I'm dreaming of a moist Christmas.

,*No evil terriers were harmed in the production of this holiday greeting.

Abysmal weather to be celebrating Christmas that's for sure. If I wanted sogginess I would've gone to Vancouver, or even England for that matter. Fog? On the 23rd? Maybe we'll get some snow our way between today and the 25th.

*shudder*

It just feels so weird.

Guess this is a little taste of what Christmas in Sri Lanka or Australia for that matter is like.

Anywho, Merry Christmas and all that jazz.

Hope you guys have been chowing down as much as I've been. Because that way I at least won't feel bad for packing on the holiday poundage.

For a good time call...

"Sup my bitchz?"
Ollie in his brand spanking new American Apparel wife beater. What's that? Yes. He is so scene.

Anyone but me. Seriously. I won't be able to give anyone a good time (get your mind out of the gutter) until Thursday (the earliest). You're better off trying to get together with Oliver. Although, he has become a rather arrogant SOB as of late due to the acquisition of new clothing (early Christmas present from Aiya.)

He's been creating waves over at the park. His homosexual lover, Meko (an obese, short legged Jack Russell who lives a few streets over from us) did not waste any time trying to score some action. Went straight for the goods, didn't even partake of the usual nether sniffing ritual.

Chikungunya strikes back
In other news, my grandmother has been stricken with that weirdly named Chikungunya thing that's been rearing its mosquito borne head in various parts of South Asia. I thought it was some made up thing until I wikied its ass. Turns out it's legit.

My grandfather is a stubborn mule. It's easy enough to gather within the first five minutes of being acquainted with him. I'm stubborn, we know that. But his stubborn? It's a firm and fruity sort of stubborn, a vintage stubborn if you will, cultivated lovingly through a combination of age, experience and hailing from a long line of stubborn jackasses. So when my grandmother blacked out (due to the Chikungunya), hitting the ground forehead first, bleeding all over the place, it's only natural that my grandfather switches into mule mode.

Ammi and Thathi hooked my grandparents up with MediCalls for situations such as the above. (MediCalls is like a "I've fallen and I can't get up" thing with a Sri Lankan twist.) They live by themselves in a Colombo suburb pretty far away from the rest of the family. As it happened that day neither of my uncles could rush off immediately to their place. Ravi Bappa was out of Colombo on business, Johnny Bappa was dealing with striking workers, and Lucky Bappa's in Hatton. You guys have seen pictures of my 84 year old grandfather, he's become this cute little frail thing with a wisp of silver hair (seriously though, don't let the cuteness throw you off), there's no way in hell would he have been able to pick up my blacked out and bloodied 84 year old grandmother off the floor.

Therefore instead of calling MediCalls he hollers for the neighbours (who he's been feuding with in one way or another for the last 25+) they rush over, clean up my grandmother and subsequently make the grave mistake of suggesting that they should call MediCalls to get her to the hospital for stitching up.

My severely diabetic, heart patient grandfather sees fit to call up the infamous Susantha (natch) and bundles my grandmother up in a freaking trishaw and takes her to some random clinic around the corner to get things looked after.

That's right. Instead of MediCalls, which would've sent an ambulance and a doctor straight to their doorstep.

Fortunately she's fine now, and had her five stitches removed on Friday. (All the excitement took place sometime last week, I don't know exactly when though.)

I pray to God I will not end up like my grandfather when I'm 84.

Also? I'm now beginning to think it just may be a wise thing to perhaps look around for a place to rent from May to August instead of shacking up with the patriarch of the family.

I need a haircut.

Any ideas?

I get bored at this time of year. The stress of exams coupled with the awful weather makes me feel like I'm stuck in a rut.

Usually this feeling comes on around mid-November and doesn't wane until about the end of February. This is the time of year when I usually go and chop off all my hair. Right now it's just at my waist, my bangs look horrid, they've grown down to my chin and I'm most definitely loosing the battle against split ends. I'll probably head on over to Pacific Mall and let aiya's hair stylist work his magic, the man's a genius.

Throughout the years I've employed various methods of pulling myself up out of the funk.

There was my bout of entrepreneurialism that resulted in me making close to a $1000.00 one Christmas on crocheted scarves. (What can I say, the waitresses that worked for aiya at the now defunct Red Drink Boutique weren't the sharpest tools in the shed.)

It was around this time of year that I first started tutoring high school brats in French. Stressful, and probably not really worth the pittance I used to charge for 45 minutes of my time.

I got my humanitarian on as well, one year I volunteered at a small but very well known NGO and ended up wanting to kill myself.

It was hard to juggle writing close to 1500 Christmas cards and then coming home and trying to study for university exams and doing assignments. Still high off the smell of black Sharpies all I could manage to muster was "Seasons greetings from all of us at The NGO. Hope your New Year is ____ ." (At this point I was allowed to fill in the blank with either "wonderful," "spectacular," "awesome," or "amazing" depending on who the donor was.)

Didn't really do much to help me out of my rut. However the experience came in handy much later on, because I decided that I never wanted to start at the bottom of the pile in a Canadian NGO ever. Yeah, sue me, somehow I think I'm a little above photocopying, getting coffee and writing Christmas cards. (My experiences in Sri Lanka were a million times better)

Interspersed between all of the above were random bouts of hair cutting disasters. Generally I go the haircutting route every 2 years, because it needs to grow back to butcher again. The last "haircut" I got was actually a trim, at the Cutting Station in Colombo (the only decent haircut I've ever had in that country), that was in mid-June. Time for a haircut. Stat.

What's in store for me this year? Turns out I've got a teaching gig.

That's right. You read that correctly.

I'm teaching French at an elementary school. To small children. In January. You guys know that I had a hard enough time dealing with two dogs a classrooom full of kids is just going to epitomise "fun."

Let me recap.

Before I went to Senegal I got the brilliant idea to do some work with inner city ghetto kids. My reasoning was, hey, I'm going to teach psychologically damaged street kids how to read and write in French, might as well get a head start with messed up kids in Toronto. (Incidentally this arrangement also took place at around this time of year.)

I didn't last very long. Why are kids so damn annoying? The kiddies I had in Senegal were angels compared to anything I've ever had to deal with here.

So yeah, I'm really hoping that Chinese guy will come through with the haircut. Otherwise I think I'm going to be totally SOL.

Yes. I am that shallow.

Tagged by a consonant.

The boys from Sloan. The last concert I went to (with thorn of course. God bless guestlisting)
So. N tagged me, and I didn't even realise this until yesterday, after I had responded to slothy's taggering. Here it is, the music meme.

1. CD or vinyl
- OoO. Well, for me, when it comes to personal every day use, neither. I'm all about the ipod. However when in a night spot, give me vinyl any day of the week. You must agree that for some unkown reason the Dream Warriors and a Tribe Called Quest just sound so much better on 12 inch

2. An album you’ve been meaning to listen to
- Not a big Oasis fan, but I have been meaning to check out their latest which dropped at the beginning of this month.

3. Grammys
- Load of tripe. Bring on the Mercury Prize instead.

4. Your favourite album is
- That? That's just an EVIL question. It's like asking me whether I'd rather die of decapitation, burning, drowning or combination. But I guess if I really had to choose, it'd probably be The Postal Service's GIve Up. That album never gets old, and every single depressing song on it has at one time or another in the last 3 years rung true in my life.

5. Invite 10 Music people for dinner. Who will it be?
Not in order of importance, but order of popping in my head.

i. Stephen Colbert and the Decembersits for the December 20th battle of the guitars. And I'm counting that as one. Suck it.

ii. Nirmala Basnayake of controller.controller to ask her WHY in God's name she did it.

iii. Bono. Simply to tell him that he used to be my idol when I was in highschool but now not so much anymore. I would include Angelina Jolie into this mix as well. I have essentially the same message for both of them. Stop with the nauseating faux humanitarianism. *cough* (red).

iv. Youssou N'Dour, he's all kinds of awesome. Got into him when I was in Sénégal. Speaking of the Sénégalaise, I'd probably also have over the man who handmade the incredible d'jembe I schlepped back from there. (Even though he was a French beach bum.) And yeah, don't nit pick, they count as one.

v. Leslie Feist, if I was a boy, i'd marry her.

vi. If I could bring back people from the grave, then Bob Marley for sure. And with that new found power, my Uncle who passed away and loved him.

vii. My paternal grandfather, because he has kickass taste in music, I'd also make him bring his record collection which features (to name a very few) Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, and Dizzy Gillespie.

viii. Seu Jorge, makes some killer samba and he grew up in a freaking Favela for Pete's sakes. Oh yeah, and also his covers of David Bowie songs in the Life Aquatic are untouchable. With that said, David Bowie would also be invited, as Mr.Jorge's date.

ix. The Clash. That needs no explanation. Okay fine, for the uninitiated, how can you not have one of the most influential punk bands (in my opinion) at such a dinner? R.I.P Joe. Hmm, since we're talking about influential folks, in lieu of Joe (since he's dead) Afrika Bambaataa is also welcome at my overflowing table

x. Sufjan Stevens, I think he's one of the most innovative and prolific musicians of our time.

--> There's a lack of Toronto artists here, only because I've run in to all the ones I've wanted to ever meet at the Beac. Granted it wasn't dinner at my place, but it was dinner. Aiya just keeps 'em coming back for more.

6. Appropriate punishment for those who play Celine Dion’s "My heart will go on" while pretending that it’s still 1998
- Remind them that 1998 wasn't all that great. Seinfeld came off the air, Frank Sinatra died, and Bill Clinton was impeached.

7. Choose your favourite instrument and its best player from your point of view.
- I don't like this question. But no one can touch Ron Burgundy's Jazz Flute.

8. The one piece of music that can move you to tears
- Perhaps a bit cheesey, but I ain't ashamed. It's a toss up between How Great Thou Art and Great is Thy Faithfulness. Shut up. My inner Anglican is very strong.

9. You are an executive at a major label and have the power to green light one album a year. What would you do?
So many things to do!
- stage a coup d'etat that would effectively make me the lifetime-sole authority-leader of the ship type thingie at said record label, ensuring that i have a musical dictatorship that will last until i am either usurped of my power or die. Then i would go about doing a variety of different things such as:
- give Nirmala all the money she and her controller.controller cohorts need in order to continue recording
- buy over SubPop records ensuring that all the indie goodness coming out of there never has to be influenced by anything other than pretension.

Now I wield my great power and tag sloth, and drac (because, I think he probably hates memes with a passion. Prove me wrong drackity!)

Tagged by a sloth.

God bless the genius that put this up on youtube. Anarkali's Veet advert has unfortunately provided me with more amusement than I am willing to admit. For those of you who have never had the pleasure of witnessing her onscreen skills, trust me, if this Veet thing is anything to go by, she is a veritable Meryl Streep.

Seriously, who knew that a slow moving fellow like slothykins would not only complete a meme but also tag two whole other people? I was wondering how long it would take, thanks slothy, *squee* does this make me one of the cool kids?

1. Popcorn or Candy
- Um, can I say both? Because I need something sweet to counteract the salty and vice versa. Also, a bottle of water please.

2. Name a movie you've been meaning to see forever
- Umm. There are loads. But right off the top of my head? Raise the Red Lantern.

3. You are given the power to recall one Oscar: who loses theirs and to whom
- This is hard. I hate the Oscars, I never feel like the movies/actors/people who deserve to win them ever do. So shall we just go back to last year? Let the homos thief the Oscar from the racists please.

4. Steal one costume from a movie for your wardrobe. Which will it be?
- Diane Keaton's wardrobe from Annie Hall.
(Aside: Diane? Isn't it time YOU stopped dressing like Annie? I mean, that was 1977, and you're no spring chicken.)

5. Invite 5 movie people over for dinner, who are they? What would you feed them?
I'm going to do two lists, one living and one dead.
Living:
- George Clooney (this will be the night when i make him fall in love with me)
- Nandita Das
- Alan Alda
- Katie Holmes (to save her from Tom Cruise, it's an act of humanitarianism)
- Ken Watanabe (incase things don't work out with George)
Dinner: Given the myriad of dietary restrictions that'd probably be present in such mixed company. I'd go vegan, with aiya doing the honours.

Dead:
- Audrey Hepburn
- Cary Grant
- River Phoenix
- Errol Flynn
- Orson Welles
Dinner: Really? But they're dead.

6. Your favourite film franchise is?
- At the moment it's Deepa Mehta's elements trilogy. Although i want to say Ocean's 11 and 12, because everyone in that was so yummy.

7. What is the appropriate punishment for people who answer cell phones in the movie theatre?
- Theatre? What's that?

8. Choose a female bodyguard
- Ziyi Zhang's Mei in House of Flying Daggers. Anyone who can do that kind of shit with beans is okay in my books.

9. What's the scariest thing you've ever seen in a movie?
- A 55+ mother with her teenage daughter seated and waiting for Wedding Crashers to start.

10. Your favourite genre (excluding comedy and drama)
- Thrillers, although I must add, I'm one of those people who MUST know how a movie ends before I watch it, so sometimes, there's not a whole lot of thrill going on.

11. You are given the power to greenlight movies at a major studio for one year. How do you wield this power?
- I'd make sure that any actor/actress who tries to cross over into music never makes a film ever again, and any musicians who think they can act, well. They just won't get a chance to try.

12. Bonnie or Clyde
- Umm, that's a toughie, I've already tried to pick.

And I'm not going to tag anyone...However, if I do perchance tag Venus, does that mean she'll start blogging again? If that's the case, then consider yourself tagged. (Thanks for the tactic N, and err, consider yourself tagged too?)