This is my first blog entry in a while. I have just moved to Ottawa and have been living there for about a month. Right now I am visiting Winnipeg over the Easter long weekend and I am sitting at the Falafel Place trying to determine how well the writing goes in a cafe setting.
Of course, the reason I live in Ottawa is due to the closure of my lab in Winnipeg, I have to work another 15 months before I can retire without penalty so I have rented an apartment and am commuting to and from Ottawa while my family remains behind. I will return every long weekend plus Anne will be coming out in the Summer so that we can take a tour of the east coast by car and bike.
It has been cold in Ottawa this spring so I haven't been able to ride my bike too much, although I do use it to go to work. I am also walking a lot more but I am a little concerned that I may have trouble with my feet. I just developed a deep blister on my left foot and I have to be careful with that because my feet do not seem to heal that well, no pun intended.
In addition to the riding and walking activities I am trying to find more cultural things to get involved with. I am right downtown so I can access a lot of things that are going on. I volunteered to work at the Ottawa Fringe Festival, which fortunately takes place in June. I am also planing to take in some writing workshops and perhaps a writers group or meetup.
I am am taking a continuing Ed course on Buddhism/Meditation at the University of Ottawa and I may look for more related courses or perhaps something on writing. I am still not sure about Francais or Music lessons as I may not have the time for that. I also have a lot of stuff to read.
There is a gym for me to use during the lunch hours at work. I am trying to cut down on the gym time because I was working out at the gym twice a day for most of the winter, I need a break from that.. I have a persistent rotator cuff injury in my left shoulder that will probably only get better with extended rest. I has been bugging me for a couple of years now. I'm not even sure how I did it but I think it was from a fall that I took from my bike during a sudden storm with freezing rain.
I do have some weights and exercise stuff that I can do in my apartment, although the place is rather small. I can do more exercises such as dips, push-ups, ab stuff. Perhaps even some Karate-do practice as well. Overall the time should pass relatively quickly. I am trying to look at it more like a sabbatical year and an opportunity to prepare for retirement than anything else.
The office environment is brutal. I have no office, only a little cubby in the admin office. This means no privacy and incessant chatter, mostly in french. Management has really done very little to prepare to receive me at the laboratory. They have a vague idea of an unfunded, unstaffed records management project but there is no plan. I am basically going to be left to amuse myself. There are four staffing actions underway but they could actually take months to fill. I don't expect to have too much to do so I am going to be doing some reading and, hopefully, developing the discipline of writing a little more. After looking at some different options I think that I will just journal as much as I can using blogger. The editing capabilities are fine and it is in the cloud and everything.
One book that I am going to read is about Historiography of Science. I think this is a good place to start because it will provide the academic structure for non-fiction writing. Any topic that I may choose to write on should be thoroughly researched in terms of its history. I am currently leaning towards something to do with genetics/emergence/complexity or perhaps even the philosophy of science or statistics.
I am also hoping to further develop some programming and statistical analysis skills as I think that data journalism would also be a very fruitful area for writing.
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