Well, I am back from Berlin, which was AMAZING and hopefully I will be going back next summer! 😀 The bummer news is that I didn’t get my grant, apparently because certain people on the jury couldn’t fathom how a documentary related to an application for a fictional drama. FUCK! Technically nearly all my videos have been classified as documentaries, ironically enough. A lot of them end up at Hot Docs anyway. Still, some people couldn’t connect my support material to my application, so no money for me! 🙁 Now I’m fucked and have to find some kind of job as soon as possible.
AND I got evicted from my apartment. Right now I’m living in my mother’s basement again, because I can afford it and have my pets with me. A pet friendly apartment in Saskatoon starts at 610 bucks, and that’s in the dodgy area of town. A nicer area costs around 850 bucks. And I have all these debts to pay off, and save up damage deposit. And 1000 bucks a month on EI is not very much, when you get down to it.
BUT whatever, life sucks sometimes. And Berlin didn’t suck, and HOPEFULLY my trip to Vancouver this next week won’t suck either, because I will be seeing some old beloved friends and screening my video for the first time EVER!!!! Of course I have no money to go though, although the ticket and hotel are paid for. Mister got colitis and I had to shell out some money for him to get treated so he wouldn’t POOP OUT BLOOD!!! Poor little guy. I love my Mister dog. I don’t want him to feel sick.
BUT what is good in my life?
Well, on a plus side my moods are EXTREMELY good! Not manic, or hypomanic, just good. I don’t feel depressed these days. I’ve been able to deal with some crap without giving up all hope. I HAVE been smoking some weed on occasion. I’m not really ready to give it up entirely, so I’m doing the Harm Reduction route and doing it less and less. I’ve generally enjoyed it, and it’s not so gawdawful when I don’t have any. I haven’t had any for a few days now actually. It’s different doing it at my mom’s, because I can’t smoke up on the property. Actually, my last couple days at my apartment one of my new neighbors started stomping around complaining about the illegal smoke coming out of my apartment, and I was like, oh fuck. BUT I was leaving, so whatever, I just kept toking with the window open. What did I care? I already knew from the maintainence meetings that they didn’t care if someone had a hashpipe in their house.
I’ve been thinking a lot about issues like mental health, and medication and if it is evil or not, and Butch-Femme (or Femme-Butch) relationships, and how I want my damn Admin Assistant diploma so I can get some decent paying job that will let me afford a pet friendly apartment in a nice neighborhood like City Park or something.
The MAIN problem with getting my schooling done is that I can’t afford the living expenses. I could get CAn-Sask to pay for my tuition, but they won’t give me any money to live, so I’m screwed. And Saskatoon Tribal Council will pay for it all, but they run out of money not very long after their next fiscal year starts, AND you have to bring them a letter of acceptance and frigging Saskatoon Business College doesn’t give me my acceptance letter until a month before classes start, which isn’t enough time. And STC wants an acceptance letter for a specific date and not just a general acceptance letter saying I could start anytime their classes start. I’ve been accepted since last spring, BUT because of all this bureacratic shit (sorry for the sp) I haven’t been able to start my program. ARG! I want to go to SCHOOL! I want to get my diploma so I can actually be qualified to apply to these seriously decent paying office jobs. There are so many, but the GOOD PAYING ones require a diploma or certificate. Oh sure, I could be a receptionist, but it would only pay 75 cents more than minimum wage. FRIG!
So, well, I’m not SO DEPRESSED about all that, although it is HIGHLY frustrating. I’ve been having a surprisingly good string of luck with super HOT HOT HOT femmes I like, although not a serious relationship. I’m pleased as punch about that, it’s always nice to kiss people who are genuinely attracted to you. And vice versa. I guess that Is why I have been thinking about Butch-Femme (Femme-Butch)dynamics. When you start bringing Top-bottom into it all it gets even more complicated.
Anyway, maybe you are wondering why I don’t get student loans or why my reserve won’t pay for me to go to school. Well, I owe 2000 bucks to student loans and haven’t paid back more than 150, and they don’t look kindly on that. ALSO my band won’t pay for my school because I already have a bachelor’s degree. If I was going for my masters, that would be a different story. BUT I don’t really want to teach, even if everyone in my family has been a prof. I just really want a job that pays decently and that there are enough of that I could quit or take time off to make my videos/feature films when I get grants or get green lighted.
Aw man, so many barriers to me being an admin assistant who makes videos! POOR ME!
I’ve been thinking about way more profound things than all this, but it’s hard to put into words on a Saturday night at 2am when I really just want to be drinking with my friends in the hottub and everyone is downtown dancing. There’s a new gay club in town but I haven’t been to it yet. I’m scared it will turn straight like pee in a pool the way the Viper Room did back in the 90’s. I should go down before it does.
Also I owe everyone money. That makes me not want to venture out AT ALL! If I hadn’t been evicted I wouldn’t owe quite so much, but I had to pay for movers, who did a shit job, and the carpet cleaner, who did a great job, and my damage deposit hasn’t come back to me yet. And other money is on it’s way, but who knows when I will get it.
SIGH!
Aw, this wasn’t meant to be a downer post, I just felt the need to update my blog readers on what was going on with me. And it turned out to all be downer. No magic Mars video is being made, just a lot of cover letters and crap. I’m writing the script though, I will try and make my video. And now that I know what confused jurors, I can avoid it the next time. Although I still think it’s crap that people think you can’t do multiple genres of videos. Why not do Docs AND Dramas????

Urine smell -> Flower Smell! 😀 (True Stories!)

Mister is digging through my pockets and finding every candy possible. He’s a very snoopy dog. I have photos of a wallet he rifled through and the money he took from it, and also when he went through Deanna’s purse and took out her pouch of tobacco.
I have HOT WATER and Coffee Filters again! And heat, which I don’t need because it is summer. No more going to Mum’s to shower! Now I can actually stay clean! I’m one of those people who showers everyday. I’ve been doing every two days and it’s yucky. Sometimes 3 days! :O But no more! Now I am going to be clean and serene. You know what I mean.
YAY! I just had a nice hot shower in my own apartment. SHOWERS! And I’m supposed to get curtains this week. Hurrah for Curtains! Now I can masturbate in front of my computer! Really, it’s been ROUGH! Curtains are a necessity. Even for people like me who write tell all blogs for over a decade of their life!
Actually, I don’t tell all anymore. I tell some, and leave the rest to word of mouth gossip. I’m no slouch, there’s not much to do sometimes besides gossip about mutual aquaintances, sometimes it’s the best small talk.
I need some monsieur net. I used the last of the floor cleaner and there is no multipurpose cleaner on hand, just Vim with Bleach.
Later:
UGH! I just washed part of the kitchen floor with this “orange scented” generic cleaner and now it smells like burning rubber! Blech! Maybe if I smoke a cigarette the smell will go down! Oh no! I’m smoking! Shameful downward spiral!
Next thing you know I’ll be smoking crack! :O
Actually that is one thing I have never done, and will never do. I’ve watched too many crack addicts to want to be one. It’s sketchy. Especially when they are looking for a rock in the cracks of the sidewalk. DEPRESSING!!!
Funny the limits I put on my drug using behaviour. Like such and such is okay, but THIS is NOT! So sad.
That smell is going away. Phew! And maybe I will have some tea instead of this coke. But mostly I think I should finish washing the floors. Cleaning to raise my self esteem.
Floors are washed! It’s starting to look nice in here, ACTUALLY. Amazing.
Much Later:
Okay, well now the dishes are done and I took the garbage out and I cleaned up a Mister Mistake. I even washed under the dog dishes, which I always neglect. And I dyed my hair again, now it’s a deeper pink, not so orangey. I like it. I left roots in. I don’t have enough for bleach.
While I have been doing all of this I have been thinking about many things. Mostly lottery dreams. Foolish things, but that faint hope is so appealing.
I bet if I made the perfect film, I could make a million dollars. I wonder.
I’ve also been thinking of video ideas, but my brainstorming would sometimes be interrupted by me trying to figure out what a dark organic blob was on this or that.
I saved my suitcase I had bought to go to Scotland! Mimi, my mom’s old grumpy vengeful cat pissed on it, but I got this stuff called Nature’s Miracle Urine Destroyer (for cats)! And now it just smells like flowers.
True story, that one.
And it’s really good because I don’t want to smell like cat piss in Berlin.
Angry cat piss.
I just found my electrical adaptor! With a usb port so I can charge my iPod anywhere! 😀 Into the clean suitcase it goes!
I haven’t gotten my results back on my big grant still. Maybe tomorrow, or the day after, or while I’m gone! 🙁 Not much time left before I leave. I was hoping to hear something about it before I go so that I can plan my life accordingly.

The Bannock Girl has clean fingernails! 😀

I am waiting to hear about my Big Grant, but I did get a little grant to travel to Berlin, which has made me pretty happy. I am looking forward to going, I haven’t traveled overseas since I went to Scotland. And for a Queer festival! Yay! I can only imagine what kind of trouble I could get up to.
I’m feeling pretty positive about finally implementing these BIG changes to my life, like quitting pot and smokes and cleaning up around here more often and walking the dog on a regular basis and remembering to groom myself properly. I don’t want to just stick a hat on anymore.
It’s such a terrible thing to one day fall into the stereotype of the mentally ill, talking to myself with greasy dirty hair and a sink full of dishes. I just need a bathrobe and I will be all set, maybe some slippers if I am really living the high life.
Today I volunteered by giving out bannock for almost two hours. Well, it was probably just one heavy duty bannock duty hour. People are very funny about their bannock. Some don’t care for it, which surprised me. Some white people don’t call it bannock, they call it bread. Whatever. It’s greasy and good!
I even cut my nails so no one would look at me and go “Ew! The bannock girl has dirty nails!”
The bannock girl needs to bleach her hair and put in more Manic Panic.
I was surrounded by the police at Aboriginal Day, they were all doing their good deeds for the community, and there was the treaty day mountie shaking hands and taking endless pictures with Indians. I only got 5 bucks this year! :'( My cousin Steven got 85 bucks! That’s a lot of accumulated treaty days! He could buy 85 jars of baby food! Or a few days worth of groceries!
One treaty day I accumulated enough to get a swim suit.
I didn’t see them giving out bullets though, I don’t think they do that anymore.
If you give someone bullets and money for gas, you can get a dead deer. Sometimes they will butcher it for you too! It sounds so black market and badass, putting a hit out on a deer.
Venison is my favorite wild meat.
30 people became millionaires during the last Lotto Max draw. 30 people!!!!! And this next time there are 55 draws of 1 million each. I’ve got to get a ticket again~! This 50 million dollar jackpot is tantalising me! It seems so much easier to gamble for my riches than actually put real work into accumulating wealth.
Accumulating seems to be the dominant theme of this entry.
I have noticed I have more energy without pot in my life. And it makes it easier to do things like clean and tidy and groom and create.
I am reading all this new information now about how the psych medication I am on make me at a higher risk for heart attacks and strokes, and metabolic syndrome. And that it basically adds up to a premature death. Sucks to be me. I mean, HOPEFULLY some newer better meds will be unrolled in the next few years. They’ve learned a few more things about how bipolar works and are working on treatments specific to those mechanisms. Soooo, I dunno. But I really have to use my time wisely. No more dicking around smoking weed and giggling about something that happened to me in high school. What if I die when I’m 60? That’s only 28 years from now. Already more than half of my life is over if that’s my timeline.
Which means I have to put more time and energy into my practice. A lot of my practice is me sitting around and thinking. It’s not very interesting to watch. When I write I go out for a lot of walks alone. I really need a kitchen table because that’s where I do my longhand and my sketches. And then there’s driving around shooting things and setting up lights and convincing friends they can act for 30 seconds or whatever. But so much is sitting around being a bum, so it seems.
Oh yeah, and all that internet surfing, doing research into things like the geology of Mars, or reading books and watching movies on certain subjects or in certain genres.
I like my life. I just want to live it past 60.

Memories of Birthdays long past!

My Birthday is coming up, as I have been telling everyone on Facebook. Really! I will be 32 years old next Monday the 26th. For someone who didn’t think they would live to be 30, that is a long time! And now that I am beyond 30, I am viewing life in a much different way. For one thing I have to get together a strategy for sustaining my life, instead of just burning out.

I’ve quit smoking cigarettes. It has been since Wednesday at 2pm that I have had a smoke. But to be honest I had three cigarettes on Friday night. BUT none since. And I didn’t ask for the first one of three, I thought it was drugs and I was drunk. But none since, no bad cravings. I was popping lozenges on top of patches A LOT the first day, and then less and less in the days since. Today I’ve only had about three of them, on top of the patch. I can smell things now, like the fresh air. Which I SWEAR to GOD smells like a Bounty dryer sheet to the newly ex-smoker’s nose. AND I have maintained not smoking pot everyday. I had some at a party on Friday night, but that’s it, just weekly tokes. I still want to get down to NO toking. I think it’s a worthy goal for myself. I don’t even really care about the feeling it gives me anymore, the being high feeling. It’s suddenly so unimportant.
UNFORTUNATELY I seem to be getting DRUNK with more intensity than before. Like REALLY drunk. I have to back off from that a bit. I really don’t want to replace getting high with being drunk, because both states are incredibly annoying to others. I’m not a mean drunk, but I can be a stupid drunk. And I don’t like being stupid.

Every time I get around to my birthday, I always re-evaluate my life, my morals and beliefs and ethics. I try to grow as a person. Some birthdays I am better at this than others. And this birthday I am torn between going out and getting FUCKED UP like is normal for one of my adult birthdays, or doing something entirely wholesome like have a picnic. I suppose there is room for both. I just want to have some fun, do something profoundly interesting with some people.

My friend Louis Cruz from back in my second home of Vancouver sent me some photos tonight of us getting drunk during my 27th birthday back in 2005. We were so cute! And it looked like it was so fun, just me and my friends hitting the pub and then going to the gay bar, me in Louis’ sailor shirt and my sailor hat. I often wonder whatever happened to my sailor hat. It was low key yet ridiculously fun. I want to have another birthday like that, a dress up get drunk and dance birthday. I should really organize something. I also wanted to have a hot tub party at my Mom’s, if she was out of town. But I don’t know yet if she is going to be out of town for sure.

YIPPEE! She says I can have a hot tub party at her house on Saturday night! Except we can’t stay too late.

Unpaid Blogging Work Ethic: And how to send weird messages that wig people out

I am always hearing this stuff about how people make themselves so famous because of blogging. And end up making all this money off their blogs.
I never made ANY money off my blogs! Sometimes I PAID money to have blogs. And mostly that is self-esteem based, I feel like I am not writing enough to be worthy of being a famously wealthy/enterprising blogger. I did once have this idea about making some Genderfuck t-shirts with my sketchy ink drawings of differently gendered silhouettes. Which would bring in some revenue. I guess. But then, life catches up with me and I go through different phases of my life of being able to write something everyday to not writing much, ever. And it’s not always because I don’t care, it’s often because I am too busy or sometimes too depressed. Uh, unfortunately when I am Manic I write ALL THE FREAKING TIME! About weird shit. Everywhere! Literally, I will be walking down the street while manic letting little weird pieces of paper with strange stories fall out of my pockets. It’s a really bad idea sometimes, to write! You can write yourself into all kinds of terrible situations! I had a burning once, of the Writings. I had access to the internet for such a short time, and then got into trouble and went home and wrote all kinds of little books full of all these thoughts I had. And then I burned them four years later. And then fuck, I went crazy a couple months after doing that and wrote all kinds of NEW things everywhere, and had access to the internet!
The Dube Centre has internet access for patients now.
I’m worried, I have never had internet access from a ward before, I might write all kinds of funny things. I am not in a ward now! I am actually at home. But my cousin was in the ward recently and I saw their new computer. I started remembering all the strange emails I wrote that wigged people out! I know all the things I would write from a ward in the future would be wigging people out, just by virtue of me being able to write from a locked ward.
Some people don’t realize this, but there is also a phone anyone can use during specific hours on most wards. It’s just been the internet that has been slow to be introduced to psych wards.
It sucks not having access to email, or your voice messages, or any other place to contact people besides through other patients answering the phone and finding you, and if not finding you then being sane enough to take a message.
AN update on my cousin: My cousin Luke is now at North Battleford in the big hospital doing some extended programming and stuff for a year or so. It’s this really old timey hospital from the 40’s that had a morgue and has some graveyard on the property and it’s pretty institutional, but he is safe and hopefully will grow into a more stable being. His life’s been pretty up and down, mostly down, so I hope this stay helps him out. Poor guy, it must be so boring. They make psych wards as boring as possible so as not to disturb people, but it gets pretty tedious. Even with the occasional person acting out, there’s not a whole lot to do besides smoke cigarettes. And even that is getting phased out. Except at the place Luke is at, he can go outside and smoke cigarettes. But not at the Dube Centre because you can’t smoke anywhere on Health Region property. Even when I was at Hantleman we had to walk all the way to the river to smoke. No smoking in the parkinglot. You have to stand just OUTSIDE of the parking lot.
And now Hantleman is an office building. Or will be.
But with care I will not have to spend time at the Dube centre using the computer and sending weird messages to the world. I have to be more mindful of taking my medications.
Little Mister wants to go to bed. I think it’s time. Little Mister! Don’t sleep on the floor!

Happiness is a warm Nun

Today mom blackmailed me into cleaning by saying she was going to take pictures of my apartment and post them on facebook!!! OMG! I was so shocked! I have been cleaning on and off ever since, it’s actually coming along really well. I even did most of the dishes.
I’m pretty happy these days, I guess the meds are working. I’ve had a couple rough days after I forgot to take my meds, but now I’m back on them and doing well. My cousin Jenny is sleeping over on the couch. We were goofing around in my apartment all night, she played this word game with me that was really racy because we are pervs. She’s looked in every book of mine that has pictures, mostly comics but also some naughtiness! :O
I need new naughtiness.
I’m glad I’m not one of those anti-porn feminists, because boy oh boy has porn been nice to me! I was in some directed by the lovely Dayna McLeod in Montreal. We were all horny in a women’s studies class. When I think about it my feminist art class at ECIAD (*now ECUAD) had some hot girls in it. My Mommy’s best friend taught it though and I couldn’t step out of line or she would say something about my dykeling years to embarrass me.
When I came out she gave me a dozen red roses to celebrate my being a lesbian. My mom’s friends were so cool with it! They just accepted me and that was that It was such a non-issue in my family. I was told the worst thing I could ever do was become a Catholic.
Well, I guess I may as well talk about a serious issue for a moment.
My mom is a sessional at FNUC’s Saskatoon Campus. She’s been working there ever since I was a little kid, it was called SIFC for a while. She’s been there well over 25 years. And right now, FNUC is FUCKED!!! They had their provincial funding pulled because of all kinds of mismanagement, and then the federal funding was pulled. A LOT of shit was shaken up and Guy Lonechild of FSIN did a LOT of things that were needed to fix it up. BUT even after provincial funding was reinstated, the federal funding was still not in place. Chuck Strahl refused to give it back. Even though the board got depoliticized and some people lost their jobs and all kinds of things happened that they wanted. I mean, my god, now U of R is handling the money even. But it might be that the school will still go under. And so this is what my mother is living with, and going to work is getting demoralizing because no one knows what’s happening next. People are packing their offices just in case the doors are locked on April 1st, which is when the federal money runs out. They said they would support the university until the end of the semester, but the semester doesn’t end until April 20-something!!
So we’re all waiting, feeling the angst ramping up and wondering what will happen. And Mom has already been looking for other work. I feel so bad that she put almost her entire working life into an institution and now she might have to find a completely new career!!! It could mean she would have to sell her house. It could mean she has to go back to school. It could mean all kinds of things. I just want to see my mum doing what she loves until she retires with a nice pension. What sucks is her old job never even paid into a pension plan, just the regular CPP.
Most of my family has worked at FNUC, it’s a family institution. My Uncle John teaches there sometimes, Auntie Beth taught english and creative writing there, Grandpa taught Cree there, and my Uncle Doug would go in to work with the students in the journalism courses. And Mum’s been there for SO long! It seems sad to see that place go down. And I remember when it started going down too, five years ago when Morley Watson started all kinds of shit. People were being fired willy nilly. People were LEAVING because they didn’t want to be fired for stepping out of line. My mom got more and more depressed about it.
And now she’s really stressed out but is keeping her composure. I think she is anticipating the worst. 400 people will lose their jobs if FNUC closes it’s doors. It’s grim.
I’ve been having a lot of feelings about being Native these days. Just feelings of frustration at the level of RACISM within Canada, in particular towards Native people. I just think that’s so rude, to steal someone’s land and dehumanize them and then bitch about some treaties that people IGNORE ANYWAY!!!! I recently found out Indian Affairs won’t cover Seroquel anymore. In fact, they won’t cover anything that isn’t generic. Our treaty rights cover prescription drugs, but they keep chipping them back further and further. If they didn’t pay for my medications I would be spending about 300 bucks a month just on my looney-tune meds. I’m really scared of having to pay for them, that is a lot of cash and I can’t afford it, and I NEED them! I know what I’m like without me looney tune meds. LOONEY! ANd TUNEY! Go look in spring 2007 entries if you don’t know how looney and tuney I can get!!!

FEELING LIKE WRITING

Sorry for the all caps. My computer does that. Not my keyboard, I’ve tried other new keyboards. It’s some kind of computer issue. And if I was younger and felt a little more manic maybe I would actually spend a couple of days getting to the bottom of it. But it’s an old computer, and I want a new one, and I just got used to it’s weird all caps issue. But when people try to work on my computer they get really frustrated. It’s like that Ruth Rendell story where the house is a killer because it keeps making a window bang open and the couple have arguements about how to close it properly until one of them nearly kills the other. And a murder had already happened in that house over the issue!!!
I’m sorry for giving away that plot by the way. I guess I should write “SPOILER” or something.
That’s a great term by the way “Spoiler.” Drat you, you’ve spoiled me pop culture!
My mum’s really bad at spoiling movies to me. She told me how “the boy in the striped pyjamas” ended. Bad mommy. I Said she could spoil it, but maybe she could have ignored me and said nothing. I was going to see it anyway.
But were you REALLY going to read that particular Ruth Rendell story>>

Or was it Agatha Christie>>>

Agatha Christie’s collected novels sold just less that the Bible.

It’s LATE AT NIGHT and I am up

I am doing well still on handling my addiction. Still doing it in small doses on weekends, but not at all in the weekdays or on Sundays. And I haven’t bought ANY in a month!!! I still want to attend an NA meeting, I just feel sheepish that it’s something as “soft” as marijuana that brought me down. I have a LOT more energy now and am getting things done. I finished my video, wrote a grant for the Canada Council, and am spending more quality time with people who are important to me, without getting stoned. Okay, well on the weekends yes. But I spent time with one of my little cousins (who is also in recovery) this weekend while we were both sober from our drugs of choice and it was really nice and made me feel closer to her. My mind has expanded because I’m no longer always thinking about where I can go next to get a hit, I’m not always waiting for the dealer or feeling cravings and having no money. AND I am saving money! Well, I spend it, BUT not on drugs! 😀
Plus I am having some REALLY amazing dreams, some of them are a little disturbing. I kept dreaming about broken glass in my mouth and needles in my tits. THAT was weird. But now they have calmed down to just being these bizarre adventures. I wasn’t able to remember my dreams while I was a chronic pothead. And dreams are how your subconscious processes things. So how could I process>> I couldn’t!
In other news, work is ending soon because my contract is up at the end of the week. I will miss it, but I feel positive about it because if things go my way I will be on EI for a few months and then HOPEFULLY find out my grant was approved. And I will still volunteer at my old workplace sometimes. It was a really nice place to work and I hope Cansask still supports the employment program I was in there. I liked all of the people I worked with and it was amazing to be in a queer environment working for my community.
There’s some other sparkly happiness in my life but I don’t think I will talk about it here. I will just say that I am having a really fun time these days and am learning more about a side of myself I didn’t get to explore for about three years or so.
My puppy is doing well and my new kitty is still being a suckling pain in the neck because she HAS to be on me almost all the time. Although right now she is sleeping next to me on the floor. Whenever I go to bed she curls up next to my head and PURRS and PURRS and it’s really cute. I love her, little weirdo! She and Mister play chase sometimes, he hasn’t taught her how to wrestle yet, but I think it’s coming. There’s nothing a cat likes better after playing chase with a dog than to RABBIT KICK HIM! So hopefully she figures that out.
It’s spring time! They are making baby bunnies! I saw a baby bunny last time I was in the psych ward, it was in our courtyard and this woman brought me out to show me it eating our pansies. SOooo CUTE! My last girlfriend was terrified of bunnies. I don’t know why. She never visited me in the ward, which was maybe good because we were surrounded by brown bunnies.
And I would yell at them “Hausenfeffer!”
Elmer Fudd was always going to make Hausenfeffer.
I’m SLEEPY and I have to get up early and catch the bus. But I was just feeling happy and wanted to stay up late goofing around. I’ve been thinking about a lot of political issues affecting me these days, and I would like to write a sensible thought out blog about them, but not tonight. This blog changes it’s themes depending on my circumstances, and for the past year or so a lot of that was about admitting I had a problem and figuring out how to deal with it. It’s a little dodgy when you want to talk openly about addiction and your addiction is to something illegal. It doesn’t help to be quiet about it, because it is a struggle, but that illegal part makes it weird to speak about. Considering I no longer keep marijuana in the home, it’s a lot safer, but when I did I always felt like a fugitive.
I think maryjane isn’t the worst evil, BUT irregardless of what people say, it IS addictive, especially now that there are way stronger strains. AND it does sap one of motivation, energy, intellect (temporarily at least) and just that lovely clear headed-ness that is important for creative workers to have. I KNOW I KNOW that people say it makes you more creative, but I was never able to toy with a thought for long enough to really make something creative out of it while I was stoned.
Oh man, beddy-bye! A fruit fly addendum: THERE ARE still a FEW fruitflies, and I am being vigilent about it, BUT the hordes are gone!!! The traps are working and I just have to redo them and wipe out the remaining flies!

Trapping

I have laid three traps in the most fruit fly infested areas of the house. This time I am DETERMINED to exterminate the whole LOT of them! I’ve had ENOUGH of fruit fly shenanigans! I don’t care anymore about their welfare, even though part of their foreplay involves cunnilingus!
The traps are made out of beer and pop bottles, with sugar, yeast, water, and dish soap inside. They are attracted by the sugar and yeast, and unable to escape because of the bubbles of the dish soap!
I successfully defeated the fruit fly hordes twice in Vancouver, once during the Garbage strike of 97 and another time soon after the 2 weeks of Okanagan peaches left out while I was in Saskatoon! They are nasty little buggers, but not as disgusting as food moths, which I also successfully exterminated!!
I am also successfully on the path to becoming a social pot smoker, meaning only on select Saturday or Friday nights, and then only with people. I’ve gone a week and a half without smoking ANYTHING! Well, except for the cigarettes. And I am even thinking about being a total non-smoker. No pot, AND no cigarettes. Just cut it right out.
It’s been a month of only Saturday use, and then no HUGE sessions either, just enough. And nothing this past weekend at all but booze. But my boozing days might be over too, because I’ve just been prescribed zopiclone for sleep and have to avoid alcohol. And I’d rather NOT be dead. I am a bit nervous, I haven’t taken a hypnotic since my Emily Carr days, when I was getting depressed and had to take something to get some sleep. I remember after I took my first pill it was about half an hour later and I said to the rat “This isn’t doing Anyt . . . h . . . i. . ..n zzzzzzzzz” OUT! But the next day I was all dopey and my ex-lover Velveeta said I looked drugged. My doctor said this one doesn’t leave you all groggy the next day, EXCEPT you have to be able to sleep for a solid 8 hours so it can wear off. Oh, but this is supposedly the same drug! When I got it, it was called Imovane. My other ex, Amber Dawn, used to sing “I’m leaving on Imovane, don’t know when I’ll be back again!” Either way, I have a bunch of them and can stick it somewhere for nights when I need a hypnotic\sedative to get me to sleep.
Yet ANOTHER drug. I have so many meds. I’m tired now, I don’t even know if I need it tonight, but I want to see how it helps me. It’s been hard sleeping since I quit pot. And the doctor says it will be a few months before I feel the full effect of not smoking up. Which is kind of why I’m tempted to quit for longer than just in between the Saturdays.
One notable thing is that my dreams have been REALLY engaging these days. Intense stories and really vivid. Not nightmares, but some are slightly disturbing.
Anyway, now my pill is kicking in, and I have to take my other meds before I am unconscious. Tomorrow I finally go back to work!! I have been sick ALL WEEK! BLeh!

No Pot STILL! But . . .

I did have some on Saturday night, when I was doing E with some folks. It was not too bad, I didn’t get uber stoned on it. But it was a relapse technically. So I feel like I should mention it.
I drank beer this weekend, but didn’t get pukey drunk. Just buzzed. I’m limiting substances to the weekend I think. But I do still want to not smoke pot. I haven’t bought any and I COULD have, I got paid. But I didn’t. It’s a very difficult thing, to stop an addiction. I’m relieved I have a couple days since my last foray into pot smoking. It’s been rough quitting before. I really want to be clean for a week, then I think it would get easier. Every day away from it is feeling better. I didn’t even think about it today.
I’ve been working on getting a wider selection of friends, mostly from people I already know and have good conversations with but for whatever reason don’t hang out with them aside from when we’re in groups of folks. I have a really good community here and I need to be closer with some individuals who I have connected with. Sometimes I forget I have a lot of friends and neglect them. I feel bad about that. PLUS when I was smoking up all the time I just wanted to stay home and get stoned and not deal with anyone. It’s good to like to be alone, but if you’re being alone just to do drugs, it kinda sucks!!! So antisocial and messed up.
That all being said, artists need to spend time alone in order to be creative. And a lot of artists smoke pot. BUT my question is, would I be more productive if I didn’t get stoned>> It’s a curious question. So many people say it helps with creativity, but I find it doesn’t help me at all, it just makes me kinda STUPID!
I did party pretty hard this weekend, but it didn’t feel bad, I was with all kinds of friends and wasn’t doing it home alone. Still I would like to not even smoke pot at parties. I guess. See, still that semi-waffling. I need to get over it and just accept that I have a longstanding (12 years!) issue with marijuana and shouldn’t bother with it. People say one day at a time. I wish I could just say never, but recovery is a slow process. And it’s one that requires a lot of inner reflection.
Here’s a song for today, and if you are reading this on facebook, it’s a Youtube video of Depeche Mode’s Clean.