Dark Side of the Moose (or Wish You Were Deer)...
The Pink Floyd references seemed appropriate
because I spent today feeling like I'd dropped acid (strictly judging by what
I've been told, of course).
First off, I just want to give myself a little pat
on the back. My team played 9 ball last night, and I was the fill-in captain
while Jake is away camping. We're in fourth place and our opponents were in
first so captaining the team really wasn't something I was looking forward to.
(8 ball tomorrow night should be different, mind you--the team we're playing
didn't win
any games
last week!) At any rate, we kicked ass thanks in part to my judging how and
when to play everyone. Out of a possible 100 points, we took 69 (leaving them
with 31) and only lost one match out of five. Okay, I know... big deal. What
can I say? I'm proud!
So today, I was a
painter--not in the inside of a house, and not the outside neither. No, my
faithful blog followers... no, today I painted a moose, two cowgirls with DD
breasts, a bench, and a two-harness wagon. I'll
explain...
This guy, another fairly
out-to-lunch Ukrainian, has an acreage--3 acres total--with this bizarre
western-themed display running up his driveway that consists of two dimensional
cut-outs on posts featuring three wolves (I mistakenly referred to them
dogs--who's to know), a moose (er, make that an elk--another gaff), a 70 or 80
year old wagon (that part's pretty cool, actually), and a dozen or so cowgirls,
all identical, all with huge hooters, none of which have arms, all of which are
wearing real, actual red bandanas, and all of which completely creeped me out.
The wolves, cowgirls, and moose (sorry, elk... but the "Dark Side of the Moose"
joke won't work if I call it an elk!) were all painted black. (See the joke
now? Yeah well, you try painting cut-out animals and large breasted cowfolk for
a day and see if your mind doesn't wander into some strange
areas.)
Other than the silly title for
this blog (and the fact that I had to rush home and
write this
blog), I just kept thinking of this thing my sister used to say and do. She'd
get this sort of troubled expression on her face, and she'd say "oh no" in this
way that basically said, "what a sad and horrible thing it must be to believe
that that is good/appropriate/tasteful/interesting"... whatever--fill in the
blank--you get the idea... but it also had an undertone of "although I couldn't
possibly relate to your bad taste, I feel your pain" and "how could such a thing
happen?" She always seemed so compassionate when she said it,
too.
My "client", Terry (a very nice man
by the way), spent a good deal of his day riding around his acreage on his
tractor wearing a large straw hat, checking up on me and the other two who were
working for him. Terry is quite a large, shorter gentlemen of about 65,
ruddy-faced, grey-haired, who always wears suspenders but
not
because he thinks they look cool--he does actually need them. Again, I hear my
sister's "oh no... that's so
sad!"
Anyway... this was just meant to be
a quick entry... and so that you know, I feel like I've been very malicious
towards poor Terry in this entry. He really is a very gracious, kind man...
openly friendly and easy-going. It's just that he's really kooky (the perfect
word! I chose it carefully). Sadly, I heard on the drive home that his wife
was killed in a car accident three or four years ago. That suddenly explained a
lot; I think he's probably quite lonely which is why he hires people to come in
and paint two dimensional moose. But again, what is it with these Alberta
drivers?! I swear the population of the province is so low because your chances
of being killed on an Albertan road are only slightly lower than your chances of
getting burnt coffee at Starbucks. The mind boggles.
Posted: Wed - August 16, 2006 at 10:27 PM