tuesday february 24

today i went to the rogers centre for the first day of my new job. in order to get an elevator pass for the day, a member of our group was forced to turn over a piece of "collateral" to security for the day, so i left my driver's license at the desk. obviously i picked it up when i returned the elevator pass at the end of the day, but it occurred to me that i had a new driver's license scheduled to arrive in the mail any day now, and it really wouldn't have been a hassle at all if i'd just left my old one with rogers centre security forever. sure enough, when i got home and checked my mail, my new license had arrived, meaning i immediately discarded my old one mere hours after it had played such a crucial role.

monday february 23

today i finally snapped a weeks-long streak of not ordering food to my house. as i noted last month, the dark, icy walkway and stairs to my apartment have made me feel guilty about forcing delivery guys to come to my front door, and obviously i've yet to actually buy any salt to improve the situation. in this instance, i left a helpful "watch your step" note on my order and prepared to give the delivery guy a big tip. however, a half-hour after i placed my order, i got a call from him -- he was out front, and essentially forced me to put on boots and a coat and go out and meet him. "scary!" was the first thing he said when i came out from my walkway, which i thought was a bit dramatic. also, having just received his call and hurriedly threw on my coat and grabbed my money, i hadn't had a chance to adjust my tipping plan, so i still ended up giving him the big tip for braving the stairs even though he hadn't actually done it. not impressed.

sunday february 22

today i went to jekyl and hyde for a friend's birthday. as the only j&h semi-regular amongst a group of people who had - for the most part - never been there, i was a little nervous about the whole thing, not only because i'd vouched for it, but also because there are some strict house rules for singing karaoke -- don't bring your drinks up to the "stage" with you, never ever do anything to host david r. nelson's microphone, etc. fortunately, the only member of our group to run afoul of these rules was a friend of a friend who i couldn't stand, an unbearable know-it-all who i had last seen exactly one year ago at this same friend's birthday party. when this terrible human finished her performance by twirling the mic around by its cord, she received a wonderful lecture from david r., and came back to our table chastened, muttering obscenities, calling him a capitalist, and declaring that she didn't give a shit about his mic. it was all i could do not to just start clapping, that's how happy i was.

saturday february 21

today i was killing time, waiting to meet up with some friends at the contender to watch the raptors game, when i noticed an instagram post from the bar's account advising that there had been "standing room only" for last night's big win over the hawks. knowing that the leafs were playing tonight too, and with nothing else to do, i decided to go 10-15 minutes earlier than planned in order to secure a table. when i arrived, there were literally two other customers in the entire place. it never filled up.

friday february 20

today i read a gawker article about the next set of emoji that would be released. there were two things about this article that were interesting to me:

1. the plural of “emoji” is “emoji”?
2. two days ago, a friend and i had been discussing emoji and i bemoaned the fact that there wasn’t a “fingers crossed” one, admitting that i'd complained about that before. she replied with an all-caps message expressing how much she wanted a taco emoji. today, i came across these back-to-back comments on this gawker article:

thursday february 19

today i noticed for the first time that on one of the walls at nazareth, there’s a giant budweiser football helmet mounted with a mini disco ball rotating around inside of it. i really don’t understand the theme of the decor at that place.

wednesday february 18

today i had just arrived home from buying groceries and had started to put them away when i thought i felt my phone vibrate in my pocket. i wasn’t 100% sure, but i don’t experience many phantom vibrations with my current phone, so i was pretty confident. still, i decided not to check the message right away, choosing to put all the groceries away and then check afterward as a reward to myself. when i finally finished putting the last item in the fridge, i went to pull my phone out of my pocket and realized there was nothing there — it was at this point that i remembered the first thing i’d done when i got home was to take the phone out of my pocket and put it on my desk. so, there was no new message.

tuesday february 17

today i decided it was finally time to open the package from the blue jays that has been sitting in a corner of my apartment since before christmas. yep, sure enough, that's a souvenir miniature bat all right:

monday february 16

today i received a message from one of my very best friends who was on vacation in hawaii, telling me that her boyfriend had asked her to marry him. the first thing i said in reply was "did you tell him to go to hell and throw the ring in the ocean?" please never tell me any good news.

sunday february 15

today i received my very first "facetime" call. it came from an unknown number shortly after 3:00am. woke me up. i didn’t answer, and still don’t know who the call from, or why.

saturday february 14

today i went to td to deposit another pay cheque and, while i didn’t get my usual teller, the one i did get recognized me and the name on my cheque, and we shared a pretty good banter sesh. also, my usual teller happened to walk by as i was finishing up and said hi. i think i’m becoming the most popular person at my td branch, you guys.

friday february 13

today i dropped a strawberry on my kitchen floor while making a smoothie. when i looked down at the floor, the strawberry was nowhere in sight, but there was a little trail of red stains that led under the fridge, which was obviously where the berry had rolled. it sort of looked like when a character in a tv show is following the trail of someone they’ve shot, and the victim is losing blood as they try to get away, except in this case the victim would have to have been about two inches tall.

thursday february 12

today i was getting near the end of a game of upwords when i suggested putting an o tile over top of the i in "mist." my opponent, apparently not in the right mindset to recognize the word "most," looked at the board with confusion and said "… maw-st?" and i laughed and laughed for probably a solid 30 seconds.

wednesday february 11

today i was walking home when i passed a domino’s delivery guy on my street. he was standing on the sidewalk holding a pizza in one hand and holding his phone to his ear with the other, looking around frantically and waiting for the person on the other end of his call to pick up.

the incident made me wonder what happens when there’s no answer at the house or the phone number that made the order. how long does the delivery guy try to get in touch with the person? if he had reached his limit for attempts to contact them, could someone like me who was just walking by offer to pay him for the pizza and take it? (obviously this sort of thing wouldn’t be encouraged by company policy, but i have to imagine there are some delivery guys out there that play by their own rules).

i assume this is no big mystery — there must be some sort of standard protocol. if you know what it is, please let me know.

tuesday february 10

today i was talking to a friend and came close to saying "you’re really funny" after she made a joke. given the adversarial nature of our relationship though, i was concerned that such an earnest compliment might not come off as genuine, or worse, she’d assume that i’d been diagnosed with some sort of illness that gave me just months to live. i ended up holding back.

monday february 9

today i headed toward the subway and - remembering what a disaster it was the last time i had to buy tokens from a ttc attendant - decided to head to the opposite entrance of lansdowne station, where i could simply buy my tokens from a machine. unfortunately, this turned into an ordeal itself when i was met at the station entrance by a guy who asked if he could swipe me in with his metrocard in exchange for a token, since he had a friend waiting for him at the station's other entrance. caught off guard, i agreed, bought my tokens, made the trade, and entered the station without incident. it only occurred to me a few seconds later, as i was walking down to the platform, what kind of scam this guy was running.

sunday february 8

today i went to red seal notary on adelaide street in order to get copies of my id notarized for my new job. while i wasn't sure what to expect, what i did not anticipate was that walking into the office would be like walking into a comedy sketch. i came in when the place had been open for about three hours, and it seemed very possible - based on comments made by the notary public, mary mainguy hope - that i was the first "customer" of the day, which added to the level of surreality. it was just joke after joke with mary. her banter game was strong, and included an extended riff on how i should consider changing my first name from "jonathan" to "janathan," after she made a typo on my invoice. really looking forward to getting another document notarized, if that's something i'll ever have to do again.

saturday february 7

today i was scrolling through the photos on my phone when i came across a shot of some bathroom graffiti that i'd taken about three weeks ago, presumably having thought at the time that it was very poignant. i'd completely forgotten about it, and had to work backwards based on the timestamp to even remember what bar it came from. i think maybe red light? anyway, here it is:

friday february 6

today i realized for the first time that a particular nfl writer who i follow on twitter for my job is a woman rather than a man. her name is one that i'd never heard anywhere else before, and i’d never actually clicked through the tiny thumbnail to her profile picture. it took me a year to notice this, a year in which i’m hoping i never referred to her as "he" on my site.

thursday february 5

today i returned to my local td branch to deposit my pay cheque and saw that my favourite teller was working. having been a little miffed after my last visit when she insinuated that she recognized my cheques more than she recognized me, i was prepared to put that theory to the test this time, keeping the cheque in my pocket as i entered my pin number. sure enough, she recognized me enough to ask "the usual? american deposit?" as i was typing, at which point i pulled out the cheque and laughed and admitted that i had maybe been prepared to stand there not saying anything until she’d guessed what i was there for. "see you next month!" she said a couple minutes later when we finished up. can’t wait!!

wednesday february 4

today i noticed that the $5 off coupon i’d received from domino’s - which i’d dutifully stuck on the fridge along with their holiday card - had expired at the end of january. there were two instances in which i’d ordered pizza and thought "i guess if i ordered over the phone rather than online, i could use this coupon," but ultimately decided to pass, thinking that another opportunity would arise. the convenience of not talking on the phone is apparently worth $5 to me.

tuesday february 3

today i got a new job, in addition to my current job. i’ll be working for mlb advanced media at blue jays games this season. workaholic summer coming up, you guys.

monday february 2

today i noticed that a friend who i'd been out with last night tweeted a sarcastic, eye-rolling comment about something dumb that a "dude writer" had said to her. my first thought was that the tweet was about me, since i meet the criteria of being both a dude and a writer, and i celebrated my super bowl win enthusiastically enough that it was plausible i could’ve said something dumb and then forgotten about it. after a minute of racking my brain, i was 98% sure it wasn’t something i would’ve said, but i may never be 100% positive.

sunday february 1

today i improbably won a big bet i'd put on the patriots to win the super bowl by six points or less. having watched the game at the ossington during trivia, i decided to celebrate my win by announcing that my team's drinks were all on me. while this felt like a pretty magnanimous gesture on my part, it turned out that only one other team member had been drinking at all, and the fact that we play with the bartenders means our drinks aren't full price anyway. still, it felt pretty generous of me to tack that extra $7 onto my bill.

saturday january 31

today i attended my grandpa’s memorial service and met a guy named sean, who didn’t know anyone else there, but wanted to offer condolences to at least one family member before he left. my grandpa played some combination of ice hockey and floor hockey until he was 75 years old, and sean, who was 62, let me know that he was gunning for that record.

friday january 30

today i arrived at duffy’s at about 7:50ish to watch the raptors game. i grabbed a seat in the basement and proceeded to sit there for about 15 minutes before a server finally came downstairs and asked if i wanted anything to drink. "what are the specials?" i asked. "oh, they actually ended at 8:00," he replied, before adding "but i can sneak you in" and listing the evening's $4 pints. when i made my order, i was very careful not to thank him for "sneaking me in" as if he were doing me a favour, since if his service had been any good at all, i would’ve been ordering well before 8:00 anyway.

thursday january 29

today i walked down the sidewalk after a modest snowfall and realized that the only pair of shoes i can wear in the snow are no longer snow-appropriate, since the toe has split and is now basically a welcome mat for snow and slush and ice to enter my shoe. throw in the fact that my winter coat is essentially coming apart at the seams and has needed to be replaced for at least the last two winters, and i spent most of the walk feeling like a homeless person, which may have finally provided the kick i need to go shopping.

wednesday january 28

today i opened a card several weeks after it was meant to be opened. it had been sent to my old address and my former roommate just informed me this past sunday that it was there, admitting that she probably should’ve told me earlier since "it looks like it might be a wedding invitation." although it wasn’t that, it was a holiday card, so the delay was funny but not too problematic. anyway, when i opened the card, i found that today’s blog entry had already been written for me:

tuesday january 27

today i went to see top five and realized a couple things about my own potential top-five list:

1. i can only think of three rappers that would definitely make the list.
2. drake is one of the three.

monday january 26

today i noticed for the first time in several weeks that the long cardboard package i’d received from the blue jays before christmas was still sitting in a corner of my living room unopened. a fellow season-ticket-holding friend had already told me that the "gift" inside was a mini-bat, so i’ve sort of left it there, put off by the fact that once i open it, i’ll have a pile of cardboard to get rid of and a mini-bat that i won’t know where to put. i guess i should probably open it someday, that day is not today.