Friday, November 30, 2007

also known as

I'm changing schedules at work (ya, ya, I know I should be doing just work, but the computer programs I need to actually do my job are down for another 20 minutes) and noticed that a new name was haphazardly added to the schedule. We had a discussion about having a practicum student in next week (whom I met at a class breakfast on Wednesday), so knew it was her. But looking at the name... I realised it was wrong.

The name: Patty Labelle.
The real name: Shannon Labelle.
My supervisor's name: Shannon.

So, essentially, my supervisor entered a large, African-American woman's name (a famous singer, no less) instead of a small, white girl's name that is the same as her own.

I find this outstandingly amusing. I've shared this with a couple others in my office and we've all had a good laugh. But now I suspect I should change it. Sigh. It would be funny to see the look on the student's face when she saw she was listed as Patty Labelle. Though that would be mean and a terrible way to start two weeks working with people.

Besides, there's still the desk schedule...

Thursday, November 29, 2007

done done

It's official: I'm one semester away from graduation.

Let's face it, this is good news for anyone who considers me a friend. I have been the worst communicator the last year and a half, and it isn't going to get any better until next April. Except for the next month, maybe.

I just got home from dropping off my final project. I finished it around 8pm or so, but I didn't relish the thought of walking across UBC's dark campus alone, so waited for Eileen to finish work at 9pm because she said she would go with. Good thing, too, because campus was virtually deserted. It feels creepy in general, but tonight, with the weather being so chilly, it felt worse.

Miraculously, the project I handed in actually worked the way it's supposed to, so I'm hoping my prof likes it as-is and ignores the fact that the summary of my project really was brief (as stipulated in the instructions) and probably didn't make a lot of sense. It was a digital library of drive-in movie ads for refreshments and I had a hard time getting the mp4s to load, but figured it out and it works and it's done and I don't care anymore.

The end of semester is always a bit anticlimactic because, for me, it's a huge thing to be done. To others it just means I return phone calls, and that isn't always a good thing. On the upside, I can start accepting invitations to do stuff. December is already looking pretty busy with social engagements, so I wouldn't mind not having a night off until school starts again.

Good things today:
- the new BUST is out and has Amy Poehler interviewing Phyllis Diller!
- my ReadyMade subscription arrived today and looks to have a printing press on the cover!
- something is waiting for me at the post office, and I think it might be my passport!
- one of the librarians brought in cheesies today!
- I put in an order for "The Party Dress" by Alexandra Black. It's the most beautiful-looking promo for a book ever!

All these exclamation marks are making me tired. Or maybe it's the 18-hour day.

Monday, November 26, 2007

point taken

This morning when I left for work, I thought I should turn down my heat from between 1 and snowflake to just snowflake. It gets too hot when it's set at 1 and snowflake often feels a little chilly since the heat isn't really on at that setting. I knew I wasn't going to be home until late tonight anyway, so it seemed a waste to keep the heat up.

The weird icy rain/wet snow that fell this afternoon made me generally cold and I haven't managed to warm up quite yet. When I got into my pajamas I thought I should turn the heat up a smidge so I don't freeze. I often wake up shivering or with cold feet. I thought for a minute about piling more quilts onto my bed and hoping for the best.

Then I remembered my Christmas gift to myself (with a little Christmas gift contribution from my mom) a few years ago: an eight-point Bay blanket. I've never used it because it's so absolutely precious to me; I've been obsessed with point blankets since I was a little kid and first heard of them in Social Studies class. I bought it on a sale day, but it was still a sizable investment. The friend who went with me when I bought it was shocked the blankets cost as much as they do. It's been sitting in its original packaging and I've never taken it out because I didn't want to ruin it. But there's little point saving it for someone else, especially since it can withstand the elements, let alone my use.

I'm looking forward to a good night's sleep. A warm one, I hope.

Other things from the day:
- I finished the database course tonight with a presentation and the handing in of our assignment. One down, two to go. One will be done tomorrow to be handed in on Tuesday morning; the other I'm hoping to have mostly done tomorrow evening and finish Wednesday to be handed in after work on Thursday. That's the due date, so it has to be done.
- Today in class I realised the shoes I wore today (blue and brown checkered Vans) made my feet look really small.
- Online gifts must be purchased now to guarantee delivery by Christmas. Must get on that.
- Egg nog season is awesome.
- December is going to be really busy. So much fun stuff to look forward to: at least 5 Christmas parties including two with the FairSands (both at their home and the office), Secret Santa at work, the Winter Ball on the 8th (party dresses! high heels! contact lenses!), visits with friends in town for the holidays, a ride through Stanley Park if they get the Christmas train running, cheesecake club meeting... I just can't believe December starts Saturday.
- This morning people kept complimenting me. I wore a sparkly grey sweatshirt thing (from Superstore!) that, admittedly, I love and is pretty fun, but three people said they liked it in less than 15 minutes. Then someone asked who does my hair because it always looks so good, even though I've just been thinking about getting it cut and coloured again because it's been so long since I've had it done. I appreciate people's good taste.

Off to a warm bed.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

oh, what a relief (it is)

Rest easy, friends. My socks arrived today with just a slight scolding from the postal service to check postal codes more carefully. Whew. It was a nice surprise since I just went to both postal outlets to double check if it was dropped off there because of the mistake.

On the plus side of one of those trips, I discovered that my cousin's friend's mother, whom I met at my cousin's wedding shower, worked at the postal counter. She recognised me (miraculously!) and we had a wee chat after I incomprehensibly went on about my error with the postal code. She was really nice about the whole thing after she discovered we had met before. I totally didn't remember her until she mentioned her daughter and the shower. I blamed it on overwork, but it's probably my failing memory. (I've been forgetting everything.)

The socks... I must admit I'm a little disappointed with how a couple of them look, as far as size goes, but I'm pretty sure I can shrink the ones that need to be and will just hand wash the ones that I want to keep as-is. I got three pairs of tabi (the big toe is separate from the rest of the toes), two pairs of toe socks (with stripes!), and one pair of knee-high neapolitan stripes. They all fit, more or less, because of the splits in the toes, so that's good. I always knew my toes were puny, but when the toes leave that much room at the end of the separated toes... Puny doesn't even cover it. Embarrassingly short toes. Ridiculously tiny toes. The one pair leaves so much room in the ends I could probably store valuables in them while traveling.

The difficulty now is deciding which ones to wear first.

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

short(s)

This morning I put my shoes on before my jeans. Skinny jeans. Hilarity ensued. Though I was the only one to witness it.

My hair needs a cutting/colouring. I'm not quite so vain as to refuse to go out without a hat during that bad hair stage, but I would probably feel less gross if my hair didn't show signs of roots depending how I turn my head. Honestly, it isn't in bad shape right now. I'm just jealous that my friend got his hair cut today.

My body is producing some fairly interesting gases lately. Maybe I should eat some fruit or vegetables or something.

The sock saga continues. I got an email back from the company, who said there was some problem at the post office the day they dropped off my and others' packages. He gave me the option to either wait out the problem to fix itself (which would involve the package going back and forth across the border) or cancel my order. Like that's going to happen. The socks are the only thing I have to look forward to. Other than finishing off this semester. But waiting for socks (until now) was easier than doing copious amounts of homework/assignments.

Sigh.

sheepish

I know I owe a number of people some fairly substantial communication. It isn't that I'm avoiding anyone or anything like that; just my brain can't actually keep up with everything it has to and decided to prioritise the stupid school stuff above all else. This is bad etiquette, I know, and annoys me to no end. I mean, it feels really weird to have not seen my neighbours for a month-and-a-half, let alone people that live a little farther away. I mean to return a phone call or email and suddenly 3 weeks have passed.

But soon... soon this barrage of projects and group meetings will be on short hiatus. Hopefully. And then maybe I'll get some of my brain back.

You know, those socks still haven't arrived, so I'm not sure what to do at this point. They seem to be untraceable. And I'm concerned that, when mentioning to the company about the postal code mix-up, they'll say it's my own fault and make me pay for socks that I've never gotten. I know I'm probably just being needlessly nervous, but it's been a week since they would have crossed the border and other people in the city have gotten socks from them in less than a week (more like 4 days!). I always think someone is trying to steal my stuff through the post, but this is a whole new level of worry. I want those socks!

Off to another 12-hour day of work/school. I'm getting pretty tired of these sorts of days, which seem to be most days since September. Blah.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

at one with the measuring cup

I came home from doing homework after a full day of work and figured I should make cornbread. The main reason for this decision is that I had milk that was at its due date and I didn't want to throw it out. I'm really struggling to use everything I buy with less waste, but as a single person who is reluctant to entertain during stressful periods I find it difficult to consume everything. Which is why my freezer has frozen bananas and almost too hard corn from the cob and frozen yogurt that was once not frozen. I just ate a $3 persimmon I accidentally bought (who rationally buys a $3 persimmon?) and then let go softish. It was better after a day of peeled chilling.

And baking makes me feel better when I've had a rough day. Not that I did necessarily; it was just long. It's like a long day that will last until the end of November when the last of my assignments is handed in.

Anyway, while soaking the cornmeal in the milk, I decided I might as well bake some cookies as well, since baking calms me down and takes my mind off of residual stresses from the day and the oven was already on. I measured everything as close to accurate as I could muster without feeling obssessive-compulsive and put the cornbread mixture into muffin tins. Unfortunately, this particular recipe does not match the size of my muffin tins and I always have another two muffin's worth of mixture. This annoys me the slightest bit, but I can't see putting the tin back in for two muffins, so I have been trying different ways of baking the last bit. Today I put foil in a loaf pan to fit about half of it and dumped the mixture in. It's fine, but doesn't look pretty.

The cookies are supposed to be chocolate chip cookies, but I thought I would just throw in a bunch of baking-related accessories, like Skor bits and peanut butter chips to go with the Chipits and some walnuts. Normally this recipe makes less than 2 dozen cookies, but I'm on my third sheet of them because there's so much crap in them. Good crap, mind you, but still.

On my return home this evening I also found a parcel slip from Canada Post. I can't believe those socks arrived so quickly, and I can't imagine anything else that would be sent to me. I will never question CP again if my postal code mix-up had no effect on the shipping of said-socks. If only I didn't have another 12 hour day tomorrow I could pick up the parcel and revel in camouflage tabi socks and neapolitan-striped knee socks. Perhaps I can make it happen on Thursday after work and cake-eating.

Today I sent an email to my co-workers announcing the Christmas potluck lunch we have annually and managed to incorporate pythonate into it. I'm not sure why I've suddenly become a key planner on my floor, but I wish I weren't this week or next. My brain is elsewhere right now.

Sunday, November 11, 2007

awardable

I'm just waiting until it's time to go to the Billy, so, rather than eating cold pizza, maybe I'll write something. Not homework, though. Why bother with homework?

I'm actually watching the replay of the Quill Book Awards show on NBC (it's on a holiday weekend Sunday, so you know it's high priority) and managed to catch Stephen Colbert presenting the Humour award. It went to Amy Sedaris. I love her so much. This was just good timing because the rest of it looks sort of dull. But librarians are involved in the process, which gives it some sort of legitimacy in my mind, though I'm not sure why because librarians also stock libraries with unlimited copies of Danielle Steel.

Actually, it was a pretty interesting line-up of presenters. Brooke Shields! Sarah Ferguson – Duchess of York! Joan Allen! Lorraine Bracco! Dan Rather! Rocco DiSpirito! It's a repeat telecast, so I guess I shouldn't be that excited. I wonder if it was such a hit the first time that they had to replay it.

At least the people are all dressed pretty nicely. All very tasteful and elegant. Not like the romance writers. I had to look at one of the recent Romantic Times magazines for work (I SWEAR it was for work) and they had pictures from an awards show they had. Imagine a whole audience of women wearing corsets (some who probably shouldn't have) with a bunch of muscley men (who make a living posing for romance novel covers) vying for the Mr. Romantic title. Uh... it was frightening. But I bet those women are a lot of fun. My goal of making a lucrative living as a romance writer could be more interesting than I thought.

My friend jokingly showed me a recent Ellora's Cave novel, but I made him pay for that joke by signing it out and making him read from it. Nobody teases me about erotica and gets away with it.

Saturday, November 10, 2007

short/long

This weekend I technically have three days off from school and work. This should make me really happy and maybe excited to have some time off from forced attendance. Alas, I am still stuck with schoolwork and it is making my weekend kind of sucky.

I said kind of because, aside from the parts that suck a great deal, there have been a couple of highlights worth mentioning.

Tonight I went to Rachel and Nathan's for dinner because Rachel wanted to roast a chicken. It was fantastically tasty and also featured potatoes with cream cheese, which may be my most favourite kind of potatoes now. I took some wine, a lucky guess in the liquor store since I don't buy/drink wine under normal circumstances, and worked on the bottle with the other two before dinner. The kids are pretty fun, so that makes visiting double good. Augie is a thoughtful, funny little man and Lily, while similar to a blob that occassionally flails, also is at the fun stage where she giggles for no reason and lets me shift her around in my arms like a bag of flour without complaint.

Rachel found the instructions to the bread maker she gave me from their storage closet, so I'm going to have to get cracking on bread making soon. Maybe my Christmas baking just got easier. I can apparently make a cheesecake and jam in the bread maker, which makes it seem to be a glorified rice cooker; in Japan, I regularly made weird things (cake anyone?) in the rice cooker. I'm keen on testing it out. Who knows if it even works.

Today I took my new birthday present bag from Terry and Kathy out and about, and had a bunch of compliments on it. It's a pretty neat bag, though a smidge smaller than it appears to be. This is probably for the best. I don't really need to carry notebooks and crap like that in a purse.

I didn't actually get any homework done today because I tried to run errands before going to R&N's. Big mistake, as everything is pretty much closed. Except for the library, which, thanks to the new contract, will be closed only for the actual stat holiday and open every other day. I'm interested to see how many people actually show up on Monday; I'm pretty sure people have better things to do on a holiday than come to the library.

Tomorrow I'll be heading to the Remembrance Day ceremony and then drinking at the Billy Bishop Legion in the afternoon. I'm also thinking of going to "Paris, je t'aime" in the evening at the Varsity, but I should probably do some homework at some point. Monday I'll be working on my database project after my landlord comes to fix the loose tile in the shower. It's a temp fix until the owners can come down for a potentially full-scale rip-a-thon, since the wall is probably wet behind the tiles and will need tearing up.

Wow, this is dull. Good times.

Friday, November 9, 2007

ongoing suckage

Every day feels like an OK day waiting to go bad.

Today I thought things were OK, except I was tired and bored at work, and nothing of any significance happened. Then I came home and discovered that my rent cheque went NSF on the first of November. Haven't heard anything from my landlady, but I'm horrified about it. I have to go to the bank tomorrow and figure out what happened because there was a less than 3 hour window where there may not have been enough money in the account, but nothing should have been processed in that time. Sigh. It's sad that I have to fight about $35, but I need the money.

Plans were cancelled tonight and no interest in doing the mounds of homework that I have to do. I was half-planning to see "The Big Lebowski" at the UBC theatre ($3 White Russians!), but my friend decided he was broke and that ended that. I was also sort of thinking of going to a shed party at my school friend's house, but she seemed non-commital about actually being there, so I think I should just stay in. Maybe it's time to watch all those DVDs I took out the first day back to work. Half of them have holds on them anyway.

Tonight I ate peanut butter chips and toffee chips for dinner with milk. I think there are vegetables in my fridge, but they don't look very appetising.

I need a break from my life. It's getting me down.