I just did a terrible thing..

I'm having a little trouble sleeping these days. I have too many thoughts and not enough sedatives. I barely even drink any more so I can't even kill off a few brain cells and pass out on the pillow. As if this isn't tragic enough a scenario for some reason I decided to punish myself even further by going on my old hotmail account. Luckily it isn't my oldest hotmail account which got a virus and I forgot the password for many eons ago, but my hotmail account which I got towards the end of 2006 when I was about 15 I guess. Realising that I was 15 at the time has only made situation even more distressing. Up until this moment I had convinced myself that I could have only been 12/13, but deep down I knew that was impossible because I was getting emails from people in Luxembourg - well I say emails, I mean regular chain mail insisting that I forward it to 30 people so that my true love would kiss me at midnight...but from looking at some of my older emails I find it hard to believe that I've become someone that anybody would want to kiss..or even be around.

I guess this is the double-edged sword of technology. On the plus side it helps you organise your life and keeps a record of your past..and on the negative side it keeps a record of your past and all the stuff that you thought was cool at the time. A few of my chosen words/phrases that stood out were:

"crazified"
"Hi! This is another Katey Updatey!"
"relllllli funny! lolololol!"

and about a thousand more no doubt, but after a page or two I had to stop looking.

It has made me perhaps wonder if at the end of the year if I should keep this blog or not, because I have a horrible feeling that in 5 years time I'll be looking back on this with the same level of disdain and wondering why I use swings and roundabouts in every other post whether it is relevant or not. Or even more worryingly maybe I will be exactly like I am now and still think that the things I say are acceptable and I will end up sad and alone cuddling cats.

mmmm cats are fun.

The inevitable nervous breakdown draws closer...

Well look at me back on the blog a few days after a post as if it the most natural thing in the world. I figure is rapidly running out I should probably try harder to keep up with the documenting...although there have been pretty much no documentable events in my life as of late. One of the things that has been keeping me amped up this week is that on Friday (TOMORROW) I am going to buy a bag of crisps. When I'm at home in Luxembourg Friday is a day to be excited for - everyone is out and the buses run til 3.30 am..but in Canada it's all about the crisps. I don't even eat crisps that often here, but it is good to focus on something. It did get slightly worrying when Jess and I would use a bag of crisps as a monetary unit i.e "It cost 20 dollars! That's like 4 bags of crisps". Yes. Crisps are expensive. Canada is expensive. One of the first things I need to do when I come home is to do the Pound Shop Spree - Poundland, Poundstretcher, Mighty Pound - all the classics. Not long to go though. Yesterday us Brits received our ceremonial "You are leaving Canada" Canadian flag. It made it all hit home. Also I say 'us Brits'. Will didn't get one, but really it serves him right for integrating into the Canadian community and doing something with his time in Canada. When Simon and Becca left they had their Canadian flags signed, but I don't know if that will happen. A part of me likes it just the way it is and I figure that probably if I hung it on my door here that it would probably take about 3 minutes before someone had ripped it down in a drunken frenzy. I know things seem more exhilarating  when you are intoxicated but still..ripping stuff off doors and walls just doesn't do anything for me. 

Oh. I just remembered another reason for me to gain some cool points. Earlier today I received an email from my Drama teacher to say that Monday's three hour class is cancelled meaning that on Monday I am free til 6pm and my reaction was "Yes! I get extra time to work in the library!" This is a tragic state of affairs. Once again when I return to England I hope that when I can actually afford things and I have BBC3 and Charles's trampoline under my feet that I will return to life and stop being such a pleb. Right now I feel like I have a hideous amount of stuff to do. On my Word at the moment I have 3 documents open all for different assignments. One on existentialism, one on the American Dream and one on The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Having so much to do at one time is probably going to make my head explode so I figure the best thing to do is be irrational and try to do it all at once and fail all my courses because I have overstressed myself unnecessarily. But I suppose if I was a rational human being then I wouldn't be me. Although probably if I wasn't me people would think more of me and we would laugh at the moronic girl who lives in her room and who coined the term "Crisp Friday" like a fool.

Anyway I'm going to go play mahjong titans and set various alarms for the day to come. I think I've rambled enough. Just as I thought - as I have started blogging again the number of views I have been getting has severely declined. When I wasn't posting I had 100 a day, now that I have posted it is about 5 a day and 3 are probably me. 

I will try to leave in a slightly more exciting way to bring back those who have lost faith in me by sharing a quote from my renaissance teacher without giving the context so that in a few years I can look back and try to work out what an earth could have provoked this and hope that nobody says this after having read my blog

"It's worse than a gang rape I would imagine"

Goodnight. 

Ooops.

Maybe should have been listening a little bit harder in French and the test would have been less painful, but you live and learn. And perhaps if Sarte was a little less of a pain in the arse to read I would have remembered the reason why they attacked the man in the street. I'm an innocent victim of the self-important ramblings of the existential movement.

This is a reminder of when Canada was colourful and fun. 

7 weeks until home time. Prepare the monkeys. 

You don't have to be crazy to work here but it doesn't help.

As I sit in my French class for one of the final FIVE French classes of the year (THANK YOU GOD) and we talk about whether a bottle is a bottle or it is just playing the role of a bottle my thoughts since then have turned towards insanity and along the same vein they have turned towards the cafeteria.

Carleton University is home to Canada's second best cafeteria or so is the word on the street. I think it also has Canada's best university basketball team but I have seen a lot more Cafeteria propaganda than Basketball. If I was one of the best uni basketball players in Canada I would be slightly disheartened if I told someone I was at Carleton and they asked me if that was the school with the nationally acclaimed cafeteria. Luckily the Basketball team said I was too talented to join so I have never had to be in this situation.

Anyway, as I was saying....Carleton's caff is allegedly among the best. The food itself has a reasonable variety to it, although after a while it all tastes a bit the same which is why I occasionally go off on a vegan binge because the vegan section is one of the few sections where they use seasoning. Either way, the food isn't the real reason to enjoy the cafeteria. It is the colourful nature of the workers there and as everyone knows "colourful" is another way of saying strange, odd etc. without sounding too rude...but really...there are some characters.

One of the things I will miss about Carleton will be laughing whimsically on a cold, dark spring afternoon with Jessica and Alyson... imagining what lives they must lead when they are not wheeling plates from station to station or having conversations with the air. It is really great that even when the rest of society has rejected them Carleton has accepted them with open arms.

A few that will be in my memory long after I have left this place (in 7 weeks and a day might I add!)

Monique, who left after term one but whose face of sadness and despair was topped by a santa hat during the festive season regardless of her clear lack of christmas cheer.
The girl whose name I can't remember,  who died her hair blonde and fooled us all temporarily into thinking she was a whole new person, but no she was the same disinterested card swiping drone.
Jean, who despite people's attempt not to make eye contact with her has never stopped trying to strike up a conversation or to begin a jig and damn the consequences.
OCD cup man, who regardless of social etiquette lords over you if you fail to put the cup in the correct place in the tray.
OCD meat man, who cuts meats so slowly and lovingly that when you finally get it it feels like it has been seasoned with love.
Pasta Man, who is abusive to other cafeteria workers and to students because he is an unspecialised cafeteria worker and we are mere plebeians who will never reach to his intellectual heights.

And last but not least...
Cathy who we have seen move from "Cathy in training" to simply "Cathy".  Despite the perilous challenges faced by cafeteria workers on a daily basis she has never let it crush her spirit and she became a fully established card swiper and hasn't looked back since.

I know that it will soon be time to bid adieu to this fair land, but I know that there are some things and people that are now a part of my very being and I will carry them with me no matter the distance between us..

"These fragments I have shored against my ruins"

 The Wasteland by T.S. Eliot

Katharine. 

Oh and.

I hope all my readers in the Philippines are enjoying this.

This one is for you as you seem to enjoy irrelevant things such as my blog:

Distance makes the heart grow fonder.

According to google stats over 100 people have viewed my blog today. Not posting anything has really seemed to have done wonders for my blog's statistics. I don't really care too much how many people read this stuff anyway. It is more for me so that I have a means of reminding myself of my year abroad, although most of what I post is exaggerated and unfair but that's me in a nutshell so potatah.

Speaking of my year abroad I recently received an email from the scholarship people saying that I still haven't sent them a picture and a statement about the joys of doing a year abroad. I keep meaning to do it but I'm discovering it more challenging than I at first expected. I am having a nice year, but it is in my nature to find it difficult to be overly enthused about anything. I'm not an unhappy person, but I do tend to look at things with a somewhat critical eye. I despised writing my personal statement. My original draft read something like this: "I would like to study English Literature at university because I think I will enjoy it and that I am good at English. There will probably be lots of other people who are good at English too, but I will try my hardest even though I might not be best. I'll understand though if you don't accept me because I'm sure the other applicants are very talented. Looking forward to reading your letter of refusal in the near future. Kate" This isn't what I submitted, but I feel I have lived up to what I wrote. Oh well. Worst comes to worst I'll just eat a bag of sugar and spew some crap about how studying abroad has helped me not only find out more about other cultures, but has helped me find out more about myself. Then I'll just roll around in the money they gave me....oh wait...no. I spent it all on zoos and chocolate oranges.

Yes. It has been a busy time - hence my absence from the world of blog. Well that is a bit of a lie. I have had plenty of time to write as my body seems incapable of sleeping before 2am and my mind seems incapable of doing any work past 9pm but somehow I have still managed to convince myself that I don't have time to write anything on here. As the introduction to my Children's Literature essay currently stands at six words..which probably need changing..and is refusing to write itself I figured it was about time to write on here.

The first half of this term went in the blink of an eye and even though I feel like I was working an awful lot of the time..right now I feel I have nothing to show for it apart from decent grades. Life is hard. It does feel a lot harder to fit things in (that's what she said) this term though as I have had to bid adieu to my Thursday free day and I am taking 1 more class than I did last term. One class is 3 hours a week, but it feels like a little bit of my soul has died. Here is a brief run down of this terms selection:

Children's Literature : We read The Silver Chair from the Narnia series so I feel pretty content at this point. The essay will most likely be fluffed but at least I've got denial. A couple of things have irritated me in this class...I know I know..me being irritated. How refreshing.
1. Group work. I don't mind it that much..apart from the fact that I have to come out of the English closet and watch people try to work out if they should react to my swoon worthy accent. Lies. But in the most recent group work where we had to answer questions from the book I was in a group of googlers. They thought I was the crazy one for having read the book. I thought if I heard the word "audiobook" one more time I was going to put a gun to my head. Towards the beginning of the year I had wondered why nobody seemed as stressed as I did about the workload. Apparently I was the only one foolish enough to do it. But now I feel my subconscious has been tainted as it has forbade me to get any work done and has turned me into a zombie. Excellent
2. Harry Potter - Studying this book was fine, but I had a few issues with my prof. who was talking about how British children react to the reading of the book. There were a couple of points where I was raising my eyebrows, but I think my eyebrow went highest when she said that we associate Harry with Prince Harry. No. When I was 11 I associated wizards with wizards. 11 year olds are not avidly looking for subtexts on the monarchy and criticisms of the class systems. There are frogs made out of chocolate that move!

Renaissance - The definition of a curveball class. Got in there expecting to be greeted by Shakespeare, but instead I was bombarded with the likes of Strapparola, Basile et D'Aulnoy. I bet you are sitting there going "Ah all the classics"..because I think that is what our professor expected. Alas no. I am no expert on 17th Century Folklorists and I fear I never will. I enjoy my degree, but sometimes when we are debating the moral implications of a Tuna fish impregnating a Princess I do have to slightly question it. I think if my professor wasn't as...unique...as he is I would have been whipped up into a coma by this point. I can't tell you anything about Folklore but I can tell you that my prof.
1. Likes spunky girls.
2. Doesn't agree with beating children...but a slight tap lets them know who is boss.
It's enlightening.

French Literature - Attendance is at an all time low. Last class there was maybe 15 people out of 45 left at the end...but really if you are going to assign a text where the protagonist is questioning the character of a bottle , you have to expect it really. Dommage.

American Literature II - It isn't colonisation or slave narratives. That's all I need in a course.

Drama - I got an A plus in it last term. I realise this won't happen this term as I have fallen into an academic ditch, but hopefully it will still bump up my marks a little bit before the inevitable failure that shall be my dissertation next year.

Next year seems ridiculously soon I might add. Picking modules for Exeter next year is really reminding me how soon this year abroad is going to end. It is kind of weird, but mostly I am looking forward to having baths and double beds on demand. I think I'm too old and decrepit for university accommodation these days.

I did have a brief flirtation with double beds and  (Whirlpool!)baths over reading week though and it was amazing. I should probably also mention that I was sharing them with Charles, but nobody really wants to read all the love stuff. What people want to read about is penguins.  

After showing Charles bulk barn  the sights of Ottawa we took a trip to New York via Montreal. Montreal was nice. It felt a lot more European than Ottawa and I kind of liked that. It was a touch of home with a beaver or two thrown in for good measure. On the second day we went to the biodome for said beavers, as apparently beavers don't just roam the streets as I had first thought. I have to say they changed my life. It also made me think that the Eden Project needs to get together. I mean the Eden Project is ok but I couldn't help but think that maybe a monkey or two might spruce the place up a bit and then maybe people's favourite attraction wouldn't be the emergency cold room in the rainforest dome. Montreal Biodome on the other hand had everything a 20 year old girl needed to forget education for a while - beavers, penguins and a MEAT spaghetti bolognese (yeah...I'm looking at you again Eden Project. Meat isn't THAT bad).

We then left my our luxury bathtub behind and hit up New York after a 9 hour bus ride including an hour stop at Albany bus station where we stared dreamily into each other's eyes over an array of chicken strips and reece's peanut butter cups. Part of me wished we could stay there forever. A much larger part of me thought it was uninspiring and so we decided not to leave our possessions on the bus and make a life for ourselves in the bus station and we continued to New York. Our hostel was nice..not perfect..but nice. The room smelled somewhat like rotting carcass, but it had a fully equipped kitchen so....swings and roundabouts I suppose. New York was really good. As we'd both been there before we didn't feel so obliged to stick to an itinerary so it was pleasant to be able to walk around and take things in. Although the giant screen showing the american flag in LED lights was a bit much and made me feel a little nauseous. A trip to M&Ms world sorted that out though. We did do nice things there though : we went to a restaurant where the waiters sang show tunes as they served you, we went to Central Park zoo and I fell in love with Red Pandas, we went to the Museum of Modern art where there was an exhibit which was simply a room full of sweets and we went to see Porgy and Bess where I found myself sitting next to an odious woman who complained the whole time and failed to deliver when she said she was going to go home at the interval.

If you want to see more of my wild adventure....or if you need a reason to procrastinate here is it in video...although it is mainly animals, but animals are far superior to humans so it's all good. Also I had a fairly limited choice of music as I only have about 4 songs on my computer...if you are wondering why these are the songs on my computer then I have no idea why you would think I had better taste than this. I have filled my room with owls and children's toys - I have no shame.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10150665351719441

Anyway, that is my life thus far in term one. I feel like there must have been some more events that happened, but they have been pushed the back of my subconscious not be found until the time is right.

It is nearly 9pm so it is time for 40 more minutes of procrastination before I can finally declare this weekend begun. Library floor 3 - I'm coming for you.

Gus says goodbye. 

This might be overtly Nietzschen but..

Wow. I am crap at this blog stuff. I am so crap that when I typed my blog into my search bar it didn't recognise it and if I can't be bothered to look at it I can't see why anyone else would. Although this doesn't seem to the case. Against all odds I seem to be getting more views the less I post - possibly because people find my silence quite endearing. I have been told in the last week that I talk too much, that I'm a dick and that nobody likes me and this was all by friends, so I dread to think what the rest of society has to say about me.

For all that crap up there, I shouldn't be writing this blog right now. I should be reading "Breve relation du Voyage de la Nouvelle-France" which in my imagination is not quite as "breve" as I would have liked. I thought it was going to get exciting when their were storms which froze their hands, but then that bastard God decided to save them and let them get to the New World and since then it has just been prayer and partridge hunting. I like my French teacher and I feel bad that most of the class don't come or duck out half way through, but he really isn't doing himself any favours by picking texts which are so boring that I am having to drink 'Hard Lemonade' to get me through - also because I am generally just hard. I just decided to take a well deserved break though to take out the rubbish. People who think that my life in Canada is dull and unexciting have clearly never felt the joy of the garbage chute. You open it; the rubbish goes in and then..where does it go? Who knows! It is the joy of mystery enveloped in the smell of orange peel and salt and pepper crisps.

---------

I just found this. Started from about 3 weeks ago and then abandoned because of some distraction or another. I am even more terrible at this blog stuff than I was 3 weeks ago. I will write something of value in the next day or so because even though I have a lot of work to do.