Let me just say that random bolgs rock my gucci socks (thanks again Kristie!)
who knew? mike from alberta led me munich! hahaha sounds rad but mike is on the top of page 4 of people when you serch alberta and munich is on one of his links. i pretty much love you both. mike nearly made me shit myself.

I just had rather shocking news. It isn`t even shocking. I`m just shocked.

Can anybody tell me what happens when you mix 13 years of a big void in the «discipling and regulating your child`s activities» part of parenting with a little bit of hereditary insanity and a whole juniorhigh full of rebellion? Oh, you get a relationship between a mother and son where the mother doesn`t know her own son (let alone wanting to) and a son who wants to believe that there is good in his mother but can`t quite bring himself to stop hating her long enough for it to sink in.

Ok then, another question; who here has seen the punk rock flick, Detroit Rock City? For those of you that haven`t, here`s the run down: four boys all dying to go see Kiss in Detroit but being kicked in the balls a few too many times by random obsticles. One of which is Jam`s (Sam Huntington) mother who is a bible thumping fucking (s`cuse my french) lunatic. The most memorable quote in the movie is between the two of them when she sees him outside the church she left him in in Detroit right before the concert. it goes like this:

«Jam: Hey what's up mom? I'm gonna ask you this nicely first. Can i have my drumsticks back?

Mrs. Bruce: Your drumsticks are the least of your worries young man. You ran out on God! My son just ran out on God! You are in a world of...

Jam: TROUBLE! I've been in trouble for the past 12 hours! HELLO? You know I'm going to be in St. Bernards Boarding School for the next 2 years. I'm gonna be out of your hair until I'm a legal adult! And then all YOU have to do is is light a candle, pray to some stupid little statue for me and all is forgiven and forgotten, right mom? Then you can spend your days in a guilt free pursuit of more constructive activities like telling people how screwed up their lives are. And then you no longer need the patience and understanding required to talk to your own son on some normal plain. And then that way you don't have to think about how tough it was for you when you were growing up and its a good thing too cause if you did, you'd realize what a lousy, goddam shitty-ass parent you are.

Mrs. Bruce: Jeremiah what has gotten into you?

Jam: I JUST LOST MY VIRGINITY IN A CONFESSIONAL BOOTH! LORD HAVE MERCY! Now for the last time, Mom, give me back my fucking drumsticks... please. »

Ok so am I the only one who sees the parallel? ok maybe you don`t but then you don`t know the family history. My aunt has been on my cousin`s back insesscantly since he first gave her reason to be. My cousin gave up trying to please her a year ago it and has been doing whatever he wants since. My uncle is useless. Well he makes money but frankly he has no idea what to do with his son or daughter... or wife.
Up untill my aunt showed her flip side (excuse the pun) my cousin had great grades but during the three years of junior high he was kicked out of five diffrent schools. mostly for cutting class and for generally being a trouble maker. Now i find out she`s sent him to lockdown in Montana. How is that going to help!?!??! The cynical way to look at this is to think «well he can`t hate her anymore than he already does, so maybe this will turn him around» did i say cynical? i think i might have meant optimistic.
My cousin who I love like a brother has been sent to lockdown. how much can this help? he`s either going to come back an army enforced droid or even more angry and uncontrollable than he is now. I think the only person who even knew what what was going on during junior high was his girl friend and for some reason they broke up. How can my aunt hope to force good choises and regard for others on him? I`m sure I`d be a monkey`s uncle if shes ever shown it herself. (I`m not saying that he disregards everyone, just her and everyone else he thinks is beneath him)

I love my cousin, how do i get him out of this? and if I do what then? would it have helped? is Bootcamp going to help?

«Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suite on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourself. Choose your future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got heroin?»
-Mark "Rent-boy" Renton from Trainspotting (1996)

Ma mère et la restant de ma familie et mes amies commence de de manquer becaucoup. Cette voyage est évidement mon prémière séjour dans la vraie vie sans ma famile à coté de moi et ça commence de m`éceuré un peu, mais dites rien à ma mére OK? Je sais qu`elle à toujours peur pour moi et pour bonne raison parce-que je suis la naïvété en forme humaine, mais peut-être pas aussi stupide que je pensais avant. J`apprends des nouvelle trucs chaque jour qui passe et je découverts beaucoup apropos moi mème de comment j`apperçois des gents et comment ils agissent avec moi. Je deviens alors une bonne juge de moralité.
N`inquete pas pour moi manman, ça à pas bon sense. Je tàime<3

A grand trip across Canada and spending six weeks in a small town outside montreal. w00t!
For all students in grade 10 or 11 out there, who know some french or are bilingual, apply for this exchange next spring. Especially if you are a shy person because there is nothing like spending three days on a train with complete stangers to help you make friends. except maybe mosh pits...thats another story though.
I started off my grand tour excited and already a little bit tired from not sleeping much the night before at the train station in edmonton, where we waited for about an hour before boarding the train. Not to knock VIA rail Canada but maybe a lesson from the british tain system is in order there..... I am what they call extroverted. I am also still not entirely sure what is implied here but whatever, I still started off my journey by stumbling across a group of girls and one boy (many, many more girls than boys on this trip.) with two guitars and a binder full of songs with chords and songs. I can`t play giutar but apparently I can sing so with them i sang myself horse that day and some of the next two days when i wasn`t playing cards with some kids from Vernon and Nelson B.C, or salsa dancing with one of the coordinators from Quebec. I had a rad trip except for the sleep(none) and for some sad twist of fate i was put in the car. yeah, that sucked. hahaha not that i don`t love music, but three diffrent genres at volumes usually reserved for TV with a deaf grannie....it gets to be a bit much. (the music didn`t help me trying to get to sleep) We arrived in Toronto at about 9.30pm and were on our way to montreal by 10.45, and spent the next several hours sleeping, well for me it was closer to passed out than asleep, and arrived in Montreal an hour early...4 am. we waited for out rent-a-families and went to our respective rent-a-homes to sleep off the train ride and then shower and eat (not nessesarily in that order.)
I`m glad that i don`t have to repeat the journey for another month but when i do i know i`m bringing something to help me sleep. apparently there is a really good natural remedies store in the town whre i work! fingers crossed for sleep!

Once upon a time I heard a joke about equality in the world that ended by comparing the US to Canada and made a point of mentioning how wonderful a place this is to live. My perception of Canada and the world is twinned with that joke and I, growing up dirt poor and still having all my nessesities looked after, can`t grasp the concept behind many long lived national and internaional feuds, or small negativities dispersed daily by the incredibly fortunate for that matter.
Having recently arrived in the fabulous province of Quebec and more particularly a small town outside of Montreal, I was shocked when I was informed that the Cirps and Bloods are not only an infection in the US but are also becoming a factor in Montreal! The first thing out of my mouth(was french, so here is the translation) was along the lines of -but what on earth do they have to fight about? Is it possible that way back when, this massive gang war began because two people had a bar fight that simply escalated along the lines of my-brother-is-bigger-than-your-brother, and has now is continuing into Canada`s peaceful terrain by the same means? To me that evokes not only dismay and anger that among so many people so few have been able to ask why everyone began to fight in the first place but also elation that the global community is becoming more tightly knit. (Who knows, maybe some day Canadian with friends in the US will be able to convince them all that the president doesn`t have to be an idiot to qualify for the presidency.) Not knowing how this all began I can`t judge the reasoning behind the fighting but I do know that life isn`t fair and in the end you just have to accept it. Maybe this is naive of me (probably; I am forever being told how naive I really am,) but if everyone involved with a gang stopped being so noble and bent on vengence, and just accepted the fact that their best friends were shot or that some people just have more money and there isn`t any rational action to be taken but a nice funeral or maybe a lawsuit, then everyone would be (poorer but,) better off.
I have to stress my naivety again here folks, I grew up dirt poor but really had nothing to whine about except bullying at school a bit (you`ll be happy to know that my ex-arch-nemissis is doing the same exchange as I am and we are getting along like best friends,) so I really don`t comprehend where people are coming from when they feel so wronged by those who were born into more privileged families. However, I`m not a complete idiot; I have compation and empathy for those who are so wronged by reincarnation or karma or whatever you want to call bad natal luck, and I definitly understand the anger felt and expressed by some while witnessing a fortunate young person flaunting weath with no idea how to be grateful for it. But really the diffrence between me and somone willing to shoot somone else over it, is that I can tell myself yeah, that idiot is so lucky and they don`t even know it, but maybe for them ignorance is bliss, so let them rejoce in their bliss. Some people aren`t meant to know the world`s sorrows.