Inclement.
Yesterday, FunkyPlaid and I walked downtown on some errands. As we left our flat, we both remarked on the loveliness of the day, blue skies barely clouded, and yet somehow we still managed to get caught in a short downpour on Princes Street. This confirmed my suspicion that Scottish clouds just dip their bellies in blue paint from time to time. Today as I sat and hammered out some metadata at my volunteer post — which was exactly six times more exciting than this sentence sounds — the building shook. After a twelve-year stint in California, I am no stranger to shaking buildings. It just hadn’t occurred to me that the wind could shake a building as much as the ground could. I hopped off the bus in an unfamiliar part of town just so I could...
Read MoreHIDWtS: Thanksgiving in Scotland.
This Thanksgiving edition of How I Decide Where to Sit is dedicated to reviewing all the rookie mistakes one can make when riding public transit in a new city for the first time, because it is kind of like what the Pilgrims did when they– no. Even I can’t torture that metaphor. It is dedicated to rookie mistakes because I made them all today and I need to laugh about them with you. I waited thirty minutes for a bus whose arrival time as reported by the phone app was stuck at "21:39" before giving up and walking to a stop of a different bus that seemed to be showing up every ten minutes. I assumed that the stops for the line going inbound were in generally the same place as the stops for the line going outbound. I forgot about the driving on...
Read MoreBluster.
I like St Andrews more each time I visit, and I already liked it a lot the first time. There are great people there, and books and learning and junk, and also videos of sneezing pandas. To commemorate my deepening affection for this place, here is a really fancy postcard that it took me all day to make. Or my iPhone did it in about two seconds. Walking to the market last night, I was gently picked up by the leaf-addled wind and set down a few yards in front of where I started. Since it was generally in the correct direction, I saw no need for alarm. This happened about four more times on the way there and back. Bluster. I forgot about proper bluster! Such polite people excused themselves as they bounced all over the walk. Every once in a while, I caught a...
Read MoreMental map sutures.
O, look! It is a photo of the castle! Another photo of the castle! And not at all because it is one of the only places I can recognize in the city! No, no, not that. Actually, it is a photo of the castle because I watched FunkyPlaid take a picture of the castle with the moon just so and I had to take one too. But his is better. But I took one too. So, you see, I am twelve. The exciting part is the part that has no picture, where I somehow recognized not just the castle but a whole string of things — including Starbuxen and libraries, yes, okay, so I am predictable — and was able to recognize them not in some arcane card-flipping memory game but in the actual field, the actual walking-about time and needing-to-navigate time, the pertinent time, the...
Read MoreVisiting St Andrews.
Due to an international banking error — those are fun, let me tell you — we do not have a car yet. FunkyPlaid wanted to show Mike around outside the city, so he rented a car and the three of us sped off to St Andrews. I hate being the little old lady in the front seat, clutching her purse, but there I was, incredibly nerve-wracked by the seemingly arbitrary rules of the road. I loosened up a bit with the M90‘s standard highway-ness. Still, it is embarrassing and disappointing to be so thrown by UK driving. Our visit was entirely worth the stress, of course. Not only did we get to show Mike around, but we ran into another friend from the store who is a first-year at the university. Small world, indeed. We all...
Read MorePacking highlights.
Although this is hardly my first day of packing for Scotland, it has been a long one, filled with Kleenex (yay, head cold) and boxes I never unpacked from my last move and lots of stuff I simply do not know why I own. And now, some highlights! Weirdest discovery: my very first mobile. I tried to sell it nine years ago, but I guess that didn’t work. I will be donating it through Call2Recycle. Packed for storage: my entire poetry library. I may regret that, but it will give me a good excuse to use the public library system while I am there. Thing I thought I would want to keep but don’t: my high school yearbook from senior year. I contacted my school’s alumni association to see if they want it. (Thanks for the idea, Unclutterer!) Books, books,...
Read MoreHIWDtS: Bye-bye, lady.
Every once in a while, I encounter the N-Judah Greeter. He is a sweet man who says hello and waves to everyone who boards the train, and says goodbye and waves to everyone who leaves. Most people avoid catching his eye, because that is his signal that it is okay to wave and talk. He spends a lot of the time in suspended animation, looking expectantly at each new passenger, hoping for eye contact. As soon as the person looks up, he waves and exclaims, “Hello!” Women get a “lady” tacked on the end. If the person does not respond, he repeats himself a few times, then stops and moves on to the next person. If you, like me, respond, then there is a short script: “Hello, lady!” “Hello!” “Where are you...
Read Moredomino effect
I gave up and ordered a new camera battery charger. The old one must be somewhere, but I have no time before our upcoming trip to Scotland to sort through all of my boxes. Believe me, there will be some serious purging of useless belongings happening when I return. My handy countdown widget tells me that only 23 days remain until our trip. It is so paltry to say that I am excited to see this beloved country, this heart-home of my beloved, and to meet and re-meet friends far away. I am beyond excited. Every time I read a page in a guidebook I start bouncing in my chair and have to put it down. I know that no small part of my excitement stems from a frantic need to be Not-Here for a short time. Living in San Francisco has become exhausting, and because this is such...
Read Moregrateful for travel
I can hardly sit still long enough to write this entry — today FunkyPlaid and I bought our tickets for our trip to Scotland this autumn! We will be there for just over two weeks, and it will be my first time in Scotland. FunkyPlaid lived there while he earned his graduate degree in Scottish history, and he has been there many times, so I will have an excellent guide. My visit to Scotland is also laced with emotional symbolism; FunkyPlaid and I spent two rollercoaster months getting to know each other before he moved to Edinburgh, and I was more than a little envious of his big adventure. Existing in Edinburgh with him will bring that part of our history full-circle. It will also be a litmus test to see if I can stand to live there in the future...
Read MoreNestcam
The cam was last on Friday, May 4.
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I am Halsted, a/k/a cygnoir, and I do stuff with words.
My favourite things to do with words are keeping this diary, writing stories, and organising information.
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