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- Written by: Rod Boyle
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The restaurant still insanely busy, but Burger month is wrapping up so there's hope for a little more peace of mind.
Wednesday, head out of town, head down, scouring the beach for arrowheads. All this lousy weather and rain should have brought something to the surface.
The bus, I planned poorly and was trapped in Balfour for 4 hours. A dismal day, but with the head down and focus it passes quick. I find a few good flakes, and a couple micro-blades, but no arrowheads. And that ends the season until after the spring floods.
Thursday, I make Salsa, it baffles be that of all the salsa's I can buy in the store, the "Fresh" and "Spicy" and none of them are either. So I make a huge batch, 2 litres, and then get hungry and eat it all. In other ways productive, list my computer for sale, clean out the closet of old clothes, sort them into "Boring Work Clothes" and more interesting fashion choices. This is an unending task, the purging of wardrobe, fortunately socks/underwear sort themselves out, and as they thin themselves I can make better choices in organizing my wardrobe.
Laundry, done, make bed, really, I'm a prodigy of efficiency.
And that's it. Friday, work, insane, easily 3 turns on the restaurant, let alone the deliveries and to-go. I'm glad to see them finally succeeding, but...
Saturday, a more reasonable pace.
Then there's the homeless, a couple of whom were paid and showed up in the restaurant. The first, maybe not homeless, regular at the soup kitchen, perpetually high, we'll call her S****. I've seen her around, clearly lit and out for lunch, she came into the "ole cock & suck" and ate, drank once before, couldn't pay, left an expired drivers license as security and never came back. Which is how I know her name. Confirm with her she can pay, she's actually "Plausibly" dressed, not "stained" in any of the ways you expect the street people to be.
Of course this day, the day she has money, she's a little demanding but...well, I'm not her server.
Saturday another one, older, my age? Older? Bent double with the fentanyl stoop, has cash, can't decide what to order, his shopping cart, filled to overflowing, is parked just outside our door. We feed him, courtesy of the restaurant, miso, rice, but he just mixes it all up, doesn't eat it, he's an adult toddler. But talking to him, hunched over the table, no conversation possible so decrepit is his state, can't decide what he wants to eat, I notice he has beautiful blue eyes. Somewhere he's in there. And I notice as well he's dyed his hair, moustache and eyebrows, and I wonder at the state of mind that sees one perpetually absent, homeless on a night with a bitter wind and chill, and worried about how one looks...
And today, again off, hit the flea market and saw my belongings for sale, my cuff-links, ties, scarves, bow ties, jackets, the way Michael's put it together make for a pretty interesting stall, and as I pretend to browse notice that they're getting some traction...
And there is the day so far. Now, time for a nap, then out to hunt for some food or bite to eat. Finished watching "Bugonia" last night, currently watching the source material - 'Save the Green Planet' - will review them together when I'm done.
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The weather the past week, piss poor, raining, cold, and I've no motivation. Even cooking is better left undone, go find a restaurant, and groceries expire in the fridge and I'm not made of money, not with the dependants I have...
Last night, upstairs neighbour, her boyfriend strangely absent these last few days, up late moving furniture, noises, banging. She'd been texting to go for a cigarette, but I'd had my own long day at work and just wanted to decompress. Then, sometime as I was trying to fall asleep, a giant crash, voices, the sound of the rail outside being banged (a peculiar reverberation), and then it's quiet.
Still, restless, the day was long and not enough got done, I sleep poorly.
Today, running into her in the lobby, querying her about the noise, at first she denies it, then confesses it was the ambulance/paramedics trying to get her out of the house...
Which explains the voices, and some of the other noises, and she's telling me she's sick, needs an operation, that she came home to an apartment covered in blood, she's doing laundry and needs an operation scheduled in Trail and she can't talk about it...
***
I have my suspicions, but I know nothing and don't want to ask, I've staggered about drunk more than a few times, kicked up a racket, broken things, but she is I suspect a long ways ahead of me...
***
I checked the obituaries, once in a blue moon, another old customer from the old restaurant, married to J**, grown cranky and cantankerous in her old age. And the Pastor that founded this housing, the thrift shop, the Christian ministry above it, his wife also died. Coincidentally both widowers have the same name. Death out here, it's a season. J**, former customer from the restaurant, comes into the Sushi place for lunch with his son. And I give him my condolences, and he's sad, but he seems as well to be - well, not so sad, the relief the dying give the living - when finally dead - is no small thing. A coincidence, I've never seen him in the restaurant before - but - there is a pattern...synchronicity, a symmetry hidden in the ordered workings of life...
***
Today, cold, miserable, rain, wind, wet, I make it out for a coffee, come home, make a big pot of clam chowder, eat it all. Then take some pictures, out again to list the former closet contents (old computer, projector, monitor, suitcases) on Facebook marketplace, sell it or give it away but be done with it finally.
The computer, there's work there, need to move all the files off of it and wipe, then to Library to list, then again home to wash dishes, read, listen to podcasts (nothing good), read all the news that was never fit to print, ever, and now - after a final walk to make my minimal exercise - to watch a movie, read a few dour books on German Philosophy (Shopenhauer) and then perhaps an early bed...
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Finally, after several trips to the hardware store I find the part and hacksaw it down to fit the Oil Lamp, take it to the antique shop to hang in their window. The owner's as impressed with it as I am. The first time in 35+ years it's hung, it looks happy there, a fine stopover on it's way to a castle.
A few of my other candlesticks in the lower left...
***
The daughter comes for a whirlwind visit, to pick up a car she had me look at. She's over the moon happy, she got a "bargain"; if you can call 4X the book value a bargain...
She manages to get the winter tires put on the following day, her old car to the wreckers, insurance - and I tell her to use the book value so she doesn't overpay on the GST, but the seller won't adjust the price on the bill of sale, fortunately she has a friendly insurance agent that suggests she rewrite the bill of sale, the price, and then when she does it again - still too high, the agent slips her a little slip of paper with the black-book price written on it, and she clues in.
So for her a successful trip and Friday morning she was off back to Nanaimo.
***
My website, a few days, down, unable to log in. Call customer tech support, who assure me everything is fine on their end...
Tech support, you're damned. But that's all I needed, poked around the back end and discover my database had some sort of injection-session attack, filled it up, truncate all the useless queries so it's back up and running again and here I am.
***
More clutter to be sorted through, the arrival of my chests of drawers means I need to attack my closet. Pushing my way through the bramble and briar of metal coathooks and thrice hung shirts, trousers, I'm more than half expecting to arrive in Narnia and meet Aslan.
Only, four bags of clothes to the thrift shop, 1 to the dumpster, 2 empty suitcases for somebody (?? Who ??), and I can see there's a wall at the back. I find an American Officer's jacket from the Korean war, phenomenal gilt buttons, this goes to Michael, mint condition, someone will want it.
***
Then burger month, had two others, one at the lakeside, good but not a contender. And one from a burger place in town, same as always, just bigger, more processed cheese, more bacon, more beef, both delicious and disgusting, but again, not a contender.
***
And work, unrelenting, full tilt from start to finish, a full on 10 KM, $1400 server marathon, this all to serve tables of two half a burger, tables of 4 2 burgers, again halved, this is one hell of a lot of running. And of course the kitchen is not keeping up, we're turning people away, advising to-go orders it'll be 45 minutes to an hour, it's pure unadulterated chaos, running out of glasses, and again, out of spoons, bowls, plates, chopsticks, cutlery, everything you might want to run a restaurant.
Damn I'll be glad when this month is over.
Otherwise, on season 3 of "Dark", the last season, fortunately, I'm curious how it'll wrap up but a poor choice, really, to watch this now, the season in the show too closely mirror those in town right now, the lowering grey clouds and snow lurking over both Nelson and Winden...
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...and work has been a madhouse. Running, top speed, I should be in the Olympics, from the beginning to the end of the shift, non-stop, always 2, 3, 4 steps behind, there’s a line up at the door, turning people away. Rumour has it that we’ve a good burger. We do, I’ve tried it, and for sure it’s a contender, but we’ve doubled our volume and not our staff and the next three weeks will be trying indeed. Last night, $2200 ring-out in 4 1/2 hours, and this is not regular dining, this is a burger split between 2, 2 burgers split between 4, separate bills, keeping up with this - insane.
Nonetheless I’m still alive.
This week, looked at car for the daughter, twice, a long walk, she’s now booked a trip out to pick it up for Tuesday. So - for her a success.
And - more stuff to Michael’s little vintage booth; there’s a few fairs coming up, I’ve stocked him up with jackets and waist-coats & neckties & cufflinks & tie clips & belts & jackets and too much more to list.
It’s liberating to be getting rid of this stuff, this detritus that has been holding me back for how long, let it go, let it go.
I might be in a position to clean out the closet and sort my shirts, already discovering piles of clothes I’d forgotten I have.
The locker is still very much full.
Then, hey, if the closet clean-out works I can always try cleaning up the kitchen, but…1 step at a time. To consider it all is to be overwhelmed and paralytic and get nothing done.
While cleaning I listen to an NPR "This American Life" podcast on how our things come to own us...appropriate. This is how to get things done.
The chilli plants, finally, I had enough, the were in the end under the grow light 18 hours a day with limited progress, not worth the rain of debris, leaves, pollen, resin, then finally the small black flies and fungal gnats, the leaves were crawling and so I took them finally to the balcony to die…
All that work for what amounts to maybe 10 grams of tiny chilis. Definitely not worth the work. Or clean-up.
The genii-infested-oil-lamp, now ready for sale, had to make a custom part but look forward to hailing it to the antique shop Wednesday, they have a fine selection of candlesticks (largely mine) in their window, I’m pleased to note that some are selling…
Then there’s Kramer, who has decided that her place is haunted; she’s uncomfortable in it, and so has taken to making herself comfortable over at mine. Wake up in the morning to a clatter in the kitchen, it’s Kramer making herself a cup of coffee and cozy in my chair. Come home from work in the evening and it’s Kramer, just waiting in my place, not comfortable in hers.
Now, this is preposterous, see my place and wonder how anyone could be comfortable there, I’m not, it’s an asylum of unfinished art pieces, picture frames, paints, supplies, paper, ephemera…
And she’s not what you’d call great conversation, for the most part just trying to stay out of her own place by commandeering mine.
This catches us up. Today, more stuff to Michaels, breakfast, dishes, shave and clean the bathroom and I feel like calling it a success already yet there’s hours to go…
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This, on behalf of my daughter, she's found a used Toyota rav4, roughly around the year 2000. Conveniently located in Nelson, a "mere" 230+thousand K and "bargain" priced at $6200.
This is absurd.
I check the Edmund's price, it's worth roughly $1000. No shit. But - look around, shopping on Facebook and other sites, that's what they cost up here. More even.
Bullshit.
Nonetheless the daughter needs a new vehicle and so I, the dutiful dad, go to check it out.
4:00, down by the Orange Bridge, a 3 KM walk through the pissing rain, the owner, she shows up on time. I explain I'm shopping for my daughter and she wouldn't be able to make it out until the weekend but...she'll secure it with a deposit...."there's been a lot of interest" she tells me, ominously. She wants to sell it ASAP, I understand, but the ad went up on Monday and it hasn't yet sold. The vehicle, looks good, minimal damage, dings in the doors is all, great shape considering the year, it's getting dark already, there'll be no looking under the hood in this light, no crawling around underneath it given the rain, but lets go for a drive...
Note that while she has winter tires, it's equipped with summer tires, these will have to be switched out for the daughter to drive back...
Only it won't start. The battery's dead.
And so that's that.
Walk home in the pissing rain.
I take it in stride, she can let me know if she gets it running, 4:00 was not a good time to look at it anyways.
***
Bloody hell, every used piece of shit by I've ever owned by today's pricing has appreciated 10 Fold. My Old Jeep Laredo, the one taken out by a logging truck, cost $2000, could have sold today for $5000, and that with the added mileage. The same for practically every other vehicle, and you have to wonder, when did vehicles become a "good investment"????
Annoyed.
The owner's messaged me, she's sourced the problem, will look at it again tomorrow. But...damn, this isn't ideal...