So I'm sticking labels onto envelopes. Bright frickin' green fluorescent labels. If I don't take the odd break, I will go blind... Luckily Magnolia has provided me with the perfect distraction...

1. FIRST NAME: Kate

2. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? My great-great grandmother. We don't actually really know what her name was, though. Her birth certificate's got "Catherine", the census calls her "Kitty", "Kelly", and "Ketty" in different years, and the family all seems to have called her Kate.

3. WHEN DID YOU LAST CRY? Good question. Last meltdown was sometime in England. Last tears-streaming-down-cheeks-silently was on the plane home from England. And there have been numerous close calls with tears of frustration since.

4. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Yeah, most of the time. It's kinda old-fashioned lookin'... and I dig the old-fashioned.

5. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCHEON MEAT? Pepper salami

6. KIDS? Ew.

7. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? I doubt it. We'd be too much alike and I'd drive myself nuts.

8. DO YOU HAVE A JOURNAL? Does this count?

9. DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT? Who, me? Sarcastic? Neeevvvver...

10. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Um, yah.

11. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? Ew, no.

12. WHAT'S YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? I had Frosted Flakes again the other day for the first time... normally I'm a Special K Red Berries kinda gal.

13. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Depends which shoes. There are some I HAVE to untie, or else I can't get them off.

14. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? Um, I'm quite good at faking complete and utter independence and indifference...

15. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR? Caramel Choo-Choo

16. SHOE SIZE? 9

17. RED OR PINK? Red

18. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOU? My inability to make close friends quickly and easily.

19. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? There isn't really a who - there's a 'what', though - my independence. I miss being on my own.

20. WANT EVERYONE TO SEND THIS BACK TO YOU? Stupid email chain whatsit.

So.... where'd 21 go?

22. LAST THING YOU ATE? I'm drinking tea right now... does that count?

23. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? "Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk" by Rufus Wainwright

24. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Black.

25. FAVORITE SMELL? Vanilla

26. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? The front desk staff

27. THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE YOU ARE ATTRACTED TO? They make me laugh. Seriously.

28. DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON THAT SENT THIS TO YOU? Um, it wasn't really 'sent' to me...

29. FAVORITE DRINK? Mmm... Strongbow... or Pepsi.

30. FAVORITE SPORT? to watch: football (soccer) participating: football (soccer)

31. HAIR COLOR? Brown

32. EYE COLOR? blue

33. WEAR CONTACTS? Most of the time, yup.

34. FAVORITE FOOD? Turkey and spinach canelloni. Fantastic way to get rid of Christmas/Thanksgiving leftovers.

35. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? Give me a good, well-researched period drama and I'm set.

36. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? Does Jane Eyre on PBS count?

37. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? Black. With black sweater vest. I have to work at TBS tonight and the uniform is just black. All black.

38. SUMMER OR WINTER? summer!!

39. HUGS OR KISSES? Hugs

40. FAVORITE DESSERT? Cheesecake

41. WHO IS MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND? No response necessary

42. LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND? No response necessary

43. WHAT BOOKS ARE YOU READING? Jane Eyre (for the second time) and a book on murders solved (or not) through forensic science

44. WHAT'S ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? a giant Dell logo.

45. WHAT DID YOU WATCH LAST NIGHT ON TV? Jane Eyre on PBS

46a. What is your favorite word? Excellent (Mr Burns style)
46b. What is your least favorite word? "Healthandsafetyorientation"
46c. What turns you on? laughing
46d. What turns you off? arrogance and egotism
46e. What sound or noise do you love? Really excellent renaissance/baroque music.
46f. What sound or noise do you hate? Cellphone ringtones, including my own.
46g. What is your favorite curse word? F***
46h. What profession other than yours would you like to attempt? Forensic science
46i. What profession would you not like to have? Prison guard
46j. What would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates? Health and Safety training really _was_ crap.

47. If you won the lottery, what's the first thing you'd buy? A condo. Seriously. And then I'd buy myself some more education - take that book/paper conservation course at West Dean... or get my PhD... or both...

48. THE FURTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME? Italy

49. DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT? I sing/play piano semi-professionally. Well, I used to, anyway.

50. WHEN AND WHERE WERE YOU BORN? '82. Ontario. Near Toronto. Which accounts for the bronchitis I had EVERY year when I was a kid. Seriously.

Tomorrow (or later today) - the joys of New Employee Health and Safety Orientation... or... More about Mould than I ever Needed to Know.

When you've got nothing to do at work, what do you do?

I've got no students coming to whinge or ask stupid questions *knock wood*

I've got no paperwork to file (I'm dependent on my co-workers for that, anyway) or mail out.

The phones aren't ringing *knock wood*.

I've finished the project my boss set for me.

I've answered all my email.

My desk isn't very messy at the moment, so it doesn't need to be cleaned.

I've read just about every story on the BBC news website.

I've read the Residence handbook yet AGAIN in an effort to educate myself. I may go read the manual yet AGAIN.

I have to look/sound like I'm doing something. Don't get me wrong. In a month we'll be swamped with applications and I'll be whinging about being overworked - I know that's the case. But for the moment...

What would you do? Surf the 'net? Organize your desk yet again? Help!

So, let's face it. The real estate market in Edmonton sucks right now for renters and buyers alike. Demand is high, supply is low. That's the way it works. The people that live in the rental next to my parents' place are just waiting for their house to be built. It's not quite Tent City, but it's getting there. This makes finding a decent, non-scuzzy apartment for a decent price in an OK part of town rather difficult.

Ok, granted, I was spoiled in my last apartment where I lived from 2003-2005. A 1-bedroom right across the street from the university, 550ish square feet all for ME, brand-new appliances ('cuz the building manager liked me), heat/water/power included, for less than $1000/month. Well less than $1000/month. I know I'm not going to find that again. But I don't want to spend more than about 1/2 a month's salary on rent and utility bills and the like. I'd like to put part of the other half into savings (geesh... look at me being all responsible and adult-like), food, hanging out with friends on occasion, and the non-necessities, like cable/internet, a cell phone (which would actually be instead of a land line), bus pass, etc.

I would, however, like something roughly the same size, albeit further out from the uni/downtown core to help keep prices down. I would like something close to a direct public transit route to the U of A - I'm even looking at apartments by Clareview LRT station. I have no problem walking 10 blocks or so to get to an LRT station. I really don't. It's exercise. Either way my morning commute isn't going to be much longer than it is now (roughly an hour from the time I leave home to the time I get to the office). I don't have a vehicle, so close to public transit is something I NEED. I'm sorta picky when it comes to interiors, too, though - I will NOT do a basement suite. I couldn't. I get depressed enough without sunlight as it is. I'd also rather NOT have something that looks like it was decorated in the 70s.

I've found a couple of options online with various companies... They look all right from the 'net, but of course I'd need to see them before I moved in. They're a bit of a hike from LRT stations, but one even has a fireplace! Having said that, that's only about 4 buildings in all of Edmonton that meet my criteria at this point in time. I'm going to keep looking, and hopefully as all the students move out at the end of the year, more things will be available, but we shall see.

In the meantime, I will attempt to not lose hope, and I will attempt to remember that really, it's only a couple of months more living with my parents (I WILL move out by the summer, that's all there is to it), and that something will come along... Or maybe I'll win the lottery and be able to buy a condo on Saskatchewan Drive. I suppose I'd have to buy a ticket for that, though, wouldn't I?

Oh, and [RIS guy]? I'm actually not sure _how_ taken he is, Genderist. Definitely "Let's go off to the mountains together on my week off" taken, but beyond that...

*The title of a song by Garbage

So...

turns out [RIS guy], who I do, in fact, think is fairly cute, is taken.

Story of my life.

The guy who runs the Residence Internet Service in the student housing at the uni is off this week. This means I have had to come up with some creative alternatives to "around the corner, first door on the left". Such alternatives include "you can try calling or emailing", followed by a general gesture to the sign I have on my desk pointing out the RIS contact info, or "I'm sorry, he's not in this week, so it'll take a while longer to get fixed", or other similar sorts of things.

I have, however, had two students who were thoroughly unimpressed - for what I think are fairly legitimate reasons. One has been getting the runaround for about a month now - unfortunately it's just the way our system interacts with the Registrar's system and how they both interact with the RIS system. The other has a shitload of web-based coursework. Apparently almost all of her courses have some WebCT stuff that needs doing.

So I emailed some of the other IT guys to see if they knew if they or anyone else could take care of it, even though they aren't RIS specialists. Here is the text of that email (remote access is lovely!):

I had this student come in – her internet’s been cut off for overuse, and she’s signed the Internet Usage Agreement.I explained that [RIS Guy] is away and that it might take longer than usual for her internet to be restored, but she was pretty insistent that I do everything in my power to get her internet up and working again ASAP. Apparently she’s got a lot of web-based course content.

Don’t know if there’s anything you can do, but if you can, it’d be greatly appreciated.

Kate

So what did they do?

They called [RIS Guy] at home.

On his week off.

You hear that smacking sound? Yeah, that'd be me smacking my head against my wall/desk/whatever's handy. That's so totally NOT what I intended. Geesh. Now I totally feel like I owe [RIS Guy] the world's hugest apology and perhaps a week's worth of Tim's coffee.

Not only that, but I then got a lecture at my desk delivered in person about how they really couldn't do anything and I really shouldn't be bothering them. Honestly. A simple email saying "nope, nothing we can do, sorry" would have been fine.

Combine all that with the fact that I felt like ass for most of today (nausea and headache, great combo) and it's been a thoroughly shitty day.

Hooray for negativity!

So today Saddam Hussein's cronies were hung.

No, I'm not about to talk politics. Don't worry. If, however, you have a weak stomach, stop reading now.

One of the guys was apparently decapitated by the noose. The floor dropped out from under him, his body drops, there's a moment of tension, then suddenly, pop!, the noose swings free as the weight of 90% of his body is released as his head snaps off.

I made it my business over the last year to study executions. I read about people being burnt. I read about executions in England from 1500-1850. I read about all sorts of hangings.

People do NOT simply have their heads pop off when they're being hung.

Depending on how merciful an executioner is wanting to be, an individual can be strangled to death with a short, slow drop. This takes a long time. The individual is fully aware they're choking to death. More merciful is a longer drop. The individual's neck breaks. They're dead next to instantly. Either way, hanging is NOT a pretty death.

**Edit - 9:43 p.m.**Having said that, people were thrown off castle walls and weren't decapitated. The BBC has kindly informed me that a drop longer than 10 feet can result in decapitation, but I'd like to see an instance in which this has actually happened. I sure haven't heard of any. I haven't seen the video. I refuse to watch it. I don't know if there was more than a 10-foot drop. And if the drop was more than 10 feet, why didn't other peoples' heads pop off, eh?**

It's possible that the neck was broken in such a way that a bone punctured the skin, muscle, etc, allowing the pull of the noose to literally rip someone's head off. But highly fucking unlikely. They might have used fishing wire to hang the guy. Again, highly fucking unlikely.

Something is rotten in the state of Iraq execution-land. And I couldn't care less about the politics of it all... I don't care what implications the mutilation of the body has. I don't care who managed to rip off the man's head and why... Nope, I just want to figure out the physics, 'cuz it just don't seem right...

Or at least it's shaping out to be.

So I brought a personal project to work on as well - my great-grandmother's journals. I've decided that since I don't have the facilities to store them properly I should probably attempt to conserve them in another format - so I've been typing them out. Good ole' Word. So that will be occupying my downtime today.

Don't get me wrong, the journals aren't anything particularly interesting. Most of the entries are maybe two lines. Her grammar was horrible. But it's _my_ ancestors, and what they managed to do on a day-to-day basis, right? So at least it's interesting to me. Not to mention that they cover some really interesting periods in history - they start at 1929 and finish around 1950. The Depression and WWII. How neat, eh?

I would probably go through more of my mother's genealogy work that she did in the 70s, but unfortunately I don't have my family tree program on the computer at work and I'm not about to haul my laptop here. No room, no point, too heavy.

So there you have it. I will likely be spending quite a bit of my day typing. We'll see. Maybe things will pick up today.

And if anyone out there whinges about Genealogy and Family History not being "REAL" history, then they can kiss my arse. Seriously. I'm not in school any more, I'm not a "real" historian any more. So bugger off.

(Not that anyone has done this recently, but whenever I expressed an interest in the project while I was at school in England to anyone in the history department, they all looked stupidly bored and/or looked at me like I'd soiled myself).

You're looking forward to telling off the guy who hasn't paid when he comes in to complain about the lock change

You're disappointed when he comes in before the locks are actually changed

Your desk has never been neater, and new organizational supplies have been ordered (what would we do without Grand and Toy, really?)

You've read the emails in your inbox twice, just to make sure you haven't missed anything.

You watch your fellow employees file - only after you fought over who got to do the filing in the first place

You water the plant you've been neglecting for the last month

You haven't had to to say "around the corner, first door on the left" yet and you're two hours into your day

You haven't taken a single payment

You don't really need that free yoga they're offering to relieve stress, but you're damn well going anyway

You sign up for a free online HTML course because it's been two years since you built a website and you're feeling a little rusty. You also complete the first week's homework.

You seriously think about signing up for the free CSS course as well

You finally say "around the corner, first door on the left" 2.25 hours into your day

The only student that's had an actual housing question isn't even from our residence

And I'm sure I will think of more shortly, but this is it for the mo.

How is it that even after a decent day at work, where, all things considered, things went well, one can still walk away feeling shitty? How all the little good moments don't add up to overwhelm the few big bad ones? I suppose when you end the day on a bad note, that just makes the whole thing seem, in retrospect, like shite.

Two incidents in particular stand out in my mind. About an hour before closing, a student came in to cancel his contract. The reason? He'd just come in from the Cross Cancer institute where he'd learned he'd been diagnosed with cancer and was to begin chemo on Monday. Fucking depressing, that.

After I'd closed the door for the night, we got a knock on the door. We didn't answer it, and the knock became more insistent. Finally, one of the other girls opened the door to find a woman there, asking for some documentation. We didn't have to documentation in question - and she was upset that nothing seemed to be done in her daughter's room to deal with the situation. Nothing we told her could convince her that all the proper measures had been taken. Keep in mind this was AFTER we closed. She complained she had driven 5 hours down from up north to come see us. Think she maybe could have left a little earlier? She KNEW full well what time we closed, and that it was Friday. She complained that no one had been around during the holidays. Well, DUH... it's the HOLIDAYS, for fuck's sake, and the entire university pretty much closes down. She started going on about the potential chemical hazards of the treatment we'd applied and about all sorts of remedies she'd found on the net... if she wants to apply some ludicrous home remedies, she's more than welcome to do so, but the uni's OHS people have done what they can to make the situation better.

Nothing like leaving the office on that note, eh?

And all this rules out all the pleasant people, the laughing with colleagues, the little things that make a day good... No matter how much I try to recall the good stuff, it's the bad that keeps coming to mind.

I'm on crack. I'm working 2 jobs, my commute to one of those jobs is an hour each way, and what do I want to do? Find myself more activities to become involved in. I'm an idiot. But am I stopping? No.

I've contacted a few (good) local choirs in regard to audition requirements and that sort of thing. Most hold auditions later in the year (ie: August) or as vacancies arise. I nearly had an audition with i Coristi (you can Google it if you want) next Monday as they may have an alto opening next month, but I _SO_ don't feel prepared - I haven't sung anywhere beyond the shower in months, and none of that was exactly pro quality.

So I've emailed my old voice teacher to see if she still teaches or knows anyone taking new students. There's another budget buster (we're talking, like, $200 a month), but I MISS singing so very much. I miss being a decent singer. And in spite of my aversion to performing solo, I would like to be considered a decent mezzo again at some point in the near future. Hell, I might even do something crazy like find musical theatre to audition for, once my skills are back.

Or not. I really don't have time for this stuff.

Ah, screw it. We'll see.