Quads and traintracks gaaah

Kevin picked me up halfway down the traintracks with his quad. And if I have any sense, it will be the last time . . . I think I'd rather walk.

Kev doesn't listen so well . . .I say he should go slower because I am thinking I'm going to fall off and die . . . he's like, naaah, this is fun. Not so much. I think he paid more attention when I quit telling him off and just chomped on his shoulder. . . not that he slowed down very much.

Yeah, I think I will just walk next time. Going around 80 km/hr on the traintracks is only supposed to happen when you are in the freaking train.

Exceeeedingly intelligent, momentarily me

Last night I worked till 10:20 pm. Yeah, you heard it. There was a big meeting in the town near the mill, where they went over the peer reviews from the air hazard study done over the last two years. It was actually really interesting - and if I'm lucky, my question to the experts might get on TV. This is because, unlike everyone else there, I wasn't involved in any pissing contest, didn't have to defend my science or my morals or my previous actions, and wondered why noone had asked where the experts would recommend the mill actually put their money in the FUTURE if they want to protect the health of the locals. Everyone else was bitching or defending what had already been done, it seems. I also asked what the locals could do to assist in appropriate testing. Of course, the experts were cut off before they had entirely finished addressing the question. Figures, eh? But the mill manager, one of the experts, and the environmental manager for the mill said I had the best question. Did I mention that I am exceedingly intelligent? Well, I temporarily was. The journalist who jotted my name down was not so smart - he assumed I was from that town. I corrected him, and waited for the obvious response "Oh, are you a mill employee?". Nope, he didn't even ask. I might be touted as a concerned citizen, who knows. Probably my soundbite will show at two in the morning, and everybody else will show the guy who was almost frothing at the mouth.

I expect some pissing contests and attacks will be on the news for wicked soundbites. Apparenly the previous meetings had more in common with Jerry Springer than organized forums with a chairman and motions and so on. The poor chair of the forum had to get savvy at chairing and fast.

Anyways, after that I just went home, told my dad what went on, and slept. Today I got the afternoon off, and used it to do a bit more work for the mill (Yeah, I might be a bit of a keener, but I kinda like my job) and went shopping in a nearb tourist trap town. I bought a bunch of my favourite cups and saucers (Royal Albert kicks ass), all used so they averaged like 12 bucks, in good condition. Some of them are maybe 90 years old. None of the ones I bought for me match, though they all pretty much go together. I bought a plate and a sugar bowl that will go with some plates my mom has - the closest thing we have to family heirlooms. Yeah, none of my family lines ever had any money for really fancy shit until after the depression, so no oak furniture for me. That's probably why I love antiques so much. Antique books, furniture, clothing, ancient houses, the whole thing - I'm fascinated.

My friend got into med school! Hot guys and my rampant imagination . . .

Apart from this giving me mini conniption fits like *what am I doing with my life, I have no direction, my future is a black hole!* and *OMG was I supposed to start growing up now I am heading towards my MIDDLE TWENTIES?* I think this is just great. Good going Keltie!!! Not that I am surprised, mind. Also, she got into the med school of her choice . . . and will end up living near me again for a year and a half at least! !Aha, and even if we don't end up roommates again and just live withing visiting distance, I am hoping that she can introduce me to supposedly smart (or at least driven) guys. That would be a nice change . . . maybe some of them could even be interesting hot guys . . . Hah, my imagination churns faster and faster . . .

There is this guy at the mill, this engineer that I met two summers back . . . I used to have the hardest time not watching his cute butt if he walked down the hallway ahead of me. I got to go see him today, to collect some information for the tour script I am rewriting. He is not as hot as I thought he was when I was mid-crush. But he still makes me act like a bit more of an idiot than I actually am, just by looking at me and acting entirely normal. Gotta love that part. He offered to help me out with calc in the summer when I first met him, and I thought GOD NO, he will find out how dumb I am, calc-wise. Later on I learned that he was dating a social science major, only a year ahead of me at the uni . . . and I was like hell, she probably can't do calc either. Why do I make these assumptions that someone is above my *dating level* or whatever the hell I assume? I mean, he probably is bright, being an engineer who fast tracked it a bit . . . but still, I didn't even make the attempt. I probably wouldn't have gotten anywhere, but I didn't even try to find out. Laaaame

Also, my dad is assisting this german guy I know, a couple years older than me, who wants to get back into Canada to work. He has an assured job if he can get back here, though his student job placement has expired. I asked my dad why else he was coming back here immediately (work permits take freaking aaaages to go through the system - Canada is really not all that immigration friendly as most people think). Dad says it is to visit his girlfried. I go, what girlfriend? He says me. Hah, apparently his big brain is cooking up multiple cover stories already. I would say he has watched the movie "Green Card" once too often, but knowing him, a story he spins will sound like it is true by the time he has it propperly groomed. Or maybe it was just me that saw the movie once too often, the guy was kinda cute, and accents are always a plus . . .

Maybe I just need to get myself back on the dating scene again . . . Is there a dating scene in my hometown? I have heard unappetizing things about it. Heh, I could always hitch a ride with Kevin to the 'Lixy. I hear they have mother-daughter date tag teams. That was all I needed to hear, never been there.

Working for a living

'Hey, it finally happened . . . I'm slightly mad!' (Queen)

Well, actually, what finally happened is that I found a job (even if only a two-summer student job) that I actually like enough that I will spend extra UNPAID time at it, just because I am interested in what I am doing and want to do it well. Not that I couldn't do it well in the time I am paid for, and my boss certainly doesn't expect me to stay late . . . but I like finishing up certain things just because I like it. Hah, and here I thought I would always be a clock-watcher. Well, well, there is hope for me yet.

The job, if I haven't already bragged, is as a tour guide at a nearby mill. I am not union - as I was last summer; which netted me three times the minimum wage an hour, lots of grunge work that was usually boring, more days off, fewer hours, and a few thousand dollars more in the end. I had a choice, too - I could have gone back to that job, but decided I wanted a challenge, even if it meant less cash. Even at less cash I am still making twice as much as your average full time student though. I am a lucky, lucky widget . . . most people get into the mill by nepotism. ME getting into the mill is actually my escape from nepotism . . . no longer will I have to get construction jobs (more money and less being nice than retail) and wonder if the people hired me because they know my dad! And me not feeling sure of getting my job back at the mill means that, unlike some students I have met there, I actually work hard. Some of them act like maybe their union parents do - hey, who here gets fired? Not the union guys! I don't think they even managed to fire any of the guys that like to go hide somewher in the mill and sleep (even though that is hugely unsafe and of course not exactly producing any work).

Anyways, I'll come back and edit this later. Somehow I didn't have anything to post for a while, then boom, ten ideas at once, five of them probably not worth sharing. Lalalala, in a good mood . . . bye!

On Birthdays

(Another marathon comment first made on Dru's page)

Hey, my birthday is on the most major family holiday my family celebrates. No points for the correct answer of Christmas. We are not religious, so we sort of move the holiday around to accomodate my mom's work schedule. Because I am so used to the family celebrations taking over my birthday, I now insist that my birthday is celebrated the same day as Christmas dinner anyways. The family part of it never bothered me - I've never had a bithday on any other day, so I never missed being the star of the show for the day. Helping entertain and make Christmas dinner is feels like the important part of getting credit for surviving another 365 days as a Hill family member.

The only downside is that none of my friends are ever free on my birthday, and not enough of them are free to have a party within two weeks before or afterwards, so my party gets put off till late January or never happens. Few people remember to bring presents, and when they do, I feel like a fraud.

I suspect that my parents try to make up for it by buying me particularly nice presents at that time, so I'm not jipped by design . . . but if I want something I can't or won't buy for myself, and develop this want in January, it's a bitch. So is stuff that has renewal dates on your birthday, like licenses. And people who go "you're a Christmas baby? Really?" and make me want to point out that probably one in 365 people are. But birthdays are all what you make of them.

In Bavaria, people celebrated their name days (the anniversary of theri first communion) more than their birthdays. My ex's Chinese parents would do a Chinese celebration on their birthday as listed by the Chinese calendar, and a westernized birthday on the birthdate on their Canadian citizenship and licenses. The Chinese have a month for each moon exactly, yet they name only 12 months. If there are thirteen moons in a year, they just repeat a month (if you ever wondered why Chinese New Year moves around). My ex's dad would sometimes rack in 3 birthdays in one year.

One of my most interesting birthdays (17th or so) involved me taking my grandma to the ER because she broke her finger. We waited for hours (low staffing on Christmas), and she fell asleep. Her snores were not loud enough to block out the interview going on in the room behind me . . . The cops had brought in some unwashed hairy looking dude, in handcuffs, and left him to be interviewed by the doctor. I assume they were also understaffed? Anyways, the doctor was clearly not willing to be in a closed room with him, and I could overhear the doctor carefully asking him the questions that were no doubt a prerequisite to admittance to the fourth floor(psychiatric unit). Aaand the guy was a DEFINITE candidate. When he was asked why he was brought here by the cops, he said it was a mix up. He had tried to explain to them that he had killed the cat, with a brick, because it had been stalking him, and plotting his demise. He detailed its repeated attempts to assasinate him, despite his precautions such as boarding up his windows etc. The interview continued in this fashion. My little ears remained cocked. It was all very informative, and the time passed very quickly.

That's Gratitude!!

Well, on my way home from visiting my grandpa, I decided to stop in at the mechanics and get an estimate. I was hoping that my redneck buddy's guestimate of "hmm, new bumper, remove panel to repair repaint - $700 bucks, Hill, good job . . ." was going to be a bit inflated (yes, he calls me Hill, and he calls my brother Little Hill). Sadly, the estimate was $808. Aargh. My dad can probably get a better deal somewhere . . . or hopefully he will at least not mind the shallow dents above the bumper, which would halve the price . . . I can't have it repaired this week anyways, because I need the car for work and have no other vehicle.

Anyways, I give my brother the estimate to look at too, and he is similarly horrified. But he is immediately cheered when I tell him that he doesn't have to pay for it, because it was (unfortunately) my idea, and it was an honest mistake of his. I tell him that he will have some sucking up to do . . . he has to be nice, maybe do his homework for once without me having to campaign and threaten and cajole. He immediately goes into whine mode about how his miniscule attention span for boring crap makes it so hard for him . . . a few minutes later I go "Hey, how about you take me out for ice cream, seeing as I'm going to take the fall for this?" He replies "well, I can show you where the fudgesicles are . . . " Cheapskate! What gratitude!

Of course, as soon as I swing into cheapskate ingrate recriminations, and threaten to write him up in my blog, he swears it was a joke. Uh huh. He is also peeved that he doesn't have the blog address. I'm not sure if he wants to defend himself, or gather info to own my soul if he tells Dad on me if my life ever gets interesting. Anything interesting is suspect for Dad. What do you say, should he get a chance to defend himself? For a 14 year old dude he is surprisingly literate.

As it is, and while my brother is unlikely to get a swelled head, I figure I'm going to make him drive more. Hell, if he picks up any more dents, I can say it all happened at the same time. The back bumper needs to be entirely replaced anyways, so backing into things just got a lot less expensive . . .

Coverup needed! Tips required!

I'm not talking about makeup either . . . ah, if only it were a pimple the size of Mt Baker (like my roommate always wails about). Nooo, me and my brother have finally hit the stage where we have fucked something up that will undoubtedly require some real ingenuity and a shared story to keep the parents off our backs. Ah, finally the kid is old enough that we have graduated to being partners in crime instead of snitching on eachother.

Whenever I am around and I remember, I try to get my brother to drive around empty parking lots and so on (which has only ammounted to like ten times in the past two years). Sure, he's got a year and a half before he can legally get a learner's licence, but I remember trying to learn to drive with my dad at 16 and it was HELL. He is NOT a low stress person to learn from, regardless of the fact that he is a good driver. Dad makes a lousy passenger for ANYONE, let alone a newbie driver. So I figured that I would jump start my brother on the whole driving thing. Besides, bunny hopping is really amusing if it isn't me doing the lousy driving. Well, this has all gone relatively well, and this week the parents are away, and I am in charge. I got my brother to drive on the road just near our house in the automatic, and decided that he did alright, so I figured I would have him drive away from the house this morning. So, we decide exactly which way we are going, and where we will switch over. He pulls backwards out of the drive just fine, then fiddles with the gear change stick thingie (what is it in an automatic anyways?). I figured he had put it into drive. Sadly no . . . so when he gives her a little to much gas, we back into a tree with a nice thunk.

Ah well. I was like, hmm, how about we go back into the driveway then, shall we? I was actually pretty matter of fact, and not pissy or accusative at all, but my brother was already telling me that we were dead, and it was mostly my fault. We get out of the van and take a look at it . . . sure enough, the plastic whatever bumper is totally pushed in at the one corner, and there is a small dent on the metal an inch away from the back door. My brother didn't freak out, but he is clearly apprehensive.

I still find the situation overly amusing, considering the expected parental reaction. The only time I ever hit anything was in parking lots, and the scratch I put on a vehicle was when someone else backed out into me, and my dad was in the passenger seat. I guess I figure that if I have to say it was me, after six years of pretty blameless driving, my dad won't totally wring my neck. I'm sure he'll spaz a bit, and since obviously I have no phone number from someone else, I'm going to get the razz for backing into something that doesn't move. Well, alternately I could swear someone backed into me in the parking lot and didn't leave their number . . . or I could say that I was going to let the brother drive to the mailbox . . . but ratting out on my brother will do bad things to his poor fragile driving confidence, which is what I was trying to promote in the first place. And I will be in shit anyways for letting the little twit drive. The hit-and-run thing has some promise though . . . So, people, give me advice! What should I do?

The one thing that I am sure to try is to ask a mechanic friend what I can be done. If he says he knows how to fix it, I'm gonna try to bribe him with food or beer or something. If that fails, I will have to pay him, or ask him to recommed someone (seeing as I don't think I want to go to my dad's mechanics unless I have decided that a partial coverup won't work). I know that even the small dent in the metal will eventually be noticed, and the bend mark in the plastic will be aparent even if it does go back to its usual shape. My brother is already giving me the lecture on how with dad, it is best to own up early. I am thinking he wants ME to own up to it though. Well, it was my idea . . . So, what do you think is my best bet?

P.S. My lying skills are not stellar but they are workable . . . I know I will look embarassed when I bring it up, but I will just have to admit to something. If I say it was hit and run, I can sorta admit to a bad parking job, if pressed.

Fast funny reads, and a new author to hunt.

Well, I have definitely read a bunch of fluff lately. Some of it had some redeeming qualities though . . .

Meggin Cabot: She Went All the Way and Boy Meets Girl
Jennifer Crusie: Bet Me
Sarah O'Brien: Hot Property

All of this stuff was mystery-flavoured romantic comedy. The Cabot and the Crusie were light and well written, as per usual, and the O'Brien was inoffensive and interesting mainly in that it was set in Ireland. Oh, and none of it had overtly strict gender roles, which sadly abound in romance books. Boy Meets Girlwasn't quite as good as the other stuff I have read by that author (who also writes as Patricia Cabot, Meg Cabot, and Jenny Carroll). This is partly due to the format - everything is in the form of emails between friends, enemies, love prospects, and coworkers.


I read a YA novel by Cameron Dokey, How Not to Spend Your Senior Year, and was really impressed. I thought it was going to be a really light read, but it was actually more than entertainment. I keep thinking about the situation the characters were in, and how the author managed to red herring me so well. A few deft touches really turned the characters from stock comedy/adventure plug-ins into people I really empathized with. I read so many books that I am so happy when I find a decent plot twist that I can't predict, but doesn't come off as forced or exceedingly unlikely. I have just found out that she has like 20 more books around, and now must hunt them down . . .


Another book which was much more realistic than expected (and HELLA more realistic than the movie) was Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen. The movie format didn't do justice to the book at all, because though some short sections were almost verbatim, somehow most of the depth was lost. All the characters got more stereotyped (and irritating, in my opinion) in the movie. The book was toned more like the movie Mean Girls, which actually had some morals hidden in it, while still being relatively realistic and watchable.

P.S. I have a guy friend who said that he quite enjoyed the CoaTDQ movie. I now attribute that mostly to a schoolboy crush of surprising proportions on Lindsay Lohan. And here I thought he was a relatively mature, sensible guy. I assume he missed large sections of the overdone dialogue while examining LL's person in her varied and usually form fitting costumes.


I read Requiem, the third book in the Mediator series by Meg Cabot, and found it was entertaining, exciting, and relatively unpredictable, and the teenage characters had the general insights (and characteristic lack of insight) of real teenagers. The Meg Cabot / Jenny Carroll series are remarkably reliable - I haven't been disappointed yet.