Posts in Culture
9.23 At Your Service

Nosing around the pasta aisle at my local grocery store, trying to decide between tomato or Alfredo sauce, a tiny older lady approached me. "Excuse me," she said. "Do you have any of that whole wheat pasta?" I looked around and realized she was talking to me.

She hadn't yet noticed that I didn't work at the store and continued, "I'm looking for linguine noodles, specifically." I said, "Oh, ah, I don't actually work here." She just shrugged and shuffled away. I grabbed a box of pasta and ran after her, saying, "Wait, here's your whole wheat pasta!"

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Blog, Culture, HumourPaul Dore
9.22 Workshop

It was damn hot. About fifteen minutes into a workshop I was doing at the Centre for Social Innovation, a drop of sweat dripped from my chin on to my notes. Immediately, I felt like my entire face, neck, arms, and hands were covered in a slick film of sweat. I stepped outside of myself and saw in the faces of everyone in the audience the same expression: What is the matter with this guy?

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Culture, WritingPaul Dore
7.11 Springboarded

A few weeks ago, I was sitting outside on a bar patio with a friend in the middle of the afternoon. The patio was right on the sidewalk and we faced out, enjoying the sun and people watching. About a block away, I spotted two women approaching and said to my friend, “Don’t look now, but an ex of mine is coming this way.” We didn’t exactly make eye contact, but she must have seen me. She did that thing where she stopped her friend, pretended they were going the wrong way, turned and headed back away from us. It’s been well documented that I seem to have this effect on women - a repelling effect. Especially when it comes to ex’s. Now, this is a situation that many people have been in, running into an ex, but I would like to use this experience as an opportunity to bring up a few points.

I’m friends with almost no ex’s. Does this reflect badly on me? Probably. Most likely. Yes, when a relationship ends, there is heartbreak and sadness, but retaining some sense of a friendship always seemed futile to me. I’m not knocking those that do salvage a friendship, it’s just not for me. Do I really need to put the effort into this? Hmmm, well, last year I ran into an ex at the bar Three Speed (a place where nothing good ever happens), she grabbed the guy she was with and ran out of the place.

This kind of incident calls for some self-reflection.

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