Monday
June 12, 2000

Preparations

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Here are a few of my favorite online haunts:

REALTOR.ca
[This is the site I visit to fantasize about living in Toronto again, which is almost every single day during the winter]

Jonathan Cainer's Zodiac Forecasts
[This is where I visit in the morning, when I need a positive spin on things past, present and future.]

Living Local
[This is where I go to see what Canadians are up to, sometimes I even buy things from the businesses listed there.]

Environment Canada Weather
[This is the site I visit every morning, and before every road trip during the winter]

The computers were shut down all day yesterday, for the first time in months. The thunderstorms began before dawn and continued until well after dark. The skies opened and poured rain on the parched gardens and fields. Our sump pump worked continuously throughout the day to remove the runoff from around the foundations of our house. The heat was heavy and humid and finally broke late in the afternoon.

Today has been cool, with some showers. The birch trees in the front yard seem to have grown inches since yesterday. Last week I attended to them daily to remove the "worms" that seemed determined to strip the leaves of their flesh. There were even the beginnings of tent caterpillar nests on some of the lower branches, which I removed from the trees and destroyed.

Attila's mother and stepfather will be arriving this weekend to join us in celebrating his birthday and Father's Day. We are looking forward to their arrival. The pressure is on however, to spruce the place up and have it looking its best. The gardens and decks have received a lot of our attention in that direction and are looking lush and beautiful. Indoors there is still much to do.

My office has been in need of attention for quite some time now. Last fall I happened upon a computer department that was discarding a great number of books. Yes, they were dated but not obsolete. There were reference books for older versions of UNIX, DOS, SPSS, and Maple. I can seldom resist reference books and these were no exception. Home they all came in laundry hampers. The laundry hampers have waited patiently on the floor, in front of the already full bookcases in my office, since that time. Most of the books have just been collecting dust. However, I have used the DOS and UNIX reference books and they have earned their keep.

We finally found a home for the books yesterday, in some unused closet space. Now it is time to spiff up the rest of my office. I have been sorting and filing all day. Sitting all over the floors and flat spaces are piles, of magazines, notes written to myself, flyers for software I will not be purchasing, bills, work logs for projects that are not yet finished etc. I have also brought in the "little computer", the SE/30, which was happily housed in the middle room. All my computers are now in one room; there is no more room at the inn.

The middle room must be cleared of its contents to make room for the bed that we will setup for Attila's mother and stepfather. We will install a new blind on the window and lamp on the table. It will be quite cozy when it is all done. We are working towards a deadline, as they will arrive on Friday.

I have been thinking all day, trying to discover the perfect gift for Attila's birthday. He is a very difficult person to "buy for". If he needs anything, he usually just obtains it without comment. If he wants something, well... that is the problem, he seldom wants anything. Attila spends little time wanting things. Each year, when his birthday rolls around, I try to think of something special for him. All I can think of though are things like, more time off work or more time to sleep. I cannot obtain these things for Attila; they would make a perfect gift if I could.

I still have a few more days to come up with an idea for Attila's gift. I drew a blank today, perhaps tomorrow it will come to me.



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Dogwood by Maggie Turner

 

Page by Page: A Woman's Journal
Photography
Poetry
by Maggie Turner

Canadian Maggie Turner writes and publishes poetry, photography, and a personal journal online. Her work reflects the current way of life in Canada, embracing Canada's past, present, and future in a unique portrayal of everyday life. Maggie's voice is one of the many that actively depict the rich diversity of Canadian culture.

Photography: "a term which comes from the Greek words photos (light) and graphos (drawing). A photograph is made with a camera by exposing film to light in order to create a negative. The negative is then used in the darkroom to print a photograph (positive) onto light-sensitive paper.
Source: University of Arizona Glossary

Poetry: "a form of speech or writing that harmonizes the music of its language with its subject. To read a great poem is to bring out the perfect marriage of its sound and thought in a silent or voiced performance. At least from the time of Aristotle's Poetics, drama was conceived of as a species of poetry."
Source: Creative Studios

Journal: " "Though a journal may be many things - a treasury, a storehouse, a jewelry box, a laboratory, a drafting board, a collector's cabinet, a snapshot album, a history, a travelogue..., a letter to oneself - it has some definable characteristics. It is a record, an entry-book, kept regularly, though not necessarily daily.... Some (entries) will be nearly illegible, written in the dark in the middle of the night.... Not only is it a record for oneself, but of oneself. Every memorable journal, any successful journal, is honest. Nothing sham, phony, false...." (Dorothy Lambert from Ken Macrorie's book, Writing to be Read )
A journal is a way to keep track of your thoughts about what you read... as well as what you did on any given day."
Source: Journal Writing

A Blog is an online journal created by server side software, often hosted by a commercial interest.

"The term "weblog" was coined by Jorn Barger[4] on 17 December 1997. The short form, "blog," was coined by Peter Merholz, who jokingly broke the word weblog into the phrase we blog in the sidebar of his blog Peterme.com in April or May 1999.[5][6][7] Shortly thereafter, Evan Williams at Pyra Labs used "blog" as both a noun and verb ("to blog," meaning "to edit one's weblog or to post to one's weblog") and devised the term "blogger" in connection with Pyra Labs' Blogger product, leading to the popularization of the terms."
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_blogging


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