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teddogIt's been a strange week all around.
Monday saw the discovery of fake chicken nuggets. I can't eat real poultry because of a food allergy; before we discovered it, I avoid poultry for years because it made me sick. After the discovery, I cut it out completely. I haven't eaten any poultry since middle school, with the exception of when it accidently gets put in my food by idiots. Long story short, they had these soy chicken nuggets at the caf that were amazing. The taste and texture are so close to the real deal that it left my body very confused. I was eating something that looked and tasted like a food that would make me sick for a day and I had no ill effects.
I would seriously go out and buy these things at the store if they weren't so darn expensive.
Today... er... yesterday marked the last big Friday trip to Hill City. I picked up the last Slayers novel I needed and that was it. Out of everything I'm going to miss from school, I'm going to miss those misadventures the most. Some of people who randomly dragged me out to that place all the way back in late 2003 (skipping part of our English class, IIRC) have become some of my closest friends at the college. Laura, we better have random Silver Snail runs in Toronto.
It feels so odd to think that my time in Thunder Bay is almost over. I've been up here the better part of 2 and a half years.
That being said, southern Ontario is in my blood. Toronto, the Golden Horseshoe, Hamilton-Wentworth, Niagara region, Grey-Bruce; I consider that ALL my home turf. It's hard to explain to people; as Mike puts it "You grew up everywhere". In Southern, one city flows into another, like a series of pools. Even when you're outside of city limits, you still feel that flow, that pulse going through, mostly because the flow isn't what you'd expect. It's not the cold grip of the urban empire; it's something more hard to explain. Millgrove feels like Toronto. It's all familiar to me. You feel the vibe even in media; Red Green is supposed to take place in Central or Northern Ontario, but it reaks of Southern. All of our exported media, like movies filmed in the area, loses it somewhat. But the media made by us for us is a different story. Some smart asses like to make fun of the fact that I listen to CBC's "Here and Now" in the afternoon. The only way I can explain it is that "It sounds like home".
Even the donuts taste different there. I think the slushie snow does it.
This personal love of Southern isn't always shared; many people up here rant about how they hate the feel and the smell of everything to the south. My marketing teacher complained to me that Niagara Falls was "All marketing", but then she didn't grow up in a community where you know that the point of the Falls is everything BUT the Falls. Southern is rude and rough and nasty, but then, I could say the same for the air around Thunder Bay. You get out of a community what you put in. Thunder Bay, for example, feels to me like Mystery Science Theater for some reason. MST3K is just different now. A lot of people comment that the humour in the series is fairly insane, but it comes with the area. Once you've lived in the backwoods where the snow falls for days on end and there's rarely any buildings tall then 5 stories, you can imagine how the show came about. It's the area and the pot, methinks.
I do worry for the students on placement intending to come to Southern on placement. I wonder how they imagine the air smells like as the sun peeks over the skyscrapers or what traffic sounds like as it drives through a blind spot on a dirt road. I doubt that many of them realize what the landscape looks like. The Niagara Escarpment would be dwarfed by the mountains here, but at home it rules the lowlands. Rocky cliffs and outcroppings are replaced by rolling farmland. It looks so pretty from the air, like a patchwork quilt. Our weather is different, too; the lowlands allow storms to blow through in an afternoon, not hover around for days on end. Then again, it floods a lot, there's freezing rain and ice storms and we get some dying hurricanes later into the year.
... I hate freezing rain.
But then, I hate the high prices for foodstuffs, the dirty res showers, bathrooms and sinks, the -50 January mornings, the fact that the sun rises after breakfast and sets before dinner, the awful bus service and the lack of Harvey's and a decent smoked meat sandwich. All of which are not really problems in Southern. I'm going to get my sandwich a half hour after I land.
I want to go home now, like Andy. She's leaving for the airport in a half hour. Lucky little...
I'll probably come up with a list of things I'll miss later. When I feel like it.
Monday saw the discovery of fake chicken nuggets. I can't eat real poultry because of a food allergy; before we discovered it, I avoid poultry for years because it made me sick. After the discovery, I cut it out completely. I haven't eaten any poultry since middle school, with the exception of when it accidently gets put in my food by idiots. Long story short, they had these soy chicken nuggets at the caf that were amazing. The taste and texture are so close to the real deal that it left my body very confused. I was eating something that looked and tasted like a food that would make me sick for a day and I had no ill effects.
I would seriously go out and buy these things at the store if they weren't so darn expensive.
Today... er... yesterday marked the last big Friday trip to Hill City. I picked up the last Slayers novel I needed and that was it. Out of everything I'm going to miss from school, I'm going to miss those misadventures the most. Some of people who randomly dragged me out to that place all the way back in late 2003 (skipping part of our English class, IIRC) have become some of my closest friends at the college. Laura, we better have random Silver Snail runs in Toronto.
It feels so odd to think that my time in Thunder Bay is almost over. I've been up here the better part of 2 and a half years.
That being said, southern Ontario is in my blood. Toronto, the Golden Horseshoe, Hamilton-Wentworth, Niagara region, Grey-Bruce; I consider that ALL my home turf. It's hard to explain to people; as Mike puts it "You grew up everywhere". In Southern, one city flows into another, like a series of pools. Even when you're outside of city limits, you still feel that flow, that pulse going through, mostly because the flow isn't what you'd expect. It's not the cold grip of the urban empire; it's something more hard to explain. Millgrove feels like Toronto. It's all familiar to me. You feel the vibe even in media; Red Green is supposed to take place in Central or Northern Ontario, but it reaks of Southern. All of our exported media, like movies filmed in the area, loses it somewhat. But the media made by us for us is a different story. Some smart asses like to make fun of the fact that I listen to CBC's "Here and Now" in the afternoon. The only way I can explain it is that "It sounds like home".
Even the donuts taste different there. I think the slushie snow does it.
This personal love of Southern isn't always shared; many people up here rant about how they hate the feel and the smell of everything to the south. My marketing teacher complained to me that Niagara Falls was "All marketing", but then she didn't grow up in a community where you know that the point of the Falls is everything BUT the Falls. Southern is rude and rough and nasty, but then, I could say the same for the air around Thunder Bay. You get out of a community what you put in. Thunder Bay, for example, feels to me like Mystery Science Theater for some reason. MST3K is just different now. A lot of people comment that the humour in the series is fairly insane, but it comes with the area. Once you've lived in the backwoods where the snow falls for days on end and there's rarely any buildings tall then 5 stories, you can imagine how the show came about. It's the area and the pot, methinks.
I do worry for the students on placement intending to come to Southern on placement. I wonder how they imagine the air smells like as the sun peeks over the skyscrapers or what traffic sounds like as it drives through a blind spot on a dirt road. I doubt that many of them realize what the landscape looks like. The Niagara Escarpment would be dwarfed by the mountains here, but at home it rules the lowlands. Rocky cliffs and outcroppings are replaced by rolling farmland. It looks so pretty from the air, like a patchwork quilt. Our weather is different, too; the lowlands allow storms to blow through in an afternoon, not hover around for days on end. Then again, it floods a lot, there's freezing rain and ice storms and we get some dying hurricanes later into the year.
... I hate freezing rain.
But then, I hate the high prices for foodstuffs, the dirty res showers, bathrooms and sinks, the -50 January mornings, the fact that the sun rises after breakfast and sets before dinner, the awful bus service and the lack of Harvey's and a decent smoked meat sandwich. All of which are not really problems in Southern. I'm going to get my sandwich a half hour after I land.
I want to go home now, like Andy. She's leaving for the airport in a half hour. Lucky little...
I'll probably come up with a list of things I'll miss later. When I feel like it.
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no subject
Date: 2005-12-17 06:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-18 02:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-17 09:03 pm (UTC)Plus, forget that ambrosia stuff, soy is the food of the gods. Except for drinking straight soy milk. Straight soy milk, while tasting better than cow milk, still is pretty nasty.
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Date: 2005-12-18 03:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-18 04:05 am (UTC)On the flip side, I do agree with you in what you won't miss. XD The bus service IS terrible. (*sigh* Remember when busses would come every ten minutes?) However, I find the sun thing really cool. :) Two and a half years and it's still a novelty. And yes, no -50 mornings for you! XD We've actually been spoiled this year in that regard. And Harvey's is freakin' awesome. Something I do actually miss. XD
I find myself grudgingly missing Hamilton from time to time, because I did grow up there, even though I wasn't born there. I have a love-hate relationship with the city ^^. And I do love to visit Toronto. But I've never lived there. Chances are, I never will.
I also really miss the house on Grosvenor, because I spent many years there and frankly, my parent's house doesn't feel like home, when I've spent less then a year there. And so Thunder Bay became home because of transplanting at the same time and I tend to miss Thunder Bay and think of it as home, so the odds of me returning south are doubtful at best. But who knows?
As for the people going down there - culture shock! XD They've really no idea and can't imagine what it will be like, I'm sure. Just like I was surprised to learn that people here have never seen the falls, have never seen the CN Tower and have never spent a day in Toronto. Talk about backwards. XD
Awww, look, you made me do a nostalgic rant. I BLAME YOU! XD