Meet Me On the Sunny Road

Two and a half months in, though it feels longer (in a good way).

Things are swell with me lately. The cats are all getting along and I enjoy the orchestra of purrs and meows when I come home from work.

The weather is warming up in Iqaluit and it is making me quite happy.

For the last few days I have been entered into the vast kingdom of dog ownership. I am dogsitting for a coworker while she is out of town and so far so good. I never really pay much attention to dogs as I've never owned one and 99% of them annoy me. The dog I am taking care of now has been trained exceptionally well (props to my coworker for that one). It's like he understands English, it's amazing. I've never had an interest in owning dogs as I'm a cat person through and through, but this little guy is nice to have around. I have him down at my place and I feel like I'm living in a zoo sometimes with 3 cats and a dog. The cats don't mind him too much. The kittens love to chase him around and then turn the other way and run from him. They run under the bed (where the dog can't get under) and poke their heads out at him. It's pretty funny.

The weather was so nice out today that I took the pooch out for a walk around Nakasuk School area. I think I might have enjoyed it more than the dog did. I love being outside when it's warm out. I know I'm acclimatized to the north because according to Weather Office, it was only 4C while I was outside. It felt like it was at least 15C, though. It was great.

So I am almost definitely buying a vehicle in about a month. I am pretty sure I am buying a 2002 Suzuki XL-7 off an acquaintance. Words can't even describe how excited I am about it. This will be my first vehicle and I'm proud to own it in Iqaluit all by my sweet self with my own money. I have decided that I altogether get too much of a kick out of never having to share anything.

I have been sharing a little bit lately, though. I found someone to share my couch with for Guitar Hero, movies, and my favourite: Seinfeld reruns. I've even been sharing my cooking and baking creations. Yes, Mom and Dad! I said cooking! I made us dinner the other night which he thoroughly enjoyed. My successful dinner has motivated me to cook again tonight which I am going to do after this entry.

Anyway, back to the not sharing part. It is really extraordinary how much I am prospering just by fulfilling my need for alone time. I know a lot of people don't like to live alone, but now that I've experienced it, I don't think I'll ever have it any other way. I enjoy doing two things you would rarely find me doing prior to April: cooking and cleaning. My apartment is clean and my stomach is always full. I work out regularly, my bedroom and bathroom are tidy, and I even find time to vacuum and sweep weekly. I'm unrecognizable!

10 Days In

So I have survived a week and a half!

So far I have eaten at 3 different restaurants: The Frobisher Inn, The Discovery Lodge, and The Nova. All three surpassed the nicest restaurant in Rankin which is a very nice change. However, The Discovery Lodge and The Nova were quite expensive. Many thanks to Janice, who treated me to dinner at The Nova. Although I had only been in town a few days, it was nice to see a familiar face.

I've got myself all hooked up with Qiniq and I am happy about that!

Work is going well and for the most part, the days go by quickly.

I'll hopefully be moving into my own place next week. I'm housesitting at the moment and I am so desperate to fully unpack my stuff. All of my things have been in Rubber Maid totes since the end of January and I am getting quite sick of it. I long to place things on shelves and in drawers. It's sad how strong such a banal desire is!

I've been driven around town enough now to have a basic understanding of where things are. I'm really hoping I am put into an apartment downtown because I do not own a vehicle and I'd rather not have to use taxis everytime I want groceries or to check the mail.

I'm enjoying being by myself. The first few days of being alone were strange but I've mostly adjusted to it now. I'm used to talking A LOT more than I am these days, so I feel like a total chatterbox when I call friends and family in Ontario. I really enjoy not being woken up at night, not having to share food, cleaning up my own messes, not having to remember to be considerate of someone else, not having to look at another person's mess, and best of all: not having to listen to another person or their music or TV shows. I am obsessed with silence. That's one thing I really like about the north. It's so quiet. You can go outside and hear absolutely nothing. I love that. So needless to say, only hearing myself in this townhouse is amazing.

I hope this blog is interesting in a two-fold kind of way. On one hand, I have just moved to a place where I don't know a soul, and on the other hand, this is my first time being completely on my own. I've never lived by myself before and I've never had to depend on myself so much. There's always been someone around to help me. So I hope if you're reading this that you'll look forward to reading about the tremendous growth experience I've just begun.

Alone in Nunavut

Well it looks like Clare and us newbies are the only ones left in Nunavut this holiday (oops, forgot Northern Sights are still in Nunavik). Actually, I should correct myself. I just noticed a new blog, M&M Cape Dorset Newbies who just arrived here, so I don't think they are flying back after 8 or 9 days in the north.

We are in the midst of blizzard #2 right now. Good thing we didn't want to fly home because we wouldn't have been able to in this weather.

Jeff and I took a walk in the blizzard last night. We jumped in a snowbank and fought the wind and it was pretty fun. Everything was snow-encrusted by the time we came back. My new aviator hat does not work very well which is too bad.

Today's big plans are to go to Ivalu gift store. Jeff's never been to it because it's only open from 10-5 M-F but it's open today for the Christmas rush. We'll also hopefully be having some people over later.

On Christmas, we are going to a friend of mine's for lunch, and a co-worker of Jeff's for dinner. It's going to be nice to just let people feed us all day. I am looking forward to it.

Well, we probably won't have anything to say for the next little bit, so happy holidays everyone!

(posted by Jaime)

Alone on the Mainland

Jeff has gone to Coral Harbour until 11pm tonight so I'm alone on the North American mainland.

I had a Guides meeting tonight which I had to lead alone because our main leader had to leave for a family emergency. I was really nervous about leading Guides alone, especially since we had so much planned. It turned out pretty well, though. We had a mom helper who I honestly couldn't have done tonight without. She was a huge help.

I knew from reading other blogs that Inuit people won't always nod their head to say yes, they'll raise their eyebrows instead (like what people in the south do if they didn't hear something). I've been looking to see somebody do that, but I hadn't seen it yet until tonight. I had to ask a girl if something lying on the ground was hers, and the conversation went like this: "Is this yours? ...Is it? ...Is this yours? ...Yes? ...It's yours? ...This is yours, right? ...Right? ...This is yours? Yes? Okay."

After tonight's jam-packed meeting, I think I will relax by drinking this excellent Pepsi and watching some good old television.

On our sidebar I've added "resources for future Nunavummiut." Since one of the aims of our blog is to help people who are moving here, I finally got around to posting those links. If anyone knows of any other links that would help people who are moving here, please let me know.

(posted by Jaime)

The First of Many Brrrrs!

Wow, it got down to 3.7C last night! Ouch!
For you Americans, 3.7C is 37F.

Jeff and I have a weather monitor thing. One piece goes outside and then the actual monitor part tells you the time, the temp. inside, and the temp. outside. It also records the maximum and minimum outside temperature since it's been last reset. It's pretty neat, it's fun to always know what temperature it is. Unfortunately the sun skews the outside temperature during the day. Yesterday when Jeff and I headed out to the Quickstop, I looked at the weather monitor and said, "Well, it's 32C, dress accordingly!" We both laughed while we continued putting on sweaters.

Jeff has gone to Coral Harbour until tomorrow.

Today on the agenda is to buy some more Hostess chocolate chunk cookies and to drop off my confirmation of acceptance into Nunavut Arctic College. I don't remember if I wrote about it, but I was accepted into the Office Administration program. I'm way excited to go to school again. I'm not sure how college-y it'll be (by Ontario standards) but either way I'm sure it'll be fun. I had my transcript faxed over there and I wondered if they would understand the course codes since they're different everywhere. Sure enough, they called me and told me I needed to come do their math and English test, which they only make you do if you don't have grade 12 math and English credits, which I do. I wasn't worried about it, though, since I did well in school, especially in math and English. Jeff had told me that they asked for me to come a bit before 1pm but I didn't get there until right on the dot of 1pm and I felt bad about it...until I saw that everyone was still on lunch. I used the chance to walk around a little bit, which made me more excited to go there. I finally sat down on a bench and decided to wait for someone and about 30 seconds later someone returned, knew who I was, and told me that they had been mistaken and I don't need to take the test.

I'm lucky because the college is very, very close to our building.
Here is how close it is:

The red building is the college. If I take the shortcut behind the Tapiriit building, it's like a 40 second walk. It rocks.

Our cat has serious mental problems. Ever since she got spayed last month, she can't stand not having attention lavished upon her 24 hours a day. Right now she's sitting at the door cry-meowing. She only stops when I quit what I'm doing and play with her until she gets tired or until Jeff comes home. She only seems comfortable when we're both here. It is seriously freaking annoying and I have to wear earplugs to bed after Jeff leaves so I don't lose my insanity the way I am right now. It is very, very annoying dealing with this every single day. I don't know what to do with her, she won't snap out of it. I am hoping she quits once I go to school so she won't be used to someone being home with her all the time like it has been since she was spayed.

Anyway, my brother made a neat cartoon for us. Check it out.


P.S. I also want to take the opportunity to say that because of our lovely site meter, we know where all our regular readers live. Not specifically of course, but we know what city you live in. We seem to have 1 or 2 Rankin readers. Oh how I wish they'd comment. ;)

(posted by Jaime)

Home Alone, the Sequel

Okay, so being home alone isn't all that bad.
I happen to sleep much better when I'm not elbowed in the face four times a night and rolled on top of another six times.

One thing I'd never know about myself unless I slept alone is that I hardly move at all. I wake up and the sheets are still all perfect. When I was kid, my mom would tuck my blankets in all the way around the bed (minus the head) and I'd wake up with them still nicely tucked in.

There has been construction going on outside our building since we moved here and this morning I heard the most awful, deafening sound. It sounded like metal...crushing against rocks. And that's what it turned out to be. Some crane thing moving around on the rocks. Argh, it was the worst noise in the world. I thought my ear drums were going to pack up and move out of my ears for good.

Other than that, Home Alone Day #2 is going quite well. It's sunny out with hardly any clouds, about 17C, and I got real mail...with money in it! Another wedding card came, so if you're reading this Bob H., thanks! I think Jeff's mom was trying to tell Jeff something...she sent some nicotine patches. Heh.

Jeff called me last night and said Yellowknife wasn't as exciting as he thought it would be. I think he was expecting some bustling metropolis a la Toronto or something. After he got off the phone with me, he was going to a bar for a beer. I told him it would probably taste amazing. He has promised me rum upon his arrival so I am looking forward to that, if it happens. I reckon I would pay about $30 for a rum and Coke right now.

(posted by Jaime)

Home Alone in the Sub-arctic

Well, Jeff is gone for Yellowknife until Wednesday so I'm here alone until then.
I can't imagine how I'm going to spend my time alone here. Anyone is free to come visit me! Ha ha ha...I slay me. Of course, you're not really free per se to come visit because the cheapest it would be for probably any of our readers is around $900.

I just came back from applying to the college. I was starting to get even more frustrated because I called to see if anyone was there in the guise of wanting to know when the program started. The girl that answered my question sounded like I just wrecked her day. That is definitely one of my biggest pet peeves. It's not that hard to sound friendly. I should know; my last job was technical support for an Internet company. I know how annoying customer service is, but it's not hard. End of story.

Anyway, I embarrassed myself a little bit at the college because I was outside knocking on the door and ringing the bell because I could not get the door open. I didn't remember it being so difficult the last time, so I kept knocking until someone came and told me the door was open all along. The man who took my application looked it over and then told me his grandparents used to live in Sarnia (Ontario; which is where Jeff and I are from). I thought it was a weird coincidence. I expect people up here to be from BC and Alberta and whatnot...not from our dinky little town in Ontario.

So now all my errands are done and the only possible thing left to do is housework and I don't have the proper equipment yet for such duties. What a great excuse, too bad it'll only work until the movers bring our stuff.

If you have any suggestions on what I can do until Wednesday night, by all means, tell me! I've had about as much as CBC Radio as I can handle and I don't own any computer games.

(posted by Jaime)