Seismic Twitch

Really, she does. Well, she’s not right now, but she was earlier. Yes, there’s a story to that and I’ll tell you but I have something to do before that.

Bran was rather testy yesterday. You see, we went out to pick up some clumping cat litter at Costco and then pick up some lunch. I was hoping to be back within two hours so that I could continue on with my essay (yes, it’s done, as usual it’s shit, but I don’t know what is expected from me in grad school and this is a way of finding out) and the midterm for my theory class. It didn’t turn out that way. But none of that is germane to what I’m writing about.

On the way to another store to get a cat food bin we had a bit of a tiff. Bran thought I was being too verbose. I thought I wasn’t, I thought I was making sure that I was being all nice and making sure that I was being clear. Talk about cross purposes. We knew that Bran wasn’t having the best of days because he’d forgotten to take his pain meds. Though I thought I wasn’t in rough shape, in retrospect I was stressed about the school work I had waiting for me. Of course you know where this is doing, right? Yes, there were some frayed feelings. Boy was stressed because he’s not used us being quite that picky at each other. Anyway, all was unfluffed when we got out of the car in the parking lot of PetLand and we had a family hug. Isn’t it amazing what problems hugs can solve? We never did find a pet food bin there but we did find a nice curry comb thing for DD.

On the way home we picked up some supper (KFC) and I continued to plug away at the essay. I worked until 5 am and then got up at 9 to continue working. Dad phoned at about 10 (he was planning on coming up sometime this weekend – weather permitting – but the roads around his city were icy and he didn’t want to contend with that so he cancelled) to let me know he wasn’t coming up. When I found that out I realized that I had some extra time to play with. I didn’t have to prepare for his visit interrupting my homework. Three guesses what I did. If any of those guesses involve me continuing to work on the essay or exam you’re wrong. I went back to bed to get some more sleep so that I could write coherent sentences. I eventually got up at 2.

Oh, I left out a trip that Bran and Boy did last night to take advantage of the 20X the points at Shoppers Drug Mart. They went to get our supplements. Bran brought home a little extra for me. He tucked it in his hood. He bought it with the accumulated points and a bit of extra cash.

I am now the proud owner of a Fuji Finepix Z20fd digital camera. I have the blue one. He made sure of that. He’s such a sweetie. Not only does it take photos it also takes video. All I have to do is figure out how to use it.

Anyway, the essay and the exam are done. The kitty got some cat nip into herself and was found sleeping in the basket we have the grapefruit in. He also picked up a short kitty tower (I know, oxymoron) for her to rest in. Right now she’s napping on the top of it, laying across the stick that has the frilly toy on the end of it. She’s weird. That means she fits right in our family.

Now it’s time to upload the software and owner’s manual for my new little toy onto my computer and learn how to do the settings and how to use it. I figure that on Wednesday I’ll do my final exam for my Aboriginal Women and Law class and then I’ll start taking photos of the jewelry. By Saturday I’ll be loading them into my computer while I’m at work. Do please cross your toes, right?

That must mean that it’s time to waste time on a meme before I try to get some sleep so that I can write coherent sentences and finish up my essay and exam and find energy to visit with Dad. I have the attention span of a ferret, which has paid off nicely in entertaining a co-worker tonight even if it wasn’t very useful in my essay writing.

I stole this from a fellow blogger I’ve changed things a little by making it present tense instead of past because I want to have things my way. I’m funny like that. I’m also changing some of the touristy type “visit” places to include a few Canadian ones. It’s sad that an American quiz has questions about visiting Europe but none about the Great White North.

Bold the things you have done, italicize things you want to do, strike out what you’ll never do and leave the ones you don’t care about in plain text. I’m adding colour because some of the changes don’t show up clearly on my template.

Start my own blog
Sleep under the stars
Play in a band
Visit Hawaii
Watch a meteor shower I got to see some of the Leonid shower when I was younger. That was pretty phenomenal.
Give more than I can afford to charity
Visit to Disneyland / Disneyworld Three words: crowds…Mickey Mouse. Both those things freak me out.
Climb a mountain
Hold a praying mantis
Sing a solo Only in the shower.
Bungee jump Having jumped out of a plane at 3000 feet on my very first flight, this one doesn’t hold a lot of attraction.
Visit Paris
Watch lightning at sea Do oceans of wheat count?
Teach myself an art from scratch
Adopt a child
Had food poisoning
Visit Parliament Hill
Grow my own vegetables
See the Mona Lisa in France I hear the crowds milling around the painting make it hard to even see the paining…I think I’ll pass.
Sleep on an overnight train
Have a pillow fight
Hitchhike
Take a sick day when you’re not ill
Build a snow fort
Hold a lamb
Go skinny dipping
Run a Marathon Yeah, like I’m likely to do that. It might as well read “win” a marathon.
Ride in a gondola in Venice
See a total eclipse
Watch a sunrise or sunset
Hit a home run. Way too late on this one.
Go on a cruise
See Niagara Falls in person
Visit the birthplace of my ancestors
See an Amish community We’ve got Hutterite colonies around here. They’re like the Amish except they use modern machinery and other modern things.
Teach myself a new language
Have enough money to be truly satisfied
See the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
Go rock climbing
See Michelangelo’s David
Sing karaoke If for nothing else, to keep from being lynched.
See Old Faithful geyser erupt
Buy a stranger a meal at a restaurant This is an interesting one. Bran has bought the order of the car behind him in the drive through at Tim Horton’s, but I’ve not done anything like that.
Visit Africa
Walk on a beach by moonlight Unless this means ocean, then it’d be italicized.
Be transported in an ambulance I’ve not done it and hope I never have to availe myself of their services.
Have my portrait painted
Go deep sea fishing
See the Sistine Chapel in person
Go to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
Go scuba diving or snorkeling
Kiss in the rain
Play in the mud I did this with Bran and his cousin. If you can slop about in a tilled garden’s mud do it. It’s the very best way to defoliate your feet and get rid of those old calluses
Go to a drive-in theatre I’ve been to many, even a porn (it was very tame but oy! back then it was very racy)
Be in a movie
Visit the Great Wall of China
Start a business Someday I’ll get Wicked Witch Jewelry off the ground. Doing that and grad school and working has proven to be somewhat difficult. I’m glad for your patience.
Take a martial arts class
Visit Russia
Serve at a soup kitchen
Sell Girl Scout Cookies Except up here they’re called Brownies and Girl Guides.
Go whale watching
Get flowers for no reason
Donate blood, platelets or plasma
Go sky diving
Visit a Nazi Concentration Camp
Bounce a check Thank heavens for debit cards. This will never happen to me again!
Fly in a helicopter
Save a favourite childhood toy My spirograph is still at Dad’s house.
Visit Quebec City This one was changed from a DC landmark. I want to visit Quebec City and all the historic landmarks around that area.
Eat Caviar It was quite possibly the most traumatic thing I’ve done to my taste buds ever.
Piece a quilt I’d like to, but I know it’s not likely to happen.
Stand in Times Square Crowds just don’t do it for me.
Tour the Everglades
Been fired from a job It was a learning experience…I discovered that I hated doing collections and would rather have a limb removed with a dull grapefruit spoon than do that again.
See the Changing of the Guards in London
Been on a speeding motorcycle
See the Grand Canyon in person
Published a book (Meh)
Visit the Vatican Even if I were in Rome I’d not likely to there.
Buy a brand new car
Walk in Jerusalem
Have my picture in the newspaper (Meh)
Read the entire Bible
Visit the White House (Meh)
Kill and prepared an animal for eating I’ve caught, killed, scaled and gutted fish.
Had chickenpox
Save someone’s life I used to be a blood donor until the continued policy of Canadian Blood Services of excluding gay men from donating made me realize that they don’t need my blood enough if they’re turning away perfectly healthy people on the basis of outdated and homophobic rhetoric.
Sit on a jury While I’m sure it would be fascinating, I’d rather not.
Meet someone famous Why would I want to?
Join a book club
Lose a loved one
Have a baby
See the Alamo in person (Meh)
Swim in the Great Salt Lake
Been involved in a law suit
Own a cell phone
Been stung by a bee
Ride an elephant It would be fun to be a mahout.

I’m sorry, she’s a cat and who can resist a Lolcat reference? Afterall, we saw a bucket lost on the freeway coming to school today (Bran founds a bucket but has no lolrus).

Here she is in all her glory

Ain’t she loverly? Better photos will follow from the SLR on either my blog or one of Bran’s. I’ll let you know which one when they’re published.

That’s right folks, we have a puddy tat.

Last night Bran got the go-ahead from the landlady to get the kitty and we don’t have to pay a pet deposit for her. She’s a lovely kitty (grey and peach tortoise shell) and her name is Duchess De-Clawdia. She’s currently exploring the house. She’s not wanting to be held at the moment, though she is a very affectionate cat. She’s currently exploring the house (and standing on the couch arm behind me).

We’re both quite thrilled. I’ll post photos later. I have to get ready for work now.

This is what I always thought Christianity should be about.

Just sayin’.

I have only one more article to read before I start writing my term paper. Thank goodness for that! I can start writing tomorrow. I also have to get a stats assignment done so I’ll be working on that all day Wednesday. Actually, there are two in that I have to do an analysis of the methods of a peer reviewed research paper. Now that I’ve got a handle on at least some of the stats processes I’ll actually start that tomorrow as well.

Today was a long and tiring day, as most Mondays are. I made the mistake of having the “curry chicken with 3 beans” stew today so I’m burping the flavours (and stomach acid too bleah) and having some tootage issues. I won’t be making that mistake again.

Bran picked me up from school much later than normal. Boy went to do homework at a friend’s house so I stayed at the school until he was done. That’s how I managed to get so much reading done. Of course, now that I’m home all I want to do is nap, but I’ll clean off the coffee table and continue on with my reading as well as see if I can get more of the theory reading done since the prof gave out the mid-terms to write over the next week.

I’m procrastinating. I’m good at it. In fact, I excel at it. Yay, me!

I finished up this weekend’s graveyard shifts. I got a fair bit of studying done, surprisingly enough. There wasn’t a whole lot of drama though I did consider not doing the fills (making juices, putting coffee into filters, refilling the sugar and coffee mate containers, etc.) to be pissy because some residents were pissing me off by acting like teenagers…it drives me nutso. However, it is my job to do the fills. I did tell them that if they wanted to act like kids I would treat them like kids and turn off the movie and make them go to bed. I mean, these are adults, unfortunately prison hasn’t taught them how to do things for themselves or anything about cooperative living. I mean, I get noise when I asked one of them to fill the water jug (instead of buying water they just keep filling the large bottle and use the cooler with it). He seemed to think that it was my job. I said, hey, go for leaving it, but if you want cold water it’s not going to be there.

They’re going to have a nasty surprise when they find they have to do all the work when they live on their own or be living in squalor. Of course, one or two of them won’t care, some will find some stupid young woman to do the housework for them and the rest will suck it up and deal. I know of at least two who don’t want to leave the half-way house. I’m pretty sure that he keeps screwing up just enough to keep on having to stay there but not enough to get sent back. I understand that it can be daunting to move forward and be fully responsible for oneself after years of being told what to do, when to do it, and how to do it.

Sigh

I definitely do forget that I’m dealing with adults.

From CBC Calgary. There’s an “External Link” video that is really spectacular:

Reports of meteor streaking across Prairies

Last Updated: Thursday, November 20, 2008 | 10:14 PM MT
CBC News

A bright light lit up the sky around 5:30 MT Thursday evening in Western Canada, with people reporting sightings in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

People telephoned the CBC newsrooms in Edmonton and Calgary to talk about what they saw.

“It was a really big flash, lit up the sky, and there was this huge, flaming fireball falling from the sky,” said Rowyn Windsor, 12, who lives on the Canadian Forces base in Cold Lake, Alta., about 350 kilometres northeast of Edmonton.

“This huge light in our kitchen window lit up our whole kitchen,” said Sabrina Schneider, who lives just outside Lloydminster on the Saskatchewan-Alberta border. “It kinda flashed a couple of times. It was really bright. It was a different light than lightning.

“We weren’t really sure what happened … got up to look out the window, and all of a sudden, we heard this rumbling.”

Schneider said her sister saw the meteor while she was driving past North Battleford, Sask.

Torey Van Vam was driving north from Redcliff, Alta., outside Medicine Hat when he saw a bright white streak.

“As it got closer to the ground, it was more visible as a ball of white light with green around it. And as it got really close to the ground, it turned kind of orange, and I’m pretty sure it went straight to the ground,” he said.

Bev Ully, who lives on a farm near Unity, Sask., was watching TV when she saw a light through her west-facing living room window.

“It was just like there were headlights right outside the window and that something was moving. It wasn’t just one big, bright flash. It was several flashes,” she said.

Ully said her daughter in Brooks, in southern Alberta, had told her she had seen the light as well.

The fireball was also visible in Edmonton. Kim Wingrove was driving in the city’s west end when he saw something in the sky.

“I saw this large orb shoot across in an east-southeast direction, on a very steady trajectory,” he said. “It was very, very big. And I’ve seen a lot of shooting stars from all the world as I travelled, but I’ve never seen one so large. It was very bright yellow, with hints of green in it. It stayed in the air … for about two to two and a half seconds.”

Alister Ling, an Edmonton-area amateur astronomer who is a member of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, recorded the fireball using equipment from Alan Hildebrand, a meteorite researcher at the University of Calgary.

“When it flares out on the tape, you can see there’s several of these multiple flashes, and that’s when it’s probably partly blowing up, which is also a really good indicator … that there’s multiple stones that have come down,” he said.

He said anyone who sees a fireball with their own eyes has a hard time judging where it came down, because fireballs stop glowing when they are 50 kilometres above the earth.

Ling said he will be consulting with other astronomers in Alberta, who will look at tapes from a local network of cameras and assess eyewitness reports to try and figure out where the fireball may have landed.

Although its early in the process, he thinks it may have fallen somewhere in central Alberta, and there could be search parties out looking for chunks as early as this weekend.

“Who knows,” he said. “We might be really, really lucky.”
With files from the Canadian Press

Outdoing Michael Jackson at his very own act.

Then in the semi-finals:

Then they hit the finals:

The most disappointing thing is that they didn’t win. I’m sure they were up against incredible talent and I’ve not seen the others but I’m biased. They did finalize in the top three.

The car went to SGI (the government insurance people) today and by sometime tomorrow we’ll find out if the damage done to the back hatch, metal around the door way, under bumper (there’s a metal bumper under the plastic, who knew?), over-bumper and entire light kit is going to total our car. It sounds like it’s going to be a close call.

The sad thing is that I’m listed as a “rare” driver on the insurance because I don’t drive often. Of course, one of the few times I drive the pole jumps out behind me. Sucks.

I went to school today and spent the day doing (in no particular order):

• laughing at the two other grad students who amuse me enormously;
• buying a new set of ear buds for my MP3 player and then finding the old ones about 40 minutes later (the new ones are staying at school and the old ones are in my purse);
• reading about regressions that are different from linear/mulivariate regressions;
• reading about how older women in prison (whether sentenced when older or who aged in prison) cope with the relativity of time;
• helping one of the grad students whack a first year student who wrote an incredibly bad essay that did not cite sources of supposed “facts” and even had the audacity (read idiocy) to use Wikipedia as a cited source in the references;
• worrying about the assessment on the car;
• talking to the insurance lady at SGI (the government insurance company that makes sure that everyone has basic insurance on their cars through their plates – they’re the ones who decide about damages and such);
• snuggling and napping with Bran after we got home because I was stressed and needed the extra comfort;
• wanting a cattle prod to zap all the undergrads who got in my way while I was going to the bathroom;
• dealing with nausea because of the Jeep;
• making supper (cheesy scrambled eggs and raw veg;)
• wondering if the landlord/landlady is going to let us have a puddy-tat.

That’s been my day.