foxtrot, foxtrot, checking in, roger go

so.  a little sleepy, but, brief recap of my past few days:

saturday 12th
got about four hours' sleep friday night.  caught a little more on the bus on the way to the airport, and a bit on the plane.  fully packed flight; fortunately the small children didn't start squalling until the final descent.  met at the airport by datlowen, who was amused by the necessity of reminding me and my culture shock that in fact it was possible to have a sort of lunch/dinner thing, hit a couple of stores, go home and change, and stop by the library, all before heading over to mearagrrl's for a party, because -- gasp! -- around here, stuff stays open past 6pm.  (but on a saturday?, i said, and then smacked myself.)  party chez mearagrrl, which was fun.  yay fun!  home and to sleep, and lemme tell you, i've always thought i was perfectly comfortable on the futon couch in couch form, but unfolded in futon form?  i had no idea how comfortable i wasn't.  yay futon.

sunday 13th
up to the curling club in time for the opening ceremonies of the USCA Mixed Nationals.  timer on the first draw, and on the sheet with the home team playing, as it happened, so the whole crowd was behind me, and then when they went into extra ends and blanked the eleventh so they went to a twelfth, everyone in the building was behind me.  just a leetle claustrophobic, that.  timing supervisor on the second draw.  home late.

monday 14th
took datlowen's car so i could get up to the club while he went to work.  timed both draws.  brought laptop along to try to get online with club wireless, but was only half successful, and that only for a few minutes before inexplicable total freeze-up.  ugh.

tuesday 15th
up to the club again, with datlowen this time.  timed the first draw; on-ice supervisor (sheets C&D) for the second.  [early in the first game on sunday, we realized that over our walkie-talkie thingers it was confusing to refer to sheets "B" and "D" (and even "C") by letter, since the transmission isn't the clearest thing in the world -- sheets are now called (by officials, at least) Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta.  apart from Bravo is sometimes also called Beta or Baker.  it has a bit of an identity crisis.]  hung around after for a bit, then came home, where jgesteve, returned from his fabulous ski vacation, helped me get set up on their wireless network, and thank god.  i was feeling cut off.

am enjoying my vacation.  is proper vacation:  have brought no work with me.  nothing school-related, apart from the files that are of course on my hard drive.  didn't even unpack my bookbag and use it as a carryon.  nothing.  it's very freeing.  might be more freeing if people stopped asking me how school is going, how long i'll be gone, etc., but of course i understand why they do, whether it's because they're genuinely interested and miss me or because they need something about which to make small talk and this is the most salient thing they've got.  (there are some of both.)  also, as cmshaw heard me observe, plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.  le sigh.  but what can you do?

will be more or less out of touch until the end of next week.  should be able to check in late at night so i'm not completely incom.  but, thursday night, mardi gras party, man.  (i know.  i didn't make the decision.)  so maybe not so much, then.  :-)