TEABAGGING!

One, two, three, four,

We want peace and not war.

Five, six, seven, eight,

Words for peace and not for hate.

Nine, ten, eleven, twelve,

them bigots are getting on my nerve.

thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen,

they live in a world of fantasy and dream.

seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty,

in their mouth they need a bag of tea.

That’s not quite smarth growth.

Smart growth is a pretty sweet idea, and definitely something one should opt for to revitilize cities, but… It has to be planned. And it’s not something you should do everywhere. It’s quite useful for larger cities, where mixed-use developements help reduce both distances and land use (two very obviously correlated things), but who would voluntarily do it in a smaller metropolitan area?

I’m writing this because that wonderful authority that is my municipality is slowly but effectively finishing the development of a nearby… thing. I’m not sure what it is. But, the thing is, they shouldn’t have started working on this at all. First, that park isn’t public property, it’s technically owned by the owners of the two blocks surrounding it, as even though this is a social housing estate, no one actually rents anymore – most people own their flats now.

And, as aforementioned: this is a rather small metropolitan area, we have enough room to built it elsewhere in more commercial areas and leave this intact as a purely residential neighborhood. But, it’s not the first time municipal administration failed over here. Even the organization of streets is lamentable. STREETS! That’s one of the basic things you have to master in order to form a succesful, independent local government. Here’s the problem:

There is a rather large intersection at the northern end of this neighborhood:

1. the street coming out (…) north is the former route of Province Highway One. It still carries trucks going to the suburbs, and several bus lines that don’t even stop here, and despite many humps, is still a rather quick highway, even though schoolchildren and mosque-goers have to cross it to get from their homes to the neighborhood school/mosque (via the bypass, which is surrounded by a dump). There’s also the parking lot of an opposite neighborhood which forms a third exit, and another one for the new… thing.
2. turning left, there is a street paralleling the former Byzantine City Walls. No one lives there, besides a few trees and a coffeeshop. Buses stop there, and trucks are forbidden from entering it at any times. No parking whatsoever, and with a very low maximum speed. All of this is so that the trees ain’t disturbed during their sleep.
3. turning right, there is a sucky street where most people park, and even more buses stop. It’s quite populated, but not as much as ours, and it’s a small street, so the parking is a problem for buses or ambulances going to our only hospital through that street, or stopping at the neighborhood pharmacy. Right. And the few villas that are nested down there.
4. the southern part is going to Main St., with not-very-problematic-traffic. The exits for this part of the highway are for the city hall’s parking lot and even more villas.

Does anyone see that 1 has to be swapped with 2 and 3 with 4? Yes. Lots of people. Just not my mayor. Well, he really ain’t “my” mayor, actually.

Note to self: become an urban designer.

I’m proud of you, Google

Yay. They did it again (not exactly in the same way as last year, though) and well, that was very considerate of Gayglers (no, that’s not gay googlers, that would be too simple – it’s rather LGBT Google employees) this Pride Week. It might as well have been a coincidence. Nay. That would be too simple. It’s probably because of the LGBT Pride month, which Obama “inaugurated”, even though Clinton did the same (without the B and T) nine years ago. But hey, at least he did that.

So, to recapitulate for these of you who stil didn’t notice: if you enter queer-related terms into that fancy search engine we all use on a daily basis, like “queer”, “gay”, “bisexual”, “homosexual”, “lesbian”, “transsexual”, “transgender”, “civil unions”, “domestic partnerships”, or “marriage equality” as in our example, you’ll get a rainbow in pride colors (see screenshot). Purdy, ain’t it?

Happiness.

Happiness is subjective, but even the objective is subjective. I think we already did that.

But, it’s really subjective. Really. For some people, partying until early in the morning is a way to be happy. For some people, it’s sex. For some people, it’s anything that involves their loved ones in any way. For some people. it’s money. Well, whatever it is that keeps you going, you should do it, as long as it makes you happy, and doesn’t really inflict too much pain on others – that’s my life philosophy, the rule I live my life according to.

Now you might wanna know what makes me happy? I don’t know. But I’m sure it’s something specific that I do, but the many little things that actually happen to you. It might be the noticing that you’ve got all sweaty after getting “crunk” in the dorkiest way ever with friends of yours in a public place letting your inhibitions let go and not give a fuck that people are staring. It might be vegetating around as the most sober schmunks ever at home, and babble about everything and nothing at the same time. Or it might be remembering that poem you read last night and liked very much, or the young stranger that gave you a Duplo in the Paris Metro. It might as well have been the lady you don’t know that is smiling at you for no appearant reason from the opposite-direction-going train at the right, but, well, for now, I don’t think it’s something material for me.

I am happy.

Littlest Things.

Sometimes, it’s indeed “the littlest things that take you there”, to say it in Lily Allen’s word.

So today, I was at various state-owned banks with my progenitor to find out that I have several bank accounts under my name that I supposedly consented (hehe! good one!) to and to shed some college-shekels from them, and it didn’t really work out. I hate our banks (not “my” banks). Municipal services are so inefficient, and the only people that seem to work there are perverts, if you ask me – bunches of paper-hungry lusters that are smiling sarcastically at me, and rejoicing at the fact that I fill out humongous amounts of paperstuff in front of them, to then “process” them and give me even more to fill out, and then telling me that all of this has to be sent to someone higher up the hierarchy so that they can rejoice at my filled-out papers too. And then, probably, and only probably – I might possibly get my money. Even the name “municipal services” itself is deceiving – it sounds as if it were referring to something quite nice you’re getting your tax dinars thrown at, like government-subsidized public bordellos in the Athens of the antiquity. Well, that would be some service!

Then, when our paths divided, I went further uptown to hang out with N., one of my BFFs, whom I found out to be possibly leaving for Paris for a month or so, which means that I won’t see him until next summer, seeing that my college year will start when he returns. It wasn’t as dramatic as the previous time where I met up with him and Toma (whose face I forgot even though I only didn’t see her since two weeks – probably because of her headscarf) where she cried my shirt wet saying that she will miss me, while he was apparently cold, which is due to culturally-reinforced emotional oppression boys have to suffer under in this society, but, that’s only my opinion.

After that, I had a significantly less depressing time with R., BFF numero dos, seeing that the homoerotic subtext of this relationship we have almost exploded (from his side, at least). We were as tight as David and Jonathan, Abraham and Joshua, or Rick and Steve. Closet cases can still be lots of fun, if you know how to master them, actually. We enjoyed orbiting around the northern limits of the city on the lamentable sidewalks of Highway 20 and 21, respectively, which was way more fun as trips starting from Highway 80 to the wilderness with dad, because I’m misanthropic like that, and I sometimes prefer the industrial wastelands of the northern beltway to the fresh mountain air of the southern roads.

But that again made me reconsider what I feel my friendship to the third musketeer A. was. He was the tram and I was – or still am – the subway train, but I know that playing with fire isn’t as fun after getting hurt, and he knows that cows aren’t violet. We ain’t little boys no more, even though at least he seems to have remained pretty much the same in my eyes while I find myself to be constantly evolving. But I really don’t him good enough, for I’m barely acquainted with myself, which is definitively something I need to work on before I can work my way to greener pastures.

I didn’t really learn anything about anyone today, actually, but I feel slightly better, and sometimes, that’s really all that matters, now isn’t it?

Resistance means conformity

(note: the following blog entry is not about what you think it is)

If resistance means opposition to something as a means of rejecting it, then, it’s definitively not a very effective way to do so. Let’s say an ideology conflicts with my personal beliefs, I would simply not have to follow it, or to agree with its followers. But if I find it to be way too intrusive in everyday life, and that the liberties its followers enjoy, and that they also take the unthinkable freedom of infringement of other’s freedoms for their disagreement with their own philosophies, then, do I really have to take it? Should I give up my own freedom as a means of being so hypocrite I act as if theirs are more valuable than mine? No. But I  shouldn’t turn the other cheek, either – and neither equate an eye with an eye. I could protest, manifest, transgress (mainly if the opponent in question is an entire established system of social conventions and rules, and not just some authority) as a means of using my right to free speech and to publicly show my opposition to this Thingamabob.

But that would be pretty ironic. If I were acting that way, I would have problems with the Aforementioned Thingamabob, and if it were so, I would want to get rid of it, as it would be an institution which I would see as an unnecessary evil, evil man-made Thingamabob, and I would be buying into its blind veneration by the masses if it were so. It would be so powerful that even I, one of its self-described opponents, would need to buy in into its machinery even though I am trying to dismantle it and harbor the world from its perils. Sometimes, just ignoring things might be a solution too.