So, this is a follow up post on the new Madonna album as it pertains to my gym. As I’ve stated before, my gym is pretty small and us members kinda have the run of the place in that we can ask to change the music and we can even demand that they take ‘Youngblood’ out of the cheesy movie rotation – which they did.

Every Saturday they drop down to a skeleton staff. And by “skeleton” I mean that there is just this really skinny guy working the desk. Ok, I wish that were actually true for the purposes of this blog, but the guy isn’t that skinny. Anyway, he is always listening to the absolute worst music known to man. Today he was listening to Alanis Morisette. Not only was it Alanis, it was Jagged Little Pill. Not only was it Jagged Little Pill, it was some sort of unplugged slowed down version so you could actually hear what she was saying. You simply can’t run to a slowed down acoustic “You Oughta Know.” It actually makes you uncomfortable and not in a healthy challenged way, but in an embarrassed way.

Taking matters into my own hands I asked the guy if we could hear the new Madonna album. Because, as I said yesterday, Hung Up gets an A and even though the rest of the album gets a C+ it is still better than acoustic Jagged Little Pill, with the exception of Madonna’s I Love New York song, which is possible worse than the black Eyed Peas song I mentioned in my last post. The music at the gym can be a minefield.

Dude at the desk complied and put on the Madonna CD. To my delight when I got to the gym I noticed that the cheesy movie of the day was none other than West Side Story. Oh what a film. I am not even so offended that I think most of the Puerto Ricans in the film were just white people with dark make-up on. I mean it all comes together with that Rita Moreno. The woman was on FIRE.

Here’s where things got strange. The first track on the Madonna album is Hung Up. When the guy put the song on, it was at the start of the scene in West Side Story where the two rival gangs go to the dance. I didn’t remember this but that scene starts with a dark screen and red figures dancing. Like those heat sensing films. I know it sounds crazy, but the beginning of that scene combined with the beginning of Hung Up merged perfectly. Then, when the film when back to a normal shot of the dance, the steps of the dancers looked like they were made for Hung Up. I am not kidding you when I say everyone at the gym – all four of us – stopped our workout just to watch the dancing. You know how they say that Pink Floyd album is meant as an alternate soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz, it had that quality.

The Madonna album lasted the duration of my workout, and as I walked out of the gym I recognized the first few bars of some Alanis Morisette’s classic set to acoustic guitar. Thankfully, I was out of there before she actually started to “sing.”
- posted by Debbie @ 1:47 PM |

 
So, last night, I spent some quality time at the gym. I was also there on Tuesday. In fact, I kinda over did it as I was working out some frustration I had built up during the day. It was great for the spirit, but bad for the body.

Anyway, I was on the treadmill when that new Madonna song, Hung Up, came pouring out of the gym speakers. Now, the first time I heard the song, I wasn’t that impressed by it. In fact, Madonna started to bore me right after Vogue. So, the chances that she was gonna win me over now, were slim. Add to that, the song was mixed with an Abba song. I have always disliked Abba. In fact, I think that they should be charged for their crimes. They have tortured the western world with Mama Mia.

Perhaps it was the pace of the treadmill or the beating of my heart, but my god did that song take my workout to a whole new level. Now I love it. I’m singing it in my head right now, in fact.

The rest of the album is just ho hum. It doesn’t stand up to Kylie’s “Fever” for pure fun value. Also, I think this album has probably the worst lyrics known to man. Perhaps they have embraced the dance music genre too much. So, “Hung Up” gets an A from me. The rest of the album gets a C+.

I am glad that I warmed up to the song. I can be pretty single minded. I feel the need to say that nothing will warm me up to that moronic song by the Back Eyed Peas. Which moron wrote “What you gonna do with all that ass in your jeans?”
- posted by Debbie @ 10:51 AM |

 
So, last night, I had several nightmares. I don’t know what sparked them, but it was not pleasant.

Well, perhaps it was March of the Penguins. I watched the English version last night. It is very different from the French version. The English version has only Morgan Freeman narrating and in the French version, there are voices for the male and female penguin and they talk to each other. Also the music is different. In the English version, the music is only instrumental. The French version has a woman singing in English. Weird.

Anyway, after my screening of March of the Penguins (and two glasses of wine) I climbed into bed fully intent on getting a good night’s sleep. I slept well until around 3:00 AM when I woke up for no clear reason, so I decided to go to the bathroom.

Getting back to sleep proved challenging. My brain was hoping from one subject to another and I guess that’s what got me up in the first place and kept me up. Sometimes my brain would rather reel than rest.

I finally got to sleep about two hours later. Well, it felt like two hours later, but then my sleep betrayed me. I had a series of nightmares. Not one, not two, but it was like a Simpson’s Tree House of Horror Halloween Special up in my brain. The first one was when, for some reason, I woke up in my old office in Toronto at the Sherbourne and Queen area. I decided to go walking down the street in my favourite long sleeve t-shirt. But, I wasn’t wearing any pants or panties. I became totally anxious and started frantically looking for the Good Will in the area to get a skirt (even in a dream state, buying under ware from a used clothing store is OUT of the question). It was really hot in my dream and there was not a lot of people on the street, just a lot of huge imposing buildings. I couldn’t find the Good Will and I am not clear on how that ended.

In my second dream, I ended up at a party at a friend’s place. Well, really it was a ‘friend’ I only barely know here in Montreal. For some reason I was totally stranded there and had no way to get to a friend’s place. So, I called Vijay who came to get me, but he was kinda crazy and scary looking. He was all pale and kept picking at his teeth, it creaped me out. Against my better judgment I got into a car with him and he almost drove into various walls or oncoming traffic all the while laughing like a hyena and looking at me like if he didn’t succeed in killing me in the car, he would just finish the job later. The worst thing is that sitting in the car I was stuck. I couldn’t move at all. The car would go careening down some street into a dangerous turn, but I couldn’t react physically. All I could so was watch trapped in the passenger seat.

In the third dream I was just being followed by someone or several people. I hate that. All three of these dreams were so real it was like I was living them, I couldn’t get out. I couldn’t believe this was happening to me and worse I couldn’t save myself. I was totally out of control and it was terrifying.

My last dream was more like a night terror. I was back in my apartment and in bed. I heard someone running up the stairs in the hall between my apartment and my neighbour’s with boots on were making tons of noise. The lights in the hall were blazing, this person opened my front door and screamed into my apartment “Aren’t you supposed to be sleeping.” And then slammed my door repeatedly but didn’t actually come in. In a half-awake state I tried to get up but couldn’t really move. But, then I finally got up and went to the door and tried to close it against a hard wind and streams of light pushing their way into my apartment. I wanted to see who was down there but I was afraid for what would happen to me. It was awful.

Seriously, I woke up exhausted and terrified.
- posted by Debbie @ 2:46 PM |

 
So, last night, perhaps inspired by my grandmother – I’ve been thinking about her a lot lately – I had a really weird dream. Before I launch into the description I just want to warn you, what follows is not for family reading.

OK, here goes. I had this dream that I for some reason decided to do some extra special muff grooming. So, I pulled out my comb and brushes and hair products and started grooming. The first thing I noticed was that I had several silver hairs. Very silver and they looked pretty nice. This is strange because in the real world, I only have one grey hair on my head.

The other thing I noticed is that I was particularly lush. It was one healthy bush. It looked amazing. I could have been in a magazine for healthy bush maintenance.

Basically, the dream was about me being super pleased that my muff looked so good.

What is going on in my head?
- posted by Debbie @ 2:33 PM |

 
So, the Liberals fell last night. Is this good or bad, I don’t know? I am pretty confident that we will end up with another Liberal minority government. That kind of annoys me as taxpayers are going to have to pay for an election simply to install the same government we have had for eight years.

At the same time you gotta love that whole non-confidence thing. All this time I thought that our politicians were too polite to actually call for the vote. And for a while they were skittering around actually doing it. But then Stephen Harper decided to put the boots to Parliament. Well, at least that gave him a little personality. Although, any glimmer of personality was totally eroded when he made a speech that consisted of “We are looking forward, bla bla bla, future, bla bla bla, we are not looking to the past.” He made those comments but didn’t bother to mention what he was actually talking about. Good message. Perhaps he hasn’t thought of it yet. I also love that he put young people behind him. He found two visible minorities and put them on stage as well. They just looked out of place.

I also saw Paul Martin’s speech. He looked like he was ready for a fight. He was a bit bigger on the podium. He talked about the Liberal record (other than Gomery). Compared to Harper, Martin has TONS of charisma. Getting right down to mud slinging, Martin called the Conservatives the “Neo-Cons.” Good strategy because every poll indicates that Canadians don’t identify with Harper or trust the Conservatives. He called the Bloc Quebecois the Separatist Bloc, which is smart because there are two politics in Quebec, Separatist and Liberal. Although, I don’t think all Bloc supporters are actually separatists. They are actually very good politicians.

I didn’t see Jack Smooth Operator Layton or Dashing Gilles Duceppe meet reporters. But I think Jack should be worried. I think that they will loose some NDP votes to the Liberals as many Canadians would rather sell their children than let Stephen Harper become Prime Minister.

Here is my prediction for each Party. As with any prediction, I could be wrong. But, keep in mind, I am not saying anything that hasn’t been said before.

Liberal – As stated above, they will form a minority government. Even Ralph Kline thinks this is the case. Belinda Stronach will win Newmarket. But she will have to run a bang-up campaign. But, I’m just talking here.

Conservatives – They will end up with the same amount of members in the house perhaps one more or one less. Stephen Harper will have to step down as leader leaving the Conservatives in a quandary. Who will lead this party? Who are the other high-profile Conservatives? Don’t even say Peter McKay, his opponents will rip him to shreds for lying to Tory supporters. Let’s be honest, Stephen Harper is a disaster as leader. But, who else do they have? Someone please tell me because I have no idea.

NDP – They will loose seats. Jack knows that they will not get more support, so really he is fighting to keep the seats they have now. His campaign will be all about trying to get NDP supports to not switch their vote to the Liberals.

Bloc – They will end up with more members in the house. Gilles will look dashing as always. The silver fox.

On another note, the CBC is doing a study on their listener-ship. It is falling and as they told some people in our office “Only old white people listen to the CBC.”DUH. This morning I listened to Sheila Rogers on the CBC. She interviewed Ken Alexander from The Walrus. The beginning was good, but then they began to bore the snot out of me. Sheila actually said that she thinks The Walrus is very different than Harpers. She must be an idiot. I wonder what they could do to attract new listeners…
- posted by Debbie @ 11:19 AM |

 
So, I went dancing on Friday night. Everyone loves a dancing girl. It was great. I danced for hours and it was delightful. The one thing that always confuses me on the dance floor is people’s natural instinct to form a circle and dance around an imaginary barrier. It really is strange. On Friday night while the DJ played track after track of danceable soulful music a sizeable circle had formed in the middle of the dance floor, which was small to begin with. For a while people would not cross a barrier defined by what must have been an imaginary hula-hoop. In an attempt to make my friend laugh I placed my half drunk gin and tonic in the middle of the circle and danced around it for a few seconds, a la the purse dancers mentioned two posts ago. This made a few others laugh as well. A group of guys across the dance floor canyon placed a beer bottle in the middle of the circle and then pretended to film the untouched bottle from a couple feet away. No one got into the shot.

It became clear a little later that a couple guys wanted to maintain the circle because they intended to dance in some sort of hybrid break dance style that would take up a lot of room. BORING! Keep in mind, we were NOT at a show. Basically they were good dancers, but they needed an audience.

Why they needed an audience, I’ll never know. It is not like they were expanding the dance genre or capturing the spirit of dance. I say if you need an audience, enroll in some sort of dance school, join a troop and either give performances or go on the road. Do not try to monopolize the dance floor of a Montreal club on Mount Royal. Guess what, we are all there to dance

In any case, people eventually snapped out of their damage and we all had a good time.

Then, at the diner down the street, things got a little crazy. I went out with two Korean women and one Chinese woman. We laughed our way into the diner ready for some very healthy after-bar eats. As we walked through the place this drunk white woman points at my friend as says “Hey!” I figured that she was trashed and that she recognized us from the club. I was only half right.

The drunk chick points at my friends and says in a mimicked Asian accent “Tourist tourist.” She thought it was hilarious. So, I looked at her and said “Asshole asshole.” What is wrong with people? Please spare me the “she was drunk” argument because that doesn’t mean she isn’t indeed an asshole. We were really surprised because that’s just crazy. If you are going to do that wouldn’t it be best to know who you are insulting? You can get yourself in a lot of trouble. I mean that’s why roaming gangs of hateful morons are in gangs. They don’t want to risk a one on one fight. Yes, it made me angry but I wasn’t going to let a moron ruin my night so I took solace in the idea that one day she’ll get beaten to a pulp by an angry Korean with a black belt in Taekwon do.
- posted by Debbie @ 7:07 PM |