Hello Lamp-post, What'cha Knowin'?

Unbelievable: two days without access to the net, more than 1200 pieces of spam in my mail-box. Whether or not you people give a damn, I am pleased to report that I took my box into the shop yesterday - I hope to have connectivity re-established in the very near future.

But I digress before I even begin.

This was a very good weekend. Spent a lovely afternoon with L on Sunday, shared some beers and conversation while watching les glorieux move on to the second round with Vern last night, all the while being quite good at not allowing my hopes for the severance package to excite me too much.

Only this morning, as I cycled into the office, knowing I would learn my fate one way or the other, did I feel those knots of helpless tension begin to pull tight in my belly.

People ...

I AM OUT OF HERE!

They haven't told me my departure-date yet, but my application has been accepted! I let out a highly unproffesional whoop when I read the terse email statement and only then realized just how well I had kept my hopes hidden from myself.

Christ, I'm pleased. I'll wait a few weeks before I start seriously thinking (thinking seriously? Whatever) about what the next phase of my life will bring.

All right, more later ...

Young Geoffrey Quixote Speaks

One of the things that has long been obvious to me - and to any thinking person - is that prohibition doesn't work. Worse, it actually exacerbates the problems with which it is - ostensibly - designed to deal.

Last week, L admitted to a minor untruth: she has not just turned 18, but 17 (what - if anything - this means for our as yet mostly undefined relationship is a matter for another post).

L doesn't drunk much and doesn't smoke (which is good for me; I have had only 2 cigarettes while in her company). In fact, during our first or second phone conversation, when she heard me lighting up she asked if that was, in fact, what I was doing. I acknowledged it.

"Uh oh," she said, laughing but serious. "Minus ten points." She then added, "Are you expecting to kiss me?"

The question itself took me aback (are all of today's young women so forward?). "Er, well, I'm not expecting to," I equivocated - but she was having none of that. "Well, you'd better not have had a cigarette within three hours of putting your mouth on mine!"

Talk about putting the fear of Goddess into Young Geoffrey's dirty old heart! But I digress - and I do have a point.

L doesn't smoke and hardly drinks.

She does, however, have far more than a passing familiarity with all manner of illicit psycho-active substances: THC (natch), LSD and ecstasy, to name a few, some of which I've barely heard of. (Happily, nothing intravenous.)

My points being: First, that legal drugs are hard for L to come by and, second, that every illegal drug is hers for the asking.

I know: this point is not a new one, but it bears repeating: Prohibition doesn't work!

If we are to believe our political masters and their hysteric "family values" supporters (particularly those lunatics running too much of the world from their isolated redoubt in the corrupt bosom of our Southern neighbour), "drugs" (illegal drugs, that is) have been declared illegal above all to "protect our youth" from the scourge of the demon weed and its nastier cousins.

And yet ...

Those substances society has deemed worse, more dangerous, more polluting of our precious bodily fluids than booze or nicotine, are far more readily available to your people than alcohol or even tobacco.

Not only do our policies aid and abet the growth and profitability of organized crime, they ensure our kids have at hand an endless supply of any and every psycho-active chemical under the sun - with no quality control whatsoever and limited only by the amount of ready cash in said kids' pockets.

I suspect most of you, my Gentle Readers, already share my view, but it really does need to be repeated.

And repeated.

And repeated.

If you think drugs are bad - especially if you think drugs are bad! - it's time to regulate and legalize the stuff.

Let's see the LCBO become the Psycho-active Substances Control Board of Ontario and give our cops productive work while we're at it.

All right. Enough tilting for now (pity there are so many god damned windmills out there).