May 2021 Monthly Entry
The spring weather has been quite enjoyable up to this point. It has gotten warmer that I'm now wearing t-shirts regularly. Even night time hasn't gotten too cold. The cherry blossoms are all gone and the leaves have grown out on all trees. It honestly feels like early summer and I'm loving it.
Work has been relatively decent the last while. For two weeks, one of the classrooms in my upstairs run at Montecito has not been used at all. I'm guessing the head teacher had a Covid infection and as part of protocol, all her students had to be quarantined for two weeks too. By saving at least 15 minutes, it made my nights more manageable to get through and it felt more fair. It's not the worst classroom to clean in my run, but anything to buy me more time is always welcome. On a sourer note, the upstairs boys washroom has been getting minor floodings almost every day from some brat overflowing the single urinal, and Jay has to take care of it. Even worse, last week someone is taking a shit in the urinal, which Jay has to immediately clean up (as it happens during school hours and I start just when school ends). It's totally unfair to him and last Friday, it was done in both the upstairs AND downstairs boys washrooms! After cleaning my upstairs washroom he locks the door for the rest of the school day until I come in to finish any cleaning as needed. Trying to find the culprit is obviously not easy though I might have to talk to the principal if this keeps happening, getting teachers and staff involved in knowing which boys are going into the washrooms. I also want to encouraging boys who immediately walk in and discover shit in the urinal or the flooding of the floor to speak up so we can narrow down who the culprit is. I feel sorry for Jay who has enough work to do in his shift and grateful he doesn't leave the burden for me to deal with. I miss this same time last year, when there were no students around at the beginning of the pandemic and then only a very small amount came for the rest of the school year.
I also couldn't resist this South Park reference from season 10:
Click to viewI got my first Pfizer vaccination on May 7th at the Langley Events Centre. The process wasn't complicated with the online registration as the provincial government was starting to prioritize some city districts' school employees. Surrey was first because they had the highest infection spread in their schools and soon after, Burnaby was included also even though our infection rate wasn't that high. Once I heard that a shipment of Pfizer vaccines arrived in Canada that week, I booked my date/time and place. For ethical reasons, I do not want to take the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines so my preference was Pfizer or Moderna. Controversially, we get no say in vaccines so we are forced to take whatever is available. I'm glad to say that outside of a sore left arm for a couple of days, I have had no side effects or reactions to the vaccine. That's a relief. But here's a sad thing: at my physio appointment last Friday I told my physiotherapist that I got my first vaccine. He asked which one and I replied Pfizer. He then told me that one of his cousins in his 60s died of blood clots after getting that vaccine - and it was never mentioned in the news! I offered my condolences and understood his skepticism in not getting vaccinated at this time. In fact, I think it's good to have a segment of the population who are not that much at risk to wait on the vaccine and see what the long term effects are and perhaps, wait for a new vaccine with all the kinks worked out. This may not be a popular opinion, but it's a "better safe than sorry" given how fast these vaccines have come out and not knowing the long term effects. I'm sure they're safe for the most part, but perhaps we need some people to wait on it. But knowing some governments, they will punish and make the lives of the unvaccinated a lot harder for defiance. I'm not sure when I will get my second shot given how slow we are up here in Canada. My guess will be well into summer.
Lately I've been thinking about David & Kevin as May 13th would have been their 20th wedding anniversary if they both were still alive today. While I was talking to David online and even on the phone before, I didn't meet him & Kevin until May 16th, just a mere 3 days after their ceremony. I talked about my experiences for the 10th anniversary back when I first joined Livejournal so I will refer you to the link provided. It is so surreal to think back to 2001 and the end result of today. From 2011, I think back to 2012 and how things got really bad between David and I plus our move to Port Coquitlam. Just the whole dynamic was different in those last final years of David's life compared to 2011 and before. Things obviously started to slowly go downhill after Kevin's death in Dec.2008, but I didn't predict how fast it went after that 10th anniversary post. Since we cannot see the future, there was no way to predict the good and the bad that have transpired. Within these ten years: David's relationship with me was more on "friend/roommate" terms, I began to no longer prioritize him as my Leatherdaddy/Sir and began to have other Daddies/Sirs in my life, he was no longer involved in the Knights and VML - which soured our friendship as we weren't going to events together anymore, he finally owned a slave and remarried, I finally got the job I always wanted as a custodian for Burnaby School District, I got my novice drivers license and a car, dealing with the passing of David and the passing of various friends these last 10 years, back living with my folks, still being with the Knights and becoming President of the Dogwood Chapter, getting to travel a lot more and experiencing some popular leather events, greatly increasing my leather gear collection and started getting into rubber too, having to deal with diagnosed sleep apnea, breaking my right arm, have beaten and reviewed over 100 games, finished 3 major Star Trek series (TNG, DS9, and Voyager), getting to see my surviving leather family in Wisconsin - one of my last links to the family David created, and while there has been no change in my folks' views on my sexuality - all my siblings now have a greater insight on the topic and it is much better than before. So much has happen this past decade. I know there will be a lot more hardship and loss in the next decade but I hope good things will come my way too. But the good memories of David & Kevin, and the friends who have long passed on, will always remain in my heart. I miss and love you guys!
My guess is that if all three of us were still together, we would have celebrated both these milestones in our lives. I had no one today to celebrate this with given the current situation and the fact that restaurant in-dining is banned in BC at this time. Once things are more normal, I'll do a late celebration dinner with a friend or two.
The first Hayao Miyazaki film I've ever seen was 1997's Princess Mononoke. I remember this one gaining some popularity back then compared to other Miyazaki films, probably because this one had better advertisement and word-of-mouth at the time. My late-third Kevin and I watched it around 15 years ago, I think via a DVD he borrowed from Burnaby Public Library. I thought it was a great film and still think so today. Princess Mononoke is set in the late Muromachi period of Japan (approximately 1336 to 1573 AD). The story follows a young Emishi prince named Ashitaka, and his involvement in a struggle between the gods of a forest and the humans who consume its resources. The term Mononoke is not a name, but a Japanese word for supernatural, shape-shifting beings that possess people and cause suffering, disease, or death. A demon attacks an Emishi village and the last Emishi prince, Ashitaka, kills it before it reaches the village, but its corruption curses his right arm. The curse gives him superhuman strength, but will eventually spread through his body and kill him. The villagers discover that the demon was a boar god, Nago, corrupted by an iron ball lodged in his body. The village's wise woman tells Ashitaka that he may find a cure in the western lands Nago came from, but he cannot return to his homeland. Heading west, Ashitaka meets Jiko-bō, an opportunist posing as a monk, who tells Ashitaka he may find help from the Great Forest Spirit, a deer-like animal god by day and a giant Diadarabotchi (large spirit that looks like a mountain when sleeping) by night. Nearby, men herd oxen to the town of Tataraba (Irontown), led by Lady Eboshi, and repel an attack by a wolf pack led by the wolf goddess Moro. Riding one of the wolves is San, a human girl. In Tataraba, Ashitaka learns that Eboshi built the town by clearcutting forests to claim ironsand and produce iron, leading to conflicts with the forest gods and Asano, a local daimyo. Tataraba is a refuge for social outcasts, including lepers employed to manufacture firearms; it was one of these guns that wounded Nago. Eboshi explains that San was raised by the wolves and resents humankind. San infiltrates Tataraba to kill Eboshi, but Ashitaka intervenes, revealing the curse to the townspeople, and knocks Eboshi and San out. He is shot by a villager but the curse gives him strength to carry San out of the village. San awakens and prepares to kill the weakened Ashitaka, but hesitates when he tells her that she is beautiful. She decides to trust him after the Forest Spirit saves his life. This film really pours on Miyazaki's feminist and environmental themes and while I didn't care much on first viewing, it is very distracting after watching more of his past works lately. Miyazaki's anti-consumerism and human-criticism themes rear their heads (even at the end of the film, San still has a hatred of humans despite realizing their error). This doesn't make this film terrible, but it is definitely preachy. The art and animation is top notch and at the time of release, was refreshing considering Disney's animated features didn't have the same punch as before.
Probably the one Miyazaki film I've wanted to see for years, 2001's Spirited Away was certainly an entertaining film and definitely one of the best ones. Chihiro Ogino, a 10-year-old girl who, while moving to a new neighbourhood, enters the world of Kami (spirits of Japanese Shinto folklore). She meets a boy named Haku, who warns her to return across the riverbed before sunset. However, Chihiro discovers too late that her parents have transformed into pigs, and she is unable to cross the now-flooded river. Haku finds Chihiro and advises her to ask for a job from the bathhouse's boiler-man, Kamaji. Kamaji asks Lin, a bathhouse worker, to send Chihiro to Yubaba, the witch who runs the bathhouse. Yubaba tries to frighten Chihiro away, but Chihiro persists, and Yubaba hires her. Yubaba takes away the second kanji of her name, Chihiro, renaming her Sen. Haku later warns her that if she forgets her name like he has forgotten his, she will not be able to leave the spirit world. She will have to find a way to free herself and her parents and return to the human world. This was a fun film that kept my interest until the very end. While Miyazaki's themes are present here too, it wasn't as preachy as others. This one was more anti-Western consumerism that has taken over Japanese culture in the last 40 years as a subtle criticism - which was why the parents became pigs. And of course, anti-human attitudes among the spirits. There was quite a bit of CGI effects in the film too, but it wasn't too saturated with it. I can see future re-watches of this one.
I've finished Final Fantasy IV as part of the Collection on PSP, but I still have to play Interlude and The After Years so the collection will be complete. I may resume playing after I complete The Disney Afternoon Collection on PS4. I hope to be finished and have that big review up before the end of the month. I'm over halfway done season 2 of Star Trek: Enterprise so hopefully I may have the review up before summer. After that review is done, I will watch the third season of Discovery. Saint Seiya: Knights of the Zodiac is almost done - I'm on the final season. While I'm not looking forward to it, I plan to watch the 4th season of Netflix's Castlevania series soon also.
Last Movie: Avengers: Endgame (Theatrical), Spirited Away (Netflix)
Last Book: The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics - The Screwtape Letters
Last Game: Street Fighter X Tekken (PS3)
Current Book: The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics - Miracles
Current Games: The Disney Afternoon Collection (PS4 - PSN) & Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection (PSP)