Boys.

So, I have a gentleman friend who I've been spending an increasing amount of time with. This is a v. clear indication that men and women can't be friends. We are now friends. Apparently I decided that being friends is boring, so I developed what can only be called a whopping crush on him.
I don't like it.
At all.

I don't like relationships and I don't like crushes.
I have emotional/commitment/fear issues.
It sucks.

I really think that in anticipation of this sucking a lot (either me being rejected, me being a wuss, or me eventually breaking up with this particular person) someone should make me a really great "boys suck" mix CD or similar.
Thank you for you help in this endeavor.

Canada, Part Toi

According to the internet, it is -9° in Kingston today. Fahrenheit. And there is snow and ice everywhere. I went to breakfast (which is unusual, but I did it anyway) wearing thick stockings, jeans, Ugg snow boots (NOT the ugly poser-boots, actual snow boots, which are great because of their snow-boot capacity, their warmth AND their incredible traction), three layers of shirts, sweatshirt, ski jacket, heavy gloves, a scarf and two hats.

I was still cold.

The concern here is about quite how screwed I am for when it gets to be actually cold in January.

Ouch.

I wiped out while ice skating yesterday. Other than that it was quite a good time, being outside under the snow, etc. But then I wiped out and injured myself. By injured I mean bruised. It's v. painful (and I am v. mature, so really...) and its on my right thigh, which is fine, except I sleep on that side, so I couldn't sleep last night. Thrilling.

R wiped out and crashed onto her knees, one of which has a bruise the shape of a Star of David now.
PS, R is Catholic.

Man-Repellant

It's like bug-spray.
Astonishing how well and with how much talent a not-bad-looking person such as myself is able to quite thoroughly repel men. So C and her sister (who goes to RMC and who, therefore, should know) has given me the following advice (which I have always used in every other arena of my life, I don't know how it didn't manage to extend to this one): It is better to ask forgiveness than to ask permission.
So that's my new philosophy.
Get ready, men.
(prob not.)

Now I really hope nobody reads my blog.
(I swear, I'm sober while writing this.)

C

C has returned, do not panic.

Missing Courtesy

So, all other complaints about my housemates (and there are many, many of them) aside, I have this to say: C is missing.

She has been having a bit of a difficult term, and as such doesn't have any exams this week but has been bumming around anyway. She went away for Thanksgiving last weekend and told us she'd be back on Monday. Fine. I got back Tuesday night and saw, upon my return, that her car is not where it usually is in our driveway. Apparently, nobody has heard from her. I'm glad I wasn't here on Monday or I would have been worrying about her that much longer.
I know she's okay (or at least, she was) because she was on facebook last night, she wrote on someone's wall. Not anyone living in our house, but someone, anyway, so I know she's alive (or at least, was last night.) But I've called her, texted her, written on her and her sister's facebooks, and she hasn't responded. Another one of my housemates, R, has also done these things. C and R aren't best friends, but R gets worried like any normal person.

Now, worried as I am, I'm a little pissed at C. She has methods of communication. She has my and R's facebooks, e-mail addresses, cellphone numbers, etc. She even has my American cell number, she could have called me within the States this weekend to let me know what her plans were. There are also things that still need to be done around the house. I need to pay January rent--C needs to give me a cheque. We also need to return our housekeys in exchange for new ones. C lost hers, so she'll need to pay for it, and clean up loose ends. The people in this house would have been happy to help, but we aren't psychics, you know? I'd think it was just common courtesy to let us know what was going on.

I understand we're nobody's mommies (thank God.) but we do worry. Something could have happened, you know?

Which brings up the question: what caused people to worry before this age of constant communication? (Everything, probably.)

Obama Maina

With the election of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the Untied States, I have been trying to sort out my feelings for my former senator. He was, as I have mentioned many times previously, a terrible senator. He did a bad job representing my state, rarely voting, and introdicing hardly any new pro-Illinois legislation during his term. Almost as soon as he was elected to the Senate (in what I remember as a terribly exciting and uphill battle in Illinois) it was clear that he had wanted to be a senator only in order to have a platform from which to run for president. This upset me because I don't think that a job in Congress should be treated as anything other than that. He didn't do his job in representing my state, and I felt, to be honest, jipped.

So my thoughts on Senator Obama are pretty clear. Presidnet-Elect Obama, though, I have no opinion about. One would think that someone as attuned to American politics as I am would have strong thoughts about such a divicive (though he claims to be otherwise) candidate. I'm pretty liberal, too, so really it shouldn't have been a problem.

Obama himself, however, has been so thouroughly eclipsed by the Obama Cult throughout his campaign, that however I might have felt about him were I to know him or his politics at all is washed out by my loathing of his supporters.
There seems to be a large group of Americans (and a surprising number of Canadians) out there who are having a difficult time distinguishing between Barack Obama and God. Frankly, this scares the shit out of me.

Don't get me wrong. I think it's wonderful that President-Elect Obama was able to get people excited about his campaign. It's been a long time since so many people have been excited about American politics, and the ability of his campaign to get "unlikely" voters, and especially young people to go to the polls yesterday is incredible.

The problem is the attitude with which they went to them. "Change" is a fine attitude. It doesn't mean anything, so I don't really have any problem with it as a voting criteria. I don't really like it as a platform, but whatever. The people I have issue with are the ones who, once Obama was declared the winner last night, said things like "I can be proud of my country again." or "I'm glad to be an American again."
Would these people not have been proud of their country if Senator McCain had been elected president? I still would have. Have they not been greatful to be Americans during President Bush's time in the White House? Would they rather have been citizens of some other country? I've been living outside the U.S. for over a year now, and to be perfectly honest, I'm thrilled to be an American. I wouldn't give it up for anything.

I'm proud of America because we had an election yesterday. No matter the outcome, the fact that our country has free elections and that in January, President Bush will willingly surrender his power to a member of the opposing party, just because the People have said he should is incredible. That's why I'm proud of America. And the resons I'm glad to be an American extend way beyond the executive branch of our government. They have to do with the ease and relative safety with which I can travel because of my American passport, and my representatives in Congress, Mark Kirk and Senator Dick Durbin, both of whom spend their time in Congress fighting for the rights and benefit of citizens of Illinois. I'm glad to be an American because I got to vote in the election yesterday (though I had to vote absentee, because of America's inability to provide affordable post-secondary education). I'm proud to be an American because all my life, I've thought that Americans are reach for higher standards, and that this was a good thing.
Barack Obama's election as president does not make me more proud to be an American than I was a week or a year or five years ago. Perhaps once he takes office, I will be able to say that I am more proud of my government than I have been. Perhaps I'll be able to say that I'm glad that my country is able to present a face to the world that doesn't make people in streets in Paris and Rome and South Africa and Iraq to look at it's citizens with disgust and hatred. But none of this has to do with my country. It has to do with my government.
I have always been proud to be an American.

People keep asking me if I'm happy about the results of the election last night.
I suppose I am. Or, rather, I suppose I will be, if President Obama is a better public servant than Senator Obama was, and if he makes good on any few of the hundreds of promises he made during his campagn. But for now, I don't know how to respond when someone asks, because truth be told, the Obama Cult has overshadowed the man, and I, an American Semi-ExPat living ten minutes from the Canadian/American border, don't know President-Elect Obama from Chicago, my hometown, at all.