Monthly Archives: April 2003

I started this entry back at at Andrew’s…I asked nicely to use his place to sleep at, because he was, at the time, off seeing…VANILLA ICE in NEW WESTMINSTER.

I’m sorry, let me clarify that: my boyfriend, who is one of the WHITEST GUYS I KNOW, was off seeing VANILLA ICE in…NEW WEST. May G– have mercy on our souls. That’s so much white, it’s blinding.

The T-shirts for the tour, by the way, say “WORD TO YOUR MUTHA”.

So today’s my last day as an undergrad. Yay. I have an essay to finish, and exam to write tonight, and then I’m done. “One more special message to go, then I’m done, then I can go home.” So I’m going to go home, drink coffee, write the damn essay, study, and then…that’s it.

I looped campus on the way home half an hour ago, before I decided to come into the office and write an entry. I went past the Chan Centre, where I’ll be graduating in three weeks.

(And I’ll be speaking at said convocation. It looks like I’m going to get to speak at my own grad ceremony. I’m going to do it wearing a yellow ACF staff shirt under my robes, and setting a golf club on the podium before I start speaking.)

I passed Buchanan, where I have spent the bulk of my UBC career, either in classes or the AUS offices. I will dream in Buchanan at some point, I’m sure.

I went past Totem, where I imagined myself, at seventeen, cramming all night, drawing a timeline of Mediaeval European History on the 4th Kwak hall wall in washable marker, the night before my last exam in April of 1996.

I looped past T-Bird stadium, where I have spent two weeks of my life over two years, working on Arts County.

I thought of all my friends sleeping in their rez rooms, in Gage and Vanier, Totem and Fairview. Or not sleeping, as the case may be.

I have farewell bonfires galore coming up over the next few days. I’ll be busy socializing, dammit. It’s very different than the hermit-like existence I led before leaving in 1996.

And now, I’m going home, for coffee and essay writing. Too tempting to sit here and watching Strong Bad reruns otherwise.

Andrew got the interview call today to go down to Berkeley to interview for a position with a small company there. Within fifteen minutes, I got a voice mail, a text message and a phone call telling me this. I immediately took the excuse to go down to Lou’s to hang out in the sunshine with him and his friends to celebrate.

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Nothing like getting woken up at 11am on a Sunday by very very bad drum playing.

When I say I got the job offer from Bowen, I mean, I got the job offer to start right away, on Bowen, like, next week after my last exam.

Six weeks on Bowen, then the company would move to downtown, and I would move back to Kitsilano. (I like Kits. It’s like home, just with more yuppies and/or hippies).

It would mean more money faster – I wouldn’t have to wait until the 20th to get paid, and Argosy won’t be able to provide me with full time and-then-some hours until late May or early June anyways. Also, with much of the Argo-income being tips based…those won’t start to roll in until end of May either.

I could spend my weekends on the mainland, partying with my friends, and spend weekday nights on Bowen, quietly studying for the LSATs, learning Flash and working on the speech I’m giving at grad. There are worse ways to spend six weeks of my life.

The question is…what if I hate the job and want to go back to Argosy? Or I don’t see a future in the job? That’s what I’m worried about right now, that I would cut off that option, at the job I adore, to chase a job that might not last the summer.

These are the options right now – both equally good. These are the decisions I have to make by end of day Monday. This is the split in the path that may well be the decision I look back on in a few years and say, “what would have happened if…” (as I do with one or two of the big decisions in my life)

Then again, staying here would give me time to see some of the friends I haven’t in awhile, who have likely forgotten me by now.

Last night’s activities were a huge success. I’d like to thank the magical sprite that left some very useful items on my pillow. We have fantastic publicity shots. I’ll post them when I get them and e-mail them to non-friends.

The clitocracy – myself, Lana, Paige, Camilla and Vanessa all went out last night & created a variation on a campus tradition. We made it a girls only event. Much more fun. We drank knockoff amaretto sours (made with lemonade concentrate rather than sour mix) while looking at probably one of the most spectacular views, on one of the most spectacular nights, ever in Vancouver.

We also thwacked golf balls off the Cairn. Take THAT, ‘Geertown!

Last night was, after all, my last Friday as an undergrad, my last Friday living on campus. (I get weepy when i think of that). I’m leaving now. I’m moving on. But nights like last night, out with some of the best friends I could have been lucky enough to make on this campus, in my time here, having a total blast, being lucky enough to have access to some parts of campus I shouldn’t…it was the happiest possible ending to my career at UBC I could imagine.

ANDREW: Lana needs to kill that squirrel so she can have closure.
ME: How is killing a furry little life form going to bring her closure?
ANDREW: It’s not a furry little life form! It’s a rat with good PR!

Job offer from Bowen today. For sure. Would be On Bowen for six weeks (dammit, i spent my whole life Escaping Vancouver Island, i don’t want to move to another island)…but after that…would be downtown.

Too…many…options…want…to…run…away…and…be…a…pirate…

Oh wait, that IS an option.

I’m all set to go back to Seattle, to a summer of slacking off with the Argonauts, to five months of sun, wind, sea, tourists, bartending…did I mention I love that job? I’m resigned to leaving Vancouver. In fact, I’m mildly psyched to go back to work on the boats, mildly stoked about being back in Seattle, and definitely excited about making killer coin all summer in tips, getting out of debt, and heading to Europe when the season ends.

Except that the guys from Bowen Island e-mailed me yesterday. This is the company I interviewed with a month ago: $3K/month, a variant position in a start up, mostly liason and sales work, stuff that, if I push it and stay on top of, I’m good at, when I work at it. They’re moving to downtown Vancouver. They still want to hire me, likely starting in June.

It’s a job I’d likely be at for a year. Pay’s about the same as Argosy, with exchange. Slightly less, but cost of living here is slightly less, too. But it would mean no Europe trip, most likely, because I would want to use the job to make contacts and regain the Industry experience that I need to go BACK into the tech field as an Internet groupie of sorts (I don’t have the tech skills – but I speak geek, and do well on the human side of IT work)

I made this decision before, five years ago, when I left the Island at the end of April 1998. I’m not sure I made the right decision then. I don’t want to repeat that. The situations’ different – everything has changed, nothing has changed…I’ve been 25 since I was 19, on and off.

So.

I should get back to the job I have here – I’m at my office in Yaletown – will be until 7am – fighting off sleep & captioning. I’ll have to think about this later. Office all day, at job I tolerate? Boats all day, at job I love? How would I want to spend that 40, 50, 60 hours a week I have to work? How do I want to spend the remaining 40, 30, 20 hours I’m awake & out of work? Cities, friends, people, jobs…and it seems like I’ve been here before, and yet I haven’t, and yet, shouldn’t i learn from some mistakes, somewhere, along the line?

Andrew has finally caved and joined the blogging craze all the kids are into:

http://trogdor.numenor.ca/

there’s the end of HIS career as Mr. Anti-Blog.