Happy Easter

Not only is this the Easter weekend, but it's the weekend before my final week of undergraduate classes at Western. Amen to that. This has probably been the lightest semester end of my entire university career because, for once, almost all of my major assignments were due in a three day period of my second last week. Busting out a film analysis and a short story this weekend was a minor task.

For various reasons and much to the dismay of the folks back home, I am not spending the long weekend with my family. Easter is the only holiday that I don't go home for because it usually falls at an inopportune time of academic hell. Most of the weekend has been spent doing laundry, finishing up school work, and watching movies. But do not fear, dear blog readers, I am not alone and I will be participating in the festivities! Considering roomie Jess and I have no religious affiliations and are both family-less for the holiday, we're celebrating the only way we know how: with nerdy activities and junk food. So tonight we shall dine on Wendy's and watch Raiders of the Lost Ark! And in response to your question, no, there never was a time when Harrison Ford wasn't handsome--that's what makes him Harrison Ford.

Happy Easter!

UPDATE: Is the Housing Torture Over?

See original post: Is the Housing Torture Over?

Nine days have passed since a rental group toured our house, so I think I can safely say that our house has been rented (knock on wood). March is almost at its end, so I imagine that most people have secured their living arrangements for the 2010/2011 school year. If my assumption proves to be incorrect, I shall be VERY ANGRY! Don't you dare do that to me, universe.

My days in London are few, which I am simultaneously stressed and very happy about. My last class is April 8th and my only exam is April 22nd, then it's back home until I figure out my future plans. Moving should be quite the adventure...

The Committee of Our Lady of Perpetual Birth March 2010 Newsletter

Hello Friends! We hope you’re all enjoying the positive change in the weather. Spring is definitely on its way, and you know what that means: its time for more babies! Spring always brings the promise of new life, so we’ve decided to dedicate this month’s newsletter to reminding everyone how important that new life is by reiterating why you should always (say it with us): Say no to abortion.

(1) Abortions are expensive and hinder the economic growth of our country. If we didn’t waste all this money on aborting the babies of young women who took all the proper precautions and women who were raped, then we’d have enough money to pay off the country’s $500 billion debt. Then we could afford to send all your babies to Catholic schools so they’d learn that sex before marriage is bad. This would prevent even the consideration of abortions (married people never get pregnant by accident and always want babies). What’s more important: paying off the national debt and sending all kids to Catholic school, or killing unborn babies? Yeah, that’s what we thought.

(2) Abortion is like slavery: embryos have civil rights too. Just because they’re in your womb, doesn’t mean they’re not people just like the rest of us outside of that nasty placental barrier. Those embryos have the right to free speech…if it was possible to talk inside of a womb…and if embryos had issues they needed to vocalize. Perhaps they would say, “Please don’t abort us; we need to grow up to be crack-whores, serial killers, sexual predators, and general drains on society.”

(3) People who think abortions are acceptable also think child abuse is acceptable. They are child-hating hippies who think that life is as expendable as that condom they clearly didn’t use. They don’t respect the life of unborn human babies; they eat chicken eggs, which are unborn chickens, so they’re also baby chicken munching monsters; and they even think it’s okay to dump out the stagnant water that holds the unborn mosquito babies that will grow up to kill people with West Nile and malaria. Outrageous! They must be stopped.

(4) Some people think that an unwanted baby is like a disease, but the joke is on them because the abortion they want will give them some real diseases to worry about! Not only do abortions potentially cause every known kind of cancer, but they also cause women to develop a very specific and horrific form of anti-social personality disorder that causes them to hate all types of babies. This includes, but is not limited to, baby birds, baby elephants, baby carrots, and Baby Spice.

(5) People say Earth is overpopulated and that aborting unwanted babies would solve this problem. Well, newsflash, Earth isn’t overpopulated; that’s just a myth, like evolution and that pulling-out isn’t a valid method of birth control (it totally works, kids). If you’re so concerned, then move with all of your babies to South Africa because, quite frankly, South Africa is severely under-populated and is possibly the safest place to raise your new family. Also, it’s about quantity, not quality. The more babies the better, right? Babies for everyone! Buy a farm, have lots of babies, then use them as a work force. The farm will provide the babies with everything they need and your family will be totally self-sufficient. Don’t worry; it’s not like slavery (see reason 2) or a cult. It’s just like…like being an Amish family… Yeah, that’s it.

We hope you enjoyed this month’s newsletter. Thanks again for subscribing. See you all next month when we discuss how you should eat your own placenta because it’s super nutritious and cuts down on waste, which is good for the environment.

Love always,

The Committee of Our Lady of Perpetual Birth

Is the Housing Torture Over?

As previously mentioned, ever since returning from Christmas break our house as been shown to potential new renters pretty much every single day. It's been hell. Complete hell. The rental company is totally unreliable: they say they're going to show up and then don't, they don't notify us of showings and then show up, they don't show up on time... Hell. Multiple times there have been groups who sounded very interested in the house, but so far none have committed.

On Saturday, I stepped out of the bathroom fresh from a shower and wrapped in a towel to hear a man downstairs saying, "Ok, why don't we head upstairs." Shit. As the first person began ascending the stairs I asked if they could look in my bedroom first so I could get back to getting ready. The guy leading the tour all but shit his pants in uncomfortable surprise. He began apologizing profusely and trying to avert his eyes as he was forced to stand beside me so the group of six (the three girls looking at the house plus three guys for moral support) could make it onto the landing and into my room. As they all awkwardly apologized to me, I assured them it was fine and that I just needed them to look at my room so I could get along with my business.

I could hear the group asking questions and making comments about the house as I stood, still towel clad, in the safety of my room. Everything sounded quite positive, although the guy from the rental company was bumbling around trying to answer their queries. However, we had no showings yesterday (Sunday) and I haven't received notification of any for today (Monday) so I'm hoping my Saturday house cleaning and my almost naked shower-fresh body tipped the scale. Please let the house be rented. Please please please. I can't have anymore strangers see me in a towel. That's why I stopped living in rez after first year.

One Summer Dessert

I am an ice-cream cone

Wafer plains and ridges promising a reward

A curved and tapered vessel

To hold sugary, crystalline cool innards

To be perfectly cradled in your fleshy palm

And your rough fingers callused by steel work

Thankfully cupping my sweetly rough exterior

A clutch too eager causes cracks in my ridges

Holes in my paper thin plains

An approach too timid lets my innards melt

Become soupy and exposed

And my fragile but solid shell

My contained existence

Implodes in your helpless hand

Written for Fundamentals of Creative Writing

(poem had to begin "I am a")

Here In My Room...

I've been back in London for a week and a half and my room still isn't tidied. The mess I left behind when I returned home for my Christmas break is still collecting dust. Every day I pick up a shirt, organize a surface, shuffle the items in a corner, but the mess remains. Groups of student have already started touring the house for next year. As our house battles the rental company due to its early and unlawful disruption of our lives, we keep our fingers crossed that a group will choose our house ASAP and I know having a clean house will help. I also know a clean room will help me get through this final semester. But the more time I spend in here, the more I resent it. How did I end up living in my bedroom?

When I was permanently living at my parents house, I rarely spent much time in my bedroom outside of the necessary sleeping and dressing. While I value my alone time, I get bored very quickly back at home and prefer to do my work in the company of my stay-at-home mom. I think we both prefer to have someone to chat with as we go about our daily tasks, and we've always been close. Then I moved into residence for my first year of university where my bedroom was my room and 'alone time' was a scarce but generally unwanted commodity. But since moving into my off-campus house (which I have lived in since moving out of res), I go through phases where I live in my bedroom.

I do work, eat, and sleep in here. Had I known I would be spending so much time here I might have decided against painting my walls Commie-red. As I become more restless here and more anxious to finish the year, I find more to dislike about my bedroom--my voluntary prison:

- the closet is way too small (I have a lot of clothes...and shoes...)

- three of the four drawers in my dresser are broken

- my bed is about one foot too high

- one window = adequate lighting for only a few hours

- the carpet is old

- my desk is small and lacking drawers (why do desks not have drawers anymore?!)

- my bookcase is overflowing with books, DVDs, and CDs and is threatening to collapse any day now

And the list continues. This semester needs to end, if only to liberate me from my student housing bedroom life. There are only 83 days until my last day of class. Will my bedroom and I survive? Tune in tomorrow for an exciting vacuuming episode.

Beam Me To Campus, Scotty

For those not living in the lovely city of London, we're coming to the end of our first week of a transit strike. So let me begin by saying:

Congratulations, ATU Local 741.

You're officially On Notice.

The LTC offered a 9% increase over the weekend but apparently that wasn't enough for the ATU, despite the current economic situation that has many people thankful to have jobs at all. Yes, at this point not even a week without transit has passed (no where near the two months Ottawa endured), but for weeks leading up to the strike the frequency of buses was reduced to exam-period/holiday levels, making it difficult for people to get to school and work on time.

For a brief period this week there were even rumours that the ATU would set up picket lines on campus because some of the transportation services arranged by the university were allegedly being viewed as strike-breaking maneuvers.

The silver lining here, if you can call it that, is today's lesson:

Nothing brings a community together quite like a transit strike.

I'm quite proud of the efforts Western has made to keep the safety and education of its students its primary concern. Campus Police has ramped up its security; the University College shuttle service expanded its routes; carpool sites were created; a van service was added (47 rented vans driven by volunteers, which cater to students living in areas more than a 30min walk from campus); professors, staff, and students are offering rides to classmates and those living nearby; and the USC organized a bike check in the UCC gym. So to the Western community I say thank you. We should be proud of ourselves.

While I don't mind walking to class (so far the weather is still relatively warm), walking home is an incredible inconvenience. By the time classes are over I'm usually hungry, tired, and generally fed up with school. Today was our first day of rain during the strike, but knowing London we can expect many more days like today. And most importantly, because it's so late in the year it's dark by the time I have to walk home. Thankfully, as far as I know, no one has been raped, abducted, attacked by animals, or thrown into the Thames while walking to or from campus. Let's keep it that way, London.

And so to the ATU I say bring it on. Because I'm just itching for another thing to complain about.

Obsessors, Be Anonymous No More

I'm going to come out and say it: My name is Nicole and I'm an obsessoholic.

Obsessions have been a topic of discussion in a couple of my classes this week. When it comes to obsessing, there are conflicting opinions on how healthy and productive the practice is in our real lives (as opposed to the lives lived in the safety of our own minds).

In my Popular Music and Gender class we talked about how obsessions factor into music fandom. It's highly feminized and generally associated with deviancy. Think Beatlemania with the screaming, crying, fainting, mobbing teenyboppers. Men, of course, don't do this. They think "Oh man, that dude is so f'ing cool, I want to be just like him and sleep with tons of sexy women and play mad guitar..." But girls, girls want to marry John and have Elvis shake his hips in their direction and shoot them one of those famous snarly smiles. Go beyond the screaming to the next level of fandom/obsession and peer into the bedroom of someone with posters all over the walls, figurines and albums littering all surfaces, a camera with a telescopic lens and a pair of night-vision goggles... That someone is a stalker. Stalking = bad kind of obsessing. As someone who has been followed home from an exam, I can tell you stalking does not make your stalkee want to hang out with you or, least of all, have sex with you. Shocking, I know.

Moving on, we've been having guest speakers in my Writing Portfolio class. Today, Western's current writer-in-residence Penn Kemp encouraged us to have obsessions. The fixation on something specific can lead to inspiration. She finds inspiration for much of her work (which includes a lot of perhaps strange, yet whimsical, poetry/sound concoctions) in those things that nag her and constantly swirl around in her mind. When you obsess over something you're likely to think about all kinds of aspects of that thing and delve deeper into it than you would a passing interest. More importantly, if you're obsessed it means you're passionate and what are writing and creativity without passion?

As I said, I'm very obsessive. I believe I suffer from what can only be described as Sudden On-set Obsession Syndrome. Perhaps this is a result of a short (albeit intense) attention span or technological induced ADD. But if this week of dreary academia has taught me anything, it's that I shouldn't be ashamed of my obsessions. This is in part due to my highly respected professor Norma Coates revealing her Sex & The City obsession. If obsessions can fuel my writing then I shall whole-heartedly embrace them, and I encourage you to do the same. Obsessions make for great party themes.

There's Nothing Funny About a "Royale with Cheese"

Some time has passed, yes, but am I in a better mental state? I'm going to have to answer no to that one. In fact, I believe my state has only gotten worse in the past two hours. And yet, not much work has been done. Intriguing. To keep you fully updated, I'm now suspecting my brain feels a little more like this Today's Big Thing video.

So. Very. Very. Wrong.

Redrum! Redrum!

The degree to which I don't care about school right now is shocking. Even with the impending clusterfuck of this week breathing it's rotting breath all over my rash-afflicted neck, I'm just totally unable to focus my attention on my notes. I just do not get this "studying" game with the re-reading of notes and articles. I don't want to do it anymore but I feel like I have to keep going until I sit down at my tiny desk and I'm handed that cursed white and blue exam booklet. I ended a phone conversation because I needed to get back to work but all I've managed to do is hit up Facebook. Uncool. However, I learned that fellow MIT-er and frequent classmate Liz Trinnear just made it to the Top 8 for the MuchMusic VJ search. Cool.

Ok, so while I attempt to return to the real world of studying and homework to write my Run Lola Run shot analysis, I will leave you with this video from the fabulous Peter Serafinowicz. This is kind of what my brain feels like right now. How appropriate that Ozzy Osbourne's Crazy Train just came up on my shuffle... iTunes is such a smartass. (P.S. I suggest watching the video on YouTube to get the full screen effect.)

P.P.S. Just so we're clear, it's pronounced "Red-rum" not "Re-drum." There's no percussion going on here. Not tonight, anyway.

Once Every Fortnight I Exhale

|> IN

I can't get comfortable. I always feel on edge, anxious, unsettled. I'm blindfolded in front of a firing squad of archers who have drawn their bows and I'm just waiting. Every now and then someone on the squad coughs, shifts his weight from left to right, clears his throat. And every time I hear a noise I flinch. I tense my muscles. I hold my breath. But no arrow is ever fired. So I keep waiting.

I'm living minute to minute because I can't settle into a routine beyond going to class. I think once I read a book or watched a movie that said some people find this kind of existence exhilarating and liberating. I don't know who those people are. At best, I function in two-week periods, living and working for every other weekend. I get lost in that time (a fortnight is a long time, you know) so I put two countdowns on my Dashboard: one counting down to Christmas holidays, one counting down to the end of the school year/university. Turns out counting down the days makes time slow down. The only way to speed up time is to sleep more. Unfortunately, my insomnia and general aversion to going to sleep mean this is not a viable option for me.

Everyone keeps telling me I'll be fine. I know I'll be fine. I'm always fine. I've made it this far. But knowing I'll be fine doesn't negate the fact that I still have to do this. I have to live the next six months in this state of unrest, in this struggle against apathy. And so, there's only one thing left for me to do: leave a path of destruction in my restless wake.

Current location: London, ON - The University of Western Ontario

(Better wipe that smirk off your face, Sudbury, 'cause you're next. Get ready.)

I'll be fine. Yes. We'll all be fine.

<| OUT

Resistance is Futile UPDATED

Thought I would share something fun that happened on campus today. I'm sure this arrest really required that many officers. I can't wait for this to spread around campus because I feel a new trend coming on. So stop resisting!

Another winner from today: In class we watched an old short film called The Gay Shoe Salesman where a shoe salesmen sneaks a kiss from the woman shopping, much to the dismay of her friend. Afterwards, the girl behind me whispered to her friend, "Then how can he be gay...?" I wish I was kidding. Laughter was barely contained.

Not too bad for a Wednesday, huh?

UPDATE

Go to YouTube to get the full UWO arrest experience. There are some...interesting comments on the video that I would hate for everyone to miss out on. Check out the CBC article and the LFP article and press conference for more information.

Arc of Time

Today I took out a piece of paper and a pen and discovered I had nothing to write.

Yesterday I saw a really cute, trendy Asian couple wearing matching silver backpacks and it reminded me I had two sleeps until Friday and 198 sleeps until April 30th.

Tomorrow I will go to a class I hate and another frustrating project meeting and I'll try to stay calm because the rash on my neck is getting worse and my insomnia is back.

Damnit, Jay David Bolter

Quick question:

Does media convergence make anyone else feel ill?

I should really stop using course readings as my bedtime snack. Turns out the digestion of remediation is not so immediate. Perhaps it's all the nominalizations?

1,000 Hugs from 10,000 Lightning Bugs

Good evening, bloggers.

I'm pounding keys tonight, working on my Popular Music and Gender essay analyzing the differences in the way music press discusses music legends Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. I have music on the brain, more so than usual, so I wanted to share my new favourite song with you.

Check out Fireflies by Owl City.

Hope you enjoy.

Welcome Back

I'm going to reprise my blog, begin my return to the online community, by writing about how much I love being alone. Every day I have a block of classes separated by a single one-hour break. Today was the first break I spent alone this week.

Since returning to London I've generally been displeased about spending much time by myself. I'm lucky enough to have one of my best friends living two doors away (and that's the two laundry room doors inside my house) and for the first couple weeks there were a lot of back to school festivities involving countless people and places. But today, within the first few moments of sitting down into a familiar chair and plugging into my iPod I remembered how much I enjoy, and need, this time alone.

I've realized that I drift away in lectures because the unidirectional, constant sound is just enough to make me comfortable (for those unaware, I'm often highly uncomfortable with silence). This time alone lets my mind wander and not risk my nearly completed and grossly expensive academic career.

Like my aversion to silence, I often think that my dislike of being alone is an issue of insecurity. Perhaps I worry that I may stumble across a facet of myself that I don't like, or perhaps I'll return to my dirty habit of over analyzing something in my life that I'm bothered by or seems to good to be true. But I suppose returning to being alone is like riding a bike, and all those worries and apprehension are, in themselves, a product of my tendency to overanalyze.

But I'm really happy about the way things are right now and I'm alright because today,

I am alone.

I am comfortable and I am calm.

I am creative.

I am at peace.

Can The Twilight Zone dethrone Fantasia as the ultimate trip?

Up ahead, you see a signpost. You’ve gone back to a time when men wore three-piece suits and women were just their secretaries. You’ve entered The Twilight Zone.

The 1960 episode “Trouble With Templeton” tells the story of theatre actor Booth Templeton (Brian Aherne) who longs for days gone by when his wife Laura (Pippa Scott) was still alive and life was good, though perhaps his moustache was much less charming. There is trouble during a new production and soon after, as Rod Serling (your friendly neighbourhood narrator) says, Templeton enters The Twilight Zone. Mind melding ensues.

While over-dramatics in film and television during this time period can range from amusing to just plain annoying, this episode lands on the side of hilarity. Aherne wears his emotion on his face, with the camera often lingers there long enough for you to notice that his Clark Gable moustache is slightly uneven. While the story line is a bit ridiculous, Aherne's range of emotion makes Templeton a likeable character.

Scott, on the other hand, barely ever changes her facial expression except to emit a jarring hyena laugh, after which her face resumes its blank Flapper Barbie stare. Her spastic robot movements certainly don’t help her case either. This is an example of those annoying over-dramatics.

One of the best reasons to watch this episode is its authentically vintage atmosphere, as it’s a relic from the childhoods of baby boomers. The piano and string-filled theatre-like score and swinging '20s jazz combo perfectly complement their respective scenes, and everyone looks classically stylish in suits, hats, and straight-cut dresses.

A scene of particular note, for which director Buzz Kulik deserves major props, is one that mimics a stage production. It ends with the literal dimming of the lighting and all of the actors poised in tableau. These visual effects, combined with the music, are artfully self referrential in an episode about the theatre. However, there is something oddly unsettling about seeing these generally live elements on screen. Oh, and 10 points to anyone who can spot the guy who looks like Jack Layton in the bar before the fade-out.

While I would definitely recommend watching this episode, even if only for amusement’s sake, I must admit I was disappointed by how much the ending was spelled-out. Perhaps some ambiguity would have prevented the sense of mundane that often accompanies tidy conclusions on screen. I also would have liked to see Serling appear and disappear in a cheesy bright flash, I Dream of Jeannie style, just to add a little pizzazz. Although I suppose that would ruin the creepiness of the camera slowly panning to the left to reveal that Serling has been there all along.

I Heart Standardization

"Why would Ford commission a devout Marxist to paint his mural?"

- guy in Legacy of the Automobile class on Diego Rivera's Detroit Industry mural

Mid-Week Mix-ed Bag

1. I love that Discovery Channel commercial as much as I hate Nickelback.
   
2. I had a dream the other night where Woody Allen was The Riddler. But I think he was an impostor. Because Elvis Costello was also The Riddler...
   
3. Apparently everyone on the 2 Dundas starts at the same time as me on Wednesdays. So congrats, 10:30am Wednesday class. You're On Notice. I was waiting for 25 minutes for the bus. Like, three "full" buses passed me. And by the time I got picked up at 10:30 there were like 30 people waiting at my stop. Trust me, it had nothing to do with the sudden snow squalls. This happens every Wednesday.
4. KH and I have decided to start a socio-political literary/arts magazine. More on that later.

Post-Secondary Education

I don’t think I can do this school thing anymore. And I love school. But after fifteen and a half years the novelty is finally starting to wear off. If I have to sit through one more student-made PowerPoint presentation I’m going to try to rip out all my hair.

Congratulations, Post-Secondary Education.
You’re On Notice.

People are always saying, “You’ll wish you were in school once you have to start working all the time,” or, “Why would you want to rush into the ‘real world’ when you’re in university?” Blah blah blah. How about because at least then I’ll be doing something, living, instead of writing academic essays?!

A girl friend who doesn’t share my opinion said that “we’ll never have as much free time as we do now.” I disagree. Most of the ‘free time’ I have now is because I’m not doing my homework.

Instead of learning things anymore, I’m being taught the same things by different people. The overlapping of content in courses is disgusting. And every semester I take at least one class that sounds boring as fuck -- but sounds really useful -- that ends up being a colossal waste of time.

The only classes I enjoy attending anymore are the ones on random topics that, while very interesting, probably won’t get me anywhere in the ‘real world.’ For example: Watching Music on the Small Screen: Popular Music on TV; From Bram to Buffy: The Vampire in TV, Print ad Film; Crash: Landscape, Culture and the Legacy of the Automobile… The list goes on. The only two electives that have proven their worth are Arts & Entertainment Journalism and Creative Non-Fiction Writing.

I’m pretty sure I just keep writing the same essay over and over but through different topics. Some essays topics include: the Jesus complex and technological rebirth in R.U.R and The Matrix; why The Wizard of Oz is a preemptive containment text; labyrinths and the questionable futility of death (particularly suicide) in Voices of Time and The Shining; the perpetuation of female stereotypes in music and failed authenticity in Girlicious…

I’m going to make next year as easy as possible. This is no longer about kill count; it’s about finishing the mission.