This Thursday, after my first week without the previous music librarian, my boss told me that I was doing great. Which was a bit of a relief, because I failed in finding a piece for the Theatre people (because it doesn't exist) and a piece for a string quartet student (because it isn't published) this week.

Oddities discovered this week include a large selection of subject heading authority files in French in the cataloge, such as Musique de piano, 2me siecle, which we also have in English ; the fact that I am starting to punctuate my sentences with MARC punctuation ; and that hotdogs roasting over a fire outside smell really, really bad.

I went to look at a place that my building manager told me about today, a bedroom, living room, and bathroom in the basement of a family home, and it was nice but it would add another 10 minutes onto my half-hour hike to work and I would really prefer to move just once and to some place where I am either sharing a kitchen with a roommate or have my own kitchen, because this whole moving into other people's spaces thing sucks. (I am currently sharing a room, and it sucks for a number of reasons, but it is very difficult to find non-staff accomodation housing out here in the summer so I am trying to not complain.) The local papers come out on Tuesday and Thursday, so I'm just going to try to be more on top of picking up those and calling the listings.

This week I decided to make use of my $12 gym membership, so I went to a yoga class that was supposed to be the easy one, according to the archivist, who does a lot of yoga classes. However, the regular instructor is on vacation and the substitute ones made it a difficult class, which meant that I couldn't raise my arms above my head for two days. I am thinking of perhaps taking up swimming instead, since I have no idea how to use any gym equipment except the treadmill and there are plenty of nice outdoor places to run here, and all the other classes take place while I am working.

One of the churches in town was having a yard sale this weekend, so I went by on Friday and picked up a bunch of cutlery, a nice chopping knife, a plate, a set of interlocking cookie cutters like my Mom has, and an old mixer. It is not big or pretty like those Kitchenaid ones that come in awesome colours, but it works and only cost $10, so I am excited. I will be making cookies later tonight, mostly just to use it.

I have been making frequent use of the public library here, going two or three times a week, just browsing and picking up anything, really. I read A Complicated Kindness last week, which was weirder than I was expecting ; I have been working my way through The Rest is Noise for three weeks now, and it's fantastic, well-written, and it makes me want to listen to everything he's writing about, which slows down the reading process ; I read Where Is Here?, which is all about how Canada was shaped by maps ; I am currently in the middle of Dead Souls, which is weird but not as weird as other Russian novels, and David Sedaris' latest, which I bought, as the library's copy had an extensive hold wait list. It's well worth the purchase, though, especially the section about Japan. The public library has a good display of new and recommended books, so I've mostly been going for those. Last summer I read all of Anthony Trollope's Palliser series, so I feel like I should find something equally substantial (in terms of volume) to work through, but I refuse to delve into the mysteries section of the library and most other non-YA books are not written in series, so perhaps I'll just pick up War and Peace.