One legged pigeons (the great unwashed)

I stood at Waverley Station yesterday taking in the hectic atmosphere of curtailed reunions from a precipice that allowed me such advantage.

I love the hybrid nature of architecture many European stations are created with. The amalgamation of people flocking to and from while everything around them whirls in synchronized bliss, all this as the sun tries to beat through frosted ceilings casting temporary shadows and temporary dials of light a strewn on threaded floors of both marble and stone.

This is a source of calm for me. The manic murmur is not directed at me thereby negating all rules my body signals as stress, and as no one is singled out, we are all subject to the interactions of this surrounding.

We become equal.

This is my 21st century meditation, holding the same limitations as its name presents, temporal. The effect is tantamount to the ability to remove yourself from any given situation and find peace in proper tranquility. I say proper as in the natural state of calm we accept as given, nothingness.

My escarpment is a walking bridge on what would be the second floor if it was not just a passageway, its rails are decorated by dark green colored patterns standing out, and adding to, the decorative allure of an older station by definition of its art nouveau styling.

In front of me, the electronic time boards now silently change where they once clicked slightly off from the next destination until a wash of clicking and clacking took over the air and overtook the stations buzz of indecipherable words, all was suddenly quiet in the clattering of the timetables chime. I believe Rome's Central Station still has theres. It would be worth the travel to hear the silencing of cacophony through cacophony.

My floor is currently marble, once I get to the platforms it will be stone and the feeling, despite my insular shoes and without regard to temperature, will change.

I decided after looking at the time board that I wanted to be underneath them, the colors and amount of sun were just right for whatever experience I was searching for. There was no need for analytical thinking, It was moments like these that I seeked, where I was lead by emotion without opening my mouth. A natural emotive response.

Making my way through the only intersection of the walking bridge I kept to my right as I am supposed to. Veering to your left would lead you into oncoming traffic to which you had no respite. The vindictiveness of those trying very hard NOT to avoid you could ruin any semblance of tranquility you may have. I follow this rule to preserve my state of mind, it is after all my reverie I am seeking.

Following a second left turn I walk down the stairs at a pace quicker than I would like but not wise to attempt, I am after all within the blood flow of a beast I am foreign to. I can keep up. I observe and store this sequence of events as I do so.

At the bottom of the steps, stretching to the far end of the stations walls is a hall flanked by shops whose roofs do not reach to the ceilings, merely rising like a vaulted ceiling. The shops contain your quintessential sandwich fronts, a book store and express versions of larger establishments like M&S. The feeling this strip of mercantilism gave was a little darker than my timetable destination, perhaps due to the sun, it would serve as a port of call another time.

To the left, the stairs gave way to a platform and included its underbelly as part of this. Accumulated personages gave this away.

It took 37 steps to detail from the corner of my eye, the right side and store lined rampart that sat beneath the walkway. It faced the open aired square as it was beaten by the effulgent light of both robust and lissome nature that spilled over to the gathering audience who seemed as if paying homage to the silent timetable.

Their own silent upwards gaze could be misconstrued, if you were a romantic, as hundreds of plebeians waiting for the clickity-clack chime of father time. It was like a pilgrimage as I came to the foot and centered court of my stopping place. I did not look up when I arrived, instead I faced down at the marble floor absolutely fascinated by what I saw.

There hobbled before me, a one legged pigeon.

It held within it a grace I have never seen in a flying rat before. I could not tell if its stub, which took the place of his left foot, was cauterized from a womb long past or if it was born with the disability. What I gathered in my rubbernecking, were more question than answers. Not only did it bob front to back as pigeons do but it also had a slight wobble that lurched it to the left every time it did. It was cruelly put, fucking adorable. Completely taken, I ignored the passerby's suddenly faced with an insubordinate.

I felt humbled by the life of this wretched little creature. Lets face it, the life of a pigeon can not be a glamorous one. Born into filth, and left to fight for itself more often than not within scrounging cities amongst others of its kind, pigeondom has always mimicked human society at its worst. Its only saving grace being that it could fly away if it had the capacity to dream of greener pastures.

This little guy was forced to adapt to an even greater degree. There was something sweet about that, that he was somehow stronger, wiser than the others who pecked the ground around him, ignoring a king amongst pigeons. His demeanor did not give off an air of cockiness, if pigeons can even give off this characteristic. I swear to you his demeanor gave off a self-effacing, simple existence. So much so, that I would have gathered him into my hands and brought it home where I would have bathed it, washed it with fine oils and clothed him if only I knew it wouldn't have broken skin with a peck, sending me to the hospital for a rabies shot. The little fucker.

Humble or not, peck me and I'll evoke the experimental ten year old inside us all. You know, like that neighbor you had back in grade 5 when your parents moved to fort Francis for a year because Dad got transferred. You never really knew why you had to move but you had your ideas, but nothing would prepare you for the day, when at 19, still idealistic and young, you found out it was Dad's infidelity that sent you to that hell hole.

It all made sense now. The hushed, whispered fights, the loud make up sex and mom stabbing dad 'accidentally' on the first day of Lent screaming, "Why don't you give up red headed whores Walter, I gave up my dignity." <insert stab here>

This pigeon showed more pride in his stubbly walk than I could say for most men I've come across, and if that statement makes me look poor its only because I am not blessed with a sycophantic entourage to watch my every word.

I had found my destination for the day, it wasn't the center court or its timekeeper tenant. A one legged pigeon made my day, as he hobbled, hobbled away.

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The Polish Sausage House

The adventure of a new city, where walking to the corner store can yield the results of a child like perspective, are bittersweet events.

 New colors and packaging, names and logos of all sorts for what would usually be mundane products, now come to life in a sparkling new glory. And all at once your bombarded with sensory overload, looking like a loon trying to understand local colloquialisms like kitchen porter which is just a fancy name for a dishpig.

An example being last week as I stood in awe at the 14p can of beans whilst in Tesco.

This was a can of beans with a logo that had more than 2 colors on it, one of which did not entirely cover the can with its sickly blue. The can wasn't even dented! I was confused, giddy, even paranoid that someone else might see these very beans and take my joy away. I advanced on them, looked to right and left as quickly as I could and in one fell swoop like a majestic foreigner, grabbed the can.

I was- victorious.

Mind you there are times when my nonsensical interaction with cleaning product and canned food are interrupted by humans, this begets a new set of rules and requires thinking on ones toes.

Case in point, the Polish sausage house.

Yesterday I went to a lovely little Polish shop I pass from time to time. I thought to myself, tonight would be a good night to leave Edinburgh vicariously through a keilbasa. I would close my eyes and imagine I was elsewhere while I polished off the peppered Polish pork with a pleasant performance of palette pneumatics.

I entered the store front and was greated by inanimate joys from left to right, shit I couldn't pronounce, shit that was dead and shit that was cheap. I was loving it.

I wondered around, observing and touching everything but the open aired bread, that would just be fucked up. I just imagine chlamyidia fingers back at the mall, 'waz iz dis ai see 'ere, is dis braid. is all funnay looki'n. Jeezus turned into braid, did yu know that?'. So I do the next person a favour and opt out of turning the showcase bread into a touch museum. I'll keep my bacterium to myself until I shake your hand, you do the same.

As these and other thoughts concerning alternative uses for topical creams rushed me like a river I came to the back of the shop, and while bringing my head up to help guide my direction into the next aisle, I made an uncertain amount of eye contact with an individual standing at the back door. I say uncertain because I did not know if the interim was less or more than what was needed for me to 'politely' turn away.  I felt locked, wonderfully awkward.

She was shocked, bothered that I had stumbled across her hidden keilbasa stash or something to the equivalent. She actually gave me a dirty look, this fucked me up. Still locked in gaze, I was officially unsure of the next move, now more concerned with frightening the mare that stood 7 feet away, for fear she might charge. The Polish are resilient folk you know.

Between mountain lions and a mob of Polish kurwa, I would choose the mountain lion.

So there I stood, feeling like I'd caught her stroking her own kielbasa when we decide to break the ice simultaneously. Me with a kurt, 'hello', and she by rushing passed me without so much as a kurt hello! I felt cheated, like I deserved an explanation. Why did I feel awkward here? I'm the customer, the foreign kind that asks how to pronounce everything in your language, thinking I'm being worldly and polite when truly your thinking, 'fucking stupid american', despite the fact that you know I'm Canadian. We all sound alike.

I still bought her sausage with some bread and cheese, it was fantastic. But that moment we shared, that will haunt me forever.

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I am a peeping tom but only in UK changing rooms

Several days ago, while searching for the impossible, that of a cheap pair of slacks, my wife and I entered a clothing shop that will remain unnamed.

As we perused,  much like we are want to do,  I noticed a girl standing by the changing rooms fixated to a mirror and giving the kind of attention to her forwhead it seemed other parts of her anatomy did not receive often. How you ask, could I know this simply by looking at her?

Mostly due to the fact that she was ugly.

She was trying to put her eyebrow ring back into its hole. I found this to be a little disgusting but not by much, not until we approached the changing rooms with clothing to try and she, it turns out, is the help.

Now I'm disgusted, only because I don't want to touch her clammy little hands and its accompanying forehead puss, agreed?

Jack proceeds to enter the changing room while I assume the typical male posture of slightly interested in my surroundings but truly I'm just checking out the manikin's bust.

After a short period Jack emerges and decides the size she has on is too small, would I fetch a size up for her? Of course. I dutifully do as I am told, secretly enjoying that I can outfit my wife in whatever attire I deem sexy. A man should know his advantages.

I gather the required garment and proceed into the changing room where I am stopped by chlamydia fingers and told that I could not enter the changing hall. ??.

I stare at her blankly waiting for an explanation, none. This one's gonna be a pregnant teen statistic, you can just smell the lack of achievement on her. I retort irritated, 'Are we in the 21st century?'.

No reply. Shit, shouldn't have thrown numbers at her, its all confused now.

So I dumb it down.

'Why not'? I ask.

'It's UK law', she replies smiling.

I find that in my old age, the older I get that is, I find acceptance in the lack of words that describe my disillusion. Much like a man who understands his limits, knows when he faces greater odds than can justify the sacrifice. The man who is wise enough to just turn and walk away is the brother of the man I am becoming, I get snarky.

I sigh a 21 century acceptance. 'mmmm..', I muster.

I pass her the garment and tell her to give it to my wife. She does without apprehension or thought. She'll make a good unwilling concubine to a bastard child one day.

As Jack finishes this now un-enjoyable endeavor thanks to succubus of chlamydia over there, not even an accidental manikin nipple could make me smile. But I am then once again brought to my knees in 'what the fuck!' when as we approach the counter, who is on the phone shoving her thumb nail down into her throat trying to scratch out what I can only imagine is last nights semen fiesta but the fucking manager. While talking on the phone. While looking at us from the corner of her eye.

I hand over my debit card making a mental note to use the hand sanitizer I have in my bag after our transaction. Looking down to key in my pin I suddenly stand in awe. I look at what must be the dirtiest, darkest, overused number pad in all of Great Britain.

I've since sanitized my card.

I've since resigned at human faith.

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A stick that breaks up shit.. not a plunger.

This, is a Scottish toilet.

It is the retarded cousin of toilets from around the world. The one who lives in a trailer on the edge of Tornado Valley.

Before I begin I must tell you that the toilet itself is so far off the cuff, that it has been designated a completely separate room from the rest of a conventional washroom. The bathtub, shower and sink, are in another room entirely.

Why you may ask?

I haven't a fucking clue... to make you talk. But it sure does add to the allure and romance when drunk and stumbling through the dark corridors of your apartment.

Now that we have a broader picture as to the dysfunction within our toilets family, let us delve into the psychosis of the toilet itself.

The toilet has a wide mouth, with which one would think can contain and swallow even the fiercest of shits.. Haggis shits.

It does no such thing.

It's just for looks and what's bloody amazing is that the plungers available, those that I have seen, have a smaller circumference than the mouth of the toilets itself, proving that you can't fuck with geometry. It is not a plunger but a stick that breaks up your shit.

 Now for the handle on a Scottish toilet.

Now if this were not enough, we also have what at first seems to be an attempt at water conservation.

That the toilet cannot be flushed twice within 4 minutes is a Scottish riddle. That is correct, flush once... wait. Just had a big shit, need to flush twice.. sorry, you have to wait.
Like that cocksucker bouncer at the bar, this toilet makes you wait, but even better, it makes you look at your shit while it insults you.

Now that we've established the inferiority of Scottish toilets to that of even Southern India shit pits, I wish to show you the sink your grandparents used as children.

This sink provides you with all the commodities of a modern sink except simultaneous use. To the left is scalding hot water, to the right numbing cold. The two in conjunction provides an interesting juggling act that ends with cursing and starts the morning with burn rashes.

Not only is the sink an antiquated albatross but the shower, a failed attempt at 21st century technology.

Water pressure? What water pressure?

You may notice 4 settings on the left, they are meant to provide you with the false hope of pressure settings. To the far right are the temperature settings which, if set to maximum create a unique hybrid of hot and cold in turn. It's much like an epic battle between good and evil where your shriveling nuts are the prize to be won.

That is all.

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Edinburgh

I've recently moved to Edinburgh, Scotland with the wife.

We decided Scotland because in all fairness, we couldn't afford London, therefor we picked the second most expensive city in the UK. Had we no budgetary sense, Edinburgh wouldn't be blessed with our stumbling avoidance of speeding lothian buses.

We interwebbed our way into knowledge where history and the landscape of D&D played a significantly nerdy role in choosing Scotland. The highlands and its unadulterated avoidance of consonants made for a unique blend of oxymoron's, that of foreign English culture and that I, wanted to ride a fucking dragon.

The choice for Edinburgh as opposed to lets say, any other British colonial setting was partly due to our naivety of the British Isle. We didn't have a lot of friends, so we didn't have a lot of informed options.

Somehow we felt a larger city would be of benefit, considering work as a need and not an option meant we favored greater odds in larger populations to help in our begging of menial payed tasks. So a larger city rather than geological preference set the tone for Edinburgh.

You may ask, what about Glasgow? Well, simply put, the wife & I were blessed by A&E Programing some 9 months ago with a documentary on the roaming violent gangs of Glasgow. You may think, 'But you've placed your assumptions on the fine content that is A&E, what if you were wrong?'. If we were wrong, we were a 1 hour choo choo ride away from another major city. 1 hour. This is something Canadian cities have no concept of, like that one girlfriend you had some years back and her definition of monogamy. no clue.

If we were right and still moved there, well then a good old fashioned Glaswegian beating certainly wouldn't have stirred in me the words, 'well at least i was right'. I'm not a sadist by nature you see. I kid, I kid. I like a little biting.

Now you say, 'but chopchop, Glasgow has a great music scene', and you would be right. But there's a fucking castle here.

Our arrival to Edinburgh was marred with the kind of fatigue that affords us the title of properly wonky. We hadn't slept in 29 hrs, the schedule was as follows:

Wake up at 10:00|EST

DEP OTT JUL28 1300
ARR WAS 1630|EST

DEP WAS 18:30
ARR LON 0720|GMT JUL29(0220|EST) - (16.5 hrs)

DEP LON 1300 ARR EDI 1730GMT - (28.5 hrs)

Sleep at 2200|GMT - (33 hrs)

I'm sure others have done worse/ more, but this was still a minor script with 5 time zones, 2 days, 3 countries and 29 hrs later.

Edinburgh's first impression on me was that of a city rushing to get, I don't know where the fuck, but doing it quickly. What baffled me is that the city only has 500k within its limits, albeit within 100.00 sq mi (259 km2)[1]. By comparison, Saskatoon is half the area 144 km2 (55.6 sq mi) and half the population at 202,340.[2]

If you've ever been to Saskatoon you know it isn't the hustle and bustle kind, so why does Edinburgh follow the rule of New York? I would venture to say its the same reason there is no right of way for pedestrians, good 'ol fashioned 'just cause'.

There is that and the fact that we came at the beginning of Edinburgh's festival season. Three weeks of tourists, Scottish tourists, English tourists, Scandinavian tourists. They come with stars in their eyes, wanting to see the greatest in low costs theater and share in the maddening walk that is the tourist lurch. Walk..Slow down a littl..STOP! Walk..Slow down a lit.. STOP!

It is also compulsory to stare up at nothing in particular and everything simultaneously. Very important etiquette.

Now this leaves us in a peculiar place as we, ourselves, are foreigners. Are we as bad as tourists? Depends on if stealing your higher end jobs like cleaning love stained sheets or pulling pints in sultry pubs for minimum wage gets your facism on.

Nonetheless we have arrived and the stories will continue..

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