To the owners of White Haven Manor:

I should've known by your carefully manicured lawns, or by the faint smell of California rolls and Diet Coke in the air every time I passed by. You hide it well, White Haven Manor, and even a super-sleuth like me took a while to figure it out. It's been fairly warm out, so people have been leaving their windows open.... This is where the truth escaped. As I passed by your building, the sounds of Everybody Loves Raymond echoed together like a fine concerto, flowing from behind Ikea curtains. This sealed the deal: White Haven Manor is, without a doubt, the most cracker-ass building in all of Calgary.

I've been in my new place for a month now, and from time-to-time, I hear the guy downstairs rocking out to Unskinny Bop, or see my other neighbours downstairs debating the merits of Ford vs Chevy, so I thought my building was pretty bad. Now that I've figured out the true secret behind White Haven Manor, I feel a lot better... Nowadays, I think of my building like a visit to a multicultural fair in the middle of Prince Edward Island. No culture or color, but at least we're trying to assimilate into a multi-ethnic society. I see that one of my neighbours has a Chris Rock DVD in their window, and I've got a pretty amazing selection of cliche hip hop on my I-Tunes, plus I grew up in the NE (one block in), so you know I've got street-cred out the ass.

Quite frankly, I'm just glad that I'll never, ever have to tell a cabbie to take me to 'White Haven Manor' at the end of the night... Probably likens your chance of a less-than-pleasant ride.

Good luck with that, guys... Ever considered a name-change? Perhaps something like "The Christopher Wallace Memorial Lodge"? With a name like that, you'd be the greatest building in town, hands-down. I should really get into property management.

~sarah p.

Two little kids with a flow you ain't never heard:

"Don't try to compare us to another bad little fad I'm the mack and I'm bad give you something that you never had."

...Words spoken by true poets.
Notice the double-entendre of the word 'bad'. The initial 'bad' being a literal translation of the word (and a sweet knock on Another Bad Creation, because the competition between groups of 12-year-olds was intense in the early 90's), and the second 'bad' was used to denote that the group was "dope, good, or tight", as defined by urbandictionary.com.

I try to remember International Kris Kross Day every year, I really do, but every single March 24th, I leave the house with my pants on the correct way. I know people stare at me, and I know that they're all snickering to themselves, because I look like a total R-tard without stripes shaved in my eyebrows like everyone else.

Sorry, Kris Kross. I have some sort of mental block. In case I don't say it enough, thanks for making songs with lyrics that are easy for white kids like me to rap along to.
p.s. It must be so difficult to pee with your pants on the wrong way! Thanks for your dedication.
p.p.s. I'll be the first to admit that I did buy your second album, but the magic from "Totally Krossed Out" was not there. I realize that you guys probably work at a gas station now, and hindsight is 20/20, but in case you guys ever find yourselves in a recording studio again, you might want to keep that in mind. 'Preciate it.

~sarah p.

So this is what Jibbs was talking about.

If these chains can make these Pumas look almost kind-of badass for a second, then what else can they toughen up?

I don't know, guys.... Maybe it doesn't work that way. I think the kitten is pretty scary regardless.

~sarah p.

Bringing our 'A' Game.

After missing out on Friday night's festivities, it was collectively decided that we better step up our game for Saturday night.

After a sweet chat-session over at Amsterdam Rhino, I stepped next door to Broken City, where I realized that I had a ton of catching up to do.

They do not trust me at Broken City. Maybe I've dropped a cup or two before. Maybe.
However, I'm pretty sure that plastic cups are one step away from sippy cups, and I didn't even drop my drink this time. Well, maybe I did, but it was well past 1:30, and that's pretty good for me.

I don't know this kid at all, but Breanne told me that he didn't know what Facebook was. Part of me wanted to sucker punch him for being so out-of-the-loop, but part of me wanted to shake his hand and say, "Good for you, son".

Then, someone suggested that Bree and I get some shots. Great.

Really, guys.... I don't care what anyone says, it's not good for my stomach at all.

No wonder Jess loves Chris so much... He's got some pretty intense dance-moves.

The night was coming to a close, but Jess and Lindsay were ready for some nourishment.

So, I headed across the street with these guys, ate three pieces of pizza and drank a Dr. Pepper, came home, and tucked myself into bed.

Sunday moring, I woke up feeling so awesome that I decided to go to Liquidation World and scope out some hot deals, but that's a story for another day.

~sarah p.

Thanks boyZZ, it's been real.

I'm coming to the realization that I am dangerously close to the age where I'm going to have to stop getting outfit ideas from the chicks in ZZ Top videos, and it actually makes me pretty sad (those video-sluts know how to dress).

~sarah p.

20 years too late.

I could've been the best dancer in the world if Carlton Banks had anything to say about it.

~sarah p.

Happy Birthday, Crystal!

Guess who turned 26 on Friday? We went over to the Marquee Room, which is pretty much the hottest shit that's ever happened on a Friday in this town, and tore some holes in the dancefloor.

This pic's a little blurry, but as you can see, I was dancing so hard that you can actually see the heat-waves coming off of me (or maybe they're stink-lines? In which-case, nevermind).

It's been a full week since we've gotten this sweaty.

See? The night's on fiyahhhhhhh.

Then, on Saturday, it was off to Broken City for a fairly sober evening (I know, I'm surprised too).

Look closely, I think that there's a ghost trying to bust out of Chris' chest.

It really just comes down to dollars and cents.

So, I'm there with Jess and Lindsay, who is from Nova Scotia, and she runs into some guys from back home, and it just so happens that they live right across the street from me! The, later on in the evening, this other kid informed me that he lives on my street, and I petted his dog the other day (this could have also been some form of innuendo, I don't know). Everyone seemed pretty excited that I was in the neighbourhood, but people should be careful what they wish for.

Matt, my new neighbour, understands the value of cheap booze! That's got to be a good sign.

~sarah p.

p.s. On my way home from work, I was walking past the park, and a bee stung me on my lower back (as in right-above-the-ass territory). I got so amazingly mad. It's early spring..... Aren't bugs supposed to be dead right now? Fuuuuck.
Then, I walked past this guy's apartment, and he was playing the Thompson Twins' Lies sooooo loud. I thought about him, and how he probably heard that song this morning on his Totally 80's internet radio station, and it probably brought him back to 1983, when this was his summer jam after that chick dumped him for some guy with feathered bangs. He probably hung out by his computer all day at the office, hoping the station would play it again (probably even going as far as pretending that he had a lot of 'catching up to do' at lunchtime so that he wouldn't miss it if it came on). At the end of the day, he was probably so, so jazzed to get back to his apartment and download that shit and open all the windows and let the world hear his favorite song.
By the time I got home, I was so stoked for the guy that I pulled the stinger out of my back with a smile on my face.

The original sneaker nerd:

500 pairs? Out. Of. Control.

~sarah p.

Homemade diamonds are a girl's best friend.

I used to say that it was a good thing that I wasn't rich. If I ever came into a decent amount of money, I'd try my very best to be responsible citizen. I'd give a little to charity, spread my wealth around to my family and friends that really need it.....
Then one day, Slick Rick would come over to my modest-sized house to hang out, and he'd make some sort of subtle-but-clever knock at how I'm living, and I'd get all jealous and start trying to catch up.
I'd end up spending all of my money on giant conflict diamonds, and Kanye would get all mad at me, and Dateline NBC would show up at my house, and I'd have to explain myself to the whole world (all of the suffering makes them amazingly shiny, okay?).....

However, what if I got rich off of making diamonds? If I had a ton of diamonds already, then I wouldn't ever have to worry about getting any sort of complex from Slick Rick (or Lil Jon). If I wanted more diamonds, perhaps for studding a jean-jacket, I could just whip some up in the microwave. Then, Kanye and I could still hang out, and I'd probably even build an awesome resort for conflict-diamond workers with waterslides and free snacks, because those dudes would be stone-cold unemployed once my business got on it's feet.

...I just need to find someone that's cool enough to start up a backyard gold-mining business at about the same time. Collabo!

Sparkle on, my friends.

~sarah p.

Circus Circus

I've really had to come to terms with the fact that, no matter how hard I wish, the Universoul Circus is never going to come to this town.

My parents were never fans of the circus. Every time we'd see posters for the circus downtown, and my sister and I would start whining, they'd take us home and make us read National Geographic until we were too engrossed in up-close-and-personal photos of the mating habits of elephants to ever care about seeing those elephants kick a ball through a hoop. My parent's favorite trick was the old "Gross-Out, Fake-Out" maneuver. The best way to take our minds off of anything (even the circus) was to show us something that was way more interesting to our warped little minds. Unfortunately, this parenting technique only worked for short periods of time, and soon enough, I'd be thinking about the circus again.

However, somewhere throughout the years, I developed a severe hate-on for clowns.... For the most-part, I try to surround myself with straight-up cynics, so if kinda freaks me out when someone is waaaaay too happy (especially if it's a career choice). What's that? You made a balloon giraffe and popped it in someone's face? Not funny. Back to the drawing-board, clown.

Now, let's stop right there for a minute. What if the same trick was done by a guy that looked a little bit like J.J. Walker from Good Times while some Wu played softly in the background? It would be pretty much the most pleasant thing I'd ever seen.

...Mix my undying love of hip-hop into a circus environment, and going under the Big Top almost seems like a good idea for a minute.

That being said, the only way I'm ever going to see the Universoul Circus is if I mail myself in a box to my pals in North Carolina quickly. Those who know me know this is not impossible at all, but what the hell would I put into the box that says 'reason for absence' on my H.R. forms at work?

~sarah p.

p.s. Can I get a high-pitched squeal for discount Easter sweets? Those eggs taste about a million times better when they're 70% off of original price.... Ya girl knows what's up on the candy front.

This just in:

Friday nights are crazy fun.

~sarah p.

I'll compare Ghostface to whatever I want, thanks.

The first time I ever heard Ghostface Killah's Run (aka-my favorite Ghostface jam ever), I was living in Vancouver. It was about four years ago, and I was listening to my favorite radio show at the time on UBC's radio station on the My First Sony I had received for my sixth birthday (the only survivor out of all of the walkmans I've ever owned). I heard something about a new Ghostface track, so my ears were totally perked-up, and when the intro started, although I had no clue what I was about to hear, I knew it was going to be the best shit ever.

That's kinda how I'm feeling right now about this long weekend. I hope I'm right.

~sarah p.

Bigfoot: Totally Real and In Your Face.

I always though that I was the mailman's kid or something. I don't think I've ever looked like I actually belonged in my family.
My mom danced around the subject for years until a few years ago, when the truth finally came out: I was a Sasquatch.
It started as a family joke, apparently my mom found me behind the recycling bins at the swimming pool. My real parents had abandoned me, mainly due to my tiny feet and hairless body. My mother, being a real go-getter, decided to take me on as her first child. My mom always tells the story to family members and everyone laughs and laughs, and I used to laugh too, but after Sunday afternoon, I'm not sure what to believe.

During the whole moving process this weekend, I had a couple of days stuck in limbo between House A and House B. Luckily, my mom and stepdad (who fed me about seven different kinds of meat over the two days that I stayed there) were kind enough to offer me a bed to sleep in, and a driveway to store my U-Haul. I did my very best to be a good little house-guest, and when someone changed the channel on the TV, I didn't complain.

Sunday afternoon, while waiting for my new landlord to get his act together, my stepdad switched the channel to CTV. My usual Sunday afternoon channel is (obviously) MTV, but I wasn't about to complain. Lo and behold, CTV was playing a documentary. The show started with a wide-angle shot of Northern Manitoba, and then zoomed into something that seemed way too familiar to me..... A blurry, shaky blob in the middle of the screen. I was drawn to this blob like crackheads to a payphone. Could this be my real family? Perhaps a cousin or an uncle?

There have been times where I have had mild urges to eat large amounts of raw red meat. I always though this was probably due to an iron deficiency, and I've ignored the urges (mostly because of a mild fear of tapeworms), but maybe my body is trying to tell me something. I'm also a big fan of wandering around in the woods.

Anyway, back to the documentary. Apparently, this guy who was a ferry operator in Northern Manitoba came out of an outhouse one day, and across the river, he saw this huge hairy creature. He ran and got his video camera, which is, of course, mandatory equipment for any Northern ferry operator. The creature was still there, and the ferry operator leaned against the outhouse to try and get a decent shot. It was windy that day, and the guy was pretty nervous, so he had a rough time keeping himself steady. When the creature turned to look at him, he turned off the camera because he got scared (it's common knowledge that Sasquatches can swim like motherfuckers).

A few weeks later, A Current Affair (aka- the world's most credible news source) picked up the story, and sent one of the chicks from The Runaways (not even joking) and some guy in a hardhat up to Manitoba to get a closer look. Unfortunately, the trip was uneventful, and the ferry operator looked like a fool to the Bigfoot research community. The last few minutes of the program were all about how a bunch of people started cashing in on the Bigfoot sighting (Sasquatch burgers? fuck yeah), and how the ferry operator was super depressed now. It wasn't the best documentary in the world, but it really made me think about getting back to my roots.

Do Sasquaches really exist? There's a depressed guy in Northern Manitoba that sure thinks so. I think the chick from The Runaways wants to believe, too. As for me, I may never know the truth. Being a Bigfoot isn't my first choice in life, but at least I'm not a Frankenstein.... That would suck balls.

~sarah p.

p.s. Sorry guys, I'm still in moving-mode, and hope to have both blogs back up and running (and making a lot more sense) within the next day or so.