wednesday april 29

today i spent my usual hour commuting each way to campus, for a total of two hours on the ttc. upon arriving at campus, i performed an oral exam that lasted no more than 90 seconds (probably closer to 60) and then called it a day. as i left school, i was torn between being happy not to have my usual eight hours of classes on wednesday and feeling like i wasted time by spending approximately 25 times as much time on ttc as i did in class.

tuesday april 28

today i decided to take advantage of my day off from school by completing the necessary forms to apply for a passport. when i downloaded the instruction package, however, the 10-step process and the application form that resembled a novel seemed so daunting that i saved it for later, electing to spend my day off doing something more relaxing.

monday april 27

today i finally read the story of the hipster grifter for the first time. although i found the story itself interesting, partly due to my concern that i'd be exactly the type to fall for her act, i felt that i owed at least 50% of my fascination to the title "hipster grifter," one of the most wonderful things i'd read in weeks.

sunday april 26

today i was alone at home, hanging out and watching basketball in my pajamas, with no intention of leaving the house. at one point, the doorbell rang and i went downstairs to answer it. while doing so, i managed to lock the door to our apartment behind me. not having my phone or keys on me, and being fairly underdressed for outdoors, i was resigned to spending most of the next hour in the tiny area in between the building's front door and our apartment's front door. by the time my roommates arrived home, brandishing keys, this room was beginning to feel a lot like a claustrophobic prison cell.

saturday april 25

today i slept through most of the afternoon, on what turned out to be the warmest day of the year to date. when i finally woke up, i felt like i needed to take advantage of the weather somehow, and walked over to the bank. during my walk home, i noticed dark, ominous clouds rolling in. i ended up making it home about five minutes before a thunderstorm began, making me feel pretty good about waking up and getting out when i did.

friday april 24

today i played a game of pickup baseball with some friends. with no bat and only three- or four-person teams, we spent a lot of time experimenting with the best way to simulate "hitting." eventually we settled on the batter closing his eyes and counting to five (so as not to know where exactly the fielders were), then throwing the ball into the field with his non-throwing hand (reducing the potential for many long balls). it worked surprisingly well.

thursday april 23

today i ran into an old elementary school friend that i hadn't seen since high school. he lives in my neighbourhood now. our brief minute of catching up was somewhat surreal -- while all i could contribute was that i was going to a different school now, he informed me that he was married, that his wife was a musician on a one-year tour of europe, and that he was a professional musician playing with a 15 year old pop star named shiloh. oh look there he is in that video.

wednesday april 22

today i went to the campus production studio to complete my production exam. when i arrived, one of my classmates was already in the studio with our teacher, being tested, so i waited my turn outside the door. a few minutes later, another classmate arrived and lined up behind me. "is someone already in there?" she asked. "yeah," i replied, adding: "he's been in there for a while though... kind of worrisome." we chuckled and she said something indecipherable to which i chuckled again in response. two or three seconds later, i realized that she'd said "how long does it take to hide a body?" which was really hilarious. this posed the problem of whether i should add a bigger laugh, acknowledging the hilarity, despite it being far too late by this point, or whether i should just forget it, not giving her an appropriate laugh for a great line. i ended up attempting to split the difference, adding another small chuckle, as if i was still recognizing the joke a few seconds after the fact.

tuesday april 21

today i stayed at school after class to meet with my group for the final day of work before our big presentation on wednesday. at 12:30, after having been working for nearly an hour already, one of my group members mentioned that she could only stay about another half-hour. "yeah, me too," i added, my voice suggesting regret and disappointment at not being able to stay longer. i ended up not leaving until nearly 2:30, revealing perhaps that i hadn't, in fact, needed to leave at 1:00 at all, but rather just really wanted to.

monday april 20

today i was about to leave campus to head home, when i saw out a window that it was pouring rain. having recently lost my umbrella, i briefly considered going to the school's lost and found to attempt to pick up someone else's umbrella for the commute home. in the end, however, having lost my own umbrella in an entirely different place, i couldn't quite justify making such a trade; the guilt at potentially stealing someone else's umbrella and making them get soaked was too great. i just put my hood up.

sunday april 19

today i watched synecdoche, new york with two friends and, when the film ended, was forced into the unenviable position of being the only one in the room who didn't like it. what does one do in this case: voice their opinion and feel fine about it, or censor their opinion to avoid being that guy, the dick who hates what you love. ultimately, i ended up sitting there silently until i was asked, point blank, if i liked it, to which i reluctantly replied, "...................... no."

saturday april 18

today i looked for something sweet to chomp on and found a chocolate egg left over from my easter stash. i ate the whole egg and although i got a little chocolate on my fingers, i thought i kept it relative clean and avoided a mess. later, when i returned to my computer, i noticed a giant chocolate blob on the chair. i quickly checked the back of my jeans and noticed an equally noticeable chocolate stain on the back of them. i have no idea which stain happened first or how either even occurred.

friday april 17

today i went out in the evening on queen street, looking for a bar called the done right inn. i wasn't exactly sure where it was, but had been instructed to look for a purple sign. finally, a large purple sign came into view and i assumed that we'd arrived at the bar. as i walked up to it, however, and prepared to go in, i took a closer look at the sign and realized that it did not say "done right inn," but rather "bates & dodds funeral service." the bar ended up being one more block away.

thursday april 16

today i was standing in line at the wal-mart when the guy behind me in line started mumbling something about the new york mets. he mentioned that they had a great game yesterday, and even namedropped pedro feliciano, a lesser-known mets reliever who will always hold a special place in my heart for briefly being on my nl-only fantasy baseball roster last season. while this man talked to seemingly no one about the mets, an old woman a couple spots back in line jeered "hurry up number 10!" to the cashier in checkout aisle 10, who was talking a longer than average time with her customer. the combination of these two characters in line with me made me think that wal-mart really brought out the crazies during the middle of the day, and made the situation feel sort of surreal. before i got too weirded out though, i noticed that a customer in a nearby line was wearing a mets cap, inspiring the guy behind me in line to make his comments. and meanwhile, the cashier in lane 10 was laughing -- she knew the old lady, it had been a joke! order was restored to the wal-mart express checkout line.

wednesday april 15

today i got on a bus whose route display was intermittently flashing "happy remembrance day!" and "remember our veterans." it took me at least 20 seconds to confirm in my head that i wasn't forgetting an april holiday, and that this bus just had no idea what it was doing.

tuesday april 14

today i met two friends outside the mod club to see metric. we were meeting up just slightly before the band took the stage, and they beat me to the venue, which meant i ended up having to jog for a couple minutes down college street to get there in a hurry. this happened despite the fact that i live less than a ten-minute walk from the venue and had spent the previous two hours doing nothing, waiting for them to make the drive from london to toronto.

monday april 13

today i instinctively started writing my blog entry as if i were on twitter, mentally limiting myself to 140 characters, for the first time.

sunday april 12

today i was asked by my mother if i thought that i had a drinking problem.

saturday april 11

today i was visiting my grandparents when the phone rang, indicating that someone was out front of their apartment building, wanting to be let in. moments later, a bouquet of flowers was delivered to their door. my grandmother had had them delivered to herself.

friday april 10

today i witnessed a lightsaber fight happening through my friend's window. while it was too dark to make out the participants, i saw two of the standard blue lightsabers and one of those dual blade red ones. while this was a little weird, it only became notably strange two hours later, when i passed by the same window and saw them still out there.

thursday april 9

today i experienced my second instance of feeling like a genuine torontonian in as many weeks, when i was introduced to a friend of a friend in london, and she replied: "oh is this toronto-luke?"

wednesday april 8

today i was part of the last small group of students in my production class to head downstairs to get an overview of one of the production studios at humber. knowing that class would be ending by the time we finished the little tour, i spent a few extra seconds before heading down, packing up my stuff so i could quickly grab it when i came back. this meant that i was trailing the rest of the group by about 20 paces. when i arrived at the studio, they'd already let themselves in, and the door had automatically locked behind them, leaving me to knock and hopelessly fiddle with the door handle for the next little while. while someone in the group noticed and let me in after about 30 seconds, i'd already seriously contemplated just leaving and go back to class, forgoing the tutorial entirely.

tuesday april 7

today i received an e-mail from a friend that examined in detail the way that my blog was similar to twitter feeds, and included the following chart, breaking down my 875 updates to date by time of day:

monday april 6

today i saw a trailer on television for the upcoming film fighting. the hilarity of the film's title, which seems to just bluntly sum up the main activity of the movie in a single verb, prompted me to spend a good chunk of the rest of the night thinking of alternate titles for past movies, if they'd used this technique (ie. footloose = dancing; top gun = flying; rounders = playing poker, etc.)

sunday april 5

today i went to call a cab for a friend to take to the greyhound station. when i got out my phone, i realized that i had no idea what the phone number of any toronto cab company was, and that i'd had no need to ever actually call one. deciding not to start now, i suggested just walking out the front door and hailing one, which proved easier. thanks toronto, for not being london!!

saturday april 4

today i passed by someone in kensington market who was in the midst of belting out the "got myself a 40 / got myself a shorty" lyric from the wu-tang clan's "method man."

friday april 3

today i felt, maybe for the first time, like a true torontonian, when, on my way to meet a friend arriving in town at the greyhound station, i was able to offer accurate directions to two different lost travelers.

thursday april 2

today i witnessed a classmate delivering a presentation refer to joseph stalin as "josé staylin," effectively making the notorious russian communist leader sound like a baseball player from the dominican republic.

wednesday april 1

today i celebrated my three-year anniversary on last.fm, which coincided with a free leech day on waffles. best internet-music day of the year!!

tuesday march 31

today i saw wavves at sneaky dee's. still adjusting to set times for toronto shows, i arrived after he'd already started into his set, and ended up spending more time commuting to the show and back than i spent at the bar.