tuesday's poem from The Writer's Almanac seems to echo the state of affairs... the long-anticipated snow did arrive... dumping its soft crystals all over and stalling traffic... the scenery is a mixture of magnificent white, muddy grey, and haze. ... and it continues to snow...
Snow-Flakes
Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare,
Over the harvest-fields forsaken,
Silent, and soft, and slow
Descends the snow.
Even as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make
In the white countenance confession,
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.
This is the poem of the air,
Slowly in silent syllables recorded;
This is the secret of despair.
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow~
... i wonder if i might ski again before the whiteness disappears...
i couldn't resist adding a little color to the apartment to welcome lunar new year in my own little way... the eucalyptus and geberas seem to make a good combination and i had fun coaxing a little 3D dance from the thick skewer-like foilage of the australian native plant... don't you think the arrangement looks splendid?!
went asian food shopping over the weekend, partly to show AM where to get ingredients for his thai-dinner, and got a free cooked soya-chicken! amazing... i was beginning to feel a little sorry that lunar new year is such a non-event here...
then, i had an unexpected thai dinner invite yesterday and will be attempting to make some jiao-zhi dumplings with a few of my colleagues tonight... it's going to be an international gathering, dominated by greeks, there'll possibly be 2 americans (including Courtney!) and then there's moi. it should be fun... and hopefully the food will be edible!
meanwhile... i can only imagine all the goodies i am missing... perhaps the left-overs might end up in a parcel my way?! heeee =C)
hope this will be a wonderful, fruitful and peaceful lunar new year for everyone... enjoy!
i don't remember celebrating Valentine's ever... well not in the lovey-dovey Hallmark way... but i do have fond memories of the "flower-rangers" that delivered carnations the night before to all the valentines and valentins or valentinos in each student dorm at the college in wales... careful not to wake anyone up.
it's a wonderfully fun tradition... and i am certain many ppl yonder are greeted by the smell of carnations this morning... absolutely lovely...
i sent carnations to girls and boys alike... for it is also friendship day! at £1 a stalk including a wee notelet wherein you pen your armorous feelings or fuzzy thoughts... anonymous or not... of course, there are other ways to show your love... some of us baked cookies or bought chocolates instead... but the fun (or dreadful!) part of it is the gossips that linger after.
see, white carnations 'symbolizes' friendship, pink indicates passionate feelings... and red is for love... you wouldn't be alarmed getting white ones or, in effect, the red ones... for love is unconditional and friendship is a form of love too... in fact, many dashing and cheeky guys send red carnations to lots of fellow female students... and it is just full of banter!
what is exciting and perhaps thrilling, are the pink ones... that's what gets you wondering... hmmmm.
pink is in the air... speckled on the cookies found in the office grazing ground... dancing in the hearts of those who find muse on St. Valentine's Day...
and just because it's all pinky everywhere... here's an interesting article about the things that people do, in particular the scientists... in the name of love... or more aptly described as the "2-body" problem ... which is a growing normality in modern day... not just a familiar occurrence for scientists but for people from all walks of life... particularly when different cultural worlds collide.
meanwhile...
am flying out to deutschland today... visiting Leipzig for the very first time... and having to give a talk about what i've been trying to do in my phd research in movement control... i am expected to hear my own voice for about an hour... i think it will be awful... hearing my voice?! oh goodness...
it's also taken me forever to put the talk together... it was an incentive to try to think of how to write up my thesis but it's been real stressful the last 3 weeks... and nearly saw me in distress as i panicked over a likely scenario of re-analyzing my data! thankfully, all that was not necessary but obviously other issues arose out of me trying to tidy up things... figures had to be created... summaries... additional scripts had to be written just for pictures... because fiddling about is not fun...
i hate myself! i am always doing this to me... putting myself in awkward situations like a 'job' interview for a postdoc postion... it sounds dreadfully formal... and i really haven't had a real interview in eons...
eeeks!
WIND CHILL makes it about -10degC COLDER than it already is... which is about -18degC... so it actually feels like -28degC. uninhabitable!!! i was nearly frozen and out of breath walking from the hospital to the borrowed car. oh my... thanks to the borrowed car! i would have been stuck waiting in the extreme cold for the light-rail or the bus... i have wonderful colleagues here!
it's going to be colder... down to feeling like -37degC (-24degC and -13degC windchill-factor) by 8 or 9am... it's SO COLD i could literally freeze on the streets...
i thought we were suffering from global warming?! BRRRRRRRRRRRRR
this is just unbearable... i can't believe it is still able to snow! utterly insane.