood

So, I'm all moved in. Pictures will follow soon. We've been here since the beginning of the month. The first weekend I moved all the stuff in with the help of two hired hands, and then headed to Vancouver to meet some online friends for the weekend. Had an amazing time and was happy to find that my long-time online friends were just as cool and interesting in person as they are in writing. I feel so fortunate to know such great women.

I stopped off at Ikea before heading back to the island and picked up a whole bunch of furniture since I'd ditched a whole ton of crappy student furniture when I left the old place and wanted a few things that actually looked good together. So, I hauled all that out (have the bruises all over my body to prove it) and put every piece together that night. Except for the chairs that go with the new dining room table. The next day I battled the Ikea instructions and put together one chair. I tried on following evenings to put together the others. So far, I've managed one more. The other two are slowly driving me insane. I have all the same kinds of pieces I had for the other chairs, and they're all the same size. I have my Alan Keys lined up, nuts and bolts and washers, etc, but they still won't work! It is so completely frustrating. Seriously, I feel like I'm dealing with a Rubix Cube here. I feel like sending Ikea a bill for the stay in the mad house I'm confident I'll wind up in as a result of these stupid chairs.

Fortunately my mom has the kid for the night because he's got some grandparent's event thing at his school tomorrow, so he's bringing her to class. I remembered I had some of BC's finest hidden away, so I had a few deep breaths and then went for a walk.

And that is what I needed to do. I felt immediately calm and happy and yet at the same time excited--hopeful. I feel like I'm living in the right place. This neighbourhood feels like the kind of place I want to be in. My son seems pretty happy so far and is adjusting well to the new space--he's discovered the joy of riding his scooter down the hill along narrow sidewalks--I chase after him shouting, "Watch that lady! Don't cross the streets! Wait for me!" It's a small nieghbourhood, but busy and bustling, and then there are quiet little side streets full of grand old Victorian houses with stained glass windows and chairs on the porches, craftsman bungalows with fairy lights on their decks, wildly colourful slightly rundown houses with toys in the yard, or small groups of people playing guitars on their decks or driveways with guys fixing their engines or painting. You know these are streets where people feel safe and have their friends and families near, but they've learned to ignore the occasional noisy party from next door or the occasional waft of marijuana outside their windows.

And the flowers! Everywhere, and trees and stars overhead, and scents that tickle your nose and change with every step--cherry blossoms, lavender, freesia, lemon, salt water, tar, oil, pot, roses--and the food! As you walk down the hill, first you smell that soapy herbal smell from the Natural Foods Store and then that starchy smell as you pass the laundromat, and then baked bread and rich spicy smells from the Ethiopian place, followed by that hunger-inducing spicy slightly greasy smell from the Thai cafe behind you, and grass and pine and beer and suncreen and coffee--lots of coffee.

The population here is diverse--young families, dogs dragging owners behind them, sports fans (a world cup party tonight in the fake British pub on the corner where my friend D tends bar), cats curled up in bookstore windows, hippies, hipsters, old couples, musicians, bikers, university students....lots of people sitting outside the cafes and people selling jewelry (and probably a few other things) outside the park. Everyone smiles or says hi around here. I lived in this neighbourhood a couple blocks up about 11 or 12 years ago with a series of insane roommates before I got one (Hi Carol!) who turned out to be a perfect roommate and a great friend. I have a lot of happy memories in this neighbourhood, and I am so excited about the prospect of making more.

For a long time I've had the urge to leave Victoria. I spent my twenties moving from town to town, province to province, and managed the occasional jaunt overseas. I am not good at staying in one place. I get depressed when I think of how much of the world I still haven't seen. I know I'll see a lot of it one day, but I've felt stuck here for some time now and it's been tough. Right now, though, I really can't think of any place I'd rather be, except in that dreamy, "Oh I'd like to be in the South of France eating grapes and bread and drinking wine and making love to an artist," kind of way.

I finally tracked down a copy of Nina Simone's The Blues on cd today. I've had it on tape since it came out in 91, but the tape has been played to the point of abuse. So I returned from my walk and sat back and closed my eyes and listened to the best Nina compilation EVER. I'm serious--I think I own 7 or 8 of her albums now, and listened to any other I could get my hands on, but The Blues is a perfect, perfect album.

Anyways, I'm happy. I've got Nina, I've got the neighbourhood, and the Ikea chairs can wait a few more days.