not a moment too soon

it is about bloody time for a reconsideration on condom use by the vatican and repayment of the $5 billion owed from the softwood lumber dispute

things on my mind

i had a rather difficult time finding an academic reference for an internship i am applying for and after emailing 5 professors i had only 2 responses and one of them said that she was not comfortable writing a letter as she hadn't yet seen my written work but would fill out a form if they were simple questions.

why do some people not want others to succeed? why do these grouchy people seem to be concentrated in academia? isn't it part of their job to write reference letters? didn't someone have to write them letters so that they got to their position?

well, a professor i had, who has since moved to another university, apologised for not responding to my email earlier, offered to write the letter on thursday, mail it to ottawa so it would be there for the deadline, and assured me it would be positive. at least there is a silver lining to this one, but seriously, i think it part of their job and a little effort would be appreciated.

after thinking i had procrastinated my way out of a trip to amsterdam, i managed to find places to stay that are costing me more than i had anticipated, but i suppose it is my own fault because i left it so late. i am happy that i had a few friendly personal responses though, and that the places i am staying seem nice on the internet. i decided against the stablemaster and their lounge parties after i looked up what a JO party was. call me naive.

i washed and dried my new sheets today to try and reduce the amount of white fluff floating around my room (perhaps this is the cause of my recent sneezing and congestion and not just the flowering plants) and i was so amazed by the amount of dryer lint that was on the screen that i actually went back to look at it in the garbage can twice. it really was that fascinating.

i finished my papers! 17000 words typed, printed, and handed in. to celebrate i ate some fuzzy peaches, started a fun reading book, and listened to the first period of the hockey game last night.

my french class has been cancelled due to low enrollment and i'd like to know what a western canadian girl needs to do to learn this language!!

go flames go!

red and yellow and purple and green...i can sing a rainbow

i woke up today feeling rather blue because my parents left yesterday and they went home to be with the rest of my family and i have papers to write. then i thought, will i ever stop wondering if the grass is always greener on the other side and if i will ever stop wanting what i don't have simply because i don't have it. cause right now calgary sounds pretty terrific and i'd love to be there.

i have effectively self medicated with some pleasant springtime coloured m&m's, but now my tongue is sore cause i like to suck them rather than crunch them so they last longer.

it is bright and sunny outside though and my african violet is photosynthesizing away and hopefully tomorrow i will be able to get outside some more and enjoy the daffodils and the smell of liquid fertilizer. if ever you have smelt that stuff, you can appreciate how i am reluctant to open my mouth for fear i might actually eat sh*t.

spring is definitely in the air!

whistlestop tour of england

charlie in the driver's sear




a cold day in york
morecambe bay
the lake district
wobbly umbrellas at tower bridge staying at the penthouse of the crestfield hotel = hot water if you're lucky
ice cream at the docks in liverpool
half pints with my mom

dayrider - zones 1 & 2

i. am. exhausted.

one day in bedfordshire. three days in london. two days in liverpool.

the tower of london. the london eyeball. westminster abbey. buckingham palace. big ben. changing of the guard. st james park. fish and chips. pub food. pints of beer. dame judi dench on stage. leicester square. indian food. tower bridge. st paul's cathedral. thai food. rain. umbrellas. starbucks. the quest to find millennium bridge. mom's broken umbrella. trafalgar square. downing street. the cenotaph. phone booths. daffodils. crown jewels. bobbies. pigeons with no sense of direction scaring the crap out of me. beefeaters. the tube, the tube, and the tube some more. almost lost charlie at a tube station. harrods. harrods delicious sandwiches. portobello market. notting hill. my future house. public conveniences. piccadily circus. platform 9 3/4. cleopatra's needle. the savoy. sore feet. a wardrobe for a hotel room. seeded loaf from organic bakery to spice up the hotel breakfast. mini egg mcflurry (meh). pollution. dry, hacking cough. market food. pin-up girl hand bag.

i love the big city.

a visit in numbers

4: pieces of checked baggage my parents brought with them
1: bags filled with stuff for me
1: family sized bag of mini eggs
1/4: amount of the bag i have already eaten
7:00pm: time they managed to stay awake until on their first night here
1: roundabouts driven around the wrong way
2 or 3: serious concerns about driving into the curb on the left hand side of the rental car
4: pairs of shoes purchased
275: stairs climbed up to top of york minster
1: afternoon tea at betty's teahouse
3: cups of the best earl grey tea i have ever had consumed at betty's
1: hours before i had to visit the ladies room after 3 cups of the best earl grey tea ever



















1000's: sheep seen from side of the road
about 10: black lambs
1: sunday pub lunches
3/3: days with rain since my mom and charlie arrived
1100AD: the age of the oldest thing charlie could find in york
4500: words left for me to write on my papers
3: times my mom has had chocolate cake since arriving
3: times i have had a bite
4: cities we've been to in 3 days
countless: times we've talked about the rest of our family at home

universal standoff

i went against my policy of not eating anything from mcdonald's yesterday. well i tried, but it was an unsuccessful mission. i wanted to have a mini egg mcflurry because there are no dairy queens to provide me with the occassional blizzard AND mini eggs in ice cream? i had to try it! but they were out of ice cream so i think the universe was trying to tell me something.

my flatmate lent me her tv while she is away for easter and today i was watching a new epidsode of er for the first time in months and i was quite enjoying my mindless entertainment when the fire alarm went off! i quickly threw on a hoody to keep dry and attempt to conceal the fact that i was still in my pyjamas sans bra and grabbed my nalgene (because i felt that water was the one necessity whilst standing in the rain in my pyjamas) and exchanged my slippers for runners and headed out. i got back in time to see the very end of the episode, believing the universe was now really trying to tell me something!

if only i could figure out what it is.

a proper waste of my time

Four jobs I have had.....
1. Cultural Activity Leader at Mount Royal College
2. Community Resource Worker at DDRC
3. Smiling Happy Employee at The Gap
4. small business owner/operator (sounds fancy when i write it like that)

Four movies I would watch over and over...
1. Love Actually
2. Brokeback Mountain
3. Heat
4. Napoleon Dynamite

Four places I have lived...
1. Mazatlan, Mexico
2. Lancaster, UK
3. Bredasdorp, South Africa
4. Lacombe, Alberta

Four TV shows I love to watch...
1. The National (online, as I am without a tv)
2. ER
3. old episodes of My So-Called Life and Dawson's Creek
4. Jeopardy! (seriously, i couldn't think of anything else because i don't watch tv, but i do like alec)

Four places I have been on vacation...
1. Havana, Cuba
2. Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras
3. Australia, New Zealand, Fiji
4. Italy

Four websites I visit daily...
1. BBC/CBC/Globe and Mail
2. all my email accounts
3. blogs, blogs, and more blogs
4. i check the exchange rate pretty much daily

Favourite foods...
1. sushi
2. vegetables (any kind apart from cooked peas, cream corn, or raw cauliflower and broccoli)
3. anything mexican in mexico
4. auntie joey's milk tart

Four places you would rather be right now...
1. running beside the fields of sheep
2. argentina or guatemala, since i have been researching them both recently
3. ottawa, because i actually love politics that much
4. sharing tea or wine with my ladies in a warm kitchen, there is actually no where else i would rather be than doing this

rolling, brewing, steeping, baking, cleaning, eating, typing.....oh and thinking

i finished one of my three papers today and it felt great! i also sent off another job application so i feel like i am rather on a roll. and i would like to take advantage of this situation of wanting to work and not procrastinate, but i think i am all tuckered out from the exertion of the first paper (ha! if you consider baking cookies, cleaning my bathroom, making and then consuming copious amounts of tea and coffee, eating loads of toast and cereal for snacks, talking on msn for hours, making iTunes playlists, and getting a pedicure hard work!) my eyes are slowly closing and it is only 1am, much earlier than my recent 4am bedtime.

but i am trying to work hard (well, apart from the time i waste doing god knows what in this tiny room) because my parents come for a visit in 3 days!

just one unit for me today, thanks

i am afraid that i have a cavity. this could become a very troublesome issue when you consider my incredible fear of the dentist. i have an irrational, sometimes incomprehensible, fear of the dentist. which doesn't make much sense because my dentist is one of the nicest people i have ever met. he leaves his own practice every year to treat children in africa and he only keeps his patients in canada so that he can follow his passion and bring his services to other parts of the world. and for that, i don't mind paying for two units of scaling, though i have no idea what a unit even consists of.

none of this, however, makes me any less afraid of the noises, the tools, mean dental hygienists, and the smells involved with stepping foot in a dentist's office. i simply cannot imagine looking into other people's mouths and poking around for a living. i always try and give my teeth a good brush before i go in for my cleanings out of courtesy for the poor souls who have to don the surgical mask and rubber gloves and scrape junk off my enamel.

right now it is a dull ache and could possibly be caused by sinus pressure or an inflamed jaw due to stress. both of these things have happened before and both have made have similar panic attacks about the possibility of a cavity. so here's to hoping that is what is going on this time.

one of the things i have learned in my years is the importance of flossing. i do love the feeling of clean teeth!

cry freedom?

i really really hope this glimpse of freedom doesn't turn out to be an april fool's joke. but that would just be mean to tease us.