which is a reference to a noirish Robert Bloch Christmas story you probably haven’t read, but when you realize he’s the guy who wrote Psycho, you’ll sort of get the idea.

[Update: I have been informed that the segue between Bloch, raincoaster, and Cthulhu is too abrupt: I would have thought it a continuum, rather, but here we go with the explication: Bloch was a pal of HP Lovecraft’s. HP Lovecraft wrote the Cthulhu Mythos stories, and Bloch wrote a couple himself, inspired by the master. raincoaster is…well, raincoaster.]

So, what did raincoaster do today?

Had lunch with a pal and got a nice tour of the Naramata Bench or portions thereof, narrated. What is the point of a drive without a story, I ask yez?

Spent several so-far-fruitless hours trying to get the new Jesus Phone activated (The Sister is paying, The Sister is in Ottawa, the Fido company insists on her being physically present with the credit card. ALTHOUGH they accept internet orders, but then she’d have to mail me the SIM card. Fortunately, I’m up in PTown and the standards of service here are nothing short of consistently amazing, and I say that as a jaded city dweller, so the Fido store manager at Cherry Lane is working it out with the store manager at Bayshore so my sister can go in, present her card, and Cherry Lane will instantly get the phone up and running and call me to come pick it up, which is more than I’d expect of any shop in Vangroover over the Christmas holidays and that’s for sure and certain, but where was I? Oh yes, closing the parenthesis).

And did you know that in PTown the most desirable real estate is in the zone called “Between the malls?” Yes, just downhill from the industrial flats. Just what I’m looking for in a home: waddling distance to Zellers and the food court.

Then, came home, made a dinner of tortellini and what I thought was leftover pasta sauce with sliced mushrooms but turned out, once I’d stirred it a few times, to be tomato sauce with greyish noodles shaped like chubby fish, but what the hell. Add some basil and it’s just like Ragu, right?

Then attempted to get some decorations up around the place (which I am only house-sitting, so it’s not exactly my style) to make it look homey. Think I’m doing pretty well, don’t you?

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Now bring us some squiddy pudding

and, of course, the centrepiece