Day Trip - Hatley Castle

Ok, I have not just been bellydancing for the last few weeks. I have been exploring!!

A couple of weekends ago I took a day trip to visit Hatley Castle. One of the two castle in Victoria. Hatley Castle was built I believe in the late 10th century, Possible the early 20th, but I not completely sure. The was the home of the Hatley family, then a Royal Military college, and now it is the part of Royal Road University. The Grounds are beautiful. I could look inside the Castle because people were setting up for a function that evening.

I will have to go back to the Castle because I did not have a chance to look at the gardens. There are an English, Italian, Rose, and Japanese gardens on the grounds. So consider this Hatley Castle take 1.

Most recently the Castle has become famous for being Mutant High! Hatley Castle was the site for Xavier's School for Gifted Children in the X-Men films.

Summer time

It's been two months and things are finally starting to settle.

My new job have been going well and I am learning lots about the technical side of librarianship.

I have been very busy for the last two months. First I turned 30 back in May so I was spending way too much time fretting over turning 30. Then I spent way to much time organizing my birthday (but it was a lot of fun).

June has been spent Bellydancing. My dance School, Asmira's School of Middle Eastern Dance, had been preforming at a number of local festivals. On the 28th we preformed at the Selkirk Waterfront festival. This was an adventure because we could not find the parking lot for the performers. No body could tell us where we to park. Eventually, we just parked on one of the main paths behind one of the no car signs. We put our parking pass on the dashboard and hoped for the best. The car was still there when we go back.

The next show was the school's student recital. The big show we have all be working up to. I was in 5 dances (which made scheduling the dances very interesting). But it was good!! This was also my first time preforming American Tribal belly dancing and it was so much fun.

Tribal Sword Dance

Then came a quick show at a local health fair. That was interesting. there were meant to be 7 of us performing and only 4 of us showed up. So we did a lot of trios.

Last was the show at a heritage Day Festival. That was fun too! We had a very quick costume change for one of our pieces and it was not easy. We all had to do a complete costume change from the beautiful, colourful coin skits and bar and belt costumes to the extremely sex black and gold costumes. One member did not make the costume change.

Now that Summer is here I hope to write more!

Long time, No wirte

Hello,

I took a brake from blogging for the last couple of months because I needed to focus on myself. A lot has changed in the last few months so I have need some time to adjust.

My time at Pearson College had ended. I am/was not sad to leave Pearson College. I gained excellent experience there, but it was time to move on.

Luckily, I was unemployed for only a short period of time because I managed to get a job at the British Columbia Legislative Library!! It's a contract position (but everything right now is contract) for a year. My official title is the Acquisitions/Serials Librarian, but that only covers two of my three roles. I also do cataloguing!! Yes I am cataloguing so those two terms of cataloguing classes have paid off!!

The BC Legislative Library is located right in the BC Legislative Assembly. So I am work right downtown Victoria, by the harbour. I am in walking distance from the Empress hotel and the BC Royal Museum!! It's a beautiful building!

For the past month I have been learning my job and there is a lot to learn. By the end of the week I am exhausted, but I know I am going to learn a lot!

3 weeks to go

3 weeks left at Pearson!

So little time and so much to do. I am finishing up my projects at the college. The arrangement and description of the college's archive is basically complete. I just have a few odds'n'ends to organize and it will be done. The back issues of the journals are almost complete. All I have to do is finish setting up the back room into a media centre and the more recent back issues can be displayed on it's new self. I have made progress on updating the science collection. I have weeded and have purchased new texts for the chemistry and biology sections. I have even managed to recycle some old wooden boxes by transforming them into additional shelf space for our paperbacks! Things are wrapping up.

Job hunting is getting tougher. Very few permanent job postings. Most of them seem to be part-time and contracts. Even the library technician positions are few and far between now. I am still know where near to understanding what my next step should be other than to find a job. The stress is starting to build. It also does not help that almost every day I hear of another store or factory closing, unemployment statistics, or discussions on the recession. "The unemployment rate is expected to increase in February". Yeah I know! You can count me as one of the statistics.

To keep myself from going crazy I have encouraged myself to splurge on Bellydancing. My dance school has arranged for Paola Blanton, a famous international bellydancer, to teach weekend workshops in February. The 1st round of workshops was last weekend and the next round is on Valentine's weekend. I have been really enjoying them and I will be preforming in the show with some of my classmates. It's been a really good stress realise.

Countdown

25 days and counting to the end of my contract!

It has begun. My last month.

Do I have another job lined up? No
Do I know if I will be staying in Victoria or moving back to Ontario? No
Do I know what my future holds? No

Yup, the economic crisis has hit the library world. Entry level library jobs are hard to come by. I have been applying, but there is not too many out there. Today the Globe&Mail had an article about the cancellation of BookExpo. BookExpo!!! One of biggest book and publishing events Ontario has to offer is cancelled. Many South-Western, Ontario librarians live for BookExpo. Although BookExpo did have a tendency to bring out the darker side of some librarians. Free books tend to do that.

At any rate, in terms of jobs. All through December and most of January there were a lot of library positions for ECOs, directors, branch managers, and heads of departments, but nothing for entry level or librarians with only a couple years of experience. Basically, every body is holding their breath. People who were considering retiring are now rethinking their plans because of the economic crisis. This means that HR department are having a hard time projecting what their library's personnel needs will be in the coming year. I hope there is a tickle down effect once the top positions are filled. However, to save money, some library's may chose not to fill in the lower ranks until the economy improves. After all, salaries and benefits are large expenses for any organization. I've been applying to jobs where I can. I have had some interviews, but not much luck so far.

It sucks not knowing what lies ahead. I can't make any long term commitments cause I don't know where I am going to be. And then there is the BC vs. Ontario dilemma. I miss Ontario: my family and Friends are there. But I am finally starting to make a life in Victoria. I really like the bellydance community here and I am starting to make in-roads with the Pagan community. I am feeling torn between the life I had in Ontario vs. the life I am developing in Victoria. In Victoria at least I am starting to get a life. If go back to Ontario, eventually, I will have to start over again. But is that not part of life? My parents moved from Scotland to Canada, from Alberta to Ontario, and from Oshawa to Ottawa during their life. At least from my time here in Victoria I know I can reinvent myself.

In the end I have to go where the job leads me. I just hope I am going in the right direction.

Operation Home for Christmas - Success

Operation home for Christmas was a success. I made it home. I left on a 9:00 plane to Calgary and then spent 8 hours in the Calgary airport. My Christmas was spent in an airport. Christmas became another day in my world. The place was not very festive. I read a 400 page book and walked around the airport a lot during my time there. As the departure time for Ottawa came closer I met a gentleman returning to Ottawa after spent time with his daughter and a "partier" (read between the lines as you will) from Pemberton (near Whistler) on his way to party in Canada's national capital for the holidays.

My flight to Ottawa was delayed by almost 2 1/2 hours because the flight crew needed for my plane was stuck on one of the connecting flights from Victoria!!! It's hard to get off the Island.

WestJet had scheduled an extra afternoon flight to Calgary for the 25th to help with the stranded people from the 24th. I guess I could have taken one of the afternoon flights, but if I had been stuck in Victoria and watching my flight be delayed again I would be freaking out. I am happy I took the morning flight and watched my flight to Ottawa be delayed.

Anyhow, the flight crew eventually arrived and I landed in Ottawa at 3:00 am!

The last few days I have spent with my family and a couple of friends. My nieces have grown a lot and I have helped in showing at least 2 of them in the joys of Knitting. I leave for London, ON on the 31st (weather permitting).

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Operation: Home for Christmas - Pissed Off

It's sunny! As of 2:30 this afternoon the rain stopped. There is blue sky and sun. If WestJet had just waited one hour they would have had a clear sky and runway for take off. I am so Mad!

What bugs me the most is that they didn't even try. One the 21st, with the snow that covered everything within 5 minutes, the plane had leave Calgary, reached Victoria, circled around the airport twice before the air authorities told them to turn back.

Today they just cancelled with out even trying. The plane would have taken off if they waited it out.