Well, first, let me tell you about the union meeting that occured yesterday. The boss allowed me to go - I suppose he realised he couldn't really keep me from it. Anyway, I went with Stacey, Julie, Suzanne and Calvin down to the ROM theatre. We were all quite tense. Joane joined us down there and slowly (no ROM staff seem to move quickly) the theatre began to fill up - though certainly not to anything remotely resembling capacity, which is sad. They did a very good job of explaining what the Union is bargaining for and exactly what the full-timers would be voting on. They also emphasised that this was not a strike vote, exactly, but a strike mandate vote. This vote was to show solidarity with the bargaining unit, NOT about striking. Despite stressing this about three or four times, with great clarity and patience, I still know at least one person who opted not to vote (or vote no) because they don't believe in striking. I will NOT let it put a wedge in our friendship, though. People have different beliefs. Even if she IS wrong.

I played with Oboe last night, as usual, and also visited Jerzy who was in the hospital recovering from knee surgery. Julie was there too, but sound asleep on a cot beside him. Tania arrived and it was a merry old time, except Julie never quite woke up. *laugh* She missed my entire visit. It seems she was recovering from a wicked headache (sounded to me like a migraine when Tania described it) and was making up for the sleep she'd lost the night before. Jerzy is in good spirits, despite having his knee completely replaced with an amazing metal and plastic device that apparently has a life expectancy of 15 to 20 years or so. Anyway, he was quite pleased when I told him he was bionic. Back at my place, I cooked up an excellent dinner for Rick and I: asparagus with melted brie over it and a delicious beef stirfry with yellow peppers, mushrooms, and snow peas. While we ate, and following, we watched Legend, another fantasy film classic directed by Ridley Scott. My opinion of it has certainly improved. What I'd seen prior to last night I recalled as boring, though pretty. I've decided the movie is actually pretty damn good. Rick agreed. We had a good night.

Today I worked at Heretic and there's nothing much to say, it was slow. Following that, I went and visited Oboe. He needed all his things looked after, food, water, litter... and, today was Thursday, and Tempest was supposed to have watered the plants. She hadn't. So, I did. I was not pleased at how she's been looking after things... and I really wanted to feed the turtles. I have a bad feeling they're starving to death, but I couldn't find the turtle food. So, I left a note for her and a phone message. Silly fourteen year old girls. They think they're grown up, but they're really not. While I was there, I watched television and there was "Universal Soldier Two: Brothers in Arms" on the NewVR. I don't know if it was made for TV or what, but there were some excellent moments and the soundtrack was pretty damn good too. My favourite part (I didn't see all of it, and lots of it looked quite stupid) was when a little girl gets on a train and the conductor seats her across from this good looking fellow. He's all stoic-like, even robotic, which was my first guess. She says, "Hi, my name's Annie." He looks at her and offers this as an answer: "GR44." The little girl's eyebrows shoot up and she says, her face all lit up, "Cool !!! Are you a rapper?!"

Anyway, time to pack Willi into a box and take her home for a couple of days. Let me leave you something quite remarkable, though. Tanya left this in my email box, and it's bizarre and funny. Also, she has this crazy thing in her weblog, which I can now happily beat with this, this, and this ! Hah ! There are more, too. Crazy.

Last night with Oboe was alright, but he's clearly missing his people and I simply wasn't any decent substitute. He did eventually curl up by me on the couch as I dozed in front of the old "Spiderman" cartoon (I woke up shortly into the following show, which was "The Incredible Hulk"). We played, and I changed his water, which was a bit grubby, and then I left. He got about an hour and a half of nearly undivided attention from me, and I'll do the same tonight.

There was talk of going out with Megan, but she was supposed to phone me over the weekend to make plans and she never did, so as far as I'm concerned, we don't have a date. Christian, who I saw briefly after work yesterday, invited me to this very cool poetry book launch. The poet is Motion, a well-respected dub poet who's spoken word is riveting. Unfortunately, despite there being bits of food and a free book in the evening, the fifteen dollar cover is too much for me. I think I'll just go home, chill with Willi, visit Oboe, and fix the broken links on my webpage.

Tomorrow is the big general meeting for the ROM full-time union, including the manditory strike vote. Yes, that's right, things have ground to a halt and it's come to this. Of course, the turn-out will be pathetic, and then they'll never get a yes vote, but the fact that it's come to this is so stupid. If, by some miracle, they do vote to strike, I've promised myself that I WILL NOT cross the line. No way. I've asked my boss if I can attend the meeting tomorrow and he gave vaguely lame answer about if the part-timers aren't in this then I don't see why... blah blah. My response was that whatever affects the full-timers affects the part-timers to which he replied, "You have different collective agreements." I said, "Well, yes, but ours is based on the full-time agreement and in places it even refers to it." Anyway, I don't know if he'll let me attend, so I've just decided that I'll go on my lunch. I'll take an hour lunch in order to go since it's from noon to 2pm, and I'll leave before it's over. The employer wants to seriously withdraw any employee rights. Scary.

I forgot to mention the wonderful dream I had (other than having a horrible fever in it, thanks to the overzealous bedding at Kelly's) ! In my dream, I call out sick (that would be the fever) from the ROM and then have to go from where ever I am, to my house. It's my house that I lived in growing up, the one on Avenue Rd. To get there I had to walk through the downtown neighbourhood I used to live in on Manning, AND along the rotary trail in Peterborough (running behind Mom's house). I go inside and there are two cats, one the kitten that one of our tennants had owned, who's name escapes me, the other Placi, the wonderful little male tiger striped grey that was born in our backyard in Brooklyn. He died in the summer of 1999 from cancer at the ripe old age of 17. In my dream he runs to greet me at the door and dances all around my feet the way he used to, before leading me into the kitchen for dinner. I go into the frige, get out a can of cat food and gather up his plate (and apparently the one belonging to the kitten, who just seems to be there). I dish up the dinner and put the plates on the floor, somehow aware that, in the real world, Placi is dead. I give him new water (the kitten is now gone) and then just watch him eat. He's just like he was when he was about 13 years old, round, rotund even, and amazingly perky and cute. And then, all of a sudden, he looks up at me with his big bright eyes and mieus at me. I look at him, now more fully aware that he shouldn't be there and reach down to pet him and he sticks his bum in the air and his question-mark tail quivers excitely and then I woke up. I was both happy to have had the dream and sad because I remembered how much I loved him.

Well, heh, I'm turning into something of the Barbeque Queen - so long as it's steak. I haven't tried other things, yet. I will, but haven't yet, because, well, steak is so damn good. Uhg, real meat ! The best sort ! I had steak (t-bone), which I will state right now, was certainly not the most fabulous cut of meat I've ever had, and fiddleheads, only I need to figure out how my mom makes them, because mine were not so tasty, despite the butter stuff. I read for a little less than an hour on the porch, enjoying, more or less, the neighbourhood noises. Lots of street soccer. And loudly had barbeques with 10-people families. Then, I went in. In the kitchen, Nick ran the tap, a while later, after my delicious supper was had, and a stray squirt of water shot out of the side of the nozzle and hit me squarely in the bosom, causing me to shriek in a MOST girlish fashion. It was embarrassing and funny. And then, it happened again. More embarrassing, and even funnier. Then he fixed the nozzle. Good boy.

Yesterday, the beginning of the hotness (where the hell was spring? Cold to hot. Lovely.), true hotness, happened, although it wasn't humid. It was beautiful. After wasting several hours doing little of importance, I walked to Nicole's to pick up the keys to her place. I'm looking in on her cat, Oboe, while she's off with Mark at Wiccan Fest for the week. Or rather, I'll be looking in on him every day, until Friday, when I won't be in the city. He's a very fun cat, crazy like Willi was when she was his age. I am thankful that she's mostly settled down. She was ridiculously active. And insane. Now, she is less so. Thankfully. She is mostly just cute, but certainly, when she wakes me at 4am for breakfast, she is much LESS cute. Anyway, Oboe is being fed and watered and whatnot by Tempest, Mark's daughter, but my role is to go and amuse, and deal with whatever fourteen year old daughter might... overlook.

Rick came here around half past five yesterday, and we headed off to, what we thought was London, which turned out to be Kitchener-Waterloo, happily or we'd have been very late, a friend of ours from the MUD. It was Kelly's birthday, well, actually it's tomorrow, but anyway, she was celebrating it yesterday. In Kitchener, rather than London. Woo, good thing, because we hit a traffic jam that was so massive, an elephant could have bled to death from a pin-prick before it picked up again. For what? For two guys chipping at a bridge. In fact, when we actually hit the construction zone, half an hour later, traffic began to move faster. Go figure. There was good fun had at a bar/restaurant called Johnny Fiascos, and then more fun had at something of a bump-and-grind club called Revolution. Okay, I admit, I did enjoy dancing to the not wonderful bass-heavy music, but mostly because I just refused to hate it. I remedied the music with a lot of pool playing, though. Also, the lights at the club made me want to vomit. Bad effect.

Kelly and Brett were nice enough to put us up for the night, too, so that we could drink enough not to be legal to drive. Naturally, I was still not a lush... I dunno. I think I have lost my interest in drunkeness. It just seems sort of stupid. I'm drunk - whee... Oh, now I feel crappy - uhg. Yay? No, not cool. I was trying to remember the last time I was drunk... and it was in September, at Scott and Meg's wedding in Virginia. I've had drinks since, but... not to the point of inebriation. It just seems sort of dumb. Anyway, I forgot to buy Kelly her birthday drink, so I guess I'll get her at the RoD reunion in the summer - like she'll need one. *snicker* Anyway, we had to leave Kitchener this morning at 10:30am in order for me to get Rick to the bus depot to go home and for me to get to Heretic on time, where I got to dress and strip manequins all day and take photos of them. It was so hot that the air conditioner was absolutely imperrative. I would have plautzed (spelling? No idea with Yiddish.)

Bedtime now. I have a long ROM day tomorrow.