Medusa and Me

I'm horribly afraid of snakes. They could give me a heart attack.
My fear is my father's fault. One day, when I was just a little innocent girl, I was in our old stationwagon with my dad at the cottage going to get wood for the fire.
We came to a large woodpile and started throwing logs into the back of the car.
I remember specifically asking: "Daddy, is there any way there could be snakes in these logs?"
"No," he said.
"Of course not."
"Don't be silly."
As we began the drive home, I felt something flutter on my leg. I swatted it away, thinking it was a mosquito. Again, I felt something tickling me. Again, I batted it away. When I felt it a third time though, I took a look.
There was a snake slithering around my feet and trying to climb my leg.
I screamed, my dad almost drove off the road into the lake, and I got out of the car and walked the rest of the way home.
Traumatic, I tell you.
Last week, I was powerwalking with a group of friends. I was heading toward our trainer when she yelled at me to stop. I thought I was just going too speedy. No.
In front of me were four massive charcoal grey snakes. No, they were not pussy garter snakes. These were the thickness of Twinkies and easily the length of a man's belt. The other women saw these devil creatures to verify this. I'm not exaggerating.
When we had to get on the ground later that session to do pushups and situps, I swear I almost fainted. I thought they were going to slither over my neck and get me.
Later that night, I went to a convenience store to buy a lottery ticket so I could win me $30 million. I was standing in line waiting for my turn when I felt like someone was standing too close to me.
I turned around to see just how close this shopper was. He looked normal enough for a young guy. He had dreadlocks, a sleeveless T, Doc Martens and a cute girl on his arm.
But wait - did I mention he had a freakin' snake around his neck?
True story - there was a man in a Kingston convenience store with a pet snake around his neck right behind me and he was sticking his little forked tongue out at me. The snake, not the man.
I almost died. And then I probably would have won the $30 million and not been able to collect it, seeing as I'd be dead.
My mother is ultra superstitious so we all believe things come in threes.
That meant I had another snake sighting to go.
The next day I checked out our front lawn before I got in the car.
Maybe I even checked the toilet to see if a snake was coming up out of our plumbing.
Maybe I even looked under my carseat just to make sure.
But I did see it.
Later that day, in front of me at a red light was a black Impala - and around its licence plate were metallic cobras.
I don't want to know what all these snakes mean. I asked my reverend friend and she didn't think God was out to get me so I'm not too panicked.
The morale of the story is always buy fake firewood.
Just don't get it at your local convenience store.





And here is the rest of it.

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Crosbiemania in The Vancouver Sun

It has been years, years I tell you, since I connected with someone instantly.
The last gal I really fell for was a sweet little blonde thing, very pixie like, named Amy.

Amy and I instantly bonded.

I knew I liked her, and we'd be BFF, when she told me she'd just farted - just a day or two after meeting her.

Well, that was five years ago.

Today, she's a reporter, music reviewer and columnist at The Vancouver Sun.

She's a talent, I tell you. Someone give the girl a National Newspaper Award already, would ya?

Anyway. This week, on Tuesday, she wrote about blogging (and me) in her column, Match Point.

Here you go.


Headline: Humour, writing blogger's gift to all
Section: Arts & Life
Byline: Amy O'Brian


There was a time when bloggers baffled me. Not that I gave them much thought or felt compelled to either like or dislike them.

It was just that I didn't know any personally -- at least, none that I was aware of -- and I was a little confused by those who felt the need to post their venomous rants or details of their daily activities on a website for the world to see.

So it was with significant curiosity that I first ventured to my friend Sarah's blog. We'd been doing some sporadic

e-mailing while she was pregnant last summer, but after she had the baby and I asked for photos, she directed me to www.sarahcrosbie.com.

I was initially slightly offended because I wanted to think I was special enough to warrant a specially e-mailed photo.

But once I discovered her blog, I became hooked. I checked for updates almost everyday, feeling weirdly guilty, as if I was cyber-spying on her, even though she'd put all these rather intimate details of her life out there for the world to see.

I never bothered asking her why she did it. Before going on maternity leave, she had a weekly column in the Kingston Whig-Standard, where she wrote about the BF (boyfriend), wrote about her pregnancy, and shared light stories about love and life's annoyances with her readers.

But then, last week, I saw an article about a new book by University of Calgary Prof. Michael Keren, who argues that bloggers live in an isolated, lonely and mostly make-believe world filled with superficial relationships.

The not-so-positive assertion prompted me to finally insist on a live phone conversation with Sarah, rather than e-mails and blog updates. I was curious to see whether she agrees with the good professor.

"This is why I do it. This is the honest answer," she said in her ever-coy voice from her home in Kingston.

"Because there are people who can do great things in the world, like my mother, who's a genius teacher, or doctors who can save people. Other than being really good at being in love and baking a great banana bread, I don't have a lot of talent.

"But I think I'm sort of funny and I think I can write fairly well and so that's kind of my thing that I can do and give to people. Even though I get accused of being egotistical or full of myself or I just want to see my name in print, I actually think maybe there's a couple people who it makes them laugh, it makes them smile."

There are more than just a couple of people reading Sarah's blog. According to blog-tracking website Technorati, hers is about the 2. 6 millionth most popular of the approximately 55 million blogs out there. Pretty impressive.

But Sarah modestly says it doesn't matter how many people read her blog, as long as it brightens the day of one person.

One of her favourite e-mails was from a woman who wrote to thank her for making her transition to Kingston a little easier.

"She sent me an e-mail saying, 'This is going to sound quite silly, but I just wanted to thank you for your writing because you made me feel a little less lonely in Kingston because your life always seemed a little bit crazier a little bit more outrageous than mine.' "

She gets plenty of nasty comments too, but deletes most of them -- only posting the more moderate ones that she can respond to.

"I don't know if they hate me, but they dislike me strongly.

"Some of them are so ridiculously snotty and mean and depressing that I just delete them because I don't think it's doing anyone any good to put them out there. The misery on blogs just fuels more misery."

Luckily for Sarah, the interactions she has with her readers do not form the foundation of her social life. She writes when her boyfriend is at work and her baby is asleep, knowing that she has plenty of meaningful relationships outside of her blog.

But for those who don't -- for those who use a blog as a means to connect with others, why not? Why judge them when all any of us want is to be heard?

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