Carbon Copy

Canada

Well, it's been about a month, but I finally took the time to organize and resize photos, so I thought I'd share them. This first photo shows me enjoying the unique shopping experiences Canada offers at the dollar store. The cool thing about this was that since the exchange rate is so beneficial for Americans at the moment, this was more like the .82 cent store. Still, .82 cents was more than I wanted to spend for this maple leaf hat. I just took a picture instead. Nothing says Canada like a hat.

Oh, by the way, I went to Canada to visit my great friend April. When I was planning the trip, I thought the 21st through the 24th sounded like plenty of time. Turns out that with traveling, it was really only 2 days. Not so long. So here we are on Day 1. April and I went shopping and then picked up some subs at a little cafe called Subway and then went to the zoo. We ate subs by the duck pond. I got mustard on my shirt.

In my Canadian Short Fiction class that I took in Austria, we talked a lot about how Canadians identify themselves through their wildlife. I could tell by going to the zoo because there were some billy goats just hanging on the rocks. They were all over the place.

They even imported some wildlife from other countries, like these camels.

April went for a little ride on the camel.

Then we went for a train ride around the zoo.

After the train dropped us off at the depot, we took a path to see the monkeys. Turns out, there was only one monkey. But the path was really lovely with overgrown vegetation and views of the river.

Later, we stopped by the cemetery where April's ancestors are buried.

It had lots of old tombstones, like this one with sweet clasped hands.

And some of them had crumbled, but they were stacked together nicely.

That night, we played an awesome game called Mall Madness. You have credit cards and there are sales and you try to get the best deals.

We also watched some Canadian Idol. I need to check up on that and see who else has made it. Ok, so I just checked and the guy I was rooting for is still a contestant. Go Josh Palmer!

The next morning, we went to a museum all about canoes. It had a lot of canoes hanging around. It also had lots of school children wearing the blouses worn by the voyageurs. I was jealous.

Then we went to the Trent University campus and wandered around for a while.

The university has a river that runs through the middle of it. There were some steps that led down to it where a swim class was doing lessons, but then on our way back over the path, they were gone, so we sat down and rolled up our pants and stuck our feet in the water. I think this was one of my favorite moments on the trip - a heart to heart while my feet soaked in scudsy water.

Then we explored Peterborough looking for the liftlocks. This particular liftlocks is the tallest liftlocks made of concrete in all of North America. We learned all about it in a film at the visitor center.

Then we went mini-golfing. I really like mini-golfing. I try and look at the angles and figure out the geometry of it. (A little trick I learned from the Simpsons.) April and I tied - we were both about 20 strokes (?) over par. Yeah, we're talented.

I swear there were frogs croaking on the mini-golf course. We couldn't figure out if there really were frogs, though, or if there was just a speaker somewhere piping out the sounds of the frogs. Here's April listening to the frogs. And one of us enjoying being together.

On the way home that night, we stumbled across the most beautiful sunset. I made April stop the car so I could hop out and take some photos.

Of course, there was much more to the trip than just these photos. I mean, you can't take photos of all the fun times and laughing or the nights up talking and reconnecting. I also couldn't take photos of me going through customs and getting my passport stamped (which was kind of a fun part of the trip). And I spent a lot of time waiting in airports and listening to music and wishing that I had brought my laptop afterall. I rode the new little tram at the Dallas-Fort Worth airport, which mitigated my bad memories of the old, horrible, breakdown tram they had the last time I was there. I love traveling.

Well, so that was Canada and my visit with April. Hi April! Hope you're doing well! Love you!

I cried myself to sleep last night.

There's nothing more refreshing than waking up the morning after crying yourself to sleep. Even if your pillow has mascara stains on it and your shirt is soiled from wiping your nose with it, there's a sense of rejuvenation only possible after exhausting your body of fluids. The only thing I can compare it to is the freshness of waking up after sleeping off a migraine. It just feels so damn good to have the sun shining through the window, a new day ahead of you. At least, for a little while. Then you remember that you cried yourself to sleep and feel a little embarrassed by it. You hope your roommates didn't hear the muffled sobs and avoid eye contact. The last thing you want on this brand, sparkling new day is to have someone ask you if you're feeling okay because they heard you crying last night. It would be even worse if they timidly knocked on your door in the night, though. I mean, that would be the height of worse. But in the morning when you wash your face and put on some new mascara and eyeliner, everything seems rosier.

Obscenities

Warning: obscenities below...

Lately I've taken to swearing. It used to be just for comic effect, but now it's becoming totally casual. I think I said (or thought) "damn" approximately 27 times today. I said "shit" a couple times, and even wrote it on IM. I called a fellow driver an "asshole" and asked him what the hell he thought he was doing. I've started writing "WTF?" (and thinking it - and not just the acronym).

I don't know if I want to swear. I keep thinking I should learn to control what comes out of my mouth, but I kinda like cussing.

Sometimes people use swears because they can't think of anything more intelligent to say, but we all know that I have a good vocabulary. Really, I'm just not practicing word discrimination anymore. I mean, if the word fits in a certain situation, why not use it? Sometimes someone who tries to turn left without getting into the left-hand turn lane really is an asshole who needs to take some damn driving lessons. I mean, WTF? Just because you're from Arizona and you're old doesn't mean you can be a shitty driver when you come to Logan for Summer Citizens Camp. My hell!

Okay, so this is still pretty comic to me. I'm totally sitting here chuckling, thinking of all 2 people that might read this who know that I really can't pull off casual swearing. I'm too conscious of it.

Unpacking the Pack Rat

There's nothing like realizing you have to somehow transport everything you own to Indiana either in your car or through the US Postal Service to inspire de-junking. That was my activity this morning. I actually did fill three bags - two of garbage and one for the DI.

Apparently some time in the past three years, I went through a really crafty stage because I threw out tons of magazines, stock photo books, and pamphlets picked up from various vacation destinations. I also had about 50 sponge brushes and 26 shades of paint. I threw out some mod-podge and gave my extra terra cotta pot to my roommate (along with brain-teaser puzzles). I threw out manuals from my first cell phone, no longer in use, and my ipod, sold several months ago. The garbage bag is an array of colors from the pads of construction paper. I even found an old sketchbook (basically empty) from my 2 weeks of art class at Smith. I was sad to throw away my charcoal of my own hand. And hidden in the leaves was a French paper all about a girl tragically in love with her mother's boyfriend. I think it was from a movie we watched in class. It was heart-wrenching, even more so because it was written in such perfectly horrible (yet beautiful) French.

Some things I kept that I probably should've thrown out: a road atlas to Europe, circa 1970 and a film canister of red dirt from South Carolina. I don't know what I'm ever going to do with that dirt. I was about to toss it, but I decided to pour a little in my hand first, and after that, I couldn't. Still trying to unpack the reason for that. And an old cosmetics-luggage-box-thingy that I was just about to throw away, but then I had this vision of it all mod-podged and cute (despite the fact that I just threw away all of my mod-podge supplies). It used to have a Virginia is for Lovers sticker on it. Wonder what happened to that.

The DI is getting some old bags, an old CD case, some t-shirts, and my last pair of capri pants since I've recently discovered how stupid they are. I'm trying to decide whether or not to keep my plastic binoculars. They might come in handy when I take up bird-watching.

Sigh... there's still so much crap here. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it all.

Hi.

So, it's July. Bastille Day. I would like to see jets flying over the skies of Paris. Or at least some berets. I mean, hell, it's the day to celebrate France. I've never been there. Still, for some reason, I'm kind of attached to it.

I have all sorts of firework pictures. I even have video. Lets see if this will work. Exploding Fireworks! - live from Sugarhouse Park. (Something fun about this video is that the fireworks are all sideways because I had my camera portrait instead of landscape and I forgot that you can't rotate it. hehe.)

And some still photos from the Logan showing on the 1st of July (Canada Day):

I think I pretty much saw all the fireworks through the 1 inch screen of my camera this year.

So other things: only 2.5 more weeks of work. today, I bought boxes to pack things into. I've been studying the map of Indiana while I blowdry my hair. I feel attached to the MidWest already. And I feel personally pleased by Sufjan's album "Illinoise" because even though I won't be in Illinois, I will be right next door. I feel fine basking in reflected glory. In fact, it's pretty much my natural state. I like it that way. Less than one month till the wedding and one month from today I leave. Today I got a new windshield. My car smells like glue. I've been seeing lots of movies lately. And I have 103 stars on Mario 64.