First of all, Happy Birthday Dad. Thank you for tolerating me for the passed 19 years congratulating myself on YOUR birthday each November 28th and how fucking annoying that probably has been for you (coupled by moments of pride of course maybe hopefully).

Secondly, today is the day 19 years ago (in the year 2000) at the age of seventeen I started up LIFE HAPPENS TO RAYMI and began manipulating my way through the world wide web. I knew I wasn’t pretty enough alone to snatch your focus. I knew I was an egotistical big mouth and figured a steady systematic stream of daily, hourly, blog rants, showcasing my amusing insights and witty insults would amass a following. I transferred my popular “brand” from the VICE message board forums to my own little blog and the rest is HERSTORY. I didn’t care about grammar. I adopted my own style and my voice evolved over the years, people “got it”. I predated trolls, got good at fighting them, then good at fleeing them.

Things I did and shared online weren’t commonplace back then. Yes I paved the way. Yes people cared. No I don’t have a big ego (as much) anymore. Would I do things differently? Yes of course, who wouldn’t? Yes I am aware of my bitchy persona, half-hated, emulated. Everyone hates everyone on the internet, social media. It’s a game. Everyone is phony. Everyone talks shit. Facebook is so out of control I bet many can’t remember a life without it or that it outright conquered blogs. I remember when I used to blog more frequently alongside Facebooking and twitter all that, someone I knew was like BUT how do I SEE YOUR BLOG THOUGH??? People forgot that the web is wide open and that you can navigate outside of Facebook. The simple act of having to click a fucking web address is foreign now. The world has gotten a lot dumber, and how.

This blog domain expires in two months yes I’ll renew it. How insane would that be to just be like, bye. Very. Yeah I know I seldom update and that I have said I would more and then I don’t. Life gets busy. I know journaling, diarying, is good for my mind which is what started this beautiful mess in the first place. Yes I know I waste my talent and that when I write, when I speak, people listen and they like it or at least are entertained by it and I can write circles around ya and I’m funny and sharp and quick and and and… so. This is another check-in reminder that we still here and I am honouring this milestone today so thank you for being a blog nerd fan girl boy for all these years still that was good on you.

We’ll be in touch, til then take care all the best. Your pal Raymi.

ps. do you know anyone who has blogged as long as me? I don’t. #First #Swish.

Forklifts and vodka don’t mix, except at Maverick Distillery where a propane-powered Masterlift forklift moves crates full of spirit in their warehouse.

In October 2018, I put on a couple different cocktail dresses and posed on a forklift for some fellas making a print calendar filled with pretty faces.  We shot the scene in the warehouse foyer between the factory and the loading dock.  I had choice and could wear Maverick’s uniform or my own smock. Now I look at these pictures and wonder, what month I will be?

Every model is the cover story for thirty days in Masterlift’s 2019 print calendar; every photo hopes to show an interesting person doing curious things on or near their heavy equipment.  Here I am backing up their big ass forklift.

Most forklifts are made with heavy rear-ends as a counter balance.  Lead weights at the rear of the truck counter the load on the forks which is so the rig doesn’t tip forward when you go bumping through the warehouse. This truck has a tall loader – you can raise the forks up over sixteen feet, and it can lift over 4500 lbs of stuff on a single pallet.  It has lights, a backup beeper alarm, and lots of handy mirrors in which forklift drivers can check their appearance anytime, even when they are driving.

We shot during business hours, and there were people working for real all around us.  Warehouse staff were getting ready for a shipment going out at noon.  They were packing bottles into cases and then Saran wrapping the stack to make cubes for truck n trailer transport.  They used the lift to make a pallet train on the locking dock. Stacked in columns over twelve feet tall, these square pillars of alcohol are Maverick Distillery’s stash, perilous towers of corn mash, tall pillars of cash, one wrong move and smash. Did you know that having more than five drinks in one sitting is considered binge drinking?

At Maverick there’s a hard line between being a professional forklift operator and an experienced forklift driver. Did you read the safety manual? Did you do a circle check?

Which is more popular in Ontario LCBO Stores, Whiskey or Vodka?

Now some little known facts about whisky and vodka in Ontario (courtesy of the LCBO 2016 /17). Whisky is the largest percentage of spirits sold at LCBO (31 per cent of sales) which equals approximately $703.4 million dollars worth across the province.  Vodka is the second-largest segment (23 per cent of sales) at $514.4 million.

Maverick makes vodka from Ontario corn, and has already won top awards for its product at tastings and spirit competitions around the world.  Showing up and winning acclaim at their beverage award shows was how Maverick Distillery expanded to sell vodka in countries like Columbia, Australia and Japan.  And the journey to get there starts here in this loading dock, with this forklift.

Burt Reynolds on a forklift in Smokey and the Bandit

And then it was over. Raymi left the building.

On that day Maverick vodka was served shaken and stirred.