it's a random sort of day

it's a slow week for me here, with all the big shots off at some conference for a few days. lots of time to kill, and no alternative in sight. i'll be done the day's work by 10am, and that includes the time i'm wasting writing this. i left at noon yesterday, leaving early tomorrow for (another) doctor's appointment.(yay pokey needles)

there are Xmas CDs out on display on the floor, and the back room smells (nicely) of cinnamon. it's not even Halloween yet, but the inexorable creep of Xmas cannot be stopped. and while i love the Xmas season, i could do without the stress (note to self: find more cookbooks!). the sheer amount of restraint i have to exert makes me tired - i like shopping at Xmas, like buying things for people, love wrapping endless presents until there's a huge pile under the tree. going the cheap (though i hesitate to say easy) route again this year though - food for everyone. meh.

the man on the poster in the staff room looks disturbingly like André. =/

seems like everyone's sick these days, with everything from minor ailments to major diseases. i've been under the weather myself for the past week or two. i'm not liking where this trend is heading though. there's a sense of foreboding buried deep in my (upset) stomach, and it refuses to go away. i hate this feeling. it makes me crazy, and irritable, and stressed.

must be all this (interminable) rain. this weather sucks.

facts (wikipedia is my friend)

the town of Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan is where i grew up. it's where i get most of my memories of Western Canada from.

when i say i'm from the frozen wastes, i really mean it.

population: 6000 (to give you an idea, that's half the size of Candiac)

location: about 5 hours NORTH of Saskatoon. what's higher, you ask? just about nothing. according to the map, long stretches of lonely (and likely frozen) highways with itty bitty towns every few hours. The Cold Lake Air Weapons Range, "the only tactical bombing range in Canada" is situated not far away.

location-wise, it's about on the level with Edmonton. It also happens to have been at the northernmost edge of what was originally the Saskatchewan territory, bordering the Athabasca territory before the provinces were officially established in 1905.

this historic/factual moment brought to you by Wikipedia and extreme amounts of random boredom.