Still Alive, and Feeling… Well, not FINE, but Stable.

The meeting went well, despite getting lost there and back again (gotta love summer construction, eh?), but I am now fairly terrified for a whole new reason. These folks mean business. For my RA work, I am basically getting sent out into the field to scour the city for Jewish opinions on food (Renegade, expect my contact soon)…

I ask: What do I know about people? All the people I deal with are like 10 feet tall and are shot in medium, long or close-up…

This could be interesting. But, then again, I may not survive. We shall see what we shall see.

Yes, yes. Term has begun in earnest.

Feel the adrenalin??
*

Pressure Exceeding Recommended Maximum Levels

Someone in my building is listening to “music” that sounds remarkably like:

Thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk.
(Pause)
Thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk, thunk-thunk-thunk.
Thunk, thunk.

Do they not know that someone in an adjacent apartment is currently having a nervous breakdown?

I mean, come on, people… Some of us are contemplating jumping out a window. Let’s have some friggin’ peace and quiet, alright, Mother-F*$%@#s?!?
*

Smoke… Good

Yesterday, I had nicotine cravings like you would not believe. I had to chew gum, just to keep from crawling out of my skin. Usually, I smoke maybe 6 smokes a day… these days, I could smoke that an hour. And I wondered, why so much need for cigarettes? What is up, system-o-mine?

So, now I know… Term is starting.

"They" (meaning the fates, muses and demons of Grad School) couldn’t even wait until September 1st before they started poking me to death, slowly, with small needle-like pitch forks and their razor-sharp incisors.

I would start therapy, but who the hell has the time?

I have a meeting today, one or two on the 6th, one undetermined… I have two proposals for different things floating in cyberspace… I am waiting to hear whether my RA work from the summer is actually acceptable, or whether I screwed the pooch on it while my head has been in the clouds for the past month.

I am way behind in my reading, and that prop will need a lion tamer to get it anywhere near ready for my SSHRC/OGS needs, not to mention the damage that such a dog could do in my “Permanent Record” (yes, I am 28, and I am still being threatened by my “Permanent Record” by school authorities).

I barely got my most recent conference proposal in on time, let along all the funding paperwork I had forgot about… and I still have to write a paper for that conference in October (which seemed like a great idea a few months ago, but, for the life of me, I can’t even remember why now).

The Director of the Program has been emailing me every 15 minutes for an hour… I feel a palatable sense of disappointment from like everyone in my bloody life right now, and flop sweat is starting to pool in my soul.

How much more wakefulness can I squeeze out of each 24 hour period?? I guess we shall see, won’t we?

So, yeah… My nerves are jangled and my head is aching, and my hands are even shaking. Right now dropping out and joining that Mexican circus is starting to look like a better option every minute.

Yup. Going for another smoke. It may not be pleasant, but it is slightly preferable to becoming a carny.

Pray for me, if you know how.

I need a hug.
*

Back to Life

Today I meet with the prof I will be working under for first term. Rats - I guess it is back to regular existence again. Fall is in the air, and the first meeting of the term is a sure sign that the party is over.

So now it is back to comp reading, and back to proposal revisions, and, dear lord, onto the whole SSHRC/OGS chase again… Not to mention that paper I need to deliver in October. Yes, fall comes, and so too come the deadlines.

However, on a brighter note, there are only 20 more sleeps to Cincinnati – so the onset of September does bring its joys.
*

So Within Reach…

I just got some incredible news. Stupendous news, really. Wonderful, relief-making news! I have been doing a touch-down-dance since I heard the good word, really.

For my PhD, I have a nice list of requirements, which I have to pick away at and hopefully master before 2009. I just got an email that dissolved one outright!!!!

The department has agreed with me that my French (and the credits I already have in French classes, as well as the fact that my MA research was pretty much all French) has satisfied my language requirements, and that I WILL NOT HAVE TO SIT THE EXAM!

So, what does this mean?

We are not permitted to begin work on our dissertations until our language requirement is met. The fact that mine is in the bag a year early means that I can start my dissertation work much earlier than expected (provided, of course, my proposal goes the full distance).

Where I had been planning on preparing for and writing the French translation exam next summer, now I have nothing but dissertation research on my plate.

Basically, this pushes my progress about a term ahead of where I thought I was!

So, now, according to my little chart of milestones, I have my two doctoral exams (January 2007 and May 2007), my finalized proposal, my dissertation, and my public and departmental defences, and that is *it*, really.

Just like that, a requirement that was there is no longer there. This PhD game gets better and better every day!

Well, this one is for you Dr. Pocknell, the greatest French teacher I ever had, who I still miss. I owe you big-time!
*

The Other Kind of Self-Abuse

The last time I actually got out of bed, it was to get ready to go to Toronto, Monday morning… 38 hours ago. True, I got an hour’s worth of sleep this morning, but it was on the sofa, and I still had my boots on when I woke up, so I really don’t think it counts.

I know I am mortgaging my future by doing such things, and significantly decreasing both my life span and the quality of that life span… but such is life in the grad school trenches.

So now it is time to make it up to the body: I will have some light supper, maybe watch Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) since Murph reminded me of it today, and now I have a yen, and then hit the hay and see if I can actually make it to 8 hours of sleep.

Ah! I can dream, can’t I?
*

Do a Little Dance, Make a Little Love

Well, one out of two ain’t bad at all!

The research/editing phase of my work has now been beaten into submission. They are now sent off into the giant, blue e-yonder… And I even managed to get an hour’s worth of sleep in this morning!

Holly P.: Master of the All-Nighter, baby!

So now, it is off to two more important tasks: Creating a Power Point presentation for a prof, and giving another read through to Murph’s massive new draft. Heh heh heh, juices are flowing, and work falls away under my hand.

So, I have survived yet again, with no serious damage, aside from a bit of a headache and a beaut of a sun burn from wandering around Toronto yesterday with Andrew looking for the U of T library.

I’m thinking that I’ll survive this program, afterall.
*

4.30am

Is it late or early? I forget...

However, second Tim's run of the night... That can't be good.

Soon will resort to toothpicks securing the eye-lids.
*

Seems Like Old Times

MMMMmmmmm… 24 Hour Tim Horton’s… Mmmmm.

Well, here it is folks:

Yet another all-nighter for Holly.

This research project is growing out of all sense of proportion, my partner is yelling for my sections, and I have just realized there were a ton of places I neglected to check for abstract searches.

(And since the money for the project has already been deposited, I can't really turn back now.)

Where has my head been, anyway?

The Old Holly would not have forgotten to look in these databases… The New Holly, unfortunately, seems to have reverted to some form of hippy-like marsupial, without any sense of work ethic, whatsoever.

Oh well… There is a breeze, it is raining out, I have smokes and coffee, and I got to see like four frogs on my jog down to Tim’s. There could be worse conditions under which to partake in all-nighter activities.

Ah, well… c’est la vie, eh?

I hope you are all snug in your comfy beds. See you come morning, I guess.

*sigh*
*

In Before Flynn

Went to Toronto today… Survived.

Felt a depression start… was pulled out by a dear friend.

Life is pretty swell.

You?
*

Wow… I Just Almost Died

Do I have a big “Hit Me” sign on me somewhere?

Once, in Halifax, I was hit by a slow-moving Jeep, crossing a street, but only barely. (The woman smacked my leg with her bumper.) Once, in Hamilton, I almost got it from a mini-van containing like four million teenaged boys, none of whom were watching the road as they turned. (Again, at a cross-walk, obeying the lights.) Last winter, I was set down into a convenient snow drift by a rolling SUV, while I was crossing with the lights.

However, tonight, the oncoming lights of a red compact were almost the last things these eyes ever saw.

Crossing, again on the walk light (I am beginning to think that jay walking is safer, actually), though admittedly with my mind on other things, I was stunned to find a car zeroing straight for me. I was in black, it was nighttime, she wasn’t looking where she was going, I think she was speeding… all bad factors against me.

If I had not jumped back out of the way, Holly would not be here to tell you this tale, folks. Seriously, this woman was gunning it.

There was a second when I jumped back, and she realized she was almost on top of me. It was kind of cool, now that I think about it, in a horrific sort of way. She stopped. I stopped. She kinda screamed. I just stared. She didn’t know what the next move was. I distinctly remember thinking, “Wow… I almost died just there.”

Then the moment passed, and I scurried home. I am now drinking a lovely, calorie-filled soda pop (no where near the Diet variety) in celebration of life itself. I figure, since I almost died, what the hell do I worry about a few too many pounds for, tonight?

It rather makes one think of what is most important in life. The thoughts of that last second were really amazing… Ask me about them sometime, and see what pops up.

As it is, the final analysis is that I am pretty damned glad to be typing this right this second. All those problems on my mind just before the Incident really don’t seem to matter quite so much any more, oddly enough.

Be well.
*

Roger Nash Baldwin (1884-1981)

Today marks the 25th anniversary of the death of Roger Nash Baldwin, an important American, and citizen of the world.

And a vital reminder that one person can work for change and achieve greatness.

Baldwin was born to a prominent and old family in Wellesley, Massachusetts on January 21, 1884. His father was a leather manufacturer and both sides of the family were descended from pilgrim stock. Destined for All-American Boyhood, Roger failed to conform to society’s values for young males. Not a boy interested or skilled in sports, he instead gravitated towards arts and literature, marking him as “different.” In self-defense, Baldwin sought what he remembered as “unconventional, nonconformist avenues of expression,” along the lines of his heroes Thoreau and Emerson, and in keeping with his parents’ Unitarian religious traditions.

As a Harvard-educated sociologist, Baldwin soon became a prominent expert on juvenile court processes, and moved to St Louis as a youth probation officer and policy researcher. He was already seeking ways to improve the American justice system, but, in 1909, he attended a lecture delivered by famed agitator Emma Goldman, and it was then that the great reformer Roger Nash Baldwin was conceived. Exposed to a plethora of political animals, from anarchists to libertarians to the truly non-conformist folks without any party at all (such as himself), Baldwin realized that there was a movement afoot, one that sought to protect the ideals of America’s Founding Fathers, to resist coercion, to defend freedom, and, even, to do all this through non-violent means. His political and ethical views were beginning to meld in this environment of free political expression.

Baldwin became involved with civil liberty causes, as well as municipal government reform, and he began to notice areas in which American society was failing in its mandate to protect personal freedoms. In 1910, St Louis denied birth control advocate Margaret Sanger the right to hold a rally in a community hall. He also witnessed, in his work, the absolute resistance of white institutions to allow a black citizen to improve his lot, such as the Washington University’s refusal to even construct a separate course of study for blacks.

It was then that Baldwin began to realize, “In cases where minority rights are concerned, you can't trust the majority,” which has remained a cornerstone of many civil rights ideologies.

In 1917, Baldwin aligned himself with the anti-war movement and took a stance as a conscientious objector, joining the American Union Against Militarism (AUAM), which later split to became the Civil Liberties Bureau. After “respectfully declining” his own draft notice, and declaring that to go to war would be to insult every one of his core beliefs surrounding personal freedom and the ideal of non-violent social change, Baldwin was sentenced to one year in prison for his refusal to serve, thereby increasing his fame and respect as an advocate of citizens’ rights in America.

Even in prison, Baldwin managed to maintain an impressive correspondence with advocates on the outside, as well as establishing a Prisoners’ Welfare League to protect the rights of inmates!

After his release, Baldwin married Madeline Doty, an impressive feminist and pacifist activist, and she convinced him that, if he was to care about the plight of the workers and the down-trodden, he must experience it for himself. He had already experienced prison, so his next step was to travel West as an unskilled labourer, and he traveled America working whatever he could find, at times as a line cook on the railway, and he participated in a real steel workers’ strike. These were all valuable lessons for Baldwin, who had always lived in upper middle class luxury.

In 1920, Baldwin returned to New York, filled with a new certainty that America needed assistance. He transformed the Civil Liberties Bureau into an organization recognized throughout the world, the very name of which can still strike fear, disgust, resentment, or admiration into the hearts of people around the world: The American Civil Liberties Union, or, as it is better known, the ACLU.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Baldwin flirted with Communism, and traveled to Soviet Russia to research alternate methods of political life. At first, he was favorably impressed with what the Russians had accomplished, and believed that Communism was a successful method to bring about the improvement of the international working class, particularly in its emphasis on unity surpassing ethnic divides, as well as fair and equal distribution of wealth according to the willingness to work. However, greatly disillusioned by the Soviet-Nazi pact in 1939, and increasingly alarmed at the counter-human rights charges against Stalin coming out of Russia, Baldwin passionately distanced himself from the Soviet model, and even began a crusade to discourage Communist ideals in the ACLU.

Horrifically, the oath that ACLU board members were asked to take under Baldwin in the 1940s, swearing that they had never been, and were not currently members of, the Communist Party, was a grim foreshadow of that used at the McCarthy Witch Hunts of the 1950s, and Baldwin’s anti-Communist fervour remains one of the darkest blotches on an otherwise impressive and admirable career defending the human from the state.

Baldwin’s achievements must be seen to far outweigh this flawed view. His interests ranged not only from idealistic causes but to on-the-ground-work for human rights, as well as for early environmentalist concerns and the international welfare of children. Applying the teachings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount (though he was not personally religious), as well as of Gandhi, Baldwin was a defender of pacifism and patriotism through two periods in American history in which those two ideas could not be spoken of in the same breath. Baldwin retired from official leadership of the ACLU in 1950, but he never withdrew from his causes, and his hand would guide the organization from his role as a charismatic mentor-emeritus all the way until his death in 1981.

Under Baldwin, the ACLU’s character and ideals were formed, and it was under his direction that some of its greatest cases were handled, including the Scope’s Monkey Trial and the Sacco and Vanzetti travesty. The ACLU was an early defender of the freedom of speech in publication, fighting against the banning of James Joyce’s masterpiece Ulysses. Under Baldwin, they also sought to protect the rights of all non-conformists, including the Jehovah’s Witnesses, trade unionists, and even the Ku Klux Klan. Baldwin insisted that the organization must use the Constitution in the defense of all people, for the very value of that sacred document was in its advocacy even of people you “feared, as well as those you admired.”

The ACLU was not born from one man, but it was significantly shaped by him. Baldwin went on to help establish civil liberties unions in Japan, Germany and Austria, winning awards and medals from several governments for his tireless efforts, including the Medal of Freedom, awarded by President Carter on January 16, 1981.
*

Goodbye, Stink-Town

Hey – I forgot to mention it this week, but around about here marks the one year anniversary of my leaving Hell-on-earth, Ontario.

Yes, the scars remain, but I can breathe clear once more!
*

Ty-Ranna

Off to the ROM today with the folks from the coast… Toronto. The Big Smoke. The Big Headache. Oh well, wish me well.

And here’s a little amusement that I enjoy, even if the jokes are semi-at-my-expense.

Enjoy!

PART I:



PART II:

*

TV Strikes Again

Heard on the news today that the new season of the reality show Survivor (a blight on the soul of those who unleashed it) will be divided along racial lines: “Black,” “White,” “Asian,” and “Hispanic” tribes… I am all for supporting difference in reasonable ways, but does this seem wise? It seems to be a situation of 40-something-emotionally-constipated-white-guys trying to tap into something they can’t understand, which seems like it honours difference, but really just limits and pigeon-holes it…

If you think these divisions are simple, or even possible in North America, take this test, and let me know how you fare.

I can’t even imagine where many of the people I know would even be categorized.

Yes, yes: The Commercialization of “Race” continues. Great! They have called this decision “controversial.” It isn’t controversial, it is capitalism. It is, however, crassly stupid. That much, I can agree on.
*

Rise With the Blue Bird, Shine

I was solidly asleep, and it was about an hour and a half before I had to get up. I was snug and warm, but my eyes just popped completely open. If you know me, you may know that my eyes pop open with disgusting vigour every morning, but this was different. Thoughts that a friend needed me spurred me from bed, so I ran to check messages and line all my ducks.

So, maybe it turns out that you are all well (I hope), and it was a false alarm. (All wood knocked.)

Well, an hour before the alarm is far enough from wake-up time to negate all rush, but it is still too late to go back to sleep, so here I sit.

However, it is a lovely morning. I have extra time to linger over my coffee, and my shower was a little longer than normal, allowing for not just lather, not just rinse, but also (wait for it) REPEAT. Hmm. What a luxury. I took my first smoke of the day down by the stream, amongst the birds. And now I have ample time to take care of all my email and to even drop the blog a note.

So, I hope all is well, anyway. However, folks, feel free to wake me up any morning. The jump on the day, and all my armour is in place hours before I anticipated it.

Beauty, eh?
*

Oh Canada!

The back seat of a mini-van, with too little space and no activity, is not my favourite place in the world. I never travel in cars, actually. If I can’t walk to it, I rarely visit it. However, since we have folks up from out East, it seemed only good and proper to roam about and see what this strange Ontario has to offer.

We drove around to St. Jacobs to gawk at the Mennonites, and out to Stratford to see the river and the shops. The towns were ok, but the landscape was exquisite… trees, and hills, and crags, and fields, and horses as far as the eye could see. I could feel my heart swell.

Lord, but I do love this country. Even Ontario.

So, even with an ache in my hip from a total lack of leg room, and the strong desire to shove the map up the back passage of everyone who asked anything about “off-ramps” or “exits,” I was a bit misty. What if I had never been born in Canada? What if I had missed out on all this?

And it hit me, once and for all, that no matter where I go, I will have this feeling, always.

That was a nice realization.

To celebrate my patriotic surge, I picked up an item or two of souvenir-status for some folks out in Ohio. I can’t give too many details, but I can say that Mounties are involved.

It was a pretty good day.

Hope you are the same.
*

The Riches of Asia

John’s family is in for a few days, and my cold seems to be improving. Generally, things are going fairly well.

The highlight of the first visit must be the present John’s mom brought me: a set of purple-black pearls from her recent trip to China. Please do not mistake this for support of China or the pearl industry, but, as a girl, I must respond, “Wow-ee!”

These things are lovely as hell, and make me feel expensive and important just to hold them. And, I must admit, I look like a million bucks in them – black hair and black pearls. What a killer combination.

I already feel five times more prepared for that conference in Vancouver… Who can resist a good paper delivered from a doll in black pearls?

Now all I have to do is supply the “good paper.”
*

I Been Up, I Been Knocked Down

Hab culd… sore troat… stuffedt nose… hurt all over…

AND I have guests coming.

Yes, yes. Good times, indeed.
*

“Good Stuff”

Yes – there are the words I long for. Third Advisor actually liked my proposal! LIKED IT!

So, the tally stands at:

Head Advisor: Good work, but bad writing.
Second Advisor: Terrible writing, “we need to talk,” not awful.
Third Advisor: Some edits; “Good stuff!”

Well, there you have it. Holly is not the nincompoop she assumed she was.

The prop has passed through the first round – it’s official!

EVERYTHING IS COMING UP HOLLY, yet again!

And here I thought luck had left me!
*

I Have Been Tagged, it Seems

Thanks to 42k for the special inclusion in this little meme:

4 jobs I've had:
1. Grad Student and Slave (then, now, always)
2. Cafeteria Lady (sexy, huh?)
3. Church Janitor (don’t ask)
4. TIM (HORTON)’S GIRL (Whoot!)


4 movies I could watch over and over (as of today):
1. Sunset Boulevard (1950) – Just plain awesome
2. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) – Awesome on the eyes
3. Avanti! (1972) – Sweet, beautiful, loveable
4. City Lights (1931) & Modern Times (1936) – CHAPLIN!

(Dozens and dozens and dozens more… ask me sometime, and I can send you the Top 100 list)


4 places I have lived:
1. New Brunswick (ok)
2. Nova Scotia (Heaven)
3. Waterloo, Ontario (pleasant surprise)
4. Hell-on-Earth, Ontario (name says it all)

(I really must protest this question, actually, as this is pretty sensitive information, and is not something you should tell strangers, as credit applications depend on such histories… Just be warned that anyone who steals my name will immediately lose their balls (or non-gendered equivalent) due to the mummy’s curse I have placed on it. I have it on good authority that my name has a numerological power you couldn’t handle, anyway, so better play it safe and bugger off.)


4 TV shows I love (love is a pretty strong word, eh?) to watch:
1. The Simpsons (up until recently)
2. M*A*S*H (Hawkeye = Deity)
3. ANY form of Star Trek (I’ve built my life on its teachings)
4. Made in Canada (I Luuurve Rick Mercer)

- yeah, and the Federal Election coverage…
- haven’t had TV in two years or so, so who knows what's on there now?


4 places I have been on vacation:
1. Charlottetown, PEI (in February… what a great season to see the Island)

- I never actually vacation. You think I am made of money???
(Ohio will count in September, no??)


4 websites I visit daily:
1. Blogs listed on the right (so update the damn things already)
2. YouTube (recent obsession)
3. Rotten Tomatoes (looking for cruel reviews)
4. IMDb (aka Biz Connection)
- Nods to The Canadian Spelling Resource, too (thanks Cate)

4 fave foods:
1. Celery (yummy)
2. Chick peas (convenient and yummy)
3. Strawberries (HOME!!)
4. Baby corn (fancy-pants treat)

- Honourable mentions to hummus, samosa, and to vegan salami… mmmmmm


4 places I'd like to be right now:
1) Nova Scotia (aka Heaven)
2) Dublin (seems like fun)
3) Frankly, here is pretty ok (it rains here, there are trees – I’m ok)
4) None of your business (everybody must keep their secrets)


4 people I am tagging:
DELETED.
*

Smuggle Me?

Hey folks! I have a dilemma. I need advice.

In over a month’s time I will be traveling to that great sleeping beast to the South.

Frankly, I am terrified to my marrow, however Amanda has tempted me and I cannot resist. My luck, I look like a terrorist to their eyes, and you’ll never see me again. In that event, all my mail can be forwarded, care of Bush, via Gitmo (or some other hellish place inspired by Devil’s Island or Club Med). Uh… you can just toss the bills; I don’t imagine I’ll need them any more after that.

And keep Amnesty International on speed dial, just in case.

(Why can’t Amanda live somewhere reasonable, like Thailand or Afghanistan?)

So, here is the main point. Can anyone who has crossed that pillar of fire called the US/CAN border tell me what ID a Canuck needs to penetrate the fortress of paranoia? Has anyone who is currently passport-less found this to be an issue?

Any advice will be appreciated.

And, yes, I already know that the Yank border guards do NOT enjoy it if you wear t-shirts with the Cuban flag on them. That I do remember from my youth.

Please help! I am a Canadian Socialist contemplating the belly of the beast. Save me from an uncertain fate.

I try to repeat this mantra: Cheap cigarettes; McCarthy is dead and buried.
*

Holly Lives!

Got dissertation-proposal-draft-feedback from Head Advisor, and it went over much more smoothly this time. Sure, no one seems all that happy with the writing, but that should not worry me. I did, after all, compose it with absolutely no sleep for days… However, it isn’t quite to serial-killer-level of rant, even if it is close.

So, end result is that I am still in the game!

I have not honoured myself, but neither have I painted myself into a corner from which only ritual suicide will save me. That is something, at least.

It seems the dissertation prop has survived its first round, though it may be bowed and bloody. I feel the old tiger rising, so you know I am still in it for the long haul.

Thanks for the e-hugs I have received. You can check my wrists if you want, y’all, but I ain’t licked yet! Not even close.
*

Marx, Groucho

Julius Henry “Groucho” Marx
Actor, Singer, Humorist, Dancer, Mangy Lover
October 2, 1890 – August 19, 1977

Funny as hell and a founding father of Diaspora Jewish culture in North America. What’s more, a personal idol, a friend and a watershed for my life.

I would write a tribute, but what more do you say? If I got sappy, he’d only slap me, so I’ll let the pictures do the work. Enjoy!

*

Happy Conception Day to Me

It is pretty much exactly 9 months until my birthday… hence Conception Day thoughts. I know it is shocking to acknowledge the fact that your parents ever had sex, but it really is unavoidable. And, whatever the horrors, the outcome was pretty damned amazing (even if I do say so myself).

Life may be a miracle, but no one ever said it had to be pretty.
*

Well, I Ain’t Licked Yet!

Break out the filibuster!

Put on the coffee...

New draft underway.

Where’s that defeatist attitude in this Maritimer, eh, Harper??

I Will…

… try harder.

… make amends for less-than-stunning proposal debut.

… keep up the old Holly Attitude.

… whistle while I work.

… make you all so very proud of me.


Yes. Good goals.
*

The First Cut is the Deepest

Arrrrrggghhhhhh!

Just got feedback on ye olde First Draft of the Dissertation proposal… I can’t tell if the lowest point is the “we have to talk” or the “we shouldn’t have to wade through this.”

Hmmmmmm. Oh well, onward and upward!

This is gonna be a long, long year.
*

Lonesome Tonight?

While many, many pot-shots have been taken at the expense of Elvis Presley’s movies, I do not participate. The man did more than Charro! (1969), you know.

Give the man a chance, especially in the week of the 29th anniversary of his death, and try Flaming Star (1960), Jailhouse Rock (1957), Wild in the Country (1961), King Creole (1958), and, the ultimate in GI musicals, GI Blues (1960; above).

All of these films capture a charisma and a true sparkle of genuine acting talent that would have actually amounted to something with better scripts, more time, and some considerate management. It is a pity.

So, give Elvie a little sugar, mama (and another try).

*

Dieting

Yes, you read that correctly.

Holly, the anti-health nut, is actually on a diet. I am also semi-jogging, too. I hope to work up to a full jog sometime soon.

Anyone care to pledge $1000 USD to the Mt Kenya animal orphanage if I make it down to a fighting weight by next summer? (Your money is safe, I assure you.)

And before you start to worry that I have been taken over by aliens, rest assured it hasn’t gone too far. They will still have to pry that last cigarette out of my cold dead hands.

This is purely aesthetic, I guarantee.
*

Beautiful

I took a wander this morning, to clear my mind and focus my energies.

It is lovely outside. We had a hard rain yesterday, so everything is fresh and green. It is not too terribly hot, but the sun is gold and dripping. A breeze shakes the pines outside my window. The spring animals are starting to come into their own, with juvenile squirrels and rabbits and birds covering every where, making every park and yard into a school room. The air is fresh and the sounds thrilling. It is that time when the flush of summer colour overlaps with the crispness of impending autumn. I love this time.

There are many things on my mind. I am starting to think of jobs and job hunting, planning ahead for the big 2009 that will (hopefully) mark my launch into my profession. Many of the best schools for me to teach at are in the States…

How can I be separated from this place, this land? Is the rain the same there? Will the snow be the snow I know so intimately here? Will I feel the same jolt through my feet when I walk on foreign grass and soil? Will I bleed internally for Canada? Will they reject me and my strange, “exotic” ways? Will I learn American fear? Will it erase Holly as I know her? Will I become disconnected?

If my heart breaks over the distance from Nova Scotia in my exile in Ontario, how could I stand the exile to another country all together?

Am I strong enough to live on batteries uncharged by Canadian soil? Would my heart remain buried here always, only to leave me without one elsewhere?

Or, perhaps, is a place just a place, and every nook and cranny can be beloved it if is home? After all, only four years ago, I never would have dreamt of loving Ontario land as much as I do here. Now I feel like I belong to it, somehow; Nova Scotia is the mother, and Waterloo is the aunt that I have come to visit.

After all, North America is only carved up by the hands of greedy humans. And nature is a law that snubs the concepts of our limited minds.

But, then, perhaps I am rambling.

Go out and enjoy the day, wherever you are.

(An appropriate tune for today.)
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Addendum:

MARITA
PLEASE FIND ME
I AM ALMOST 30

When I was in high school, this little Leonard Cohen scribble confused me – I could not figure out why it was poetry… Sadly, I start to understand it more and more, now-a-days.

Is it too late to go back and re-write that grade 11 Canadian Lit midterm?
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Soft Tissue Damage & Midlife Crisis

It has happened, finally. The golden gates of middle age have started to crack open.

Was feeling pressured and wired tonight with pent up something-or-other, and I decided to grasp at a little of my youthful angst. Put in some Marilyn Manson, which used to always cheer me up. I cranked it. My ear drums were surely bleeding, but the music felt good. So, as my younger self was wont to do, I started to do a little headbanging.

I was enjoying myself, bopping and smashing around like little 18-year-old Holly might have done, and then tragedy struck.

I have hurt my neck, headbanging.

(How do you know if you have whip lash, by the way?)

So I sat there, thinking of my ache and what a swift apple I surely am, when it dawned on me. There I was, well into my late-20s spread, wearing a brown cardigan, massaging my neck, and realizing I am now too old to headbang.

And it occurred to me: In about 21 months, I will be 30 years old.

30 years old.

Think of that.

Roll that number on your tongue. Feel the burn of it. Taste its bitter horror.

On May 17, 2008, I will be 30 years old.

I am too old to headbang.

Too old.

In a brown cardigan.

Man, when did it all become too late?

When did I become so damned old?

Certainly, when I wasn’t looking, that is for sure.

Tomorrow, I start shopping for canes along with my neck brace.

Dammit.
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Wood Smoke.

The first whiff of fire wood, and the woolens start to appear; summer is dying.

Soon, it will be fall, and life will get back to normal. This sleepwalk will be over, and I can get back to my work, back to my goals, back to my life. Here and now, that’s all I have.

Where is your head?

Where are your priorities?

Have you forgotten yourself?

Reality. That is what matters.

Keep that in mind.

It is not too late. Pick up the shreds of your dignity, and try to make amends for negligence and loss of center. The center can always be found again; that's what makes it the center.


(This is post 700... What I have accomplished?)
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I.O.U.

Wow. For the first time in months, I have forgotten about this poor orphaned blog. Well, I am in, just barely. Promise, I'll get you tomorrow.
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Holly on the Air Waves

Well. It’s official. I am now a comp addict.

I have now been to Radio Shack to buy something for a computer.

Could it be just last Fall that I couldn’t believe that I actually owned a printer? Well, now I’m onto microphone technology… After much cursing and figuring out my USB from a hole in the ground, I think we have contact. I think.

Anyway, by the end of the day, even I will be able to figure this out, and my tinny and completely un-dulcet tones will take to the information highway.

Wave of the future, baby. Wave of the future.
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Please Help

In an effort to prove that Amanda von Ohio has the truly uncanny ability to have crushes on every Jewish man in 50 paces, I need proof that Wayne Coyne of The Flaming Lips is Jewish. If you have any referenced evidence, please leave it in the comment box.

(Of course, with a name like "Coyne" he likely has some Irish fence jumpers in there. But then the Irish are widely considered to be the Jews of the North, so maybe it will still count.)
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Feeling My Hippie Roots

Perhaps it was recently making friends with a Republican (!!!), but I feel long-buried flower child urges flood to the surface from their dark exile.

A list of the major offences:

Acres and acres of hippie rock; free love to the world.
Staring The Man in the eye, and offering him a flower.
No grass smoked, but many a tree hugged.
Actually feeling, "Everyone is beautiful."
Thinking of people as "brother" or "sister."
Vest worn.
Use of terms: “Freaker,” “The Man,” “Positivity.”
Guitars have been strummed.
Dylan, Ginsberg and Lennon quoted.
A peace & understanding rally? Hell, yes.

Man, when did I become my parents?

My Unlimited LOVE to You All.

Frankly, I disgust myself.
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I’m a Bad Widdle Goil

So I have let this blog slip, by never posting on time any more. So I have let my other blog slip even worse by being three days late with an update. So I let the apartment run to ruin. So I am behind in my research for Dr. D. So I have seemingly abandoned my comp reading. So I have still not written that paper I am presenting in Vancouver in October. So I have not edited anything other than the Benny piece for publication.

So now it is make-up time, folks.
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I'm a Big Kid Now!

Jumpin Jiminie!

Dissertation proposal (draft) is written, finished and emailed off.

I shiver.

One step closer to the end.

Well, one-step-that-will-spur-a-million-re-writes to the end, anyway.

This time next year plus a month, with luck, I will be ABD.

ABD = all but dissertation; aka “all but done.”

I AM NATURE'S GREATEST MIRACLE!

I will be half a DOCTOR.

How’s that for grown up?
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Far Too Symbolic

I sit at my desk. Before me sits a can of soda pop. I want it so very badly… I am warm and it is cold. It would be sweet and refreshing. I tried to open it, but condensation had made it too inaccessible to my tired hands. It had a blow out when I managed to open it a bit. Foam everywhere. Now it is both sticky and covered in condensation. I will never have my pop, even though I still want it as badly as before despite its rebellion.

Normally this situation would not be blogworthy, but on a day that holds the insurmountable deadline… This pop seems to embody my whole life right now, as I try to cram three months’ worth of work into 12 hours. The contents are sweet, but under too much pressure. I fear an explosion.

Sigh. All I want is my pop. And a dissertation proposal. It’s not like I am asking for true love or the moon.

Some pop and 8 pages of worthy work.

Are these things too much to ask for???
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50 “Modern” Songs

Blurry boundaries, that’s the problem. “Modern” really means crunchier, here, as well as generally devoid of doo-wop and a bit less romantic/ more disillusioned. You get the drift. To be honest, I don’t really know any actually modern songs. Even Marilyn Manson is getting long in the tooth. Really, most of it is along the lines of “Homer Rock” (as in Simpson). However, I likes what I likes. It’s not my fault that all music sucks past 1999.

Amidst complaints from friends that my “50 Songs” lists thus far (one and two) have been too oriented towards the golden ages of 1930s-1950s (they used different, more aggravating terms for this period), I have now to prove (or at least contend) that I am not an utter square. Actually, these songs are really great, and deserve to make my list, anyway. They rise above the general cruddiness of their respective genres and generations, and all rate “hyper-volume-crank” whenever I hear them.

32 Flavors (Ani Difranco)
Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar) (The Doors)
And if Venice is Sinking (Spirit of the West)
bad as they seem (Hayden)
Bark at the Moon (Ozzy Osbourne)
Black No. 1 (Type O Negative)
Blue Monday (New Order)
Break on Through (To the Other Side) (The Doors)
Caught a Lite Sneeze (Tori Amos)
Children of the Damned (Iron Maiden)
Cold, Cold Town (Piggy)
Cover of the Rolling Stone (Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show)
Crazy Train (Ozzy Osbourne)
Diary (Iced Earth)
Don’t Fear the Reaper (Blue Öyster Cult)
Don’t Hurt My Friends (Piggy)
Fade to Black (Metallica)
Fiddler on the Green (Demons and Wizards)
For My Lover (Tracy Chapman)
Freakin’ at the Freaker’s Ball (Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show)
Genius in France (Weird Al Yankovic)
Go to Hell (Alice Cooper)
Happiness in Slavery (Nine Inch Nails)
Hard Luck Woman (KISS)
Hardly (Hayden)
I Am Stretched on Your Grave (Dead Can Dance)
I Need a Man (Eurythmics)
I’m the Coolest (Alice Cooper)
Iron Man (Black Sabbath)
Kinda I Want To (Nine Inch Nails)
Laid (James)
Light my Fire (The Doors)
Little Earthquakes (Tori Amos)
Misguided Angel (Cowboy Junkies)
More Than a Feeling (Boston)
Mountains O’ Things (Tracy Chapman)
My Country (Midnight Oil)
Over the Electric Grapevine (Primus)
Saffron’s Curse (Cradle of Filth)
Shrivel Up (DEVO)
Sweet Home Alabama (Lynyrd Skynyrd)
Tainted Love (Marilyn Manson)
The Million You Never Made (Ani Difranco)
Titties n Beer (Frank Zappa)
Truganini (Midnight Oil)
Use Your Fist and Not Your Mouth (Marilyn Manson)
Volunteers (Jefferson Airplane)
Weather With You (Crowded House)
Wrap Your Arms Around Me (Barenaked Ladies)
You’re a Movie (Alice Cooper)

So there. I am a new-millennium-sort-a-girl, after all… Ok, maybe a 70s-90s sort of girl, then. I think I have defended myself adequately.
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Neat-O!

what decade does your personality live in?


quiz brought to you by lady interference, ltd

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Match in the Gas Tank

Sometimes, you just have to indulge in something sweet, slow and maudlin.

The joy of the cinema is that it can, indeed, make you feel everything, anything and nothing at all; it has the power to compel, repel and attract. It always moves those prepared to me moved, without fail. It is cathartic therapy for those who cannot afford it – it is in this way that film has replaced the church for many of us. Simple pure light shining through plastic strips… Amazing.

(And if it features Johnny Depp as photographed by Sven Nykvist, two basic scopophilic delights and addictions, so more the better.)
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Unmarked Bills

Received a plain VHS tape in the mail yesterday. It sits on my desk. I have seen too many movies to be entirely free of concern and trepidation over its contents, even if it has come from a good friend. Its label of “A Fun Surprise” should calm my worries… But horrible, horrible irony is too cheap these days.

And, really, how well do you know any of your friends until they kidnap your brother and send you a video tape of his torture, claiming that if they do not find $5,000 and directions for finding the jade monkey in the park by noon tomorrow, you will receive his right hand in the next shipment?

Hmmm…

Well, Catherine, you have certainly added some spice to my dissertation-imposed solitude. That’s a wonderful thing. (And you can keep my brother with my blessings.)
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A Hint of Fall?

Oh please, oh please, oh please?

Today, the smell of damp leaves on the ground represented the first small, slight glimmer of hope that this accursed season may finally be drawing to its bitter end, racing towards the finish line on the unwanted and diseased last limb that is August. FINALLY.

Summer has gone on far, far too long. Any more weeks ahead of me spent in the drudgery of isolated summer toil and my brain would certainly break once and for all. As it is, I am systematically alienating every single person I know, as well as my cat, with my horrid mood spasms and moaning complaints.

Should summer not end on time, I will most likely make the final descent into madness, and will be found traipsing around Waterloo Park with my knickers on my head, evading the men with the long nets.

So, summer, if you could just die, that would be super. And fall, please hurry up.

Oh, and while I am at it, Mother Nature, if you could convert mosquitoes to vegetarianism, that would be great (for humanity is too much to hope for), and paint all snails in glow-in-the-dark orange, I would really appreciate it.

Thanking you in advance,
Holly
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Cooking With Gas

Something must have dislodged in my brain, because it’s all going gangbusters with the proposal this morning. Working steady now for three hours!

I may actually lick this thing, yet.

No hang head.
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Childhood Trauma # 586

When we were kids, we weren’t allowed near windows during thunder and lightening storms, let alone go outside. Nor were we allowed to swear, play cards or turn on the radio. My mum used to sit on the chesterfield with a towel over her face. I remember reading to her for hours – either to cover up the sound of the thunder, or to block out the sounds of her whimpers, I don’t know which.

I learned a healthy dose of irrational fear when it came to storms.

Still, one must admire my mother. She tried hard not to pass on her phobia to us, as she had inherited it from her mother. Her mother made them all huddle in a room with no windows, and led them in an occasional prayer. No one was allowed to speak, and her mother cried and rocked until the storm had passed.

Tonight, alone and watching the lights flicker precariously, I tried not to be scared. It didn’t entirely work, but I am an improvement over the past generations.

Tonight I took a walk in the storm, to have a smoke and prove something to myself. I whistled past the graveyard, as it were. Cringing at every flash, I firmed by spine. I refrained from whimpering. I am tired of being scared.

I even swore once, to take the curse off.

I think the storm is passed now… I hope so. I probably will never like them, but tonight I scored some sort of point. Don’t ask me what.
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And the Sky Turned Blood Red…

And, yes, the sky is also as black as sackcloth and ashes.

Out of a clear sky here has come red lightening.

RED lightening.

Did you read that correctly?

I was outside and had to come running in from the wind and dust gusts, like some Oakie caught by a twister.

This province is cursed.

Repent while there is still time.
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(Currently listening to Marilyn Manson… I am tempting fate, methinks.)

The Shame of it All

I've had to beg an extension on the dissertation proposal, which is due on Friday. Not much of a one; just until Monday. Still, the stigma, it burns.

Hang my head.



(Currently listening to Type O Negative’s The Least Worst… feeling dark and mysterious.)

***
Attention Blogathon 2006 bloggers: Don’t forget to vote in the awards race. See the post.
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Tick Tock

Sponsorship for Blogathon 2006 ends at midnight EST tonight. If you have been considering it, now is the last chance.

Sponsor Me!

(Details in link.)
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Sun Comes Up, It’s Tuesday Morning

When you are out taking a long walk alone in dark areas at night, have you ever counted the massive number of seedy vans and suspicious guys in track suits that go by?

I wonder, is this just to keep our instincts sharp, or is it designed to keep us trapped inside?

***
(Have tried Johnny Depp tonight as my William-Holden-Remover. During Sleepy Hollow (1999), I thought it was working… But then I immediately put in Breezy (1973), so now I don’t know.)

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Currently listening to: Jann Arden, Living Under June; Barenaked Ladies, Gordon; Cowboy Junkies, 200 More Miles.

Feeling: Very, very Canadian. And very wholesome for being up this early... or is it late?

***
Sponsor Me!
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What More Can I Say?

Monday afternoon, I woke up with a splitting post-blogathon headache, as well as sore shoulders, a stiff back, and cotton in my brain. But I made it! Mission accomplished.

If you still would like to Sponsor Me!, you can today.

If you have already sponsored me, you can go to the Mt Kenya Wildlife Conservancy donations page, and it will show you how to honour your pledge.

Thanks again to all for helping and reading.

Now I have to return to Real Life again.

Rats.
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