Suzanne Craig-Whytock's Blog, page 16

Things Are Getting Real

I love reality shows. I’ve loved them ever since I was five years old and I was on a children’s reality show called Romper Room. It was one of the most popular shows on Ontario television, and it consisted of a different group of children each week just playing and doing activities under the supervision of a kindly, teacher-type lady. At the end of each show, Miss____ (there were several women who played the role—mine was Miss Grace) would hold up a magic mirror, and say, “I can see Johnny, and Sarah, and Ian, and….” Kids across the province would sit fixated, desperately hoping to hear their name. I don’t know why my parents decided to put me on the show, but two incidents cemented for me the fact that reality shows have only a tenuous relationship with reality. First, I kept jumping up and down, prompting the director to tell me to stop. “You’re TOO excited,” he said. But I was excited. A SUPER f*cking excited 5-year-old, and I had to stifle my real enthusiasm because it was TV. Second, they taped all five episodes for the week on one Saturday, and I kept getting into sh*t for contradicting Miss Grace when she would start the next segment with “What day is it today, boys and girls?” Everyone was supposed to say ‘Tuesday’ or whatever, but I yelled “Saturday!!” every time. Once again, the director had to talk to me about how we were only “pretending” and to just play along. Yep, that’s me—a non-conformist pain-in-the-ass from an early age.

Still, reality shows are the best, especially building shows. And I’m very lucky because:

a) There’s a renovation going on across the street from us, turning a church into a family home. And while I can see updates on Facebook, I literally have a bird’s eye view of the deconstruction AND reconstruction process from my window. Whenever I’m bored, I can just look out and it feels like I’m watching TV. And here’s where it gets really meta—the renovation is actually being filmed by a network in the States and it will be on TV when it’s done. How cool is that? Also, if you’ve read my new short story collection, At The End Of It All, there’s a story called Twist of Faith which is loosely based on the opening of the cornerstone last year at that very church.

b) I work at an antique market which could very easily be the subject of a reality show, a cross between Hoarders and Storage Wars. For example, the other day, a new vendor showed up. His name is Bob and he’s like 90 and he makes birdhouses. Bob’s Birdhouses. The intention was for him to display his birdhouses on a shelf above the till but everyone forgot to brace the shelf. So he arrived, and one of my co-workers had to immediately start cutting wood for braces because Bob was PISSED. And then my co-worker had to go find a drill. He found four of them in the basement. None of them worked. But we didn’t throw them away because if we did, the owner would dig them out of the garbage and make us put them back. Then we all—me, Bob, and Bob’s wife, watched my co-worker screw the braces into the shelf, which made him very self-conscious and irritated, especially when Bob kept inspecting the braces, and I kept saying, “You should be using a Robertson bit, not a Philips.” I know this because I WATCH REALITY SHOWS, DAN. In fact, I watch so many reality shows that I should pitch one of my own. Thus, I present to you several ideas for fantastic reality shows, starting with…

1) Cubicle Wars

Host: Hello once again, and welcome to Cubicle Wars, where each week, two co-workers compete to see who can create a stunning office space with little more than a $50 gift card to the Dollar Store and their own imaginations! Let’s meet our challengers! This is Jill, a temp worker with a fondness for frogs, as you can see by the many, many statues and stuffies that she has on her desk. Tell us a little bit about yourself, Jill!

Jill: Frogs are amphibians and can speak 7 different languages.
Host: Only one of those things is even correct! Welcome, Jill! And now here’s our other contestant, Josh. Josh is an engineer, so no one knows what he actually does!
Josh: That’s not true. I—I…
Host: Exactly! Now here are your $50 gift cards. See you next week, you crazy kids!

One week later…

Host: Let’s see what Jill and Josh have accomplished. Our live studio audience will then announce the winner!
Audience (which consists of a panhandler that the host found in the lobby): Does anyone have spare change for coffee?
Host: After the show, Stinky Pete! First up is Jill!
Jill: I used my $50 to buy aromatherapy candles and placed them strategically around my cubicle.
Host: That’s it? How many candles did you buy?
Jill: 50, obviously. It was the Dollar Store.
Manager (passing by): You can’t light those, Jill. I told you, it’s a fire hazard.
Jill: FINE, STEVE! But don’t come to me when the power goes out, you fascist!
Host: All right—let’s see what Josh has done. Ooh, a tiki bar theme! Very nice! I particularly like the inflatable palm tree.
Josh: Thanks. I’m very pleased with the way it turned out, although I’ve been getting a lot of side-eye because of the torches. THEY’RE CULTURALLY APPROPRIATE, STEVE! I’M NOT A NAZI!
Host: And now it’s that moment we’ve all been waiting for. Audience, who is our winner?!
Stinky Pete: Is there any whiskey in the tiki bar? NO? Then I pick the candle lady.
Host: Congratulations, Jill. Your prize is that you get to keep all the candles!
Jill: I just want my frogs back. Marcel was teaching me French.
Host: See you next time on Cubicle Wars!

I really think this show has potential. And while I was fleshing it all out, here are some other show ideas I came up with:

2) Souped Up! (a cheaper version of Top Gear)

In this show, two guys take cheap cars and try to make them look cool. With VERY limited resources.

Host: Tell us about today’s project, boys.
Gary: It’s a 1988 Ford Tempo, base model, beige, with rust accents.
Mitch: We got it for fifty bucks at a yard sale. The upholstery smells like cheese.
Host: And what are your plans for this car?
Gary: No spoilers!
Host: Oh, sorry I asked.
Gary: No, dude—we’re not putting a spoiler on it. Spoilers are pretentious.
Mitch: You’re goddamned right they’re pretentious!

The next day…

Host: Wow! What a transformation. Tell us what you did!
Mitch: We found bigger wheels at the dump and put them on the back. Now it’s slanty!
Gary: We used duct tape to make racing stripes. I probably should have used a ruler.
Host: Um…did you put a tow hitch on the back of this car JUST so you could hang a fake scrotum ornament off it?
Mitch: You’re goddamned right we did! We made it ourselves out of two oranges and one of Gary’s granny’s old kneehighs.
Both (highfiving): Our car has balls, b*tch!
Host: All right then. Join us next week when Gary and Mitch transform a Pinto into a fancy lawn tractor!
Both: Unsafe at any speed!

3) 19 and Counting: Feline Edition

Voice-Over Intro: “Meet Meredith, a ‘cat lover’, who roams the streets of her town at night, looking for more cats. She has a LOT—maybe more than 19 but who’s counting? None of them are actually hers; she stole them all from her neighbours. Her house reeks of urine, but she insists she’s ‘not crazy’. You be the judge!”

4) Cooking With Wieners

This show is simple. It’s just hot dogs. Every week. Audience of at least one (Ken) guaranteed.

5) Flip That Port-a-Potty!

While you might be thinking that this is a decorating show where people take old portable toilets and pretty them up, you’re wrong. This show is about Bobby “Flip” Johnson, a real douchecanoe who waits until people go into port-a-potties, then he sneaks up and tips them over. He’s killed in episode 3, and the remainder of the season becomes a detective show, where a slightly Asperger’s detective and his madcap female sidekick investigate Bobby’s murder. Kind of like Jackass meets Elementary. Will we ever find out who killed Bobby? No spoilers!

Going Viral

Last week at work, one of the vendors came in and approached me for some help with bags. I took them from her and as I did, she wiped her nose with the back of her hand, sniffed, and said, “Ugh, I feel so crappy.”

And I was like, what the actual f*ck?

Me: Are you okay?
Vendor: Yeah. But don’t worry, it’s not covid, I tested. It’s just a bad cold.
Me: Yet you’re here, and you’re not wearing a mask.
Vendor: Well, it’s not covid so…

Don’t worry, it’s NOT COVID? Since when is that a thing, that it’s acceptable to spread your germs to other people as long as it’s not covid?! Why on earth do you think I want to get a bad cold any more than I want to get covid? Because I DON’T. Yet—I did get a bad cold, thanks to this person and their communicable disease. So I spent the last week sick as a dog—but don’t worry, it’s not covid, I tested—and had to lose three days of pay as well as cancel my mom’s 81st birthday party because, even though it WASN’T covid, I didn’t want her and my dad, and my co-workers and the myriad of customers who come into my workplace to catch whatever sh*tty virus I had.

I honestly thought at this point, after everything people have been through, that they might be a little more considerate when they’re sick, but I’ve actually heard that phrase “Don’t worry, it’s not covid” more than once from people with colds, flu, or stomach bugs. And I remember pre-covid, when people used to stagger into work, hacking and sneezing and sharing their viruses with everyone around them, and we all just thought it was par for the course. But can we not do that anymore? Because after almost two years of not getting sick, I’d forgotten how awful even a bad cold can be, and how incredibly grumpy it makes me. And what the hell is wrong with my immune system that I’ve eluded covid for over two years but can’t fight off the common cold? Of course, I only have myself to blame really, because I wasn’t wearing a mask. Apparently, I am now going to have to wear a mask for the rest of my life because a) people can’t be trusted and b) I am very un-fun to be around when I’m sick, like the other night when Ken and I were watching Drag Race Belgium:

Ken: I didn’t know chicory was a Belgian national food.
Me: Well, apparently it is.
Ken (looking it up on his phone): Did you know that chicory is not only used as a coffee substitute but it also can be used as a sweetener?
Me: No, I didn’t know that.
Ken: The chicory we have here in Ontario has blue flowers but it’s different from this kind of chicory, which is technically Belgian endive.
Me: Uh-huh.
Ken: Ooh, you can also use it in some kinds of beer, like Belgian–
Me: Okay, Trivial Pursuit, can you stop rambling on about chicory and just WATCH THE GODDAMN TV SHOW?!
Ken (whispers): You’re so mean when you’re sick.

And then, to make matters worse, a couple of days ago, there was a news story about bird flu and how people are getting it now, and I was like, What new hell is this?! Why do birds hate us? Although frankly, I don’t blame them, and if you’ve ever had an encounter with a Canada Goose, the evil lake chicken that is our national mascot, then you’ll know I’m right. But the newscaster was like, “According to the WHO, the situation is worrying but the risk to humans is still very low.” And I don’t believe that for a moment:

Me: Are you okay?
Vendor: Yeah, but it’s not covid, I tested. It’s just the bird flu. C-caw!

See, this is why the zombie apocalypse is an inevitability. I’ve been watching The Last Of Us, which is basically The Walking Dead meets The Mandalorian, and in it, the world is infected by a mutated fungus. And just like everything else, the fungus spread because, although it was initially in the food supply, it kept going until most of the people on the planet were zombies. Why? Because a lot of the people on the planet are jerks:

Me: Are you okay?
Zombie: Yeah, but it’s not covid, I tested. Just a little mushroom thing. *tries to eat me*

And now I’m an incredibly grumpy zombie.

My Valentine Is Bigger Than Yours

It happens every year, on pretty much every occasion—I get outdone by Ken. It’s bad enough that I have a terrible memory and Ken writes EVERYTHING down:

Ken: Guess what day it is today??!!
Me: Oh, god, no. What day is it?
Ken: It’s the 33rd year anniversary of our third date! Here, I got you a little something…
Me: Sigh.

But it’s worse on the major occasions. We’ve been married for almost 32 years, and Valentine’s Day is no longer a big deal. Of course, when we were first dating, and then married, it was a week long celebration of our love, complete with red roses, special dinners, and flirtatious lingerie, and let me tell you, Ken looks wonderful in boxer shorts decorated in hearts. After a while though, as it does, the excitement died down a little. Twenty years in, it became less of a surprise and more of a competition, which Ken inevitably won:

Ken: Is it OK if I drop you off at the grocery store? I went to three different places yesterday, and I can’t find the thing I want to get you for Valentine’s Day.
Me: What? You don’t have to get me anything. It’s not a big deal.
Ken: No, I have this thing in mind. You’re really going to like it.
Me: All I got you was some chocolate…
Ken: That’s OK. I just want to get you something special. Do you want to know what it is?
Me: Um…OK?
Ken: It’s a digital picture frame!
Me: But that’s really expensive. All I got you was chocolates.
Ken: But you’re worth it. Don’t worry about it.

On that Valentine’s Day, he presented me a beautiful digital frame so I could have pictures of him, Kate, and all kinds of flowers, clouds, fences, and trees that I could look at while I was working. But I won in the end though:

Me: Here’s your chocolate. AND YOUR CARD.
Ken: Oh no! I forgot to get you a card. I’m so sorry.
Me (a little smugly): That’s OK. The present was enough. Don’t worry about it.

In recent years, it’s been a little hit and miss—sometimes we just have a great dinner; other times Ken gives me something special and I get outdone once again, and I can never predict what’s going to happen. So this year I decided to nip the whole thing in the bud and announced last week, “Here’s what we’re doing for Valentine’s Day. I’m going to buy you chocolate and you’re going to buy me wine. No cards. Cards are a waste of money, and we just throw them away now anyway.” Ken agreed.

Then, the day before Valentine’s Day, I had completely forgotten about it, and I was driving home from work when it hit me that I had nothing to give him in the morning. Luckily, the local liquidation store was open until 6, so I drove there quickly and grabbed him some delicious gifts—a giant peanut butter cup AND a more pricey tin of Bailey’s filled chocolates. I was feeling pretty good about everything, so the next morning while he was at work, I put them on the counter with a piece of scrap paper that I had lovingly drawn a heart on in crayon. When he came home, I dragged him over to show him his presents:

Ken: I have your present in the car, chilling. I’ll just go and get it.
Me: Ooh!

And he brought in not one, but THREE bottles of wine. I was flabbergasted. Outdone once AGAIN!.  And then he said, “Oh, hang on, I forgot your card!” He ran upstairs with me yelling behind him, “We said no cards!!”

“It’s okay,” he reassured me. “It’s just a piece of paper with a heart drawn on it. I mean it’s bigger than yours and more card-shaped….”

Outdone, indeed, but my heart was drawn more symmetrically. I may have snickered a little to myself at that point. But don’t tell Ken. He’ll always be MY Valentine.

Smells Like Teen Syrup

On Thursday, I went out shopping. Thrift store shopping because this month is ‘Cabin Fever’ month at the antique market, which means most of the booths, including mine, are on discount to encourage people to come out even when the weather is crappy. Sales have been good—or I should say, stock has been moving, because between the commission the market already takes combined with the discount of 20% that I agreed to, I needed to do a little buying. So I headed into town to Goodwill. It was absolutely pouring rain, in keeping with the ‘weather is crappy in February’ theme (three days before it was a blizzard), and I ran into the store, soaking wet. After taking a turn around the metalware section, I headed for vases. A few months ago, I found a vase at a different thrift store, and recognized it as something I’d seen at the market before—turned out it was a Chinese vase from the late 1800s and I resold it for $300—not bad considering I’d paid $5 for it—AND had a coupon. So I’m convinced that the same thing will happen one day, just like I’m convinced every time I play the lottery that I’m going to win, but I never do and I’m always disappointed. And on Thursday, I was not only disappointed but also disgusted. Why? Because I was looking through the vases and turning them over to see it there were any interesting makers marks, as one does, when I picked up a small urn that looked like it might be satin glass. As I flipped it over, suddenly my hand felt…wet. Something had dripped out of the vase and onto ME. And it wasn’t water. No, it was some kind of weird oil. AND IT SMELLED. I immediately went to the cashier, holding my hand in the air:

Me: Do you have any paper towels? Something just dripped onto my hand from that vase over there.
Cashier: No, sorry.
Me: Nothing? Like Kleenex or wet wipes? Seriously? It’s BURNING.

He grabbed me a couple of tissues and passed me a pump bottle full of hand sanitizer. And as I cleaned myself off, I realized that the smell was kind of perfume-y, but not the good kind of perfume. The smell was more like if you said to an AI, “Design me a perfume that smells like maple syrup and gingerbread” and it gave you a bizarre approximation of what it THOUGHT that was. Or like when you walk past the Yankee Candle store in the mall, and the mixture of scents is initially sweet then REALLY off-putting. And I had to keep shopping with this weird, expired candle/moldy syrup smell on me until I got home.

Once I was home, I washed my hand very vigorously with soap. I dried off and checked but it was still really pungent. I took off my rings and washed them too, but it didn’t help. That night, I had a long bath, and when I got into bed, I shoved my hand in Ken’s face.

Ken: What are you doing?!
Me: IT STILL SMELLS!
Ken: Yes, it does. Please get your hand away from me. It’s like a candle that no one wants burning in their house.
Me: I KNOW!!

On Friday, the scent was still very strong, despite me having washed my hands several times and soaking my hand in wine, which is totally something that normal people do. And then I had a bath again on Friday night, but every time I waved my hand near my face, I could still smell the combination of old gingerbread and expired maple syrup. Sure, it was getting fainter, but how the f*ck was it still lingering?! Was it the cockroach of smells? On Saturday afternoon, Ken and I were out, and I held my hand up to his nose:

Me: It’s still there!
Ken: Get it away from me!
Me: You are SO mean. “Meh, don’t make me smell you!” What a baby.
Ken: Is this going to be a forever thing? Like, you will always smell this way? Because…
Me: That’s not very nice.
Ken: And neither is the way your hand smells.

I have scrubbed it and scrubbed it, and even as I write this, if I put my hand up close to my nose, I still get a faint whiff of that oil. But I don’t feel quite so bad tonight though, because Ken just made coffee and it smells even worse. Maybe if I rub the grounds into my fingers…

Here’s a picture of Ilana in a box because a picture of my hand is nowhere near as cute:

In other news, my new short story collection At The End Of It All came out last Tuesday, as you might have read, and I was completely floored when I saw that it debuted at Number 1 on Amazon’s Hot New Releases Chart. And it stayed at Number 1 for most of the day before being supplanted, so despite reeking like the corpse of a gingerbread man who has been embalmed in maple syrup, I was pretty excited. I know a few of you have started reading it—I hope that if you like it, you can give it quick review. It would mean a lot.

Creative Tuesday: Release Day for At The End Of It All

It’s finally here–today is the day my new short story collection At The End Of It All is released! A huge thank you to Potter’s Grove Press and publisher extraordinaire River Dixon! At The End Of It All is available in a variety of formats through either Potter’s Grove Press itself or on all the Amazons. I hope if you do purchase, that you find it appropriately twisty and weird–just like me.

A Novel Idea

As you may or may not have known, I haven’t been working at the antique market since before Christmas. I didn’t really specify why—it was mostly because I haven’t had much time to write, and I had a new novel idea brewing in my head that I really needed to get done. So I took a six week leave. Well, I asked for a leave and they told me I’d have to just quit, so I did, but then a couple of weeks ago, I was asked to come back. And I am. On Monday. And not a moment too soon, because on Friday, I finished the book. I initially felt like I powered through this one, but I worked on the last novel pretty much once a week until it was done. So technically, this one probably took me the same amount of hours, except that I wrote about 2000 words almost every day since January 2. It’s called Charybdis—yes, like the whirlpool monster from Greek mythology and it’s a gothic thriller.  I’m super happy with it. I like to finish a chapter or two and let Ken read it first for feedback, but this time, as I got close to the end and started explaining to him what was going to happen, he said, “Stop. Don’t tell me. I want to read the rest of it in one chunk and find it for myself. I want to be surprised.” And that was fine, but then the other day, I was driving on the highway and the weather was shitty, and it suddenly occurred to me that if I crashed my car and died, he would NEVER KNOW. And it would haunt him for the rest of his life. So I started trying to summarize the rest of the book in my head VERY succinctly, so that I could whisper it to him as they were loading me into an ambulance or whatnot.

But then, after I had finally come up with a pretty good synopsis of the ending for him, I started struggling with the plot a little, trying to make it both suspenseful, twisty, but logical. I literally lay awake in bed for hours, trying to put all the pieces together in a way that made sense, and once that happened, I completely changed what I’d thought I was going to do (because I’m a pantsing plotter), and then I had to re-summarize the whole ending AGAIN just in case I got hit by a forklift or something. So as you can see, I’m exhausted. If only there was a place where I could sit and rest…

Seriously. Was there no thought AT ALL put into this sign? If I’m sedated, why would I BE DRIVING?!

And here’s something really weird that happened last week. I looked out the window at my balcony, and I yelled for Ken. He came slowly ambling in (because no matter how much I yell, he never runs), and I pointed at several small pieces of blue and green paper:

Me: How did that paper get up here? It wasn’t there yesterday.
Ken: That stuff is all over the neighbourhood. It’s like someone shot off a confetti cannon. There’s a gold paper star right in the middle of our back yard.
Me: AWW. That’s kind of nice. But strange.
Ken: Maybe they all flew out of a recycling truck that drove by very fast.
Me: I think you’re reaching. Let’s just call it magic.

In other news, I just found out that my first novel Smile is under contract with my Canadian publisher to be translated and published in Georgia. And every time I tell people that, they say “Great, y’all!” No, not Georgia the state, Georgia the country. And what language do they speak in Georgia? Georgian, of course. It’s due to be released this summer. Maybe I should buy a confetti cannon. Now that I’m going back to work, I can afford one.

Ironing Out The Bugs

On Thursday, Ken and I went away overnight. We didn’t need to—it wasn’t a special occasion or anything, but we’re planning a bigger trip in May, and here’s the thing: We have never left Atlas alone for more than one night, and up until now, either Kate or my parents have looked after him. But now Kate’s in school to become a veterinary technician and she’ll be moving to another city when she finishes this semester to do an internship, so SHE’S not available. And my parents are wonderful, but Atlas is a very active young dog, and when he tries to hug my mom, he literally knocks her down. So we were kind of stuck. But then Ken and I went to a banquet right before Christmas and became acquainted with a young woman in town who…TADA!…does dog and house sitting. She came over a couple of weeks ago and she and Atlas got along like a house on fire, ending the visit with him lying across her lap. So we hired her for a trial night and got ready to leave town.

Atlas: What you do?
Me: Just putting some old clothes in a bag. Nothing to be concerned about.
Atlas: Why does bag have wheels? Is toy?
Me: No, just easier to wheel out to the car. Don’t worry. Here’s a cookie.
Ken: See ya, nerd!
Atlas: What? Can I come for ride?
Me: We will only be gone for 5 minutes. Here’s a cookie. Go to sleep.

So we left him lying in his favourite chair, unsuspecting as he was. We drove down to a lake town, stopping at a couple of wineries along the way, and I was feeling pretty happy about the whole thing. Wine has a funny way of helping you avoid picturing your dog crying and whimpering while the sun goes down and he realizes he’s been abandoned. Am I being melodramatic? Obviously.

Anyway, we checked into the hotel, a very fancy and luxurious place that I still had money on a gift card for. Our room was beautiful with a huge king-sized four poster bed and a lot of weird Victorian era paintings like “Portrait Of A Man Standing In Front Of A Fireplace”–and he was. Within minutes of settling in, I got a text message from “Ivy, my virtual concierge”, who promised to help me with any and all needs I might have. So I texted back, “How do I make dinner reservations?” because I wasn’t sure how to call the hotel restaurant. I waited for a response. And I waited. And waited. Finally I texted back, ‘Ivy you’re not doing a good job at assisting me” at which point I received a very terse reply: “Call 65320 for dinner reservations.” But then, as Ken and I were trying to relax, I noticed several very large bugs on the ceiling, walls, and THE BED, so I texted her again with a picture—“Ivy. What kind of bug is this in my room?”

Well, before you could even say “I’m actually not an AI but a real person who is extremely flustered right now”, the response came: “It is called a brown marmorited it is a common harmless bug i will Maintenance come and remove it for you. I am sorry he made his way to your room.” And IMMEDIATELY after the message, there was a knock on the door. I didn’t know what to expect, but when I opened it, there was a guy standing there with a ladder and a roll of paper towels. We gave him the bugs, which we had carefully wrapped in toilet paper, and instructed him to let them outside. He looked at us like we were out of our minds, but nodded and left.

Then, fifteen minutes later—more f*cking bugs. We put them in a coffee cup and instructed Ivy to have someone come by and pick them up. The message? “I’m so sorry for the trouble. Would you like a bottle of white wine for the inconvenience?” And I was like, “You don’t have to ask me twice, you considerate quasi-artificial weirdo—send it on up.” So at a certain point, we were bug-free and wine-full. If only the pillows hadn’t been hard as rocks, it would have been idyllic.

I didn’t sleep much and finally woke up to a lovely message from the dogsitter, that Atlas had had a good night, sleeping on our bed, but had played, eaten, done his business, and was now sleeping in a chair, awaiting our arrival. So most of the experiment was successful.

When we got home, he was still asleep:

Atlas: You back so soon?
Me: Yes. Did you miss us?
Atlas: No.
Me: That’s actually ok, buddy. Have a cookie.

One Thing After Another

A couple of weeks ago, my parents emailed me with a picture of a big old pine wardrobe that someone in their condo building was giving away. I showed Ken the picture and he thought about it for a minute, then said, “You know that built-in cupboard in the upstairs hallway, the one made out of plywood that we keep sheets and pillowcases in?”

Me: It’s not plywood. It’s just not the best wood, but it’s not horrible.
Ken: I’ve always hated it. What if I rip out the built-in and we replace it with that wardrobe?
Me: It’s built right into the ceiling. You’d have to replace the drywall and then patch and paint behind it.
Ken: Cool!

We picked up the wardrobe from the very elderly parents of the guy who lived in my parents’ building. They were literally adorable, both in their 90s. He insisted on helping Ken and his son carry the wardrobe out to our trailer, while she insisted on showing me their house, including the rugs that she’d hand-knotted herself. We promised to send pictures of the wardrobe in place once we’d completed the project. And so the process began, as most home renovations do, in the ‘one thing leads to another’ school of fix-it projects.

1) Rip out the old linen closet. Discover a very cool hollow space at the base that would be perfect for hiding valuables, or love letters, or human remains, or old clocks. Discover that there is NOTHING in there. Wander the house in existential disappointment for 10 minutes.

2) Find some drywall for the ceiling. The old linen cupboard pre-dated the upgrade to the hallway, and the previous owners had simply drywalled AROUND it, which left quite a gap. Go to the store to buy drywall compound. Purchase Pokémon toys, shampoo, and chocolate in addition to drywall compound because I’m AT THE STORE, KEN.

3) Put up the drywall. Tape it and patch it, as well as all the holes in the wall where the nine-inch nails were holding everything in place. Not Nine Inch Nails the band, because that would have been super cool. But no—just stupidly long nails that ripped out pieces of lathe and plaster when Ken crowbarred the cupboard out.

4) Continue to apply drywall compound, because Ken is a fanatic.

5) Let the drywall compound dry. Search the house for the one can of paint that might match the rest of the walls in the hallway. Find three different cans, none of which match. Determine that now the ENTIRE hallway will have to be repainted.

6) Sand the drywall compound that coats the walls like a powdery white lover until you’ve almost scrubbed into the next room so that the walls that will be hidden behind the new wardrobe will be supersmooth. Spend half an hour vacuuming up all the dust.

7) Contemplate the waste of opportunity around having a very large space that would have been perfect for gold bullion, a severed hand, or even a rat skeleton, but which has been squandered. Realize that reality is never as good as your imagination and that you may be obsessing just a tad.

8) Mix two colours of paint together to get an approximate match. Decide that it’s not approximate enough to avoid having to repaint the ENTIRE hallway.

9) Curse the wardrobe. Curse it long and curse it deep. Rip a small piece of painted wallpaper off to get a match at the paint store. Meet a girl who is a WHIZ at paint mixing and who makes you paint that is indistinguishable from the rest of the hallway.

10) Realize that, if nothing else, the whole experience has provided you with a writing topic in a week in which not much happened.

In other news, there are less than 3 weeks until At The End Of It All, my new short story collection, drops. I’m super-excited. I don’t know how these things work, but if you want to host me on a blog tour once it’s out, I’ll repay the favour by promoting you and your own work, or posting a review, or whatever you like. I’ll even come to your house and look for ghosts, or name a character in my next book after you. I’m easy. And if you want to grab At The End Of It All as soon as it’s released, you can go to the Potter’s Grove website, or pick it up on Amazon.

Here’s A Tip

Recently, I started tutoring to earn a little extra money, now that I’m no longer working at the antique market. I still have a lot of teaching resources, including children’s books, in one of the guest bedroom closets, so I went through the stack of books the other night, looking for something that might interest one of my new students, a child in grade 2. I found a couple of cool I Spy books and some other fun reads, and then I found a book called Dinosaur Bob And His Adventures With The Family Lazardo. I couldn’t remember ever buying it or even reading it to Kate when she was little, and I started flipping through it. Here’s the gist of the story: An American family named Lazardo goes on safari and finds a dinosaur which they bring back to the States and it causes a lot of issues but in the end, (spoiler alert), the dinosaur helps their town baseball team win a big game. And that explanation is only slightly longer than the title of the book. But that’s not the weird part. The fact that they go on an AFRICAN SAFARI with their small children and find a dinosaur isn’t even the weird part. No, the thing that absolutely confounds me is this. On the cover of this book, which was written in 1988 by the way, and on almost every page, there is a man wearing a regimental uniform and a turban. He is briefly described on the first page, when the family initially encounters the dinosaur thusly: “Jumbu, their bodyguard, said nothing.”

Okay, first, why the hell does this family need a bodyguard?! And why is he some kind of Sikh warrior? But then things get even weirder because based on the illustrations, it turns out that he’s not really their bodyguard—he’s actually their MANSERVANT, and on the second page, the Lazardos are lounging on the dinosaur’s back in their swimsuits while Jumbu is in some kind of ceremonial beachwear and he’s SERVING THEM ALL DRINKS. This book was published by Scholastic and can you imagine the pitch meeting?

Author: So there’s this white family and they find a dinosaur…
Scholastic: Like, dinosaur bones?
Author: No. A real dinosaur. And they bring it back to the United States to play baseball for their hometown team.
Scholastic: Interesting. Are there any quirky unexpected characters?
Author: Well, they have an East Indian manservant–
Scholastic: Manservant? That might be perceived as racist. This IS 1988 after all. Better call him a bodyguard.
Author: Oh, okay.

Throughout the entire book, no one talks to him, no one mentions him, even though he’s on almost every single page serving drinks to the family, playing catch with the kids and whatnot, and no one even thinks to ask “Hey Jumbu, you’re a bodyguard, right? Do you think it’s safe to bring a dinosaur back to the Unites States to play baseball?” Because I’m sure all the chaos could have been avoided by letting Jumbu do his damn job. The only time we hear about Jumbu again is on the last page where the family is celebrating the big baseball game win and “Jumbu brought out the musical instruments” so the family could sing and dance. But then it felt like there was some ominous foreshadowing because right at the very end, “Jumbu smiled.” I’ll bet he did. And the sequel to this book is called, Jumbu Gets Even.

The other thing that completely befuddled me the other day happened when I went into the cannabis store. That’s it. That’s the story. No, I’m kidding. I went into the cannabis store, because I live in Canada and we like weed so much that we have government-licensed and regulated places where you can legally purchase it. I don’t smoke it or anything—I use CBD gel caps to help with my shoulder pain. I ran out of pills, and walked into the cannabis store to buy some more. On the counter at the till, there were two jars. These jars are TIP JARS. Every month, this store and others like it, have a question that prompts you to leave money in one of the jars. Last month, the question was “Is the Earth flat?” and terrifyingly, there was almost as much money in the YES jar as in the NO jar. Like, how stoned ARE you if you think that gravity, physics, and every explorer who circumnavigated the globe are just LYING TO YOU? But this month the question was “What TV show was better?” and the choices were Friends or Seinfeld. However. The questions are NOT the point. The point is, Why is the staff in a government licensed and regulated business asking for tips? First, they get paid $15.50 an hour at the very least because that’s the minimum wage. Second, it’s not like they cooked me food or brought me a drink—like, all the woman in the store literally did was open the locked cabinet that I pointed at and hand me a bottle of pills. And she wants a TIP for that? But I guess people are very grateful to cannabis store workers because there were a LOT of tips in those jars. More tips than I bet Jumbu ever got anyway.

Creative Wednesdays: My Spooky Six Interview with Willow Croft

Thanks to my good friend Willow Croft of Willow Croft: Bringer of Nightmares and Storms for her unique and very fun interview with me for The Horror Tree’s Spooky Six Interview Series. I hope you enjoy finding out more about me, especially the reason why I never dangle my arm off the bed. You can read it here on The Horror Tree!