OK let’s see….whipporwills, whipporwhills….
First off things have been going super with Marlo. We just hit the 5 month mark. My job still stinks, and no leads on anything better yet*. Drawing has been really slow for the past few weeks but I just got another assignment yesterday so that should pick up. Absolutely nothing has been happening with the band. Gaming group is going smoothly with our new player, Jeni, and I am still planning on starting a shorter, funnier campaign. I met a guy at the Weathertop convention last weekend (which was really fun – and yes it got almost 2 minutes of coverage on some show called “Express” on Shaw, which repeated like every 3 hours for 3 days and was quite amusing) who seems like an excellent addition to a new gaming group. He’s new in town. He’s unfortunately named Chris. Kodos is good. Stewie is good and in his new office so hopefully he’s getting some sleep. I spent a couple hours last night rearranging the apartment and trying to organize all of our crap. It’s an uphill battle but I secretly like cleaning up (you wouldn’t know it from looking). Marlo has become enamoured with strippers which suits me fine, so we’re going again tonight. Tomorrow is Janet’s birthday and it’s been too long since I’ve hugged her. We will partily heartily.
Today is Yvonne’s birthday and repeat hugging sentiment but in decidedly no less sincere way. I spent weeks at work looking for a book that I thought she might like (as a belated Christmas present) but none of them seemed good enough. So I came up with something else which I hope will go over well. Happy birthday you crazy kids – I’m so glad I met both of you and I take pride in the fact that in some way I was responsible for you meeting eachanother.
* I had this idea, which I think is super good but I can’t do it myself. I want to open a laundromat. I could totally sit in the laundromat all day and read and write and draw and watch movies while handing out change. And at night we could play games in the laundromat. Where’s a good place to open a laundromat? Anybody want to go into business with me? I have no credit rating to speak of, but boy…can I ever hand out change to people who want clean underwear.
I am actually seriously considering this. Maybe I need to go to Taiwan/Japan and make some money first.
I’m gonna start a support group for men named ‘Chris’. I think the hardcore implimentation of nicknames is the only solution to our ever growing number. Fugger called me ‘Shark’ once which I LOVED but it didn’t stick and I got the no-less-cool “Sid/Sidswoorch”. Bob’s really the only one who uses it daily though. ‘Chappy’ was another one that had a brief moment in the sun but it has now crossed the teminator into night. I call Chris Stewart ‘Stewie’ which I hope he is comfortable with as it seems to be in fairly common usage. My wife calls me ‘Chip’ because that is my family’s nickname for me (if you can believe it) and I cring when the uninitiated use it. The famous Chris Switzer was the king of the nickname being universally known as ‘Bean’ or ‘The Bean’ in high school by all and sundry. I wonder if he still answers to that? You need a palm pilot that generates nicknames for every new Chris you meet. It will print out a tag which you will slap on him automatically to avoid confusion.
I suggested it, the rest is up to you.
Well the way his name anagrams I could call him any of the HILARIOUS nicknames:
REGIS CHISEL (my favourite)
CHESS GIRLIE
LEIGH CRISES
CHILI EGRESS (clearly a term for bumhole – I don’t think I know him that well to call him that)
Even just calling him Chisel would work, because you’re taking the beginning of his first name and the end of his last name. I like to think that Chris will get some say in this, though.
Toren – you need a BA or some degree to teach in Taiwan, but you can get a working holiday visa in Japan, and probably in a few other places as well. You can also teach in China and a few other places without a degree. Check out http://www.eslcafe.com for more details.
ARGH I had your site open and then got interrupted and thought I had read the whole thing but hadn’t ARGH
Thank you thank you thank you for your birthday greetings! Except mine was yesterday, but – details. And yes! You were an essential chain in the pairing of two birthday almost-twins! Thanks for that too 🙂
Teach, nothin! I’m going to work in the toy factories. Although I might teach them how to love.
As a brief correction to Marlo’s comment, Taiwan is actually another country where they could mostly care less if you’ve been B.A.’d or not. As far as i know, Japan is the only Asian country that’s still strict with verifying legitimite certifications (hong kong some, thailand some). That’s beside the point though. Where else in the world can you still draw blood from your students and get a healthy paycheck for it? Hell you should see the lovely assistant chinese teachers swoon when it happens! (the blood or the paycheck). You wouldn’t believe how easy it’s been to create my own miniature (more so than usual even) Asian super-army. Now i just need to get visas for them all…
On a more somber note, you are just as likely to meet a million chris’s there as you are here.
that was Janet, not me. I suggested we call Chris G. Chisel.
Which Chris G are we talking about? The fact is that Gibbins and I went to high school together and while we had the uncanny ability to understand who was being spoken to when people would call our names, the people themselves were often confused, so we adjusted to Gibbins and Stewart (or Stewie – actually I have too many nicknames. Maybe Woods can have one of mine.)
I don’t think you’ve met him, Stewie. But you will when he starts playing D&D cartoon edition.
I should have been more explicit. It is my understanding that you need a degree to obtain the work visa in Taiwan. Your only other alternative is to go on a student visa, since the visitor’s visa doesn’t provide for work. Is this not the case?
sorry marlo. sorry janet. sorry tory. it seems i did reveal too much too readily. er.. yes the easiest way to obtain a work visa in Taiwan is to simply have a degree (although i once had one there obtained by using an unnotarized photocopy of my moms degree with my name printed on it). i was under the belief that it’s illegal to work in Taiwan on a student visa. By far, most foreign English teachers are there working illegally on either a visitor or student visa though.
As for the name, i suggest you go with your first impulse and refer to him as ‘unfortunately named Chris’.
Everyone should be so lucky to be called “Chris”.
my first name was going to be Christian but my mom was worried they’d shorten it to Chris so she went with Warren instead. go figure.
to back depresso up, i know a guy that scanned in a degree, photoshopped his name on to it then gave that to the organisation of choice in SE Asia with not even a second glance. if you want to get over to Asia to work, you will have NOOOOOO problems. i do like the laundrymat idea though.
HAPPY VALENTINES DAY TO YOU AND MARLO. Funny you should talk about a laundromat, your uncle Garry Tucker in Victoria owned one for quite a while, and he and Dad used to go around and empty all the coin boxes on sundays. Made millions he did.
Love to you both, Mom