Is there anybody out there?

Swine and Go Down and Sick

2009-06-09T08:51:00.008-06:00

With two confirmed cases of swine flu in the island, the ministry of health is asking us to take extra precaution this crop over season.

Don't spread the flu. Leave the scarf at home.

For those who don't yet know- THIS is the safe way to wuk up.

THIS is not.

Not clear enough?

This is right.

And this is wrong.

And if you're still confused, you can always purchase a festive mask for the occasion.

But for heaven's sake leave your scarf at home.

Knocking B.C. Pires- into shape

2008-10-27T17:58:00.003-05:00

For the last few weeks, I've been reading BC's Barbados in the NATION with bemused interest. I confess, the curiosity arose less from the content of the editorials themselves and more from the fact that he took over the Monday slot from Rob.

Rob didn't always write genius. Rob was a little pretentious and he has this haughty English way of throwing in all kinds of long-winded asides to show off his intellectual briliance. But Rob wrote spicy, like a naughty little school boy slipping in the smut and grinning behind his words for getting away with it. Frankly, that piece about the man who gave it to the horse was the first chunk of solid literary filth our paper's dared to print. I loved it.

But back to B.C.

In many ways that's what it feels like to read his articles. It's been over thirteen years that I landed "as a new resident...upon this rock". Beyond the fact that Mr. Pires uses way too many dashes- confusing his sentences with a lot of unnecessary bits of information to make him appear more (or less) charming, as though it could ever be charming to infer that Barbadians are tight-assed, micro-sized, humourless- certainly it's very funny indeed! to be referred to through a series of commas and hyphens- Hitlers- Mr. Pires and his play on Dick is just not funny, (but he does do a nice job of buttering bajan botsy as he bows and scrapes over his printing presser who incidentally, gets two-thirds more readership because IT is entirely 100% crap (Bajan or otherwise) and EXACTLY- what this country appreciates).

I'm of the opinion, that one needs to earn the right to disparage this hole. Crucifixion by Trident, so to speak. Dead sheep can't measure up to good ol' horse sense.

Dead burying with Dead

2008-10-06T08:52:00.003-06:00

My heart bleeds for the family of Marion McPherson who watched in horror as soil technicians tossed second hand ribbons and wreathes unto the casket of Granny Mc-Phee at her burial on September 24th.
According to the Nation, when Mc-Phee's grandaughter confronted Canon Mayers about this gross act of desecration, he admitted that getting rid of the dead by burrying it with the dead was standard graveyard tidy-up practice.
McPhee-second generation- isn't to be hoodwinked by any dead bury dead Christian adage. She's taken it up with the Bishop.
Forget the notion of protocol. Why should she give the cleric she's hired an opportunity to account for his actions? Not when the precious memories of mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, sister, aunt, cousin, second cousin, niece, sister in-law twice removed and friend Marion have been forever tarnished by old flowers being thrown on her new wooden box!
And how could Canon Mayers' apology be accepted as sincere? As tutor of pastoral counselling at Codrington College, he surely has no concept of empathy and is obviously a man who has never in his life, had a moment of experience in dealing with grief and mourning.
No. Karen Richards has no issues with her ego whatsover. And to prove it, she's on a mission to protect the rest of us who might find ourselves one day, being eaten by maggots with someone else's condolence card as company.
"Something like this" will never happen again, if she has anything to do about it.
So Karen Richards has forwarded her anti-litter letter right to the man upstairs. Not to God.
To the PM. (I know the halo makes it hard to differentiate)
If that fails, I suspect she'll take it straight to Lambeth.
Or join the People's Cathedral.

Do you see what I see?

2008-09-16T16:05:00.009-06:00

Dear Mr. Cumberbatch,

Thank you for sharing your deep and perceptive understanding of God's works. Indeed, the circle around our Prime Minister's head on the front page of September 1st's Nation drew my attention as well.

I didn't think, however, that it was a watermark or a printing error. At first, I actually thought the photographer might just have taken a really lousy picture against a ridiculous background. But then! I realized, the facial expression of Mr. Thompson is so flattering that the photographer HAD be a pro. I mean common, he takes pictures for the NATION!

So then I started thinking about other pictures of Mr. T in the paper recently... Mr. T on a jet ski, Mr. T at a crop over fete, Mr. T rally racing... and I came to the conclusion that with a man so hippity hop, the orb surrouning his head could only be one thing- an afro puff.

Now that I've considered your assessment of the photo, I reckon you are indubitably right. There IS an "actual glow". Your informed letter and the brilliant picture has "confirmed" to me also, that the Prime Minister has a halo. Your visions, Mr. Cumberbatch, are inspirational. You need to talk to Harcourt about beatification right away.

You've also prompted me to draw upon my own mysticism and seek out futher divine messages that are coming to us via newsprint. HARK! There in the same paper on page 23, God has given me visual insight into the miraculous feat of Usain Bolt.
If you look just to the right of his (impressive) manhood, you will notice a gust of smoke which Usain is blowing away with his puckered lips, as though to cool it down. This "confirms" to me that God has blessed Bolt with an engine in his cock enabling him to reach super-human speeds. I'm sure when the Lord raises him up, he too will make quite the deliverer.

Thank God for our Caribbean men and thank you.

Sincerely,

BIM

Accentuating the Positives

2008-09-10T17:49:00.003-06:00

I'd like to give a shout out to my mole. Wuz up?!!
I didn't consider that by coming back, you too, would return. Page 9A did not go unnoticed. TY. It's one of today's small pleasures that make it all ok.

My mother says that she and I harp too much on the negative and take the positive for granted. Easy to do in a place like this where the negative is so 'gobsmacking'.

I've been complaining all day and it's not JUST my PMS-

My car is sick.

As my car is the quintessence of my control- I feel mentally incontinent.

And it's addictive, this negativism... from the car to the cable to the service to the roads to the mess to my purse to politics two atoms smashing in a tunnel without My consent... How dare they steal My party tricks?

to to two is too much to flap off my wings so I thought- maybe I can immortalize today's little positives and use them to bake a new pie.

The wake-up call dripped with honey that stayed sweet through my sour, all day.
The lady from Callie's pharmacy personally delivered my newspaper.
The boss, a client and I had a group hug.
The guys at Trans-tech gave quality service.
The man who said "excuse me. Are you leaving?" by Scotia Bank, Wildey was very polite about wanting a parking spot.
and most importantly,
The boys are doshveta.

There are no accidents.

International Literacy Day

2008-09-08T09:28:00.004-06:00

Today is International Literacy Day. I wouldn't have known it but for a notice from the Public Editor in today's Nation newspaper. Newspapers, according to the associate editor, promote reading and attempt to be "attractive to young children who may just like to know what's happening in their society." Well put! In fact, the other day when my son and I realized we didn't officially do the 15 minute prescribed reading he got for homework, I bought a Nation and he read it to me on the way to school. He reasoned that in his society, the government takes too long to fix bridges.

I think, to commemorate Literacy Day, I'll ask him again, to read the Nation on the way home. Why not the article right beside the one that trumpets how the Nation encourages our youth to read?...the guest column that asks 'are you smarter than your six year old'? I just know my seven year old will be attracted to that- he does love the game show, after all.

I'm so excited for him to come to the part about how "smart" his white mommy is for putting him into private school. After all, I'm prepared "to lie, cheat and commit adultery to get (my kid) into the right school." I'll take out a loan, take up a religion, sleep with his headmistress if I have to. Anything to get my son educated.

My middle class upbringing and my genetic whiteness give me the edge when it comes to thinking of the future and making the necessary sacrifices for my child. I know that even if I have to bump off a few kiddies to open up a space for my own or give a hand job to the chairman of the board, my actions will guarantee my son's smartness. He'll be cultured and erudite and through his vast reading, au courant "to what's happening in his society."

And who knows, through my uncompromising white efforts he may just "be interested in the profession of journalism" and write informative and inspiring articles like Pudding and Souse or Sanka Price. He may be promoted to editor and re-print such meaningful and relevant articles like the one we're going to read together this evening. Just think...if he gets a job for the Nation, he can attract countless children with his choice of quality literature! I can't hardly wait for his acceptance speech. "I couldn't have done it without you mommy!" A real heart-warming pay it forward story if there ever was.

I'm Back

2008-09-03T08:16:00.004-06:00

I'm back.

You can thank or blame the Bajan Reporter for that. We bumped into each other stupidly and he charged me with not having written since "June 7, 07". He gave me that 'where's your homework look', I uttered some lame excuse, felt like a right naughty girl and privately reconsidered my position on the matter. Ok ok Mr. Bourne, I'll amuse you.

What better day to return to the public than my boy's first day back at school?

He's been excited about his return to institutionalization for atleast a month now. This morning as I blew kisses at the morning traffic, his only concern was where he needed to line up for his particular class. I told him not to worry, his school is so oraginized they've probably pre-flushed the toilets the exact amount of times they're going to be used throughout the day. Sure enough, as we drove in, the parking sentinels were at their posts and the lice pickers were rearing to go. I dropped his freight in the "epaulets only" breezeway, drew blood at the treasurer and left him hangin' wid de boyz.

So here I am- back in my self-made confessional while my son is being matriculated. I too, need to get back to studying, even if it's only studying my world. Sometimes, I wish I'd studied etymology. Take the word "matriculation": from the latin "matrix" meaning breeding animal and later referring to the womb ('mater' meaning mother, of course). Apt. Indeed, the first day of school does feel somewhat surgical as my child is ripped from my womb and placed into the care of another breeding animal between the hours of 8:15 to 2:15.

Sir Hillary didn't miss this truth in his matriculation ceremony. Welcoming the new flock into the fold he payed special attention to ensuring his womb was sufficiently masculine to make the y's feel at ease. His new initiatives "MACHO" and "SEED" effectively convey the kind of breeding he hopes to get out of our boys. Hell, with80% female graduates something must be done to remind our sons that academic intelligence is all about "having or showing characteristics conventionally regarded as male, especially physical strength and courage, aggressiveness, and (a) lack of emotional response"(Encarta N.A dictionary). In the Nation Prof Beckles, ever the role model, promises to pursue the propagative dreams of our sons "very aggressively". And as these young men come home to sleepless nights and the most pain they've ever faced, they'll realise how beautiful it is to get their bubble jet printed piece of paper that proves how manly they are.

I reflect back on my own son, sitting on the stairs, motioning me to get lost so that he can look cool in front of his little friends and I'm so proud of his epaulets. So long as he's encouraged by programs that remind him he has a penis, he's sure to graduate top of class from his alma mater.

One for the Masses

2007-06-07T21:01:00.000-06:00

To all of my million billion fans,
Please excuse me while I take a request for a post more suitable for the masses. With all the rain, an ugly cut and a subsequent depression that expressed itself on my right back tyre this morning, I gave up to my soul's pleads and decided not to join the ugly world out there. I made a 180 at the gas station and came back home to a second cup of coffee, this time hot, pleased with myself that I mustered the gumption to not look at anymore faces. Working from home has its perks. I actually eat more than once a day and I actually pee more than twice. Unfortunately, I actually do more work too. Anyway, a short while ago I received a complaint that read:

"Your blog is driving me crazy...provide something readable for the poor uneducated masses that don't understand the bulk of your religious references or long-winded hand wringing. Throw us a bone every now and then..."

As I avoided the masses today, I figure I owe it to them tonight. So excuse me as I endeavour for a moment to appease my critic in far far away land.

Dear Linda,

Like ok so today I watched a shit load of television in between answering non stop phone calls from people who speak the language of fuckin' idiot. Since you don't get to watch any tv out there I thought I'd fill you in on what you're missing between the sand storms and the plagues, the tanks and the festering wounds, the biafric, HIV infested children and the septic drinking water. I figure there's no way to make day time tv sound hand ringing and well, we'd all hate for you to come back and not be totally up to date with the really important stuff.

First of all the news was very informative today so it's a good thing I turned on BBC to start. Thank God Paris Hilton is back in her mansion after three horrible days in the private wing of a women's correctional institute without a curling iron. Can you imagine the horror that poor girl must have gone through?

Then Oprah, restored my faith in humanity when she took a group of "women warriors" to a spa where they could relearn how breathe through their diaphragm and love themselves with a mud bath and a treacherous climb up a 35 foot ladder with nothing but a harness and a team of spirit coaches. Oh those brave women! Dem Iraqi Muslim girls could really learn a thing or two!

Then I watched some really great documentary where a horsey girl admitted to her speed date that she'd do anything after 6 drinks and unbelievably he asked her for "cocktails" after the buzzer while yet another girl with a miniature rabbit tail pierced to her chin, begged her sister to support her during her lezbian porn auditions. It made me think of us, Linda, and I dare say that I regret we never had that kind of closeness growing up.

After that, I watched 20 year old Days of Our Lives. No need to catch you up there. The plot has been skipping since you left. No one knows who they are. No one is telling the truth and there's always some woman with an hysterically induced illness. Sheesh..give her a mud bath and a ladder already!

The Man Show! Gotta love that. What is an evening without women in short skirts jumping on trampolines?

And the best ever- Girls Gone Wild is on TV! Yup. If you stay up late enough, on the same channel as the the sin city travel show where the english perv watches the really fat ugly german guy finger fuck ladies- oragsms or their money back guaranteed, you can watch college girls rubbing their bare breasts together. Now that's quality!

So, I thought I would share that with you in case you were thinking of doning a hijab or something having been so far removed from the women's lib movement in the west. Plus, I didn't want you to come back and be like totally out of the loop.

Toodles....

P.S. Who was it that was adamently arguing with me that our society does not oppress, brain wash and otherwise sabotage the minds of our daughters from cradle to grave? Common dear, I love ya but give me a freakin' break! If you still doubt me- watch girly cartoons. They're nothing but a prequel to evening television. Now you know and I know that it's all entertainment and choices lie with the individual and all that other pro-libertarian crap but let's be honest, when we have to be proud of our people for not walking around with shit on their asses (wink wink dad) can we really expect them to be immune to the filthy degrading woman munching sexism being blatantly promoted out there? I think it's great fun but then I've never been ashamed of my balls.

Meanwhile...back in the land of Kocurkovo

2007-05-31T12:52:00.000-06:00

Meanwhile back in the land of Kocurkovo, the natives are thirsty.

The clouds have been constipated too long and those who fix the pipes are too busy playing cards with the ones who fix the roads to mind the leaks. Water is reaching a shortage.

Coming from the fresh water haven, we Canuks knew to set our furniture down next to an underground spring. A private source of liquid gold if you will. Not exactly gold to be truthful. More like 1/100th fecal matter and 50% chlorene but it looks like water. It's good for washing, rincing, flushing and if you boil it you can even drink it with nothing worse than a sore throat.

So, while everyone waits for the truck by the roadside with buckets and jugs and frousy BO, we enjoy the contant outflow of H2O. Or atleast we did.

Until the water went off this morning. And upon investigation it would seem that some poor parched fellow could take it no longer. He trespassed his way into the bush in the dark, cut the pipe line, emptied the water tank and carried it off on the back of his truck along with two lengths of pipe, leaving the spliced end to water the weeds. I do believe he would have carried away the spring itself if he could have figured a way to dig deep enough to remove it from the source.

After a trip to the store to purchase more lengths and a bottle of solution, the damage is mended and the water restored.

At least on my side of the street.

The neighbour, who shares the spring is still trying to fix his own pipes...

They melted after roadworks figured it would be easier to set his property ablaze rather than cut back the bush.

Who said Barbadians were all pride no industry?

And He Beats His Fists

2007-05-29T20:29:00.000-06:00

The man by the road side is pleading again.

more time… less burden… new hope…

He beats his fists on the ground.

With each tick, his need for the days to slow down gets more rash and desperate and frightening. Time for him moves exceedingly fast for he’s shoved by the years behind him. I shouldn’t be here, the man screams out. He wails through a voice cloaked in humour. The others hear but don't care. They filch his cry for comic relief laughing with an air of pomposity. There is no discern for his pain.

But I hear the pain and though it cause me to stir I pray for it to continue.

It is the loneliness that fuels his ardor; it is the vacancy that accommodates him. In the darkness he illuminates. In the silence he resounds. I reach in my pocket and give him six moons. Great masses of time. Alas they’re too heavy for one who’s but carried grains of sand all the days of his life. So I cover my eyes and I listen to his breath and I prostrate myself on the ground…

And he beats his fists.

Waiting for Time

2007-05-24T22:07:00.000-06:00

Barely over the threshold, into the land of the dying, with a whip-poor-will for my psychopomp, go I. I know you bird, we met once before when your wings killed a clock. It’s nice to see you again my friend, but surely you know the clock has been restored. This is the kingdom of Chronus after all; wristwatch is the teraphim of His followers.

The fishers of men have long left this place to the dead burying the dead. They line-up their cars behind the hearse. They queue their bodies in front of the pharmacy. They set their breaths by the second hand. Oh that I had the helm of Hades to hide myself from these time coveters!

“Spare a minute ma’am?” says a man begging by the road side.

Everyone is waiting for the Reaper with both dread and awe. To be permitted a few more moments is their solitary desire. But moments are passing by like wind. As they reach up to catch one, it slips through their fingers and the strangest thing occurs. Relief. Another moment means another risk, another chance that life might take them from this place. And the realm of Chronus is so safe and predictable. No one wearing a watch wants to leave.

Fear of Dying. Fear of Living. Fear of Forward. Fear of Back.

This is not the place for me little bird.

I have no minutes to spare anyway. I have left my timepiece at home. The weight of it was too much to bear on this journey. No. I am not a time seeker. It takes too much time. And time takes too much of me. And I owe time nothing.

Move on Mr. Whip-poor-will, take me to the fishers of men. Perhaps they have managed to catch one who isn’t mesmerized by a tick tock. Or take me to Father-T, Himself. I’ll tell him what he can do with his hourglass.

Embarkation

2007-05-21T15:17:00.000-06:00

I suppose I've got to start this Quest alone, as the search for someone with whom to embark upon it, has proven to be something of a quest of its own.

I suppose I have to trust that as I make my way through forbidden forests and demonic deserts the right people will come at the right time.

It’s not a faith I find difficult to muster as it is the very nature of God to make it so. But I set out with a heavy heart nevertheless, forlorn for the lack of company.

My kind of adventure is not for the faint of heart nor the ones contented with artificial peace.

My type of journey is not for the sticky footed nor the ones bogged down by superficial desires.

There are no well wishers who understand the mission, to give charms and amulets for protection. Not a prayer is spoken here.

There are no brave souls to shout “I will fight by your side to the death!” Everyone is asleep.

Nothing left to do now but pack my sack, put on the armor and set out into the sunset alone.

Fair thee well. Fair thee well. May our paths cross again some day.

The Fate of Scheherazade

2007-05-03T17:03:00.000-06:00

At my mother's insistance, I've further stressed my night stand. Now on top of Vonnegut's Bagombo Snuff Box, Eliade's Myths, Dreams and Mysteries, An Encylopedia of Mythology, the NRSV Bible with Apocrypha, A book about the Hebrew Goddess, the autobiography of Malcolm X and the Oxford Dictionary (yes, I read the dictionary), I've added Tales from the Arabian Nights. I'm keeping it on top not because I prefer it but because the colour is purple and since my discombobulation (see I told you I read the dictionary), it matches the new paint job I gave my-once bed, now romper- room.

It sounds like a lot of reading. But truth is, I've read X already and have yet to return it to its owner. I keep it there next to the word Goddess to make Detroit Red roll in his grave. The Bible, the Encylopedia and the Dick are for reference. So that leaves two non-fiction and two fiction. I have alloted myself all the time that I require to busy my brain dot dot dot two weeks.

Now I am not embarssed to admit my ignorance re: Arabian Nights. I took it as something of a cross between animated Aladin and the Old Sinbad movies I watched as a kid. I was pleasantly surprised to discover the story is how I adore them-a story within a story within a story within a story, on and on. And having read only the first four tales or so, the common theme emerges with the sound of my God's cruel laughter.

Waiting. Waiting- with anticipation of dread. Waiting- with fear of the end. Waiting using stories to pass the time in hopes that the stories themselves will somehow alter the inevitable executions.

And oh how I want the Sultan to be in love with Scheherazade, to not fear love, to stop making the poor girl worry if every night may be her last. But most of all, I want the Sultan to allow Scheherazade to remain in his life where the stories can go on and on.

I shall cross my fingers for the brave girl and in two weeks I shall know her fate.

Thesssse People

2007-04-20T09:12:00.000-06:00

I've needed some seperation from the world.

The blogging is all part and parcel.

Along with the car, we found evidence that someone had tried to start a blaze on my sister's porch.

This place...

I shake it off.

In my reality I'm compelled to take it as divine comedy. My God is a literary genius. And He's so funny when She's not overwrought.

Latey I'm getting misssti-fied. It's all the spit. Scarred tongues, stitched down the centre make speech sticky. Words slither sounding duplicitous. Disingenuous. Every smile seems a smirk, every sentence makes me squint.

I don't know if I like thesssse... people. I'm quite sure they don't like me.

Crafty. Making believe wisdom can be attained by way of consumption. So that they may bask in the horror of discovered exposure.

no. I'm quite sure I don't like thesssse...people.

Backdraft of Barba?ianism

2007-04-09T10:24:00.000-06:00

I had psyched myself up for the backdraft of my reintroduction into BIM's inferno so I was able to see the artistry in God's literary form. I was awoken to my mother's frantic screams at 3:30am Easter Sunday. "WAKE UP!!!! WAKE UP!!!!! THE GARAGE IS ON FIRE!!!!!!!!"

I fumbled for my bedroom light, wrapped in a towel and went to investigate from an upstairs window. I could feel the heat on my face, the smoke in my lungs and the red eye was wide and vicious.

Too late.

Ricky's car was engulfed in flames and being parked in the garage and near to the cooking gas, the situation was dire.

I called my numbers 211 for the Poh-leeece, 311 for a fiiiiire....

...and for the next 15 minutes which seemed an eternity I clung to my purse, my child and my faith, screaming at Ricky that the hose was a waste of time and to step off before the car exploded.

Our service men were exemplary. Considering my location behind God's back they could not have stalled a moment in coming to the rescue. The police first- silent and sensitive. The firemen next- outing the blaze in seconds. I stood there with sad gratitude- my synicism in 'what if?' restored- but i didn't look at the damage. It was too fresh. Too ugly.

When the sun came up and I'd had a chance to let it sink in, I took my ashen clothes off the line to be washed anew and peeked to my left, holding my hands over my face. The colour of hell. The colour of envy. The colour of Barbadian cowardice and evil.

Poor Ricky is in a state of utter dejection. How can a bad boy from the block ever lift himself up from the ashes? He secured a license. He worked hard for that car. Earned the eight grand by the strength of his hands. Every single day he was outside tuning it, servicing it, shining it. It seemed to run on pride-not gas.

But in Barbados, Pride is a threat worse than Fury. A man like him should never get ahead. His caste belongs in prison or in morgue. He is nothing- he should have nothing. And so, with a match lit by jealousy, his hope was completely incinerated and replaced by something unsettling.

Though the delivery of God's reminder was pure Art, the reminder itself was obscene. Easter Sunday... what a sick and twisted lot! I too have risen from the dead and now I wait patiently but with absolute conviction in God's justice. Her wrathful and equally artisitc re-enactment of Acts 1:18 upon the ass of the firestarter is something I dare say, I'll almost enjoy.

The Honeymoon is Over

2007-04-07T14:18:00.000-06:00

My cousin left yesterday after a long delay at the airport during which we made wishes tossing coins in the fountain, watched Abba and Queen videos as IZ ate chip crumbs off the bar and drank coffee with Florida sugar.
I said to the man behind me "Didn't Owen say we'd always have Bajan sugar?"
To which he replied "Didn't Owen say we'd be fully booked?"
- funny guy.
I went to the VD machine to pay for my parking and it froze with my card inside. I had to wait for the human being to open it up and let me out of parking prison...again...
Couldn't come home to watch t.v. cause my cable went off conveniently Thursday at 2:30pm. I was told by the voice that if I wanted it fixed before the long weekend I had permission to bring it in to Roebuck Street before 4. I was in Bay street at the time. The box was in Bathsheba. My telekinesis is a little rusty.
So Friday after the send off I got spruced up, turned around and took the long drive back to the bar hitting some sizable crators in the Belle along the way. I opted for red wine over G&T it being Good Friday and all. Then using my transmutating skills (which are not that rusty), I drank my easter sacrament to my honoured and intimate request for something melancholy and tragic.

The honeymoon is over.

Just Good Enough

2007-04-01T22:23:00.000-06:00

My cousin has come into the island as God's remedy for my recent bitterness. Normally I find visitors more than a little tedious but she is exactly what I needed to restore my love for this country. I've been trying to show off as much as I can in the short space of time and I'm allowing myself to share in the fresh eyed experience of BIM. It's wonderful! Everything looks so much more vibrant. Everyone seems so much more friendly. The rain is falling when the sun's not shining and the moon is almost full.

How could I have forgotten how quiet you get entering the grounds of Codrington? The way the place itself creates a sense of reverence? The pride I have for my Alma mater!

How long has it been since I've gone in the sea? Months. And yet it surrounds me. Why don't I go in the sea?

The talent we have in this country!! 2 nights out in a row and I'm watching alternative bands rip it up. But I also pay tribute to the intimacy... they're not just musicians rockin' in a club. I went to school with these guys. I know their parents. I'm not only impressed-I'm honoured.

I laugh when I get lost and the directions make me loster. I smile as my son hunts crab and harvests wilks. I notice the little boy with the sticks and plastic bag kite. I hear the crickets and frogs. I'm glad we don't have self-serve gas stations.

I make my visits to the special places and I'm relieved they're still secluded. I promise myself not to say where they are because they belong to me. And I take stock of the places which cater to the high life, greeting the crowd with their kids and their food and their mass of paraphernalia. They're not intimidated by the yachts- the beach belongs to we.

My cousin says this place has a charm of "just good enough" unlike up north where the poor souls suffer in a world that's "just in case". I laugh at her observation knowing exacly what she means. I have 4 and a half more days of therapy before God returns me to my life. I plan on savouring every moment of my honeymoon in BIM.

Last Bording Call for Flight 595 to Shame

2007-03-22T15:38:00.000-06:00

Stopping at a nearby shop I infrequent for various reasons now historical, I was drawn into converstaion with a man I recognize. Well, I know him, I suppose, but in the shallowest sense of know possible. I know they call him short man. I know he lives somewhere 'bout dey and I know he drinks too much.

So, coming out of the shop with my mustard and juice, I lingered too long and became the object of his romantic confessions which started almost sweet but deteriorated quickly, him having a slippery grasp of the english language. It went something like this: "I like you- don' mind you does pass me wid barely a shout and it would hurt me tuh see you hurt. Fuh trut', yeh... if you d'in pain, I would tek dat pain in my own heart. I see-rious...if you have problems you can speak wid me, yuh know, fuh real. But I is a man who does shy from girls like you, sight? And too besides when I does see you, you always rolling wid some udda man and I does respect my bruddas propety. But still, if I had you fuh my self, Jah knows, I would never let you out of my control. I got real love for you. No lies."

I thanked him and wished him a good evening.

A converation of this nature is something of a daily occurence for me. Most of the time it comes from the lower end of the social stratum as their dignity is somewhat less fragile, but in quiet surroundings with less of an audience a "better man" will lavish me with the same speech making corrections to the gammar and employing more exciting and ambiguous vocabulary.

A man has license to say anything doesn't he? He can confess love, appeal to guilt, appear vulnerable, pour out his soul... and the next morning wake up- claim it was all a game to get a little pussy and damn it's not his fault if the bitches are naive. Men just don't have to stand trial for their words. They're never accused of being damaged or scorned. They don't get branded pycho. In fact, their pathetic love-hurls actually enable them to score! Even faced with rejection their candour rewards them with a gentle bandage and a butterfly kiss of compassion.

Thank you. Good evening.

Then Friday night I was with a friend when he received a text that went a little something like this "How can you treat me like this? Leaving me to go with her. After all that's happened between us. I hope she fucks you as good as I think I did. (that's a direct quote) I like you blah blah blah but you hurt me boo hoo hoo." And from out of the mouth of a woman the same words holler- pathetic, desperate, run away before she boils your bunny. I felt so sad for her. I found her shame most painful. Except now I'm thinking what if she woke up the next morning and claimed it was all a game to get a little doggy and damn it's not her fault if the cocks are naive?

A woman is to be coy. She's to be calm. She's to sustain her mystery. A woman is to be aloof. She's to be guarded. She's to control her emotions. For whatever a woman says, a man will always pass it through the mental detector and query any alarm that suggests needyness. Whereas a man who is open and honest and passionate and candid and emotional and communicative- he sails through security, his bags don't get checked and he ends up getting it on in the loo.

I thought back to all the times when I might have been the author of that text. When I should have acted cool. When I came across as foolish. When I ran them away because of words and to be honest, I thought of enough incidents to fuel the shame plane. But now that I've had a chance to pick at the double standard and consider who I am I think back to the times when I might have been the author of that text and damn, I'm brave. I'm fucking hard core. And despite what all the words might suggest- I have no need for any pity. I got me under control and if it's scary it's only because I've got the Vincent Price laugh in my heart. Woooah ha ha ha ha ha !

Debridement of National Narcissism, Please.

2007-03-18T10:15:00.000-06:00

I'm always weary of how much we blame others for the filth in we culcha. The national psyche is a case study for Peck's People of the Lie. But then the nationalism and pride-of-self in Barbados makes it treasonable to even blow on the religious zeal of Bajanism. So we preserve our illusion of paradise by becoming the worst kind of xenophobes. Hypocrites with absolutely no ownership and conscience.

Everything ugly, everything 'sinful', everything stinking of rot, is attributed to outside influence. Smut- it's the Jamaicans. Thieving- it's Guyanese. Racism, Prejudice, Inequality-it's the Brits and slavery. Ruthlessness, Apathy, Greed-Americans and globalization. If it were not for the world beyond the sea we'd be walking with Jesus along the sandy beaches, eating fruit from off the trees and singing Kumbaya. If it were not for MTV and BET and CNN and HBO we'd be freakin' Adam and Eve before the apple.

I say we because I earned my stripes in BIM unlike those who were born into flawlessness but I'm being presumptuous. My navel string is not burried here and so I will always be tainted by my past. In fact, I suppose, I am the enemy robbing you of your cultural perfection-envious of your close proximity to God. And do I sound bitter? How dare I sound so! I can hear it under your breaths... "Why don't you carry your white foreign ass home!"
Only thing- this is home.

This is where I grew into a woman; this is where I bore my child; this is where I learned to think; this is where I surrendered. This is more than twelve years of my life. It's become me.

But twelve years or not, I can't let go of those formative years up north. I can't pretend that my roots aren't elsewhere. And I can't look at this country from inside a rose coloured fish bowl and pretend our shit smells sweeter than everyone else.

We're thieves, racists, backstabbers, liars and cheaters. We're disloyal, uncompassionate, shallow, unforgiving and malicious. Bajans. It's we culcha. And yet despite all these things, I love BIM and I find my way to laughter. I endure year after year with new discovery of how happy I am on this rock. Shit, we're only human. My arms are too full of sins to carry stones.

But this culture HAS to debride itself of the national narcissism that promotes self-deception, guiltlessness and rationalization of evil. This denial of a conscience- this sweeping under the rug has got to stop. We need to take responsibility for our choices, for this island and own it right or wrong. Not because of some divine punishment in the form of a tidal wave impending and not because we won't gain entry into the pearly gates to drink milk and honey with the saints but because we're blessed and we're wonderful and we have so much to be thankful for and absolutely nothing to be ashamed of... except, of course, our disgusting lack of shame.

Of Jesus, Eunuchs and the Trojan Horse

2007-03-14T14:56:00.000-06:00

Drawn in by the mannequin with double D breasts, Shackles and I entered the Twat Shop to browse through edible undies and lickable warming lotion. Saleslady, already peeved from having to chastize us for fondling the impressive plastic melons, assured me in her haughty taughty way that the chocolate and strawberry drawing pencils DO taste good, in fact, she'd bought her daughter a set based on the flavour factor alone.

I watched as Shackles, ever discreet, moseyed to where madame sex candy connoiseur was sitting in front of her computer assuming my friend wanted to size up her internet porn. But alas, Theresa Twat had her Christian minded attention focused on some hot and steamy gospel videos. I had this sinking feeling that we should run but the legs wouldn't move. With our shutdefuckup purchase of Irish Cream Liquid Heat we got a complimentary critique on our shabbyness as wives and mothers. Something about my child- the victim of my assailing selfishness, something about my life- a derailed train to disaster, something about her wisdom- happily giving her marrow through 4 years of marriage, something about Jesus- the light, the truth, the way. I think she just was angry I didn't buy the chocolate pencils.

On my way home today I was held up in a eunuch motorcade. Young men, no longer in school yet still without a thing to do but wait for the final bell to ring, joined forces of about 6 to 1 and entertained the Pine intersection by cuffing and kicking the shit out of boy solo. They then proceeded to take full advantage of the road works construction and armed themselves with heavy boulders- heaving and chucking them at the boy's back, chest and head. I hung up my phone, rolled down my window and hollered "LEAVE THE FUCKING BOY ALONE!" and then I leaned on my horn unil I was joined in concert by the line of dumbfounded eunuchs suddenly riveted by the idea of doing something. 6 against 1 paused for a moment to assess the sudden noise. The victim tore off running down the highway. All I can wonder is how many boulders us spectators at the Pine would have sat through before a reaction. Would we have watched from our air-conditioned comfort- the skull of a young man collapse into his brain?

We regurgitate our Sunday lessons interpreting the 'judge not' to be passive.
We attack the consumer with Christian propaganda and moral superiority surrounded by crotchless thongs and lubricant. We think our responsibility for the betterment of the nation is watching human injustice as if it were a flic at the drive-in then placing a call to Brass Tacks to compare our disgust in the youth of today. Where do we fit in to this picture? What mark do we want to leave here on this rock? What contribution are we hoping to make when we lunge at the unsuspecting with a Jesus vaccine in a ten inch syringe then sit idle as a young man is stonned to death on the sidewalk? Will we ever have the courage to stand naked in front of a stranger and let them see us for what we are- dirty little self-gratifying creatures? Can we take ourselves light, step up on the stage and bear whatever's thrown at us? Because the way I see it, until we get off that high horse we've been straddling- we're doomed to the Trojan fate.

International Women Aligned at the Seam

2007-03-08T21:44:00.000-05:00

International Woman has been popping up at me all day, but just as soon as I take notice, she runs for cover again to be forgotten. And here, now, at the eleventh hour, I finally catch up to her, tired and almost out of breath. "What....what do you want from me?"

I look up from my desk and my eyes rest directly on an old children's toy I keep as a cultural reminder. It is the first time I'm struck that this isn't a symbol of my heritage so much as it is of my sex.

At first glance it appears to be a metaphore for motherhood. The baby Babushka in the belly of the mother and so on and so forth to the oldest, largest Babushka carrying all the weight of their generations within her. Upon further examination, however, it doesn't seem to be telling a story of motherhood at all.

When I was very young, just learning to write, I remember hearing about the cold war and perhaps I asked a question and perhaps the answer didn't penetrate properly but whatever happened in my head, I sat on the pink carpet of my room and I can clearly remember crying. I took out a piece of paper and started to make a list of the greatest concerns for mankind. Never the brain, I got it all mixed up. 'The 7 Wunders of the Wurld'. what is love, why is there war, why do we die? I don't think my poor heart was able to get much beyond that.

Now 20 some odd years later my wunders haven't changed.

I think back to the little girl I was then and the only difference now is that I'm bigger and can carry more weight. I carry the little girl, I carry her 3 minus 7 wunders, I carry the teenage girl, I carry her 3 times 7 blunders. I know that my Babushka doll still has some layers to add... but there are enough layers of the same now to recognize and admit that the next layer to come is going to be the same as the ones before- only bigger and able to carry more weight.

I think of the last episode I saw of Amazing race when the teams had to search frantically for the next clue in some belly of a room full of Babushkas and the chaos of it strikes a chord. Layers upon layers of mixed up women waiting to be put back together... Perhaps it's true that we weren't to blame for the disorder but certainly, we can't go on bemoaning the mess. The time is ripe for us to buck up and face who we are in this world; stop forcing together layers that don't fit; cease mixing ourselves up with the Babushka's around us. It's a long, tedious, arduous process, this humpty dumpty labour we're facing but it is beyond necessary.

There is nothing less fun and more frustrating than a Babuhska doll with mixed and missing pieces. Topless women who get used as change dish and ashtray, bottomless women spinning like tops. Anyone whose played with Babushka dolls knows that the pleasure is in lining them all up in ascending-decsending order and then putting them back together as one, bellies perfectly alingned at the seam.

The Hag Lives On

2007-02-27T21:33:00.001-05:00

I'm not a news buff.
Investigation, Reporting, Statistics, Political Debate-frankly, it bores me. I pick up the Nation every day with a sigh. Nothing. Nothing. Same Old. Same Old.

I do the crossword.

Today, for example, breaking news- in the last 3 years food prices have gone up 25%. Thanks be to the economist who gave that up because I had no clue- I've been eating air for 3 years...
Then our Lord Bishop admonished some Dr. Evil song lyrics. I love you Dr. John but common- you hadn't heard it until now? Is the choir too loud 'cause IZ has been trying to find a reason why a next man would lie with a guy name Stephen for over a year now...
What else, what else- no prosecution for foreign police. Big surprise there- everyone knows how vigilant we are at addressing our local boys' indiscretions...
And of course- Darth Vadur giving the nation the ol' thumbs up- can't go a week without those dimples of optimism.

No- I don't much like the news. It's boring. And if there's one thing I can't suffer too long- it's boredom. I am an addict for good narrative. I like drama, I love passion. I adore divine irony. And my most favorite thing is the moment of ah-ha when it all lines up in perfect pleasure.

Last week I crossed the street to hear some tales from ago. The raconteur indulged my habit and told me a story of the Old Hag. Old Hag, he said, takes off her skin at the crossroads and goes out on a moonlit night, unseen, to suck blood. The belief is that if her skin could be found, lime and salted, she would be unable to re-enter it and her vampiric binges would come to an end. But no one has ever found Old Hag's skin, he concluded.

The story didn't make a lot of sense at first. If she took off her skin, how could she be unseen? I mean, what of her bones-surely she would appear skeletal? Why does she need the skin anyway- why not just suck blood? Why can't a pile of skin be found? And lime and salt? My raconteur got fed up and answered something like "Oh Fuckin' Hell, It was just a story to stop the children from playing marbles so they would come home before dark."

But the story has been making me think...
....think of the country and the news and the constant cry for transparency and I've been doing a little exegesis. Bare with me-

The Old Hag takes off her skin so that she can't be seen but of course she can. We all see but we don't. We only always know the bare bones don't we? The flesh of the matter is so carefully hidden behind bogus inquiries and missing documents. Though the rattling bones make plenty noise, they're rather difficult to hold on to. The Hag continues her treacherous path lit by that big bright spotlight in the heavens while we are left pondering her motions in the dark.

And she continues to suck the blood. My blood, your blood, the blood of the nation. It is the necessary sacrifice on which the Hag flourishes. Still through our blood we become part of the Hag; whether we like it or not, we are accountable. Therefore, we become complacent, we let the Hag take what she wants, or worse, we allow the Hag to absorb us completely.

There are some however, some, who refuse to be sucked, trying desperately to locate the skin before she gets to them. They struggle to purge the nation of the Hag by drawing out the blood from the flesh using the lime and salt of the earth. Lime and Salt- the traditional, distinctly 100% Bajan antiseptic.

Yet still, the skin cannot be found and maybe it never will.

The Hag has wisely left the skin at the crossroads knowing that when we arrive we will easily fall victim to our convictions, our righteousness, our certainty that we know which way to go, we know which road to take. And of course, we don't.

The Hag lives on.

So sure are we- that we know what's best- that we fail to look down and see the Hag's skin lying right there- at our feet.

The Masturbator of My Own Amusement

2007-02-24T14:42:00.000-05:00

Ending my 8 year boycott of Shitey Whitey's didn't do much to aid me in my quest for distraction. Surrounded by drunk white people tripping over drunk white people luridly"dancing" up on drunk white people spilling their drinks on me, I felt rather supercilious.

As I was standing at the bar, trying very hard to breathe a stranger promised, with a soft lingering handshake, that if I was willing, he would whisk me away to Pahrree. It was straight out of an OC episode with Henri Michel. "I be-leeve in des-tinee. I theenk you ahrr tres mysterieuse..." I have to admit, the french flavour of male bullshit amused me for awhile particularly when he went to fetch me a drink. As he passed it to me in a suave Euro manner I asked him in jaded Canadian if he'd drugged it and he grinned and answered unruffed "mais oui and when you drink it you will fall in luhve with me." I made him take first sip.

Then I went upstairs to pee and started a cat fight for the hell of it. A little girl was asking for a light from a friend of mine. I got in her face and asked her what she was doing with my man. "Girlfriend I'm just getting a light." "Well Don't." Her two little friends stepped in but I didn't back down. " "You very aggressive!" she snapped, "We ain't want you man." One asked me if I was from England and I said yeh. She feigned bravery, "I know you cyan't live in Bahrbadus cuz if you lived hayre you wouldn't be getting on like a cunt for a light. You're pretty but you're a CUNT!" Her hand actions were classic! I laughed and laughed and laughed.

How can one distract one's self from one's self by one's self?
Amidst the people seeking endorsement from each other, I wandered around the masturbator of my own amusement.

E.T. in for WCC

2007-02-21T20:40:00.000-05:00

Speaking of space- Have you all heard the word?- Barbados is now one of the few places on earth discernable from the outer limits by the naked eye.

Right there in the middle of that large blue mass identified as the Atlantic Ocean and clearly visible under a thick veil of brown dust is the distinct network of dented oil drums and orange cones we call home.

Absolutely ingenious, I say! If Cricket World Cup blows and Legacy turns out a pipe dream, we can market ourselves as the first official landing strip for UFO's-

ARTH-vad-UR

2007-02-20T00:07:00.000-05:00

Oh the comedy of the universe!

Is it just me or does the handle of that weed wacker Owen has so generously donated to the fringes look like a star wars light sabre? I had to fine tooth the caption to convince myself that it was in fact garden equipment and hence, not the super sonic space slayer I first perceived it to be. But the visual of my initial reaction just won't go.

There's our three times a charm man, sugar daddying the block community with $3000000 worth of photon beams.

It cracks me up!

The O-meister dressed head to toe in black plastic lustre, an aspirator hooked to his voice box, statuesque in front of one of our fine ghetto establishments, holding his very own weed wacking weapon and commanding all powerful "I am your father!"

-then sending his armies out to grow tomatos!

Even Should The Flowers Be Thrown At Our Feet...

2007-02-14T20:16:00.000-05:00

I witnessed romance in its purest form this morning when IZ decided he was going down die hard for Valentine's Day. He found a picture he'd coloured and wrote some I Love S's along the border. He folded it up and put it in an envelope addressing it to:/from:. Then he set out to the garden with a kitchen knife and cut out a few flowers requesting that I tie a ribbon around the bouquet. He put it in his school bag and set off with total confidence, having no concept of rejection yet at 6.
Sadly, romance in paradise was sabotaged.
No sooner had he offered his heart to the pretty little girl, the flowers were snatched from her grasp by a savage in school clothes, shredded and thrown at her feet.
Oh spite! Oh cruelty! How early you bare your ugly head!

We have a serious rodent problem in Barbados-t'is true.

While the four legged vermin scurry about contaminating stored food, the two legged parasites consume and pollute happiness and amity and love. What pleasure we get from our pudding and souse! How we thrive on each others misfortune!

You get a promotion- I get you fired. I build a house- you steal material. You find a love- I spread your secrets. I get flowers- you shred them apart.

We are so hollow- so lonely- on this little rock in the middle of the sea. We have only us and we drive us away with our resentment and fear and envy. We are weary of friendship; we are terrified of love; we wear scowls or fraudulent smiles to cover our pain and disgrace.

Tonight as Valentine's Day comes to a close, I take a page out of IZ's book. There comes a point when the leap of faith becomes critical to our humanity.

Even should the flowers be thrown at our feet let us have courage to trust. To say...I am so happy that we are friends and to make the words manifest by our actions.

Inter-Faith Jamboree

2007-02-13T22:48:00.000-05:00

I had mentioned that the dad called concerned that my blog was right wing fundamentalist insensitive and my life was becoming more and more precarious with every entry. He was bemoaning that the spread and influence of evangelicalism in Canada was moving swifter than the bubonic plague and I laughed that in that one department, we're ten steps ahead of them and happy to be of service. Remember Snozzle and the Grimsby Pentacostals, dad? Well they came back last week for a reunion tour. Seems they don't pull a crowd up north like they do here in BIM. We know quality entertainment.

I'm one of those parents that bring my kid late to school every day. I roll up with Prince blasting- compliments of my radio show feeling my needs- and drop the boy off in time to miss the greater portion of the morning praise. I pretend I can't press fast enough to make the bell but the truth is, I'm busy giving my son his morning lesson in theology. The teaching method is a passive one but IZ is catching on quickly. So when Snozzle returned he wisely inquired, "But why mummy- why do dey only always talk about Jesus? Jesus Jesus Jesus! Jesus Jesus Jesus! Always Jesus!"

Yesterday, the Nation printed a picture of a 600 pastey man parade of nerdy middle aged Canadians jumping for Jesus in Bridgetown. These Jesus Jesus Jesus fanatics are island hopping under the pretence that by acting shamefully obnoxious in sweaty short pants and straw hats, they are deseminating some kind of good news. It's a "working" vacation, if you qualify doing a Jesus congo line working, more than likely financed by the tithes of some fools left behind in the cold. It struck me however, that with all the talk about love and acceptance maybe these Christians wouldn't mind extending an invitation to the jamboree on a wider scale. Not to mention the tourist dollars we could rake in with my plan of inter-faith gesticulation.

To the 600 crazy Canadian fundamentalists let's add 600 Islam extremists in full hijab regalia, 600 wailing Jews with 600 peenee peenee hats, 600 Asian Budhists, 600 Wican Nudists and 600 Harry Krishna's with 600 tambourines. We'll have them jump and wave their way into our newly renovated Independence Square where we'll have prize winning contests like Which Team can Scream their Saviour's Name the Loudest or Who Can Balance their Scripture on their Head while Crossing the Swing Bridge?. We'll taste each other's sacraments and we'll sing a medley of Haleh Haleh songs and we'll laugh and hug and have a merry old time.

BTA- you gotta pick this up-

Mending the Code

2007-02-12T14:44:00.000-05:00

Thank you Nation newspaper for clearing the fog. I didn't fully grasp the meaning of 'breaking the code'. I vaguely knew it was about teenagers and phone sex but I took it to be more broad based and metaphorical. I was interpretating "breaking the code" to mean "finding the solution". Once again, my naïveté has hoodwinked me.
The break the code seminar seems to have been ironically literal. The objective was to educate parents that when our younger reflections discuss tea bags they aren't debating the quality of Twinnings versus Lipton nor when they go diving for pearls are they engaging in an exciting new nautical passtime for the aquatically talented. One man divulged that he brilliantly deciphered the girl next to him who "baked sweet bread and licked the icing" wasn't a pastry chef. He's a super smart guy. Because as Ms. Marshall keeps saying over and over and over- these girls are using "highly sophisticated" methods and frankly, I'm surprised they didn't invite some of those windtalkers to the meeting. Those cryptograms ain't easy!
Sadly, I've reached the age where I don't need to let my honey bunny know that the PAW (parents are watching). I can text any smut that I want and I earn enough money to pay for the words unabbreviated. But though sex is sanctioned for us adults there are a multitude of things that are not so acceptable and I think this whole code text thing has opened our eyes to the invaluable possibilities of an old sliparoo. Instead of using the mundane to express our sexual desires we can use sexual imagery to vent about the state.

Here are some of my codes:

Sucking C*ck = choking on the bullshit the go*ernment run med*a feeds us.
Sh*t or C*m Licking = suf*ering the inadequacies of ro*d or wat*r works.
Stroking Hairy B*lls = engaging in com*unity develop*ent.
Org*es = educati*nal seminars for moronic par*nts.
Bl*w Jobs = de*th by A&E
P*ssy Eaters = CSME and CWC enthusi*sts.
F*cked up the *ss = being charged $16.*9 for a half gallon of m*lk.

WUZ UP BFP!!!

2007-02-11T17:27:00.000-05:00

Daddy calls me up to talk about my blog and warn me against possible assassination threats. Amongst the usual daddy paranoia he reveals to me that not only am I included on the sidebar as link off Barbados Free Press (as I've just recently become aware) I am also in the actual texts making appearances in two headlines as I can tell. I read the little bits about me with much amusement. Kuh Dear, the people at Free Press think I need comfort!

Okay, granted at the end of July 06, I was on a raisinification mission but I promise you, I was far from a breakdown. Free Press reads:
"It has been a few weeks since I stopped by the Barbados blog Is there anybody out there?, so I was rather unprepared for how prolific our friend BIM has been recently…BIM is having a crisis as she approaches 30! Poor darlin’ actually wrote this…All of us should stop by Is there anybody out there and let BIM know that we still care. Shona…. Marcus says you are forbidden to read BIM’s blog. Way too Amazon!"

I can't recall having ever been called poor darlin' before nor qualified as Amazon and I dare say, I rather like both terms of endearment. Thanks y'all- that was hot!

Then more recently in January BFP reads:
"Our friend BIM at Is there anybody out there? had a rough day at the PTA fundraiser. Drop over and cheer her up!"

And now I'm just tickled because not only do I have friends over there but they're of the caring and concerned breed that recruit and assign their readership to extend to me their compassion.

So! I thought it only fair that I return the goodwill and give Barbados Free Press a WUZ UP!!!! with one of those really eager high fives that make the recipient slightly embarassed. I am really moved. I was griping just two days ago that I don't get that soft touch treatment the needy girls get all the while oblivious to the kind support being thrown my way over the blogosphere. And Shona, you can read me girl, I promise I won't bite and if Marcus has a problem there's room in the raisin box for one more. he he

Breakfast for the Babes in Bim

2007-02-10T15:53:00.000-05:00

Last week there was a public plea for government to feed the nation's children some breakfast.

It isn't really a question of poverty,"they" say. Parents have to leave house too early for work thus they don't have time to satsify the swallows.

Truly, getting to work in the morning is a daunting task. Traffic is excrutiating and every second road is under construction. To get from A to B means cutting through C only to find D has been closed. So we detour through E but get lost trying to find F and we weave and we wait, inching our way through the alphabet of chaos and potholes...

That's if we're lucky enough to have a car.

If we don't, we do the same- but as a passenger on a transport board bus with an added bonus of atleast an hour's wait at the bus stop, crossing our fingers at the sound of every diesel engine and making silent prayers that someone we know will pass by and take pity on us.

And as we embark on this glorious 5 am journey each morning, we are forced to leave the tea and toast to providence but alas Jesus Christ is too busy being called to the road rage- the children's belly grumbles are left unheard.

Until they get to school.

Then the growling and the yawning and the disinterest in the work stares those super interesting, highly creative and way informative teachers in the face. No matter how hard they try to make the morning praise a delight, the children do not get aroused. How frustrating it must be to know that a couple of bakes could have awakened the pupils to the majesty of possessive nouns! How ingenious that the decline in literacy could be easily remedied by a boiled egg or a fried plantain!

But woe and befoul those children who attempt to feed themselves! They were caught on camera less than a week after the breakfast blame, buying fish cakes from a street vendor after the bell had tolled. It's a good thing we've got school policy for such a blatant act of impertinence. Any child failing to make their own way through the alphabet of chaos and potholes and dare risk being tardy for a morsel of greasy flour shall be publically spurned and refused any and all entry to the school compound. That'll teach 'em!

Heart Attack

2007-02-07T14:32:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, late at night, after too many beers and a little prompting, you might get a Bajan man to whisper about the dreaded 'heart/hearse men'. As the story goes, back in the 70's -early 80's, after the sun had set and the streets grew quiet, mortal danger, in the form of a black hearse, cruised through rural villages searching for anyone on the road- in the dark- by themselves. From what I understand, whilst a lonely adult would meet the requirement, a child forlorn was the objecive. The vehicle would pursue the target, the heart men would pull the victim inside the hearse and then, they would cut the child's little heart out of their chest cavity as part of some cultic ritual.

The cutting out of hearts, particularly of our children, is still, 30 years later, very much an intrinsic part of Bajan social order. We don't wait for the cover of moonlight anymore. We have much more sophisticated surgical methods. We've learnt to stretch the process from infancy into adulthood, extricating the heart out bit by bit. In fact we've gotten so unashamedly good at it, that we've managed to convince the nation's psyche that the victim never had a heart to begin with so that after we've removed the heart, we get the added pleasure of our own moral superiority.

We steal $60,000.00 of court paid child support. We charge $16.99 for a half gallon of milk. We buy ourselves a shiny new four door with the money and we put you in front of the court for not having reflectors on your bicycle. We expell you from school at 15. We harass you, we belittle you, we crush your self worth. When you point your gun at an officer at 17, we do not hesitate to gun you down. You're street trash. A scourge on society. Send him off in the hearse! By the way, we caught your sister making sex videos on her cell phone. She's 13. We've been talking about her on the air but we're keeping her anonymous. At 13 she should know what seriousness sex is! Hell, we've been teaching her about it every crop over since she was born! She should know the consequences of her actions! She was, after all, the product of a sixteen year old mother! There's no excuses for her lascivious behaviour! Call her home to get ready for her "uncle", milk costs $16.99 for a half gallon, you know. Well of course she has AIDS at 19. She was nothing but a two bit whore. A scourge on society. Send her off in the hearse!
What's that? You've managed to survive your horrible childhood??!!! We'll just usher you to work through heavy traffic, with back biters and brow beaters who steal from the till, break in your car or just rob you of your ideas and myrth. If that doesn't rip your heart out, we'll spread wicked stories about you, sabotage your happiness, smile in your face and laugh behind your back...exploit you and generally fuck you over... One way or another we'll get you in that hearse!

I don't know 'bout the rest of you but I ain't letting no heart men get the better of me. With the state my road is in no hearse goin' bother come by me anyway. And just in case I'm wrong, I've forged my heart from the rattling chains of the steel donkey.

260 Thousand Times Redundant

2007-01-30T20:44:00.000-05:00

The other night I met a guy who's here on contract from the US of A to investigate possible terrorist threats during our hosting of World Cup Cricket. I told him, in more diplomatic words, that he needed to get his green paper cause he's about 260 thousand times redundant. I mean, this is BIM- all a we does spy 'bout hay- ain' nuh forner come tell we wu's wha'.
I could just see him at his desk, waiting for Cable and Wireless to be right there where he needed them, fixing his ADSL so he could surf through social security numbers and bank accounts. Meanwhile, everything about the terrorist- his plates, his dates, his rates- are being observed, collected, memorized and circulated by the little old lady next door. She then forwards it to the bigger younger ladies on the bus who pass it on to 'de bad men pon de block'. It then gets branched off to old rummy's who still want to be young and little boys trying to be old who in turn carry it to school so they can impress the little girls on the pasture all within earshot of the yard fowl. Before my man from the states can so much as type in the terrorist's name, every man, woman, child and animal from Bridgetown to Bathesheba knows what rice the terrorist prefers, the ring tone he uses, his briefs size, who he's fucking and how often he has a bowel movement. And by this time he's also got some infamous nickname- something really apt- like Osama de Flamma.

The Communicable Card

2007-01-28T22:09:00.000-05:00

It was quite a shocker to be told this blog has been added as a link on Barbados Free Press. I even went and checked for myself and yup, I'm there. I then dug through the archives of my brain to see how much damage I'd done myself- chuckling at the shit in my pig pen story- the water works dude- all a dat- and I've come to the conclusion that my readers could only want more of my sarcastically cynical yet highly entertaining Bajan intrigues because I certainly haven't been added for my bouts of melancholy reflection. The irony is that the intrigues are often what set off the melancholy- but anyway, on with the show.

If Bajan Bellyaching is what ya'll want - dats wha wunna goin' get. My mission, until I become too disgusted, is to focus on the stuff I try so desperatley to ignore so that I can do my little bit of fame justice and at the same time, satisfy your scary cravings for tales of Kocurkovo.

Tonight's gripe is with GAIA's parking 'system'

I roll up to the card dispensor and I'm thinking about the last episode of Top Inventor with the toilet seat couple who showed a slow motion poo germ explosion of what happens when you flush, even with the toilet seat down. I'm not generally a hypochondriac but the brown mushroom bomb of bacteria has engraved itself on my senses. So as the card shoots out, I'm thinking...how many people have used this card before me and how many have just pissed on the side of the road? I'm willing to bet that the statistics are equally high on both counts. I give the card a once over and check for stains.

I park. I wait. I holler at my son for rolling on the ground, touching up the poles, examining the soles of his feet, sticking his fingers up his nose and then sucking off the experience. He coughs- (the rain, of course)- I give him the card to hold.

I wait some more.

I'm ready to leave and as a well seasoned parking card user, I make my way with luggage and child to the Parking ATM adjacent to where I've skillfully parked the car only to find the money eater has been heavily scotch taped with a note that probably reads OUT OF ORDER but I translate -aloud- I HATE THIS AIRPORT AND THEIR STUPID CARDS!

I trudge back to the human being on the other side of Arrivals, on the other side of my car.

One dollar is paid for my convenience.

I trudge back to the Parking ATM, cross the road, get in the car and drive to the card eater. The card eater is not hungry. He tells me to go back and pay for my parking. I yell at card eater "I've paid for my parking you ass!" I put back in the card but the eater won't budge. I'd forgotten that when talking to machines you must mollycoddle them like men or they seize. I press assistance instead.

The human being asks me how much I've paid. I say "I now left you, I'm the one with the boy." The human being says, "just leave the card on top of the machine" and she graciously buzzes me out of Parking Prison. I place my card on top of a stack of cards and shudder thinking of the chaos that poor human being must have had to endure when the flow of traffic was heavy.

Now I admit, I'm not too bright but I can't figure out what, other than coat my hands with a film of bodily fluids thus making my parking experience in the Kocurkovo airport that much more social, was the purpose of the card. Does anyone know?

Slippery

2007-01-23T20:31:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I think I'd be better off in a cave.
To grow gills and hang out at the bottom of the deep.
Or sprout moss and get lost under a tree.
Maybe yet, a combination of all three.
Hard to catch a moss covered fish in the dark dot dot dot

Too Much Bajan Ruralism For Tired Bones

2007-01-21T07:29:00.000-05:00

After two long nights on the town in a stretch, massive amounts of driving and office work, a serious conversation, bad news about a baby and a near 6 hour turn men into horny, slobbering goats while boosting my ego session, I was too exhausted to stand.
I was supposed to put on a hairnet and dispatch grease balls to grease balls (or rather small, oily, fishless flour cakes to rum drunken, piss on their hands customers) but instead, I sat on the grass near the playground and found a drop of joy in the smiles of children genuinely happy to see me shouting "Auntie Nicole!!" and even bending down to throw their arms around my withered bones.

The PTA carry your own key session was just too much Bajan ruralism for me to endure in the condition I was in, however. Tracker is sweaty and shirtless, on his back, jucking the sky to calypso. Every sing song in between is a Celine Dion/Whitney monstrosity. Big boys are carrying around their babies proudly, scoping the dark park for the pusher man. Bigger women are standing up in clusters of bling watching like foreman and hollering at some child to behave.

It was fun. But not when the spirit's requirement is a bed.

I eventually got up and left when the cellphones started ringing and the country began to inform itself that (last update I received) two young boys smashed a truck on the black and white bridge in Blackman's corner and subsequently died. There was a hum of "yuh mean de young dark boy wid de plait hair?", "de boys dat does cyarry de grass?", "dat ain't dem truck- a man di give dem dat fuh drive.", "you pass down dere and see?", "Go' Lin' dere muss be bare people out dere, yeah."

There was no mallice in the way the information was passed and actually people looked kind of sorry but there was a definite sense that they would rather be there at Blackman's corner, catching a glimpse of the wreckage before two sons carried them away than in the park supporting a PTA fundraising event. And I decided, if they would rather be there than here, I can go home. And I did.

Right Hay When You Want Dem

2007-01-16T20:57:00.000-05:00

The lapse has been long, I know. I have been preoccupied somewhat and impeded somewhat more. What could possibly impede me from sharing with my readership the tales of life in the sun, one may ask? Well…in part…rain. But not rain exactly rather the brain drain that rain summons in a land run by kocurs.

Be direct- you demand. I shall try.

The latest kocurs come in the form of Cable and Wireless, our telephone dictators, who dangle us by the balls as they force us to listen to the calypso rendition of how they’ll be right here when we want them for a minimum torture period of 20 minutes each call. I have had to endure over an hour of how they’ll be right here when I need them- and of course- they are not.

The rain.

Every time it rains my phone begins to crackle getting progressively worse until it cuts off entirely. I called them early to correct the fault but of course, they didn’t rush and my phone went off. It was only when I pleaded that a lonely house with no phone is a danger waiting to happen, that they fixed it- that was today- a mere week after the problem began. So my phone should be working.

It should-but it is not.

Once the phone was repaired I was subsequently soft disconnected which means I cannot dial out. Although I have paid my bill, apparently I should have known better than to do so at the no line-up country post office. Ah me! No line of course means that everybody besides me knows that the post office doesn’t have a good working relationship with the phone company. I should have known better, the C&W operator informed me. In future, just because the bill says I can pay at the post office doesn’t mean that I should pay at the post office.

So you mean to tell me, I start, that I must pay for a service that does not work with a bill that has not arrived in a timely manner and still pay for my mobile bill which has had to work extra hard for the loss of my land line and my internet service which I cannot use whilst ensuring that when I pay, I do so in a location that is both awkward and time consuming so that when my phone actually does work, it will not be cut off?

Basically yes.

'We will reconnect your phone shortly', I am told. 'What is shortly?' I ask. 'In a few minutes', I am told. 'Is it on now?' You ask.

Of course not.

I spend another 20 minutes listening to how Cable and Wireless will be right here when I want them just to be told the very same thing by another very stoic operator.

And still one week and 24 hours later I am without phone.

(Please note that this blog was originally typed and saved on word to be cut and pasted on this blog a mere one week and 30 hours later.)

Is there anybody out there?

2006-12-30T11:55:00.000-05:00

The year ends like Tolkein's first two thirds. I ask the question once more, "is there anybody out there?"
Is there anybody out there that respects present day mythology? Is there anybody out there that acknowledges that God is the ultimate character and God's Plan is not Fate, and Fate is not Irony, and Irony is not Coincidence? That this IS- THE- story?
Is there anybody out there that sees the cosmic humour and the human horror of the Godfather of Soul sleeping through Chistmas while Saddam takes Berlioz into the New Year? But mostly, Is there anybody out there that centres themself in the midst of this story and laughs demonically at their location, while the concentric circles of their experience dance to the light of the moon?
I'm not being poetic and I'm not being cryptic, I'm asking a question that can only be affirmed Yes if it is wholly understood without explanation.
This is MY story and I'm still so torn bewteen fear, embitterment and awe. Life is Grand but oh what a life to be waiting for Frodo's success.

The Chains That Seperate The Men From The Boys

2006-12-20T21:31:00.000-05:00

I spent every lunch hour in middle school at the plaza "illegally". I had to wait for the lunch lady who side lined as a 'Brick' Commercial star to make her way out to pasture so I could step over the chain link and scurry to the KFC. Not that I'd ever buy any. I was just too cool to hang out with the hyenas and the nintendbimbos. The walking in a 10 man parallel line or circular multi-faced amoeba was nauseating to me. I prefered liming at the plaza solo and exchanging flirty remarks with Joey from the neighbouring highschool because Joey's brother, who was my age, hated it.

I was cool. I got invited to every one of the hyena and nintendbimbo parties. As much as they usually despised me, they never left me out. And I went, spending the night slow dancing with one of Mikey's friends -the only outsiders to our upper middle class french immersion school mixed parties. Looking back, I should have paid more attention to Mikey himself - did he ever turn out fi-i-ine!

But here's the thing, because I believed myself so hardcore and managed to make the cool crowd believe it too, I was able to keep the nerdiest kids close without their nerd factor actually rubbing off. Sweet little rat face, two years my junior, who brought me a bag of batteries for my walkman just because I was nice to him. Adorable David from the "retard" class who would run and hug me when we passed in the yard. Losers from my own year, whose full names I remember with total clarity- Dhooki, Roopnarine, Buttersingkorn, Ostrovski- because I took the time to acknowledge them. Yes, anyone uncool, I treated with great sensitivity.

The cool ones well, I was not so kind. I threw poutine at Kristy in the public transport bus, I had the morning t.v. news zoom in on a picture of Lauren and referred to her as a "canine familiaris". I flirted with their boyfriends, I was insulting and condescending and basically treated them with a carefree contempt. I was a cool kid terrorist.

It seems to me that as we've aged, the nerds have turned out super cool and the cool ones not so much. It certainly explains why I liked the nerds then and why I don't much like the nerds now. Here I am going on 30 and I'm still so much a loner stepping over the chains that seperate the men from the boys...

dot dot dot

The Tragedy of The Elipses

2006-12-18T16:03:00.000-05:00

...I find the dot dot dot to be the most morose of punctuation marks...it lends to an exhalation that seeks breath in the following sentence...where in fact it is not.
The dot dot dot is sign that while the thought continues it has in fact already faded...there is no hope with the elipses...it always ends in nought. Some may say it enables the flow of conversation but actually, used excessively, it leads the reader on a deserted road where they must find their own way in a lonely lonely world of no possibilities. The dot dot dot is melancholy...

Santa Sabotage

2006-12-12T18:27:00.000-05:00

IZzy told me "mum, you is a liar!"
IZ don't call me that and what are you talking about?
Santa ain' real! You does wrap de presents when I sleeping and you does put dem unda de tree. And reindeers don' fly neida!
Who told you that??!!!!
My teacha! She tell we 'dat we parents is who's Santa and wunna buy de presents and hide dem and den you does take dem out at night.

I had to do some serious back backing to make the boy believe in Santa again with a speech that went something like,

Reality is relative. Do you want to live in a world with fairies and giants and dragons and trolls and Santa and the Easter Bunny or do you want to live in a world with none of them? IZ says he wants to live in a world with Santa. So believe in Santa then. Your teacher wants to live in a boring world with boring things and that's why Santa doesn't bring her any presents.

Miss Kill-Joy Lovell's poison bomb was defused.

Neurotic Knot

2006-12-12T10:56:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I was told by a professional character analyst that my neurotic knot is one of control. I am obsessed with having control and yet I like it when others try to control me. This psychological tug of war has me in a lock. It will not allow me to be free and freedom is what I truly desire above all else. "Take Control! Be Free!"

I confess, I do have control issues particularly with regards to men.

I didn't really contemplate just how bad they were until I found myself getting somewhat irate and deeply frustrated that the damn man was trying to control me with his fucked up control mumbo jumbo while at the same time being strangely attracted to the control his 'control' theory gave him.

I'm not sure I want to explore this neurotic knot- I think poking at it might just strangle me.

Ghetto Golf 2006

2006-12-07T09:59:00.000-05:00

Having found repeated tyre tread marks in the freshly cut and very wet grass, Ricky set up a spy network to source who is out to smite his effort.

See, with this heavy rain, the tyres left big ugly grooves on the lawn, a lawn he has become VERY particular about.

Then a new discovery! He went out to pretty up by the cart road only to get tied up on banana stems strewn about. Literally tied, as the pieces of banana tree wrapped themselves around his whacker string.

He is now convinced that the banana hawker is out to deliberately sabotage him. To teach her a lesson, he has placed 'flags' (stakes of rod iron with pink plastic bags tied to the top) all around the grass to test whether she will disobey his bold sign of caution.

The lawn now looks like a ghetto golf course just in time for World Cup Golf. I'm gonna lure Tiger Woods away from Sandy Lane and set him to play a few rounds with the road works crew. You can purchase your Ghetto Golf 2006 tickets from any one sitting by the side of the road drinking rum and cursing loudly.

The World of Drunken, Sunken Souls

2006-12-01T09:41:00.000-05:00

I am still having trouble relating to the fact that I have embarked on a journey of the social callender. Some may find this hard to believe, what with me being so damn fly and interesting, but truth be told, I hibernated through those 'college years' finding peace in the company of monkeys and goats and IZ and Self. I never did dates. I don't know about all night binges and keg paties. As my Unknown Souljah would say, "I lacked social skills".

Suddenly, everything is different. One night I'm meeting Shackles at Opa's after a horrible lecture (supposedly) on the Old Testament and the next minute I have to check my diary to see what I can swing. It's weird.

I feel like a visitor in my new life. I am not yet comfortable here. I often think the shadows were more honest. But I check myself. I'm still in my twenties and shit if I don't get out now then when?

So I make the necessary investments for sociability. I get my hair done. I spend more than I need to on clothes. I re-introduce my body to cigarettes and alcohol. I learn to operate on less sleep. I argue with my smarter self that this is all part of the program- if you're in for a penny- you're in for a pound. I argue with my dummer self that this is all illusion so what in the end, does it really matter?

As I dive into this forgotten world of drunken, sunken souls I realize a few thing:
1) I am sickeningly lucid.
2) I am disgustingly nonchalant.
3 I am nauseatingly empathetic.

and as such

4) I inevitably end up listening to someone's spirit sing.

I don't know how to put on that tightened nasal voise and I can't muster false enthusiasm. Perky is downright painful. Nevertheless. The social world embraces me. It's long been straved for a cool compassion and two ears that truly don't give a fuck.

Bearing Bullshit

2006-11-23T15:33:00.000-05:00

My mole has had the tank relocated to the school joining the road works crew who'd been moved some time earlier. Now they huddle together in the corner watching the clouds and smelling each other's farts. The road has been left a complete diaster and apart from the debushing nothing has been done about the burst main but oh! what a show. The Pomp. The Circumstance.

Our government is on a new kick- some pseudo-born again, return to old time values-family first agenda. The Moral Road is being rammed down our throats with the usual Jesus references being thrown in for flavour. The problem is this island is just too small to hide how this new found morality is being applied to our leaders' personal lives. I'm privy to enough of our government's private affairs to give me a feeling oddly similar to when you eat too much popcorn, candy and soft drink while sitting through a lousy double feature in an uncomfortable chair.

And the apathy of this country has infected me. I make my little jokes but they end with a don't-carish shug of the shoulders that says "what can I do about it?". I'm returned to grade 10 math class where we were determined to stage a much needed walk-out on Mr. McCarrell yet remained firmly seated to our chairs. All I could do was leave a dirty piece of anonymous poetry at the bell.
Solve for Y, Solve for X, I look at you and think of sex.
Sex was of course the last thing anyone would think of when it came to Mr. MC.

But I digress,

I mentioned that this place is a Circle Game. Of late these circles are getting smaller, so faster, and I'm getting dizzy. I've always had problems with motion sickness but now this queazy feeling that I'm going to hurl won't go away. And no. I'm not pregnant with child but yes I'm pregnant with bullshit and since it's the only meal around here there appears to be no hope of bearing anything but that.

RIP Suzanne

2006-11-20T17:30:00.000-05:00

And from Kocurkovo we return to Dogter Kovorkian-
This place is an honest to God, Circle Game and carousel of time.

Truly, I am sometimes in absolute awe of my own strength of endurance.

The last of my dogs was found dead.

This time some Sperminal Spawn of Satan took it upon himself to chop out the ass of my dog and leave her for dead in the grass.

Poor Suzanne was about the mildest most pathetic dog I have ever had the sad privilege of condemning to death.

I was explained by one who knows of such things, that her murderous torture was probably her punishment for her trying to steal the fertility "strength" of the pure bred pitbull below. The owner of the "good dog" would surely not let my bitch get away with canine rasinification. Her vile castration was likely her final lesson on where she stands in the doggy caste system.

Sounds sickeningly familiar.

Water Works Get the Slavic Wrath

2006-11-16T09:43:00.000-05:00

Back to Idiot Village.

Idiot Village now has a name. It's 'Kocurkovo', pronounced kotsoorkovo, and it means male pussy village (which is really very appropriate if you are fortunate enough to know any male pussies).
I felt it wise that the name be in Slovac because whenever the kocurs come they will and do get the experience of Baba's full blown Fury. My mother does not suffer fools.

Yesterday's kocur came in the person of fat, dumpy, gross man driving a big tank with scoup. "Oh...like de one's 'pon de ABC Highway mummy..." Yes IZ.

Kocur drives into the yard in a white pick-up and parks to count the clouds and smell his own farts. My mother comes out to see who he is. He's with water works. The main's burst again. He'll be excavating.

Of course, after 11 years, you know better than to be informed, let alone asked, if a thousand ton machine can roll into your backyard and tear away your land. But Kocur does make a request. Can he go through the back behind the new house being built? "No, says mums, take the truck through the front gate and come down like you always do."

Well, in Kocurkovo that translates as "Do whatever you'd like" and so fat, dumpy, gross man goes through the back, behind the new house and spends the day excavating our rock.

This morning, Ricky goes out to investigate. The spring water pipe (our only source of water because the BWA thinks we drink air), is burst in two places having had the thousand ton tank roll on top of it all day. I sometimes wonder why water works doesn't put a question mark behind the name. As in, your water works? Don't worry we'll fix that.

Good man that Ricky is, he mends the pipe and comes in to gripe as to why mums let the man drive through the back.

My mother was not what you'd call amused. She smoked herself patiently until Kocur returned. He came just as I was leaving for work. Ricky went first (good cop) "So why yuh had tuh drive tru de back dough? Yuh bus up de spring wadda pipe." Kocur takes out his penis and without turning from Ricky (and mums marching 3 feet behind)pisses on the the grass, zips, and replies that he wasn't told 'bout no pipes.

That was it. The Fire Raged. (Bad Cop) I don't have to give you an explanation of my life. I told you don't drive behind the house and you still do whatever the hell you like. You Kocurs think you can come in here like it's your very own water works yard!!! And on and on.

"Who sent you to do the work?"
"I dohn know- I forget he name?"
Why didn't you come through the gate like I told you?
"De truck did too big."

OK. My mother cooled off a little, I mean if the truck's too big it's too big. But wouldn't you know? Water Works have gotten their hands on some fine ass machinery because apparently all you need to do is press a button on the dash and the tank squeezes to half the width.

Kocur rolled the maginficent tank in through the gate and went down the hill to see how many more Neem trees he could devastate.

Real. Really? Fuh Real.

2006-11-15T10:52:00.000-05:00

What is Real?

In part the question is prompted by a blog I was reading about being "Real" on the first date. (http://memoirsofadater.blogspot.com/)

In part it goes back to Friday night, when having escaped the clutches of my bodyguard, I went out alone and was told I was 90% fake.

In part it goes back to a conversation I had with a recently turned warm and fuzzy friend about love and emotions being real because I take the time to convince myself of it.

In part it goes back to a theory I shared with my boss:
"People are only "real" in so far as they're real for you. As soon as they leave your mind, they disappear until you bring them back to recall. When I leave work and you forget about me, I'll cease to exist."
(Dear heart says, "I don't forget about you- You're too important to me!!!" kuhdear, who wouldn't want a boss like that?)

For me "Real" is fluid. It's what's real today- right here, right now. And if tomorrow it changes it doesn't mean yesterday's real was superficial- it just means today's real is new and exciting.
For me "Real" is the coincidences (if they can be called that). The common theme that runs through the period- like the theme of real is for me at this time. It's the words between the lines of the writing on the wall. So hard to see because they are so so obvious.
For me "Real" is whatever I want it to be. Not the I of the ego but the I of the superego (God, I hate these psycho terms). Put it differently. As long as your God- the God that is your reality, is comfortable with your perspective of "Real", it is as much.

I refuse to subscribe to the idea that "Real" is only the most common, most comfortable or most accepted us. No- I'll keep my "Real" real and manipulate it however I please.
And if my "Real" is for you, "Fake" then forget about me and I'll cease to exist. And if the "Real" you is not fabulous enough just shake it up and watch the snow fall.

Driving Miss Crazy

2006-11-13T18:28:00.000-05:00

I got my license late in life. My mother never had one and for too long I was following in her footsteps. I listened to the brow beaters when they told me how dangerous the road is and how I'd make a lousy driver. Then my boss, bless her heart, insisted and paid and pushed and forced me to claim my freedom. Now she has me driving everywhere. I don't refuse- partly because I hardly refuse anyone who asks something of me but also because I love being on the road by myself. It is the only time I take for me. Saturday I was on the road from 10-6. I burnt almost $70 in fuel. Today I 'purposely' got lost in Indian Ground trying to 'short cut' to Mount Brevitor.
But driving by myself is also driving myself crazy. I have these long drawn out conversations with me where I over analyze and castigate myself. I second guess decisions, I yell at me for the way I feel. And the more driving I do, the more nuts I become. And the worst part is, even after a long long day on the road- where my back is stiff and my neck is shot and a headache is begging for attention, I still itch to get back in the car.
It seems that with every new nook I find on this pebble in the sea, I find a new cranny in my psyche. People worried I'd get in accidents but I worry I'll become one myself. I'll either drive myself right off the cliffs of insanity or need a tow to Black Rock.

My Mole

2006-11-12T19:28:00.000-05:00

I would like to say a special hello to my mole. I don't know who you are but you know I mean you so hey! What's up?

When my family first moved to BIM I had lots of moles. Moles reading every piece of mail with our address then sealing it back with tape and a big stamp claiming 'damaged'. I had moles on the road with little note pads scribbling away the times I came and went, what I wore, how much weight I'd gained. I had moles that would drop by under all kinds of pretexts, asking all kinds of questions, making all kinds of reports...I was inundated with moles.

Of course, those moles were there to check us out. I mean what kinda crazy white people ship their family to the third world to raise chickens? Once they discovered that we were exactly that interesting they set about finding someone else to investigate. Every once in awhile they pop their heads out. I wave. I'm still exactly that interesting.

But now, now I have my very own personal blog mole who reads and responds with enviable subtlety. I am impressed. For example:

I write about the licensing authority- the paper writes about it same week and then the L.A. gets overhauled.
I write about the roller- the roller gets taken away the very next day and hasn't come back since.
I write about the snails and the paper takes that too only they white wash it 'cause Lord knows they wouldn't dare have worm say anything bad about WCC (and in the process cut the humour in half).

I am really quite flattered and if such a mole exists- one that actually has the power to make changes based on my bullshit- then I will do my utmost best to provide you with as much as possible and maybe you all can actually run this fly speck island with some kind of efficiency. So Mr. Mole, please don't get scared off by my sleuth work, I actually enjoy having you here. Now why don't you see about that driveway at St. Elizabeth Primary? Your government sponsored mosquito breeding splash ponds are absolutely ridiculous.

Don't Believe The Hype!

2006-11-09T10:30:00.000-05:00

I don't know where Yahoo gets its facts...
Invasion of snails in Barbados, my foot! (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061108/ap_on_fe_st/snail_invasion_1)
All of them have been properly approved by the Immigration Department and have been issued valid work permits.
How else are we goin' get all de wo'k do for World Cup?

Boycott of Blog

2006-11-08T09:07:00.000-05:00

I've been boycotting my blog.
My readers are far too silent.
I know not every post deserves a rah rah but it's really starting to feel like I'm writing to myself. I mean raisin utopia...that is not something to be silent about. And then I get these little snippy comments about how busy I must be or if I've had time to post anything as yet. I find it a bit ironic that you all want me to believe I have no readers and still expect me to keep writing. I don't need to write to create masterpieces. I am very well skilled in talking to myself.

This last week I've saved all my thoughts for me with the exception of a few little e-mails that I could not resist. I found that talking to me was a lot more responsive than writing to you. And every now and again my God jumps in with something hillarious and the three of us have a great time (me, myself and I that is).

So! I refuse to disclose my convictions about historical time versus Mythological Time and the implications it has on gender relations. I will not tell you how Pierson O'Brien and I had a good time scaring little kids in a basement with the help of Winston Hall's murder victim. I will not share how breasts can be made to look super disgusting if you pump them up by using your forearms. I refuse, I will not tell, I won't share.

The Sky is Falling

2006-11-01T09:32:00.000-05:00

I woke up to Halloween with Michelle's prophesy of doom.

'The Sky is Falling - The Sky is Falling'

The electricity is off, the radios don't work, there's no signal on the cell phone...

Creepy.

Our dog is missing and I get blamed because I suggested she get a chance to run 'bout after being chained for so long.

I drive the kids to school, go to work and still the electricity is off - In Town!?!

It's an island wide black out and shut down. Stores, Banks, Parliment- everything closed!

When the current does go back on, I get a call from IZ's school to come back for the kids because the school meals truck is not delivering and there's nothing to feed the swallows.

I leave work and the electric gates at the only port of entry/exit have seized and will not open by force. The override key was dropped in the mail slot of the lady who protects it when the current went back on. Now she's gone out and there's no way to open it. I sit in a line of cars which includes some Welch dudes trying to catch their flight but who are now forced to wait in self-imprisonment (such as the gated community and jobs on army bases are)until the manager lady drives half cross town to come with spare.

I am freed, pick up the kids, mom's yoga class is cancelled "everything is crazy today!" her student bemoans. (It's not just me...)

I start to cook, when Michelle calls-

She's slid down Horse Hill, hit a truck and busted her front bumper and light. She's fine.

Dinner on hold, I drive up Horse Hill to check on her, get more of an earfull about dog and blow all fuses. If wrath could be personified it was I.

But what, pray, could possibly have caused the island to whack out???

A monkey.

Yes, the evening news reports that a monkey was seen jumping on the box prior to it being blown, in the Whitehall area. But here's the thing, one million billion volts went through that monkey "who's had the shock of his life" (you're so funny, news people) and no monkey corpse can be found. Want to know my theory?

It was Koko.

Halloween brought his little spirit back to life so he could set about f-ing up the place for awhile.

(incidentally, lost dog will join Koko in next year's bruggadung. She was found this morning in the flowers.)

Raisin Utopia

2006-10-30T21:02:00.000-05:00

Those who have been fortunate enough to hear my raisin utopia must have come to one of two conclusions- either I'm kidding around, trying to get a laugh/negative attention or I'm one crazy bitch. I assure you, although, I may have been a little over-the-top with some of the assembly line, fat kids with bad teeth imagery, I am far too self-absorbed to care about anyone's reaction. No folks, I was dead serious about the heart of the matter - raisin heaven pretty much sums up how I view the Kingdom of God. I guess Crazy Bitch is in order, your honour.

When I ran through the concept with my boss, she laughed from the belly and called me a black widow spider, this was minutes before I was asked to stop cutting off a certain set of balls (I'll save you for first box if it makes you feel better).
I will admit that from the outside looking in, I have painted a self-portrait that could appropriately be entitled 'The Castrater'. I am "intimidating", "scary" even and while I find it fun, fun, fun- it's not really the interpretation I was seeking. I have rethunk. Perhaps I have been a wee bit harsh. A revision of utopia is wanted if it pleases the court.

I shall keep the keagle muscles, the sucking out of all boyish myrth, the womb as filter and the energizing of my spirit with the souls of those that need purging. I maintain that the shriveling up to litte raisins is absolutely essential and the conveyor belt and packaging is a fairly suitable analogy for what we vagina weilders have had to go through. I will take out the "Happy Halloween" stamp and the Aunt Jahmima logo- my intent was never to be racially or religiously discriminatory- and I will replace them with something more neutral like "cheers" with a sunflower. Oh! I will also include a fortune so that each box may provide not only mystery but a good old fashion piece of advice.

Next, scrap the fat boys with bad teeth, they'll be in a box themselves soon come (which incidentally, will require a mechanism something like a breast pump to suck manually because lets face it- who's gonna want to do some of that and we sure as hell don't want a world with nothing but fat, smelly, ugly guys)and instead, send the boxes to Africa or South East Asia or somewhere else with starving little children. Each raisin will be cherished and honoured as they help to restore and sustain once dying innocents. The fertilizer will then be used to plant more food and grow some of the most beautiful and medicinal plants the world has ever seen.

Once this has been realized, I will release my superhuman powers to shine the light of now purified souls over the world, a light from which none will ever wish to avert their eyes. And our own sons will respect the wombs that bore them as they were never able to before and our own daughters will bask in the glory of what they may now become.

As the light blankets the earth all will bless the day of the coming of the raisins and those who once thought me to be nothing but a castrater will understand the required sacrifice for the glory of the greater good and they will wink knowingly when they see me pass.

I realize that some soon-to-be-rasins may not wish to go along and although the idea of force is tempting it is not really my style. To correct this theoretical problem- utopic shriveling men to raisins sex will be the man's only means to multiple, wowwer than wow orgasms; a way to feel 100 fold better than ever fathomed. Men will not only agree to be raisins but they will line up for the experience.

Now which woman can envision raisin utopia without writing her very own mental list of first pickings?

the defence rests

Read This

2006-10-26T09:53:00.000-05:00

‘I always read you’ I heard it said and I found the ambiguity so hilariously apropos that it has required quite a bit of thought to suitably respond. Still now, I find my finger very near the backspace as I snicker, then frown, then laugh and shake my head in utter disbelief. Ah so you read me, this blog, these bits of scrap that I throw out for my own personal satisfaction. I am flattered that you find ‘me’ worth reading. I sometimes read myself and I wonder why anyone would care to spend those few minutes moving the eyeballs from left to right in order to hear my tripe. And I say tripe because I feel no ways to readily admit that the large portion of my writing is drivel. I am faithfully committed to it- and as there is very little I’m faithfully committed to- this in itself speaks volumes.
But I digress…you read me. Yes honey, you read my blog or rather, because I can only guess the full scope or identity of my readership, I must take you at your worm. But you want to know what I really think? You must if you always read me. lol.

I think you don’t.

That was just you trying to be cute in a could-have-been-awkward situation. But let me clarify; even if you had passed your eyeballs (behind a pair of sexy nerd glasses no doubt) from left to right you did not read me, you’ve never read me. What you’ve been reading, is a poppy-cock blog. You never wanted to read me, you never could have read me even if you had wanted and to believe anything otherwise- well that would just be even more nonsensical than the blog itself. I must applaud you for the poli-polish you seem to have acquired in the trade but spare me it, please. If you have read any of me surely you must know that I am not your average woman.

Little Children and Bare Stress

2006-10-23T10:50:00.000-05:00

IZ and O quarrel all the time. On the way to school this morning O had a sword and was jucking IZ in the guts. IZ had no weapon to retaliate. Envy lends to tattle tales and so of course, IZ took it upon himself to whine "mommy...Ocean bringing a sword to school!!" I look through my rearview at them and a plastic rainbow sword near takes off my neck.
"Ocean!! Put that sword down!!! You are not to carry toys to school!!!Toys are to be left home. Next time don't bring any toys in my car."
Ocean, a mere 3 years, retorts in full Bajan accent, "Next time- I gine put de toy in my bag!"
Wouldn't you know, when we get to school Ocean hasn't got a bag.

He's left it on the couch at home.

Roller Reunites with Roadworks in Idiot Village

2006-10-20T15:12:00.001-05:00

My driveway is now the official parking lot for a Ministry of Transport and Works road roller. It's been parked under my window for a couple months and it has become the boys' favorite outdoor toy. (They climb on up and mock drive it like one of those cop cars in Chefette Wildey.) Whether the road works crew use the roller or not I can't be sure. I saw it moved but once. That was at about 2 in the morning when a very loud, ginormous truck rolled in through the gates and lifted said roller on its back to have its flat tyre fixed. She was then brought back home the next morning, tyre repaired, to resume her post guarding the frangipani tree. "Yuh mean, I gotta let out de air in dese tyres tuh get dis move from hay?", asks Ricky.
With the amount of road repair going on in the island, one might consider this roller reststop a gross waste of productivity but considering road works have knocked up a little board house in the bush, have found a waterhole in my freezer and a toilet in the pig pens, it actually makes perfect sense that their vehicles should join them behind God's back in this idiot village.

Like Anywaayz What-Evehr

2006-10-18T22:01:00.000-05:00

The critics (who never leave any messages) have accused me of using too many big words and writing about not fun things. Recall that my Gloria project -step 1. toward taking over the world is to improve the vocab so I can out-mouth them but ok anything to please my fans... This blog is a dedication to the office dead head who's so bored she's going to take a 6 month vacation to an Afghan army base. It is an attempt to make-up for the exegesis/eisegesis blog prior which I have been told, sucked but which I have also opted not to scrap because dude, that's what I study, that's what I do and that's all I know.

So ok like I went to St. Winnie's today and like I got some books from this old lady who's the president of the PTA or something but anyways, I told her right? that my sister like she used to go there and she made the teachers so mad 'cause she would go to Shitey Whiteys and the Boat Yard and come to school with the stamps on her hand the next morning right? and she would wear her skirt like totally above the knees and the teachers wanted her to get in trouble with our mums or whatever and they like totally tried to set her up and mums wrote them back this letter like "My daughter can't like come to school 'cause she's too busy injecting heroin and getting prego from drug lords" but like she was so good at school that she could party all night and get super drunk and then write a cxc and like totally ace it. So I tell the old lady my sisters name is on all the walls and they like totally hated her 'cause she was smarter than their kids or her kid or whatever and the old lady said something about bad examples and HIV.
So ok like now my sister graduated from like a U F T or something and she must have drank harder and worn her skirt shorter or something 'cause like now she don't know english no more but thats ok whatever I mean like between Afghani rebels and American soldiers she won't need to know any english anyways.

National Pride Unfeathered

2006-10-18T10:32:00.000-05:00

Rumours of replacement pelicans to a pond of the north have helped to ease the sorrow of last week's pelican murder.

Dear Little School Boys

I know hitting birds with rocks is second nature for your prepubescent little brains but let me make a small suggestion.

Hit a few black birds (they scared the crap outta my Koko), a wood dove maybe (I've hit a few with my car), hell come to my yard where the big boys get off shooting those foul shitting pigeons with riffles.
Or hey, hit an egret- they spread ticks. Or a chicken- a chicken's good- we can eat it after.
But please, please leave the pelicans.
It's a national embarassment to kill our only single solitary national bird at home base.
Now that Pelys cousins have come to mourn him- leave them be. Use those rocks and that testosterone to lick down a few cocks instead. I know plenty that could use a good whack to the head.

Thanking you in advance for your kind consideration.

Row the Roses

2006-10-16T15:07:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I watched Chitty Chitty Bang Bang on cable. I haven't seen it since I was a kid. Funny how it's not the same movie anymore. Like who knew the old dudes were singing "grow the roses" and not "row the rowses" espeacialy in light of the fact that they were all holding oars and buoys.
What's strange is how experience colours the way we internalize a story. IZ says "Mummy, you know, Lost is so stupid. How they could be in the jungle and still living in a big nice house?" 'tis true-'tis true.
One of the things that nauseates me about acadaemia is this masculine fetish for all that is supposedly objective and exegetical. I happen to like eisegesis seasoned with subjectivity. It's a lot more honest isn't it? and it does away with the bullshit of "transparency" in the prologue where scholars spew their my-space profile in an attempt to expose their personal bias up front and personal like that will somehow make them more impartial. Who determined that reading out of something is better than reading in to it? Who said there was any difference betwixt the two? As I see it- it's a dialogue and whoever wrote the thing has no more rights to the story than I do. It all boils down to who is the authority- objectivity in scholarship is a notion that is founded on the belief that the only view that is valid and untainted is the one held by the white well-to-do male who's piggy backed off of a long line of white well-to-do males and have have had the monopoly on Truth passed on to them as if it were a fraternity handshake.
Because here's the thing, now I know that the words are "grow the roses", I still acknowledge the ironic homonymous onomatopoeia in the pantomimed rowing of aforementioned old dudes with oars and no one can tell me it's not there.

Sourcing Souls from Idiotville

2006-10-12T11:15:00.000-06:00

I had another 'I hate Barbados' moment yesterday when I attended a Town hall meeting on the upcoming Bathsheba Heritage Festival.

This is BIM

Legacy Barbados with World Cup 2007 have implemented a community project using Bathsheba as the guinea pig under the premise that tourists are not just looking for nice beaches anymore- they want to experience 'we culcha'... our culture. So- they've organized a festival for Independence Day in Bathsheba celebrating all that is Barbadianna. Nature walks, Food and Drink, Cultural Shows, Picture displays, Treasure hunts you get the picture. They've also pledged to make it green (good luck to them).

It is supposed to be an opportunity for residents in Bathsheba to have first dibs of stalls, jobs, etc... to which they(Legacy) are coughing up half of the bill to rent the stall, doing the set-up and the security and the clean-up and the marketing and the bussing in of tourists and the promotion of individual businesses and products. Sound Good?

To me it did. Ok. You make a few fish cakes and they bring in 1500 people to potentially buy them. Good money for one day- very little effort required.

Here's how it went:

A flyer about the meeting was sent to every house in the area. I say every house but really every adult 'cause I got two in mine. When the meeting started there were two people there. My sister and my self.

Ah Community Apathy how well I know you from the PTA.

But then, we did get a couple of residents in.

Angry as the fires in hell about copywriting of the name 'Bathsheba Heritage Festival' and exploitation of the residents and their culture and the ramifications of World Cup and "soon from now we won't be able to walk down the street" and you people want to come in here and take over and profit off of us and stomping foot and pointing finger and puffing chest and witholding names. It was so juvenile.

Poor poor dude who came to explain the festival- doesn't he yet know that when there's room for anything except apathy in this country it's contention, derision, jealousy and negativity?

The evening culminated nicely in the appearance of drunk asshole who came in to "bre'k up this meeting" because he has a beef with the Chair of Legacy over parking. (He doesn't own a car, mind) Upon seeing Michelle and I maternally comforting the wounded idealism of the Chair's protege, he bellowed out my most favorite Babadian argument for anything from cookware to cockfights:
"Those white bitches come from away and tink dey can come hay and slave 'bout de people dem. I born hay. I 100% Bajan. Dey want going to fuck long what part dey come frum."
(His father is a white foreigner, of course)

Ah Barbados...Why are you so hung up on sourcing your souls from Idiotville?
Will I ever be able to stomach the spiteful mentality of your offspring?

Somewhere Under de Rainbow

2006-10-10T08:58:00.000-06:00

Yesterday the brightest rainbow I ever did see was in full arc over my property. And it wasn't alone- another fainter rainbow sprawled over it's twin below. IZ went out lookng for the leprechauns and because you could actually see the end of the rainbow in the sea, I had to tell him they were swimming, protecting the gold on the ocean bed. Of course children don't miss a trick,
"so if de leprechauns are wid dis rainbow- who wid de odda one?"
well...they're swimming really fast between the two.
"but mummy ohhh...what about de sharks?"
dolphins
He's always been too sharp for me-when IZzo was just learning to talk he was sitting by the tobacco tree and quiped "where's de onebacco?" since then I've never been right.
Then this morning dressing it was "But mummy why we gotta tuck-in and de teachers don' gotta tuck in?"
I don't know what that rainbow meant (yeah yeah IZ- God's promise of no more floods...)
but for sure
it was for us.

Lost In BIM

2006-10-09T08:52:00.000-06:00

A truly Bajan experience is easily achieved by having no idea how to get somewhere and asking the natives for help.

I set out with an address- something like "Sunbeam-St. George" between Market Hill and Francia.
Pretty easy.

I drive to Market Hill and ask man on balcony watching traffic could you tell me how to find blah blah.

Man on balcony gets off balcony crosses road and says,

"Best ting fuh you to do is turn round and mek de first left, guh down to de gas station, pass de school and yuh know what part dey wokin' 'pon de cut rock? Is down tru a cyart road 'bout day. Yuh can get tur it from hay but de roads goin' get wunna confuse-"

Good directions.

I know the gas station, the school, the cut rock- I go.

When I get to the cut rock I ask fat man with dumb face sitting on house step "could you tell me how blah blah"

The man says "yeah I hear a dat place. Turn back pass de gas station and don' guh down to St. Joseph but foller de next road."

I say, "but it's supposed to be here- between Market Hill and Francia"

"Yeah I tink I did hear something 'bout that place tuh. Go straight 'den"

Thanks.

I turn left at the next available gap where I ask rasta man with the buckets of sweat and the red eyes "could you blah blah blah"

High as a kite he says with no breaks between the words...

"yuhgottagorounddatbendandfollowderoadandbackarounddereandpassdathouse
denroundtodeleftandroundtoderighttilyuhgettoahydrantyuhknowwhat'sahydrant?iswunnadosetingsfuhwaterwitderedtopturnuptrudererounddechurchandupsomemoh
denleftand
onetwotreeyuhdere."

He's standing in the road so a car wanting to pass blows the horn.

He shouts

"Drive de rasshole car yuh dumb fuck!!!"

The driver passes him and he starts back repeating the directions

"yuhhearwhatIdidtellinyuh?yuhgottarounddereand......."

At this point Ricky's going,

"Press Gas!!!!!"

I go a little farther and I see two guys looking pretty normal chatting on their bicycles "Can you blah blah blah"

The guys say.

"Turn left by de church"

Good directions

Left at the church but still not there yet I'm getting fed up driving slow and car man coming at me looks me in the face and drives by slow too. I ask "Can blah blah blah?"

"Tell you what to do" he says, "Follow me."

He drives me round a couple bends makes a few turns and stops.

"Go up tru day"

"thanks."

I drive across a cart road for 10 minutes that is less of a road and more of an X games track.
....ah cart road...(remember man #1)

I reach.

Thanks be to God.

Things They Never taught You In Sunday School

2006-10-06T18:02:00.000-06:00

Here's a little bed time story...

God made the firmament and the stars and the trees and all the fuzzy little animals ran about.
Then God made man.

Man, being the indiscriminately horny little penis-pounder that he was (is) wanted to get jiggy with it.

No women yet for penis-pounder to pester he set about making nookie with all and every female beast he could find.

horse, dog, zebra, camel, cow, skunk, porcupine, anteater...

"These just don't feel right" man complained to God, "couldn't you make me something my size?"

God went generous and made woman.

Man took woman and tried to get it on

Woman said,

"listen boy, this ain' wo'kin' for me. I gotta get on top 'cause you've obviously no idea how to satisfy a woman. Dis ain' a charity yuh know."

man said,

"God made me first and I say stay on your back!!!"

woman said,

"Back this swine fucker-"

and took off towards the sea.

Man cried

"God the animals don't like it they just chew grass and ignore me, the woman neither - she gave me the finger and flew off ...oh make me another woman that'll lie on her back and I'll give you blood sacrifice forever."

God made Eve

Who's Up For Good Things???

2006-10-03T08:38:00.000-06:00

Today I learnt that "I hear you're doing good things" is code for "so you've got crack for sale."
This is useful information. I am now equipped with the knowledge of how to respond the next time I'm asked if I have any good things to report.

I obviously don't have good things going on but I do know where the good is readily available to anybody wishing to end up really really good ie)homeless, unwashed and begging for small change.

Thesis A Go

2006-09-29T09:01:00.000-06:00

I have renewed zeal for my area of specialisation.

Whenever people hear that I'm studying the bible with no affiliation to the church and no desire to teach they shake their head and give me a look of utter disbelief that says "how you going to make money? why would you want to do that?"
I like money and all that it can buy but forever money has always come near the bottom of the list of priorities that include at the top self-examination, IZ and the mystery of synchronicities.
I've said I'm not smart and this is the absolute truth but I have the gift of grasping connections without thinking. My brain seems to put information on top of each other in sheets with cut-outs and I can immediately see where the two holes line up.
I have been toying with an idea for a thesis that was completely a shot in the dark. Rolling it around without evidence- just a deep solid feeling that I'm unto something.
Yesterday for the first time I began to research my idea and it was like striking oil.
It's cut out upon cut out upon cut out and I'm breathless, muttering curses to myself that such synchronicity exists in the world hidden while completely exposed. How can one not want to study humankind's relationship with God and themselves as expressed in myth? It's fabulous and I am so completely enamoured with it.
I wish I could go into the details of my findings but I think those things are supposed to be secret until submission. What I can say is that those who find me a FS now will shudder at the crap I'm going to spew forth.

Smart People

2006-09-27T08:57:00.000-06:00

My day finished near 11pm last night, coming home just after 10 getting my computer sorted by a computer genius. Smart people rock.
Like Dr. House. Who isn't in love with Dr. House?
or Allan Shore. He's hot.

Anyway, my computer saviour's lovely wife made him burn me 2 seasons of some comedy series.
I watched 4 straight hours of Ali G in bed and laughed 'til I cried.
I can't figure out how he manages to secure interviews with such 'respected' individuals but it goes to show you that surgeon generals and press secretaries are not so sharp as one might expect. This guy has to have some production crew to make them believe that he's serious. And seriously he rocks.

More on smart people
Just now, I was reading a blog that was recommended to me on the comments- I love people who've managed to grab hold of the english language with their teeth.
"Volunterrorism" lol
(That's how I feel about the PTA.)
She rocks.
Vocabulary is something of a passive skill for me and even then I'd be generous to say I have a good one.
I think my personal Gloria project is going to be to improve it.

I wish I was a smart person but I'm really not.
I'm "insightful".
or so they say
Maybe "foresightful" is the better word.
I tell people me and God have a good relationship.

The other day I reminded i that I and i almost got licked over by a COW truck in a sharp blind bend that has the left side (we drive on the left remember) broken away as you turn. I've driven it a dozen times since and a thousand times prior but it strikes me on this day that I thinks i should be a little cautious. And as God and i are having this dialogue I and i agree that maybe we'll just hold a little brakes an pause before we round 'round.
A transport bus tears through both lanes. Gives me the horn.
"Beep-beep" translation "Smart Girl"
I and i rock.

Where's The Exit Sign?

2006-09-25T08:32:00.000-06:00

Has anyone noticed I've had something of an epiphany?

If only I knew what to do with it.

It's the whisper of God that moves the winds.
But it's left unto us to change the tides.
(what I would do with the moon in my pocket)

On something of a studied whim I read through an ancient yearbook. Not so ancient it turns out-
The more things change they say...

Keeping my eyes peeled for the words between the lines of the writing on the wall.

Chop Off Their Heads and Squeeze Out Their Juice and Throw Their Tails Away

2006-09-20T09:26:00.000-06:00

This morning I ran a car off the road by my dazzling good looks. The driver, a clean-cut, good looking young thing, was driving a bit fast round a bend coming down as I was going up. We made eye contact briefly, I noted the car (which I never do) I rounded the corner and heard screeeeaaach....smash!
So I reverse, return to find said driver out of car, a love scratch on his arm, hiding his shame in a cell phone.
"You took that corner too fast" says I.
"Ain't got much brakes-"says he.
After determining everything was okay except his ego- I continued up the hill.

Men shouldn't oggle and drive.

I was told that kissing me would be like opening a can of worms. It sits on the temples these worms and I wonder who they belong to- me? he? the circumstances of the universe?
If I wasn't on such an 'I' high lately I might have been offended by the imagery. Wormy lips.
These days I don't take too much criticism to heart. I'm basking in the joy of how wonderfully wonderful I am- worm lips and all. I think I have spent too long being my own worst critic. I'm not smart enough, not pretty enough, not fun enough...

always super cool though...

I mean enough is enough. I feel like I am now at the starting line of a mission to take over the universe. I am the Brain. I also feel like I should have a line up of men running from Bathsheba to Bridgetown for the opportunity to gaze in my eyes. I am the Madonna. Screw this be humble, be submissive, be self-critical, be self-conscious bullshit. When do we get the chance to be glorious.

I'm glorious damn it!

and if the line up don't like it...they can take all the cans of worms on this God given earth and

Ashrams and Cowbells

2006-09-18T09:07:00.000-06:00

I know some are sick of the "feministic" - I felt a little sympathetic and then a bit guilty until Michael Moore reminded me that if I blogged about vaginas everyday of my life it couldn't put a dent in the milleniums of 'his'tory we women folk have had to endure.
So I do not appologize, I do not care about hurt male egos, I don't mind if I am labled or boring or stuck in a cructh rut. I don't care if men like me. I don't care if women like me. I don't care if I'm cold or hard or spiteful or vindictive or unapproachable or scary.

The fact of the matter is I love men. I really really love men. No sarcasm. I do.

I just think the world would be a whole lot better if women had ashrams and men wore cow bells and did what they were told.

Arguing about feminine power at my Friday night lime, an english white alpha male, though perfect gentleman, said he was completely about equality. "I cook...I clean..." The mere fact that he equated gender with domestic chores spoke volumes about where he located women's liberation. He didn't say "I put others needs before my own, I sacrifice my happiness for my loved ones." or "I give value to my emotions, I feel my partners grief" or "I acknowledge God as mother, I nurture Her creation" or even "I would gladly give the better years of my life to service, pushing an eight pound ball out of an orffice if I could feel another's living soul within me." No. He'll fry an egg and wash the pan to make things fair and square. Charming.

Of course, I never get too ruffled by male ignorance. I tell everyone- keep expectations of men low. They will always meet your expectations. I had to interject with a bit of snap though so I said "Equality isn't about cooking and cleaning- It's about men acknowledging their inferiority."

The one thing I will say about the Y chromosone however, is it certainly affords men the gall, the tenacity and the confidence to fool women into a position of subordination. Men are genetically programmed master brainwashers. Thus my moment of apprehension prior to writing about gender. I often wonder how many other aspects of my life are still goverened by the male agenda unbeknownst to my consciousness. And what about those poor women who shake their heads and tsu tsu tsu at any hint of 'self-reclaimation' contented by the fact that their man cooks and cleans? Ah women. Let us build ashrams and cowbells. Have we not slept long enough?

Don't Hold Muh So Tight- You Know, I'm Tickle-Ish.

2006-09-13T09:20:00.000-06:00

When Laura came to BIM years ago we were at the Toat yard on a Booze day and she somehow got roped into a tourist game where they blindfold you and give you indigenous fruit and make you guess what it is. Anyhoo-Laura got a Plantain and to help her out I yelled out "Something in your pocket keeps stickin' me..." To which she cried "It's a ripe Plaintain! It's a ripe Plantain!"
That's a song- for those who are not up on the calypso.

The point is after Ricky's story yesterday it was the first thing that came to my mind.
His story runs a little something like this:

While standing on a ladder over some concrete blocks at work banging a few nails, he feels something crawling on his thigh inside his pants. Thinking it was a centipede, he grabbed it from the outside, holding it firm between the material, jumped off the ladder backwards, sprained his foot and broke 3 decoration blocks. Still holding the thing at his thigh he's feeling it on his ankle and he's wondering how the ass a centipede could be that long. He wriggles out of his pants, looks down inside and sees...

A Snake. The length of his leg. Now half dead from being squeezed too hard.

Something in his pantleg keep stickin he...

So he brings the thing home dangling it from the passenger side window, asking all the pedestrians if they want he.

Even paro Tucky jump back and say "nah boyee..."

Ocean liked it. He flung it around like a lasso and wanted to carry it home. Michelle wouldn't hear of it. Apparently Ocean had just watched Snakes On a Plane and woke up in the night with a "Snakes eat Baba!"

Snakes in BIM is one hot topic let me tell ya.
Ricky's friend is now memorialised on Clifford's fence.

Phone Phobia

2006-09-12T09:05:00.000-06:00

I've realized that I have a bit of a phone phobia. In grade 7 I used to talk on the phone to Kristy for 6 hours straight and then write a 20 page report for her to read in class inclusive of diagrams. In grade 9-10 I used to talk to boys all through the night hanging up only to get ready for school. I've always been nervous to place a call but nowI get edgy whenever the phone rings and I have real difficulties with dialing out.
It's fine at work- it's not for me. I can call Sasha easy but I don't do it often. It's ok when it's about the PTA but I try to avoid it as much as possible. I don't like, but can bring myself to call school, bank, whatever but under a great deal of duress and at the last minute. I hardly call my father, my sisters, my brother-
But personal calls are the real problem. First time calls are almost if not always impossible. I simply do not bother to exchange numbers because I know I won't call. Calls to people I've not spoken to in a while is similarly hard and the longer I postpone it the worse it gets. Yet by far the worst calls are the calls with baggage. The ones that are necessary. It's torture. I pick-up, I put down, pick-up, put down, pick-up, put down and on and on and never do I make the call.
Maybe I need therapy. Maybe I've been reborn into an age too advanced for me. Give me a pen. Give me a paper. and the baggage disappears. I can write my soul into being. If only I didn't have to drop it in the box. Lately, I've come to realize I have a bit of postage phobia...

Back 2 School

2006-09-11T08:51:00.000-06:00

IZ and O are back in school today. A little tired maybe 'cause I took them to the Mexican circus last night.
I managed- no scratch that- IZ managed to get the ring worm on his face under control just in time for start date. (School won't let them in with it and the face is a hard place to hide without Elvis side burns.)
Anyway, I gave him the bottle of tea tree oil and he put it on diligently until it scabbed up then he picked off the scab diligently until it's become an uncontagious clear mark on his right cheek. It was looking good. He was set.
Then a series of unfortunate events-
I couldn't find a new black belt don't mind I went to every shop in the newly extended Sheraton Mall- so strike one- old brown belt don't match black shoes.
Then "Barber" the barber (creative nick name, hun?) was no where to be found and IZ, though not shaggy altogether is striking two with the beginings of the Elvis he no longer requires.
And then...
IZ had to go frolicking with the new dog, tripped over a rock and scratched both arms and his chin. Strike three- with the wound too fresh to pick, IZ is going back to school old and unmatched, unshaven and scab faced.
IZ is supposed to have a young Miss teacher about size 3 who likes short skirts and high heels. This should not pose a problem as IZ is still more interested in snails and an assortment of bugs than he is in felines. And if the vermin should prove to be too distracting there's no need for concern. Looking at the books, IZ has this year in the bag.

Happy B-Day Dad!

2006-09-08T08:48:00.000-06:00

Happy Birthday to my father the Blog Poet- Who would've know it?!

As a tribute to his literary talent here's a poem of my own

Enjoy your limit of two drinks, Pops
One over that may bring the cops
Is the fete at the Lodge or the Tamworth hotel?
Don't matter much since all goin' sell.

Rupture the Rapture

2006-09-06T09:23:00.000-06:00

I've been watching this really bad trilogy starring Kirk Cameron about the end of days and the Rapture. By the rapture I mean the idea of believers suddenly vanishing into heaven leaving behind the unfaithful to experience war, pestilence and famine aka Judgment Day. In the movie, the believers include all children and all- make you want to hurl with the way they spew Bible passages constantly- evangelicals.
I think the rapture is about the scariest most vile little concept the Christian Fundamentalists have invented. Besides the fact that it speaks to Christian supremacy, elitism, guiltless vengeance and hateful 'you're on your own now suckas' imagery, I just don't favour a God who outs His cigarette in Her Creation. It's Imperialist and it's anti-climactic and it's Ugly.

Should this story end with the Fundamentalist's epilogue- Oh other God help us all- I don't want to be transported naked to drink milk and honey to the sound of harps...

I'd rather be A Red Cross Volunteer. A Superhero. A Holy Woman

Or An Ice-Cream Bicycle Dude- with a bell-

Rats Down-Pants Down

2006-09-05T10:20:00.001-06:00

What is it about boys that makes them all snips and snails?

This morning Ocean and IZ are devouring some home grown oranges- juice dripping down their dirty little faces when Ricky walks in-no struts in- with the proudest most gloriest of news that he'd killed the big rat that was running on the roof and a smaller one too besides.

Those boys all but threw the oranges down and tore off running to see the rat exhibition Ricky had prepared for them outside.

When they got back in I had to sit through the narration of how it was 'dis big boiyee-like a mongoose 'den' until the conversation was too exhausting and needed to be replaced by nude wrestling.

Pants thrown with the oranges they ran peepee dogs swinging to try and take down Ricky in all out war.

Whether Afrikan Tribal, Greek Gymnos, Japanese Sumo or Bajan Brawl- men's love will always be for bugs and rats and naked man-on-man fighting.

Who Does Know 'Bout Teeology Anyways?

2006-09-04T08:52:00.000-06:00

September.
Back to School.
I had an information meeting with the graduate students (whose numbers are increasing) and the prin. Nobody knows how many credits I have, am supposed to have and still need. Even a trip to the University office of graduate studies left me waiting in the dark. Dem don't know 'bout teeology, see? What I do know is the course work being made available to me should I need one more semester (which I do- and seem to be the only one who knows this) is completely not my speed. I'll either be left failing at everything but boredom in history of the caribbean church and missionary movements or choking back nausea in pastoral counselling. All I want to do is write a dirty piece of scholarship about God being a giant man-eating uterus. Gotta go down with a bang! I'm already something of a living legend 'round seminary. Hot little foreign white girl who doesn't go to church. Years from now-when I'm leaving my mark in some larger space, I want a student to be browsing through the library, pull out my research paper and half bemused- half in awe, say " Now dis one knows 'bout teeology, den."

of course I don't- and there's the rub.

Tribute to the Ghost in the House

2006-09-01T09:50:00.000-06:00

Whoever's been to Shaver knows that the ghost in that house is evil. Evil and a perv. Any naked opportunity that ghost had a chance to crash in on he was there... in the closet...behind the foggy shower glass...in the dark room with the porn...
He had poor Giz, who was scared of nothing and nobody, petrified to go downstairs. Every game of hide n go seek fell apart because you actually wanted to be found...quickly.
The whole basement was his- from the storage room that I never saw the back of because I refused to take more than 6 steps in and where the celery disappeared and reappeared two weeks later seemingly unblemished, to the computer room where he clawed on the walls, to the bathroom with the mini boiler room disguised as a linen closet that he was particularly fond of and the little room to the back that never did become a sauna and was the scariest place I ever slept in when bycr came to steal my sanctuary.
Then there was Mike's room. Mike who, overcome with the evil surrounding him, drew upside down crosses all over and required a second baptism for the salvation of his soul.
The huge Yoga room, probably the only place relatively safe (except the closet, of course) and only because the vastness of space left little room for the ghost to hang unexposed and finally,
The Dark Room-need I say more.
The ghost was not confined to the basement, he retreated there whenever the house got too loud.
If ever home alone, he would creep up the stairs and peep over the wall...
One time he actually set off the metronome on the piano and when I went to stop it, I found it silent with the cover on. He is the original terrorist of my memory and I do believe his unsuccessful aim for us Shaver dwellers was very big and terribly malignant. I mean he almost got Mike (goat cheese...should we forward that to the arsee-empees?)
I rehash all this as a prelude to the point that there is a ghost in my house in BIM. He's pretty much a front of the house, hang on the stairs kinda guy. And so far, he's been pretty shy. The other night when I was taking IZ up to bed, he was sitting on the bottom step. He got up so fast, ran up those stairs and took a nose dive out of the top window. If you fall asleep on the couch, he'll watch you from behind the storm shutters and every night he'll wake you with the stomp stomp stomping of him walking upstairs to jiggle the middle room door where I can only presume he used to sleep. Whilst the ghost in Foster has scared the pervious owners to sale, I have never found him particularly threatning and I think he must like us because he's being a friendly guy, chilling, hanging out, but not looming and creeping and being all I'm going to posess you and take over your body like.
So, this blog is a toast to my ghost. May we continue to live together in harmony, you are a heavy improvement from that rotten little horn bag I left in Etobicokey.

Dog Reaper Strikes Back

2006-08-24T08:30:00.000-06:00

I ran over the puppy yesterday.

Doggy Death Camp

2006-08-22T08:39:00.000-06:00

So on Sunday night I suddenly remember that I forgot my purse in the car. There was nothing in it except some make-up but I got to thinking about the pledge I made not to leave my purse visibly displayed in a locked car lest another jackass bust the glass.

The more I think about it the stronger that annoying feeling of my gut conscience gets to do what I don't feel like doing but know I should do.

At midnight, out of my bed I go, trudging with a towel to the car, take the purse out, all is swell, fix said towel discreetly, head back through the door and hear "gchaaak....gcahuuck...." coming from the garden.

I'm not scared but my stomach sinks. I know that sound well and I growl to the universe before I confirm with my eyes "You really called me out of my bed for this????!!!"

There's our puppy hacking out his inners, shaking, barely standing, eyes aglaze, slugging his way to the crypt that is the dark moldy gutter.
Damn f-ing dogs eating frogs this afternoon poisoning their own asses and then invoking the Spirit to remove me from my warm bed to become a dog Saviour yet again. (I'm a professional dog Saviour by the by. I've done this shit only a few dozen times since moving to this doggy death camp we call home.)

I get a pet bottle of sugar water, hold open the dog's jaws and pour it down until she looks dead. I guess the rationale is- if I kill her by drowning she can't die from poisoning. I'm feeling compassionate tonight, so I drop an old rag on her and dump her in the laundry room.

In the morning, Ricky spots the corpse, digs a grave and picks up the dog on the shovel but of course our dog is a dog of faith and just before she hits the earth, she is resurrected, jumps off the shovel and goes back to the rag to lie down.

Here is the land of short returns, I spare myself the enthusiasm.

(though none have ever gone by chicken bone Bonnie....) I've seen:
Poisonings, Parvas, Mean Monkeys, Mean Cows, Worms, Ticks, Cancers, Dognappings, Assassinations, Suicides, Run Overs, Run Aways, Run Wilds- I've been through more dogs than underwear in these last 11 years.

and one thing you can always be sure of

the dog reaper is never satisfied.

Liberation By Hellboy

2006-08-17T08:44:00.000-06:00

With my niece over taking care of IZ while I'm at work and the mums jet setting with the Sky Guy I've been watching a lot more television and mostly of the adolescent persuasion. I'm a one hour drama girl- give me Dr. House, Grey's Anatomy even Everwood and I'll watch the relationships unfold and comment on character discrepencies.
Having reversed my t.v. viewing options by 10 years in maturity I have rediscovered just how crutchety I am.
While Parris and Nicole are completely palatable and Tyra Banks is just barely a swallow, the Ashley Twins in Billboard Dad is bordering on nausea. Still, while my niece may yet believe that these shallow, painted women paid and directed by dicks are to be admired, her choices remain those of a human being.
As soon as she fell asleep and her brother got control of the remote, I found myself mesmerized (for lack of a better word describing a brain being eaten by maggots then rolled around in a pile of pig shit) by something called 'Hellboy.' And here I say little except that all women must watch this movie. Must repeat watching it any time they doubt that the female sex is more complicated, more sophisticated, more intelligent, more profound, more beautiful, more sensual and more Godly than their sexual counterpart. I implore you ladies, Hellboy is liberation.

Cloudy to Overcast with Sunshine

2006-08-15T08:42:00.000-06:00

I hear far too many rooster rings on cell phones and other elctronic gadgets. The Cranberries are making audio appearances daily on the radio even when I'm trying to get a Friday night buzz.
Oh God our Mother of all that uneases us, what humour you have...

I wait in patient anticipation for Your encore.

Canada Eh? Part 2

2006-08-10T08:51:00.000-06:00

Having landed barely safe and sound in BIM I am not only glad but grateful to be home. When little children are flying around the cabin at 5 billion feet above sea and the pilot is screaming over the intercom "EVERYBODY SIT DOWN AND BUCKLE UP NOW!!!!" you really do give thanks and praise for rock. I am not dead yet.

My trip included spending lots of money and going lots of places to ride lots of rides and eat lots of crap. I think the highlight for me was the Jays game (Go Jays Go!) because it reaked of solid, nerdy and obnoxious Canadian patriotism. It was for me the single time where I felt Toronto under my skin and it didn't hurt that the seats were excellent and free. (Thanks Jen.)
Barbados is completely the obverse. All you ever do is feel it steeping into your blood stream.

It didn't take 2 minutes before the Bajanism flooded my senses. 2 drops of rain had buses rolling to the staircase to load up arriving passengers so that they could be transported a distance of 3 feet dry and sound. I'm home.

I get into a beat up suzuki van with the bass on Dr. Evil moving the wheels forward, IZ seatbeltless and standing as we scoot around bends blowing horn hailing friends and watching every goings on of every little thing. I'm home.

I get home sit down, eat flying fish and try to watch days of our lives 1990 where Dr. Neil Curtis is druged and set up in porn pictures with his daughter as a tuk band blares in the distance at some house party I wasn't invited to. I'm home.

I go to sleep with the breeze and the bugs blowing through the window landing on my face biting at my legs. Ahh Home.

Canada Eh? Part 1

2006-08-01T07:47:00.000-06:00

It used to be that whenever you passed a Canadian on the road you would look at them until you neared 5 feet or so and then together you would drop your eyes to the ground and pass without greeting. The apathy I was hoping for is not so pure anymore and I can only guess it's IZ. He talks and talks and talks and talks and talks and then starts a conversation and talks some more. When he's not talking, he's asking questions and when he's not doing that he's reading billboards embarassingly loud "What happens when geek knocks up sleek??" With that funny little accent and squeaky loud voice everyone whose within earshot is looking and smiling and dipping their toes into small shy conversation. A few years here and IZ would have the public transport system one big get to know you party.

We went to visit my father in a little town out of Kingston last weekend. IZZY's charm managed to snag him a VIA rail activity book and crayons.

My father's town is the setting of Stephen King' s next novel. There are less than a hundred buildings in the middle of the forest and 83 of them are for sale. All the lawns are decorated with the same Century 21 realators sign including the church, the hotel and the conveniece store. On the second night my sister gave up her bed to our brother and shared with IZ and I. Half way through the night she gets up and never returns. I wait for 45 minutes or so with the various explanations of irritable bowel or creepy incestuous relationship passing through my head and then it dawns on me that everyone in Tamworth is moving because the young fertile women are being stolen out of their beds to keep the population of indigenous Tamworthians from being genetically compromised. Needless to say, my father's house is now on the market with a Century 21 sign in front.

Yesterday we went to a theme park and gave IZ the thrill ride experience. After an hour of line and no drink IZ was crying and sucking and arguing that he didn't want to go on this ride and wanted to be somewhere else instead. At this point we're ready to board so I stuff snotty teary IZ into a cart and we start the chain banging climb to the summit. As it releases and that rush gets to the stomach IZ holds on for dear life and screams he's gonna fall out. The look on his face is utter fear and it doesn't change until we slow to a stop. He gets out snot and tears now windblown and says very tentatively "What ride we doin next?" After that it was smooth sailing for the rest of the day. Got to hang with my estranged cousin Vlad who introduced us to the greatest piece of music since Beethoven's 9th. I'm only praying I get my hands on a copy so I can pass it around because truly if I sang it no one would believe...

And now I'm off to shop 'til I literally drop.

Can't Wait To Get Out!!

2006-07-21T10:18:00.000-06:00

I seem to recall that the last time I left here, which now seems like eons ago, I was given a rather rough spell by the universe to make me not just excited about going but relieved for the exodus of that which is my life.
After this last month I absolutely need this two weeks out. Otherwise, I fear, Ill be spending this two years in either Guantanamo or Black Rock.

The last thing to happen was my car was broken into and a good deal of cash was taken. Cash that was in a sealed unmarked envelope and only that and nothing else. The perp obviously knew about it and as I know who knew I also know who was behind it. Of course it can't be proved so I' m left to feel not just taken advantage of but totally betrayed. This is a distinctly Barbadian quality (one of the worst, I'm afraid)- to smile and play friends in anticipation of the moment when it can be used to their advantage. Jealousy and envy and pretence.

I am looking forward to anonymous robbers, unfriendly faces and no good mornings in the GTO. To not be looked at, not talked about and not given a seconds thought. Just for two weeks.

A little apathy will cure me of my frustration.

Push Dey Suh One Time

2006-07-17T08:51:00.000-06:00

This morning I went to renew the road tax on my company car at the Licensing Authority in the Pine. I knew this was a mistake because mornings and lunches are heavy flow times for all government offices in BIM, particularly on a Monday. When I drove in however, the line was pretty manageable so I joined the cue and started playing tetrus on my cell phone. A long long game of tetrus. Only to look up and observe that I had not moved an inch.

A description of the hour+ I spent in the line would not do the situation literary justice. It smacked of post colonialism and psychological warfare but with an oddly comical tinge that made the whole thing feel a little television.

The cell phones going off with ring tones so entirely antithetical to the respondant like old dude in suit and tie with bashment, and bashment dude of scar and scowl with love song.

The door marked 'push' that wouldn't open unless you simultaneously pulled the one beside it so that as you stood in witness of people fumble their way to exit you would find yourself unconciously joining the chorus of old timer liners with instructions on how to work it.
"Pull dis hay and push dey suh one time'

The weary, should be retired security guard trying to figure out how to curve the line to accomodate the thirty new entrants into an office the size of a bathroom then engaging the liners to join him in a hostile denunciation of the clerks who refused to take their job seriously and were making his line management near impossible.

And of course the clerks themselves taking bathroom, phone, run way, gossip and copy pages of information in long hand on scraps of paper then staple it numerous times, throw it into the garbage and stare into the the ceiling breaks between each customer. Except, in fairness Mr. #9 who without, the line must certainly would have curved its way to the Bussa roundabout.

After an hour in line with 9 in front and 29 in back it took me 45 seconds to present my insurance and check and receive my receipt. In good Canadian fashion I flashed Ms. 'I have no work ethic and am unhappy with my crappy job so instead of asking for an incentive I'll be passive aggressive to the liners and let them wait as long as humanly possible then act like a crabby bitch when they finally get through' #7 a smile, said have a nice day and left.

Not before finding the door marked push unmoveable and hearing the newbys chant "Pull dis hay and push dey suh one time."

Crazy

2006-07-14T10:07:00.000-06:00

Everytime I hear the Crazy song on the radio, I feel gay!

(in the tadtional sense of the word, geez)

I'm particularly enthused by the bit that goes "Common now, who do you- who do you, who do you, who do you think you are? Ha ha ha bless your soul. You really think you're in control? I think you're crazy, just like me."

My father read my blog and said "well honey, don't take this the wrong way but I think you're crazy." The 'just like me' I took to be implied.

And this view that I've got a few screws loose was shared by others (yes you!). Some with some serious issues, I dare say. A bit ironic but nevertheless...

The fact is, I must be crazy because I think I'm sane and the world around me is crazy. This is the tell tale sign of madness, I've heard.

But in my defence, I guess why I like the lyrics of Crazy is because the song writer equates thinking one is in control, with madness. It's a question with loads of hidden depth.

You really think you're in control?
I think you're crazy.

Bathseba Setting Precedence

2006-07-12T10:45:00.000-06:00

For those of you on pins and needles waiting to hear the climax to the Bathsheba Development saga, you will have to wait for our Saturday meeting with the bigwigs to find out. However, this I do wish to share...
Yesterday on the radio the community protesting the water park (I empathize- but god a water park would have rocked) said "you tried to do it to Bathsheba and now you're trying to do it to us...
Then, in the paper, the community protesting the moving of the civic buildings to a not so prime beach location to make room for hotels etc.. said "you couldn't do it in Bathsheba so now you want to do it here."
Yeah Bathsheba-Community of Rebel Rousers!!! I intend to burn my bra as a symbol of nothing. (memoir: BCC and the toilet paper controversy)

The Postman

2006-07-11T08:59:00.000-06:00

Throw a little feminism around and men will quickly turn it into a gender war. The previous entry was not intended to start an argument, not even a discussion (although I do say, I'm rather impressed by the passion) It was just a statement of fact.
After I wrote it, I watched the Postman starring Kevin Costner. Not coincidental really. When dealing with the qualities of what makes us man/woman, even Hollywood consciously or not, resorts to basic truths. This could be any film but let us use Postman as example.

Basic Truth.

The male lead spends the whole film never fully grasping ownership or responsibility for a situation that he created. Yes, there are some heroic moments but they appear almost accidental and are quickly overshadowed in doubt. Moreover, the final army, need I remind, is made up of women and children (where, I wonder is the guitar player? still strumming I suppose.)

The female, in a subltle and deliberate way is the pillar of strengh.
Pay particular attention to the time spent in the Wilderness. Wild woman drags man behind horse, cuts out bullet, nurses him to health and even shoots horse when man complains about the snow soup.

But the question is, what viewer really believes that woman walks into freezing river and risks drowning by accident? Knowing that man must have reason to be hero in order to be man, she deliberately puts her life at risk to get sulky Kevin off the couch.

I say all this not to be cruel to men but to illustrate that women are the backbone and jawbone of a world where the men "play" the lead. My girl was up against attempted rape and brutal beatings while preganant and newly widowed. My man couldn't get out of bed to fetch a bowl of horse soup.

Get out of bed and get the damn horse soup- that's all we're asking.

Feminine Strength

2006-07-07T08:48:00.000-06:00

As something of a feminist, I don't just believe, I know, women are the stronger sex.

Admitedly, men have physical prowess.
Muscles.
One single sole advantage.

And since it's all they have over women they flaunt it and fluff up the feathers trying to increase its value. It is also their only measuring stick of comparisson with other men so they fight and threaten and war. Check the animal kingdom-all male animals battle for their own glorification. One scares the other into submission. Woman chooses Victor.

Women's strength is subtle, it's hidden and it's slumbersome. We draw on it only to the degree that it's needed thereby giving the reservoir plenty time to replenish. And when a time comes that all is needed, all is there. We can lift cars to save babies. We can move mountains if need be.

At 28, this I know. The feminine aspect of God is Wrath. The moon can turn very cold. The waves can become exceedingly cruel. Dicks and Stones, Tanks and Guns, none can escape the fall into the belly of mother earth when she opens her jaws to receive them.

Sweet Sixteen Part 2

2006-07-05T08:14:00.001-06:00

As 30 approaches I feel oddly excited. I tell people I am entering the desperate housewives phase of my life. 16 was the only other number where I felt such fervour and to my surprise, I am not the only one that remembers that party.

So! I have begun the preliminary stages of planning the big 3-0 and I am giving anyone who is interested ample time to save some pennies. The plan is that all will fly down to my rock where we will tour and party for a week straight, renting a guest house(s) with pool and living it up with BBQ's, rum and reggae.

Anyone who would like to reserve a place can leave a message with a name that I will be able to decipher (be bop a brother shem/uncle goat will suffice).

June 30, 2008 in Barbados- Just Beyond Your Imagination.

Happy Birthday To Me.

2006-07-03T08:21:00.000-06:00

Some birthdays blend into others, some disappear altogether but every now and then there's a birthday that will carry you to the end of days.

16- That was a birthday! Smoking pot and drinking 40's with a backyard full of people while mum and Dennis were far off in Perry Sound.

Now 28...

Permanent scar on my memory chip.

My heart goes out to those who were there to share the day.

The Magic of Childhood.

2006-06-29T08:47:00.000-06:00

IZ and I stayed up late into the night (school the next day and and all) to discuss our plans for the upcoming trip. I told him that we were going to take every conceivable means of tranportation bar helicopters and space crafts. Trains-"I don't like trains mummy 'cause sometimes dem does run off de track" Planes- "I know dat already" Buses- (bored) Boats- "What kind?" Ferry Boats to and from Centre Island with your Godmummy. "Dey have real fairies? Like Peter Pan?"

Of course IZ and the fairy dust lifts us up from the water, over the waves and back to the shore.

"I goin 'pon dat fairy boat!"

Georgie Porgie

2006-06-22T07:39:00.000-06:00

Georgie Porgie pudding and pie kissed the girls...

Did they cry because they were disgusted (grade one Danny Ovaldick comes to mind) or did they cry because they were jealous of the plural?

Getting older, I think they either cried because it was just so sad that Georgie felt he had to run as soon as he started getting close, leaving the girls to suffer it out with the unromantic boys.
Poor Georgie unable to be vulenrable.

Or else Geogie really did never like the girls and they cried because they were only being used to enable George to get out of his hole.

Then again, maybe they were crying in ecstacy.

If only we could ask George.

Bertha and the Big House

2006-06-21T09:20:00.000-06:00

My imagination always leads me to think the worst. That's why I can't smoke the chronic- what if the house burns down, what if the roof blows off. I can do embarassing but I have trouble with illegal. Each and every infringement I've ever done from Kindergarten up has been branded on my conscience. I'd make a good catholic.
Yesterday I made arrangements with a friend for regular smokes and money deliveries and drew up a preliminary contract with Bertha for protection on the inside. That is if plan A- escaping up North and plan B- barganing with whatever I have at the office of the attourney general fails to succede.

Needless to say, all of this was unnecessary when I learned that the Law only wanted 7 numbers not 7 years.

Fear of Big Brother Illiteracy

2006-06-19T09:27:00.000-06:00

My appologies to all who have ever wanted to comment and could not because they are not bloggers. I have only now become aware that I have blocked you out. In an effort to hide from Big Brother I have only just started carrying a self-phone and credit card and my computer skills are not concerned with the internet. I hope I have corrected the problem. Test me and see.

The Shopping Cart - the latest rave

2006-06-14T09:09:00.000-06:00

My brother Mike, as some of you may be aware, has an uncanny knack for inventing new dances that become popular. The putting on your pants dance- a case in point.
While he was here he revealed his newest dance secret sensation which I passed on to a bar full of mean girls. So innovative is the shopping cart dance that Mike was instantly one hot bitch and the girls were all pushing imaginary trolly, taking things off the shelf to check the expiry date before putting them in the cart or back where they came from all while doing a kinda neck bob thing. Anyhow, while making my way through Emerald City avoiding the propa pork the radio kicks in with 'Another one bites the dust' and I start doing the trolly tramp. When I turn around I got a posse of old dudes watching me and applauding my performance.
Thanks to the cool moves I'm finally a dancing diva-
I took a bow.

Ready Or Not - Here We Come

2006-06-13T09:19:00.000-06:00

It is official. The tickets have been bought. IZ and I will be leaving this rock on July 26th for a two week stint of Bajan meets Canuck. Anybody who has time off July 26th thru August 9th and wants to meet up will have to engage in some kind of tourist activity if they want to fit into this hectic visit every conceivable amusement area in the time frame given adventure. Or shopping.
Seriously, I would love to see wunna so get in touch.

Those F*@$ing Trees!

2006-06-09T09:42:00.000-06:00

Me and me brudda went to de local rum shop to drink a few beers and talk shop with the local proprietor. Subject was the obvious- Development in Bathsheba.

Apparently I just can't shake the Canadian out of me because try as I might to feel otherwise- I like trees and actually prefer them to concrete.

The owner of the rumshop, Carlos, is a Bajan and try he as he won't to feel otherwise- trees are a nuisance and ya can't park your cars on 'em (even if ya catch bus.)

Deese rashole trees get plant but nobohdy ain't wan trim dem. Bathsheba da out of electricity fuh two whole weeks when a branch fell on a power line.
When was that Carlos?
Man 'bout twenty years ago yeah.
Yuh wan' trees look 'pon de cliff dey got nuff deh so. What more trees yuh want?
Check it- de uder day Fosta de burning and fuh two days nobohdy ain try tuh put out de trees. Das how much people 'bout hay care 'bout trees. You see anybohdy even call de fire brigade?
I called them.
Ahlright den. Yuh like trees... Yuh wan' a next beer?

Call 211 For The Poh-Leece

2006-05-29T09:44:00.000-06:00

Not my story but so Bajan I had to pass it on.

My boss, while entertaining on the patio of her safe little gated community home which neighbours the Oran mansion, is shocked out of polite dinner conversation by the shrill and perpetual scream of a young woman coming from the said mansion. Noting that earlier the young lad who lives there had invited the ghetto block boys for an unsupervised pool party this five minute scream for her life conjured up images of gang rape and worse. Perhaps a bit over cautious but certainly with good intetntions, she dials the emergency number to report the incident.

It went sort of like this:

"Hellowuh..."
"Yes hello, is this the police emergency number?"
"Oh Yah-police 'mergency."
"I'd like to report an incident."
"Who dis is?"
"My name is F---- A----."
"What part you calling from?"
"My home in G--- S---"
"Where dat?"
"In B-- Hill"
"In Hillbrooke?"
"No. In B--Hill."
"And whaz you number?"
"It's 555-5555"
"Un Hun..."
"Umm... I've just heard a young lady screaming for the last five minutes from the house behind mine. Everything has gone quiet now but I'm a bit concerned."
"Whas de name of de house?"
"I don't know."
"Alright."

Needless to say no police ever did check on that report- why would they need to? If the screaming had stopped she's either fine or dead. Either way not much to be done about that now. There's nothing beats good common sense.

Putting Shoulder to the Filthy Plough

2006-05-24T10:24:00.000-06:00

The morning after the meeting I assuaged my guilt for having launched a green attack on the state of the beach by joining Mr. Money Bags (a proponent of this Amerindian fiasco) at 6am in front of the church where Michelle married, to pick-up trash. Well I didn't really join Mr. Money Bags, he passed at the end of the mission in his BMW, tinted windows up, to confer with his minions. His "associate", the AG's boy, some Brownies, Michelle's pregnant friend, IZ and I pulled on the surgical gloves and climbed through gullies and over rocks filling our Santa sacks with all kinds of loot. Bottles from the 80's, condom wrappers, styrofoam food containers, buckets, tyres, pieces of car engines, you name it. At the risk of sounding politically correct, Bajans are filthy, disgusting, shameless pigs. I literally picked up their crap off their front yard as they peeped through their windows. One of those "I hate Barbadians" moments, I experience from time to time.

Anyhoo, though Money Bags didn't pick up a single scrap, he did finance the garbage bags and the congratulatory tuna sandwiches so three Boos for Boos and his beach clean-up effort. After putting his money where his mouth is by using my shoulder to the plough, I know I went home to scrub off the scum.