- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 1835
On Sunday the boy and I, for want of more exciting activities, check out the Occupy Calgary encampment in Olympic Plaza.
Now it's pretty much as been described, mostly hippies and granola's living free off the publicity and trying to bring awareness to Calgary's issues with inequality - read - their inequality. Most of them are unemployed, not particularly searching, how they heard about the Occupy Wall Street movement is the biggest mystery.
As much as I'm for social change and redressing the gross inequalities that a capitalistic society creates, this isn't the way to go about it. Peaceable demonstrations and protests only invite the abuse and scorn of the police and media - to think that any change will be wrought by these small publicity stunts is naive. The rich will continue to get richer, the police, for reasons unknown even to themselves, will continue to use whatever tactics they deem necessary (read brute and abusive use of force) to ensure the status quo remains unshaken, nothing will change.
It's sporting of the 99% to give notice of their dissatisfaction like this, but don't expect the wealthy and ruling 1% to give up their share of the pie so easily. Revolution always involves bloodshed, and until the heads of the greedy, the corrupt and the unjust are raised upon pikes the cycle will continue.
Still, the boy and I wander around, look at the tents, read the feeble protest signs, take some photos, it's good at least for him to come to some awareness of these issues, although I'd protest these aren't the demonstrators I'd want bringing it to his attention. Maybe I need to make my own sign?
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 1732
It's been almost a couple of years since I've seen him, by whom I mean Fucking Asshole, he was barred and hasn't been seen at the restaurant since.
I know there have been customers lobbying on his behalf, asking that he be allowed back, and the owner's been adamant that he not be readmitted, so I did a double take when I saw him at the door. He doesn't remember me (I made myself scarce around the table, didn't particularly want to deal with him), he's here to meet another regular customer.
He's polite, gracious, a far cry from his former self, and when his guest arrives he talks about all the great life changes and self improvements he's made. The owner comes out and sits with them, they all talk - all has been forgiven and the former asshole is now careful to be sincere and courteous.
They shake hands with the staff, everyone is happy, they'll be back.
We seem to have a revolving door, to be barred means that we'll simply pick up another client that's been barred and give them another chance, the owner tells me: "Sometimes they need to be told to fuck off....". He's right.
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 1795
He comes in every other week or so.
He looks a bit like John Liithgow - a younger version, 30 something with long, prematurely greying long hair.
He comes in alone, in the early hours, dines usually alone, tips well. Friendly enough, he's not one of our usual clientelle. He works for a living.
And he stares long at G, or me, he has this huge smile on his face, he's by himself and it's not busy and so I make light conversation.
He's in IT, a programmer, he's on his way to either a D&D game or Ballroom dancing lesson. And I've figured out why he stares long - too long - at G or me, it's not (necessarily) that he's gay, it's that he has no rudimentary social skills.
G has grown to hate him, thinks that the prolonged eye contact is a come-on, maybe it is, but IT folk, and I've known a few, they're weird.
He comes in one night with a few of his friends, more IT folk, they are all fucking weird. Strange glances, abnormally timed social skills, you don't realize what socially awkward is until you meet someone who inadvertently thwarts all the norms. Some of them we've served before. They're all a bit too friendly, they all work together, all play D&D together....
They take forever to eat. We need the table. And after dinner, no coffee but they sit and chat, there's the fear they're going to pull out the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master's Guide and start playing D&D at the table.
They're an odd bunch, eventually they leave and we all breathe a sigh of relief. Nerds.
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 1776
Time is running out.
I have only until April, the bills must be paid, renovations finished in the condo, I must acquire maps, equipment and relevant experience. How far off the beaten track will I get? Should I learn to Kayak? Buy a gun? Acquire remedial survival skills?
Time passes.
I've finished my first book in 3 months, a slender volume of some 125 pages, narratives and poems of Northern Alberta and BC. Relevant, but somehow I couldn't immerse myself. And no less than 100 other unread books upon my shelf, yet still I don't think I'll be attacking them soon.
There are countless projects that need doing, completion, yet when I find myself on that rare day off, free of commitment and obligation, there's too much to be done, painting, writing, there's xmas and treasure hunts at the local thrift shops, I find myself paralyzed with a sort of Agoraphobia.
I'm not agoraphobic, of course, but I wonder at my reluctance to leave the house, get fit, go to the gym, for coffee, dinner, dancing, do anything, something, outside of myself. Truly there's nothing to keep me here but housework and chores.
"There's too much to be done" I tell myself.
That's true, but it would be much better served by my going out and then coming home and just getting on with it.
I speculate that it's depression, probably it is, chemical? Not likely, more likely circumstantial, caught in the mindless rhythm of day to day existence, nothing to push myself forward, challenge me, help me to evolve. And, were I depressed I would expect to feel - well, depressed. As it is I just feel empty. I'm a worker, a silent, unobserved pillar of the economy.
Somehow I've found myself stuck in the mindless routine of work and home. Home, so much to be done, only another 5 or 6 months. I need to find a catsitter, finish the stairs, other light repairs, trips to the recycle, sell off shit, then Alaska.
If not Alaska then at least BC and the Yukon.
SO it is that the days escape me.
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 1821
Friday, busy, Saturday, Crazy.
We're fully booked, with flips, nothing fixed but we're hoping that customers leave in an hour so that others can be sat.
We're not the sort of restaurant where you plan to be in and out within an hour or two.
I've brought in pedometers for all the staff, want to track how many steps each of them take each night, it's lighthearted but I'm aiming to prove that some are definitely a lot less valuable than others.
The new waiter, M I'll call him, he really doesn't need a pedometer, he needs a odometer for the wheelchair that J pushes him about in, but in the interests of not offending anyone (or offending everyone equally) I've gotten him one as well.
They take it in good stride, figure out how they work, attach them to their belts or waistbands, and the night begins.
***
The night, it goes off pretty much as expected, it's crazy busy, the staff - mostly support apart from G, disappear the moment things get busy, reappear a couple of hours later when it's cooled a bit. We have the demon table from hell, a regular who's family is in from Montreal to wish him happy-important-birthday, they've imposed all sorts of financial restraints on the party, in the end 24 people spend what 3 or 4 tables of 4 would have spent without their patronage, they tip badly and stay until 1:30 AM. getting far too drunk and ignoring all subtle cues to get the fuck out.
It's a long night.
***
The end of the night, all the staff sitting down, a couple still serving the party from hell, most relaxing, the pedometers having proven a poor measure of worth, J has figured out how to shake them and rack up 10, 000 steps in a minute or two, the competition is off. A drunken native walks in off the street, wants us to call a cop car to take him to the lock up, won't leave unless we do, he refuses to go outside, it's too cold.
He's right.
And so the staff go through the motions of calling imagined friends and relatives, he provides us numbers, the party, they're shocked, they want to pay his cab to wherever he wants to go, he isn't going anywhere. What cabbie would pick him up?
I call the police,
It's an automated machine, not 911, this isn't an emergency, rather the local line, but I have to push buttons through 3 minutes of options before I get a live operator, another 10 minutes answering questions before they send out a car....
The party, most have never seen anything like this, they want to give him money, buy themselves a clear conscience, I try to explain, to him the police are cab drivers and the drunk tank's a warm hotel, like the Regency or Hyatt, they don't really understand.
Eventually the police come, take him away, the customers reluctantly leave, it's 1:30 AM. A long night. Come Xmas every night will be like this, December will be a long month. But 3 weeks yet before I need to worry about that.