Whispers from the Myth Teller

History Lesson: A brief history of Medicine:

2000 B.C.E. Here, take this root.
1000 A.C.E. That root is for a heathen. Here, say this prayer.
1850 A.C.E. That prayer is superstition. Here, drink this potion.
1940 A.C.E. That potion is snake oil. Here, swallow this pill.
1985 A.C.E. That pill is ineffective. Here take this antibiotic.
2000 A.C.E. That antibiotic is artificial. Here, eat this root.

I really want to see this happen. Are you with me?

Did you see my last post about the New York group Improv Everywhere? I've decided to start our own chapter in Montreal and maybe we can pull off a few missions in our fair city.

If you're interested in giving this a try, join us at the Montreal Improv Everywhere yahoogroup at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mtl_Improv_Everywhere/

Now... let's have some fun. The more I think about this, the more I think this event can straddle that fine line between a prank and art.

Remember when I told you all about the Montreal Pillow Fight last week? I didn't go because it was raining and I figured no one would show up with soggy pillows.

It turns out that I was wrong! Many people did show up and Pillow Hilarity ensued! Drat! Such a missed opportunity.

Fortunately, sfllaw was there and took photos to immortalize the event. You can see the photos of it at sfllaw Flickr site.

I wonder if you could turn a Pillow Fight event into a charity-based event?

Ms. Carotte and I attended an awards party for our LARPing game (Ms. Carotte won in the two categories she was nominated in!) that took place in a resto on Prince-Arthur. As you can imagine, the streets were packed solid. After a futile hunt for a spot, I settled for parking in a lot. I paid the price ($15), left my keys, and went off to the party.

Four hours later, I headed back to the lot to get the car. To my annoyance, I found two of the attendants leaning on the car having a conversation. I decided to let this slide, but I was annoyed. I unlocked the front door and when I got in, I saw it.

An old coffee cup (half-empty) that had been sitting in the deep coffee cup holder was now lying on its side in the passenger seat, cold coffee spilled all over it.

I jumped out of the car and started swearing like a sailor, outraged. "You @#$@! I paid $15 for this?!?! What the @#@#$@#!?!?"

The attendants came over, asking what was wrong. When I tried to tell them that I found coffee on my passenger seat, they tried to tell me that I must've done it. "What?!? Why would I have done this? When I left, this seat was dry!"

"Sir... Explain to me what happened," said one of the attendants.

By this time, I had the coffee cup in my hand and it still had a bit of coffee in it. "This cup was in my cup holder when I left you the car. When I came to get my car, it was all over the passenger seat. One your guys must've dropped it in there!"

"No sir," he shook his head. "My boys wouldn't do that. You have no proof that you didn't just spill that now."

"Proof? You want proof! Here's your proof!" I hurled the cup at the attendant's booth, causing it to explode and rain coffee all over the window.

At that moment, I knew I had gone too far. I must've looked like a raving lunatic, so I decided to try to make it funny. In a moment of ultimate cheese, I pointed to the crumpled Tim Horton's cup and roared "Roll up THAT rim!"

After more ranting, one of the attendants offered me some paper towel and a plastic bag to cover the seat. Still fuming, I got in the car and went off to pick up my folks. Very wisely, my passengers talked me out of returning to the scene of the crime to get a refund (where I probably would've been the recipient of the wrong end of a few fists).

Somewhere in the middle of all of that, Evil Gab called me to find out what was keeping me. He would hear me ranting and raving, but didn't have a clear idea of what was happening when I hung up. My friends were relieved to see me in one piece when I turned up finally, but I was still too fuming to notice.

At some level, I believe that the world is out to get me, to walk all over me. So when I'm the victim of an injustice, I explode in righteous indignation. This can be a good or bad thing, but one of these days it's gonna be the reason behind a black eye, missing teeth, and good rattling to my brainpan.

So now you're all caught up on my Saturday night adventure. And the coffee came out fine in the end, except the car still smells like Tim Horton's capuccino.

Check out this discussion I posted in my Other Blog.

I think we all need to accept this fact: sarahcarotte is trying to get me killed.

One of the most difficult aspects to working is dealing with difficult people. I find it galling that I have to keep the peace, be calm/cool/collected, be polite, be respectful, while I have other people here who are constantly rude and aggressive.

When I get pushed, I tend to push back. But as a techwriter, I can only push back so far because I tend to need people to get my job done.

I sent an email to a progammer guy that went something like this:

================
To: ProgGuy
From: Hobbes
Subj: The Blue Doodad

How does the Blue Doodad work? Does it interact with the Red Doodad?

His reply:
================
From: ProgGuy
To: Hobbes
Subj: Re: The Blue Doodad

The Blue Doodad doesn't work right now and I don't have time to fix it. Don't ask me about this again. I will let you know when it is working and how it works.

My reply:
================
To: ProgGuy
From: Hobbes
Subj: Re: The Blue Doodad

Can you tell us when you will get back to us with the information? My deadline to get stuff in is next Thursday.

His reply:
================
From: ProgGuy
To: Hobbes
Subj: Re: The Blue Doodad

The Blue Doodad doesn't work right now and I don't have time to fix it. Don't ask me about this again. I will let you know when it is working and how it works.

==========================================

Argh. I'm tempted to just quote my original reply to him and see how long it bounces back and forth until one of us cracks.

Actually, I'm beyond tempted. I've just gone and done it. I'm a bad man.

Last weekend, I was at my LARP (Live Action Role Play) game called Domaine du Createur (the longest running LARP in Montreal (9 years!)). sarahcarotte and I both play characters in this game: I'm a wizard named Karnack the Magnificent and sarahcarotte plays a healer named Kindara.

I just want to share a memorable moment with all of you: Sunday morning at 10:30 am sarahcarotte had just woken up and chatting quietly about what had happened in the LARP the night before. We heard a thumping sound from nearby that sounded distinctly like a large boffo weapon smacking the ground. We had just enough time to wonder who was making that sound when we heard a growling right outside our own tent. I yelped when that same boffo weapon hit the platform our tent was sitting on.

"You have 10 seconds to get out of there and fight or you're dead," growled the animator.

"But I'm not dressed!" I cried.

"I don't care," replied the animator. "10, 9, 8, ..."

So sarahcarotte and I scrambled to get up and grab our weapons. We got out of the tent and began to fight the monster-animator. Unfortunately, sarahcarotte got trapped in the camp and was almost killed, but I managed to get the monster to come after me onto the road. As we fought, a staff weapon flew over the camp wall and landed next to the monster, picked picked it up and continued to fight.

"Thanks alot," I cried out. "Now the monster has TWO weapons!"

I managed to fend the monster off by myself (armed with a staff that does 1 point of damage as opposed to the monster's hammer that does 5 points of damage) for about 200 yards until I was able to get grrscary out of her tent to help me.

When the monster was finally dead, I had a chance to take a moment to notice that I was only dressed in a shirt, red boxer shorts, and purple dress socks. I bent down to search the body of the monster for any objects of value, which means I said to the animator:

"I search your corpse. Do I find anything?"

"Nope," replied the animator, who then grinned. "I can't believe you fought me in your boxer shorts!"

"Dude, just be glad that you didn't get a glimpse at why I'm called Karnack the Magnificent!"

Heh.

I was out at Cafe Dolus with the usual crowd that gathers on Thursday nights (with the happy addition of Chris who has just returned from Japan) and there's a moment I wish to record.

I was standing and chatting with two very sexy ladies, one on each arm, and I couldn't help thinking.

"Once in awhile, I am a sexy beast."

Carry on.