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The Commercial Olympic Torch
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2026
There are people and noises from the street, small throngs of people are gathering.
It's the arrival of the commercial Olympic Torch.
And because the restaurant isn't yet open and we're curious we go out to the street to watch.
There are lots of police. Vans and cars going up and down the street. Then there's music and more cars, it's like a parade, and a big truck comes by blaring music, loaded with all sorts of youthful dancers "getting down", passing out little Canada-Coke Olympic flags and special "collectible" bottles of coke. As the music fades another truck appears, more waving dancers "getting down", it's the Royal Bank of Canada, who would have thought bankers could be so fun?
Is this a day off for them? Do they simply pick the "cool" tellers and stick them on this van to drive up and down the street for the day the torch is in town? Or are they professional dancers, traveling across the country to promote the good name of RBC and Coke? They don't seem that professional. But they sure are trying to look like they're having fun. Although if you worked in a bank a day spent dancing on the back of a truck might seem like fun.
Do they drive down the highway like this, dancing on the back of the truck in the empty prairie, in the cold mountain passes?
Then there are more police, a squad on bicycles. Police come down on foot, pushing back pedestrians from the street, keeping it clear for the torch.
The crowds, the people, they immediately push back onto the street when the police have left.
More joggers, and finally the torchbearer, smiling and waving for all the world like it's Santa Clause. I'm seized with an overwhelming desire to grab a fire extinguisher, it'd be easy, for all the security and precautions, the millions spent, it all comes down to goodwill in the end; we're Canadians, we have nothing to protest, it's our moment, "lets all get along, shall we", meanwhile the torchbearer, still smiling and waving disappears down the street.
Anticlimactic.
The Haunted Mansion
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Dreams
- Hits: 1705
It's the standard waiter's nightmare. I'm in the restaurant, serving table, they just keep coming in and in, I can't find the kitchen, get the orders quick enough, and eventually I give up and sit down to eat.
It's the restaurant where I work, only it's not, it's a large mansion, "The Haunted Mansion", that sits atop center street overlooking the bridge and the city and the restaurant is in the basement...
"G", my partner, he finds me sitting and eating and yells at me, it's 6:00 PM, I shouldn't be eating now and I'm fed up, fed up with this working and not ever being caught up and so I tell him to f#$Q%! himself and walk out.
I'm filled with regret almost as soon as I leave the restaurant. There's a big slide that goes down the hill from Center street, leaves the restaurant, and now I return to pick up my things, final cheque, the owner is there in the center of the restaurant, center of a marble floor in front of staircases that go both up and down, I've never been upstairs, he doesn't speak to me, he's mad, nor does Franco or G, they're all mad at me for leaving and I'm remorseful, this was not how I wanted it to end, and jobs nowadays are tough to find, this is going to be difficult...
I take the slide down from the restaurant, the last table is leaving, they're taking the slide as well, they're a nice family, rich, all our customers are. And I'm wondering how this is the last table, there were so many just a few moments ago when I was inside, I get off the slide at the bottom and looking under it, at the supports that hold it up, and there are giant fossil shark teeth embedded in the stone, and I'm annoyed at having discovered this treasure just after having left my job, and I'm sad as well, having taken the fun slide down the hill, that I'll never be able to take my daughter on it, we're not rich enough, her and I, and I can't afford to take her on it because I'm poor and I no longer work here....
I'm looking at the neighborhood, where the slide exits, trying to remember how to get here so I can sneak back in and steal some more of these shark's teeth....
**Note: this is an entirely explicable dream in terms of daily events, life at the restaurant, conversations with child, etc. Very straightforward.
Candlestick Rescue
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2093
It's the inadvertent collection of things I had no intent of ever collecting.
Antique brass candlesticks.
Sometimes they turn up at garage sales, the flea market, thrift shops, in the summer as often as a pair a week. And I buy them, usually because they're too cheap to leave, far cheaper than buying the new made-in-India rubbish that saturates the market now. I can't resist a bargain.
You learn to spot the real ones from the fakes. The fakes are heavier, lack the color, the patination, the distress and wear. Although there are some very competent fakes out there, most can be spotted without even lifting them and checking the bases. When you get them home you try and date them, compare the styles, look for a makers mark, most are unmarked and can only be dated generally by comparing styles to other candlesticks where you're certain of the period.
And there are the "orphans", the single candlesticks that have lost their partner sometime in the past 100, 200 years. I have a special affinity for these, pick them up for a dollar or two in the hopes of eventually reuniting them with their mates, rare but it's happened, I've found one at a garage sale and paired it, years later, with another from a distant garage sale. I think, romantically perhaps, of what they've been through in their years of separation and imagine, could they talk, of their conversations and joy at being reunited.
Awake at 5:00 AM
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2094
For some reason I'm awake at 5:00 AM, filled with a murderous rage.
No recollection of waking up, just the thought of strangling someone.
And I can't fall back asleep. So review my notes, drink a cup of coffee, open a few bills - today's a long one - longer on only half a night's sleep; but tomorrow - with luck - I can sleep in.
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