Work work work

I am terrible at keeping up to date with posting on this.  Also, lately I'm terrible at just being online.  I decided to turn my life further upside down (I was already half-way there, why not just REALLY stir things up, eh?) and change my career plans completely.  So, my dreams of academia are on hold.  Temporarily, but indefinitely.  I am not giving them up entirely, just a little bit, for just a little while.

I am giving them up for this:

That's my job site.  Now, I had no idea how lucky I would be to get such a placement when I decided on this new path, but there you have it.  I'm well pleased.  I am now what is called an Occupational First Aid Attendant, Level 3.  I'm there in case bad things happen, as the step between the accident and the hospital.  I can put on bandaids (properly!), clean wounds, deal with sprains and strains, and if a really BIG bad thing happens, stabilize someone as much as possible and strap 'em to a board to get loaded into an emergency transport to go to the hospital.  Mostly, it's a sit around and wait job.  It's a lot of down time, which is.... down, but gorgeous surroundings and I love my coworkers.  It's a good thing I'm not busy fixing people all the time, that would indicate unsafe practices!  As it is, I do other little things like keep track of who is where on site.  It's 5-6 days a week, 11-12 hours a day.  So, that's why I'm behind on updating anything.

I love my job.

I'm also extremely glad I moved up north to FSJ.  It's gorgeous here. Yes, the mosquitoes are huge.  I heard that one landed on a runway recently and the ground crew fueled it up before realizing it wasn't a plane.  (ba-dum-tiss!  That's actually my Papa's joke.)  And the days are long this far north - sunlight peeks over the horizon at 3am and doesn't fully disappear until after 11pm.  And I hear the winters are atrocious.  Time will tell.  For now, I'll enjoy my summer, with a short drive to a view like this of the Peace River:

*dreamy sigh*

Am also loving my participation in the SCA.  Garb, combat, camping, bawdy songs.... doesn't get much better than that.  However, my first "war" event, north of Edmonton, was rained out partially; it flooded so bad that the war field became a war lake.  And the tent partially flooded.  And everything I took was soaked.  But.... still a lot of fun.  And I got a special dragon token for playing the harp!  Huzzah!

Ishbel, of course, continues to adventure with me.  She has come to work a couple times now, and sits in the car being a terrible influence on me.  I need to stay awake in case of an emergency and she keeps trying to talk me into a nap.  So hard to say no to such a cute face!

Ishbel at the W.A.C. Bennet Dam

The Adventure Continues

And now, for something completely different....

So, first off, I left off over a year ago and life has changed somewhat since then.  I've moved, a couple of times, and am back in my Home and Native Land ... sort of.  While I've returned to Canada, I'm not at my old "home" any longer.  I've moved way up into the frozen North, and I am loving it so far.  Even with the ice and cold and mud and potholes.

I have lovely roommates, who have taken me under their wings as I am joining the SCA, which is excellent.  I am continuing my harp and language studies, and am exploring exciting career options in the wild frontier north that I live in.

Ishbel, of course, travels with me, and is the inspiration and joy of my life.

Mommy, you're interrupting my studies for pictures.

I'm settling in well, and aim to share this blog more now.  Things... got hard and complicated and I lost interest in sharing my life, but, here we go again on another new adventure.  Stay tuned and see where we go from here!

For those who say I never post pics of me...  this is the view from my grandparents' place.

Cheers!

The Holiday Season Approacheth

It's been a busy few weeks.  Classes are in full swing, and in addition to classes and the myriad of other activities I find myself involved in, holiday parties have begun.  Being a North American, I had the privilege of being enlisted to help with the planning and celebration of American Thanksgiving (though we all know real Thanksgiving was in October, a lá How I Met Your Mother!).  This turned into a beautiful thing ~ 18 people (6 Americans, 1 Canadian, 8 Brits, 2 Germans, 1 Austrian), with LOTS of food and laughter.

The restaurant decorated for us; crackers, pretty napkins... They even put up their Christmas decor, upon learning that Americans often put up their decorations the day after Thanksgiving (which was technically when Thanksgiving here was celebrated).

Table to my left, with my favourite redheaded Celticists.

Tables to my right, full of mostly non-Americans.

Dishing up.  The restaurant provided some food, and some of us brought other things.  I, for example, brought cornbread, as the Alabaman who was hosting was complaining of wanting such things.  There were two types of pumpkin pie, a veggie lasagna, a nut roast (for the vegetarians), cheesy cauliflower...  and the restaurant had turkey, gravy, potatoes, sweet potatoes/yams, sprouts, stuffing, and some other veg.  YUM!

OM NOM NOM NOM!

Also, I was crowned Queen of Thanksgiving.  It was my own fault; I have this silly habit of stacking cracker crowns on people's heads.  I had crowned 4-high on my neighbour, but it was then decided that I had to have crowns too.  So hah!  Queen of Thanksgiving Feasts!

Further along, towards Christmas, last week we (Post-Graduate Association) went to Birmingham for their traditional German (Frankfurt) style Christmas market.  It took over a LARGE part of the city.  I'll attach a couple pictures; these are courtesy of the lovely Joanna Shimmin, because I didn't feel like taking my big camera out for pics while struggling to handle everyone wanting to pet Ishbel in the crowd.

Polar bear!

Stately Sheltie in front of Birmingham Cathedral; next to the massive (MASSIVE!) mall called the Bull Ring.  Apparently the largest and busiest shopping centre in the UK.

I had mulled wine and cider.  Didn't get any stuff; nothing jumped at me.  Found a UK location of Lush, which made me happy.  Made me miss BC.

Ok, I must get back to things.  Off to a lecture on things in the Arthurian legend this evening, and I need to eat first.

One final note:

So.  Cute.

Hay-on-Wye

I suppose I'm overdue for an update, yes?  Here is a bit about my trip to Hay-on-Wye, then.

Hay-on-Wye is a town of bookstores.  Full of them.  Notorious for them, even.  That was our end goal; going book hunting in a town of bookstores is like Christmas for a bunch of book nerds.

En route to Hay, we stopped in a town which I believe is called Rhayader, so we could feed one of the party who had neglected to eat breakfast before our early morning (supposed to be at 8.30 but more like 8.45) departure from Aberystwyth.  We went into a tea shop and had... coffee and tea, and some of us had food.

Rhayader has a lovely clock tower in the centre of town, right in front of the tea house we went to.

And it has a pretty river running through!

On to Hay.  Hay-on-Wye, as you might infer from the name, is on the river Wye.  It's just on the Welsh side of the border between Powys, Wales, and Herefordshire, England.  It dates back at least to the time of the Normans in England; its castle was a Norman structure.

The remains of the castle

In the 1970s, a man named Richard Booth declared himself to be the king of Hay-on-Wye.  Fortunately, no one took him seriously (except the tourism industry - all sorts of things are made of this there!), because (as our group discussed) this is a rather treasonous thing to do.  The queen doesn't like parts of her territory declaring themselves independent, you see.  Regardless of legality, Hay has since enjoyed a bit of infamy which has greatly boosted their local economy.  They have somewhere over 30 book shops, according to Wikipedia, both with and without specialties.  There was one devoted entirely to murder mysteries, even!  Bibliophile's paradise.  We decided collectively that our favourite was the one that had a surprisingly good Celtic linguistics section.  Mmmmm, philology.

Hay's clocktower

In addition to bookstores, there are all sorts of other places.  I found a really neat stores that had lots of wool yarns and other crafty products.  We all sat down for a pint at lunch in the local pub, which had a delightful selection of hard ciders on draught that I was able to choose from (and so did the other girl in the group.), all with silly names (something about a crazy dog, and one called orgasmic that, while tasty, did not live up to its name).

Welsh countryside - lots of sheep

It's about a two-hour drive through the beautiful, twisty Welsh countryside from here to Hay, and it was a picturesque drive home, filled with singing and discussion of linguistics.

Have I mentioned how much I'm enjoying life here?

In other news, I have acquired a rental ("hire") harp.  It is nice and has lovely sound, but I miss mine own harp, and hope to bring it with me when I come back after Christmas.  Unfortunately, I've been so busy between classes and being out and about that I haven't had much time to practice, and my first lesson here is tomorrow.  Eep!

Cheers!

Seanbhean Kirstie

So, the lesson I have been told this week is that I am old.  Now, I don't think I'm *that* old (usually), and I'm not used to people telling me this.  In fact, quite the opposite:  I am used to being the baby of the group.

This week I have been called old for making a reference to Charlie Brown, which I thought was universal and transcended ages.

I've been called attractive... for my age.  (A compliment is a compliment...?)

And I am nominated as driver for a group of us renting a car, as the oldest one.  And other things.

Now, you all know I'm just playing and whining for fun.  I know I'm not that old.  And even if I am, I'm quite happy with it.  All my experiences serve me well.  I am quite content to be an old, experienced person.  People have always called me an old soul.  Well and good, then.  Seanbhean Kirstie.  And that's all I have for the week, heh.

Enjoy a beautiful sunset from the Prom in front of my building.  Hopefully not the sunset of my life, in my venerable state, eh? ;)

Devil's Bridge (Pontarfynach)

So, last Saturday, Ishbel and I took the train out to Devil's Bridge.  Its a lovely little steam train, and the line leaves from Aberystwyth's downtown area and goes though some beautiful Welsh countryside for an hour before arriving at the Devil's Bridge station.

The Engine

Example of some of the countryside we went through.  In the centre, distant, you can see Bryn y Castell, which (according to my guidebook!) is the site of an early fortification.  The train goes by here.

Upon good recommendation from a friend, I opted to stay out for the day, rather than attempt to rush everything in an hour and catch the first train back.  It turns out for the best; the big walk you can do there is a ~45min hike, which you basically can't do the whole thing in time to make the first train.  So we got to take our time.

The first set of falls you get to see in the Rheidol Gorge is the Mynach Falls.  This is where the river Mynach spills down the gorge to join with the Rheidol river.  The Rheidol is one of the rivers that runs through/into Aberystywth (the other being the Ystwyth).  The Ystwyth, though namesake of the town, doesn't actually run through the town - it skirts around it and spills into the harbour.  I will have to get pictures of that area one of these days.

Mynach Falls

A "pot-hole" in the bed of the Mynach.

The set of stairs referred to as Jacob's Ladder on the descent into the valley on the hike.  They were VERY steep.  Ishbel could be two stairs behind me and be at level with my hip, and the treads were not very wide.

Wandering through, you get some spray in the face (and camera lens) from the falls, but it was one of the most lovely walks I've done.  There's a grotto (which was difficult to get a picture of) that is the remains of what was once a cave where some sibling highwaymen hid out with their loot until their capture and execution.  The cave was partially destroyed so no one else could use it as a hideout in the future.

Climbing the steep steps - she had a rough time but did it anyways!

Up-close of the waterfalls, on the ascent of the walk.

After the first 45 minute loop, we did the short loop where you get a great view of the 3 bridges that give the location its name.  As the legend goes, there was an old woman whose cow was stuck on the other side of the river Mynach.  Because the gorge was so steep, she didn't know how to get it back.  So she made a deal with the Devil, who offered to build a bridge across the gorge in exchange for the soul of the first living thing to cross it - assuming it would be the woman herself.  The old woman agreed to this deal, but tossed a crust of bread across the bridge first so her dog would run across after it, thus leaving the Devil stuck with the dog's soul instead of the woman's.

Discussion with friends has decided we wish to amend this legend.  As it makes little sense that the cow could cross the river but the woman could not, one friend of mine theorizes that perhaps the old woman was engaging in the long-time Celtic tradition of cattle raiding, and it wasn't actually her cow in the first place.  I am inclined to think this is a fantastic thought, and while not part of the original legend, I am quite happy keeping it in my mind.  Another friend also chimes in that he's pretty sure the Devil would soon be fed-up of all the dog's licking, and send it back.  Ishbel approves of this theory, as she couldn't imagine how I could possibly let the Devil take her from me.  Obviously the old woman's dog wasn't nearly as cute as mine, right?

The three bridges - the original bridge that inspired the legend is on the bottom.

The lowest bridge is thought to have been built by monks from the Strata Florida abbey, in the 1100s.  The second bridge (in the middle) was built around 1708, and the top bridge was constructed near the beginning of the 20th century, and strengthened in the early 1970s.

I love to observe water erosion - the gorge here was all smoothed out in rounded areas.

*raspberry*

...What?

Walks and Socs

As promised, on the next sunny day (this past Friday), Ishbel and I went up the mountain at the end of the promenade in town.  It is named Constitution Hill, but everyone calls it "Consti."  After a brief chat with my flatmates about my plans to go up there - wherein I was advised that the hill was a hell of a climb - I decided to take the train up, and walk down.  When it was opened originally in 1896, the cliff-side railway was powered by a "water-balance" system, which means that as one of the two cars went down the hill, it pulled the other car up.  It has since been converted to electricity.  So Ishbel and I hopped into the train and rode up.  It was a lot of fun - short though it was - and a novel experience.  I'm glad I was lazy and took the train.

In the next three pictures you get a sense of how steep the hill was that the train climbs.  And it runs every few minutes.  I passed the descending train and waved at the people riding it down.

Looking down at the track we've already covered.

Ishbel has no idea what this strange contraption was, but she was excited to be along for the ride.

Looking up to the top once we were near.

Once up, you are way above the rest of Aberystwyth and can see for miles.  It says on a clear day you can see all the way to the tallest mountain in Wales - Snowdon - off in the north.  I don't think it was quite clear enough for us to see that, but we did get a beautiful whole-town view of Aberystwyth and could see out through parts of Cardigan Bay.

View of town, and the rare sunshine

A close-up of the Old College (left), the runs of Aberystwyth Castle (center), and the War Memorial from WWI (right).

Once at the top there are some things you can do - apart from admiring the breathtaking view.  There are more activities in the summer, when the weather is nicer and there are more tourists in Aber, but there are year-round activities too.  There is a cafe and bar, which hosts events and apparently is a nice little steakhouse on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday evenings.  There is bowling you can reserve, an arcade, frisbee golf, and a camera obscuras - you can see things birds-eye-view up close and personal.  I looked longingly at the frisbee golf nets, but had neither a frisbee nor another player with me.  I also passed on the camera for this trip.  I did, however, grab lunch at the cafe.

This is the camera obscuras - one of the largest in the world, apparently!

The only "activity" I did was get food.

Following a lovely lunch that I drew out for some time while reading my Kindle, which I had the foresight to pack along, Ishbel and I walked back down.  The walk down was nice - and I only slipped once, which, for someone as clumsy as me, is saying something.  Ishbel was gracious enough to sit down on the hill behind me as if we'd stopped for a sit intentionally.  She's so thoughtful.

Part-way down the hill, I stopped and snapped what is likely to become one of my favourite pictures.  When I return home, I'll print this big and frame it.

At strategic viewing points along the climb, there are benches.  I would certainly be thankful of them on the way up.  As it was, I didn't need to stop.  However, I was able to grab a couple who were sitting on one bench and get the to take this picture of me (gasp!) in front of town, to prove that I am indeed here, and not just Ishbel.

Not too bad, I suppose...

On to 'socs,' which is short for 'society.'  This bothers me a bit, as it is pronounced 'sock,' which doesn't fit 'society,' but it's not my word so I have to go with it.  I am thus far involved in the Tarot and Meditation Soc, and Aber Archers Club (sports groups are clubs, where as other interest groups are socs).  As previously mentioned, I did attend one fencing club event, but I think I've ruled that it is not for me at this point in time.  I am tossing around the idea of going to the Scottish Reeling soc event tonight; it's something I want to do, but I'm feeling a decided lack of confidence in my ability.  Plus, it means going back up the big hill, which I have already done once today.

I successfully navigated the big library this morning and found a book I need to read part of for class.  I feel quite accomplished having done that.  On the other hand, I also have a cold, which is not a good feeling.  Oh well.  Cold or not, I helped my team win pub quiz for the second week in a row last night.  Huzzah!

Cheers.