#179 - One Closes and Another Opens

The good news is that I got some reading in last night after finishing my writing. The bad news is that I slept poorly and had to drag myself out of bed.

It felt like one of those morning-afters, back when I was young and less discerning about how many beers I would allow myself to consume, but without the headache.

I managed to get on the seven fifty-three train, only because it is always a few minutes late. Today, that worked out in my favour.

The seat I managed to get was one of the smaller, cramped ones in the corner, and writing would have been impossible even if I’d had the energy to do it. So, I napped as much as I could instead.

Once I arrived in Toronto, I grabbed a streetcar to the Patrician Grill for my bacon and eggs. They knew my order without having to ask and I had my Easy, Bacon, Brown within minutes. Their coffee is still the best in town, in my opinion.

There is a bit of a preachy douchebag sitting behind me dispensing advice to another colleague of his. The poor guy being talked to has barely said a word.

The owner of the grill has eclectic musical tastes and plays his collection from his phone throughout the diner. When I arrived it was modern jazz, which I actually liked, and now he has Genisis’ “Suppers Ready” blasting. Strangely, the music and the surrounding conversations are really good for writing. I need to add that Genisis song to my playlist. I don’t think I’d heard that one before. Looks like you have to buy the entire album though; you can’t just get the single.

I wasn’t going to write while I was here; time seemed to be running too short. But fuck it! Work can wait an extra fifteen minutes. I needed to sit here and do this and boy, am I glad I did.

Most of the crew are in the studio today, it’s what they refer to as our anchor day. Even still, I have been able to get a good amount of work done this morning. These days have the potential for great amounts of distraction. I had been expecting the animation crew to be in house today, but I guess they won’t be in studio until next week to give our I.T. Department extra time to set up all their equipment.

We got to talking about how expensive concerts have become, and that it is cheaper to go see a musical or a play. Robyn and I will be attending a night with David Sedaris at the beginning of next month and then a few days later we’ll be off to see an evening performance of “The Book of Mormon.”

Olive Garden is set to open restaurants in the Vaughan and Ajax area in the coming months. I happen to be married to a person who absolutely loves this restaurant. Every time we pass one on the way to see family in Michigan, we have to stop. And for my part, I like it too. I won’t complain about eating there. I’ve always been able to find something I like, and I think the all-you-can-eat breadsticks and salad is a great idea that more restaurants should implement. The only downside is that they closed the local Olive Garden in my city years ago and we had to travel to the states to get it.

Soon, I will be forced to visit Vaughn Mills to satisfy my wife’s culinary needs. There is a Bas Pro Shop there and plenty of other stores to round out the time it would take us to make the trip. It takes about an hour to get there most days, with traffic.

Last night, as I was writing a scene where the main character meets a police officer, I had forgotten what name I had come up with for the guy. I knew I had written it down on a piece of paper but couldn’t remember where it was and I didn’t want to interrupt my writing flow to go search for it. So, I just wrote in, “Officer Doofy,” a la the Scary Movie character.

I don’t know why, but it makes me laugh every time I type it. And I hear his catchphrase each time I do it… “Have you seen my baseball?”

Anyway, the real made-up character’s name is going to be Seargent Cobbs. A more respectable name for this yarn.

I was happy to get some writing done at the diner and then at lunch. I managed about seven hundred and fifty words and a few of them were even for the short story.

The day was a good day just to get work done in general; no meetings or questions needed to be answered, and I just painted all day. The downside is that my back is sore, and the upside is that it is Survivor, Pizza, Hot Tub tonight and I’ll get to give my sore muscles a good hot soak.

I left work and hopped on a streetcar that seemed as if it was sitting there waiting just for me. It wasn’t; the traffic light was just red, and it couldn’t speed off without me.

The ride was fairly quick, but the driver liked to treat the accelerator like it was a bass drum, and we stopped and started our way down the street. At Union Station, there was a train also wating for me up on the platform, and it wasn’t overloaded with passengers. I found a seat with no problems, and one that would allow me to get some writing done.

There are some overly chatty passengers behind me, who are not supposed to be talking on the top level, but my ability to ignore people and distracting noises is getting better all the time.

I’m going to play a quick game of chess on the train and then switch from writing this blog to writing the next scene in the short story assignment.

Well, I lost that game. Back to writing.

The drive home was perfect. I made it through every stoplight and easily made every left turn. And then I arrived home and immediately smelled natural gas. I left the front door open and pulled the stove out. I dripped some soapy water on the joints and found one area that was bubbly ever so lightly. So little could have been just the foamy water moving from gravity. I grabbed some wrenches and tightened the joint. The bubbling stopped, and I triple-checked it and turned on all the house’s exhaust fans. I’ll add some pipe sealing compound tomorrow and check back on it when we get back from our friend’s house.

We stopped along the way to get some Little Caesars Crazy Puffs and Crazy Bread. Our friends had a lovely pizza waiting for us as well, not sure what to call it, but it had some jalapeños that I really liked.

They cracked a nice bottle of red wine, which I forgot to get the name of, and we sat down to watch Survivor and stuff our faces with food.

Later the ladies went walking and the “Men” hot tubbed.

The ladies returned just as the timer for the hot tub shut it off, and we had more wine and some cookies and churro marshmallows. And of course, the rest of the Survivor episode.

Speaking of food, my copy of the Dishoom Indian cookbook arrived today. I swear Amazon just keeps getting more and more efficient. I only placed the order late last night.

It’s part cookbook, part food tour through the streets of Bombay, filled with all kinds of photos of the locals fand vendors. It’s as much a love letter to India as it is a recipe book.

I am looking forward to making Dishoom’s Ruby Chicken and Salli Boti dishes with the new stove and oven. Dishoom is a famous Indian restaurant in England. I found one of their recipes on a YouTube channel called “Anti-Chef,” and it looked amazing when he was done with it.

And I do love butter chicken!

The president of our animation company and another employee gave an hour-long talk about women in the animation industry. I listened along as I did my work and then she was asked a question and I found her answer interesting. She was asked to say something about herself that others probably didn’t know. She responded by telling us that she always dreamed of writing a book. Naturally, the author in me perked up upon hearing that.

I’ve had some good conversations with her in the past but had no idea we shared the same dream. I see her regularly at the studio, so next time I will ask her more about what type of book she imagines writing, and maybe I can point her towards some of the classes my writing teachers offer, as I have found them incredibly helpful.

Who knows, maybe this will be the catalyst that gets her started on her dream.

I ended the evening by reading for an hour or so. I felt amazing to get back to reading again. There were probably shows we could have watched, but ending the day with a good book is best in my opinion.

I’m aiming to be in bed before midnight, with a goal to get up around nine AM.

I could really use a full eight hours' sleep or even more. Maybe I’ll get the full nine!

That’s all I have for today.

Night all!