Just walked in the door -- 10:40 p.m. and I left my apartment at 6:40 this morning. Crazy stuff. I wanted to go to work a little early this morning so I could work on some school stuff before my actual work hours started, I knew somehow I'd be able to focus better at my desk there in the wee hours of the morning than I would have been able to here at home. Then of course, a day of continuing prep for tomorrow, ending in tearing my hair out due to a Netscape/CSS thing (okay, so what else is new?)... inconsistency across browsers, do not get me started, I have been going on about this for YEARS... then I left work and went to school... my class that goes til 9 went a bit overtime, but that's okay, because it was an interesting class and I'm getting to know a few of the people in it. :) So, you'd think I'd be nice and ready to come home and collapse into a heap somewhere, but I still had a few things I had to do, including getting a car wash, because good grief, the parking lot I'm in at school uses gravel and it's DUSTY. Every vehicle that parks there comes out coated in dust and dirt. I imagine that will change once it sno-- ack. I forgot. I once banned that s-word from my vocabulary, and a friend and I have decided we will try it again this season-that-comes-after-fall. Anyway, you know what I mean.
So, finally home. Just in time to go to bed! Well no, not immediately, by 12:30 for sure, though. And tomorrow is Friday! (Yes, I know, thank you Little Miss Obvious. It is a miracle that I still know this by this point, though, so let's delight in the small things, m'kay?)
That said, time to watch a bit of The Bachelor... we had to cancel our The Bachelor night as it appears all of us had quite the nice load of school work. It's funny. We were all off of school last year, either because we had just finished one degree, or because of a co-op year, and this year we're all back in school. I made sure to tape it, though. It is the one remaining item within current pop culture that I might actually be up on. Time to enjoy the remaining couple of waking hours of the night with some mindless entertainment!
Right about now, I'm usually kind of incoherent, but I made it, and I'm going to post regardless :)
Tuesday night at 9 o'clock brings this indescribable, accomplished or maybe triumphant kind of feeling. Neither of those words accurately describe it, but it's the feeling I get after having just gotten through the most challenging 48 hours of my week. On Monday, I'm at work for 8 1/2 hours and then in class for another 3; on Tuesday, I'm at work for 5 1/2 hours and in class for another 6. So, 14 hours at work, 9 in class. The rest of my week tends to have a bit more breathing room, one more day of work followed by an evening class, and two days where I'm just at work. In case anyone is trying to figure out how I get the 40-hour work week when I leave early on Tuesdays, the other four days are extended by a bit, so 8 1/2 hours three days a week, and 9 hours one other day. Quite honestly, this was almost normal where I used to work; not because it was requested, but due to the high volume of work we had. Once I switched jobs, though, it was quite amazing to fall back into the pattern of oh, right, I can leave after 8 hours without an attack of "but what about all these other things we have to do and...?" No one would ever ask me to stay (unless we're counting national health emergencies or something, and even then, it usually wasn't me who was staying or on call, just a couple of times), it was just this work ethic and need to keep on top of things that caused it to happen. Oh, and we had too much work. But that's a long story, and this isn't the place to talk about it.
Last night was fun, after my class that all of us in the program have together, I decided to stick around and join some of them at the grad pub on campus... it's actually kind of a quiet, cozier place. The best thing ever was when our prof brought a pitcher of beer and a ton of glasses over to the table. Yes, we have generous, friendly faculty.
The really weird thing is how incredibly extroverted I am around everyone I'm meeting from my program. Sometimes in situations where I don't know people, I can be quiet until I warm up to them... no, really, I'm serious. Ask anyone who's gone from someone I didn't know too well to a friend. The same people who have commented that I'm really quiet now know the truth that if you get me talking, it just doesn't end. ;) But this extrovertedness seems to be a good thing, because I've met a lot of really cool people and it's fun, this social aspect of grad school.
Right now, though, I just really want some quiet, reflective, peaceful time to relax, let my brain have a break after back-to-back classes... although I do have some reading to do. Heh, that is becoming my new favourite saying, but only because it's true!
Yup. I should have sequestered myself inside my apartment all weekend, after an interesting horoscope or two and hearing TSTSNBHBME. Not that anything remotely big or catastrophic has happened, no, just that when I've been out this weekend, it has not been altogether good. I am a wee bit apprehensive of what this may be a prelude to.
Building on that last point, it appears I have run out of patience for many things. I am also tending to express this when I've had enough of hearing about particular things. Please don't take this personally, if you are a friend I've reacted about this to -- I still love ya. I just woke up entirely intolerant this weekend.
I think now that I've started getting spam mail about how to avoid getting spam mail such as said spam mail is (an advertisement for a spam filter), it is time to turn the "greylisting" feature my domain provider offers back on.
I have done more reading than you want to know about this weekend, with still more to read today. I could ramble on and on to you about curiosity in a selection of Journal of the Plague Year, or theory about literary theory, or what I've read up to so far about queer theory, but just don't ask me something simple like, "How are you?" I might have to deconstruct that and theorize upon it.
I have also written out my ideas, viewpoints, and arguments for my position piece, hopefully to be made coherent by tonight.
Yoga, how I need thee.
I bought a baby Foreman grill this weekend. It started off as a quest for a metal garbage can for the kitchen. Don't ask. The retirement party for the old electric grill is pending.
Coffee is, quite possibly, a gift from the gods.
This space for rent. I don't really have a ninth item for my list.
I really need to get back to doing something productive right about now.
It's Friday, and I cannot think of an interesting entry title...
Friday night, and let me say, it's good to be home right now. I've had a very busy week, three nights of the last five really only home to sleep. But, I made it. My first full week of school and work.
I'm hanging around home for most of this weekend, because I have some reading to do and three assignments to work on. Tonight I chose to stay in, because what I wanted to do most was first go pick up the books and coursepack for my course we just got the final reading list and locations of the books and coursepack for (none of my classes have gone with the university's bookstore, which although in some ways has its drawbacks, its benefits are that it has let me discover two bookstores in the city that I hadn't yet, and shown me just how wonderful and accomodating the people at Allegra Print & Imaging are, having gone out of their way to help me solve a conflict of my work hours and their business hours), then come home, have a nice, long, hot shower, and change into my soft, fuzzy, comfy red sweater and favourite light beigey-white PJ pants, make some chocolate chip muffins, turn on the TV and just relax for awhile before tackling some reading.
After all four classes and a 40-hour work week, I really don't feel any different than I do at the end of a regular week, or make that what used to be a regular week, just work and not school. Not drained, and not overwhelmed as long as I keep on top of things. I do have plans for tomorrow night, and I'll be going to yoga on Sunday, so life isn't too much different except that I'm really busy during the week, I get to read things other people have chosen for me, and am feeling my brain switch back on into a mode where I can think and analyze.
I love being back in school. I love the fact that something can hold my attention for three hours at a time, intrigue me, get me to think, and that I'm once again learning new things. I love that I can leave work and go somewhere where I am thinking about and discussing things that are completely different from what I do all day. I love the energy it gives me, the feeling that I'm doing something useful and productive, and the social aspect of meeting new people. It's like waking up after being asleep in some ways for over a year. Yes, it's a lot of work, but it's wonderful. :)
A backrub right about now, though, would be heaven.
A good weekend to all, and happy new TV season. This week marks the return of girls' night with the premiere of the new season of The Bachelor, so also exciting. :)
Maybe it's because I'm an incurable clotheshorse. Maybe it's because where I'm most often around guys is at work, and while my workplace is without a formal dresscode and you can choose how casual you want to be, guys still respect that four days out of five, one should dress, well... anywhere between looking like they just stepped out of an ad for a more trendy, younger men's clothing store to somewhere beyond it being a weekend afternoon where they are going nowhere, seeing no one, and have big plans to sit in front of the TV drinking beer but happen to, for some reason, not be doing this in their underwear. What I mean, is that even when dressed casually, they still somehow have a very nice, pleasing appearance all-round, attire included. I like this. A lot.
Yes, dammit, I'm shallow and I'll admit it. Not in judging people by their physical appearance, i.e. face and body and that's all; I detest this more than I can say simply because it bothers me to no end if that's how someone judges me, rather than by taking the time to get to know me as a person, to find, respect and be attracted to the little, non-physical things that make me who I am. I do, however, believe that appearance is important. I think making the effort to be clean and well-kept within your own means says at least a small bit about a person, and yes, it's something that I find attractive in a guy. Now, everyone has their days, I certainly have my days, and there is nothing wrong with that -- it's expected and, depending on the person, sometimes rather endearing. The dishevelled, scruffy look can make me melt, so long as this is not one's usual, 75-90% of the time standard look.
There is a slight problem, however, that a lot of guys in their early to mid-twenties fail to see the point of anything more than a slightly dirty, maybe kind of ratty pair of jeans and some kind of old t-shirt, and have yet to seek out a haircut that they can both have fun with and that suits them. If observation holds true, many will not for a couple or a few more years. Maybe they just haven't yet developed a sense of their own, personal style. Maybe they haven't had to, going from school to a more casual work environment, or to yet more school. There does come a time when this seems to change for the majority of them. For my own purely shallow and selfish sake, I wish it would come sooner. It would quell this overwhelming urge to first take them to my hairdresser for a more suiting hairstyle, and then to Le Chateau for some wardrobe replacement therapy. (I'm pretty sure this would be therapy for me, by the way.)
I do realize that I sound entirely pretentious, but I'm not meaning to be. I just find it attractive when people care about how they look a bit, that's all. Not in a vain, self-centred, stop-in-every-mirror kind of way, but a respectful of their own appearance kind of way. You know, before one day, in a fit of some kind of exasperated delirium, I send Queer Eye for the Straight Guy after all of you. Sigh.
Essays are a little piece of heaven compared to tile grout
As is becoming the standard for me on Saturdays, I was up at the crack of 8, and by 10 had done several loads of laundry, played some Pogo and cleaned the bathroom tile around the tub... I hate tile grout like you would not believe. This may be because I feel it necessary to first scrub the grout itself with a scouring sponge, row by row, column by column, and tackle the tiles, one at a time. Takes forever. Clean, though. But this is just one example of why it can take me hours upon hours to clean an already-clean apartment.
And, enough of the boring cleaning stuff. The last couple of days have been very different, and very busy. Thursday marked the start of school, and wow, did that first class ever feel odd. Of course, I was already not in the best headspace when I got there, after some things at work, after being out several times in the remnants of Hurricane Frances, and after the challenge of getting from the parking lot to my class in the first place. After I dodged the mini-lakes in the parking lot, I headed for the tunnels, only to find that there were a few lakes in the tunnels as well.
My Thursday class is the fourth year honours seminar that I am taking for grad credit this term -- this is pretty standard among all Masters programs, at least at Carleton, as I had M.A. students in my fourth year seminars, as well as M.J. students in my fourth year journalism seminars and professional practices workshop courses. This could be part of why I felt a little out-of-place at first, though. There are a couple of other grad students in the class, but the majority of the students are those set to graduate this year, and none of their faces were familar to me, because they would have been finishing second year when I graduated. Thursday was a bit of a shock to the system, as I've been away from this for 17 months, and I did have a bout of the "Oh dear God, what have I gotten myself into?" anxiety, but I've settled down a bit now.
Yesterday afternoon there was an orientation session for the grad students in my program, and then a reception with the faculty of the department. I started feeling a lot more comfortable and a lot better about things after that. I also solved the mystery of why this one particular seminar filled up so quickly during registration... and I am pretty sure that, excluding maybe one or two students, it has nothing to do with an extreme interest in or popularity of a particular genre of literature, and more to do with the prof. Hell, I probably would have signed up for the class had I known. ;) However, I think this prof started teaching at Carleton last year, so there's no way that I could have. I'm willing to place bets that the great majority of the class is made up of female students who finished their undergrad at Carleton last spring, though, LOL.
Lots to do this weekend, though. Reading, questions to prepare answers for, and perhaps I'll work on my first "think piece" for my Thursday class. Maybe a yoga class tomorrow, maybe get a bit more cleaning done, see and talk to some friends... then it'll be Monday and a jam-packed week of all four of my classes. I am going to be anything but bored between now and December.
A day such as today is made for one thing, and one thing alone. As rain pelts the window, as the wind tosses the trees to and fro, I long to be curled up on my incredibly comfy marshmallow bed or my couch with someone warm and yummy-smelling, wrapped up in a soft blanket, the room smelling of cinnamon, hazelnut coffee and buttercream, from the candles that give a soft glow as they burn, chasing away any dampness that may linger in the air. Snuggly. Content.
It's that nervous little feeling before the start of something new
And so here I am. My last official night of summer. My last night of this particular groundlessness. Tomorrow, the start of a year-long commitment, and total schedule chaos.
It is sweet, blessed relief in terms of something productive to occupy my mind and my time; it will keep me out of trouble (or so one may hope); it is something that I really, really want to do and achieve. I applied a year ago, and six months ago they said yes. In a way there are a few things to prove, for going in with a combined honours degree to my name, a degree in journalism and English, my undergrad courseload was one with which I had little leeway for electives outside required courses in English. It's a challenge to myself to show myself just as capable and then some as those with oodles more "formal" study. In a few ways, though, I know that my background in journalism works in my favour.
Bah. Nerves of the unknown. Of being out of school for 17 months, and worried that I've become a little bit rusty. Of knowing, like with so many things in the last couple of tumultuous years, that this is a big change, that this may bring about other big changes, as big changes do seem to bring about such a ripple effect. Nerves as I embrace this ever-changing life, something so very difficult for a stubborn Taurean like myself to do. Comfort, for me, has usually come from things that I know and can depend on to be there, to be the same. Stability. Yet that old notion, that old method of deriving comfort has been something that has been forcibly tossed to the wayside in the last couple of years, because life just said no, you're due for a massive shakeup with a little bit of breathing space in between so you don't become entirely unglued from trying to adapt to it all at once. Get through this and we'll throw you that. Succeed, but don't get too comfortable.
It all happens for reasons, I know. If everything was the same, all of the time, for your entire life, it could probably turn into a rut. You would do things and stay with things that maybe weren't, in the end, best for you at all, for the sake of stability. I know this, I've been guilty of this, until the universe said a big no way Jose -- you need this out of your life and this in your life, you need to feel unsettled for awhile in order to strive for something more, to understand what it is you truly want from life. It's gonna suck some days, oh yes, it's going to make you question everything you know. Some days you'll be exhuberant, and some days you'll just curl into a ball and cry. It's going to make you wrack your brain for reasons, it's going to leave you with questions you may never be able to answer. But most of all, and most importantly, it's going to make you live.
Such productivity for a Saturday... scary, isn't it?
Wow. 12:11 p.m. as I type this, and I've already done a few things today. I woke up, for some reason, just after 7:45 this morning, lazed around in bed for a bit, got up, made coffee and had breakfast, read my e-mail (thank you, A.P., for the advice re: car shopping and great news from your end), checked in at some message boards, read my horoscope, played some Pogo Canasta, then got dressed, went out and got a car wash, then to a yoga centre so I could get a class package and a new sticky mat (cos I wasn't using a sticky mat before and I wanted one), then Wal-Mart after that, now back home for lunch and I'll probably do some reading for a bit before I head back out to look for a few things.
This is an abnormal amount of activity for me before 1 p.m. on a Saturday, which is why I'm detailing it. Who am I, and what have I done with the girl who loves weekend laze?
Seems I am turning into a wake-up-early person against my will. That's okay, though, because then I can get lots done in the morning and just veg in the afternoon. Or, as is the case today, vegging being reading that is actually something productive, since it's for a class. There are a lot of things I need to get done this weekend, though.
Back to the yoga package... I was sad earlier this week, when I got an e-mail from the instructors of the yoga classes I took from last fall until the spring (we had the summer off), about classes starting again next Monday. I lurrrved that class, but I have classes at school on Monday nights now, both terms. I am hoping that I can drop in from time to time if I ever have a class that ends early enough or is cancelled for some reason... if not, I can do a spring session with them if they do one this year. But after the summer off from yoga, I need it. I will especially need it to just unwind and rejuvenate over the fall and winter. One good thing about where I will be going is they have Kundalini classes at some point every day of the week. So, if I'm not at work or in class and need a yoga pick-me-up, I can go.
Shiver... chatter... minus a billion and one... or is that a spillion and five below? INDOORS.
I would like to start by saying that I'm not a piece of meat.
Apparently, though, someone has it stuck in their head that the building I work in is actually doubling as a public servant meat locker. You're going to find me there one day, hand frozen to my computer mouse, snowed in to my chair, with icicles decorating my cube and polar ice caps drifting through the hallways.
I know, I know. I do get cold easier than a lot of people. However, the other day I had a meeting in a different building, and I was perfectly comfortable and warm wearing a skirt and a sleeveless shirt. My sweater remained with my purse, beside me on the floor, and I was not cold at all.
This I offer as proof that I am not just whining. Even my boss comes over, frozen through-and-through, saying we must go outside to warm up. You know, if we were running laps around the floor and doing drills up and down the stairwells, there might be a reason for this artificial ice age. Unless this is their way of getting us to participate in Stairway to Health... hmmm... and that does belong to my Centre... I'm getting a little suspicious now. (Work joke. 99.9% of you are not going to follow that unless you go Googling or something.)
This week, I graduated from being just "Parka Girl" -- along with my big woolen sweater, I now also have a fleece throw blanket to wrap around my legs on the days I'm wearing skirts. Even if they are ankle-length skirts. You all should have seen me yesterday. The moral of the story is, us Canadians don't get enough practice with A/C and thus get a little overexcited and overzealous with the controls once the calendar tells us it's spring. And then we keep it on til October. Even when there is frost overnight. Even when we can see our breath in the air. Which? I could when I left my apartment this morning.
But enough about that. It's almost the long weekend -- my last weekend of freedom and general sloth-like laziness. I'm excited, because a friend and I are going to the Psychic, Mystics and Seers Fair. I mentioned here, a couple of months back, that I'd seen a psychic just over six years ago. I think it could be interesting to see if there are any similarities at all in the readings, for the longer-term things.
Now, if the internet commenting application spam artist/robot/annoying mofo known as bob@yVariousNumericEntitieso.com with all sorts of IP addresses could kindly eff off, that would make me very happy. Darn search engines that have indexed the Movable Type directory. Yahoo! Slurp, I'm looking at you.
Must go be halfway responsible now and do some reading... or be slightly less responsible and play Pogo Canasta. Stop looking at me like that. Don't knock it til you've tried it, and are up til all hours of the night coveting those elusive red 3s... Canasta. A mystery finally solved for those under 65, and a new sport for the 2008 Olympic Summer Games...
