Pens

The pen I use doesn’t look very nice. It used to look nice. It came in a velvet pen holder kind of thing, which I still have, and it’s fancy, but not so practical. The pen was a promotional item given to me by the company that laid me off in 2006. I got two, and the other one still looks new. The new one is really nice. The one I am using, though, is all scratched up. It looks like they impressed gold letters on red paint on top of a gold base. Then the red paint comes off so it has gold letters on gold. Can’t read it so well. Doesn’t matter though; I know who gave me the pen, and I’m not about to avail myself of their services anytime soon.

The company that I’m writing about, I didn’t start out working for them. I started out working for an entirely different company, and I have their pen also. It’s not as fancy, and it’s all wrapped up in plastic, and I’ve had a few of them, and they don’t write very well. But they look nice.

The last company I worked for, not counting the one I work for now, they also had pens, and I have one. It also writes black. It’s a fat one, blue sparkly with a black rubber bottom part where you put your fingers, white lettering.

All of my former-employer pens write black.

I have four Microsoft pens. Two are black and two are blue. They write nicely, and I don’t supposed Microsoft made the pens, anymore than they made DOS. One is a black pen with an orange cap. It says “Microsoft.” You can’t get more direct than that. Two of them are TechNet pens. They have this kind of weird triangle shape. TechNet is Microsoft’s network for technical people like system administrators and the like. Maybe all sysadmins have mucked up fingers from plugging in too many cables, so they have make special triangle pens for their fingers. Maybe not. And then I have an MSDN pen. That’s Microsoft Developer Network, for programmers and developers. I got all these MS pens going to Microsoft events at the Paramount and at the Convention Centre and places like that. They used to give away not just pens, but backpacks and software and books and stuff. After a while all they gave away was paper and a pen, and I quit going. I think they quit having them.

All the rest of my special pens write blue, except the Novell pen. But the rest are blue.

I have a pen from fuze HR, that’s a recruiting company. They tried to set me up with a company that specialized in XML, but they didn’t want.me, and the truth is that I didn’t want to work for them either. But I got a pen. I have a CGI pen, and I don’t remember exactly where I got that, but it’s got an hourglass figure. And then there is LMB Systems Services Inc., that’s a company that provides simultaneous translation services, and the pen only writes in one language at a time, and the colour scheme looks black, the it writes blue, and I don’t know what that means, but I’m sure it means something.

The last tech pen I have says “Novell” on it, and it doesn’t work. So I don’t know what colour it doesn’t write.

Well that’s almost it; I have an FRI pen, it’s a translucent red, and I’m not sure that a financial company should distribute red coloured pens, although it does write blue, and I have a pen that says “Mon Frére” on it; my sister gave me that, sweet eh? It’s a big fat green one. And it… oh no oh no, my sister is *not* green.

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I keep all my pens in a plastic box in a space in my desk, and they will stay there for a very long time. I will bequeath them to my children, and perhaps to my grandchildren. As it is I probably write about 20 words a week, mostly just grocery lists, and I think that the average pen has the capacity for 4,567,789 words. So I would have to live 4392 years to use all these pens, at the rate of 20 words per week, and Methusela only lived 969 years, and he didn’t buy groceries. And he used a pencil…

Montreal - Bad

Everyone rags on this city. Indeed he does.

I don’t. Not much. I like this city. But I can’t deny that living here can be a royal pain in the foot.

So here are some things that I don’t like about this place. Some are city specific, some are province wide; I don’t bother to diffrentiate.

Weather. Hey, I’ve was born and raised in this country, the only winter I ever missed was the winter of 1975 – 76. So It’s not like I’m not used to the cold. But here, it’s that melting – freezing – melting – freezing thing that goes on, making the sidewalks into deathtraps, while all the while these vile ice pellets plummet down on your head.

And then there’s the snow storms, last winter we had about 20, each one paralyzing the city. If you happen to have a dentist appointment that day, well then you’re lucky, but if you have a job interview, then you’re not so lucky.

And, well, cold. I’m from the praries. It’s cold there eh? Says everyone. It’s cold here too, I say. Not like there, they say. Yes like there, I say. Sheesh.

Which brings me to:

Services: let’s start with snow removal. This deserves a post unto itself. Suffice it to say that it’s bad. Very bad. The city congratulates itself each time on a job well done, and it makes public statements to the effect that the crews are doing an excellent job, and that they are doing it very quickly, and the truth is the opposite. They are doing a terrible job, and they are doing it very slowly. So traffic slows down to nothing, and parking becomes nonexistent. Heaven help you if you have to go anywhere.

Transit

This is like the little girl with curl, when it’s good it’s very very good, and when it’s bad it’s horrid. They go on stike, or threaten to go on strike, every five days. The Métro is great until it breaks down, then there are a series of announcements over the loudspeakers that garble everything, and anyway it’s all in French. But at least on the métro you get the courtesy of an announcement.

When you’re waiting for the bus, there’s no way to know why the bus that’s supposed to come every 6 minutes hasn’t shown up for half an hour. And then of course when it finally appears it’s so full that it sails right by. And of course this is most likely to happen in winter while the ice pellets are pounding on your head…

Parking Signs

Really this is No Parking Signs. On one side of the street it’s between 12 and 2 every Tuesday and Thursday from March 15 until November 22. Then on the other side of the street it’s every Monday and Wednesday between 10 and 12:12 from February 21 until September 22. Then you have to watch for registered parking. This isn’t easy to spot, but in some neighbourhoods you must have a permit, and it is indicated on the signs but it’s difficult to see.

There is a street in my neighbourhood which is a one way street, and there are no parking signs all along the right hand side of the road, then at the bus stop it says no parking until the bus stop, then after the bus stop it says no parking.

Everything here is in French, the stops signs say “Arrêt” and the French word for parking is “stationnement” but the parking signs all have “P”. Call the language police.

French: I don’t have any thing against French, not the language, though it’s impossible to understand, nor the people, but having to live in an environment where your ability to communicate is limited by language issues is difficult. I have run into very few people in this city who don’t speak any English, but they exist. And so I am talking to the animal control person, called out by our neighbour because of a gopher that happens to live in our backyard. But I don’t know how to say gopher (gaufre, apparently), nor do I even know that it’s a gopher, could be a groundhog (marmotte d’Amérique – I kid you not) and I get that he’s here to find and I guess dispose of the unwanted creature, but I can’t really talk to him very much, il y a un petit animal I say, there is a small animal, mais il se cache, but it is hiding, and that is the best French I can do. He goes away. Tell your neighbour I was here, he tells me. I think. I don’t really understand.

I’ve already mentioned the métro issue, annoucements I can’t understand, do I sit and wait? Do I get off and take the bus? Do I ask someone? Do I expect to get an answer if I do?

The premier, who is a Liberal, and who gets all the anglophone votes, complains that there is too much English spoken in downtown Montreal. If the premier of Ontario complained that there was too much French in downtown Toronto, he’d be roasted alive.

Pedestrian walk lights: being neurotic, I have this unfortunate tendency to walk when the sign says walk, and not to walk when the sign says don’t walk. That leaves me in a minority of one in this city, where people tend to stampede across the city without regard for lights, traffic, weather, astrology, anything. I told someone not long after I arrived, when it says don’t walk, I don't walk, if nothing else I am making a statement. The only statement you’re making, says he, is that you are from out of town. But that’s not what I hate. What I have difficulty with is this. Not every traffic light has a pedestrian light, and those that do are highly inconsistent. Usually all four directions say walk at the same time, making it impossible to cross both ways in one go. And the busiest and widest corners, like the ones on Réne Levesque Blvd which I cross every day going to and from work, have none. So you step off the curb when the light is green, and I have no idea how long it’s been green, and chances are that it turns yellow, and then red, and I’m only half way across, and do I have a prayer book with me.

Animals. Okay, I don’t mind the gophers. But I could do without the skunks…

Holiday Memories

Let’s take a break for a bit. I've been thinking of the ghosts of holidays past, with apologies as appropriate to Charles Dickens. So here, in no particular order, without further ado, are some random holiday memories:

1. Tashlich. Now this is a walk to the river. That’s where we cast our “sins,” on the first afternoon, or on the second if the first day happens to be Saturday, and back home I’d walk down to the Red River, because it wasn’t so far, I could go to Kildonan Park, that was pleasant, or just walk up to Scotia Blvd and there were a few open spots there where you could stand on the river bank, and I used to go by myself, until the kids got old enough to walk, it was a long journey altogether, because it’s about 40 minutes there, at my pace, and then another 30 minutes or so to the Chabad House, and afternoon services, although usually one does tashlich after the afternoon service, then a 30 minute walk home, so by the time we’re done, it’s quite the safari.

I always remember one particular year, it was a while back, I’m guessing now about 17 years ago, and I happened to be reading a biography of Bob Dylan, not very holiday appropriate, but that’s what I’d been reading, and I guess the songs from Blood On The Tracks were running through my head, and it’s good that they were, because I remember what a miserable day it was, raining, this nasty miserable rain, the whole way, and I just got soaked, and it was cold. “It’s a wonder that we still know how to breathe.”

2. The old man who yelled. Ok this one is a bit strange, and this goes back a long way, back to when I attended services at the CT, and that last year I went there was 1984. Well, there was this old man who sat in the back, and he only ever came during the high holidays. That part is not so strange. But he was very intense, he followed the service with great intensity, you could see how he followed every word on every page, and during the responsive prayer he would respond; boy would he respond, he would get louder and louder as he got more and more excited. So we came to call him the old man who yelled. I assumed he was from out of town; it made no sense that someone that enjoyed the services that much would not be a regular. But no, he lived a few blocks away…

3. The lady with the harelip. Sorry about this one. I don’t feel good about it. But it’s how it was. She used to look after the kids. It seems to me that wherever I was, she was, she gravitated from one place one year to another place the next. I don’t think that’s really true; she was at the BA, and she may have been at the TT for some years. But everyone knew her, and that’s what we called her, the lady with the harelip. And she always looked after the kids...

4. Headache. We all get headaches from fasting. Hunger, dehydration, and, worst of all, caffiene withdrawal. That’s normal. We bear it. One year, though, I’m still traumatized from that year. It was Yom Kippur, by the end of the day, it just felt like there was a vice around my head, I couldn’t stand, literally, not figuratively, literally, I could not stand up so I had to sit during the final Ne’ilah service, throughout which one is really supposed to stand, and I was fainting and feeling nauseous, and it seemed as if it would be better to break the fast, and get some strength back, and finish the service properly, because I could not concentrate on a single word. So I went down into the kitchen, fully intending to make a quick cup of coffee and go back in, but I could not bring myself to do it. So I sat in the kitchen and listened from there, until the final shofar blowing, after which the fast is officially over, although we still have to go through the end of the ne’ilah service, about another five minutes, and then the evening service, say another 15 minutes, then havdalah, before we eat, but given my condition those were formalities, so I made myself coffee right then, and it rejuvenated me, like a miracle cure, but the experience traumatized me from then till now. And it was a long time ago, maybe even 20 years ago, and I’ve always kept an emergency supply of pills since. I should keep an emergency cup of espresso.

5. Cigarettes. Ok I’m sorry if my kids are reading this. But yes I used to smoke, and this was before I was married, I used to go to the aforementioned tashlich with my friends, we’d walk together, and we’d have smokes, but no way to light them. So we’d look to find someone smoking, and get a light, and it was a problem if he / she would hand us a lighter, we had to say no please just give me your cigarette, because we couldn’t use the lighter, it being Rosh Hashana and all, but we had to keep smoking once we got lit, so we would take turns, so we would always have a light. It was a smoking-go-round, the whole way there and back…

6. Kreplach. Look it up. It is a tradition to have kreplach on the eve of Yom Kippur. And so, being traditional, we have kreplach on the eve of Yom Kippur. My wife makes them, and makes them well. She makes everything well, and I don't say that just because she will read this. I happen to be writing about kreplach. She fills them with ground beef.

Okay this was totally random. I’ll do better next time…

Autumn

Autumn is not my favourite time of year. Oh it has its beauty alright. Sure we get the leaves changing colours and stuff. And there are some really really nice days here and there.

The word “autumn” sounds kind of poetic, doesn’t it. The English, that is people from England, they say “autumn,” but here in North America I guess we say “fall.” Still, I like to call it autumn, but then I’m partial to certain anglo expression: I wear trousers, I eat biscuits, etc.

So autumn, that’s actually our holiday season. People try to neutralize Christmas by wishing one another “season’s greetings” instead of Merry Christmas; but our season is autumn, usually mid-September, this year early October. People should wish us Season’s Greetings in autumn I think. But after we get through the high holidays, which can be intense, we come to Succot, and we eat outside, well we’re surrounded by walls but it’s still outside, and so when it’s nice out it’s the quintessential autumn experience.

But that’s a bone, compensation for the fact that summer is over and we are transitioning to winter, and winter in Canada is not a trivial exercise.

Here is a story. It’s a true story about a vacation we did one year, my family did, and at the time I think that my family was three people.

We headed straight south. It was near the end of August, and I guess it was 1986. One hour to the border, then into the US. We did not take the usual route which if I remember is Interstate 29; we headed south on highway 59, which is less used, with less traffic, and I remember stopping at some playground, in some town, about an hour south of the US border, and our son played and we sat and had lunch, and it was a beautiful sunny Sunday morning.

And so we carried on, to Detroit Lakes, to Bemidji, to Minneapolis. And when it was time to go home, we made a point of going back up the same highway, thinking we’d stop in Detroit Lakes maybe for a picnic if it was nice, take a nice leisurely ride back home.

So we headed out from the twin cities, and I remember that it was September 1, and that’s still officially summer, but everyone knows how bogus that is, September 1 is fall, autumn, and no climatologist or meteorologist can convince me otherwise. So here it was September, and it was a cold, miserable, rainy day, and I noticed as we headed back north up highway 59, and we passed that same playground we’d stopped at only a week before, and we just passed it without stopping, there was nobody there and no kids playing, and it seemed like the whole world had changed, changed from happy summer holiday to rainy cold miserable autumn.

I could make this into a metaphor but I won’t. Because I’ve learned that the misery that the world threw at me that day is bogus, there is no misery except what we choose to let in. So let autumn, and even winter, do its worst. I’m ready.