the daily snivel

 

Whew. It's been a bit too long since my last update, so I'm sneaking in one today and hoping that a few people will notice and be gladdened. I guess the first thing I ought to mention is that I have, indeed, finally found myself a job. When last you heard from me, I was in the depths of summer job-hunting despair, but had an interview coming up that I was optimistic about. Well, the interview actually went very well, and a week later I began working at the Canadian Breast Cancer Network, a national information resource database run by cancer survivors. I'm their student research assistant and web content manager over the summer, and I dearly love my job. It is meaningful, challenging, fascinating, and rewarding work. I have to manage a tremendous amount of information (and conduct an audit of the website's hundreds of resources in between), and though I'm only earning minimum wage for the summer, I feel a lot better about my work than if I was slaving for big bucks with some corporate law firm. Heck, a job offer of that sort actually did come up once I'd taken this job, but I wasn't about to go back on this meaningful and wonderful position for anything, even the 3-4 times more money that the corporate job promised. Yep, me and my ideals. I'm going to be one of those incredibly poor lawyers someday, but at least I'll sleep well... in my cheap IKEA twin bed, cold and alone, but morally superior.

In all seriousness, I love my job. I actually look forward to coming in. It's in the busy heart of downtown Ottawa, meaning that I don't have to race like a maniac to get here in the morning, and during lunch I can go for a walk downtown and run errands without having to stray too far. I can bike here in fifteen minutes, which is really pleasant on a bright summer's morning. Cycling, though hectic in downtown traffic, continues to elate me and fill me with puzzlement that more people don't get out and enjoy the fresh air and actually some exercise (forgive me for sounding like somebody's mother), rather than being stuck in rush hour traffic with nothing but beeping horns and the inane blather of radio morning crews to spur you onwards to a fun-filled day.

I will say this for driving, however. It isn't having a car that makes you an incredible bastard, it's just that a lot of incredible bastards have cars. I'm sure many of them have bicyles and Macintosh computers, too, but it's the ones who drive that stand out when they choose to be irritating. Last night, I was cycling home from a friend's house. It was late, it was dark, and I was extremely tired after a long day. All I wanted to do was go home to some friendly faces and my demanding cat, and relax. I was only a few minutes from home after half an hour of cycling, and I had stopped at an intersection as I waited for a light to change. There was also a car at the intersection, behind me, but when the light turned green, it stayed where it was. Assuming that the driver was waiting for someone, I proceeded out and ever closer to home. All of a sudden, I heard the chugging engine crawling up behind me. I checked to make sure that it wasn't going to hit me, and kept going on my merry way. All of a sudden -- THUD. Something hit me in the back. The car sped up and drove past me, with a load of grinning idiots guffawing in the back seat. I tell you, if looks could kill, their car would have caught fire and the doors would have fused shut. I was humiliated and furious, all the moreso when I discovered that I'd been hit with an egg. A fricking egg! Did they have nothing better to do on a Monday night than drive around with a carton of eggs, looking for tired, grumpy people to pelt? I mean, get a girlfriend or a ficus plant or something just a little less pathetic and dumb.

Meanwhile, I'm looking forward to yet another delightful visit by my friend Lucretia, who will be in town this week for the occasion of her mother's 50th birthday. I always enjoy playing the host when she is around, and even if our past together was once volatile, we've both since matured and moved forwards into a very close and loving friendship (for two people who live several hundred kilometres apart, that is).