Are you Kevin?

Occasionally the secretary will step out and ask me to keep an eye on the reception. I'll usually sit at the front, answering the phone and buzzing people in. It's a nice break, and it's akin to "playing office" like when I was a kid.

"These papers are important! Call the President of Canada!" *stamping things loudly*

Today she had to step out to the post office. Our stamp machine is on the fritz, so she has to buy proper stamps. Our nearest post office is in La Maison Ogilvy. Going there is so odd. You walk into a luxury department store and head to the elevator, walking past shiny displays and beautiful young women who seem to know how to apply make-up correctly. It's impressive. You pass cosmetics that cost entirely too much and blue-haired old ladies that raise their game up a notch by also having small dogs that are blue. It's magical in a financially-offensive way.

Once on the fourth floor you walk through a sparse menswear display. Off to your right if a small nook that houses the Canada Post desk. It's just so odd to mail your two-dollar letter next to 700$ jeans. Every-time I go I can't help look around and just feel out of place. I expect to be asked to leave. It's like walking into a scene from The Wolf of Wall Street meets The Devil Wears Prada. Seeing people that look like the Rich Dicks from Kroll Show up close is really upsetting. The 1% is real and it just does not make any sense to me.

Moving on.

Our landlord is presently renovating seemingly-everything. Our lease is up, and the usual-slum-lord is now deciding to give half-a-shit. This means our main entrance is closed for renovation, and that technicians and labourers of all kinds come into the office often.

Just now a utility belt-wearing-guy came up and asked if I "saw Kevin." This is how that interaction went:

Guy: Have you seen Kevin?
Me: No, I don't know who Kevin is.
Guy: Well he is suppose to meet me here. He forgot his cell phone in the car.
Me: Well I don't know him, he doesn't work here - and he's not here. Feel free to look around for him.
Guy: Oh no, what do I do?
Me: Well I don't know who he is, I'm sorry, I can't really help you.
Guy: *stands there*
Me: Do you want to leave a message of your name and number, and if a lost-looking Kevin shows up, I'll give it to him?
Guy: Okay! I'm Sebastian! Here's my number!
Me: Okay, no problem.
Sebastian: Thanks! *skips away merrily*

I now have an orange post-it note scribbled with Sebastian's number on it. And every-time a labourer walks in I ask, from across the loft-style studio: "Are you Kevin?"

And nobody is Kevin.

I also find it especially odd to take a message for someone who doesn't work here from someone who doesn't work here. 

Are you Kevin?

Please Like Me.

Look, I love Please Like Me. It's an Australian narrative/comedy written by and starring Josh Thomas, and it's brilliant.

It's quick, cleaver, sweet and occasionally absurd and dark as fuck. It's my life. The fact that much of the show also deals with mental illness in a super open way is just the icing on top of a delicious television cake.

I just relate to it so much. Sometimes really dark things happen, and then sometimes you dress up your dog and make a music video.

This exchange takes place in a psychiatric hospital:

I love the humour, I love the credits and the visuals. I just love it. I love it I love it I love it.

The first two seasons just played on CBC here in Canada, and seem to be playing on ABC in the US.

I don't know much about Josh, he hasn't done a ton of press here. It goes without saying (as I say it) that I want to be friends with him. He seems great.

I know the show has been compared to Louis and Girls, which I think is fair, though Please Like Me is sweeter and funnier, but there is an often darker/grittier undertone, just subtler. Louis and Girls can have very dark episodes, but Please Like Me can talk about something pretty serious or dark through a lens that's still pretty ambivalent and sarcastic. 

I can't recommend it enough. It's currently streaming on the CBC website, and I think you can get it online in the US and in Australia. Check it out.

A lot of the above gifs are from the Please Like Me official Tumblr.

Salt in the wound.

Illustration by blood farm.

The stuff is absurd, and sometimes dark, and occasionally disturbing -  it could be triggering.

Last Man on Earth.

I really liked Last Man on Earth. I thought the first few episodes, where Will Forte is alone were fantastic. It really makes you ask yourself a bunch of questions, and accept the absurdity of the situation. 

What would you do? Where would you go? What would you wear? What would you steal?

Anyway, the title of the show says it all, though the main character soon makes a friend or two. 

The following exchange is still one of my favourite things ever, even months later. 

 

I even love the art. I want a print of "Dog Bridge" by Monet and Carole!

Oh boy!

Apparently this old thing is real and not a hipster reproduction. At first I found little information on the Ever Ready Label Corp. All I could seem to find were other stamps and stickers they made, and an add for their services in a 1935 magazine digitized by Google.

Turns out though the stamp was part of a series of stamps made after the great depression.They were sold with proceeds going to the salvation army. 

Wonderfully absurd without context - but interesting with it! 

Context! That thing that matters!

Sometimes, pickles.

Sometimes, you look for a humorous pickle gif for a work e-mail, and this is what you find...



The internet is a wonder for those with an appreciation for the absurd.