Tatiana's Wanderings

Ayler and Hiero surprisingly called me at 10:20 AM, which is how I discovered that my phone was still on from last night, but that was a good thing in this case! This time, I was prepared with the light on AND my reading glasses very nearby! They wanted to call since we only talked for a very short time yesterday - I said that was nice and thanked them! We discussed a 300-piece Thomas Ravensburger puzzle, Hiero building something, Ayler playing a long piano piece for me, Ayler thinking that Beckett misses me (he probably doesn't understand why I can't come and play), Beckett saying "Goo Mah / Auntie / Yeah" into the phone, and Ayler wanting to play piano a lot. He doesn't want to disturb the downstairs neighbors, so I reminded him about the soft pedal. When they asked me what I ate for breakfast, I lied and said "oatmeal and a granola bar" as I hadn't eaten yet. Turns out they "also" had oatmeal, haha! Good choice!

I reminded Ayler to protect Beckett when he goes on the couch by either blocking him or holding his hands. He said that they play with the red and yellow stuffed dragon, asked me if I knew what "Didibug" and "Didibop" were (interesting - LADYBUG!), and said that they go outside instead of going to church. Hiero wanted Beckett to repeat "John Horgan / Kennedy Stewart / Justin Trudeau" for me, but no dice! Beckett just said my name into the phone, which is good. Harmony asked how I was doing, so I told her about Pathways closing because of the coronavirus pandemic. I also asked about her parents, who are both being cautious. Told her that Dad had texted me asking about my food situation - I was like "NO, DON'T COME HERE!" Harmony said that Mom was more upset about missing the sales than the special senior hour for grocery shopping, of course! That was interesting and good to talk to them.


Mathias Jakshitz and Theressa Jakshitz have a tombstone?!

Jimbo / Nate LEFT the SuperFriends Discord server - WHAT THE FUCK?! I went shopping at 2:05 on a 407 for on-sale NEW limited-edition pink packaging SpongeTowels paper towels, NEW London Naturals plant-based citrus detergent, Colgate MaxFresh toothpaste x2 (Clean Mint green / Cool Mint blue), Scrub Daddy, and on-sale Walkers Shortbread Highland Oat Crackers / Three-Seed Oat Crackers before getting home at 2:55 on another 407 prior to COFFEE TIME! May Chan unfriended me on Facebook, but whatever - she was just Gabriel's friend. The Canucks played Columbus today at 4, and lost 5-3 thanks to an empty-net goal AND four unanswered goals in the last eight minutes of the third period... thanks, new goalie Louie Domingue...


My NEWEST top-voted Reddit comment as of February 20, 2020: A used condom display on a public bulletin board IS disgusting and dehumanizing! 5313 points! :D Every time someone uses "body count" to describe their number of sex partners, I think: "HOW MANY PEOPLE DID YOU KILL?!?" because THAT is what "body count" really means! Millennials and zoomers, I swear...




NEW limited-edition pink packaging SpongeTowels paper towels!




NEW London Naturals plant-based citrus dish detergent or dish soap!




NEW London Naturals plant-based unscented FREE AND CLEAN dish detergent or dish soap!




Walkers Shortbread Highland Oat Crackers!




Walkers Shortbread Three-Seed Oat Crackers!




Colgate MaxFresh Clean Mint toothpaste!

Today is No Bra Day! After COFFEE TIME, I went out at 3:10 on a 407 to go to the family Thanksgiving Dinner. Killed time at Shoppers Drug Mart by buying on-sale M and Ms in Hazelnut Spread flavor, on-sale Life store brand honey lemon cough drops (the pharmacy students didn't understand the word "lozenge"...), and NEW on-sale Live Clean foaming body washes: Shea and Murumuru Butter, plus Mango and Aloe Butter! I must have LOST MY COMPASS CARD on the 3 Downtown bus (which I just managed to get at 4 PM) because I couldn't find it when I left Jon's! It definitely wasn't in my pockets or on the floor that I could see. I need to stop stuffing things in my pockets! UGH!

Anyway, I read six whole books to Hiero (BERENSTEIN BEARS / three STAR WARS / one BATMAN / one Monkey book) and remembered to enjoy the moments of him on my lap and listening. Ayler wanted to read the bus timetable, tell me about decimals (in Grade 2?!) and division in Grade 3, and said "Are you kidding me?!" in Cantonese a lot. When Harmony got back with Beckett, he wanted to play with me, so I made him laugh at the baby pop-up toy. He also went up to Mom, who didn't seem to know he was there, so Jon and I had to say that Beckett was saying hi to her! Of course he also wanted to play with the HP printer display, which had changed into Chinese for Hiero-related reasons. Dad eventually managed to fix it, so was blocking Beckett from playing with the display. He wanted to grab my hat, but I said no. Mom said something about SIM cards and Steph's number and phone. Sure, whatever. She also referred to me as "Fat Aunt" with him - UGH!

Due to the dinner configuration, I sat next to Beckett while eating cheese / apple slices / turkey / gravy / kimchi / cranberry sauce / pizza bread / Brussels sprouts / salad. He grabbed my sweater a few times (I JUST washed it!) and threw food around as usual. Later, he wanted to crawl to my chair when he'd finished eating and Harmony had cleaned him up, but was blocked by Ayler's special chair. I did play with him more after I myself had finished eating and washing my hands: he still throws the little Play=Doh container at people, as well as all the balloons that were on the floor.

Then Beckett cried when a balloon popped! He also cried when he was really done with dinner, as in real tears and everything! Later, Harmony had to put him down for sleeping, so we waved goodnight to him. Harmony was surprised when Beckett imitated what I was doing; that was the FIRST TIME EVER that he waved to ANYONE, so I must have the magic touch! (like I did with Hiero in 2014 when he wouldn't let Harmony sleep) Since Jon agreed to drive me to King Edward Station later, Mom and Dad left because there were only 12 inches of room between the carseats in their vehicle. Hiero asked me about that later, using the correct family names, so I gave him an answer. I later discovered that I had somehow lost my bus pass! Jon gave me $6.50, which was it (that's fine) and enough to cover Tuesday's fare as well. Got home at 9:10 on a 401 (I'd missed a 407 by a few minutes) and then thought that maybe the bus pass could be between the couch cushions. If not, then I will call the Lost and Found Office / Ministry on Tuesday morning.


Random stuff from Mom and Dad: Western Family hot and spicy pasta sauce, plus a small silver pan thing.


Live Clean foaming body washes: Shea and Murumuru Butter, Moringa and Matcha Butter, plus Mango and Aloe Butter!




Western Family hot and spicy pasta sauce!




What is with this weird VerifyError Spectrum Plugins error message when I try to post phone pictures on Facebook?!

Vanessa says her husband Jason's aunt was involved in this Burnaby car crash yesterday evening, so she had a bad night. :(

She called me at 9:50 AM to let me know how he knew it was her - she was just out to take a walk and never came home, so his cousin went to see what was up and came across the scene. The cars were speeding and she never knew what hit her. Jason came home crying and so she wondered what was up. At the time she called, he was over at his mom's and aunt's place to spend time with them, since he was angry. Of course Vanessa isn't going to the funeral with the baby!


From Melissa and Buzzfeed Canada: A yellow pooptastic hardcover notebook!




From Julie M. and Unnecessary Robots: Begging my poop to flush when I'm at someone else's house, but the poop just peeks out over the toilet water and seemingly refuses!

From Julie: A woman named Dean?! I've heard of Billie Dean or something, but not Dean by itself...




( More black people and BORED PANDA! )

After COFFEE TIME, Eric M. picked me up at 5 so we could go to Golden Spring Restaurant (near the old VCEFC church site) for Beckett's baby banquet. Unfortunately, I forgot his birthday Lindt Excellence dark chocolate bars (Madagascar / Pink Peppercorn) and birthday card on the way out the door, despite leaving a note for myself. I guess I'll have to give it to him at the Felico's dinner like he wanted. UGH! At least he can give me a ride to that one! We talked about his first hockey practice today, his first game on Wednesday, there being a good reason why Steph / Lisa / Fraser / Henry weren't here this weekend, Highway 99, Steveston, and more.

We had seafood soup, sweet and sour pork, chicken, fish, yee mein, red bean soup, jellyfish, Chinese cold cuts, seafood soup, tea, and more for dinner - I got to take leftovers home, too! Dad thought he had to remind me to say hi to Mom, Uncle Richard, Auntie Gloria, Pastor Fulton, Auntie Teresa, Auntie May, Uncle Anthony, Uncle Andre and his wife Anna, Uncle Joe, Auntie Wing Yee, Auntie Vivian (who said that she missed me and wondered where I'd been "hiding"), Uncle Eric, Auntie Brenda, and their other friends. No, I just wanted to get settled first! I did say hi to Holly, Peter, Evander, and Everett when they got there, of course.

When Auntie Catherine got there, we caught up a little later - she remembered my birthday in September as "a special time," and wanted us to get together. She said that Frances is getting baptized next week - ha ha ha, good luck with that! (from what Ellen tells me...) I'm probably not going to go for THAT service, but did personally tell Jon that I would be willing to go to Beckett's baby baptism service if VCEFC ever got around to organizing one. Auntie Catherine also would be willing to meet me in RICHMOND (!) on Saturday the 15th, and maybe invite a friend my age. Okay, then! As long as it's not about religion AGAIN...

I taught Ayler about Talk Like A Pirate Day since he was wearing a pirate T-shirt. He asked what people did for that, and how he could celebrate; he eventually figured that he could wear his shirt and say "Arr, matey!" like I suggested. Good ideas! He did ask about my skin scars, but I told him that it was my choice to make boundaries about my body, just like him. Later, he refused to ask my reasonable question about how Grade 1 was so far; then he didn't want me to see the time on Eric's watch, so he covered it up. Okay, then. I did say hi to Hiero, but Harmony was wearing Beckett all evening, probably to prevent people from taking photos.

Nathan, Jeremy, Randal, Caleb, Rebecca, Jon, Harmony, Eric, and I talked about Batman / Quentin Tarantino / Twitch streams / my new glasses and upcoming eye surgery / my Felico's celebration (Jeremy and Nathan say they'll confirm later) / Danielle travelling these days / FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL / learning to ride bikes from Ron and Veronica / CRAZY RICH ASIANS / JOY LUCK CLUB / Kendrick Lamar / some guy named Danny Miller / addiction issues / rappers / the weird Asian shows on the TV, which Harmony did NOT feel the need to ask the staff to turn off / counting the courses. We saw Alan and Tracy with their kid Noah, so waved at them on their way out of the restaurant. I wished Myles a happy early birthday while saying hi to him, Brittney, and Naomi. Then Eric had to wait a few more minutes while I said bye to everyone that I knew... oh well.

Eric dropped me off at 8:40, which is still pretty good. Time to relax now! Oh wait, Mom wants Jon to choose the location of my birthday dinner AGAIN - yeah, I'm not putting up with that this year. Let ME pick the damn restaurant, although at least the Oakridge area on a Monday afternoon is better than Commercial Drive with Sunday bus schedules! Not saying I'll never go to Commercial Drive, but NOT at the behest of another person ON MY ACTUAL BIRTHDAY! No, I'm not feeling guilty about that. She tried calling me twice, but I was NOT in the mood for yet more social interaction. That's the true introvert nature!


Random stuff from Mom and Dad: $20 cash (making up for yesterday's pizza plus a little more), an old one-litre Proctor-Silex water boiler (half the size of my current one), a pair of white socks, a pair of pink-and-white candy toe socks, and 200 sheets of Hilroy lined paper.


Chinese jellyfish with chili!