August 2005

I really think going into business for myself will be fun. Yes, I do. After all, everyone else is having a good time with it!

Can someone please hold me?

Jane is one of the few ‘mainstream’ magazines that I regularly pick up and read – mostly because it’s full of tidbits and interviews that don’t annoy me. The product reviews are usually quite decent, I like the “Makeunder” section, and generally enjoy reading the articles. It’s not ideal – after all, there can only be one Bitch and one Bust – but Jane‘ll do in a pinch.

Flipping through the September issue of Jane this morning, I came across the usual assortment of folded pages containing perfume samples – the sort where you open the fold and can sniff the product, or rub it on your wrists or tuck it into your lingerie drawer or whatever the hell people normally do with them. (Me, I try not to breathe deeply while flipping past. Heh.)

Among the various pages was an ad that featured a white-fluffy-dress-clad woman posing in a half-yoga, half-seductive pose on a shimmery, watery surface. There was no product identifier – and the text read, “Beguile your senses. Succumb to the freshness.” I flipped the page and discovered it was an ad for Tampax “fresh” – which is apparently, “the new cardboard tampon with a light clean scent”. Of course, I pried open the page and sniffed. Perfumey-powdery-ick.

I have issues with this ad. Several, in fact.

1. “The new cardboard tampon” – umm, please tell me you mean “cardboard applicator” and not cardboard TAMPON.
2. There is no smell from your period until the blood hits the air. There is no reason to scent tampons – once they’re removed, they’re disposed of. Most people I know don’t wave them around in the air before they flush/dispose of ‘em.
3. Why do we need to convince women – of any age – that their cooter should be scented like anything OTHER than cooter?

Grr.

Dax is one entire year old today. One! Year! Old!

Thank God I finally sent him his “congratulations on being born!” gift a month ago. His one-year birthday present should arrive somewhere around the birth of his own first child at this rate. Sheesh.

Melle:When I was out getting snacks, I saw this guy that you and I totally would have fought over in high school.
Dana: Ooooooo! But, um, it’s 2005 now. :)
Melle: Yes, I know, but he made me giggle.
He had long Axl hair – brown, though.
Dana:Oooooooooh, Axl hair.. Mmmm.
Melle: Some sort of fucked up paisley print shirt, a dress shirt, but ratty and too big and half-unbuttoned.
Dana: My 15 year old self aches!
Melle: And ripped up jeans and black Chuck Connors.
I know!
Dana: She wants to rush upstairs and put on some black eyeliner!
Melle: And he smiled at me when I turned the corner and I was like… Fuck, dude, 15 years ago…
Dana: Admit it – there was a small part of you that still wanted to!
Melle: Hell yeah.
Dana: Dude. I love you. :)

Is everyone properly nauseated yet?

A few nights ago, we ordered Chinese food… no, wait. Allow me to depart from the subject for a moment.

I’ve been back in the Hamilton area for a few years now – since 2000, in fact, where did the time go? – and it still amazes me how many questions I can’t answer. Questions like: If I wanted to order Chinese food for delivery, what would be the best and cheapest place to call? In Toronto, where I spent my young adulthood, I knew the answer. Around here, I’m left leafing through the phone book or struggling to remember the name of the place my Dad once ordered from. It makes me insane sometimes. I cannot be bothered to start calling up local friends and relatives.

Back to the story.

A few nights ago, we ordered Chinese food. Along with the spicy szechuan noodles and spring rolls, they threw in enough fortune cookies for both of us to have three (which is either a statement about the quantity of food we ordered or their generosity – heh). One of mine seemed particularly profound: Our first and last love… self love. My husband believes that I can make ANYTHING seem profound and dripping with meaning – and he’s absolutely right. I decided the fortune was suggesting that I purchase some new sex toys and prompty began investigating all the new and interesting products on Come As You Are‘s web site.

After much discussion, debate and after checking every web site known to man, I tentatively settled on the “LAYAspot” from Fun Factory. Being practical people, however (and realizing that vibrators are generally not returnable – thank god and ew ew ew!) we didn’t buy it online, and instead got in the car and ventured to Lovecraft in Mississauga (the nearest store carrying them for a reasonable price) so I could test the various strengths and speeds and ergonomics of all the “hot new vibrators”.

Hamilton’s best offering for sex toys is the Stag Shop (due to some fucked up bylaws) and it’s a place that I equate with the high school mentality on sex. In other words, crappy products meant solely to titillate (“Ohhhh, a mug shaped like a PENIS! hehehehehe!”), with no quality control, and no one knowledgeable on staff to help you make your decision. I’ve never been happy with anything I’ve purchased there – it’s either been crappy to use or broken almost immediately.

Lovecraft is a nice, neat, clean store. I used to do all of my shopping at the Yorkville location when I worked around the block – I don’t even try to deny the fact that I was totally spoiled living in Toronto. While I lived there, I had a world of toys and accoutrements at my doorstep, and so it became the default to expect good service and “grown up” sales staff. Since that’s where I visited my first “sex shop”, I assumed every city was blessed to have such a great place to go. Lovecraft, like Come As You are, is well-lit, well-organized, and has a huge variety of product – including the obligatory “joke” section – and staff that have no qualms about giving their opinion. They’ll happily pry open a package to put in some batteries so you can feel how something works (erm, on your hand, I mean!) and offer their suggestions as to what would be a good ‘fit’ for your needs. They don’t pressure you, though, into purchasing what you’ve tested.

It’s the sort of shop that I like – chock full of deviant ideas and healthy sexuality and videos and books and toys and lingerie and lube and condoms, and strap-ons and toys I’ve never seen before. Walking in doesn’t make you revert to teenagehood, and you don’t feel like whatever you’re about to ask will make the sales clerk blush. It’s suitable for teenagers and grandmothers and everyone in between. Come As You Are is similar in style, but less stocked and somehow a bit disappointing in person.

Back to the product review portion of this post.

The LAYAspot rocks.

I mean, people, if I was wealthy I’d send one to each and every one of you. It’s small, it’s comfortable to hold (though Melle made fun of me for enjoying the ergonomics of the item – something along the lines of, “What kind of death grip do you normally HAVE on your vibrator that ergonomics is such an issue?”) and the highlight is the multiple settings. This puppy goes beyond “low/medium/high” settings and features seven different speed/pulse options. It has two simple buttons (on and off) and is completely waterproof. I’m in love.

And now I’m even more determined that my business needs to make money NOW NOW NOW dammit, because I’m jonesin’ for the entire Sue line and about 30 other new toys. (What’s that? You were just thinking how much you’d like to buy me sex toys? Why, you go right ahead! Can we start with the Royal Surfer? ;) )

One of the challenges I face in getting my business up and running is the ever-present need to hurry up and wait. I’m not good about delayed gratification.

As much as I appreciate a day or two filled with Google Talk messages with Melle, and afternoon road trips to sex stores in Mississauga (story to come shortly, I suspect), none of these endeavours pay the bills – in the literal sense. Doing it this way, however – slowly and methodically – helps me feel considerably more confident. I’m able to see, for myself, that all the “i”s are dotted and the “t”s are crossed – and that’s very important to me. I’m not presenting a half-assed business to people. There are few things I hate more than finding myself halfway down a road and realizing that I forgot to take care of something. Like remembering to shut off the coffee machine, if you will, before leaving the house for the day, or forgetting to charge GST on an invoice to a client.

A lot has actually been acomplished, despite my warblings. I have already done some client work – including a second project for one of them. I have a PO box, a GST number, a phone line, a web site that’s being constructed, and all the basic office supplies have been procured (and you KNOW the office supplies were the highlight of that list!). I’m still waiting for my logo to be finished, and for my business cards to be created, and once the web site is done I shall market myself like nobody’s business. I’m really looking forward to telling people about what I’m doing now that I’ve left the corporate world – finally, a business doing things that I’m really really good at, instead of trying to fit my square-peg self into a round corporate-hole.

Tomorrow afternoon I have an appointment to set up my bank account (which is good, since I have a cheque waiting to be cashed!) – and then I have some final editing to do on some of the web site content. I’m pretty sure I can work in an hour of Tetris, too.

Must treasure these quiet days – I intend to put an end to them soon enough.

Swiped from here, though she originally stole it from here.

Favourite toothpaste: I love toothpaste. I love floss. I love anything that I get to put in my mouth for more than a few seconds. Yes, anything. Currently sitting beside the sink in my bathroom – for me, and me alone – are five tubes of paste. There’s one of “Lemon Ice” and one “Vanilla Mint”, thanks to the good people at Crest. There’s also a tube of Burt’s Bees Lavender-Mint, and one of children’s orange-flavour paste. There’s also some organic cherry that tastes a lot like red NyQuil – I love NyQuil. My favourite – all time, hands down – is the lavender mint. It’s soothing, it’s tasty, and it leaves my mouth clean and tingly. My good friend Karen brought me two tubes of the lavender when she and her husband came up for the wedding in June. Mmmmmmmmm….

Singer that will most likely make me cry: I cry all the time, for all sorts of reasons, but it’s generally certain ‘magic’ notes, chords or lyrics that get me bawling. In the past, U2′s Bono could get me to weep by singing, “Red Hill Mining Town” – the part where he launches his voice to bellow, “Love, slowly stripped away..” gets me going in about a second, flat. In high school, I’d sit with my finger on the rewind button of my walkman, listening to him sing it over and over and over and over.. Thom Yorke from Radiohead (in addition to being hot) can usually find a way to make his voice low and whispery and dramatic enough to make me well up. And there’s something about a strong, unwavering voice – male or female – that makes my heart plunk a few times. I think it’s that my own voice is so incredibly terrible when I sing, that hearing someone’s voice just explode into the air makes me overwhelmingly wistful.

Most life-changing experience: Realizing I was in love with my husband. I was already married to someone else when it happened – I had the sudden realization that my lack of happiness in that marriage wasn’t just because I was the sort of person for whom ‘comfort’ can sometimes be a bad word, but because the relationship itself wasn’t right. I spent a solid month feeling parts of my life shift and my perceptions change before I acted on it, and holy crap, my life has changed.

Favourite colour of socks: Bright colours! Orange and yellow are my favourites – I call them “sunshine socks”. Heh. I’ve called them that since I was a kid, and have firmly believed that wearing such socks contributes to the overall mood of the day. You can’t stay mad or sad when your feet are radiating sunshine, right?

Most annoying thing about sidewalks: They aren’t enough. I want sidewalks that also have room to be bike paths. I want sidewalks that don’t just.. stop randomly. And I sincerely believe that when the concrete for a new sidewalk is poured, the people who live in front of it should be allowed to carve their initials and the date into it with a stick.

Favourite soundtrack for a movie I’ve never seen: I’m not sure there is one. Hrmph. I suppose one answer could be the soundtrack for “Garden State.” We watched it as a rental from Zip. A coworker met me in the kitchen a few days after we watched it and kept telling me how it was a fabulously uplifting movie, how chipper and upbeat and inspirational it was. I stood there, feeling my brain bubble and wondered if there was ANOTHER movie called “Garden State” and if somehow I had watched ‘the wrong one’. I still haven’t rewatched it to see what the hell she was talking about.

Reason that i would survive if I lost everything I have: I have never lost “everything” but I’ve certainly felt as though I have at times in my past. I survived that, and short of being run over by a bus I’ll keep suriving. What other choice is there, really?

Favourite neighbour: Our neighbours are worth a thousand demented blog postings of their own, but I will say that I am reasonably fond of the guy who lives next door – he’s rarely home, doesn’t complain about our dogs, doesn’t invade our privacy and he drives a great big dump truck (which gives him instant points!)

Best experience on a rooftop: After a certain age (9? 10?) my parents would allow me to climb up the TV antenna on our house and .. sit on the slanted roof for as long as I wanted. It was unspeakably cool to be there – above the world – by myself. I’ve never lived in a building with a rooftop that was accessible (like a rooftop patio or garden or whatever) nor have I ever known anyone who did.

Karen’s mom had several weiner dogs – or, if you’re all fancy, dachshunds. A redhaired one, a long-haired one, a black one. I believe one was named “Heidi”. That’s the end of my recollection of these dogs, other than the fact that even then – as a kid – I found them unspeakably hilarious. They’re the best form of Prozac ever invented.

This is a very, very long story. But I think I just saved myself about 400 therapy sessions.

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It turns out that my husband’s meatloaf recipe reminds our hamster of death.

Last night, for dinner, we had meatloaf with a really yummy mustard sauce. As is our habit, we fed the dogs a small slice, since it seems rather cruel to subject them to the meat-scented air for an hour while it cooks, followed by the sight/sound of us eating the meat, and then not share a little with them. (We are all members of the same pack around here.) The moose (as we are calling our plural mice) had a little as well, being as they are omnivores.

And then came the question: do hamsters eat meat?

We did a quick Google search (all hail!) and discovered that hamsters do, on occasion, eat live crickets and mealworms and other meaty creatures. We placed a tiny chunk of meat into Weet’s cage and watched. He approached, sniffed, tentatively licked, and then got exceptionally manic and buried the meat with two quick kicks of his feet before running away VERY quickly to his wheel.

We stood there for a second, and then started laughing (and uncovered the meat and removed it, of course, before it became a stinkymeat experiment in a hamster cage).

Poor Weets. First we refuse to get him a female hamster so he can get his freak on, and now we’re tossing carcasses in.
I wonder how we can torture him next.