Now is the time to pass down his knowledge before it’s lost in a jail cell, or beyond the reaches of death.

The only noise I hear is the hum of electricity, subtle as the sound of the universe whispering.

I blast the airhorn before the lump on the floor knows what’s going on.

Take a percocet at around 4:30pm.

Eat a large weed cookie, drink 1 750ml can of beer and then 3 pints between 6:30pm and 10:00pm.

I think about her. A faint yellow light from the street falls on the floor.

I only get twenty bucks that day. Trevor tells me to call him next week. He'll have some more work for me. But I never see him again. Or even hear his voice. I lose him number. Greaseback is never around. And then the phone gets cut off. I'm back to where I started.

The bum drags himself off the floor. Then comes on nice. Real buddy buddy shit.

And christ it's gonna be hot inside the tiny bar where SUMAC is playing tonight. I should've stayed home. Like I always do. An old man on his couch.

Then I hear it. Loud as the train coming into the station. Fuckinragabagagrrahfuuck. Ah ha. Of course. The unmistakable call of the down and out drunk.

Had a little accident last night Stevie, my boss yells. Tote fell over in the back of a truck. Someone's gotta clean up all that fish. I turn my head from him. Stare off out passed the end of the harbour. Where the horizon and Lake Eerie meet. Dissolve into one another. The breeze in my hair. Thinking why me?

So on this X-mas eve. There I was. Sitting in the basement. On an old blue sectional couch. Alone

I don't like most people. And have been jealous of Bud for ages. With reason.

Now here I am. The same fucking predicament all over. The universe testing to see what I'll do.

Sitting in the Montreal bus terminal I make a decision. To eat the last of my weed candies. 

It must've been the late nineties. I was collecting welfare at the time. I couldn't have been more then 17. Summer vacation was coming to an end. The high school I attended was close to my

1.

I cut through the small park. Come out the other side. As soon as I do I feel eyes on me. I look up from the sidewalk. He's standing down the block and on the other side of the busy cross

Of course the laundromat goes quiet. I glance around. We're all shocked. I catch the eyes of a little girl. Hair in pigtails. She looks scared.

It's the middle of winter. My last submission was rejected with good cause. It went a little off the deep end.

I came at reading this book as I do most things. Like a fool. I expected what the cover hinted at. A memoir. Some casual retelling of Norm's life. I expected quaint takes of rural Canadian life

...the products we couldn't get here. They'd come home with stories of innocent smiles given to bored border guards while they wore two pairs of jeans under three dresses. The trunk of their car filled with Cherry Coke and flavours of chips we couldn't comprehend. Cheap rum. Meat. Cigarettes. Electronics. 

I look across the street. I can see the bookstore. It’s right there. I think about kicking my way through the wall, making a sprint across the street. All before the marching band closing in comes stomping into view. Because after that I'm sunk. The flood gates will be open. And the entirety of the county's Christmas spirit will be let loose like a foul bowel movement from the asshole of a very old drunk. I decide against it.

The next day I send the above photo to a friend in Michigan. She asks if I'm fine. And what the doctor recommended. My response is typed laughter. I tell her I've been taking it easy. Staying medicated. But the chance of seeing a doctor is slim. The hospitals are over run. She's a little surprised. It's contrary to what she's been told.

But if it's anything like years passed it'll boil down to something real simple. Start drinking as soon as the coffee is done. Bottles of beer and wine. We'll wrap ourselves up in blankets to stave off the cold. Too cheap to turn on the portable radiators we use to heat our place. Her parents will call. We'll feign sobriety. A hard thing to do at 10:00 a.m. with wine-stained lips.

I look down Rue Acorn. Along the red brick factory I live in. And at first all I see are parked cars. Shadows. And the slow moving Sunday traffic farther up the block. Along  Rue Saint-Rémi.

You were right, I tell myself with confidence, there are no fucking fallen dogs out here. Just a sack of rice or side of beef. Plain and simple.

In my head I can't believe what he just said. How the hell are we going to take a bunch of ordinary popsicle sticks and turn them into bombs? Bombs? Shit, they explode. There's fire involved! Is Kevin nuts? We'll kill people!

With my back to the washer and dryer I started pissing down the wall.

One time I was sitting near a row of bushes along the side of the house playing with some toys. Immersed in what I was doing. And a thick river of shit flowed from my asshole.

A few weeks ago my wife told that I have some mild hoarding tendencies.

She said she was sick of it. The thousands of marijuana roaches I'll never smoke. All the goddamned books lying

Cockroaches

This was a sign as far as I was concerned. The high water mark. The North American standard for being a shitbag.

A plague of the poor and dirty.

So when we started to see