tuesday june 29

today i walked over to shawarma flames in the evening to buy a chicken shawarma. when i arrived, i noticed that the employee working tonight was the new guy -- he was being trained when i'd come in last time. the first time i'd seen him behind the counter, he had exhibited both an eagerness to make small talk and a real lack of speed when it came to putting together a shawarma. not a good combination. sure enough, after i placed my order tonight, he was at it again, asking me how my day was. this is not what i come to a shawarma place for. i replied "oh not too bad," and debated whether to continue talking, maybe about the soccer games or something, but decided against it. the small talk fizzled out quickly.

monday june 28

today i was walking home from the hospital when i arrived at college and bathurst. a big jones soda truck was stopped at the light, and a guy waiting for the streetcar at the corner called up to it: "hey! can i have a free soda? it's so hot, i need something to drink!" someone inside the truck must have heard him and given him the okay, because i heard him exclaim "really?!" and turned back to see a window open and a girl lean out to hand him a bottle of blue bubble gum jones soda. the light turned green at this point, meaning there was no time for me to try to pull off the same move, but i was happy for this guy and his free drink.

sunday june 27

today i watched this youtube video about seven times, fascinated that it took place at an intersection i often frequent.

saturday june 26

today i had a nightmare in which i accidentally posted a pornographic link on the wrong tweetdeck account, sending it to @mlbtraderumors' 31,000 followers instead of my personal account. why my dream had me posting porn to my twitter in the first place, i have no idea.

friday june 25

today i got dressed up nicely, boarded the subway, and headed to the 10:00 am job test i mentioned in yesterday's post. when i transferred to the streetcar and it pulled out of the subway station, i received a text message clarifying that the test was, in fact, online, and i could complete it from the comfort of my own house. upon receiving this news, i immediately got off at the next stop, caught a streetcar heading in the other direction, retracing my steps and arriving home with two minutes to spare before the test began. although the mix-up was embarrassing, i took solace in the fact that no one had witnessed it, and that if i'd known all along that i wouldn't have to dress up, i never would've ended up buying an $11 pair of shoes.

thursday june 24

today i was running a couple errands on college street in the evening when i suddenly realized that i had no dress shoes. this hasn't been a huge problem in the past, but i have a "test" for a job tomorrow that i'll need to look nice for, which means not showing up in my adidas kicks. so i wandered to the dufferin mall and went into the first store that looked like they might have some shoes. i found a handful of nice-looking pairs and decided to ask about one on the "clearance" shelf. "ahh, we usually just have a pair or two of the clearances ones," the employee told me, but in a stroke of luck, one of their remaining pairs was exactly my size! at only $49.95, i figured i could do worse. when i got to the checkout, the girl rang them through and commented: "wow, this is a GREAT deal!" i nodded and agreed, not entirely sure how much this sort of shoe went for typically, but assuming $50 was pretty okay. it was at this point that i looked up at the price displayed on the cash register, which read: $11.29. oh yeah, pretty good deal.

wednesday june 23

today i was walking out of our living room when i felt the house shake a little. "what was that!" my roommate exclaimed, clearly more concerned about the shake-up than i was. "i dunno," i replied. "someone was working on the house downstairs this morning... maybe he did something." we went out on the balcony, checking to see if anything was happening below us, but nothing seemed to be awry. "maybe it was an earthquake," we joked, neither of us believing that that was a real possibility in toronto, ontario, canada. when i checked twitter a few minutes later and saw my feed filled with "earthquake?" tweets, i realized that's exactly what it had been.

tuesday june 22

today i was waiting for the subway with my roommate. suddenly, the old guy standing a couple feet from us started repeating a phrase that sounded like "she language." uncomfortable and hoping he wasn't talking to us, we avoided eye contact with him for a few seconds, but he kept talking until finally i glanced up. "she language!" he said again. i chuckled and nodded, which seemed to please him. i still have no idea what he was talking about, but i doubt it was this.

monday june 21

today i was awakened by someone outside my window yelling "PORTUGAL!" repeatedly and blowing what sounded very much like a vuvuzela.

sunday june 20

today i had a dream in which tiny fey and i co-starred alongside one another in a movie adaptation of a novel we'd co-written about the struggles one faces in one's late-30s.

saturday june 19

today i was at the blue jays game when the giants brought in hard-throwing relief pitcher santiago casilla. "look at how fast he throws," a mother behind me exclaimed to her young child. casilla tossed a fastball across the plate and the stadium's radar gun flashed a reading of 99 mph. "that's the same speed our car goes on the highway!" the mother exclaimed, leaving me silently thankful that i'll never be in her car while she's behind the wheel.

friday june 18

today i headed to a friend's karaoke birthday party not intending to sing. an hour later, i was leading a spirited rendition of miley cyrus's "party in the usa."

thursday june 17

today i was writing something that included the phrase "he is not." debating between whether to shorten the line to "he's not" or "he isn't," i wondered why there wasn't some sort of rule for instances where back-to-back contractions could be used. rather than having to decide between my aforementioned options, it'd be much easier to just write "he'sn't."

wednesday june 16

today i was retweeted on twitter by porn director lee roy myers.

tuesday june 15

today i was waiting in line at foot locker while the guy in front of me was being rung through. while i waited, a sean kingston/justin bieber music video played on the televisions over the counter, inspiring the foot locker employee to point out that there was a certain girl that appeared in every justin bieber video. "she must be his girlfriend! i see her in every one!" she exclaimed to the guy ahead of me in line, who politely nodded and mumbled assent, but looked like he couldn't possibly care about anything less.

monday june 14

today i was discussing the halloween setup at canada's wonderland with a friend, as she tried to talk about how scary the corn maze was. what came out of her mouth instead of "corn maze" was "corn rape," which injected a whole new level of scary into the discussion.

sunday june 13

today i had the television to myself, with no roommates in sight, for a tremendous 8-11 pm run of lakers/celtics game 5, white sox/cubs dueling no-hitters, and the incredible season finale of breaking bad. it was easily one of the highlights of my week.

saturday june 12

today i was standing on my own, sipping a beer at a 90s party at neutral, waiting for my friends to come in from outside. suddenly, a girl i didn't know grabbed my hand and pulled me onto the dance floor. while i tried to be enthusiastic about this stranger wanting to dance with me, the fact that she tried to spin me around twice within about ten seconds was a bit of a turn-off -- i hate being spun, and resisted her attempts, forcing her to spin instead. within about 20 seconds, she'd lost interest and wandered off.

friday june 11

today i watched the first volume of kill bill. even though it was my second time seeing it, i was still fully engrossed, perhaps even moreso than the first time around. still, watching the dvd by myself, i paused the film, which isn't even very long, on three separate occasions to check various things (baseball scores, e-mail, etc.) online. this is exactly why i have so much trouble watching movies anymore. no attention span.

thursday june 10

today i placed a take-out order at one of my most-frequented restaurants, phil's bbq. when i arrived and saw the total price of my order, i was pleased -- it came to $9.04, which meant i could pay about $10 and leave my standard 10% take-out tip. i handed the girl behind the counter at phil's a $20 bill along with a dime, intending to pocket the $10 and leave the $1.06 in change that i got back. "there's your change," she said, handing me a $10 bill, a nickel, and a penny, with no loonie in sight. "thanks," i replied cheerfully, secretly very concerned now about how to handle the situation. as far as i could tell, these were my options:

• fish through the rest of my change to try to find a dollar to leave, which would essentially meaning leaving a TWO dollar (20%+) tip. more than i'd leave a waiter!
• calling attention to the forgotten dollar, only to just give it back to her anyway -- so not only would i be suggesting she was an idiot for forgetting all my change, but i'd be doing it just so i could get the RECOGNITION of handing it back to her.
• leaving the nickel and penny, in hopes that when she took the bill back she'd notice her mistake, but risking being viewed as the guy who left a six-cent tip.

i elected for the final option. i hope they don't remember me next time.

wednesday june 9

today i lay in bed before falling asleep, thinking about how often i have a really good dream, but wake up before i see how it ends. the disappointment that comes from being denied closure usually cancels out any enjoyment i get from the dream itself. at some point during this brainstorm, i fell asleep and eventually had a dream in which i was playing for a baseball team. in the dream, we were playing against our hated rivals, and emotions were running high, not only between both teams, but also between our team and the umpires. at one point, i belted a home run over the left-field wall, but was called out when the umpire ruled that i'd missed touching second base during my home run trot (i had missed the base, but the fact that the umpire alerted the other team of this fact, getting them to appeal, made me livid). finally, after seven innings, we'd taken a narrow 13-12 lead and were poised to take care of business in the final two frames. it was at this point that i woke up. typical.

tuesday june 8

today i went to the laundromat to do some laundry. while my clothes were being washed and dried, i ran a few errands, meaning i had to walk back and forth between my house and the laundromat about four different times. normally this wouldn't have been problematic, but today there happened to be two groups of 20-somethings with clipboards on the sidewalk along the way, attempting to stop passers-by and preach about some cause or other -- probably about the environment, but i wasn't about to find out. after barely being able to turn down the spiel the first time i walked to the laundromat, i planned my course more carefully on subsequent walks past. although the two groups were on opposite sides of the street, they weren't directly across from one another, which gave me a gap of about a block in which i could cross bloor st. without running into either group. needless to say, regardless of the amount of traffic in my way, i took advantage of that block every time.

monday june 7

today i heard my new favourite line on the bachelorette, when one guy poetically declared: "it's just my heart.... jump in. stay a while."

sunday june 6

today i observed a house party happening across the street. songs like david guetta's "sexy bitch" blasted loudly from the house, and its interior was lit up by a pulsing red light. when she passed by, my roommate reported that it seemed like there was even a bouncer standing at the front door with a clipboard -- possibly a guest list? when i took another look a half-hour later, it was impossible to tell whether the front patio was just packed with people wanting to hang out outside, or if this alleged "bouncer" was holding a line.

saturday june 5

today i attended the blue jays' 1:07 game. although i worked at 6:00, i assumed the game would be done in plenty of time that i wouldn't have to rush home. this turned out not to be the case, when the jays tied the game up and sent it to extra innings. when the 14th inning began just before 5:00, i announced that this had to be the last inning i'd stay for. when aaron hill got the game-winning hit for toronto a little over 15 minutes later, the timing was perfect -- i made a quick getaway from the stadium and ended up getting to my computer at 6:01 for work.

friday june 4

today i bought a beer at the rogers centre during the blue jays game and, for the first time ever, was not asked for any identification. given the signs posted around the park that promise they'll id anyone under 30, i can only assume i was looking much older than usual today.

thursday june 3

today i had a dream that i had traveled back in time to 2003. "i'm from the future! 2010!" i told people in the dream. when they asked me to prove it, i invited them to quiz me about the coming years, but they insisted i tell them something concrete. bizarrely, the only proof i could think to give them was that by 2010, a twitter account dedicated entirely to baseball's closers would exist (mlb trade rumors' @closernews page). upon waking up, i was irrationally annoyed that i hadn't provided these unknown dream-people dozens of other, more interesting snippets of "the future."

wednesday june 2

today i dropped a ttc token into the appropriate slot as i entered the subway, but when i attempted to push my way through the turnstile, it wouldn't budge. confused, having never had this happen before, i located the "token reject" window for the first time, pulled out my token, and tried it again. this time it worked, rendering the initial rejection inexplicable. "is that gonna be your one thing i did today?" my roommate asked, and i just chuckled, thinking that surely i'd be able to come up with something better.

tuesday june 1

today i dealt with multiple house issues in the span of about five hours. first, a pair of guys came in to clean our air ducts, moving around household items and leaving dust and dirt all over the floors when they left. later, a new water tank was installed, meaning that not only was our water turned off for about two hours but, when it finally came back on, very little of it was hot. finally, when i attempted to cook dinner, the oven never heated up enough to be effective, ultimately forcing me to order take-out. the whole experience left me feeling not so bad about the fact that we'll be moving out of the place in three months.

monday may 31

today i went to canada's wonderland. although i attempted just about every one of the most "thrilling" rides at the park (some more than once), and experienced that pit-in-the-stomach anxiety at the start of a few, the time i felt most nervous about my well-being was on the drive to the park, with my friend weaving in and out of traffic and driving much faster than seemed necessary.