Ice, White & Blue

Redhead Amok in Antarctica

So Much So Fast

Gosh. I leave the Ice, a limited community and location, and come bursting out into NZ with such a fervor that I can only imagine I will fall flat on my face. Certainly it took some adjusting to get to equilibrium in the larger more varied world. But things are happening so quickly now that I've lifted off from the hunkered down position I was in in Christchurch. I am now engaging with the world again.

And the world is engaging back, fiercely. Despite misgivings I am standing up to it and I can feel the adrenalin rush.

To begin with is the hitchhiking. I know many of you are seething with curiousity about this, since I have now arrived safely on the West Coast of NZ's South Island. How did it go? Well, easy-peasy folks. I took a city bus to the outskirts of Chch (#84 Russley) and the bus driver regaled me on the way with the beauty of Arthur's Pass, and made sure he dropped me off as close to Route 73 as possible. He wished me luck with a gleam in his eye.

I walked half a block up to 73, stepped on it, moved about 30m beyond the lights and stuck my thumb out for the first car that rounded the corner. That same car stopped for me. Yes. First 10 seconds of the first 100 feet of hitchhiking, the first car picks me up. Small hatchback model with two 30ish women in it: Lois, an Aussie visiting Tracey, a Kiwi, on holiday around NZ. I really lucked out. They were both wonderful women and we got off to Bush-bashing. Such a pleasant bonding activity to do overseas and at home, I recommend trying it if you're not too depressed because you have to live in that accursed country. Lois also a Women's Studies major in college, as was I.

Since this was a sight-seeing trip for Lois in NZ for her first time they were going to be stopping on their way up 73 for photo opps, which was fine with me, since I had been lusting to stop at Castle Hill since I first heard about it. I saw it last year on Atomic Shuttles as we zipped by at light speed in our desperation to go from A to B, with the subsequent inability to pause and enjoy the beauty.

What is Castle Hill? It is a formation, gawd, it is a spectacular eruption of odd stones from an otherwise gently sloping sheep-grazed hill at the foothills of the Alps. The East side of the South Island is very dry, as the westerly rain-bearing clouds from the Pacific (as in the Rockies in Canada) stumble up against the height of the Alps and stop there, dropping their moisture on the West Coast. The West Coast is a rainforest. Yeah, no joke. Once you shoot through the pass and get to the other side the world changes from brown grass to green lushness. It's like two different seasons in one hour.

Castle Hill is still in the dry brown grassy side, but in the foothills where the valley folds start getting sharper. As you speed around the narrow two-lane highway you are suddenly regaled by a hill covered in odd stone shapes, huge and animated, faces & figures & animal shapes & Easter Island-like statues, naturally occurring, on this grassy knoll. Lois & Tracey stopped, the dears, and off we trotted into the stones where we leaned back and gasped at the size of these things. Some as large as houses, all curved and carved soft limestone, shadowed and cool underneath in the day's bright dry sun.   Isamu Noguchi would have stopped sculpting if he had encountered this, he would have seen the vast looming, gently rounded, personable creatures here and he would have had to put down his tools in awe. I could have spent the day and a night there (I fantasized about putting my tent up, but it was Conservation land and not allowed. But I did crawl through holes and wander around the great beasts of stone until Tracey & Lois decided it was time to go. Back to the car and on to Arthur's Pass where they stopped for sandwiches. I continued with them another 14km to Otira.

I had been given the names of the owners of the historic pub/hotel there by a friend of mine, Peg, with whom I hiked last year on the Banks Peninsula track. Her brother Bill, and sister-in-law, Chris bought the place and have been fixing it up since. Peg had called ahead to let them know I was coming, and I had left a message on their machine earlier in the week, too. So there, in the sprinkly hesitant beginnings of rain that had appeared once we threaded the pass to the West, they dropped me off.

Chris offered me a place in the hotel and a homecooked meal with them in exchange for a few hours work. Of course, I leapt at the chance to work off my room & board.

But first I asked directions to the river I had followed yearningly from the car window on the way there. It was a bit of a hike through gorse and over cattle fences and then a rather thudding ungainly rocky slip down the bank to the stone bed through which the river threaded itself clear as a bell. Unbelievably clear water. I hopped up river, stone to stone, jumping & skipping along.  I imagined the river swollen and rapid, rolling the great boulders I came upon down its length. Indeed these mountian rivers are well known for flash floods and people are recommended not to camp near the banks on the flat. So I was cautious. I did not know how fast it would rise, but I did know the rain was a bare sprinkle at present, and the stones were not even wet. I continued on upriver past the town, seeking a way up. I tried once to take a cattle track back up, but that gorse. Prickly stuff, and rather thick. Even crouched over I was stopped by the constant stabbing and tearing at my skin thorugh my clothes. I also didn't really fancy coming upon a cow who may be as startled as me. That wouldn't be a pretty picture as we both ran through gorse away from each other.

Of course, my arrival in this tiny village of 50 people did not go unnoticed. As I walked down the street, visiting the two emus behind a fence, saying hello to the two young calves (big eyes, long eyelashes) behind another, I could see the children of the village notice me. They noticed me, a stranger, the way a deer herd notices movement in the bush, heads suddenly up, legs tense, ears swiveled forward. This small gaggle of children in the playground next to the emu all stilled and faced me without catching my eyes as I walked by.

Spent the night surrounded by the Hennah family, children, grandchildren all rollicking about this great hotel space. Built in the 1860s, with a lot of renovations looking dated to the 1950s or 60s even. Tall tall ceilings, tall windows, low-slung beds. The next morning I vacuumed the second floor for Chris, all the rooms and halls, under the beds, behind the tables, etc. It took a few hours, and then I was packed and ready to set off.

Into the pouring rain.

Chris suggested I ask people stopping in her tea room, headed West, if I could hitch a ride with them. She quite smartly said that it can be harder to judge the person behind the wheel on a rainy day when the windows are wet, which could be a safety issue. The second person we asked was a resident of Otira and Sandy gave me a ride to Kumara, about 10 minutes inland from Greymouth itself.

Dropped off in Kumara, got on my rainpants, emerged from under the hall roof where she had deposited me, adjusted my pack, stuck my thumb out. First 15 seconds, first 10 feet, first car. Wolf, a young man from Germany in a friend's car. Quiet fellow except for his ability to swear quite fluently in English about the rain. Goodness. I wasn't shocked, but amused and trying to not burst out laughing at his English. He dropped me off in town. "Fuck" is a good Germanic-sounding word, and when spoken with great fervor and a heavy German accent, can have quite the impact. Or it can simply sound silly, as it did to me.

Where I stopped in to the internet cafe there on the river front, peed, emailed Mom I was safe, phoned Pav (no answer) and walked up to Wild West Adventures.

There the best part begins. Because I am still there. I spent the night on their couch.

posted by: coldwish at 08:13 | link | comments (3) |
nz 2006

Back In The World

Things I've noticed:

A spider web in the corner of the Otira Hotel shower, built like a hanging bridge or the struts on a small Golden Gate. Stitches back & forth from guy wire to guy wire like Serger stitches on a hem, then a mad profusion of seemingly unorganzied crazy-work stitches inside. All outlined in the humidity from my shower.

A cat on my lap, purring and happy to be there, me happier than the cat by far. Enchanted by the animal warm on my knees as I waited for the next guest to come in out of the rain headed West out of Otira.

The same cat stalking chickens the day before. The chickens standing on the doorway's light sensor where the ding-dong rings, asking for food. The cat also asking to go out, the same way.

A quiet smiling baby boy, 4 months, peaceful and content and easy. I may have considered motherhood if I could have met a child as serene as this one when I was young and impressionable. Okay, so I would have had to have been about 9 years old to be that impressionable that children would be an option for me...but, y'know, this was a sweet baby.

Rain. Moisture falling from the sky. Wet. Comforting and uncomfortable both.

posted by: coldwish at 07:15 | link | comments |
nz 2006

The Weight Of It

Let me talk about my backpack. It's a very fine piece of equipment, and in it I carry the next three months of my life and all the possibilities I may come up against. I have a tent for shelter, a sleeping bag for warmth & comfort, a sleeping mat to alleviate the solid ground against my hip and shoulder as I sleep. I have a campstove and fuel, a basic set of cookware (aluminum & light), a lighter, matches, a headlamp, raingear, and 4 pair of underwear. I carry what I need, and only what I need, and trust me when I tell you that my understanding of need changed drastically as I humped that damn thing on my back all the way from one side of Christchurch to the other side of Christchurch to catch the bus out of town.

I don't need a book to read; I need maps, I need the WWOOF guide and the Tramping Guide to NZ. I don't need anything excess. I have two pair of hiking pants, light as air, a set of polypro underwaer, top & bottom. I curse the pair of jeans I carry and the long-sleeved cotton short, but I must keep them as they will be necessary when I WWOOF. I have Teva sandals and LL Bean hiking boots (worth every damn penny of the upgrade I made from last year's pair).

Every step of the way, every inch in the heat and on that pavement, every pinch on my hip bones of the pack, every muscle I felt with every movement in my thighs and hip flexors, and I was sorting through my pack getting stricter & stricter with myself. FOUR pair of underwear! When would I ever need that much? I could do with two, wash one let it dry wear the other for two days (once then again inside out). Think of the weight saved!

I doubted myself as I schlepped this huge pack on my back, gathering comments and looks along the way. Men felt most comfortable in pointing and smiling, or passing me in pairs and making the loud remark intended to be overheard but ostensibly to their companion. I doubted my ability to do this trip. I doubted my courage to hitchhike, to tramp, to WWOOF. This pack on my back, with three months of my life on it, seemed overwhelming. I am just one small frail female human alone in the world hoping for a soft place to rest at night, friendly faces to greet me when they stop their cars to pick me up, and a bit of isolation and freedom. This was the heft of my freedom, this was the weight of my choices.

As it was my choice, I had no one to disappoint if I chose differently, if I chose to hand over my credit card and rent a car for a month, or to flee to Aukland and there to the warm welcome invitations of my friends Peg & Tanya.

But no, if I fail for not trying then I fail miserably. If I try and fail, then I fail proudly. So dammit, I try. I carry this backpack, I pack carefully, I duck under low doorways, I lie upturned like a turtle legs flailing in the air as I try to dislodge & unsnap my life from my back into the boot of a car that stops to pick me up. I laugh at myself. I take it one step at a time, one car at a time, one small decision at a time. I do not need to know now where I go tomorrow, those decisions are best left to tomorrow. I cannot bite off too much of the future or I will be overwhelmed by my own choices and fears.

All this is in my backpack, with every step I take, heavy weight centered over my hips, balanced on my shoulders, looming over my head. Every twinge and shift keeps me in the here & now where I need to be to do this trip. The weight of my backpack keeps me solidly anchored to the next few seconds, facing the road ahead. I smile broadly, and I'll be damned if the world isn't smiling right back.

posted by: coldwish at 10:31 | link | comments |
nz 2006

Plans

Tomorrow, Monday, I'm off. First to the CDC for one more shipment home of stuff I don't want to schlep on my back. Then back into town, pick up my backpack, try not to tilt over onto my ass when I heft it, then onto a city bus to the edge of town to Route 73 on the way to Arthur's Pass. Stick my thumb out, travel to Arthur's Pass or Otira for the night and do a bit of hiking (sans backpack) there, then back thumb out to Greymouth.

Where I will hopefully intercept with good timing, Pav of BadAssBees where I will start on my first WWOOFing adventure: beekeeping. I'm pretty psyched about this opportunity. Then on the 2nd of March I will hitch a ride with friends of friends from Greymouth who are headed up to Motueka for a party. Lest you think I am a real partier to travel so far for a party..well, I'm not, but it'll be a good chance to hook up with some Ice folk and maybe move on from there. Yeah, okay, I confess, Fuelie Ice Folks. I missing that certain eau de deisel they sport.

Click on this searchable map for an idea of where I'm going. Click on MAPS in the yellow menu tabs up top, then on the next screen choose "search for a place", choose "World (topographic maps)" and type in whatever city/town/region name I am mentioning in my blog. When you get the map, make it larger (lower right hand corner option on map) and zoom in & out as instructed (upper right hand corner). It's a great tool, and you can track me if you want. There's quite a bit of detail there if you zoom in all the way. I've found it incredibly helpful in figuring out where things are in relation to each other in NZ.

But them there's my plans, as firm as they get about a two weeks out, then...who knows? I'm here for over three months.

So forgive me when I go silent for awhile. From now on I'll be paying for Internet access, and it will be limited. I suspect I'll be completely offline for the entirety of my stay with Pav. Think Kiwi boondocks, folks.

posted by: coldwish at 16:39 | link | comments (3) |
nz 2006

Climbing & Stalking

I am doing people better now. Perhaps I had to have a few doses before I built up an immunity again. Oddly, running into a few good Ice folk helped.

I also found a tree to climb. Scared the crap out of a little boy who came round the base of the tree saying, "Look! I found a school bag!" and pointing at my backpack. He did this just as I reached the downward momentum where gravity does the rest of the dismount for you and I could not have stopped if Mahatma Ghandi had parked himself under that tree. I nearly landed on the boy but luckily he looked up just in time and startled himself out of my way. The look on his face was priceless, and his parents laughed and laughed at him. I apologized, laughing too. Possibly I did not set the right adult example in the Botanic Gardens. I don't think we're meant to climb the trees.

I found a dog. Not yet a cat, but still a four-legged mammal of the furry persuasion. I went into Scorpio Books here on Hereford St (the best bookstore in town, but as with all new bookstores bloody expensive: trade paperbacks $30-40NZ!!) just to tease myself. I hefted books for weight, sat on the wood floor and read Hone Tuwhare poetry. Then I heard the distinctive click-clack of dog nails on the wood floor and caught a glimpse of a short trotting black & white animal heading around the stacks.

I'm not proud. I stalked the dog. With great subtlety, hoping the lust & desperation I was feeling was not glaring from my face in that dirty old man way my yearning felt like. After 6 months of not even seeing a mammal with four legs (screw the two-legged or flippered kind) I was ripe for animal contact. But also after 6 months of only being able to approach the two-legged kind (humans) because of the Antarctic Treaty, I felt slightly weird & guilty to be casually yet purposefully slinking around that store following the Dalmation as it browsed the stacks. I caught up to him at the door. I patted him. He stood patiently ignoring me. A store dog, doesn't need more people.

posted by: coldwish at 16:16 | link | comments |
nz 2006

Duck Shit On My Soul

Walked into a store yesterday, pulled in by the colours like flowers and rainbows, a hat store. Or rather, a boutique. It was full of whimsical, charming summer hats in an explosion of colours--all straw & ribbon & feathers & abstract loop-de-loops. I was immediately accosted by two hyper-tanned straight-haired (blown out I'm sure)bottle-blonde women in their 40s. They oozed class, or wannabe class since they were obviously working retail (they did not seem to be the makers of the hats). One look at me in my quick-dry hiking pants, Tevas, unmanicured toes and fingers, unmade-up face, sunhat, pack on my back and they easily dismissed me with their frozen smiles. I could hear them thinking, see them thinking "wrong sort, not gonna spend". Indeed they were right. But the hats were so fun that I wandered the small store touching and admiring, complimenting their wares, followed by a blonde.

"These hats are lovely."

"Lovely." She echoed.

"I love how whimsical they are."

"Whimsical." She said.

Everything I said, she repeated the key word and made a hmmm noise in her throat. She wasn't going to waste her time even saying thank you, or accepting my compliments. I was tempted to spend the $50-$100NZ on one of the hats, after all, I'd been saving money for 6 months and my resistance against impulse buying was low. And one green frothily subtle hat, I could see on my mother. But I left, impulse firmly swatted by their attitude.

A few blocks on though I found a leaf on the sidewalk, sitting in the shade under its tree, folded and curved around itself like a tiny change purse.  What was so odd about the leaf was its colour and texture. It looked like kid leather, golden and soft and wrinkled like the finest quality leather, as delicate and tearable looking as paper, but durable and flexible. I picked it up and felt it. Indeed, it felt like leather. I held it gently in my hand on the way to the Botanic Gardens to climb a tree, and it was gentle & light in my palm.

I am not as enchanted and lustful toward greenery as I hoped to be, not so easily swayed. Perhaps that'll come when the green I see is no longer as kept and groomed as it is in the city, even in the gardens. I have just come from nature, wild in tooth and claw, a great expanse of unconquerable white danger & threat, and now green is lacking impact on me. It is so innocent. Perhaps I am overwhelmed and allowing my senses a vacation. After all, six months in an office, even an office in Antarctica, is six months in an office.

I went barefoot on the grass in the park. Hmmm....barefoot on grass = barefoot in duck shit, acorns punching into the softness of my too-long-shod feet, tender as they are. I want my feet tough & dirty after a summer's worth of rollicking about barefoot, stomping in puddles, plucking dandelions between my toes as I run across the grass, soles almost impervious to the heat and jagged footing. I want to hop blithely from stone to stone along a rocky coast.

Enough of this city crap. I'm ready to get out of here.

posted by: coldwish at 06:08 | link | comments |
nz 2006

Scanning the Faces

I need to stop scanning peoples faces looking for the familiar, the comfortable. I am twitchy with it, swiveling my head parsing all the faces in the crowd on the street next to me. I am looking for Ice faces, yet at the same time, I think I would duck if I saw one. The current risk of ducking is that I will pop into the sex stores that fringe Colombo (the main drag in Chch) and be seen doing so by said Ice face. Unless I have a vibrator afterwards to prove I really meant to go in there, it'd be a bit odd. Jewelry stores sparkle, shoe stores dumbfound, fashionable people parade in weird clothes, skin all exposed and vulnerable. Too much input. Too many colours. Too many noises. Too many people to scan. Can't stop scanning.

Went shopping again, this time with a list. Stood in a chemists and twirled in place, vibrating weirdly, completely disabled by the colours and light and people. Luckily a nice young woman came over and very carefully (I must've looked a bit scary) approached me and offered help. I blinked at her, looked away, unfamiliar face, looked back, distracted by blue to the left, red to the right, a little orange over her shoulder. I could not keep my focus on her face so I looked down at my list and read from it. At least my handwriting was familiar. I read & she fetched.

I did this in all the shops I had to go in, except the grocery store, where I fondled vegetables and fantasized strongly about what I would do with them. Lusted so much I bought a bit more than I'll be able to consume in the next few days: One tomato (red, so red, so plump and sweetly scented); Two small courgettes (zucchini, sauteed gently to a slight wilt and a bright green in garlic, butter, salt & pepper, sliding off the pan onto my plate); One cucumber (crisp & green & summery...I imagine cucumber sandwiches); One small head of broccoli (butter, salt, the whole green flowery tightly budded thing in one sitting); One onion (crisp orange papery skin, sweet bitter sliced thinly long strings sauteed in butter. Do I detect a theme?...butter butter butter); EIGHT heads of garlic (it didn't come any smaller, and for 99 cents Kiwi a bargain to boot); A small knuckle of ginger (oh what a piquant and devastating smell arose when I cracked it off the main body of a root); Five small portobello mushrooms (earthy and warm smelling like deep forests and dark topsoil); One avocado (small & toad-skinned, dark green lumps on bright green indentations...needs a few days to ripen. Toasted bread, sliced tomato, avocado, olive oil, salt & pepper. Dribbling down my chin, messy & crunchy & soft & filling.)

Didn't see an Ice face my whole excursion.

All this and I forgot to eat. I have lost the habit of mealtime effort. Didn't eat breakfast (the effort!), barely ate lunch (sushi rolls at the food court in the mall), but oh my, I am planning my dinner. I can see it now.

Leaving Akron Lodge Backpackers tomorrow for a night at the Celtic, then after that a night at Frauenreisehaus Women's Hostel. It is peak season in NZ and all the backpackers are full, it was hard to even find a Saturday night stay anywhere.

Frittering away great gobs of time packing & organizing my backpack, alone in my room. Away from people.

And who can recall after so long that feet need sunscreen? Must remember. I can see I could have gotten a worse burn than the light pink they turned. Tevas, toes wiggling free in the sunshine. Foolish redhead.

The humidity still puts a chill on me. My clothes feel damp and if the sun hides behind clouds and there is a bit of a wind, I can feel it all over my body. Odd to feel chilled in weather 30-40 degrees warmer than where I came from. Bought long thermal underwear, just in case it lasts while I'm hiking.

Missing the Ice.

posted by: coldwish at 14:00 | link | comments (3) |
nz 2006

Getting to Know Humidity Again

I am back in the land of the living breathing chittering squeaking singing rustling beeping honking crying. Yeah, well some of it is good.

Realize there are things I did not miss:

Cellphones. They ring, people talk into the air, I look at them. I'm listening because they might be talking to me, and because that listening is forced upon me by their proximity. Gack! It invades the privacy in my head I seek on buses and city streets.

Cars/traffic. I've been out of traffic for long enough that I don't have the look both way instinct back yet. I'm waiting for what before I cross? A rumble? A beep beep beep back up noise? The crunch of tires on gravel? Without all those clues, these damn cars on their damn pavement just sneak right up on me and scare the crap outa me.  Oddly though, having been away from the left/right driving difference for 6 months, and not having driven at all, I'm at least not tied to the look left then right habit. If indeed I look I'm swiveling my head back & forth in terror before I'm 10 feet from the roadway I seek to cross. So, that's a good habit here in NZ where they drive on the opposite side of the road from North America.

Decisions. Holy bloody hell it was odd to walk into a small dairy (corner store) looking for bread, eggs & butter only to come acrupper of the thousands of possible items I could be induced to want & buy. I got the eggs & butter and was halfway down the block before I realized I'd failed to remember the bread. I damn near didn't go back to get it, because I wasn't sure I had the strength.

Children. Youth. Kids. Infants. Adolescents. Teenagers. Yup, didn't miss 'em at all. Not happy to see them back. Kids are awful. I admit it. Antarctica is perfect for me. Not that there aren't adults down there who act like kids, but that's usually when they are drinking.

Perfumes/colognes. Hello? What the fuck people? Lay off all the scented crap. You don't need mango-smelling hair, lily-scented armpits, babypowder-perfumed feet, plus all the millions of creams and powders and other things that accumulate on our bodies as we bathe. Yick! Chill out, we don't smell that bad.

Strange faces. I am scanning all faces for signs of recognition, and strangers alarm me a bit. It is not that I seek other Ice folks, I have not seen any except when I was back at the CDC doing the repack/unpack thing for several hours yesterday, but I am also avoiding strangers. My defenses have not come back yet, and I find interacting on the simplest of levels ("Do you have a half dozen eggs?" "Where does the bus stop?") to be needful of preparation and the girding of loins. I ventured to the CDC and back to the backpackers, the dairy, and no where else. I have not gone to climb a tree or wander the streets. Too much too soon.

And the things I missed:

Humidity.  Finally when I pick my nose I no longer have to use a backhoe and various other excavation tools, I can just apply tissue and honk and out it shoots. I no longer even need to be on such intimate terms with the geography of my nostrils. The boogers that grew in my nose in that dry environment were remarkably like stalactites, with the occasional stalagmite if I lay on one side all night. And with that comes my sense of smell, as mentioned above. But on the positive side what I am smelling is flowers, greenery, and earth (not dirt). I'm smelling clouds and wind and mountains and ocean.

Though, oddly, the humidity has me getting chilled easier, as the bed does not warm up as fast, my clothes are constantly slightly damp. When a slight wind blows I feel the chill faster even if I am in my fleece. Humidity makes me feel more vulnerable physically, as I can feel the weather on my skin more intimately.

Hot food. Eggs with butter. Bus schedules. Seaside. Fluffy clouds. Spider webs in the shower. Flies scaring the crap out of me in the kitchen. Who knew things flew?

It is not so bad really, I just am adjusting right now. I'll be fine. I am not as enchanted by what I thought I missed as much as I anticipated needing it when it was gone from me. I am suspicious of my own yearnings, indeed I had forgotten about the whole need for feeding myself. I've been fed and watered three times a day non-stop without choice or cost for the past 6 months, and I can't quite bring myself to go to a restaurant yet, but I am also not yet feeding myself well. But this is only my 2nd day back in society. I've got a shopping list of vegetables already. I will cook tonight. Simple food.

OK, enough delaying the inevitable. I've got to go out and brave the world again.

posted by: coldwish at 07:37 | link | comments (3) |
nz 2006

I Fly

Nuff said.

posted by: coldwish at 10:49 | link | comments (2) |
nz 2006, housing 2005-06

With Apologies To Robbie Burns

Up in the Morning Early
by Robert Burns

Up in the morning's no' for me,
Up in the morning early;
When a' the hills are coverd wi' snaw,
I'm sure it's winter fairly.

Cauld blaws the wind frae south to north,
The drift is driving sairly;
Sae loud and shrill's I hear the blast,
I'm sure it's winter fairly.

The loaders sit chittering with their horns,
A' day they fare but sparely;
And lang's the night frae e'en to morn,
I'm sure it's winter fairly.

In fact, on Monday morning I failed completely to heed the call to arms of my alarm clock. I'd gone to bed at 8:30pm the night before and with earplugs firmly in place, hat pulled down over my eyes, pillow on my head, I did not wake to the 6:30am alarm. I did not wake up the the return of my roommate at 7:15am. I did not wake up to the phone call my co-worker made to my room at 9:40am. When I did finally wake up, to pee, it was in a state of complete disgruntle that I had been woken, yet again, before my alarm, by the urgings of my bladder. I stumbled out into the hall, unamused by my neighbours' early moving efforts involving open doors and music. They must be annoying the people still in bed at this hour, I thought.

Pushed open the door to the toilets, tilted in the direction of a stall, and noted, as I passed the open stalls, that all the seats were up. We don't have a coed toilet, except for the stray late night visitor halloooing "Man on deck!". So, that meant, the toilets must all have been clean. So, that meant, What The Fuck Time Was It Anyway?

Called the office from the hall...10:15am!!

I think my co-workers don't love me enough. If they loved me they would have tried calling a few more times and someone would have come over to my room and knocked on my door. Used one of the keys we have so many of and keyed into my room to see if I was okay.

I heard the flimsiest excuses from them all day..."We figured you needed the sleep." "We didn't want to wake your roommate [a daysleeper]."  Really.

Maybe I put my earplugs in too deeply?

posted by: coldwish at 07:34 | link | comments |
housing 2005-06