children galore

Today I picked some children up from school and then spent the afternoon with them at one of our after-school programs. Here is what I saw and heard:

- a tiny Japanese girl wrestling with a backpack that was probably twice as heavy as she was

- another girl wandering around the playground saying, "Squeak! Squeak!" in a frequency more suited to a dog's hearing range than a human's

- a very trendy-looking boy (if he were older, I might think he was gay) who had a super-villain accent. I think he was from eastern Europe. At the end of our Bible lesson he had this prayer request: "I vould like to prrrray for my glasses, because zey are brrrroke."

- boys playing soccer, and the newly immigrated Chinese boy not only was included with hand gestures, but also wasn't half bad as a goalie even in the face of hard kicks from the popular leader-boy

- lots of rope-jumping and monkey bar stunts

- some remarkably insightful comments by the grade 4 and 5 kids during the Bible lesson. I don't remember any of them right now, but those kids sure have brains in their heads!

...sigh...

But I still kinda miss nunchuks girl.

comment extravaganza!

In the last seven posts (two weeks), I have received a grand total of two comments, both from Elliot. (Thanks Elliot!) This makes me feel sad and unloved, or even *gasp* wonder if people find me boring. However, I am not one to issue a plea for comments and leave it at that. I like to provide a reason, a question, an incentive or a discussion starter...anything to prove that I am not boring!

So I would like to ask you, what is the human obsession with the weather all about? It is the classic conversational haven of uncomfortable party guests. It is one of the first thing my mother will ask about when she calls from Toronto (admittedly, I also express genuine curiosity in the meteorological happenings "back East", as the Vancouverites like to say). Is it perhaps a way of reminding ourselves that there is somthing greater than us, something that affects our lives over which we have no control? Or is it the remnant of a more outdoors-y way of life, where the weather had a serious impact on our livelihoods?

In other news, a pair of Aussies pose the question: What have we learned from history? (Thanks be to Elliot.)

reboot

I feel like my brain has finally rebooted. For the past two weeks it's been jam-packed with a big fundraiser at work, a leadership training event I had to plan and run for the teens I work with, leading worship at church, meeting with each of the teens I work with for evaluations, and having Sam and Annemarie visit us (yay!), and all this on top of the normal weekly work that I have to accomplish. So, my brain has been extraordinarily full, and finally this morning there is [almost] nothing left to do but the pile of little and not-so-urgent things that has accumulated. This morning it is empty of concern, and ready to do all those little things. How refreshing!

I still have to teach youth Sunday school and be part of the worship (music) team this Sunday, but that should all be okay.

So, I'm back! I'll find something more blogworthy to post in short order, I'm sure of it!

i need a day off

that is all

today I Made A Difference

Today, I Made A Difference. It was my first day of doing evaluations of my kids at work. By "my kids" I mean the teenagers who work in our after school programs with the little kids. The site directors who actually run the programs wrote the evaluations, and it's my job to meet with the teens to go over them and set new goals for the next months. The evaluations themselves basically consist of three affirmations and two challenges to improve.

When I came to the program to get Angela (I'm not allowed to use her real name), she looked tired or something, like she was upset or having a bad day. We started to go over the evaluation. By the second affirmation, I noticed she had this really weird look on her face.

I asked her, "What's up? Is there anything you'd like to say?"

She said, "No, nothing's wrong...I'm just not used to getting compliments."

By the time we were done, she was wearing a big smile, even after we talked about her challenges. The site director told me later that she was a bit giddy after our meeting.

Angela is one of those girls that has grown up in our after school programs who probably doesn't have the most supportive home life. We make a point to try and keep her involved with our programs, even though she's not much of a natural leader. And today it made a difference.

more snippets of the life of me

This past weekend I went away to Manning Park for a church youth retreat. It was lots of fun, and even though it was a huge disappointment that Aaron couldn't go at the last minute, I'm really glad I went. The youth were very fun to hang out with. I miss them, I don't get to hang out with them too much now that I work full-time. One of the junior divas said I was very pretty, so that felt pretty cool. It did not feel cool when the youth pastor (my brother-in-law) threw an apple and hit me in the head. I still have a bruise, but it was an accident because he thought I was looking. A smaller group of us went for a walk to the river and played with some vividly green slimy stuff, and it was gross and fun. There were pretty leaves, lots of bright yellow ones. But it was sad to see all the dead trees that the pine beetle killed. In some sections of the park, I can confidently say that 90% of the trees were dead. In the areas where there wasn't so much pine, it obviously wasn't as bad as that.

Yesterday I took a walk downtown and I saw a bright plum-purple garden hose at a nursery. I also saw a baby, well, just the leg of a baby that was sticking up and out of its stroller. It was wearing white pyjama-type things with feet, and the foot part of the PJ's was pulled a fair ways off the end of the baby's foot, and it looked like a little truce flag sticking out of the stroller.

You may remember me mentioning that I only have two recurring themes in my dreams. One is that of being late, and the other is that of losing my teeth. Well, last night my tooth dream was taken to another level. Not only did I have that incredibly tangible sensation of my teeth getting wiggly and having the roots poke into my gums and the squishy place that is left once they've fallen out...no, in this dream I actually went to the dentist and said, "I keep having these recurring dreams about my teeth falling out, and now it's become real! What do I do? Can you put my teeth back in?" In the words of Strongbad, WEIRDED OUT!!!

ugly websites

For work, I'm going to take some of the grade 11's and 12's to the Vancouver Education and Career Fair. Check out the ugly header and logo on their website. They sent me a poster that's even uglier, because in addition to the ugly header, it has lots of black text with hazy pastel pink shadows that looked like grandma spilled her makeup. And the logo...! Words fail me.

Also, I used to work for BC Rehab, which is an absolutely fantastic organization, but their website also suffers from a sorry colour scheme. When I worked for them 2 or 3 years ago we already thought the website needed help, and I just checked back today for the first time since, and nobody's even touched the website design.

academia land

Yesterday I went to a lecture at Regent College by Miroslav Volf on "Faith that Makes a Difference." He seemed like he had his head on straight. It actually sounded pretty common-sense to me, but I got the sense that this fit the structure of the three-lecture series quite well. The first lecture had been a bit of a "shocking diagnosis", the second (the one I attended) was a "return to the foundations" message, which is why it was filled with good-sense-making theology, and I think the third was going to be more of a "radical outcomes" kind of lecture.

Anyway, it was interesting to be back in the academic theology sphere. On the one hand, I felt how easy it would be so slide right back into that comfy niche and to be all brainy and buddy-buddy with the student sitting next to me. He had a scruffy half-beard, was wearing jeans and a t-shirt with an open plaid shirt over top, and laughed loudly and genuinely at all the theological insider's jokes. The notes that I read over his shoulder were things like "blessing---relevance to Didache?" and "sex and St. Augustine---in conflict with Volf's deliverance theme?" These notes made my brain hurt, because I knew that I should probably be able to understand exactly what he was thinking, but at the same time, I didn't give a rat's ass about Augustine or about making witty references to Volf's ecclesiological clashes with Ratsinger.

Basically, it all boils down to this: I'm doing good and important work these days, and theological-academia-land is not the place for me right now. I don't really miss being in school. Maybe one day I'll want to bring all my work experience to seminary with me to get an M.Div. and then get better at doing ministry work again, but until I start running low on fuel or inspiration or something, I'm staying out of university.

guest post by my mom

My mom likes reading my blog, particularly my people-watching posts, and so she has written a guest post for me on some people people-watching she did on the Toronto subway. Without further ado, here's my mom (her name is Laverna):

I'm on the subway to work, on a week day, my 10th day of work non-stop and counting (bleuwch!)...at Yonge & Bloor i spot a fishing pole in the periphery of my vision... a person has just gotten on to the subway, its 8:30 a.m. and the person (could be a man, woman or child - I never got to see the face of this person, but he/she had very small petite hands...) was clearly set for a day of fishing - he/she rummaged around in his/her various bags and I saw that this person was prepared for a picnic and cold weather - thermos, sushi, quilted vest were all re-stashed and re-organized. I oriented myself to a world of "other" - other than subway, metropolitan work-a-day mode and started to imagine..... imagine what kind of a day this person might be anticipating; sunny & cold, going to Humber River perhaps?.... anyway, I got off at St George station (having only shared a brief ride - 2 stops) with this "other world" person.... and felt happier as a result....

excitement, family, and marvellous nerdiness

First up, hear my happy news: I'm going to be a bridesmaid! For my brand-new-(almost)-sister-in-law! My brother and his fiancee are having all their siblings in their wedding party. Meghan's other three bridesmaids are her roommates (she just has one brother). Apparently they're going dress shopping soon, and one of the roommates said something about how all of them could certainly find something to agree on, but what about Tobin's sister? Meghan told them not to worry about me, since I am cool. See? We're going to be great sisters. Too bad I live so far away...oh well. I get to wear blue, and I'll probably even get to sew the dress myself. Yahoo!

Today Aaron and I had our first Thanksgiving together, and it was nice. His parents are in Italy at the moment, and his grandparents are about to leave for Austria, so we had Thanksgiving with three friends of ours (2 sisters + 1 boyfriend who is also my coworker). When I got home I called my family, and I talked to all of them, and that is when I got the good news about the bridesmaid thing. I love my family and I miss them all very much.

Yesterday was also fun. Aaron and I went to see a microwave telescope! A friend of mine from Toronto is part of the team of Princeton graduate students who are working on it, and it's being constructed here in Port Coquitlam (a suburb of Vancouver). It was quite nifty. The main mirror surface itself is about 7 metres tall, and I'm estimating that would make the entire telescope structure to be about 15 metres tall. We got to climb up in and around it, but not while it was moving and doing its scanning motions.

One of the special things about this telescope is the reasonably fast rate at which it scans back and forth across one section of the sky. This motion ultimately helps filter out atmospheric interference, and creates a bigger picture to work with. Another nifty thing about the telescope is that the actual recording instruments are kept at a temperature of 0.3 Kelvin. That's right folks, only one third of a degree above absolute zero! This also helps eliminates interference from all those warm atoms jiggling around.

When the telescope is done, they're going to take it apart into 2-4 pieces (it's not quite decided yet), and then they'll drive it down the road on a big truck to the river, where it will be put on a barge, which will go to a major port, and then the telescope will be loaded on a bigger boat and go to Chile. In Chile, it will get loaded back on a truck and be driven up a mountain to a high altitude where there is even less atmospheric interference. Did you know that part of the project's budget is to improve the roads up the mountain in Chile so that the telescope can actually get there?

Now for a vote: which post of geekiness is more fascinating, this one or the one on A440?

all y'all

I've been having fun learning more about the proper uses and pronunciation of "y'all" from my two American colleagues. The American pronouns go like this: I, you, he, she, it, we, y'all, they. For example, when talking with Blair the Texan about my husband and our apartment and such, he said "So, where do y'all live?" It took me awhile to figure out that he meant just two people: Aaron and me. When I was telling Mike from Cali about this, and that I had thought y'all meant a whole bunch of people, he said, "No, that's 'all y'all'!"

So, there is now a further distinction when it comes to the second person plural. "Y'all" refers to a few people, whereas "all y'all" refers to a whole bunch of people.

And by the way, don't pronounce the L's too strongly, it's best if you just leave your mouth somewhat slack and make it more of a "yaw."

windfall

Yesterday I was told that I have 5 vacation days that I'm supposed to use before December 1st. Isn't that sweet? Normally I'm supposed to use my 4 weeks vacation before our new fiscal year (which begins in December), but the week of vacation that I've earned this fall will be hard to spend due to the busy nature of the season, so they may let me bank them for next year. How's that for a story of "news the boss gives you on a Monday morning?"

Also, I may have mentioned my work trip to New Jersey before...but here's the new plan: after our three days in Camden, NJ (Wednesday to Saturday morning), five of us are going to spend the rest of the long weekend in Philadelphia! Since we were flying from there anyway, all we have to spend is food & accomodations for our little vacation. Too bad Aaron can't come.

My job definitely has some perks, even if they're not financial!

trio

Today I saw an unusual group of three people walking down the street together. Two were Hutterite-looking women in dresses and black head coverings, and their companion was a man in a flashy Hawaiian shirt and sunglasses. Go figure.

Engrish

This morning on the bus there was a young Asian woman who was listening to a tape and reading an "English for Everyone" book. I looked over her shoulder to read her book, and saw this sentence: "You're sister is coming to visit." How is anyone supposed to learn proper English if the books are wrong? To add to the irony, the next page was a full lesson on "I am = I'm, you are = you're," etc.

I considered pointing out the mistake to her, but judging by the level of English in her book, it probably would have been a pretty confusing conversation. Besides, who would believe a stranger on the bus when your published textbook says something different?

pipe cleaners

Yesterday I went to work on a Saturday because there was this "visioning day" with the board that I had to attend. It wasn't so bad as far as visioning days go. We got to use lots of post-it-notes of various sizes and many flourescent colours, as well as sharpies.

When I first walked into the room in the morning, I saw that there was a pez dispenser (with candy) on each table, as well as a jar of assorted pipe cleaners. I was curious about what sort of activity we might be doing with them. Half an hour into the sessions, the moderator man interrupted himself to say, "By the way, those pipe cleaners and pez and such are there to be used at your discretion. I find that pipe cleaners help the fidgety and creative among us sit through an entire day of this without getting bored or disinterested."

This, of course, made my day.

I picked a sparkly pink one that reminded me of fireworks, and I put it on my glasses to make them look all glam and cat-eye-style. Then I made a sparkly flower. Then I tried to make a frog, but it looked odd, so I turned the frog into a tumbleweed and all was well.