my friend martha has made a phenomenal musical introduction to me.
i know i’m behind the times in many things, music being one of them. so of course i’d heard this song but didn’t know the band behind them. but i have to say, i love this band! they are quirky and they have a cellist, their sound is easy and they sing simple but deep songs about jesus.
once in a while i have a really bizarre sleep.
yesterday i drank a coffee in the mid-morning. not because i felt like i needed it, but because i like the taste and the smell and the act of drinking it. although not a hard and fast rule, drinking coffee later in the day contributes to a unrestful sleep. but i didn’t think it’d be that bad, it was only 10am after all.
but then i woke up at 1:53am and couldn’t go back to sleep. then i was hungry (i didn’t eat after going for a run last night). then i was restless.
so i got up and had some cereal and read.
then i came to my senses around 3:15… what am i still doing up?? eventually i got myself back to sleep, but what a strange middle of the night.
i was in toronto friday and saturday and was again, a bit overwhelmed.
i took the bus in on friday, landing me right in the middle of downtown around lunch hour. it was busy and people were everywhere. before meeting with a friend, i walked over to a tasty bakery called “wanda’s pie in the sky” in kensington to pick up some dessert for post-dinner at friends’.
to begin with, it took me longer to get to kensington than i had thought it would. so i was walking faster, which under normal circumstances would make me proud for fitting into the toronto scene better. but i was walking through chinatown, which i discovered is comparatively slow in the way of pedestrian traffic. not only were there many people, but the sidewalks are narrowed by bike parking and food stands.
i had a sweet few hours with my favourite baby and her momma and meandered my way down to the queen’s quay area. being a bit early, i sat in the music garden and read. though i could still hear street traffic, it was actually kind of nice. cooler and calmer.
after visiting with those friends, i hopped on the subway to my friend’s who lives near downsview park. the air was cooler and cleaner than downtown, but the cars were intense. i suppose it’s the aggressiveness of suburbia.
in the morning i jumped on a bus to go to york for the running and reading 5k race. i marveled at all the housing we drove by, as if all those people live in toronto! according to a newspaper clipping on my friend’s fridge, 5.7 million people live in the gta, 2.7 in toronto proper. i can’t quite conceptualize that number in human terms and the corresponding vehicle traffic, homes, services and businesses. how do people not feel claustrophobic??
last monday the city of kingston put out a press release saying that they were offering 1000 rain barrels for about $40 each. i was excited to hear because i’ve been thinking of getting a rain barrel for a little while. i was still out of town when i got the email from my friend telling me about the offer and then have been busy or haven’t been home during the day or have remembered at 4:58pm (too late to reasonably call an office!)
finally, about 20 minutes ago, i hit the perfect formula: i’m at home and i remembered! and i’m just doing computer work so i could phone.
to my great surprise, they still have rain barrels available! so now i’m on the list to get one delivered the second week of june. sure, i’ll have to figure out: 1/ where to put it, 2/ how to set up the drainage system and, 3/ how to set it up, but we’re at least one step closer.
this was a pretty jam-packed but accomplished weekend!
my ambitions for the garden this year are higher than last year because of the successful foray into gardening last season and my housemates/friends/students who are excited to be a part of the endeavour. the goals for this weekend: remove a bush-like tree, clear the ground, build a raised bed and set up the raised bed where the foliage used to be.
buying wood on friday was a big deal. i went to the hardware store and talked to the nice older man who works in the lumber section. he was patient and explained things pretty well; he gave me time and options to decide what i wanted while still being directive. at one point he asked me if i was a queen’s student, a question i get fairly often, probably because i look young. then we got to talking about history because he asked me what i studied. it turns out he participates in historical re-enactments and he told me all about the costumes, the historical societies that are around, among other tidbits. i love random conversations like that.
anyway, i bought the lumber, screws, dirt and grass seed and was all ready to start the work!
we got out around 8am on saturday and started on the raised bed. i had a general vision and possess basic building skills; the rest we figured out as we went along.
we squared the corners and attached our screws, everything going smoothly until we were on our last corner where there were knots all along where we wanted to put in the screws. by that time, our neighbour had come out, saw what we were doing and handed us his power drill over the fence. it was wonderfully empowering to: 1/ build something ourselves and 2/ use a power drill! also, i have to mention that the ground we were working on was quite uneven, adding an element of difficulty.
kk and i deliberating
there she be!
there had been considerable shade-providing bush-like tree right in the middle of the sunniest spot in the yard, meaning it would cast a decent shadow on the garden last year.
being much more ambitious this year, i decided it was time to take it out. so kk hacked at it while i tackled digging out a basket that had been under the compost bin, wedged in about three feet deep. we borrowed a saw from the neighbours and that helped with the tree.
feeling triumphant about pulling off branches
it took me a long time to dig that thing out!
i think he’s breaking off that big branch in this shot
the leveling of the bed took a little while and i was grateful to have rob around for that because i was getting tired and hot and wanted to let it be uneven. kk had to leave for a bit, so if it had been left up to me, the bed would have been lop-sided.
by the time we wrapped up around 3, this is what we had:
the future home of our vegetables
so we called it a day, took showers and went downtown for gelato.
philosophically, i’m a fan of home gardens for various reasons: they encourage self-sustenance. they discourage use of the traditional food production system. they contribute to good physical health (working in them and eating the vegetables). they contribute to good emotional and mental health. they are useful and pretty.
functionally, i find it hard to get out into the yard and do work. i’m just not a self-motivated outdoors person. if any other human being is added to the equation, i’m out there in no time, mainly because i love to spend time with people.
last year i had what i thought was a brilliant idea: having students over weekly to work on the garden, share a meal and do a Bible study on a passage relating to organic growth. they loved it: digging around in the dirt, eating delicious vegetables and Biblical truths becoming more real because of their experiences.
this year i’m getting ambitious. yesterday with an acquaintance/friend we cleared the garden space. tomorrow, we hack down the rest of a bush/tree, build a raised bed and level the ground where the bed will be. then we will fill the space with dirt and be all ready for the veggies!
stay tuned for photos…
growing up in a suburb of toronto, i had the experience of being close enough to downtown to learn streetsmarts while being suburby enough to learn to drive in a car-dominant area. and of course there was the pride of being in the “416″ – ie, “real” toronto, as opposed to the surrounding gta/real suburbs.
since arriving in town last wednesday night for a week of support raising, i’ve realized how much of my toronto-ness has leaked out living in the comparatively calm and friendly kingston.
firstoff, toronto is huge! and growing! places that were literally farmland 10 years ago (when i last lived in toronto) are now subdivisions and shopping centres. i’ve been everywhere from north stouffville to vaughn to mississauga to scarborough to the harbourfront. it never ceases to amaze me how big this city is and just how long it can take to get from one place to the other.
secondly, people in toronto are intense! they walk fast and they don’t seem to have much patience for you if you’re in their way. i also get the sense that they take themselves very seriously. drivers are generally more aggressive and less gracious.
also, toronto is expensive! support raising means that i’m often meeting people over meals. about two thirds of my meetings were in restaurants or coffee shops and it was either that people were inviting me to fancy places or that food costs more than i’m used to.
this is my first extended toronto trip during which i feel not only the difference between a small and big city, but that i can’t switch as easily to “toronto mode” as i had for many years before. and i’m kind of glad about that, though. i don’t like the stressed out, rushed feeling and the heart pumping, fast walking and the frustration at anything that is holding me up.
i think kingston has finally broke me. and i’m glad.
a couple months ago my friend’s bike was stolen. i’ve actually heard that kingston is the bike theft capital of canada. i’ve never had one stolen but know plenty of people who have lost theirs.
not surprisingly then, there’s a bike auction a couple times of year in kingston. that’s when bikes the police have reclaimed are sold to the general public. my aforementioned friend is out of town this weekend so i went with another friend to buy a bike on her behalf.
as we turned onto the street, parked cars lined the side. this is a bigger deal than i thought it’d be! i registered, then went into the garage area where the bikes and auctioning were.
after picking one out that suited my friend’s instructions, i kept an eye on it (you have to be quick at these auctions! a few seconds gone by and you’re too late!) and observed the situation. people were standing in a crowd around a table on which someone would hoist the bike that was being auctioned. the auctioneer (who sounded like a legit caller) then would roll off numbers and people who wanted to bid stuck their number in the air.
getting my friend’s new bike was easy enough. i think the auctioneer started the bidding at $50 but i couldn’t really tell what he was saying. and i was a bit intimidated. then i heard $20 and shoved my paper in the air. another person was bidding against me but in the end she gave up and i got the bike for $60.
what a hilarious experience.
lessons learned for future auctions:
- know what you’re looking for.
- be decisive about your choice. second guessing may result in other people buying what you had been deliberating about.
- decide your max price in advance. the bidding moves so quickly that you don’t have time to determine whether the offered price is what you want to pay, unless you’ve thought about it beforehand.
- bring a friend, that makes everything more fun.
i got my last computer in the summer of 2006. it was a welcome addition to my life because for about a year i had been fighting with my old one, which was having virus/hard drive issues. i called it ace – partially because it was an acer computer and partially because i believed it was going to do me well. and it did!
a couple years in, it started overheating and spontaneously shutting down. but this problem was easy to fix: i would prop it up with a book and it very, very rarely decided on it’s own to shut down. then, a couple years after that, the case was starting to crack at the hinges. duct tape worked for a bit, but then it really cracked and i had to hold it together with butterfly clips. at this point, lots of people were telling me to buy a new computer. but i don’t give up so easily.
a couple years afterthat, i discovered that the cord was fraying. so i used electrical tape to cover it up and it was fine for a while. then, about a month ago, it started crackling whenever i plugged in my computer or tried to shift the area that was taped. then the ac adapter wouldn’t always deliver power to my computer. without power from the outlet, my computer had about 6 minutes of battery life.
ace, my trusty old computer
then i decided the time had come. i did some internet searching and found what i thought was a good computer for a good deal. my computer-knowledgeable friends agreed with me.
on monday this past week, a big package arrived for me. inside the box was another box. inside that box was another box. and inside that third box was my new computer! i like it a lot but it doesn’t have a name yet.
my new computer with it’s crocheted bag
my favourite things about my new computer are that the lid closes and that i can take it places.
in contrast to the epic race to pack, move and get my student to the bus station on saturday, i helped another student move today.
his belongings? a hockey bag, a camping backpack, a printer-sized box, a laundry basket and a knapsack. that’s it.
i wasn’t joking when i told him that he is a role model to us all.
