More knitting

I'm busy with school these days and Edmonton is cold. Nothing new, I guess. I wasn't sure if I should just do another knitting post, but I'm assuming a good majority of my readers (all 10 of you) are knitters so here goes. I was so inspired by Maureen's latest blog post that I'm about ready to run out and buy what I assume is some pretty pricey yarn. But aren't the colours gorgeous! Also Mom told me today that she's finally found a way to get paid for knitting. Granny's Garden hats are too cute for words. As for my latest project, I sent it to Carole in the mail. She has a mini computer that she lugs to and from school everyday, so I made it a cheerful cable knit cover. Cute, eh? I also sent her more IKEA stuffed mice for Charlie, and she's promised to put up a picture of him and his prize possessions. Supposedly he likes the white one best- she's done a scientific study.

High Praise

I was waiting in the LRT metro station downtown yesterday reading my book. An "eccentric" old man walked by me and started talking loudly in a sing-song voice. I'm pretty good at ignoring such things (every single ride on public transportation in Chicago seemed to involve a similar encounter), and I couldn't really catch what he was saying. But I got the last word... lit-er-ary. I took it as a compliment!

Take a Break

It's reading week! I can't even tell you how great it is to sleep in a bit, go to the gym, and relax with my morning coffee. Plus I'm catching up on my personal to-do list as well as trudging through the workload of my classes. Not much else to report, but here's a youtube video some of you might enjoy (at least everyone in my pronunciation class enjoyed it!)

Muffin-y Goodness

Well, I'm surviving the cold, still enjoying most of my classes, and managing with the workload. I had my first really late night working until 3am on Thursday- 12 hours straight of reading pronunciation articles and writing pedagogical implications. I was really proud that I finished and it was fairly good quality. And, believe it or not, I didn't put it off until the last minute, I started two weeks ago, and had been working on it whenever I had a spare moment. But I have been engulfed with TA work (30 hours last week, 30 hours this week!) and my research class which has an incredible workload. Anyway, after the next few days of marking midterms, I have reading week (just in time). It corresponds with Alberta's "Family Day" Holiday, which was instituted to help depressed people through the miserableness of winter. I feel that! Anyway, as to the title of my blog post, I feel the need to proclaim my love of Tim Hortons' low fat cranberry muffins. I always scoffed at low fat muffins in the past (why bother if they taste like cardboard), but now that I've tried them, I can't go back. I always get a low fat cranberry muffin when I need something sweet and it's so much healthier than my previous favourite, the sour cream glazed donut. And, lest you think the cranberry would make it tart, the reason I love it is because it's so sweet and reminds me exactly of vanilla flavoured cakes from my easy bake oven in childhood (seriously!)

My pretend cat

I am running out of mental and emotional space this week. I had assignments to grade for my TA job that took eight hours Friday and another eight hours Sunday. Plus all my schoolwork took all day Saturday, so I feel like I need a weekend after my weekend. Unfortunately I have a huge journal review due on Thursday night, and midterm grading next weekend (probably at least another 15 hours!) But the great news is that next week is a reading week so I'll be able to stop for air. Yesterday, after a particularly weary day in the world of academia (which, granted, is no where near as wearying as the real world or, even worse, the world of high school students that Carole is swimming through) I was spent. I went home after a nonsensical three hour statistics lecture to find a little brown paper package on the kitchen counter. With wonderful timing, So Young (college roommate from Korea) had sent me the sweetest gift. She knows me well, it was a small stuffed cat. He/she doesn't have a name yet, but it's lovely to pet for stress relief (not to the point where you'd doubt my mental stability, of course!) Submissions for names will be accepted in the blog comments. I wish, of course, that I could have a real cat; maybe one of these...

Necklace

I guess I should fill you in with part two of last weekend, but first... here is the amazing necklace that my Aunt Carole knit and sent to me! Actually, there were originally two necklaces with other types of beads included, but I loved the knit ones so much, I combined them all for a colourful and funky necklace. As Michelle warned me, though, they do get a bit scratchy after the first few hours of wearing! But they first time I wore it, the woman in the elevator couldn't stop complementing it! Do you like the picture? I think it looks like something on Etsy (not that I ever spend hours looking through jewelry on there or anything).

So the reason I had such a great weekend was that I had tickets, and I love tickets. Friday night I went to see Les Ballets Jazz de Montreal perform one of the most beautiful nights of modern dance I've seen in a long while. There were two pieces choreographed by an Edmontonian, Azure Barton, and I found (what I assume to be) Canadian characteristics of contemporary dance to be colourful, joyful and full of rhythm and musicality.

Saturday night I had tickets for a concert by Hannah Georgas and Jeremy Fisher. I had just been looking around for tickets for events on campus, and the concert came up. The tickets were only $15, so (although I'd never heard of either artist) I listened to some of the songs online, decided I would most likely enjoy both of their music styles, and decided to go. On a whim I mentioned it to my friend Amy, and she wanted to come, and then Jun overheard and she decided to come too! And it was much more fun going together because it was such a great concert, it was nice to have people to enjoy it with. It was small, and very independent-Canadian-artist-y which I loved. I feel like I'm just beginning to discover Canadian music. Any recommendations?

Despite the grimness of being a student in Edmonton in the winter, I am so happy to be living Canadian life again. There is a world of difference between living as a Canadian overseas and living as a Canadian in Canada. One reason I really wanted to come back to do my masters was to be a "real" Canadian again. And once in a while I stop and appreciate my lifestyle. I feel especially Canadian when I read Macleans (which I subscribed to in my quest for Canadianness). Or when I ride the bus and the bus driver is SO friendly to everyone. Or when I drink an extra large coffee at Tim Hortons on an almost daily basis (cause it's so cheap, I can afford it). The only thing I haven't gotten used to is the Edmontonian accent... it kind of scares me.

It's been a great weekend, and pretty much as exciting as it gets for me here in Edmonton! Friday I had to go return some shoes at West Edmonton mall. I made the mistake of buying footwear online and it turned out to be an annoying headache trying to coordinate the delivery with UPS. I had stayed home all day Wednesday when they were supposed to be delivered, but the call never came. It turns out the driver had forgotten to read the buzz code I had printed on the label and just left without trying. Then they were supposed to come on Friday, I stayed home all day and left post-its in the lobby advising of my buzz code, etc. and the UPS guy didn't buzz up, but somehow got in and came up to my floor! If he knocked, I didn't hear it, I just found another infuriating little brown and yellow UPS note on my door. I stayed home all day Monday, though and they finally came (and the boots didn't fit).

So after returning my too-small boots, I went through every shoe store in the mall looking for another suitable pair (and, yes, it is called the biggest mall in the world). No luck. My problem was I wanted the comfort of Uggs without the overdone-teenage-trendiness of wearing Uggs (no offense to anyone who wears Uggs, but unique footwear is important to me). I really needed boots, so I ended up going to another mall the next morning for the perfect pair in my size. They look something like this:

Anyway, while at West Ed, I decided to walk up to Michaels. I had looked it up on google maps, and it was less than a centimetre! What a nightmare. Trudging through snow (have they heard of sidewalks?) and trying not to slip and break my back. What should have taken five minutes took about 20. I've been meaning to rant about the ice here in Edmonton. I cannot get over it. Walking to school is deathly, and I slip all the time. The sidewalks are pure ice! They sometimes put down little stones but it doesn't really help. I guess that's why I never see anyone over 50 walking outside- it's too dangerous. The roads too get caked with snow and frosted with ice (do you like the cake and frosting reference?) At the end of the walk to Micheals my shins, calves and entire legs were exhausted like I'd been ice skating for hours. Anyway, do you know where I'm going with this? I have been shocked and appalled by this and kept wondering if Albertans are too poor to afford salt or too lazy to put it down or what. Thankfully my roommate, also a displaced Toronto girl, explained that salt doesn't work here because it's too cold (if you're thinking I'm an idiot for not realizing myself, understand that I am the kind of person to be thankful things work the way they do and not ask too many questions).

Anyway, that's one of the reasons I moved out here... to learn about western Canada. I've also discovered it's too cold for maple trees so the fall colours are mostly just yellow. And they don't have rats in the underground train station. This puzzled me for a while, although, as I said, I don't like to ask too many questions, I'm just happy to be in such a rodent and insect free city (they also only have two kinds of birds, which is kind of freaky. I've only ever seen pigeons and black billed magpies:) Anyway, back to the rats. Do you know the story? Rats only ever made it to the border of Alberta in 1950! And Albertans didn't want rats so they set up a border patrol, still in operation today consisting of eight employees, 600 x 70 kilometres and a whole lot of rat poison. So there are really no rats in Edmonton.

Well, it's bedtime due to an important statistics midterm tomorrow night. Therefore you will just have to wait for the Friday night through Sunday portion of my weekend review.