Whistling tunelessly...
Hello,
Well, it’s one conference down one to go. Overall I think it went well. The presentation was fine. People actually showed up and asked intelligent questions, which was a concern since I was presenting on the last day and wasn’t talking about either ballast water or zebra mussels. That is one problem with going to an aquatic invasive species conference, there’s a lot of ballast water chit-chat. And I get to go to a second one next week… Oh. Joy. No, I’m kidding (sort of). I’m sure it will be a lovely conference. So, yes, overall, conference = good. Although the sessions were organized by organism (instead of, I don’t know, by question) so I did learn more about tunicates then I ever really wanted to know. For those of you who aren’t aware (and I’m assuming everyone that might possibly be reading this falls into that category), tunicates are aquatic invertebrates, and causing havoc in some of the maritime fisheries. Yeah, they named the concurrent sessions by organism. It was odd organizing, but great for mockery purposes ([In overly cheerful voice] “I’m going to tunicates this afternoon!” or “Oh curses, I can’t go to Bullfrogs! It’s on at the same time as Plants!”) so I guess it all evens out.
Montreal was a lovely city though, although it did rain the entire week we were there. And the Montreal Canadians were eliminated from the playoffs, which was very sad and so the city was in mourning. It was actually pretty funny; on the evening of game four you should have seen the number of police officers wandering around the bars and the pubs around St. Catherine’s St. I’ve never seen so many law enforcement officials in one place at one time before in my life, except maybe on television.
I’m going to Halifax next week, which should be good. I had to make a poster for it though. I hate making posters. They just seem so pointless to me. For one, in what other situation would you ever have to make one? Seriously, when am I ever going to use that skill again? I’ve just jinxed myself haven’t I? My job is going to consist almost solely of making posters now isn’t it? Sigh…
What else has been going on? Not much. Am in the process of working up the courage to go swing dancing in Waterloo when I get back from the conference.
Mom has a new ally in her quest to get me to visit home more. I was talking to my parents on the phone a couple of weeks ago when nephew picked up the extension. After the usual greeting and me asking him what he was doing (“Talking on the phone.” Ah, of course. How silly of me.) He gets to this, “Why aren’t you home?”
My reply: “Well, because I’m at school?”
Nephew: “Why?”
Me: “Because I have to go to school.”
Nephew: “Oh. You come home soon?”
Me: […]
Luckily at this point my sister managed to get the phone from him. I feel that this development isn’t any too fair.
In other news, Murdoch Mysteries continues to be possibly the most ridiculous show ever.
First, last week the plot was ludicrous. I’m not even going to explain the case to you. I explained it to Best Friend and I believe her head was spinning at the end. It involved a missing child, a dwarf dead in the river, an automatron war machine and the usual accompanying warmongering, a (fake) blind assassin (hey, I wonder if the reference to the Margaret Atwood novel was intentional?), a Prussian spy (even though I’m pretty sure Prussia didn’t exist during that time period), and whatever the 1905 equivalent of CSIS was.
However, the episode is kind of fantastic if only for the following exchange between the Prussian spy and the CSIS guy:
“Murdering liar!”
“No you’re the murdering liar!”
“No, YOU’RE the murdering liar!”
Until the inspector yells at them both to shut up. This is made all the more amusing by the fact that CSIS guy is played by the guy from Slings and Arrows who sells water and tells Richard to get him on the board of directors to help out the festival.
Also, when the automatron mysteriously disappears George runs in with:
“Sir! There’s been reports of a giant metal hooligan on a rampage!”
And this week, well, not quite as good. However, the case did feature a surly parrot as a witness, and Murdoch was injured so George was acting detective, which was funny. Also funny, when Murdoch is injured and the woman who owns the boarding house he lives in and her friend come to visit him. I feel at this point I need to point out that because we only have rabbit ears on our TV, CITY doesn’t come in that well so the picture is really blurry and it’s hard to make out any kind of detail. So her friend says like two things, and I’m sitting there sure that I recognize her voice, but she’s just this little old lady in a bonnet, and the picture’s so bad, she could be anyone. I figure she’s just a random Canadian actress, and I’ve seen her in some small part somewhere and dismiss it. Then, she’s comes back later and actually has more than one line, and I realize, no, no I definitely know her from somewhere. I recognize her voice… who is that? Is that… IS THAT MARTHA BURNS? It was totally Martha Burns! Dressed up as a little old lady because it turns out she was a confidence trickster. Every so often Murdoch likes to feature Confidence Tricksters. I cannot tell you the absolute glee I experienced watching Martha Burns play a confidence trickster on Murdoch Mysteries. Also amusing, listening to them say “Confidence Trickster” a few thousand times at the end. This makes four Slings actors on Murdoch. Clearly Susan Coyne should be next.
On the other hand, the love story plotlines, a little sickening (much as Murdoch hallucinating Dr. Ogden amuses me, although, again, it was more amusing (and weird) last week than this week). I wouldn’t mind it so much if it wasn’t happening so very quickly. Now, I will readily admit that I will suspend disbelief for television shows really easily, too easily one might say, and one of the best things about this show is that it requires you to suspend disbelief pretty much continuously. But usually only for the cases, not the character interactions. And I’m sorry, but I can’t believe that Murdoch starts and ends relationships as quickly as he seems to be doing. I understand that you only have 13 episodes a season, so you’re a little crunched for time, but seriously, maybe it would have been better if you’d extended it over a couple of seasons or something, because this is getting ridiculous.
On the other hand, if this show gets cancelled I am going to be so, so very sad, because it just brings me such joy.
And that is all for me for now. Oh except that I got a new userpic. It's from this British TV show Black Books about a really sarcastic, antisocial bookstore owner. I thought it was appropriate considering how much of a whole lot of nothing this entry contains.
Oh, and also, on the way back from the lab I saw a one-legged goose standing in a puddle. I regret the lack of a camera as now I'll never be able to photo-shop in an eye-patch and a peg-leg and make an icon out of it.