I got to bed last night at 3am. I had trouble sleeping mostly because of our cat Sporty not feeling well. He has the sniffles. Anne called the vet and we think he has a virus. He doesn’t move around much. The Veterinarian said a steam like shower in an enclosed space helps. I got my gst cheaque in today and Anne’s going to book an appointment for Thursday. I get $20 out of the $116 cheaque and we each get paid tomorrow.

It was on this day 27 years ago I’d have my A&N pay cheaque cashed. Richard and Ellen met me down at the Hobbit shop and I picked up my comic file. Richard had been suggesting to me earlier that week we pick out a couple of Crowley books over there at Audrey’s. I recall the 3 of us walking together. It was a beautiful sunny late afternoon a bit on the breezy side. I wish I had a camera with me and I had the presence of mind to take pictures. I would have loved to have, taken pictures of old Edmonton. I think I lent Richard $10 bucks. I recall Richard leading us to the back of the store as he picked out some essentials for me. I recall him scooping up “Diary of a Drug fiend”, the Thoth Tarot (I still have that original edition from Audrey’s, showing the price of $14. I can’t recall what else I bought there. Probably 777.  Richard would leave us to go home and I recall how I would escort Ellen as far as the Sandy Lane I had my rent covered my comic file and Crowley items. I recall nothing after that for that day. I should have kept a diary the day after my introduction to Thelema.

Yesterday on the news the hot topic around here is sky rocketing rents. Liberal Leader Kevin Taft at the session yesterday in the legislature directed the floors attention to the gallery where 27 people are facing emergency conditions due to escalating rents going out of control. “Doe’s the housing minister have the guts to meet with these people face to face to address their concerns?” So the film shows the housing minister standing up and saying “Yes”. Nothing much was accomplished at the meeting but Taft said the opposition will continue too fight for rent controls. Right now, I’d say rent as my main concern at the moment, then my vision woes and the economy. I like what Taft said, “Not everybody needs health care all the time, not everybody needs education all the time, but everybody needs a roof over there heads all the time.” Absolutely. So what’s going to happen with out rent? At the moment we’re paying $730 for a 2-bedroom apartment. I can see $800 for a 2-bedroom apartment. But technically we haven’t had a rental notice this year. The one we did get was in December for June 30th of this year. But as of April the new legislation says landlords can only raise the rent once/year. All fine and well but after the June 30th hike what’s to prevent our property management firm (PMF) to slip a $200 rental hike notice under the door July 1st? I see it by the end of this year that our pmf will most likely do this. Or raise the rent to $1000. I can even live with this. That’s just $500 each. The thing is what about next year?

How does this affect my bottom line? It means that Rob is going to have to give me more money. Yesterday, one of our new tap shooters Brandon has barely been here less then maybe 3 months and Rob is paying him $9/hr so he was complaining. That’s my hourly rate of pay as of last June and I’ve been here 7 years! Granted I haven’t been putting in the hours as I’d like to but as of tomorrow I’m coming in Thursday/Friday. Once Rob sees me putting the hours in then he’ll meet my request. I’m going to ask for $12/hour. If Rob says something like “All I can do is give you $10.” Then I’ll accept that but with provisions. He gives me a letter of recommendation. If I don’t get $12/hr then I walk. It won’t be right away but it will be as soon as my vision clears up and I can get something else. I’m looking at the customer service desk for Dell. Their worldwide call center is on the south side and I’m going to investigate that and other call center options. Lets face it $9/hr doesn’t cut it in these days of sky rocketing rents.

Anyway, I got into work not feeling good about all our troubles, what with the friggen landlords gouging people around here. Then my vision woes and all the other shit of the day. And if damn environmentalists get in the way and pull the plug on our oil and gas industry I’d love to see their faces when they have to pay double at the pump what they’re paying now. Or wonder why City transit has to raise bus passes to $200/month or cut service in half or worse because lack of fuel. Even better still when they wonder why a box of Craft dinner is $6 a box and a “have it your way” Burger king is $15 for a whopper. Even still when a newspaper that today costs .50cents is now $5 bucks because lack of fuel available means the cost of everything else goes up. Simple economics people, supply and demand. Worse still when a paperback book is now $20 and a hard cover book is $50. Everything will go up and people will lose their jobs.

Also, a local crisis, if only the rich can afford a roof over their heads at least there is always a place for me: It’s called jail. To ease the housing crunch, they’re going to have to introduce conscription and all the jobs in the $8/hr jobs in the world won’t do anyone any good when a one bedroom apartment is $1000 bucks/month. But the Feds have a built in solution: It’s called Afghanistan and I’ll be spared because I’m almost a senior. I pity the rest of you because if you don’t have a roof over your head it’s either jail or Conscription. We can’t have the people in the streets now can we? Civil unrest will collapse the status quo. Anarchy will be wide spread. We got a war in Afghanistan that can keep the people bogged down for decades and after the American Democrats leave this next term ten years from now another bunch of Neocons will have another war lined up and so on it goes. I don’t see a solution either at least not in our favor. Lucky for me though, I’ll be dead in about 20 years.

So. People say well, “why do I write science fiction?” I write because I see a future that might be better then the one I can’t see for myself and my community. I paint people in conflict similar to the issues I face but in new and different ways that might not help me immediately see the forest for the trees but at least might help make some sense of what’s going on around me. I write science fiction to relieve stress as well. I write science fiction to entertain myself and others because there are very few authors who write the kind of story I want to read or characters I care about. We’re not all interesting characters. Sometimes we fart, sometimes we’d just like to tell the world to fuck off and leave us alone. I write about characters that are people with mood swings because we all get them and if you say you don’t you’re a fucking liar. We all need to eat we all need to feel needed and loved and to feel that we matter. We all fart we all burp and we all say things we don’t mean and regret. We all masturbate either we fuck with our selves or screw someone else to get our jollies. But most important of all, we all need to feel a sense of self worth. We all need respect and to be heard. We all need to feel emotional release but we can’t be all things to all people. Sometimes we want to tell the boss to go fuck himself. Notice a common denominator here? “We all need”.

Sorry for being so long winded today. I’m not having a very good go of things lately.

e. Jim