Middle East, Blah Blah

The Onion has an extremely macabre little stock news article that seems to reflect current situations. Or something.

Everybody Hates John

What does everyone think of the Shiny New (Leaked) Climate Change Plan? Well, it looks pretty much like everyone hates it. Everybody from EnCana's CEO (Randy Eresman) and Buzz Hargrove to John Bennett has piled on. Ouch. Also, the part where the chief economist of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters turns into Dr. Evil is pretty funny. He threatens us with costs of "billions and billions and billions of dollars" if the plan is implemented.

It's beginning to seem like the oil will just run out before this stupid civilization will actually stop arguing and misdirecting long enough to do anything.

Holy Calamity, Scream Insanity

Some good old mellow times of being sick and thinking too much have been on the agenda this week. I've had a cold that robbed me of my (admittedly divine) voice. I sounded like a cross between a raven and Whoopi Goldberg, with the bad voice conveniently coming on right before my choir's performance last Saturday evening. Ech. Monday I went to choir practice, for I am a trooper and go places even when I can do nothing but infect other choristers with Mystery Microbiota. Tuesday I went out to Free Cone Day with Rosina and Ian. We cruised in Ian's sweet ride. Then I got home to find that Facebook had exploded because Joanna and Jaime (from choir) are dating (OMGBBQ!). It was pretty cute. Wednesday was study-tastic and libraryacious. Thursday was examinationlicious. I wrote a paper on the causes of the Rwandan genocide and neglected to mention any external political factors whatsoever, because apparently I am an idiot, and then I went for a run with Jacob. Hill sprints are murderous, but we must do them again!

Friday night was very busy. I was busy feeling like shit, for reasons I don't entirely understand. I hate not knowing exactly why the world strikes me as a bad and evil place, but no more than I deserve, on certain days while on others everything is fine.

Katherine zoppitied off to Toronto on the Saturday afternoon bus to be a Birthday Surprise for her mum -- I successfully maintained her cover when her mum called this afternoon. She returned on the late-late-late bus bearing news that the party was a very great success and there was much champagne and many teriyaki shrimp.

All this excitement was bookended nicely by a divine Saturday night. I met up with Louise and Matt, Joanna, Anne-Marie, Kristen, and JP to see the Ottawa Choral Society's production of Carmina Burana, a new Matthew Larkin piece, and the Canciones por las Americas, all of which were quite beautiful. After that, it was off to the Thirsty Toad for the Red Light Saints' show, which was very good and actually a lot smoother and more put-together than last time. They're developing some stage patter and seem really comfortable performing now, whereas last time they just sounded good. So well done, them!

Mellow times are being superseded now by frenzied studying for international affairs and wigging out over my Middle East exam, which terrifies me deeply. I am not alone in this, I know.

I got an A in geopolitics and am now going to bed. Goodbyeeee!

Motioning a Table

As promised: the new table, and the microwave stand they threw in with it. Much love to craigslist for this, although the microwave stand has indirectly ruined our Franz Ferdinand poster. I will explain. The Easter chicken appears to have squirted greasy juices onto the poster during carving, which would never have happened were it not for the microwave stand being there to support said chicken. The tangled web we weave...

I cordially invite everyone who reads this to a choir concert tomorrow at St. Paul's, on Woodroffe Avenue north of the Queensway. It's going to be at 7:30 and feature the Toronto Mendelsohn Youth Choir as well as the ORYC, and we'll have some instrumentalists and some solo acts from within the choir as well. It should be pretty cool. Tickets are $7 for students, so give me a ring, Facebook message, or e-mail if you're interested!

Exam In Nations

Unfortunately, I strongly suspect that for my critical geopolitics exam, the only bit of my study notes I will be able to remember is this: "We hate Henry Kissinger sooooo much!" Which is really a disservice because it was a fantastically interesting course and I had a blast all through it.

Sweet Relief

Classes are done! As of Tuesday, that is, but today was my first day without a schedule because yesterday was my last day at CanSIA's office. If you want to take a look at our Solar Ready page, it is here. Et nous l'avons traduit en francais, r'gardez!. So that is what I have been spending some of my time doing this year.

Now I only have a one-page-long to-do list to get out of the way before the end of the month! Highlights include four exams, one of which is a take-home, a final research proposal, and... I don't know what else, but I have it written down so that I don't have to remember. One of the things is figuring out when to pick up a table that I have bought. It is spectacularly nice and has tiles on top that manage to match our carpet without being as, you know, hideous as the carpet is. Pictures to follow, fear not, because there is little that is quite so awesome as Real Grownup Furniture.

So that's awesome. Tuesday night I went to Mike's Place karaoke with Jacob and a small group of people who have bonded courtesy of their mutual hatred of their security studies class. Jacob and I butchered Layla ("darlin' won't you ease my worried miii-EEEEE-nd!") and then drank a glass each of bad cider and have both felt absolutely dreadful for some time now. It is not usual hangovery headache, it is more like having a bear sitting on my head and digging its claws into my skull. Oh the bad. But it's better now! It's OK!

Mum and Dad are at an Arlo Guthrie concert right now. My parents are cooler than I am.

"Flight of the Galvatron"? +10!

OK, so on my study break I found this:

Yes, new Franz Ferdinand! I am immoderately excited for the new album if this is anything like what it sounds like, because it is so different from what they have done previously. For one thing, there is so much more synth, which is eighties in the best possible way. The whole thing sounds like the soundtrack to a broken-down spaceship taking off.

Feel free to mock my taste in music and my attempts at pretentious rock critic writing, starting... now.

Pysanky Season Approaches

International affairs paper: only a few pages to write tonight and then much editing to do tomorrow. It will be fine. Yes?

Boopsie's visit was ever-so-lovely. Sadly I didn't have as much time to hang out with her as I would have liked, but she seems to have largely enjoyed herself anyway. We may or may not have had cake for dinner on Thursday night after we went to the National Gallery. Saturday we stopped in at Kelly's shoe store, where she gave me a pretty excellent deal on some fabulous (yet practical! So practical!) red heels. This morning was a very early morning indeed, as Boopsie and I went to the airport to put her on a plane back to Al Birda. More on these exciting events later; for now, I have a paper to write. Below: debauchery! Hilarity! Horrible faces! Whipped cream with chocolate smushed in!

A Small Conglomeration of Things I Appreciate

1. The enormous sign for the Virtual Simulation Building on Carleton campus. I dunno, guys, it looks pretty real to me...

2. The bus shelter ads for Jewel FM whose alternating font colours don't break well over the lines, resulting in an advertisement for something called "Barry Manilow Air Supply".

3. The graffiti under Heron Bridge reading "The blue butterfly of the mind". Extremely accurate spelling, for someone who was clearly on acid.

4. The efficient, friendly, and Hot/Guilt-Trippy waiters at the Greek Place. Always a pleasure.

5. Boopsie is coming to visit on Monday! I only have twelve pages to write before she gets here. Excellent.

In other news, I'm sleep-deprived and cranky, oh wait that's not news at all. And I've sent out my CanSIA resignation, though everybody knew I was leaving at the end of the month anyway because that's when my contracts are due.

The New Yorker Is King For The Day

This is uncommonly good: The Wisdom of Children. Link courtesy of Dooce.

Potatoes: Because Saint Patrick Says So

Delicious roast potatoes. I love potatoes. As members of the carbohydrate family they are automatically a superior foodstuff.

Not much new here. Mad, mad, mad amounts of work to do before the charming Boopsie comes to visit, but it is actually looking semi-feasible since my research methods statement is working out fairly well so far. It could even be good, or close to it...

Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

Reasons to adore Nature: it has, in the recent past, featured the sentence "We believe the assumption that wizarding has a genetic basis to be deterministic and unsupported by available evidence." Sublime. This was in a rebuttal to a brief piece speaking about how Harry Potter analogies could be used to teach children Mendelian genetics. For instance, Neville Longbottom's poor wizarding skills demonstrate variable expressivity of the wizarding gene (as opposed to incomplete penetration, as stated by the authors of the original piece, "Harry Potter and the Recessive Allele"). Everybody and his Muggle-born brother is writing about HP these days, but hey, I'm definitely buying and reading Deathly Hallows the instant it comes out, despite the slightly lame title, so who am I to judge?

I Prefer to Think of it as Impromptu Gravity Research

Finished my Africa essay. I think it is respectable but not phenomenal, which is becoming usual given the amount of work I have to do and the mysterious capacity of my own motivation to recede when I need it most. Fell over on my way to school, so that I walked into class with a scraped knee to match my cracked hands, which themselves were holding a book the prof had lent me so that I could let my nose haemorrhage all over the cover. Apparently I am some kind of reverse vampire, sprinkling all with delicious plasma.

Public affairs class was insane on Monday because everyone got angry because we didn't get our assignments back. The next assignment was supposed to be handed in in the next class and we need the first assignment to do the second. Whatever, it's not like I was going to do it until the weekend anyway, right? Right? And there's no way it was going to meet the prof and TA's standards because, among other problems, we all speak Quantitativese but they speak Qualitarian. The translation is not smooth so far. It is probably a bad sign that these assignments have taken so long to mark in the first place, as it suggests quite a lot of red ink.

Kelly, Wulfric and Steph jointly win the Champs of the Day Award for their heroic nocturnal essay-writing. I wish all three a very good sleep. Perhaps I will even refrain from misting them with blood should I pass them on the street.

She Goes To The Land Down Under

While I'm thinking of it: I've meant to post a linky to Becca's New Zealand blog, since it is a very entertaining read and helps us keep track of the adventures of our favourite honours immunology student. So here she is:

Kiwi, or Beckie Does New Zealand