A Few Quick Notes - 627

-After several days of warm weather we awoke yesterday to relatively cold and windy surroundings.  Of course, it seems that what passes for cold these days is nothing like winters past when cold was cold (and cars needed to be plugged in).

-One major consequence of our unseasonably warm weather is that we haven't had much snow to shovel.  While I can't really complain about the lack of shovelling, I was expecting a somewhat typical amount of shovelling this year.  I was further expecting that this shovelling would finally be enough to wear out one of our two shovels.  Because of these nested expectations some number of months ago I began dreaming about the replacement shovel I could justify buying once the cheap shovel I'm currently using finally wore out.  Somehow, and maybe for the better, the cheap two-pack of shovels that we bought about three years ago just so that we would have shovels when we moved into our house have been much more resilient than expected.

-Several months ago, for reasons that are no longer entirely clear to me, I decided to try to up my cabbage consumption.  Thinking back on this decision I think that it must have had something to do with price as it wasn't until after I'd made the decision that I learned that there were some nutritional benefits to be derived from the dietary addition.

While I can't say that I'm yet a daily consumer of cabbage, I have gotten pretty good at adding to my soup rotation, using it as the base component for any salads, and adding it to sandwiches.

I'm quite impressed with myself that I've managed to keep this going for a few months with relative ease.  Maybe with a few months more of effort the practice will become so ingrained that it will no longer require effort.

-I really think I need a nap.

Cameron - 4
Neil - 0

A Few Quick Notes 613

-Much to my surprise, we've had a few grey days in the past few weeks.  Maybe even more troubling, these grey days (as well as some of the non-grey days) have been rather humid (though not quite New York/Ottawa humid).  In any event, the temperatures have felt very summery (though that may just be the humidity speaking (as it's supposedly only 19 today and it feels borderline miserable).

-Last Friday night we experienced one of the most impressive lightning shows I've seen in my life.



[Embedded video]

For several hours there were near constant lightning strikes lighting the sky.  For the first while there wasn't even any rain or wind where we were.  If you watch the above video you should be able to hear when the rain and wind really started.  It eventually became much more intense and several nearby areas are still cleaning up from the damage caused by the storm.

-Apparently I haven't been very good at keeping this up to date recently.  Not entirely sure what's up with that but it certainly my plan to improve.

-I knew I didn't sleep well last night, but I was still surprised when all of us (Jeannette, the cats, and I) fell asleep in the living room for three hours (well, Pierre and I fell asleep for three hours - the ladies were still sleeping when we left).  Now that I've had that rather long nap I'm feeling much more refreshed.

-I guess now that I'm so refreshed I should consider tackling a laundry folding project I've been putting off for some time?

A Few Quick Notes 536

-Today turned out to be a pretty nice day. I guess it was fitting for Earth Day.

-Today,for the first time in quite a while, I took an afternoon nap - it was great.

-I made some chili for dinner tonight.

-As Easter is fast approaching I will soon need to start work on my Easter bread baking project. As things stand right now I will likely be taking care of most of this baking tomorrow afternoon or evening.

-Today was an advance polling day in the current Canadian election. Based on polling station reports from Neil and Rebecca and comments I have seen on Twitter I get the sense that these events were well attended. Actually, I am curious if we will ever see exactly how many people voted this way and if the numbers were higher than in past years when the advance polling day happened on a not-holiday.

-Actually, the more I think about it the more I think that voting day should be a holiday/non-work day. Such a change might also provide Canada Post of being a little more useful in terms of collecting special ballots on the final day of the election.

A Few Quick Notes 457

-We had another somewhat overcast day today. I guess there might have been a few sunny periods, though as I didn't really spend much time outside I can't really remember if there were or not. More recently there have been a few periods of very light drizzling. Hopefully this drizzle won't make the transition to full-fledged rain.

-I cranked out a quick loaf of bread today. I think I may have some as a snack later this evening.

-I managed to make it to the grocery store twice today. Not surprisingly, I was able to find quite a number of things that I forgot to buy on the second trip.

-I took a pretty satisfying nap this afternoon.

-Tomorrow, for the first time in three years I will be able to attend Dal's annual teaching assistant professional development session. Typically they schedule these sessions at times when I have classes. Apparently being so far along in your program that you don't have classes is best way to make sure that you will be able to attend.

-Wow, I should get back to work.

How is it possible that I am tired

So far today I have had three Coke Zeros, 1 liter of coffee, 2 cups of tea, and 1 hour long nap, yet I am still exhausted.

Not just exhausted but so tired I am having trouble concentrating.

And all of this is less than twelve hours after I woke up this morning. How is it possible that I can feel as though I could go to sleep right now?

As I have a few more things to do tonight I will have to find a way to power through for at least a few more hours.

A Few Quick Notes 309

-Though occasionally overcast, today was a generally nice day. As far as I can tell, it was generally warmer than predicted. Apparently tomorrow is to be the first very warm day of the year, with temperatures that are expected to go as high as 26. If this is the case, it could be a little warm for my liking.

-I am now 2/22 on this year's Roll Up the Rim to Win contest. As supplies of cups are running out or have run out, I don't imagine that I will manage to really improve my rather dismal record at this point. I guess I need to re-group and come at things strong next year.

-Just moments ago I woke up from a nap. Originally the nap was supposed to be 45 minutes at most, it turned out to have run 1 hour and 15 minutes. As I ended up setting my alarm incorrectly I guess I am luck that I ended up only sleeping for an extra 30 minutes and not several hours.

-If my most recent 'stache was any indication, it seems that temporary tattoos may last longer than mustaches.

While I was out walking last night I realized that I had a conference to attend today which. Though it may have been unnecessary, I thought it would be best if I shaved before attending this morning's opening session.



-The conference, which is on the European Union and is my first full-fledged academic conference, is quite informative. Unfortunately, I was relatively tired for most of the day (the 9:00 AM starts really hit me hard). There are a number of sessions tomorrow that should be quite good.

-It seems that the swine flu problem in Nova Scotia has only gotten worse since it was first reported yesterday. CBC is now reporting that it seems that the disease has likely spread beyond the original four cases, which should not be all that surprising considering that it is contagious. As you might have expected, this news hasn't really comforted me.

A Few Quick Notes 304

-The weather today was quite variable in terms of quality. At times this afternoon we had precipitation approaching hale, while later in the afternoon things cleared up and the sun came out. One of the few consistent elements of the day was the temperature, which was continually within a few degrees of zero.

-I have my only exam on Tuesday. I spent a number of hours studying today, and plan on doing more of the same tomrrow.

-Yesterday, as predicted, we ended up having a visit from the Easter bunny. I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that the Easter bunny brought me, among other things, a ticket for a Halifax Comedy Festival show. Somehow the Easter bunny knew that this was the very show that I wanted to attend, as it will be featuring Stop Podcasting Yourself's Dave Shumka (as well as John Wing and Reggie Watts, to name just a few of the comedians scheduled to appear). It seems that Neil also received a ticket for the same show.



Before we could get on to the candy component of our respective hauls, all three of us took a crack at our scratch'n'sniff tickets. Not surprisingly, only Neil managed to get a winner. I am still baffled that people would be inclined to play these on more than an annual basis. Once or twice a year more than satisfies any gambling or lottery urges I might have.



I also scored a bottle of multivitamins and a toothbrush. I guess there was a little bit of candy too.



For breakfast we decorated a few of the bunnies (and also had bacon and eggs).



-Later in the day we had a few friends over for turkey and a few associated dishes. For no particularly good reason I decided to add some bacon to the stuffing. While the resulting stuffing was definitely edible, and not in anyway ruined by the bacon, I am not sure if it really was worth the extra calories.



I didn't time things particularly well, so the turkey was done a little while before the rest of the food. Though in many ways I think this actually worked out better than trying to have it come out at exactly the same time as the potatoes, as this second option is a little harder to time and may lead to significantly over-cooked or cold vegetables.



-Some how I managed to go for three days without taking a nap. These mistakes really caught up with me today, and resulted in today being a two-nap day.

-As usual, the plants keep on growing. Unfortunately, it seems that the seeds I planted most recently still haven't shown any signs of germination. As it has only been a few days so far this isn't particularly surprising, I will only begin to worry if in a few more days I still haven't seen anything.

A Few Quick Notes 302

-Though the forecast is calling for rain it is quite sunny at the moment, as can be seen in the photo below. If I recall correctly, a similar situation arose yesterday. I guess if Environment Canada is going to be wrong, I would rather have it go in this direction.



-As I was working on assignments earlier this week I wasn't able to bake bread on Wednesday, as has been my habit this term. Finally this morning I found the time to start a quick batch, which is presently in the oven. I am quite looking forward to sampling a few slices shortly.

So far things are looking pretty good, at least if this photo is any indication of the eventual outcome of the loaves.




Update: I have just removed the bread from the oven and it seems to have turned out quite nicely, though I guess I won't really know this until I sample it. Unfortunately, one of the three loaves seems less inclined than the others to leave its pan. At the moment I have just left it there, hoping that it may decide to detach itself at some point in the near future. I really hate it when this happens.

-At about the same time as I was putting the dough in the oven to rise I decided that I would like to make some French bread. After quickly consulting the Joy of Cooking I determined that I had all of the required ingredients (flour, water, salt, and yeast), and would be able to move ahead with the project.

Not only is dough much harder than I expected, it really doesn't look quite right. Hopefully things turn out a little better than I am expecting them to. I guess I will let you know.



Update: The dough has now been formed into rather ugly baguette-ish loaves. Hopefully this stuff manages to be edible.

-Last night Neil and I made a last-minute pre-Good Friday trip to the grocery store. While there we realized that we needed to pick up a few supplies for dinner tonight. After a brief examination of the meat section we decided to go with an on sale leg of lamb.

Only today did I realize that having lamb on Good Friday is probably a little uncommon, some might even go so far as to call it distasteful.

-On Wednesday Neil and Rebecca took advantage of a video rental coupon and rented two movies for the price of one. The two they chose were House Bunny and Transporter 3, each modern classics in their ways.

They watched House Bunny on Wednesday night. I ended up trying to watch House Bunny on Thursday afternoon but gave up after about 7 minutes. I ended up joining them for the Transporter 3 viewing last night. Not surprisingly, I wasn't particularly impressed with this film either, though were a few somewhat inventive strip/fight scenes that were quite funny and completely unbelievable. I think it might be safe to say that I likely won't try to seek out either of the other Transporter movie (which I didn't really know existed until last night).

-When Neil and I were returning these movies last night we decided to try to take advantage of another coupon and see if we could get a free rental. I ended up selecting Slumdog Millionaire, a film Neil and Rebecca saw in the theatre some number of weeks ago.

While I thought the movie was just fine, I am not sure if I was quite as amazed by it as some people seem to have been.

Unfortunately, as we were finalizing the rental we realized that as today is Good Friday I will be unable to return the movie until Saturday, and thus be charged for one day, negating the benefit of the free rental coupon. Maybe I will see if I can call customer service and have them remove the charge from my credit card.

-It turns out that having a nap and an energy drink on Wednesday evening was a bit of a mistake. I didn't manage to make it to sleep until some time after 5:00 AM. As I had to wake up at 7:10 this was a bit of a problem. Fortunately I made it through to the afternoon without falling asleep.

-After class yesterday I met Neil and a few friends at the Grad House closing party/barbeque. I was quite glad that they had the barbeque. I eventually had four (small) burgers. As I hadn't eaten since breakfast I really needed the food.

The party was a little funny as they were using it as an opportunity to get rid of stock before closing. They seem to have sold out of draught beer quite early on and basically just had bottles left by the time I was ready to order a beer.

The sign at the bar suggested that "everything" was $3. I asked about the lone can of Guinness and was told that it was $5. I kind of get the sense that one of the parties involved in this transaction didn't understand the word 'everything,' and I am pretty sure I wasn't the one with the problem. In the end I went with a bottle of a locally brewed beer.

Done

So it is done. About twenty minutes ago I finished my final essay of the semester. All I have left is an exam, which happens to be for the same course.

Once I finish the exam I just have the thesis to focus on until the end of August. Should be fun.

My present problem is that I am hepped up on naps and energy drink because I was expecting an all-nighter that I ended up not needing to pull. Hopefully I will manage to get to sleep in a reasonable amount of time because I have an 8:30 AM class tomorrow. Sadly, in the best case scenario is that I will get a little less than five hours, which isn't quite enough as far as I am concerned.

In some ways the 8:30 class isn't my biggest fear. My biggest fear is dealing the with class I have immediately after, which runs from 11:30 to 2:30. I imagine that I might not get as much as I would hope from this class.

On a moderately unrelated note, the Grad House closing event will be taking place tomorrow starting at 1:00 PM. At the moment I am thinking of possibly heading over after my last class, and then returning home for a nap. For those of you in the region, this event may be worth noting, even if you don't plan on attending. The other key aspect of the event is that they are planning on having free barbeque, which was fine the last time I had it at this location.

Anyway, enough procrastinating. If I want to catch even 4.5 hours of sleep I need to get moving.

A Few Quick Notes 293

-It seems that we have managed to turn back the clocks and re-enter Winter. I would guess that we have between 5 and 10 cm of snow on the ground in most places, and a little wind and drifting to convince those stragglers that we are definitely in the midst of a period of inclement weather. Fortunately, as of tomorrow things are supposed to become a little warmer and sunnier.

-For dinner tonight we had a white kidney beans with pork and vegetables cooked in a slow cooker. I think the most useful aspect of this dinner is that we reached the conclusion that we prefer white kidney beans to red kidney beans. There seemed to be key attributes that made them better. Firstly, as their colour didn't bleed as much (we have had a particular problem in this area with green lentils). Secondly, the skin seemed to be thinner. This made for a more pleasurable eating experience. It is quite good that we found these passable as we have a bag and a half to get through.

-Almost immediately after dinner all three of us went for naps. While all of us are relatively regular nappers, it is somewhat unusual for us to all nap at exactly the same time. The beans seem to have wiped us out.

-I am not quite sure what we will be having for dinner tomorrow night. Hopefully it is something tasty.

A Few Quick Notes 290

-Today wasn't quite as nice as yesterday. Things have been rather overcast and wet for most of the day. I can't say that these are my favourite conditions.

-When my mother was in Halifax in September I acquired a 20 kg bag of flour. As of Wednesday this flour was basically gone. Though I am not surprised that I managed to make my way through such a large bag of flour, I am somewhat surprised that it went so quickly, I was expected this to last at least another month or so. Not so surprisingly, the 1 pound bag of yeast is still quite full, though I think I will be able to make my way through it in the coming months.

-Somehow I managed to make it through Tuesday and Wednesday without a nap. Sadly I wasn't able to carry my streak through to today, though I did make it to 4:00 PM before breaking.

-It seems that I am now 1/9 with this year's coffee competition. At the moment I am where I would expect to be, but if I don't want to fall below this success rate I am going to have to be sure to not miss any opportunities and compete at the highest possible level.

-I had a presentation to give this morning. Going into the presentation I was a little worried about how it would go as it was quite early in the morning I am not all that much of a morning person. Somehow, once I got going things seemed to go much better than they should have. The post-presentation question and answer session seemed to go particularly well, I was really having a lot of fun and I there were a number of good questions from the crowd (I even managed to get a few laughs).

-Yesterday, what at the helicopter crash memorial service, my sister observed Danny Williams and Stephen Harper shaking hands. Given the public rhetoric this might not be the behaviour one might expect, though it is quite appropriate given the circumstances. I am curious if any of the Newfoundland political bloggers will mention this interaction. As I don't follow all that many of these blogs it would be quite easy for me to miss such coverage.

Xmas Check 12

It seems that since I began my nap about three hours ago the rain has
only gotten worse. Amazingly, it seems that most parts of the yard
are still covered in snow, though I not sure how much longer this can
possibly last. On the other hand, as temperatures are expected to
drop this evening, if we do manage to keep our snow we should be then
have a nice white covering for a number of days.

Though I haven't yet checked, I presume that people have or will soon
be be arising from their naps and re-emerging. I presume that this
will be a signal to start working on preparing the food for tonight's
fondue session. On the other hand, Kirsten did get a copy of Ticket
to Ride: Europe this morning so it may be necessary for us to first
play that game before getting down to work on other more timely
matters.

Xmas Check 11

We are still playing Fluxx, which means that the games are going on
longer than I expected. Neil managed to win the first game, though if
you ask me it was a bit of a weak win (someone just played the goal he
needed).

Just moments ago he managed to pull a second win out of thin air.

The good news is that it is definitely now nap time.

Xmas Check 9

We just finished breakfast a few moments ago. A few people are now
cleaning up the recently dirty dishes.

In a few moments we are all likely to head back to bed for naps. If
everyone feels as I do these will be quite welcome.

I guess this means that I will take a break from the live-blogging of
Christmas for the next few hours.

A Few Quick Notes 185

-As predicted, today was another was a relatively low quality day. We started things off with overcast skies, low temperatures, and a little precipitation. This was followed my more of the same, but with a little less precipitation for much of the work day. Just as I was walking home from work the precipitation levels picked up a little, though not too much. It seems more of the same has been predicted for the coming days (only on Tuesday is any sun predicted).

-Some of the beans that I planted almost three weeks ago have started to sprout. In particular, it seems that one or two, maybe even three, of the scarlet runner beans have popped up. At least one of the yellow or green beans has also showed signs of life.

These recent developments are giving me some hope that I will be lucky enough to have a few more plants over the coming days. Maybe I will soon have a much better sense of how much re-planting will be needed.

-Soon after returning from work I decided to take a quick nap. Unfortunately I ended up sleeping for almost three hours. Now, later in the evening, I feel much more awake that I would like to be at this time of day.

-Almost as soon as I awoke from my nap I saw a recipe for bread on my floor and decided to try and make it. The deciding factor was that the recipe was for beer bread, a concept that I found particularly enticing.

As the recipe was from a British flour bag things were done a little differently. Instead of in cups ingredients were listed in grams and ounces and millilitres. This difference allowed me to use our kitchen scale for the first time, something that was a little easier than I would have predicted.

Another difference with regards to this batch of bread from others that I have made recently was that I made it in a mixer using a dough hook. While this cut out the hand stirring it did make things a little easier, particularly the kneading and initial mixing.

A third major difference was that the bread called for only one session of rising. I am typically used to letting my dough rise twice, the second time in the pans in which the bread will eventually be baked.

-As the bread was baking I realized that my friends Dave and Amanda were just about to move away. As it was likely that they would be driving I thought that they could possibly use a loaf of bread on their travels, and dropping such a loaf off would be an excuse to see them off.

As the bread was just about to come out of the oven my parents returned and agreed that the idea seemed reasonable, the only problem being that they were due to leave very early the next morning.

Eventually we just decided to head out and try to find them and drop off the bread and say good-bye. Fortunately, almost as soon as we pulled into the driveway at the house where we suspected they were staying Dave pulled up the drive. Soon after Amanda joined us in the driveway and we were able to talk for a while.

-To kill the day off I will be engaging in some Settlers. Hopefully we will have good boards, unlike some of the more recent games I have played.

A Few Quick Notes 55

-Environment Canada is indicating that it is several degrees below zero, though I am having a hard time believing this assessment. Maybe it is a little cooler now that it is a touch more overcast.

-I learned that someone in my class found out about this blog from a friend. Apparently the friend was searching blogs and came upon this one. From information that she was able to gather she figured out that I must be in the same program as her friend. The relevant details, the URL, were passed along. I have been meaning to ask my classmate if she managed to read very much, or any, of our blog.

-I am thinking about taking a nap. This will give me a bit of a break before I dig into some pretty heavy reading that I need to take care of.

-Food would also be good, but I can’t say that I am that hunger at the moment.

-Today in class one of my classmates approached me about joining her group for a project. This was pretty good as I didn’t know what I would be doing for this project. I had been hoping that someone would just come up and ask me, which they fortunately did. The only bad thing is that we are still one member short of the required four, and we haven’t been able to finalize a project topic (preparation for this is why I have so much reading).

-Work was pretty dead again last night. It seems that Monday nights are not the big party night at Thomson House.