this below came from lora but i thought it was so great and loraish that really, it shoulda gone to fishbreath for everyone to like as much as me so i don't think she's mind if it did go to wire, would ya lora?
so here it is: (and thanks, it made my day! :-))
> hey ef,
>
> this morning i transfered $400 us into the account.
> other small things
> happened today. i gave macko a bath with emma, terina,
> angie and nellie.
> everyone got soaked. later they said they wanted to
> come for dinner. i said
> fine, but this time they had to cook for me. we had a
> pot luck. i helped
> them cook all the food they brought. we had 1/2 a
> weiner, a spoonful of
> mixed frozen vegetables, noodles with tomato paste,
> leftover mashed potatoes
> and ham, a bit of tortilla with melted cheese. for
> desert emma and i made
> jello. gerry stopped by. he said to say hi. he didn't
> want to stay when the
> kids came back so he took off. i don't trust him, but
> i don't trust anyone
> much.
>
> erik and i had a really great christmas. i had csaba
> and him for christmas
> breakfast. i made them stockings and filled them with
> small presents. then
> we had bannock, bacon, vegetables that csaba said was
> a little like lecso,
> and eggs. i was playing a mixed tape my sister made me
> for christmas and
> csaba when i told him where i got the tape said, "she
> must be a really happy
> person." i said, "well yes, but she does have a
> brain." later he said he
> didn't mind the tape and asked, "is this what they
> call r&b?" i felt like i
> should make some sort of introduction, but i just let
> the tape play.
>
> later that afternoon, erik and i went for a walk. we
> walked through
> chinatown, through gastown and then to crab park. we
> saw a seal. i told him
> about some strange people i'd met in that park over
> the years. i left a lot
> of things out, because it was a cool damp overcast day
> and i didn't want to
> hear my voice much. then erik noticed one of the huge
> ships had a polish
> name, aquarius, well some of the letters were polish.
> he assumed our way
> there would be blocked by gates and i assured him he
> was wrong. we went over
> to the ship and he started talking polish with two
> sailors just come off the
> ship. i nodded at first in greeting but just let them
> talk. the ship was
> just huge and black and while i hadn't thought of
> pirates until just now,
> it's size, colour and solidity gave it an ominous
> authority. then erik
> turned to me and said, "do you want to go inside." i
> was waiting for him to
> get to that and was really excited.
>
> januszk took macko by the leash, marius followed us up
> and then we were
> inside and it wasn't really clean, but humming and
> clanging as we passed
> through halls of steel, stairs of steel, down more
> stairs of steel, through
> more halls of steel, past a feast in a common room,
> and past the stares of
> the standing feasters who were probably past feasting
> and were just talking
> around the feast. i don't think they saw females often
> and i think they saw
> dogs less. i am never sure how easily i am recognized
> as a female as i am
> sometimes called sir, but i tried to play it down,
> whatever it is. januszk
> took us to their quarters and i wanted to make myself
> as at home as they
> seemed to want to make us. so i sat in on the bench on
> the inside of the
> table hoping erik would sit beside me, which he did.
> it was very small.
> there were two curtains, behind which would have been
> the beds. there were
> shelves above the sink with polish coffee and shaving
> cream. there were
> three pictures of partly naked women with huge breasts
> and one of them was
> masterbating. the name the picture gave her was ellie
> and she had dark, dark
> brown hair. there was a table cloth probably from a
> tea towel and the little
> round window above the table, opposite the bunks. the
> sink was while
> porcelin and chipped and rusting and when later i
> tried to get water to wash
> my hands i couldn't open the taps.
>
> they poured us shot after shot of vodka and told erik
> many things. i just
> looked around a lot and watched their excitement. at
> one point i thought
> they were arguing and i pulled erik's jacket and
> asked. he said no they were
> just explaining their situation. then januszk
> apparently told eric to
> translate. their company had gone bankrupt two months
> ago and they hadn't
> been paid. they had no way of getting back home to
> their families and no job
> prospects out of vancouver and so they are stuck. they
> went on strike. their
> kids are out of school supplies now and unemployment
> back home is
> ridiculous. they are a fish processing plant bringing
> in up to 70 tonnes of
> fish in a catch. otherwise fishers from the zone the
> company aquires bring
> them their catches and they pay them and process the
> fish on the sea. this
> last zone was a particularly bad loss for the company
> there were no fish,
> and belly up seems to be the appropriate metaphore.
> they got smokes and
> liquor from the company which they sold here to get
> some money, but now that
> they've gone on strike they aren't getting even that.
> the vodka was courtesy
> of the captain for christmas. they gave us polish
> coffee and polish tea and
> fed macko a whole pound of bacon. we could only accept
> their generosity and
> hospitality. januszk kept telling eric to tell me how
> very thrilled they had
> met us, how glad they were we came.
>
> a little warmer and smooth-feeling from the libations
> we followed them
> through a tour of the ship. we went past people's
> quarters and down to the
> fish filleting room. it smelled not unlike a dairy
> farm. like it was
> cleaned, but there was nothing you could do about the
> fact that there was
> always something left over to turn. turn smelly i
> mean. the machines had
> lost most of the knives, but the catch came down a
> shute and one man had to
> slot 180 fish a minute (that's 3 fish a second) into
> the sections that would
> carry them one by one chopping their heads off,
> squeezing the roe out,
> cutting out the bone and guts leaving the fillets,
> scaling the fillets, and
> then sending them shaking through this series of blow
> driers. they then got
> frozen and packaged in wax boxes, like captain
> highliner sells. they called
> the fish pollock and i guess they might have meant
> alaskan pollock. below
> the gutting, chopping, boning part the fish meal was
> sent down a shute to
> the meal room and it was supposedly terribly smelly. i
> still wanted to go,
> eric didn't so i went down with januszk. it was warmly
> lit, like a barn. the
> fillet room had just been flourescent light with metal
> slats to catch the
> water that sprayed. here the slats were of wood and
> around the 3 walls of
> the room were stacked these bags of meal. like sand
> bags in a trench. the
> chute filled the bags and then they were sealed and
> carried to the pile. the
> filled bags were rock hard and yes it was incredible
> the smell. januszk
> wanted me to see the bag at the chute then he took my
> hand and kissed it,
> then he grabbed me and kissed my neck. i pushed him
> away and said, "okay."
> knowing from hungarian that this was a universal
> saying and knowing that
> there was no way he was going to mistake my arresting
> tone. i then walked
> back to where i thought we had come from, but i was
> turned around and had to
> turn back and follow januszk out. i did see three
> pairs of shoes left down
> here. i guess maybe it was too smelly to wear clothes
> here anywhere else. i
> vowed to stick close to eric so when we got to the
> engine room and eric
> changed his mind about going down and said, "you go."
> i pushed him and gave
> him a look like, "no fucking way!" so we went down to
> the engine room there
> were earphone things, but most of the engines were
> turned off. even so it
> was loud and i had to shout to eric when i had
> questions for him to
> translate. supposedly you wouldn't be able to hear the
> loudest scream when
> all the engines were on. it was really warm and that
> black greasy dirt got
> all over our hands. one of the great things about the
> insides of ships i
> think is how round everything is. the doorways are
> rounded. the banesters
> are rounded all the shutes and ducts are rounded. it
> seems like tunnels and
> caves. there was a bit of corrosion around this thing
> that could have been a
> radiator. on the way up i bumped my head on one of the
> rounded ducts.
>
> we went back to the room for more vodka. we washed our
> hands in that sink.
> they asked eric for my impressions and i told them
> some of the things i told
> you. then we went up to the top were the navigation
> went on. we met the
> first mate. he was lithuanian and so they all talked
> in russian. he really
> loved macko and was actually a very attractive man.
> reserved, and
> self-possessed like macko sometimes. he explained the
> stearing and knew some
> english so i was able to understand. i didn't realize
> at first he was
> talking in english. i knew i was understanding
> english, but thought that i
> was sort of just hearing things after straining for
> understanding of tones
> for the last hour or so. the lights and computers
> seemed old like dr. who,
> without the wonky beeping.
>
> when we got back to the cabin, eric suggested we
> invite them back home with
> us, which i kind of assumed. so they accepted and we
> walked home. i told
> them stories about different places and eric
> translated and then eric asked
> how much i had to drink, which he knew because it was
> the same as him so i
> didn't know why he asked that and i didn't tell any
> more stories. we got
> home and eric wined them. i served christmas pudding
> which i explained was a
> display of english colonialism. the orange and lemon
> peel, the rum, spices
> the other dried fruits, the sugar. in the eighteenth
> century it would have
> been a way of showing off. they liked the pudding
> anyway januszk said. i
> made them quickly some christmas stockings for them to
> open and fed them
> bannock. eric let them use his phone card to call
> their families back home
> and they kept telling eric to tell me how glad they
> were to meet us today.
> eric also told me that they kept calling me his wife.
> we laughed.
>
> we went to take them back to the ship in eric's van,
> but there was a flat. i
> realized how drunk we all were when i watched the
> three of them tried to
> change the tire. i know how to change tires, but there
> was no way i wanted
> to try to offer any help. januszk was probably in his
> forties and had very
> skinny arms, bone thin. he wasn't getting the right
> angles of his arms and
> so he couldn't put any weight behind the rachet.
> marius got some of the
> bolts out, but eric had to do most of it. we got on
> our way and i crossed my
> fingers. we dropped them off and my hand got kissed
> again. i wished them
> merry christmas in polish, which i forgot. and thanked
> them again for
> bringing us on board. i was just glowing as we rode
> out of there. i was
> tired, but i could almost not believe it.
>
> eric decided to go straight to csaba's and not come to
> my friend's christmas
> dinner even though i invited him. at naniamo and
> hastings a man crossed the
> street in front of us
> eric: henry! henry!
> henry: eric, my god, what are you still doing in this
> country. i thought you
> would have left by now. this is a country full of
> idiots, if you don't leave
> soon you're going to become like them an idiot.
> eric: happy chanukah, henry.
> henry: christian, muslim, jew, i don't care who you
> are, they're all idiots.
>
> we nearly pissed ourselves laughing. eric told me
> henry's story as he knew
> it. and his son's. then he dropped me off at my
> friend's. i landed in there
> about four hour's late sat down at the dinner and
> regaled them with my
> story. i made more bannock that night and sang this
> death metal song that i
> wrote three years ago. i also gave love advice to my
> friend terra, who has a
> crush on my old roomate emily, who was just out for a
> walk, while we talked,
> with her girlfriend willa. months before i had had a
> crush on emily, but
> realized that i didn't want to be a home wrecker after
> my affair with oz and
> gave it up. it made for a rather jane austenish
> evening.
>
> hope you are feeling better. i would say drink lots of
> water, because you
> are in danger of dehydrating, but i don't know about
> the water. i know one
> composer friend of mine who told me no one drinks
> water there. the booze is
> cheeper and safer. i don't know about that. i think it
> is good advice to see
> a doctor though, if possible.
>
> take good care, good luck, write soon.
>
> lora.
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