::alio!::

ideas for the new year

I'm still miffed about that paper. What bothers me most is that he spelled my NAME wrong, with two "L"s, even though three inches from where he wrote it was my name, PRINTED, spelled correctly! Grr.

My parents are home now. They came home a day early, which was quite the surprise for some of us, but it all worked out in the end.

OKAY! I just had a brilliant idea. It might not work, but it's an idea:

New Year's is always kind of a bust. We sit around, trying to make up a plan, then end up just hanging out at someone's house, waiting for midnight and drinking sub-par bubbly, which is all we can afford. So I think we should do something a little different this year.

I, for one, am all about a skating party. I was talking to Sarah on the phone and she thought it was a good idea (I give her half-credit for the notion). We either rent a place (I know Belltown is going to be empty for part of that Friday), or we sweet-talk Shannon into letting us use Bell, and we just skate around, maybe play some pickup or whatever, for a couple hours, then go somewhere and warm up with some beer and good friends. All you'd need is a pair of skates of some kind and maybe five bucks for rental.

Questions, comments? Email me: allythebell@gmail.com. All who are interested, lemme know.

HAte . . . PROf . . .

Workin' hard or hardly workin'?

The thermostat on my computer tells me that it's twenty-six degrees centigrade below zero outside. Without windchill. Who in their right mind decided to colonize this joint?

*bitter*

Ooh, I'm so ANGRY! I got my meditation essay back in the mail today: a B+! First of all, it was way better than a B+. I mean, please. I'm amazed that I managed to tie meditation and horseback riding together. It was a feat of genius. Secondly, I went and ASKED the prof for help on the damned thing. He told me to look in a certain database and read a certain article. I did both -- neither was particularly helpful. Then I get the essay back, and, as expected, every second page had a snarky comment on it, because, I'm assuming, I tried to avoid Buddhism, which he so loves. The worst comment, however, was on the front of the essay, along with that pitifully low mark. It was an admonition that the inclusion of the idea of "neuroplasticity" would have greatly enhanced my essay. a) WHAT THE HELL IS NEUROPLASTICITY, and b) WHY THE HELL DIDN'T YOU TELL ME TO LOOK IT UP IN THE FIRST PLACE?

Grr.

/rant. Out.

Christmas - a time for FREAKING OUT

Today the gods have decided to test my faith. They are placing bets to see how many Christmas card envelopes I can lick before I run out of saliva or die of glue intoxication.

I've done a couple hundred. I feel slightly ill and I think I have a papercut on my tongue.

On the plus side, it's FRIDAY. And I have my last hockey game tonight for three weeks. Next Friday is Christmas Eve, and the Friday after that is New Year's. Go figure. So it had better be good.

I've also figured out my dad. I rejected getting him clothes this year. So I'm getting him a cap from this neat fishing shop on Richmond called Orvis. Really nice stuff in there, but super expensive. I saw this sweater I liked but it was $200. The cap is significantly cheaper. They also have some nice gentleman's hats there, but they're also in the $200 range. But it's a NICE store. You should all go there if you want to get stuff for your dads. I think I'll also get him some fancy pickles from Bloblaws. He likes those.

Cait emailed me yesterday with the option of her purchasing her Christmas present and then just sending me the bill. I nixed that. She has to tell me where it is and then I'll go get it for her. ;) *sigh* It lacks a certain amount of originality, but she's hard to shop for. When you've known someone for TEN YEARS, you have to put some serious thought into a Christmas present.

This weekend should be busy as all hell. In addition to all the household chores I have to accomplish, Andy and I will also be putting up the Christmas tree (I think I have to cut some trunk off the bottom, too, boo), and perhaps Cait and I will give ourselves a dye job -- who knows? But I will basically be booked solidly busy until, say, Wednesday.

Why is life so busy? I have all this garbage to do, and I have to start working on my grad school applications, which I can't do, because Mr. Chris "the Stressinator" Bell has monopolized the computer for the past three days. And he refuses to shovel! And then there's Christmas, and I have to make time to see all the people who are coming in from out of town, at the same time entertaining Andrew, because none of his friends are coming into town and there's just me and Chris to hang out with . . .

Basically, I could give you a big list of all the things that are pressing to my existence. But I won't. This post is random and nonsensical enough. Out.

Goddamn songs

I have Electric Six's "I'm the Bomb" in my head. Don't get me wrong -- I love the song -- but having "3-2-1, I'm the boo-ooo-ooomb, and I'm ready to go off in your shiiiiip" repeating incessantly in my skull is starting to drive me slightly potty.

Man, I've been running all over the city with my head cut off these past few days. Doing a lot of chores at home (no thanks to CHRIS), trying to make Christmas happen without the supervision of the rest of the family.

Been spending a lot of time with my boy these past few days, trying to catch up on lost time. Last night he came over for dinner and I made Fettucine Alfredo with onions, mushrooms, and blue cheese in the sauce, garlic bread (you should have seen me trying to hack apart this ginormous baguette!), with blueberry pie for dessert (which I did not make myself, sorry).

We watched "Walking Tall," which I've been trying to see for months now, because in the trailer, there's this song that I LOVE, but have no idea what it's called. HOWEVER, said song appears NOWHERE in the movie itself. I feel gypped. As an interesting aside, the movie was filmed in the Sea-to-Sky Corridor in BC, near Squamish, which is very close to where I used to live. I recognized it right away. The only other place that looks like that is Norway, and it's more fjord-y.

It turns out I actually have a lot more time to do things than I did previously. This is a good thing. I was worried about the construction of Sarah's and Andy's presents. They're taking longer than anticipated. And I still haven't figured out what to get for Caitlin yet. She's the last person on my list.

But I don't have to go to that stupid lawyer party tonight, because the Wayner's sick. And I'm not going to Toronto to see Lisa, after all, because it was a logistical nightmare with no easy solution. So now I can accomplish things. Maybe sleep in a little more.

I'm not feeling all that well today, so I think I'll go home after work and have a nice hot bath, then veg out in front of the TV with one or more of my present projects. I'll go to bed early, get up early (I have charge of the dogs while the folks are away, and this means they wake me up when they want breakfast -- usually before dawn), go to work, and be all shiny smiley by tomorrow.

I hope.

And that's my story. Out.

Freedom!

Hello. Yes, I am still alive. And FREE. Oh, so free. This is when the non-academic responsibilities kick in. But meh. I can handle the frantic Christmas shopping, the hectic party schedules, the taking-care-of-two-retarded-dogs schtick. You know, the usual.

Yesterday was good. The show went remarkably well, considering the weather, and Sergeant's afterwards was fun. I got to have a good talk with Sharon, and get to know her a little bit better. So all was good.

I don't know how much I'll be posting this holiday season. I'm trying to get a lot of work done on my thesis (OH YEAH I'M IN WITH THE 'PIQUES HOW COOL IS THAT?), and I usually only have pithy things to say in here if I'm procrastinating. Just a warning so you don't get your hopes up. Plus, Andrew's home and this is his bedroom, so I feel back invading it all the time.

Now I have to go buy a Christmas tree.

working . . .

Completed essays:

"From Brass Casings to the Iron Ring: The Lamb Lamp in the Social Context of Railways and Engineers in Canada"
"Practice on the Mind, Practice on the Body: The Effects of Meditation on Athletic Performance"
"Closing Time: A Gendered Situational Analysis of Last Call at Brady's Bar"

I would have been finished sooner, but Stefan called me and stressed me out. Don't DO that to me! Thanks for the flugel, by the way.

I just have an exam left now, in social psych. It's 9:00 AM Friday morning, somewhere in the UniCentre. I'll study for it tomorrow when I get home from work.

Now I should go and give my brother Andrew back his bedroom.

In case you wanted to know

Did ya ever wonder why women go to the bathroom together? And why it's called a "restroom"?

"In modern times, mating pairs appear naked to each other and are even likely to employ a bathroom at the same time. But beyond this, the mature genitalia of one sex is not supposed to be exposed to the eyes of the other sex. Furthermore, although it is recognized that persons of both sexes are somewhat similar in the question of waste products and their elimination, the environment in which females engage in this act ought (we in America apparently feel) to be more refined, extensive, and elaborate than that required for males. Presumably out of consideration for the arrangement between the sexes in general, and the female sex-class in particular, it has come to pass, then, that almost all places of work and congregation are equipped with two sets of toilet facilities (a case of parallel organization), differentiated with respect to quality. A case of separate and unequal. Therefore, in nearly every industrial and commercial establishment, women will be able to break off being exposed to males and their company and retire into an all-female enclave, often in the company of a female friend, and there spend time in toiletry, a longer time presumably, and perhaps more frequently, than males spend in their segregated toilet, and under more genteel environmental conditions. A resting room that is sex-segregated (as many are) may extend this divided realm. There is thus established a sort of with-then-apart rhythm, with a period of the sexes being immersed together followed by a short period of separation, and so on. (Bars, gyms, locker rooms, pool rooms, etc., accomplish the same sort of periodic segregation, but from the male side, the difference being that whereas female redoubts tend to be furnished more genteely than the surrounding scene, male redoubts [at least in the U.S.] are often furnished less prepossessingly than the surround.) This same pattern seems to be extended outward from toilets and resting rooms to larger domains. Large stores have floors which merge the sexes by also smaller zones which offer one-sex merchandise patronized very largely by that sex alone. Schools provide coeducational classes, punctuated by gym, sports, and a few other activities that are sex-segregated."

Goffman, Erving (1977). "The Arrangement between the Sexes." Theory and Society 4(3):301-331, pp. 315-316.

Whoops.

Oh crap.

One of the problems about being really nice to someone for their express benefit is it sometimes ends up turning around after you've walked away, glowing with righteous good-samaritanship, and bites you in the ass. HARD.

I have been partly responsible for making someone's life better (although I don't want to be there when she makes the announcement, because hell is going to BOIL), but in doing so, I have made my own fall spectacularly into shittiness.

Meaning?

I need to find a new job. STAT.

I am officially looking, if you know someone who's hiring. Ideally, I'd like it to be hockey or sport related, so I can get research experience and get paid for it. But I'm not too picky.

So if you know someone . . . lemme know.

define "fucktard."

Welcome to Alison's Angry Hour.

I'm trying to write this bloody essay on Meditation. 'Cept it has to connect with my thesis topic, which is, of course, Rituals and Superstition in Professional Sports.

How does one do that?

More correctly, how does one do that when Prattis is involved? Good question. How do I connect the works of the great symbolic anthropologist to my essay? Even better question. And how do I connect them in such a way as to get a stupid good mark on my essay, so stupid good in fact, that the famous Prattis will bend over backward to write me grad school references? That, folks, is the question of the day.

Ooh, I'm so angry at him and his arrogance! I got shot down during a presentation in his class because the author I was citing was outdated and inaccurate. Then I go to his site this afternoon and I find that, in some of his BRILLIANT works, he CITES THE SAME GUY! And there are no dates of publication on ANY of his works. GAH. How the FUCK do I cite them?

Fucking fucktard of a fuctard . . .

*stomps off in a black cloud*

Working title

I had to stay late at work, which caused the annoying client for whose sake I was staying try to embarass me and himself by giving me $1.50 for a coffee. What am I, your waitress? Do NOT try to tip me. That's just offensive.

Anyway, tonight is Essay Night. I'm skipping hockey tonight in order to get this done, so it'd better be nearing completion by the time I go to bed, because I intend this to be the ONLY hockey game I ever miss, willingly or otherwise.

Even Andypie is leaving me to my own devices and going Christmas shopping. So it's just me, my computer, my notes, my NERDS, and the oh-so-powerful lure of the Intarweb . . . but I will resist that temptation. Hell, I have blow torches and the social responsibility of Canadian Engineers to write about!

Out.

snowflakes keep falling on my head

Folks, I bring you THE BLIZZARD!

Very pretty, but hardly practical. JB must be thrilled. I am less than thrilled. Time to break out the winter boots and hat. I guess the weather decided to make up for the fact that it hasn't really snowed enough to stick yet, and so it's dumping on us all day. If you're driving today, folks, drive carefully. Everyone in the city will have forgotten how to drive in the snow, and they'll be psychotic. Plus, Bush has to head off to Halifax today, so that will not help the traffic snarls.

Right now, I'm sitting on my ass appreciating the different kind of light that filters inside when it snows. It's a cozy sort of light, makes me want to go back to bed . . . *shakes self* But I must not! I slept far too late today (I got up fifteen minutes ago). I have fifteen minutes of class (read: a private meeting with my HRP supervisor) at 11:45, so I'm contemplating getting ready to go to school. I'm reluctant, however, because when I come back, I have to write an entire essay. Or most of one. I love my life . . .

Peace.