In which I give myself the name Hears Water Run

The long weekend must be over, because here I am, glued to the internet and clicking my online substitute system over and over.

And over and over.

In all, it was a pretty good long weekend. I didn’t get out of my jammies before 2 on most days and read a lot with a sleepy kitty on my lap.

I’m feverishly working to get a job for the summer (or a full-time one; I’m not picky) and had two interviews last week. Thankfully, I have another one this Thursday because

a) the first interview, for a one month term job, didn’t pan out and

b) the second one is just for subbing at a daycare, which would involved watching tiny tykes for 7:30 to 5:00 for minimum wage (and only if I pay to get my CPR certification)

Oh, the opportunities a BA can get you!

I haven’t been blogging much because I’ve been tweaking my teacher’s webpage in time for the June hiring rounds. It would be nice to get a term for the fall, and I’ve been working hard to make it so. I’m even reading teacher’s textbooks like crazy, updating my LinkedIn profile, and being the best little job hunter I can be.

Thankfully, subbing has picked up a little in the last few weeks; I expect it will be brisk until mid June or so, when everything wraps up for the year.

And finally, over the weekend, I got to go to a family get together where there was lots of food and (did I mention?) lots of food.

Once, while trudging back and forth between the food area and the sitting area, I heard water running.

Perplexed (after all, it was a dry evening) I looked for the source of the water, and would’ve looked for awhile if someone wouldn’t have spoken up.

I forget what they said. Mostly because I was

a) surprised a person was making the water sound beside the house

b) slightly embarrassed to be caught looking for the source of the water sound

You can probably guess what was happening. I’m surprised that, as a good country girl, I didn’t think of that.

I finally joined the 21st century by ACTIVATING my wireless

Even though I live in the Sticks, I have had high speed internet for quite a few years. It may be end-of-the-line high speed internet (according to those speed tests) but at least it’s better than dial up. (Do people even still have dial up? I mean, I can see having it at one’s cottage, but at one’s house? Not that I have a cottage. Or a house. Or a car that’s completely paid off.)

I’ve also had a wireless modem for as long as I’ve had my broadband.

Of course, just because I plugged it in and began using it didn’t mean I figured out how to start using it properly.

Today, while spring cleaning my computer (and deleting a bunch of junk), I decided to call Bell Aliant support.

And so, tonight, I’m writing this post on my netbook far away from my desktop computer and my modem.

I feel free.

I’ve spent all evening updating programs that haven’t been updated since last summer, when I last connected my netbook to the internet.

I can’t really explain why it took me five years to get my wireless working. Especially because I’m super excited the wireless works outside on the porch! and in the basement! and in my bedroom!

It’s like someone discovering indoor plumbing for the first time.

I don’t know why we put off doing things for so long. I attribute it to a well-developed sense of procrastination—and maybe the fact I know I will NEVER EVER get off the internet now that I’m plunked down in my comfy arm chair.

Can you expect more blog posts?

Yes. I think you can.

I survived another day

It’s 11:30PM and I’m pretty stoked. I have a day’s work tomorrow. And these days, I take it one day at a time, even though I’d like job security for the next 300 years, please.

Today was a non-work day (that’s the terminology of my online substitute system called AESOP) because I had my first massage therapy session at 1:45, which killed the day for work.

It wasn’t bad. I didn’t even have to take my bra off, which I’m loathe to do outside the privacy of my bedroom.

Tonight, I don’t even hurt.  (I may regret these cocky words in the morning, as I was warned my muscles may be tender the next day.)

*

I felt good enough afterwards that I went to the gas station, got gas (seems like an obvious thing to do), and vacuumed and washed my car with the self-service cleaning areas that smell of questionable decisions washed out of cars the morning after. (There was a weird blanket by the vacuum despite the sign stating Take your garbage with you, you filthy pigs. I may be paraphrasing the sign, however.)

Spring makes me want to keep my car spotless. I don’t know if it’s the shovelling out of the winter rocks which accumulate on the floor mats, or the stale funk I keep trying to drown with Lysol’s answer to Febreeze spray. Even so, my car has been smelling like old winter air perfumed with “fresh linen” or the chemical concoction that promises to trick my brain into thinking there’s fresh laundry in my car.

As long as I’m paying for the car, it’s going to be so shiny, it’ll burn your retinas if you stare at it long enough.

And it got kind of dirty going through the woods of Queens County, quite literally. A Sunday drive turned from a “Why don’t we go down this road?” to wending through the pines alongside the Medway River. There was not even pavement. No siree. Just dirt. I thought we were going to die, but the power lines marking the road gave me strength that we were in “some” form of civilization, and were going to make it out on the other side.

However, a bathroom emergency necessitated stopping at the nearest rest stop (a mossy road) and praying for no oncoming cars.

Not one drove by. Not in ten whole minutes.

FYI, the road between Mill Village and Greenfield, although a bit rough and unpaved, offers gorgeous scenery of the Medway River and the thick forests of Queens County.

Just remember one thing: there are no Tim Hortons on the route. Plan accordingly.

*

As you can tell, I’ve been doing some serious redesigning on my blog.

I don’t mind, because I feel like I’m ready to commit to this theme template for quite some time. It’s got amazing features, fonts that don’t make me want to throw up, and a slider menu that is just incredible.

Please let me know what you think. Even if you hate it, I’ve got to live with it for awhile. However, I always enjoy feedback for my future endeavors.

Happy reading, peoples, and get out there and enjoy some spring weather.

I’ve got my lawn seed, my lettuce seed, and sheep s#!^.

I’m still not sure why I buy such things as manure when I live in the country.

However, at 4 for $10, it seemed too good a deal to pass up.

In which I spend my Saturday night redesigning my blog yet again.

It’s a well-known fact that I don’t have a life.

And so here I am on Saturday night, redoing my blog with a new theme that really rocks my socks. I’m hoping this one is a keeper, because I spend more time messing around with themes than I do writing actual posts.

On job hunting…

Yes, the job hunt continues. I’ve even resorted to applying to fast food restaurants, although I’m pretty sure managers will look at my resume, see three university degrees, and consider me either a) useless and inept (only a half-truth) b) over-priced c) someone who is going to get bored really quickly with deep-fryers.

I love having Arts degrees.

On raking…

Spring is here, but NOT THE FLIES. This means that I rake every. single. day. And let me tell you, two acres is a lot of frickin’ raking. Especially since the snow plough drivers winged enough rocks onto the lawn to fill in most of the driveway. (I’m not lying on this one; we seriously have a new driveway.)

However, I only last about two or three hours before the sun makes me beet read, and my neck starts snapping like popcorn in the microwave.

Good times in the Maritimes.

On physio…

I finally got the insurance paperwork done for physio after getting whiplashed in February. By the time the paperwork was done, the doctor’s forms filled out and signed, faxes completed, my neck and shoulders were getting much better. Now that I’ve started physio, I’m almost worse than I was in the beginning, plus I’ve put in over 500 kilometres driving back and forth to medical appointments.

I can hardly wait for massage therapy on Monday. I’m told it will hurt. Goody.

On the best news I’ve had in a long time…

I’m going to be an auntie again in October! Yes, my one and only brother will be having a new baby (well, not him, but my sister-in-law).

Who wouldn’t want another of these? I know I would!

You knew it was coming

I’m sorry. It was just inevitable that I would do a blog post about Rehtaeh.

I am sure many Nova Scotians are ready to take a break from the news and commentaries on Rehtaeh Parsons, the girl who was disappointed to death by the health, justice, and education system; the girl who said she was sexually assaulted, then victimized repeatedly by the viral photograph documenting her assault, and by the victim-blaming and cyber bullying that ensued.

However, as a feminist, I am appalled that a woman has to commit suicide for the world to hear her.

For almost two years, Rehtaeh tried to seek justice the right way. She reported her assault to police. She sought counselling and even a stay in hospital to treat her depression.

Yet she could not make the world believe she was assaulted. The cursory police investigation, which took place a year after the fact, ended without any charges laid because of a lack of evidence (despite photographic evidence of the sexual assault and a likely trail of IP addresses; but I digress).

I have been shocked by the lack of justice for survivors of sexual assault in India; but I am aghast that in a country such as Canada, a sexual assault is not believed by society until a girl uses the very body that was victimized to send a message.

From the outrage across the globe (People.com even featured articles about Rehtaeh) one can assume that people have heard her, loud and clear.

Yet why do we need a young women to kill herself in order for people to seek justice for her? Is she a liar until she commits suicide to stand behind her principles?

An inquiry until the Rehtaeh Parsons’ case is necessary if we, as a society, are to improve resources for victims of sexual assault. It’s the only way we can prevent more suffering.

I commend Rehtaeh’s parents for bringing her story to the public’s attention, even though they must want to hide away with their grief. If they hadn’t let the world know why Rehtaeh died, she would’ve been just another obituary in the newspaper, another victim silenced.

We, as Nova Scotians, as Canadians, as humans, should not forget why Rehtaeh was disappointed to death.

Otherwise, her death will not be the last; and she will not be the last survivor of sexual assault to suffer while the world turns on.

We owe her, and others, better.

My bi-monthly I’m-not-dead-yet post

Good afternoon, dear reader. I hope you’re well and not looking out at the snowflakes thinking, as I am, OMG WILL IT EVER STOP?

The bird herd out on my lawn seems to think spring weather is nearly here. There must be dozens of robins bopping over the grass, uprooting leaves. I’m not sure if there’s a Hitchcock movie filming here in Lunenburg County or they just have bird intuition that the snow is soon over.

I’ve already cleaned out my car and begun panicking over swimsuit season, so the birds must be right.

I hope you had a great long weekend. Mine was a bit dull, but punctuated with welcome visits and a lemon pie I made that was epic. It was from scratch. From REAL lemons. And butter. Needless to say, it was rich and made me think I will never stop craving pastries and other naughty sweets.

Although I haven’t been blogging much, I have been trying to write fiction. I’ve also been reading up a storm. These seem like good occupations for an underemployed substitute. I feel that I’m at least nurturing my mind.

I had a job interview last Thursday for a mentor/guidance counsellory type position, and I’m watching the phone like a hawk, willing it to ring with positive news. Do I jump every time it rings? You betcha. So far, I’ve only gotten excited for telemarketers. (Probably the only time they get someone picking up the phone with an eager, Hello? Hello? You want to hire me? I’s a good girl, I is.)*

There’s been a lot of upheaval in the local school board this year. There were a lot of budget cuts (READ: no extra jobs for new graduates) and there are more in store for the next school year.

I should have become a hair stylist. I’m also practicing another line for when the tulips blossom:

Buy a flower off a pore girl, won’t you?*

* I may have recently read Pygmalion, among my many literary exploits.

Steal of the week: A list of things everyone’s supposed to like but I’m just not that into

The title sums it up perfectly: this is a list of things I should like, but don’t, borrowed from fellow blogger Amy Wheaton at Rainy Saturday.

Things most people are supposed to like, but I don’t

• beer (yeasty grossness)
• wine (maybe because I only buy cheap stuff?)
• nutritional yeast (I’m sorry, but it DOES NOT taste like cheese; instead it tastes like dry flakes of blech)
• high heels (I think it’s because my balance is atrocious)
• people on smartphones 24/7 (while I enjoy the fact people no longer talk to their loved ones via cell with loud voices, it’s appalling to see how besotted people are with their smartphones, to the point of ignoring people around them; I’ll pick live people to chat with any day versus some text on a phone)
• snow days (I don’t get paid for them; nuff said)
• iPods (I have the Shuffle and it drives me bat-$#!% crazy when it moves onto the next song when you bump it. I also hate how I had to erase all my songs when I changed computers. Eff you Shuffle. Eff you.)
• Pinterest
• reality shows (I never got into Big Brother and its ilk. Never will)
• and finally, despite my love of cats, the Grumpy Cat meme is well past annoying (I felt a little dirty looking for a pic to illustrate my blog post, but here it is)

Winter blues and other news

Why, hello there! Yes, long time, no see, right?

I am still alive. As you know, if you read my blog regularly, I go through spurts of silence. (Having the word “Daily” in my blog title is a bit of false advertising, I admit.)

I attribute it to the winter funk.

For one, it’s winter. I shouldn’t have to say much more. Long days, cold days, dark days, snowy days… oy vey.

And icy days. I gave meself whiplash the other week falling on the ice. If my rather ample behind hadn’t hit the icy ground first, I probably would still have a headache. Instead, my bum hit first, whipping my neck forward, which promptly came down and smucked into the ground.

Lessons learned:

1) whiplash, even whiplash which lasts for a few days, is uncomfortable, especially when you’re driving in reverse or trying to sleep. Glad it was healed in a week.

2) don’t wear sneakers to the garbage box in icy weather

3) even if you think you’ve maimed yourself good, you WILL try to get up off the ground because of the irrational fear that (oh, gosh!) someone might SEE YOU. Heaven forbid.

4) I really need to start wearing a helmet to the garbage box after this, especially after this is the SECOND time I nearly gave myself a head injury taking out the garbage. The first was when I leaned into the garbage box during a wind storm and got the super-heavy lid on my noggin. I squeaked away without a head injury that time because the ball on the top of my hat absorbed enough of the impact to keep me from getting hurt.

So, in summary, eff you winter. Eff you.

And two, my winter blues are enhanced by the fact that money is low because subbing is quiet during January.

It’s not just the money which is an issue during periods of super-low underemployment. Nope, it’s the lack of structure, which means you need the will of steel to get up at a decent hour in the morning and not spend your time drinking coffee and playing Bookworm.

Thankfully, the days are getting longer. And there are periods of warmth in which your skin doesn’t freeze. Huzzah.

Even though the groundpig saw his shadow yesterday, I’m betting spring is JUST AROUND THE CORNER.

So buck up, dear reader. The winter blues are soon on the way out the door. And none too fast, because Valentine’s Day is coming up, and there’s nothing worse than being single on a day in which coupled up women enjoy chocolate, jewelery, and roses.

Come on spring! I’ll even take swimsuit weather at this point.

Dispatches from the weekend

Well, here it is, Saturday again.

Since I’m a fan of bullets (the computer variety, not the NRA kind), I’m going to write everything in bullet form. You’re welcome.

• I’m writing on a new keyboard. Well, it’s not exactly new; I bought it years ago when I was at Acadia University and forced to endure typing theses on laptops (around this time, I also learned the glory of laser printers). I saw this cordless keyboard set on eBay and was hooked. The keys feel luxurious. The tapping is gentle, soothing. I am in computer heaven. I don’t know why this was buried in the basement under a layer of dust for the past few years.
• The days are getting longer. Yes. I know I’m stating the obvious, but since it’s January, I thought you could use the reminder. Spring is coming, yes! (Oh, crap. That means summer is coming. And that means swimsuit season is coming. And I haven’t started on my resolutions yet. $#*&!
• I have a new fridge. Thank you Kijiji. I have needed one for about a year, which is as long as the 35 year old fridge was making death noises. Over the winter, the noises got worse. I happened upon a 2 year old fridge on Kijiji one night. $250. And although it took a month (!!!) to arrange for the final pickup, it’s in the kitchen and humming beautifully. Even better, through Efficiency Nova Scotia’s Appliance Retirement program, someone is going to pick up the old one, send a cheque to me for $35, and put 125 Air Miles on my card. Win. I can’t wait to see the first power bill, too; I expect the fridge to pay for itself in savings in 2 years, especially as it is an Energy Star model.
• I am now a Regal Representative and Avon Independent Representative! I wanted to do some selling from home, and decided on these 2. I suspect I am going to buy more products than any of my customers, however, so I’ll let you know how profitable it is. The cool thing about both companies is that you can order online now. Everything can be done online. It’s like heaven. Especially with this keyboard. Tick, tick, click, click.
• Subbing has been slow so far. School has been back for a week and a half, and I’ve only nabbed one day. However, that day involved eating corn chowder made in Family Studies, so win for me!
• On the literary front, I’ve got a couple of books on the go, including Go Ask Alice. Look forward to some new reviews in the near future.

Well, that’s all for now. I’m sure this is enough reading for you on the weekend. So go forth and do your weekend things.

Drink a little wine while you’re at it, or be like me, and rock the coffee.

Upon the eve of my 32nd birthday, I’m only a few cats away from becoming a crazy cat lady

Another year has gone by. That means I’m closer to 40 than I’d like to be.

But I keep telling people that 40 is the new 30. Especially once I get there.

However, these are the facts.

This past year, I found my first grey hair other than the one which grows out of my chin mole. In other words, it was on my head. The only good thing about this development is that grey hair will take on colour better than my dark brown hair. Hello RED and BLONDE!

Also, this year, my first tooth broke. I figure I’m on my way to dentures. Dang.

Furthermore, I almost considered the use of medicated liniment when I was doing Christmas wreaths at a local farm. I held off, although I know one of these years, it’s all downhill. I should start buying shares in Bengay

Yes, I have to admit that the year are piling up. Which is sad, because I still have my collection of pink Care Bears in my room. Unfortunately, they do not seem to be a talisman against grey hair, broken teeth, and becoming honorary CEO of Bengay.

Here’s my list of things that concern me about getting older—and things that rock.

Things which bother me about aging

• feeling like a goof for having a sub-woofer in my trunk
• arthritis
• wrinkles
• dementia (some days I’m already putting the sugar in the fridge, and the cream in the cupboard)
• constantly talking of bowel movements
• constantly saying things like “Kids in my day” or “When I was younger, they made things to last” etc.
• requiring Velcro on my shoes
• thinking I need to buy all manner of creams and tonics for my skin
• looking like a child when I wear glittery, sparkling makeup
• ugly veins

Things I like about growing older

• having no desire to buy One Direction merchandise or CDs
• not giving a $#!& about what people think
• being super-psyched about getting IDed at the liquor store
• possessing some variety of wisdom and life experience
• not having to answer to any authority besides the law
• finally enjoying some of my Literature with a capital L
• being composed on Facebook (most of the time, anyway)
• appreciating the finer things in life—like naps
• eating chocolate chip pancakes whenever I darn well feel like it

Well, there you have it.

Another year gone. However, I only possess ONE cat, so I think I’m doing all right.