Monday, Tuesday and a fist full of quarters!

Monday 14th

Today I woke up pretty much paralyzed. My arms ached, my butt broken, my legs sore and bruised! Somehow I hauled my self out of bed and got ready for school. I had a pretty full on day today too!
I had to usual history – where we were issued with essays! Then ye olde power walk to chemistry, to honking teacher. The honk is getting worse I’ve noticed! I think honking leads to a sore throat, which leads to more honking. I then had a wee break, where I churned out my assignment for geochem, which is due on Tuesday. Then some environmental systems, where we took in the glory of the first fall leaves spied on campus!

I met up with my Australian friend, Brendan, for luncheon, as I had no food left in my cupboard (Monday is student discount day at the supermarket. So I was holding out on my shopping for the evening with Annabel). We had some sandwiches and TWO salads all for $6. Australia just can’t compete with such cheap, affordable lunches. We bopped around for two hours, and went to Second Cup, where I had the most intense cappuccino EVER. So normally cappuccinos come with froth, yes, I understand this concept, but this one was half froth and a little bit of coffee at the bottom of the cup. And then, they didn’t even put the chocolate on top. That’s what they taught me at the Vina Bakehouse! Cappuccinos have the chocolate powder on the top!
Then I had a tutorial with the honking chemistry teacher! Half the people in the tute left due to the non-stop honk. I tried to extract some knowledge from this experience and then I walked on home to get ready for my cardio workout! I walked up to Sara’s residence and we walked up to the gym together. We wandered around with a group of similarly confused girls to try and find where our class was. We finally worked out (witty) where we were meant to go, and went into the class. The instructor was amazing; she was so inspiring, yelling so nicely for us to keep on working out. This session got the old heart rate up, got everyone in the class sweating like pigs, but it felt good! I was so happy. Sara and I are so pumped for our semester of fitness ahead. I came home, showered and then Annabel and I went out to Provigo (supermarket) for our student discount shopping. But you had to spend $50 to get the discount! I couldn’t spend that much, and I hadn’t been for a good shop in weeks. It was nice to get some fresh fruit and veg. We came home, struggling under the weight of our groceries and made the most amazing green curry ever. I taught Annabel all I knew about curry in a hurry. Delicious! I feel more accomplished as a cook, as it’s always Annabel that’s giving me the tips, but tonight my Nigella Lawson knowledge reigned supreme.

Tuesday 15th

Today at school I felt really cool. I bumped into lots of people I knew, I’ve made bonds and I know people – it’s a good feeling. I bumped into a few people from the kayaking too, and we had a good laugh about the aches and pains left from the weekend that was. I had some geochem at 9:00. I even made a friend – well a forced friend! He had just moved into the class and didn’t have the notes from the past week. This was my time to shine - I gave him my notes. This would then lead to the follow up taking back of my notes, and then the asking of how the notes went. I couldn’t wait for the lab later, where I would assert my new friendship status. I went home in the break, did some work and did some washing. The washer stopped taking dollar coins - but I had saved up enough quarters (14) that I could pay for the washing and drying with all my hard earned quarters. I caught up my blogging, and my GIS that I was going to be missing later on in my geochem lab. I hung around around and had some lunch and English tea with Lucy. I walked off to my geochem lab AND as a class we bonded! Oh, the glory! We had a break at 3:00 for coffee and cookies! I had about 4 cookies and a mocha coffee. I chatted with my fellow students and enjoyed all that was geology coffee and cookies. We solved some problems and laughed at a boy that looked like Harry Potter, but his name was cereal (at least it was pronounced Cereal) as he struggled over everything he tried to present to the amusement of the class. My group finished our problems early, so we had nothing left to do but bond and learn about each other while waiting for other groups to finish! The glory!

I met up with Annabel and we went to the Activity Night. This is where all the clubs set up tables and you join millions of clubs you never intend to turn up to. I joined so many! I even joined a vegan club – this was in the pretence of obtaining some new, tasty and protein-ous recipes. I joined the ping-pong club, I joined to McGill greens party, I joined a drama society, I joined a volunteering for the elderly club. I just went nuts! The only thing I didn’t join was one of the twelve singing clubs. There were a crazy number of choirs, all asking me if I could sing. “NO!”, I kept on telling them! I also didn’t join the sororities; they were all lurking in the basement, so when I wandered in it was quite overwhelming, the jocks with their backwards caps and the jock’s chicks with their boob-tubes! The most glorious moment that occurred that night was the quidditch team waving and recognizing me. I stopped by their booth after they waved me down and we had a good chat. I was enjoying my in! I also ran into the president of the McGill outdoors club and she recognized me too, and we had a good chat! Oh, I was enjoying my new-found club status! I tried to go for a swim after that with one of the girls from the ANU, but the swim team was having a meet, so we were kicked out. I walked home and made some stir-fry with Annabel! It was quite a tasty number. I then gave in to the desire to hang out with my roommates and had a beer with them in the kitchen and just bummed around. Life is good.