The world so far

Well I'm happy to announce I'm finally unpacked. Though looking around my place feels like it's from a West Elm catalogue. So I guess I still need to personalize it a little more.

The last round of fire classes finished a few weeks ago, and the students had their graduation a few night ago. That was fun, and I'm proud of the students. Despite our best efforts, they passed and become quite proficient with basic firefighting skills. I'm also happy to say that I did really well with my student evaluations. I'm glad my efforts were both effective and appreciated.

I took January off from the fire station to get my world unpacked and organized. This Saturday I'll be back on Engine 18 for 24 hours. Will be fun as always.

I'm also trying unsuccessfully to not get promoted at my station. The Chiefs seem determined to get me moving up the ladder regardless of my own personal wishes. "For the good of the whole company."

Hell, if that's the case I should only be allowed on the Canteen unit.

Furious book clubs

Now that I'm back in civilization, I have been able to pursue some venues to quench my thirst for intelligent discourse, quick wit and repartee. What's this you ask? Why don't I get this at work or at the fire department?

Well, I largely work from home. Should I be found debating with myself, it's a small step to joing the crazy people outside on the street between my building and the Chinatown arch.

As far as the fire department goes, while there are undoubtedly brilliant people (they are an exception), any attempts at witty banter usually end with the vanquished promising to "kick some Canadian ass". Not really the crowd I'm looking for.

So I found myself at a bookclub the other day. Much to my surprised, I thoroughly enjoyed myself. The book was Fury - by Salman Rushdie. Unfortunately I didn't have time to read the book (I joined only a day or two prior to the meeting), but I went anyway.

The group was a rather eclectic gathering of DCites. There were some govvies, computer nerds, aspiring writers and even some military folks. A fairly accurate cross-section of DC in fact.

The discussion was surprising non-pretentious, thought provoking and meaningful. They talked about the book for a hour or so, then some us went to imbibe some barley based beverages. This too was also good.

I learned a couple things the other night.

1) my opinion of Rushdie's random writing style is also held by others
2) it's possible to have literary discourse without pomp and pretension
3) I'm glad I moved to DC.

Next month's book: The Sparrow, by Mary Doria Russell.

I'm looking forward to it.

New Year, New Beginnings

2 weeks ago, I left suburban hell and moved into the heart of DC. Right smack in the middle of Chinatown.

So far I'm loving it. I'm on the top floor of a fairly new condo building, with an awesome view of the capitol building and the washington monument.

The move, however, was a complete nightmare. Movers canceling, people not showing up, damaged goods from movers etc. If it could go wrong, it did. I also had to move some of my favourite toys (pool table and such) into storage. My poor motorcycle is parked at the firehouse until I sort out where to park it here. Ugh.


As you can see, there were many boxes. It's hard to go from around 6k square footage to just over 1k.

Nonethess, badass view. The roof has a nice pool, built in gas grills and such. 4th of July fireworks at my place baby!



So this year I'll actually try to post. I didn't post a whole lot last year - it was such a crappy year overall I couldn't be bothered. I did spend some time posting to my spoof response to one of my fire student's blog. He has an excellent writing style (though I'll never again admit it publicly) and talks about things other than the usual dull fire / rescue nonsense.

With that, I wish you a happy new year and let's see what happens in 2008.