Category: travel

lagos

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What a beautiful boardwalk.

What I wouldn’t give to live somewhere like here and not the plain, everyday southwestern Canadian town I do. Like, it’s not horrible, but man, the majesty that some people are able see, every day.

I hope they appreciate it.

One thing I will give Chatham-Kent is that the world over, and I’ve been a reasonably large number of places, is that there are very, very places that get sunsets like ours.

The colours are so vivid, it’s what everyone always wants them to be setting over a Caribbean sea, or a quaint European villa, but they’re right here, in cornfields and flat ground.

Target: 1500 words
Written: 534 words, short story: Never Worked That Hard

Read: The Last Day Of A Condemned Man, Victor Hugo
Comics: Everafter: From The Pages Of Fables 4-7
Music: 4-Track Demos, PJ Harvey (so underrated)

the best pizza i’ve ever had

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You’ve been beaten, Chicago deep dish (and New Yorkers, shut the fuck up, your flat, sad pizza is like most things big city – monstrously overhyped).

Thank you, Da Michele. Pizza Tedesca. Fucking brilliant.

Target: 1500 words
Written: 1470 words, short story: Never Worked That Hard

Read: The Last Day Of A Condemned Man, Victor Hugo
Comics: Fables: The Wolf Among Us 48, Everafter: From The Pages Of Fables 1-3
Music: 4 Nights At The Palais Royale, Discs 1-2, Sloan

albufeira

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Nice place. Affogato and ice cream on the best, which is a crazy orange. Pretty cool.

We’re getting around okay, even with the cobblestones. Great dinner, watched the opening ceremonies of Milano Cortina, which was amazing, because I didn’t realize the room was filled with almost entirely Canadians until we were introduced and the place blew up.

I’m not particularly patriotic, but I’ll admit.

It choked me up. I’m kind of proud.

Target: 1500 words
Written: 1097 words, short story: Never Worked That Hard

Read: The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
Comics: Fables: The Wolf Among Us 44-47
Music: 4 Future Tracks, Spacehog

welcome to portugal

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Where I’ve been awake for roughly thirty-six hours, rented a van too big for the small European streets, and immediately scraped the back right passenger side on the ramp out of the airport parking lot, to which I thought, “thank goodness for insurance”, before being thrust into a five lane roundabout (with stoplights! In the middle!) outside the airport, and we could get out of Lisbon fast enough.

We are Algarve bound, and thankful for it. The scenery is lush and green, with the terrible rainfall they’ve gotten, and distracts us from the fact that everything north of Porto is without power, for the better part of a week.

It soon turns to Sergio Leone territory, before becoming the land of roundabouts, and the taste of a shitty Portuguese beer down by the water and its washed out beach.

There are statues made of washers which are surprising lifelife (and kinda sexy, which is probably a weird thing to admit), but still, pretty darn cool.

And cats. Lots of cats.

So, you know, good.

Target: 1500 words
Written: 3524 words, short story: Never Worked That Hard

Read: The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
Comics: Fables: The Wolf Among Us 40-43
Music: 39/Smooth, Green Day

portugal bound

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We are on our way to the land of sardines and pastels.

My vet tech sister is watching my recovering pup, and I can only pray it doesn’t get any worse.

How could hell get any worse?

As a wise man once said.

Target: 1500 words
Written: 1680 words, short story: Never Worked That Hard

Read: The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
Comics: Fables: The Wolf Among Us 36-39
Music: 30 Years Live, Bad Religion

regular programming

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Whatever that is, we’re back to it. It’s weird how the kid lashes out a bit when we’re leaving. We have such a good time, and then, when it’s time for it to be over, the big feelings come and since we’re not quite old enough to know how to deal with that yet, we get a little passive-aggressive (or aggressive-aggressive) and push away.

Do we ever get old enough to know how to deal with people letting us down?

I wish I could be there forever, but alas, there are jobs and money and houses and pets and parents who would lose their shit if we were around twenty-four-seven.

We might lose our shit a little as well.

In any case, it has been a blessing to be around this kid, and I’m so glad we get that opportunity, even if it doesn’t come up for nearly long enough.

Target: 1400 words
Written: 634 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: The Faded Sun: Kesrith, C.J. Cherryh
Comics: Violator Vs. Badrock 4, Bloodstrike Assassin 3, Bloodpool 1, Chapel v2 2
Music: Who's Missing, The Who

downtown trick-or-treating

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That’s actually a cool idea, kids getting to go store to store and stores get good PR and publicity and karma (and maybe sales) by doing it. I wonder why we don’t do that here? It was a real hit in Belleville.

Plus, they had Burger Revolution, which somehow equated Che Guevara with dead cow.

I’m torn on Guevara. I know he’s an icon for t-shirts and all, but he wasn’t exactly a great guy. I mean, he was Castro’s right hand man, and Castro was a piece of shit. Death squads by both and the whole bit.

Sort of a nice in theory, terrible in execution icon, like communism itself or vegans.

Anyway, fun day. Good burger. I love me some caramelized onions.

Target: 1400 words
Written: 697 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: The Faded Sun: Kesrith, C.J. Cherryh
Comics: Brigade v2 25, Violator Vs. Badrock 3, Bloodstrike Assassin 2, Chapel v2 1
Music: Who's Last, The Who

grandchild-bound

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This should be fun. It’s not quite Hallowe’en, but it’ll be close enough. We’re doing some stuff Hallowe’en related.

Cannot wait. Drive faster, people.

Target: 1400 words
Written: 2627 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: The Faded Sun: Kesrith, C.J. Cherryh
Comics: Violator Vs. Badrock 2, Bloodstrike Assassin 1, Team Youngblood 20, Brigade v2 22
Music: Who's Got The 10 1/2?, Black Flag (fun fact: it's Kira)

home again

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I was praying for peace, but, uh, yeah. Nope. Sofi’s not well (hopefully overkill from the week gone), and coming home to no Isis, and Raiden (her twin) being weird.

It’s hard.

Why doesn’t everything suck so much all the time?

Target: 1300 words
Written: 1344 words, novel: Bad Neighbours

Read: Hammered, Elizabeth Bear (finally, some progress)
Comics: A Righteous Thirst For Vengeance 11, Deadly Class 56, The Sacrificers 1-2
Music: Washing Machine, Sonic Youth