Home!

Home again as of one seedy still dirty feeling from the airport hour ago. Home again as in one chatty how has the weather been how did you find the service with United taxi ride. Home again as in chirpy 'strange I have lots of energy and I'll unpack now and then do my washing and maybe make a cup of tea' energy rush which is now crumbling in the face of the aeroplane coffee wearing off, my body clock kicking in and the luscious expanse of bed laying with it's arms wide saying 'c'mon, it'll be lovely.

Home and a week worth of stories banked up ready for the telling.

Home and excited 'fresh eyes around the house' sensation which is so nice after being away.

Home and 'have I been inspired by my trip? what is fresh on the to do list now?' musings.

Home, and more stories later.

A quick hello from Montreal, City of...

Bikes
Yes, they're everywhere. If you were allergic to bicycles, this would not be a good city for you. These bikes also frequently have baskets - made of old milk crates, in jaunty colours. New 'bike taxis' (DIY bikes for hire from stands in the street)scattered liberally and loking very appealing - maybe tomorrow I'll try one...

Blokes
Ooh la la. So this is where all the dark haired, urbanely dressed, lanky and suave or surly and muscly good-jacket-wearing French speaking straight men have gone. Well, now I know. I have to keep a spontaneous little smile in check when I see shortish, solid, behoodied, shaven headed, gorgeous, clear but blank faced youths who look like they're about to be photographed for the Face magazine. Or the kind of tall, casually haired and elegant, bespectacled bookish men with 2 day growth and layers on. They give good eye contact as well - doubly disconcerting.

Biere
Oh local beer is good! There are micro breweries, local brands of bottled beer, beer related somehow to malt whiskey hops, 'spicy' beer, beer made from buckwheat - many and varied beers. And all good.

Boulevards
Wide wide streets, like my hometown of Radelaide (that's hip 'Adelaide, it's so Radical' slang talk, in case anyone is from elsewhere and tries to google it only to find it doesn't actually exist). Not much traffic, not that many people, and tree lined to boot. Easy to cross. Handy little seats for pedestrians. Loverly.

Berry berry curly staircases
Yes metal stairs that run up the coutside of buildings, like fire escapes, like fancy stairways to heaven. All different colours and configurations. They look elegant but ilke they'd be slippery in winter. Haven't figured out why they are all outside the buildings yet and why they never seem to be brick.

Books
Lots of bookstores, in French mostly. I was even given some lovely tattered second hand books from someone I met here, to keep.

Brotherhood
Well you know, 'fraternetie' in that non gender specific sense. Always blown away by peoples' spontaneous acts of generosity towrds travelers - those brief encounters that extend to a 'well if you want me to show you the city I'm not doing anything tomorrow' or 'well let's swap numbers and catch up in New York' or 'well what are you doing now, come with us, it'll be fun'. Also somewhat surprised when I go along for the ride and put the angsty 'OMG anyone offering to do something nice must be a serial killer' instincts on the back burner, and take up random (yet safe)gestures of hospitality. For example, I have a lunch date tomorrow at a Professor of enviro toxicolgy's home, with her young family, and tomorrow night will be meeting random artsy crafty locals at a pub to watch a jazz band with friends of their in it. Next week I plan to call 'Ian' who lives in NY and was at my conference go out for coffee.

and other things beginning with other letters of the alphabet.

Bonjour

Made it to Montreal! Had extended meandering trip over here punctuated by stop over in an industrial area of Queens, NYC, near the airport. Now, after one night in Montreal, and making myself sleep for 12 hours, my body clock seems to have stopped swinging from 'ON! Excited! Let's go sightseeing!' to 'OFF! Can't move/ eat/ walk/ think - must sleep NOW' every 3 hours which was what was happening before. I'd just go 'woo hoo, second wind, I'm going to go and grab a meal, and explore' and no sooner would I be out dointg that then I'd switch back to 'ooh shit, run out of batteries' and long for bed. Then from midst of deep sleep would 'bing!' to wide awake, after realising I'd only been asleep for an hour and a half. Realising now that a few days of acclimatising pre conference would have been a great feature for the itinerary!
So. Montreal. This not a long post because I promised myself I'd stay offline, and focused, till I presented at the conference - I am so easily distracted! - but felt like a quick and sneaky little post wouldn't hurt anyone.
Grey today and cold. I'm wearing just about everything I packed, all at once.
Bed and breakfast lovely, feel like it was a great decision not to stay in a big hotel. Much cosier here, human touch.
Conference. About to go register, exciting. Slightly nerve wracking. New conference like a big party where you actually don't know the hosts, or what anyone else will be wearing, and whether you'll find anyone to mingle with. You also don't know whether the conversation will be tedious, slightly batty, informative and stimulating, same old, or so esoteric you feel the need to creep away backwards wishing you'd read Foucault and Derrida. Going alone to a confernec very similar to going alone to large party also, you know you're going to have to make a bit more effort on the mingling front, and as a result you may be more likely to meet new people.
I have to remind myself sometimes that I'm actually ok at this stuff - you know the 'hi, so where are you from', the smile nicely, the listening and note taking, the presenting even. I seem to forget and get nervous all over again each time, when really, it's not that hard.
Sorry, just blathering on about me and the conference, very little about this city. First impressions have been good - city feels self contained, grey, grungy, cool without trying, sleety, crouched figures with hoodies under jackets, pedestrian friendly, cycle studded, balcony dotted, spiral staircase wrapped, fillagree treed and delicate morning songed.

Light as a feather

So excited today I feel like air. Packed last night, with help from the gals, aka Amberguity and Miss Snapdragon, support team of ‘telling like it is’ crew – acting as outfit advisors/dinner cookers /trip packing tipsters. Packed. Talk almost done. Slides conceptualized. Bookings made. Trips planned. Excited excited. Ticking things off to-do list, and it all seems possible, do-able, probable. Travel is like possibility made manifest, such magic in dreaming something up, deciding on a whim and then birthing it into being through the little aggregate actions.

Work also going well, moving along, sense of team. I think what I’ve really noticed this past fortnight is feeling supported. Encouraging, kind and helpful people. I’m sure it's just my frame of mind just makes me appreciate this more, and people have always been like this.

Am also really enjoying my contact with one of the peeps on that random internet dating site. And it reminds me that there are all sorts of people out there, and it is possible that one day I might someone new I want to spend time with.

Feel like I might float away, I’m so light.

Lovely box of chocolates

So, imagine that you have begun to explore the world of ‘internet dating’. A misnomer really because it’s not like you want to date Google (well actually google’s pretty smart, I might like to date google), or just have ‘dates’ online, in virtual reality (though with second life I guess that’s an option – where you really would have reason to complain that your date was kind of two dimensional …. Ugh, sorry). No ‘internet dating’ refers to internet match making ‘let me be randomly assigned strangers or trawl through a billion thumb nails of people to choose possibly compatible ones’.

I have been doing this for little over a week now and feel like I have experiences almost all of the possible array of interactions, short of actually talking to someone or meeting them.

For example. My first message from someone on the site was to see whether I’d like to be bound in ropes and participate in certain activities involving his pink bits and mine. ‘Tick’ I thought – not as in yes please, tie me up, but as in ‘here we go, my first classic overtly sexual message from a complete stranger creep with control issues’. I felt like it was an experience I’d been half expecting on the site, and I had it out of the way 5 minutes in.

Next was a few contacts with demure, sweet seeming boys which eventuated into periodic messaging. These fellas asked about my day and asked after my health. Discussed books with me, and were frank about their weekends, and were as gallant as any knight in shining, LCD, armour.

More recently I had my first clear (but hip and not creepy) ‘I’d go you’ style reference within an otherwise chatty-and head flirty but not boudoir-flirty conversation (though – see google reference above, we know the two are linked for me). I did ‘a sharp intake of breath’ like the books always have in them but you never really do. I did that. As I reread and thought ‘did he just mean..? Oh yes, oh yes he did’. And then felt a little bit rosy and pleased with myself. And maybe a little bit interested.

And there’s one, who I’m embarrassed to admit, I seem to have slightly pissed off, by reading his information too quickly and responding to his message hastily and getting certain key facts about his life wrong. Whoops.

This myriad of experiences and variety of people. I am currently having to remind myself that it’s probably a bit like a box of chocolates. If you’re being handed the box, they all do look lovely, and different, and sweet and you kind of want them all, a little bite out of each – but generally that is seen as rude, and in fact the person with the box might get the shits and struggle to get it back from you, and taking the orange creams just because you feel sorry for them because no one else seems to like them probably isn’t such a good idea, and also other people might come and nab the chocolates over your arm, as you stand umming and aahing over the little explanations and photos of each, and actually the chocolates might get snooty, and or you might end up not knowing which one you want.

I go to Rio

Well actually no, that's not true, I don't go to Rio. But I am going to lovely old Montreal and New York (as mentioned every so briefly in passing below). So, just quickly, a bit more on the who when what why how of it all. Conference, followed by holiday. Random mix of acomodation - B&B's, hostels and hotel (specific itinerary produced through a strange algorythm of budget, location and availability). Never been to North America before really except for a brief hourish or so in LA airport as I came through on my way back to Oz from Central America. Hardly seeing the sights, drinking cofee and sitting in airport. So. Very exciting!

Conference is for work, and yes, you'd be forgiven for deducing that things are going rather better back in the office now, after my slow start to the year and, ahem, brief interlude, at the end of last year. The conference looks like it will be really interestnig, great program, interesting topics, interesting side program of mini artsy festivals attached to the main conference. Will tell more details about it when I get back. Oh and I'm presenting. Er. Should be fine, right? Should be a good audience, right? Should be apiece of cake seeing as it's on something I worked on and really enjoyed, right? (Repeat, twice daily, after meals)

So, this week is 'finish the presentation', 'get the outfits ready', 'finalise random bits of trip organising (first night accomodation - note to self, get some)'.

Any general travel tips or suggestions of specific things to see and do in those cities very welcome :)

NB hanging out with BSharp in Noiyoik. [Sorry to tell your holiday news in blogosphere for you miss!]