beboots

 Blah, I'm losing my ability to keep my eyes open... so tired... 

So today I met with my client for EISA (that's the Edmonton Immigration Services Association). Essentially, in lieu of writing a research project for my translation class, I have the option of volunteering with EISA! Once a week, I meet with a client, someone who has been in Canada for less than three years, and needs help getting to know the city and, most importantly, practicing English. I met with my client over tea at a little café called the Three Bananas on Sir Winston Churchill Square. Her name is Maria, and she is from Peru. :)  It was nice enough weather that we could sit outside the café and enjoy the crisp fall air and talk about a variety of things, including good vacation spots in Peru and Canada, Hallowe'en traditions in both of our countries, the bizarreness of English and French dialects in Canada, the preponderance and recognition of native languages in Peru and Canada, and so on. It was fun! ... and much more rewarding than a research paper would be. Also, guaranteed marks. :3

Other than that... I finished a few small assignments today, and I've been keeping up with my readings... as I think I've said before, I feel like I'm just treading water: I'm keeping afloat, but I'm not going forward. I really need to start - and finish! - some papers, especially that primary document analysis which is actually due TUESDAY. I've selected the book I'll be writing on, but I still need to identify the passage that I will be analyzing... but I still need to write the thing. I think that it's fairly short, and I sort of know what I'll be writing about... blah. It'll happen. I just need to sit down and FOCUS.

Luckily, because I have Fridays off this semester and we get Monday off for Thanksgiving, that means that I will have a FOUR DAY WEEKEND to work on some of this stuff. Let's see me get some proper sleep, first, then buckle down and get stuff done. I'll have to write off one of those days to help mum cook this year, though. I think that I'm going to make a cheesecake the night before - possibly eggnog & cinnamon flavour. 

ANYWAY I still feel stressed out about what I have to finish this semester - no time! - but I found the time this evening after my brain started to turn off to sit and listen to podcasts for a few hours and do some beading. I'm about two-thirds the way through this mystery project, and I will definitely post photographs once I've finished! (Along with a time estimate of how long the thing took me to actually make.) I felt very zen while doing this; it's a very repetitive yet intricate activity. I was listening to episodes of this amazing podcast by the BBC called A History of the World in a Hundred Objects. I would highly recommend downloading it off of iTunes. They actually talk about a history of the WORLD, and so aren't as Euro-centric as many "world" histories are. Also, they pick neat objects, have great voices and oral descriptions, and, well, I've been learning a lot! :) So even though I spent the last two hours or so essentially doing crafts, I was learning, and I was de-stressing. :)