{Wednesday, March 17, 8:54 p.m.}

Hurrah for days off! Today Rena and I zoomed off to the mall in Kristine’s silver Civic and spent the whole day laughing – at people (like the man who stopped while crossing the street in front of us to do a little shimmy and a sort of exaggerated wink which was more hilarious than creepy), at ourselves (like when Rena asked quite expressively why it should be raining and I gave her a look she described as terribly amusing), at a preview we saw before watching Viggo Mortensen’s Hidalgo (the preview: “I am quiet. And yet – not quiet.” the movie: Viggo Mortensen. need anything more be said?). We laughed at Rena who got out of the car, stood looking over the side of the ferry for a good ten minutes, and then came walking back all for the sake of discreetly checking where the fuel tank was on the car. We laughed at me, who invariably headed off into the produce section of Save-on Foods unawares both when I tried to enter and to exit the store.

And we laughed at The Cake. The Cake, my friends, is … special. Precious, really. A pessimist might call it hideous but we prefer to smoothly transition from the grimaces that inevitably follow a glance at this Cake to mirth and jollity at its very ugliness. We ordered The Cake today for our domestic supervisor Karin’s birthday tomorrow. Her nickname being Cheetah Feet (mine is Dancing Dolphin if you care to know, but please don’t ask), we told the bakery assistant to write “Happy Birthday Cheetah Feet” on The Cake.

This the obedient bakery assistant did, in translucent icing the colour of orange Jolly Ranchers if there are such things. Use your imagination. She also added three “flowers” that look rather like mounds of orange silly string (or maybe intestines steeped in beta carotene?) with one black dot in the middle of each. Regardless of aesthetics, chocolate cakes with white icing are always good and rumour has it that tomorrow’s supper (since only staff are here) shall be Karin’s favourite – Kraft Dinner with no veggies!

“Goodnight, little girls, thank the Lord you are well. And now go to sleep,” said Miss Clavel. She turned out the light, and closed the door. And that’s all there is … there isn’t any more.