crowdog66

I haven't updated in a couple of days because I've been run-off-my-feet busy. Here's the summary.

FRIDAY

Went to the Second Cup coffee shop for a meeting with a potential Full Moon Group outer court member. She never materialized. Ah, well.

Came home long enough to get changed before heading out to the Red River Ex. Went downtown at 4:45 pm to Portage Place, where I picked up cheap drinks at A Buck or Two and had dinner at King Pie before meeting cockatiel_art. The Ex had dedicated feeder buses running through downtown every 20 minutes, so we went outside to wait for one. As we were waiting, a creepy guy tried to pick cockatiel_art up. Ewwwwww! (To my shame, I did not tell him to fuck off right away. I felt that cockatiel_art was in charge of the situation. But if he'd laid a hand on her, I would have been in his face with my best Wen-Do voice telling him to BACK OFF!!!!.)

Because of El Creepo, we caught a non-feeder bus down to Polo Park, where Robin and her family were waiting for us. While we were there and waiting for a non-packed-to-the-gills feeder, cockatiel_art mentioned that she'd found a cell phone in the roadway in front of St. Vital Centre, about to be run over by a car, and had snatched it up before it could be destroyed. I asked to see it and, seeing that it was down to its last bar of power, started busily pushing buttons in an attempt to get in touch with someone on the phone's contact list. The guy I eventually got was the boyfriend of the girl who had lost the phone, and it turned out that SHE works at the same Starbucks as eastpath. OMFG, this city is too freaking small... we made arrangements for her to come by on Saturday to pick it up from my place.

Three feeder buses went by, all stuffed absolutely full. We decided that if we couldn't get a bus out to the Ex by 7:30 pm we'd go to the Forks and have dinner instead. Just then a Not In Service bus pulled up and the driver leaned out and announced that even though he was off-duty he was going to the Ex and taking anyone who wanted to go. Score! We rode in relative comfort and arrived at the Ex grounds at around 7 pm.

Over the next few hours, we:

-- Went to the vendors tent, where I picked up a nice summer dress for $20 and got a henna tattoo for $10
-- Saw the butterfly exhibit, where you could go into a massive net tent with 30,000 butterflies. They were very social and liked to land on people, which was a wonderful thing indeed. I picked up a mounted tropical butterfly to take home.
-- Went down to the Midway and picked up ride tickets. Went on the Niagara Falls ride, which is basically a roller coaster with water. Got quite wet.
-- Had a corn dog, my one food indulgence for the evening.
-- Saw the Iams SuperDogs show with cockatiel_art.
-- Wandered the Midway until we found Robin again. Went on the Tilt-A-Whirl, which I'd remembered as a baby ride. Brother, it is NOT.
-- Gave the last of my ride tickets to a young mother with a stroller who had kids on the Merry-Go-Round.
-- Left the Ex at around 11 pm, tired but happy.

We didn't see half of what there was to see, but we certainly saw enough. By the time it was over I was more than ready for a quiet apartment and a nice hot cup of tea.

Which brings us to...

SATURDAY

Dragged myself out of bed at 11 am. As I was making coffee I heard repeated meowing sounds coming from the back fire escape. Curious, I opened the back door to see if I could see the cat in question -- and the cat in question ran right into my kitchen. It had been standing at the back door vocallizing repeatedly, for all the world as if it knew that I could (and would) help it.

It was a medium-haired tabby, matted and scrawny under its long coat. I put it in the bathroom and had an emergency consult with George. When I went down and talked to the building caretaker, she said that it didn't belong to anyone in the block but that it had been hanging around the building for several days; she suspected that someone was feeding it. Bugger. That meant that my choices were:

1) Put it back outside, which I wasn't about to do given its condition.
2) Take it down to the Winnipeg Humane Society, which aside from the cab fare would probably make me late for the ritual the Full Moon Group inner court was holding in the early afternoon.

In the end I went the WHS route. The cat was very friendly and allowed itself to be put into a cat carrier without much trouble. When I got it down to the WHS's new digs, which are actually much closer to me than their old facility, I found out that "it" was a "he", and his name is Harley (thank the Gods for ear tattoos and microchips). Apparently his listed owners don't live very far away from me, although the WHS staff wouldn't tell me their exact address. Given his condition, I suspect that they're idiots who probably abandoned him. There should be a special circle of Hell reserved for people like that, in my opinion.

$24 later I was back home and scarfing down a bowl of cereal. As I was scarfing, the girl whose cell phone cockatiel_art had found came by to pick it up. She also brought a $25 Starbucks gift card as a "thank you" for getting the phone back to her. When I talked to cockatiel_art later, she agreed to sell me her half of the card since there's nothing at Starbucks that interests her. Sweetness!

As soon as the cereal was in my belly I booted it out the door to M&M Meats to pick up some appetizers. (Their Oriental Party Pack, for the record, is superb.) Then down to Osborne Village, where I actually managed to catch the bus that I would have been taking to Robin's anyway if the cat hadn't dropped into my lap.

Then the solstice ritual. I can't share details, but it was powerful and satisfying, and as always it was good to see my inner court sisters.

And finally back home again, by now thoroughly exhausted. I'd bought two Oriental Party Packs, and now I cooked up the second one for a quick and easy dinner. I killed some time on the Internet and was in bed by 10 pm.

Today... my regular AD&D game. I really just want to chill around the house, but that's not going to happen.

Off to drink some coffee. Then I'll try to get some MM done before I have to head out at around 2:30.