From VANCOUVER, British Columbia
March 17th, 2011
First things first. Hello, oh loyal friends, and welcome to a whole new era of Tourist-ness. The Vancouver Era. This new and momentous era may only last until September or October, who knows, but I like the word “era”, okay? ERA! Era era era! There, it’s stopped even looking like a word. Now I’ve done it.
In an exciting milestone for you fans of punctuation out there (Josh?), I am pleased to point out that my last blague post featured a single sentence that contained five commas, three semi-colons, one pair of brackets, some choice capitalization, a hyphen and two sets of ellipses. No italics, oddly. But yes, a partridge in a pear tree.
And a warm welcome to some new fans – Ashley O'Connell, as lucky reader one trillion and five (give or take a trillion), you've won a Skeptical Tourist pantsuit! It's too small for you and, well, made of pipe cleaners, which doesn't make for the utmost in pantsuit comfort, but it IS rather dashing...and made in the official Skeptical Tourist Sweatshop, which is staffed entirely by grown men serving time for use of the phrase "lol". If any of them is heard referring to something as "epically random" or "randomly epic", his scant pay is confiscated for that week. They’ve tried to start a union on facebook but keep getting distracted by links to Failblog and “People of Walmart” and Lady Gaga videos. Men these days. (Enjoy your pantsuit, Ashley!)
To Vancouver! Firstly, yes, it’s true: I did, in fact, land the first thing I auditioned for here. Though for all I know it may be the last gig I ever book, that fact sure does sound good, and will contribute nicely, I believe, to The Legend Of Scarborough Lill (my Wild West name; they make you pick one when you move out here).
YUP. THAT’S ME NOW.
The job is a JK Rowling biopic, Magic Beyond Words, for the Lifetime Network. And thus begins my career as sassy friend. When you do a JK Rowling biopic, Access Hollywood shows up on set and gets copious shots of your butt and the back of your head to share with all of TV land. So you may have seen that and been impressed. I sure was.
The other thing that happens is, authorized or not, Rowling herself is so wracked with curiosity about the thing that she has to watch it. So THE JK Rowling herself will see my face.
She may immediately think "What a stupid face", but who cares, too late, she'll have seen it. Or she might think, "What a wonderful face; I think I'll write a book about it". Substitute "ripping" for "wonderful" and "fancy" for "think", of course. (She's from England.)
In fact, for all I know, JK Rowling (or, as we in the know call her, Jojo, or just “bird” or “mate”, is stalking me already, even before this thing airs, based on the knowledge that I've played her sassy friend. She and Beyoncé have rented the house across the street and spend hours in the dark front room, passing back and forth the binoculars and egg salad sandwiches. They're over there right now, hovering over a laptop (the one used to create the final Harry Potter book) reading this out loud, at the same time as you. Don't you feel a little famous, just knowing that?
“PUT ON YOUR CLOAK, B. THEN SHE CAN’T SEE US.”
For those of you (actors) out there feeling that ugly yet inevitable twinge of jealousy and That Bitch-ness, there’s this: My love life is the pits, I’m still eye-deep in debt, and I have a heart murmur.
Is all this true? Maybe! Take it if you need it.
I’ve also turned to prostitution, which may mitigate the envy even further for some of you who frown on that sort of thing, though I consider it a good move, with benefits both social and financial. Proactive is what I call it. Plus prostitution is nicer here because of the warmer climate.
Before the sassy actor cash and the hookering bucks came along to improve my situation, funds got awful low. It’s strange to be in a new town and broke...I kept thinking that I wasn’t just the Tourist but a tourist, and therefore felt like I should be able leap gaily from concert to play to martini sushi opium parlour…and then keep getting slapped in the face by my reality, which said, "Hey kid, you're not a special guest anymore: you live here. Maybe. Sort of. Now go home to your basement apartment and eat some toast.” (With organic peanut butter, mind.)
I’ve been living, since January, at the downstairs apartment at my friend Jenny Young’s brother and sister-in-law’s place. Jon and Kim happen to be founding members of Vancouver’s acclaimed Electric Company Theatre, and have been out of town a lot, allowing me the run of the place…so I’ve had plenty of time to tuck copies of my photo and resume in strategic locations all over the house. I’m particularly proud of the laminated headshot hanging in their shower. I think they’ll like it, too.
I also get to take advantage of that modern-day housesitting tradition, wherein you temporarily become the Borg and plunder every bit of your hosts’ technology (ask your Trekkie friend to explain that joke if you don’t get it or are pretending not to). I’ve ripped all of their CDs, which in this house has amounted to a major indie band windfall, as well as taking cellphone pictures of each page of all their books and photocopying their sheets. I spread the pages on my bed and use them as an extra set of bedding and pretend I’m someone else. It’s all so wonderful.
TAKE ME TO YOUR WINTERSLEEP
And yes, just like you, I do feel a little bad whenever I steal music – and, like you, I get over it and do it anyway. Though, I must say, I do pay for my online tunes – I’m only guilty of the friend Borg-ing. But that’s probably bad enough. Perhaps I should have to adopt an indie band as penance.
We could develop a whole system of free music reparation. For instance: Illegally download one song – the band gets to come to your house and make a sandwich. Two songs, you make the sandwiches. Steal a whole album, they get to fuck your kids. or something. These are just guidelines.
But hey, the deal here includes my feeding and changing the litter of the weird resident cat, Meow Meow. I doubt the Borg do that. Or maybe it’s in the deleted scenes. Meow Meow also tricks me by acting affectionate and then leaping on my face with her claws out, which is her cute feline way of protesting my abuse of copyright law.
Come April I’ll get to go and suck all the technology out of another home, as I’m moving into a sublet at 15th and Maple. The poor, unfortunate tenant, a beautiful flaxen-haired young writer, is being forced to go live at her rich lawyer boyfriend’s house on the coast of Spain and go for long walks and observe stunning sunsets while working on her novel. I feel for her, I really do.
If it weren’t for my sympathy for Beautiful Bevin and her difficult situation, I surely would be moving into Green Margaret’s place. It had everything going for it: great west end location, unobstructed view of Stanley Park’s Lost Lagoon, meticulous German tenant who had outfitted the place with a nice green and white carpet covering the hardwood floors, green blankets, green trinkets, green bedspread on the SINGLE green skirt-wearing bed…
Oddly, I didn’t notice all this at first (okay, I definitely noticed the single bed – that, coupled with the fact that Margaret kept insisting on “no overnight guests, ja?”, meant I had to fight the urge to run screaming into the street). As I was leaving (politely, not screaming even a bit), Margaret complimented me on my bright green bag. I thanked her and pointed out that it matched her shirt rather well, to which she replied, with the stoniest of faces, “Ja, I only vear green.” That’s when I noticed. You might want to reconsider hiring me as a detective.
Of course, I can roll my eyes at Green Margaret and her tiny bed and weird apartment all I like, but the truth is, she sent me an email a week after our meeting telling me she’d decided to rent to someone else. She’s probably writing on her blog about how weird I was, with my nonmatching clothes, and calling me Rainbow Lisa.
Today is St Patrick’s Day, so Green Margaret is on my mind. I’ve a feeling I’ll think of her on this day every year, wondering whether this is a divine day for her, a day where she looks around at her green-clad fellow man and feels a kinship, thinks, “Mein Gott, they’ve finally got it”. Or is it a day when she looks around and thinks, “You bunch of phonies. You don’t know green like I know green”?
I wonder if she adds food colouring to everything she eats and drinks, all year round. OH, GREEN MARGARET, GET OUT OF MY HEAD! You emerald temptress, you!
Anyway, my new place, which Bevin thought I was cool enough for (take that, fraulein!), is cute and nice and has a grown-up bed. It’s also conveniently located a stone’s throw from both the West Coast Tropical Bird Studio and The Spy Store, which, combined, may help me develop my weird Bond villain persona. Parrot on the shoulder, or budgies in my pockets? What to do? And can I still be Scarborough Lill?
From there I will enjoy jaunts to Kits Beach on my borrowed bicycle, continue enjoying BC’s beautiful surroundings and fine friendly folk, venture out to Spanish and kayaking classes (and Spanish kayaking classes – “Ay Ay Ay! Me he caído en el océano!”)...
I’ll also attend the occasional audition, thanks to my fancy new agent who is awfully handsome and has astounding teeth. I hang around the office on the flimsiest of pretenses (“Just making sure the building’s still where I thought it was”; ”Do you guys need some gum?”…) in hopes of catching the occasional glimpse of their gleam. Of course, my agent in T.O. does triathlons and has the most amazing arms I've ever seen, and my Toronto voice agent, even despite wearing stupid slippers around the office, looks like a hotter Faye Dunawaye, so this new guy had better step up his regimen if he wants to hold onto me, boy. My new voice agent here is a marathon runner who wears nice boots, so things are looking good.
I’m keeping in shape with semi-regular visits to the downtown Y, which are just as regularly sabotaged by the presence of the original Japa Dog cart within a block, where I can enjoy a tasty 9000 calorie snack before and after each workout. I’ve resigned, however, to eat less Korobuta Terimayo dogs, ever since the Japa Dog staff not only refused my gracious offer of a picture for their “celebrity customers” photo board, but seemed unduly angry when they noticed me pasting my head onto Ice Cube’s body. There may have been a scene.
COME ON NOW, JAPA DOG. WHAT’S THIS GUY GOT THAT I AIN’T GOT?
To your future benefit, I’ll continue to wander and observe…trying to figure out a town that can have given us Botox and a chain of stores called “Mantique”, and at the same time support the world’s highest per capita concentration of white girls with dreads. (Is it wrong to want to kick those girls? I really, really want to kick them. Can I kick them?)
I’d planned to do the Grouse Grind climb weekly on arrival but haven’t gone once yet. My excuses are as follows: It’s too cold. It’s been too rainy. My knee is buggered from running. My bed here is comfortable. And, best of all: Nature Shmature, that’s for tourists. Apparently my one trek up Grouse Mountain last year is more than any of my friends who were born and raised here have done. I will do it soon, I swear.
As for rainy days, yeah, there have been one or two of those.
But you know what, all you dry Toronto gloaters going on about how sad and soggy I must be? I’ve got two words for you: wind chill factor. That’s three words. I’m a rebel. Anyway, we don’t have that here. If it says seven degrees it is seven goddamn degrees. I know all too well the agony of those Ontario weather reports:
“It’s twelve degrees”
“Oh, that’s nice.”
“- but feels like minus forty with the windchill.”
“Then why don’t you just say minus forty, motherfuckers?!!”
I’ve embraced BC coffee culture, becoming one of those people laptopping at cafes. I even bought a mug from the lovely Our Town Cafe, to replace the ceramic Starbucks one I bought on tour, which, reflecting my state of mind at the time, cracked right down the middle. I almost got the green Our Town mug, glanced down at my green bag and my green-jacketed book (Alligator, by Lisa Moore), remembered Margaret, went with blue.
But truth is, I’ve eschewed the Cafe People and written much of this post at Budgies Burritos, which makes me feel less like a hipster and more like a romantic, struggling down-and-out writer, working away with a cheap taco hanging half out my mouth and refried beans smeared on my face. Except I only write a BLOG, for FREE, and what’s more hipster than that? Plus everything here is veggie or vegan, and there’s a squeaky-voiced customer at the counter telling the staff about her “kind of an art show”. But next to her there’s a construction worker and an old guy who keeps burping while he eats. Ah, B.C.
I do think there’s something in the idea that everyone should move to a new town once in a while. I’ve never done it before, except for gigs, and hell, it is invigorating. It can be a little lonely, not having your same old gang at hand, but it’s also exciting and challenging. I'm making new friends, it’s giving me a kick in the ass, career-wise, in that nobody knows who the hell I am and I’ve got something to prove all over again, and I’m stretching my brain into new shapes…and apparently becoming ridiculously earnest and prone to spewing smug inspirational bullshit. GOD! What the hell was THAT??? Somebody needs a green cider.
So that’s enough blarney outta me.
EXCEPT…
Consider, friends, what reading this blague has done for you today. And consider every other day you’ve enjoyed the wisdom of the Tourist AT NO COST WHATSOEVER. For some of you this has been going on for years, this free delivery of guffaws, chuckles, smiles, and insight. Think of the value. Yet while I may very well begin charging exorbitant amounts for entry (as well as a complicated sign-in process and a webcam video proving that you are wearing a silly hat and doing the required dance), THIS MONTH I ask that you instead donate that money to the relief effort in Japan. Let’s say five bucks per laugh. So if you laughed five times, a modest twenty-five bucks to the Red Cross or someone. And if you didn’t laugh at all? In that case, you are clearly a black hole of humour, a very scourge on humanity, so a big fat donation is the least you can do to start justifying your presence on Earth. I’ll tell you what, it needn’t even be made in my name.
http://www.cbc.ca/japanrelief/ has a great list of links to reputable charities’ donation pages. Please help. If nothing else, it will get you in my good books. You might even win a pantsuit.
Yours, soggy and true,
The Tourist
