Corolla

It is with great jubilation I announce that we have bought a 2000 Toyota Corolla.

Oh, sweet standard. How I missed shifting gears. Blue is a lovely colour, not that colour was a deciding factor. Darla seems to like the car too. She can't wait for her first car ride!

Now we can finally get to all the things on our to-do list - such as purchase supplies to build our raised garden beds on the backyard slope so that I can get all the seedlings out of my living room.
I foresee a lot of gardening for the rest of the month. And we've just had a stretch of cool rainy days to really soak and prepare the ground.

Spring Has Sprung

With exams over we're moving on.
Today I dug into our gardening project for this summer. I began to turn the soil on the slope. Keeping sure footing on a slope while you dig is not easy! I only got about 2/3 done. And I've decided to leave the rest for Robin! I also cleared away most of the old tree, the branches of which I'd laid across the areas to be gardened to keep grass from growing. It worked quite well, and the gardens have the added bonus of pine-needle mulch. I was pleased to see many worms in the ground. I can't wait to get some wood to build the beds!!! Many of the seedlings are probably aching to get out there too!
Thursday we have plans to spring clean. I'll cheer after it's all done I suppose. I intend to finally finish lining our kitchen cupboards too.
We're still car hunting. I hope we get something soon!

PhD Candidate

That's me.
I wrote my last comprehensive exam yesterday. Yippee!!!!
I am confident that I passed - this exam went far better than my general exam.
So now I can move on to the next stage of research.
But first, I'm catching up on podcasts (particularly Deo's Shadow), cleaning the office (maybe get to the house), and NOT reading.
It's cold out today - a good reason to stay in. If it was warm again I'd want to be outside instead of in here catching up.

Robin's new shift is a great day shift. 9:15-5:15. Sure enough he got one of the split "weekends" - but it gives him Saturday off. And the idea of breaking up the week is appealing for now. Challenging the split might (would likely) mean getting two weekdays off. Plus, I'm sure the shift will change sooner than later.

Take a break??

I met with one of my committee members today, and he advised me to stop studying.
Take a break?
What would I do with myself?
I'm not about to pick up another project. So I can't do more 'work'.
So when I got home, I admit, I did do a bit more studying. Then I took Amalthia out on the deck, tuned her under the shade of the deck umbrella, and played all my favourite tunes. It didn't sound too bad for rusty fingers.

And I also confess that last night I watched some TV - particularly Law and Order shows.
I think I've been managing my relaxation time pretty well. I don't feel overly stressed about Friday. Of course, I don't feel perfectly prepared either, but how can I expect to be so in a mere 3 months to learn 30 books and more than twice as many theories. (Some books are compilations of essays.)
So come Friday, I'll know what I know.
No point stressing over what I will forget, or what I might have missed.

I plan on watching Smallville and Supernatural as usual Thursday evening, and then going to bed for a good night's rest.

Thoughts of what I will have to dive into after Friday (more work) are hovering around me, but I'm ignoring them right now. We shall not speak of such things.

In other news, Robin's in the midst of yet another shift bid at work and once again he has crappy options. They're even trying to make people take split days off - which we checked in Ontario's labour laws... they can't do it. Not even with a written agreement between the employer and employee. That's not quite true, they could make employees have a split 'weekend' every other week, but not every week. And since the weeks at his work are always the same schedule, that's not an option for how they currently schedule shifts. But other employees may not realize this, and may avoid a good shift that is supposed to have a split weekend. Then maybe Robin can get the shift and proceed to inform the employer that they will have to reschedule the weekend to accord with provincial law. Well, we can hope for that situation at least. Because otherwise he may be stuck working until midnight!