Out of nowhere I thought of this woman today.  She came into the store with pushing one of those turqoise coloured walking wheelie things that many seniors do.  You know, the ones with the brakes, in case they want to park and have a seat, or speed too fast out of control.

This particular lady was special because she could not speak.  She wanted to play the lottery.  Luckily the store was empty so I sat with her asking her various things.  Do you want to play 6/49? Do you want to play Ontario/49 as well?  Do you want Encore?  How many weeks?  Etc. etc.  It was fairly strenuous but I remember feeling relatively proud about how I managed to give her what she wanted using only her binary responses, a shake or nod of her head, as feedback.  Then I helped her down the front step of the store as she was heading across the street to No Frills.
I remember she came in the following week to, to play the same numbers.  I remembered who she was and she was terribly thankful that I did.  Then she didn’t come in for a few weeks, but then she came back again to play her numbers.  She gave me a ticket to check and I noticed whoever did it screwed up her ticket.  So I asked her ‘They did it incorrectly, huh?’.  She nodded.

So this time a I wrote a little note of instructions and attached it to her ticket so that whatever store she went into, she would be able to get what she wanted.

The next week she came in again, and I popped her ticket into the machine, not before removing the note I had attached the week prior.  But this time she was buying some extra stuff.  As she was leaving she gave one of the tickets to me.  I took it hesitantly, as I do with most gifts of monetary value, and smiled, and she made a sound come from her mouth that sounded vaguely like ‘It’s lucky’.  I didn’t ever see her again after that.  I wish I could so I could split the $10,000,000 with her.

Ha ha, kidding.

As if I’d split that. Ha.

Ok, no really.  I didn’t win.

Or did I?

May 4th, 2006 | Flashback | No comments

Last night I was sitting around with Steven, Antnee, and Brandon at the Waegook.  These guys are some of my favourites.  When we’re together it’s just a real good time.  Always hilarious, and always interesting.  We were talking about our first albums, and such.

I managed to pinpoint the moment at which I really got into music.

In elementary school going towards gr. 7 I listened to the regular pop stuff that we all listened to.  I was into Ace of Base, BoysIImen, Jodeci, and such.

But it was one summer afternoon, I was in the van with my brother driving down Major Mackenzie Road towards Leslie st., likely headed to the highway.  We’d just left our house and he pops in a tape and says to me “Listen to this guitar in the start of the song.  It sounds so amazing.”  He pops in the tape causing a chain reaction of magnetic pulses, and electric currents, converted into movement of a membrane causing the air to vibrate, and send a familiar hiss into my ear.  And then it begins.

And he was right.  The guitar did sound amazing.

Come as you are.

April 14th, 2006 | Flashback | 3 comments