This one goes out to the ones I love. This one goes out to the ones I've left behind. A simple prop to occupy my time.

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Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Your Heart is an Empty Room

Sometimes I think that Toronto is large enough for me to get lost in and feel happily isolated, but other times I am reminded by just how small it is. The past week and a half have brought about random run-ins with people that I haven't seen for at least 3-5 years, some even since high school. It's just interesting to see where some people have ended up and where others just haven't. Mostly I am glad to see that a lot of us made it out of that prison called high school, alive and relatively sane.
On Saturday night I went out with Gosh and Hayley (both high school friends) on a boat cruise organized by another high school friend. I haven't been to a club in about 3 or 4 years but apparently the music hasn't changed that much. I mean, I know that the music has changed (and changed quite a bit), but apparently I was stuck in some time warp in the Toronto harbour for 4.5 hours.


Time Warp Posted by Picasa

It was so bizarre and made me realize how superficial that scene is and how glad I am that I choose not to relive my early 20's every weekend. I had to drink heavily to make it through that night. I started out with the relatively tame rum and cokes and by the end of the night was onto the gin and tonics. Hayley and I at one point were observing a couple on the dance floor next to us, when the guy suddenly grabbed the girl's face and drunkenly professed that she was 'sooo beautiful' and then he went in for the kiss. She stood there kind of surprised but then just let it happen. It was so utterly ridiculous and arbitrary that Hayley and I had to suppress our laughter. I mean... does some ridiculous move like that still work? I guess it must because university students still manage to get laid frequently enough off of bad pick-up lines. I also have to admit that most of the people I met early on in university weren't particularly suave either. I guess I must be a cynic or something now, because if someone said things like that to me I would have laughed in their face and stomped on their toes. But that's just me.

Anyways, I had today off of work because the remnants of Hurricane Katrina were supposed to hit southern Ontario, but that was a bit of a bust. It ended up being humid and overcast with occasional sunshine. Most of the rain seemed to occur during the night -- I know this because I slept with my window open and could hear it softly falling all night. It was not at all like the torrential storm we had on the 19th which could have passed for Katrina except that it manifested itself 13 days before Katrina was born. I guess I shouldn't complain too much because I had the opportunity to go out and buy the 4th Season of Six Feet Under and the new Death Cab for Cutie album. Both of which are awesome. I just finished watching downloaded episodes of the final season of Six Feet Under which is pretty traumatic but the final episode is amazing and I thought it was a fitting end. Alan Ball is a genius... the way he depicts reality kind of feels like the way I perceive it a lot of the time. I am definitely going to miss that show, but I think it was fair to say that it had a good run and it was time to move on. At least I can re-live the drama on DVD. Sometimes watching the episodes again makes me laugh because the first time around I find that I was usually a bit stunned by the events to fully absorb the very dark humour that pervades the circumstances. Anyways, enough of the gush... I have to get into bed because I am definitely going to work tomorrow. Our new site is awesome. It's got 57 features of fun-ness. Yesterday, Steve and I dug a small privy! Yes, I did sanitize like a mad person afterwards... but it was still cool and we got some dirt for soil floatation. Wes also found a coin from 1852... pics of a coin in much better condition, but of the same design are below.


Half Penny Obverse Posted by Picasa


Half Penny Reverse Posted by Picasa

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Sunday, August 14, 2005

Ennui

Cassie always finds good quizzes which makes me want to go and waste time by filling them out too. This one is a bit bizarre, but was still satisfying to fill out. It was about trying to determine one's sense of humour via three variables, which you can see the percentages of below. Apparently I am somewhat twisted and dark. The darkness I can see, because I have been aware of that for years now, but twisted and slightly cruel humour may reflect my current state of mind which is kind of frustrated since I feel like my life is confined to a box. I think I need to relax and learn to cut dead weight from my life, know what I mean? Sometimes, you need a good clean sweep. Anyways, read the results of my weird sense of humour.

The Cutting Edge

(61% dark, 46% spontaneous, 26% vulgar)


3 Variables Humor Test Posted by Picasa

your humor style:
CLEAN SPONTANEOUS DARK

Your humor's mostly innocent and off-the-cuff, but somehow there's something slightly menacing about you. Part of your humor is making people a little uncomfortable, even if the things you say aren't themselves confrontational. You probably have a very dry delivery, or are seriously over-the-top.

Your type is the most likely to appreciate a good insult and/or broken bone and/or very very fat person dancing.

PEOPLE LIKE YOU: David Letterman - John Belushi

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

~You scored higher than 80% on dark
~You scored higher than 59% on spontaneous
~You scored higher than 47% on vulgar




Can you tell I am bored today? I have updated the blog like 3 times and am still kind of obsessing about what I can change about it. I could change the template but I did that last autumn and I really don't want to spend the time doing that now. Besides, I still sort of like the simplicity of this format, although like 4 million other bloggers also have it. Maybe I should take some basic programming courses when I get laid off this winter. I could learn AutoCad for usefulness in my supposed archaeology career and then fun stuff like graphic design.
Oh, who the hell am I kidding? It's obviously not going to happen just like taking more Greek and Latin this year is so not happening. Not if I have to work and save money to go to school next year and the following 3 years. Which leads me to the realization that Newcastle still hasn't gotten back to me about deferring my start date. I know it is the English way to ignore stuff until the last minute, but really, when I don't show up on September 26th, bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and ready to have my ego blasted for another 4 years, do you think they will check their emails and realize they should've been talking to me right now? Well if not, they will definitely know it when the tuition payment doesn't go through.

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Header Picture Change

I've procrastinated an awful long time in changing over the details of my blog from Vancouver to Toronto, and now it is August so I am thinking I should finally change the lovely photo I have been using as my header for a long time.
I have three panorama shots of TO that I like and here they are. Opinions are welcome about what I should choose. Keeping the Vancouver scenery sadly isn't an option, Cassie. If I move back there, it will be. I just want the blog to reflect where I live at the moment.
So, here are the candidates:


Toronto1 Posted by Picasa


Toronto2 Posted by Picasa


Toronto3 Posted by Picasa

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J.C. Trull Site (AlGq-72) - Darlington, ON

As promised, here are some pics I took on our last day at Trull. You can see that it was a particularly bad haze day over the construction site. Normally you can see Lake Ontario because we are located right on the shore of the lake, but it can hardly be seen through the pollution at 8am. The construction site is currently on the first three fields in from Courtice Rd. and our site was in the fourth field. As a result, we could drive out across half of the Construction site and park with other workers' vehicles, but then we had to walk the other half of the way into our site, which was still somewhat sheltered from the nastiness of blowing dirt and noisy machines.

If you are wondering why the features like the root cellar are excavated in quads, it is because they are so big and the Ministry only requires that 50% of a feature be excavated as long as a satisfactory range of artifacts have been found. Excavating in quadrants also provides four profiles of the fill.

The well was not excavated, because it's not that safe to dig them out and it looks like a lot of the stones from the original circular retaining wall had fallen into it. Wells seem to be commonly filled into with field stones rather than midden material full of artifacts. Although artifacts have been known to pop out of wells and we did find some around the rocks at the surface.

I am really sorry that the photos of that pipe didn't turn out that well, but it is clear enough that you can get an idea of what it looks like. It came out of one of the test units that we placed in the midden.


Construction site at Darlington Posted by Picasa


Construction at Darlington - See the HAZE Posted by Picasa


8am - Darlington Construction Posted by Picasa


The filled-in well aka large pile of rocks Posted by Picasa


The Well  Posted by Picasa


Through the woods, to other 'finds' Posted by Picasa


Abandoned Car in the Woodlot Posted by Picasa


Yep, It's a Plymouth Posted by Picasa


It's seen better days Posted by Picasa


Collapsed Barn Posted by Picasa


Collapsed Barn2 Posted by Picasa


My favourite Tree at J.C. Trull Posted by Picasa


The Whole Root Cellar - Quads 1 and 3 not taken out. Posted by Picasa


Feature 15, Quad 4 - The Root Cellar Posted by Picasa


Feature 15, Quad 4 - The Root Cellar2 Posted by Picasa


Feature 15, Quad 2 - The Root Cellar w/ Drain at top Posted by Picasa


Feature 15, Quad 2 - The Root Cellar & Drain Posted by Picasa


Cross-section of the West Drain attached to Quad 2 Posted by Picasa


The midden with 1 test unit put in Posted by Picasa


Artifacts found on the surface of the midden Posted by Picasa


Clay Pipe - bad profile Posted by Picasa


Clay Pipe with Face on Bowl Posted by Picasa

 
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