O brother, where are thou?

Just wanted to know if the following sibling is around, didn't get news from him in a while:



He is, of course, the one doing the pretty face with the hat, the girl to the left is his great girlfriend, Marie-France and wonderful little sister Andree-Anne sits (and smiles) in between. Hey, whacha do bro? Cegep students are still on strike? Give me news!

As for me, since nobody really cares about brother when there is me, well I just can say that I hate blogging every 5 days or so when so much is happening.

Today is my first of two consecutive days off. Tomorrow, Sunday, I'll try to hike one of the mountains around town, probably a small one to get reaquainted with hiking. I can't wait for my paycheck on Tuesday, I'm sick of eating the same shit and doing mostly nothing...there isn't a lot of free stuff in Banff!!! In the small list of free stuff you can do, a few friends and I went to our hotel's pool and spa last night. The pool is outside, heated, with an incredible view of the mountains and it was so relaxing that I ended up passing out on the back's appartment couch (we had plans to sneak into a neighbour's party later). So I woke up at midnight and quickly went to my bed in the front. It was good to get a long restful sleep (woke up at 1PM this afternoon) by myself.

In the last week, I pretty much slept most of the nights in a friend's bed, and she became a fixture in mine. Without a doubt due to the fact that we work and live together, and contrary to others, Marie-Eve became more than a "one-night stand" and grew up to be a good friend with whom you can share more than "physicality". Of course, it looks like everything is temporary in Banff, I'm leaving soon for planting and she'll go pick cherries in the Okanagan Valley in B.C. with most of the other Quebecers and I wouldn't change my plans for anything or anybody, but I would like to keep contact. There is other people I hope I'll keep contact with, but between promises, good intentions and reality, there is always a big gap, so we'll wait and see.

There was some shit in the last days with the Quebecers clique (I sincerly hate the "ghetto-ization" of the place, but I have to admit I grew closer to the Quebecers because they have interests - and party habits - closer to mine). One of the guys, Ben, was fired after many warnings and no efforts to improve. It pissed the others because they have plans to leave together, as said earlier, to go pick cherries, and they are not ready to go. So it became a big thing, people feeling stressed, under pressure and forced to do stuff they don't want to do, usually what they wanted to flee from when they came to Banff. They finally ended up finding a compromise, they'll leave in two weeks instead of a month and a half, Ben will find a new job somewhere in the meantime and they'll hide him somewhere in the staff accomodation (you are usually kicked out, 24 hours after being fired)...

It means we'll have a gigantic shortage of housekeepers at work, we are already short and I had to go help them a few times this week after doing my regular work. The shitty part is, I hate housekeeping! Most of the housekeepers hate my job, but theirs is so much worse in my opinion. The cool thing is, I ended up working 117 hours in the last payroll! After 88 hours, you're overtime, and therefore being paid time and a half so it'll give me a really nice pay Tuesday! Until then though, I have to do my laundry in the bathtub and dry my clothes in my room...And my diet consists moslty of quesadillas, tomato-sauce spaghetti and cheap burgers at work (when I find enough change around the video lottery terminals). Tuesday night= Grocery time! And liquor-store time of course!

It also means I'll lose most of the people I'm close too soon, but it doesn't really matter, if we keep contact, cool! If not, well, too bad! My roommate, J-R, was also fired a week ago, he was a good friend here, saw him twice since he left and we had fun, but things change so quickly here! Friendships are of the fast-food kind; you're getting close fast and easily, but you can lose contact as fast. I'm just happy I have my own projects and nobody dictates my plans and itinaries. Never been so free and autonomous in my life! I don't have real plans of what I'll do in the next years, just good ideas and a pretty clear image of where I'll be in two years. I realized that I spent the first 25 years of my life dreaming, now it's time to realize those dreams and do things!

I'll probably be able to post tomorrow, since I'm off again and I already have a great title for it (I love titles, that and the Cape Verde flag are my two all-time favourites things, at least for today)! Time to go, I have dreams to catch!

EDIT: The pope is dead! Next! (It'll probaly take 2-3 years before the Cardinals can reach an unanimous decision, time for the Church to rethink itself!)