Montre-awesome!

(two days late, sorry)

As expected, Montreal was filled with enough wonderful times to keep me going for quite a while :) My favourite part was how even though we did a lot, we were still able to make it feel, in part, that we were just doing some low-key hanging out chez Megan.

Thanks to weather and traffic, we made it to Megan's place just after 2am. Now, normally for Mark and I, this would mean that the fun would start whenever we woke up the next day. NOT THIS WEEKEND. Thankfully, Megan had started the party by herself (with some help from Tycho and some vodka and some mudshakes), and it was in full force when we got there. We then dug into Megan's bucket-o-kahlua and joined the fun, managing to stay up till after 4, when the sugar wore off and the alcohol wieghed down our eyelids.

Saturday, we woke (quite late) to downpour and decided (to Mark's dismay) to head to the underground malls for some shopping. I'm jealous of Megan's awesome new boots and coat - but am pleased that someone else is reinventing themselves via higher heels. We can compare our back pain and terrible knee joints in solidarity when we're 50. Around three, we caught a bit of Mark's underground mall hate - but thankfully stumbled into the movie theatre just in time. It was then, officially, that Saturday became all about the dark - we had a perfect amount of time to see "The Nightmare Before Christmas(IMAX!!)" before our dark dinner. The best part was when we all put on the glasses JUST TO LOOK COOL:





(yes, I lifted those directly from Megan's blog, which also has an entertaining description of the weekend's events)

On to the exciting part: I scored some BLOW! And by Blow, I mean this, not drugs...

On to the really exciting part: We ate in the dark!

I'm not talking moonlit night dark here, I'm not even talking moonless night - I'm talking can't see your hand in front of your face dark. It was absolutely pitch black, and gave a sense of what it might be like to be absolutely 100% blind. Unbeknownst to us, we were sat at a table with two other people, which was a little bit disconcerting at first. It ended up being a non-issue as the place got really loud really quickly, and we ended up only being able to talk to each other over the din. One thing that I noticed is that it's really hard to eat a meal without eyes - I had no idea how I was cutting my food, and as a result, frequently had forkfuls of nothing, or forkfuls of way too much.

It was interesting hearing how normal social attitudes fell away - the place was filled with obnoxious laughter and yelling - not normal restaurant behaviour. We had some fun imagining what they could be doing in the dark to provoke such laughter (some people must take advantage of the complete anonymity). It was fun though - I'd like to try it again, but maybe as a small party with friends rather than a whole bunch of strangers. Blackout night anyone?

We left the restaurant (with me making Megs and Mark carry out a recovery from dark adaptation experiment, massive failure) and headed down to Brutopia, where Mgan was convinced that she would get me to like beer (no dice), and from there we headed back to her apartment to curl up watching Donnie Darko. Sunday we shopped some more and had a fantastic Montreal breakfast of REAL hotchocolate and lovely flaky pastries, and then headed up to the marche Jean-Talon for some fresh veggies and final good times. We dropped M off, Mark got his poutine fix, and we hit the highway at around 3, with me falling asleep around 3:30. A successful, relaxing, and exhausting weekend :)

Hundreds and Thousands

Proof that people with posh accents are cooler than we Canadians will EVER be. Thanks to Mark for being the cute-finder.

THEY CALL SPRINKLES 'HUNDREDS AND THOUSANDS.' How cute is that? Can you not picture a little British kid going and asking for a doughnut?

"That one, ovah there - wit the hundreds and thousands!"

Also, in all of the excitement of the past few days, I have forgotten to mention this:





(and, by 'this,' I mean being at stupid York all day on a Saturday)

Exciting times!

Things to be excited about:

In two days, Mark and I will be on our housewarming roadtrip to Montreal. We will warm Megan's apartment whether it is cold or not. We will also eat in the dark (expect a full report on MONDAY), eat croissants, and possibly dress up like zombie bears. Ce sera superbon!

More long-term excitement:

1. Sharon is moving to Toronto, with T, for an amazing opportunity. I couldn't be prouder! Looks like my wish is coming true - now I just need to work on Megs and Paula.

2. My dad absolutely has to use his vacation time by the end of the year, or he'll lose it. VACATION!!! Looks like we'll be going somewhere warm, possibly all-inclusive, and hopefully involving cultural exploration (Mayan ruins?) and sailing! I wasn't sure I'd be able to get time off, since I'm only here for a short time and Fran would like to get some papers written, but it turned out to be no problem at all. It's going to be soon, too - likely the week after my borthday. BORTHDAY!

Everything's coming up Jenhouse.

!!!

OMG I am so excited.

V&V

I have a new rule for my friends: get jobs that bring you to Toronto every once in a while. Better yet, get jobs in Toronto. I got to see Sharon last night thanks to a two-day meeting that she's in town for, and it was so nice being able to have someone just drop by and save me from my normal routine (home, six feet under, sleep). I think that if I could have anything right now (other than secured admission to med school), it would be to take Megan, Paula, Maggie, and Sharon and place them all in apartments on my floor. And I'd move my floor up to the top floor. Brilliant!

French is coming along.... I was able to tell my teacher last night that I forgot to bring my homework, and also to answer a question, in French, without feeling like a total dolt. Before you know it, I'll be able to talk about how much I don't know, but IN FRENCH! Mes devoirs pour cette semaine (Megs, Shar - is that right?): compile a list of 3-5 phrases about what I did this summer, oh THAT will be fun.

Tonight will be nice - relaxing, possibly look for something cheap and nice to wear to convocation on Saturday. Tomorrow Mark and I are going to a "velour and velvet" party with his Frisbee team (they won the B division national championship!!), but I have nothing velour OR velvet to wear. Salvation army? Or - American Apparel?! I think it might be a little bit cold to wear THIS (but think of the awesomeness!):



Also - got my mcat scores, and they're pretty much how I expected them to be. Not so swell in the sciences, since I had no time to study thanks to the thesis, but I'm really happy with the other scores. My essay score was shocking - v. high score for basically the worst writing I've ever done in my life. It's making me feel a bit more confident that if I can get down to studying for the January or (more likely, the) April exam, I can actually do a really good job at it.

Quiet-Time Activities

Despite my memory telling me that Miss M was not too fond of it, I started reading "No Great Mischief" by Alistair Macleod and I'm really enjoying it. It seems that as much as I try to get outside the rural/maritime themes in CanLit, I keep falling back into it. It's all Megan's fault. Upside: not having to read the Metro on the Subway. Update: The M loooooves the MacLeod. I'm just crazy.

The weekend was nice, lots of family and friends and time for naps. If you have naptime, and wake up early, you can print and colour your own Jen.



Alternatively, you can bake her some cookies (for the real Jen, please).

Avec... Grandmere?

Now that I'm in my down-time period, I've started taking French classes Two hours a week, nine weeks. Last night was my second class, and we discussed the importance of having a good French-English dictionary.

Mme. Francaise: (In French) you need a good French-English dictionary, with grandmother.

Me: (in head) Whaaaaa???

Me: (2 minutes later, in head, still stuck on the grandmother dictionary untilll... la bulbe de lumiere!) OHHHHH!

Avec grammaire! I, apparently, am more in need of a good translator even more than I originally thought. Ne grandmere PAS!



Aside from feeling very left-behind at times, I'm glad that I signed up for the Intermediate level. I've noticed that I can usually pick up on what's being said, even if I can't yet respond. I think I'd be grumpy if I had to look at picture cards name les chats, les pommes...

I'm feeling very challenged, which is nice, and hopefully, it will really force me into making serious progress.

Holi-dayyyys

Thanksgiving was super nice. I got to enjoy lovely family times both with Mark's, and with my family. I made rosebuds out of maple leaves found on the nicest drive of the year, and got all mushy about Mark. Mark's mom and I made a Bourbon (ok, we cheated and used JD) Pumpkin Cheesecake, and sipped some straight bourbon while we were at it. We finished watching season 4 of SixFeetUnder, and are going to try and hold off till we're closer to the Montreal visit to start on season 5. Also, I think I LOST weight this weekend - definitely a rarity on Thanksgiving.

I was thinking about Halloween, and I'm considering going as a Can-Lit heroine. I might have to think of something simpler, because to do justice to the image in my mind, I would need numerous unwieldly props. Like a dinghy, in which I would struggle through a stormy sea to get the doctor for my sister, who would be in chilbirth, and would later die and I'd have to raise the baby on a remote Newfoundland rock. I would also need a weatherbeaten window to look through, at my desolate surroundings. I'd have to wear some worn-out grey dresses, and maybe I'd hold a candle (that would keep going out). Possibly, I'd make myself up to look like I had TB. I'll also need to recruit someone to be the incestuous male in my life. I hope someone else goes as a psychologist that can give me some prozac.

I played a what?!

Yesterday turned out to be unexpectedly fun. Mid-afternoon, I received an email asking if anyone was available for a fill-in slot on CHRY that night... so I signed up. I haven't done much at all at the station in recent (and even not-so-recent) months, so I was a little bit nervous (and excited!). So I called up my Mark to be a co-host, made up a sweet-ass playlist from recently loved music on my computer, and hauled my ass up the stairs to the station. Mark hauled his ass too, but due to all the frisbee he's been playing, it wasn't so much a haul as it was a complete lack of effort.

The show started off well enough, with the new version of Basia Bulat's Snakes and Ladders, which is a thoroughly awesome way to start a radio show. Next, we tried to play a Polaris-themed set, starting off with the New Pornographer's "The Bleeding Heart Show, when we noticed that my newly burned playlist had not burned a track, screwing up the whole song order - oi. Anyways, no big deal.

NEXT - a girl from a group of people standing outside the studio comes in to talk to me. She was there with a band that was scheduled for an on-air interview and live performance on the show we were filling in for!!! 1) I had no idea this was going to happen, 2) I knew NOTHING about this band, and 3) I'd never had to set up the mics/etc for an on air performance before. Anyway, I would feel completely terrible if these guys had come all the way to York to promote a show (tonight, at The Absinthe pub on York Campus, 9pm, free) and didn't get to do anything. End result: we interviewed them, and gave them half an hour to play, which was really, really fun.

The band: Basement Arms, a happy, really nice, and really fun 3-piece jam band. Now, normally I don't go for jam bands, but last night I really saw the appeal. These were guys playing music because they love it, and because they're good at it. They're as big as the audience, and as diverse as the number of instruments and people willing to play them present. I played some hand-help cymbals on one of the songs, keeping my rhythm for the most part, and having a really great time. Finding out later that the cymbals were called a "hand-job", on-air? Probably priceless. Anyway, Mark and I are going to go see them play in a couple of weeks at Grossmans (Spadina and Collece, across from the ElMo) with Laura Barrett - should be very fun!

Anyway, the rest of the show went fairly well, and I'm looking forward to my next opportunity!!

Here's one song that we played - Lose My Breath by Deerhoof (the song was originally by My Bloody Valentine, and my favourite song of theirs EVER. I was SO excited when I found the Deerhoof cover, because they're the bestest). Deerhoof is playing in Toronto at the Opera House on the 21st of October, and it's the first show in a really long time that I've been super-excited to see! WOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Deerhoof - Lose My Breath

HAHAHA

Yeah, unbelieveable is right!
Originally uploaded by stevegan.

Ok - after yesterday's not so happy post, I give you this wonderfulness!

O RLY?

I really don't want to get into this too deeply because it's really upsetting me. I just want to vent a little bit. I've been thinking a lot about personal safety lately, as a woman. Nothing has happened to cause this, it's just been happening. But the gist, basically, is that it really sucks that as women, we have to be more cautious, more "on" in terms of awareness of our surroundings, because of vulnerability. Now, I know this can be remedied somewhat by taking self-defense classes etc, but that can only help so much.

Today's Star:
Page A1: Amish school shooting. 11 young female students bound and shot.
Page A16: Violence against women drops.

I can see why they buried that second one. Honestly, even if the statistics are showing that sort of a trend, does it make anyone actually feel safer? Not me. Generally, I try not to worry too much about this sort of thing. There's no way to see such an event coming, and realistically, it's very unlikely I'll ever directly experience something like it. I'd rather go around normally rather than be on the constant watch for __________ (pick one: terrorists, armed psychopaths, corrupted businesspeople, evil pharma companies, etc). But honestly? when something like this happens, something in me just feels sick. Why is this guy targeting young, innocent girls? I really don't even know where I'm going with this... I guess I just wanted to express a bit of how angry I am that as a woman, I can't feel completely safe, and how I don't really expect we'll ever get to that point.

And of course, my heart goes out to everyone affected by yesterday.

A brilliant, but old, 16 year old.

I went over to Maggie's last night to help her practise administering clinical tests - specifically the wisc-iv. The plan was for me to go, get tested, and the rest my brilliant brain in her hot tub. Instead, I went over, and got tested for 3.5 hours, and then dragged my tired brain home on the subway because it was too exhausted to fathom staying up any later despite the lure of the hot tub. I learned that I'm a pretty smart lady (well, compared to the average 16 year old), and that I have better memory for reciting numbers backwards than forwards. Also, I'm pretty decent at finding missing eyebrows. Downside: I STILL have a headache - this brain apparently doesn't like being put to the test when it is supposed to be resting.

Tonight: I'm going to hit up some shops to fins some cute but cheap longer sleeved shirts to get me through the winter. I'm going to also try and arrange some transportation to fun things. I'll most likely watch House, possibly pick up the new issue of the New Yorker, and generally just enjoy my newfound temporary freedom from responsibility. Hooray for me!