A tribute to a friend

Three years ago Friday, a good friend of mine from my undergrad days came out of the closet. It was one of those moments where you will always remember where you were and what you were doing at the time, like when Kennedy was shot, Henderson scored the winning goal, and when the towers fell. I was working at the law library at the time, it was early afternoon, there was no one else in the room, and I'm pretty sure it was snowing. In his email, he acknowledged that some people would reject him for this admission, and he was prepared for that.

I was shocked for two reasons - firstly, because I never suspected it at all (I have non-functioning gaydar - just ask me about my two major high school crushes!), and secondly because I couldn't understand why someone would reject his friendship for such a flimsy reason. He hadn't changed anything in his basic nature - he just came clean about his sexuality. It didn't change the fact he was one of the smartest and most politically astute guys I knew, or that he was snarky and opinionated, and could sit in Tim Horton's until 3am talking department gossip with myself and another friend.

We haven't talked lately, but neither of us were good at the whole correspondence thing. I might send him a quick email to tell him what's up, and I'll get a short reply in response. However, it doesn't stop me from worrying about him every time I hear some narrow-minded bigot declare that homosexuals are evil or wrong or somehow not worth of the same rights and protections as everyone else. If you prick them, do they not bleed as well?

So, this is just to say that I hope he's okay and that he's made peace with his decision, and that next time he's around, we really need to go to Timmy's and get caught up.

Flying Fickle Finger of February

Ten minute post.... go!

Gah! I had a bunch of random things to post about, so this seems like a good time to get them all out and down on a post.

I had half a day off today - woo-hoo! Part of it was spent going to Home Depot to get a dowel to use at bellydancing (don't ask). Also got a card for my father, whose birthday is on Saturday.

For everyone who isn't interested in participating in the Knitting Olympics, but want to participate in some, small way, there's a button for you too:


Put it on your blog, and feel smug about sitting there on your duff doing nothing during the Olympics while the rest of us sit on our duffs and knit. That's okay - we won't make you feel guilty about your lack of craftiness. We also aren't going to knit anything for you, either :)

I gave up on Gods, Mongrels and Demons. I'm sorry, but I had to. It was basically an encyclopedia of odd and eccentric people, which might be interesting, but the writing was too dry and unfocused. The book I read before it was also causing no small amount of reader's block, which is maybe why I didn't try very hard, but I gave it two weeks, and... nothing. I wasn't feeling the love. So sorry. I also gave up on the book after that, which I didn't even get a chance to post - it was a book from the CBC's list of literary hoaxes. Three pages in and even I could tell it was too over the top to be real.

Technically, my time is up, but I had trouble finding the button, and I haven't run out of things to say just yet.

I was considering changing the template for this site - again. I know, I know - I just redid the bugger in July, but I want to redo the sidebars, and the font scheme, and this, that, and the other, so it felt like it would be easier to just start from scratch. However, I haven't really tried to fix things with this template, so I may take a bash at it, and save what I did get done for another time. Or, finish the modifications and give it to someone I know who was mentioning they wanted a new web site. Whatever. I like doing it, and I'm learning more about CSS when I do it, so bring it on!

"Pancakes" by Zuul's Evil Disco is quite possibly my new favourite song. And that is all I have to say about that.