“Evicted is a rather strong word honey,” the Dingo says. And I don’t know what to think.

The first box left for Singapore this week. I’m uprooting and moving to the other side of the planet and we’re homeless? Nowhere to live? Thrown out on Serangoon Road? Situations like this don’t fill a Canadian boyfriend with heaps of confidence.

“It’ll be fine,” the Dingo continues. But I’m not so sure.

If I were homeless here, I could cope better. I would pack up my front-loading LG washer and dryer on a wagon, and know where to go: houses with unguarded outdoor power supplies and carelessly unattended water taps. I could survive. And smell fresh doing it.

Singapore is another story. I’ve been there a total of 5 days in my entire life. The Dingo took me for a spectacular dinner on the top floor of a posh hotel and I looked at the city twinkle in the night. It was beautiful. But surviving within the bowels of it? Homeless? I wasn’t convinced.

But I don’t want to seem like the type of boyfriend that gets nervous about being homeless in a foreign country. I try to play it smooth and cool, like this type of thing happens to me all the time. Entering Singapore, I’m already technically an illegal alien, so why not homeless?

I start to surf the net for hints and techniques on weaving palm fronds into a sensible ranch-style bungalow. Because what do I know? Something inexpensive and portable that will be comfortable and stylish as well as typhoon proof. And what the hell am I suppose to do during a typhoon anyway?

Most of my suggestions, the Dingo doesn’t think practical. Palm fronds? Laundry wagon? So when he suggests I look at the Singapore property market on the net, I become completely confident that I will solve the problem.

“What district do we live in now? What district are we moving? 8 thousand dollars a month! The Bencoolen? What the hell is that? A penal colony?”

The Dingo decides that it best if I look up properties he suggests, which proves more useful. I make helpful comments such as, “I like the bathroom” and “I like the pool.” Not very practical. So, with no help from me, the Dingo solves the problem and finds us a home.

But I think I’ll learn how to weave palm fronds into a stylish home, because you never know.

My boss has been barking at me all day, even though he’s out of the office with a pinched nerve in his back, even though it’s both month end and year end and both have been dumped in my lap. If the phone isn’t ringing off the hook, he’s emailing.

I’m not kidding, this just came in: “Thanks Kelly. That’ll do pig.”

Okay. I added the pig. But that’ll do? I feel like Babe, even though, I’m neither singing nor herding sheep.

If my gayness were a secret, it would be the worst kept one in Western Canada. I’ve never been ‘in’ the closet, but I never sprang out of it either. I’ve just been happily living my gay life for the last 100 years and never really given it much thought. If you know, you know, if you don’t, you don’t.

As well, work is work. Private life is private life. I have nothing against co-workers prattling on about their private lives, but I never reciprocate, because, work is work. Private life is private life. Simple. I talk about my private life here on this blog, so why waste it at the office?

They wouldn’t get it anyway. We talk about fishing and swim meets and kids and grocery prices and dirty coffee cups and the price of gas and interest rates and mowing the lawn and bake sales. All the things I avoid like the bubonic plague.

But my mom is another story. I told my mother I was gay in 1988. It didn’t go well. 1988, while marking the ascension of Madonna to pop star legend, also coincided with the AIDS epidemic. There was a lot of unknowns. And a lot of fear.

When, I said, “mom, I’m never going to get married and settle down. Not with woman. That’s not what I’m…in to.”

My mother heard, “I’m going to start lisping and prancing around, wearing lipstick, dressing like Boy George and spending my free time being ravaged by thousands of men who will fuck me up the ass before I die an excruciatingly painful death of AIDS. Alone. Now, if you’ll you excuse me, I have an audition to become the sixth member of the Village People.”

It went as badly as it could. My Mother went into a combination of denial and shock. After that, with my parents, my sexuality took on the, ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy. It was known, sort-of, but treated like the family drunk: everyone knew Aunt Bessie was guzzling Vodka all afternoon, but no one tried to stop her because as unbearable as she was as a drunk, she was even worse sober. My gayness sat beside her on the couch, largely ignored.

I decided that the best thing to do was broach the subject when there was a reason. I left home when I seventeen anyway, for university. It seemed pointless to bring it up. I never moved back. My parents and I had as functioning relationship as any gay son who doesn’t discuss his gay life with his parents. And we blissfully continued along for years.

Until now. Because my mother is a Christmas Nazi, and gathers the family very much like we’re being carted off to Auschwitz for eggnog and presents, I knew that Christmas would be the deadline. When my being gay meant that I’d spend the holiday with her and the family or with a boyfriend. And it’s finally come to it. Well, if you can consider 2 decades, finally. So I told her. Well, my sister started the ball rolling and I finished the job.

It was rather lovely actually. Funny what time will do. We had a lovely lunch. I guess it’s trendy to have a gay son now, or maybe, and more likely, we’re both older and see happiness differently, a clearer vision that these things are important because time is short. It doesn’t matter whether you love a man or woman, just that you love and feel love and allow to be loved.

So, she’s coming to the wedding. The mother, one of them anyway, mother(s) of the groom(s). Yip. The Dingo and I are getting married. But that’s another story.

I didn’t know his name, but The Dingo was standing with his boyfriend in Punto. And I didn’t know if he was with his boyfriend or not. He was standing with I guy I assumed was his boyfriend, so it seemed harmless enough to stride across a bar in Barcelona and say hello. And hope that one of them spoke English.

At the time, I knew two other people in all of Spain, my traveling buddy from Canada and José, who appeared in the lounge of the Hotel Axel and was our new best friend. Naturally, I assumed he was a prostitute. This turned out to be only partially true. He was an unsolicited guide. The night before, he took us to Bacon Bear Bar, and the name says it all. The tapas were delicious, devoid of bacon, however. Never figured out what bacon had to do with it. The bear part is self-explanatory, even though the bar was full of shirtless, hairless young men the night I was there. I proposed that the bacon might be to lure the bears, but never got confirmation.

José spoke Spanish and Catalan, which had proven useful. He knew Barcelona as well. He wore a lot of Lycra, even though he probably shouldn’t. And the other traveling Canadian and I had a silent deal that if José dragged us around with him, we’d buy the drinks. It was an amicable relationship. We met him the day before I turned forty. That was three days prior.

After thwarting the proposed moped ride, the three of us on a moped?, José decided that cocaine would help us truly experience Barcelona, cocaine and a sexy party, which left me confused, because I’ve never attended a sexy party before. I wasn’t convinced. Cocaine and the three of us naked made me nauseous. I had no idea how these variables could combine to become a sexy party. It was our last night. I needed an escape. And standing across the bar was The Dingo and a chance.

So, I knew The Dingo was The Dingo by the time I financed the cocaine buy, even though I wasn’t calling him that yet. That came after we had sex in Vancouver which was four months in the future. I had no idea at the time.

But the reason I crossed the bar to meet The Dingo was primarily because I wanted a sexy party with him and not José. The travelling Canadian could have him, because he had decided to help the situation by letting José stick his hands down his pants. That’s when I walked across Punto to meet a handsome stranger. Boyfriend or not, it was better than witnessing what was going on around me.

And if it cost 50 Euro, what was the harm? I never saw José after that night and the traveling Canadian disappeared soon after, though I met up with him the next day. I have no idea what happened, never asked, so whether there was a sexy cocaine fuelled party or not, I don’t know. That’s not my story.

But the first thing I learned about The Dingo was that his boyfriend was not his boyfriend. And the second thing he learned about me, the first being, my name was Kelly, was that I was purchasing cocaine for an orgy. Not really the type of thing I do regularly.

“Are you going to introduce me?” I said, referring to the boyfriend, who was standing grinning at me. Being the financier of a drug buy and the supposed organizer of sex parties, I thought it best to reflect conversation away from myself.

The Dingo’s response: “He’s not my boyfriend. I don’t even know him. But he’s got a massive cock.”

And he did, because he showed it to me as well. A little later, after The Dingo and I had bought each other drinks.

And this is the first 15 minutes of how The Dingo and I met. I knew it was going to be interesting. But I couldn’t have said how interesting until now. And there’s still a lot more to come.

“Hi ya handsome!” That’s what she yesterday. Wanda. We’ve moved into a ‘temporary’ office location. Serviced. In an enclosed beehive of offices. Vagrant businesses I would guess. I hate it. The florescent lights drive my eyes crazy.

There are two of them down the hall. The girls. That’s what they instructed me to call them. ‘We’re just the girls’, the larger one said. ‘Anything you need, just let one of us girls know.’  But they’re both decidedly middle-aged, or approaching it, and not girl like at all. I suppose they’e referring to their personalities.

Every time I do anything, I have to pass one of their offices. They never close their doors. My new boss, the Australian, calls it, ˜an open door policy”. He has one too. I don’t like it. If I had grenades with me, I’d toss one in every time I passed. A whole box full into the new Australian boss’s office.

Lovely ladies, I suppose, the girls but very chatty and dressed funny. Business casual, I suppose it’s called. I have no idea. I would suggest something a little looser, like a moo-moo, or something roomier. They seem very constrained in their ‘office’ clothes. As well, they change their shoes upon arrival and departure. This seems pinnacle to their day and outfits.

At first, I thought the merry-go-round of shoes was because some athletic activity was involved in the transportation of them to ‘the office’. But both of the girls drive sensible sub-compacts. More perplexing, their feet are always killing them. They say this loudly and because their doors are always open, I hear it, even though I’m hiding under my desk with my fingers in my ears.

Wanda calling me handsome yesterday was better than Friday, when the larger one called me ‘fresh meat’. Which scared me. I hid in my brightly lit prison with no windows for the rest of the afternoon for fear I was being prepared for slaughter. Do they grill gay men up on barbecues in the suburbs on weekends? I had no idea. Better to be safe was my thought. And I already knew that their feet were killing them. I supposed they could easily be pushed over the edge.

Every morning I smile and say hello to the girls. But I don’t really know what they do, because another woman sits at a reception desk. She’s not one of the girls. She’s a ‘don’t fuck with me’ type and takes pleasure in bossing courier drivers around. She doesn’t change her shoes. Her feet in agony are part of the job. She doesn’t have time to chat about it. FedEx might be trying to attempt entry through an improper door. Or having a cigarette in the loading zone.

It’s the second week that the girls have been in my life. Wanda loudly clears her throat a lot, like a horse. It lets me know she’s lurking around when she’s not in her office with the door open. She drops by, if I forget to latch the door, or if I have to open it because it gets warm in here. I’m thinking about proposing a bell she could put on, when she changes her shoes every morning. It would give me some warning.

I’m not sure I’ll survive this, but at least, if I do hang myself in here, the girls will have something nice to barbeque. Not sure how fresh the meat will be by then.

If the Dingo and I were Smurfs, this would be the Dingo:

And this would be me, though I’m not really very cranky:

This is the Dingo Smurf touching my bum:

We’re good together:

It’s pretty Smurfy.

While I was sitting on the patio, sweating in the warm Singaporean evening, I had no idea I was about to meet the devil. And who would have thought he’d be cooking? If I ever bumped into the devil, I assumed he’d be eating puppies or babies, impaling priests, raping nuns, producing a Celine Dion CD, that type of thing, not making curry dishes at the Yassin Restaurant on Serangoon Road.

And I didn’t actually meet him. He poisoned me with take-away. His roti-prata looked innocent enough, and it was delicious, at first. But like all evil, it took some time to fester, to settle and cause damage. My stomach very unpleasantly, and quite suddenly, exploded the next day.

Of course, I was wearing white and on a ferry to Indonesia when the roti-prata decided, rather violently, to exit my body, because if you’re going to have a diarrhea attack, you should be in all white and on a ferry with one bathroom and a line-up. There’s really something wonderful about being on a boat, rocking to and fro in the South China Sea, to increase the pleasure of stomach cramps and a colon explosion.

When we landed on Bintan, and I was afforded the luxury of a private toilet, which I broke with constant flushing, the devil added fever and night sweats for dessert. 24 hours later I was fine.

I sincerely hope I can repay the devil at the Yassin Restaurant with my famous syrup of ipecac laced blueberry muffins. I’ll bake a batch for my next trip. It’s only fair.

“I’d love a cuckoo clock,” I said, because what are you supposed to say? The Dingo was on the phone from Switzerland. Apparently, the Swiss are very talented cuckoo clock makers, and since no one, and I mean no one, has ever offered to buy me a cuckoo clock, I became excited over the idea.

The Dingo phoned me from Gepeto’s Cuckoo Clock Maison de Swiss, something like that, a store that sold only cuckoo clocks, the next day. The background cuckooing was deafening.

The Dingo said, “do you want a traditional cuckoo clock or one a little more fancy?”

“I don’t know that means,” I said, because I’ve never really thought about cuckoo clocks before. And what does one look for when cuckoo clock shopping? I said, “I should have researched this a little bit more. I don’t even really know what a cuckoo clock looks like.”

The Dingo passed the phone to his mate and we chatted. They both were hung over and cuckoo clock shopping wasn’t the best thing for her head-ache. I asked her to help. The Dingo began holding the phone up to various cuckoo clocks, and even with the Atlantic Ocean separating us, they sounded loud.

“You decide,” I said.

The Dingo picked out a multi-level cuckoo clock, with dancing girls on one level, a dog and a guy drinking beer on the next and a cuckoo bird that explodes out of the attic. The thing apparently comes to life every 15 minutes in an explosion of dancing and drinking and chirping.

Next week, I’m flying to Singapore to pick it up. Because when a man gives you a cuckoo clock, he means business, and it’s the least I can do.

I don’t usually do these, but this one came from Rey and I had nothing else to do over lunch.

1. What time did you get up this morning? 6:15-ish am MST

2. Diamonds or pearls? Platinum.

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? That Compass movie with my twin 7 yr-old nieces. Then I had to listen to them for the rest day asking me for Golden Compasses of their own.

4. What is your favourite TV show(s)? Not good with episodic television. I used to sort-of watch Pushing Up Daisies, but I think it got canceled. I like real estate shows, people buying houses, not renovating them, especially internationally, like Location, Location, Location. Love that shit. I would so have Phil Spencer and Kirstie Allsopp over for dinner.

5. What do you usually have for breakfast? Piece of toast with some cashew peanut butter the Dingo (bf) bought.

6. What is your middle name? R.

7. What food do you dislike? Bananas and raisins, both make me dry-heave. The smell of a banana can make me sick, like that watery mouth, heavy swallow, I’m gonna barf, sick.

8. What is your favourite CD at the moment? Evermore

9. What time is it right now? 12:09pm MST

10. Favourite Sandwich? Turkey. Turkey, lettuce, butter, salt and pepper on panini roll. Eating one right now. Bland. I know. But all the creativity I can muster at 6:30am, when I made it.

11. What characteristic do you despise? Moochiness, this is rather new, and lack of independence.

12. Favourite item of clothing? I’m not really a clothing person. Whatever I have on is my current favourite.

13. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Singapore. But anywhere the bf would meet me.

14. Where would you retire to? Anywhere without winter.

15. What was your most memorable birthday? 40^th in Barcelona. I fell in with the city and I fell in love in Barcelona.

16. Furthest place you are sending this? No idea.

17. Person you expect to send it back? No one.

18. Morning person or a night person? Night owl, but have to get up early. I live on very little sleep. It’s the only thing Martha Stewart and I have in common.

19. What is your shoe size? 10 ½ - 11

20. Pets? A cat. Last cat I’ll ever own. Found him as an abandoned kitten in a dumpster behind a pizzeria. Love the guy, but after him, I’ll never clean another litter box as long as I live.

21. Any new and exciting news you’d like to share with us? My buddy Kelly, another Kelly, is finally making enough money to support himself as a painter and quit his day job on the 1^st.

22. What did you want to be when you were little? Stevie Nicks.

23. How are you today? Happy. Good. Lonely. Busy.

24. What is your favourite flower? Anything that blooms.

25. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? April 30^th. Flying off to Singapore to see–have sex with– the bf.

26. What are you listening to right now? CNN.

27. What was the last thing that you ate? Eating my turkey panini.

28. Do you wish on stars? I’ve wished Madonna would call, but so far, no luck.

29. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? Any one of the free ones you get at Red Lobster when you go with kids.

30. How is the weather right now? Warming up. Spring is in the air.

31. Last person you spoke to on the phone? The bf in Singapore. No! My Mom and sister drunk from Phoenix last night, they phoned after him.

32. Favourite soft drink? Fresca

33. Favourite restaurant? The Shanghai Dumpling place in Shanghai.

34. What was your favourite toy as a child? Girder-Panel building set.

35. Summer or Winter? Summer, though I like fall.

36. Chocolate or vanilla? I like men period, but the bf is vanilla, so I’ll have to say vanilla.

37. Coffee or Tea? Neither.

38. Do you want your friends to email you back? Absolutely.

39. When was the last time you cried? Cried a lot the day the bf went back to Singapore in February. Had another good cry waiting for my HIV status, couple of weeks ago, driving, for no reason, listening to Sarah Mclachlan.

40. What is under your bed? Dust. Cat hair. A plastic ˜under the bed” Tupperware thing of clothing I haven’t opened in 3 years.

41. What did you do last night? Monday night? Watched a horrible movie on the CBC, the bastardization of a great book, The Robber Bride. The bf phoned. Installed a new shower head. Talked to my mom and sister in Phoenix, who had been drinking wine. It’s exciting being me.

42. What are you afraid of? Needles.

43. Salty or Sweet? Have to with Rey on this one: Spicy.

44. How many keys on your key ring? 4

45. How many years at your current job? 17. I went to a retirement party of a family friend two weekends ago. She was with Westin for 19 years and retired at 67. 2 more, and at 42, I’ll have beat her ass. I gotta move on.

46. Favourite day of the Week? Thursdays. Weekend has not quite arrived but it looms on the horizon.

47. Do you make friends easily? I meet people easily, and enjoy them, but, no, I don’t make friends easily.

48. How many people will you send this to? No one. If you want to do it, be my guest.

49. How many will respond? No one.

50. Do you like finding out all this stuff about your friends? Sure. I suppose it’s a good way to find out a day in the life.