whose nose twitches as it should and who is as curious as a cat, and with a cat, Poum, who is getting visibly older and who sits in the sun and sleeps most of the day, and when he's not doing that, he's yowling with the loudest yowl in the world. He could yowl for earth in a universe-wide contest. I love them both very much, but I miss my boy more.Life is good here. I have settled in well, and life is now a different routine, but routine, nonetheless. I've stayed home the last couple of days, waiting for a UPS parcel with a new laptop backpack. It's one of those that hangs off one shoulder, like your two black backpacks. That stupid, beautiful leather bag I have ... I don't know what to do with it. It's just too heavy to be practical for me. Not that I'm going to throw it away or give it away, just that it's taking me longer than expected to find a practical use for it. I'll get there eventually.
I've be
en going in regularly, other than the past two days, to Toronto and studying in the library in the mornings, and then walking around Toronto in the afternoons. It works well. I've been to see an exhibition of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM); I've had hotdogs almost every lunch hour (tasteeeeee!! and cheap); I'm planning on a visit to the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) this week to see the renovations. Helga said they were amazing, and I've seen her pictures, and they do indeed look amazing. I'll have an update once I visit. I'm happy and satisfied to be back in this marvellous city, but I miss NZ unceasingly.The weather, before yesterday, has been just beautiful. Hot, dry days with brilliant sunshine and cool breezes. Then yesterday, it became as you would expect in southern Ontario - humid, oppressive, heavy, hard to breath. Today was a bit better. I can't wait for the snow, but don't tell the others.
Tim has wireless internet at home, and it's so very easy just to slip online and browse. I've been collecting sites with photographers and their work, adding them to my bookmarks. Some breathtaking images. Not the ones here, of course.The first weekend I was here, we went to the Orono County Fair, although unfortunately Carrie had to go to work. It was relatively large... well, not really large, but they got about 50,000 people through, and there were rides and games and carnival food and face painting. I got a straw cowboy hat (natch) and rode on two rides. The highlight of the time was a demolition car derby, where they just drove around hitting other cars until they stopped. The last car left mobile was the winner. The noise was tremendous. Restless kids meant that we were watching a stupid pony show when they had demolition trucks and one of them actually caught fire! We were some put out that we didn't see that, I can tell you. As you may have guessed, I'm a great screamer at things like this. We went with a friend of Carrie's, Kathleen, and her son, Aaron, and Kathleen and I are diehard converts now. Ah, rural life. It was one helluva lot of fun.
Did I tell you much about Melbourne? We went to a wonderful Spanish restaurant (it's in the book). The front door is just up an alleyway, and the alley is covered with the most wonderful graffiti. It's one of the best alleys for graffiti, apparently, at least according to the all-mighty book. I have the feeling that Melbourne is one of those cities that is eminently wanderable. Something to look at wherever you walked. Toronto is much the same. You could easily spend weeks in either city, just walking and looking and coming across interesting parks or shops or houses or ... T
he conference went exceptionally well. I was thrilled to be among my own academic kind again, and they were all so welcoming. They were quite insistent that we have the next one in Auckland, which I'm more than 
happy to arrange. In this case, Auckland is ideal, as cheap sleeps are near campus, as are cheap eats. We were already discussing what could be done in Auckland.
I particularly like this one, just for the irony of it. I mean, what a marvellous youth project!I'll try to post more amusingly next time - Dodes, it's quite a mission trying to keep up. I loved your last one.
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