Our McGill man in Ottawa

It seems that former McGill University president David Johnston has sworn in as Canada's new Governor General. Even though I bear something of a strong antipathy towards McGill administration, somehow this individual's past association with McGill has encouraged me to listen up whenever I hear his name. As much as I might not like to admit it, my association with McGill has likely left some kind of mark on me, even if I don't yet know the precise nature of that mark.

All of this being said, I think that Johnston's back ground and experience will serve him well in his new role. Furthermore, I am inclined to go so far as to think that he will actually do a very good job. Hopefully he will bring to the job an understanding of the constitution and operations of government that has not always been present among our Governors General.

The wave heads East

Yesterday I saw an announcement that Seymour Schulich was giving a $20 000 000 donation to the Dalhousie Law school/Faculty of Law. Immediately I wondered if this meant we would now have a "Schulich School" at Dal as similar donations at other universities have lead to a number of "Schulich schools" including the Schulich School of Medicine and Denistry (at UWO), the Schulich School of Music (at McGill), the Schulich School of Engineering (at the University of Calgary), and the Schulich School of Business (at York).

This morning I finally got around to reading a little more than headlines on the topic and learned that Dal will in fact be joining the list with the Schulich School of Law, though, interestingly, they haven't yet made the change on their webpage or even mentioned the donation on their News and Events page (at least they hadn't as of 11:30 AM on Friday).

A Few Quick Notes 192

-Today has been another nice day. Amazingly, the higher temperatures did not make my walk to work particularly unpleasant.

-While yesterday was both Memorial Day (until noon, and in Newfoundland and Labrador only) and Canada Day I didn't participate in any of the available activities. Instead of an active member of the community I stayed at home and kept to myself, and eventually got around to chopping up several pounds worth of vegetables.

-The celery that I am eating right now is not particularly good. Neither the flavour or texture meet my exacting standards.

-Instead of book marking or remembering the URL for the Amicus, each day I go to Google and search for it.

When I first started doing this some number of years ago I learned that the first hit was actually for a union in the UK, rather than the Canadian union catalogue. Eventually I trained myself to go to the correct link (though it took a fair bit of time).

At some point in time, though I don't really know when, this union was dropped to a lower position by Google.

Just today I unfortunately found that the union has once again been returned to the prime position for the 'Amicus' search. Maybe I will have to try and post the link in a few places to get my preferred Amicus back in the prime spot.

-In the coming days Neil will be moving to a new apartment. This is particularly important to me because as of late August this will be my new apartment. Hopefully the move will go well and the transition to the new apartment will be smooth and painless.

As I was able to send many of my goods to Halifax when I left Montreal many of my belongings will be in the apartment when I arrive. Furthermore, the plan is to have Neil and Rebecca unpack all of the communal type objects and put them away, thus preventing a major re-arrangement of items once I arrive.

-Will I get my diploma? This is something that I have been wondering about since I missed my graduation ceremony about a month ago. I would have thought that McGill would have just mailed it to me, but I guess that hasn't happened yet. Maybe if I don't see any action on this front I will have to look into the matter.

A Few Quick Notes 182

-Not surprisingly, today was filled with rain and overcast skies. As was the case yesterday, winds were low, and temperatures were at least approaching ten for much of the day. Apparently, though I don't know on what basis this is being suggested, we are due for some temperatures in the teens and maybe even a clear-ish day in the the near future.

-It seems that when writing my post about our foray into the realm of usage stats with Google Analytics I hadn't noticed that we seem to have actually had one hit apiece from both Indonesia and South Korea, though I can't imagine why. I guess in the future I will need to pay more attention to the light shades of green on the map displaying the origins of our visitors. Sorry if anyone's feelings were hurt through my omission.

-Kirsten and I took another trip to the library this evening. I did a little reading in one of the books that I checked out last trip and also skimmed/read sections of political science journals. My general goal is to re-familiarize myself with some of the literature of the field before I return as a student in the fall.

-Today I was able to set up my Dalhousie email address. Unfortunately, this was much more complicated that in should have been. Instead of quickly creating a NetID and password I hand to dink around for a long time and then eventually use a backdoor that Neil found to finally have a password issued. Though I couldn't believe it at first, I think that Dalhousie might have a less user friendly system than McGill.

The big plus of the Dalhousie system is that they allow me to get my university email in my Gmail account (which is particularly important considering how cumbersome the webmail application is). While McGill allowed this for a period of time they eventually clamped down and disallowed the access that was needed, costing me valuable minutes a day.

-On Thursday I should be sending a few more things to Halifax, this time with Rebecca's father. I guess I really should start to box some of this up so that it will be ready to go when he arrives in two day's time.

I am particularly looking forward to being able to use the mixer once I arrive. While in Montreal I was forced to return to the stone ages and mix everything by hand. A few of the other kitchen related implements will also be quite nice (particularly when complimented by those already possessed by Neil and Rebecca).

A Few Quick Notes 146

-Today was another unseasonably warm day in Montreal. On my way to school I would guess it that it was approaching 10 degrees, though it has since dropped a little. On top of the warmth we have also had a fair bit of moisture and win kicking around. Moments ago the wind was strong enough to blow my building’s large recycling bins into the street.

It should also be noted that the temperatures appear to be dropping and are forecasted to dip below zero in the coming days, though this is still relatively mild considering the location and that this is supposed to be a harsh winter.

-Last night I was invited to a classmate’s for lunch today. A few of us went over for vegetarian nachos. I was quite impressed with the lentil dish that served as a substitute for ground beef. This dish has inspired me to try lentils again, though I know that I am sure to screw them up, as I seem to be unable to cook beans and legumes properly.

-Upon leaving our host’s house after lunch three of us stopped at Segal’s, a Portuguese grocery store on St. Laurent. The advantage of this store is the range of products, many of which appear to have originated from Portuguese speaking lands, as well as its commitment to low prices.

I ended up purchasing some olive oil, bacon, crackers, and a raspberry pie. Unfortunately, the pie was a bit of a dud and didn’t end up tasting all that much like raspberry. If I had to describe the pie I might say that it tasted like red flavoured goo with a stale crust, fortunately it wasn’t all that expensive.

-Segal’s also sells various salt cod products, most notably full split fillets and split heads. A few months ago, and still kicking around in the back of my head, I was thinking that it might be neat to mount of the cod items on my wall as a decoration. The idea being that in some ways this might be somewhat reminiscent of something that Mary Pratt might do.

Anyway, soon after thinking about the idea the problem of smell came up. Having a salt cod fillet on one’s wall would be a little nauseating after a while, and may frighten any guests away.

As I am lazy and running out of time in Montreal I probably won’t get around to solving this problem (which will also be more difficult as I don’t have that much space), but it seems that I might be able to coat the cod in some kind of clear spray paint or sealer. Several applications of such a product might be enough to seal the smell in and assist in the preservation of the item, as well as making it somewhat more rigid that such things tend to be in their natural form.

-By tomorrow evening I will have completed my first week of my last semester of classes at McGill.

Halifax Update

So I have been in Halifax since Saturday evening. So far things have been going relatively well. The main reason for the trip was to see Neil's convocation ceremony, an event which took place on Sunday afternoon.

Since this event things have generally been pretty relaxed. One of the more explicitly exciting events to occur was that Neil and I ended up attending a reading by Brian Mulroney at the Lord Nelson Hotel last night. This ended up happening only because we happened to walk by the book store hosting the event and see that they still had a few tickets left. The general assessment of the event was that it was much more enjoyable than either of us expected.

While I have been here I have also been able to walk around Dalhousie a little. One of the places I wanted to see was the library school, now called the School of Information Management. Once Rebecca and I found the place we were surprised to see how small it was. Also, it wasn't a very welcoming location as one had to walk through the office to access the classrooms. Not surprisingly we did not take this next step and just admired the facilities from the atrium.

Afterwards I decided to check out the library, or at least the main library. All in all I was pretty pleased, though there were a few places in the microfilm section that were on the tight side. Actually, they were so tight that a person in a wheelchair certainly couldn't access them, and I wouldn't be surprised if a few larger individuals also couldn't access them. Another element that I found a bit strange was that the Z section of the reference section seemed a bit small. Maybe they placed many of the library related materials in the stacks instead of in the reference section.

Generally Dal seems to have fewer hipsters, something that is quite nice. It seems that McGill is infested, something that I occasionally find it hard to deal with. Dal also has a nicer campus feel, even though McGill does have a pretty clearly defined campus. It also seems that the buildings are also nicer on the inside, a problem that I have frequently noticed at McGill.

Anyway, I guess I should get back to my trip.

A Few Quick Notes 124

-The temperature has been somewhat higher for the past few days. It was so hot this morning that I was sitting on the balcony reading my paper in a tee-shirt and shorts. Actually, I heard that the expected high is to be 25. Unfortunately, these high temperatures are to be accompanied by severe thunderstorms starting this afternoon.

-In cataloging class on Wednesday 10 Library of Congress schedules were presented by members of the class. I was responsible for presenting on D-DJ, general history and European history.

Prior to the presentations it had been made clear to us that we would be timed and have an absolute maximum of ten minutes. Within several minutes of the commencement of the first presentation it became very clear that we were being time, a beeping noise kept coming from a timer in front of the professor. It was clear that this beeping meant something, but exactly what was not immediately clear. My sense, and I believe that the rest of the class felt the same way, was that the beeps were bad and likely an indicator of the 10 minute mark.

While I was giving my presentation I thought that I was on pace for an 8 minute presentation, which is where I wanted to be. I heard my first beep, thinking that I had already reached 10 minutes, and sped up, covering the rest of the presentation in about a minute.

As we learned afterwards, the beeping indicated 5 minutes, meaning that I was basically on pace and could have comfortably finished all I needed to say without fear of going over time. Hopefully this new knowledge will lead to a smoother round of presentations in two weeks when we get the next batch of 10 (when I will presenting the J, or Political Science, schedule).

-Shortly after I moved to Montreal last August I bought a multi-pack of cheap knives. With a cutting board and sharpening rod the whole package came in at less than $10. Not surprisingly, these weren’t really the best knives in the world, actually they were barely passable as knives.

This year I decided that I would take a step forward and buy a good, or at least passable, knife. I ended up with a $20 Ikea knife, with which I have been generally quite pleased. When I first opened the knife I read the care instructions and learned that the knife should not be kept sharp with a stainless steel sharpener, but with a ceramic sharpener. The problem this presented is that my knife sharpener is entirely stainless steel, and therefore not suitable for the job.

While I could tell this would be a slight inconvenience, I didn’t think it would be all that bad. I would just head out and pick up a ceramic knife sharpener at the next opportunity.

As it turned out, that next opportunity was yesterday. While at a kitchen store I learned that while knife sharpeners are expensive, ceramic knife sharpeners are obscenely expensive. They wanted $54 for a ceramic knife sharpener, something that was a little outside of my spending range (though I might have been suckered in for $40).

Maybe I will see about getting something at Lee Valley while I am in Halifax. They seem to have such sharpeners for only about $23.

-The previous note would suggest that I am heading to Halifax. I will be heading out on Saturday and returning on Wednesday. The reason for the trip is to attend Neil’s convocation ceremony.

-A few days ago I was hired as a research assistant for a project at McGill. Aside from the work being more in my area of interest, I will also be able to drop my Thursday night busing shift. Though for all of my loyal fans, I will continue to bus on Friday nights.

-While heading to school yesterday I noticed a TV truck outside a local chain coffee shop. On my way back from school, I noticed more TV trucks and protestors. Though I did not know it until I approached them, they were protesting the lack of French on the chain’s signs. It is interesting to note that a brief story on the protest appeared in today’s Globe and Main.

-It appears that today McGill will be starting a very large fundraising drive. To commence the drive they have erected a massive series of tents on the playing fields in front of the McLennan library. My thought was that if a university can afford to set up a tent village for a week maybe they don’t need hundreds of millions of dollars. Or if they do need hundreds of millions of dollars maybe they shouldn’t set up a tent city (particularly when I am using library resources that are 20 years out of date).

A Few Quick Notes 122

-For the past few days we have been making up for the lack of rain we had in September. Skies have been generally overcast with intermittent rain.

-The heaters have been turned on in my building. This means that even with windows open I am uncomfortably hot. I wonder if we live in a building that heats at a uniform level all year, or if the level of heating is adjusted to outside temperatures.

-Moments ago I bought our apartment’s first plant, a basil plant. Hopefully in the coming weeks and months we can develop this trend, though I have no idea where this or any other plant might go. And as I like my plants to either bare fruit or be edible my options are more limited.

-As of a day or two ago McGill has changed there email service in such a way that no longer allows me to import my messages to my Gmail inbox. The reason is supposedly security. A more reasonable explanation might be that things were to easy before, students should need to work to access any ‘official’ communication.

-Tonight is another work night. Fortunately I should be able to punch out early and have a few drinks with the library school types, or at least those that are still there at 10:30 or so.

A Few Quick Notes 116

-Aside from a brief period of showers today was a pretty nice day. One possible flaw might be that even though the sun has set the temperature has not really dropped all that much. This trend is somewhat problematic when it comes to sleeping, or attempting to sleep.

-For the past two nights I have worked until close. While neither of the nights was problematic it certainly was tiresome. These long shifts were not made any easier by the fact that I have been suffering from a cold for the past number of days. Hopefully my Sunday afternoon shift will involve fewer keg changes than the last two.

Actually, that is the other thing that has been impressive my last two shifts. I am not sure if I have ever changed as many kegs. At one point on Thursday four went almost simultaneously. On top of that two sets of lines were not working properly and required continued attention.

-The mouse problem seems to be expanding, or at the very least continuing. While in bed after work on Thursday movement caught my eye. It turned out that one of the mice was on my bedroom floor near my closet. Shortly after its movement caught my eye it ran back into the closet.

Though I didn’t really want to do much about the mouse at 3:30 AM it seemed a pretty opportune moment, mainly as I knew exactly where the mouse was. Within a few moments I had re-arranged the contents of the closet to form a barrier, inside of which I hoped to trap the mouse. Though once the barrier was constructed I could not find the mouse. I quickly realized that the only place it could be hiding was the poison box in the closet.

With a curtain rod I tapped the box to limited effect. Confident that the mouse had to be inside I tapped again, this time more vigorously. After the second round of tapping I managed to get the mouse to leave the box and enter the open space of the enclosure. The mouse went from the box to the bedroom door, which it then managed to scurry under, meaning that to continue my hunt I would have to rummage around Nithum’s bedroom with him asleep at 3:30 in the morning. At that point I decided that the hunt was up for the night, I had failed.

Since then all that has happened on the mouse front is that I have been unable to get the motivation to go to the store and buy some wire traps for the creation of my trap line. Maybe I will get around to this on Monday (as the store where I was planning on making my purchase is closed on Sundays).

-While at Lobos yesterday I bought a few hard peaches as well as a pair of hard plums. As far as I am aware, these, aside from lemons, are my first fruit purchases of the academic year.

Actually, that is not the case. I just realized that I have purchased (during a sale) several bags of frozen raspberries.

-While listening to Randy Bachman’s Vinyl Tap tonight I was again reminded of a question that has been bothering me for some time. The question is whether or not Canadian Content rules apply to Mr. Bachman, and if not why? It seems that other shows could not play almost exclusively foreign music, particularly American music, and get away with it. Does his playlist mean that the rest of CBC Radio One’s content has to balance his high level of foreign content?

-For the first time today I saw an entire football game in person. The infamous McGill Redmen played the Acadia Axemen. In the final minute of play McGill managed to score to take the lead and then allow Acadia to score a field goal for the win.

The final score of 45-44 is somewhat indicative of the quality of defense. It seemed that both teams were more interested in offense.

Something else that was striking was the size of the players. Some of them were tiny and none of them were huge. I feel that if I stood next to the McGill football team I wouldn’t look particularly less athletic than most of the members of the team (though this may be a slight exaggeration).

A Few Quick Notes 90

-Today has been relatively nice so far, certainly much nicer than many of the days in the near past. It seems that we are supposed to finally have some nicer weather in the next few days.

For some reason we seem to have had a pretty large amount of snow this April. While the snow does not have any real staying power, it does manage to make things much less pleasant than they would otherwise be.

-My final assignment of the year was submitted on Monday. It was nice to get this out of the way. Since that time I have been focusing on packing and getting ready to head back to St. John’s for the summer.

-In less than a week I start work again. This will be a rather big change from my current lifestyle. I am looking forward to this change.

-For those of you that were saddened by the paucity of posts in the past few days, I apologize. Unfortunately, my schoolwork was taking a fair bit of my time and mental energy. Though I frequently suggest that Neil need only take a few minutes each day to post, I now see that at times that can be at bit much to expect. Hopefully I will have better time management skills in the future so that this lack of posting will not occur again (though this is unlikely).

-To pack I needed boxes. My first stop was Thomson House. From the recycling bin I was able to find a few good boxes, mainly wine boxes. Unfortunately, the few boxes I picked up were not sufficient to meet my box needs. As I am somewhat shy the idea of going to other places to look for boxes did not really appeal to me. Eventually I worked up the courage to go Dollarama, though I only found one box. Afterwards I went to the local depanneur, only to learn that they wouldn’t have any boxes until Thursday.

My next stop was the McGill Bookstore. While on the main floor I found a clerk working on a mug display. I asked if she knew if they might have any boxes available. When she asked what size I was looking for I pointed at the box of mugs she was working from. She then left to try and rustle up some boxes. When she returned a few minutes later she was carrying five brand new boxes that had yet to be unfolded.

As excellent as the boxes are I immediately began to wonder why a bookstore would have all kinds of new boxes. Wouldn’t they just use old boxes if they needed any? Why would they need such a large number of boxes? Does this type of practice (the buying unnecessary items) explain why the prices are so high at the bookstore?

-For the past few weeks I have been exposed to several pieces by a Montreal based group called Arcade Fire. Apparently they are really popular. The part of the equation that I don’t understand is why. None of the stuff I have heard has particularly interested me or held my attention. In most cases I can hardly manage to listen to the entire song. I would guess that the common consensus would be that I am missing something. If anyone wants to explain it to me I am more than willing to listen.

-My Roll Up the Rim To Win record is now 3/41. Apparently I really don’t have any skills when it comes to this game.

A Few Quick Notes 57

-Another winter day in Montreal today. There are a few flurries falling as I write, though nothing all that serious. It is also still about -10, though I must say that this seemed warm when I was walking around this morning. If it keeps snowing maybe I will go for a walk this afternoon.

-My father flew into Montreal this morning. He was on his way to Kingston. The original plan was that he would arrive yesterday and spend the night. Because of the “weather bomb” this did not happen, his flight was switched to this morning. The modified plan was that he would take the bus into town and we would meet for breakfast. Unfortunately, the plane was late leaving the airport, the gate was iced up on arrival, and then the luggage failed to arrive. With about 15 minutes before his train was to depart we met at the airport. Several items were quickly transferred to my bag, some hot drinks and a cinnamon roll were purchased, before we made our way to the gate.

If all goes according to plan, my father and uncle should be in Montreal as of this Wednesday evening. I am really hoping that things aren’t quite as rushed as they were on this trip. On the other hand, this is the fourth time that my father has been in Montreal since September.

-Last night Nithum and I went to a party. An open invitation was issued by one of my classmates so I asked Nithum if he was interested. After a little bit of vacillation he decided to go for it, his second party of St. Joseph in two days.

Though I was worried that we might be late, it turned out that we were really on the early side. It must have been about 30 to 45 minutes before anyone else showed up, and then another 20 before the first real group.

The heart of the party was made up of friends and classmates of my classmate’s roommates. As these people began to arrive Nithum started to recognize some of them as attendees of Friday night’s party.

It turned out that the party was infested with people that had connections to Newfoundland. Aside from Nithum and I, there were at least two and possibly four other people who grew up in Newfoundland. There was also a pretty large Nova Scotia contingent. Nithum actually seems to have wangled us an invite to the upcoming “East Coast Kitchen Party” that will be held in the same location in the coming weeks.

[Author's note: I forgot to say that I had an excellent time, sometimes I assume that everyone already knows the good things. I also forgot to thank Nicole for the invitation, it was nice to party with such a wide variety to attendees. It was also nice to hear those bawdy songs as sung by Oscar Brand.]

-As I arrived at McGill today I was reminded that today is the winter Open House. If I had a bit more energy I could probably manage to get a hold of some free stuff.

-Today needs to be a big study day. I have done most of the prep work already, I have the reading materials, the caffeine, part of the mental preparation, and the knowledge that it really needs to happen.

-Yesterday was the first day that I have not had ginseng in about four days. I am not sure I noticed much of a difference, but maybe the old stuff is not out of my system. Anyway, I definitely did not notice any downsides, and I feel as though I could even accept just a placebo affect right now.

Friday

Thursday night was a pretty good night. I was able to take care of some studying, though not as much as I would have liked, and then head over for Thomson House for a night of socializing. Based on my knowledge that the Archives stream had a class and my knowledge that they tend to go out for a beer afterwards I thought it would be pretty safe time to show up and meet some people that I know. It turned out that my timing was just about perfect; most of them were in line as I arrived.

I jumped in line behind them and order a pitcher of a blond locally brewed beer. While it is not my favourite drink I believe that it was what I was drinking all night.

In about an hour most of the archives people had left, but a few general GSLIS students remained. Gradually the first pitchers turned into second and third pitchers. It seemed that most people were having a very good time. One particularly enjoyable part of the evening, at least from my point of view, was the discussion I had with a separatist. I think that she didn’t quite know where I was coming from or what to expect as feel I took a pretty pro-Quebec stance, though was solidly against isolationism. Later in the evening we were swamped by Manitobans, there must have been 4 or 5.

At about 1:30 I finally realized what time it was time to head home. I was back in my room before 2:00, only a little worse for wear.

On Friday I awoke at about 11:00. For about 15 minutes I just stayed in bed listening to the radio. Eventually I got up and started doing the morning internet rounds (weather, news, email, blog, etc.). At about 11:23 I realized that I had been planning on attending the Faculty of Education Faculty Council meeting, which was to start.

After a few quick mental calculations I realized that I might have just enough time to take a quick shower and still make it. Unfortunately when I arrived at the bathroom I found it occupied, and with this my plans were ruined. I went back to my room and tossed on some clothing and got ready to go. Within about two or three minutes I was on my way, slight hangover and all.

As the meeting was to be in the Education building that was where I went. The only problem is that I couldn’t find the designated room, even though it was supposed to be on the main floor. After asking about 3 people and spending 10 to 15 minutes looking for it I was about the second person there. One of the only non-support staff there ahead of me was my cataloging professor. I continued to sit alone, talking to no one, as the others began to file in over the next few minutes. By the beginning of the meeting most of the library school faculty were sitting within a five-seat radius of me.

Eventually the Dean showed up and things began. As Friday was Australia Day we started with a brief themed slide show and Vegemite sandwich tray. Soon enough we were down to business.

The heart of the meeting had to do with Faculty of Education space allocation. It seems that the university is engaging in a major planning exercise of which we are a consequential element, particularly the library school. Unfortunately a few squeaky wheels dominated a fair bit of the meeting, even though the issues that they were raising weren’t really relevant to the current discussion. I was even able to ask a few questions, both of which I feel were quite reasonable.

Attending this meeting was quite good as it gave me a much greater understanding of several issues, including; departmental staff dynamics, faculty staff dynamics, McGill administration, strategic planning, and university committees.

After the formal meeting, with most of the faculty from the library school, I went on a tour of a potential relocation site. I, as with several of the faculty members, were pretty impressed with the potential of the building that we toured.

It was a damn good thing I didn’t back out just because I didn’t have time for a shower.

Short clip of snow falling in Montreal

This clip was taken on January 15, 2007. It was snowing a fair bit in the early morning and afternoon (as you may recall if you read the posts from that day). I had to head over to Thomson House to drop off a key I had accidentily taken home with my on Friday. As usual, I took the short cut from the main campus across the resevoir. Just after reaching the resevoir I decided that it would be a good time to film some of the snow falling, as I did in St. John's.

Pay attention to the first few seconds if you want to see the action sequence, though it was completely unplanned and likely painful. This fall occured because the snow covered pre-existing ice, creating a rather dangerous situation. As soon as I saw this I figured out the problem and walked along the road next to the field.

If you are interested in viewing video clips that have been posted on this blog in the past use the label "YouTube" in the lower right hand corner of this blog to access these posts. If you do this my number of views for each clip will rise and I will feel satisfied.

Soccer

Several days or weeks ago I mentioned that I would be playing on an intramural soccer team with other individuals from my school. Today we had our first “practice.”

What I had imagined to be getting together to kick the ball around in the gym turned out to be having our “team” join a revolving game in which the losing side switches out. Once we eventually figured things out and assessed our troops (we only had 4 of the needed 6 to play) we put our name on the list of challenging teams. It should also be noted that many of the individuals present clearly play regularly and well.

After about twenty minutes it became our turn to play. Unfortunately just moments before our turn came our captain decided to do a quick two laps around the field. As he was making the first turn we were in place on the field.

Almost instantly the game began and as goalkeeper I was quickly under fire. With a groping slide/dive I managed to stop the first shot and bring my team honour. Our team was able to get the ball down to the other end but it was quick to come back.

The second shot was not as nice to me as the first. Without even coming close to stopping the ball it entered the net. The rest of the game was pretty much like this. The ball would be put in play and then we would lose possession and be scored on. The only difference is that on the last shot I managed to tip the ball into my own net.

As we were coming off the field our captain returned from his two laps and couldn’t quite figure out how it was over already, but it was.

On improvement that I can already spot is my attitude. I don’t think that me thinking that we suck is really helping us. While I don’t know that I will be able to delude myself in thinking that we are the best team I might be able to keep the negative thoughts to a minimum. This might be hard when I consider that one of our players doesn’t have sneakers and will be playing in dress shoes.

Our first game is next Saturday. I will let you know how it goes.

A Few Quick Notes 49

-Today has been on the cool side but with temperatures rising all day. It seems that we should peek tomorrow and then drop again. The daily temperature change is quite impressive.

-Tomorrow is another work day for me. I am not really sure what to expect as Thomson House will be hosting the beginning of term party. Apparently this party last year was a dud, but the equivalent party last term was packed. I guess it is some about which I will just have to wait and see. If it is well attended I hope that I won’t have to stay too late as I don’t want my sleep schedule to be too far out of whack.

-Today I did something that I have not done in a while. I set my alarm incorrectly, off by 12 hours, causing my to sleep in and wake up after class had started. Fortunately because of my proximity to McGill I was able to miss less than 25 minutes of class. On the whole it was a less than pleasant experience, one that I hope not to repeat in the future.

-So just a minute ago I was digging around Blogger and I found out that Neil has started his own blog, a competitor to this masterpiece of creativity. We will see to which blog Neil manages to post more. So as not to lose readers I don’t think that it would be appropriate to pass along the URL at this time.

-I still have not been able to get a hold of the books that I need for my courses. I replied to several messages were sent by senior students indicating that they had books for sale but have still heard nothing. None of them seem to be on reserve and the bookstore does not have two of them and a third that they do have is not quite correct.

Contrary to a decision I made yesterday, I ended up purchasing the course pack for one of my courses. While I could get most of the contents on my own it is not all that much more expensive and I believe my time to be worth something. I think that it is also likely that I will read more if it is in a bound format in my room that somewhere on the web waiting to be downloaded.

A Few Quick Notes 48

-The temperature is now down to about -12, which is quite chilly. Though it is cold we still don’t have any snow or frozen water to talk about. It seems that it might be generally colder in the next few days than it has been over the past few weeks.

-Today before class I went to the bookstore to purchase a book for the class that I had yesterday. Though the book available was not the one that was originally ordered I decided that I would splash out for it. After the purchase I went over to school and started to read a few of the first pages.

What initially struck me about the book was that it was absolutely nothings special, just another textbook dealing with social science research methods. To me the greater than $80 price tag did seem special.

After class I decided to head back to the bookstore to pick up the course pack (collection of reading for the class) for the course that I had just had. While in the store I ran into three of my classmates. The discussion quickly turned to books that had been recommended. It quickly became clear that I didn’t really need to purchase the book that I had already purchased and likely didn’t need to purchase the course pack that I had gone to buy.

My plan is to use the library copies of the books and then get a copy of the table of content from the course pack and get each week’s articles.

This decision meant that I would have to return the already purchased book. So I went up stairs and attempted to do this. At first the process seemingly went smoothly. The book was handed over to the clerk and an amount of money refunded to my bank card.

Just before the process was over the clerk realized that he had refunded me too much money. This kind of threw him a little off kilter, he didn’t seem to know quite how to deal with it. Eventually he was able to figure out a way to get me to pay pack the money, though he insisted that I used my bank card.

As I have a limited number of free transactions a month I wasn’t really interested in paying for this $3 on my bank card. I suggested that I might be able to pay in cash, which at the end of the day would leave their till balanced.

This suggestion wasn’t all that welcome. The clerk eventually went to find an answer. Though it took a few minutes and didn’t seem to be a big deal to his supervisor, I was able to pay back the $3 in cash.

-Unfortunately none of the books that I would like to read for my courses is available from the library. It seems that they have all been checked out and recalled, though they might not be back for more than a week. This doesn’t really seem acceptable.

-My classes have been pretty good so far, though some of them could be a little spicier. Tomorrow’s class will finally give me a final view of my term.

-The free book box is back again this term. So far I have been able to pick up three free books. Score.

A Few Quick Notes 46

-Today was another beautiful day in Montreal. Though it was a little cool and slightly windy, the sun was out and shining nicely. It seems that over the next few days were are forecast to have some cooler temperatures.

-I was able to make it out today, the main reason was to head to a local office supply store to pick up things for my classes. At about 10:30 I arrived in the train station, the location of the store, and learned that it was still closed and not scheduled to open until 12:00.

After this initial disappointment I returned to my part of town and went to the library and returned a movie I borrowed the day before. I spent a few more minutes checking my email and eventually thought that I had blown enough time so that the store might be open.

When I returned to the train station the store was still closed, though the clock was showing that it was scheduled to open in a two minutes, I decided to stick it out. While they were a few minutes late in their opening the wait was not bad. I was in and out with the desired products in just a few minutes.

-My term starts tomorrow. One very nice part of this term is that not all of my classes are early in the morning. The downside is that the two morning courses that I do have are the ones that I am not as interested in. It would be nice to have these courses in the afternoon when I would be able to do a better job paying attention.

-The more I deal with it the less I like the McGill computer accounting system. As far as I can tell it is not really automated and up to date. Hopefully everything will be fine with my account by Monday, though I should likely give them a call before class.

-Hopefully my free papers will be back this year. I will have to check tomorrow morning before class.

So I am back in Montreal

Much of my time back in town has been spent catching up on sleep or relaxing, though I was able to do a bit of skating last night. This has been quite nice as my trip to St. John’s didn’t really lead to too much sleep.

Aside from this sleep matter I have had the displeasure of dealing with McGill’s proto-automated system for students. While it appears automated I feel it has a few kinks to work out. One of the more noticeable problems is that they issue e-bills that don’t reflect the amount that is actually owed by the student, particularly if the student is receiving money from the University. Additionally, if money is to be credited to the account, say because of a refund, it is not reflected how this money is used on the bill. I just don’t recall having this problem at MUN, my account was just updated automatically and things were easy.

Another issue with McGill is the inability to use a credit card to pay, though they are quite willing to take credit cards for application fees or deposits. Students have to use online banking features, which might be pretty easy if one does this frequently. I have the problem that I keep forgetting my banking details so I can’t even access my account (though this could be solved by a telephone call to the bank).

The other McGill issue is accessing one’s grades. While most North American universities that I am familiar with seem to post grades within a few days of the exam period ending. This is not the case at McGill. I finished my exams in mid-December and still don’t have access to my grades, though I had expected that they would be up yesterday. It would seem that knowing whether students have passed or failed before the term begins might be of use to both students and administrators as it might cause changes to course loads (a problem that I am not expecting to affect me).