7 Quick Takes (VII)

1. On Saturday, I set up a computer in my room. Do you recall reading that my computer is fried? Well, it is, in case you didn't read it or don't remember. Anyway, I got the hard drive recovered--that is, I got it ripped out intact and bought an external reader.
Well, I used my Dad's old tower and keyboard, and my Mom's old moniter and speakers, and a brand-new mouse, and I cobbled together a new computer for my room. I got a desk and rearranged the furniture and plugged everything in and voila, I have a personal computer.
Only it doesn't have the Internet, so for this I'm still using my folks' computer.
And the hard drive? Well, it's apparantly still protected by my old password, which I know, only I can't type it in anywhere that I can find because I am now trying to open it like a file. Yeah.

So, while I do have a computer, it does not have Internet and I cannot use it to read any of those old files I wanted to open.
I still have a few tricks to try, but I gave up for the moment. By which I mean week.

2. On Sunday I again attended St. Thomas' Anglican Church across the road. That's about all I have to say about that, except that it might be easier to pay attention to the front when Sunday school resumes. Children are awfully disruptive there.
Oh, and I'll mention that they are very enthusiastic about sharing the peace. There are some there who want to say "Peace" to every person in the congregation; there are some who hug everyone, too. One woman, who seems quite friendly, noticed the paint on my arms and joked about it.

3. I also decided sometime in here (though there's not really a defined date) that I'm not likely going to school in New Zealand come February, as I had planned. I will still go to school in September, though, if all goes well. I'm not just not really sure for what, yet. This isn't a crisis so much as an indecision.

4. On Monday I got married. Well, ok, maybe not for real. A photographer came into Heritage Park to take pictures, and he/his clients wanted models dressed in historical garb in the buildings. 'Models' turned out to be Heritage Park employees. Some pictures were taken in St. Aiden's Church, which is our 'wedding' church. It has nice white pickets fence around it and is still rented out for marriages. The models were to be getting married. Since I am the only current male employee in roughly the same age bracket as the female staff, I was the groom. A nice girl named Dayna, who I really hardly know, was the bride.

So I now have professional wedding pictures (oodles of them, let me tell you), and eventually these will surface. There is a good chance that they will turn up on Facebook, and there is also a good chance that they will turn up in promotional material for Fort McMurray Tourism and Alberta Tourism. So if you ever see a picture young bride and groom, where the groom has weird sort-of-blond, sort-of-brown hair, and the bride is pretty and quite thin, wearing a hat, and they are walking down a boardwalk with a white picket fence in the foreground, and the picture is in a pamphlet or something which encourages you to visit Alberta or Fort McMurray or Heritage Park, then the groom is likely me.

And if they do get on Facebook, I am sure many of my highschool friends will be congratulating me and asking why they weren't invited and so forth. Only some of them will be joking.

I have heard that the pictures are quite good. They were somewhat awkward to take. Have you ever tried to fake being in love with someone for a camera? Apparently we did it well.

Some of the other staff saw the photos, and one of them said she wanted to use them for her own wedding. Her guests would say, "These aren't of you," and she'd say, "I know, but aren't these ones so much better?"

5. The rain finally broke off. We got some sun starting on Tuesday, and it's been nice and bright ever since. This means...

6. We finally got painting done! The decks look so much better properly painted. They are oxide red, which is regulation. Before they were a faded oxide red overlaid with black spray and white spray from adjoining surfaces, mingled with dirt and rust. Now they are a solid, strong colour. On Wednesday we did the whole of the barge in one go, and then on Thursday we got a good deal of the Miskanaw deck done. Today my supervisor finished off the Miskanaw and I painted some silver on pipes and vent hoods and things on the D250. My supervisor was very pleased with the amount of work we got done, as was I. However, there was a drawback.

7. Since Wednesday, my knees have been sore. I have spent most of the week on my hands and knees, which means my knees were resting on the bare metal deck. You know, "resting" is such a bad word for this context. "Weight-bearing" is a better one. On Thursday my Dad lent me his kee pads (and thanks again for that, Pa), so it wasn't as bad as it could have been. But oh, man, my knees were stiff and weak both Wednesday and Thursday night, and somewhat this morning, too. Even now I can feel that they're a little weak. Whenever I hit them against anything, they hurt more than usual.
But I can be such a masochist. See, you'd think that the above paragraph is self-pitying, complaining. But, no... it's bragging. I am pleased that my legs hurt. Why? I'm not sure, other than, perhaps, that it's a reminder or badge that I worked hard and that I'm tough enough to take that pain. If it's work-related, I don't mind pain. Discomfort makes me squeamish, but pain I can manage.

And that's 7. See, it's been a busy week. Lots of work, some pain, a wedding, all sorts of good stuff.

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