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[caption id="attachment_10335" align="alignnone" width="497"] Used cigarette butts don't taste any worse and they might even be healthier![/caption]

This evening my friend Florida Pete showed me the latest thing in "safe smoking" apparatus for street people: a short length of clear plastic tube.

Pete was wearing at least two too many jackets to be comfortable when he came to visit me this evening in McDonald's. It wasn't long before he was so dozy he had to go back outside -- to look for a place to crash. But first he put on a bit of show and tell.

He started with a nifty little LED flashlight some one had dropped. It also doubled as a red laser pointer. Neat!

Then he showed me what he said a community health nurse had given him earlier in the day outside the Kingsgate Mall at East Broadway and Main Street. At first glance it looked like the sort of glass tube used for a crack pipe but no, it was about two-and-a-half inches of flexible plastic tubing. It was the simplest of devices for "safely" smoking used cigarette butts.

[caption id="attachment_10054" align="alignnone" width="497"] Homeless binner's ransacked bike and trailer. Prior to being moved along in the alley.[/caption]

Chris Jensen's disappearance from the Fairview area on Wednesday evening was neither unusual nor necessarily unwelcome. What was unusual and what caused several of South Granville's homeless population to take notice was the fact that he went away without taking his bicycle, attached trailer and most of his worldly possessions.

Well I've just seen him -- darn the luck! Only one day missing; that wasn't much of a break, but by the looks of him he wasn't off having a picnic.

I haven't done the statistical analysis yet but observation strongly suggests a binner's subliminal reading diet -- all the words on all the street furniture, signage and dumpsters they encounter in alleys -- consists principally of negatives: "No," "Never," "Don't," "Stop," with a rare "Please" thrown in to soften the blow.

Once the stats are in, physiologists will probably tell us this surfiet of environmental negativity in the back alleys makes for a toxic workplace -- binning-wise -- and declare us victims of a hitherto unknown type of PTSD: Pessimistic Traffic Sign Disorder Syndrome.

Street people, binners, parking attendants, traffic enforcement officers, even garbage and tow truck drivers may, in the near future, be in line for significant disability claims. In the meantime I take solace from the signage in the parkade pictured above.

I think having my index finger partially over the lens adds a touch of vérité. Some might suggest it's just not far enough over the lens. And perhaps others would argue that though I appear to be over the flu I'm still not, clinically-speaking, a well man. Click the image to enlarge it.

[caption id="attachment_9886" align="alignnone" width="497"] Sick as a dog. Even the camera's seeing spots.[/caption]

It's awkward to be ill when you're homeless. All I wanted to do this morning was go back to bed -- forever -- but that was easier said than done.

It's easier done in the summer than the winter. In the summer you can always find a corner of a park. Today all those corners would have been sodden wet.

Winding my way westward from the bottle depot at Ontario Street I stopped in a parking lot that I use as a shortcut between a street and an alley. I got it into my head to try and catch the multitude of specular highlights the setting sun was bouncing off the parked cars.

I was aiming the camera at the cars like you'd aim a rock you wanted to skip across the surface of a lake. I got one shot off before I heard:

"What the @%#☄ are you doing?"

Clouds willing, and aside from today's fog slumbering on False Creek, a scene very much like this happens every morning at this spot looking north down South Granville Street.

The camera's not catching it at all -- the distant North Shore slope dripping molten gold with the rising sun; the flashes and sparkles on the buildings downtown -- you need at least $600-worth of camera. I saw it just fine with my own two eyes; I just can't show it to you -- you'll have to take my word.

Jonathan says:

“Canada is a third world country with wings.”

Don't know what it means; don't think Jonathan knows, but it's the most profound thing I've heard in a while.

[caption id="attachment_2706" align="alignnone" width="497"] "No officer, the eyes are close but my friend was clean-shaven and had smaller ears."[/caption]

I saw him slouching into the McDonald's last night dragging a giant black hockey bag. That told me lots. I knew he wasn't over here just to get some fresh air.

He didn't see me. He only came over to me because he saw my laptop. He wanted to borrow part of an AC adapter -- the wall plug part he didn't have. He was kneeling down to look at my adapter and only then looked up at me.

"Oh, it's you" he said, in his distinctive gravelly voice, more a statement of fact than anything else.

I took in the cleanness of him, the dryer-sheet smell of fresh laundered clothing and his slightly mussed appearance, particularly both his eyes -- his black eyes. The bruising had to be a few days from fresh but he still brought to mind a tall, rangy, raccoon.

He had a story all right and he told it to me. In a nutshell: room broken into and burgled; took law into own hands; arrested; homeless again after five years off the streets.

How sad, but sadly not unusual. And of course he made a bee-line for Fairview -- why wouldn't he? A fellow who had been so visibly homeless in and around the South Granville area when I came out on the street in 2004.

[caption id="attachment_10401" align="alignnone" width="497"] The Jack and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre at VGH.[/caption]

1. Follow my own advice and sometimes help people I do not like.


2. Try to be nicer to people who are not nice.


3. Be nicer to everyone by finding a shower at least once every three days.


4. Check out the UBC dental clinic at the VGH Gordon and Leslie Diamond Centre.


5. Do not be rude to elderly people collecting bottles (except that one guy).


6. Find some better alternate sleeping spots -- and one with a plug-in.


7. Improve my math skills. Really! They embarrass me.


8. Do one thing a month towards getting myself off the street.


9. Challenge my assumptions and admit my weaknesses (see #7).


10. Do a better job of proofreading my posts.

Joe the panhandler is seen here straight from the sidewalks of West Broadway modelling his particular brand of street chic.

This timeless look, once known by the now-deprecated term "street Arab," is currently referred to as the "crescent roll."

His cartoon nasal voice can be heard imploring people in the South Granville area and. I'm told, in parts unknown in the Kitsilano neighbourhood. Click the image to enlarge it.

[caption id="attachment_8896" align="alignnone" width="497"] My "sleigh" on Christmas Day.[/caption]

Christmas Eve is a magical time -- it gets sooo quiet.

I imagine you could hear the beat of tiny hoofs and sleigh bells but there were none of those last night. More importantly there were no shopping carts clattering through the alleys -- not just the alley off my parkade -- any alley in the vicinity.

Usually one or two intrepid binners come through in the early morning hours between 2 and 4 a.m. They move rather slowly and haltingly but they still manage to generate their own kind of sonic boom.

This is partly the result of a known physical law: a shopping cart's audibility is inversely proportional to how full it is.

Three wine bottles bouncing around in an otherwise empty steel-wire shopping cart can make a helluva racket. And only some binners take the trouble to put a piece of cardboard in the bottom of their cart basket.

In the dead quiet of the night, with the sound bouncing back and forth off the buildings lining an alley... oh my!

Fully-loaded carts have much quieter, monolithic loads and the weight reduces wheel noise considerably, but they are never quiet.

[caption id="attachment_8891" align="alignnone" width="497"] This fills me with Christmas cheer! Thanks for being open Waves.[/caption]

I woke up this Christmas morning refreshed but a bit disappointed. I slept like a lamb but, sadly, still no pony from Santa. Oh well, perhaps he can't deliver to parkades. And Santa would be pretty law-abiding -- I bet Vancouver has rules about that sort of thing: chickens yes; ponies no.

The Waves Coffee House on Broadway Avenue at Spruce Street was open -- the Blenz at Broadway and Granville Street was open also, but I'm monogamous by nature when it comes to my love affair with coffee.

Not only did Waves barista Eun-Hye deliver up a real "White Christmas" dark mocha but her counter mate, who declines the stardom which comes from being named on this blog, gave me both a big heart-fluttering smile and a cute little bobble-headed giraffe from her native Mexico.

I wasn't aware they had giraffes in Mexico, but I know they have one less now.

Does anyone remember the flocked bobble-head or "nodder" dogs that were a popular fixture on the "dash" of car back windows some some 40-years-ago?

Those were only slightly less surreal than the 1980s Christmas duet between Bing Crosby and David Bowie playing over the sound system as I polish off my dark mocha and this post. Click the top image to enlarge it.

[caption id="attachment_8890" align="alignnone" width="497"] Are you hungry? No? Do you need to go potty? No? What is it then?[/caption]

I came out of McDonald's this morning to find that a another homeless binner had locked their bicycle to my bicycle.

Saw the fellow when he did it but figured he was just locking his bike to the same pole my bike was locked to  -- it's easy to lock two bikes to one pole; one on each side. Cyclists do it all the time with the pole by this McDonalds. This bike binner used to do the same -- months and months ago. But not today.

He had gotten a coffee in McDonalds but then wandered off. I checked in the alley and the immediate area; he was nowhere to be seen.

I could wait for him. I certainly couldn't break the U-lock. Anything else I might do to free my bike would irreparably damage his bike, and though he was an idiot, he was an idiot who needed a bike to collect bottles, and haul his trailer full of his earthly possessions -- I didn't want to damage the bike.

The police were never an option; they don't care about stuff like this, and they don't have the equipment for dealing with a bike lock.

Either the fellow with the key showed up or I found someone with a circular grinder; I didn't believe anything else would do.

I had no money for a locksmith so that left either someone from the City of Vancouver Engineering department, or the Vancouver Fire and Rescue Service. Fortunately there was a Fire Hall just on the other side of the alley on 10th Avenue.

I explained my situation in detail to two of the firefighters on shift at Fire Hall No. 4. They agreed to come and have a look. They brought with them the longest, biggest pair of bolt cutters I had ever seen.

After I proved to their satisfaction that I was the owner of my bike they had a go with the cutters.

Bolt cutters use the leverage of the long arms together with special compound hinges to take the force you apply on the handles and multiply it many times at the point of cutting contact; the longer the arms the more force they can apply.

Big though they were, they could only cut the vinyl shrink-wrap; they couldn't so much as scratch the shackle of the U-lock. The firefighters tried twice and gave up. Bolt cutters can make short work of the most imposing-looking padlocks, but U-locks have much thicker shackles. U-locks can damage bolt cutters not the other way around.

[caption id="attachment_8716" align="alignnone" width="497"] The kindness of strangers. A warm feeling on a cold day.[/caption]

When I finally finished my breakfast and got off my butt to make some binning rounds, I couldn't help but notice that some thoughtful person(s) had given me the gift of food.

First I saw the package of salami tucked in the the back of my bike trailer. It was in a clear-plastic store bag. In the front of the trailer was another store bag containing more luncheon meat and a block of cheddar cheese. And beside the bag, bold as brass, a plastic jar of peanut butter. Thank you kind person(s). These are all excellent choices for a homeless person on the go.

All of this provender is brand new, near as I can tell -- I've yet to eat any of it -- I just put it in the fridge for later.

Meaning I just left it neatly on my bike trailer. I'm living in the fridge right now.

That's not a complaint; it's a handy fact. The food on my trailer is not in any danger of spoiling -- if peanut butter and salami can spoil. That means I can eat it when I'm hungry, and I don't have to eat it all at once. More importantly, I can hold off on the luncheon meat until I find some mustard.

Once I crack the seal on the peanut butter, I give it half-a-day -- one day tops

[caption id="attachment_8693" align="alignnone" width="497"] A living homeless Nativity display. Unfortunately the Chihuahua ran away.[/caption]

Last night it was a bit colder for homeless people in Vancouver than in Abbotsford, but I'm only referring to the temperature -- Abbotsford is being plenty cold to it's homeless people -- and at Christmas time to boot. For shame!

Tomorrow morning a B.C. Supreme Court judge is expected to rule whether to grant an injunction ordering a group of 20-or-so homeless people to clear out of Jubilee Park and an adjacent parking lot in downtown Abbotsford.

The City argued in a New Westminster court on Tuesday for a sweeping injunction not only to clear out the camp but also to keep homeless people out of parks and other city-owned spaces across Abbotsford.

The "Shitty City in the Country" is trying to solve its homeless problem by forcing all its estimated 117 street people to simply leave town.

I always try to take The Vancouver Sun newspaper to bed with me in my parkade; my bike trailer gets to sit on newspaper in case it wets itself -- those darn drippy beer cans, and it only takes six big broadsheet pages to do the job.

That's how I found this headline staring me in the face last night. Ugly subject, ugly awkward headline. The worst thing about it wasn't how the whole thing turned on a comma, the worst thing was that I understood it perfectly, and that was because politics itself increasingly makes no little or no sense.

Naturally the headline will be as absurd as the subject (not to mention the resulting  post).

[caption id="attachment_8553" align="alignnone" width="497"] Tent city! A leaky condo on 7th Avenue.[/caption]

As I rode towards my sleeping spot last night -- past the gently dilapidated apartment buildings of Fairview, running down like old clocks, with their mildew smells and their small, $900-plus suites -- and then past a few of the tent cities, oops... leaky condos, on 7th Avenue surrounded by scaffolding and draped in green mesh -- I couldn't help but reflect on how lucky I was to be homeless. When I arrived at my parkade, cozy and dry and smack up against another leaky condo... let me just say that gladness filled my heart.

To recap: Yesterday in Abbotsford, homeless campers in Jubilee Park -- under threat of an eviction order -- moved their camp to a nearby parking lot with the assistance of businesses and groups from the local community.

The group of 10 to 20 homeless people hardly had time to settle in behind the eight-foot wind barrier walls which had been built for them before the City of Abbotsford was on their doorstep with a new eviction order telling the campers to get themselves and their belongings out of both Jubilee Park and the parking lot by 6 p.m. or the city would take "whatever steps" it deemed "appropriate to remove the structure and belongings."

Wow! Whatever steps? Two weeks ago when the homeless group defied an earlier eviction order, Abbotsford's Mayor Bruce Banman was quoted taking pains to step lightly:

“You will not see the city coming in like storm troopers, throwing tents around and bodily removing people. If they do not move of their own accord we will go to the courts.”

Two weeks later it's no more mister nice guy -- off with the kid gloves.

Pivot stays Abbotsford's heavy hand

Fortunately the homeless group's legal counsel, The Pivot Legal Society, stepped in. According to this item in The Vancouver Sun Pivot lawyer DJ Larkin was granted an emergency stay Thursday afternoon, blocking the eviction order ahead of the 6 p.m.deadline.

And today, the City of Abbotsford is reportedly heading to court today to call for homeless protesters to vacate the parking lot on McCallum Road Wednesday. Pivot will likely be there representing the Jubilee homeless group.

Pivot was already planning to be in B.C. Supreme Court on Monday when Abbotsford's original injunction against the camp is again before a judge.

Perhaps when  the Jubilee homeless are next casting about for a new camp site they should consider just setting up their tents and stuff in a court room.

[caption id="attachment_8502" align="alignnone" width="497"] This seems strangely appropriate.[/caption]

 

[caption id="attachment_8463" align="alignnone" width="497"] A Google Map showing the Jubilee Park exodus to an adjacent parking lot.[/caption]

A group of homeless people who have been camping in Abbotsford's Jubilee Park -- some for 50 days -- have picked up and moved -- again.  This time to an adjacent parking lot. And by the time you read this they may have been moved again -- forcibly by the City of Abbotsford.

Thursday morning, by 10:30 a.m. an early news report described how dozens of homeless people were dismantling their tent city in Jubilee Park and moving it piece-by-piece to a parking lot across the street on private property, where a huge eight-foot wooden wall was erected to screen the new camp from the elements.

The plywood wall designed to act as a windbreak for the new camp is made in triangular, free-standing, sections which reportedly surrounds the camp on all four sides. There are gaps between the sections to act as doorways which can be covered with tarps. A local company donated their expertise and labour to build the wall, which was entirely made using donated materials.