This is Roli. His owners are away a lot, and he's lonely. So he's come to live with us. He's almost eight months old, he's housetrained and cratetrained, and pretty well-mannered other than he's a bit humpy with Joeby, being au naturel and in need of neutering soon.

I really wasn't intending to get another dog. I don't want to replace Jazz. But at the moment it doesn't feel like that. Cos Roli's his own dog...

On the radio, while I was at work:

"Terry Waite was a special envoy to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who worked as a hostage negotiator until he himself was taken captive and spent almost five years as a hostage. This Sunday on Tapestry, Mary Hynes talks with Terry Waite about how he survived it all."

He was talking about how in times of crisis your body has reserves you aren't aware of, that it continues to go on long after you think it should just stop.

He told Mary Hynes, when she asked him what his ordeal did to his faith, "My faith has been exposed for what it is -- uncertain, questioning, vulnerable."

He also said that his contact with his captors taught him that: "I was probably fairly narrow in my understanding of faith."

He said he learnt that one of the most difficult things is how to live creatively - with people of different backgrounds, and to find a common source.

The interviewer moved on to the question: How can A GOD allow all this?

He didn't seem to have issues around this. Amazingly, he asked her, "How do you view your own responsibility? Have you been a kid too long?"

Near the end of the piece, Mary asked him if he would contribute a song to her informal poll. She's been asking those she interviews, mostly on spiritual topics, to name a song that has touched them in some spiritual way. Waite said, very quickly, "Please Release Me." And sang a few bars.

Then he said no, he was just kidding, and picked, and I was very surprised: A Whiter Shade of Pale. Which has been, since I was about 16, one of my enduringly favourite songs. He explained his choice by saying that there's Bach in the background, and so I went looking for that, but it turns out it's only inspired by Bach. Or so Wikipedia says. (And you may know I have issues with Wikipedia, since they tried to ban me as a 'possible sock puppet')

Do I have any faith? I don't know. I think if I do, it's more than vulnerable. What do I believe? Certainly I know I err on the side of personal responsibility... And yeah, different backgrounds can be difficult. That the faith of another makes sense in their context, even if that context seems fake or contrived to me. Is the outward expression of grief ever not sentimental?

So many things that happen to me at the moment, I can't talk about. Not that I'm trying to be coy, or anything, but I can't discuss what happens at work. And I wish I could, because some of it is very emotional. It was court week this week, and we had folk on remand staying the week. Usually the lockup is just drunks or mentally unbalanced folk. Not much in the way of conversation. I'll never understand drunk people. I mean, if I've already said no you can't have any coffee until you're sober, and then you start insulting me (I get a lot of racial/sexual slurs) do you really think I'm going to go, "Oh, dear, I'd better give you coffee so you stop calling me names." I know the Innuinaqtuin for stupid white chick. So don't think you're fooling me with that either. I also know most of the names for sexual organs.

Anyway. This week, with regular sober folk, I actually had some conversations, and felt like I was actually doing something useful. At 4 o'clock the other morning, before a couple of them were due to appear in court, I was listening to their anxieties...

What I'm saying, I guess, is that it feels strange to be writing a blog that can't really reflect what I'm doing. When I was running the lottery booth, I used to be able to report on my strange happenings. But not now.

I'm so jealous.

Well, not so much as a regular thing, but certainly right now. I'm jealous of the young blonde pretty girl who has blithely reclaimed her job after maternity leave. I don't think she appreciates how good she has it. But, then again, maybe that's just me being old and petty. Because I feel old and petty. It doesn't matter that I've been approached about three or four other jobs. I want her job. I feel like a vulture. And I can't shake the feeling that somehow life is not being FAIR to me. Grmph.

On a brighter note, the class I'm teaching has been superb. I've had a wonderful time debating group theories and practices with them. Trying to come up with enough material to challenge them without overwhelming them. Too much fun.

Last weekend we bought a cabin. Out by Mount Pelly. So, if any of you want to come and visit, we can retire to the edge of civilization and hide. Come north. We'll fish. Or we'll just sit on the porch and watch the lake. (We have a porch! Near a lake!)

caribou, you may be happy to hear, possess effective cloaking devices. this according to my son who went hunting with Miguel and his friends today.

Sometimes I rise to the occasion.

I'm teaching -- a class in group counselling -- and enjoying every minute of it.

My head is spinning, though, because I had to design the course in three days, to last over nine full days of school (ending next Friday). Plus I have racked up full-time guard hours over the last week. I worked a midnight guard shift starting Friday at midnight after a full day of work at the college, and by Saturday morning things were very surreal.

Cubs tonight. We're making yarn turkeys. Thanksgiving was yesterday... turkeys are still topical, I think. Perhaps we could say we're making them early for US thanksgiving?

A funny thing -- used the word postmodernist today, and had to explain it to the class. It gives me a good starting point in undercutting the whole of the textbook...

Went to church today. It happens occasionally, when I don't do a night shift Saturday night or a day shift on Sunday. Rachel is a regular attender, she enjoys the Sunday School. She remembers her verses and feels very holy.

The bored minister has gone back down south, and so the congregation is taking turns to lead the service. We don't do communion, because we're all layfolk, but it's fun anyway. Somehow we are released from the need to be pious and attentive. The person doing the sermon today talked about Hell and Lazarus. And we all giggled a bit.

I've been away for ten days. Went to see my brother and his wife, and my mom and dad. This was tiring. But I went to see Snakes on a Plane. By far the high point of the whole holiday.

But I'm back now. To my motley collection of jobs (detachment custodian, lockup guard, statement transcriber) I will possibly be adding 'teacher'. I have to go tomorrow and meet a lady at the college who says she might have a course in group counselling for me to to teach.

Joeby is blowing spit bubbles. Rachel is wearing my new shoes. Ian's crunching Werthers and Miguel is yelling at him, because he can't hear the television program he's trying to watch. Kirsten is singing to her IPod and doing her homework. It's good to be home.

FarNorth Lockup Blues

4am witness statements and
instant coffee, he said
it's over and I tried to
give him back his
ring

drunks are snoring until
woken by coffee and
the arrival of those who
work in the
day

can I have a cup of
water and a blanket, needs
are few in the dark
and then he banged my
head on the steps and
I said grow up,
baby

a drunk with a few teeth
says he'll meet me at
the Lodge for lunch.

Sometimes my hand is shaken
sometimes, hugs.
cleaning cells I find my name
in one handwriting
and 'bitch'
in another
and I know it's a boy
who I wouldn't let
have a smoke

soon, snow. soon, darkness
one day I won't smell of cheap vodka
and unwashed blankets
I'll be asleep at 4 am, without the
voices in my head, and there will
be no instant coffee, no news
in Inuktitut.
Mamiana. such a shame

My neighbour's dog, Kaylar, died this week. The vet consulted on the phone said "deathly ill. probably dying". After some discussion, (her husband is out of town and I was being surrogate spouse, I think) we decided to end the poor dog's suffering humanely. I have dogsat her on occasion, the last time for five weeks, and I've seen her go downhill over the last few months. The vet said, liver failure. Poor sweetie.

thus, at 9pm on Monday night, another friend and I were out trying to dig a hole in the tundra (permafrost's not that far down...) and joking around about Six Feet Under. We buried Kaylar out near where Jazzy's ashes are, but Kaylar's in the valley behind the hill and Jazzy's up top.

Can't resist the urge... turns out it's Red Rider I want to listen to over and over.

I had you and my poetry to protect me
We were so much younger then

Well, things change.

Now I am a full-time lockup guard. Freak me green and call me frog.....

I can't say this is my favorite way to spend time. But in some ways, it's like being the night desk clerk at a very strange hotel. Like the Hotel California, you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave. I sit and amuse myself while drunks sleep in the cells. The regulars know my name now. I even found my name in dispatches on the cell walls -- apparently I'm a bitch. I know who wrote that, though, and it was a young man who was trying to convince me that having a cigarette would be a good idea. I disagreed. Especially since it sets off all the fire alarms if I let people smoke in the cells...

I'm fighting the urge to listen to the same songs over and over again. It seems that that is the doorway to manic. Either it's a symptom or it's a cause, but either way listening to OUTKAST doing "Roses" or whatever repeatedly seems to trigger something. I suspect that all of it revolves around lack of sleep but I have no proof....

I'm off tonight. I called (I'm so STUPID sometimes) and volunteered to go in at 6 am . don't ask me why... All I know is that *I* like it when I know when I'm going to be able to go home, so I called and told the person who's working right now that I'd be in at 6...

Apologies for absence. I had not intended the quote from Gnarls to be the only entry last time, but the planned sequel didn't get done.

I've barely been home since the afternoon of the eighteenth. Miguel said to me on the phone today (while I was down in the guardroom yet again) "These long-distance relationships are hard." At this particular moment I should be phoning my mother and responding to emails, but I feel a need to explain my silence.

On the afternoon of the eighteenth of August, I took a call at work. For this. Some calls stop your blood from circulating. I think I handled it ok. The aftermath was time consuming. Somehow I found myself sitting in the morgue for 18 hours guarding the body, and then doing overtime guarding the suspect over the next few days. The paperwork was immense, and Major Crimes were here, big burly guys using our office space.

However, the upshot was that Major Crimes needs someone to transcribe all the interviews they conducted in town while they were here. As in all small towns, I imagine, everyone knew something and wanted to talk about it. So I'm going to be doing that over the next few weeks. The lady I was replacing came back to work this week, too. I found that hard, to give up the job, but it's all done now. And this weekend, due to a guard shortage, I've been working midnights. And while all this has been going on, I've been ill, first with a cold contracted in the draughty morgue, and then yesterday with a killer flu.

So. Crazy, yes. But it's a good kind of crazy.

I remember when, I remember, I remember when I lost my mind
There was something so pleasant about that phase.

I am enjoying my new camera. It is allowing me to chronicle the oddities of the north. Such as this. I'm wondering who decided that this sign was needed, and why?

Other people have laptop problems. In fact, according to CBC, who we all know to be a bastion of truth and non-sensationalism, it is the Summer of the Exploding Laptop.

In other news, today I met a wonderful man. So wonderful that I invited him to dinner on the spur of the moment and then had to explain what I'd done... to Miguel. I also offered to lend my boss' daughter our truck to take her drivers license test in, and I forgot to tell Miguel that, so he was a bit surprised when she showed up to get the keys.

I digress. The man I invited to dinner has been canoeing solo in the Back/Baillie/Aramark river system since July 1st. Some of my neighbours are canoeing enthusiasts, and so I invited Bob the canoe man, three neighbours, and two of their children. Suddenly we were eleven for dinner.

I should really start at the beginning, because Bob is an amazing man. In June, I received a letter at work informing me of his trip. I sent back an email, asking for his date of birth, and when the email was answered, by his wife, she told me he was born in 1936! So there's a seventy year old man out canoeing around in the middle of nowhere... Yesterday he phoned me on his satellite phone, from somewhere up the coast, because he was trying to reach people to come and pick him up, he was done. I was a bit worried, because one of the outfits he was trying to phone called me, too, and asked me if I knew what he wanted. I made a call in the afternoon to make sure that someone had in fact gone to get him. They had.

Bob came to check in with me this morning, in person, as he had promised in his letter, and I was instantly enthralled. I could have sat there all day listening to him. My boss was bugging me, after he left, saying, "Are you in the habit of inviting total strangers to dinner??? He could be an axe murderer." (Policemen can be soooo cynical...).

But it was a fantastic dinner, lots of great stories and my neighbours were just as enthralled as I was. Too much fun.

I've only got just over two weeks of work left. I'm sad about that. They will continue to employ me, as a guard, and probably to do the cleaning, but I won't get to do all the fun stuff I have been doing. We're very busy right now because of this... and other midnight activities of the more adult variety.

I worked all weekend. Not on purpose, so much, as I went on Saturday at lunch time to wash the floor in the main building (Friday was a muddy day... when it rains in this place the mud is like concrete) and was met by a panicked guard who had been working since 4am and REALLY wanted to go home. Her relief had failed to show. I arranged for someone else to come in at 4, the next shift change, and he stood me up too. So by the time I got home I'd been away for almost nine hours. The problem with doing impromptu guard shifts, that I've found in the past, is that you are stuck either reading old Reader's Digests or watching the one channel on the television. All the drunks in the tank were sleeping, so no entertainment there. I like it better when I know I'm going and I can take my writing or reading or crocheting. Or all three, in case my mood changes halfway through.

Well, my laptop is still limping along. However, Miguel brought me a beautiful digital camera back from his trip. I've never had a digital camera. Haven't even had an old-fangled camera since before the kids were born.

My laptop is dying. About every third time I start it up, it just goes through the motions but won't let me do anything. It gives me the desktop and all, but the icons are just pretty pictures, can't click on 'em. And yesterday Mozilla disposed of all my bookmarks. Argh.

It is HOT here. 22 degrees today. Not very Arctic, as such.

The National is here today. A helicopter buzzed me while Joeby and I were walking on the tundra. My neighbour is hoping we'll be on tv.

Yesterday I went off up the coast by myself. Drove the ATV up to Long Point and fished for a while. Didn't catch anything, as usual. But it was a beautiful afternoon, just enough of a breeze left over from our windstorm to keep the bugs away. So I sat on the beach with my thermos of tea for quite a while, thinking about things. The sky was blue, the water was choppy, and I saw a herd of muskox on my way back.

Today Joeby and I went for a walk on the tundra. He went swimming. I didn't. He's tired tonight. And jealous. The dog from next door is staying with us. She's very quiet, and no trouble other than a bit of nervous peeing on the rug, but Joeby seems to be feeling a need to be right next to me at all times to ensure his favoured dog status. It's funny, because I thought he missed Jazzy, and would be happier if we got another dog, but I'm beginning to think that wouldn't actually be the case. He has settled in to his only dog life.

It's been ten days that Miguel and the kids have been away. I've enjoyed the solitude, but I'll be happy when they're home. Not for another week, however. A week tomorrow. I haven't seen Ian for quite a while, as he was at cadet camp before they went on holiday. I'm looking forward to hearing all his adventures, and Kirsten's from her trip to Ohio. I think I'm starting to get a bit bored. Good thing I've got to go to work tomorrow.

One big factor in my boredom is the fact that I tried to go to the library AGAIN today and it was closed. I wish they'd just give me a key. I swear I'm the only person who takes out books with any regularity. Sometimes I come in to return books and put them in the box right on top of the last books I returned.

It looks like I'll be working until the end of August, anyway. After that, who knows. I'm going to miss it. Best job I ever had....