Weekdays, Words and Wonders

In my previous blog, it seems like people are fighting over who induced me to leave ON in the first place... truth be told guys, I made up my mind years ago, on my own. So there.... but I still wonder every week what my friends are up to back in ON, now that I am not around to bear witness. *grin*

Nov 3 - Square Starts

It's a Monday, and it's been a while since I've written about, well... Mondays. Seems that most anyone you ask has an opinion on the subject of Monday; it seems to elicit a very strong response in most people when asked. One can imagine why ... though I try not to get the image of a cubicle dweller trudging into a corporate office on a rainy monday for another day of dull meetings and bad coffee. This video seems to sum things up for such folk quite nicely.

This fellow seems to love mondays though: HappyJoblessGuy.com, whose article was written around the same time I arrived in Victoria last year. Since I already had a job waiting for me here on arrival, I was less worried than most about raiding my savings until I managed to land a job.

I wonder what Mondays are like in Second Life, that virtual world where you can design and be anything you want, from a talking fire hydrant to a sentient stapler. I would hope that there is not a single cubicle farm to be found in the whole place, save as dungeons to be navigated by the very brave...

Nov 4 - Flu for Me, Flu for You!

I went to the doctor's office just down the road today and got a free Flu shot, as I both work with the public( ick )and have Thalessemia Minor, so the more help I give my immune system, the better. Now, I have heard several detractors argue that it iss better not to get the Flu shot, to 'build up your defences naturally' or 'It doesn't work, I got sick anyway' or just plain old "I don't want to.' Well, I have to say that these folks are fools. The WHO gets together every year after tracking influenza strains from Asia, to devise countermeasures for this upcoming cold season. Why is it we HAVE a cold and flue season anyway? Two words: world travel. You have a look here for some useful common answers to flu season questions, as well as looking here for the whole reason we HAVE flu shots: The Spanish Flu that killed close to 100 million people( est. )from 1918-1920. Back then, a flu shot would have saved millions of lives, and people would have paid fortunes for a shot, wheras today it's free or cheap.

Continuing the thoughts from yesterday, I had a great conversation with some folks in the doctor's lobby after I had had my flu shot. The one gentleman was in his 80's, and was curious as to 'my generation's' habits towards savings, considering he had lived through the Great Depression where a penny saved WAS a penny earned. I replied that today, most people are living well beyond their means, depending on credit to extend their purchasing power far beyond their actual paycheques. As an example, I mentioned all those gas-guzzling trucks sitting by the roadside 'For Sale by Owner Cheap!' that have been seen in recent months as the gas prices climbed - I bet their former owners are feeling a bit put out now that gas has fallen again, but still, the point remains: they thought the best thing was to sell, rather than try to come up with 50% more operating costs per month.

That's the thing: Monthly Income. I'd wager that most people know exactly what net dollars they pull in, on average, every month. So they juggle, cajole and tweak their budgets to allow food, shelter, transport and such other necessities... then spend all of the rest on cableTV, entertainment and new clothes. Or whatever. Saving part of every paychque seems to be an alien thought to most, though some see the advantage of socking away RRSP's for the far future as well as more immediate tax gains. Happily, I can report that just recently it was revealed that Victoria has the lowest jobless rate in Canada... which is odd, seeing as we also have a very high number of homeless here too, many of which are embroiled in fights over camping in public parks. It's a strange world we live in.

Nov 5 - Woden's Day and Magic Pans

Continuing my thoughts on Days of the Week, we have today: Wednesday, also known popularly as 'Hump Day' ... the middle of the week, and a day nobody really looks forward to at all. Well, I used to, when it was Kilt Day, also Cheap Wings At The Kilt Day, $2.50 Pints Day, and even Cheap Mussels Day.... all of the previous being eat-cheap nights at the Kilt & Clover in Port Dalhousie. Ah, those were the days, all behind me now though I do not regret the undercooked mussels or wings, some of those nights.

Back to the Days of the Week though. This modern calendar we have is rather interesting, in that the names of the days are all descended from various special observances by past cultures. My favourite is Saturday, most obviously because it comes after Friday, and also for the fact that it is named for the Roman god Saturn, and not one of the Anglo-Saxon deities such as Thor, like Thursday / Thor's Day. Those reasons, plus all those great Saturday morning cartoons from my youth... ah, wasted TV time.

Speaking of my youth, does anyone else remember going to a restaurant called The Magic Pan? They had quite a few outlets in the 80's in Hamilton and Toronto, byut had vanished well before the end of the decade. After much searching, I located this great bit of Magic Pan info, by a professor no less. I really loved those Monte Cristo sandwiches from the M.Pan in Sherway Gardens, they were so tasty! Only much later did I come to discover they were not named afer the famous story of the same name.

Nov 6 - What was that word?

Still working nine-hour shifts this month, and to be honest I enjoy them. No need to swap things over to someone else starting their shift at all; just open the store, do the day thing, close the store and go home. Nice and simple, and far less stressful in some ways. Again, I do not have a problem with working alone, which doevetails nicely with my being able to live on my own, in a new city, with only a few contacts after a year on this strange soil. Still Canada though, so that's something... I cannot imagine uprooting myself to a country where English was not the major language, or where I could not find a reasonable fascimile of a Tim Horton's or a Canadian Tire... heck, even a Walmart would do, evil as they are.

Today I discovered this great blog about some one else who has been writing about their experiences in Victoria, and best of all... they have LOTS of pictures! Seeing as I am still working on my own photo projects( that never get too far, of late )then in the interim: I urge you to go have a look!

I also found UnWord.com, a place that I did not know I have been searching for all these years. Now I can finally find a home for all the words I have made up in my head over the years, like Splink, or Tworp( already there, darn it! )and even Guzooloo... me so hapy! Damn... now I'm reegressiinng. Have to breaktake now...

Nov 7 - Focus, people!

I was very disappointed today in my new laptop, more specifically it's 64-bit Vista OS. After enduring a massive 2gb download and a long install procedure to get a program working, a little box popped up with 'Sorry, this product is not designed for a 64-bit operating system' - argh! I was trying to get my rather expensive copy of Dragon Naturally Speaking v9 to work on my laptop, so I can increase my typing speed as well as spare my fingers from my odd typing style.

At the moment, I am foundering a bit for my tech writing, as Cyberwalker has shut down new articles for the forseeable future. Nothing but good news for Andy Walker, but not so good for getting any of my articles out to the public... so understandably, I am a little adrift on that front. I had a great time working with the team though, and hope that I can be on the inside for any future projects they create.

Which just means I have more time to focus my efforts elsewhere, like voice acting and writing novels. Heck, the old 'lemons make lemonade' slogan comes to mind, though of late I have switched to iced tea... which is still too acidic for my poor cola-crippled stomach to handle. Root beer for now, folks.

Nov 8 - Butchart Gardens

The time change has me getting up earlier, for some reason, so I have put the 'extra' time to good use, like today: early laundry! One surefire way to get an empty laundry room is to get there BEFORE anyone else, so I spent the morning running loads of clothes up and down the stairs. Seems folk are reluctant to trade quality weekend sleep-in time for convenice, which worked out well for me.

I was off to Butchart Gardens at 1pm today, in the company of my parents, who have already been to this garden wonderland several times. Never having been before, I envisioned something like a larger version of Niagara's Botanical Gardens - boy, was I wrong! You can see in this video what an amazing place it is, built initially on an old quarry and owned by the same family for over 100 years, it is obvious that generations of hard work have gone into every inch of the grounds. The sun cooperated today too, giving us fair illumination through some cloud cover for most of the day - my first view of the Quarry Garden was in full sunlight, and I have to say it was simply... spectacular.

Yet it was the Japanese gardens that stopped me in my tracks, though for a reason not likely to snap other people out of their reality. The entrance to the gardens was flanked by giant Japanese cedar trees, whose leaves were being gently blown by a light breeze. They were floating to the ground in perfect clusters, filling the air with fluttering continuous motion - tree snow, as I called it. What made me blink was that this was the SAME image that my favourite game, Neverwinter, uses in some of its most perfect animations. I had a sense of deja-vu in seeing those leaves fall, as I experienced the same sense of perfect peace then as I did onscreen - damned strange, and damned delightful, all at once.

Sadly, I have no pictures of the Gardens, as my parents forgot to bring our camera today even with my reminder of the day before. Just goes to show I need one of my own if I am to document my trips!

Nov 9 - The Salmon Run

Just after Rene called me today, I was on the road today again at 11am and heading north and west to Goldstream Park, where the annual Salmon Run was underway. No, it wasn't a marathon( hi Lucas! )but is instead the annual spawning of the pacific salmon, in their many thousands. I drove along the Malahat Highway for a ways, deep under the incredibly tall green trees perched on the sheer cliffs all around. Getting close to the park, we noticed hordes of people doing the same thing - well, maybe not hordes, but quite a few folk were out today. We managed to secure a parking spot fairly quickly at a point well along from the park entrance; the walk was lovely in the absence of rain and a semi-cloudy / semi-sunny noon-hour.

The first thing I noticed was the smell: anyone who has visited a fishery or been down to the docks when the fishing fleet is in would have recognized this distinct stink: dead fish. We took up a viewing spot on the single bridge across the stream, and took in the sight of hundreds of salmon trying to make their way upstream. Dozens of rotting carcasses dotting the stream sides attested to the difficulty of the task, and the shrieks of the many gulls looking for freshly-expired salmon added to the charm. Once we got used to the stink however, we could more easily appreciate the efforts of the fish to make their way through the very shallow water, only inches deep across most parts of the stream.

I would have posted a few nice pictures, but yet again the high-res camera was left behind by my parents, despite my reminders this morning; I was very annoyed for a good part of the day. Even so, the dark mottled colouring of the salmon meant that they were very hard to see against the rocks of the streambed, so the light and angle had to be just right for anyone to get a nice composition.

We had lunch afterwards at the Malahat Mountain Inn, whose spectacular view was very limited initially by the vast cloud bank that had rolled into the area. Fortunately it cleared somewhat after lunch, and we were treated to a misty view of the Finlayson Arm branching northwards.

After an afternoon of reading, chores and video games, I was sitting here at 8:30 when I realized I had spent well over an hour crafting this blog - it's great! Setting down my thoughts like this is far better than a journal, in that I am not trying to document washing socks or what I had for breakfast. Instead, I can let out some of my many interests, as well as filling in folk on the Great Things that I am discovering out here in Victoria every day...

So, do you like... socks? Until next week!


Jen, are you still out there? In all the ninjas, spiders and scheming school chums, your voice was the lone spotlight of reason in an insane Commentary... come back and spin your wondrous words! Aw hell.. now I'm spouting spider-rhetoric! Argh!

The Second Week in Victoria: Lots and lots to tell...

My second week in Victoria was rather stressful, and I ended up catching a cold by the end of it from some helpful stranger, likely one at work. As always, you can comment on this blog at the bottom - I keep wondering if anyone's actually READING this thing....? ALL previous Blog enries have been updated as of today with Links - images will be next, I hope, in a week or two.

Nov 11th - Remembrance Day

We drove through Beacon Hill Park today in the rental Pontiac G6, the last day we had it. I took a lot of pictures, as the sun peeked out here and there from the overcast sky to give a few good photos. The park is very large, larger than the sizable Bourgoyne Woods back in St. Catharines, and since it sits in the middle of the south end of Victoria, the city surrounds the park but does not intrude on it. Tall trees cover about a quarter of the land, with winding roads and paths meandering through the vast spaces. A good portion of the park is undeveloped wilderness, with great rock prominences jutting through the grass like the bones of the earth itself. Some areas, like the ones where I saw 4 peacocks, are planted as beautiful flower gardens, while another area contains a large pond surrounded by willow trees. A gorgeous park, the south end of which overlooks the ocean straight and gives amazing views of the Juan de Fuca Islands.

We saw quite a few folks out for Remembrance Day today as well, despite the weather. Quite a gathering was down at the Parliament Buildings on Government Street, and we saw many military uniforms returning home from that area as we finished our tour of the park. After returning the rental car, my parents and I had lunch at the Bay Centre cafeteria, which is on the fifth floor of the Bay Centre and is quite large. The food is excellent, as are the prices, and included in the meal is a fantastic view to the west of Esquimalt, where my parents will be getting their retirement digs set up in a month or so - more on that later. The view of the harbour shows seaplanes taking off, as well as the ferry to the USA and other boating traffic.

Another nice thing about Victoria is that everyone seems to watch out for one another. The bus drivers actually SLOW DOWN when nearing each stop, even if all they see is someone walking towards the stop area - they slow, just in case that person is trying to catch the bus. And as I've already mentioned, everyone THANKS the driver when they leave the bus; it's great to hear. Even seeing people wait patiently in groups to cross almost-empty stretches of street is a treat; I keep expecting people to do the Niagara Falls dash-for-your-life-through-oncoming-traffic thing, and seeing people actually WAIT for the 'walk' signal, en masse, even with no cars in the immediate area, is still a source of fascination for me even weeks later.

Nov 12th - Stay Home Storm

A nasty pacific storm blew in today, revealing that our temporary quarters at the Landmark building are not all that well sealed against the weather. In particular, the door to the patio of the main bedroom had huge drafts of air blowing in around all four sides, so we sealed those with painter's tape temporarily. We also have noticed the tile floor in the kitchen is quite chilly, which we suspect is a lack of insulation in the walls. Another point is that the kitchen backs onto the second bedroom, and there is a complete lack of noise insulation in the wall - you can hear every drawer or cupboard close, utensils rattle or appliances running. I am very glad we haven't rented this place for more than the few months planned, for although it looks to be a lovely building and the trimmings are very nice, the guts of the place aren't very well thought out a'tall.

Needless to say, we didn't go much of anywhere today due to the storm, and a good thing too. While we didn't lose power here, the evening news revealed a lot of damage all over Vancouver Island - the heavily wooded Island meant a LOT of trees fell from the severe winds. Seeing as today was the second of FOUR days off in a row, I spent some of it sorting through things I had brought from the storage depot and just generally relaxing, as I've been very tired of late.

Nov. 13th - a Day Spent Shopping

A very quiet day again... I had received notice from Multicites Moving that the delivery would be taking place either today or tomorrow, so I was very grateful to my new co-workers for giving me these three weekdays off to get that taken care of. Unfortunately, nothing arrived today due to delays caused by that severe storm a few days ago - it played havoc with shipping schedules for the Vancouver Ferry, setting things back at least a day... of course.

So I went walking around Victoria instead, determined to get a better look at the place on foot. I wandered into the London Drugs store on Yates, and found a fantastic camera that I had been eyeing for a while. After having a better look at it, I bought it - a Fuji F50fd, a little pocket camera that packs a 12 megapixel SuperCCD, a large screen and a ton of features. While it cost a fair penny, it was nowhere near the SLR-range price insanity that seems the rage these days.

I also bought a 2-gig high-speed SD card for the thing too, to ensure I could snap pictures fast. Seeing as our last camera had started to severely malfunction a few weeks ago, I knew that I would be needing a new one, so my research pointed me to the Fuji above all others. Joy!

When I arrived home that evening, I discovered that Multicites had called; the shipment would finally arrive tomorrow. I was thrilled, as I had been stressing that the bad luck revolving around trying to ship our goods would keep true to form and result in its total loss in transit. Whew! I slept a lot better that night, let me tell you.

Nov 14th - Our Stuff Arrives

I went to the Budget Car Rentals just down the road with my mom at 8am to rent a nice SUV to use today once our things had arrived in a few hours. It was a nice Ford Freestyle, which had a ton of interior cargo room, lots of bells and whistles and drove like a brick, while looking like a squashed cousin to an SUV. At least it had heated seats, as it was quite chilly today.

We got a call from Multicites at 9am: they were en route from the morning ferry. We met them at the City Centre Storage depot on Johnson St a little after 10am; after some paperwork, they started unloading our stuff... which was no longer palletized - Strike One. I had organized our goods into seven distinct pallets, to allow easy shipping and distribution of important boxes on arrival - apparently that wasn't good enough for Multicites, which jumbled it all together... while damaging several DOZEN boxes in the process. The moving crew of three men were nice enough, but they were NOT careful with our boxes at all, even though we were right THERE watching them unload and directing certain boxes to be set aside for our SUV to take. I saw quite a few boxes CLEARLY marked 'Fragile!' in red marker all OVER the box simply tossed around and piled under other boxes marked 'VERY HEAVY' - can you say, DO NOT CRUSH?

It was rather stressful, and all this in the wet and cold too. I ended up paying a TON of money for these folks to mangle my goods, and LOSE several boxes in the process, conveniently one containing my Olympus camera, which was marked clearly on the box. I suspect that this was 'lost' intentionally along the way, but the last laugh is on the theif: the camera is defective, and while I had to eat the $200.00 cost through an eBay fiasco I won't get into, I am very slightly satisfied that the camera will NOT do whoever has it now any good. However, the flipside is that I have NO idea what ELSE was in that box, and never will likely know. My whole plan was to take pictures of the contents of EVERY box before it was sealed, as a record of the goods that we could use in case of loss in transit. Due to the failure of our old camera and severe time constraints at the tail end of October, this simply didn't happen - let that be a lesson to any of you who are going on a long move that will see your goods out of sight for weeks: TAKE PHOTOS! My shattered Visions pots, broken wine bottles and missing boxes are all proof that any idiot can move, but only a wise one will take precautions against other idiots messing it up. Given the MANY negative reviews of Multicites I have since come across on the 'net, I am not bothering to claim anything with them, as very few people have had any results without a lawyer!

We packed and moved three SUV-loads of goods to take back to the Landmark; I had had the foresight to purchase a handcart from Canadian Tire for the move, but it was defective - the tires went flat in minutes, and since I was the only one capable of heavy lifting, I had to move ALL the boxes on my own. My parents could not do more that unpack the stuff once I hauled it to our condo, which was stuffed with vital necessities by day's end. I was exhausted by the whole experience, and went to bed early with thoughts of how I could have managed the move some other way dancing a nasty tap in my head. I hadn't come up with any solutions before sleep whacked me with a soft pillow.

Nov 15th - Wow, can it RAIN here in Victoria! But what if you have nowhere to sleep...?

When it rains here in Victoria, it tends to be a gentle sprinkle in the morning, followed by some clearer skies around noon, then some more rain in the late afternoon. Today was no different, save that the rain decided to skip the clear bit around noon and dump a load of water instead.

Which made me glad to have my umbrella as I walked to work today for the closing shift; having a solid gust-proof umbrella is a must for anyone walking among downtown's odd wind patterns.

One thing I haven't mentioned yet is the preponderance of street people here in Victoria. While there were homeless and street walkers in Niagara, one didn't see too much of them all that often, which wasn't to say they were not really there. However, here in Victoria they are quite visible in the downtown core, right in your face quite often. My first time walking through downtown Victoria, I counted more homeless folks in sight that one day than I had ever seen in my life up to that very day. Here, they are polite but ever-present and certainly not shy; they will approach anyone to ask for change, and there is usually someone sitting in front of any store or business that is closed for the day, or in front of the few empty shops that dot the area.

I have mixed feelings on these folks, having worked in cheque cashing for nearly eight years now and seeing the many paths that life can lead a person down. On the one hand, some of these folks were simply dealt bad hands and became stuck here in Victoria, where their life went askew and they haven't been able to turn it back around again. That, I can understand very well. On the other hand, I see people every day on the other side of the glass at work that simply don't care to try, or are so lost to themselves that they are beyond the help of all but the most dedicated social worker. Having heard stories about folks making more by begging changed that I make working for a living( and questioning those same stories ), I always wonder as I pass these folks what their real story is, and why they sit on the sidewalk day after day, asking strangers for change... and where they go at night. I have seen things in passing down alleyways that I will not repeat here, and I know there is a sordid life that exists in every larger city, everywhere in the world, that most folk do not see nor care to. Due to my job, and my own observant nature, I KNOW it is there, and it tarnishes my image of this lovely city to see each street walker working the crowds in downtown Victoria day after day. For it is where the crowds are that they set up; you will not find them outside the local malls, or on side streets or suburban shopping plazas - downtown is where the easy money is, and why they still persist day after day in asking for change. Which is sad, and ironic, for they themselves will never change until it is forced upon them, likely through circumstance and likely through violence. And while I applaud the efforts of organizations like Stop Homelessness.Ca, I wonder how many of the people I see every day walking to work actually want to change things for themselves. That, I think, is the sad part, and one I see played out day after day in the lobby of my workplace.

So that's my rant on the homeless and the street folk of Victoria. Like it or not, they're there, and nobody who lives in Victoria can deny that fact, though many choose to ignore it as they walk past them... day after day.

Nov. 16th - T.G.I.F.

I spent the morning putting together the last of my PC, so that I could communicate with the world once more without having to use my parent's laptop. Too bad I have to run a fifty-foot cable all the way down the hall to the main room here to connect to the 'net; I will have to figure out a wireless option one day soon when I have more time, as I had to work later this day.

My closing shift last night went well enough, or so I thought. Apparently I missed a few things, as I am wont to do when faced with a new way of doing things in the same company. At least they were minor, and I am dilligently taking notes as I go along, so tonight will go better. As I noted above for yesterday, there are quite a few homeless folk here in Victoria, and the system here to support them is set up somewhat differently from Niagara. Wheras I was used to seeing Social Assistance cheques once a month coming through the doors at work, people here receive a weekly allowance instead, albeit three much smaller cheques and one larger per month. I should also note that due to the wet weather here in Victoria, many of our poorer clients do not have the best odours, and I find that hard to ignore when dealing with them regularly, being a fairly clean person myself. My empathy is working overtime in this new job; seeing so many people so hard-pressed to get through each day tugs at my heart, but at the same time I have to deal with the anger, mental illness and stress that same life brings about in them. Good thing I've trained myself not to get emotional at work, or I'd be a wreck some days.

Nov 17th - A cold, of course...

I woke today with a sore throat, which I blamed on the lousy air in the Landmark; there's no fresh air save if one opens a window( and baseboard heaters only )so I resolved to unpack my air cleaner later tonight after I finished work, hoping it would fix the problem while I slept.

No such luck. By the end of my shift today, I had added a stuffy nose and a headache to my sore throat, all classic signs that I had caught a cold. Lovely. I've very careful at work to wash my hands, use sanitizer regularly and NOT to touch my face, but something got through the window and now I'm going to suffer for it.

I did talk to some of my friends tonight, thanks to my foresight of getting a local number set up in Niagara through Vonage, so that anyone can call me from there as a local call and have it ring out here in Victoria. It was great to talk to all of them while they were at Starbuck's at the Fairview Mall in St. Catharines, as they are wont to do most every Friday. Though I can no longer be there in person, I did stop at a local Steeb's here on the way home tonight, so that I could hoist a hot Tazo Chai tea to them as we talked on the phone. Lovely folks, I miss 'em all.


While it was a great way to end the week, I was feeling rather under the weather... but there you have it Next time, I will try to pack two weeks into one, as doing a week at a time, as a once a week blog entry, will mean I'll always be behind. There's lots more to come!