What happened to that week?!

This is one of those times of year when time seems inadequate for
everything that has to be done. Soon I'll be moving back to the city
where I live when I am at school. Thank goodness this is the final year
of living away from my husband! But in the meantime, there's been soooooo much to do that I've neglected to write here.

Well, I never wrote about our road-trip vacation, and now it has
receded into the middle distance in my mind. It was great, but there
weren't a huge number of photos, so I don't know that I'll document it
here the way that I did our camping trip in July. Not that it wasn't
hugely fun, the road trip; but somehow I didn't feel a need to run
about with my camera the way I did while we were camping.

This week I turn 42 as well. Somehow, your idea of yourself never quite
catches up to your actual age, does it? How many of us middle-aged
types actually forget, at times, how old we are? Have you ever had to
sit and calculate your age based on your birthdate? I have! *laughter*

I will celebrate this birthday with: dinner with friends, a trip to the
Canadian National Exhibition in downtown Toronto, and a party with my
parents and my aunt whose birthday is near mine.

I promise to keep in touch. Have a great day!

We've just pulled into the driveway of our darkened home, brightened
things up considerably, opened all the windows and dragged alllllll our
stuff inside from the truck.

Home from vacation! Too tired to say much just now...

We ranged far and wide, as I outlined just before we left... Dave's
faves included a paddleboat ride right up to the face of the Mazinaw
Rock at Bon Echo, and people-watching at Place Jacques-Cartier in
Montreal on a velvety summer evening. For me, highlights included a fab
harbour view from our hotel room overlooking Kingston Harbour, and a
delicious lamb kebab dinner enjoyed at a Lebanese restaurant in Ottawa.

Low point: I spent an hour technically
in the United States (touring Boldt Castle on one of the Thousand
Islands during a boat tour). To get off the boat, I spent over half an
hour in a customs line-up as all boat passengers were hassled and given
trouble just so we could have the privilege of a short visit to an
isolated island tourist attraction. Let's just say -- never again.

Anyway, more tomorrow! Missed you all! *falls over and starts snoring*

Tomorrow, my husband and I are headed out for a road trip.
We've installed a new stereo in our old truck so that we can play some
of the over eight full days' music residing in our iPod. Waaahoo for the open road!

I know, some of you will be saying: hey, weren't you just on a camping
vacation? Well… yes. But when Dave and I got married, we acknowledged
that we have a different idea of the "ideal vacation." His is
canoe-camping in the back country of Ontario; mine is rather more
urban. So we agreed to try for two weeks each summer: July = camping;
August = non-camping. I really enjoyed the July vacation Dave
organized, and I hope he'll enjoy this one just as much. And there is a
little camping in it, too!

Some of the places we'll be visiting: Bon Echo Provincial Park; Ottawa; Montreal; Kingston. Click on my links to see more about any of these places.

Bon Echo is
cool because you can rent a canoe and head out to view old Indian
pictographs painted on a beautiful sheer cliff wall that rises out of
the water there.

In Ottawa, we'll visit the National Gallery to see an Emily Carr exhibition. I studied her journals in class last year, and I'm interested to see the paintings
that she produced at around the same time, as she visited secluded West
Coast Indian settlements in order to record their totem poles.

In Montreal, Quebec, Dave wants to find a purveyor of the famous
Montreal Bagel, the one that can't be beat, the one beside which all
others pale into doughy insignificance. I also want to visit an
archaeological and historical museum there.

Back in Ontario after that, we'll take a boat tour of Kingston's Thousand Islands, including the famous Boldt Castle.

I hope you enjoy your remaining summertime! I'll catch up with you upon my return. Cheers!

Next summer, I hope to make a driving trip out east to the Canadian
Maritimes, especially Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. I've been to both
places before, but never with my husband. Today, I thought I'd talk
about what, to me, is the main site to visit in Nova Scotia, since I
love history so much: the recreated Fortress Louisbourg.

The province showed amazing foresight when it decided to rebuild this
fortress town from the 18th century. In the early 1960s, there were
many out-of-work coal miners in Nova Scotia. The province was also the
location of a uniquely undisturbed archaeological site, the only such
extensive site in North America that was not subsequently buried
beneath a modern community (the modern town in this case is farther
'round the bay).

Nova Scotia decided to create jobs by retraining its miners in the many
trades - traditional stonemasonry, carpentry, ironworking, and so on -
required to build a modern recreation of this famous French fortress,
originally in operation from 1713 to 1760. All in all, about two-fifths
of the original town and fortifications have been rebuilt, right on the
foundations of the original buildings and walls. Nova Scotia also had
access to detailed plans for the fortress, still on file in France (land of paperwork!),
as well as extensive records of exactly who owned and resided in each
building. Therefore, they were able to recreate the look and ambience
of the 18th century with great accuracy. The level of attention to
detail is amazing.

This
place is now a major tourist attraction, generating plenty of revenue
for the province. People plan to spend an entire day on the site, since
there is so much to see and do. Louisbourg was not only a military
community, but also a fishery and trading centre for the region, and a
town of up to 4,500 people. You can eat at the taverns using dinnerware
and china recreated from patterns found there. (You can buy the china,
too.) Interpreters representing actual individuals who lived in the
various buildings demonstrate what life and work was like at that time.
Certain buildings house museum-quality collections of the millions of
artifacts found on the site so far. Plenty of valuable material remains
underground, work for future archaeologists.

I have my own photos of Louisbourg, but they were taken in the BD era (before digital!),
and my scanner is put away right now.  Therefore I have snatched
some photos (all copyright Parks Canada) to display here. Click on them
to make them bigger. The interior shot shows the chapel, by the way.
There are plenty of other great representative interiors on the site.

The link I gave at the beginning of this entry is
the best starting place for anyone who'd like to explore Louisbourg
online. If you love history, you will have an unforgettable day at
Louisbourg. See if you can go there next summer - we could have a group
lunch!

Today, I thought I'd tell a story that gave me goosebumps when one of my oldest friends, Chris, shared it with me.

I met Chris when we were both very young. Now he lives a thousand miles
away, but for about 20 years we were close and did many things
together, including running a business as partners for over a decade.
He is a great friend – intelligent, thoughtful, warm-hearted and
generous, dry sense of humour, killer smile – unforgettable.

A few years ago, Chris was sharing a rented house with a few friends,
while I lived with my partner of the time a couple of blocks away. His
grandfather, a southern-Ontario teacher, had died, and he received a
box of his old papers. I think he enjoyed going through them and
learning more about this interesting man.

He discovered that his grandfather had hoped to publish some of his
writing, particularly some poetry. After he retired, back in the 1960s,
he had investigated this possibility, but he was unsure how to go about
it. Naively, he responded to a magazine ad from a "literary agent" in
Toronto who, for a price, would seek publication for his clients. Chris
found a bundle of correspondence between his grandfather and this
agent. Despite many letters over a period of years, Chris’s grandfather
was eventually frustrated to realize that the unscrupulous agent was
taking money without providing any useful services. It seems that he
was never able to get his money back, either.

Leafing through these decades-old letters, Chris was naturally angry
about this agent who took advantage of his grandfather's longing to be
a published author. He took a closer look at the man's contact
information, and noticed the address from which the agent did his
business.

At that moment, Chris was sitting in the very house the agent had been writing from, over 30 years before.

Did you shiver? I did, all over again!

Later edit: Some
of you asked about the poetry, whether it could be published now. As I
recall, Chris said that it was very old-fashioned verse, the kind of
thing you might expect to read in a volume from the 50s or 60s entitled
"Boy's Own Annual" or something like that. So it could certainly be
published privately for the family, but there might not be a public
market for it.

Hi all!

I've been a bit scarce lately, so I thought I'd just compose something
quick here and then treat myself to a tour of your pages to see what's
been up with you all lately.

On the left you will see a Hubbard squash growing to tasty maturity in
my mother-in-law's garden. It's about soccer-ball size already, and it
has some friends thereabouts too. I anticipate some fantastic pies this
fall! (Hubbard squash pie is madly better than mere pumpkin pie.)

I'm already busy getting ready for classes in September. I can't
believe how much organizing I have left to do! It seems endless And of
course, it's too hot to do much of anything at the moment. Right now,
for instance, I am hiding out in my relatively cool basement. I'll go
up to enjoy my backyard in about an hour, I figure.

I want to know if anybody has ever had fledgling robins on their property as of August 7.
Yep, you heard right. We have three robins who are about to emerge into
the world of robin adulthood, either later today or tomorrow, we think.
Although I can't be sure it's the same mom and dad robins, we've had
three families raised from the same nest under our eaves this year. I
bet some of you remember I posted a video of the first one in the
spring. Nestlings in August. It's a crazy world!

The
other photo here shows a big shiny-butt bee on a nasturtium blossom in
yesterday's sunlight. Apparently, all parts of the nasturtium are
tasty, so the bee is definitely on the right track here. My husband
eats nasturtium seeds. He says they are like horseradish and will take
your head right off whoosh!

The other reason I am hanging out in my basement is to keep my husband
company while he works on an illustration. He is drawing some kinda
special submarine for an educational textbook. I try to stay present
but out of the way while he works that artistic magic on his massive
Mac over there. I wish I could draw, it's all a big mystery to me!

Anyway, enough of my rambling. Essentially, I'm happy and cheery and
busy, so of course there isn't too much of consequence to say. All is
fundamentally right with the world, and therefore totally boring to
others! *laughter*

Note the working title of my thesis has already changed!

No time for an entry today -- have a good one, and I'll see you all tonight!

Whee!

I visited my prof yesterday morning about the undergrad thesis credit I
want to do. The topic above was proposed, and I have to say that I am
delighted. I realize it may stiffen others with boredom, so if you
notice any muscle cramping, I suggest a few deep-breathing exercises.

Seriously, though, I've been studying in this area on my own, on and
off, for the last couple of decades. As many of you know, this is my
second chance at higher education, not my first. It's hard to be an
independent scholar, kinda lonely at times. At various points in my
adult non-student life, I've managed to pursue my interest (which is
mainly in Norse culture and society during their westward expansion,
from 870-1300) by attending conferences, adding to my library, and even
doing some interesting recreative research. By that last I mean, for
example, sewing clothing that might have been worn in this period. (We
still have a lot to learn about that.) In the process, I've met some
great people who share my fascination with history, such as this talented blacksmith. In 2000, I also visited this UNESCO World Heritage Site in Newfoundland, which was a Norse outpost in North America a thousand years ago.

So this time next year, I will have written anywhere from 10,000-20,000
words on one of my favourite subjects. I'm all psyched up about this
final undergrad year already, especially since I'll be learning Old
Norse at the same time. Now if only I can get my master's-degree
application underway on time!

... somebody give me some interesting ideas about directions in current
Anglo-Saxon scholarship! I gotta figure out something brilliant and
scintillating to propose when I meet my prof about my undergrad thesis
credit on Tuesday morning.

*simmer* *simmer*

And somebody tell these darned cicadas to shut up already!

Later edit: You guys are all really cute!

A picture I forgot to post with yesterday's entry.

Saw the latest Uma Thurman movie last night. I can report that,
although reviews for this movie are generally bad, if you go with a
group of friends and plan to whoop it up a bit (e.g., chants of "Uma! Uma!" would not be out of place), then you will have a great time and laugh your silly head off! She is more gorgeous than ever.