New office!

2 days before advisory committee meeting, someone decided without notice that all the grad students were to move to a new room. My first annoyment obviously immediately moved into happy procrastination as I moved all my stuff, and threw away lots of the garbage that I totally had no need for, and installing myself into a corner by the windows in the ex-4th year lab. It's interesting how a new location can trigger lots of inspiration! All of a sudden yesterday's anguish was gone (there's still some anguish left due to the meeting of course, but at least it's not the mega-"whatamIthinkingdoingaPhD-Iamstupid"-anguish).

That's it for today. I have a talk to prepare. ugh.

Culture clash again

Grr! (hm. it seems like this forum of mine has been some kind of vent for occasional frustration, making it look like I'm constantly annoyed. However, I pretty much only write here when I vent, so the frequency of my writing should be a good sign.. ;)

Anyways, today I really have no reason to be annoyed at all. It's 26 degrees warm outside, beautifully sunny, tomorrow we expect a high of 31 (SWEET), and I'm even inspired writing on a paper (how often does THAT happen?). But, the grad student office I'm sitting in is pretty much unbearable. The reason is that the AC is broken, so the air is totally non-moving, about 30 degrees warm, and it feels like the oxygen is disappearing. Now, had I been in a civilized country (most of the world except for northamerica, according the standards I'm about to present), I would simply have opened 2 windows in opposite directions and created a draught. Simple. Who needs AC really (and I actually totally detest AC, since it makes tha air dry and artificial, and usually way too cold). Now, do you think this kind of window (openable) exists in a building on this continent? right. So the effect is that, I'm slowly suffocating, thinking back on the hottest day we had at the observatory in sweden, when it was 30+ degrees. The air was flowing through the building, making cosy ruffling noises through the piles of paper. Of course, I'd sit there, nicely cooled down after the lunch-time dip in the ocean, but that's besides the point. The observatory didn't have an AC, simply because it wasn't needed. And I don't see why it is needed in Winnipeg either. Grr.

It's not only the window situation that makes northamerica uncivilized. Banking too. Who uses checks these days? I have to pay my rent with checks...!!! How do you transfer money to Sweden without getting ripped off? won't happen. According to my swedish bank, it's only Canada, US, Australia, UK. So much for british conservatism (ha, yeah, it's not only northamerica that ends up on my private axis of evil) that takes out horrendous fees for doing simple money transfers. I ended up sending a cheaper so called "money order", but that was so ancient, so instead the swedish bank had to take out a fee to handle it.

Would I like some cheese with my whine? :) (well not american cheese for sure) So why do you live there then, you donkey, you might ask. Well, priorities, right. And no, everything is not good about Sweden either. Just one example: People who sell you stuff, they must meet really nasty customers all the time. Last time I bought stuff (train tickets, groceries etc), both in Sweden and Holland, I felt like I was imposing on the sellers valuable time, I was a bug not worthy of a smile or even look. That felt weird after all the awesome conversations I end up having with all the sellers of stuff (there's got to be a word for that, but it's too hot for my brain to function right now) I meet in Canada.

Blablabla. there's no point to this rant, that's for sure. I wonder if I can find a place in my life, where all the best parts from all the countries I've visited are brought together. Perhaps that is found by the attitude with which I meet rather unimportant details of specific nations...

Unopenable windows are NOT unimportant details though. It's just plain dumb. Grr. (although, I'll admit that it's nicer to have the heat indoors than the cold).

old, but not old enough (yet)?

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!! I just pulled a silvery white (almost pretty, if not thinking of everything connected to it) hair from my head. It might be my old mutation though, it was superthick and totally different from other strands of hair, but STILL. So, all the signs of age hit me like an anvil falling down from the ceiling onto my approximate location in the chair. Not pretty. My only consolation is this: I went to Il Divo for free (NO, that is not the consolation!). They sang at the MTS centre in Winnipeg last Monday and my very good friend J, her little inhabitant in its large swimming pool (she's very pregnant) and I got tickets for free from some friends who couldn't go (well, the baby came in for free). I had barely heard this group, even though I have a bunch of friends who are really into them. And how much I didn't understand until afterwards... but that's another story. Anyways, so I was quite excited to visit the MTS centre, since I'd never been there, and was prepared to meet a whole bunch of cheese. It started very nicely with an awesome pianist, and then i divas came on stage, and the centre immediately transformed into a giant cheese fondue, and most people there were VERY open to every kind of cheese that was served (while I'm a bit more picky about my cheese) I kind of got used to the style though, after gulping down an enormous portion of american cheddar (the inoculation?), and surviving. Now and then, a little piece of excellent gruyere or scottish glenphilly cheddar was noticed, among the songs that to my knowledge not were covers of original cheese productions (celine dion, mariah carey, etc etc) (?), but it was often pretty soon drowned in the major divo of the quartett, who seemed to enjoy setting his intestines in resonance, and whose inbetween-songs-chatting was rather excessively.... well, I wouldn't want to overuse the expression here, but I guess "cheesy" is the most accurate adjective. And hereby I'm also able to deliver my own piece of Edam or Gouda (keeping with the theme, nationality of said cheeses of course totally intentional) - being in love is probably a prerequisite for enjoying much of the music, and I did enjoy some of the lyrics rather well. It's like cheesy poetry.. all of a sudden you don't go "EWWW" anymore, but your pupils turn heartshaped and pink, and you need a good friend to hit you on the head before you become unbearable as company. Anyways. I met one of those we got the tickets from a few days ago, a very wonderful lady, who wondered how we had enjoyed the concert. Might be one of the occasions when one gracefully keeps the totally honest sentiments to oneself, and expresses gratitude for the experience. Which I did, and the gratitude was totally honest, because it was a superfun experience, and I loved being able to spend some time with J (luckily she had the exact same opinion as myself, which made it all so much more enjoyable).

Back to the topic though. Looking at average age of audience at the concert, perhaps I'm not as old as my silvery strand of hair implies. It's gone btw. I.e. not attached to head. Instead I attached it to the wall. It's probably a vain attempt into making me more serious about time passing and work needing to be done.

ear and throat pain

My throat hurts. And my left ear. I wonder if that is bad. It seems to be residue from the flu I had 3 weeks ago. D and I bought tickets for Sweden in August a few days ago :) And today it was 18 degrees. About time!

I was leading a choir practice today. Not as nervous as last time a few year ago... I seem to like to be in the dictator position. Scary. At least the population of my choir seemed to be happy. And on saturday I played chamber music (Bach and Mozart) in a quartett with a violin, viola and cello. Amazingly fun. Tomorrow is monday, and I have to finish off grading the last lab reports. And a thousand over things. Argh. Also going to see Il Divo with Jessica, she had an extra ticket. That could be fun.

Gggg

I don't seem to have anything to write lately. Waiting for spring, still, and it seems to be here, now and then. Got a cold, and felt like garbage today so stayed home despite lots to work on. Slept, worked, saw a stargate episode, and redid the cycle. Twice or so, but in the afternoon I got an amazing migraine, so that was the end of that day. Yodeloo. I think I have to go and see this film btw.