field study

+ the polls closed, after three days and six months, and nothing really changed. nothing was different. i walked down the hallway to the ASB and started taking down posters. so did the other guys - students were walking past, as they had for the past three days, but everything was different now.

i tried to kid myself that i was so numb all over from the end of it all, the end of the year, that i couldn't feel anything anymore, either way the vote went. i told everyone to stop speculating, not to read too much into preliminary results, don't get excited. IT IS MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR US TO LOSE NOW. but wait, wait... and i miss the moment, everyone else realises what happened first, but there you go.

i had a speech to lose with, but nothing for a win. we won, so i gave my losing speech anyway, and it worked because we were all so happy. there's more to say, but not really. it's outwardly the most important thing we did this year, the apex, but i think other stuff mattered more, to me, maybe. this was vindication, though.

+ i worked myself out on the weekend by listening to 'the boys of summer' over and over again. also van halen, 'why can't this be love.' i made myself a modern rock mix and listened to it over and over again. def leppard's 'animal.'

and then grace jones, the extended mixes, louder and louder. i walked home from sam's yesterday and listened to grace jones the whole way down the drive.

+ i've noticed that i read canadian fiction, mostly short stories, and american non-fiction, mostly travelogues and politics. there's something to be explored here.

margaritaville

+ i remember how exciting it was in high school to realize that people thought about cities this way, wrote essays on how they worked and how they didn't, how people lived in context. people listened to radiohead records, i guess they still do, and thought about cities. i didn't know anybody personally who thought that ok computer was an important album, but i had that sense when i bought it, and even more so after i looked at the booklet. i was working at purdy's chocolates and buying records. summer 1999. when kid a came out i bought it, and enjoyed it - i didn't listen to it a lot, but i liked it. nothing else really mattered, and i didn't buy the last two records. i guess i downloaded the last one but it doesn't mean very much.

they have specialised shoes now, mall walkers. they have treads designed for the untextured tile floors of malls, expanses and soft carpets inside stores. seniors groups meet in malls to walk, around and around. it's a safe, controlled environment.
i still get lost in metrotown. i finally understood what was going on there, two different malls, joined by a bridge, when they renovated into one mall. now i'm lost again. i still remember how excited i was to visit the open-air mall north of everett last september. it was a visit to the heart of the beast.

+ the theft of copper wire fascinates me too. thieves are digging holes, finding trunk cables, pulling out the copper wire, taking it out to sell. terry fox had nothing to do with prince george but he trained there, once. so, they have a statue. he was a student at SFU, apparently, which matters quite a bit, apparently - we have a statue too. the prince george statue looks like it is made of copper, but it's really made of plastic or alloy or something, but the thieves tried to knock the head off. melt it down, sell the copper. the 'subprime mortgage crisis' has led to lots of vacant, abandoned homes across the united states. people are breaking in, thieves, stealing copper wire.

+ i've been reading lord jim for a while now. it's a relatively fast read when i sit down with it but i'm not especially interested in it anymore. the 60 pages of an unsinking ship to start were marvelous, but the patusan section is dull. i'll tough it out, but then what? i've got a lot to read.

+ taking the helijet back from victoria, we went low over richmond at twilight, the roads like arteries. i followed the highway to the massey tunnel and out the other end, lonsdale up the mountain, higher and higher and ending, turning to the left. i don't know the gulf islands but i saw them, sun off of the lonely houses, docks and boats.