Pay-day at last! And after all that, it doesn't really seem worth the wait. Of course, since pay-day is the last of the month and rent-day the very next day, I don't even get to look at the shiny shiny numbers in my account before they're gone.
It's definitely one of those days. Luckily I have The Brother From Another Planet to look forward to when I finish and go home. We've just discovered the uni library's audio-visual collection. Fun and free!
oh yes - I nearly forgot: about a month ago, we filled out a questionaire about energy consumption; we got the results yesterday. Their advice? A very helpful 'insulate outer walls'. Great. Thanks. I wonder how our agency would feel if we tried doing that ourselves. Perhaps we should invest in some tapestries?
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Monday, November 27, 2006
Me meets the mould monster
Everything we own is in danger of being eaten by mould.
I love our house - mostly I love the power-shower and the gas hob in the kitchen. There's no storage space, it's a bit small, there's no garden. But then, it's mostly quiet, there's a green-grocers and a fantastic Halal butchers just round the corner, and it's a 10-minute walk to campus and 20 to the city centre. And we haven't moved in three years...!
But it is damp and mouldy. I did once have a very nice man who'd been called round to check out the mould problem explain that it was simply because the temperature outside was so much colder than the temp inside - case closed - that was just the way it was - how quaint... Thing is, I grew up in Canada where the temp outside was MUCH MUCH colder than the temp inside and, while Jack Frost drew lovely pictures every morning on every window, we never had condensation and black mould up and down the walls. I can understand it in a bathroom - as a student, I'm familiar with the mouldy bathroom issue. But everywhere?
So we keep the heat steady, we don't hang clothes to dry, we open the bathroom window after showering (all of which, by the way, on the advice of our letting agency who, despite being geared towards students, don't seem to have any understanding of the skyrocketing cost of electricity and gas) and still, without fail, every year this time, the mould returns like some freakish weather-based demon.
But when I find my pair of trusty black-stretch-boot-cut trousers covered in mould...what's am i to do?
Suggestions? Send 'em on.
I love our house - mostly I love the power-shower and the gas hob in the kitchen. There's no storage space, it's a bit small, there's no garden. But then, it's mostly quiet, there's a green-grocers and a fantastic Halal butchers just round the corner, and it's a 10-minute walk to campus and 20 to the city centre. And we haven't moved in three years...!
But it is damp and mouldy. I did once have a very nice man who'd been called round to check out the mould problem explain that it was simply because the temperature outside was so much colder than the temp inside - case closed - that was just the way it was - how quaint... Thing is, I grew up in Canada where the temp outside was MUCH MUCH colder than the temp inside and, while Jack Frost drew lovely pictures every morning on every window, we never had condensation and black mould up and down the walls. I can understand it in a bathroom - as a student, I'm familiar with the mouldy bathroom issue. But everywhere?
So we keep the heat steady, we don't hang clothes to dry, we open the bathroom window after showering (all of which, by the way, on the advice of our letting agency who, despite being geared towards students, don't seem to have any understanding of the skyrocketing cost of electricity and gas) and still, without fail, every year this time, the mould returns like some freakish weather-based demon.
But when I find my pair of trusty black-stretch-boot-cut trousers covered in mould...what's am i to do?
Suggestions? Send 'em on.
Friday, November 24, 2006
dear santa...
One week left in November 2006 - is it trite to say something like 'where does the time go'?
Our friend has returned to Leeds with the winter - she'd laugh if she heard that since a big part of leaving Leeds was escaping the winter! At any rate, it's great to be welcoming someone home rather than sending them off.
I still haven't figured out what I'd like for Christmas. I cringe at the price of books - especially when I'm a member of one of the best research libraries in the UK - I don't like technology; I have a mobile. I suppose I could use new trainers for the gym as I've been using my squash shoes...but then, I've been using my squash shoes and they've worked so far! Stuff for my garden? I don't think I can carry seeds into Britain from Canada. Kitchen gadgets? The only kind of technology I like! but then, anything quality is heavy (a very dear friend once carried a pasta machine to ours from Canada - very very dear!). Besides, our kitchen is the size of a closet and pretty much full. Clothes? How dull. Jewellry? I don't really wear much and I'm not much of an accessories person. Shoes? YES but kind of a strange thing to ask for - I'm not sure why, but people don't tend to buy shoes as gifts...
Am I one of those people? One of those impossible-to-buy-for people? I don't think so. It's just that I usually feel like my family knows me better than I know myself - that and they are all those people: you know, the can-find-perfect-gift-for-anyone-anytime people.
For me, I prefer thinking of all the lovely things to do at home:
* watch telly with Grandma and Papa - they've always had the most comfortable floors - great soft carpetting.
* practice Gran's recipes (with her expert supervision) - she doesn't write anything down so every year I try and learn how to make those things I've taken for granted.
* have breakfast with mum and dad in the kitchen - with CBC on the radio and The Globe and Mail on the table
* chat with mum in the kitchen - I don't know why, but we always have the best chats in the kitchen while making food.
* dinner-discussions with dad! And game-night...we'll have to think of a new one for this year (last year was Cranium year...)
* go to Vietnamese place with aunt and uncle - my dad's sister is probably the greatest aunt ever and they know the owners of the best Vietnamese place...
* go out with sibs et al. - my sibs don't get nearly enough coverage on this blog
* meet Nina - this is really part of the last item...
'See everyone from home' is just too big...but I really hope we get to see some friends that we missed last year, and our newly-wed friends in T.O.
But to do all of that, I need to:
* finish chapter
* finish teaching
* pack
* pick up Christmas puds from Harvey Nicks
* get train tickets to London
Huh. What's the day again?
Oh yeah...just to tease...I've got the special-est gift ever for the bro this year...!
Our friend has returned to Leeds with the winter - she'd laugh if she heard that since a big part of leaving Leeds was escaping the winter! At any rate, it's great to be welcoming someone home rather than sending them off.
I still haven't figured out what I'd like for Christmas. I cringe at the price of books - especially when I'm a member of one of the best research libraries in the UK - I don't like technology; I have a mobile. I suppose I could use new trainers for the gym as I've been using my squash shoes...but then, I've been using my squash shoes and they've worked so far! Stuff for my garden? I don't think I can carry seeds into Britain from Canada. Kitchen gadgets? The only kind of technology I like! but then, anything quality is heavy (a very dear friend once carried a pasta machine to ours from Canada - very very dear!). Besides, our kitchen is the size of a closet and pretty much full. Clothes? How dull. Jewellry? I don't really wear much and I'm not much of an accessories person. Shoes? YES but kind of a strange thing to ask for - I'm not sure why, but people don't tend to buy shoes as gifts...
Am I one of those people? One of those impossible-to-buy-for people? I don't think so. It's just that I usually feel like my family knows me better than I know myself - that and they are all those people: you know, the can-find-perfect-gift-for-anyone-anytime people.
For me, I prefer thinking of all the lovely things to do at home:
* watch telly with Grandma and Papa - they've always had the most comfortable floors - great soft carpetting.
* practice Gran's recipes (with her expert supervision) - she doesn't write anything down so every year I try and learn how to make those things I've taken for granted.
* have breakfast with mum and dad in the kitchen - with CBC on the radio and The Globe and Mail on the table
* chat with mum in the kitchen - I don't know why, but we always have the best chats in the kitchen while making food.
* dinner-discussions with dad! And game-night...we'll have to think of a new one for this year (last year was Cranium year...)
* go to Vietnamese place with aunt and uncle - my dad's sister is probably the greatest aunt ever and they know the owners of the best Vietnamese place...
* go out with sibs et al. - my sibs don't get nearly enough coverage on this blog
* meet Nina - this is really part of the last item...
'See everyone from home' is just too big...but I really hope we get to see some friends that we missed last year, and our newly-wed friends in T.O.
But to do all of that, I need to:
* finish chapter
* finish teaching
* pack
* pick up Christmas puds from Harvey Nicks
* get train tickets to London
Huh. What's the day again?
Oh yeah...just to tease...I've got the special-est gift ever for the bro this year...!
Monday, November 20, 2006
Cinema thots
I forgot to mention - we saw The Prestige on Friday night. Has anyone seen it? I'm not sure what to think of it. I want to like it but parts of it were really terrible (David Bowie as Nikola Tesla - but with simply dreadful Russian accent; Christian Bale's fairly awful cockney accent; Scarlett Johanssen's almost-there English accent) but there were some really interesting themes. Alas, typically, the ending was far too heavy-handed - for a film about magic and showmanship, it displayed a total lack of subtlety.
I've discovered that it is a book - I thought all the way thru that it would make, in the right hands, a brilliant truly Gothic story - so I'll have to read it. There is one significant deviation from Priest's novel - one that involves the surprising effect of Tesla's machine. But I think the more interesting story is Borden...anyway... I don't want to ruin it for anyone who wants to see it - though it might be worth waiting for the DVD release.
I've discovered that it is a book - I thought all the way thru that it would make, in the right hands, a brilliant truly Gothic story - so I'll have to read it. There is one significant deviation from Priest's novel - one that involves the surprising effect of Tesla's machine. But I think the more interesting story is Borden...anyway... I don't want to ruin it for anyone who wants to see it - though it might be worth waiting for the DVD release.
Slip-time
Wow - I can't believe that it's past the middle of November...
In the last two weeks:
* I got my residence permit to live in the UK for 2 years - then I have to apply to stay indefinitely (with, undoubtedly, another goodwill gift of at least £300).
* the University of York has not only paid Nasser's remaining fees, but also paid for his final writing-up year.
* I've been working full-time (well, training full-time) at the Local Studies library in the city
* Nasser's best friend has been over from Spain
* I finally got cover for my last December shift at the university which means I don't have to call from Canada and pretend I'm sick
* The German Christmas market has come to the city again!
Local Studies is a facinating place to work - maybe it's cause I'm not from this city (or country!) so it's all new to me. We have maps from the 16th century of the area - I learned that round the corner from my house used to be a brewery - and that it's called 'Burley Lodge' because there once was a lodge with grounds right where we live. The library has the censuses from 1843 thru to 1901 and parish records for most area churches (including non-conformist) from the 16th century when churches were obliged to keep records.
Last week, I started to help out on some of the continuing projects - Local Studies doesn't exactly have a huge budget and most of the information is in dusty, crumbling old books or on microfilm. So (and this is still slightly behind the times!) we're digitizing our own collection onto MS databases. For the last week, I transcribed graveyard records from microfilm to paper. It was fascinating. Old records (this one was for the area of the city right over the valley from us) list occupation, age, place of death, parish... wonderfully suggestive stuff. As I wrote, I couldn't help but picture these people (I just made it up to records from about June 1939 on Friday afternoon) dying. It's a small thing - a name: so incredibly evocative and yet so empty on its own.
All I had was a name not spoken in 50 years, an occupation ('labourer' was the most common for men), an age, and where they died. And it represents a whole lifetime - and more curiously, it represents a perfectly unique, individual lifetime. Names can be repeated - I recorded a John Smith or Thomas at least 2ce an hour - but a name plus a death-date plus where they died: that's irreducibly one person's experience. That these people had been largely forgotten in most cases is true - but I enjoyed it, selfishly, as a reminder of the materiality of the past: that these were people who were as I am, who died in a place as I will, and were recorded by details that stripped them of their substance but preserved their uniqueness as I might be.
And I buried them again - and perhaps more surely this time: anyone can open a book and find a name (even by accident), now they are so much binary code.
But enough - Mondays are no day for sustained philosophical digressions!
Nas's best mate was up on the weekend from Spain which was lovely - even the weather thought as much and we've had two almost perfect very-late-fall days of sunshine and crisp air. We went up to York yesterday to one of my favourite pubs for a Sunday lunch - and went to the Fudge Kitchen... I did splash out a bit but it's in my freezer waiting to accompany after-dinner-drinks over Christmas. And one piece is set aside for my friend who has a new baby and needs lots of energy (and really good chocolate...). A couple of Christmas puds from Harvey Nick's and we're set for foodstuffs to take to Canada...
Tonight is the first Christmas do of the season - at the School of English. It feels a bit early - but then, we're off for Canada in three weeks...yikes!
In the last two weeks:
* I got my residence permit to live in the UK for 2 years - then I have to apply to stay indefinitely (with, undoubtedly, another goodwill gift of at least £300).
* the University of York has not only paid Nasser's remaining fees, but also paid for his final writing-up year.
* I've been working full-time (well, training full-time) at the Local Studies library in the city
* Nasser's best friend has been over from Spain
* I finally got cover for my last December shift at the university which means I don't have to call from Canada and pretend I'm sick
* The German Christmas market has come to the city again!
Local Studies is a facinating place to work - maybe it's cause I'm not from this city (or country!) so it's all new to me. We have maps from the 16th century of the area - I learned that round the corner from my house used to be a brewery - and that it's called 'Burley Lodge' because there once was a lodge with grounds right where we live. The library has the censuses from 1843 thru to 1901 and parish records for most area churches (including non-conformist) from the 16th century when churches were obliged to keep records.
Last week, I started to help out on some of the continuing projects - Local Studies doesn't exactly have a huge budget and most of the information is in dusty, crumbling old books or on microfilm. So (and this is still slightly behind the times!) we're digitizing our own collection onto MS databases. For the last week, I transcribed graveyard records from microfilm to paper. It was fascinating. Old records (this one was for the area of the city right over the valley from us) list occupation, age, place of death, parish... wonderfully suggestive stuff. As I wrote, I couldn't help but picture these people (I just made it up to records from about June 1939 on Friday afternoon) dying. It's a small thing - a name: so incredibly evocative and yet so empty on its own.
All I had was a name not spoken in 50 years, an occupation ('labourer' was the most common for men), an age, and where they died. And it represents a whole lifetime - and more curiously, it represents a perfectly unique, individual lifetime. Names can be repeated - I recorded a John Smith or Thomas at least 2ce an hour - but a name plus a death-date plus where they died: that's irreducibly one person's experience. That these people had been largely forgotten in most cases is true - but I enjoyed it, selfishly, as a reminder of the materiality of the past: that these were people who were as I am, who died in a place as I will, and were recorded by details that stripped them of their substance but preserved their uniqueness as I might be.
And I buried them again - and perhaps more surely this time: anyone can open a book and find a name (even by accident), now they are so much binary code.
But enough - Mondays are no day for sustained philosophical digressions!
Nas's best mate was up on the weekend from Spain which was lovely - even the weather thought as much and we've had two almost perfect very-late-fall days of sunshine and crisp air. We went up to York yesterday to one of my favourite pubs for a Sunday lunch - and went to the Fudge Kitchen... I did splash out a bit but it's in my freezer waiting to accompany after-dinner-drinks over Christmas. And one piece is set aside for my friend who has a new baby and needs lots of energy (and really good chocolate...). A couple of Christmas puds from Harvey Nick's and we're set for foodstuffs to take to Canada...
Tonight is the first Christmas do of the season - at the School of English. It feels a bit early - but then, we're off for Canada in three weeks...yikes!
Saturday, November 04, 2006
Pax Felix
I think we have a truce...at least, we're pretty sure they aren't constantly trying to kill each other...
Friday, November 03, 2006
another Friday
I just lost an entire post...very frustrating. Anyway, my eyes are blurring and my head hurts and I blame G.J.Barker-Benfield and The Culture of Sensibility. I've been reading it all afternoon, trying to decide how to define 'Sentiment' and 'Sensibility' in my dissertation. Fun times. Met my supervisor this morning - lovely as usual - and now know the likely panel for my viva this time next year. Slightly scary - but kind of exciting too. It's nice to know this has a definite end in the not-so-distant future.
Yesterday I bit back my pride, withdrew money from our Canadian credit line, and paid for those things that must be paid for: university fees (I was half-hoping that they'd accidentally give me my scholarship again this year...alas...), new gym membership, new underwear...(new convert to Bravissimo right here). Briefly entered fug of 'why-am-I-still-broke-and-a-student?' but snapped out of it by the time I got home (it was pitch out and only 4.30!). So now I'm officially a student again, officially a gym member, and I have underwears without holes, sticky-out wires, etc etc etc.
For the record, my seminar classes did not like Dryden. I must find a new angle on it to get them into it a little more next year. They did thank me for the annotations that I handed out, which was nice. It's a tough piece - doubly so for students without much knowledge of either the Bible or Restoration history. Curious? It was Absalom and Achitophel, A Poem.
Yesterday I bit back my pride, withdrew money from our Canadian credit line, and paid for those things that must be paid for: university fees (I was half-hoping that they'd accidentally give me my scholarship again this year...alas...), new gym membership, new underwear...(new convert to Bravissimo right here). Briefly entered fug of 'why-am-I-still-broke-and-a-student?' but snapped out of it by the time I got home (it was pitch out and only 4.30!). So now I'm officially a student again, officially a gym member, and I have underwears without holes, sticky-out wires, etc etc etc.
For the record, my seminar classes did not like Dryden. I must find a new angle on it to get them into it a little more next year. They did thank me for the annotations that I handed out, which was nice. It's a tough piece - doubly so for students without much knowledge of either the Bible or Restoration history. Curious? It was Absalom and Achitophel, A Poem.
