Financial advice

Wednesday Father and I went to see a lawyer at his office just east of Eglinton station. (I had to miss my Chinese art class, which I hate to do.) He told us that the Henson trust didn't suit me and I should try putting my money into something called segregated funds, where I can put as much as $100,000.  So now it's back to Scotiabank.

I've started translating another of those Portuguese pamphlets about the lives of the saints.  The new one is about St. Philip of Neri, who came to Rome in the 16th century and befriended street children.

In the Facebook game Tribez I'm now at the stage of creating dino coasters, businesses that require a lot of polonarium but probably yield big money.  My investment in planetariums is now paying off in a big way.

In the game Forge of Empires I'm now in the early medieval stage and belong to a guild.  I've started making trade offers in the market section.  Sometimes I offer five of one good for three of another, which could give me a competitive advantage.  It's been over a week since I've been stuck with my forge points at the maximum level, unable to spend them on new developments.

MOBY-DICK

"No town-bred dandy will compare with a country-bred one--I mean a downright bumpkin dandy--a fellow that in the dog-days, will mow his two acres in buckskin gloves for fear of tanning his hands"--Moby-Dick

The other day I finished Lapham's Quarterly and started reading Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (for the second time). Melville creates a whole world, witty and a bit crazy.

Sunday I went to the Aspie Meetup at a house north of Eglinton and Kipling.  I also brought the cookies from Friday's fundraiser.  I only stayed for an hour or two because I didn't know most of the people.  Getting there was a bit of an adventure:  I took the subway to Kipling station then the bus north, and I went back by the Eglinton bus for variety. (Last night I brought the cookies to choir practice and most of them got finished.)

Yesterday was so mild that I took out my spring jacket for just a day.  But it was so windy I had to hold my hat in my hand to keep it from being blown away.  The temperature's now back to normal cold.

Tonight was the last opera rehearsal before Christmas break.  I already have much of the music memorized.  We've now started blocking the first half of Ballo.

Fundraiser

I've started watching the second season of THE WIRE, with Moira who's seen it before.  She prefers to watch it in the afternoon this time, which is convenient for me.  The second season is about union shenanigans.

Thursday I had a dental checkup.  My dentist was telling me that when she was a teenager she was in a theatre group.  She gave me a new mini-toothbrush that's useful for brushing between teeth. (She finally has her name on the clinic door!)

Last night was the opera fundraiser.  This year it was at the Blythwood Baptist Church, where we did the Christmas concert last year.  The concert was in the back room, and the chorus waited in the pews while the soloists performed.

I left the binder in my music there last December, and it was still there! (I'd always thought I left it on the subway.) It also had some memoir pieces that I hadn't blogged.  I wish I could tell Mother about this!

I'd baked gingerbread for the fundraiser Wednesday.  Afterward I got a big collection of leftovers as in earlier years.  Much of it I'll be bringing to an Aspie Meetup tomorrow.

Home fries

"I heard that if the going gets rough, your best bet is the French embassy." "Who told you that?" "The British embassy"--The Killing Fields

Saturday afternoon I saw the Met production of Verdi's Macbeth. (Nancy's acting class had another mock audition that day because she knows that doesn't interest me.) When they interviewed Anna Netrebko during the intermission, she was cracking people up in the green room.  She looks like a live wire!

Yesterday was the Classic Book Club, where we discussed The Europeans.  We decided that our next book after Moby-Dick will be Dickens' Our Mutual Friend.  I was careless enough to order the omelette with home fries and it made me sick later that day.  I've made a new resolution to stick to French toast and waffles and such.

Last night I saw Roland Joffe's The Killing Fields (for the third time) with the Classic Movie Meetup at the Imperial Pub.  It's a powerful, important movie full of telling details.  Too bad I missed a couple of minutes because those home fries were making me sick.

The cold weather has arrived.  Today I started wearing my long johns again.  I looked around for the electric heater for my room, but couldn't find it.

I finally quit the Facebook game Sunshine Bay.  I'm not sure how long I'll keep playing Tribez now that Forge of Empires is my new passion.

Vivid dreams

I've been having some vivid dreams lately.  (A few days ago I ran out of Cipralex and missed some doses, which seems to make my dreams more lively.)

The other week I dreamed of visiting New Zealand.  It was a dream I'd had before, and the place I was visiting seemed so familiar that I wasn't sure I hadn't been there in real life! (I hadn't.) And the other night I again dreamed of visiting my hometown of Sackville.  In this dream the tallest elm on York Street had been reduced to a stump.  I'd been thinking of making an elm tree in one of my future paintings, which may have had something to do with this.  And in this dream, as in some earlier ones, the local cemetery was expanding and taking up nearby space where there had been houses.  Is there some connection here between my beginning and eventual end?

I'm getting the hang of that online game Forge of Empires.  My main focus is on keeping the research going to get to higher levels of civilization, which means producing or trading for the secondary goods that'll open each improvement.  The main bottleneck is producing supplies that'll power goods production, building and military expansion, though I now have fruit trees, goats and butchery.  Conquering adjacent territory has been a low priority lately, though I'll soon return to that when my armed forces are fully developed.  

Happiness is a sad song

Yesterday was the November ROLT event.  Since this was Armistice Day, I focused on sad writing, with the title "Happiness Is a Sad Song." (That's one of those Peanuts sayings along the lines of "Happiness Is a Warm Puppy.") About twenty-five people said they were coming, I made a reservation for twelve, and seven people showed up.  It was unusually successful.

I read the Alice Munro story "Days of the Butterfly" (which I'd read in high school); the last part of the Longfellow poem Evangeline; the Whittier poem "Maud Muller" (with the famous line "The saddest words are 'what might have been'); and the Housman poem "To an Athlete Dying Young." Jane read something from the Marilyn Monroe book Conversations With Marilyn.

On the way out I left my wallet at the Victory Cafe, and only noticed after I got home.  I went back and got it just when John and Kathrine were there for dinner. (Moira wanted me to cancel my Visa card right away, but I held out.)

This afternoon I was uncharacteristically late for the memoir group, and didn't have time to write about the first subject, which was trust, but my mind drew a blank anyway.  I did get to write a whole page on the second subject, which was magazines.

In the evening I was over half an hour late for choir practice (also uncharacteristically), because I'd gone to the party for Olivia Chow volunteers at 21 Cecil St.  I only appeared there briefly, and that to see Nelson L., whom I didn't get to meet on election night.

EUROPA '51

"I'd rather be lost with them than be saved by myself"--Europa '51

The other day when I went to 2Q Video the last Borgen disc was out, so I rented Roberto Rossellini's Europa '51 and saw it tonight (for the second time). It's a moving story about a rich woman who reacts to her son's death by reaching out to the wretched and achieving a kind of sainthood.  Ingrid Bergman (then Mrs. Rossellini) gives a great performance:  I actually looked at her in a new way, something that isn't easy for movie stars.

Tuesday night at the opera we learned the small chorus part for Don Giovanni.  Beatrice had us dancing on the stage, and I did some Arthur Murray turns that really impressed her.  On the way there I slid down a slope in the rain like McNulty in a certain scene in The Wire, and got mud on my stuff. (I would have taken the steps, but they were closed off for repairs and the alternative was a pretty long detour.

Today I went to the Staples at St. Clair & Keele to find a portfolio big enough to hold my works of art without folding them.  It's going to close soon, and the place looked pretty empty.  The thing I bought turned out not to be quite big enough, so I'll try the stores that specialize in art supplies.

I made a reservation for twelve people for Sunday's ROLT event, but thirty people say they're coming!  We'll see how many actually show up, of course.

In that Tribez game on Facebook, I'm close to building the last stage of the observatory, which may open a lot of new quests in all the islands (or may not). It's something I've been working toward for quite a while!