In advance of Father's Day

Assuming that my plans for the weekend will likely prevent me from posting tomorrow, I wanted to get this posted today. I've watched High Fidelity twice in the last week (in shameful, US network censored versions) which has caused me to make a number of All Time Top Five lists in my head. I'm quite pleased with this one--and I can't think of anyone I'd rather make Top Five Lists for than my dad.

The All Time Top Five Songs for My Dad (Father's Day edition)

5. Rod Stewart - You're In My Heart: When my dad retired from the police force, he gave a really touching tribute to my mother. Being the wife of a police officer wasn't easy (particularly for someone who had to balance her own career as a nurse against the demands of a province-wide force), and the early years of their marriage might have broken up a lesser couple. He used part of this song in his speech.

4. Crosby Stills Nash & Young - Teach Your Children: One of my dad's favourites to play on the guitar: "Don't you ever ask them why/ if they told you, you would cry/ so just look at them and sigh/ and know they love you."

3. The Beatles - If I Fell: The Beatles are, of course, my dad's favourite band. This is his favourite Beatles song, near as I can tell--can you ever pick just one favourite song by your favourite band? I'm always kind of surprised by this one--it's an easy one to forget, I think, in term of the Beatles' overall oeuvre, but it is a good one.

2. The Animals - House of the Rising Sun: This song was the first 45 single that my dad ever bought, launching him on a music collecting career that's spanned about 40 years and several different media. At last count his CD collection comprised about 2500 volumes. My mom bought him an 8 gig iPod touch for his birthday in April, and he's already filled it.

1. Rod Stewart - Maggie May: His favourite of all his favourite songs. Need I say more?

Happy Father's Day, Dad! I hope you like your Darth Vader card. It beat out the Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own card by a very small margin. (And if the Tom Hanks one had said "Avoid the clap, Jimmy Dugan" instead of "There's no crying in baseball", it would've lost.)

left and leaving

My father was in town briefly yesterday, and he came over to check out the new guitar. He agreed with my assessment that it was in good condition, saying that it looked to him like it had hardly been played. He then tuned it for me, so I am playing around with it a little tonight.

It's been years since I've tried to pretend like I could learn to play guitar. I have no rhythm, and no particular musical talent. Strangely, my rhythm has gotten better as I've gotten older. While I'd never say that I'm good at Rock Band or GUitar Hero, my performances there aren't quite as EPIC FAIL as they once were.

Back in high school I used to spend a lot of time teaching myself bits and pieces of songs from the Oh Canada Tab Archive. The archive is still there, though it looks like it hasn't been updated in about 8 or 9 years. It is literally like living in 1999 again. Which manages to be awesome but sad.

Though sometimes I feel out of step with my generation, I'm glad that I wasn't born younger. I would've been an emo scene kid--one of the worst kind.

after the pity party

Thank you for bearing with me through last week's efforts at throwing myself a pity party. I'm working hard on keeping busy, at least until I think of another plan. Mat bought me a secondhand guitar last week, so that should help. Or at least eat into my knitting time.

My sort of-LYS, Sheepstrings, is closing. I'm not terribly surprised by this announcement, but am still sad. Girl Tuesday and I drove down on Saturday to visit the closing sale, but I didn't buy much. Hard to justify it with the looming house repairs. There was some remaining Mirasol Sulka for $4/skein, which was irrestible, but that was pretty much it.

Being responsible sucks. But I know it will pay off in the long run.

Against Despair

I don't like blogging when things are bad. Not that things need to be sunshine, lollipops, and rainbows for this, but I've started to realize that sometimes it's better simply not to acknowledge some of the negative aspects of life. I'm a person who dwells on things, and sometimes writing them out makes them real.

Thus, the radio silence around here as of late.

Things could be worse. *knocks wood* I have an unfortunate habit of manifesting my mental and emotional stresses with physical symptoms. My left arm went numb for about six days last week. It was very strange, and very uncomfortable. I couldn't knit (or do any number of other things)...and since knitting is my stress buster of choice, the feeling just kept perpetuating itself.

This time of year is always hard for me. I just don't know what to do with myself, and my end of year aimlessness is combining with my fear/anxiety (most of which is house related this year) to make me listless. I could accomplish so much right now, and I simply...have not.

Things still aren't great, but I'll survive.

I don't have any other choice.

75 years ago today

Today marks the 75th anniversary of the birth of the Dionne Quintuplets. Annette, Cecile, Marie, Emilie, and Yvonne Dionne were born to Elzire and Oliva Dionne of Corbeil, Ontario (just outside of North Bay Rock City, for those of you keeping track) on May 28th, 1934. They were the first (documented) set of quintuplets to survive infancy; they were also the first and only set of identical female quintuplets. (The odds of that are unbelievable--the initial egg splitting, then each of those splitting again, and one of those splitting a third time. It boggles the mind. The "sixth" likely died in the womb.) Their combined birth weight was less than 14 lbs., and when you consider that they were born two months premature in a farmhouse, in 1934, to a mother who didn't know she was pregnant with multiples...the odds against their survival were substantial.

The story of the Quints is fascinating. The Ontario government took control of their lives when they were four months old, establishing the girls as wards of the Crown, and taking them to live away from their parents and their siblings on the grounds that Elzire and Oliva were unfit parents (though the Dionnes still got to keep their other five children). The girls were raised in a compound by the doctor who "delivered" them, Dr. Allan Dafoe (he was assisted by two midwives) and a few other caregivers. The compound, colloquially known as Quintland, included an observation deck where tourists would come daily to watch the girls playing inside the compound.

The Quints were big business. It's estimated that they earned approximately $1 million in 1934, and brought approximately $51 million to Ontario in tourism-related revenue. I know that sounds like a lot of money, but you need to think of it in perspective of 1934--you know, THE MIDDLE OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION. The girls' images were used to sell just about every product imaginable, including corn syrup, baby food, toys, candy, toothpaste, Lysol, Heinz, Victory Bonds, Carnation Milk, and cod liver oil. And, of course, this doesn't even begin to touch the commemorative merchandise that was produced to sell to the tourists.

The other half of the story is a very sad one. The girls' parents did eventually win back custody from the Crown, in 1943, and with it access to the girls' money. Having grown up separately, they had to be re-integrated into a family that treated the girls differently from the other children. Once they reached 18, all five left home and had very limited contact with their parents. Marie and Emilie both died quite young, and Yvonne passed away from cancer a few years ago. Before her death, she, along Annette and Cecile, revealed that they believed that their father had sexually abused them as teenagers.

With the way that our culture currently treats multiples--particularly with John and Kate Plus 8 and their reality show ilk--the story of the Quints is well worth remembering. I do believe those kids are being exploited, and I wish that people would remember that they won't be children forever. Someday they will be adults who have to live with everything that's happening right now.

Frost/Nixon

There were a lot of things that I liked about Frost/Nixon. I liked the cast, and thought that both Frank Langella and Michael Sheen were excellent. I liked the staging, as well, and thought that the contrasts in location worked really well to emphasize the tensions.

I did not like the pseudo-documentary style, where the characters would occasionally break out of the established narrative to comment on themselves or other characters. This can be an effective device when used properly, but I don't think that it is here: it's dropped roughly halfway through, so it doesn't go anywhere meaningful, and ultimately just winds up being distracting.

The other problem that I have with it is that the climax of the film falls a bit flat. Actually, the real problem is that the climax is just fine; it's the rest of the movie that seems flat: We get to that point where Nixon says the unthinkable...and then we see almost nothing else of their interview. Did it really go nowhere from there? I find that hard to believe, so I will have to check out the source material.

It's a 3.5 out of 5, I think. Worth seeing, but not as strong as it could be.

Quick Poll on Buttons

If you needed buttons for a February Lady Sweater, would you choose:

a) Tudor Rose buttons

or

b) Epona* buttons?


**Epona is a Gaulo-Roman goddess connected with horses, and one of the antecedents of Rhiannon in the Mabinogion.

Against Despair

A recent facebook post by a grad school friend about her favourite Timothy Findley book, Pilgrim, inspired me to pick up my favourite Timothy Findley book, Headhunter today. (I haven't read all of Pilgrim. It was a bathroom book at my parents' house for a long while, and I really can't think of anything less suited to be a bathroom book.) Headhunter is, in many ways, deeply uneven--but it is also magical and inventive, and thoroughly engrossing.

I had lunch with my mother in Huntsville last week, and we wandered around downtown, and spent sometime poking through the antique shops there. (Sadly, the downtown is mildly less exciting since the yarn shop moved 25 km outside of town.) I was surprised by how many Royal Family-related antiques there were until my mom reminded me of who used to populate the Muskokas in the summertime--anyone who was anyone in Toronto owned land there, and summered outside of the city. And, naturally, anyone who was anyone in Toronto would be a staunch Royalist. In Headhunter, Findley describes this attitude as "more British than the British", which I think works quite well.

The cat would like to say hello. We've been travelling so much these past few weeks that he's been a bit lonely, and is a bit sucky as a result.

I still have to collect my thoughts about Frost/Nixon, but I think I'm closer to formulating exactly why it doesn't work all that well for me--or at least, why it doesn't work as well as I want it to.

long weekend

I've had about five failed updates in the past week; for some reason I have found this particular time very difficult to write about. I suspect that the largest reason for that is that I haven't done anything particularly interesting in the past week. This academic year simply refuses to die, which is frustrating, as I'm less than two weeks from the end of this contract, and I would just like to bloody be done already.

The major accomplishment of the last few days has been watching Frost/Nixon with my dad. I need to think about it a bit more, but I'll post something more thorough in response once I've thought it through.

She Goes On

I took the bandage off my finger yesterday, in hopes that it had sufficiently healed...but found it was not to be, as it started to bleed again today. This, coupled with the the few minutes of snow at 7:30 this morning, made for a rather inauspicious start to the day.

My mom's Mother's Day socks are coming along nicely. I will probably finish the first one today, and get started on the second one as quickly as possible, as I cannot wait to be done. I have the yarn for a February Lady Sweater waiting for me, and I really want to get started on that...or really, to be doing anything other than these socks.

I'm sad not to see my mother on Mother's Day. She's in Scarborough at a family gathering, I think, celebrating the mothers and our family's May birthdays. But she knows I love her no matter what--including that six month period where she persisted in omitting vowels from all of her emails and IM conversations with me.

One good turn...

I cleaned the craft room today in preparation for the purchase of a large file cabinet. My house is approximately 875 square feet, so space is always at something of a premium, and new additions need to be plotted out very carefully. The cabinet in question did not actually materialize, but I'm happy to have done some serious organizing in my room, and you'll be pleased to know, Readers, that I actually culled a whole bunch of acrylic yarn from my stash and sent it on to the Value Village.

I almost sliced off the tip of my right index finger last night when I was cutting onions on the mandoline. I was holding the onion with my hand, and thinking, "I wonder where the holder is for this. I'm probably going to cut off the tip of my finger." About three minutes later, I nearly did that. Fortunately I stopped in about 3/4 of the way through. It's not a deep cut, but it is right on the tip, so it is pretty sensitive. According to my mom, I should've superglued it shut--this is the new hot treatment in the ER for this type of wound, rather than stitches.

A strange thing happened, though. After I'd washed the cut out, and wrapped it in paper towel, I was holding my finger above my head to help slow down the bleeding. Suddenly, I just felt all of the blood drain out of my head. My vision went blurry, and sound went far away. Fortunately, I managed to get my head down between my knees before I keeled over, but it was pretty touch and go for a few minutes there. The same thing happened last summer when I sliced my ring finger instead of a cucumber.

I don't know what my problem is. I'm not an especially squeamish person, and I've certainly injured myself in much worse ways, involving much more pain and blood. (I wouldn't say that I'm accident prone so much as just a bit careless and a bit foolish.) I've treated people with much worse injuries--the time Fiancé fell off the wall behind Cellarman's, anyone? It usually doesn't bother me at all. And yet, these last two times...who knows?

I blocked both of my Ishbels tonight. They look great.

the kids rant

The Boyfriend (or rather, the Fiancé) has started a new job this week. In the process of getting to know his co-workers, he's (apparently) had to talk a lot about his relationship with me, and had to justify a number of the choices that we've made as a couple. The biggest one, of course, is our decision not to have kids right fucking now. (I should probably also add that there's been a lot of consternation over our decision to get married two years from now, and not this year or next, from quite a lot of people--friends, family, and otherwise.)

The Fiancé, when asked, told his co-workers that kids are part of the future, but unlikely to happen in the next two or three years. Why not? said the co-workers. Because we can't afford to have kids right now, said the Fiancé. That's stupid, said the co-workers. You should just have them--everything else will just sort of fall into place.

So then the Fiancé came home and asked me: Do you think that's true?

It is true, I imagine. For some people at some times. Waiting for more money probably sounds foolish to a lot of people--once you start down that path, is there ever really enough money to have kids? The people the Fiancé was discussing this with live on household incomes of about half what we make combined, he said, so why couldn't we make it work? (Can you tell that I'm the primary breadwinner and billpayer in our household?)

Why not? First, these people are eligible for support from the government that we wouldn't be because they make so much less than we do. Second, these people haven't just purchased houses. Third, these people don't have a combined $50 000 in student loans that need to be paid back. Fourth, these people don't work on ten month contracts, and have two very scary months where there is relatively little income. Fifth, these people have very different relationships than Fiancé and I--while we've been together for nearly 5 years, we've only lived together for one, and the other four have been long distance. We need (and deserve) time to figure out US together. Sixth, neither of us wants kids right now, and it irritates me to no end that I need to justify that to people.

We will have kids when we are ready to have them, and when we want to have them. Why is that so hard for other people to understand?

Follow the directions

I like to make fun of my partner because he is an inveterate non-follower of directions. Any time he is required to do something that involves reading from a manual and progressing through steps, he's usually convinced he should "just know" instinctively how it will work. This can lead to a particularly awesome combination of hilarity/frustration.

My students also don't follow directions. After every single test and assignment, I will stand at the front of the class and say, "The most important thing you can do to ensure your success is to read the directions carefully, and make sure that you know what the question means." But they don't. And then they lose marks, and say, "But my answer is right." And I say, "Your answer may be factually correct, but it doesn't answer the question as it was posed."

All of this is a lead up to say that I should probably practice what I preach. Back in February, Starlite75 came up for a few days and we dyed some yarn together. One of the things that every single set of directions for yarn dyeing tells you is that you should tie your hank of yarn in several places. I assumed that the two ties in my Knit Picks Bare skein would be sufficient. That assumption was incorrect, and I spent the better part of 45 minutes this morning detangling the skein on my swift. It wasn't a huge deal (I am the kind of weirdo who like untangling knots) but it could've been avoided pretty easily.

The offending yarn is now a pretty little pink and white cake, and I'm off to get started on some socks for my mom for Mother's Day. Good times.

woof

Why are things often on sale when you don't really need them, or can't afford them? Pick Up Sticks is having a 20% off everything in the store sale, including the Dream in Color line. Damn!

I'm home from work today because I'm sick. I wore my contacts home, and forgot to pack my glasses. I was very excited to come home yesterday and take out my contacts, but when I got into the bathroom they were nowhere to be found. I wore my old glasses for a little while, but they are in such poor shape (they're four years old, so any anti-scratch coating is long gone) and the difference in prescription is such that I wound up with a lingering headache. I also wound up throwing up all morning, but I'm not sure whether or not that is related to the glasses.

Ugh. I hate being sick. I napped on the couch for a while, and felt much better when I woke up, but now that I've been up for about an hour I'm starting to feel woozy again.

painted ladies and a bottle of wine

Not much new to report here. I'm back in the Bay, having survived the trip home and trip back with intense winds pushing away at my beloved tin can of a car. My mom and I went to a yarn store yesterday. It had been about five or six years since the last time I visited it, and it has changed a lot. Where previously there was lots of very overpriced acrylic yarns and snotty saleswomen who didn't believe someone in her early twenties could be serious about knitting, there is now a store filled with a wide variety of fibers (including the whole Rowan line) at reasonable prices. Having spent my money at the Frolic last weekend, I only picked up a couple of balls of Patons' recently discontinued SWS soy-wool yarn, but my mom actually bought a couple of things (including a Fleece Artist thrum kit for me to make her some mittens). As we left, she remarked, "I really feel like I should be buying more yarn."

And she has decided that once we find a yarn and a sweater pattern that she likes, I will make her a sweater.

Having just learned that we will not uncover the secret of the final Cylon until July, the boyfriend and I have decided to rent Miracle at St. Anna for a treat tonight.

I love a man in (powder blue) uniform

Last night, my dad and I went to a Blue Jays game. Our tickets were free through the alumni association for the university. It was the first game I'd been to in probably about seven years. The organization is now doing "Flashback Fridays" in which everyone wears the vintage uniforms from the 70s, and I have to say that I like it. There's just something about the powder blue/royal blue combo that I love. If I ever find myself with a spare $100 I'm definitely going to get one of the replica jerseys.

The whole trip down was very nostalgic. We always come down the 400 to Black Creek Dr, and then head down Weston Rd. to Lakeshore. There's new row housing, and the Palais Royale has been re-done. Can I get married there? Please? If I win the lottery? (Side note: How cool would it be to get married in the venue that I've seen my favourite artists play concerts? I could make a much more persuasive pitch for a Finn song as a wedding song in that case, I think.)

The game itself was pretty awesome. Paul Molitor was the guest of honour, and they showed lots of video clips from the years (1993-1995) that he played for us. The Jays' victory was also pretty sweet. (Although I would've pulled Halladay before that last batter--brother had lost it, in my opinion. That said, Cito Gaston has two World Series rings and I have none, so take that for what it's worth.)

One of the biggest changes to the Dome itself (I am refusing to call it the Rogers Centre) is that there is now the Toronto Blue Jays' Level of Excellence--which is this club's version of retiring the jerseys. The most notable name in the Level of Excellence for me was that of Tom Cheek, who was given the number 4306. 4306 was the number of consecutive regular season games that Tom called on the radio for the Blue Jays, starting in 1977 and going up until 2004. I grew up with his voice (and that of his partner, Jerry Howarth), as my dad always preferred to listen to the radio commentary while watching the broadcast on TV. This was the first game that I'd attended since his death, and it was very strange not to have his voice in my ear--particularly as the Jumbotron showed the clips from the old games, when I can still remember the calls he made at the time.

The club is hosting the Stitch and Pitch knitting night in late August this year against the Oakland Athletics. Think there's any chance I can talk my dad into that?

Into the blue again / after the money's gone

Watching Canadian PM Stephen Harper talk about the whole Chrysler situation on TV this morning has me wondering what's going through his head. He's the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada--the man who united the right to take control of the country. He wants to minimize the influence of the government in the lives of private citizens--you know, all the usual good capital-C Conservative kind of stuff.

And here he is to tell us that the Canadian government, along with the government of the province of Ontario, and the United States, is becoming a shareholder in Chrysler: he is telling us that in order to 'resolve' the situation, the government has had to step in, pony up some cash, and take a seat at the boardroom table. On his watch, the government is now more involved in Big Business than even the NDP has dared to dream.

I wonder if, as he stood up to give that press conference, the lyrics from Talking Heads' "Once in a Lifetime" flashed through his head: "How do I work this? Where is that large automobile? This is not my beautiful house...this is not my beautiful wife."

After the boys of summer have gone...

The youngest sister made the trek up to visit me (oldest) and middle. Middle is currently employed as an administrative assistant for the local AIDS outreach group, and last night was their annual fundraiser, "A Taste for Life". In essence, local restaurants all agree to donate 25% of the proceeds for the evening to AIDS charities. Naturally, we all wanted to eat out for the cause.

Youngest has just finished her college program. She had to pass two sets of exit exams in order to graduate and be certified in her field, and passed them all in the first try. It's been so interesting to watch her grow through school. Youngest has never been an especially bookish or academic type, but as soon as she started in this program, she's been right on the ball. She knows more about the human body than I could ever imagine. Now that she's done she think she might take a gap year. She wants to do some volunteer work in Africa, and will be headed to Nicaragua with my mother in November.

I finished my first Ishbel last night. I made the larger shawl size, and I have to say, I don't love it. Now, I haven't blocked it yet, so that might change, but on the whole I think it works much better at the smaller, scarf size. Which is probably why everyone on Rav has made the small one. I've just cast on for the smaller one with my Three Irish Girls Finley Merino in Vintage Zinc. This yarn is incredible: soft, soft, soft, and such a depth of shade. This Ishbel I am going to love for sure.

Headed to the parents' again tomorrow--Dad and I are going to Toronto for a baseball game. It will be my first in several years, although I'd like to make the Stitch and Pitch later this summer too. I'm actually not sure I even know who plays for Toronto any more. Sad, really...there was a time when I could've named the entire roster and their stats.

There are 8 suspected cases os H1N1A in North Bay Rock City. I am not allowed to read Stephen King's The Stand until this is over.

Got $500?

V. – Thomas Pynchon

Lippincott, Philadelphia, 1963. 8vo. 492 pp. First Edition, first printing w. first-issue dj (table of contents on rear panel). Pale purple cloth with silver lettering on the spine and blind-stamped “V”s on the front panel. Top edge stained dark blue, gold endpapers. The price-clipped dj is slightly rubbed, with some chipping (esp. head & heel of spine) and a small tear in the middle of the rear hinge – a 1cm square tear at the top of the spine has been tape-repaired on the inside. The boards are clean except for a slight fading along the top edge, a square area at the head of the spine (resulting from the dj tear) and a slight discoloration at the heel edge, and very minor scuffing along bottom edge of front panel. Internally, the book is clean & sound.

Published in 1963 to critical acclaim, V. won the William Faulkner Foundation Award for best first novel, and immediately established Thomas Pynchon as a “Talent to Watch”. V. is a sprawling novel, filled with a colorful cast of characters whose various adventures and interactions range across a century.

My friend Mike is headed down to Toronto for the Toronto Book Fair this weekend. He sent me the evaluations of several books that he'll be offering for sale there, and it just made me itch to get my hands on some books. The language of selling books is simply incredible--I still dream of opening a bookstore some day, though it seems more and more distant all the time.

I read far too little of any consequence during the school year, so I'd really like to catch up on my reading this summer. Pynchon is on the list for this summer--what else should be?

If I am good...

If I am good I will finish my large Ishbel today. If I am better I will work on Caitlin's sweater. It's a variation on a toddler sweater I made last year. Apparently grown women are much larger than two year olds. Who knew?

I am a packrat. While this has obvious implications for my home life, it also spills over into my professional life. In some ways teaching is well-suited for this kind of behaviour: the culture of entitlement forces me to hang on to things that should simply be binned or recycled, because if I get called up to prove that a student earned (or didn't earn) a certain grade, I need to have all of my documents in order. This year, I am throwing out everything from last year--I figure 12 months is plenty of time to hang on to things.

Once my office is clean (which should take a few more days), I am going to start on my craft room at home. It's sewing time, I think.

Warning: This post is long and yarn-related. If you're not a knitting type, please disregard.

Toronto's Downtown Knit Collective held their annual Knitters Frolic this past weekend. It coincided, magically, with my hometown's annual Maple Syrup Festival (reportedly the second largest in Ontario), so I was quite excited to head on home. I brought Girl Tuesday down with me, and we stopped at The Purple Sock in Coldwater. After deciding that money spent there did not count as part of the Frolic budget, I picked up some Fleece Artist Woolie Silk 2 ply in their Silver colourway, and a beautiful wooden shawl pin. The next day, we met up with Starlite75 to have the traditional pancake breakfast. From there, we headed to Toronto. Naturally, the Don Valley Parkway was closed for cleaning, so we had to take an alternate route, which we promptly messed up, but thanks to the marvels of GPS we were able to correct our course and arrive in one piece. We even managed to get a totally sweet parking spot right by the door.

Inside the Japanese Cultural Centre was pretty overwhelming. We decided to make a circuit of the whole thing to get an idea of what was available. I got to see a lot of stuff that I had not seen in person before (Malabrigo lace, Dream in Colour, etc.) and we saw both the Yarn Harlot and Amy Singer walking around. I would have loved to talk to them, but didn't want to bother them. There was some stuff that I didn't see that I had hoped to, like Berroco, Brown Sheep, and Rowan, but I did somehow manage to find enough to buy...

Like this:


And this:


And these:


And this:


And this:


And of course no yarn would be complete without:


I also picked up Kristeen Griffith-Grimes' French Girl Knits, and am quite pleased that I did so.

Return from the netherworld

It has been a long time, hasn't it? In recent weeks my job has all but taken over my life; I feel like I've done little other than mark, knit, sleep, and watch Battlestar Galactica in the last two months. Even now, when I ought to be at the end, I'm not--missing exams and a couple of INCs mean that I won't really be done for probably another two weeks, but classes and exams are over, and students are off campus, and there's only a month left to this contract.

In addition to the heavy workload, in the last few weeks there's been lots of fun personal stuff to deal with as well. I won't dwell on the negatives (let's say that owning a home and a vehicle really is as expensive as everyone says), but the positive is worth mentioning: the Boyfriend is now the Fiance.

This past weekend was wonderful: I made the trip down to Toronto for The Downtown Knit Collective's Knitters Frolic. I stuck to my budget, but managed to buy some pretty impressive yarns...I need to head back to the house now, but I intend to post a full report of the awesome. Hint: I saw both the Yarn Harlot and Amy Singer.

Over and over and over again

It is finally Friday in a week that has often seemed as though it won't end. Even it being Friday hasn't really changed that--I only remembered last night that I have an exam meeting after all of my classes for the day, which will add another two hours to what I'm doing. :(

The weather has been very strange in the last day or so. It seems we are limping towards some kind of spring, so it has been slowly getting warmer...it's not quite four seasons in one day, New Zealand-style, but it is strange. Yesterday, we had snow squalls in the afternoon, followed by hail, then freezing rain, and then a thunderstorm. It's quite odd to see lightning and hear thunder when there's still a good six feet of snow on the lawn...

The Watchmen is out in theatres this weekend; the boyfriend is quite excited. I am not. I know everyone who reads graphic novels is all like "OMG watchmen=best thing ever" but it's really never done all that much for me. I like some of the pieces, but I can't say that the whole quite adds up for me. The misogynism might be part of that.

I Hate the Recession, or, It's Called "Common Sense"

One of the things that irritates me most about this recession (aside from the big picture worries of the world coming to an end/the economy actually imploding/not being able secure another job) is the veritable pantheon of "Survive the Recession" advice that is flying at us from all corners. As a society, it is of vital importance that we be told not to buy $9 coffees (sidebar: I'm shocked that Kinder Bueno commercial is still on the air), because we certainly can't figure it out ourselves.

The advice bugs me mostly because it is impractical: Have a staycation (gag) instead of a vacation. Do your nails yourself instead of going to a salon. Consider buying a smaller model car. Well, if I couldn't afford to do any of those things in the first place, how does continuing not to do them save me any money?

And don't even get started on the terminology people invent for this. Recessionista? Srsly?

Some of the worst advice yet comes from the Knitting Daily newsletter, which comes from Interweave Press. Mostly I enjoy Knitting Daily: with free patterns, helpful columns, and the gallery so you can see how stuff actually fits real people, what's not to like? Sure, they do shill Interweave's books/magazines/etc. a lot, but it's a small price to pay for what you get in return.

This week's newsletter is "Knitting Creatively On A Budget." Apparently, one does this by only buying one skein of yarn at a time from their local yarn store (to make sure they stay open, of course) and then making hats, wristwarmers, iPod cozies, neckwarmers, and baby clothes out of them. Or, one might purchase Leigh Radford's One Skein (published by Interweave) to access a number of one skein projects, including (!) some tiny knit cupcakes! They're adorable!

So here is my dilemma: why am I buying yarn for the sake of buying yarn, and why am I using it to make stuff with varying degrees of usefulness? Sure, as KD points out, I can make several iPod cozies out of one skein, and give them as gifts to my friends, but surely each friend only needs one, and don't most people already own some kind of iPod cover? Why am I making knit cupcakes? Sure, they are cute, but they're also useless. Aren't I supposed to be trying to cut down on waste here?

Here is my advice on how to survive as a knitter during times when money is short:
1) Knit from your stash. You already own it, so it doesn't cost you anything.
2) If you hate the colours in your stash, dye them yourself. This can be done relatively inexpensively when compared with the costs of buying all new yarn.
3) Save all of your leftover yarn for use in future projects. Learn to make mitered squares so that you can make squares for a blanket. Try to do one or two a week. If you start now, you'll have something ready to put together by the time December rolls around.
4) Don't knit things just for the sake of knitting them, or because Someone Famous is. Yes, the Yarn Harlot has fabulous taste in patterns and yarn, but you don't need to make a Clapotis/Jaywalkers/February Lady Sweater just because EVERYONE ELSE is making them. Which brings me to my next point...
5) Make things that you like AND that you'll wear/use. If you like shawls and wear them, by all means, make a Clapotis. I like to look at shawls more than I like to wear them, so it would be a bad choice for me.
6) Only buy yarn when you know what you're going to use it for. When you are looking at it, think "I will use this for _____". If the blank remains blank, or you change the sentence to "I want to buy this because it's soft/pretty/cheap/I want to buy something", put it back, and think about it for a couple of days.
7) If you're a book buyer, ask yourself how likely you are to knit more than one pattern in the book. If you're not, don't buy it.
8) Similarly, only buy online patterns that you already have the yarn for.
9) Look for sales. This applies to both yarn and books. Again, though, don't think, "OMG, Kidsilk Haze for $5/ball. Must buy." if you hate mohair. Yarn you hate or won't use is never a bargain, no matter how cheap it is.
10) Use the destash function on Ravelry. If you play your cards right, you can either get rid of stuff from your stash, and use that money to fund other yarn, or you can pick up yarn you need (for a project, of course) for less than you might pay at a store.
11) If you belong to a knitting group, arrange a destash night. My guild did this in January and it went really well. We had a table for stuff that was free, and a table for a stuff for trade. If people had anything really valuable, they were allowed to put a figure on it ("I want $40/equivalent trade for this skein of Blue Moon Ribre Arts Luscious Single Silk".)
12) When knitting for others, make things that are appropriate for the recipient. Don't use luxury fibers for newborn gifts. I know you want to make something awesome, and a cashmere layette makes a great statement, but no new parent will thank you for a gift that requires such delicate treatment. Similarly, if you are going to make something for an adult, make it something they will use.
13) Prioritize. If you really want to try that Tilli Thomas or Wollemeise, think about what you're willing to go without to get it.

bad blogger

I am a bad blogger.

More correctly, I'm a busy blogger who also has the personality defect of being somehwat lazy, an dletting her personal life swamp her rather than taking the time to add a tiny bit of sanity and order to the chaos by writing 100 words here.

Sleep has been something of a luxury lately, as changes in my schedule have confused the cat to no end, and he is now determined to wake us up through playing the pouncing game at various hours of the morning. This has resulted in him getting shut in the bathroom for a few hours each morning in the interests of actually being able to sleep. Now, of course, he has conked right out on the floor. He is a very tired cat, you see.

I started a pair of socks last Monday and I am within five pattern repeats of finishing them--I can't believe how fast they've come off the needles. The yarn is a merino/bamboo/nylon blend, and it handles so nicely. This is my first attempt at toe up socks, and it's been a good experience on the whole. I am a bit worried that it will result in a lot of ankle/short socks, though, as I usually get very bored of what I'm doing after the heel. Cuff down, I have to keep going because socks need a toe, but toe up, I'm free to quit whenever I want to...

I've also cast on for my mom's birthday present. She's been after me to make her a sweater for a while now, but when pressed she's expressed no interest in any of the particulars: size, colour, shape, cardigan vs. pullover, fibre, etc. Thus, I've chosen the yarn and pattern myself, and will reclaim the sweater if she doesn't like it. (Although I'm pretty sure she will.) The only thing I'm really nervous about is the fit--I may have sized a bit big, but I supposed bigger is better than smaller.

you can read me like a book

The venerable Wall Street Journal has an article in its Book Lover column about fictional crushes. Naturally, this stems from Twilight-mania, but I would be lying if I said that there weren't a few good men from between the pages who have claimed a tiny piece of my heart.

Gilbert Blythe, from Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne series, has ruined me for other men. Montgomery's characterization of him is just awesome: he loves Anne for who she is, and is drawn to her strength and her intelligence. He's also proud, so he is an actively participant in their relationship.

I also love Andrew Ryan from Kathy Reichs' Temperance Brennan series for many of the same reasons. The replacement of the Ryan character with David Boreanaz's FBI agent in the TV series is one of the main reasons I don't watch Bones on TV.

Jon Snow in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series.

Craig in Craig Thompson's Blankets graphic novel.

I'm sure there are others, but I'm quite tired and can't think of them.

Inspiration

I like to think of myself as a creative person, but if that were true, wouldn't I have a lot more to show for it? There may be a lot going on in my mind, but I'm seldom able to transfer that from the realm of possibility to the tangible world. There are currently two novels, a play, a screenplay, and a couple of poems in my head; the sum total of all these in terms of actual writing is probably less than two thousand words at present. I lack discipline and confidence.

So imagine my surprise, then, when I picked up a stitch library at a friend's house over the weekend, and thought, "I could make a sweater from that." And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that there are several knit items that I want that don't have patterns. The only solution is simply to create themselves. I've got five projects in mind: a cowl, a pair of mittens, a pair of socks, a series of purses incorporating elements of Charles Rennie MacIntosh's work, and the sweater, which I think wants to be knit in a wool-silk blend and will use a Gothic spire stitch pattern.

It remains to be seen, of course, whether I'll be successful in producing patterns for any of these, but I remain hopeful that I can make it work.

in the arms of a poet

I'm about to see a major project come to fruition tonight: My department's fourth annual creative writing exhibition. I've spent much of the last month drafting letters, booking rooms, emailing, editing copy, calling writers, cajoling writers, badgering writers, and all manner of stuff. I'm excited because it is good to see the results from the things that you do. Knitting is good for this; teaching first and second year university students critical reading and writing skills is usually...not. I've also been self-appointed as the event photographer. The university has loaned me a Nikon D-SLR, which is quite nice, and I'm hoping to spirit it away home to take pictures of Finished Objects, and also of the Cat.

I'm wearing my new sweater for the first time in honour of the occasion. I've already got two compliments on it from students.

Starting Over, Passing Through

I didn't get to watch today's inauguration because I was busy running around trying to get a variety of things organized. One of my colleagues is out for two weeks, as per doctor's orders, so I am having to pick up one of her classes and a joint project we are working on. This isn't really a big deal, but when you combine it with essay proposals in both of my courses and the general high anxiety levels of my second year students...well, let's just say that it makes for a busy day.

A few good things did come out of all the busy times, though: I snagged a waffle iron and a hot air popcorn popper, and my new glasses were finally in! The types of people who "design" glasses frames (or lend their names to such) fascinate me. There's everything from Hilary Duff to Nintendo to Eddie Bauer to Cadillac. The pair I wound up with are Cosmopolitan (...I know) and I have to say that I think they are pretty sharp. This is my first new pair in about 3 and a half years, and it's marvellous to be able to SEE again.

Reading the status updates of my friends on Facebook today has been a tremendously uplifting experience.[1] It's hard not to catch that optimism, that hope. In one of those moments that is truly serendipitous, my first year students are reading Nella Larsen's Passing, a novella that will challenge them to consider and re-consider how they perceive race and gender. Right after the first lecture, one of my students asked me, "But how can it be that no one notices that these people are black?"

Which is, of course, a very loaded question to deal with in that few minutes while your class is filing out and the next class is filing in to the lecture hall.

My students attend a *very* white school. (In fact, every time I see the school's latest marketing campaign, I laugh a litttle, since it suggests a student body that's much more diverse in terms of both race and gender.) A lot of them will have never thought about race in anything more than an abstract way, much less realized the myriad of ways that race shapes discourse and interaction in our society. I'm hoping Obama's inauguration allows at least some of them to engage with the ideas that Larsen proposes in her novella.

1. The other thing that really struck me, upon reading through pages of Facebook status updates, is how many people viewed this as a historic moment. Which, duh, it obviously is, but it's interesting to see how people identify it as such in the moment: "...is watching history being made" etc. CNN has historic t-shirts, too. The half life of nostalgia is truly growing smaller each year...

Reading, Knitting and Other Diversions...

Reflecting on yesterday's first post,[1] I'm sad that I no longer read as much as I should/want to/used to. Knitting takes up a lot of reading time, you know.[2] I'm currently cracking through The Mill on the Floss again, while working on two lace projects: Wisp and Ice Queen.

I think it's time for me to start listening to audiobooks again, so I can do both at once. Listening is such a qualitatively different experience from reading, though...

[1] Which I keep having to edit as I think of other reasons why I read.
[2] So do video games.

Poetry mittens

Two posts in one day, I know. But I just couldn't wait to write about these: Poetry Mittens.

According to the Knitting Daily newsletter, poetry mittens are an early American tradition, where women would choose their favourite poems and knit lines from the poems into the mittens. They're pretty awesome looking.

(Boyfriend thinks they are the nerdiest/lamest thing in the world. He is lame and thus I am never going to make him that second mitten.)

The most important question, obviously, is what poem to pick.

It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar-limbs
--Wallace Stevens

Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
--T. S. Eliot

The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
--Matthew Arnold

All good possibilities...but what I would likely choose:

Hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
They danced by the light of the moon.
--Edward Lear

At least until I can choose a Finn song, anyway.

The Big Question

Karie asks an important question over at her blog: Why Do You Read?

I read because I can.
(And let's be honest, it's one of the only things I'm good at. I'm a really good reader. I read at least 600 words per minute, and have impressive retention skills for what I have read. It seldom takes me more than a day to finish a novel.)

I read because I enjoy it.
(I do. I like books. I like holding them, touching them, ogling their covers, learning about the characters, solving the mysteries, falling in love when the characters do, being devastated when they are, laughing at the good bits, crying at the sad bits. I like what reading tells me about myself and about other arounds me. I like that I can read serious academic works and the most trivial mysteries and comic books and enjoy all of them.)

I read because it's compulsive.
(It really is. I'll read the ingredients on a cereal box if nothing else is around. I have to be careful when I read comics because it's very easy for me to forget about the pictures and focus just on the text.)

I read because I get paid to.
(I love my job I love my job I love my job.)

I read because I makes me happy.
(When I was a child, one of the most effective punishments was for my parents to take away my books.

I read because I get lost in what I'm doing.
(There are numerous stories about me getting lost on the way home from school because I was too busy reading to watch where I was going. I never actually got lost--we lived too close--but I did tend to dawdle.)
Why do you read?

oh, the weather outside is frightful...

I could not blog today without talking about the weather. It is cold here. In all fairness, cold does not begin to cover it. At present, it is -32 celcius here in North Bay. The television tells me that this can technically be referred to as a deep freeze. The only good thing I can think of right now is that at least when it's this cold, it doesn't snow.

Second term is now underway. I feel bad for my second year students, as I think they are vastly unprepared for the onslaught of work that's about to hit them in the next three weeks. I have to keep reminding myself that it is not my fault if they are unable to read the schedule of assignments off their syllabi.

I've decided to make it a point to mention Twilight in each of my classes this week. We're doing Great Expectations in first year, and Tennyson's "Tithonus" in second. What is the relevance, you might ask?

For Great Expectations, we're reading and comparing the two endings that Dickens wrote, and discussing which we think fits the tone and scope of the book better. (I am published ending FTW, by the way.) One of the questions I like to put to the students is to what extent an author needs to consider how his or her audience will react to a text. Harry Potter and Twilight are the obvious comparisons because of how personally invested their readers tend to become in the stories. It's actually prompted really good discussion from a (normally) fairly quiet class, so I'm quite happy about that.

For "Tithonus", we've been talking about what aspects of the Tithonus myth are relevant to us, and the idea of eternal youth/beauty to go along with immortality presents an interesting segue to Twilight and our larger obsession with vampire stories. The ideas of immortality and eternal youth are so closely intertwined for us that you almost wouldn't consider them separately. (And, of course, in Twilight, Bella is obsessed with being even slightly older than Edward.)

I finished my sweater, and it is huge. It actually looks more like a sweater dress. Stupid blocking. I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. Perhaps once I get the sleeves on I'll feel more kindly to it. I've started a new Wisp in the KnitPicks Imagination sock yarn, which is an alpaca/wool/nylon bled. The colourway is called Looking Glass, and it's the most lovely shades of blue, green, and grey. It actually reminds me of beach glass.

I need another project, but just can't seem to figure out what I want to knit. It's making me antsy.

End of the year

This is going to be a hard year's end for me to write. The year hasn't actually been all that bad, but the last month has, and it will be difficult for me not to let December change my perceptions of everything else that happened. I don't know that I've ever been so happy to see the back of a month--and I can only hope for better things for the next year.

Good things I would like to remember from 2008: Buying the house, moving in with the boyfriend, adopting the cat, the Danforth Music Hall, front row for Great Big Sea, the "Crisis in Orkientalism" lecture, 3 year contract, "Life of Pi" lecture, Darren's wedding, Ravelry, new friends, old friends, Extras, new babies, Juno soundtrack, Stars album, 7 Nights Pt. II announced, Tropic Thunder, Wall-E.

I will also remember the people I lost this year.

For resolutions, I have a pretty big list:
1) Eating better. (This is already in progress, but there's always room for improvement.)
2) Finish knitting projects, and knitting through the stash. It's getting quite big.
3) Be more sympathetic. (I've had a very hard time seeing beyond myself this year. I want to change that.)
4) Be more active.
5) Write more. (Including blogging every day!)
6) Be happier.

Book Challenge, yeah

Since I clearly don't read anywhere near as much as I should, I've decided to sign up for the "What's in a name? 2" book challenge. You get six categories and have to choose and read a book with a title that fits that category.

1. A book with a "profession" in its title.
2. A book with a "time of day" in its title.
3. A book with a "relative" in its title.
4. A book with a "body part" in its title.
5. A book with a "building" in its title.
6. A book with a "medical condition" in its title.

My choices:
1.) J.K. Rowling's Tales of Beedle the Bard
2.) Dennis Lehane's The Given Day
3.) Joyce Carol Oates's My Sister, My Love
4.) Ursula LeGuin's Left Hand of Darkness
5.) Ken Follett's Pillars of the Earth
6.) Vincent Lam's Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures

the goose is getting fat

Every year my parents ask me what I want for Christmas. It always takes me a really long time to figure out what I want, and this year has been no exception. In fact, I only realized what I wanted this morning. Which, what with being a good week from Christmas, is much too late to actually communicate that to my mother.

(An iPod touch, just in case you were wondering.)

I took Cait Christmas shopping this morning, and managed to keep the spending to a minimum, although once I get paid on Friday I'll be heading back to the mall. I actually only have a few gifts left to buy: Boyfriend's mother, Boyfriend's sister's boyfried (...), one friend, and a cousin. I do have a couple of things left to knit, though, and most of them seem to be for my mother. (Who has suddenly decided that she wants a hat, please and thank you.)

I've been knitting frantically for the last few days, which have been a bit stressful. My gauge, normally quite loose, is like cast iron--to the point where I actually had to tear out part of my knitting. (When I went to try it on, I could hardly get my hand through it.) The other result of this tension is that I've actually started to lose some of the feeling in my left arm. As tingling and numbness of the arms, particularly the left arm, are not especially good things to be experiencing, I was worried that it might be something else, but it is definitely the knitting. Bah humbug.

wherever you go, there you are

Every once in a while, the universe likes to remind me that I am actually exactly where I should be. Today was very much one of those days. The semester is done, and I have been working from home on marking knitting fiendishly for the last few days. Today I had a meeting at the school, and between one thing and another (specifically, Boyfriend and Cat) I wound up leaving a few minutes late. As I was driving up the hill, a Crowded House song came on the radio--and if I had left on time, I would surely have missed it.

After my meeting, I had to grab a book from my office, and when I got there, there was a small package attached to my doorknob with a note:

“Professor X,
I saw these at the booksale and they made me think of you. One is new but has lots of margin notes and the other is old and doesn’t have any notes. If you already have them feel free to give them away. Happy holidays!”

The books in question are a new Folgers copy of Romeo and Juliet, and an old (1923) Copps Canada Library copy of Henry V. To say that this made my day would be a massive understatement. The marking I've done in the last couple of weeks has been soulcrushing, for lack of a better term, and I really needed something like this to remind that there is a reason for me to be here. I have no idea who sent the books, but I'm really happy that he or she did. Thank you, Anonymous Student!

Sleigh bells ring...

What a week. What do you mean, it's only Wednesday? Tell that to my bones.

So much has been happening these last few days--to me, to my friends, to Canada. These would be exciting times to be alive if they weren't so darn scary.

On a personal level, I finally accomplished something this week that's been ten years in the making: I am now a fully licensed driver. It only took me ten years. I took my first G level test about three weeks ago, and failed, but this test went much better. (When the examiner asked me to parallel park, and I pulled up beside a Smart Car, I figured everything was going to be okay.)

I am also finished school until January, which is fantastic. Loads of marking to be done, but that's okay.

The Boyfriend and I have also put up our first Christmas tree. We did this Sunday night, and the cat has already succeeded in removing three of the bottom branches. (It's an artificial tree. Boyfriend is allergic to the real kind, which is unfortunate, as the cat might have more difficulty with a real one.) He (cat, not boyfriend) has also figured out how to remove some of the ornaments, and plays a game where he throws one of his pompoms into the branches and then has to go get it. It's quite adorable to watch. I am a bad cat disciplinarian.

the most blunderful time of the year...

The countdown is on. One day left to this week; three days left next week, and minimal teaching all around. (Minimal teaching, of course, means maximal marking. Bah humbug to that.) I'm always ground down this time of year; I let my job be more stressful than it should be, and I am so effing ready for a break I can taste it. I went to bed at 11 p.m. last night, and woke up around 7:30 this morning. It's now 4 in the afternoon, and I am exhausted. There's nothing left in this tank. Just air.

(As an illustration of my point, I just paused from writing this scintillating rumination on my life to go pick up some stuff from the print room here. Apparently, you actually need to send documents to the printer before they will be printed off. Where the heck is my telepathic printer?)

Don't get me wrong. I like my job. But I'm ready for a break right now. I'm ready for comfy clothes and healthy food that doesn't cost an arm and a leg, and time spent with a cat who has no sense of entitlement except when it comes to the Boyfriend's computer chair. I don't want to read more essays that misinterpret both texts and questions. I don't want to be as tired and frustrated as I am right now.

I'm hoping the quick trip home this weekend will refresh me. If not, maybe I will just sleep for the whole month of December.

Goodbye, yellow brick road...

I have lead a life that been largely untouched by death. In 27 years, I have lost only three family members, and no friends. Today changed that. A friend of mine went out for a run last night, had a heart attack, and died, at the age of 44 years.

I've known John for about four years now. We met at The Historic Site Which Shall Not Be Named, where he was working part time while teaching. I was working on my MA thesis project at the time, which he was quite interested in, as his background was in history. He shared my love for North Bay Rock City, having also attended Nipissing for the Bachelor of Education program. Our paths would cross at work several times over the next couple of months, and we grew to be friends outside of work as well.

John was always up for a good time. He loved to grab a pint at Cellarman's, or to stop by other people's houses, or welcome us into his home. The Possum Lounge, his cool, drafty attic, was a wonderful place to hang out, full of hockey memorabilia and souvenirs of John's life. He loved music, as well, recording and releasing his first CD, Highway 401 Tonight, this past year.

John had a very generous and kind heart. When I lost my first teaching job two years ago after the board restructured, he went out of his way to offer me supply days in his kindergarten classroom. Oh yeah--that's also the kind of guy that John was: the kind of guy who was quite happy to teach in the primary stream. When I went into his classroom, it was very apparent how much his students just adored him, ahnd with good reason: he made up songs just for them, and created a strong, nurturing class environment. I can't even imagine how his little ones are going to deal with this.

I think what makes this so hard to understand and to accept (aside from the part where I just plain don't know how to deal with it) is that John was at the peak of his existence. And sure, it's a cliche to say that someone "was taken to soon" or anything along those lines, but it does actually apply here. A few months ago, John met a woman and fell hard for her. They had just purchased a house together, and given their housewarming party four days ago. I saw them at the Historic Site over Thanskgiving, and their happiness was so complete that it was almost tangible. My heart breaks every time I think about what she is going through now.

How terrible to be taken away from this world just as everything comes together. It is difficult not be saddened by all the missed opportunities; the unfulfilled potential; the memories. But at the same time, I can't help but think--at least he was happy.

Take care, John. I hope you know how much your friendship meant to me.

Gears of War: 90 years since Armistice

"But it's not 'Lest We Forget', it's 'Lest We Remember.'"
--Alan Bennett, The History Boys

I'm a big fan of Alan Bennett's The History Boys, though sadly I have yet to see a stage production of it. For me, one of the most intriguing scenes in the movie deals with Irwin, the teacher, attempting to teach the boys about how the first and second World Wars fit into their views of history. The quotation above sticks in my mind for a variety of reasons, not least of which is that I am currently very interested in how we choose to commemorate and remember our dead.

My maternal great-grandfather fought in WWI; my paternal grandfather participated in WWII as a Royal Engineer, and saw action in both the European and Pacific theatres. Both were fortunate enough to survive. I do not take war lightly; I do not take lightly the sacrifices made, nor the people who are overseas right now--no matter how much I disagree with our role in Afghanistan. That said, I'm really unimpressed with a commercial put together by the Royal Canadian Mint to commemorate this year's Remembrance Day. The commercial in question is below:



This commercial bothers me because it approaches war from the perspective of a first person shooter video game, like Wolfenstein or Halo. War video games have always made me uncomfortable: I feel that they trivialize the sacrifices made by those fought and those who died. They simplify history into the lowest common denominator of GOOD (us) vs. BAD (them), and remove the humanity from history. Battles that real people fought in become simply obstacles to be defeated; levels to be conquered. There is no humanity in it anymore: it is simply entertainment and cinematics.

(I am aware of the various counterarguments here--movies as entertainment/glorification of war/propaganda; no real difference from non-war first person shooters; etc., but I will simply remind you that when watching a movie, or playing Halo, there is an additional level of fiction built in. You don't have to kill anyone simply watching Saving Private Ryan, and you don't have to kill anyone human in an FPS, which makes it much easier to disassociate yourself.)

Obviously, the Mint has chosen to portray this ad in this way for a particualr reason: they think it will appeal to a different audience. And to an extent, I think they're right--I was sure this was an ad for a video game, since it apes the conventions of video game trailers most expertly. The implied message, though, is what makes me so uncomfortable. In the video game world, war is a finite series of combats that have an infinite number of 'do overs' and 'save points'. If you die, well, just start over! If you stick to it long enough, by Geroge, you'll eventually beat the whole thing! And then you can put the CD back in its case, and leave it on a shelf, and forget all about it. There is no real sacrifice--not by the soldiers, not by those living in the war zone, not by those left at home. The actions of the gamer have no real consequences--unlike the soldier's. Even more than that, there is no aftermath. The war simply ends when you take out the game. There are no war reparations, no post traumatic stress disorder, and no real cost involved.

What a sad statement it is on us, that we have to interest people in remembrance in this way.

American Politics Through Canadian Eyes

I'm a pretty staunch Canadian nationalist, and I've spent a good portion of my life convincing myself that I don't care at all about what happens in the States. Obviously, as I've gotten older and my worldview has developed, I've realized how foolish that is, and I followed the 2008 presidential race pretty closely for someone who didn't even get to cast a ballot.

Canada just came through an election that few wanted, to the tune of $300 million, and it has been fascinating to contrast that process with what I've seen unfold in the US. We were sluggish and apathetic, lacking leadership in a time where it could have made all the difference. The status quo remains here. The Americans, by contrast, are fiery and energized. People care. Voter turn out was awesome, inspite of a million difficulties.

And Barack Obama was elected.

I watched the election coverage by myself, knitting away on a toddler sweater. The first few hours were so tense for me that I had to keep changing the channel every few minutes (perhaps CNN's Election Night in America music had something to do with this) but as more and more states went blue, I was able to relax and just enjoy. At 11 p.m., when CNN declared for Obama, I lost it. I cried. Watching the reactions of everyone gathered in Chicago, and in the studio, and in Ebenezer Baptist Church was truly awe inspiring.

John McCain's concession speech was very classy. I know some have expressed the idea that it was written by someone else, and not necessarily something he believed, but I think he did an excellent job of selling it. He behaved very graciously and spoke very eloquently. (Just out of curiosity, does his voice remind anyone else of Andy Rooney's?)

Obama's speech had me tearing up again. It served to showcase all of his best qualities, and again, watching the crowd's response to him was as heartwarming as actually watching him. I'm so happy his daughters get a puppy. His story about 106 year old Ann Nixon Cooper was especially strong. It is easier to believe in the future now. I have hope.

One of my more politically inclined friends told me a few months ago that Stephen Harper timed his election to avoid being conflated with the American election, in fear that an Obama victory might turn the tide against the Conservative Party here in Canada, and I have to say that I think he's probably right about that. (So, unfortunately, was Stephen Harper--I don't think Obama's victory would have done anything good for his party.)

Here's to the future, everyone. Regardless of your politics, let us believe that things can only get better from here.

4 Nights at the Palais Royale

As I was driving home from work tonight, I was reflecting on birthdays past. Last year's was pretty quiet, a quick trip down to Guelph to visit the boyfriend; the year before that was...well, messy but a lot of fun. In the long run, only a few of my birthdays really stick out in my mind in a really concrete way. And that's just well--it really is only another day, but with cake. (If you're lucky. There was no cake for me this year.)

There is one birthday that stands out from all of the others, though, and as I was driving home, I came to the realization that this is actually the tenth anniversary of that day.

The year was 1998. I was in grade twelve. Chretien was Prime Minister; Mike "the Knife" Harris had Ontario firmly in his grip. It was November, which is a threshold month in Ontario, neither autumn nor winter. But none of this mattered: It was my seventeenth birthday, and I was going to see my favourite band in concert for the first time.

Sloan defined my adolescence in a way that no other band could. Most of my friends hated them, often for the reasons that I liked them so much: strummy Beatles-esque guitars, earnest vocals, playful lyrics, warm production values. Of course, there was also the boys themselves. (It is strange to think that at the time, they were the age I am now.) The boys of Sloan were real: genuine, Canadian, and normal. Unlike the Backstreet Boys or Hanson or other boy bands that some of my friends adored, these were no poster boys--sure, I was head over heels for Patrick, but he was the kind of guy that you might serendipitously run into at the mall when shopping in Toronto, not some farflung matinee idol. (That did actually happen, and he was totally awesome about it.)

The other reason that Sloan was integral to me as an adolescent was because of their online presence. My introduction to Sloan via "The Lines You Amend" in 1996 (a song described by Rolling Stone as beginning like "The Ballad of John and Yoko" before morphing into a "likable hybrid of T. Rex and Crowded House"--srsly, you wonder why I love this band?) came at roughly the same time as my introduction to the internet. The early Sloan online community was a revelation to me: as socially awkward, nerdy, and unsure of myself as I was at that age, the Sloan Message Board was full of fine, kind, accepting people. No one online cared that I wasn't sure about drinking, or that I didn't want to do drugs, or that I liked school. In some ways, these relationships were often more satisfying than my real life friend: these people liked me for who I was. For the first time, I was able to forge an identity as part of a group that I felt secure in. As a result, ten years on I am unable to separate my love for the band/music from my love for the people that they connected me to: it is part and parcel of the experience for me.

So on that cool November day, my dad drove me and my friend Erin down to the Palais Royale, a converted dance hall right on the shores of Lake Ontario in Toronto. It had been a popular venue for big bands, once upon a time, and the floor was mounted on springs to move with the dancers. It was a truly magical venue.

Rufus Wainwright was the opening act, having just released his debut album, and his pop-opera sound was mesmerizing--especially "April Fools". His sister Martha performed with him wearing black pants with red pockets. It's strange what you remember after all this time.

My dad ditched us for the safety of the 19+ section, so we positioned ourselves on the Jay side of the stage, right in front of the speaker stack. On its technical merits, the concert wasn't anything spectacular. Sloan wasn't an especially tight live band at that time. Anything it lacked in technique, the show more than made up for in charm: the set list might have been taken right from my heart. And even now I have a hard time remembering another show that hit so many of my favourites.

After teh show, my dad found Erin and me, and we watched the roadies clean up the stage. When one of them got to the drumkit, he pantomimed throwing the drumsticks out into the crowd. My companions began to short, "Birthday girl! Birthday girl!" until he relented and handed half a drumstick to me.

I still have it, along with the letter Jay wrote to me one time, in a box in my parents' basement.

Sloan played four shows at the Palais Royale that week, which were collected and mixed into 4 Nights at the Palais Royale, a double live album. I bought it on its release date, six months later, and though tonight is the first night in years that I've listened to it, I couldn't ask for a better momento of that night.

I would go on to see Sloan some five or six times over the next few eyars. I would eventually meet all of them, and run a fansite for one. But as I got older, I grew up and away from the band. University and adulthood crept in, and Neil Finn/Crowded House became my defining soundtrack. (Ironically, the first time I would see the Finn in concert, it would be in that same Palais Royale.) Somewhere along the way, my world had changed.

The seventeen year old Rhiannon could hardly have imagined what her world would look like ten years later. The friend she loved most, enough to share this concert with, is someone I haven't spoken to in eight years. She dreamed desperately of owning a record player--I don't even own a CD player anymore. She dreamed even more desperately of having a date--I've just bought a house with my partner of four years. She went to so many shows, bought so many CDs--I've been to maybe two shows in the last year, haven't seen Sloan in five, and haven't bought a CD since January. I'm not as smart, as cool, or as indie as she thought she was. In the end, it's okay, though--I'm also a lot happier than I ever thought I could be, when I was seventeen.

Happy to me

27 is not off to a good start. It seems unjust to have to work an 8:30-5:30 day (even if I do get to meet with an old friend for lunch)--but the real injustice is that when I woke this morning, it was not to the sound of my alarm at 7:00, but to the sound of my cat vomitting all over my brand new duvet. At 5:30.

Now, I can hardly be mad at the poor little guy--today is a big day for him, too. He's six months old now, which means it is time for the big snip. He wasn't allowed to have any food after 8 p.m. last night, and I think his hunger drove him to have a nibble or two of the lone plant in our house. Or at least, that's what I'm assuming the bright green stain on my duvet was caused by. I sure hope it comes out.

Hallowe'en was a good time. The Professor McGonagall costume was a big hit, so I'm pretty sure that I will reprise it next year, and my evening costume came together pretty well considering I started it only three days before Hallowe'en and sewed the whole thing together myself. All things told, it was a very good time--lots of good, dancing fun, including "Rock Lobster" (no "American Boy" though, alas) and more than a few mini Oh Henry bars.

Caitlin and Mum are off to Nicaragua today for the annual medical mission--I'm wishing them blue skies and smooth sailing (flying) all the way down.

Alpaca alpaca alpaca

Saturday's trip to the alpaca farm was pretty awesome. (If a little wet.) The alpacas are such strange but interesting creatures. They hum to each other, and they all have to poop in the same place. (It's part of the herd mentality, I guess.) The thing I like most about them is their eyes--they're just so inquisitive. I got some nice yarn, too, which is good, because the yarn diet is in full force as of now.

I picked up the material for my Hallowe'en costume today, and I'm hopeful that I'll be able to pull it off for Friday. There will have to be a lot of working very hard to make it happen, but it looks like a pretty easy pattern, comparatively speaking.

This week would be great if there were about three more days in it.

Fall is upon us in full force. The leaves are mostly gone now. It was a short leaf season this year, which is unfortunate because it is one of the most beautiful things about this city. Now it seems to be rain, snow, and increasingly colder days. One of the things I like most about the new house is that it has a very small driveway, which will make shovelling less of a chore than it was last year. (At my last apartment, which was a basement one, I somehow suckered myself into shovelling the driveway [which is easily six times the size of my driveway] on my landlady's schedule--lots of 6 a.m. days, and lots of shovelling the driveway 4+ times a day.)

Lots of the mail I was waiting for finally showed up this week, including my Professor McGonagall hat and rosewood wand (see previous post), but also my latest KP order AND my birthday present from the boy (my very own personal ball winder and swift). The Imagination sock yarn at KnitPicks is just gorgeous. I bought two balls each of Wicked Witch and Looking Glass--it's an alpaca/merino/nylon blend and the colours are stunning. I'm contemplating a scarf in the Looking Glass for the youngest skylark sister, since it's her colours (turquoises, aquas, blues, greys) but I'm not sure about it since it's got such a high nylon content.

The ball winder and swift are especially fun to the cat, who thinks that it is Great Fun to try to chase the swift when it spins, and then is surprised when he gets caught under the umbrella part.

This afternoon, I get to go make friends with alpacas. The knitting guild has been invited out to the alpaca farm outside of town. The sisters and I went in the spring, but it was a pretty quick visit during an open house. This time we get to go into the barns and actually see how the alpacas are cared for and such. The owner has a lovely little yarn shop there, full of yarns from her alpacas and from an Ontario alpaca co-op where everyone contributes some fibre and then they all get yarn. I think I'm going to wear the socks I made from the yarn I bought when we went in the spring--is this the knitter's equivalent of wearing the band's shirt to a rock concert? (A faux pas I've never committed, I should note.) My camera is definitely coming with and I'm hoping to pick up some yarn. It's not breaking the yarn diet if it's local, one of a kind yarn, right?

Hallowe'en

Hallowe'en approaches (a scarce eight days!) and I still have no idea what I want to be. I'm going to be Professor Minerva McGonagall during the day, of course. (My McGonagall hat came in the mail yesterday; it is ENORMOUS.)

But what to be at night? No idea. I need to decide pretty quickly here, as this weekend will be my prime costume making time. If it helps, I'm going to a party, so it isn't just a "handing out candy at the door" kind of deal.

All suggestions are welcome.

October

I took this picture about an hour ago. It hasn't stopped snowing since then. My poor pumpkins.

plus ca change...

So, $290 million later, what do we have to say for ourselves?

Not much, apparently. We still don't want to give Harper a majority mandate, but we sure as heck don't want those other guys in there, either. What a mess--the Ceeb is even reporting this election as having the lowest voter turnout since 1898.

Stephan Dion is in a whole heap of trouble. The Liberals' showing in this election speaks pretty clearly to how the Canadian populace responds to Dion as leader. (Which is unfortunate, as he has been fighting an uphill battle this whole time, and I quite like him.) He seems convinced that he will stay on as leader, which is a decision that may end up costing the Liberals quite a lot of money (as it forces them to undertake a leadership review, which their broke party can ill afford). Neither Iggy nor Rae seemed willing to admit to their own leadership hopes last night on camera, but it's got to be on their minds.

The Liberal candidate here, Anthony Rota was re-elected handily; the only one of his party to retain his/her seat in Northern Ontario...Health Minister Tony Clement held on to Parry Sound-Muskoka, turning his 28 vote margin from 2006 into a 10 000+ vote of confidence...and the rest of the north fell to the NDP. Back home in Simcoe Grey, Helena Guergis (who has the dubious distinction of being our country's second sexiest female MP after Rona Ambrose) easily defeated her opponents despite some controversy over Site 41.

The highlight of watching the election results come in, though, was CTV's Craig Oliver, who was wonderfully cranky and crusty, and made sure to ask all of the candidates he spoke to all of the delightfully direct questions that other reporters would just pussyfoot around. You, sir, are my hero.

Election madness and the genius of Stephen Leacock

(Note: I had actually written most of this post last week, but my work computer ate it, so I'm re-creating from memory.)

Tomorrow Canadians return to the polls to elect a new federal government. This election is ill conceived from pretty much every angle: No one party stands to gain much here, aside from Elizabeth May and her Green Party. (Though, when you have nothing, there is nowhere to go but up.) We have no hope of anything but minority government, which means it's only a matter of time before we are back at the polls, and broke again.

Last election I got to hang out with Ryan, eating strawberry shortcake, and conversing intelligently as we watched the numbers come in from across the country. No such luck this time, though I will still be watching.

It is at times like this that I am reminded of the awesomeness of Stephen Leacock. Certainly one of the reasons why I'm partial to his work is that he's a hometown boy, so I do identify strongly with the satire that he enacts in Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town--a satire that is still relevant 96 years later:

Let me begin at the beginning. Everybody in Mariposa is either a Liberal or a Conservative or else is both. Some of the people are or have been Liberals or Conservatives all their lives and are called dyed-in-the-wool Grits or old-time Tories and things of that sort. These people get from long training such a swift penetrating insight into national issues that they can decide the most complicated question in four seconds: in fact, just as soon as they grab the city papers out of the morning mail, they know the whole solution of any problem you can put to them. There are other people whose aim it is to be broad-minded and judicious and who vote Liberal or Conservative according to their judgment of the questions of the day. If their judgment of these questions tells them that there is something in it for them in voting Liberal, then they do so. But if not, they refuse to be the slaves of a party or the henchmen of any political leader. So that anybody looking for henches has got to keep away from them.

But with all the talk of strategic voting, it's the eleventh chapter of Sunshine Sketches that comes to mind, entitled "The Candidacy of Mr. Smith":

In any case, everybody who has ever seen Mariposa knows just what election day is like. The shops, of course, are, as a matter of custom, all closed, and the bar rooms are all closed by law so that you have to go in by the back way. All the people are in their best clothes and at first they walk up and down the street in a solemn way just as they do on the twelfth of July and on St. Patrick's Day, before the fun begins. Everybody keeps looking in at the different polling places to see if anybody else has voted yet, because, of course, nobody cares to vote first for fear of being fooled after all and voting on the wrong side.

Don't worry about being fooled, gentle reader. Vote for who you think would do the best job. I know it seems like a piss poor choice sometimes, but it is a choice that we have, and that's worth a lot. The system only works if you let it: strategic voting doesn't help anyone here.

we only said goodbye with words

This post is my 399th here at this blog, which seems like a great number, except that I have been blogging here since 2002. Not such a great track record, after all. I've done better at blogging this year than I did last year, though, which is a promising sign.

So, in the interests of approaching that magical 400th post, I should probably say something interesting here. With regards to my last post and the election contretemps therein, I'm given pause to wonder about the results of the police investigations into the incident as hate crime. If Popescu had said, "All Jews should die," or "All black people should be put to death," would it even be a question that his words constitute hate crime? It wouldn't. So why is homophobia more socially acceptable in this way? What does that say about us?

I've completed weekend #3 in my four weekends away from home. This one found me in Fergus and Guelph for the wedding of a friend from grad school. I love going back to Guelph - it just makes me sad that I don't live there any longer. The wedding ceremony was wonderful: it showcased the couple very well. The reception was an excellent time. Alicia is a Jane Austen nut, and Jason is a Batman fan, so they each had an action figure with them at the head table. It was adorable.


I got to catch up with two of the other women I went to Guelph with, both of whom are doing interesting and awesome things right now, and who really make me miss the MA experience. I'm giving serious thought to the PhD now. I think I actually want it now (I haven't for the last few years) but I am terrified of the changes it will make to my life.

dreaming of better lives (the kind which never hate)

This is terrible. Not only that, it's in my own backyard. It's a pretty interesting situation--I'm troubled by the school board's reaction, in particular. I'm appalled that they left Sudbury Sec's principal to fend for himself rather than making a comment as a board. I also don't know what to make of the principal's response: Yes, we certainly do want to promote freedom of speech, but we can't do so at the risk of spreading hate? Do Popescu's comments constitute hate crime?

I'll be interested to see what the investigation into his comments turns up. It's been a few years since I taught grade twelve law, so I'm a little rusty on the hate crime laws...but this incident has the potential to have far reaching implications for how we think about public debate and how we try to involve our youth in political discourse.

I'll definitely be keeping an eye on this.

Salami Bridal and Other Adventures

At times I feel like I live several very separate lives. Family, university friends, SMATH friends, seminar instructor, post-university friends...these segments seldom intersect. So when my friend Jess asked me to be in her wedding party, she was quite surprised to find out that this will be my third time down the aisle (and, by conventional wisdom like "three times a bridesmaid, never a bride", the key to eternal singledom). The wedding isn't til next August, but Jess wanted to get an early start on everything. And that's how we found ourselves on our way to Toronto visit a bridal salon that will forever be known as "Salami Bridal" in our minds and in our hearts.

The day started out well enough, but when we arrived at the bridal salon, it was in a tiny strip mall, directly above, of all things, a deli. Inside, it was small and dingy. There was only one fitting room, and we wound up having to trade off mirror time with another bride. None of this is particularly bad, really, but after we had tried on a number of bridesmaid dresses, Jess wanted to look at their bridal range, and that's when disaster struck. She had on the third dress of the day when our sales consultant came in and told Jess to get dressed: "My next appointment will be here in a few minutes and you have to go." Just like that. Since there were four bridesmaids and a bride, we'd booked a double appointment (or thought we had), and we thought we still had loads of time. As we went out the door, the sales consultant told us we could come back when we were ready to order.

Not bloody likely.

Fortunately the rest of the day was a very good time, even if I ate far too much. I was only a little hungover on the car ride home, despite not sleeping very much last night. Today has been the most gloriously lazy day for both me and the cat, who has worked out a way to lie across my lap between my stomach and the laptop, and who is currently sacked out like a ragdoll. Silly cat.

ETA: When we were at the second bridal store in Barrie, Jess was trying on the dress that she was about 75% sure she was going to get so that we could all see it. No sooner was she zipping it up than Paul McCartney and Wings's "Maybe I'm Amazed" comes on the radio, which is her and Aaron's wedding song. It's definitely a sign.

I open at the close

The first 'real' week of school has been quite a challenge. I've got seminars in two courses this year (the first year intro course AND the second year British literature survey) and the balancing act required therein has been difficult at best. Add in a little personal turmoil and you've got the makings of a week that I'm quite pleased is over.

I taught scansion in the first year courses and it went from being an unmitigated disaster on day one to being mostly okay by day five, which is excellent since it's something that I'm totally crap at. If you want obscure New Wave song lyrics from the 80s, I'm your girl. If you want to know anything about rhythm...well...*cough*. I get to teach it again in second year next week, so we'll hope that they are able to grasp it. Overall I've been really impressed with my second year courses thus far.

I received an email from an old internet friend that I'd fallen out of touch with several years ago. After adding each other to the key social networking places (as you do) we discovered that since we last spoke, we have continued to share interests. It's hard to explain why that makes me so happy, but it does: the friendship that I treasure most seem to be those that can hang infinitely in the balance, but always fall back into place in the most satisfying way that says: Here we are again.

someone smudged my Puma

I was late for one of my own classes today owing to some unforeseen circumstances(and that particular sub-section of Murphy's Law that states that if you're already late, more stuff is just going to make you even later.) Talk about embarassing. I really hope that this doesn't get the whole thing off on the wrong foot for the year. Logically I understand that I will probably think about this a lot more (and be much harder on myself about it) than any of my students will, but in the meantime...I'm really mad at myself.

The premiere of So You Think You Can Dance Canada is tonight, and as much as I hate the audition portion of any talent reality show, I'm quite excited about this. The kitten mostly hopes that there isn't a lot of Mary Murphy, because it wakes him up from his naps when she screams.

More class tomorrow, and then I've made it to my first weekend. Hurray!

Why I Can't Give Conference Papers

I've been trying to plan out my academic year for the last little bit; a big part of this involves trying to figure what kinds of scholarship I'm going to engage in. I would really like to attend this year's NeMLA, but most of the topic areas that interest me are ones that I just couldn't give conference papers on. Here's why:

Cheering for the Bad Guy: The Rise of the Anti-hero in Popular Culture: From Sweeney Todd to Darth Vader, some of our culture's most iconic characters stem from our darkest vices. Why do we find ourselves rooting for the bad guy in literature and popular culture so frequently? What is it about these characters that appeals to us? What does our acceptance of these characters say about contemporary society as a whole, if anything? Submissions should focus on the answers to any or all of these questions.

Here I would want write about either Noah Bennett and Sylar in Heroes or Snape and Voldemort in the Harry Potter franchise, with particular reference to the role of the internet/fan culture in their success. Unfortunately, that's about all I can think of to say, unless I were to extend the Heroes talk by talking about the bad dad complex.

History, Memoir, and Comics: "History, Memoir, and Comics" invites papers on recent graphic narratives. The panel seeks papers that investigate (1) why the comics form lends itself to the representation of tragic events; (2) the strategies by which graphic narratives simultaneously invoke personal and public history; and/or (3) why studying the interaction of verbal and visual narratives matters, especially today.

This paper would go something like this: "OMG, Maus, you guys. Maus! It's so awesome. "My father bleeds history." That's not seriously the coolest thing ever written? [pause] Blankets is pretty cool, too.

[As a side note, I would add here that I'm not sure why we STILL need to discuss the questions of "why studying the interaction of verbal and visual narratives matters, especially today." Srsly.]

Lost at NeMLA: Mapping TV's Most Elusive Island: One of the most remarkable television series in recent years has been ABC's Lost. Beginning with an archetypal premise of castaways stranded on an island, the show has evolved into a complex network of obscure connections, esoteric mysteries, literary and pop cultural allusions, and baroque experiments in narrative temporality. The objective of this panel will be to contextualize the television show within diverse but complementary critical perspectives.

Say it with me, kids: Bad dads, bad dads, bad dads!

Those Who Do Not Study History Are Doomed to Watch Repeats: This panel solicits papers on remakes of television shows such as Battlestar Galactica, Queer as Folk, and The Bionic Woman. What do these remakes say about the cultures that produce them? Are these shows indicative of any obsession with history? What are the intertextual implications of the narratives? What narrative techniques do the shows employ that differ from those of "original" series?

[taps mic] So...uh...has anyone here seen Degrassi?

Don't get me wrong, I would actually like to write these papers. I just don't know that I could come up with a full fifteen minutes on any of these topics: my position as fan situates me in a place where it's very difficult to write critically. We'll see, though.