{"id":1318,"date":"2005-01-28T12:28:10","date_gmt":"2005-01-28T12:28:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/28\/its_expat\/"},"modified":"2024-12-02T20:21:42","modified_gmt":"2024-12-03T04:21:42","slug":"its_expat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/28\/its_expat\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Expat!"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve left the country!<\/strong> No, not for good. But Glenn had a free airline ticket up for grabs and I have no job, so I figured I\u2019d take a brief retreat to Montreal for a few days \u2014 someplace cheap and close where I can hole up in a small room or in coffeehouses without distraction from TV, constant internet access, and the damn cat. I\u2019m trying to write up lesson plans for this next semester (somebody IS thinking about the children!) and make a dent in some tedious coding projects that always seem less important than a nap or Gilmore Girls<\/i> when I\u2019m at home.<\/p>\n

The plan has been working so far, but I have a new appreciation for New York’s smoking ban. These Canucks really like their cigarettes, and my itchy eyes and smelly sweaters are the proof. Since I\u2019m passing a lot of my time in coffeehouses, I\u2019m surrounded by smoldering tobacco on all sides. Yes, smoking makes you look cool (Kids, I hate to admit it but it’s true \u2014 at least if you know how to hold a cigarette properly), but that shit really does stink. Also, lung cancer! Don’t forget the lung cancer. (This PSA was sponsored by viewers like you.)<\/p>\n

Most of the time that I travel, I\u2019m horrified by the idea of a city having a “gay village,” a place where all the gays hang out since that\u2019s where all the gay bars, restaurants, and boutiques are clustered. Since the temperatures in Montreal are hovering somewhere above absolute zero, though, I have a new appreciation for the gay village phenomenon. It’s comforting to know that I never have to travel further than five blocks to find food, hot beverages, eye candy, or someplace to cut the rug for an hour or two. It may be an upscale ghetto, but it’s also a model for the kind of urban experience I like \u2014 a variety of services within walking distance, people who know each other everywhere you go (luckily, the gays barely notice you if they don’t think you’re cute, so the solitude of my retreat remains unsullied), and thriving businesses holding their own against the encroachment of big chain stores. Maybe the threat really posed by the gays isn’t to marriage after all: maybe we pose more of a threat to Wal-Mart and Starbucks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve left the country! No, not for good. But Glenn had a free airline ticket up for grabs and I have no job, so I figured I\u2019d take a brief retreat to Montreal for a few days \u2014 someplace cheap and close where I can hole up in a small room or in coffeehouses without … Continue reading “It’s Expat!”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ultrapersonal"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1318"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77514,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1318\/revisions\/77514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}