Stupid Money
And the last day of my 5 day long stretch, Monday August first, the August Long, the day of stupid money. My first table tips $25 on a $50.00 bill.
And the day continues in that vein. Dag, $20, the Golfers, $50 in the hand, another couple, 20% on the bill, another $20 in the hand, another single man, $20 in the hand...
This was not all.
I'm a currency press.
The whole of the 5 days, the August long weekend, they've been the Mt. Everest for the restaurant, our busiest days of the year, and Monday, this is the Summit.
I make stupid money, which I argue against, but - come Tuesday I discover that stupid money only lightly pushes against the tide of unstoppable bills.
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- Category: Miscellany
In a peculiar museum, the bottom of a disused pool
I'm in a house high up on a forested mountain. The basement, an empty disused tiled pool that spirals upstairs...I don't think to try and figure out how the pool keeps level, accepting that it spirals up over a couple of floors...
Upstairs, a dark paneled room, there's a museum or art exhibit of sorts, curiosities, books with leather-tooled custom bindings done in the fantastical shapes of demons heads and gargoyles. Opening them they're like the "Codex Seriphinianus", an inventory of colors, shapes, writing in foreign languages, they're all puzzles, riddles wrapped up in enigmas and mystery...
The objects are as well curious, of no discernable function or purpose, this resembles an orrery, but isn't, this a compass, or globe, but not, and so forth. Everything beautifully done, but inexplicable. Somehow I think that maybe it all explains itself...
Outside a cool fall day.
Discussing with the other visitors I find that the owners of this curated collection of absurdities explained it all the night before, at the gala opening, I missed it, but - somehow I think I know them - and I'm thinking of this bigger goth couple that would show up and buy my curiosities for sale in Calgary, these must be the people hosting this...
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- Category: Dreams
The Centex in Kimberley
The next day I try again, remember my wallet and make it too Kimberley.
Stop and get gas at the Centex. The gas station that sells fresh organic fruit, cappuccinos, espresso, iced coffee, no JF but vitamin C gummies, organic teas, no soft drinks but 57 different flavors of Kombucha, fresh organic juices, cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil, dried and crispy all organic (local) pork-belly rinds, Salt spring-island cheeses, I mean, this, without a doubt, is a model for every gas station within 1000 miles. Without a doubt by far and away the best. And, sure, you pay a little bit more, but youi're getting such extraordinary quality and diversity from your standard Gas Station goods...
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- Category: Places
Shambala
Between the Dentist and Shingles I've got to stay out of sight.
Bloody Hell.
The heat, untenable, unbearable, 37 degrees Celsius, higher even.
Up early, on my way to Kimberley to check out some beryl crystals in the pegmatites at the headwaters of the Saint Mary's. On the way check out a few thrift shops, replenish my wardrobe.
I'd forgotten about Shambala.
Salmo, the town pump, packed with cars leaving the festival. Cars filled up with neon lycra leggings, feather boas, facepaint, glowsticks, tutus, tie-die, inner tubes, to the brim, overflowing, camping gear falling out whenever a door is opened, poorly packed. They're easy to identify.
Get coffee, supplies, then head off....
Into the 1 KM line for the check stop, there's check stops either side of the festival, a line up of tow truck drivers to seize impounded vehicles, it's too easy this, shooting fish in a barrel.
From here, a convoy of Alberta plates, eastward bound, past car accidents, careless, or not-so-obviously impaired drivers, through the perennial summertime construction zones, the obligatory stops - Tim Hortons in Creston, packed to the gills, the 7-11, party central...
I Make it as far as Cranbrook, getting out for an ice cream discover I've lost my wallet. I rack my brains, eventually remembering that - oh, no - I left it at the Salmo Town Pump
A quick call confirms it.
Now I'm lucky, I've enough gas to make it back to Salmo. Or I think I have enough gas. In any event it doesn't matter, and so the day is cut short.
The long drive back, just enough for a small ice cream and pop in Yak. And to Salmo, again wait out in the sweltering heat the check stop, then to the town pump.
I'm doubly blessed, not only do they have my wallet but it's contents are intact, including the $200+ I had in it.
Sit at the Subway and watch the show.
This, a super spreader Covid and (it will be seen, I'm sure) MonkeyPox event.
And, just as they sold tickets to Shambala, Salmo should be selling tickets to the aftermath. The most sketched out people - and these the ones that made it through the check stop - the Wolfman of Salmo, somehow escaped, now howling at a table outside the Salmo Town Pump, others, in various stages of recovery, many yet weeks away from any sort of baseline, an oversized girl in an undersized bikini shrieking at the Subway employees that "there's too much sauce...." before storming out, the Subway, fully staffed, a line-up out the door, vendors were in short supply this year, starving festival goers patiently lined up out the door,
...This has to be every service industry workers worst nightmare. Everyone hired must get the same spiel - gas station, bar, Subway employees: "Wait until Shambala...".
It's an economic boon, the busiest couple of days of the year, but at what cost?
The workers, the stony-faced response of having to work this the worst day of the year, for a minimum wage job, serving the sketchiest people in the nation, this, their worst day of the year, the day after Shambala, passengers passed out in their cars wearing nothing but facepaint, tattoos, pasties, there will be no prospecting today, merely sit and enjoy the show....
A week after the event the RCMP put out a call for a missing festival goer, trying to hitchhike out of Salmo, last seen "running through peoples yards", this a week ago, some people don't know when the parties over, a tragi-comedy unfolding...
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