Gallery

Journal

Photography

Note me

“Somethings so sick about this,
My misery is so addictive
I'm halfway there with your Northshore from the floor singing to you over my shoulder”

The voice inside of my head was dying to tell you the unfortunate tale of my past week but I decided that just was not quite me.

As a brief overview, the end of last week was filled with disappointment and angst. During one of my favourite classes – Habitat Classification – I realized that my tree identification skills had slipped a little from last semester. I incorrectly called a mature common buckthorn (Rhamnus cathartica) a black ash (Fraxinus nigra). For your sake, just know that those two trees look nothing alike. I was so embarrassed.

Later that day, I was informed that the next Friday (November 20th) would be the lab midterm in Vertebrate Biology. It is worth 25% of my mark. I felt even worse that I had not known that was coming up. I kind of freaked out a little in my head. However, I got to play with some rock doves (Columba livia) which was pretty cool. Yes – they were alive. No – we didn’t kill them.

At least we did not yet. That will be this week.

I went home that weekend figuring that my days would with nothing back homework. I was half correct. If I was not doing the actual work, I was fretting about it. It is a sad part of my personality, but I am hyperaware of what is going on in my school schedule (for the most part; Still don’t know how the VertBio midterm alluded me). To point in laymen’s term, I am obsessed.

Monday proved to make things a little more complicated. In retrospect, it was not that bad and I am unsure why I got so upset. In Introduction to Fisheries Management, I received an assignment which I got an extremely dissatisfactory mark on: 50/100. To a keener like me, this was like a small death.

What was the cure? Well, why not two solid days of nothing but schoolwork and self-destructive internal conversation of course!

I am rather brutal on myself when I think I have ‘failed’ something. I had some thoughts about quitting school and starting a career in windshield washing. Luckily, I was able to snap out of it at 9:00pm last night (November 17th). All it took was hearing my father’s voice telling me that he understood. No lecture about how it was unfair that I was punishing myself. No far-fetch tale about how he had a similar situation back in ’83. It was just solid empathy and I adored it. I love that man.

Today proved to me that everything will be quite all right. I finished my Geomatics in Surveying assignment, I took the Wildlife Technology test (83%! !) and got back my Limnology midterm (86%! !) had a good chat with Sarah and Laura.

I know. The ladies love me

Probably the best part of my day was in Geomatics in Surveying while I was dinking around in AutoCAD. To Sarah’s amusment, I was dictating each and every action I made. I also added a good measure of comments like, “Oooo. What are you doing here? Silly parcel boundary, you are not supposed to be over top on my point elevation. I kill you. I kill you now!” and so on.

As it is, I am still under some stress but I think it will work out. Today I had an epiphany that this is just school work. If I get a poor mark on something, I am not going to die. It is highly unlikely I will fail the course either. Life will go on. The world will continue to rotate. Puppies and kittens will still be adorable.

NaNoWriMo Word Count: 38,000+

Little known fact: Jeffrey writes every day in either his journal or some poem on his computer. I feel it is good for my soul (sorry for slipping out of third person so quickly).

I didn’t write anything on Monday. That is how crazy I was.

Question of the Journal: What do you think about this Swine Flu/H1N1 outbreak?

I have my bias. Let me hear what you have to say.

One last thing – Tegan and Sara and their CD Sainthood = Amazing. They helped me dance last night. That was much appreciated.


- Jeffrey
Take Me To Your Enclave

P.S. There is no PS this week. Just letting you guys know.