When you look up into a snowy sky and it’s all just white on white with the falling bits kind of glimmery and shimmery, it’s easy to topple over and bruise your bum and get really wet but still laugh really hard because it’s beautiful.
In past years I have lived within spitting (or stumbling) distance of a liquor store. The current house is a 10-15 minute walk or a 5 minute drive, depending on traffic, trains, etc. I decided today that I prefer this distance.If you walk, you are earning your alcohol. Working for it, in a way. And if you drive – and sometimes you have to – you pay for the privilege by having to deal with parking lot ghouls and above-mentioned traffic and trains.
Plus, sometimes – like today! – it’s snowing and it’s slightly safer to walk. And your chin gets cold and you get snow all over you and you’re really happy to get home and try on the new socks you bought at Superstore. Red fuzzy chenille socks! Half price!
I have been lucky enough to use some fantastic soap for the last few months. The woman who makes it donated a bunch to the organization I volunteer with and no one else has been interested in it. It’s amazing soap because it gets me clean, doesn’t dry me out and doesn’t really smell like much. I use it on my face and body, even between my freakishly huge toes. It’s cut in blocks, unlabeled, in a big cardboard box in the volunteer office so I never really knew who made it or where it came from. (I’m a trusting sort.) But just now, whilst tidying, I have found a piece of paper that is a business card and presto! there is a website here. I got real excited and went to it!
But someone is trying to make a point that I’m just not getting. The company is called Nurture with Nature, right? The woman’s name is Sheila. She lives on Scotia Street. She makes soap and is in touch with her soul and whatnot. Grand and groovy. Like a lot of internet/home businesses, the site is not spankyfancy, which is fine. But the weird bit is this device where there are frequent substitutions in the text: “z” for “s”.
Az in, zoap iz nice becauze it getz you clean. The substitution is mostly used in the product descriptions, not in the paragraphs about Sheila and her life. But in the case of: “zhampooz,” I’m thinking; hey, wha’ happened? I can see how an “s” at the end of a word sounds like a “z”. But in front of an “h”? Whatcha gettin’ at? Zheila zells zlimy zoap down on zcotia ztreet, I guezz.
I’ve heard of substituting letters so’s to take the “man” out of woman – spell it “womyn.” Or going a little further and removing our “wom”bs from the equation entirely to make it “wummin” and “wimmin.” But the s/z thing confuses me. Is it a feminist thing? An environmentalist thing? Did it just seem funny at 3 am when they were finishing the text for the site? I guess I could email her and ask.
Good damn zoap, though.