::alio!::

shades of gray

I keep meaning to bring my camera with me to take a picture of winter in this city, but it's always too cold and I'm in too much of a hurry to make it happen.

So this is the best approximation of what I see in the morning when I'm on my way in. This is at the crest of the hill by The Rooms, moving towards Garrison Hill and Rawling's Cross. At the mouth of the Narrows you can see Signal Hill (the black blob) and Fort Amherst (the white blob). The smaller black blobs are the houses that make up what's known as the Battery, and the grayish blob on the other side indicates the naval base (the blob is supposed to be a destroyer).

There are houses and stuff, but I'm not good enough with perspective and Microsoft Paint to do them justice.

Maybe I'll save the jellybean rows for another entry.

I had a dream

I think I'm dreaming someone else's dreams.

I had a very vivid and detailed dream this morning. In this dream, while I looked through her eyes and I knew what she was thinking and feeling, I was also able at the same time to analyze her actions with my own power of thought. The dream was also entirely in a foreign language, I'm assuming Arabic, of which she only knew a few phrases and of which I, of course, knew nothing.

She was in her bedroom, a grand room, with floor to ceiling silk curtains, cream coloured. She was standing in front of her dressing table, putting the final touches to her outfit: red alligator ballerina flats, long red silk skirt, cream silk blouse (same as the curtains), and an eye-catching wine red pashmina of some indeterminate flowy material. She picked up her silver handled brush to smooth her thick blonde curtain of hair. I couldn't see her face because she had brushed her hair over her eyes, but I knew she was unhappy.

She was planning her escape.

Her husband, a foreign dictator of olive complexion and sporting a huge moustache whom she had married against her will, had arranged for her a public birthday celebration. She knew it was nothing more than a publicity stunt, as there had been rumblings amongst the populace that she was unhappy with her cruel spouse. This event was to be an overt display of mutual affection between her and her husband.

A knock at her door from one of the servants or guards or publicists (I'm not sure who) signaled to her that it was time. She put down the brush, smoothed down her skirt, and followed the vague shape of a person down a long hallway to the outside.

Once outside, she was to cross before the crowd and join her husband at a podium on the other side of a war memorial (which I think probably commemorated the dictator's own victories). She managed to smile at the cheering crowd through her veil of hair, lifted a gloved red hand to wave as she turned to walk in front of the memorial. As she did, hundreds of tamed pigeons took flight around her, the air from their wings playing havoc with her hair.

Instead of joining her husband on the podium, she kept walking, smiling and waving, past the dignitaries, past the crowd, past the gate at the end of the park. Once she was beyond the sight of the crowd and her publicly embarrassed husband who was likely too afraid of looking a fool to raise the alarm, she began to run. She headed downhill, toward the river.

I'll stay on the side streets, she thought, but I won't go far. I'll tire quickly and they'll catch me if I try to go far. I'll just hide somewhere close by until they've gone past me, then I'll find a way out of this city.

At a bend in the road, she climbed over a guardrail by the river's edge. She slithered down the short gravel embankment and crouched down by the water. Hearing someone coming her way, she rose quickly and ducked behind a concrete pillar that supported a large bridge above her head. There wasn't too much room behind the pillar, so she knew that some of her was visible. *I* thought perhaps she should have picked a less obvious outfit. She pressed her face into the concrete and closed her eyes, praying. Then there was a tugging on the edge of her pashmina. She ignored it at first, then it became more insistent, pulling her away from her hiding place.

She slowly peered out at her pursuers with wide frightened eyes. I knew this was partly a sham to encourage sympathy, because she was, for the most part, dead inside. She saw two round brown faces looking back at her, big men who silently pulled her away and along the embankment to a spot further under the bridge. She wasn't sure if these were friends or enemies. She didn't understand what they were saying.

They hustled her, inexorably but with a certain amount of gentleness, to a flat level of concrete at the water's edge. The roaring of motor traffic echoed under the bridge. On this concrete pad were two squat white aluminum sheds. The two men were rummaging around in one of them, their attention, for the moment, distracted.

She looked despondently out at the wide, cold river. And saw a vision of herself swimming, no, drowning, with a smile on her face, somewhere out in the middle. Crying hysterically, she stumbled towards the river's edge, slithering on the gravel leading to the water. She struggled out of her pashmina, which was tangled about her arms, and leaned over to take off her shoes. She was crying so hard she had trouble with her balance, and so this took longer than was really necessary.

I found myself thinking that, with the amount of noise she was taking and the time she was taking to make this suicidal plunge, she would be caught again by the two men before she was five feet away from the bank. I hoped that they would catch her before she dove in too far, so that she and I wouldn't have to spend the rest of the day wandering around in cold wet silks.

She seemed to think this kamikaze mission would succeed, and she marched into the water, which actually wasn't as cold as I was expecting. When she was in up to her knees, she could hear her kidnappers behind her, yelling. She raised her arms to make a swan dive into the water, and they caught her before she broke the surface. They carried her back to the shore and sat her on the cold concrete, after handing her her shoes and pashmina. We were lucky - she had only gotten the hemline of the skirt wet, but she was shivering, and still crying.

While the two men were arguing over what to do next, they heard other voices shouting behind them. She knew that, regardless of the motives of her current companions, these next pursuers were bad news - they were definitely her husband's men. She followed the two men into the second one of the sheds, a cramped stuffy affair filled with broken bits of things. She struggled into the corner and tried to force herself behind a tiny obstacle, but I knew she was too big to be able to hide for long. The larger of the two men braced his body against the door.

She cowered in the corner, eyes on the floor, as her husband's men attacked the door. The big man was, so far, standing fast, but I could feel the shed wobbling under the men's assault. I assumed that they had weapons, knives and guns, and wondered how long before they started going after the walls of the shed, and how quickly they would manage to pierce through the thin metal walls.

I found myself hoping that she would think the same thing, and perhaps move away from the sides of the shed, but she simply sat, staring blindly before her, cowering in fear.

Then she turned her head slightly to the left, and we saw a rectangle of slivered light. A vent, large enough for her (or someone else) to come through. The men outside began banging on the walls of the shed. The din increased, shouting and banging and swearing. Everywhere there was dust and garbage being jumbled around. Just at that moment the big man stumbled back into her - the door had been breached.

And then I woke up.

dribs and drabs

I actually managed to walk almost all the way to work today on a sidewalk. Well, the St. John's construction of a snow sidewalk, which is wherever the plow went, which could be on the actual sidewalk or could be ten or twelve feet into the road. Regardless, I had a sidewalk for most of the trip, which was nice.

I was sick all weekend, which totally blew. Some weird kind of cold where I blew my nose so much it felt like it was broken, and was really sleepy and really cold all the time. I feel better today, but I have a ton of homework to do that I'm now horribly behind on. Wish me luck that I can get it done tonight and tomorrow afternoon.

I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow. I had one last week, too, but that was for prescription renewals. Now I have to get my yearly physical. With a new doctor that I only just met. She seems really nice, but I usually like to be on a first-name basis with people who jam cold metal implements up my yoo-hoo. So hopefully that will go well.

Mostly spent the weekend on the couch, sleeping through The Dog Whisperer, as our internet is still broken, and won't be fixed until tomorrow. We threatened to cancel with Rogers and they credited us the entire month where we didn't have internet, which was nice.

Finished watching the first season of Arrested Development, which was lent to me by one of the lawyers here. I am not generally a huge fan of awkward humour but the characters grew on me towards the end. Pie and I were disappointed with the second-last episode, however. With Angus and Travis saying "BEEE-EEES?" all the time, we were expecting that there would be more of a bit there, instead of just a remark in passing. We agreed that Travis and Angus are funnier (at least, for that part).

We're also halfway through Stephen King's The Stand miniseries. So far it's just as weird as every other Stephen King film I've ever seen. Molly Ringwald is in it as brunette. She's very pretty but not acting very well. I can only hope it improves . . .

Oh, and I got kicked out of work early on Friday because they wanted to turn the library into a BAR for a QC reception. Gotta love my work. They like to party.

putting my life on the line

I think it's only a matter of time before this city gets me killed.

We had a positively RETARDED storm on Wednesday. It was fine when I was on my way to work, but later I looked out the window and thought that it was really foggy - turned out it was sideways snow. They shut down the city at 1:00 PM essentially, and I got to go home. If the wind hadn't been at my back, I never would have made it. The wind was chucking ice at about 100km/h and it was agony to even glance backwards. As it was, because of the sheer amount of snow on the ground (about 15cm and drifting), it took me 45 minutes to get home, instead of the usual 20.

My calves are still sore from fighting through that nonsense.

The ice turned to rain at one point, and the wind increased. If you live in Ottawa, you're familiar with how this turns out - jagged ice peaks instead of snow banks.

Except here, they don't plow the sidewalks. Or if they do, they do such a shitty job the sidewalks are now sheer ice and they won't salt them. So if you want to avoid falling and impaling yourself on an ice pick, or twisting your ankle as you try to negotiate the rubble, you walk on the street. Most pedestrians in St. John's walk on the road. It's just so much easier.

However, despite the fact that this is a St. John's tradition, motorists will still scream by you at 80km/h with only inches between you and certain death. And they give you dirty looks, to boot. When they do that I gesture to the 6 feet of ice boulders that make up the sidewalk.

The driving habits of motorists in this city only complicates matters.

I refer to it as "stoptional" syndrome - stop signs are merely a suggestion, not a command. NOBODY stops at stop signs. Not even the police. To quote the movie "Clueless," they, like, totally PAUSE. If that. And they usually do that while obliviously looking in the opposite direction to where they're going. Of course.

Added to that is the fact that, yes, St. John's is a city of steep hills, and at the bottoms of the hills ice forms. No one has bothered to get snow tires, so stopping on ice is not an option, and because they have no intention of stopping in the first place at the bottom of the hill, they're not going slowly enough to make it even possible to stop when they discover that a) oh wait, there's ice at the bottom of this hill, what a surprise, and b) that I have been waiting for my chance to cross the street and they are about to mow me down.

I was nearly hit twice today, once by a cab who decided to turn right without stopping (and without looking) directly into me as I, who had the right of way, crossed the street, and once by a lady who was going to fast and forgot that in winter there is ice and couldn't stop in time.

AND

People here are just as inconsiderate to pedestrians as they are in Ottawa. I'm standing there in a blizzard, perched precariously on top of an ice boulder a metre above the road as I wait for traffic to slow enough for me to cross the street at a well-marked pedestrian crossing. The wind is such that it's all I can do to keep my balance, and the ice flying into my back is starting to freeze my legs and butt. Do the people flying by (too fast for that weather) in their nice warm cars think to stop for me? Of course not.

DEFAULT! DEFAULT!

Wow, when they said they didn't plow the sidewalks in St. John's, they weren't kidding.

Did you know that the city only owns ONE sidewalk plow and ONE drivable snowblower? On my way home Monday night I saw the snowblower stuck in a snowbank.

Today is day 4 since the last big snow dump of about 20cm (drifts of up to 1m in places). I'm still walking most of the way to work on the street, next to fast-moving cars. Though they have managed to plow the sidewalk in front of the local schools - I suspect that's more of a private enterprise, however. At least they've plowed the sidewalk in front of my house - Elizabeth is a scary street, especially at night.

We're expecting a huge storm this afternoon, so things could get even more interesting.

In other news, I have a hopeful tidbit.

Being a grad student, we're expected to seek external funding for our projects. This means applying to any and all scholarships that come your way.

If the scholarship is run in association with the school (i.e. the foundation or whatever allots a certain number of awards to each Canadian university), then you have to send your application first through the School of Graduate Studies. If it passes their vetting process, it goes on to the foundation in charge of the awards.

More often than not, my applications don't make it past the first review board, and are never sent out to the foundations themselves.

Last week I got a letter from the SGS about my SSHRC application, basically saying that, although my application was good, it wasn't as good as the other 85 that they sent on to SSHRC. Alas. I think SSHRC and I will never get along. That must be the fifth time I've applied to them. Only once has my application made it through the first review, and that was only because I wasn't a student at the time and therefor could send it directly to the foundation.

YESTERDAY, however, was a different story altogether.

This year, I applied for the Trudeau Foundation Scholarship, a relatively new scholarship, one with which Memorial only started to associate this year. The application process was bizarre, to say the least. I had to write a 2-page personal statement detailing the underlying philosophies in my life and how I came to be the person I am today. I also had to take care to mention a person or event that shaped this philosophy.

Very touchy-feelie for an academic award application. My supervisor, who I have secretly dubbed Eeyore, because he's never happy, thought it was the weirdest application he'd ever seen, and had no idea how to counsel me on it.

Because it was so weird and so new, no one else in my department applied for it. I suspect that very few people in other departments applied for it, either.

All to my benefit, of course - because last night I got a letter from SGS telling me they've nominated it to go through to Trudeau!

If I win, I get $40k a year for tuition and living expenses, and an annual travel allowance of $20k for research-related destinations. So my fieldwork in Ottawa would be pretty much paid for, as would conjugal visits back to my husband who I will have abandoned in St. John's. In addition to this, it's a super-prestigious award, so a lot of new doors will open for me. As a Trudeau scholar, as well, I will be expected to travel all over the country (that's why the travel allowance is so high) to speak for the Trudeau Foundation and to interact on a panel with other Trudeau scholars in each of the four fields of the award. My field would be responsible citizenship.

Cross your fingers. I mean, they only award 15 of these a year for the whole country, and I'm sure there were applications that were better than mine. But at least I have a fighting chance!

NERRRDS

Watched Revenge of the Nerds and Revenge of the Nerds II yesterday.

I find it interesting to look at cultural commentary from 1984.

At that point, anyone who wasn't pretty and preppy was a "nerd:" geeks, foreigners, those with disabilities, gay people, stoners . . .

It's also interesting to see how the second wave of feminism hadn't yet trickled through into mass media. Women were trying to assert themselves as equal, but their attempts at intelligent conversation and dominance of social situations is parodied as failure.

Speaking of nerds . . . there's a bunch in this office.

One came into the library today to inform me that I was allowed to LEAVE the library if I wanted to (like there's anything for me to do elsewhere). And then thought it was incredibly funny to make the joke that I was chained to my desk.

Another arrived to find out what books I got yesterday, because he'd been thinking about them since that time. He then remarked that it must be "exciting" to receive piles of new books every day.

Not that it isn't actually exciting and I'm just as nerdy as these two. But it's funny to see so many dorky people concentrated in one area.

killing time with corgis

I'm trying to waste some time so people don't know that I'm already more or less caught up after my vacation.

So I'm starting a wishlist of things I plan to purchase for my new dog. If you have any ideas or reviews of these items let me know. Most of these I know the people who manufacture the stuff or have met with their reps so I'm pretty confident about my choices. And can I really help it if you can buy almost everything here from Bark & Fitz?

FOOD

Evo Red Meat Small Bites
Tripett Green Tripe

TREATS

Bark & Fitz Sizzlin' 100% Beef Liver Fillets
Wildbites!
Zuke's Ridge Dental Bones
Zuke's Hip Action Glucosamine Treats

TOYS

West Paw Design Hurley - Recycled, Floaty, and Chewy
West Paw Design Tiny Turtle - Recycled and Squeaky
Planet Dog Squeaky Baby Blanket Buddy - For Bonding and Squeaky
Planet Dog Orbee Tuff Strawberry - Minty and Chewy

GROOMING

FURminator Small De-Shedding Tool
Kong Zoom Groom
Bamboo Dog Slicker Brush with Flea and Fine Combs
Bamboo Mud Magnet Paw Cleaner
Earthbath Totally Natural Grooming Wipes
Earthbath Shampoo
Earthbath Between Bath Spritz
Grannick's Bitter Apple Spray
Nature's Miracle Stain & Odor Remover
Dremel Cordless Pet Nail Grooming Tool

GEAR

R.C. Rufflective Vest
R.C. West Coast Rain Wear
Ruffwear Bark'n Boots Grip Trex All-Terrain All-Season Boots
Ruffwear K-9 Float Coat
Around the Hounds Buckle Collar
Smoochy Poochy No-Escape Nylon Leash & Harness

PERIPHERALS

Bowser Tufted Mat
Sherpa Original Bag Deluxe
Precision Pet Great Crate

Teehee, I can't wait!

alone again - naturally

Wow. Welcome back.

I haven't been this exhausted since my dad and I spent two weeks hiking up and down mountains in Japan and then another two weeks recovering from the 14 hour jet lag.

Christmas was . . . hectic, I suppose, is the best word. It was tremendous fun, but I wouldn't call it relaxing in the least.

The flight to Ottawa was surprisingly uneventful. Almost no turbulence, no delays, nothing. They did, however, lose one of our suitcases, the one containing most of the presents, my socks, and Andy's underwear (note to self: pack underwear in several suitcases and in carry-on). They said they would deliver the same when they received it and we got notice the next day that they were going to deliver it between 6 and 10 that night. At 10, having heard no word, we went to Stefan's. At midnight, the most retarded person I have ever spoken to in my life called, trying to find the house so he could deliver the suitcase (two hours late). He could not for the life of himself understand the simple directions I was giving him - he didn't even know where he was or what direction he was facing or where he'd come from. Turns out he was actually parked directly in front of my house. Where he then delivered the WRONG suitcase. We lost a little red one. We were given a large orange one. Go figure.

The next day we returned the suitcase in person to the airport, not trusting any more deliveries, and it turns out our suitcase was just sitting there on a shelf in a back room, and Andy just happened to see it when he was bringing back the one that didn't belong to us.

So that was interesting.

We did manage to accomplish quite a bit in the first few days, despite our lack of underwear and socks. I had my first dress fitting for my lovely dress, which was even prettier than I remember it being. I first tried on a ten, and so we ordered a twelve to accommodate my boobs and butt, and now it's too big, which is gratifying. God bless St. John's hills! The dressmaker is just going to pin it for now, not do any cutting, so that when I come back two weeks before the wedding she won't have to make any serious changes if I've seriously changed (which of course I intend to do). Fortunately there's almost nothing to the dress, so she's only altered the hem, the band at the ribs, and the clasp at the neck. Gotta love destination dresses!

We also made a visit to the corgi breeder and met with several very happy corgis. Andy fell in love with one of the little girls who was pregnant, and so if she has another litter after this one, we want one of hers. If not, we will be expecting a baby corgi for next Christmas. We're both tremendously excited. Especially Andy, now that it's really happening, it's become very real to him. He's watching The Dog Whisperer every day, and we've purchased Cesar's Way. I also got him a book on Pems for Christmas. Our parents and siblings have become resigned to the fact, now that we're officially on the waiting list.

What else did we do . . .?

Ran around like crazy. Tried unsuccessfully twice to fix my grandmother's TV. You know it was serious when Andy couldn't do it. Visited with all the grandmothers. Went to IKEA. Bought video games. Partied like it was 1999. Got food poisoning from bad shawarma at Shawarma King on Bank Street. Vomited in Travis' front garden. Celebrated Newfie New Year an hour and a half before Ottawa New Year. Ran around some more. Slept a little.

FROZE TO FUCKING DEATH OH MY GOD OTTAWA IS SO COLD IN COMPARISON TO ST. JOHN'S.

We made it out of St. John's just before a huge storm that closed the majority of the Atlantic provincial airports. Made it back into St. John's just before another huge storm that knocked down our wooden lattice on the front porch. All our flights were late leaving and landing but we didn't miss any. No one lost our suitcases. Nothing broke.

It's weird to be home again. Weird because Ottawa is also home. But being in Ottawa was weird, too, because we were staying with my parents but all traces of me were gone. We stayed in my brother's old room, not even my old room. We missed our cozy apartment. But now that we're back it's like we don't live here either. Everything is familiar and strange at the same time. It's a bit of an adjustment. Once we have everything packed away and we buy some food for our fridge I'm sure it will be home again. Right now it's just kind of a disaster zone - clean laundry in baskets, dirty laundry in baskets, wrappings everywhere, empty suitcases in the bedroom and hall, detritus of meals we were too exhausted to clean up upon our return . . . We spent yesterday in our pyjamas in front of the TV, so not much got done.

We were just so happy to actually be ALONE again. We had maybe one hour completely to ourselves, on New Year's Day. Aside from that we were in visit/family/hang out mode for every other second. When you're used to just you and your spouse it's quite a shock.

Now I'm back at work digging through a pile of books and correspondence and invoices on my desk. Only 300 emails in my inbox, which was less than I was expecting. I should have everything squared away and back to normal by the end of today.