More old Piplelayin' blogs

A Heartbeat on the Highway and Thoughts of Impermanence.
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Saturday, June 30, 2007 at 10:45am | Edit Note | Delete
I don't like to drive the speed limit on the highway. If I have an open road in front of me I am going to open the throttle. I see the speed limit as a recommendation for inexperienced highway drivers. I'm well aware of the fail points of my vehicle, my reaction times, road condtions etc. Those who drive with me frequently will note that while I do drive fast when conditions are favorable I exercise a few more precautions than most drivers. Having driven hundreds of thousands of highway klicks, I'm looking a lot further ahead than most people, I observe a greater following distance than most people. Most importantly, when conditions are not favorable, I reduce speed accordingly. Like this weekend for instance. I finished work yesterday at 6 and hit the highway, along with thousands of other Canadians heading hither and thither for the long weekend. I had only one highway to choose from, being stationed in the middle of nowhere as I was, and this highway cut through the heart of Alberta lake country. Consequently it was packed with RVs and campers and boat trailers and young partiers on their way to the lake. Traffic was bumper to bumper and slow. While I found it extremely frustrating I didn't speed, realizing that under such circumstances speeding carries greater risks than normal. The traffic continued slowing and slowing and as I rounded a corner and came to a stop I saw the cause of the disruption. About 12 cars ahead of me there were firemen blocking the road in all directions. The highway was a frenzy of activity; firetrucks, police cars, and 4 ambulances, all with lights flashing. We were held up for about half an hour before I decided to get out and walk to the front to see if I could find an alternate route. It was then that an air ambulance helicopter came flying in. Emergency people had set up a makeshift landing pad with flares and flashlights beside the highway and the dust flew up all around and all the stranded motorists got out of their cars to watch and a figure on a stretcher was rushed into the chopper.
Another motorist who had walked to the front just before me asked the fireman blocking the traffic "What happened?" and the fireman stiffened and he said "Head-on" with a voice that tried to be toneless but wasn't and I asked "Is everybody okay?" and he said "No....' and he sounded like he choked on his words a bit when he said it and he said it like there was some horror for him in thinking of it or talking of it and he waved me off quickly and I shook because I'm on the highway a lot and there was some horror in it for me.
So I was held up yesterday for the better part of an hour and the traffic lined up for miles behind me and it was all families and groups of friends and they were all going out for a good time and a fun time and I don't think anyone expected to die or be horribly maimed but somebody was and that's disturbing. In the hour that we waited there none of the ambulances moved and I finally turned around to backtrack my way out and the ambulances were still there and I had to wonder if they were still there because the crash victims were no longer in need of earthly services or because everyone was okay.
A heartbeat on the highway; somebody picks a moment to pass and tons of metal collide, each going 100km/hr but probably faster, and as a guy who walked alongside of me back to my car said "That's twice as hard as hitting a brick wall at full speed."
An impact, essentially a 200km/hr impact into tons of hot sharpened metal and it takes only a second and then everything is different.
We had stopped to change into clean clothes only half an hour before Sometimes we change on the way home from work and sometimes we don't in the interests of saving time, and yesterday we debated. Had we not changed we would have been 5 or 10 minutes further up that highway and perhaps it would have been into our path that the oncoming car would have wandered, and perhaps it would be me in the back of an air ambulance on a long weekend with a dead friend in a pile of twisted metal and tangled bodies, or perhaps I would have been the tangled body. If I'd had one less piece of pizza at supper time and left a few minutes earlier... So many seemingly inconsequential choices in life seem to have cosmic repercussions at times. Deciding that I needed to change my shirt may have been the most important decision of my life, or deciding on that second piece of pizza orsparring for a couple of minutes with Cooper at supper time instead of eating...
The whole experience made me think of my family, of how precious they are to me, of how precious everything in life is. It made me realize that it can all change in a heartbeat and that there will come a time in my life when a heartbeat is all I have left, or perhaps all that someone I love will have left. There will come a time, whether it be trapped in a wreck or laying in a bed or walking down the street where each heartbeat is a struggle to get to the next. Yesterday there was a wreck on the highway and it made me appreciate heartbeats.
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Updated over a year ago

The Proper Way to Listen to Freebird
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Tuesday, June 26, 2007 at 11:45pm | Edit Note | Delete
Alright listen. Freebird is the shit. We won't debate that here, it's a given. For those of you who would say "I'm not familiar with Freebird" uhhh...yes you are. Freebird is the song in the movie Forrest Gump that Jenny is listening to when she's all coked up and nearly jumps off the umpteenth story balcony of her hotel. Freebird rocks. But most people listen to Freebird all wrong. They plug it into their mp3 player and put the headphones on, they crank it up to half volume in their car driving through the city and chat with their passenger or talk on their celly. Freebird is the culmination of one's band complete and utter union, an undivided focus, a greater than human will to rock like a muthafuck.
Now listen; I can appreciate Mozart, I like a little Vivaldi; when I hear 'The Spring' I feel like frolicking in a meadow. Nat King Cole can croon and I kick back when I spin that gold. I appreciate music, and musical greatness in all of it's forms, the list goes on. But Freebird is the penultimate achievement in music. And I'm going to share with you now the proper way to listen to Freebird.
First and foremost you have to appreciate that Freebird is a highway song. Get out of town. And I'm not talking on to the Trans-Canada or the Yellowhead. Freebird demands a narrow winding highway with curves and hills and oncoming traffic and potholes and woods and soaring vistas from dizzying heights. It demands an open road in the truest sense, so make sure that when you hit play, there is no one in front of you. Ideally it should be played at sunset, while heading west, and you should have recently parted with a loved one that was against your leaving.
That being said, we'll assume you're on the highway and all other conditions have been filled. The next thing is to make sure that you are exactly 2 points below your stereo's maximum volume. (You don't want maximum volume, this will become clear in a moment.)
Now, regardless of the weather, it's imperative that you lower the driver's side window half way. If there is a passenger in the car, they too must lower their window half way. You continue along in this manner, obeying the speed limit, or at least maintaining an 11% variance or less from the speed limit until the guitar solo begins.
Now this is where it gets damn good. The instant that the guitar solo starts you must crank up to full volume, drop all the windows in the car to completely open, and push the pedal to the floor. 140 is the minimum accepted speed for the Freebird guitar solo, and there is no maximum. The screaming lead, the driving rythm, and that funky southern bass are the perfect accompaniment to a roaring highway wind and screaming engine. Without the adrenaline rush of wild acceleration and a chaotic wind blasting through your hair, Freebird is only experienced in half-measures. Speed, freedom, and controlled madness are key.
This is the most accepted way to listen to Freebird properly. The only other way, which I do not condone, is to listen to it while coked up and trying to balance on the railing of a highrise balcony overlooking a busy urban street. Again however, I do not condone or recommend method 2.
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Updated over a year ago

The Great Zen Philosopher Basho.
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Saturday, June 23, 2007 at 11:30pm | Edit Note | Delete
The great Zen Philosopher Basho once wrote "A flute with no holes is not a flute. And a doughnut with no hole, is a danish."
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Joe Vs. The Volcano
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Saturday, June 23, 2007 at 10:57pm | Edit Note | Delete
Today I added 2 new clips from Joe Vs. The Volcano to my Posted Items section. If you haven't seen it, this movie is amazing. And if you have seen it, well watch it again and watch it a little more closely. The 2 scenes that I've posted basically define the whole movie for me.
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You'd Think That People Would've Had Enough of Silly Love Songs
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Wednesday, June 20, 2007 at 10:52pm | Edit Note | Delete
Well I haven't dammit! Lately I've been talking to a lot of people about love, and I guess about romantic love. I've discovered quite a few things about myself and about others in these talks. What I've discovered is that it seems everyone has had a broken heart. Everyone has had something that made them run home and lock the door and not talk to anyone for days. A broken heart is easily the single most universal injury there is. And everyone has a broken heart story, and while everybody's story is different, there seems to be one common thread running through them all...'and now he/she/it/they're gone' and some people say it with a smile and say 'but it was great while it lasted' and some people say "and that's why I'll never love/trust/care/feel joy again", and it's the same whether it's a chef or a waitress or salesman or a construction worker talking.
So I'm going to share my broken heart story with all y'all today, and it's the story of my very first broken heart and I'd like to hear your very first broken heart stories too.
When I was ten years old my brother got married. As with all weddings there was a reception and it was at the Sheraton Hotel and my parents rented a room there so we wouldn't have to drive home. I still remember everything about that reception; the smell of chlorine on my skin from the hotel pool overpowered by a thick cloud of cigarette, cigar and pipe smoke,the music blaring, lights down so low that the amber was almost orange and the smell of my drink, 7up mixed with pepsi mixed with diet Pepsi mixed with bar lime with a lemon wedge and a cherry in it. I remember my shoes hurt my feet and I remember that I didn't sit with my parents all night long. I was chasing girls and they were chasing me. There were 3 kids my age there that I remember, Yasmin and Amy were friends of the family and Diane was a relative of my brand new sister in law. I was the only boy (ah if only those ratios had remained). We did an awful lot of running around. I remember that the floor was incredibly slippery, and I remember spending hours sliding back and forth on it. At first. As the night progressed however the lights got lower and the crowds got thicker and our euphoric elation at young running freedom was giving way to a feeling of almost narcotic contentment. At 10 years old I may have been the oldest one of our group, and at 10 o'clock we were all so tired we may as well have been drunk. Our voices croaked, the atmosphere was festive, and any initial nervousness about dancing boy/girl had passed so that I was dancing all night long. I really started to hit it off with Diane. Diane was from Drumheller, and I didn't know much about the world at that time, but I did know that Drumheller had dinosaurs. And we talked about dinosaurs and it was fun and she liked to laugh and she liked to play tag and at some point in the night the game turned to 'catch Andrew and kiss him' (I was Andrew then, still liked the big person name) and I remember being careful not to run too fast and collapsing on a couch outside the ball room and getting kisses on the cheek from all three of them and pretending I hated it.
Yasmin and Amy had to leave early and that left Diane and I on our own. Our creativity and imaginations exhausted we could think of no more games, no more stories, and so we danced together, and I was a pretty funny dancer which she liked and she was a pretty pretty laugher which I liked. We even danced to the slow songs, and when we did she came in close and she came in tight and she put her head heavy on my shoulder like she was trying to pull me down and I was nervous with her that close but it felt warm and safe and I had such a trembling and whirring in my stomach that I was afraid to speak. So the night went on and I was ten and no night had ever lasted so long and I had never been so free and neither had she and then suddenly, the DJ announced that he was going to play the last 2 songs and they would be slow. I don't remember the second last song but I do remember dancing to it and holding on to her tight like I never wanted to let her go. And I remember I was gripped by a terror and a realization that in minutes this girl would be gone from my life forever...IN MINUTES! I do remember the last song though. And it's a song that after 26 years I can't listen to without thinking of Diane, and it's a silly love song alright, but it was so appropriate at the time and I felt every word. It became so ingrained in my soul that even a decade later I memorized the words to it and I would sit in my room and play it in the dark and I could get misty to it if I really wanted to. The song was a silly love song and it was "Can I Have This Dance for The Rest of My Life", and I wanted the dance to last the rest of my life, but it was only about 3 minutes long, and when it was over there was so much that I wanted to say that I didn't know where to start. But her parents were there and they had their coats on and they had her coat and the lights came on and they told her to say goodbye to me, and she said goodbye to me and she was leaving and I stood there sick and cold and suddenly so very alone and I couldn't think of anything to say either except for goodbye so I said
"Goodbye."
And she was gone and I had my own key for the room and my face was getting hot and my throat was swelling like it would burst and my stomach was filled with a cold hardening and I knew that if I had to speak my throat would break and I'd be a bubbling mess so I ran to the elevator. I think I was crying before I got into the elevator, and I got up to the room and I jumped into the bed and I buried my face in a blanket and I talked to myself while I was falling apart and in the middle of crying and talking to myself I heard my Mom's voice (didn't hear her come in though) asking me "What's wrong?". And I felt stupid for crying and more stupid for getting caught talking to myself and I told her that my knee hurt. Diane was 9 and I was 10 but the night lasted forever, and indeed I will have that dance for the rest of my life.

Could I Have This Dance by Anne Murray

I'll always remember the song they were playin',
The first time we danced and I knew,
As we swayed to the music and held to each other,
I fell in love with you.

Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?
Would you be my partner every night?
When we're together, it feels so right.
Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?

I'll always remember that magic moment,
When I held you close to me.
'Cause we moved together, I knew forever,
You're all I'll ever need

Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?
Would you be my partner every night?
When we're together, it feels so right.
Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?



My Social Conscience and the Importance of Mentoring.
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Wednesday, June 20, 2007 at 9:52pm | Edit Note | Delete
I've never been one for giving back to the community, and i guess it's finally starting to weigh on me a bit that I haven't really been putting in my 'buck-oh-five". And today, instead of feeling guilty about it, I decided to make a change in my life. I decided that I'm going to help someone. My job unfortunately carries me far away from the community in which I live, so to make a real difference, I've had to choose someone from my peer group to help. I've decided to help Cooper. Cooper is a young man, about 20 or 21, who COULD have a bright future. When he first started with our crew, I was impressed at the way that he seemed to care about his appearance and his physical fitness level. But since those days, Cooper has REALLY let himself go. Perhaps it's the dozen donuts he eats each day, perhaps it's the half dozen daily ice cream sandwiches he consumes with his liter of chocolate milk. More likely it's the French Fries and Gravy Burger with Cheese that he has for lunch and supper every day. Well I've decided that I'm going to mentor Cooper. I'm going to be the example for him to follow. I'll start small, because I know that he has a VERY long way to go before he can begin to compare to me. I'm going to use a lot of positive reinforcement with Cooper. Whenever I see him not eating I'm going to say "Hey, that's terrific, you're not inhaling food for once today, good work!" The other night he walked to the top of a hill for cell service and I really blew a lot of sunshine up his ass for that one..."Keep it up and those jowls will slide right off!" I think that it's important to be there for your friends, and Cooper, I'm there for you :)
Could this be Cooper 2008??? Not if I can help it!
In this note: Cooper Cowan (notes)
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jus' a holla to all ma peepz yo
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Tuesday, June 19, 2007 at 10:56pm | Edit Note | Delete
'sup yo! What What?! Awwwww yeah it's da Mack Daddy wifout a Caddy givin a shout out to all da playaz in da 780 an' da 306 an' da 403 an' da 604 as well as awwwwwwwwwwwl da muthaz and da bruthaz on foreign shores. I'z jus' keepin' it real tonight, know wud I'm sayin, layin low in da 780 surfin on da phone lines and bustin' rhymes. I ain't got no high speed out here and I am JONESIN fo' some 128kbps pimpin, but instead I gotz to drive on the shoulder of the information highway at 24kbps. 24! Sheeeeeeeit I got snail mail goes faster than that. But it's alright, I'm just keeping the graphics to a minimum, and workin the keyboard and I'm able to communicate to all y'all broadband playaz.
Alright, enough gangsta stuff. Can you believe there are entire Canadian communities ( like the one I'm stranded in tonight) that have no high speed internet anywhere?! The other guys on the crew say I'm making too big a deal of it, that I'm too much of an internet junkie and maybe I need a break. They suggested I head over to the (internet free) bar with them for a while. I said nah, I had shizzle to attenz too and they started in again on my internet habit. I told them I would respond to their criticisms once I had checked my e-mail, messenger, myspace, msnspace, pokerforum, Hi5, lit. forums, the news, tomorrows weather, my downloads and my facebook. When I'm done that we can d3b8 wh0 h45 4n 1n73rn37 pr0bl3m...t1m3 4 pwn4g3!!!! A-ight, peace out all. Awwwwwwwwww yeah!
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Mr. Hankey and me.
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Tuesday, June 19, 2007 at 1:07am | Edit Note | Delete
Today I had the pleasure of a surprise visit by Mr. Hankey. I think I've posted the details of my current employment already, but if I haven't, here goes. I work with a water and sewer crew, and we put in new water and sewer pipe. We work 14 hour days, 5 days a week, and the work is incredibly physical. Usually we install brand new pipe in brand new ground. Today however we were doing 'sanitary replacement', which is essentially replacing old sewer lines; old, operational sewer lines. So when the machines broke the old pipe today, out rushed a torrent of water. I expected a reeking sludge of human waste, and was quite surprised to see a really clear stream coming out. Mike explained that human waste is only a small percentage of what runs through the sewer; the majority of traffic in the pipe is dishwater, laundry water, drinking water, and some polluted toilet water. Andrew and i were thinking about quitting the job rather than sink our feet into this fetid pool of disgusting shizzle, but realizing that we were well protected we worked up the courage and stepped in ankle deep. After all we hadn't seen anything too gross.
It was then that Mr. Hankey the Christmas Pooh and all of his family came leaping out of the end of the pipe to splash down in the water and float towards us. Yes four big human turds, and i was standing in the same water with them. Again I almost walked but realized I was fully protected and would be fine. That's the story of Mr. Hankey today. But one more thing. The town we're working in is called Plamondon, and I swear that is the sound that these big brown lumps made when they hit the water...Plaa-Mon-don.
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Sunday Evening Comin' Down
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Sunday, June 17, 2007 at 10:32pm | Edit Note | Delete
First things first. NO COLD PILLS EVER AGAIN! I stuck to the reccomended dosage and 3 days later I'm singing Aretha Franklin on Youtube apologizing for my haircut.
I hate Sunday nights. They're my last dying hours of freedom each week, my last dying hours with the people I love. I tried to weasel out of work tomorrow using my cold as an excuse, but all I managed to do was buy myself a few hours of sleep. Which is good, it means everyone will be awake when I leave, no predawn kisses on sleeping cheeks. There will be tears however, and that will be tough.
Wednesday through Friday I quite like my job, but Mondays and Tuesdays blow.
This week I'm going to Plamondon, which sounds about exciting as Plunkett Saskatchewan...maybe less. I'm praying that my hotel this week has internet, but if it doesn't I'll be working on the new lit. website and my fiction, so it won't be a complete write off, just a little more lonesome and isolated than I want to be.
Gonna cut this one short and head to bed now since all I'm going to do is whine anyway.
On the blue side of evening when the darkness takes control, you start looking for a reason to take your lonesome on down the road.
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Updated over a year ago


Thoughts on Father's Day
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Sunday, June 17, 2007 at 9:24pm | Edit Note | Delete
Today was a rainy damn day, and that was fine by me. Without the rain I would have spent my day shuttling back and forth between soccer practices, and spending very little time with my kids. As things worked out I spent the whole day entertaining the kids.
We lazed around the house all morning, had some pizza for lunch, and I offered them the choice of going to the Mendel Art Gallery for their weekly kids activities in the Studio Xpress, or going to the MVA center to see the exhibits. They chose the MVA, so we went to learn about the origins of Saskatoon and play around. We spent about an hour in the gift shop, playing with puppets that they have in there. Then we browsed through the exhibits. We took turns playing the piano while the rest of the family danced on the stage (none of us can play piano or dance, but so what.)
After that it was off to McNally Robinson book store to terrorize the children's section.
Drew and Parker lost themselves in books of pirates and books of plants, and I love that they have such a passion for reading already. I sat with Anderson and read through a book of insects. He managed to get laughs from everyone that passed by. He's only 2 but he talks like a 3 year old. He'd ask "What's that?" and I'd say 'a centipede' and he'd say 'I'm scared of centipedes' and then it was "what's that?" and I'd say a beetle and he'd say "I"m scared of beetles" and then it was a head louse next and he practically yelled "I like head lice!"
On his list of bugs he's scared of; moths, flies, beetles, caterpillars. And on the list of bugs he likes; jumping spiders, head lice, bedbugs, tarantulas and wasps.
Strange kid.
Anyway, it was great to spend the day with the kids doing things they wanted to do. It was about the best thing a Dad could hope for.