Sunday July 8, 9:27 a.m.
Met up with Shard yesterday down at Christie Station. It had been a little over a month since our last meeting due to our increasingly busy schedules...more on his end with family responsibilities. Sometimes, I get that twinge of regret that I decided not to have a family of my own but after hearing my friend's story, I'm all better. We went to our usual hangout of the Thumbs-Up Eatery in Korea Town. It was a brief session this time but we basically had the entire restaurant to ourselves, and our waiter was very dutiful....got a handsome tip from us. I had the feeling that my Kimchi Fried Rice was a bit smaller than before, though.
I walked Shard back to the station although I had already decided to take a further walk on Bloor eastwards. With the lament that Queen West was going away from its bohemian stylings to a more trendy and corporate style, it was pretty nice to see that perhaps Korea Town may be picking up the boho slack. There were the small bookstores and even a shop specializing in obscure Asian knickknacks including a hookah pipe. Plus there was a Japanese paper place that I'm gonna have to investigate someday.
After my goodbyes to Shard, I started that walk over to U of T when I suddenly got that urge for a washroom. At times when I eat something spicy with a lot of fiber, my GI tract has that need for speed. GI GO, you might say. By the time I turned south on Spadina (a couple of stations away from Christie), I started slowing down and focusing some of my energies on certain muscles. I've been through this before, so I think all that sinew was already at Olympic-strength. Still, it was obvious that had I been walking through the St. George campus during the weekday, a caring student would've inquired whether I was OK or not. But as it was a Saturday, the campus was deserted as I slowly made my way into Robarts Library. Surely, there was a washroom facility in there. Not on the 1st floor apparently. UGH! So, it was down the stairs, across Hoskin Ave and down St. George to try the next oasis of Sid Smith Hall....all while under emergency clench mode.
There was some sort of job fair being held there when I went in, so I was happy to know that the place was indeed open. Problem was that I had to travel the byways of the basement area like the proverbial emaciated man in rags dragging himself through the desert before I finally found a washroom. I checked all the stalls and found one whose toilet had actually been properly flushed. After 30 seconds, I was one literally relieved fellow. I won't go into the gory details about the other two stalls, but I will rhetorically lecture that pushing down the handle doesn't take a whole lot of energy. I ended up flushing them myself....one very happy set of stalls resulted.
The rest of the walk down St. George Ave. was considerably less pain-wracked. It's always nice walking down there at any time. Perhaps nostalgia is going to be as much a condition as neuralgia as I get older. I ended up getting on the subway back home from Queen's Park Station. It was a quiet day, to be sure. Didn't see any protests coming up the street.
As for today, I was planning to just enjoy the day at home but last night, The ostracized Anime Chamberlain called me up to see if I would be willing to come out to see his little anime group which gets together periodically for viewings. Apparently, due to a request by one of his otaku, they'll actually be tackling some Japanese dramas for the first time. Ergh....not sure how that's gonna go, although some of those shows possess about the same amount of logic and acting ability that a Sunday morning anime has. But I'm not particularly interested in seeing dramas; just wanted to see how The Chamberlain has been doing and perhaps get a chance to meet some of his friends as well.
