just dickered

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mount mckay aka thunder mountain. this is my third consecutive thunder bay summer. why? the eternal search i suppose and turns out this place is swarming with norwegians, finnish, danish, scandinavians aaaand i recently learned there’s a possible (probable) scandinavian streak in me by way of my grandmother (rip) sheila, which explains the blond hair (brother and i were both born blond, i more so than him) and the, awesome?

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anyway we had a hotel crawl of this hotel that is based on a viking theme lay-out and they give you a map and it looks like middle earth, seriously, totally perfect LARP convention weekend, and the map only represents the first floor. there are five and multi-level bizarrely placed elevators. unfortunately not like willy wonka’s glass elevataors this one will not fly vertically to the adjacent tower where our room is. in short, we’ve been walking in circles through the shining. plus, the staff are aggressive. writing a letter.

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willy wonka shower though. we have a luxury suite. it’s gorgeous. we are practically ON the landing airway strip too i saw the hotel FROM the plane.

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there is celtic font words written with names like SCANDIA II gold gild wood dark hallways of rooms leading to weird bomb shelter plaster dorm-like cult compound lesser luxury suites, the room we got for steph & rye which is kind of amazing as it’s tree-level overlooking the courtyard, cottage treehouse cavernous.

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it’s a pretty wacky tripped out scene. we are annoying the hell out of this hotel they feel as if they are babysitting us. i wrote ahead and was assured VIP treatment and instead of that we are getting dog shit. maybe that’s the norm here apparently they have a thing against southern ontario which triggers a memory i stifled from last summer of how rude everyone was to me and i was in my own mega-depression so was aloof to it but now i’m kind of hyperly-focused (as teacher says) so i can’t not see it. anyway we’re having a great time so complaining is dumb. but that’s what canadians do. complain.

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but not in paradise.

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great sun. very quiet. a convention was going on and we walked by in our degenerate bathing suits robes smoking drinking while a reunion or club reception of sorts went on. we were in the pool watching and they watched us back, like cedar rapids (the movie, watch it it’s hilarious) and an older loner man read the longest winter by the pool while steph and i swam. why is he reading a depressing book about the longest winter in summer?

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it took them 4 hours to bus our table after we were done with this and they chastised us for being 2 minutes late to get it on this courtyard THE ONLY ONE IN ALLOF MIDDLE EARTH at this place. i was huffed at on the phone, CORRECTED, snarked with glee that it was 5 after eleven once the kitchen was closed. just ridiculous. vip my ass ian.

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mountains everywhere. or the same mountain.

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steph wore my jumper when i took us to see florence. i am giving it to her.

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see? kind of like being in a school.

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our room. we have a mountain view.

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that was stuck to the wall.

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so we had to order pizza. we watched hanna. half of it. amazing film.

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the best pizza. best. best i’ve had in a year? i’ll find outthe name again. also in part cos of the way i topping’d it but it was their pepperoni that put it over the edge of greatness.

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polluted. maybe we’ll climb the mountain today.

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they said my bubbles hat won.

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ok gotta check out now.

xoxoxo