i've lost my credit-card-fraud virginity.
someone stole my two credit cards and made obscene purchases at future shop. fortunately, the credit card companies reported suspicious activity and are sending me new cards. i guess it's lucky i didn't have anything else taken from my wallet, though now i have to put a flag on my credit file in case my identity's been stolen.
also, i'd still very much like to punch whoever took my cards in the teeth.
Sunday, November 13, 2005
Thursday, October 13, 2005
still in recovery...
instead of eating turkey and stuffing like normal people, my sweetie decided that the thing to do thanksgiving weekend was to take a kayak trip out by the discovery islands and harvest shellfish. see, oysters aren't any good in the summer because they spawn and get all gross -- october's allegedly when they start building a glycogen supply to live through the winter and actually get sweet. he'd made me promise a couple of months ago that i'd keep thanksgiving weekend free to go get oysters.
i had misgivings from the get-go, but i assumed we'd be camping at quadra island, head down to rebecca spit and pick up oysters from the beach at low tide. i thought we'd be out there for two of the three days, come home and get rested up and cleaned up for work on the monday. then i found out we'd be kayaking. and that we'd stay out all three days. and that low tide was at about 4am plus or minus an hour each of those nights. and that we weren't going on some romantic getaway -- a girl from his lab and s&a would be joining us.
i told him i didn't think i could go. the timing was shit. the weather had already turned rainy, i was supposed to write my thesis, and i was likely to be hitting the peak of PMS on the trip. i was going to freeze my ass off, i told him.
then he got all sad and whined about me promising to go. he tried to tell me i'd enjoy the trip and that it'd be good for me.
i relented, telling him that to make up for lost time on my thesis, he'd have to take care of stuff at home before and after the trip so that i could work. after two ferry rides interrupted by a two-hour drive from nanaimo to campbell river, we arrived at herriot bay, where we set up camp, had the last civilized meal we'd be having for several days, then headed out at about midnight to harvest shellfish. we filled our quota of oysters and dug for clams, then headed back to the campsite where a crazy and presumably drunk man was having a fit about a chess game or something. the noise, the cold, and my thermarest, which is not made with a lady's curvatures in mind, made for a rough night's sleep.
we set off on our kayaks the next morning, after numerous hours of dillydallying. the first ninety minutes were fine; we arrived on a tiny wooded island; the largest of an ostensible archipelago of rocks, several of which featured fattened seals in poses that might be considered sultry if they were human. their blubber rippled as they launched themselves with their bellies into the water, where they seemed considerably more elegant and cute. we ate a lunch of oysters at our wooded island; my first mistake (after agreeing to go on this trip) may have been that oysters were pretty much all i ate. most of us cut ourselves shucking the damn things; the wound i made with my oyster knife is still festering away on my ring finger now. although the oysters were quite fresh and delicious on their way down, let me tell you that i wasn't terribly fond of them on their way back up...
after lunch, we launched into a bleakly cold paddle against the wind toward an island but without a specific destination in mind. all we knew from my sweetie was that there were "some bays" on the other side of read island that probably have lots of oysters. after two hours of being tossed around on three-foot waves and having the wind chill me to the bone, i began feeling unwell. "we'll just go past that point there and there should be a place to beach."
past the point was an aquaculture operation, which meant that we couldn't harvest within several hundred metres of it. we paddled past the next point. more aquaculture.
this seemingly endless meandering made me feel even more ill, and with about an hour and a half or so before sunset, i lost it and vomitted off the side of the kayak. my sweetie picked up speed to drop me off in a bay where i was supposed to find a decent camping spot while he turned back to find the others and let them know where we'd ended up.
in neoprene boots and carrying an ungainly kayak paddle, i had to amble my way across rocky crags then hack my way through the bush only to find that the grassy area i thought might be a promising campsite was actually an impossibly rocky region next to a stream. meanwhile, the sun was setting, and there was no sign of the others. all i had with me were the extremely wet clothes on my back and a paddle. i climbed over this valley of fallen trees that smelled like rotting garbage and made it to a mossy landing, paced around, and waited. clearly, someone had been there earlier. there were discarded nets and old crab shells. was this person still there? was he going to emerge out of the bushes with a shotgun ordering me off his property?
i was relieved to see kayaks coming around the bend and into the bay just as the sun was setting...but they were sans my sweetie. apparently, when he'd backtracked, he missed them somehow. the others set up their tents while i sat and worried some more. after what seemed like hours, my sweetie paddled back into the bay, exhausted. he charged me with the task of setting up the tent while he pulled the kayak to higher ground. as i put the tentpoles in, one of them snapped catastrophically. we eventually reinforced the break with a piece of aluminum tubing, but it was just yet another thing that went wrong on this trip to make it stressful rather than enjoyable.
we started making food -- stirfried vegetables on couscous -- but after throwing up, it's hard to convince yourself to eat again. i swallowed a few bites and retired to the tent, where i spent another night tossing, aching, and being fucking cold.
the next morning, we harvested oysters from the bay, which was teeming with the creatures because, as we later found out, the land had actually been a shellfish lease, though my sweetie seemed convinced that it had since been abandoned. on our paddle back to our little wood island, we encountered even bigger waves than the day before, and although i'd taken all the steps i could to try to stay dry and warm, believing that being windswept and cold contributed to my seasickness, one of the larger waves came down right over me, running down my neck and drenching my fleece. i didn't throw up that day, but i sure felt like it. i didn't do much paddling, but by the time we got back to the island to set up camp, my thumbs were blistered, and i was cold and broken.
that night was a bit better; at least we could set up the tent in daylight. the island was small enough that we knew there was nobody else and no bears around, and my sweetie built a fire, which i used repeatedly to dry my feet. i only had my neoprene boots, and they were waterlogged. if i took them off to dry my feet, i knew i'd be wet again the moment i had to step into them to go anywhere. with our vegetables going bad, we just dumped everything into a pot and boiled them up with our clams and the remaining couscous, which resulted in a watery soup that would only be acceptable as camping food.
the next morning, we had a fortunately uneventful paddle back to heriot bay. and, as soon as we lifted the kayaks out of the ocean, the sun came out, after hiding behind clouds for the entire weekend. we ate at heriot bay inn that afternoon; we all gorged oursevles, me especially, since i was starving but didn't want to eat too much for fear it'd all come back up.
anyway, we got the 9pm ferry home, which meant that we didn't get to bed until midnight. the next morning, as i attempted to get up for work, i found myself with a cough, a headcold, and achy shoulders and knees.
"next time we go kayaking," my sweetie said to me, "maybe you'll listen to me and get the expensive paddling jacket."
to which i replied -- only partly in jest -- "what the hell makes you think i'll go kayaking with you ever again?"
~sigh~
i'm a bit better now, but i still feel dazed and quite broken. my sweetie is off on an intrepid hike up blacktusk in a couple of weeks.
i'm not going.
instead of eating turkey and stuffing like normal people, my sweetie decided that the thing to do thanksgiving weekend was to take a kayak trip out by the discovery islands and harvest shellfish. see, oysters aren't any good in the summer because they spawn and get all gross -- october's allegedly when they start building a glycogen supply to live through the winter and actually get sweet. he'd made me promise a couple of months ago that i'd keep thanksgiving weekend free to go get oysters.
i had misgivings from the get-go, but i assumed we'd be camping at quadra island, head down to rebecca spit and pick up oysters from the beach at low tide. i thought we'd be out there for two of the three days, come home and get rested up and cleaned up for work on the monday. then i found out we'd be kayaking. and that we'd stay out all three days. and that low tide was at about 4am plus or minus an hour each of those nights. and that we weren't going on some romantic getaway -- a girl from his lab and s&a would be joining us.
i told him i didn't think i could go. the timing was shit. the weather had already turned rainy, i was supposed to write my thesis, and i was likely to be hitting the peak of PMS on the trip. i was going to freeze my ass off, i told him.
then he got all sad and whined about me promising to go. he tried to tell me i'd enjoy the trip and that it'd be good for me.
i relented, telling him that to make up for lost time on my thesis, he'd have to take care of stuff at home before and after the trip so that i could work. after two ferry rides interrupted by a two-hour drive from nanaimo to campbell river, we arrived at herriot bay, where we set up camp, had the last civilized meal we'd be having for several days, then headed out at about midnight to harvest shellfish. we filled our quota of oysters and dug for clams, then headed back to the campsite where a crazy and presumably drunk man was having a fit about a chess game or something. the noise, the cold, and my thermarest, which is not made with a lady's curvatures in mind, made for a rough night's sleep.
we set off on our kayaks the next morning, after numerous hours of dillydallying. the first ninety minutes were fine; we arrived on a tiny wooded island; the largest of an ostensible archipelago of rocks, several of which featured fattened seals in poses that might be considered sultry if they were human. their blubber rippled as they launched themselves with their bellies into the water, where they seemed considerably more elegant and cute. we ate a lunch of oysters at our wooded island; my first mistake (after agreeing to go on this trip) may have been that oysters were pretty much all i ate. most of us cut ourselves shucking the damn things; the wound i made with my oyster knife is still festering away on my ring finger now. although the oysters were quite fresh and delicious on their way down, let me tell you that i wasn't terribly fond of them on their way back up...
after lunch, we launched into a bleakly cold paddle against the wind toward an island but without a specific destination in mind. all we knew from my sweetie was that there were "some bays" on the other side of read island that probably have lots of oysters. after two hours of being tossed around on three-foot waves and having the wind chill me to the bone, i began feeling unwell. "we'll just go past that point there and there should be a place to beach."
past the point was an aquaculture operation, which meant that we couldn't harvest within several hundred metres of it. we paddled past the next point. more aquaculture.
this seemingly endless meandering made me feel even more ill, and with about an hour and a half or so before sunset, i lost it and vomitted off the side of the kayak. my sweetie picked up speed to drop me off in a bay where i was supposed to find a decent camping spot while he turned back to find the others and let them know where we'd ended up.
in neoprene boots and carrying an ungainly kayak paddle, i had to amble my way across rocky crags then hack my way through the bush only to find that the grassy area i thought might be a promising campsite was actually an impossibly rocky region next to a stream. meanwhile, the sun was setting, and there was no sign of the others. all i had with me were the extremely wet clothes on my back and a paddle. i climbed over this valley of fallen trees that smelled like rotting garbage and made it to a mossy landing, paced around, and waited. clearly, someone had been there earlier. there were discarded nets and old crab shells. was this person still there? was he going to emerge out of the bushes with a shotgun ordering me off his property?
i was relieved to see kayaks coming around the bend and into the bay just as the sun was setting...but they were sans my sweetie. apparently, when he'd backtracked, he missed them somehow. the others set up their tents while i sat and worried some more. after what seemed like hours, my sweetie paddled back into the bay, exhausted. he charged me with the task of setting up the tent while he pulled the kayak to higher ground. as i put the tentpoles in, one of them snapped catastrophically. we eventually reinforced the break with a piece of aluminum tubing, but it was just yet another thing that went wrong on this trip to make it stressful rather than enjoyable.
we started making food -- stirfried vegetables on couscous -- but after throwing up, it's hard to convince yourself to eat again. i swallowed a few bites and retired to the tent, where i spent another night tossing, aching, and being fucking cold.
the next morning, we harvested oysters from the bay, which was teeming with the creatures because, as we later found out, the land had actually been a shellfish lease, though my sweetie seemed convinced that it had since been abandoned. on our paddle back to our little wood island, we encountered even bigger waves than the day before, and although i'd taken all the steps i could to try to stay dry and warm, believing that being windswept and cold contributed to my seasickness, one of the larger waves came down right over me, running down my neck and drenching my fleece. i didn't throw up that day, but i sure felt like it. i didn't do much paddling, but by the time we got back to the island to set up camp, my thumbs were blistered, and i was cold and broken.
that night was a bit better; at least we could set up the tent in daylight. the island was small enough that we knew there was nobody else and no bears around, and my sweetie built a fire, which i used repeatedly to dry my feet. i only had my neoprene boots, and they were waterlogged. if i took them off to dry my feet, i knew i'd be wet again the moment i had to step into them to go anywhere. with our vegetables going bad, we just dumped everything into a pot and boiled them up with our clams and the remaining couscous, which resulted in a watery soup that would only be acceptable as camping food.
the next morning, we had a fortunately uneventful paddle back to heriot bay. and, as soon as we lifted the kayaks out of the ocean, the sun came out, after hiding behind clouds for the entire weekend. we ate at heriot bay inn that afternoon; we all gorged oursevles, me especially, since i was starving but didn't want to eat too much for fear it'd all come back up.
anyway, we got the 9pm ferry home, which meant that we didn't get to bed until midnight. the next morning, as i attempted to get up for work, i found myself with a cough, a headcold, and achy shoulders and knees.
"next time we go kayaking," my sweetie said to me, "maybe you'll listen to me and get the expensive paddling jacket."
to which i replied -- only partly in jest -- "what the hell makes you think i'll go kayaking with you ever again?"
~sigh~
i'm a bit better now, but i still feel dazed and quite broken. my sweetie is off on an intrepid hike up blacktusk in a couple of weeks.
i'm not going.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
holy fuck, i haven't written in a long time.
an update:
two weeks ago, i finally got keys to my workplace. roughly a week ago, i got a real e-mail address (for the summer, i was intern@douglas-mcintyre....). on monday, i got an official title.
now i can introduce myself as an editorial assistant at douglas & mcintyre.
and, i'm making real money. not a lot, but i'm out of the starvation zone.
things are looking up.
***
in other news, my sweetie flew to ottawa last week to reclaim our stuff that had been growing increasingly obsolete for three years in a heated storage facility that charged us about two grand a year. he drove a u-haul cube van all the way back in three days, and up until a few days ago, there was a seven-foot cube of crap sitting in the middle of living room.
one thing about my sweetie that's generally very endearing but incredibly frustrating when it comes to discarding possessions is that he attaches sentimental value to everything he owns. he brought back about eight hundred t-shirts, all of which say something hilarious or are otherwise "cool," and even though we have zero space, he's insisting on keeping them. he's got a back-story for virtually every one of them.
~sigh~
***
i have a little over twenty pages of my internship report written. i'm not supposed to call it a thesis, but calling it an internship report seems to trivialize it some. anyway, it looks like i might have to invoke some serious triple-space action to get it to the requisite sixty pages. my days of student journalism trained me to economize words and be succinct. i just can't ramble or make my prose any more literary. as a result, the report is incredibly short and shit boring to read.
oh well.
i guess the point is just to get enough done so that i can graduate and focus on my job.
i have a job. cool.
an update:
two weeks ago, i finally got keys to my workplace. roughly a week ago, i got a real e-mail address (for the summer, i was intern@douglas-mcintyre....). on monday, i got an official title.
now i can introduce myself as an editorial assistant at douglas & mcintyre.
and, i'm making real money. not a lot, but i'm out of the starvation zone.
things are looking up.
***
in other news, my sweetie flew to ottawa last week to reclaim our stuff that had been growing increasingly obsolete for three years in a heated storage facility that charged us about two grand a year. he drove a u-haul cube van all the way back in three days, and up until a few days ago, there was a seven-foot cube of crap sitting in the middle of living room.
one thing about my sweetie that's generally very endearing but incredibly frustrating when it comes to discarding possessions is that he attaches sentimental value to everything he owns. he brought back about eight hundred t-shirts, all of which say something hilarious or are otherwise "cool," and even though we have zero space, he's insisting on keeping them. he's got a back-story for virtually every one of them.
~sigh~
***
i have a little over twenty pages of my internship report written. i'm not supposed to call it a thesis, but calling it an internship report seems to trivialize it some. anyway, it looks like i might have to invoke some serious triple-space action to get it to the requisite sixty pages. my days of student journalism trained me to economize words and be succinct. i just can't ramble or make my prose any more literary. as a result, the report is incredibly short and shit boring to read.
oh well.
i guess the point is just to get enough done so that i can graduate and focus on my job.
i have a job. cool.
Sunday, September 04, 2005
back from a week of houseboating, where i spent every day hiking, floating around in the lake, or doing crossword puzzles. a much-needed break following a few months of frenzied hell.
it was refreshing not to have internet access, though i feel a bit out of touch now, having missed the katrina ordeal. when i saw lewis lapham speak at nash in january, i asked him if there was a sense of outrage in the US that the mainstream media was simply ignoring or if there was just no anger whatsoever. there is no outrage, he told me. the american people had gone numb.
well, there's certainly outrage now. a year too late, maybe.
on the houseboat, SW brought along a copy of the walrus, in which i noticed that one of their illustrators, sam, shared the same name as a remarkably gifted artist and genuinely awesome person i knew in high school. at the risk of feeling like a bit of a stalker, i am tempted to get in touch with him. is that weird? just a couple of weeks ago, my sweetie and i were on the bus going home from a party, when a chick approached us and started talking to us. i'd recognized her as the queen bitch from my junior high years, while my sweetie had the misfortune of going to high school with her. she talked to us like we'd always been pals.
when we got off the bus, my sweetie said, "you know, that's the first time she's ever said a word to me."
i felt indignant at her nerve to come speak to me after how mean she was to the nerdy loser girl in junior high. at the same time, i couldn't help but feel that her high school years probably were her best and she was trying to find any excuse to relive them.
anyway, point is, i don't know how a random e-mail from me to sam would be received.
***
one week before starting up again at d&m.
it was refreshing not to have internet access, though i feel a bit out of touch now, having missed the katrina ordeal. when i saw lewis lapham speak at nash in january, i asked him if there was a sense of outrage in the US that the mainstream media was simply ignoring or if there was just no anger whatsoever. there is no outrage, he told me. the american people had gone numb.
well, there's certainly outrage now. a year too late, maybe.
on the houseboat, SW brought along a copy of the walrus, in which i noticed that one of their illustrators, sam, shared the same name as a remarkably gifted artist and genuinely awesome person i knew in high school. at the risk of feeling like a bit of a stalker, i am tempted to get in touch with him. is that weird? just a couple of weeks ago, my sweetie and i were on the bus going home from a party, when a chick approached us and started talking to us. i'd recognized her as the queen bitch from my junior high years, while my sweetie had the misfortune of going to high school with her. she talked to us like we'd always been pals.
when we got off the bus, my sweetie said, "you know, that's the first time she's ever said a word to me."
i felt indignant at her nerve to come speak to me after how mean she was to the nerdy loser girl in junior high. at the same time, i couldn't help but feel that her high school years probably were her best and she was trying to find any excuse to relive them.
anyway, point is, i don't know how a random e-mail from me to sam would be received.
***
one week before starting up again at d&m.
Monday, August 22, 2005
woot!
i wandered into my last week of my internship expecting to slip right into "what are they going to do -- fire me?" mode, but the vp operations called me into a meeting and offered me a 3-month contract to stay on, do editorial work and help set up their central database.
woohoo! i get to put off worrying about unemployment until at least the beginning of 2006. and they're paying me more than twice what i'm getting now as an intern, meaning i don't have to come home every night and do freelance work just to make ends meet. and i have the option of working just four days a week so that i can spend that extra day working on my internship report.
sweeeeeet.
i wandered into my last week of my internship expecting to slip right into "what are they going to do -- fire me?" mode, but the vp operations called me into a meeting and offered me a 3-month contract to stay on, do editorial work and help set up their central database.
woohoo! i get to put off worrying about unemployment until at least the beginning of 2006. and they're paying me more than twice what i'm getting now as an intern, meaning i don't have to come home every night and do freelance work just to make ends meet. and i have the option of working just four days a week so that i can spend that extra day working on my internship report.
sweeeeeet.
Saturday, August 06, 2005
wow, i haven't written in a long time.
this is perhaps because the month of july attempted to kill me.
in addition to working 8 to 4:30 at d&m, i did my ccsp indexing project for my department's anthology and edited an entire book on fluid dynamics. i sent out my invoices two days ago, and discovered that i'd done over $3000 in contract work this month.
and i almost died.
i guess i've discovered the cap on the amount of money i could make as a freelancer. i suppose $2400 a month is a comfortable enough living. also, i probably wouldn't have been in such rough shape if i didn't also have to do internship work.
my internship is coming to an end in about three weeks, which makes me sad. there's a rumour going around that d&m might be initiating a junior editor position. fingers crossed.
my sweetie's gone on a kayak trip with his lab. it's much less nerve-wracking that he's actually going with other people, as opposed to last year, when he made a solo trip to quadra island. still, though, the timing sort of sucks, because this is my first sort of free weekend in over a month.
in a couple of days, i start designing the september issue of the physics journal. i have no idea what the content is going to be like...but i've discovered that i don't really care, which i see as a healthy and overdue step away from student journalism. it'll be good to do design again, though. i've been doing so much editing, i'll need a bit of balance.
until then, though, i'm trying to cram my days with social plans so i can keep my mind off the fact that my sweetie is under constant threat of drowning.
this is perhaps because the month of july attempted to kill me.
in addition to working 8 to 4:30 at d&m, i did my ccsp indexing project for my department's anthology and edited an entire book on fluid dynamics. i sent out my invoices two days ago, and discovered that i'd done over $3000 in contract work this month.
and i almost died.
i guess i've discovered the cap on the amount of money i could make as a freelancer. i suppose $2400 a month is a comfortable enough living. also, i probably wouldn't have been in such rough shape if i didn't also have to do internship work.
my internship is coming to an end in about three weeks, which makes me sad. there's a rumour going around that d&m might be initiating a junior editor position. fingers crossed.
my sweetie's gone on a kayak trip with his lab. it's much less nerve-wracking that he's actually going with other people, as opposed to last year, when he made a solo trip to quadra island. still, though, the timing sort of sucks, because this is my first sort of free weekend in over a month.
in a couple of days, i start designing the september issue of the physics journal. i have no idea what the content is going to be like...but i've discovered that i don't really care, which i see as a healthy and overdue step away from student journalism. it'll be good to do design again, though. i've been doing so much editing, i'll need a bit of balance.
until then, though, i'm trying to cram my days with social plans so i can keep my mind off the fact that my sweetie is under constant threat of drowning.
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
finally.
i'd finished the newsletter redesign for the physics department over a month and a half ago and i just got paid. allegedly, the problem was that the finance department hadn't changed my address since i moved (which was almost a year ago now), and the physics department couldn't enter the data for my cheque to finance before they changed my address.
it's all bullshit, if you ask me. first of all, i moved up two floors. that's a three-digit change in my address. also, i'd filled in a change of address form last august.
i'm pretty sure that it was just a bunch of newbies in the physics department who didn't know what they were doing and lost my invoice. i had to remind them i hadn't gotten paid before they finally got off their fat asses.
why they had to go through payroll and not just pay me as a freelancer, i have no idea.
i fucking hate ubc. seriously.
i'd finished the newsletter redesign for the physics department over a month and a half ago and i just got paid. allegedly, the problem was that the finance department hadn't changed my address since i moved (which was almost a year ago now), and the physics department couldn't enter the data for my cheque to finance before they changed my address.
it's all bullshit, if you ask me. first of all, i moved up two floors. that's a three-digit change in my address. also, i'd filled in a change of address form last august.
i'm pretty sure that it was just a bunch of newbies in the physics department who didn't know what they were doing and lost my invoice. i had to remind them i hadn't gotten paid before they finally got off their fat asses.
why they had to go through payroll and not just pay me as a freelancer, i have no idea.
i fucking hate ubc. seriously.
Monday, July 18, 2005
so i'm home from work after three straight and solid days of indexing that have left me exhausted and broken with a brain functioning at, oh, maybe 0.4 capacity. and i'm officially scared shitless about what i'm going to do with my life in six weeks after this buffer internship's over.
sure, i feel more prepared than ever to take on the publishing industry -- i'm armed with all sorts of obscure knowledge you could only get in a classroom and a high tolerance for tedium you could only get in an internship. unfortunately, i think that having one and a half master's degrees has pretty much done nothing but boost my standards to unattainable heights. any job description i read, i say, 'oh, i don't want to do that kind of crappy entry-level work.'
i wonder how long it will take me to bite the bullet and realize that i've still got to pay my dues in the real world before i get the cred to move up in publishing. no editing for nori just yet -- no, first she has to be an assistant to some editor, filing manuscripts and fact-checking bibliographies.
sigh.
i'm so tired. i just need a real weekend off. really off, where i could sit on my ass and not do any housework or contract work. just to make ends meet and be able to make the $2000-a-term tuition i'm paying the school to work for someone, i've been working my ass off editing or indexing. in some senses, it's something i'm essentially used to, since it's kind of like doing school work. mostly, though, it's just really really exhausting.
sure, i feel more prepared than ever to take on the publishing industry -- i'm armed with all sorts of obscure knowledge you could only get in a classroom and a high tolerance for tedium you could only get in an internship. unfortunately, i think that having one and a half master's degrees has pretty much done nothing but boost my standards to unattainable heights. any job description i read, i say, 'oh, i don't want to do that kind of crappy entry-level work.'
i wonder how long it will take me to bite the bullet and realize that i've still got to pay my dues in the real world before i get the cred to move up in publishing. no editing for nori just yet -- no, first she has to be an assistant to some editor, filing manuscripts and fact-checking bibliographies.
sigh.
i'm so tired. i just need a real weekend off. really off, where i could sit on my ass and not do any housework or contract work. just to make ends meet and be able to make the $2000-a-term tuition i'm paying the school to work for someone, i've been working my ass off editing or indexing. in some senses, it's something i'm essentially used to, since it's kind of like doing school work. mostly, though, it's just really really exhausting.
Monday, July 11, 2005
Friday, July 08, 2005
*sob*
they've confirmed my ibook's hard drive is fucked and needs to be replaced. it'll cost $120 for the part and at least $90 for the labour. the old data might be recoverable depending on the state of the old hard drive. data recovery will be another $90 or more.
*whimper*
my poor ibook. my poor stolen computer programs...my poor stolen fonts...all of my files...
*sob*
they've confirmed my ibook's hard drive is fucked and needs to be replaced. it'll cost $120 for the part and at least $90 for the labour. the old data might be recoverable depending on the state of the old hard drive. data recovery will be another $90 or more.
*whimper*
my poor ibook. my poor stolen computer programs...my poor stolen fonts...all of my files...
*sob*
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
i just won a hundred dollars!
it was for a writing competition among my classmates. i highly suspect that i won because nobody else submitted anything.
it's still a hundred bucks. i promised myself that the next hundred dollars i earned would go to unicef. that was about six months ago, so i guess this is perfect opportunity to make good on my word.
word.
it was for a writing competition among my classmates. i highly suspect that i won because nobody else submitted anything.
it's still a hundred bucks. i promised myself that the next hundred dollars i earned would go to unicef. that was about six months ago, so i guess this is perfect opportunity to make good on my word.
word.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
Monday, June 27, 2005
scattered ambivalent crap:
1) critical mass friday: amazing. there were over 1100 people, and we took over the lion's gate bridge. it was a pretty impressive sight.
2) sunday: catastrophic computer failure. my beautiful ibook started making this clicking noise and stalled. my attempts to reboot led to additional clickling. it's undoubtedly a hardware problem; i just hope i can recover what's on my hard disk. they say to back it up, but i don't really know anyone who does that...
3) almost one year to the day, some pigfuckers rip off my sweetie's bike again. this time, they didn't even leave the wheels -- everything's gone; it's been stripped down to the frame. what's really retarded is that they're going to take the parts home and realize they can't do a fucking thing with them; the whole chain ring was custom machined.
4) i have to edit a 239-page book on fluid dynamics for wiley, and i'm getting paid far less than what i was paid for my book for springer.
bah!
1) critical mass friday: amazing. there were over 1100 people, and we took over the lion's gate bridge. it was a pretty impressive sight.
2) sunday: catastrophic computer failure. my beautiful ibook started making this clicking noise and stalled. my attempts to reboot led to additional clickling. it's undoubtedly a hardware problem; i just hope i can recover what's on my hard disk. they say to back it up, but i don't really know anyone who does that...
3) almost one year to the day, some pigfuckers rip off my sweetie's bike again. this time, they didn't even leave the wheels -- everything's gone; it's been stripped down to the frame. what's really retarded is that they're going to take the parts home and realize they can't do a fucking thing with them; the whole chain ring was custom machined.
4) i have to edit a 239-page book on fluid dynamics for wiley, and i'm getting paid far less than what i was paid for my book for springer.
bah!
Saturday, June 25, 2005
dear lord.
so one of the things i have to do for my job is compile an author handbook – something editors can give to new authors that explains the editorial process, the formatting requirements of the manuscripts, etc. to do this, i'm essentially taking a bunch of scattered papers that are used in the firm and putting it all together into a coherent document. this is an excerpt from their disk requirements document:
"Manuscripts should be submitted on 3½” disks using recent versions of IBM-compatible WordPerfect or MS Word."
also:
"Never type the letter l (“el”) when you mean the number 1; and do not interchange zero and the capital letter O."
my first thought when i read this was "is this for real?" and after i'd ascertained that it was, my second thought was "how old is this document?" that second requirement is like a throwback to the days of typewriters before they put number keys on keyboard and people had to improvise. WTF?
i asked if CDs or e-mail attachments were acceptable. i mean, i don't even have a 3.5" floppy drive on my computer. turns out they're not a big fan of CDs, apparently.
if there was ever a testament to how technophobic the publishing industry is, this is it.
so one of the things i have to do for my job is compile an author handbook – something editors can give to new authors that explains the editorial process, the formatting requirements of the manuscripts, etc. to do this, i'm essentially taking a bunch of scattered papers that are used in the firm and putting it all together into a coherent document. this is an excerpt from their disk requirements document:
"Manuscripts should be submitted on 3½” disks using recent versions of IBM-compatible WordPerfect or MS Word."
also:
"Never type the letter l (“el”) when you mean the number 1; and do not interchange zero and the capital letter O."
my first thought when i read this was "is this for real?" and after i'd ascertained that it was, my second thought was "how old is this document?" that second requirement is like a throwback to the days of typewriters before they put number keys on keyboard and people had to improvise. WTF?
i asked if CDs or e-mail attachments were acceptable. i mean, i don't even have a 3.5" floppy drive on my computer. turns out they're not a big fan of CDs, apparently.
if there was ever a testament to how technophobic the publishing industry is, this is it.
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Thursday, June 16, 2005
babies.
seems like everyone is having them. my tech instructor at school, the publisher's assistant at greystone, a dude in my sweetie's lab, a friend of a friend i ran into on the bus...
i, on the other hand, dread the thought of having babies. i can't at all understand how anyone in our financial and career situation could even contemplate having babies. it's not that i don't like babies -- although clearly, i'm less interested in them than most people seem to be. i think what really turns me off about the concept of parenting isn't the child, but the thought of being obligated to interact with other parents. people who believe they're the only ones ever to have procreated. women who preface everything they say with "well, as a mother..."
same thing with dogs. some dog people are really cool, but in my brief trip back to alberta two weeks ago, my sweetie and i took his two family dogs out to the off-leash park. i sat back and observed as dogs sniffed each another's asses and the owners were forced to make asinine small talk, which revolved largely around breeds of dogs, dog food, dog toys...
it was torturous.
seems like everyone is having them. my tech instructor at school, the publisher's assistant at greystone, a dude in my sweetie's lab, a friend of a friend i ran into on the bus...
i, on the other hand, dread the thought of having babies. i can't at all understand how anyone in our financial and career situation could even contemplate having babies. it's not that i don't like babies -- although clearly, i'm less interested in them than most people seem to be. i think what really turns me off about the concept of parenting isn't the child, but the thought of being obligated to interact with other parents. people who believe they're the only ones ever to have procreated. women who preface everything they say with "well, as a mother..."
same thing with dogs. some dog people are really cool, but in my brief trip back to alberta two weeks ago, my sweetie and i took his two family dogs out to the off-leash park. i sat back and observed as dogs sniffed each another's asses and the owners were forced to make asinine small talk, which revolved largely around breeds of dogs, dog food, dog toys...
it was torturous.
Friday, May 27, 2005
ahh, the oft-neglected index.
for some unknown reason, i've found myself in the position of having to index two things at once, my previous indexing experience being precisely nothing. one is a cookbook, which should be pretty straightforward (recipes, subrecipes, ingredients, some techniques -- easy, right?), but the other is our departmental press's anthology for its tenth anniversary celebrations. i've been indexing for two nights straight, and i'm only on page 23. of 381.
i've discovered this since i first started: indexing is hard. deciding what to include, what not to include, how to define subheadings, etc.? non-trivial.
i've always had a great appreciation for good indexes -- and cursed poor ones, of course. i'm growing increasingly apprehensive that the one i'm currently constructing will be one of the latter.
***
my sweetie and i convocated yesterday. heard the president of the university give one of the most hypocritical speeches ever. everything she said, i interpreted ironically, and i was constantly wishing i'd brought a bucket of peanuts to throw at her.
but i've neatly wrapped up that chapter of my life. in addition to donning the ridiculous gown with its ridiculous hood and ridiculous mortarboard, i met up with my old supervisor and finished the training him to use the template i'd made for the redesigned departmental newsletter. now i can invoice him and put that behind me as well.
people say 'congratulations' when i tell them i've convocated, but i don't feel proud of the accomplishment at all. it's a degree i wish i'd never pursued.
books are so much nicer than lasers.
for some unknown reason, i've found myself in the position of having to index two things at once, my previous indexing experience being precisely nothing. one is a cookbook, which should be pretty straightforward (recipes, subrecipes, ingredients, some techniques -- easy, right?), but the other is our departmental press's anthology for its tenth anniversary celebrations. i've been indexing for two nights straight, and i'm only on page 23. of 381.
i've discovered this since i first started: indexing is hard. deciding what to include, what not to include, how to define subheadings, etc.? non-trivial.
i've always had a great appreciation for good indexes -- and cursed poor ones, of course. i'm growing increasingly apprehensive that the one i'm currently constructing will be one of the latter.
***
my sweetie and i convocated yesterday. heard the president of the university give one of the most hypocritical speeches ever. everything she said, i interpreted ironically, and i was constantly wishing i'd brought a bucket of peanuts to throw at her.
but i've neatly wrapped up that chapter of my life. in addition to donning the ridiculous gown with its ridiculous hood and ridiculous mortarboard, i met up with my old supervisor and finished the training him to use the template i'd made for the redesigned departmental newsletter. now i can invoice him and put that behind me as well.
people say 'congratulations' when i tell them i've convocated, but i don't feel proud of the accomplishment at all. it's a degree i wish i'd never pursued.
books are so much nicer than lasers.
Friday, May 20, 2005
my parents arrive tomorrow morning for a week's stay chez moi. that means that tonight, i'll have to:
1) clean the bathroom hard core
2) clean the kitchen hard core
3) vacuum
4) take out the recycling
5) gather up my clothes, currently randomly strewn about the apartment
6) find something to hang over the photo of a flattened mouse that will horrify my mother -- and not in a good way
7) find a good place to keep the bone carvings of two asians having sex that will horrify my mother -- and not in a good way
tomorrow morning, i should probably get some food or something, too. i have no idea how i'll entertain my parents while they're here.
1) clean the bathroom hard core
2) clean the kitchen hard core
3) vacuum
4) take out the recycling
5) gather up my clothes, currently randomly strewn about the apartment
6) find something to hang over the photo of a flattened mouse that will horrify my mother -- and not in a good way
7) find a good place to keep the bone carvings of two asians having sex that will horrify my mother -- and not in a good way
tomorrow morning, i should probably get some food or something, too. i have no idea how i'll entertain my parents while they're here.
Sunday, May 15, 2005
i am editing a book for the very first time.
it's a springer chemistry book about molecular orbitals and shit. it's an interesting learning experience, going through this massive manuscript. i'm getting paid 3 euros a page, and because the pages are way less dense than the papers i was editing, it's supposedly a net gain for me.
too bad this is the most boring book ever written. ever.
also, all of the authors are japanese, and their english ranges from poor to shit-poor.
i've asked my freelancing supervisor to give me next week off. my parents are going to be in town, i'll have my convocation, and i just don't want to have to come home from work and edit for three hours each night that week. it means the second half of the manuscript's going to be delayed by a week, but i don't think the world will suffer too much if this collection of papers about the DV-X(alpha) method isn't made immediately available.
***
i'd promised to write a thing or two about my internship. it's pretty good so far; i'm doing a lot of filing and photocopying, but it's pretty much what i'd expected. at least i'm still learning stuff. i've been going through the slush pile of unsolicited submissions and have come up with a system to make the process more efficient. i submitted a proposal to my supervisor about the project; if it works out, it may be a substantial part of my internship report.
otherwise, i've been doing a lot of proofreading. my supervisor's given me two proposals to review, both of which i rejected 'cause the writing was just too bad.
i might be indexing a cookbook in a couple of weeks, but this upcoming week, i'm actually covering the front desk for the receptionist. i'm terrified i'll answer the phone "dumbass and mcintyre" or hang up on someone when i transfer their call.
i can't believe i've already been working there for three weeks.
***
finally started my herb garden last week. i have basil, sage and rosemary growing, and my oregano and chive seeds are finally starting to germinate.
yum.
it's a springer chemistry book about molecular orbitals and shit. it's an interesting learning experience, going through this massive manuscript. i'm getting paid 3 euros a page, and because the pages are way less dense than the papers i was editing, it's supposedly a net gain for me.
too bad this is the most boring book ever written. ever.
also, all of the authors are japanese, and their english ranges from poor to shit-poor.
i've asked my freelancing supervisor to give me next week off. my parents are going to be in town, i'll have my convocation, and i just don't want to have to come home from work and edit for three hours each night that week. it means the second half of the manuscript's going to be delayed by a week, but i don't think the world will suffer too much if this collection of papers about the DV-X(alpha) method isn't made immediately available.
***
i'd promised to write a thing or two about my internship. it's pretty good so far; i'm doing a lot of filing and photocopying, but it's pretty much what i'd expected. at least i'm still learning stuff. i've been going through the slush pile of unsolicited submissions and have come up with a system to make the process more efficient. i submitted a proposal to my supervisor about the project; if it works out, it may be a substantial part of my internship report.
otherwise, i've been doing a lot of proofreading. my supervisor's given me two proposals to review, both of which i rejected 'cause the writing was just too bad.
i might be indexing a cookbook in a couple of weeks, but this upcoming week, i'm actually covering the front desk for the receptionist. i'm terrified i'll answer the phone "dumbass and mcintyre" or hang up on someone when i transfer their call.
i can't believe i've already been working there for three weeks.
***
finally started my herb garden last week. i have basil, sage and rosemary growing, and my oregano and chive seeds are finally starting to germinate.
yum.
Friday, May 06, 2005
saw sloan last night. i'd never seen them live before...they were fun, but i was actually pretty impressed with the opener, magenta lane, a punky chick band from toronto.
***
allegedly, if you start exercising, at some point, you will find yourself more energized rather than tired. i sure hope that's going to kick in soon. i've been biking to work for the past two weeks and i'm still exhausted.
i've got stuff to write about, but i'm too incoherent at this point -- more later.
***
allegedly, if you start exercising, at some point, you will find yourself more energized rather than tired. i sure hope that's going to kick in soon. i've been biking to work for the past two weeks and i'm still exhausted.
i've got stuff to write about, but i'm too incoherent at this point -- more later.
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