stuff
Tact is for those who haven't mastered the art of sarcasm.
Thursday, April 24, 2003 ::: Surreal experience of today: Discovering that the exchange student in the house has never seen Seasame Street. I always thought that every person on this planet under the age of at least 30 had seen Seasame Street, but apparently not. It's quite hard for me to comprehend someone being able to grow up without Big Bird and Elmo and Kermit and all the rest... surely it's impossible to grow up well-adjusted without them!
Tuesday, April 22, 2003 :::
Started on a new project at the museum today: helping develop a new 'disaster plan'. Basically we have to write guidelines on what should happen in the event of a fire, flood, tornado, earthquake, nuclear power plant emergency, rodent infestation, medical emergency, bomb threat, explosion... it's the kind of project where you have to imagine every single possible awful, terrible possibility, which as you can imagine is all very fun and entertaining. On several occasions I did feel really stupid reading about what the museum should do in the event of a terrorist event, or answering questions such as "is the museum's located on a site that is prone to civil or international war?" I suppose it is important, but in a strange, obscure and slightly ridiculous way.
I promise I will write a wonderfully detailed, informative and entertaining entry on what happened over Easter, but right now, well, I can't really be bothered!
Monday, April 21, 2003 :::
For the last few weeks I've been seeing a lot of dark cars driving around Brockville with flags on their bonnets. I thought that it was a bit strange that diplomatic cars from the embassies in Ottawa were hanging around in Brockville, but I just thought that they were maybe on their way to Toronto or something. Didn't really think much about it, until I actually saw one of the flags up close a few days ago, and saw the words "The Ottawa Senators" written on it. Then another with "The Toronto Maple Leafs". Turns out these are not embassy cars - they're the cars of hockey fans who have put team flags on the bonnet. As you might have guessed, hockey is a big, big thing over here, and I suppose I should have realised that in the middle of the playoffs for I think the Stanley Cup (as you can see I don't pay a lot of attention) that people may be putting team flags on their cars.
Yes, I felt stupid. Very stupid. But I thought you might all enjoy my stupidity...
Wednesday, April 16, 2003 ::: OWC (Obligatory weather comment): Just in case people don't believe me when I tell you all about the weather over here, the following info is taken directly from Brockville's website.
Today: Showers of rain and snow. High 4° C
Tonight: A flurry early; clearing, cold. Low -9° C
Thursday: Sunny to partly cloudy. High 8° C /RF 7° C.Low -2° C /RF -13° (I think that RF means what it actually feels with when you factory in the wind chill).
To put all of these temperatures in perspective, you have to take into account that on Tuesday it was 26° C. That's right. 26!!! I promise I'll stop talking about the weather soon but, well, I just wish it would make sense! Sincere apologies to certain Canadian relatives who have been trying to educate me about the wonders of Canadian weather - I swear at least some of your wisdom is sinking in!
Surreal experience of the day: Being given the following writing assignment in english after reading an essay by Charles Darwin - "Write a story where your main character is a worm. Make sure your piece includes action, humour, and try to include some of the ideas Darwin presents in his essay on the impact that worms have on the geology of the earth." My english teacher is really nice, but when you receive assignments like this, you have to wonder whether he actually has teaching qualifications...
Sunday, April 13, 2003 :::
So it would seem my wonderful plans haven't quite worked out, and to be honest I really can't be bothered fixing it now. I also have to finish this stupid history assignment. So you might all have to wait a wee bit before you get to use the lovely comments feature to leave lovely comments on my equally lovely blog! Sorry... (I can tell you're all really disappointed)
Housekeeping first: scroll down to the bottom of this post, and hopefully (don't hold your breath, I've been struggling with this for the past half hour) you'll see a link saying 'comments' that will lead to a lovely little pop-up window where you can post equally lovely comments to my wonderfully lovely blog! Yay! Says everyone. Or not. Anyway, it's pretty simple right now and I'm not sure how it'll work, but we'll see. Anything to get you to come back for more!
Right now I should be working on my history assignment, Justifying, Planning, Implementing and Maintaining a Revolution, but it's so excruciatingly boring that I've been fooling around with this thing for ages. Basically I have to make up my own country (a very small Pacific nation called the Republic of Tamar, capital Esk. So I couldn't think of any names ok?), invent problems for that country, invent a revolutionary party and then invent how that party is going to carry out a revoution. Thrilling huh? It's actually not that bad, it's just that I really can't be bothered working. So obviously nothing's changed in my work ethic from last year... :-p
It's only me and the EX (look, I'm using my terribly complicated secret code system!) in the house atm, which is kinda cool. Everyone else has gone out to visit various family members or to see friends. I think. I've quickly learnt that it's pretty much impossible to keep track of where everyone is in this house. I've got the tv set on a radio station (one of the many, many benefits of having satellite tv, apart from being able to watch stuff like The House of Elliot or The adventures of Sherlock Holmes) which is playing music other than Avril Lavigne or Good Charlotte, something for which I'm eternally grateful!
Going to see Frida this evening at the Brockville Arts Centre with the EX and a few other people tonight, which will be cool. I was going to see The Hours last night, but it was just too much bother with everyone in the house going in different directions. I'm so desperate to see that movie though: not only does it have 'our Nic' in it, but also the absolutely wonderful Alison Janney from where else, The West Wing! Hopefully I'll get to see it sooner or later... In other movie news I did manage to watch the new(ish) Harry Potter movie on DVD on Friday night which was cool, although it did result in me getting home just a little late which did result in a bit of a telling off the next morning... ah well, you can't be perfect all the time! Although I know I have convinced many of you that I can do it... :-p
SWC (standard weather comment): It's warm! It's sunny! There's no snow left! I spent all of yesterday outside! Without a coat on! Yippee!!!! :-D It was actually something like PLUS 14 degrees yesterday, which as you can imagine was really quite nice. All we need now is a little bit of rain (which I hear you've been getting a lot of down in good ol' Tassie) to wash away the dirt left by the snow, and we'll be right!
I have nothing else to say really: it's been a pretty boring weekend all round really. Hopefully I'll have something more interesting to report next time. Until then, please, please, pretty please sign the comments thing for me so that I can be sure that it works!
Wednesday, April 09, 2003 :::
Oh dear. Once again, a long time between updates. I could come up with a really creative and convincing excuse... but honestly, I really can't be bothered! So just handle it, all of you :p
Obligatory weather comment: Snowed last night, still lots of snow on the ground, still cold, still making no sense to me whatsoever. The 'winter storm warning' that was forecast for the weekend wasn't as bad as it was supposed to be, which was good, but it was still a winter storm warning in SPRING. My well-meaning and very lovely relatives in Edmonton (they read this so I suppose I should be nice about them :p) have been trying to teach me all about Canadian weather - they keep on saying that you get used to it. What I want to know is: why would you want to get used to it in the first place?!?! I dunno, I'm sure some people like the weather. It's just coming from Australia (granted, Tasmania, which is not exactly known as the warmest place in the country) it takes a bit of getting used to!
So what else has been going on... work at the museum's going really well, everyone there loves me of course. The Geohistory project is finally coming together and we've some positive feedback from the teachers who have heard about it, so so far so good. I had a GPS unit to play with over the weekend, which was really cool. They're so much fun! I mean, I can't think of any possible practical application for someone who ventures into the great outdoors only when she absolutely has to, but I'm sure I could find a reason why I would need to know my current velocity and my elevation above sea level.
We've been doing 'debating' in english. 'Debating' in quotation marks because that's apparently what they call it over here, but doesn't resemble any kind of, well anything I've ever seen. Inter-school debating doesn't seem to happen at all over here, and watching/participating in the debate today definitely made me realise how much I miss it. I didn't speak because well, I know absolutely nothing about NAFTA and the possibility of Canada selling its water in bulk overseas, but I really wish I could have. I kept on wanting to jump up and rebutt...
Today's special topic of conversation? Music/radio in Canada. To all of you back home in Aussie: get down on your knees now and give thanks to whatever kind of higher power you believe in that Triple J exists. Because once you're surrounded by commercial/pop/MTV crap continuously, you'll truly realise what a fantastically wonderful thing it is. Radio here seems to have a playlist that consists of about 7 songs that are played continuously in rotation. The songs? Anything by Avril Lavigne, a couple of songs by Good Charlotte (good the first couple of times you hear it, but getting a bit tired after 124,356,245,544 playings) and this song that I still don't know the name of sung by Sheryl Crowe and Kid Rock. It's either that or country music. I have never listened to as much country music in my life before I came here. My favourites? Well, there's one called something like 'man to man' about a son kissing his father on the cheek after making up with him after his dad kicks him out of the house after his wife leaves him. Or there's always the one with the line that goes something like "I don't care/You can kick my glass/I hope you're happy with him" - this music is so clean that you can't even say 'ass' in a song. After Triple J this music is a bit of a shock...
Still on the topic of music: am I the only person on the planet who didn't realise that Shania Twain was Canadian? I had no idea until I read it in a magazine on the flight over. Apparently she's from a tiny town up north somewhere. I'd always presumed she was American.... Anyway, I just thought that was weird.
I was supposed to be going to Quebec City this weekend with some other exchange students but my coordinator has apparently changed the date so I won't be going until after Easter which is a bit of a bugger. I do however have a pretty massive History assignment due next week where I have to plan, develop and carry out my own revolution in my own made up country (which I haven't started) so it's probably a good thing that I'm not going...
Parting note: I've discovered Brockville has a website. I can just hear you all sighing in relief, now that you know you can further explore the wonder that is Brockville and the surrounding community online. (It's not actually that bad, but I'm just in that kind of mood) There are maps if you want to see where all the stuff I've been talking about is. The museum's on Henry Street, St Mary's is just south of the 401 (the major highway that runs all the way from Toronto to Montreal - and just happens to run directly through Brockville) and my house is... well I'm not about to put the address of that up here, but I'm sure I've emailed it to all of you anyway.
Thursday, April 03, 2003 :::
Essential comment on the weather first: I had to walk from the museum up to school this morning at 11 after my co-op session. It's not a particularly long walk, maybe 15 minutes, but not always that fun when it's starting to snow and blowing a gale. At that time there was only a centimetre or so of snow on the ground and most of the stuff that had fallen a few days ago had melted. By the time I finished school at 2.15 I would say at least 5cms had fallen, and it's still going now at 5.48pm - there are predictions of 20 centimetres overnight. Now could someone please explain to me what on earth is going on here!?!? I honestly thought that winter was over, spring was here and it would only be a matter of time before there were leaves on the trees, birds in the branches and the opportunity to not have to put on 6 layers to go outside. But noooooo, this is Canada people, the weather here doesn't make sense! It's going to take forever for this snow to melt again: the only bright side is that it's pretty likely that tomorrow will be a snow day, meaning that I won't have to go to school. But still, urrrrr....
On Tuesday all of the family (minus a couple) plus a couple of exchange students went out to see some family friends of, well, the family! These people live further down the river and their property has quite a bit of land out the back, land that includes quite a few maple trees. Which means... maple syrup! The family has the whole set-up going, including the taps, the cute little buckets hanging off all the trees, and the shed where the sap is boiled down for what seems like hours to make the syrup. There was some sap actually on the boil when we went to have a look and we all had a taste. It's a more subtle taste than the syrup, definitely not as sugary. This shed was one of the dingiest, dirtiest, most un-hygenic things I've ever seen, but I was reassured that the maple syrup that I have on my pancakes (the family doesn't sell it, just gives it away to family and friends. And probably keeps a bit for themselves :p) is not poisoned or contaminated. Apparently the temperature that the stuff boils at is so high that anything 'nasty' in it is really, really dead by the end of the process. Then they strain it like 5 times - I can only imagine the mess that you could get into trying to strain something like 10 litres of maple syrup repeatedly! Anyway, all in all it was a pretty cool night, particularly riding to the shed on the back of a ute with my feet hanging over the back laughing my head off while a host-sister screamed for her life next to me.
Ok, bit of housekeeping here. I now realise that I'm not talking to myself on this thing (big hellos to everyone that did actually email me and tell me that!) which has kinda made me realise that I should probably try to make this a bit easier to read and understand, particularly when it comes to talking about specific people. The only thing is I don't want to use people's names when I write - I've seen that blow up spectacularly in a certain someone's face, a certain someone that I spent 5 weeks travelling around Australia with earlier in the year.... *nudge nudge, wink wink* But I still want you to know who I'm talking about, well roughly anyway. So I've devised an ingenious code to refer to different people, while at the same time cleverly concealing their identities. Yeah, I know, I'm pretty good! So I have 4 host sisters, who will simply be known as HS1, HS2, HS3 and HS4 from oldest to youngest. It's amazing! I hear them say, incredible! And for the wee exchange student that's also somewhere in the house? How about... EX? Catchy huh? And then for my lovely host parents we'll have HM and HD for host-mum and host-dad. Yay! Clear everyone? Clear as mud, I'm sure. I'll probably change it within a week, but in the meantime it'll make it easier than just saying "one of my host-sisters"
On other housekeeping matters, I emailed most, if not all of you who read this details on how to see some photos of me with what I've been told a lot of snow. If it doesn't work for you, write a wee email and let me know. If you don't have my email address, well then you shouldn't be reading this. Get out! Get out now! :p
I think that's enough for now - more to say, but honestly, can't be bothered right now! Update soon though, I promise. Or at least I'll try very hard to... :p
Tuesday, April 01, 2003 :::
The snow that I mentioned yesterday has come. With avengance. I really don't understand the weather in this country: it's supposed to be spring, and even this morning when I went to the museum the sun was shining and it was looking like it was going to be a beautiful, albeit crisp, day. That whole idea quickly changed when someone opened the blinds in english class and we all looked out onto a blizzard. Ok, maybe not a blizzard, but it was snowing pretty hard. By the time I got on the bus this afternoon there was at least a couple fo centimetres on the ground, and it still hasn't stopped. I hope it doesn't take long for it to melt, I was really enjoying seeing something that was a colour other than white or slushy yucky grey on the ground!
Did quite a bit of work at the museum this morning, doing write-ups on each of the different sites that we're using for the treasure hunt. It's been a bit hard though, because I don't know any of the background knowledge that someone from Brockville would have, so I have to ask/read/research everything which can certainly be time-consuming. I swear by the time I finish this placement I'll know more about the history of Brockville than about Launceston, which is a pity because I'm pretty sure Launnie's history is far more interesting.
I've been asked to join this group at school that does this competition called 'Reach for the Top' which I think is basically just a quiz-show type thing for high-school students. I went to a practice today where they were going through some sample questions. I thought I knew some pretty useless stuff: absolutely none of it is close to being useless enough to be included in this competition. 'Philosophers from the 1900s with the letter P in their name' 'The national game of Afghanistan' 'The real name of the dog on Frasier'.... really people, this is pushing the boundaries of completely pointless just a little too much. Despite that, I did have quite a good time - everyone involved seems nice, even though one guy thought I was from New Zealand. I explained to him through gritted teeth that the one thing you never say to an Australian is that they're just the same as Kiwis: I like my sheep on a plate thank you very much! :p Anyway, there's a tournament for this thing tomorrow but because I've got co-op in the morning I'm going to go at lunch and just watch what goes on. At least it's something to do: school here is decidedly uninteresting/unchallenging, so it'll be good to do something a bit different.
Dinner time, so I better go. Everyone eats early here, not just Lions. I had tea at 4.30 yesterday....
