adios 2007, allo 2008
I started off with a trip downtown to catch some lingering Boxing Week sales, causing damage to my pocketbook. Mirvish Village yielded several cookbooks and a half-dozen mangl..well-loved comics from the 50s through 70s. Kensington Market yielded a bag of poblano peppers and several on-the-go snacks. A clearance sale at The Bay at Queen and Yonge added to the new wardrobe I built up over the Christmas break.
Discovery of the day: while passing by Honeydale Mall on a west-end grocery run, I noticed the bees over the doorway had vanished, replaced with non-descript lettering (mental note to take camera on next trip to that area for a future "before/after" post).
The early evening was spent batch scanning photos from the early 1970s that lay in a box back home - more on those in the near future. After finding scattered photos of myself from high school in the same box, I came face-to-face with the roots of my mild form of photophobia, even if in reality the shots are not much worse than your average awkward teenager.
Around 11, I headed downtown to join friends to see out 2007. The TTC was busy, but it didn't look as if too many people had started the party early. The closest I saw to out-and-out inebriation was a hyperactive 10-year old literally bouncing off the walls on the subway. Laughing louder than a happy drunk, the kid ran into other passengers. The parents laughed along, the other passengers didn't. When I got off at Bloor, I noticed the car behind mine was packed with revellers singing in an Eastern language, accompanied by drums. The platform was lined with police, most appearing to be in cheery mood.
The last quarter of the year was rough for many people I know, so it felt right to put a stake through the heart of the year...or burn it in effigy.
Enter Nadia's creation, who quickly earned the moniker "General F**kwittery".
We scrawled things we'd rather forget about 2007 on the General. Come midnight he burned quite nicely, despite a few false starts due to the snowfall.
Afterwards, we headed indoors for drinks, munchies, Kanye West and exposure to the strange pairing of August Strindberg and helium. I headed home just before 3AM, perfecting ways to dodge corn chowder on the floors of various subway stations. A reveller on the Eglinton bus merrily greeted oncoming passengers, proclaiming himself Father Time.
2008 was getting off to a good start.
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