Aloha from Manitoba!

Hey. It feels like it has been a loooooooooong time since I have hammered out one of these entries. Maybe that means I have been busy? Or maybe it means I have been lazy? Or perhaps it means that nothing has happened at all? Or that so much has happened I don't know where to begin? It is, I think a combination of all of the above. It definitely becomes more intimidating to write when the momentum slows down and I lose a few days in a row-- suddenly everything and nothing becomes a topic worth blogging about. So, given that it has been a little while and I am feeling bogged down in both the details and the vagueness, I think that I will approach this blog systematically or categorically. I will discuss school first, then dad's visit and finally return to the topic of fun and entertainment in this strange and ?exciting? prairie town.

School:

Much, much to say on this front. To begin with, I am happy to share that I am still loving it and think that it is a very good fit indeed. I had a class last Wednesday that was markedly different than the class I reported on earlier, a fact that I can attribute almost entirely to the incredible eccentricity of the professor. A woman with extensive credentials, tremendous charisma and quirks more bizarre than I have yet to encounter in the sphere of academia. The first feature I should mention is her outfit: a matching top and pants made out of a bright hawaiin print fabric. The second notable point was her penchant and belief in stretching, indeed every 10 minutes a stop watch positioned on her desk goes off signaling that we all must get up and invigorate our brains by stretching our limbs. Stretching at ten minute intervals in a graduate level course, fantastic!!! She also fashioned her lecture with diagrams that I am certain only made sense to her (full of all sorts of zig zaggy lines and cryptic coding) insisting that learning occurs better when there are visual aids. However despite her true quirkiness, I must admit she appeared to have a deep grasp of the content of the course and I am super hyped to get into the material. It is a pure theory course and from what I can tell is going to include a ton of new information for me.

Dad Visit:

My incomparably sweet and wonderful father re-routed the tail end of a business trip to come to Winnipeg for one day and two nights. It was such a delight to be around someone who knows me so, so very well-- to speak to someone without my new found negative brain chatter that convinces me that no one I meet likes me or wants to hang out with me! :( ! My dad has to like me, he is my dad!! Ha! No but for real we had a really nice time and actually crammed quite a bit of winnipegging into that one day. We explored the Exchange District which is a pretty nice part of town full of extremely large old, beautiful warehouse type buildings, (as well as some fancier more elaborate gothic type constructions) some of which have been taken over by business. We wandered into some really awesome places... i.e. a massive, massive used book/record store called Red River Books which I plan on returning to when I am in need of my next read. I gleaned some more evidence of this charm that people who love this city refer to, which was reassuring.

Our visit was topped off by going to Rae and Jerry's steak house, a restaurant truly like NO OTHER. It is a place that has literally been frozen in the 60’s. The restaurant is housed in large bungalow type, L shaped building, it’s interior is almost entirely red (REFER to pictures above)—the walls have red paneling on them, the carpet is cherry red, the staff wear red vests, plush red vinel swivel chairs and the incredibly retro font on the menu is a rich red colour. It is in my opinion aesthetically incredible, classy and romantic feeling but also somehow without pretension. The patrons all look fairly casual and at ease as they eat their incredible meals. Dad was particularly enthusiastic about the menu, ordering pickled herring, chopped liver (yes, I do believe it is a Jewish establishment!) and a steak sandwich—we all shared the herring and liver and then had our own meals as well. The food was actually amazing and thoroughly enjoyed by all (as were the Manhattan’s).

As for entertainment/ socializing… I think I will leave that category for now, however I will mention that things seem to be getting better in this department and I have come to develop an appreciation for carpeted bars as well as for the REMARKABLE drinking capacity of the average Winnipeger—a capacity, I have learned (the hard way) that I simply do not have.

Finally, Patrick my other room mate has returned from Europe and I must say he one hilarious dude, so yay, my room mates are awesome. It’s looking up….