Me, me, me

The nature of things



The other night there was a spider on the wall above my head while I was sitting with D. on the couch. We started to wonder about the term Arachnid, and whether it was the Species, the Genus or the Class or what (in the Aristotelian scheme). So, without an encyclopedia and being too lazy to get up and go to the computer, I got out the dictionary and one word led to another and I learned that Arachnid is the class (which includes scorpions, daddy long legs and mites and ticks), Arthropod is the Phyllum and it includes arachnids and insects and (my suspicions about lobsters were correct!) crustaceans. Also myriapods. Myriapods are many-legged creatures like millipedes and centipedes. The dictionary search went on from there, one word leading to the next. All this is probably old knowledge to anyone who took Biology in school, but for someone like me, someone whose parents advised her to to go into the vocational program and "take typing", this was all so interesting and cleared up some of the fuzzier areas of my knowledge about our multi-legged friends.


Don't you love dictionaries? And to think, we were wondering what we'd do with our evenings now that our favourite shows are in repeats. We's gonna do us some learnin'! I once heard that hippos are related to whales; I wonder how... And are sea cucumbers related to centipedes? I'm so glad I don't eat sea creatures.

May

Well, the big rush of May celebrations is over now. We had my little one's 3rd birthday (with party), Mother's Day (with illness), my birthday (nice!), and D's and my wedding anniversary (we had to be reminded of this by our daughter, but when we remembered we went out to dinner -- alone! -- to our favourite Indian place. Excellent.) The beautiful weather has returned and I've been enjoying sipping coffee and reading out on the deck. How did we live without a deck?

The season finale of Heroes was sooo good. I did not see the solution to the nuclear man scenario coming. My belief in Nathan was justified. What a sad ending -- so Iron Giant-like! (If you haven't seen The Iron Giant you should.) The only false note was the cheerleader's response (or lack of same) to the death of her beloved uncle and her newly-discovered biological father. Some weeping and rending of garments would have been a more appropriate response than the "Oh well. What should we do now?" that they gave us. The hints dropped about Volume Two were tantalizing. Sweet!

The wages of sin

I've been suitably punished for my earlier happiness about finishing up my contract. Niggling work-related loose ends have eaten up a lot of my free time of late, while I got a load of writing work from my other employer. Unfortunately, on Friday I was hit full-force with a repeat of the illness I had exactly one month ago and couldn't get out of bed until Sunday afternoon. My writing work had to be given back to the team with my apologies (written for me by my hubby, as I couldn't get out of bed).

Mother's day was not as wonderful as it would have been if I hadn't been sick, but I was at least able to enjoy a little family gathering on my bed, with beautiful artwork by my children, including a gogeous painting by my son and a pop-up card by my older daughter and a card with a drawing of the whole family done by my little girl (She's just started drawing people, and we're all pretty thrilled, especially her). I also scored a new and very elaborate wallet from D., who hates the fact that I always have a piece-of-shit wallet that's falling apart and dropping my change all over the supermarket floor. (I, on the other hand, think that this is part of my irresistible charm.) Like my daughter said, it's a Mother's Day I'll remember, for good reasons as well as bad.

Only 4 Shopping Days Left!!!


Your Birthdate: May 18

You are a cohesive force - able to bring many people together for a common cause. You tend to excel in work situations, but you also facilitate a lot of social gatherings too. Beyond being a good leader, you are good at inspiring others. You also keep your powerful emotions in check - you know when to emote and when to repress.

Your strength: Emotional maturity beyond your years
Your weakness: Wearing yourself down with too many responsibilities
Your power color: Crimson red
Your power symbol: Snowflake
Your power month: September

What does your birth date mean?

via Maggie


S'funny. I mostly think this kind of thing is bullshit, but having just suffered through the worst illness of my life -- twice in one month! -- after a grueling work schedule, I'm inclined to agree with just about all of this stuff.

I do feel powerful in red (but who doesn't?). September is definitely the month when I accomplish the most and start new things, but I always thought that was because of that old "back to school" feeling. It's kind of funny to say that my weakness is that I wear myself down with too many responsibilities. It's like the standard (lame) answer to the job interview question, "What's your greatest weakness?" "I just work too hard. I'm a perfectionist!" I actually think I'm really very lazy. Then when I do work hard I get sick. I do have a lot of responsibilities, though. Most of the time I think I really suck at handling them, however. Maybe my weakness is that I prefer to believe bad things about myself than good things? Oh yeah, and I'm learning to repress, but that still needs some work. Emoting is just so much more fun, y'know?

And, Snowflake?

Mmmmm

I am so totally revelling in this time, the time after a huge project is done, when you're thanking people and they're thanking you and congratulating you, and everybody's satisfied. Y'know? What makes it sooo much better is the fact that I am done with work for the time being, and get to spend my time with my various children and hubby and friends and enjoy the long, delicious streeetch of Spring unfolding itself into a green world of birdsong.

I'm smiling right now. Can you tell?

Picking up where I left off

Oh dear. where to start? My life has exploded in a minor, temporary way in the last 2 weeks. Illness knocked me down, work got me up and threw me around for many many hours of every day, my daughter's illness spun us all around and around. Thank god for friends, sisters and good, patient husbands.

Things have calmed now: I'm well, the literary festival is over, and my daughter is finally -- after 2 and a half weeks! -- on antibiotics and responding well. We found that she is allergic to penicillin, and we didn't find out in a horrible terrifying way, so that's positive. Useful information to have about one's offspring.

The literary series that I worked on was a great success. Here is a list of just some of the things that happened during those five days of literary overload:

-- I got to work with a CBC Uber-producer and learned a lot from her. I also thought she was funny and sexy and fun to work with. Couldn't ask for better, really.

-- Our sound technician was new to the festival this year and he was great. Calm and efficient and professional and good-humoured. Important when you're spending 14-hour days side-by-side.

--I met Ed of Blork fame. Recognized him from his photo and introduced myself. It's weird to feel as though you know someone from reading their blog and then realize that they had no idea that you even exist.

--Fell in love (well, lust) with a Scottish-Pakistani writer named Suhayl Saadi. I was so happy to have him in our series and his interview was fascinating. We asked him to come and have a drink with us after out last event but he never showed up. Probably a good thing, since I was pretty tipsy and would have made an ass of myself. Man, was he sexy! He's also a doctor. Me love he.

--Talked a little bit to Margaret Atwood (!!!). I didn't think I'd be as impressed with her as I was. You feel her awesome intelligence, but you also feel what a normal, kind, giving person she is. She's so much tinier in person than she is in her writing. She had some time to kill before an event and said that she was going to go and get a coffee, then she turned to me and said "Do you want to come and get a coffee?" My face nearly fell off. I had to say no thank you, though. Then, when she was going away to get her coffee (with the Uber-Producer instead of me) I told her that she couldn't be too long, because we had to start soon. Then I burst out "Look at me! I'm bossing Margaret Atwood around!" She smiled in what I hope was a benevolent way.

--Michael Ondaatje is extremely impressive in real life. He's tall and white-haired and his voice is so beautiful that when he reads his gorgeous, gorgeous words the sound is like a warm wave washing over you. Our technician, who is a unilingual francophone and doesn't know Michael Ondaatje from the janitor, said after the reading that it was like being at Mass. You could have heard a pin drop in a room that was filled with more than 300 people.

--My sister A. came to some events and seeing her there made me feel so good, so normal, and reminded me that life was continuing outside the festival and would continue for me after the festival. She also brought me lunch which, as my friend said at the time, confirms that she is the "Best sister, EVER!"

-- After the last event in our series I drank more glasses of wine than was strictly necessary and my husband and kids came to pick me up. We took the glass elevator to the top of the hotel and went to check out the revolving restaurant. It was so cool! The kids were so excited and I was so tipsy and so relieved and happy that I felt like I was floating. We want to go back and eat in that restaurant. I know a revolving restaurant is old hat now, but we thought it was incredibly cool.

--I want more wine.