merry christmas eve from kinda-sunny southern california. out here visiting family and awaiting a terrorist attack...and i'd rather be in canada. the longer i am away from southern california, the more i despise it when i visit. there's just something different...that i can't pinpoint, but i know i don't like.

i flew 'el al' airlines from toronto to LAX. i purchased my ticket thru delta, though. some code-sharing thing. my flight had originated in tel aviv. interesting flight - to have everything printed and said in another language, and having to wait for the english translation. which, sometimes, with the announcements from the cockpit, we never got.

there was a 'duty free' catalog in my seatpocket. the descriptions of the items were obviously translated into english - some of them were quite funny. my favourite:

nike presto watch

fresh unique line integrate maximal convenience with actual colorful lucent fashion. $59

must've been written by the same people who write instruction manuals. maximal convenience? hee hee.

we were wished a happy hannakuh on the plane...no merry christmas on this airline! unlike delta, i didn't have to pay for the meal i was served. it was edible and kosher. there was a slip of paper on the tray explaining that all items except the cream cheese and butter were kosher, and that they were shipped pre-packaged and not opened until they were on the plane. interesting.

now they found mad-cow disease in the US. the US decided to boycott canadian meat when mad cow was found there. i heard a commentator on npr this morning say how the US's self-righteousness will now haunt them.

i have a feeling it's going to haunt the US more and more in the future - and with things much more serious than mad-cow disease.

wow. all i can say is wow. wow. um, WOW.

rochester, ny
12.20.03

--------------------
dave and tim's set
---------------------
#41 *
Where Are You Going *
Typical Situation *
Cry Freedom *
Dancing Nancies *
--------------------
dave and friends' set
---------------------
Intro ->
Trouble
Dodo
Stay Or Leave
Up And Away ->
Tell Me Something Good
So Damn Lucky
Gravedigger ->
Grey Blue Eyes
Up On Cripple Creek @%
American Tune +
Oh
Oh, Sister ^++
Too High ->
Fire !%
Some Devil
(Butterfly) & ->
Spanish Moon Ä
Solsbury Hill #
Sweet Up and Down
Thank you (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) ~
-------------------
Everyday *** ->
Bathtub Gin ***ñ
Fool In The Rain $$

* Dave and Tim
# Peter Gabriel cover
^ with Emmylou Harris
++ Bob Dylan cover
% Trey on lead vocals
+ Paul Simon cover
@ The Band cover
& written by DM for the movie "because of winn dixie"
** Dave solo
*** Dave and Trey
ñ Phish cover
$$ Led Zeppelin cover
Ä little feat cover
~ Sly and The Family Stone cover
! jimi hendrix cover

at&t wireless has terrible customer service. the people are always really friendly, just terribly incompitent. i called twice a few months ago to get on the canada plan this adds canada to my one-rate (no roaming, ever) plan for $19.99 a month. a lot of money, but a good deal considering the times i call to/from canada.

today i found out my at&t bill was $279. what? then the online bill-view system wasn't working correctly, so i couldn't even figure out WHY it was so expensive. after 10 minutes on hold - terrible music, then every so often there'd be a pause, you'd think that you were finally going to get a human being (or some semblance of the sort) on the other end...nope, it's just ms.machine voice saying they are experiencing 'an unusual number of calls'. why are they always experiencing this? why don't they hire more operators? duh.

the guy who finally picked up sounded bored and annoyed. great. i asked why the bill was expensive, given my plan. he tells me i'm not on the canada plan. i'm put on hold for ten more minutes. when he comes back on the line, he informs me that i should be, and should be for the past few months, but he can't do anything about it i had to call back later because the system was being maintained.

hello? i have to wait on hold again for something YOU screwed up after i called TWICE? why aren't they maintaining the system in the middle of the night when, i hope, fewer people are calling. which is when i guess i will be calling.

i hate at&t, but they are the only company that offers a one-rate and a canada plan. grrrr.

*end irate complaint*

going to go bake christmas cookies and attempt to forget about at&t for a bit...damn cell phones!

bathtub gin! oh, i wish i was there! i wish they play that - and sweet up and down - in rochester. *crosses fingers*

Here comes the joker
with his silly grin
he carries a martini
made of bathtub gin

Here comes the joker
we all must laugh
cause we're all in this together
and we love to take a bath.

my lil' dream band...the perfect dmb/phish combination. i love phish, love trey solo, love dmb, love dave solo - and am stoked to hear them together. thought i missed the days o' phish and dmb.

i broke a nalgene bottle today. i was always told they were unbreakable. i've seen mangled bottles that had been run over with a car (or suv) and only bent, taking on a crumpled can shape, not broken. an outdoor store will have one proudly on display - as if to say 'see? buy one of these bottles. for all those times you almost back over your waterbottle!!' (what i don't get is how they got the car to run over it in the first place? wouldn't it just keep rolling away? did they try to get someone to hold it? weird.) it was one of my first two nalgene bottles, from about 1995. they had a giant graphic of a cat and 'nalgene trail products' written on them. lllooonnnggg before the days of coloured nalgenes. beat up, full of stickers, it's had water from at least 7 states and two countries in it.

i'm sentimental over a nalgene bottle? (mine multiply - i have 5 or 6 now. but this was one of my favourite ones. *sniff*)

interesting: nalgene is actually a lab equiptment company. i wonder how they came to make water bottles, and how/why it's the best material for the bottles.

that would really get the really earthy backpacking types...the extremists. you see, the same company that makes your water bottle makes lab equipment that *could* be used in a lab where animal testing is done. the water bottles aren't vegetarian. (mind you, i'm against most animal testing) hmmm.

Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinion of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth. - Katherine Mansfield

i was reading today about a man who decided to 're-live' his life and change the things he regretted. the ones that are possible to change, of course. i'm sure this was very fulfilling and life-affirming and all those other good things that women's magazines are always saying we should do for our 'wellness'.

what i have a harder time understanding is the desire to revisit these things, to somehow try to change the past. regret is for little things: 'oh, i wish i would've bought tickets to that show' or 'i wish i would've studied harder for this test'. too many people regret big things: not speaking to their family, working too much and not spending time with your family, not taking an opportunity when it arose. what an awful way to live - trapped in 'whatifs'. i prefer the 'whynots' and 'doits'.

we make many many choices in our lives, an overwhelming amount when you really think about all the decisions you make everyday. what kinds of cereal, what to wear, our route to work...we just make many of decisions so automatically that we don't realize there was even a decision there in the first place. that is, until a mini-crisis. you really wanted frosted flakes and there's only special k. your favourite skirt is at the drycleaner and you have a big presentation. hopefully you meet these with an 'oh well'. you wish you would've, but in the grand scheme of things, does it really matter? nope. not worth wasting time worrying about.

this is what happens in other areas, too. of course you are going to spend a lot of time at work - you need the money. your brother was rude to you at the last family get-together, why should you be the one to call him? then there's a crisis. a child becomes gravely ill, and you realize that there's more to life than work and money. your brother is in a serious car accident, and you realize that trivial things are not worth holding grudges over. why isn't it the other way around? you think of the precious amount of time your kids will be well, kids and make adjustments in your life to make more time for them. we need to make more decisions from the heart, not the head. from the heart, then hope that the head will figure out some way to make it work. and it usually does.

if someone asked me to name my biggest regret, i wouldn't know what to say. likewise, something that i would change about my past. because i would not be the me of today without the me of yesterday, and i'm very happy with the me of today - the road may have been rocky at times, but in hindsight it looks like i was cruising across the open plains, convertible top down, sun bright in the sky...

(haha, hmm, maybe i've been reading too many magazines...i'm starting to sound like one! oh, another thing i learned in canada. the importance of a toque (tuke...it's the canadian word for winter hat. what do we call them in california, you ask? winter hats. d'oh), scarf and gloves. and with the way i lose all three of these things, i hope i make it thru the winter with at least one of my pairs of gloves!

it's raining. it's december in ontario. it's not supposed to be raining, is it? go global warming. :/

i have realized there are some skills that are requisite to survive in canada:

1. you must learn how to walk on ice/snow/snowy ice/icy snow/ground that looks perfectly fine but is really super slick black ice without falling and seriously injuring yourself. if you're really good, you can do it without actually falling, but i haven't made it that far yet.

2. who don cherry is. i was informed that i HAD to know that in order to live in canada. i wonder if it's a question on the immagration test?

3. that minus two (celceius) is NOT cold. hell, it's not even hat weather for some. i've seen guys in shorts when it was minus two. i guess double-digit minuses are 'cold'...i wonder what 'fucking freezing cold' is.

there's more...i'm learning. i bought my very own ice scraper (my first!) at canadian tire. i've yet to use it. which, i believe is a good thing, eh?

Yahoo! News - Gore Says Dean Is Candidate to 'Take America Back'

hmm...the possibility of dean winning could give the US some hope. unfortunately, i have a hard time imagining that a candidate from tiny, liberal vermont could win, but it would sure beat another round of bush II.

on a happier note, i get to see dave 'and friends' (i still think that sounds weird - aren't the band members his friends? dmb, i mean) on friday. yay!

i want more snow. i never ever thought i'd say that. then again, i also now think that 2 degrees is 'warm' or 'not cold'. :)

make a snowflake! i have gotten lots of them now that i'm in the great white north, and now you can make one (or two or three...it's addictive!) of your very own! enjoy!

one of mine...

crazy how much perspective has to do with how 'good' your life is - if you choose to look at things from a positive angle, even things that are unexpected and life-changing are more interesting than 'bad'.

i live in a small 2 bedroom apartment with 2 other people...i don't know where i'll be living come january...i'm unemployed (well, being i am in canada, i don't have much of a choice on that one.)...my stuff is stored in 4 different places and i'm living off of what fits in 1/2 a small bedroom and a hall closet...yet i am in a more content place than i have been in a long while.

the alternative to this doesn't sound too appealing. the last place i'd want to be right now is behind a desk and computer 9 hours a day. that is my personal nightmare. i suppose many people share this nightmare...a large number likely live it.

at times i feel guilty for not wanting 'it' - that life. somehow i *should*. isn't it what most people would want? or is it that most people want a slow paced simple lifestyle but few have actually attempted to do it? i wonder how much of your life just happens, no matter what amount of effort you put out to make it happen another way.

if you put forth the effort in the areas which 'feel right' and are personally satisfying withdrawing from things that don't give you this, no matter how 'crucial' or 'important' they are, will your life be flowing in the 'right' way - even if that way is against the flow. i used to wish for someone to tell me what was next, what was coming up, what i needed to be expecting. now i know how free 'not knowing' makes me. it becomes less conscious, the choice to not to stress, to be generous and forgiving and kind...to live.

every so often, something especially irritating will happen at the wrong time, and i get upset. suddenly i'm 'homeless, jobless and useless' instead of 'nomad, seeking and doing'. i hate it, that feeling. it happens less and less often. i still am in a state of, hmm, 'well, it was a certainly something i learned something from'. it hasn't become 'i'm a horrible terrible worker who can't do anything right'. it was something that i needed to do for myself, too. to stand up to someone when i think i've been treated unfairly, not communicated with and not respected by someone i work for (or, anyone, really). it feels good, to know that i didn't suck it up and deal. everyone deserves to be treated with respect, as do i.

in other words...life is good. i'm happy - very happy. grateful. fortunate.

i just need someplace to live january 14...and somewhere...

even though it's been around awhile now, it is still interesting to me to see how the internet has changed how we live. the accessibility to information is overwhelming sometimes. on the news last night i heard that the toyota pirus was named one of car and driver's '10 best'. bravo! amazing, really. hopefully this will help boost interest in alternative fuel vehicles...

hearing this made us wonder what the '10 best' had been for other years...that information is readily accessible at our fingertips online. in the pre-internet days i would've had to dig though my dad's collection of car and drivers (probably almost 20 years worth...all cataloged and boxed in the attic. my dad is the most organized pack rat ever!) to find this information out. on one hand, it's convienent to have this info available so easily, but i also feel like i 'need' to find this information, simply because i can.

no wonder we have information overload...too much going on....open up my head and let me out...