Decession.

For my distance class, the prof leaves discussion points or whatever on a message board to simulate a classroom setting. Except he can't spell. Or use correct grammar. Or figure out how punctuation works. It is ridiculous.

And for the record I checked to see where he was from (who knows, maybe English is his second language), and he has degrees from MUN and Manchester University in England. Where I think it's safe to say that they speak English.

A small excerpt:

"Lets start with a brief review of stoessingers book "Why Nations go to war. This book differs from most books on war in that most books about the causes of way look at things like religion, economic and other reresources, politics, or a combination of these, as a cause of way. And there is certainly no doubt that these play a major role in why nations go to war. However the text takes a different track. Stoessinger pointas out that while these are important - in the end it is still the leaders of any given nation that must in the end make a decession to go to war and so they must share some of the balme. And he looks at certain individual leaders, and more specifically at their chacteracter flaws. and throughout the book he gives a numbers of case studies to prove his point."

At least I don't have to worry about spelling or phrasing when I'm writing my essay tonight. HE WON'T KNOW THE DIFFERENCE.

P.S. I am now this far in that game I mentioned, helpsies please!

Ransom captive Israel.

THIS IS MY 400th POST, CELEBRATEEE! :)

In addition to my brother’s Christmas gift (Bounce sheets) I sent him a tree that he could put up. I know he can be bahhumbuggy like the rest of the Smith family and I wanted to extend some of the Christmas cheer that I had been feeling as of late.

He sent me a couple pictures to show that he had indeed assembled and decorated it (and you know it's in the Arctic by the tinfoiled windows).
It made me think of a really good idea that I should have thought of earlier. How nice would it be if I got us webcams and we could set them up and go on speakerphone on Christmas morning? My parents would honestly die.

I’m going to mention it to Darryl and maybe if he likes the idea he could order one direct from Staples or something (so it could get there in time).

UH OH, new game challengeee! Maybe we should team up on this one. After a half a day's play I am this far:

Sleigh bells in the air, beauty everywhere.

We bury those things.

Tonight I was really missing my kiddies from the daycare I worked at in Iqaluit. I think about them a lot, over the course of four months you can make some really tight bonds.

So in hopes of curing my heartache I dug out the CD with all my pictures from the summer on it and started to flick through them. I didn’t take a whole lot of pictures, but in the last couple of weeks that I was there I took more and more hoping to keep something to remember everyone by.

I got to the photos of my last day at the daycare and there is easily a hundred pictures. That morning we took the kids to the RCMP station for a tour, it was one of those rare nice days and we made the trek with about fifteen of the kids in tow.

I got some beautiful shots at the RCMP station of the kids. A wonderfully nice (and awesomely hot) guy greeted us when we came in “Hey kids, ladies, I’m Constable Doug and I’m going to show you guys around today.” Well Sheena and I pretty much melted right there. Uniform. Cute smile. Blonde hair. Yum, yum, yum!

And show us around he did “Well kids, this is the drunk tank!” Insert big eyes from me and a “No, uh, it’s just for bad people.” This guy obviously hadn’t caught on that these were four and five year olds.

Man was he awesome though, I kept snapping photos of him left right and center. Hot, stable job and extremely nice to small children… MARRY ME. Sheena kept telling me to ask him to meet us at the Storehouse that night for our leaving town bash. She kept nudging me and going “nooo ringgg!”

A combination of me being chicken, plus already going out with someone kind of stopped that idea. And of course the fact that I was leaving the next day.

Before we left he got every kid an RCMP hat and we took a group photo. As I was trying to get the kids situated he came up to me and said “I can take the picture if you’d like to get in with the kids” and he held out a hat towards me. I could see Sheena and another girl I worked with freaking out because he was singling me out.

But of course the only thing I managed to get out was “um, no that’s okay.”

I was looking at photos of him tonight and smiling to myself thinking about that day, when suddenly I stopped. Constable Doug. Constable Doug. Constable Doug.


"People in Nunavut reacted with shock and grief Tuesday to news that an RCMP officer was shot and killed in the Baffin Island hamlet of Kimmirut. A man was arrested by Kimmirut RCMP several hours after Const. Douglas Scott, 20, was fatally shot while on duty late Monday night. Police have yet to identify the man who was taken into custody in Iqaluit on Tuesday. Charges have not been laid as of Tuesday[. . .]"

I wonder if subconsciously I remembered and that’s why I got so upset when I read about his death.

Tookie.

There have been camping trips in rural areas and picketing in major cities. There have been countless parties and gatherings as well as numerous drives and talks. There has been fights, laughs, tricks and treats, plays and concerts, bingo games, playground visits AND PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING ELSE IN THE PAST SEVEN YEARS. Man, we've done some stupid stuff. But we've always done it together. :)

I have always had fourteen inches on you, and that will never change. But everything else we've shared and that's a pretty cool thing.

HAPPY 19th BIRTHDAY, HOLLY AUCOIN!