George W. Bush Invades Canada! (Just Kidding)

I was roused from my sleep this morning by a loud crash. This wasn't your ordinary, run-of-the-mill crash, but a resounding sort of crash. It was a crash fit to herald the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, or the start of World War III. It rattled my windows and scattered my dreams. I launched myself from the couch in a panic: Hitler! Hitler is attacking! I plastered my face to the windows, looking for smoke. Seeing nothing, I began to collect my muddled thoughts. Hitler? Was I dreaming of Hitler again? I didn't think so...Oh! George Bush! George Bush is attacking!

I hurried to the north window, jamming my head between the Venetian blinds. An assortment of confused yelps and cries floated up from the street, but I couldn't see a thing. Maybe it was a plane crash, I thought, collecting myself a little--but where's the plane? I tried to check out the southerly view via the reflections on the side of the Pacific Press building, but I could see nothing remarkable. (Truth be told, I couldn't see much of anything, besides the sky.)

At length, having calmed down and woken up, I did what any thinking human being would do: I got on the Internet and asked around concerning the crash. It turned out to have been, of all things, thunder! Lightning had struck a building on Main Street and, charging down a metal pipe, ignited the laundry room. I've never heard such thunder in my life--and, let me tell you, having lived in Scotland, I'm no stranger to rubbish weather. I've suffered through every possible incarnation of the miserable drizzle and the howling gale, the flash storm and the all-day deluge. But never, not even once, have I heard thunder like that. It sounded like a bomb going off, or Baldrick singing his "Guns of War" song: Boom, boom, boom. Boom, boom, boom. Boom, boom, boom...boom.

Blimey!

At any rate, it was quite the rude awakening. Stella, the lazy wee sod, slept straight through it. She must've been the only living creature in Vancouver who did. People in bloody Maple Ridge probably heard that thunder.

Thus cruelly turfed from my repose, I raided the fridge, which is full of fruit and leftovers. Frits brought over bags of grapefruits and oranges yesterday, and then we ordered dinner from Tandoori King. Tandoori King is known for two things: tasty appetizers and ridiculous--no, positively heathen amounts of food. Obscene amounts! My sister and I ordered from them at Christmas, and, because of the low prices, we assumed they didn't send very much. We ordered lots of everything, and ended up with bags and bags of nosh. The same thing happened last night--there were naan breads the size of tea trays, bags filled to bursting with pakoras, bowls of unidentified sauces and dips, plates groaning under mammoth servings of chicken, goat, and shrimp--you could've fed a small army from this order. Even Stella got her own little bag of vegetables.

I breakfasted on a handful of pakoras and half an orange. I'd have had the whole orange, but Stella roused herself just in time to beg a few slices. Watching her jam 'em in her mouth four or five at a time is always worth the sacrifice. She's a bottomless pit, that rat, a bottomless pit with a mouth on. Remember that bit in Star Wars, where Luke & co. fly their ship into a tunnel on an asteroid, then realize they've gone and landed in the maw of a giant worm? Well, that worm could've been inspired by Stella's great-great grandmother. If you shouted down her throat, it would echo forever.

That infernal crash, though! What a din! I think it shook something loose in my head. Try as I might, I can't quite take full possession of my faculties. I needed, oh, another forty-five minutes of sleep, at the very least, and now I'm all dopey and dream-cobwebbed. There are still shreds of Hitler clinging to my cerebellum. Most unsavoury, I must say. I'd go back to sleep to get rid of them, but the streets are full of clamour, too much to doze off to. There's a car alarm hooting at half-second intervals, a street-sweeper whooshing, and the low swish of a thousand cars and buses. There are vrooms and honks and screeches. There are the immoderate cries of packbawkies. There's the Skytrain, sighing and wailing on its tracks. Motorbikes--there are motorbikes. And someone's television, tuned to a talk show, filtering in from a neighbouring apartment. In this building, there's no escaping the noises. They drift out one window and in another, disturbing innocent occupants. As for the street, it sounds closer up here than it does in the midst of it all. Shreds of conversations intrude, folks muttering nineteen storeys down, too soft to make out, too loud to ignore. Ordinarily, I hardly notice, but in my sleep-deprived condition, I'm going bonkers.

Bonkers or not, of course, work awaits. Time and the fourth page of Fleshrot's Halloween Special wait for no-one.