Getting around in Ottawa...

Walked to work today. Got here ten minutes late; not bad; I suspected as I left home that I should have been leaving fifteen minutes earlier. Altogether, it took about sixty-five minutes. I'm walking so much more slowly than I used to. And there's all that snow to slow me down.

It was rather invigorating. Pleasant, but too bad I couldn't follow it with a nap.

The news, no surprise to anyone, is that the striking bus drivers rejected the City's offer of a contract and there's no end to the strike in sight.

I find it's given me a new lease, psychologically. I don't need no stinkin' buses! We can cope! Badly, maybe. It's exhausting and inconvenient, diastrously so for some, but that is (or should be) on the conscience of the Strikers and the City, who are so caught up in their own battle they don't care what happens otherwise.

But once the sidewalks and streets are ploughed, and as long as it isn't -40C frostbite weather, I can endure. Walking last night gave me a sense of freedom, and relieved some of the stress I've been feeling.

I hope I don't have to walk to the hospital from the theatre this evening - it would take at least two hours, likely more. But I can if I have to.

Fannish migration and pimping...

catalenamara's interesting post on fandoms today made me want to answer her questions in a post of my own. I'd love to hear and see other people's answers, too.

On writing this, and thinking about it, it clarified a little of what fandom is for me. It's falling in love with a book, show, or movie, and then finding other people to share my enthusiasm with. The enthusiasm was there from the beginning; the fandom was a bonus. In some cases, before the Net, I was a fandom of one. It's more fun when you've hundreds of people to share you passion - especially when it comes to slash fandoms - but that isn't the impetus.

( Q: Have you ever followed friends/favorite authors into a fandom without ever having seen/read the source material? )

( Q. Have you ever really enjoyed the source material, read the work of specific authors into a fandom, and yet have no interest in the fandom as a whole? )

( Q. Have you ever been strenuously pimped by your friends into another fandom and immediately fell in love with the source material. )

( Q. Have you ever gotten into a TV show/movie before your friends and busily pimped the source material to them in the hopes that a fandom would ensue? )

( Q. Have you ever gotten into a TV show/movie and tried to pimp it to your friends only to find out that they’d just gotten into it as well and were about to pimp right back? )

Writer's Block: Comfort Food

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Popcorn with butter and salt
Potato chips with onion cream cheese dip
Ginger cookies (the Swedish kind Ikea sells)
Raspberries
Hot chocolate

... Oh, wait. The question said one food.

Oops.

Looking forward to...

From fannish5: What 5 fannish things are you looking forward to in 2009?

1. Torchwood series 3
   
2. The next set of three Torchwood novels, including the new aduiobook CD, Torchwood: In the Shadows.
   
3. The four upcoming Doctor Who specials.
   
4. X-Men Origins: Wolverine, with its inclusion of Gambit
   
5. Dollhouse
   

I'd like to say the Watchmen movie, and George R.R. Martin's A Dance With Dragons, but I have no faith either of these will actually appear in 2009. I'd also say the new Miles Vorkosigan novel by Lois McMaster Bujold, but I'm not sure when it is coming out.

I'm also looking forward to watching and commenting on more Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes, but that isn't new material - except to me.

Friday...

I went to see maaseru in the hospital again this evening. maaboroshi was already there when I arrived, and we went to get some supper in the cafeteria, and then took it up to eat it at maaseru's bedside. maaseru seemed much more chipper today - she could hardly be less chipper than she was yesterday - though tired, and her knee hurt. Her friend Sue also dropped by, and maaseru spilled a glass of ice water over her bed, which was a few minutes of excitement and drama.

maaboroshi and I shared a taxi to come home. It was a relief. After walking home from the hospital last night, and walking to work this morning, the muscles complain. I don't think I'll ever walk again.

Till tomorrow, anyway.

I am now sitting comfortably in warm apartment (warm compared to the winter out there), with a blazing fire on my television - the budgies love it, and are chirping loudly.