The World Would Be A Better Place

There are many things that I covet - or maybe its not that I covet them, because I don't necessarily know people or places that have them. I think it might be that I'm greedy and have a sense of self entitlement - yup, that's it.

I think this post might start a series about things I think I should own, and I think the world would be a better place if I owned them. Sometimes the universe should just pony up and get me these tools to fantasticness. In the meantime I'll just keep pining (no fjords).

Today's thing 'o necessity is this:


If you guessed that it is a 1 1/2" Button Maker Machine with Graphic Punch and 250 Button Parts from buybuttonparts.com you'd be right! Good for you! Let's talk a little more about this exciting collection of bits shall we?

This combo contains:

• the Button Maker Model #150, which produces standard 1-1/2" buttons, it can make a magnet, bull dog clip or key chain simply by assembling a button without a pin and adding the neccesary accessories
• 1 1/2" Graphic Punch (aka the guy who cuts out the circles for you)
• 250 pinback button sets

Can we just sit for a minute and dream about the fun buttons I could be making - oh man... the hilarity, the communication, the wonderment. I can scarcely believe that there are only 357 U.S. dollars (plus shipping and handling) standing between me and some awesome pieces of metal that would aid me in making some rad, rad, world bettering buttons.

How can the universe be so cruel as to not have provided me with one thus far. Sigh... someday.

The Despising

It is not really a hidden fact that I really despise doing dishes. The other day in the act of doing said despised activity I came to a few conclusions on why there is so much despising.

1. "Old" food - I'm a finicky princess and I don't like dealing/touching with food that has been all mucked up, may have been in or near someone else's mouth and I especially don't like touching it after it's been in the sink for 10 minutes and has become soggy "old" food.
2. Back pain - there are few sinks that are at just the right height and closeness to the counter that don't cause me to bend and begin to ache as begin to wash the plates.
   
3. Excema - I have excema on my hands, it is worsened by exposure to moisture. A sink full of dishes in water is quite moist. I love itchy, red hands that have a rash on the palms and fingers. It is my favourite.

It made sense to my itchy hands, sore back and alerted gag reflex that dishes might not be their best friend.

So there, that that dishes!

Why I Think Winter Is A Crock O' Nasty

I know its only November and it hasn't even got really snowy or really cold yet. But as the white begins to pile up here in London I am already reminded of why I think winter is dumb. Do I think there are some profoundly beautiful and awe inspiring parts of winter - yes. Do I think there are some fun things you can do in winter that you can't do at other times - yes. Those things are not the point of this ranting, griping, crank.

My main complaint with winter (aside from sub zero temperatures) is this: everything takes longer (I have composed many songs about this in my head). You could accuse me of western rushing attitudes and tell me that winter is God's way of making me slow down. You could do that, but you'd be wrong.

Let's compose a little list of things that take longer because of winter and all its accoutrement.

1. showers - no longer can I dash out apres shower, now everything must be moisterized lest it dry up and fall off or crack, itch and burn
2. getting dressed - just throw on a dress? heeeeck no! long johns, pants or tights ('cause dem hose just ain't gonna cut it), shirt, long sleeved shirt, sweater - layers, layers, layers - a person could die of skin suffication.
   
3. leaving the house - throw on flip flops, grab keys and go - oh, no. put on socks, put on boots, put on and zip up 20lbs coat, find hat, find mitts, begin sweating
4. using a car - fight polar bear on way to car, use mitts to dig way into car, start car, I said saaa-aaaart the car, turn up anything that makes heat and defrosts things, dig out scraper/brush, scraaaape scraaaaape scraaaaape, brush brush brush brush brush <-- repeat brush and scrape routine for 20 minutes, brush snow and ice off self, wring out now sopping wet mittens, get in car. oh, not so fast - silly, you forgot that you have to shovel the driveway in order to even get this freshly cleared car out. i hope it's not snowing heavily while you're shovelling 'cause all your hard brushing work is about to get undone
5. driving anywhere - main roads are plowed and salted? sweet! what's that? you don't live on the 401? oh, your house is on a purely residential street, oh and that won't get plowed until 4pm the day after it snowed like mad. ok, so it takes you 20 minutes to ram your way out to a main route (this is added to the 20 or so it took you to get your car ready to leave the driveway - and add to that the half an hour it took you to shovel) . now you're on that main route but traffic is moving at an astounding 36 km/h which should have you at work only 3 hours late (you have second thoughts about having won in the fight against the polar bear and wonder if just having let him eat you would have solved a lot more problems).

So by my count something (exiting the house and getting to a main route in a city) that would have taken you 5 minutes in June has now taken around an hour and a quarter. And there my friends is my just some of the fuel for my fire of thinking winter is dumb.

I Think It Was A Good Day

I spent some time at home on the weekend. I got pretty tired (for various reasons) and decided it wouldn't be safe for me to drive all the way back to London on Sunday night. Therefore I thought I would get a good jump after breakfast on Monday morning and be back to London just after lunch. That was a pipe dream.

The following are my facebook status updates that I made via my cell (with some commentary):

Laura is on the side of the 401 with a flat tire, although she is capable of changing said tire, she is glad to have caa. 10:51

-I'm just driving along and the car starts to handle all crazy and there is a bad bad noise coming from the back. I pull over and swear. Then I call CAA. Then I wait for CAA. Then CAA comes and puts the spare on and inflates it for me. Then I make phone calls to Dad and L.Bo for advice on where the heck to go and get this tire repaired. I end up at Northumberland Tire. They say its gonna be 45min or so. Alors, I take off on foot to kill the time.

Laura stly) replacement. Hurray! 12:01

-this was supposed to read "Laura is eating chinese buffet by herself in port hope. She was just informed that the tire cannot be fixed and she is waiting for them to put on a (likely costly) replacement. Hurray!" I had decided lunch was in order and a 6.50$ chinese lunch buffet is ok with me.

Laura gives up on trying to update this from her cell. Grrr. 12:03

-I was pretty frustrated that I had taken the time to put that whole long update up and it didn't work. though I think it may have worked over the mobile network because I got a text from L.bo saying that I was killing her. she felt sad that she was working and couldn't come and have 6.50$ chinese buffet with me.

Laura is killing Lesley, possibly slowly and with her song. 12:06

-so I thought I'd let everyone know that I was killing L.bo

Laura just watched some woman named Doris get surprised for her birthday at the aforementioned chinese place. 12:18

-yup, just as I was heading back to the buffet Doris and a couple of friends walked in and she spied a very long table full of more of her friends and very quietly and sporadically they started going "uh, surprise." "surprise Doris" "happy birthday Doris" I was pretty amused. And I was just killing time while I was waiting for N-Tire to put the newbie on my car.

Laura cannot do anything simple. Sigh. 12:42

-while I was in the bathroom my Dad called. he had just remembered that before I got the car, he and Mom had put new tires on it and they might be under warranty. but the warranty would be with Canadian Tire, which I was not at and which there is none in Port Hope. this frustrated me to know at this point. so I called Dad and said that it was too late for this tire as a new one was being put on, but I was glad to know for future tire 'incidents'. I got back to N-tire and the spare was still on my car. what? growl. they hadn't had time to find a suitable replacement. so I took that opportunity to check my glove box for anything that mentioned tire warranty. found it, called dad. after some discussion dad called cobourg CT for me and they said to bring the tire in. I got my tire back from N-tire and slowly headed to the 'burg.

Laura is on her way to cobourg canadian tire, frick. 13:00

-I was obviously thrilled to be back tracking and likely eating another hour of time. if I didn't leave cobourg by 3pm then I wouldn't be making it to London by 7 for rehearsal (because of traffic) and would just go back to my parents.

Laura was really wishing she would get an unsecured wireless signal at CT. that wish is going unfulfilled. 13:17

-I pulled out my laptop and thought I might get some work done while waiting for my 'free' replacement tire to be put on. this work would not be involving the internet

Laura has a new tire and is ready to take off across toronto (into traffic). Oh look, its raining. Fun. 13:51

-after about a million phone calls, a bunch of hours spent waiting on the 401, in port hope, and in cobourg, I was finally able to start heading westward again

Laura is back in London, thinking about supper and getting ready for rehearsal. 17:07

-traffic was nice, I made good time and I made it back with a bit of space to breath and have supper before choir rehearsal.

So I think that was a pretty stellar day and was in no way frustrating or a waste of an entire day. Cough.

Have You Ever?

Have you ever been looking for domain names and the ones you really want are taken by people, but they have like one picture up and are saying the page is under construction, but its been under construction for like a year and you just want to punch them in the face and take the domain name. Of course by punch them in the face I mean communicate the love of Christ and speak calmly to them about why you might want to acquire that domain name. Of course.

The Kind Of Bars I Frequent Now

We hit up a couple of buffets whilst on tour - one regular type buffet in Montreal and one Chinese buffet in Barrie (yes, the same one we hit the last time were there, and yes, it was still instant gut rot). Of course I sampled the salad bars at both of these establishments. Let me just say - very disappointing. Is it too much to ask for radishes and hot peppers? And a few sunflower seeds? Dude, those can make or break a salad - even Calvin College has those at its salad bar - and Vicky's Buffet in the cultural city of Montreal doesn't? Sigh. I was glad that John and Kevin where there - they having sampled from the pinnacle of salad bars at the Mercy Centre.

I just had to share that disappointment.

DSB - seriously - if you find a good salad bar, and you take me there, i'm as good as yours!

Things That You Think Are Bad When You Live In A Basement Apartment...

...but turns out be much worse when you live on the 7th floor - forgetting something in the car.

Basement Apt:
Oh man! I left something out in the car, now I will have to scale those 12 stairs, or 4 stairs a landing and then 6 more stairs, to get outside and walk allllllll the way along the house to the driveway or parking spot beside the driveway to get the forgotten item.

7th Floor:
Realization of forgotten item - assessment of worth - is it worth getting the keys, exiting the apartment, locking the apartment, waiting for the elevator (say anything about the stairs and I'll hunt you down - and besides, the stairs would not fit well into the worth to effort ratio), riding the elevator down, walking down the hall, going out two sets of doors and walking across the parking lot, and then reversing the process to get back up - usually not worth it, but sometimes you really need those pants.

Disheartening

Sometimes you get up real early to finish your last piece of school work, so that it can be out of the way, so that you can study for your last exam. Sometimes you get up real early to read about how there is a winter storm watch for your area and how at the precise time you want to leave the area to go home for Christmas because you are done school for the semester - there is supposed to be 25cm of snow coming down and travel is not recommended. 'Cause I don't want to stay longer. I want to finish that exam, get in my car, drive to Richmond Hill, drop things off and then get my bad self to Brighton. I have been holding on for that plan. In my head there is no plan for, "stay put and leave on Sunday when things are better". I'm operating on a distinct action/reward system here - write another paragraph, get a piece of licorice; finish your semester, get your ass home.

Winter, if you wreck one more thing, oh son, we are going to have words.

And Once Again Legalism Has Spoiled A Good Thing

For the past 4 years the Concert Choir has sung at the Warplane Heritage Museum Remembrance Day service. Its always powerful. Its always touching. We are the first choir to have been asked to sing in consecutive years. It is a great honour to be asked to sing at it. And it is a small thing we can do to honour veterans and current service personnel.

This year November 11th falls on a Sunday. That's right, up/op/ob Sondag. And because of the 'uncomfortableness' of some people both in and out of the choir with the choir (or more, certain individuals) singing in the morning, on a Sunday, we are not singing in the service this year.

That paragraph may have just opened a conservative reformed can of worms that is about to indignantly crawl all over me - but let me say this first - it is not about a willingness to keep the Sabbath holy, it is not about a lack of willingness to be away from home churches. For me it is about a lack of flexibility for this particular day.

I'm just gonna throw this out there - our military veterans did not have comfortable options about how they were going to spend their Sunday. So I just wonder if we can't step out of the norm and honour them with something that makes us a little uncomfortable.

Let the very well worded lambasting of me begin...

Good Try Though

Redeemer is the land of self improvement. And this extends to the building itself. There are constantly little things being made better - dorm windows, paving things, etc. Currently there are some renovations being done in the center foyer/A stairs/stairs area. The area known as 'the couches' was recarpeted and the carpet at the bottom of the stairs has been turned to tile to match the tile on the floor. There are also new couches and chairs (though I'm still not sure what was wrong with the old ones as they were only a couple years old, but the new stuff does look very nice and is veeeerry cushy and comfy... anyway).

Nearing the completion of this renovation everyone was sent an email from campus services outlining what had been changed. Apparently this also included the name of the area. This area is supposed to be called "The Commons" now and even in the email it said The Commons (formerly known as the Center Foyer). I'm not gonna lie, this got me a little riled up. Why does campus services get to rename part of the school? And why The Commons. While sitting at The Couches this week, I discussed this and people said they'd be willing to start calling it The Commons if things (aka food) were actually sold in The Commons area (Mac's food court has Commons in its name). Perhaps it was also decided that The Commons sounds like a kissing disease - "Oh man I've got The Commons!" "You were kissing Klaas again weren't you?" "Yeah, its true. Just don't tell my parents I got The Commons". There would also be a willingness to call it The Commons if there were some end tables to set things on in The Couch area (currently there is just the arms of the leather furniture - ok, if thats where you want us to rest our drinks). Possibly also the idea of having a mini-tramp built into the floor at one point and the accompanying St. John's ambulance booth.

I also decided I would be willing to start calling it The Commons, if I was able to rename other parts of the building. Example - Rename the main office, Fred. "Well, if you go down to Fred and talk to Jane she should be able to help you." Or, "Cheques can be dropped off to Zach Pillings in Fred."

Likely though, this attempt at a name change will fall to the dust like the well intentioned naming of the 3 parking lots - Luther, Calvin and Cranmer Courts will forever be known as First, Second and Third Parking Lots.

Tiny Gripe

I wish the whole of Redeemer was like you guys, that they read my blog. Then I wouldn't have to be explaining things all the time.

I think I had 500 conversations yesterday that went like this:

Random RUC Person: Hey, Laura Stewart! Its good to see you!

Me: Its good to see you too!

RRP: So, you're all graduated eh?

Me: Um, nope.

RRP: You're not?

Me: Nope. I'm back for one class each semester.

RRP: (puzzled look as they try and figure out if I'm dumb or just pathetic for not doing the classes in one semester and finally getting out)

Me: (looking at them while they think this, wondering if I could make their brain explode by telling them that I only need first semester's class to graduate)

RRP: Cool, well I guess I'll see you around eh?

Me: Yup.

So yeah, maybe you've been away or something, or maybe i haven't clearly communicated this - I am back for the whole year. You'll remember that I am the chair of CITB this year. That means I have to be a student for the whole year. There. Now you know. Oh how this won't clear up anything.

Snow

I'm going to be sorely disappointed if we get this pile of snow and the only thing it does make me dig, shovel and leave early for everything. Jacob Ellens, if you read my blog - multiple snow days in a semester is not a bad thing, in fact, it will make you a living legend.

The Sidewalk and What It Is Used For

If you live on campus or know those who do, maybe you could pass on a message on for me...

USE THE SIDEWALK

I have included a diagram to help this "discussion" (aka I talk, you listen and you change - aren't I going to be a great mother!)



Ok, here we go... when you are heading by second parking lot on the way to the main academic parking lot there is a roadway and a sidewalk. They run parallel to each other. In fact I'm pretty sure that the edge of the roadway and the edge of the sidewalk are less than 8 feet apart. There seems to be some confusion currently about what the roadway is used for and what the sidewalk is used for. Let me clear this up for you: the roadway is for things that have wheels (see, I'm lenient, I could have said things that have an engine, but as a motorist I don't mind sharing with bikes, boards, scoots, unis or whatever) and the sidewalk is for things with feet/legs. So if you are say, just walking with your friends to your favourite class (or anything at all actually) you should be on the sidewalk, you and your 45 friends should NOT, I repeat, NOT be walking on the roadway.

Now friends, I'm going on this tangent and made this happy diagram for a couple reasons: a) your safety and b) my rage/impediment to forward progress. See, when you walk on the road you take up a lane (or two!) on what is only a two-way roadway. And if I'm coming into class in my car and someone is leaving with their car in the opposite direction then I cannot simply swerve around you, I must drive excessively slow whilst I wait for the other car to proceed safely in their lane. This makes me rage. It makes me rage a lot. Because pedestrians and motorists could all be heading in a forward direction at an acceptable speed, together, if THE PEDESTRIANS KEPT TO THE SIDEWALK! I don't care if you don't want to keep on the sidewalk all the way to the side doors. I will work with you if you keep to the sidewalk and then cross to cut through the academic parking lot to get into the school via the doors by the athletic centre. This is because parking lots, unlike roadways are all about the cohabitation of pedestrians and motorists.

So here is the deal - walk on the sidewalk, or maybe, just maybe someday me and my rage filled self with run you and your iPod and your tight pants down. :)

(oh and lest i be judged as some oil guzzling maniac - sciatica permitting, i walk into school when i can, and i use the sidewalk!)

Moist

You know what I want?

Some sort of machine thing that will moisturize my skin. All of it. In one shot. Some thingy that I just step into or in front of or walk around that squirts or slathers or somethings and just makes my skin all happy and not dry. I bet that have those on the star ship enterprise. "Computer: activate moisturizing sequence Laura Delta One." Oh yeah. That's the moisturizing of my dreams. For now I have to spend all this time with a little pump bottle. Bah.