blue and brown books

It is Wednesday, 9.3.08 and it’s cool.

Up early with Jeannine, she took the dogs to Gimli on her way to work. Her mom’s smallest has a “date with the knife” and Marvin is having trouble with his leg, so he’s going in for a checkup. The other dogs went too to stay for a few nights at Jeannine’s parent’s place since I’d be at school. On the bus by 7:30, I made wandered around school for a while, and headed to my Intro: Japanese by 8:30. The prof is American, and a new graduate of the PhD program at UBC for Japanese. He was on the JET program for 3 years in Kyoto, and lived in Hokkaido for a year on highschool exchange.

The introduction to the class was short, and we broke after 20mins. I talked to him for a while about the class and Japan, and he recommended that since the class was mostly full and I could read, I should try the Intermediate level. I caught some lunch and at 10:30 I found the room and prof’s name and sat in on, then explained my situation and she’s entirely fine with my situation and she’s looking forward to having me in the class. Mizuko-sensei is her name, and she even has a “summer home” in Shizuoka! Fancy that.

After class I went up to the faculty room to chat with a few profs I had had in the past. Keenan, who was the chair when I was attending, and I sat down for an extended conversation about my flakiness. I really appreciated his direct and wonderful cruel humour. He criticized my past work while also recommending I continue a career interest in Public Administration and not Philosophy. I told him I believed him, but still wanted an Honours from the UW. The new chair, Savickey was much more supportive and interested in my interest. We went over some finer points of what it actually means to write a thesis and I’ll be hunting for an observer over the next few days and a general topic that I’d like to take on. I’m thinking Savickey herself might be best suited, given her Wittgenstein background, although even she admits her view differs greatly from mine. I’ll have to think more about it.

Heading downtown to check out Don’s Photo and spied a Roleiflex for under $200CAD, and even though it’s a bit beat up I think I’m going to get it when and if I can afford it. I bought some 120 film for the Holga and plan on trying out some 400ISO. Went to the nearest MTS store and bought a phone and signed a 2-year contract. It’s a pretty great phone the LG Rumour http://www.rumorbylg.com/ and an excellent plan in terms of data and text messaging. I felt a bit bad for doing it because I really could live without it, but I’ve honestly felt lost without my phone for this week. It’s a utility more than anything that I just feel like I need.

On the way back to school, I saw Dylan who I haven’t seen for more than a year. He was heading for lunch to meet another philosophy-colleague (I saw colleague because it sounds better than friend or mate) Nick. We sat down for sushi and I had some inari and some deep-fried tofu. It was delicious. Made it to my seminar just in time for it to start. It should be an interesting term with Tomsons talking about Moral philosophy. I’m really looking forward to talking about and extending the ideas I’ve had about language and holism and personhood to a greater extent. More than anything, I’m looking forward to getting back in to reading.

Class was exhausting, and I headed home immediately. Made some dinner and then SMS’d my friend Stu. Over dinner, I read a new mail from Rhonda. Rhonda’s emails are to die for. Here’s a snipit: “I decline the offer, and recall this is not the first time someone has wanted me to be a madam of a brothel.” She seems like she’s doing better, but I’m still worried for her. My Mom and Brother came over, so I had to cancel on Stu. We sat around and watched some Food Network and CBC. God I missed the CBC.

Nearly midnight, and I’m exhausted. It’s my first night alone in Canada, and it’s a bit strange. No dogs, and a big house. I hope I can sleep. I’ll be watching the Daily Show and Colbert Report before nodding off.