Connecting to the outside
(Actually posted May 30 2003 - 12:17)
So I felt like sitting outside but I also felt like using the computer. So here I am, sitting outside the back door to my house with my computer. Of course, I'm not actually connected to the Internet, I'm writing this post in Notepad with the intention of later copying & pasting it into my weblog. I assume I have less than 2 hours of battery life, so this post shouldn't get too incredibly long (in 2 hours I could probably write 2 or 3 chapters to a novel). Anyway, first off I'll describe what the "backyard" of my house is like.

It's a ravine. A steep slope, heavily err "wooded". There are quite a few trees, a small forest really, and an abundance of wildlife. There is one particular chipmunk (who cornily enough I've named "Chippy") who will eat out of my hand (sunflower seeds are his favourite). In fact, Chippy is about 4 feet away from me right now eating seeds off the ground. There is a back deck on this house, but since Bracebridge is nothing but hills, the deck is about 8 feet off the ground, even though it's on the "ground floor" of the house. Chippy is now less than a foot away, eating. He is now on my foot, actually. He really isn't scared of humans at all, which is disturbing. In case my description was a bit confusing, I am not on the back deck, I am on the ground under the deck, just outside the basement door. Now for some seemingly random observations...

-I never noticed until now, in this natural sunlight, that there is in fact a numpad on this laptop (I'm quite severely colourblind so I couldn't see it inside). The letters U, I, O, J, K, L, and M (and numbers 7, 8, 9, 0, and the semi colon...oh and P) double as numpad keys. So I assume if I were to hold down Alt, I could make the fancy letters (as if I'd want to).

-Sitting out here as I often do, looking at the myriad of wildlife, I can't help thinking how inconsequential and trivial the world of politics really is. All these animals couldn't care less what Bush does. They just want to wake up, find food, and go to sleep. There are squirrels, chipmunks, infinite different kinds of birds, lots of insect life, snails, a racoon or two. They all live in relative harmony. Sure they don't particularly like each other, but they rarely kill each other (there's a cat that comes by occasionally and causes all the wild animals to start sounding their air raid sirens). Actually yesterday I saw a squirrel chase the cat away, which was funny. Humans really do seem detatched from nature.

-How does a chipmunk know when it's stored enough food for the winter? That is what my dad asked me once. The only answer I can come up with is: they don't. They just store as much as they can. What happens if they don't store enough? he asked me. Then they die. My dad laughed. Imagine living without any serious thought to the future. Does the chipmunk even remember yesterday? Does he know there will be a tomorrow? Does the chipmunk know that he was he yesterday and will be he tomorrow?

-It was really loud out here earlier today, there was some construction going on at the bottom of the hill, immense amounts of dust cluttered the air. There was also some music coming out of the highschool, which was strange seeing as it's school hours at the moment. All the noise seemed to stop simultaneously though, and the dust seemingly vanished instantly. I wonder what they were doing. People say that Canada has two seasons: winter and construction. Take a quick tour through Bracebridge and this statement would be confirmed. Even way out in the woods, where the abundance of trees really is ridiculous. There's one road about 5 minutes south of here where they actually built a bridge just to use as a detour for the construction.

-There's an old barbecue out back here that we just can't seem to get rid of. We've been periodically putting it by the road with signs saying "Free barbecue!", "Free BBQ, take it!", "Take this Barbecue, PLEASE!", "Free Barbecue, No questions asked, just take it!", "Take this God forsaken BBQ, for the love of all that is good and holy", and so on. It occured to me how slim the chances are that someone would be driving along, suddenly thinking "damn, I wish I had a barbecue" and boom, happens to be in front of my house, with a pickup truck or an oversized SUV.

-Yikes, the chipmunk just leapt onto my lap. I think it's time to end this post.