Hello, Muddah

Well, I have had an excellent weekend and another mediocre Monday. Mum and I painted Ottawa a very becoming shade of crimson. Ruth came up Wednesday night and we went out to Azteca, this really excellent Mexican restaurant, where we discussed all men (except my dad) in scathing terms and did some post-election gnashing of teeth on delicious coriander chickpea soup, shrimp alambre, and/or chile relleno. The waiter looked rather Italian, I suspect he got lost on his way to his job in the Corsa Italia and just stayed.

We stayed at Webb's, for old time's sake, and had a slumber party of sorts. Indra got the room to herself for a weekend, though she went to stay with her friend Maral for a couple of days, too. Indra's quite fun to hang around, actually. I kind of missed her. Anyway, Thursday we had breakfast at Al's Diner (all our old haunts...) and Mum took Ruth on a tour of Ottawa. I was with them in spirit, but physically was in economics class. Alas. We met for lunch in the cafeteria, and Jacob came with. Mum found out that Jacob went to McEarnen (sp?) when he was living in Edmonton and proceeded to grill him about the teachers he had. That's okay; Jacob doesn't mind answering questions. Ruth left Thursday afternoon, since her horrid director apparently doesn't consider Friday nights part of the weekend and scheduled her to work. This meant that I got Mum to myself for two days.

During those two days, we shopped almost continuously. Nothing like retail therapy. And we also walked in the Arboretum and saw Garden State, which she seems to have loved, which I gather from our long conversation about its fabulousness. She got to meet Katherine, Robin, Jacob, Bharkha, Sara, and a few other people briefly. Now she has some faces to put with names. I am very, very glad she came; I was a little concerned that I'd have become such a lone wolf in my, you know, three months' absence from home that I would chafe at having any kind of maternal controls on me. But it really wasn't a thing, because we were just bopping around town free of time constraints.

It is fast becoming pedal-to-the-metal knuckle-down time because finals are approaching and I have just spent the weekend on previously described delightful mini-vacation. Will my trials never end?

Short answer: No.