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I'm keeping myself busy and school is fun, I have friends, more than I thought I would. That's good news. It's ridiculous but I can't seem to sink in here with my other half somewhere else. I have hobbies, good food, aspirations, a schedule, a job, money, beauty everywhere and I just can't settle, I'm always turning my head away from something and looking for another thing. I speak to Mag no less than every 4 or 5 hours.
I went camping last weekend with 4 friends from class. We drove to Chemainus after class and bought groceries, and more importantly, raspberry wine. We ate well and swam in the coldest freshwater I have ever swam in. It took me 20 minutes to get the courage to cross the river (due to the cold, not the current), I did, got out, warmed up and got my heartbeat back to normal, then dove off some rock back in and to the other side, then we left. There was bear poo, it looked like raspberry but didn't have the same aroma. We drank and laughed a lot, it felt healthy. I opted to sleep outside after remembering my discomfort on the last camping trip, it was pretty special sleeping in the grass. I felt great the next day.
We've made a lot of cool stuff in class these last 3 weeks. A whole world of stocks, thickeners and sauces; white, brown, bouillon, fricasse, blanquette, beurre manie, roux, cream, bechamel, tomato with prima vera, hollandaise, balsamic and white wine vinegarettes, caesar. I've deboned whole chickens, made french-fries, learned how to properly clean a mango (finally), eaten jicama, cut more shallots than I have in my entire life, and made fresh mayonaisse. It was all fun but the games are over, on Tuesday I go into main-kitchen rotation, I start in pastry, the most challenging station. If you make a mistake with a sauce, you change it, if you make a mistake with a cake, you throw it out. There are 8 people in my group and 3 of them are probably the most unprofessional, uncaring and immature people I've ever worked with, 1 of them I am nervous to work near...should be fun once we go to a la carte. Not that cooking shouldn't be fun but if you're having fun it's 'cause you wanna be there, not 'cause you're bored and your mind isn't on your work.
Here is a photo of me with a huge spider that was in my kitchen. Objects in photo are larger than they appear.
Trust me, it was huge, it just looks small 'cause I have a giant head.
It's a long weekend, I was thinking about hanging out at the airport and catching a last-minute cancellation but the trip home was far too epic for even my unfaltering limits of patience. Fly to Philly from Ottawa at 6am, Philly to Bellingham WA, Bellingham to Seattle, 3 hour Seattle ferry to Victoria, coach from Victoria to Nanaimo. Total travel time was 14 hours for what could be accomplished in a 3 hour flight. I'm just gonna skateboard instead, there are great parks here, I've skated every day for the last...while. I might also call my Dad's friend John Tanner and inquire into whether he and his family would be interested in visiting some local vineyards or cheesefarms.
I probably have a job, $19 an hour, 4 hours every Monday night, bistro linecook. It's just to aid in getting myself home at Christmas.
112 days until I kiss Mag at the airport.
Here is a poster I bought.
I'm going to skate.
Today I got home from class and packed up all my belongings, 4 times, and made 4 separate trips to the nearby Vancouver Island University townhouse residences. I'm unpacked now, in a big empty 4 bedroom townhouse, listening to every single Beatles album in chronological order. I'm making a ground-beef ratatouille over couscous while I write this...the onions are sweating and it's raining outside. This is a mighty large empty house, none of my roommates have moved in yet, the first one will be here on August 26th. I feel very small after spending 2 weeks in a closet.
The circumstances surrounding how I met Mag were pretty amazing and romantic, it makes a decent story. I saw her for the first time walking through the Rideau Centre, we locked eyes and I watched her walk away and spent the next week wondering who she was. Somewhere in that week, Ben Walker encouraged me to check out the SPAO (http://www.spao.ca/) end of the year "Red Wall" event. I'm usually pretty lazy and uninterested in these things but I went with some friends. We walked up to the building and there was Mag sitting on the windowsill, we spent the evening exchanging bashful glances from opposite ends of the room. I proposed buying one of her pieces for $1000 and we both laughed then we both went our separate ways. I hated myself for a few days until a chance encounter with a regular/friend at Caffe Mio where I was working. This friend is the owner and a teacher of/at SPAO. I asked him about the 95lb. girl with the afro. He suggested I make myself welcome at the invitation only potluck at SPAO that Friday. I made a gazpacho, walked in, dropped it on the food-table and walked right up to her, she paniced and walked the other way. I pursued and the rest is pretty easy to figure out.
The circumstances surrounding how Mag left yesterday are kind of interesting too. We spent our last night together, I woke up at 6:30am for school, I came out of the bathroom after washing up and could barely look at her, I ate half of my bowl of cereal and gave up and lay down beside her. We held each other for half an hour and then I walked out the door, but I had to turn around because I'd walked out with no shoes on, that error probably had nothing to do with my lack of sleep. It wasn't a very satisfying goodbye, I wasn't happy with the thought that I'd see her again, I was just regretful that it was so rushed and painful. I went to class and it was horrible but I got off 40 minutes early. Mag's bus left at 2:20 and I was out of class at 1:20. I went to the changeroom and there was a massive horde of students trying to get to their lockers. I stood there for about 15 seconds waiting and then God entered my mind and said "it's a good idea to leave in your uniform (strictly forbidden) and go home NOW" so I stormed out, dressed to a T in my chef's jacket, checkered pants, black scarf, pillbox hat...the works. I began my ascent into a brisk sprint home and halted suddenly as God entered my mind once more and said "you best be checking the bus-stop first". I turned around and there it was, the sun reflecting off the seams of her big black afro. I felt much more satisfied with that goodbye.
Magical Mystery Tour is such a horrible album, what a shame. Like the C in gym-class on an otherwise straight A report-card.
Sometimes when I go to the grocery-store I buy an ice-cold orange flavoured Jones Soda for Mag, she likes the fortunes. My last one said "today you saved a child's eyesight...thank you".
Yesterday, I skateboarded to the Quality Save or Safe Food or Food Quality or whatever to get some salad-fixings and I saw the neon-orange soda glowing at me from the fridges and I thought "I should surprise Mag with a soda", so I went to get one, "but which one?" I thought to myself. They all have different photos printed on the label and I usually take the photo as an indication of what sort of good fortune will be inside. Yesterday as I pondered over which soda to pick I saw one without a label and I thought "that's gotta be good luck". So I grabbed it and got my other groceries and headed for the check-out.
Because I'm an environmentally-friendly young buck I stuffed my groceries in my knapsack and headed out the front-door to ride my environmentally-friendly skateboard home. Because I'm a show-off I decided to ollie over a path of destruction in the parking lot. It was a little gravel patch where they were doing construction, ollie popped cleanly, solid landing, but unfortunately I landed with a rock under my front wheel and was tossed violently upon the ashphalt like a frog into a fire. The pavement felt like fire on my skin, my hide is pretty raw these days since I just recovered from a 2nd degree sunburn. But I brushed myself off and pulled up my socks and headed on my way.
Later in my travels, about 20 seconds later to be exact, I noticed a sticky residue on my hands, this sticky residue smelled delicious, like citrus and carbonation...and broken glass. I opened my water-proof bag to discover a pool of soda-pop, fruit and bread. The movie I had just rented was floating in this swamp as well. I salvaged what I could and threw my entire bag in the nearest garbage can.
Don't judge a soda by it's cover. That soda was 100% delicious bad luck.
The following events are unaltered in chronological order and completely true. In January/February of 2008 I took a trip to the Canadian West-coast with my uncle and Dad. We spent short amounts of time in many BC cities, one of them being Nanaimo, Vancouver Island. It was my first time there and while there I decided that it was where I wanted to live in the near future. I came home from the trip and applied to Malaspina College, now Vancouver Island University in Nanaimo.
In or around March of 2008 I bought a book at the dinky little used bookstore on Rideau St. beside the Bytowne Cinema, in Ottawa, Ontario. It's called The Wanderer, and it's written by Kahlil Gibran, a turn of the century Lebanese poet who preached simple messages of relativism and equality, things like you are who you are and ain't who you ain't. Ben, my old roommate got me onto him when I expressed some interest in Taoism. I didn't open The Wanderer until yesterday, August 9th, 2008, from the bed of my residence-room at Vancouver Island University, Nanaimo, B.C. Between the coffee-stained frontcover and the first page was a homemade postcard.
On the reverse side of that postcard reads the following message. I left out Elizabeth's last name and address but I have attempted contacting her via Facebook.
Aug. 27, 1970.
Hello Lizah,
Hope you have fully recovered from the accident and are able to use your head once again. It's a good thing we were able to talk the staff at the hospital out of giving you a transplant.
There are so many beautiful things to see - ocean, mountains, pink + blue sunsets; to smell - cedar + millions of flowers; to taste - blackberries + other fruits; to hear - gulls; and to touch - rain...But I'm lonesome + want to go home but my Mom + Dad would be hurt so stay I will.
Give "Rose" a big Hug for me + say hello to friends please. See you soon + may be sooner than that.
Here there is a large X and a large O followed by a smaller X and O, there is an arrow pointing to the larger ones with the name Rose and then the smaller one's are labeled for Lizah, and it says "She needs bigger one's"
Love to you, Pinky
P.S. I read the water colour book quickly before I gave it to you. Have you ever thought of buying an extremely large tea pot, just thought I'd ask.
Miss Elizabeth ___________
___ Bradford St.
Britannia,
Ottawa, Ont.
Would you please tell Arlene that I found the bear pattern + I'll send it to her along with the other sweater pattern. Thanks.
The post-office stamp on the postcard reads:
Nanaimo
5PM
August 28
1970
B.C.
Post number one from the deck of the epequod.
Last Thursday I embarked on my epic voyage across the seas of Canada. We left Ottawa on the Greyhound and 3 nights later we were in Vancouver. One guy, Joe, was forcibly removed in a drunken rage. Another guy was left on the side of the highway after calling an old man a fag and our friend Viche a terrorist. Mag saw not only the Rockies for the first time, but also a moose.
When we got to Vancouver we got breakfast at Cafe Du Soleil with our friend Neal and his Van-crew, Mike and Heidi, they were lovely and so was my first cappuccino in 4 days. We wandered through Hastings and Powell and saw lots of prostitutes and discarded needles. We met 2 girls, Jade and her nameless friend who showed us how to bus to Katie's (http://fanglifegem.blogspot.com/) house. From there we checked out the amazing International Ultimate Frisbee Tournament, it was ultimate. We made vegetarian chili and promptly passed out in our first bed of 4 days. The next morning I skateboarded around most of the city, I ended up in the Granville Market and had a cappuccino and looked at the tourists, then went back to Katie's. Upon searching the e-net I found that Mag and I had 2 hours to get to Pacific Central to catch a coach which would take us to Tsawwassen to catch the ferry to Duke Point, Nanaimo. We got there with plenty of time to spare. We saw a few seals and some seagulls that were notably larger than Ontario seagulls. We had no way of getting from Duke Point into town so we hitchhiked which took a long time and was scary and discouraging. Finally an unnamed man from Fort Smith, NWT picked us up, he was going to Duncan to see his son play golf in the Indigenous Games. We asked him to drop us off at Port Plaza in Nanaimo because it looked familiar to me but I really had no clue how close it was to the college. As we were hauling our bags from his truck another nameless stranger hollered at us..."where you going from here?" He drove us right to the frontdoor of the residence administration. We've spent the last few days setting myself up and trying not to turn into a hateful married couple living in this shanty I now call home.
Yesterday we tried finding this swimming hole called Colliery Dam Park, we had to trek for a good half-hour down the side of the Nanaimo Parkway which was terrifying, I hate doing that but we saw this biketrail at the bottom of this incline at the side of the parkway so we hopped the rail and got on this trail and saw a sign for the park, so we followed the trail.
It lead us to the swimming hole which was a bit green, but refreshing. I swam a lot, Mag was a bit nervous but she definitely got her toes wet.
When we were leaving I asked a woman if there was a better way to get back to campus than the one we used to get there, she said to follow the parking lot out and go past the army-base so I'm like "cool", we did this and it turns out we were 10 minutes away from the park the whole time, and to think we almost died on the edge of the highway when we could have just walked down the block to this place.
So yeah, we'll be catching a Greyhound to Victoria in about an hour where we'll do some touristing and then 3 short days from now I start classes. My heart is in my throat but I'm excited. I wanna rock the Malaspina culinary arts world.
