One Month Later

So I realised that I've been here a month already. I can't decide whether it's gone by fast, or felt like forever. Kinda depends on the day.

I miss everyone and hate that I'm missing out on things at home, but I'm glad to be here. The program is really great, and my advisor is amazing. I think this is where I'm supposed to be... now if only I could trick you all into being here too.

It's turning to fall here, despite the warm weather which is persisting. The leaves have started to fall and in the place where I walk the trees are vibrant shades of orange, yellow and red. I love walking at dusk and I only wish that my camera could get the hues right.

Victoria will be out this weekend, so I'm sure there will be more updates soon. I can't imagine her and I not finding some trouble.

PS. if this video thing works well enough I promise something more interesting next time, right now all I've got is Molly in a feild.

I have just two words - Mennonite Buffet

Last Saturday's group of people from my class decided to go down to St. Jacob's Market. Originally I was going to drive, but my car ran into some difficulties that morning. The emergency brake light had started flickering Friday night, and when I dropped my roommate off on Saturday morning the light was constant. I decided to go down to my mechanic, too bad he was closed. I got lucky, and the shop across the street was able to look at my car. Good thing too, since my break line had sprung a leak and my brakes were about to stop working. Glad I checked on that light...

Luckily one of the other people had a car so we still got to go to the market. After buying a ton of fruit and vegetables we headed to a buffet that Jeet knew about. Now I don't know what kind of image springs to mind when I say Mennonite buffet but it was pretty great. Lots of potatoes, fresh vegetables and a ton of pies. In fact I think it had almost as much dessert as regular food.

It also had some nice cars in the parking lot.

Elora

On Sept. 19th I didn't have any classes, so I decided to head out to Elora in the afternoon. It's a small community on the outskirts of town and was supposed to be pretty. These are some photo's I took.

Medieval Fair

The fair was mostly geared towards children, but was still interesting to check out the costumes as well as the items for sale. There were Dragon hand puppets at the fair, and I thought of getting one for Christine, but thinking of the look on Mike's face as Christine talked to him through the dragon dissuaded me. I'd like to live past Christmas.

Just a note

Okay, I'm trying to catch-up on these posts. I'd like to get up to date before my homework gets too intense and I forget all about the blog. So I'm going to post some photos without too much comment so that I'm not always two weeks behind.

School? I mean I went here for school.... right?

the crazy campus sculpture things, and you thought the blue pyramid was odd...

I figure by now you might be wondering about my school. It was the whole point of going to Waterloo after all. So far it's been pretty good. The orientation was pretty good, and a nice icebreaker. The LED program is pretty small, only 12 of us. I'm taking four classes, but I've got the same prof for two courses. It looks like there will be a lot of work involved. I may die.

My methodology Prof suggested that I might want to take a more intense statistical course (you know something with lots and lots of math). Hum, nope, don't think so. Given my history with Statistics I don't think I want anything too challenging.

An African Safari - because why else would you go to Ontario

So I was adding some of my classmates to facebook when I noticed a message from Danielle. She was wondering if she should come out for the weekend. Neither of us had much homework yet, and the Safari closes mid-October.

She came out Friday night, and then on Saturday we decided to see how many things we could cram into one day. Quite a few actually. First we went down to St. Jacobs Market. It was huge, and I think I know where I'm getting most of my Christmas presents for you guys.

Then we headed to Cambridge for the Safari. How could we resist... I mean who goes "Gee, I really want to go on an African safari, lets go to Cambridge, Ontario." There are some regular zoo exhibits, but the best part by far was the Safari. You get to drive your car through the park and the animals are just roaming freely. They have huge signs that read "Dangerous Wild Animals - keep windows rolled up!" Not that anyone seemed to abide by that. Windows were rolled down, carrots were waved in the direction of the animals.

I loved the baboons. Now, I'm not usually a fan of baboons, but when they run around like hairy panhandlers they're pretty cute. They come and sit beside the windows hoping that someone will feed them. The generous cars would sometimes have as many as 5 baboons riding on the vehicle.

Oh, and then we rode an Elephant. They are quite comfy,

if rather prickly.

After the safari we headed out to Stratford to catch the Ideal Husband.

Roommates

I wasn't that worried about getting roommates... or at least I wasn't that worried until Rachel and I had the open house.

I'd advertised that people could come by on Wednesday and check out the place. So Rachel and I rushed back Wednesday (the same day we were trying to buy the car) to wait for people to show up. And wait... and wait.

Not one person showed up... Now I was worried.

Anyway Rachel assured me that it would all work out. And what do you know she was right (it so rarely happens). Anyway by the end of the next week I had three roommates, and they've turned out to be great.

I'm living in with a houseful of guys. I had said I didn't care about gender, but everyone who called me about the place was male, so that limited my choice. But the line-up for the bathroom is much shorter. They're great guys - except that they like math - but I can forgive a few flaws.

Pictures of my new place (my room)

Pictures from my new place (kitchen & living room)

Downsizing from the giant white truck

Getting a car should have been easy, right? You just buy the car and buy insurance. Or not.

In Ontario there are a few more steps. First you have the car e-tested (AirCared) and safety tested, sign the seller's papers, get an Ontario drivers licence, get insurance, get a second insurance quote (which turns out to be half the original quote), and then take all those documents to "The Ministry".

Still, less then 48 hours from going and seeing the car, I was driving it home. Oh ya, and I had even had a mechanical inspection done.

We weren't supposed to sleep on the floor...

Photo: Molly with our make-shift bed

I knew that we wouldn't have a bed to sleep on the first night. But that was okay, I had a plan. I had what I thought was a foolproof plan. But like most foolproof plans it failed miserably.

I would bring an air mattress with me, and pack the air pump in the boxes I was shipping ahead of me. They said that the boxes needed 5 days to ship, so I gave them 7, and I checked the bus depot in Kitchener was open till 8:30, so we'd be in town with plenty of time to pick-up the packages.

But nothing ever goes as planned. When I stopped by the bus depot the woman at the counter claimed to have never heard of my boxes. I tried to conger up the box by describing it in greater detail. Then the other woman walked by and said, "Gee your name sounds familiar... isn't that big box over there for you?" The other woman looked annoyed and said, "Well, yes, but just the one, so I can't give it to her. We have to wait till they both arrive." Now since I had already paid for the boxes it seemed a little odd that she wouldn't give it to me. After much pleading they gave me the box, too bad it didn't have the air pump in it.

The next day we were looking in the Salvation Army when Rachel found a small air pump. She stood there, with big puppy eyes, pleading for me to buy it so that we wouldn't have to sleep on the floor again. She reminded me that it was the first thing she'd asked for on the trip. The puppy eyes worked, but I suggested we call the Depot first and see if my other box had arrived yet. It had, we were saved.

Sort of. That night we discovered that the air mattress was broken.

How I learned to drive in Waterloo

So Rachel and I arrived in Waterloo on schedule, picked Molly up, and found our rental car. Now when I say car, you should imagine a huge white truck, something four times the size of Baby Car. I was so glad I had Rachel to drive it. However, every time we passed another car, cyclist, pedestrian, skateboarder or mailbox asked: "am I going to hit that car?.... how about now?... now?... now... what about that person? Did I hit it?"

Since she was driving, I had to deal with navigating. Now this is not a good situation for anyone, since I can’t tell my left from right. I mean most of the time I can read a map, but as Rachel would tell you there were a few moments where I went “OH NO, RACHEL WE’RE GOING THE WRONG WAY!!! WAIT A MINUTE LET ME CHECK THE MAP, WE HAVE TO TURN AROUND! WE’RE GOIN – oh, never mind… it’s okay… we’re fine, we’re going the right way.” In my defence that only happened three or four times… or maybe as many time as she asked if we were going to hit passing cars.