I got a very nice email from the chair of the sociology department at Dalhousie last night, advising me that they had chosen not to accept me into their program.
So it looks like I'm going to be around for some time yet.
Don't fret yourself - other than being disappointed, I'm pretty much fine. I mean, it's not like it was entirely unexpected.
My main concern these days, actually, is of the financial sort. I don't want to give up the Bark & Fitz job, because I'm really enjoying it, but the owner can't give me more than part time hours. So I need to find some more transcription or research work that I can do from home two or three days a week.
Or if you know someone who needs something done (like a garage/basement cleaned out and organized) and is willing to pay for it, lemme know!
I had my official interview yesterday at Bark & Fitz. As I'd already pretty much guaranteed myself the job through email, this was more of a this-is-what-your-schedule-will-look-like, meet-and-greet, and here's what you have to learn before you start type meeting.
I have to become an expert in canine and feline nutrition before I start on 1 April.
So I don't start cold, I'm going to do a few hours of unpaid (I think) job shadowing, just so I can see what's what. I haven't used a cash register in five years - I'm bound to be a little rusty.
see a cool blue passion flower on sweet night earth
imagine this peace as a dance to secret beauty
through want some live in easy need -
crazy power is her sad little playing
feel free together now
learn about self: I am his girl
kiss the day loudly
think like green songs
know fire and say with love
we may not run lost - time filled us out
let it go for me.
So I got another rejection letter today, this one from Simon Fraser. So Michigan's out, SFU is out . . . keep your fingers crossed for Dalhousie.
I knew that B+ would hurt me.
Ah well, if at first you don't succeed and all that.
On the streets of Philadelphia.
So my journey is almost over. In two hours I will board my final flight home, and two and a half hours after that, I will be there.
It’s just after 7 AM, and I’m now in Terminal F at the Philadelphia airport. There are no power outlets, pretzel shops, or free WiFi stations here. Good thing I bought a billion books in Las Vegas, terrible though they are – I’m on my third since this afternoon.
I’m awfully tired. There was an obnoxious woman on my flight who was subsequently on my shuttle from Terminal A to F, and she kept trying to initiate conversation with me. I pretended I was American and ignored her.
The flight was long, but okay. It’s kind of annoying being the only person awake on a flight – I feel guilty to have my light on. But it’s nice to be able to be awake to see the sun come up when you’re flying over the horizon.
Also there was a ridiculously hot flight attendant who held my interest for a while. He was made up of all kinds of good, and was very pretty to look at. I’ll be taking a pond-hopper back home, unfortunately, so, unless the co-pilot is hot, that’s it for aesthetics for me.
More later – I’m going to see if I can’t find myself a pretzel somewhere . . .
p.s. Lisa, those organic fruit bars from Trader Joe’s? Very good – made in CANADA. Go figure.
8:23 AM
Got me a pretzel, but it wasn’t very good – I suspect it was stale. I got it from some weird kiosk, not the store I got it from last time. Alas. However, the airline pretzels coming out of Philly aren’t the regular US Air ones – they’re special, and they’re oh-so-good. I do suspect, though, that with the non-service of this flight, I won’t benefit from that.
Just got my gate changed from F5, to F29 – that was a trek. I thought only Newark liked to do that to you last minute . . .
7:30 PM
Yep. I’m home. Came home, distributed presents, opened my much-anticipated rejection from University of Michigan, then PASSED OUT.
Man, this airport is weird.
I mean, it's not really THAT different from any other, save that all you can hear is the hubbub of Southern conversations and the ding-a-ling of the slot machines.
(One look at the vapidly dependant sloths occupying the majority of the machines turned me off putting even one single through that dangerous slippery slope of a slot).
Aside from the bright lights and the ridiculous signage for Chippendale's (EVERYWHERE), there are also people scattered throughout, camped for however long on the floor, vagabonds dependent on the electrical outlets that will provide their laptops with much needed power. For the number of people lying prone in corners and against walls, one would think there has been a natural disaster and they are displaced. I suppose, in a way, they are displaced, but it is a strange thing to see nonetheless.
I, however, have only a few more minutes in this many-horsed town. I saw the strip as we were landing. It's right next to the airport. Had I had longer here, I may have slipped through security for a few minutes, just to get the ambiance of that decadent street. In any case, I won't be here long enough to need to wrestle any of the carpet's inhabitants for a power outlet. I can do that in my million hours in Philadelphia.
My computer, which has faithfully maintained Ottawa time since I departed, tells me it is now 1:05 AM. My cellphone, that traitor, tells me it is 10:04 PM. It's hard to know what to believe in this weird world of in-between.
Nevertheless, I'm glad to be going home. I've been doing a lot of travelling since I got to America, and it will be nice to stay in one spot for more than 24 hours. in addition, I've been suffering from these really debilitating headaches since my trip started. I suspect it has a lot to do with the sudden changes in altitude as I went from a plane to the coast to the mountains to the high desert to the low desert to the mountains to the coast and then up into a plane again. So I hope they stop when I get home, whenever that is.
Other than that, I haven't been able to find a keychain in this airport that costs less than $20, so that puts paid to my attempt to get Erin a keychain from every city I visit.
But I should go and see if I can get myself a juicy romance novel for the long flight across the country.
Later.
Portland Airport
So I'm about fifteen minutes from boarding my flight to Las Vegas. I'm a little miffed now that I'm not going through Phoenix, but only because I wanted to buy those geckoes for my mother.
Anyway, I'm assuming now that most airports have internet - this is way cool, because it's free!
Today was pretty low-key. I woke up early and double-checked my packing before having a shower. Lisa got up about twenty minutes before we were due at the spa and then we were on our way. We both thought it would be weird to have a massage, but it totally wasn't - it was great. Remind me to make it a regular part of my routine - when I'm rich, of course, because it cost me $170 for the both of us, including tip. On the way back to Nate's parents' house we stopped at Haystack Rock so I could take pictures. It was so windy we were nearly blown over!
We left Cannon Beach at that point and headed back to the city. Nate's parents were out so I didn't get to say goodbye, which was sad, but I'll send them a card. The drive back to Portland was uneventful, and we took a bit of a walk after I managed to magically fit everything I bought into my suitcases. The weather was really warm and nice - it will be hard to go back to -40 weather.
This is going to be a long night for me, especially because I had a full day. I'll see if I can update you on my slot machine wins in Vegas!
Tata.
Today was pretty easy-going. We woke up relatively late and headed into Nehalem for breakfast at Wanda's (we're at Cannon Beach now). We did ourselves some shopping and had a little fun, then met Nate and his parents for a drink at the Warren House in Cannon Beach. So we're now a little tipsy. Whoops. But it was fun. This evening we might catch a movie (stupid Pie saw 300 without us), but then again, we might not.
The weather this past day and a half hasn't been all that clement. Fifty mile an hour winds and whatnot. I ony hope it clears up tomorrow so I can get pictures of Haystack Rock, which is beautiful.
I have to say that I'm pretty ready to come home now, which is good, because I'm on my way back tomorrow - I miss my own bed, and I'll be thankful to sleep in it for a while, even though I've been having a great time.
So I probably won't get to post tomorrow, at least not until I get home on Monday - because I have an overnight flight - so I'll probably talk to y'all when I get back to Canadia - which is what everyone calls it here.
Until then!
a
Day 6
This day was mostly uneventful. We had a lovely breakfast in Bend, and ordered two enormous cinnamon buns to go – we still haven’t finished the first one.
We spent a longer than intended at a better than expected museum a few miles out of Bend, and then headed towards Sisters, a tiny cowboy town in the high desert. It wasn’t as interesting as we had thought, and we were running late, so we headed for the coast and Newport.
We didn’t get there until after dark, and, after getting lost a few times on bad directions, barely made our reservation at the Saffron Salmon. AND WE HAD CRAB. It was good.
This hotel, the Sylvia Beach Hotel, is a reading hotel. All the rooms are decorated and named after famous writers. We are staying in the Herman Melville room. There’s a very ugly whale lamp that I have to take a picture of. We spent a lot of last night just tiptoeing around, so as not to disturb the other guests, who are reading all over the place. There are also two cats with whom Lisa is quite taken: Dickens and Shelley.
Day 7
This morning we ate breakfast with the guests, and sat with a peculiar psychic from Seaside OR. Odd, odd man.
Today we plan to do a little shopping, go to the aquarium, maybe get a massage (we didn’t have time yesterday), and then head to our final destination of Cannon Beach, where I will hopefully have internet.
Until then . . .
********
[later]
We made it to Cannon Beach, but not without spending a lot of money and eating a lot of seafood on the way.
Still no massage, but that's tomorrow for sure this time.
The aquarium was pretty awesome, and I bought some presents for my parents (I couldn't help it), but other than that, it was pretty unremarkable. Back into the mountains and the beach again to arrive at Nate's parents' house, which is lovely. We had a great dinner and are now just digesting the spoils of the day, all plugged into our respective computers. It's very social. I'm currently stealing internet from the neighbours so I'll keep this short.
More tomorrow, and more pictures, of course!
*EDIT* Just learned that Flickr is currently broken, so you'll have to wait a little longer for pictures of the past two days. Sorry. Blame Flickr.
Howdy.
We're about to head off to a mountain place called Sisters en route to Newport, and we plan to visit a desert museum on the way.
I just thought I'd mention that McMenamins is super cool. We watched part of The Departed last night on a couch in a movie theatre that serves a lovely beer made with raspberries. Then we took a soak in the Turkish bath. Which was amazing. Some low-chlorine, salty water, a fountain, stained glass, and an open sky so the steam rose into the night.
It was AWESOME.
So we're going to pack up all our free wine (which we didn't have last night, because we were drinking beer - we're in a brewery) and head out. I'll take more pictures. Of course.
Stay tuned.
p.s. Happy Birthday to me.
Tonight we're staying at McMenamins in Bend. It's a mincrobrewery/hotel here in the city that used to be a seminary. We're staying in a room that's named after one of the first students at the St. Francis School (which McMenamins took over). It's got its own theatre and a Turkish soaking bath, which we're planning on visiting later. We've got to digest our dinner at another microbrewery - Deschutes.
I'm very impressed with this hotel, really. Each and every room is wheelchair accessible. Even the bathrooms have safety bars and seats in the shower. I recommend this place to all.
Right now we're recovering from a morning tubing session on the hill at Mount Hood, and then a long drive through the desert. The pictures are quite spectacular - we kept ending up at the bottoms of canyons.
Other than the ridiculous scenery and the long drive, the day has been pretty unremarkable. We visited a museum in Warm Springs about the native tribes in the area - I felt really guilty on behalf of all the white folk who stole their land - Lisa felt no such qualms because she's brown. Damnit.
Soo . . . yeah. That's about it. Tonight's going to be very low-key. Tomorrow we're going to hit a desert museum and see some stuff, like a lava tube maybe . . . oh yeah, and it's my birthday tomorrow too. Weird. The big 2-5.
Anyway, I gotta post some new pictures for you.
p.s. Dad, what was that type of wood that you and Andrew and I saw in that store in Oregon the last time I was there? There were all these stores for it by the Californian border. Anyone?
Day 4
I’m trying to type this quietly while Lisa sleeps on the bunk below me. It’s actually 1:00 AM on Day 5, but I don’t like to sweat the small stuff.
I will tell you that today has probably been one of the most ridiculous days of my life.
After leaving Portland relatively early this morning, we headed off the highway and enjoyed some ridiculously pretty scenery.
We were nearly blown over by a ridiculously high wind while visiting Vista House, overlooking the Columbia River Gorge.
Then, for some reason, we decided to climb a ridiculously steep mountain at Multnomah Falls in order to see the state’s second tallest year round waterfall. It was hard on the knees and the lungs, but it was worth it.
We took a break in Hood River for lunch and some dallying. I sent off a free postcard to my parents. Lunch was had at one of the town’s breweries, atop a hill and beside a ridiculously long staircase. I had a ridiculously good salad. Greens, honey roasted walnuts, gorgonzola, and a dressing with some kick.
Finally we hit the higher latitudes on our way to Mount Hood and Timberline Lodge. It is, predictably, on the timberline to this very impressive mountain. It took a while to get decent photos, because haze set in and we could only see an outline of our destination. After a long time of driving through some treacherous mountain roads and watching the snow banks on the side climb to an alarmingly high level, I at last got a decent picture of our imminent host. I hope to get a good one as well tomorrow when we leave.
Timberline Lodge was built in the days of President Franklin and hasn’t been updated since. It’s AWESOME. The exterior of the lodge was actually used in the film The Shining – which is on loan at the front desk. The first two floors of this three-story lodge are actually covered in snow – there’s been a lot of snow recently. Our room is on the first floor, and from the top bunk of my lavish 8 x 10, $100 a night room, I can get a spectacular view of a wall of snow. Which actually turned out to be very convenient for us. The ghetto rooms on the first floor (next floor up add an extra hundred bucks) don’t get ice buckets. No problem – we followed in the footsteps of those who came before and inserted our “three-buck Chuck” into the snow bank to cool down.
After reflectively consuming the first bottle, we headed to the hot tub to experience warm water outside on the side of a mountain. It is certainly an odd experience to be swimming in an outdoor pool in March, surrounded by snow banks. Once dried and changed, we headed upstairs to the four star restaurant, and had an excellent meal. For me, it’s now all about the beef tenderloin. And my vegetables tasted like gravy, and we both agreed that’s the best tasting vegetable there is. No room for dessert, we were polishing off our lovely wine (actually good stuff this time) when the guy who runs the restaurant came over to talk to us. He had found out from the waiter that we were Canadian, and he had grown up in the Muskokas. As we were leaving the restaurant, he beckoned us down to the wine cellar, where we spent the next 20 minutes or so learning about wine in Oregon. As we left, he handed us four bottles of half-full wines for our enjoyment. One of them was the same Lisa had been enjoying at dinner, which was $15 a glass. I’d hate to imagine what the rest of them cost. In any case, we’re pretty much set for the evenings now.
We head out for one more dip in the pool and hot tub, and sneak in a glass of the expensive red for garnish, then head up to the third floor bar (where you can get wi-fi, as the rest of the place us under snow) for a quick bite of dessert. We later curled up on my bunk and played Finding Neverland on this here Mac, then turned in. Of course, I couldn’t sleep with the ridiculousness of today, so here I am.
I’m not sure when I’ll get this posted. I’ll bring it to breakfast, perhaps, and see what happens. The photos may be title-less for a day or so, but they’ll be up, too.
Tomorrow: Bend. I will see you there. Good night!
****Edit: I posted this from the bar at 7:00 in the morning. Lisa is still asleep in the bunk below.****
We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo
How about you, you, you?
You can come too, too, too
We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo.
We went to the zoo.
IT WAS AWESOME.
Some lady gave us juice to feed to these birds, and we got scared by a too-close leopard, then there was a bored tiger, and a fat and loud hippo, and a super dooper fast penguin (that I couldn't get a shot of becuase he was super-dooper fast) and then we watched a polar bear play for hours and hours.
Lunch was spent at the Oregon College of Art & Craft, where I wanted to buy everything that had NFS written on it - unfortunately. There was also a crudely made gold ring that was a thousand dollars. Sheesh.
We headed out after that to the Japanese Garden, which was really pretty, and then spent the rest of the day shopping.
Look at the pictures!
I got a raincoat, which was the goal.
And two pairs of shoes. One of them is super nice though, and when I bought it, I found out that the guy who worked in the store, his dad was from Winnipeg, and he's a huge hockey fan, so we talked about that for a while.
And the weather was BEAUTIFUL! I was hot in just a thin sweater - not a cloud in the sky!
Road trip starts tomorrow. I'm really HOPING that I have internet, but if not, things may be delayed until we get to Nate's parents' house on Friday. We shall see. I'll keep you posted - if I can.
In other news, the prof that I TA for has just come down with double-lung pneumonia and asked if I could run the lecture this week - too bad I'm on the other side of the country. That sucks.
Today was a quest for a raincoat.
But we couldn't find one that fit that was less than $300. Alas. There's always tomorrow.
The day started at Lisa's office, which is right next to Nike world headquarters. It's a pretty nice-looking joint. Then we headed to OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) to catch an Omnimax feature: Everest. Lisa just finished reading "Into Thin Air," so she was stoked. It was really good.
After that we went to Thai Peacock for lunch and I had the most amazing Pad Thai of my life. Then there was some abortive shopping, and then we raced to the Rose Garden Arena to catch our first American hockey game. We were watching the WHL's Portland Winter Hawks, which are apparently a Chicago affiliate. It wasn't until the second period that we realized that Portland is the worst team in the league. They have a record of 16-46-1-1. WOW!
So that's the score right now. We're vegging as we wait for our pasta. No plans for tomorrow as of yet.
Lisa has just interrupted me to insist we do have plans.
We're going to Victoria's Secret for new bras for me (because actually I'm a 34E instead of the 38D I always thought I was), J. Crew for a bathing suit for Lis, the Zoo, the Japanese Gardens, and then Gino's for dinner.
And that's it. Nothing spectacular to report yet. Check out today's pics.
As I write this I’m actually floating somewhere above Arizona, on the last leg of my very long but otherwise uneventful journey – which, considering my luck, is pretty impressive.
I wish I’d gotten a few days to recover from the contract before I headed across the continent. Going from being forced to sit still for two straight weeks to being forced to sit still for hours at a time while people yell and scream and your ears keep going pop is not the best way to recuperate from a stressful job.
But whatever. I’m here now, and it’s almost over.
My flight plans have been changed so many times, I wasn’t sure where I was going to end up today. As it was, although I was expecting Las Vegas, I ended up in Phoenix, where it was only 64 degrees out (that’s like 16).
I didn’t want to update you through every airport I was in while I was in it, because, well, quite frankly that would be a dearth of inane information that you really wouldn’t want. Because nothing happened. The flight I’m now on was delayed about half an hour, but that’s it. No low ceilings, no snow, no running frantically through Philly or La Guardia or Toronto . . . Even Philly was nice. I had me some fried chicken. And then, because I was in Philly and couldn’t stomach a cheesesteak, I had a pretzel. WHICH WAS AMAZING IN ITS BUTTERY GOODNESS.
In any case, I expect to be landing in Portland in about 2 hours, and after that I’m going to bed. Phoenix time it’s 930. My Mac says it’s 1140. I’ve been in transit since 900 this morning and I went to bed at one last night. So I’d better get to sleep in tomorrow.
I’ll try to post this when I get wherever I’m going. I’m serious about that running photo diary.
*******
Just flying past Las Vegas now. I can’t say I’m super-impressed. Sure, you can see the lights of the Flamingo from up here, but that pyramid thing with that beam of light you’re supposed to see from almost space? Not that bright. I can’t see the pyramid itself, just the beam, and from up here it’s pretty pale.
This is the last time I'm going to be typing for a while because of the pain, but I thought I should let you know the following (because I know you care).
So there's this song, Soccer Practice, by Johnny McGovern. It's addictive. I spent an entire summer listening to it with Stefan and Jon.
Anyway, it's exactly 4 minutes long, and it has enough of an entrance beat that you can hear it through several floors.
When I was re-recording my interviews so I could use them with my software, I set it so that Soccer Practice was between every interview, just so I could be alerted, wherever I was, to change the tape.
It worked very well.
So Soccer Practice became rather emblematic of my work.
Now that I'm finished, it's playing at top volume, on repeat.
And I've been dancing.
And I don't mean the cool kind of dancing you do to attract people.
I'm talking full-out, dorky-to-the-extreme, terrible TERRIBLE dancing.
Yes, the Shopping Cart, the Q-Tip, the Carleton Dance, the Elaine Dance - you name it, I just did it.
No one's going to want to marry me now.
But I don't really care, BECAUSE I'M DONE!
I'll be leaving tomorrow for Oregon. I will try to maintain some sort of running photo journal with this blog and my Flickr. But that is all dependent on the internet situation in the hotels where we will be, and my inclination to do anything like that.
In any case, BRING ON THE OREGON ADVENTURE!
See ya SUCKAHS.
woot.
I put a fluffier cushion under my butt.
Things are better.
I had to switch pedal feet because my knee exploded.
I won't finish this second one before I go to bed but it will cut a nice chunk out of my tomorrow, when I have so many other things to do.
It's very windy outside. I hope that none of this affects my flight plans for Saturday.
Two questions:
1) Do I have to pay to use power outlets in computer carousels at the airport? Pay for internet, yes, but power?
2) Anyone know how to unsqueak a squeaky space bar on a MacBook Pro? I've over used it and it's queaky. I'd oil it or something, but my keyboard has its own AI and I don't want to mess with it overly much.
Tweeeeeet . . .
Autocorrect is my best friend.
Why?
Well, my carpal tunnel is acting up and I can barely type. The pain is pretty excruciating, although considering how long I've been ignoring it, I suppose it's actually worse than I think it is, because I've become used to it.
Also, my exhaustion has made it so my dyslexia is really bad, especially with letters now, and my fingers don't like to listen to my brain.
So? Autocorrect. I misspell a word, select "Autocorrect" - and then whatever that word is, and the next time I misspell it like that, which will likely be in the next thirty seconds, I'll get it right without trying.
I did this mostly because I have to put [laughs] in when people laugh, to explain why they're not talking. But it mostly comes out as [aglush] these days. So thats in Autocorrect.
I love Autocorrect.
Sorry, I'm a little loopy right now. I'm working my way through 2L of Black Cherry Vanilla Coke. It's really quite good.
More bulletins as I get crazier.