2004-04-29

“Yes, headdress and veil are included, but the do-rag stays with me.”

So great.

Also great: travel mugs! This is a whole new thing for me. I just got a travel mug, and the whole concept is just fantastic – mobile liquid consumption! What a thing! Modern technology never ceases to amaze me. Now I can drink tea on the bus; at least, I could, if Ottawa bus drivers hadn’t all been trained at the Starsky & Hutch Driving Academy. I have to hold my silver canister gingerly, as though it were a containment unit for deadly anthrax spores, lest a particularly sharp corner land me with a scalding faceful of Vanilla Hazelnut (“Gaaaaah! The ginger root is BURNING MY EYES!”). Anyway, it keeps my hands warm.

Today I’m writing a letter of recommendation for myself, to be signed by my landlord, so that English people won’t be afraid to rent to a crazy North American. (“To Whom It May Concern: Robin Smith is an exemplary tenant. She generally refrains from discharging firearms on the premises after dark, except on special occasions.”) I hate doing this kind of thing. I’m incapable of singing my own praises unless I’m being sarcastic, thanks to some convoluted mixture of Protestant modesty and British genes; and I find myself cringing at phrases so effluent as, “She has not been the cause of any complaint or disturbance.” Golly! Jeffrey Dahmer’s landlord couldn’t have put it better.