Tabula Rasa

So my edumacational period started again this week. Woo for that I suppose. I have this very distinct feeling this will not be my favourite semester ever.

Why ever do you say that?!  you ask? Well, I guess I'll tell you (cause lets face it, if I didnt think would be a relatively short and pointless blog doncha think? lol).

First off, I only know people in 2 of my 5 classes. Now of course, this isnt the end of the world. If I were truely a optimistic person, I would even go as far as viewing this as a chance to make new friends. Which it is, don't get me wrong. But sometimes it is harder than you'd like to make new friends in class. Mostly because people dont just sit down and introduce each other to the people around them (well, they did in first year. But I think that is because that's what all the Frosh Week leaders told them to do lol). And then people normally just pack up and leave at the end of class and making friends is a lot more challenging when you have to chase a person you dont know down and introduce them whilst out of breath. And of course part three to this is that I am in third year, which means most people already have their social groups relatively estabilished and it does become harder to intoduce yourself to a group of people rather than an individual person. Still, I think I can manage something. Especially considering that I have a couple group projects, so that will definitely help break a couple barriers.

The second reason is the pure amount of work I have to do. Now yes, I know, I am in University. I am going to have to do a lot of work. In fact, past semesters have been a lot of work as well. But if everything really is as the proffs have laid out for us, this semester is going to be hell. For starters, I am taking anatomy. Anatomy is a lot of work. It is not that there is any extra assigments or extra tests or papers or presentations, but have you ever looked at a breakdown of the human body? It has a lot of parts! And I have to remember all of those parts! So, um, yeah, thats fun (seriously tho, I bet its going to be a lot of fun. Just also a lot of work). And then on top of that, in my Rural Health class not only do I have an assignment, an essay and a presenations, but I also have to read 3-4 different readings per week and then summarise and review them and hand it in every Monday. In my Health Policy class I have 2 assignments on top of my midterm and exam, in my History class I have a paper worth like 60% of my mark and in my Health of Aging class I have an assignment due every other week. Also my program is VERY reading heavy and I am DETERMINED to not get anything below a 75% which means I am going to have to work my BUTT off. So yeah. Busy. Lets not forget about work, volunteerings, going to the gym, being in guitar club, keeping up with my blog and maybe actually socialising or have sometime to myself once in a while (tho at this point in time, that all may have to wait until summer). Wooo! (Paige complains, but lets face it, she likes being busy. Otherwise she would be switching and dropping things.)

And the part three of my not-so-happy semester is the classes. Anatomy I am excited for, History and Aging I'm relatively indifferent towards. I haven't actually had those classes yet, so I dont have the best idea of what they'll be like. Policy, on the other hand, is going to make me want to shoot myself in the foot. I understand the importance of policy, especially going into the Health Feild and all, but oh MAN is it not my feild of study. I just find it soooo boring. And Rural Health. The subject matter sounds interesting, especially as I come from a Rural background myself. But the proff seems, well, either very finiky or like a super hardass. I'm not 100% sure yet. Also she doesn't seem very good at answering peoples questions and instead of emphasising points she just repeats them over and over without further explination. Or at least that's what she did when she read very single word of the 8-page syllabus. A lot of people sitting around me were talking about dropping the class. I think I'm going to stick with it, I just hope I dont regret that decision come mark-getting time.

So yeah, thats my semester. I bet it'll be better than I make it sound, I mean, people always get jittery going into a new semester because you dont know how it'll turn out right? And if it is all that horrible there is always a plus side - in less than 4 months it will be all over anyway!
Well Internets I hope you have a good semester if you are in school, and if not - have a wonderful day. Heck, even if you are in school have a wonderful day!

P.S. - This is a really stupid question, but how do you reply directly to a persons comment? Because I dont see a reply button on comments and I can't figure out any other way to do it... 

But you gotta have...

So what attracks you to the internets? There could be a lot of answers to that question- the wealth of knowledge and creativty out there, a way to stay connected to people you wouldnt otherwise be able to, a to stream/download TV shows and movies so you dont have to get cable, a place to do business, to help you stay organised, a time waster or procastinator (just to name a few). And I'm not going to lie, a lot of those things are also what attracts me to the internets. However I believe my largest attractor is the community. I love the way the internet can bring people together in a way that has never been done before, how people can have good or close friends all over the world. Yet, as much as that is an atraction for me, I don't really feel I participate in it.

Take, for example, one of my favouirte communities - youtube. I spend so much time on youtube that I wouldn't be able to calculate my time spent off the top of my head. I find the videos fun and the people fascinating. Yet when first got my current account on youtube, it probably took me a good eight months or so just to work up the nerve to post a comment. Probably took me another month and a half to post a second comment. Im used to commenting now, but there are other hurdles I have trouble overcoming. Posting something controversial for example. Participating not just in commenting, but in conversations. And my biggest one - making online friends.

It's kind of weird in a way. In real life I have no trouble making friends. While I sometimes experience some slight social anxiety right before facing a new situation with a large group of people, but that is normally brief and totally forgotten about once I'm in said situation. Once I get online, however, it is a completely different story. Normally in these online communities, you hear the opposite. The internet is known for being a place for the anti-social or the socially inept (**edit**of course, not everyone IS, but thats the stereotype). Maybe that's why I have troubles, or maybe it is because I still have all those horror stories in the back of my head about how all online friends are really evil predators out there to rape and murder me and eat my unborn (...or concieved... ) children. But whatever the reason, I have yet to make any REAL online friends.

Now don't get me wrong - I'm not feeling sorry for myself or anything silly like that. It's just an observation. I'm sure it'll happen. I just need to get over my inernet-social anxiety. I need to learn to reply to comments and not to be afraid to private message people who message me. Also to not be afraid to reply to people who message me. And maybe possibly better advertise my blog -  I mean, I have the loverly Kathy of That's What She Said who is nice enough to follow me and comment (and also has a wonderful blog herself). But I think that's about the extent of people who I do not already know personally who read my blog. Possibly because I went from posting constantly to posting once a month to not posting in like 3... I suppose it's somewhat difficult to meet people online when I don't put any effort into my own outlets lol.

Of course my other reason for not keeping up with the internet is of course school, work and general busy-ness. I suppose that pushes me away - I start telling myself that I don't have time for it. That's definitely what happened with my blog last semester lol.

So I feel like I've spent this whole blog whining about not having any friends. GAWD. NO ONE LIKES ME! WAAHHH lol. Honestly, not what my point is. I swear lol. In the end I just find it interesting that for someone who is so into the community aspect of the internet and is a great lover of people in general to be more on the sidelines than right in the thick of it. I guess you could almost say that the internet has finally found a way to shut me up *looks at length of blog* then again... maybe not.

Goodnight Internets!

Train Brain

Some keeping up with my resolution to stay on top of my blog, look, I'm posting again! 

Cuurently I am heading back to the lovely city of London, On to head back to El school. My classes don't actually start for another week but I'm heading up a bit early for work and volunteering. Actually I only work one day this week, but I've signed up for at least 3 days of volunteering it they give me the shifts. I hope they give me the shifts, otherwise my coming home early is kinda pointless and slightly disapointing. I love going home but i never have the time to visit enough (or at all) with every one I want to see. It really makes the idea of working in Ottawa for the summer all the more tempting. But then I'd be pining for my London peeps, so I suppose it wouldn't really be all that different in the end.

So did we all have a good New Years? I went to a party at my friends place. Normally I do New Years small, maybe a group of close friends or whomever happens to be in town. This was the biggest New Years party Ive ever been to, with somethingblike 25 people in a tiny loft apartment. It was awesome. I met so many awesome new people, got to watch my best friend get smashed (but in a safe way cause I was sober and was there for watching her) and got to see my friend Pearl (the hostess) whom I really only get to see once a year or so. Unfortunately my friends and I had to leave not too long after midnight (see again my drunk friend) and apparently the party went until about 4am. Oh well, next time I'm around for one of her shindigs, ill be sure to stay longer.

It makes me kinda sad as this train takes me further and further south (currently about an hour or so away from TO) how the snow has dispeared. One of the wonders of being in Ottawa for the holidays was I got to spend an entire 10 days with real snow cover on the ground. Oh sad I'd it that it is Jan 2, living in Canada and there are still so many places without snow. All the poor people who did not get to experience a white Christmas, who won't have the joys if skating, sledding, skiing, snowball fights, snow angels... I think we should start a fund! We'll call it the SFPC. Snow For Poor Canadians! We can raise money to bring down snow from up North, promote massive cooling generators. Yeah, I like this! Let's do it! Woooo! Yeah.

In other news I finally settled in a name for my tablet. Instead of naming her after anything, I'm gonna call her K.A.A.T.O. (pronounce Kaito). It stands for Kool, Awesome Android Tablet, Obviously. I think its fitting, suits her for sure. Also, for those of you out there worrying, my old tablet is going to a good home. I sold her to my best friend, someone who'll treat her right and love her in just the appropriate way, the appropriate amount. See, I wont abandon her.

Anyway, Im starting to feel a little motion sick. So I think I'm gonna try to sleep off the rest of this train ride. Good night my sweet readers :).

Hello Joe

Why hello blog-reading-type people. I bet you were starting to think I had given up on this thing. Silly people. Silly, silly people. I'm just lazy, but I'd never given up on you.... well, not purposely anyway. Lol.

So this isn't gonna be the longest post ever (so by the standards on my blogs, only HALF a novel long :P) but I figured I should say something. I'm gonna try to stay on top of this blog again. After all, if nothing else its a great procrastination tool lol.

So how was everyone's Christmas/other denominational or non-denominational holiday? I gotta say, mine was excellent. In terms of presents I got absolutely spoiled. That wasn't why it was excellent btw, just a bonus. It was excellent cause its been so nice, relaxing and snowy! Finally snowy btw. I live in Canada but I had to wait til Christmas eve before I saw an real snow? Not cool weather, not cool. Great Christmas present however lol. I also have plenty of time to spend with family and friends, yet no solid plans so I don't have to stress myself out trying to schedule everyone in between other plans and run from friend to friend so I can see everyone. Just kinda taking every day as it comes and figuring out my plans that way.

I suppose I do have some solid plans, I do have a big New Years party I'm going to. That in itself is odd cause normally my New Years are just small parties with whoever is free. So I am purdy excited about that. Anyone else have big plans foe New Years? (She asks as tho more than like four ppl read her blog). 

So ATM I am writing this blog on my new tablet... my second new tablet lol. I got one super super cheap a few months ago, which turned out to be a lesson in "you get what you pay for". So I saved up a bit and used some Christmas monies (and thought up some damn good excuses) and bought myself a new (tho still slightly cheap) tablet. I love this thing, should a waited from the start. Even the fact that I *can* blog shows how much better this thing is than my old one. I'm trying to think of a name for her. Right now I'm thinking Hexm after the wizards "computer" in Terry Pratchett. I'm not sure if she feels like a Hex or not, but its starting to grow on me. What do ppl think?

Anyway, I think that is all for my quick update Internet. I have more to tell you, but i'll save it and get another post out sometime soon. Try and stick with my before-New Years resolution. Until then, have a good one!

Flabbergasted

Life is so crazy right now. I constantly look at this loverly blog and feel guilty for my lack of updates, but its hard to find the time lately. When I do have the time, I normally just want to collapse with a good book or for a nice, long nap. Anyway, hello Internets, how are you doing today?

So what has been keeping me so busy? Well, mostly work and school. This is the first time I have REALLY combined the two at a University level. I mean, last year I "had a job" over Christmas working at Sears, but that was MAYBE once a week if I was lucky. While at Talize I am working 10-20 hours a week. Plus I have a lot more assignments this year in school on top of regular readings and classes. Which I like because they help take the pressuer off exams, and for the most part I'm a better writer than I am a test-taker, but it does eat up more time. I'm ok with that though. I love being busy, it makes me happy.

I am really liking my classes this year, to my surprise. My last blog I think I promised to fill you in on what I am taking and what I think of it, so it's been a few weeks - here we go.

Health Promotion: The point of this course is to look at Health Care at both the individual and the population level and look at how better health can  be educated, promoted and advocated (so how to help make people healthy as well as help raise awareness for both the community and the governmental bodies on what would help an area be overall more healthy). I really like the basis for this course, because health is about more than sick or not sick. On top of that our proff is hilarious. And really good as well, using slides as an aid rather than reading the information directly off of them. I've gotten a bit of a chance to get to know her as well, as I did the Terry Fox walk/run with her and some of my classmates a couple weeks ago.

Childhood and Adolesence Health: This course is (atm) probably my least favourite course. Not that I dont find the information interesting, because it definitely is, but Im not fond of my proffessors teaching style. Namely that what is on the slide is what she is going to say. And she gets annoyed if we havent done the readings for class, which is always something that has bothered me. We are in University, you shouldn't sold us like children for not doing the readings - we're old enough to decide for ourselves at this point. I do like when she starts talking about her own work, which is often quite interesting as her method of research is to esentially intergrate herself into the culture she is studying and try to live the experience with the people she is studying, in the best way she can. So thats often interesting to hear about.

Research Methods - aka, Stats: Now as a general rule, I severly dislike Stats classes. I am normally pretty good with numbers, but stats is something I have incredible amounts of trouble wrapping my head around. However I really like our proff. He uses real-world examples and explinations, in ways that we can really relate to. Often in class he will actually get us to interact in the lesson as well. It is a really good way of explaining math and stats. I've always been better at understanding when the "theoretical" is taken away and I can see a real-world use to something. So I think I could actually do well in this class, as long as I keep up with the homework.

Speculative Fiction - Sci Fi: Oh MAN do I hate analysing books. SO much. Dont get me wrong, I LOVE reading - reading to me is almost as essential as breathing, no joke. But I enjoy the stories, I enjoy the connection with teh characters. I HATE analysing books. Yes, authors will purposely put symbolism in their books. I have learned that much from watch John Green videos. But I don't think they've put in enough sybmolism that people are still finding "hidden meanings" 100+ years later. Also analysing a book to me always feels like learning a bad secret about a good friend. I really enjoy a book and then I find out the "meaning behind it" is supposed to be, I dunno, anti-feminist or some other idea I disagree with. Then I am conflicted as to whether or not I should still be enjoying the book...

Quality of Life: this is the class I talked about last time. I still really like it. I really like the proff (he kind of looks like my Great Uncle David. Its weird). He's nice, friendly, very engaging. And again, I love the premise of the class. Health is more than just being sick - health is about the personal percieved quality of life. A person can be very sick and feel healthy because of aspects of teh rest of their life or their outlook on life, and a person can be medically "healthy" but be still be not-healthy, some aspect of their life is subpar. I feel this is one of those courses that anyone wanting to be a doctor should take. Guess what, your patient is more than just a condition - maybe you should treat them like a person for a bit and see what happens.

So those are my classes. I'm trying my hardest to keep caught up with readings and stay on top of things. My goal is to have no mark less than an 80 this year. And honestly, I dont see any reason why that shouldn't happen!

So I'm really hoping I can try and update a bit more in the coming months. Next weekend I'm busing 9 hours back to Ottawa for Thanksgiving and my 10k race I'm doing (!!!). So hopefully I'll put up a post about that or perhaps something else. Until then, keep it healthy Internets :P

Flemmingsworth

So I apparently fail at this whole updating thing. Was doing so well for so long, and then - nothing. I blame August. It's OBVIOUSLY all August's fault :P.

Why, you ask, do I blame August? Because it was such a meh month. I realise this is an unfair assesment as it had to go after July and July was just amazing, but all the same... I came back to London, all my friends were working, I had no job and nothing else really to distract me. Mostly it was spent handing out resumes and being locked up in my room. Now, not to say nothing good came out of it all. I made a bunch of jewelry to give away to ppl at various times in the upcoming year (some of it I already have done) and I did (FINALLY) manage to find a job the last week of August. Yay! Nothing exciting, your basic retail job. Working at a thrift store (called Talize. Think Value Village but with the colours of royal blue and bright-ass orange) as a cashier. At least it pays, and honestly, that is all I really wanted.

Anyway, I don't really have too much to say. I just figured I should put something up here, prove I havent died or anything (not that it was ever a threat that I WOULD die, but its still always good to know right?). I started school again this week, so probably more posting will happen soon when I start to have random thoughts or just am looking for a way to procrastinate. Like right now. I should be cleaning the disaster I call a room. Instead I am writing a relatively pointless blog. Productive, no?

I'm not too sure how I feel about my classes this semester. I've only had 2 so far (semester started on Thursday). The first I had was my Health Related Quality of Life class. I'm not too sure about the content, I hope it turns out to be interesting, but I think its going to be a lot of repetativeness on the theme that is this entire program. On the other hand I think I'll like the Proff. He's very chatty and high-energied and can be very funny when he doesnt try too hard (the jokes he purposely seems to put in often end up sounding like he is trying to appear cool to the young student crowd however). So hopefully that will keep the course interesting *cross fingers*

The other course I had was this morning, and I dont know how much I can tell you about it. I get there for my 930am class (after havign trouble falling asleep and then waking up early) for a 10 minute lecture. No joke. He obviously planned the lesson to just go over the syllabus (waste of time in general, I mean, we CAN read), but he couldnt get the new computer system to work (*eye roll* proffesors. Am I right?!) so he just talked to us and condenced the entire class into a 10 minute schpeal. I was there like "really? REALLY?! I came to class for this?!"

What I can tell you is that he seems nice and possibly even engaging, but its hard to judge at this point. Also the class is "Reasearch Methods in Health" but by looking at the course readings, apparently "Research Methods" is a fancy term for Stats. Woo-effin-hoo. God I hate stats. Sooo much. So I really hope he is a good proff, or at very least a good teacher. Otherwise I am going to start dreading Fridays.

So next week I will have the remainder of my classes. This includes a Sci-fi reading/essay-type course (which could be interesting, but I always find disecting books to the degree english classes seem to ends up ruining the book for me), Health Promotion and Health Issues in Childhood and Adolesance. I shall report on them, you know, eventually.

I suppose that's enough procrastinating for now (at least of this type lol). I shall talk with you soon Internets :)

Kanga and Roo

So, Internets, it occurs to me that not only have I majorly slacked on keeping up with my blog this month, I also seemed to have not managed to finish my Australia story. So I suppose I better do that now.

We left off on the bus home from the snow, am I correct? I really should have written this earlier, because the days now seem to blur together a little bit. Lets see...

So we got back to Sydney around 4 in the afternoon (ish... very ish). After a brief exploration of the cities train system while carrying luggage we managed to make it back to my sisters apartment. As far as I remember, we didn't do anything overly exciting that night. Brief grocery shopping, homemade wraps for dinner, spent the evening reading and going on the computer. I remember us discussing the idea of watching a movie on one of our laptops, but I dont think that ended up happening... OH! I remember the major thing that happened that night. My laptop broke. As in physically broke. The left-hand side hinge decided to give out, to my dismay. Stupid laptop, honestly never again buying an HP. Anyway, it wasnt that big a deal. The hardware and software and all other types of ware still worked, so my computer was still usable. I just had to be very careful with opening and closing my laptop until I was able to get it back to Canada and my tech-guru fasha.

Anyway the next couple days were quite fun but not exactly what you would call Ulitimate Australian Experiences. On the 25th, so the next day, my sister and I decided to hit up Patty's Market for some last-minute souvenir (and whatever else) shopping. However it turns out that Patty's Market was closed so we went to a different part of the Sydney Harbour (the name escapes me at the moment) and did souvenir shopping there. I found this awesome little store full of touristy aboriginal Art. Have I mentioned I love the Aussie Aboriginal art? Cause I really do love the Aussie Aboriginal art lol. But anyway, we spent pretty much the entire day there shopping and wandering and talking and whatnot.

That evening was awesome. We went to a all-day Pancake and Breakfast restaurant (not the awesome part, as I pretty much got plain creps and then bought myself sushi afterwards) with my new friend, my Australian counter part, Elyse (also known, to me, as Padfoot. And I am Prongs :D). It was a night filled with hilarity, newly formed inside jokes, puns, that's-what-she-saids and nerd humour. And it was awesome to see her again (met her last in Canberra, as I BELIEVE I mentioned in this post here. ). It is saddening that she is now on the other side of the world from me, but hey, isnt that what facebook is for? :)

Only picture of Elyse and I in my possesion -
Her allowing me to delight in the sight and aroma of her chocolate and whipped cream and etc. crep.

The next day Jen introduced me to her friend Louise and the three of us went rockclimbing. Not real rock climbing up like the side of the Three Sisters or anything, but at a Rock Climbing Gym. Which was pretty cool in itself as I was unaware such things existed and it was covered from floor to ceiling with rock climbing walls. And it was such a blast. I've only gone rock climbing before, at someones birthday party when I was a kid, and it didn't go well. If I had to pin-point my one major fear it would be heights. Inarguably it would be heights. And I am working very hard to, if not get over the fear, to at least be able to tolerate it. Not freeze up when I'm more than a meter off the ground. And I did it, at least with the rock walls. The first time up was pure determination, not concentrating on anything but the next grip up. The second time I froze about half-way up. And then forced myself to move. After that, it was no problem at all. Also I love the decending part after you've reached the top. So much fun.

Louise was quite good at the rock climbing thing. She does it at least once a week, so I guess she better be, but it was still fun to watch. And then there was my sister. My stupidly, annoyingly naturally-athletic sister. Helped, of course, by her pole-dancing muscles (have I mentioned that before? My sister does competative pole dancing. Anyway, back to my story) she would just scurry up those walls like a little monkey. Climbing both the walls and the ceiling, trying to find the most challenging path she could do. Little shit :P.

AFter we were done that we went to Louise's house and made pizza (or, for me, dough with veggies and chicken) and watched Sucker Punch. I really liked the movie, much better than I expected it to be. I really want to see it again because I feel like this is one of those movies with more details than one can get in their first view.

And then I left. Next day, July 27th, I packed up my bags (well, finished packing my bags, they were mostly packed the day before really) and headed off to the airport. Got there at 8:30amish expecting my plane to be leaving 10:30amish. Boarding pass, when I got it, said 9:30am - but the plane still ended up leaving at 10:30, so I think something just was weird with the boarding pass. So I said goobye to my sister and headed off through security.

So my journey home was supposed to go something like:
Sydney to Vancouver: 14 hours
stop over
Vancouver to Toronto: 4 hours
Stop over
Toronto to Ottawa: 1 hour (or less)
And essentially it went like that. However it wasn't exactly what you would call a "seemless" collection of flights.
We left Sydney slightly late, not monumentously, but something like 20 minutes or so. However our slight was slightly longer than normal because we had very little tailwind the entire time back. This resulted in our getting to Vancouver at 8am (Vancouver time), when we were supposed to be leaving Vancouver at 9am. And in that hour we had to get off the plane, get our luggage, go through custums, go to the other side of the Airport, re-check our luggage and re-go through security before boarding the plane again. Which, if you couldnt figure out, takes a little longer than an hour to accomplish. So I was absolutely running through the Vancouver airport (not, by the way, a small airport) with two large peices of luggage in hand as well as my carry-on bag and my purse. Oh, did I mention it was about 3am Auz time at this point and I had had no sleep on the plane? Yeah, definitely in the best frame of mind during all this. By the time I got to security it was 9am. I was of 2 minds - part of me was thinking that they couldn't take off yet because there was definitely more than one of us who got off that flight who needed to get back on. The other was "Please please PLEASE don't take off without me!!" Which they didnt. Of course, I didnt find this out until after I got through security, but they had delayed the flight 40 minutes.

Actually, they ended up delaying the flight almost 2 hours. The other flight from Vancouver to Sydney via AirCanada got cancelled for some reason, so they had to delay to get them onto our flight. Which ended up meaning that more than half of us on the plane ended up missing our connecting flights. Now for me, not a big deal, there are flights from Toronto to Ottawa like very couple of hours. For the lady and her 3-year-old sitting beside me heading to New Brunswick, bigger deal. There was only one straight connection to NB, and they missed it. Meaning the poor lady had to drag her (admittedly well-behaved for a 3-year-old on a long plane journey) through a couple more airports and transitions. I felt bad for her, I hope everything worked out in her favour.

But finally I made it to Ottawa. Got a new connection from TO, let my friends and family know I was going to be late (the Vancouver plane landed pretty much at the time I was supposed to be landing in OTtawa) and settled down. Had a bit of a nap on the flight and just enjoyed the thought of getting off the damn thing in less than an hour. And then I was home. Well, techincally it was my friends and families home as I am actually living in London, Ontario atm, but it was close enough. Spent a week in Ottawa before heading back to London, which was super nice - I think tht may be my next blog post. Or a future one anyway. Unless I forget. In which it wont.

So, Internets, that was my journey. From Canada to Auz, there and back again. I'm really glad I blogged it, hopefully that will let me remember specifics better in the future. So until next time Internets, this is Paige landed and signing off.