An Issue of Size

Let me tell you something about drapes.

See, since I moved into my lovely apartment here in Montreal, I’ve been living in something of a cave. In Ontario, when people change apartments, they usually leave their appliances, and often times their window coverings. In Quebec, people leave nothing.

So, I moved into an apartment with no window coverings. Immediately, I fashioned my own stopgap solution by taping cardboard to the windows in the bedroom to offer some measure of privacy. I used boxes from several different sources; so it looked classy, trust me.

After three months of living this way, I finally went out to get some blinds, or drapes, or whatever, to cover up my windows.

The first place I went to had no pre-fab blinds. Just custom ones that would have taken 6 weeks to get. I’m much more of an “instant gratification” kind of guy, so I moved on and checked out a few more places. At the third hardware store I went to, I found some affordable pre-fab blinds. So I bought 4 of them to cover all my windows, and happily set off for home to install them.

2 hours later, when I was furiously back at the store returning said blinds because I had gotten the measurements backwards, I decided to look into the drapes option.

Let me tell you, drapes are f’ing expensive.

So I bought some “temporary” paper/fabric blinds that stick directly to the wall above the window. The cost seven bucks and do the job as well as taping up cardboard does.

The road to adulthood continues…

Haiti

For the last seven years, I worked in the news. I have been witness to the stories and images of bombings, tsunamis, hurricanes, and many dark moments in recent history.

I suppose that during the course of my time in the media, I learned to separate myself from things. I used to joke that we were “like doctors. We joke to distance ourselves from the tragedy.” Now that I have been out of that industry and mindset for a while, I find it impossible to do so.

I have been following the devastation and horror of what is happening in Haiti. It is an unbelievable scene in this tiny part of the world, and I am absolutely shaken by some of the images that I’ve seen.

It’s such an overwhelming situation that it’s hard to know where to begin, or what to do to help, so I got in touch with some media contacts at The Salvation Army, The Red Cross and World Vision. They are all on the ground providing help in Haiti, and could use any support you can muster.

I know that times are tough, and these things always seem to happen when they are at their toughest, but even a small donation amounts to a huge help.

The world seems pretty big when we are watching it from home, but we who spent a great deal of time online participating in communities and Internet Culture know that the world is in fact very small, and getting smaller all the time.

I don’t know what else to say except take care, and thank you for your time.

-JM

No Reason Comics

An Issue of Size

Haiti