God my back aches today. Still, I need to do laundry so I have clean clothes to wear to class this afternoon, so I guess it’ll be a move around then use the heating pad type of day. I already got some groceries for us, since I was in Giant Tiger and they do sell some perishables. Their plus size area seems to have disappeared though. Not that I ever bought any clothing from there, but I still like having the option. (of buying cheap, poorly made clothing. Woo!)

I have my portfolio page to write about yesterday’s MI 201 class. I think I’m going to ponder on paper how odd I find the desire to live close and be social, yet they won’t invite someone into their homes unless they’re very close friends. I wonder if it’s the same for Morocco. I should ask Abdou, or save it and ask him as my professor later. Make myself look all clever. ;)

It’s weird trying to run my days now with school there, looming over me. That sounds a lot more negative than it actually is, it’s just there. I have class at 2:30, I want to leave by 1:30, so I have enough time to do… blah. The structure it brings to my life is both awesome and really difficult to get used to. I mean, I resent that I had to go grocery shopping this morning because it takes away from my limited pool of time I have to take care of other things.

Also, working in the evenings on anything more focused than reading over my notes and pulling out the main points is not going to happen. Sara bounces around, Mike wants to talk or wants affection ( I mean, really! Hrmph! Hee) the cats are everywhere, and I feel like I need to be on as Mommy as well.

Oh, there’s a tangent. Sara’s new guilt trip method is to exclaim that I’m shooing her because I don’t want to spend time with her. I apparently don’t want her around. Yeah. I shoo her because if she was left to her own devices, she’d show up at school around noon and go to bed around 2am. Plus, she’d never get decent sleep so she’d be a foul bitchy bear to be around. Also, her room would devolve from messy to an allergy ridden hell hole. She’s 10. She needs to be told what to do to a certain degree. Oi.

Oh well. Parenthood, whee.

Imaginus was on Campus last week. (big university poster sale) I got this lovely watercolour of a cat for Sara, a phenomenal photograph of a family of lions and I finally bought myself a Georges Meis print I’ve been coveting for a few years now. It’s currently on my wall behind my desk, but I suspect I’ll frame it before long. The more I look at it, the more I realize that I like it so very much because it’s the picture I would have shot myself. The framing is exactly the way I like to do it.

I’ve always known that we enjoy the art that we ourselves would create, but it’s never been quite as clearly displayed for me as it is now. It also makes me wonder if I’ll be able to break out of my composition mind set and shoot what is considered good photojournalism. At the meeting on Sunday the guy was going through examples of Pulitzer prize winning photographs, and I kept thinking to myself “wow, that’s… plain” or similar.

Blasphemy, I know. It just doesn’t appeal to me on an artistic level. Plus I have serious issues with the concept that there is ever a time that someone’s private grief needs to be photographed and shown. I don’t believe there is a tactful way to stick a camera in someone’s face when they’re in pain, crying, afraid, etc. To say otherwise is delusion. I guess I’d feel better about the concept of photojournalism in negative or difficult times if it was more honest. If I wasn’t sitting in a chair reading a slide show put together by a young man who makes it very plain how he feels about “getting the shot” in his tone alone.

But then again, I choose to never watch or read the news because I think it is emotionally and spiritually draining. I choose to not be someone that watches people hurt, kill and torment each other then turn it off, perhaps tisk a few times and then go on with my comfortable North American life.

And I have no idea how to go on from that point. Good thing that the timer saved me. That’s 30.