If you feel like you didn't quite nail today, I gave a wedding toast in which I called the bride "smoking hot," and told her that if she ever needed a "sadder, fatter, less successful" partner, I could see myself available, and then forgot to do the toast part, so you did fine. I know this sounds like the indiscretion of a young and stupid man, but this was in July, and I was 48 years old. And the groom is sometimes my boss. A woman in the audience gave me the throat slash! Anyway, you're doing awesome, is the point.

Years ago, I was in a park in San Francisco. Beautiful day. There was a homeless guy sitting in the sun. He opened a can of beer and took a sip. Closed his eyes in ecstasy. I said to my then-wife, "That dude is enjoying that beer." He looked like a free man. Then some skater kid walked past him. For zero reason, he took his skateboard and swung it at the homeless man's beer. Can goes flying. It ends up on the grass near us, spilling out. Kid cackles like a witch and keeps on walking. Homeless man just sits there, empty handed.

I was just refereeing a U11 House League soccer game. Boys and girls. Last game of the season. There was a tiny red-faced girl with a ponytail named Emma who was running all over the place. Absolute engine. With maybe 20 minutes left in the game, she scored. EXCEPT— —Emma was VERY offside. Like, many yards offside. So I blew my whistle. And the coach and the kids and what felt like the entire crowd deflated like a popped balloon. Turned out that was Emma’s first goal of the season. In the last game of the year. And I called it off.

Our under-14 Boys just had a Ukrainian refugee join us for training, a lovely boy who carried his soccer boots to Canada. The kids welcomed him using Google Translate and went out to play. He scored a goal, got high-fives, and then he used his phone to ask to play again tomorrow. We took him for Dairy Queen after. He had no idea what to order so Sammy decided he should have an Oreo Blizzard. My turn to use my phone. He nodded and said “It is very beautiful.”

So last night I watched a well-reviewed Irish film on Netflix: Originally titled "Calm With Horses," it was retitled "The Shadow of Violence" for North American audiences, because Lord knows, we can't handle enigma. This movie has caused me to have an existential crisis. It is everything I love in a movie: a slow-burn character study, brilliantly acted and beautifully shot. Not for all tastes. Kind of like if "Drive" were set in rural Ireland with more impenetrable accents. (No joke, I watched it with subtitles.) But what I would hope to write.

This FIFA cartoon shit is what I imagine Hell will be like. You guys, I'm not sure these fellas are really singing.

I coach U15 mixed indoor House League soccer—our team is Orange—and we've tied Blue five goddamn times this season, and tonight, in our last game against them, our kids finally won 4-3, and I will live off that moment of sweet Orange victory until I'm at least 500 years old. A girl named Paige scored the winner and after she asked, "Are you proud of me?" and I said. "I'm very proud of you," and then held it together until I got to my car and Sam was like, "We won, why are you crying?" and I told him when you get old, happiness makes you cry the most.

When I was a kid, I thought a life on the road would be pure glamour, and yet here I sit, at a hotel-room desk, having Pringles and ginger ale for dinner for the second consecutive night. The truest scene in a sportswriter movie would be a tired-looking guy in an airport hotel in the middle of an industrial park, cobbling together "dinner" at 10 PM from the lobby snack selection and having the clerk say something like, "Whoa, party at your place."

Not sure eating a giant bowl of clam chowder before my soccer game was the brightest idea. Let's find out! Already feel a little crampy and I haven't even left the house yet. Mistakes have been made.

Sitting at the Mazda dealership for a service and they've played Neil Diamond, Village People, and now the Happy Days theme back-to-back-to-back. They have my keys and I can't leave. I am in Hell. Now they're playing "Kodachrome" by Paul Simon. I'm having acid flashbacks. I've never taken acid.

I rode along with paramedics for a month. Old man had fallen off his roof. He was lying facedown on the snow with an obviously broken arm. Paramedic asked him if anything else was wrong. "My penis," the old man said. I was like, Oh dear God, no. And then he said, "is very cold." To answer the obvious questions:

1. He was shovelling snow from his roof.

2. His wife made the call. She was yelling at him, "I told you not to go up there!" when we arrived.

3. Heated blanket.

Organizing a bachelor party for a friend in his 40s is different from organizing one for a friend in his 20s. Now everyone is like, "Let's go to a ball game and then get a nice dinner, and if things get really crazy, maybe we could go see an avant-garde play or rent scooters." Lest this sound judgy, I'm the one who proposed the ball game.

I was just thinking I look pretty good for an 86-year-old man but unfortunately I'm 48. Yes, I'm still trying to get over that time my VERY REAL GIRLFRIEND was apartment hunting and the real estate agent looked at me and said, "Maybe your dad can help with the rent." Only pops into my head every six minutes or so anymore.

A batch of freshly signed (and hand-corrected) copies of The Eye Test is available at the beautiful ⁦@FurbyHouseBooks⁩ in Port Hope, Ontario. I’m beyond moved by the local support I’ve received. Thank you, friends. (And if you've already bought the book—thank you!—and would like it signed, get in touch and we'll find a way. Probably at the Goose when it reopens.)

It's Box Day! Hard to describe the feeling when you hold your book for the first time. I don't know about anyone else, but I flip through it and think, "Holy shit, that was a lot of work. I hope people like it." And then I feel light-headed and need to lie down for a spell. The four-leaf clover on the cover is a reference to Charley, who sees four-leaf clovers for beanstalks. The part about him is my favourite part. It will be available everywhere, including your local independent bookstore.

twelvebooks.com/titles/chris-j…

Boosted. I’m now AZ-Pfizer-Moderna. I’m getting vaccinated the way I used to drink in college. Just give me whatever and let me get on the goddamn dance floor. Oh yes. This husky fella can bust it.

I stay away from politics on Twitter, because opinions are like assholes, and I usually have a fiery one. But if we get locked down again tomorrow because unvaccinated morons are clogging up our hospitals, things are going to get VERY political around here. I've gone to a lot of therapy to try to be a better person, and I swear I try really hard to be the shepherd. I delete 10 tweets for every one I post. But I have two teenagers, including one with autism, whose school has been fucked up for nearly two years, and I AM DONE.

Think I’ve broken my hand again at footy. Maybe just sprained? But it’s pretty swollen. You guys ready for a picture? Behold. If a potato grew fingers.

CRISPY BITS INCOMING YES YOU BEAUTIES

Every year, my lovely friend Thomas Lake organizes a gathering of writers. Maybe 14 or 15 kindred spirits, talking about writing and playing music until 5 in the morning. Usually, it takes place in the fall at his family’s beautiful old house in Ludowici, Georgia. It’s magic. The Lakes put out an absolute spread: It’s like eating at an extremely Southern version of Hogwarts. The chicken and dumplings make me believe in God. The only downside for me, as a Crohn’s sufferer, is trying to evacuate my very full self without humiliation or catastrophe.

Wasn't sure whether to share this, because it's quite personal and a little sad (and also happy). But it might help some divorced parents out there, especially the recently divorced, for whom it can be a fraught time of year. So here goes... Five years after our catastrophe, my ex and I are doing well enough (thank you, Gary the Therapist) to have talked about having a joint Christmas for the first time since. My ex, wisely, thought we should ask the boys what they wanted to do. I sat them down last night.