Preludes And Nocturnes

I’m loving the art these days. Jim, Malcolm, and I headed out to Vancouver last week (I packed up the marking and took it along with) and I got to go to my favorite art store on Broadway.

So along with a wonderful visit with Auntie Leone, Melly, Jess, Jason, (the new Jay) - some wonderful food of sushi, ethiopian, Indian, and Chinese - I also got some art time!

Side note - Malcolm is the cutest thing in the world. He is totally eating all sorts of things now and had sticky rice from one end to the other. He turns one year old in less than two weeks. Can you believe it?

Here’s my newest art piece. I’m working on doing some prints on cards of it:

Here’s the other cute stuff in my life:

I have 8 finals left to mark!  Yay!!!  And then I’ll have two months off until I start teaching (every day!) in July/August.  I’m very very much looking forward to this time off.  I have made another trip to the Amazing Art Store in Vancouver and picked up more painting supplies.  Malcolm and I are planning lots of fun time in the backyard with the weather turning nice like it is right now.  And once we get our fence in, it will be even better!

So on the Malcolm front - he is trying to talk a fair bit.  The only word he does well … is kitty.

He calls me “bob” and dada is “nya nya nya”.  I mean, he has words and we’ve learned what they mean to him, but he is spending more time trying to teach us the right words than learn ours.

But he can exactly mimic back the sound of the orange cat calling from upstairs. He’ll look up and meow right back. And he can do the cutest little “uh oh!” for no reason whatsoever.

Jim and Malcolm actually carried on a converstation the other day.  It went as follows:

Malcolm crawls over to Jim, pulls himself up to stand holding Jim’s chair and asks, “Bob?”

Jim looks down and says, “Mom is sleeping upstairs.”

Malcolm looks at him and says, “ohhh.” And then crawls off.

We were driving down the main road  - two lanes each way - and cars kept slowing down.  We get up ahead and see why.

There is a turkey wanding on the road.  Big huge turkey.

So that is strange enough, but then to add to it all I was stopped at our side road this morning waiting to turn left onto the main drag to go workout… and there was the turkey. Right there, outside my door pecking at something on a lawn and, um, being a turkey.  I saw him later when I came home (up further by some apartments) and then tonight Jim and I saw him running up the road from the bottom of this hill.

I’ll call the SPCA tomorrow and see if anyone has reported their turkey missing. I guess.

Ahhh, what I was going to do today!!  We had houseguests all weekend - it was wonderful! Coral and Anne-Marie were here, we had a great time, Malcolm loved it - but today I was going to tackle THE LIST!  Our guests left yesterday, it is a ‘work day’ and my classes are done.  Exam is next week so there are packets to mark, grades to assemble, I need to call Toshiba and London Drugs (huge rant here about asshats and non-working USB ports and “oh, it is a physical problem you caused’ you know, by plugging something into the USB port.. oh the wackiness we do). I need to fill out my EI forms, get an appointment at the bank, pay some bills, etc.  Bunch of stuff that needs a business day.

But instead Malcom and I decided that we would get a MAJOR head start on the day.  A 4am start to the day.

Iz not so productive at that point. And even though I then resolved to stay up for the morning and Get Going!  I ended up just kinda dozing in front of an episode of Star Trek TNG and then being sent to bed by Jim.  I slept 10am-1pm.

Nothing kills a feeling of anticipated productivity like getting up for the day at 1pm.  We pretty much had time to get a little visit and then get Malcolm ready for swim lessons (2:30).  We grabbed some groceries… and here I am, with my list.. FOR TOMORROW!!

Yeah, go team. Whooo. [/forced enthusiasm]

If anyone is wondering what my sister Julia is doing with MSF this time around, she is the project coordinator for a pilot project in PNG on gender-based violence. She has worked her way up over the past three/four years working in Sudan, Bangledesh, and now PNG.

You can watch a video on this very important work HERE.  You can see Julia at 3:48-:55.  Maybe leave her some nice comments here as she has just contracted Malaria and it sucks.

She’s my hero. xoxo

For I have been SUPERWOMAN today!

Malcolm and I got up just after six am this morning.  By 9am I had run a wash of diapers and hung them to dry on the rack, played with Malcolm, changed three diapers and one sleeper-acting-as-a-diaper-when-mom-turned-to-get-a-diaper-and-Mal-peed-on-it.  We had breakfast, unloaded the dishwasher, and loaded it again. We tidied the toys, had some milks, and put Malcolm down for his nap. I got15 exams marked (I am marking a very exciting grammar exam this week), and finished up some emails from my class.

Then by noon we added to the list: gassed up the car, got groceries, got a rake, found two new tops and necklaces for summer teaching and a pair of yoga pants (buy $75 and get an instand $25 discount - booyeah), got home, put away groceries, had lunch, and got Malcolm down for his second nap. I then finished ordering textbooks to preview for my summer class and updating WebCT for my class.

This afternoon Malcolm and I went to his swimming lessons and then stayed in the pool for an hour. We just got home, had a snack of organic brown rice cakes with cream cheese and some yogurt, and now he is at my mom’s and I’m thinking I could fold laundry… or maybe just crash on the couch for two hours.

Okay, that whole “swimming with a beeb” thing - it is hard work!  My arms are wobbly.. but the good wobble.

I hate April Fool’s.  As a kid I got into it a bit here or there (my sister should show up to tell you MY BEST TRICK EVAH!) but that aside, I hate pratical jokes.  Usually I hide out on A1 but I teach this morning.

Poop.