We're back!

I really should have gone to bed two hours ago, since I have to be up at 9... *grumble*... dang co-head and her morning-person persona... Why can't we have department meetings after the committee meetings? It would actually be simpler for the out-of-towners... you could sleep an extra two hours. ;)

Not much actually happened today, though I went to angrykat's birthday dinner. Far too much food... I now have another meal waiting for me in my fridge. I had lemon chicken and rice soup, Greek salad, and Mediterranean churrasco chicken with potatoes and veggies. No room for baklava. :( Good company, though. :) A group of people were going to see "Million Dollar Baby" after dinner, but I didn't tag along - I needed to make sure that all messages were received regarding transportation to the hotel tomorrow, and that everybody who needed rides was getting them. I still have to print a copy of the agenda to take with me. It might be faster just to write it out in my notebook, though...

I found a couple of job postings last night that Workopolis hadn't sent me auto-emails about, so I fired off applications. One was through an agency called Computer Horizons, for a mainframe developer position, and the other was through Planet4IT. There's another one with the Ministry of Community and Social Services that I'm somewhat qualified for, but they haven't made an online application (or even an email address) available, so I'll have to print and hand-deliver my resume and cover letter.

Otherwise, nothing is happening. So why did I feel like I was suffering LJ withdrawal symptoms, if I have nothing to post about?

Oh, and if you haven't seen the images from Titan, look here at once. The main page now has acoustic data collected from the microphone that was part of Huygens' instrument package, too.

Busy day.

People often tell me "just go to bed earlier" in order to get up earlier. It would work if I could fall asleep... I went to bed around 2:30-2:40 this morning but was still awake at 4:15. I know I was awake a bit later than that but I turned away from the clock so that I couldn't see it. I still managed to get up around 9:10 and got to the Finch station only about five minutes later than the agreed-upon meeting time to meet up with kosst_amojan; cuteteenboy arrived a few minutes later. What I want to know is this - since the subway only starts running at 9 on Sundays, why do the drivers need a break only an hour into their shift? I would have been on time if we hadn't sat for five minutes at Lawrence station...

Anyway, the meetings were productive, which is good. Sometimes our meetings - particularly the departmental meetings - tend to be somewhat social. There's nothing wrong with that - after all, informal methods seemed to work well with the group last year, and most of last year's department members returned this year - but sometimes you also want to get through an agenda in less than two hours and not feel like someone was left out.

Following the full committee meeting, a bunch of us went for dinner in the hotel restaurant. There were some fun discussions about fanfic and slash that may turn into panels. (Mind you, we now have so many fanfic writers in the department that that's one track that will definitely not be short of ideas. ;) ) Note to self: order something different next time. Nearly $19 for a burger, a few lonely French fries and a Pepsi was a bit on the expensive side. I could've gotten a better burger at Lick's for half the price. :( (And yes, I know hotel restaurants are inherently expensive.) I was also a bit irked that the waitress brought the bills without asking if anyone wanted dessert. I wouldn't have minded something else...

rockgoddes was kind enough to offer me a lift to the York Mills station (thanks again!), during which I found myself trying to explain the difference between aleph-null and aleph-one to her six (I think?) year old son. Yes, I'm weird.

I'm finding it interesting that tonight's "Boston Legal" episode is featuring a storyline involving schoolteachers suing the school board for trying to force them to teach creationism against their will. Given the recent news stories about school boards in the U.S. being forced to remove the stickers from textbooks that state that evolution is "merely a theory", and should be considered with an "open mind" (code words for "Biblically false"), I'm forced to wonder: does David E. Kelley write this show a week before the air date? This isn't the first time the show has been unusually topical. I'm also still getting a kick out of Candice Bergen's character, but I'm a bit aggravated at the commercial breaks every five minutes.

Off to bed early tonight, I think. Or earlyish, at any rate. I think. I hope.