Here we go...

School's almost here. But before we look forward let's have a look backwards, if I can remember it all.

last Friday: I spent the evening at Ann and Steve's with them, Derek, Rob, and Rebecca. Great fun AND I found Dion and me curling buddies. I'm playing with Leigh and Jenn on Mondays and with Dion, Ann, and Steve on Fridays. This is going to be a fun season.

last Saturday and Sunday: Gee, I cannot remember anything except good long phone calls to Ottawa. If you know what I did last weekend, please tell me.

Monday: I went into school caught up with Heather a little. I really enjoyed Litter's game, though I was the only one apparently. Dan and player on the other team were arguing over a foul call right off the bat and we generally got our butts kicked. Our defence was actually really good. We just could not execute on offense. The player Dan was arguing with is Dave Flynn, with whom I have played and whom I really like and respect. I definitely played better than I have most of the season. I wonder if Dave's presence did it. I was making things happen on offense with precise OIs upfield around the zone, no drops, only two or three bad throws or throwing decisions.

Tuesday: Dream in High Park after school with Ann and Rebecca, which was fun despite the rain. It was Much Ado About Nothing, which I think they did the last time I went to Dream several years ago.

Wednesday: I started the day at Grand and Toy and stocked up on binders. At school, I started filing all the handouts in my drawer into binders. It took me all afternoon and I got "kicked out" around 6 because the last of the custodial staff was leaving.

TV: I'm glad that it wasn't Melissa or Aaron who got booted off Canadian Idol, as they and Amber were the only ones in the top 10 who had good voices and pitch control. Kevin has called me the pitch-Nazi in the past. I don't really like live music because of pitch problems. So I always like the in-tune Idol performances best, with little regard to "performance" but some regard to song-selection. So You Think You Can Dance was entertaining as always. The disco was INCREDIBLE, so was Artem in the Passo Doble. The rock-and-roll was also really good. It bothers me somewhat that the hip-hop dancers will get votes no matter what. Kinda like the best "country" singer in American Idol, who will always go farther than s/he deserves.

Thursday: Dion took the day off. I went to school and continued filling binders and reorganising my filing system in my desk. Got caught up with Kaitlyn and Heather and had a lengthy discussion of teeth. Crest Whitestrips come highly recommended but I'm not sure if that's really my thing. My teeth are clean and healthy - do they need to be pearly white?

BOOKS: I finished Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Leguin. I recommend it highly. It is classified as science fiction and won both the Nebula and Hugo awards for 1969 but I think it will appeal even to people who do not like science fiction. The one and only disappointing thing was the introduction, which was written by the author. I always read the introduction last because I hate knowing anything about a novel before I read it. But I had been looking for some criticism, particularly about the politics of the countries and entities involved. Is there a relationship between the Ekumen and the UN? (not really, I think) How about the Sarf? I thought that the Sarf was much like the Stasi and, of course, Orgoyen was much like East Germany. Does that make Karhide West Germany, even though it is a monarchy? Is there a relationship between the politics and gender in these countries? Anyway, I was left cold.

Friday: I got my class lists and went over the OSRs in preparation for making a seating plan. O man. I have a bunch of my strongest personalities from last year back. This should be another fun but tiring semester. I still don't really know what I'm going to be doing in resource. We'll see. Some people tell me I'm going to love it; some tell me I'm going to hate it. But the people who tell me I'm going to hate it hate everything.

I went out to dinner with Mike, Rob, and Rebecca. Good fun. We ate at Fresh, near Bathurst and Bloor. I had the special, guacamole veggie burger, with soup, Dahl. The burger was okay to good, the soup was amazing. I decided to walk home and was pleasantly surprised to find out that Indigo is open till 11pm on Fridays, especially since I got there just after 10pm. I ended up with "just" four books.

Saturday: spent forever making scalloped potatoes for the week and for the barbeque uptown. "Uptown" is my usual short hand for Dion's parents' house. The potatoes did not turn out will at all. The potatoes were undercooked, bland, and cold. But the name game was great.