5 Guilty Pleasures (what are yours?)

I tried really hard to write a blog this morning when I first got up. I just couldn't get it right. I knew what I wanted to say, but I just couldn't type the right words in the right order. So, I simply gave up for the day.

We're just about to go out and go to a movie and I checked my emails. There was only one. It was from a reader who said that she loved my blog and looked forward to reading it but sometimes found my writing hard to read. First as a large woman, as a wheelchair user, she identifies a lot with what I write about. Second, she sometimes worries that my days are dominated by some of the nasty things that happen when difference meets prejudice.

So she asked me if I could do a blog that listed 5 of my guilty pleasures. Just for fun and just to get to know a different side of my life. She said that none of these could have to do with work or with advocacy. I immediately thought of a few so, I'm going to give it a shot:

5 Guilty Pleasures

1) Books. I love to read. Now that's a pleasure, an intense pleasure but not a guilty pleasure. My guilty pleasure is buying a hard back book, when it first comes out, because I can't bear to wait for the paperback. 95% of the books I read are paperbacks. Any of the 5% that are hardback will tell you a story of authors I really like or books that I've been desperate to read. I just finished Tom Rob Smith's "The Farm." One of the most compassionate books I've ever read. I won't even think of lending anyone my hardback copy of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - a book I found intensely moving. So, hardbacks - guilty pleasure.

2) DVD sets. Joe and I watch little broadcast television. We prefer box sets. Mostly we watch BBC stuff but we also enjoy  some American programs. For example right now we are watching Oz and the second season of a great Australian series Jack Irish. We really get into the series and some we keep to watch again like Y Gwyll ("Hinterland" in English) and Deadwood. The cost of these can add up, but I don't drink and I don't smoke so ... what the hell.

3) Museum Memberships. I love museums and I love supporting them. We are members of the Royal Ontario Museum and the Gardiner Museum and our membership has lapsed at the AGO, something that we'll take care of on our next visit. We love wandering around and spending time just being in the presence of such beauty and such talent and such history. And, most of them have good places for lunch.

4) Butter Tarts. I'm diabetic. Rare treat. Enough said.

5) Tom Ford's Noir. I like the whole line of Noir but I particularly like the after shave balm. It's amazingly smooth and makes my skin feel great. (I can't believe I'm writing this.) It's ridiculously costly so I don't use it all the time, I don't use it for every shave, I use it sparingly. More and more places are 'scent free' so I don't wear the cologne much (my second favourite scent is Autograph by Marks and Spencer), I tend to run out of the balm and the deodorant most quickly.

So, there.

Five guilty pleasures.

I do realize, as I write this, that I often document things that are dark. Let me assure you, all of you, that my life is also full of light. Lots of light. I live, I love, I laugh ... most of the time. But, for what I want to do with the blog, which is chronicle my life as a man with differences and disabilities ... I need to and want to be truthful to that experience. (And if you look closely, my freshly shaved cheek, looks awful good, while I'm having those experiences.)