New Glasses

Guess who has new glasses!

The boys next door say she looks like a librarian or a teacher.

Happy Hallowe'en

Suburbia and Cate - the water goddess

The kids are outside playing street hockey on our very big driveway - well away from the road. I can hear them bashing about and the best part is that I don't have to sit there watching them like we had to in Ottawa. They also spend time in the big back yard and I cannot wait to have BBQ dinner parties next summer out there - after a day of swimming in our lake.

I don't miss our ottawa house at all really, I don't miss the tiny living room or the postage stamp back yard. If/when we go back does this mean I will be looking for a place in suburbia? has it come to this? it creeps up on you doesn't it.

On another note - one of the Doctoral students told me yesterday that she thinks I am a goddess of water research. apparently she saw me present in Ottawa last may and could not believe that I was coming to Dal. That was certainly a welcome compliment.

At least I am good at presenting - the same cannot be said for writing exams. yeesh. They tell me that almost no one fails in the Masters program - I sure hope they are right. There is nothing quite so "stomach falling into your boots" as having the prof say "5 minutes left" and you haven't done the last 2 questions worth 10 percent each. I guess I could cut myself some slack - after all it was the first in class exam i have written in the last - what - 15 years? but I don't think you get extra points for being a rookie.

simple pleasures

I have a big time exam tomorrow and am really worried about passing. This going back to school stuff is not for the faint of heart or the feeble minded (I am beginning to believe that I am both those things). Sometimes late in the night I can see my crazy boss saying "see I told you we should not have sent her". If I failed now, what the heck would we do? It doesn't help that Mike is having a problem finding library jobs in this town or that C misses his grandparents and cousins.

So this is a quick note to say that some times it is the little things that give a perk to the day. And for me it is the sight of a basket filled with toilet paper. It says loudly that "we will not run out". The days may be filled with all sorts of weather, arguments, exams, missed deadlines, unpaid bills, noisy mufflers, and sleepless nights but when the poop hits the fan (metaphorically and literally) we are ready!

Robbie Burns

There is a statue of Robbie Burns in the park near my campus and spitting distance to the eye doctor's shop. We are walking through the park when we come up to a man with a pipe studying the statue. Somehow he strikes up a converation (well it is Halifax). As a child he was a fisherman with his father who could light a pipe in all sorts of weather. Later he went to school to become a folklorist and still teaches from time to time though now he is retired and is staying in Halifax while his wife is in hospital - I suspect he is a little lonely and misses home. But he loves Robbie Burns and loves to visit this statue.

When he hears that Mike was born on robbie burns day he knows that he has an appreciative audience and proceeds to explain the pictures on each side of the statue - they each represent one of Burn's poems - Auld lang syne, Tam o Shanter, a Cotters Saturday Night and To a Mouse. Tam o Shanter - the one with the witches - reminds me of ichabod crane and in the dark drizzle it seems even a little more scary.

I learn that apparently Burns loved women - many women. The man feels that Burns loved each one truly but somehow just loved too many. ha ha.

The man's favourite poem is the scene on the back "To a mouse". Even 300 hundred years ago Burns understood the relationship between humans and nature and understood too that mankind was wrecking this relationship.


To a Mouse
(Whilst ploughing on a November day, Burns ruined the nest of a field mouse. He ponders why the creature runs away in such terror)

"Oh, tiny timorous forlorn beast,
Oh why the panic in your breast ?
You need not dart away in haste
To some corn-rickI'd never run and chase thee,
With murdering stick.

I'm truly sorry man's dominion
Has broken nature's social union,
And justifies that ill opinion
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor earth-born companion,
And fellow mortal.

I do not doubt you have to thieve;
What then?
Poor beastie you must live;
One ear of corn that's scarcely missed
Is small enough:
I'll share with you all this year's grist,
Without rebuff.

Thy wee bit housie too in ruin,
Its fragile walls the winds have strewn,
And you've nothing new to build a new one,
Of grasses green;
And bleak December winds ensuing,
Both cold and keen.
You saw the fields laid bare and waste,
And weary winter coming fast,
And cosy there beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash; the cruel ploughman crushed
Thy little cell.
Your wee bit heap of leaves and stubble,
Had cost thee many a weary nibble.
Now you're turned out for all thy trouble
Of house and home
To bear the winter's sleety drizzle,
And hoar frost cold.

But, mousie, thou art not alane,
In proving foresight may be in vain,
The best laid schemes of mice and men,
Go oft astray,
And leave us nought but grief and pain,
To rend our day.
Still thou art blessed, compared with me!
The present only touches thee,
But, oh, I backward cast my eye
On prospects drear,
And forward, though I cannot see,
I guess and fear.

statue can be seen here http://www.mikecampbell.net/robert_burns.htm

The art of dancing close

The neighbours insisted that Mike and I go out on a date. Mike has been looking after their kids in the evenings some times when they both have to work and they wanted to even the ledger so to speak.

I had no idea what to do so suddenly it is friday morning - the day of our date - and nothing is planned. I walk into the coffee shop and there is a poster for a special workshop "on the art of dancing close". The argentine tango school is bringing in a special guest teacher from Boston for this weekend long series of workshops and the first one is tonight.

With much trepidation Mike and I show up at 7:30. The foyer is filled with about 40 tango dancers who all seem to know what they are doing and had pre registerd for the event. Mike and I are already feeling out of our element and had not brought proper soft soled shoes - I don't even have socks on - which looks like it might end our foray into the dance world right then. Fortunately everyone is really friendly (well this is Halifax) and MJ lends me her socks. Aside from the teacher I am the only one not wearing heels.

The place is filled with people ranging from their 20's to their 70's. There are couples and singles but everyone seems to know each other. Peter, a nice older gentleman takes us under his wing and shows us around and tells us a story about the young couple in the corner. It seems that they decided to learn tango for their wedding dance instead of the waltze and loved it so much that they promptly moved to Buenos Aires for 5 months to learn it from the masters and now teach a class on Sundays.

Our teacher had us do "warm-up" exercises - Mom you would have hated the whole thing.
We have to walk around and "greet" each other with our eyes. the next exercise is to "pat" each other, and the next is to "touch" each other without using our hands, the next is to circle each other, looking into each others eyes, and the next is to circle each other while touching. It is all very unnerving.

When it came to the couples part - the teacher does not let us dance with our partners that we came with. So we keep having to do the steps with complete strangers.

The dancers are supposed to come together very close - joining the two axis together with the "follower" sort of leaning into her "leader" but not losing balance. The leader is supposed to sense when his partner is ready to move and then press off with his leg to start the movement. The follower is supposed to sense this "invitation to move" and then move her leg back - which is when the "follower" actually becomes the "leader" because a really talented "leader" will then take his cues from his partner instead of trying to lead. I imagine that when two really good dancers who have good chemistry do this - it really does become two people working together, listening with their bodies and senses as to what the other is about to do. A statement of gender politics and coupledom in a sense - the true listening, the inviting, the leading, the following, all being done by both at the same time, without egos coming to play.

With some of the dance partners it is easy to get a sense of when and where they are moving - with others it is a confusion of stepped on toes and loss of balance. The biggest trick seems to be to let go, and don't worry about zero personal space. If you sit there worrying about bad breath and body odour you are dead in the water.

The last exercise is the ...most difficult. The followers all have to make a circle on the inside facing outward, and the leaders have to make a circle around them facing them. But the followers have their eyes closed and the leaders have to gently move into their space to "invite" them to embrace and then rock gently from side to side before setting the follower back on her axis and move to the next partner. It is a truly strange experience to stand there with your eyes closed and have some strange guy come up and touch you and you have to basically embrace them very closely and then they move on.

In the last 3 minutes the men had to close their eyes and we have to move around to embrace them - Mike, my dear short man - has his eyes closed when this woman comes up to embrace him. He can feel skin on his cheek except that she was over a foot taller than he and he realizes that it is not her face that is pressed against his cheek - apparently he has a very hard time concentrating.

We can't take the rest of this workshop this weekend but somehow we will have to find a way to take the regular tango lessons - it is actually quite a lot of fun when you forget your puritan upbringing - and remember to use heavy duty deodorant and gargle with mouth wash first.

43 things

I was listening to CBC the other day and they mentioned this site 43 things - which of course is about a list of 43 things to do in this life. There is a top 25 list for most of the major cities and the announcer listed the top 3 from Vancouver, Halifax, and Toronto - they were:
Vancouver -
1. complete the 50 best day trips from Vancouver,
2. do the Grouse Grind,
3. climb the chief

Halifax -
1. create a collaged suitcase
2. take advantage of living in Halifax
3. see every bar in Halifax

Toronto -
1. contribute more to my RRSPs
2. digitize my photos
3. climb the CN tower

remind me not to move to T.O.


The other interesting thing about this site is that a whack of people have listed "doing a masters degree" as one of their top 25 things - who knew I was so trendy?

Geckos and feeding time

Geckos eat meal worms. Meal worms live in a box that is filled with rolled oats. Meal worms somehow live off of old fruit and vegetables. This means that we have a mealworm box that we add old fruit to every now and then. I originally thought that I should take the very old black hairy fruit out of the box but then noticed that that is where most of the mealworms seem to come from - ick.

Minuit seems to like coming down to feed the geckos and stays very close by when I get the mealworm box out. Its been over a month and I only figured out why recently - Minuit loves to steal the mouldy old fruit and snuffle off somewhere with it - double ick.

The geckoes, particularly Inky with her dried skin, gives me the willies and feeding wriggling worms to these creatures does not help that feeling so it was in this "ick mode" that I made my way downstairs to feed the critters last night. We had finally gotten(?) (I am an engineer not an english major) off our butts and bought mineral oil to put on inky's dried skin so there I am standing with an open bottle of the stuff when my foot steps on something squishy and wet. Mineral oil all over the place! I'm looking madly around counting geckoes to see which one has escaped and fighting the heebiejeebies big time when I see that I've only killed a very old squishy piece of fruit, which is now ground into the basement carpet.

Minuit is banished from helping with feeding time.

knitting at the Loop

There is a neat little place near my campus that sells all things knitting. Plus they have a thursday night knitting open house where you can bring your knitting and hang out.

So today the kids and I went over for our first ever knit night. C and M both chose a really nice yarn and I bought new wooden needles for all of us - only one of C's made it from Ottawa.
Given the weather out there there were not as many as in this pic from their website - but there was a Cathy, a Cate, and a Catherine out of the 4 adult women at the table. There was also a Matthew so C was not alone.

The beauty of this place, amongst other things, is that here are a bunch of people who can help start the knitting and then pick up dropped stitches - something that always stalled C's projects back home, unless we were a grandmas. Catherine, the astro physicist, was very nice to M while Cathy, the owner, helped C start his project. C remembered right away how to do it and M was kinda getting the hang of it by the end. The kids lasted for about an hour which is pretty good. Then they played with the etch-a-sketch until dad came to get us.

C wants to make a scarf for his dad and M is thinking about making a blanket for her doll. I'm just happy that they want to go back next week.

water treatment assignments

I am starting to dream about water treatment plants. How to size them? what treatment systems to use? how much do they cost?

For my undergrad course we have to design a water treatment plant - which maybe doesn't sound so bad but is actually pretty tricky, especially since I did not understand the sizing question on the last assignment.

For my grad course we are supposed to write a critique on a journal article related to innnovations in filter backwash..... The assumption is that I would know enough to be able to critique it I guess. It is due tomorrow at 4 and I am trying to figure out which paper to review: the one on filter backwash and ultrafiltration technology, filter backwash for reuse using microfiltration, treatment of backwash filter water using dissolved air flotation or my favourite title Variations in backwash efficiency during colloidal filtration of hollow-fibre microfiltration membranes.

Thanksgiving

What does one do for Thanksgiving when one is far away from home and family?

Well - the best thing is to get everyone into the car and go to Laurencetown beach and have fish and chips and chocolate milkshakes with a bit of banana thrown in at Happy Dudes surf shop. and then spend the rest of the afternoon looking for great rocks on the beach. Oh and get wet!

Grand Pré

I should probably have stayed in all long weekend and studied but instead we went to "the valley" near the bay of Fundy and toured an Acadian museum there. Somehow it was magically peaceful there. I do not know why but everything seemed rather timeless and surreal.
I did not take pics but it actually looks like this scenic shot on this website http://www.grand-pre.com/grandpresitedevelopment/en/TheStory.html plus the site tells a bit about those Acadians.

We stopped into a shop called tangled garden which in fact had a rather amazing garden to wander through. But the best part was on the top of the hill which overlooked the water. There they had planted a huge honking maze out of flowers - the kids ran back and forth back and forth as they raced for the centre and then all around again as they raced back out.

If I was rich I'd have a garden like that. If I was a little rich I'd have bought some of their very neat looking jellies that included all sorts of flowers and herbs in them. They were almost more fun to look at than to actually use. Next time we will have to bring the camera.

you can see the jellies and the garden at their website - the maze is cool but even better looking at eye level when the flowers really stand out. http://www.tangledgarden.ns.ca/

The birds are singing, the sun is shining, I have a lightness in my step - no I'm not in love - I dropped hydraulics!!
I will audit the thing but I don't have to toss and turn at nights trying to figure out how to make my calculator work and how to iterate colbrooke white. yay yay yay!

getting old

One of the things that has come to my attention (which is another way of saying that it was trying to come to my attention before but was always shouted down by the dozen other things trying to come to my attention - most of which started with a "Mom" kinda yell) is that my eyes are not as great as they used to be.

Squinting at the board is becoming commonplace and while in recent past I could chalk it up to poorly designed power point presentations at conferences - it is getting a mite worse.

So I had my eyes checked today and the nice eye doctor wanted to perscribe me a pair of modern bifocals - I cannot remember what he called them - I wish he could prescribe me something for my failing memory.

These were going to cost at least $150 but his very nice assistant quietly told me to go to the drugstore next door and just by reading glasses for $15 bucks. I wonder how long the nice eye doctor (who sells nice expensive glasses) will keep the nice pragmatic assistant.

So now I have a pair of funny looking tiny reading glasses - which make the words on the page appear much more clearly but make anything else a complete blur.

Why reading glasses when I am having problems seeing the board? apparently because my eyes cant switch between distance and close the way they used to.

I have a theory that looking at a computer all day is the optical equivalent of becoming a couch potato. I should be staring off into the mountains and forests - hunting and gathering, then my eyes would be able to see!!

But no - now I will just have to look like Mrs. Claus.

calculators

who knew that calculators could be such a big deal.

For all of my student life I had exactly one calculator - a sharp that I got in the early 80's and that lasted me for all of university. It was still in a drawer in our house before the move - oh how I wish that I had helped pack!! Ok I don't really ...let's be honest ..... Oh how I wish that I knew where the damn thing was!!

You see because in Hydraulics (what else) we have problems where in order to find a pipe diameter we have to assume a pipe diameter and then keep "iterating" (aka screwing around) with two equations to try to solve for 2 unknown variables that will give us the correct damn diameter - easy eh?

and to solve this thing one of the equations is the infamous Colbrooke White equation which has no less 1 log and 2 square roots in it. The thing literally takes the entire width of my page and I have to write in teeny tiny writing to fit it all in.

But the engineering guys in my class all have these big calculator thingys that they madly plug away on and get answers to colbrooke white in 2 seconds. Some even have the damn equation programed into their calculators and just fiddle with the variables - ahh the life.

so I am looking for this type of calculator - which is not as easy as one would think. I have phoned a number of office supply and electronics stores and asked them for such a product and they do not seem to know their calculators performance very well. Mike says that this is because this type of knowledge is very limited to a small group of engineering and math geeks (why does he grin when he says this?) and most of us just don't need to know.

Well I have to go on a calculator quest tomorrow - which is beginning to seem more difficult than questing for a grail. Oh and return the $130 one that said it was programmable but doesn't do what I want it to do.

Did I mention that I hate hydraulics?