Friday, October 28, 2011

Lady GaGa

Some women choose to follow men and some women choose to follow their dreams. If you’re wondering which way to go, remember that your career will never wake up and tell you that it doesn’t love you anymore.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 19

A song from your favourite album:




Kid A is my favourite album. Everything else pales in comparison.

Saturday, June 4, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 18

A song that you wish you heard on the radio:



A good remix... what can i say? i'm addicted.

you haunt me now, like you haunted me then

the problem with living a public life is sometimes there are things that you want to say, but you can't so you won't.

today i learned how to fix various things on my bike. i learned how to tell when to replace my breaks, how to tell when my wheel is out of tune, how to fix a derailleur, how to take care of a chain, how to patch a tire, replace a tire, adjust breaks, and much more. i think that my bike is in better shape as a result. i do however, need to replace my break pads (or at the very least i need to sand them down. i learned some of the dos and don'ts of bike maintenance, and i feel better as a result.

note to everyone: WD-40 is not good for your bike, not good!

Friday, June 3, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 17

a song that you often hear on the radio:



pretty frequently actually.

graffiti sex

i'm in love with this song. the best part about being in love with a song is the lack of ambiguity. really this is true of any relationship with an inanimate or abstract thing - you always know where you stand with relation to it. i love this song, and it will *never* love me back; an unrequited relationship that is simple to come to terms with.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Monday, May 30, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 14

A song that no one would expect you to love:



unless you knew me before 2005, you probably did not know that i'm actually a pretty huge fan of screamo.

Saturday, May 28, 2011

what have i gotten myself into?

well... i'm not sure.

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 12

A song from a band you hate:



Perhaps the only song of theirs that i find tolerable (since it appeared on one of the Big Shiny Tunes albums).

Friday, May 27, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 11

A song by your favourite band:



the best, just, the best.

I said "don't you turn around, wouldn't like what you found out here anyhow..."

Sometimes it's hard to remember that not everyone is the same, and that you can't always find the solution to other people's problems. I think that perhaps the worst is knowing that there is a good chance that there is nothing you can do to make someone happy, because it's not the world that's getting them down, but it's a problem that originates within them (seriously, there is nothing I can personally do about chemical imbalances). It's just rough; it's hard to watch a friend smile, and know that it's only a fleeting sense of happiness.

Thursday, May 26, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 10

A song that makes you fall asleep:



I could easily let myself be lulled to sleep by this song.

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 8

A song that you know all of the words to:



I'm pretty much the worst at remembering lyrics. The only reason why I remember all of the lyrics of this song, is because it has very few lyrics.

Monday, May 23, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 7

A song that reminds you of a certain event:



This song played at my friend Jessica's funeral. It was the first funeral I've ever attended for a friend. It still makes me sad to listen to this song.

Sunday, May 22, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 6

A song that reminds you of somewhere:



i can't make it through this song without feeling my heart break for nyc. if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.

Saturday, May 21, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 5

A song that reminds me of someone:



this song makes me think of peter. he introduced me to matt & kim, and did so just as we were about to move to nyc. i miss nyc.

Friday, May 20, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 4

A song that makes me sad:



I don't think I can make it to the end of this song without wanting to cry.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 3

A song that makes me happy:




This song has been one of my favourite songs since I was 17. Just hearing them play this song is enough to get me through some of the worst parts of life. It's perfect for me.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 2

My least favourite song:



I used to skip this song on Big Shiny Tunes 2 all the time.

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

30 Day Song Challenge - Day 1

My favourite song:




It was the first to come to mind, though so did many others. The memory attached to this song is not my favourite, but that does not change my love for it.

Friday, May 13, 2011

for the 5 year journal

Wednesday:
Red Sox vs Blue Jays at the Sky Dome. Missed the first pitch by Colby Armstrong (of the Leafs) due to my bus breaking down in Guelph. Sneaky Dee's nachos to follow.

Thursday:
Burrito from my big fat burrito! Bought eco-friendly supplies from Body shop using groupon. Red room for dinner, and then saw Ilan in My Fair Lady with Sarene.

Friday:
Lunch and froyo with Em, then fixed up Pi's old bike. Biked around the 'hood for a bit. Off to kensington to pick up supplies for the indoor picnic with Sarene. Bought more herbs. Ran into Ed on the way back.

Friday, April 29, 2011

Sending April off with a bang!

April has been an otherwise annoying month. Thankfully the end of April is beginning to turn itself around (which still brings high hopes for May, which has some exciting things planned in it). I look forward to seeing what the future has in store.

I'm currently editing a paper in my office. I tidied my desk early (both a form of procrastination, and for my sanity). The paper is significantly better than the previous versions, and I think that that ought to be true, since it was first written by Josh in his second year, long before he had really gotten into his research. Now as a fourth year it seems to be a much more together and focused paper. I'm proud of it.

I got a goldfish plant for the office. Meghan said that she liked it. I really like it, it brings a bit of life to the office, and will make me feel less depressed while working here in the summer. I also brought in a butterfly chair. Granted, it's not as nice as JD's new office chair, it's a real improvement on the current sitting situation in the office. Maybe sometime over the summer I can replace my desk lamp.

Since my last post a lot has actually happened. Some of the highlights include: meeting Jorge Cham of PhD comics, sitting through the first GASP meeting of 2011-2012, booking the first stage of my trip to Colorado, permanently changing my appearance, and spending more time with my fellow classmates (no sign of desirable number one, but i'm pretty sure that that is destined to go nowhere, so i'm glad to at least be seeing more of the others). Sana and I started talking again and I'm glad.

Anyways, back to listening to Parachutes (Coldplay) and editing!

Saturday, April 23, 2011

March 2004

Since it was quite so depressing to start at the beginning of my blue journal, I decided that it would be better to start at the end. The book ends on April 2, 2004 (near the end of my grade 11 year). I found a page where I asked a series of questions, and a friend took it upon herself to answer them (her answers are short, and vague).

  1. How can you understand death?
  2. How would you know if your time has come?
  3. What if tomorrow never comes?
  4. Is anything a coincidence?
  5. What can you do?
  6. How would you feel in you knew that for you 1:51 will never come?
  7. What can you say?
  8. Is there a reason behind everything?
  9. Does fate exist?
  10. What does God have to do with it?
  11. Does romance exist?
I think that this fell at a time where I believed that love was about as real as god, fate, and Santa Claus. If you can't see it, if you can't test it, then who is to say that it exists?

brief updates

because twitter limits my updates, i'm using this page as a makeshift twitter account...

since all my plans got cancelled, i went for coffee with niya instead, and became less focused on this paper. i'm just downloading "game of thrones" so that i can watch it again (maybe i'll understand more if i can actually focus on it, instead of having to watch out for my grandparents as well). i figure that since i have pretty much 75% of my paper done, that it is time to have a little more fun. this time tomorrow night this is all going to be over... sigh.

i started reading my old journal, and thus far have learned 2 things about past me:
  1. my writing was slightly loopier, less consistent, angled funny, and in my opinion just plain bad. sure my current writing has its imperfections (sometimes i write "e"s on the end of words without "e"s, and make my "n"s look like "m"s and so forth), but it is pretty tidy.
  2. i was pretty depressed, or at the very least reading my half-entries from grade 9 / 10 are depressing.
  3. i was obsessed with the idea that music was saving my life... crazy.

Friday, April 22, 2011

determination

i'm working on this paper in sections, and skipping back and forth between them (it takes a lot of work these days to get through a paper). i'm determined however to get this shit done pretty soon. I'm about halfway through it, page-wise. But I really want to see Devon and Konrad tonight (so I am aiming for 10 pages before I go out), and I want to have lunch with Em tomorrow (which means that by the time I go out / go to bed, this paper not only needs to be nearly finished page-wise, but that it needs to be conceptually near done).

when this is all over i want to post some things from my teenage journals (i used to keep paper journals). i'll either type them up or scan pages. since i've been packing / cleaning my parents house, i've come across these wonderful little finds. they're quite great, i was a pretty passionate teenager (which is a stark difference to my apathetic 20s). they'll also highlight reasons for which it is sometimes better to be apathetic and emotionally stable, then wild and out of control. while i miss my days of more reckless spontaneousness (i still feel impulsive, just in a more controlled way), i don't overall miss my teenage years.

screw april forever

i'm super looking forward to this month being over. may is looking better and better by the day! warm weather, biking, photographing, reading papers under the sun, picnics, parties, friends, the usual. i'm now 3 full pages into my 12-15 page paper (yay, 25%... now if only it were going somewhere). given that i am writing it in the middle of the night it is going to need some serious editing tomorrow.... you know, to take out all of the non-sequitors, and to fix the super long run on sentences that are inevitable at 2 am).

time for bed, i'd say.

good night, world.

Little known fact

I can't deal with left justification. All of my writing needs to be justified; it just looks all nice and tidy!

Thursday, April 21, 2011

They want to own you but they don't know what game they're playing

Hopefully a short post. I've been home for 2.5 days, and I've really accomplished nothing. I've sort of sorted through some of my stuff in my old bedroom (and found some money from my high school graduation), and spent time helping my grandmother get up and down in our living room. Both of these things are actually a little exhausting, not to mention the fact that I don't know when they'll get here, so I wake up at 10 every morning. Now you may be saying to yourself, 10 am isn't so bad, but it really is when you compulsively stay up until 3 am. There is something about this house that tires me... maybe it's the fact that I haven't taken an iron supplement lately, or dealing with my father pressuring me to pack and having to watch out for my grandmother, all while still trying to recover from a cold and a twisted ankle (insanely, it still hurts a little, and there is still a lump on my foot...).

In case you haven't guessed, I've been listening to the Arcade Fire's the Suburbs a lot. Which makes a little bit of sense while sitting in the suburbs, but the truth is that I have to get back to my real life. I'm certain that a lot is happening in my absence in KW, and I'm going to try to not think about it until Sunday. But somehow between now and then I have to finish this semester, which means buckling down and writing my final paper for Mathieu's class. I just feel so unprepared to write. I really want to be done so that I can spend the time with my friends without feeling bad about it...

More on my non-existent secret second life next time...

Sunday, April 17, 2011

An Important Experiment

Between high school and undergrad I was really happy to move to my cottage for the summer, and be free of all of the social obligations that resulted from having the internet. Unfortunately, I lost this battle early as my parents bought me a laptop for graduation, and installed the internet so that my father could work from the cottage. Disappointed as I may have been to lose my excused freedom from the keyboard, I managed it well. I only used the internet after the sun went down, and only when I was alone without a friend in town. Here we are 6 years later, and yet again I find myself wanting the same things. So I cancelled my internet for the summer... and maybe longer. To be fair the stakes have changed since I was 17. For one, I'm paying for my own internet, for another I have an office with unlimited internet at my disposal all day (I also have to impose a rule on myself to leave the office at a reasonable hour and enjoy all that the summer has to offer), and lastly, I have a phone with a great dataplan that can save me in times of need (sometimes you just need to look something up quickly). To be clear, I'm not cutting myself off, I'm just using moderation.

Giving up the internet means gaining more time, and with more time comes great responsibility (to not waste it elsewhere). As a result, I have decided to make a list of new season's resolutions.

  1. Read more (fiction and non-fiction)
  2. Write more (fiction and non-fiction)
  3. Bike more, explore more
  4. Photograph more
  5. Swim more
  6. Cook more (I want to try a new recipe every day, and why not? I will allow days to be skipped if instead of coming home to cook, I spend time out with others)
  7. Commit more (I said I would join the basketball team, and the dodgeball team... now if it would just happen)
  8. Socialize more (visit people more)
Wish me luck, I'm going to need it!

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

In the suburbs i learned to drive and you told me we'd never survive

Well... I survived. Now if I only I could make it through to the end of this paper. The end is in sight, I just have to figure out what it is... seriously, how do I wrap this up? What is the answer?

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

things are just a bit nicer over some coffee

i'm pretty excited about tkd tonight. it's been far too long.

i'm having issues with waking up these days, in fact i slept through my alarm this morning and could not talk myself out of bed.

lastly, i have a tiny bit of a crush on a blackbelt.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Keeping track of important events!

154. 8-Month Olds Know Words Refer to Number: Verbal Labels Enhance Large Number Discrimination in Preverbal Infants
Sara Cordes, Emily J. Hopkins, Elizabeth M. Brannon

Friday, March 11, 2011

she said let me clean my teeth

about to head out... pretty excited for the evening (but i may just be saying that, no part of me feels physiologically excited).

i guess i'm looking forward to going home this weekend. it'll be nice to see my family... now if only i could see my friends. i feel like it's been forever, and that waterloo has eaten me whole. just making it through the weeks... winter needs to end.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

bitches ain't shit

man, i'm a bit jittery. it really was not a good idea to eat the remainder icing at 1 am. i'm still stuck in a bit of a sugar high. weeeeeeeeeeeeee...

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

weirdness

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

Is it weird to quote the bible, when you mean to take the quote for what it is - in this case, a great line about the nature of the world - and not for it's biblical interpretation?

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

remember to breathe

As a reminder of my list to live by (I swear I have typed this before...but now has additions):

1) Do not change anything for anyone
2) Your mother is a good judge of character
3) Your heart knows nothing
4) The ability for someone to call you back is reserved for best friends
5) Promises are often broken
6) Most things that you cry about are not worth your time
7) Do not initiate conversation with jerks
8) Steal no one's first kiss for selfish purposes

(stolen from the 17 year old version of myself)

Friday, February 4, 2011

South Western Ontario Road Trip!

This weekend I'm hitting up Hamilton, Guelph and KW! Hamilton for some fun with old elementary school friends (one of which JUST got engaged), Guelph tomorrow for the Arkells, and KW on Sunday for TKD, stim making, and homework! It's going to be a long weekend!

I've also just finished my LSA application. So fingers crossed that I win an award so that I can afford to attend the institute this summer!

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Daily Goals Day #2!

  • Write LSA statement
  • Create new stim
  • Practice guitar
  • Physio exercises!
  • Set makeup midterm time

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Daily Goal Updates!

  • finish stats assignment
  • start working on LSA statement
  • make some stimuli for new study
  • contact RA about calling daycares
  • start readings for next week
  • email marta back
  • dishes!
  • email students about make up exam
Extras!
  • Make cupcakes for Bill's birthday
  • Plan Iron Chef party

everlong (acoustic, greatest hits version)

yesterday i told my friend brendan that i feel nothing. he asked if i had some sort of superhuman spy training. man, i wish that were the case.

i felt a bit annoyed today. i was told that my program likely will not include a master's section. i personally would like to get my master's. I'm doing all the same work that the students who get a masters with their phd are doing, so I want the same recognition. i think that that is fair.

anyways, work to do tomorrow:
  • finish stats assignment
  • start working on LSA statement
  • make some stimuli for new study
  • contact RA about calling daycares
  • start readings for next week
  • email marta back
  • dishes!
  • email students about make up exam

Sunday, January 30, 2011

i'm not the sun

Recap on the NYR:
  • I have been doing more blogging... but it's mostly been here. A new blog I started to help my grandparents start exercising. I hope that I can get them involved!
  • As for exercising, I've been doing Tae Kwon Do, so I think it is fair to say that I am following through on that resolution. I plan on starting swimming again soon (I'm looking at you Wednesday!). I figure that if I exercise more, that maybe I can convince my grandparents to do so as well.
  • Travelling: thus far I have been to - Wasaga Beach, Toronto (for Winterlicious), Chicago, and KW. This weekend I am visiting Guelph - admittedly not really an adventure for the purposes of "travelling", I'm still going to count it. Still to come: Boston, Ireland, Boulder, Montreal, NYC, and others?
  • Reading: I've been reading the news, does that count? I bought new books... and have been reading a crap load of articles... not the same I know!
  • Baking: making dinner with a friend tomorrow. I tried making risotto this year, made a pot roast in the slow cooker, and a few other things.
  • Photo-taking: iPhone photos don't count, so I've been failing this one.
  • Saving: I paid off $1000 on my line of credit, but that won't last forever. So only a partial pass.
  • Spending: I feel like I've spent a little less.
  • Sighing: I no longer sigh in my sleep.
  • Procrastinating: I'm failing as I type this... working, working, I swear...

Thursday, January 13, 2011

resolutions were meant to be broken

i said i would blog more, and procrastinate less. it seems like i am failing these things. more when i have the energy...

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

starting a new year revolution

more:
  • blogging
  • baking
  • photo-taking
  • traveling
  • reading
  • saving
  • exercising (tae kwon do!)
less:
  • sighing
  • spending
  • procrastinating?
exciting times! happy new year!