Yay - I got a care package! Thanks, Gina! And Keri, Kyle, Caia and Ella...

It made me giggle to see all the fun stuff. Chips, candles, candies, socks, ziploc dishes, soup, coffee, tuna, popcorn, and more.

Best of all, drawings from Kyle and Caia. Very nice artwork, guys!

But Gina, I've gotten all the way to the bottom of the box and I can't seem to find that gigantic photo of you that you promised. I've saved a special place on the wall for you and everything... bummer.  | ¶ 2:15 p.m.

  student living Today I got stuck behind a train.

There are two sets of tracks to cross on my route to school. As I was approaching my usual crossing spot (on Depot Street), I could hear the train coming (by the obnoxious horn and the rattling of the cars), and I saw a few students hastily hopping the tracks. I wasn't around the corner yet where I could see which direction it was coming from, so I wasn't about to make a mad dash when I didn't even know how close it was. But I should have.

As I got to the tracks there it was. Three engines. Hauling a l-o-t of cars. I started walking alongside the train, so close that if it had tipped over, I would've been under it. I got all the way to College Street where a small crowd of students was gathering (what are they thinking passing through town right when class is about to start?). So we stood. And we waited...

It felt like a long time, since I was well aware of precisely how long I had to get to class, but it was probably only five minutes or so. Long enough for a crowd of thirty or forty students to amass. Sheesh.

Check out this handy visual aid:



Okay, enough messing around. Time to study!  | ¶ 1:47 p.m.

  pathetic payday Woo hoo - I got paid. 205 dollars for 4 DAYS of back-breaking work (okay, that might be a slight dramatization...). Man.  | ¶ 8:58 a.m.

  September 29 I skipped some classes today. I couldn't sleep last night (my mind started stressing about everything - and by everything, I mean money, midterms, my part-time job, and even future plans like how I'll get my cat to Montreal to fly home for Christmas {you can't take pets on the bus}... yes, I worry about these things...).

Bank balance today = $2,071.

Anyway. I was pretty tired this morning, so I figured it would be okay to skip Perception. Our teacher, Professor Bacon (and that's pronounced Bah-cogn, or something - he's French), puts his class notes and slides on the common drive at school, so I can get them later. That's the first time I've skipped that class. I dragged myself to Testing (aka psychometrics), then went to the library to do some studying until my computer lab started.

This week my lab strategy has consisted of going only to get a copy of the assignment, then leaving. I find I'm not learning Java so well, and sitting there being frustrated and feeling stupid isn't really the best use of my time. Today I came home and started teaching it to myself. I do attend all the classes, but I don't find the way Professor Vouliouris (he's Greek, can you tell?) teaches helps me very much. I keep hoping it'll just click one of these days, but that hasn't happened yet. And I haven't been focussing too much on this class since there's no midterm to prepare for and not much to stress about just yet. Except those three assignments piling up on me. Well, I'm almost through one of them after spending this afternoon struggling through class slides and the book dilly was kind enough to send me Expresspost(!), The Complete Idiot's Guide to Java. That's me, the Complete Idiot. So far...

Today I went to make myself a cup of coffee and I neglected to put the filter in the coffee maker. Not a recommended course of action. I went with tea instead.

Also, I skipped my History of Psychology class. That's the only one I've missed so far in that one, too. I've talked to a couple other people in that class and there's sort of a consensus that the lectures aren't all that useful. Nobody takes notes because they don't really know what the purpose of the lectures is. So missing this one won't hurt, I figure. I did, however, go to Korvette and bought myself some $1.00 wine glasses (just two).

Oh! Good news for Pammy P. and Tone-L. They got their house! And take possession next month. Nice work, guys!

Back to the books now.  | ¶ 7:19 p.m.

  some learnin' In perception class we have been discussing the very complex visual system. From the very beginning, how an image is formed on the retina, right up to higher-level processing in the cortex where we learn about specialized cells that respond only to very specific stimuli. One interesting part of learning this stuff is all the visual aids used to demonstrate the various phenomena being discussed. Here is one:



This is called the Hermann Grid. It demonstrates a phenomenon produced BY the visual system, called lateral inhibition. At the various intersections of white, you should see gray spots, until you look directly at the spot, and realize there's nothing there. The explanation probably isn't that interesting, but here goes: the visual system likes to perceive edges and borders, so at those intersections, because there is white being perceived from every other direction surrounding that spot, the white is actually being inhibited by four different forces (the bipolar cells at the back of the eye, to be precise).

Fascinating, huh?  | ¶ 10:35 p.m.

  When you have several pressing things to do, sometimes you don't choose the most pressing item to devote time to. I was a little behind in my European Politics reading, so did some of that this afternoon, but then I went online to our university journal and periodical database and did a bunch of research for my paper, which isn't actually due until November 15. Probably better to keep on reading for the midterms next week, Stace...!

I have to say again that I'm really quite impressed with the resources we've got, though. I've been able to find the full text of every article I've wanted to read through these various databases. And Bill (our cute instructor) said Bishop's doesn't have the best resource materials. Maybe he doesn't know about this here new internet-thing. Or maybe I'm missing something...?

Anyway, I took a break from my work for a second to read some news and found a funny article on MSNBC about the upcoming US presidential debates. An excerpt:

"The candidates may not ask each other direct questions, but may ask rhetorical questions." So, Kerry can’t ask, "Mr. President, what are you going to do to ensure a swift transition to democracy in Iraq," but he can ask, "Just how dumb are you?"—a rhetorical question that always stumped me when I was a kid. I mean, if you think about it, there really is no good answer.

Funny. From this article.  | ¶ 6:20 p.m.

  those crazy Ryan girls
That's dilly, Caia and Gina.

Fun.   | ¶ 8:05 a.m.

  zzz... Today was a bit of a write-off. It's one of my heavy class days, so I was busy attending all of them, but I was kinda in zombie-mode, due to the extreme fatigue. After a weekend of getting up too early, being too stressed and being unable to unwind Sunday night, I'm just plain exhausted. Tried doing some reading after dinner tonight, but I was falling asleep already at 8:00. So I told myself I could have a nap. Now it's 11:00 and I'm only barely awake. School work is going to have to wait 'til tomorrow. I wish I didn't have to work (at the restaurant) next weekend. Preparing for midterms is going to be a little challenging if it's anything like this past weekend. I can't really take the time off, either, since I've already requested the following weekend (Thanksgiving).

I suppose I was somewhat productive today. I did attend all my classes, so that always gives me a good understanding where I am in my reading relative to where the prof is in our lectures. I visited Dr. Stout to read examples of papers turned in by previous students for our historiographical biography assignment. He isn't providing much in the way of instructional criteria or copies of the aforementioned papers, so reading others he considers "good" is kinda useful. Also kinda lame, though, because the papers are rather tedious to go through. Our topic, in case you forget, is explaining the history of our decision to major in psychology. Wading through personal stories isn't as fascinating as you might hope. It doesn't feel very much like an objective assignment - our grades will depend on our ability to write combined with how compelling our "contextual history" is. It's basically a creative writing endeavour, not a product of our understanding of the history of psychology. Dumb.

I also hung up my "turkey poster". This is the public outreach I'm doing in order to secure a ride to Moncton for Thanksgiving. I'm hoping that some kind soul has the space and the inclination to transport a passenger to the Maritimes next weekend in exchange for gas money. We'll see how that goes.

I better tackle some reading and hit the sack.  | ¶ 11:00 p.m.

  don't quit your job today Man.

My job is SO busy. I know, I know: blah blah blah.

I've just never had a cooking job that was so non-stop. It's homecoming weekend, so that might account for the slamming we got today, but sheesh. We kept running out of stuff. We had five people in that tiny kitchen trying to keep up. And I'm not so good on the lunch menu items yet, so when we get a table of 8 or more people and they order a combination of breakfast and lunch items, I'm pretty much lost. That's when I spend my energy trying to stay out of the way.

And I missed out on another lovely sunny day. I could see the sky out the kitchen door and it was looking particularly crisp and blue today. Before leaving work, I dumped out the remaining half a cup of coffee that I had poured for myself at 10:00 and barely had time to touch for the four succeeding hours.

Blah, blah, poor me.

In other news, I went shopping on Friday afternoon. I caught the bus to Sherbrooke and spent a few hours at the Carrefour de l'Estrie (the mall). I've been struggling with getting dressed since getting here - my 'student' wardrobe was pretty limited, due to, you know, not having been a student for the past seven years.

And I'm not a shopper; I generally hate shopping. So things started slowly. But once you break that spending seal, the floodgates open. I scored some excellent attire at numerous stores, spending a bunch of money I do not have (thank you, Visa). Whatever, though. A student needs to have clothes. It just means I'm a little more dependent on my part-time income. Or a sugar daddy. Or some imaginary lottery winnings...

I'm going to be making a whopping $8.50 per hour at this work-your-butt-off cooking job. That's a little better than minimum wage. And the whole thing is an excellent reminder why I am here: so I have a degree and am not stuck working in low-paying but physically demanding jobs.

On the school front, I'm starting to feel some serious pressure. Next week I have a midterm in perception (2 parts - each worth 12.5% of my final), then I have a midterm in European politics (worth 25% of my final mark), and a 'progress test' in psychometrics (worth 12.5%). I also have a three computer assignments to complete. I had intended to spend some time on them this weekend, but after the incident with my computer, I haven't been able to re-download JBuilder3, so I gotta get myself to school to use the computer labs there. This afternoon was dedicated to some serious decompressing after that crazy shift this morning, though. It's now approaching 8 P.M. and I'm finally having a cup of coffee to perk myself up a little before diving into my studies. It doesn't look like I'll make it to the library tonight. Time management is becoming more critical.

Please send your good vibes my way.  | ¶ 7:20 p.m.

  oh my god i thought i died I had a little crisis here recently. It involved my computer grinding to a near-halt and me losing my internet connection. My lifeline!

I had spent several hours downloading JBuilder for my computer class earlier this week - and it turns out it's quite the humongous program, so when things started going wrong, I automatically assumed that either something bad got into my system during that process, or it was just hogging too many of my resources. My computer was still working, although at about a tenth its usual speed, so I proceeded to un-install the entire thing, and deleted every associated file from my system. But that didn't work. I was kinda freaking out trying to figure out what I'd done to bring on this disaster.

And it turns out that it was probably just the internet going down. Videotron (the cable company here in Quebec) had a technician working on it all day today. My computer was chugging along because it was trying to connect, and some of my other programs that run automatically at start-up (and need an internet connection) were also having issues.

But yay! it works!

And maybe I didn't need to un-install that whole program. Maybe another 6 hours of downloading it is on the horizon. My computer homework is due soon...
  | ¶ 7:14 p.m.

  just for you, dilly Look over there ---->

See that link called "Class Schedule"? Now you'll know where I am.

For those thinking of using this information to stalk me, please feel free. I could use some company here in good old Lennoxville. Have fun on the plane, bus and taxi. See you next week.
  | ¶ 9:03 a.m.

  another blurb about the nice I've never liked the way it smells in Calgary. I could never put my finger on exactly what that scent is, but to me it was almost the smell of grease, like the whole city's been doing too much deep-frying.

Tonight I went to the library for a tour. Now I've been to the library lots before, but since I need to do research for my politics class, I wanted to familiarize myself with the resources available. And it's really cool what they've got available - a bunch of publications online, so we can even do our research from home! I'm such a keener - I'm totally going to start my research tonight, now that I know how.

Anyway, as I was walking home, I was, for the two-hundredth time since I've gotten to Lennoxville, appreciating the natural beauty of this area. It was dark, but since we're basically in the middle of the countryside, there are many elements of nature to savour even without light. The way the grass gets wet with dew shortly after sunset, the way the crickets get even louder (and I hear them ALL DAY LONG anyway), and mostly, the smell of the air. Like some kind of nature-lover, I was walking along inhaling as deeply as I could, trying to fill my lungs with the biggest earthy clean breath possible.

Tonight I was doing some star-gazing too. I could see the big dipper pretty clearly. I found this image, and rotated it to match approximately what I was looking at. Is this what it looks like where you are?


  | ¶ 9:05 p.m.

  nature freak Today's one of those days I wish I had a digital camera to show you the beauty of this place at this time of year. It's gorgeous today - sunny, hazy and warm. The leaves of all those lush trees have started to turn various shades of golden yellow and rich red. It's a stunning sight.  | ¶ 11:43 a.m.

  Happy Birthday, Mom! The family is gathered for cheese fondue and Spanish coffees right now. Caia (she's five) said if they have any left over maybe they'll send it to me. Cool.  | ¶ 8:45 p.m.

  HA Yay - I got my money back!

Last week I sent an email to my ex-landlord, saying:

"Under provisions of the Residential Tenancies Act (s.48), you are not permitted to deduct anything from a security deposit when a move-in inspection was not completed for the premises in question. There was no such inspection done when I moved into Unit 9.

I am requesting that the balance of my damage deposit be forwarded to me forthwith."

Forthwith!

So they sent me a cheque for the $144 they had deducted from the previous refund. Woot!  | ¶ 3:14 p.m.

  politics Here are the choices we were given for our term paper in Introduction to European Politics class. This will give you an idea what we're studying in this class (although we haven't covered all of these subjects yet).

1. Does Britain need a written constitution?
2. Is cohabitation good or bad for French politics? (I just learned today that cohabitation in this context is NOT when people live together before marriage. It's something to do with France's "hybrid" political system.)
3. Is Berlin the right place for the capital of a unified Germany?
4. Does the EU undermine state sovereignty? (I'm leaning toward this one so far)
5. What does Europe mean?
6. Are referendums a good thing or a bad thing for democracy?
7. Which electoral system is more useful - First Past the Post or Proportional Representation?
8. Should states limit political party participation in elections?

I was very irritated in class today. This class is comprised mainly of first-year students. And mostly males, which I find interesting, since apparently Bishop's has more female students than males. This dude who sits beside me is not interested in listening, or in being there. Today he was all sniffling, coughing, rustling papers around, re-adjusting his hood (strategically placed to cover almost his entire head while he rested), dozing, bumping me. I wanted to tell him to go back to bed. Oh, and he stunk like smelly teenage-boy feet. Ugh.

Also, only seven people (out of 40 or so) passed the geography test. I got 27 out of 50. But we needed to answer 35 correctly. Re-write in October...  | ¶ 2:03 p.m.

  fix it I haven't mentioned world events on my site for a while, but this story is really bothering me.

Families plead for hostages' lives

It's so sad to read about these innocent sobbing men being beheaded for such a stupid reason. This damn "war".

And then all Dick Cheney has to say is "our thoughts are with the families". Wow.

When is this going to end.  | ¶ 8:47 a.m.

  account, chronicle, narrative, report, story, version Today was a long day. After a long weekend. I'm t-i-r-e-d.

Since I haven't talked about it much before, I thought I'd share a little about what I'm learning in my classes so far. I just got out of the "History of Psychology" class so that's what I'll get into today. After today's class I'm more and more convinced that this class does not really try and conform to its expected content. Today's lecture (and probably a couple previous ones) could have been called "the psychology of history" (or, the psychology of the study of history), not vice versa. And it gets pretty philosophical, with Dr. Stout randomly selecting quotes from authors we may or may have not have heard of to help make the points HE thinks are important. At least, they're important to him. I'm not sure how much these ramblings are contributing to our understanding of the HISTORY of PSYCHOLOGY (unless it's Dr. Stout's current psychology we're trying to understand).

I mean, it does get interesting at times, but for the most part, I'm not sure what we're supposed to get out of these lectures. One theme we kept coming back to today was this idea that in studying history, one can make the mistake of thinking that just because something DID happen means that it HAD to happen. Over and over he mentioned this point. And all I could think was SO WHAT? I'm not sure that the way in which we regard history (with events being either necessary or contingent) has anything to do with understanding the history of the development of psychology as a field of study. Who cares whether something HAD to happen? It DID happen, and that's how we got here. Why explore the other possibilities, unless that was our defined pursuit? Just teach us some history.

I was doing some reading before class of a piece called "Epilegomena" (part of our assigned reading for the week). It made a point that another mistake we might make in studying history was thinking that just because a discovery was made at a certain date, that the actual fact did not exist before. We might know that Newton discovered gravity in year X (what do I know about the discovery of gravity?), but the discovery in itself was incidental to the existence of gravity as it is.

So does that help me understand the history of psychology?

Again, I think it should be called the psychology of the study of history so far.  | ¶ 6:11 p.m.

  job stories, part 2 Today I went to work even earlier than yesterday - 6:30! But they let me go at noon. I'd been warned that Sundays get pretty hectic with the 'church crowd' coming in big groups, and we got totally slammed. Derek (the main cook showing me the ropes) had to put me on dish-duty for a while and pull up Shawn, the dishwasher, to assist him. Shawn's been there for a while, so he's a little quicker in that role than I am. Even washing dishes was pretty busy with the crowd we had today. Then, to make us panic, we were told that a group of 40 people was coming in. That's w-a-y too many meals to cook with the staff resources we had, so calls were made to bring in other senior cooks. By the time the group called to cancel the reservation, Carolyn was already on her way. So I got to leave early. Woot.

Cooking is hard work! We work out butts off, non-stop. My back is killing me.

Time to do some homework. Ah... sitting...!  | ¶ 2:29 p.m.

  my toes hurt Today was rather exhausting. I started work at 7 AM - that's earlier than I get up for any of my classes during the week! And I think this restaurant is busier than any I've worked in before. The breakfast 'rush' was manageable, but constant; the lunch rush was plain overwhelming. I can do breakfast pretty easily. Two eggs over easy is the same everywhere. But lunch menus vary a lot. They do ribs, shrimp, and baked potatoes, and these are new to me (in the role of restaurant cook). Oh, and the bills are all in French (even though the kitchen staff is all English): 2 oeufs, tourné, brouillé, pain doré, p. de terre, brochette, crevette.... I'm going to be fluent in kitchen French pretty quick!

I was on my feet for almost seven hours straight, and by the end of my shift my back and feet were feeling it. Things went well, though. I've got time to get up to speed. But they actually want me to take over that shift completely. Eep.

At least I can pay for my cable now. And I'm feeling better after a nap and some yoga. It's more satisfying to actually produce something tangible than to read and study all the time - my life is needing this balance.  | ¶ 7:39 p.m.

  keeping tabs I'm concerned that people know where I am, so here is my class schedule, for your information:

Monday / Wednesday / Friday:
Perception 9:30 - 10:30
Psychometrics 10:30 - 11:30

Monday / Wednesday only (here @ Bishop's, we don't go to school Friday afternoons!):
Computer Lab 1:30 - 3:00
History of Psy. 4:30 - 6:00

Tuesday / Thursday:
Computer class 10:00 - 11:30
Intro to European Politics 11:30 - 1:00

Everyone clear now?  | ¶ 3:18 p.m.

  connection I've got internet! I've got internet!

And cable!

And more bills to pay...

Eep.  | ¶ 1:43 p.m.

  this is where i whine a little... I drink wine from a plastic cup (didn't bring wine glasses with me). I bought a new corkscrew though. There's this little store in town called Korvette which is basically a down-sized Wal-mart. Cheap stuff. Cheap.

I really want cable. But when I subtract the next few months rent from my current bank balance, I've got 772 dollars left for the semester. That's for food, bills, and any extra-curricular activities. Man - my job better pan out.

I discovered that minimum wage in Quebec is $7.30, so if all goes as planned, I will really be relying on that income.

In Calgary where I didn't have cable, I still had five local channels to choose from. Here there's nothing. I'm so bored sometimes. I just wanna watch TV when I eat my dinner. Cable is $17.59 per month. My only permitted indulgence is my internet connection, though.

Oh, and I don't like the water here. No matter how much I drink, my mouth feels dry. I even tried some bottle water ( it was on sale at Provigo) and it's no better. Sheesh.  | ¶ 10:32 a.m.

  dork In my politics class this morning we had our geography test, then Bill (our cute instructor) handed out the topics for our term paper. I'm kind of excited to get started on this. I have to admit that I don't know much about European politics, etc. and the European Union appears to be playing a big role in the topics we cover, so I came straight to the library after class to begin my research. I'm starting with some basics, like what the heck IS the European Union anyway? Luckily, there are some good books on the subject, so I checked out several for my afternoon reading (done class for the day now).

As far as the geography test, I don't think I passed. It's not part of our final mark - he just wants us to get 35 out of 50 multiple-choice questions correct. I studied up on my state capitals, so I got all 5 of those questions correct, but other topics like "what's the significance of the Danube River?" and "what's the significance of the city of Bonn?" were pretty much mysteries to me. We get to re-write it at some point, so with a little more instruction from Bill (our cute instructor - heh), maybe the next sitting will go more smoothly.  | ¶ 1:32 p.m.

  I'm right! I was interested to discover the following information (from this site) just now:

When an inspection is not carried out

If a landlord does not carry out an inspection either before or after the tenancy, he cannot deduct anything from a security deposit for damages.

If your landlord does make a deduction from your security deposit for damages where an inspection was not carried out, you can take legal action to recover the money. Even if you did cause damage to the property, your landlord will not be able to keep any of the security deposit for damage unless a court awards some of the money to the landlord.

I can take legal action to recover the money. Man. At least I know I was right about that much. There was NOT an inspection carried out when I moved into my current apartment. So where do I start - a letter?  | ¶ 2:56 p.m.

  ouf, my aching back Monday and Wednesday are busy class days. So I have to bring more stuff in my backpack. And it's heavy. Ouch.

In other news, my ex-landlord thought it would be reasonable to charge me $144 for EIGHT HOURS of cleaning. That's $18 per hour! And eight hours...?!! I had the carpets cleaned before I moved out; Melissa spent hours on the bathroom. All that was left was the kitchen, the storage room, and maybe the walls needed to be wiped down (hey, I didn't clean much when I lived there, but I'm not exactly a pig either). I gotta do some research on Alberta tenancy laws to determine what my rights are in this situation, but I'm thinking that some type of letter demanding at least part of that deduction back is in order. I also note that I was not paid any interest on my damage deposit. I know that the rate is stupidly low, but if my $525 was sitting in some type of interest-bearing account since January 2003, I believe I would be entitled to at least a few dollars. These people piss me off.

Yesterday I went to the L'ville town library and got myself a new novel to read. It was Can you keep a secret? by Sophie Kinsella (author of the popular "shopoholic" series). And I proceeded to spend the next 5 or so hours reading it. It's done. Nice work. It's been ages since I spent an entire day just reading like that. I didn't feel like doing school work, so I just didn't.

Anyway, I'm off to class...  | ¶ 9:20 a.m.

  baby pink toes What are they trying to do to me...? Those damn Visa people keep upping my limit, just when I'm learning to handle the debt I've got. I've just been getting this $3,000 limit under control (i.e. not hovering around a $3,000 balance constantly), and I check today and they've put me up to $4,500. Don't they know I cannot handle that kind of temptation? I'm a student! I can't start spending money I don't have without an income to even make payments!

Other good news is that it only cost me $98 to ship all my stuff with UPS. They had quoted me $146 based on my weight estimations (I don't have scales, so I was picking stuff up and going "5 lbs? 10 lbs?" and just rounding everything to the nearest 5. I was a little frantic that day - placed an urgent call to Tone-L, "how much does a computer monitor weigh?" He said roughly 20 pounds, so we went with that. I likely overestimated several of the other boxes. Oh, and the 13th box arrived safe and sound on Friday. Not bad delivery service. And the part about losing two mugs in transit...? I've been drinking a lot of tea this weekend, and have to keep washing the same mug over and over. Might be time to invest in a new mug.

And now the bad news. I spoke to Melissa, my ex-neighbor, last night. Melissa was very helpful to me in the packing, and even some of the cleaning of my apartment when I left. She's a bit of a compulsive cleaner, so I thought it couldn't hurt to have her helping me. Anyway, my last night in Calgary was a bit of a gongshow. I got back from family dinner (mmm, t-u-r-k-e-y) rather late and discussed with Melissa whether she'd be okay with finishing the cleaning of my place. All she needed to do was give the kitchen a wipe-down, and then sweep the place out. I gave her a bit of cash and she said no problem. I assumed everything was taken care of, especially since I spoke to her last weekend and she said everything had gone smoothly with our building manager. Well, now she tells me she didn't actually DO any cleaning. I was counting on getting the majority of my damage deposit back, and now I'm not so sure that I will. Sheesh.

And to finish off, more good news. My first class of the day was cancelled. Now I've got another 45 minutes or so to wake up for the next one. Or I could do some reading...

Oh yeah, I changed my internet hook-up date to Thursday, due to a conflict with my class schedule. This no-internet situation kinda sucks.

Oh yeah, I also got a job on the weekend. I'm going to be working as a cook at Sebby's restaurant on the breakfast shift (7 AM - ouch!). At least, I'll be working this coming Saturday. And if it goes well, I'll work Sunday too. Cross your fingers for me. I got a little frantic on Friday when I got my loan money and realized that I was definitely going to fall short at some point this year. Constantly scrimping sucks, and going further into debt would also suck. Finding a job is the solution. So I hope it works out.  | ¶ 9:40 a.m.

  bye-bye, persuade Tomorrow my friend Persuade takes off for London. She's copying me, you know, in the going-back-to-school thing. Only hers is a slightly different quest. She is completing the bar admission course in the UK so that her already-conferred LLB degree will have slightly more power in Canada. She will still have to "convert" the degree, but hopefully she will be a step ahead in that conversion process by taking this year to complete this program (I hope I got that right).

Her decision-making was a little different than mine too. She is leaving behind her husband, their home in Tuscany, and their dog. I have no husband, no home, and well, Salsa came with me. I brought my whole life (except the bed and the car); she was planning to bring a rice-cooker.

Good luck, K! Bon voyage!  | ¶ 1:30 p.m.

  lost in translation Here are some of the French words I had forgotten about:

quincaillerie (hardware store)
service au volant (drive-thru)

Here is a phrase used by a dude trying to communicate the appearance of his house:

"two-step house"

André had some televisions for sale. He repairs them and sells them cheap (woot!). But he's very French. A lot of conversations with french people in Quebec consist of each person actually speaking their own language, and the other kinda, sorta understanding what they're trying to say. dilly d and I set out looking for a house with two sets of steps, based on André's helpful "two-step" description.

What he actually meant was two storey house. We figured it out. And got me a decent 20-inch TV for $50.  | ¶ 12:15 p.m.

  My life's here! My life's here! After choosing UPS to provide my delivery service to Lennoxville, I started hearing horror stories from various people about how they don't deliver on time, if your stuff arrives at all. Today was my "guaranteed" delivery date, so I hung around this afternoon to see if anything would show up. Twelve of my thirteen boxes arrived. My computer monitor, microwave, VCR, clothes, mini-stereo, dishes, some school supplies. The missing box is another box of school supplies.

Yup, I'm happy.

There appears to have been an incident with one of the boxes - the bottom must have come loose and things went flying, because I'm missing a mug (although I found shards of it), another mug is broken (my HB mug; I'll take that as a sign that I don't need that much Heenan in my life), and a bowl was broken. Oh, and there was salt everywhere (someone shoudl have taped that sucker closed!).

Not bad.

I've unpacked a bunch, washed my dishes, and I'm enjoying some of my mp3s while I drink a Molson Ex (woo hoo, the wild student life of Stacey).

Yay - my stuff is here.   | ¶ 6:15 p.m.

  I should've been a poli-sci major Well, maybe not. I would have had zero interest in world events / politics back then.

I made a decision last night. I had intended to re-take sensory & motor systems (a psych course) since it's another in the list of failed classes for me. But you know, I'm not that interested in the biology-focused aspects of psychology. I think a contributing reason for my failure was lack of interest. I'm already taking perception and that's enough science-of-the-brain stuff for me. So I started looking at into-level courses in other programs last night, and made a list of courses that fit my Tuesday-Thursday schedule. I took a chance and attended "Introduction to European Politics" after my computer course this morning. And it was fascinating! (Sidebar: and the teacher is a cute young man!) They had enough space for another student, so I'm IN. This course will require writing a paper, but I don't care. I want to learn about broader concepts and about the politics of Europe. Yay - education! (dork)

Did you know the margarine in Quebec is white? Something about yellow margarine being misleading to the consumer - looks too much like butter...? When I first came to Bishop's, I thought they were serving us lard.  | ¶ 1:21 p.m.

  it's raining it's pouring We're getting the remnants of some hurricane (can't remember which one - F___?) so it's been raining non-stop for several hours. Sucks when you're the student-who-walks-to-school. The umbrella doesn't quite cut it.

And I don't know about the damn trains. The tracks pass right through town, and about 100 feet from my livingroom/bedroom window. I woke up both at 4 AM and 6 AM thinking the house was going to collapse. The long heavy trains sure rattle the place. I thought I was getting used to them, but these were loud like bombs or something this morning.

Off to my next class (if they have room for me). I'm trying to get my schedule finalized today.   | ¶ 11:11 a.m.

  sheesh My least favourite teacher, Professor Stout, has not changed. He still delights in showing off his knowledge, and not really attempting to break concepts down in an understandable fashion (I think of it as teaching, this breaking down of concepts...). Unforunately, the History of Psychology is a required course for psych majors, and he's the only one teaching it, so I'm stuck with him.

I had three classes today. The first two do not have paper-writing assignments. Woot! History has a couple small papers ("write about your decision to become a psychology major in a historiographical way") and a reading diary (take 2-page notes on the assigned readings). Psychometrics will be challenging, I think, though. It relies a little bit on stats, and that was definitely NOT my forte way back when. Add in seven years of attrition of knowledge (the little there was), and you've got a bit of work in store for me.

I've been reminded how much walking a person does when they are a student. I think I'm losing weight already! And I'm very tired today (see previous posts about excessive last-hurrah-ing before leaving Calgary). My MWF schedule has a lot of breaks in it, so I'm still figuring out whether leaving campus in between class is practical. I gotta plan my snacks better so I'm not leaving specifically to eat cheap at home. Better to get my butt to the library and do some studying / researching / writing of papers.

That's the update for today. Home for dinner!  | ¶ 5:32 p.m.

  First day of class I have school today! Class at 9:30 and another at 10:30. Perception and Psychometrics. I know, I know - sounds rivetting!

I got a good night's sleep last night on my new bed. Tone-L and dilly d called last night, so I had some contact from the outside world. She made it home without incident with our crappy rental car. And then the rental company tried to get her involvement in some scam to get money out of Visa. "It looks like someone ran into you", they said. Right. A little dust on the bumper constitutes an "incident". WhatEVer, people. Don't rent from Advantage Car Rental.

It's funny to be completely alone in this little town. I'm happy that I've been here before so at least it doesn't feel completely foreign. Just a lot of unfamiliar faces. I've been wishing they had this special category for me called "returning after seven-year break". There are some things that have changed around here, and since I'm not a first-year student, nothing gets explained for me. My student card has some kind of computer chip in it that I believe I can use to store points or dollars for food purchases or photocopies / printing jobs, but I'm just guessing. I have no idea what's involved in purchasing the aforementioned points / dollars. I know, I know - I'll ask someone...!

I better get going. Gotta grab a coffee before class. Wish me luck! Time to work.  | ¶ 9:01 a.m.

  boys with beers ...everywhere you look in this town, there are boys carrying big cases of beer. Welcome back to student life, Stace.

The other thing I want to mention is that it really is quite pretty in this part of the country. Unlike Calgary when we left, it still feels very much like summer, and we just love the humidity. It's been around 25 degrees or so the last few days. It's green and lush everywhere, and we're on the edge of farm country. Walking to this cafe I was remarking to dilly d that it smells very manure-like tonight (that is not a constant in this town). We've explored various small highways that I'd never ventured down before (never had a car at my disposal as a young student). I really enjoy the hilly landscape.

dilly d leaves tomorrow morning, so I'll be car-less and companion-less. And school is open for business, so I can head to campus and take care of things like picking up one more class, getting my student loan certificates processed, purchasing more books. On the purchasing books front, you all know that university books are outrageously expensive, and I knew that too, but I'm still rather pissed off at the prices I'm seeing here. One of my required books, a fairly average-sized text book, is $158!! ONE-HUNDRED-AND-FIFTY-EIGHT DOLLARS! So I've already started looking on Amazon for a used and cheaper copy. It's totally unfair to ask students to pay that much for required reading material.

One new thing they're trying here is a "fall break" for students. For Thanksgiving, they're giving us a 5-day weekend. I'm thinking I should go visit my friend Christa in Connecticut that weekend. We'll see...

  | ¶ 7:51 p.m.

  I'm here We made it to Lennoxville safe and sound. There's so much to talk about I'm not sure where to start. I don't have my computer set up, and I'm using a little internet cafe in town (down the street from my place) to get caught up. They only had their "grand opening" yesterday, so we couldn't get in 'til now (internet wasn't working the first day). I cannot wait until my stuff gets here, so I can feel connected and entertained. Here are some of things I've had to buy (well, dilly d has actually contributed to the majority of my "start-up costs"): mattress (they're delivering tomorrow), television, small dresser, full-length mirror, various kitchen items (my dishes arrive with the rest of my stuff on Thursday).

It's very... odd... to be here. In a way it's very much the same as when I was last here seven years ago (even some familiar staff faces on campus), but a few things have changed, and the whole young-kids-partying-their-butts-off is interesting to take in from my ripe old age (heh). Yesterday I witnessed a young man positively spewing vomit on the steps of the furniture business right on Queen Street (the main street of L'ville). And last night was the first night of frosh week, so we were exposed to many loud chants ("let's get fucked up"?), and numerous renditions of the school song (raise a toast to Bishop's University, on the mighty Massawippi shore).

In other news, we're not too impressed with our rental car. It's a Ford Focus, and the engine has sounded a little clunky since we started out. And then the "check engine" light came on two days ago and won't go off. The rental company told dilly d that it's simply because the car is overdue for an oil change, but we're not really sold on that. Thanks alot for the peace of mind, eh! dilly d is a little worried about the drive back to Montreal tomorrow. At least she has AMA.

It took us close to an hour just to get out of Montreal on Friday. We were positively exhausted from not sleeping the night before (me because of my last-hurrah-partying, and dilly d just 'cause she was late getting packed). Apparently I just reeked of booze when we flew out. How classy. How nice for my fellow travellers. Whatever - I'm a student! Anyway, the exhaustion did not contribute to a positive mood for being stuck in Montreal traffic. Go. Go. STOP. Go. Go. STOP. Sheesh.

Anyway, my time's just about up, so I'm going to take off and finish my coffee.  | ¶ 1:05 p.m.

  will it ever end! Okay, this is really going to be my last post from this position. And you should know this position actually involves typing on my knees in front of my desk. Today I'm going to get all my packages off in the mail / courier / whatever. My computer will be packed and ready for transport (on the plane).

I have been much much too stressed this week, and I still have a bit to get done this morning, but last night I made some good progress. My mom did an excellent job on my kitchen yesterday. She took away all the dishes and food I'm leaving behind. And Oh my God I'm leaving a lot of dishes behind. We had a little debate about how many dishes I was going to need, something like this:

Mom: How many dishes do you want to bring?
Stace: I don't know - four of everything?
Mom: FOUR? How about two?
Stace: TWO? Can we compromise on three? I don't want to be washing dishes everytime I want to eat something!
Mom: Okay, three.

Man!

Thank God for my friends. Tone-L had invited me over for dinner last night, so my new lack-of-food-and-dishes status worked out okay. We had a nice meal of chicken and fresh-garden potatoes and beans. It was dee-lish. Oh, and the beers I had on the patio while he cooked helped a bit too. He was off to pick up Pammy at the airport (she's been in Los Angeles for the past several days - Miss World Traveller). And I came home to pack. Luckily, they picked me up shortly afterwards and we headed to BU for a late cocktail. It's so nice to have Pammy home. She once packed up her life and moved to Istanbul, so she can relate to what I'm going through with the decisions about what's important enough to bring with me. So we enjoyed a couple beverages, some Lucky Strikes, and they dropped me off.

I had a burst of energy around 12:30 last night (the trance music I broke out helped) and managed to get finished with my bedroom and clothes. Two boxes ready to ship, one to store, one big suitcase of stuff for the next week or so 'til we get there and the stuff arrives. I also divided my livingroom in half and placed all the "leave" items on one side and the "take" items on the other. It helps to have a visual for just how much stuff still needs to be forced into boxes. I'm a little nervous about packing my computer monitor. Hell, I'm nervous about packing a litter box for the cat - when your cat is in transit all day, when and where does she relieve herself...?

Again. Man!

Anyway. Time to get out of the house for some breakfast. And then, you know, more packing. See you at the par-tay. 8:00. Bottoms Up!  | ¶ 10:44 a.m.