Category Archives: Diary

Determined

I am listless. Lethargic. Languid. Langorous. Languishing. Limp, even.

I have absolutely no energy whatsoever. The most action I have participated in over the last twenty-four hours was waking up much too quickly at 2.30 this morning to bounce out of bed and partially close windows. Some storm! Then, of course, I went back to bed with a headache because of the plummeting air pressure and the waking-up-too-quickly-ness.

I broke three glasses yesterday because someone who shall remain nameless insists on piling all the used dishes into the sink. He claims he can’t stand them being on the counter. My point of view is that the counter is smaller than the sink, so the dishes would get washed faster if they’re on the counter. In addition, piling them into the sink means that as they don’t get washed as often, they take up more room, and I can’t use the faucet to get water in the kettle. Finally, he has a bad habit of just piling, not thinking it through, which means that heavy plates and pots get put on top of glasses and delicate mugs, resulting in breakage of said mugs and glasses when attempts to shift the pots and plates out of the way are made in preparation for washing.

So I was irritated about the glasses. We now have two glasses from that set left. That’s it.

On top of that, I woke up in a crafty mood and pulled out a sewing kit I’d had in my possession for over ten years. Yes, indeed; with all my back problems I’ve been toying with the idea of finally constructing the corset I fell in love with lo these many years ago. Unlike others, I actually have enjoyed my previous experiences wearing a corset; I’ve done it a couple of times now for two runs of stage work, and they’re darned comfortable, let me tell you. So I ordered a reconstructed pattern and supplies from an American dry goods company and then left it, not having time or the sewing skill at that point to accomplish what the pattern asked. After ten years, I’ve acquired a sewing machine and made my share of insanely complicated Renaissance outfits, including a couple of boned bodices, so when I looked at the corset pattern yesterday, hurrah! It made sense! In fact, it was easy! I could put it together in a single day!

Yeah, well, the best-laid plans, etcetera, etcetera.

Having such long legs and a short waist, I have to adjust every pattern I use to shorten the torso, otherwise the waist ends up around my hips. I shortened the corset pattern and then on a hunch, I decided to check to see if the boning and the front busk closing would still fit.

My hunch was correct. The busk was now an inch and a half too long.

Busks are made of metal, like the boning. You can’t just trim it. So I folded the project up and seethed for a bit about the unfairness of the one-size-fits-all mentality. I wasted time on the Internet. I finished my reread of Howards End. I decided to watch the movie while the book was fresh in my mind.

The VCR didn’t work.

By now I understood that the day was in fact out to get me. Fine, said I; I’ll read, then. Upon which I remembered that I had just finished my current fiction and had to find another novel to read. I hate choosing what book to read next. Being between books is dreadful.

Then, of course, I broke the glasses before I even started washing dishes.

The day did get better. I watched Howards End over dinner with my husband once he’d reset the VCR. He had never seen it before and was surprised to discover an energetic examination of what constitutes richness, intellectual riches or material possession. I was delighted to re-discover how true the movie is to the book. I also decided to re-fit the pattern and allow for nice big seam allowances on the top and bottom, which I rarely do (why trim the seams when you can sew tiny ones to begin with?), resulting in the front busk just barely fitting. However, alas, there was no way to rescue the glasses.

Today looks like it will be another horribly listless day. At least I can finish the corset. I started another book, Still She Haunts Me, about Charles Dodgson (whose nom-de-plume was Lewis Carroll) and Alice Liddell (immortalised in Alice in Wonderland), but it’s rather banal, so I think I’ll switch to The Winter King which Tas has lent to me.

Know what else is frustrating? I can’t string my own bow. I manage to flex it to about an inch short of where I’d need it to be to slip the looped bowstring over the tip, and then I’m stuck.

Maybe I’ll go see what’s happening in the Great Canadian Novel, which acquired four and a half more pages on Saturday after all that procrastination, thank you very much.

Thoughts

If I were a mage, there are two things I’d invent immediately.

One: Self-cleaning dishes. Coming home after a week’s vacation to a sink of dirty dishes is bad. I don’t not enjoy washing dishes, I dislike having to wash them.

Two: Self-cleaning clothes. Doing laundry is expensive and time-consuming. Worse, though, is the Eternal Laundry Basket Curse all my clothes seem to be laden with: Where’s my brown shirt? Where are my jeans? Wait, I know – the laundry basket, because when I finally washed them, I didn’t have the energy to put them away in drawers where they’re supposed to go. At least they’re folded.

I found a copy of Bridget Jones’s Diary in a second-hand bookshop yesterday, started reading it on the way home, and finished it yesterday mid-afternoon. Brilliant. Now I have to see the movie, because in the book Bridget suggests doing a TV journalism piece on the off-screen romance between Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle, the stars of the BBC Pride & Predjudice, and of course, Colin Firth is in the movie version of BJD, playing another Mr. Darcy. Look! Inter-media reference! I love it!

And for those who have not heard the news, we have the new car; the albatross is no longer in our possession!

A Positive EI Experience?

Well. That was anti-climactic.

I just came back from the EI office. Having heard horror stories, I was expecting a dark, crowded, dour office with hard wooden chairs and evil civil servants looking down their noses at me because I was no longer one of society’s beneficial contributors. Evidently, I read too much Dickens (or Lemony Snicket). Instead, I walked into a bright, open office, waited in a line of four people to get to the front desk, told the nice gentleman who served me in the language of my choice that I had applied on-line but was here to drop off my Record of Employment, where did I need to go? He smiled at me and said I didn’t need to go anywhere or see anyone, because he could take it. Seeing by the print-outs in my hand that I had obtained a confirmation number from the on-line application (I’m so prepared), he told me that I’d be receiving further instructions in the mail. I blinked, and said, “That’s all?” “Yes, he said, smiling again and holding out his hand for my ROE. “Can I just make a copy of this, then?” I said, still stunned. He even directed me to a (free) photocopier, then gestured me out of line again when I returned to take the ROE with another friendly smile.

And I walked out five minutes after I’d walked in. It would have been sooner if I’d thought ahead and had already made the copy of my ROE. My husband couldn’t stop shaking his head with a grin; he claims that the ease of the whole exercise further underscores the fact that this was the right decision.

The Morning After The Farewell To Retail Party

Traditionally, I dislike parties. I especially dislike parties at my place because I can’t get away from them. I’m unsocial that way. Only once did I actually leave; I walked out of my own birthday party a few years ago. I called off holding parties for that very reason: you’re stuck there. You can always leave other people’s parties.

Last year I decided to give it a try again, and we had a successful housewarming. Might have been a fluke, I thought. We had a couple of small gatherings throughout the year, getting me up to speed again. Nothing huge. It’s not like I’ve suddenly decided that I’m throwing myself a big birthday party or anything. Let’s not go to extremes.

MLG suggested I have people over to mark my last day of work before my sabbatical. I anticipated a quiet evening with much conversation. Sure, why not, I said.

Well, this morning, I walked into my kitchen and looked at the number of empty bottles on the counter and the table. I have no idea how few people could drink so much. I’m afraid to do the math. The glorious thing is, though, that it wasn’t an alcohol-fest (I just don’t do those); it was simply a terrific evening. I think everyone needed to relax. And for once, I was happy to be the excuse everyone used to kick back.

Note to self: drink O’Casey’s with cream again sometime. Mmm.

So people had fun. Yes, we had that good conversation thing; there was also much laughter, good music (in my CD changer at the beginning of the evening: Buffy – the Musical, Ella Fitzgerald, the LOTR soundtrack, Great Big Seas’s Turn, and Classic Yo-Yo Ma… I am nothing if not eclectic), good food (I made baked Camembert with sage and then forgot I’d made it, although everyone else tells me it was terrific), and of course, good company. I know good people. And it’s good when we all get together.

My first day of my non-retail life was lovely. I went for a walk at 9 AM, grinning like an idiot. I practiced. I read. I napped a bit. I tidied up all those bottles and cans (still unable to comprehend how much alcohol was consumed). I nibbled bread and cheese. All in all, a wonderfully relaxed day. My parents should be en route to Montreal from Oakville; I’m really looking forward to seeing them soon too.

Life is pretty darn okay.

Canada Day Concert Countdown

It was a three-hour, gruelling dress rehearsal. At the end of it all we stumbled out of the church, exhausted. We were driven, forced to repeat bars over and over again, made to feel like we were all fumbling amateurs, threatened with removing pieces from the program if we couldn’t get it absolutely right. When we were released, our conductor thanked us, and said quietly that we should all be very proud of ourselves, because we sounded fantastic.

I should know this tactic by now; I’ve worked in theatre for seventeen years. It gets me every time, though.

If I had any doubt as to my sight-reading abilities, they were assuaged by the smooth, adept performance of the German aria Andras distributed when we arrived. It seems that in the eleventh hour we have added another piece to the program. For those of you who know Marian Siminski, our lovely and talented Mozart soloist from our last concert (and, incidentally, the musical director of Lakeshore Light Opera who has directed me for years), she’ll be back on Monday night.

The church is lovely, so if anyone gets bored with the music, they can look at the architecture and all the saints (if they tire of Andras gesticulating wildly). I know I spent a lot of time looking at it while various sections worked through rough sections and transitions. (Oh, we had our share, don’t think we didn’t.) We played with all the doors open last night, and people walking by came in and sat at the back for a while when they heard the music. I thought it was lovely. Imagine taking a stroll by the lake as the sun is going down, and the air is cooling off, and you hear this wonderful soaring Mozart which draws you in. The church melds the sound beautifully; I can see why many groups choose to record in such places. I can also see the immense technical headaches they create, namely that the brass and winds sound like they’re a fraction of a second behind the strings at times, because the sanctuary is round and collectes their sound before projecting it outwards.

One. One more day. Seven hours. Then friends, and music, and a summer of freelancing, writing, and catching up on me again.

Beauty

For some reason, I feel six feet tall today, willowy and all leg. My cello feels tiny. I hefted it through metro turnstiles and (worse) the outside doors to the stations themselves, where the vacuum created by the trains sucks them shut on you, forcing you to struggle to keep them open. Hard at the best of times; nigh impossible when you’re carrying sixteen hundred dollars that could all too quickly become firewood. Today it was easy, though.

I am, however, stuck humming I’m Getting Married In The Morning from My Fair Lady, since I played the Lerner & Loewe medley to bits this morning. I simply cannot get the Camelot section – Lusty Month of May is a cinch, but the actual Camelot theme – it’s a write-off. Fortunately I surge back supremely well with The Night They Invented Champage, thanks to MLG who burst into song in HMV last week when I asked him what show it was from. (You had to be there. No, really.)

There’s hope for me yet.