Groundhog Day

I watched my father's chemistry show online this morning, which was fantastic, though I admit that I am biased in this view. It was strange knowing that a few thousand miles away, he was blowing stuff up and making small children scream in fear. He was also burning a hole in some poor unsuspecting person's £20 note. This was not meant to happen, I hasten to add. The note was soaked in a chemical that basically combined alcohol and water, meaning that when set alight, the alcohol would burn off and the note would be protected by the thin layer of water. In theory. In practice, my father didn't actually soak the note properly, and hence had to stamp out the flames threatening to consume the note, much to the glee of the school kids watching. The poor teacher he borrowed the note off will probably never encourage any of her kids to do Chemisty ever again.

Today is one week away from my birthday (nearer 30 than 20, eek), 8 days away from our flight to England, and 12 days away from Valentines Day, though the last one (and to some extent the first one) are generally not worth celebrating.* The flight, however, is to be looked forward to - in a sense. Anyone who knows me will know that I have a problem with planes in general, and ten hours in the air is enough to send me totally insane a few times over. I get through flying by making myself tired the day before and then trying to sleep through most of the flight. When I flew over here, the fact that I had been sobbing for an hour solid before getting on the plane did wonders for my sleepiness, and also my nerves. I was past the point of caring whether the plane stayed in the air for most of the flight! Plus two of the movies were Shrek 2 and Harry Potter, so they were actually worth watching. Anyway, I am excited about seeing my parents again, and am already planning all the nice food I want to eat when I'm home....

I planned to go running today, I really did. But then I realised that my running shoes were still soaking from being muddied during filming on Monday and being washed yesterday. So instead Denise and I made, and ate, pancakes with maple syrup. This was due to our mistaken belief that today was pancake day. Actually, it was Groundhog day, which for those who don't know (and I was one of them this morning) is where people in Canada (and the US) ask certain groundhogs how long the winter is going to be. I mean I knew there was a film about this, but I thought someone had just made it up. Not so. There are a few places in Canada where people gather to watch (named) groundhogs come out of their burrows, and check the weather. If the groundhog sees his shadow, and is frightened back into his burrow, then we will have another six weeks of winter. If the groundhog stays above ground, and doesn't see his shadow, then spring is going to come quickly. The original Canadian groundhog was Wiarton Willie, who died some years back but has now been replaced by Wee Willie. And today, apparently, he predicted that spring was coming. Although two out of the four active groundhog psychics in Canada predicted that winter would be here for another six weeks. Which sucks for us mere mortals who don't have a nice warm burrow to hibernate in.

A quick observation: despite my lack of a job, a love life, or a will to get fit, I am having a surprisingly sane period, you'll be glad to hear. I have lost a little weight since being here, toned up a bit, met some nice people (does messenger count as 'met'?), and have stopped putting myself in positions that are bad for my emotional stability. Now all I need is to stop being irrationally afraid to fly (undergrad modules on human error in aviation disasters have a lot to answer for...) and I will be sorted. But then I guess I'd have nothing to blog about. Swings and roundabouts.

Another observation: I asked my parents for a haircut for my birthday. Now if that isn't the action of someone becoming an old and boring mid twenty-year-old, I don't know what is!!

*Actually, having said that, I miss those days at school when you had the Valentines postbox and got to send cards to all the people you fancied, marked with Xs that were so obviously in your handwriting. I think that tradition should be carried on. I might just randomly send out a load of Valentines cards just for kicks! Look out world....