gone fishin'

i set off to work at the information commons today quite happily. the pay is great, the job is cushy, and i had decided to do a bit of extra work on my indexing because the server was down for a few days this week. plus, i really really like the idea of making over thirty dollars an hour. but when i got here, i realized that i forgot my power cord. there are few things that i dislike more than having the desire (well, at least the plan) to get some work done and not to be able to do. it really gets my goat.

one of the things that could have circumvented my annonyance would have been a nice giant sized cup of coffee. but, of course, our cafetaria service on campus is switching contracts, so everything is closed. in my opinion, to withhold coffee from the poor saps that have to work on sundays is absolutley medieval. there are very few things i can't handle without my extra cuppa joe.

so, instead of getting work done while comfortably enjoying a nice hot drink, i am a bit bitchy and a bit bored. on the upside, i've made a few dinner and lunch plans this week. and, for the most part, i am all set to head off to scotland on thursday. tasha sent me an excellent email of things to do in glasglow (she lived there for a few months) and i am looking forward to seeing the things she recommends for a couple of reasons: a) i am sure they'll be worth seeing and b) its a neat kinda time warp thing whenever you send someone to some place that is special to you.

it is true that i do have a paper to write tomorrow (thought...should i start that now? maybe i will, maybe i just will!), but i am, for all intents and purposes, already on vacation. that might not be a good thing, but only when it comes to the paper.

the little brown dress

my mom sent me this link this morning:

The Little Brown Dress

Check it out before you continue reading, otherwise you'll have no idea what i am taking about for the rest of this post. i can give you a brief synopsis, but it won't be the same. a woman decides to make and wear only one brown dress for 365 days. she adds on sweaters or layers as needed, but the core of the outfit is only the brown dress. she maintains that most of her co-workers did not even notice that she was wearing the same dress day after day (asserting that our own self-absorbed-ness prevents us from seeing other people.) the whole experiment can be summed up by her saying, " made one small, personal attempt to confront consumerism by refusing to change my dress for 365 days." (Alex Martin)


now, i was expecting to see one dress, 365 times. but she spruces up her outfit daily (in nice traditional granola wear), to the point that i now understand why she said that her colleagues did not even notice that she was duplicating her outfit. now, the woman seems to be some kind of creative force, also transforming this experiment into a dance. the whole experiment seems intriguing to me: the idea that we are not what we wear, no matter how hard i'd like to justify the goodness of what not to wear. i think it also fits perfectly into our national tendency to over-produce and over-use. not only did wearing, gasp, one article of clothing not stifle the spirit of this woman, it inspired her.

when i was in grade 12, our high school decided to embark on the path of uniforms. active in student government, i have to admit, i was prepared to put all my student influence towards rejecting the uniform (or clothing simply existing to turn us into clones, whatever you'd like to call it.) and i wasn't the one you'd think would protest: i was overweight, friends with the artsy types (who have all turned out to be wonderful interesting people, just like they were then), and heck, i was on student council. i was the poster girl of why there should be uniforms. but i hated the very idea of them. but that hate lasted about one second after my mom bought me mine. not only could i roll over and practically be dressed, i also looked like everyone else. and because everyone looked the same, all of a sudden, people had to listen to what other people said to distinguish them. i don't really have to words to describe this process. was it because we were teenagers? because we didn't really know who we were yet (but do we now?)? did clothes really make for class disctinctions? i don't know. but i do remember a vastly different environment when we did have uniforms. one that i was quite thankful for. and i do remember that people words meant more than they had mattered before.

now, ms. martin isn't promoting uniforms by any means. i would hate to put words in her mouth. but, i still like the message. and i think the message is rather pertinent to us, overconsumers and mass wasters, and that we should listen.

i'm sleepy

i've been up since five this morning.

today was jarrod's first day at a new place of employment. we live downtown toronto. it was located in richmond hill. on saturday, we tested out the commuting water. it took a long time. so jarrod decided he'd just take the go train, even though it is slightly more expensive. well, the joke was on him. the go train does not run from toronto to richmond hill, excepting evening rush hour. there is not even any go bus until ten in the am. so he was back to the ttc. but, he had to leave so early in the morning that even the subway was not yet running. so he had to bus it from yonge/dundas to finch. and then to richmond hill. and then a local bus. ouch. and by he, i might as well have been saying we, since, for this one morning, i went with him. (i have a sense of direction, he doesn't.) besides, i wanted to get a head start on the day. ahem. well, i am working on switching my schedule so that instead of staying up till four or five, that is the time i wake up. we'll see if it works.

i believe that keeping a relatively similar schedule is the only way to prevent one of us from killing the other. we're both fairly light sleepers and there is simply no way for one of us to get up without annoying the other. sometimes, i get passive agressive about it. like, i'll ask him if he wants to use speakers to watch tv. or he'll come out and be, "do you want help unloading the dishwasher?" when i've woken him up with the clanging. for the most part, we're adjusting remarkably well. but, i am a terribly spoiled girl who's never had to share a room before (excepting of course first year where my room mate and i just simultaneously snoozed our alarms through class, feeling better because we were both still in bed). so, i'm adjusting, just to some things better than others. for instance, i really like having an ally on the cleaning front. we might still be losing the war, but we've won some good battles.

i rode the subway home (it was running by then) alone. getting on at finch, it wasn't hard to get a seat. however, i was completely blown away by just how incredibly packed it gets. for a commuter city, i have to say that the experience of finding a way to richmond hill, and then seeing this overcrowding, shocked me. why on earth aren't we focusing on making public transit easy, affordable, and timely? i read an article the other day comparing toronto's subway with chicago's (two cities of comparable size). toronto's is a cross. chicago's is a multi-pointed stick star.

except for the viva buses, i am widely disappointed. fortunately, i brought my book and i could pretend no one else existed. even the woman who kept touching my arm. gross.

i'm halfway to fifty

yesterday was my birthday. i both hate and love my birthday. not for getting older, that doesn't bother me yet, but because, and i know some of you aren't going to believe this, i don't actually like being the centre of attention. i mean, when i'm cracking jokes, of course i want people to laugh. but i hate feeling like i am obligating people to be nice to me or to treat me special. (this feeling excludes boyfriends, family and close friends, who are, in every way, obligated to treat me special for the day...and they always come through.)

but birthdays are weird, aren't they? people say that blogging is self-indulgent, but i believe that the birthday is the holiday most guilty of this trait. at least at christmas you also give away presents. but a birthday, its all about one person. at least when we were little we had to throw one heck of a party to get presents. and by we, i mean our parents. wheelies will always have a special place in my heart.

as birthdays go, yesterday was very nice. i have decided that i will keep on having my birthday on a saturday, forever. its just a nicer day to relax on. jarrod was off, i was off, much nicer than say, a monday. we spent the morning figuring out where jarrod's new place of employment was. richmond hill is not far from T.O., but, in terms of having been there before, it made for an interesting jaunt. first of all, the buses are amazing. get this: the bus stops have displays that show you when the next bus will arrive. brilliant. there's nothing worse than waiting when you don't know how long you have to wait for. its kinda like doing push ups. its much easier to do a number of push ups when you can visualize the ending than to not know when you'll get to stop. that's a true story. in tae kwon do, sometimes our teacher wouldn't tell us how many we'd have to do. it was pure terrible torture.

after we scoped out richmond hill, we did a little shopping (it was my birthday!) and then grabbed jeff for an early dinner at reb lobster. i love love love crab legs. i don't remember this ever happening before, but, somehow i couldn't finish all the crab. i had to give some away. it was awful. i kept saying, eat alli eat! and i was just too full. this is why i would never be able to have gastric bypass surgery: i pride myself too much on the sheer volume of food i can put away when i want to. like chugging. i know there's something disgusting about it, but, i just feel so proud of myself. now, my only complaint about red lobster is that they don't give away a free slice of birthday cake. with bills that high, i think everyone should get a piece of cake. just for being there. regardless of birthdays. it would be such a happy place.

these things also made my day:

• a balloon bouquet from my parents. i like to tell people it came all the way from england, but i suspect balloons don't travel so well. so they're probably torontonians, born and raised. though i think the best part was hearing my mom talk about how she chose them...she knows me too well!
  
• a pair of green socks, with little frogs attached to them, from my grammy. i hesitate to wear them in case the frogs fall off. but i'll probably risk it.
• emails and phone messages from friends and family. although i don't like obligated people to call or email, it sure is nice when they do!

things i learned while reading reader's digest

1. the word mendacious means untruthful
   
2. you need government permission to commercially produce eggs. you have to buy "quota" (to participate in the system), which works out to about 175 bucks a bird. the high cost keeps many people out of the egg game and leaves a nice monopoly for those who can afford it (under the guise of preserving market equity and protecting farmers from competition)
   
3. Carl Leffler, the mathematician behind the popular game 'bingo,' was hired to create unique bingo cards and, according to legend, went crazy after he produced about 6000 of them.
   
4. The average lifespan of pets (cats and dogs) has increased by one third over the past decade due to increased vaccinations and better vetrinary care. (and in my personal opinion, a growing penchant to treating an animal like one of the family and a decrease in number of shotguns kept in the house)
5. the japanese have this word, "katahara itai" to describe the phenomenon of laughing so hard that your stomach hurts. english suuuuucks.
6. psychopaths enjoy dramatic lying for its own sake
   

the reason that i choose to sit at the starbucks at st. george and college is that it is close enough to campus for me to still reside on the university of toronto's network. and i get to sit in a coffee shop. i do need an internet connection to complete my indexing (which must must must be done by a week friday!). and i do need coffee to do my work. so, the situation is win-win.

however, i feel like as i've gotten older i've gotten more and more intolerant of other people. let me say this as clearly as possible--other people piss me off. for instance, those people at canada's wonderland, weeks ago, if i think about them too much even now, i can feel my blood starting to boil. i hate when people are inconsiderate. not in the emotional sense, heck, i don't care how you treat the people in your life. you're a stanger. inconsiderate in the inability to recognize that other people exist.

i'm sitting in the comfy chairs. you know, there's two in every starbucks. i am by myself. (working, remember?) but then this middle-aged man sits down in the other chair. and he didn't ask if he could. he's supposed to ask. these chairs are two of a kind. i could have been waiting for someone. they could have been getting a coffee or be in the bathroom. he should have said, "excuse me, is anyone sitting here?" he needn't ask my permission, but he also should put me in the place of having to be "uh, there's someone sitting there." see what i mean?

now, the thing that really pisses me off is that he's one of those rather creepy people. he keeps checking out the young girls, nursing his coffee. i hate when people do that. its just so...dated. get on the internet already! they don't care if you look!

other than that though, starbucks is pretty boring today. so, at least he's providing a little entertainment. he's not in the league of full body suit girl (i miss her), but who is?

when i should working, i am reading...

i spend a lot of time browsing the internet. i work from home. what can i say? my reward for doing a good half hours work is to read a blog. i set up a bloglines account, which i thought would streamline my blog reading, but i found that i missed reading blogs in their natural environment. every blogger creates their own space and somehow, it makes a difference. (if you've not seen bloglines, its basically just a text file. not pretty.) because these blogs are essential to amusing me during the day (when my boyfriend and room mates are not home to amuse), i thought i would share my favourite ones. now, these are not the blogs of my friends. those are my favourites, of course of course of course. i mean, i check those everyday. and not just because i might be mentionned, but because, my friends are creative, hilarious, good people. even my mom keeps a blog (she's "A Bowmanvillain Abroad," in the links section there to the right). and i love that too, because as i've grown up, as i think is rather normal, i've realized that my mom is not just my mom, but also...ready?...her own person. you don't really get to see that as a kid, but, as an adult, i love getting that little look into her life. plus, she lives in england, so she has some really great stories.

so, here's my favourites (but in no particular order):

I am, therefore I date: written by a young woman in new york. i started reading way back when she was just a single girl having a whole lotta fun, now, she's leaving new york for washington. a new job, a new boyfriend, a new future. this process (though she doesn't write as often as she used to) is something that is especially interesting to me. how often do you get to hear about this? as young women who value our careers and our friends, it is often difficult to navigate the role we want our significant others to play in our priorities. roxy naviagtes these with us, setting an example that is very human. i enjoy reading...even if the sex has almost disappeared!

Why don't we get drunk and blog?: i am about to betray my gender...i think boys are funnier than girls. i think male comedians are funny. I think female comedians are not. of course, there are exceptions (myself? absolutely!). but for the most part, boys seem to be the ones who can make me pee my pants a little from laughing so hard. i have a very strong background in hilarious male friends (as well as a very amusing boyfriend and little brother). so, i mean, my bar is set pretty high. but dave, who exists for me only as "some guy," is hilarious. and so, since i like hilarious, and although this blog is fairly new to me, i am still really enjoying it.

Spendqueen: okay, this is as close as i get to knowing someone that i am writing about here. she's a friend of a friend. and honestly, she's someone that i hate to love. superficially, her and i are many many miles apart (for instance, she's buying a half million dollar condo...i'm buying microwave popcorn and calling it dinner. okay, not really, but you know what i mean). but every once in a while, she writes in such a vulnerable, yet clever, manner, that i keep on coming back.

This Fish: some blogs i read because they are funny, some blogs i read because i think their life and their choices are interesting, and some blogs i read because they are well-written. my mom calls me a snob, but really, i can read something that is poorly written with a great story and something that is well written but has a poor story. if it has both, i'll treasure and love it forever. hence, i love this blog. (but not as much as the book thief. huh. it says this book is for young readers. i am shocked. its quite detailed. shall i say sophisticated?) heather writes about her life: unlike some others, she doesn't have a gimmick. she keeps readers coming back (and boy does she have readers!) because, well, for all the stuff i just said.

No Sex and the City: as much as i just disparaged gimmicks, this one, though based on such, is one that i approve of. its the only blog i read that is written by more than one person. can you guess? its written by not charlotte, not carrie, not samantha, and not miranda. see? good gimmick. why go to four different blogs, when i can get four at once?

now, of course, i also read the celebrity blogs. and i say of course, because if you have met me once, and this is not something i am proud of, but you'll know. probably because i have said this, "oh, i read somewhere..." which really means "on the superficial today..." its not a very difficult code, but it still makes me feel a little bit like how i think a master's student should feel.

doin' my part

i love when people find stuff like this.

Check out "My Great Idea" from Why don't we get drunk and blog?

delicious!

i wanted a ginger molasses cookie from starbucks. they are big and soft and coated with a light coating of white sugar.

its been a long day. first of all, i had to get up at ten o'clock this morning. now, remember, its all relative. i usually work till about midnight, mimicing jarrod's hours, and so i never call it a night before one or two. and i will be the first to admit that i need a lot of sleep. or else i turn into this she-beast that roams the condo until noon. i worked hard today though, had several meetings, and got a lot done.

so i felt like i deserved a cookie.

so, i set off to starbucks. first stop, my regular haunt. nodda. see, this is the thing about starbucks: they are terribly sporadic. it depends on the day, the time, the gods, i don't know, but half of the time they have nothing that i want to eat. today, they had a cookie called "breakfast cookie." now, everyone who knows me knows that i try to stretch all my pastries into breakfast foods, but not even i would try to include a cookie. its probably some kind of granola-trail mix-good-good-for-you cookie. which, in my opinion, isn't actually a cookie as much as something baked in a round shape. that does not a cookie make. a cookie needs chocolate or oatmeal or ginger. ah, right, back to where i started.

now that i had decided that i wanted a cookie, i was getting a cookie. starbucks was not going to limit me to what was simply in that particular display case. there are too many starbucks for that. i headed to the starbucks at the athletic centre. nothing. again. of course, i happened to run into a few friends outside of the starbucks...who of course thought i was a bit off my rocker. they don't know how good the cookies are. of course, it started to rain, adding to both the hilarity and the determination. the only thing that would make this better is if i fell off my bike. but i didn't.

then i went to the starbucks on queen street. third times the charm!

so i bought two. just for good measure.

"i just wish you didn't know each other"**

my brother and i pride ourselves on being sneaky. it is a pride that is completely not earned, and worse, it is not accurate--we are not sneaky at all. i think we like to think we look sneaky, but mostly, we spend our time looking over our shoulders. its all that damn honesty mom built into while raising us correctly. i'm sure we'll be grateful for it someday. my brother and i also pride ourselves on the number of movies we see. if its playing on the big screen and if i have the evening free, i'm all about seeing it and jeff usually has his shoes on by the fourth word of "what are you doing tonight? movie?" but, i have to admit, i hate paying fifteen dollars to see a movie. i also hate having to pay fifteen dollars for popcorn and a pop if i want something to snack on while seeing said movie. i often leave thinking, thirty bucks? for what? and the urge to beat the system grow and fermented, and, eventually, bloomed.

i hope you can see where this is going. yes, jeff and i have combined our sneakiness and our love of movies. really, its all AMC's fault. growing up, the process was this: you bought a ticket for one movie. you hand ticket to ticket guy. you enter the hallway that led to the one theatre that was showing your movie. they don't make 'em like they used to anymore. now, the megaplexes have no time for this one screen, one ticket holder business. suddenly, one ticket granted you access to five, ten, even fifteen or twenty movies. and, once you were in, they never looked at you twice. i have been known to see three movies in one day. its not something that i am proud of, but it has happened. in my defense, why would you leave? there's toilets and pop and so many movies.

on sunday, we saw two of them. its been a dry summer, but i think things are picking up. a scanner darkly, for jarrod, and pirates of the caribbean, for me and jeff. jarrod didn't quite make it through the second movie (thus suggesting that not everyone likes to sit in one place for seven hours) unlike the AMC, this was a slightly smaller theatre. and we had to kill quite a bit of time in between. and the lobby wasn't all that busy. but then we noticed something, something that makes me think that they intend for you to stay for more than one movie. varsity theatres has a little cafe. you can buy beer, coffee, snacks...all rather lingering refreshment breaks, if you ask me. perfect for killing time. i have to say, my cafe mocha was much less expensive than the price of another movie ticket. and much more relaxing too. (i have heard that theatres make their money not on ticket sakes but on concession sales--to this, i say to you, movie theatre owners, why not embrace the multi-movie phenomenon? put up signs! encourage us to stay!)

of course, to avoid being too obvious in an uncrowded theatre lobby, we slipped into another movie to kill time. thus, really, i saw two and a quarter movies. and i swear, i almost had to drag jeff by the shirt out of the devil wears prada.







**the quote refers to a family dinner a few years ago. it was after a hockey game, so jeff and i did not see each other very often. i think leanne and julia t. were around as well, so jeff and i were probably putting on a show, as we are wont to do. after some particularily crude remark, dad muttered, to everyone but jeff and i, "i love my children dearly. i just wish they didn't know each other." its right up there with "this is NOT a good idea!" but, that's another quote for another post.

words unread

i read postsecret pretty religiously. as in, its pretty much the first thing that i do when i wake up on sunday mornings. its a little like christmas, except without the santa claus and presents. but with all the touching moments. this one, in particular, struck a chord with me.

why? because its true. when someone hurts us, or even when we just feel hurt, we find it hard to accept. we see answers to questions, explanations, and even, closure (which, due to sit-coms, has been given a rather bad reputation lately). and yet, we get to the point where we can't say how much we hurt to the person that hurt us anymore. because they've moved on, because we should have moved on, because...for a million reasons. i think even because we shouldn't care anymore but because we just...can't...let...it...go. do you think that she still loves him? (it seems like a girl to me. but maybe just because i empathize with the author. and you know, i'm a girl.) does she write to him, even though he won't hear because she can't help herself? because she still is hurting? maybe even, because she won't let him know that she still hurts because that will give him still power over her. and its a small but satisfying revenge to at least hold something back.

i am not proud of being a dweller. or a worrier. or a planner. but i am all of these things, perhaps even to the extreme. (i've been called manipulative, but i have decided to reject that particular label.) when the person i first said "i love you" to broke up with me, i'll admit it, i wrote letters. or emails. and i sent them. and then, time passed. life went on. some of the hurt went away. then all of the hurt went away. but every once in a while, and here's deep dark secret, i get this pang in my stomach. and i find myself wanting to speak with him. to really speak with him. i have a friend that makes me feel this way too. we were room mates in fourth year. and even though we said terrible horrible things to each other (and i think we truly meant them), i find myself, now that time has passed, wanting to write to her, to say sorry, to that there were more good times than bad, and that really, all i want is friendship in this life. i want to speak with her too.

i wonder if many people do this. write letters that aren't sent. some, i am sure, should not be sent. but perhaps, some should be. the ones that say, i am sorry. that say, i still love you. that say, that was a mistake. to say, you are special to me. letters that are so true to the heart that one cannot send them. so i will confess: if you know me, and we've had some kind of disagreement, some of falling out, the chances are very great that i have written you a letter that i have not sent. i always thought that getting older meant that you learned how to forge and maintain relationships. it doesn't. its like the solar system: people rotate around you through life, getting closer, going farther. there's nothing you can do--its natural. things wax and wane, some explode, some burn out, some collide and make something new. (okay, i am done with the universe analogy. sorry.) are we supposed to just take what we can get? to leave things up to chance? i have no idea. some people stay, some people leave. and some people leave even though you dont, dont, want them to. and so we write them letters, that go unsent, not because we want to make them come back, because we don't have that kind of power, but because we are sad and sorry and because we still think of them, even if we won't admit that we do.

hsyeji

okay, i tried posting a comment today. and i failed the "word verify" test. and i failed it because, even though i am a literate person with several years of education, i cannot identify six letters when they are all scrambly like that. i hope this happens to other people. but i am afraid it does not.

i am still impressed with the internet

well, turns out this summer working from home is going a whole heck of a lot better than last summer. first of all, i have a nicely defined position: i have a binder. i have a bunch of images. i need to make them navigable. i can do that.

of course, i do need to do some background work. which really, has led to a whole bunch of neat things. first of all, all you writers out there, WordNet. Basically an online thesaurus, it'll really help me when it comes to assigning key words to images. my vocabulary may be a little above average but it certainly is no match for this web site.

i also found an ongoing indexing project, Flamenco. I think that i will incorporate this search interface into the finished project because it gives a great overview as to what is actually included in a database. it also prevents dead ends and dead links. plus, you can easily add to it.

wow, this might be my first "librarian" related post since i had to do so for class work. maybe it won't even be the last.


Image Indexing
Flamenco
WordNet

fighting injustice one line at a time

i've been meaning to write about this for a while. canada's wonderland. i have so so many wonderful childhood memories of this place. the rides, the funnel cake, the characters, the hustle and bustle, the funnel cake...but this time was different. jeff, jarrod, kim and i went (and, because of this company, nothing can be that bad) and it was packed. to the point that i have never seen it so packed. it was hot, so we booted it to the water park. which was still packed. but we made the best of it, doing a few slides and relaxing in the lazy river.

our fun was slightly marred, however, when we came face to face with a few who seemed determined to wreck it for the rest of us. we all noticed (and yes, laughed) at the four adults who went down the waterslide fully clothed. and then, still waiting, we noticed them go down again. see, what you had to do was wait for a raft, and then you took the raft to the top of the slide and raced down. but these four people decided that they did not have to wait, they just could stand at the front and take rafts from those who had waited legitimately. we watched them try it again, only to be stopped by another adult. this got my blood boiling...because if there is one thing i hate, it is following the rules only to have others flaunt them. three of them walked off, but one adult tried again. again! he was told there was a line! he budded again! and then, jarrod stalks towards him, and literally took the raft from the man. not in a particularily violent way, but certainly in a forceful one. the three of us started cheering, and other people clapped too. of course, it doesn't end there.

when we get to the top of the slide, right after jarrod mentions, "if i see them up a head of us, i am going to lose it," we notice that people are coming back down, through the line. yep! its our friends! who had somehow decided that if they couldn't get rafts, they'd just...break more rules and head down the water slide without mats! of course! that makes sense! they marched down rather shamefully and i felt happy that they were caught out. i have no idea what they did the rest of the day. i hope they got kicked out, but i doubt it. who are these people that think that they are free of the rules? that they should get to go twice before the rest of us, before a bunch of kids, get to go once? i did not know what to do about it. the lifeguard's didn't care. not even many other people seemed to care. should we not have said anything? i am just so sick of constantly letting people get away with things. stupid things. i just hate it. i have a big mouth. and i suppose i think of myself as fairly intimidating. i mean, really, look at me? what girl would try anything? heck, i'd even take on a guy. (this from someone who has never been in a fight in her life...except for a little brother who mostly, i'd just hit and then run and lock myself in the bathroom.)

we went of that slide again, you know, gluttons for punishment that we are (we were also trying to not let the earlier altarcation ruin a) the slide or b) our day). this is where the highlight of the day came from. a daughter and a father were debating whether or not to do this one. they decided to, and the dad kinda cut the line. and then the daughter just lost it! she yelled that there was a line, that they had to wait...and the dad shamefully walked back to the end. i don't know where she got it, but it seems like at least some of our youth have a sense of right and wrong.

after the water park, we headed back out to do some rides...and got waylaid by giant giant hot dogs. seriously. they were huge. i know, i know, stree meat, street meat...they have nothing on the dogs at wonderland. so, we ate, we had fun, we had a bit of hostility. pretty much, just a regular day at wonderland.

**a quick proviso for this photo. i had just gotten dressed. clothes over the bathing suit. i wasn't waiting in any lines, not even bathroom lines, that didn't involved a pay off like a roller coaster at the end.

***i wore those pants when i rode on a camel in morrocco. (sometimes i have to plug myself because i don't feel like my posts are good enough.)

committed by credit card

oh, its on. i have officially signed up for the Toronto Half Marathon. i know i mentionned earlier on that i had decided to do it, but, now, now i am really going to do it. i want another t-shirt and another medal. (speaking of which, has anyone seen an ottawa half-marathon medal? i seem to have lost mine.) i have spent the last couple weeks (whew, so far into my training) building up my mileage, which really translates into blistered toes. i am going to need some new running shoes soon...if only my mom was coming into town soon. oh wait! she is! (i'll keep praying to the running gods...and keep on hoping that no one notices that i am turning 25 in july, which makes me officially certainly completely an adult who should be able to purchase her own running shoes). Annetta and i have made a plan to both run it (perhaps together, perhaps not, depending on how fast each of us is taking it) and its nice to know someone else is undertaking the challenge. (that was certainly a guilt trip to plague her should she decide not to run).

in sadder news, jarrod's bike was not the easy fix we expected. turns out, the cranks they were going to replace cannot be replaced without replacing (can i say that anymore?) the whole undercarriage. which would cost more than the bike. much more. i was a bit troubled, seeing as how my finances do not really allow for wasted purchases, but then...i found the golden ticket (the receipt) that mentions that the bikes contain a two week warranty. i did not expect this, seeing as how we bought the bike from a pawn shop from a man who i would descibe as a "bike hustler." i am hoping for cash back, but i will take store credit. jarrod can just pick out another one. hopefully we can find one that evokes the same sense of "awesome!' that this one did...though i have to admit that i fear that just won't be possible. we shall see.

the curse of the dopplegangers

okay, my cousin told jarrod about this website called fuzzy squid. basically, its some feed that displays the latest images posted to the very popular public journal site Livejournal. since he found out about it, he's noted some very odd things. like someone cleaning up a toilet seat covered in what appears to be human excretment. like a chubby little man imitating the pose of a pin up girl. and personal family shots and friends shots and funny images and everything you could possibly think of. from all around the world. so, while i don't recommend viewing this site at work, i do recommend viewing from the comfort of your own home when you want a rather diverse glimpse into what makes human beings tick. because some of it is more than mildly unsuitable for work. like the vintage porn shots. seriously. you know how everything has that favourite photo of great aunt beatrice? exactly. but add genitalia. somehow, maybe with the time elapsed factor, it just looks like art. very odd, pornographic art. i would not even have guessed this existed. and it makes me think of that costume booth at canada's wonderland in a whole new (rather dirty) way.

just keep in mind that what you find is very very bizarre. like these photobooth shots. please note, despite the uncanniness, these are not of jarrod and i. i repeat: not. not even that third one is a ringer for me. nor that last one, which, i swear, is not jarrod.

death and i have one thing in common

once, in high school, a teacher caught me reading the last page of a book i was reading. i have no memory of the book, or the ending, but i do remember the look of horror that i would "ruin" the ending for myself. i didn't even know that it was deviant reader behaviour. little did she know that this was chronic behaviour for me. to this day, often before i even buy a book, i will read the last page, perhaps even the last chapter, first.

so, dear teacher, and all others who have questionned why i allow this little behaviour to persist, i direct you to this quote:

of course, i'm being rude. i'm spoiling the ending, not only of the entire book, but of this particular piece of it. i have given you two events in advance, because i don't have much interest in building mystery. mystery bores me. it chores me. i know what happens and so do you. it's the machinations that wheel us there that aggravate, perplex, interest and astound me.

there are many things to think of. there is so much story.

--p. 243
The Book Thief
Marcu Zusak

the narrator, Death, has it exactly right. i care very little for a suspense novel (though, of course, i will read them, as well as romance, fantasy, cereal boxes, whatever i can get my hands on). i care very very much for the characters about whom i am reading and about their lives: their loves and hurts and fears and dreams and whatever else it is that makes a human being. i have certainly gone so far as to laugh out loud hysterically, or, more often, to cry a good hard cry. i'll cry even if its the fourth or fifth or tenth time (lions of al-rassan i am thinking of you!). but even when a book evokes such a response in me, it very rarely has to do with the ending of the book and more to do with the present.

so, i will continue my nasty little habit. and i will rest easy, knowing that there are others, even if that other is a fictional entity in one novel, that knows a little bit about what i am talking about.

did i say thank you kristen? thank you. what a wonderful book.

please score edmonton, please score!

its 2-0 carolina. i hate that this is the score. usually, i watch hockey all season. whether its my brother or room mates or friends or myself, i end up catching a decent amount of leafs games. it didn't happen this year. julia d. and i caught one game (actually i think i still owe her some money for that evening), but that was pretty much the extent of fanship. until game 5 of the stanley cup when the oilers' managed to score short handed in overtime. holy mother, that was exciting. so i watched the trouncing of the 'canes that occurred in game six. and now, now, i am watching game seven. and i find myself getting very very angry with the oilers. and that makes me realize why i had to stop watching hockey: i hate that i care. and if i don't watch, i don't care.

they just blew a five on three power play. and then took a weak hooking penalty. (for the record, if i was a coach and my player took an ass head penalty, i'd bench him. but both my father and my brother, who know so much more of the game than i do, have told me that this makes me a terrible coach.)

in brighter news, i got that job today. i start friday, its twenty five hours a week, and i work from home. it ends just before i go to scotland, it doesn't conflict with either my helpdesk job nor my course...all in all, i am pretty happy with it.

the king of bikes

i had an interview this morning. usually they ask nine million questions, from "what would you do in this situation" to "what are your strengths/weaknesses" to "why are you qualified for this position." you know, the standard, stupid, interview questions. i always thought that they were terrible but necessary. however, this morning, the interview was revolutionized. the woman, very friendly, young, pretty, smart, basically just declared that she had no idea logistically of what i would be doing, just that she had this general view of what the project was. (image indexing...it sounds great.) seriously, it lasted fifteen minutes. now, i just have to send her references and a letter of reference from a prof (uh oh) and she'll go from there. i have no idea how it went, if they'll call, whether it will come together...but i do know she said that i could work from home. and i am liking that very much.

this afternoon, jarrod and i headed to the bike repair shop. because you know, after you buy a bike, of course you need to get it repaired. damn it. actually, when i was in belgium, i rented a bike. and i rode it home. in the rain. and my pedal fell off. so, it was some kind of cosmic coincidence that jarrod and i rode our bikes all the way to canadian tire (but not in the rain, in the humidity) and on the way home, his pedal fell off. of course, also, we need to get his "cranks" replaced. i put it in quotes because i have no real idea what cranks are. however, i do believe, three days from now, our biking adventures will begin.

here's jarrod on his bike:


i think he's a happy boy. we're both on the job search, but whereas he's a little more antsy about finding work, i am happily settling into the routine of watching oprah everyday. i have the sneaky suspicion that this little vacation is coming to an end, so i am trying to appreciate it while its here.

OH! the best news: my grammy has officially booked our tickets to scotland! from august 03-14, my cousin sarah, my mom, my grandma and i will be gallavanting around scotland, visiting the places that i missed last time, but also visiting places that are sentimental for my grandma (being born and raised in glasgow). its one thing to visit a country that you know you come from: its completely another to visit it with a person whom you love and who can open the country in so many new ways. i am excited to travel, yes, but i am also excited to talk and to listen and to learn.

frustrated

there are several things that are going really well for me right now. my grammy just booked a trip to scotland for my cousin sarah, me, and her. my boyfriend just moved in and things are going so well that it makes me wonder how i could ever have hesitated. i have started running again, and though i am not nearly in the shape i once was, i am beginning to feel proud of myself. the weather is hot and sunny, but not humid. i am reading several books, i spend a lot of time drinking coffee, i am taking a summer course, like i said, things are looking swell.

except for one thing. my job. i have a job. technically. you wouldn't know it from the hours i work. actually, i am not even being paid anymore for the hours i go in, because i've used up all my training. and yet, i am still not on the schedule. there is no rush to put us on the schedule.

it is endlessly frustrating. i don't want to push, because, really i am liking this job, and the people, a whole heck of a lot. but at the same time, its been over a month, and well, i am getting ancy. i need to be doing something, putting some money in the bank. i was given the impression in the interview that i would be given weekly hours. and i'm not.

i have an interview on monday for a job that pays ten bucks an hour. and i am excited about it.