29/10/00-well, its been a decent week, even after 2 midterms, both of which i knew the stuff but ran out of time to finish. logic was wednesday and economics was thursday. other than that, classes have just been the same ol lectures. the social life this week has been pretty interesting. first of all, its actually snowing here, now, so that's pretty cool. its sticking to the ground, but not the roads, but ah well...should be good skiing soon. thursday night i went to the royal montreal curling club, to curl, since i signed up for the mcgill curling team. it looks like an easy game, but its pretty hard. first, there's the slider you put on your left foot, which is like a piece of plastic that covers the shoe bottom, but its not like ice skates, cause with a slider, you have no control on the ice. and the other foot goes the gripper, so you dont fall down. then you put your right foot in the hack, and your left foot parallel,crouch down, lift up your ass, slide your left foot back a little, and then as you get momentum, slide it forward and push off the hack. then let go of the stone. sounds easy. not so. its hard to figure out how hard to push off so that the stone goes past the hogline on the other side but stays in the target area and doesnt go past it. then the whole sweeping thing, we didnt really get to talk much strategy on that yet. this week...

YANKEES WIN THE WORLD SERIES 4-2!!!!!! good way to an end of the subway series. after that a couple of us went to vol de nuit for a few drinks, and then went to madonna's pizza. nothing biggie.

friday night was the limp bizkit/eminem/papa roach concert at the molson centre (molson centre being where the canadiens play, and thus, my yankee stadium of hockey). eminem almost didnt get into the country cause the people in toronto didnt want him the night before and some political guy tried to block his entry at customs. but he was there talking about it in the show. it was me and jon. and then we were supposed to meet jared at peel pub after the show, but instead, i met jared and we lost jon. we got there late for papa roach, but the sound quality sucked til bizkit. they played some songs and then their singles, broken home (which i like), and last resort. then eminem came on and opened with this blair witch spoof before he came up from the stage in a jason mask and a chain saw rapping "kill you" they went through his set and then had a major curtain problem. bizkit came on for about an hour 40. played almost all their hits and stuff off the new album. when i finish my rousseau essay, i might work on my concert review and catch up on some album reviews i've needed to do. suffice to say, it was a pretty good concert and the canadians are a lot less rowdy at these kinds of concerts than the americans who rioted at woodstock.

last night was halloween night here, with a party in the rez cafe. i went as a girl, borrowed emma's dress and bra, devon's shoes and scarf, bought a 60" blond wig and cut it to shoulder length and pantyhose, and then christine did my hair and make up. best looking halloween girl i've been yet. i had about 30 guys wanting to touch my breasts and then christine kept grabbing them...and then devon was grabbing them and back and forth...of course, it was all about the booze here. at our floor meeting last week, we decided that we were putting the $40 rez council gave us to candy and decorations for the floor (cause we got to go up and down the floors getting candy) and then everyone chip in like $3 for jello shots. i didnt even get to the jello shots. when i was shopping for my stuff, i bought a $9 bottle of wine at SAQ and downed like 90% of it before the jello shots came out of the fridge. wine was strong, i think i had like a 7 hour drunk. so we went to the BMH party, but it was a bust cause no one was really there. but some girl came up to me and said "i'm gay." and i didnt hear what she said, so i said "i'm spencer" so she says back "no, i'm gay, as in lesbian." and that was kinda weird so i just said i'm sorry, i dont go that way. but then i realized that i'm not a girl, so what difference would it make if she was a lesbian...except i think she really thought i was a girl...well thats a guy(halifax) and a lesbian thats hit on me...

somehow in our drunken stupor, christine, devon, jared, jon, and i ended up following jared floorfellow to his friends house off campus and then we took a cab to another friends' house for his halloween party. so we were quite drunk, then some guy at the party kept looking at me funny, we were all dancing and whatnot....pretty phat pad. left around 4am, but then the clocks were turned back, so it was really like 3. got home, got changed, ordered pizza, the guy never showed up for delivery. so i was hungry all night from all the alcohol and no food. but it was quite the different halloween from halloween pasts back home, but it was fun and i'm fortunate enough that i dont hangover...

on tap for today: reading rousseau's social contract and writing an essay on it (i need my computer back!!!!) yep thats right, i'm still procrastinating at college cause the things due tomorrow. not to fear, i always get the work done by hook or crook...

22/10/00-so we're on game 2 of the world series and already my yanks are up 1 game and winning this one so far 4-0. i bet they'll take it in 6. in international news, prime minister chretien has called for elections to be held nov 27. should be interesting to see what a canadian election is like and a lot of the people here are now eligible to vote in these national elections as well...then again, a lot of the canadians are 20 since they've gone through an extra year of high school which is something exclusive to ontario i guess. in the middle east, it looks like we could have a war on our hands in the next week in a half. arafat told barak today to "go to hell" in his response to the israeli "timeout" on the peace process. and the UN is condemning israeli force and they're talking war crimes tribunal. i find this highly disturbing because they blame it on the numbers. that palestinians are dying and palestinians are being injured. but israel never attacks, israel always retaliates. so what are they retaliating from? stonethrowing, firebomb throwing palestinians. that's all neglected in this crisis. funny how one-sided people get when its about israel. not to mention you wouldnt want to fuck with israeli defence forces. i mean come on, they thought they could do it in 67 and in 73, all by sneak attacks, but we beat them anyways...they wouldnt want a war...

thursday wasnt mch of anything, because i think i skipped both my lectures after i got up late for economics. got the new radiohead cd and the new our lady peace cd. the radiohead cd is really good, really experimental. and i just found a hidden booklet in the case under the plastic piece that holds the cd. i forget i have like 6 music reviews to write of albums i've gotten since i've been here, moist, limp bizkit, wyclef, radiohead, olp, and something else i cant even remember. friday was comparative politics midterm, my plato essay return, and my logic assignment return. i like the canadian grading system (sorta). they grade EXTREMELY difficult but their letters correspond differently. example. i got a 67/100 on my plato essay. but thats a B-. i got a 75.5 on my logic assignment, thats a B+ so its really different. hopefully i did well on my comp politics multiple choice exam. that would be dope.

yesterday was waking up at 1 and going to the first home hockey game here at the newly renovated mcconnell area. hockey as we know it was actually invented here at mcgill in 1875 and the first hockey club was also formed here at mcgill in 1877. cool, eh? anyways, we beat the university of toronto varsity blues, 6-3. came home, shot pool (which is what i do a lot these days), and stayed up til 6am to watch the ball game. yeah, the game was til about 1, but everyone else here was up...

today was really a nothing day, except i actually cleaned (not just straightened out) my room and now its the ballgame and some pool. i should do some more economics reading and my logic homework, but that'll happen sometime tonight...when? i dunno...oh yeah this is gonna be cool, check this: nikhil, and sarah d, and jon and scott are coming up here for new years. i'm coming back the 30th of dec, and nikhils taking the train up, and i think jon and scott and sarah are driving and staying til whenever, although classes start for me the 3rd, so they'd prolly be leaving the 2nd. still, 4 days here in the city, chillin, not having to worry about schoolwork, etc...i'm thinking we might be able to try and get into club 737 (the one on the skyscraper with the rotating spotlights), which is prolly gonna be packed for new years, but if not there, theres plenty of clubs. now how to get them all into rez, i could only fit about 2 in my room...we may have to have some sleep in the halls. but that shouldnt be too bad cause there's prolly gonna be room since a lot of people might not be back yet. but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it...

18/10/00-wow, going 3 for 3 here...well, the yankees won the AL pennant and we've got a subway series. should really be great cause there's a bunch of people here from NY, some who are mets fans and others who are yanks fans and even though the teams are from two different leagues, new yorkers tend to have allegiance to only one of those teams. but i know who i'm routing for...

so after the game, i watched the rest of the presidential debate. really good, gore kicked some ass. george bush was talking in about 5 word sentences, 97% of which were cliches like "we're gunna have guernment that's gunna make you proud..." the other 3% of the time, he meagerly answered the question proposed to him. not to mention his little kindergardner whine about how gore "wadn't following the rules." wah wah wah, mr. hussain wadn't followin the rules daddy, what do i do? gore really came out fighting, and that was really good. but after all that, 67% of the people that took msnbc's online poll said that bush did a better job. i've figured it out. i just need to make canada my permanent residence for 3 years, know french or english well, and have some knowledge of canadian history/politics. thats all i gotta do to become a citizen. or---go to israel, say i'm jewish and get israeli citizenship that way. surely the american public should be disgraced if w is elected and brings the country back down to where his father did. the elephants should have kept john mccain as their candidate. atleast he's competant...

went to bed around 4am, got up at 10, went to logic, bummed around, went to comp politics and political theory and completely fell asleep through them all, not to mention i just got up from a 1 1/2 hr nap. i got my plane vouchers in the mail yesterday. i leave dec 21 at 730pm and come home the 30th at 1010am. new years might be cool actually. sarah d and jon and scott and i have been talking about them maybe coming up, spending a few days, etc etc. if that happened, it would be really cool cause there's lots to do here and new years should be cool up here in the city. but as for if it happens, we'll see. i'll be back here anyways so...

who knows what else is going on...i should be studying for my comp politics midterm for friday, but i haven't a clue what to study in depth. maybe tomorrow i'll lock myself in my room and study (yeah, right). atleast my economics midterm was postponed, so that meant not having to study for 2 midterms the same day. i mean i'll prolly be up til 4am anyways...i think christine is reading lines for her play, so i'll probably help her with that tonight. wrote 2 more poems last night. i think thats 6 poems, 1 song, and 2 drawings in 4 nights. i dunno how come i'm so inspired. granted all the poems are in draft form only in my sketch book, but still...yeah, the problem with me updating everyday is then i run out of things to say. so that'd be about it...

17/10/00-the mets won the nlcs and its starting to look like a subway series...but of course, i'll still be rooting for the yankees...today wasnt a bad day...went to bed around 4am, which is starting to become typical these days. got up at 1030, went to economics and found that my midterm has been postponed til the 26th. so this is awesome cause it was originally supposed to be today, then friday, now next thursday. then went to the store, bought the new limp bizkit cd. not bad, but its still not as good as significant other. went to lunch, blah blah, woo woo, went to space time matter but then i remembered class was cancelled, so i came home and shot pool for a while. that's what i've been doing a lot of these days- shooting pool. i dont think anyone will have a chance against me next time we all play, although the table here is lower. ah well, so we'll go to a pool hall or something...

tonight's the last presidential debate, but i sent in my ballot last week. gore obviously. i still cant figure out why anyone would be voting for bush. i mean, he speaks in complete generalities and has nothing to back up what he says, other than that we should take his word. gore is a helluva lot smarter than bush and he's been inside, he knows what goes on in the national level, internal security, etc. i cant understand why a man who cant speak and who cant think before he speaks would be elected president, or even considered for president. even john mccain was a better presidential candidate for the republican party. example, in the last debate, they were talking about foreign policy, and it was quite evident to me that w had no idea what the hell he was talking about. his statements on the middle east were completely wild like "yeah, we're gonna tell them they need to make peace between the israelis and the palestinians. then we should take out saddam hussain." ok yeah, you're an idiot with half the voting population behind you. absolutely ridiculous. plus he never answers the question. for instance, on gay marriages, he talks about how he respects gays and that he thinks a marriage should be between a man and a woman, but gore said the same thing, only addressing the fact that something needs to be acknowledged about a civil union. i rest my case...

lets see, heres my analysis of the middle east conflict. first of all, palestinians blame the violence on the visit of ariel sharon to the temple mount, but sharon visits there every year. palestinians were incited at prayers the day before to throw rocks at the israelis. rocks are weapons. rocks can kill. rocks have killed. so they cant justify that soldiers defending themselves with guns is out of line because bullets kill. its the same thing. and they use children as their vehicle for protests by making them martyrs. he gives families 300$ if you're injured and 2000$ if you die as a result of the violence. personally, i think the cease fire agreed upon today is a sham. hamas, the palestinian militant group, does not believe itself to be part of that agreement, so they feel that they can still cause violence. israel has already stated that if hamas strikes that they will retaliate as a result of arafat's release of hamas prisoners. if hamas wreaks havoc, israel will retaliate and i wouldnt doubt it one bit. the ceasefire thus ends...

no more poems last night but maybe tonight. oh right, last night we went to see this kid on my floor play with his jazz combo at another jazz club. bernie and the barrelful of jazzers (although he messed up cause it was supposed to be barrelful of monkeys). they were really good. just 5 guys, this kid, matt, plays trumpet and hes pretty good. the other cool thing about this band was they had jazz guitar in it, which is something i like in jazz music. anyways, to where i was going with that also...mainly it was me and 7 of the other girls on our wing (which was like half our wing). so basically i'm the only guy there so i kinda shut them out and wrap myself in the music and a nice martini (quintessential jazz club drink, eh?) but i couldnt help but overhear now that they have these "rules" like jon and scotts guy code and they're figuring them out as they go. and just like the guy code rules, its kinda a sham...like the one i still have a problem with is this whole "floorcest" thing like i said yesterday because it makes no sense. i realize that if the relationship turns bad that it means strained relations with the floor but...on the other hand, it might not. maybe its that way with some of the guys that these girls date, but i've never been one that's out to make enemies, no matter what the circumstance, so...? why cant it work, just because you're on the same floor? yeah, i'm being vague again. anyways, best be productive or something. one of these days i'll get around to reading my class texts...

16/10/00-another funfilled time in the great white north. i've been finding myself inspired again and in the last 3 nights, i've written 3 poems, 1 song, and 1 drawing. since i've been off the cough medication, things have kinda gotten sucky again. like i went out a couple of fridays ago with the guys on my floor and that was kinda the point where i realized how our floor, which is mainly girls, has now become cliquey so its like i'm a, the only guy that would go around and do things or b, the tagalong. and i find myself becoming the tagalong to various different people around campus that i know, not just with the people on my floor. things have gotten really wacky around here and that point where i thought i had found myself somewhere here has kinda vanished.

obviously, i still havent sent out my computer to get fixed, one day it'll get done, and no one wants their own computer more than me, but i havent gotten around to it. the great news is that my parents think i'm an alcoholic since i've gone out with some people sometimes. that i should stay on the wagon...this is just nuts...today was an israeli solidarity rally that i went to for about 25 min. nothing too interesting, just singing and speeches, but i've got so many views on whats going on there, that i dont have time right now before dinner to speak. as it is, the floor seems to be leaving without me...

the female situation is interesting...i know, i'm a sucker for any good looking girl that will talk to me. and thats definitely a bad thing. cause as it is, things didn't work the way i wanted it in the last instance, but i realized that i wasnt her type that night we went out with the floor. that was also the same night she ripped the poem i showed her (albeit accidentially). and since then things have been cool but not cool. and as for other women, this whole "floorcest" thing is a fucker. because how do you realize you like people but by hanging around them a lot? so if the people you're hanging around with are the people on your floor, why isnt it possible that something could be bound to happen. i mean i know you run risks of if something goes wrong then you're on the same floor, but still...its not like roomcest like on real world hawaii. (*drool* i want my realworld). so last night was up til 4 am and was talking to christine and helping her practice lines for the play. you know, i just might audition one of these days. who knows?

as for school, 2 midterms friday, economics and comparative politics. should be interesting. comp politics is 40 multiple choice and economics is short answer. lot of studying to do for it though, particularly since i havent really read anything. tomorrow is the new limp bizkit album which should be good and the concert in 2 weeks will be awesome. i'm going home dec 21 to dec 30 and coming back here for new years in the city. that'd would be an awesome deal if people came up here for new years and we could all go to a club or something and hang and then have a REAL dance party with actual djs and whatnot, but something in my head tells me i know whats going on back home for new years :P. now that i'm thinking about it, halloween is 2 weeks from tonight. bummer, i'm missing the bethanne halloween party. :P ah well, i think our floor is trick or treating in ouestmount, so that shouldnt be too bad. now that i've got girls around with bigger clothing and whatnot, maybe i just might be able to dress as a better looking girl in drag :)... who knows, i might have had a lot more to say here, but now i'm tempted by dinner so it may have to wait....

3/10/00-yes, thats right, another day of ol fashioned html coded page. give it up for the arrogant tim ryan and our high school internet club for teaching me how to work code. tonight's the presidential debate, so its gonna be a great night of drinking and watching al and w. and still, i've got logic hw and my plato essay to work on and still no computer. but i'll get it done of course. other then going to lectures, things have been same ol same ol up here. today i skipped economics to go to pierre trudeau's funeral service at the notre dame basillica. jimmy carter was there, fidel castro, prince andrew and a few others, but unfortunately there were so many people we couldnt actually get in, so we watched on the bigscreen outside. trudeau's one of canada's most revered prime minister and was the one that signed the bilingual act into effect, making canada a bilingual country. meanwhile as a result of this, héma-québec leaves a message for the blood drive this week on my answering machine completely in french. :)

we've seen them filming two more movie things here. one day, they were doing shots with a camera mount on a car, and old fashioned checkercabs, and anglicized street signs, etc. and we saw one guy that looked like bruce willis get into a red ferrari convertible. but we dont think it was him. this weekend was pretty good, i went out drinking for the first time in a month. drunk is weird. but we didnt see sly stallone again :P other than that its been pretty tame here. lots of news going on in the middle east and it makes me optimistic for an unrealistic peace process. and i love how they blame ariel sharon for going to the temple mount and blame the israelis, when the palestinians incited their youths to throw rocks down at the jews playing at the western wall during services. its so sad. but yeah, like anyone ever cared about my political standpoints.

things here are starting to go rather mediocre again. stuff's just not happening the way i've been hoping and i realized at dinner that no one here has really gotten to know me other than the drug induced euphoric spencer that i've been for the past month. no one knows what music i like (bizkit, eminem, papa roach, xzbit- oct 27!!!! woo i'm going!!!!), no one knows what tv i like, anything about my political standpoints....hell, the only thing people really know about me is that i have a guitar and sometimes play and that i'm jewish. which is really kinda sad. i've had a lot of deep conversations with people here on different things (which is more than i really ever had with people at home), but even that isnt everything. like take dinner for instance. i realized tonight that they knew i was in my room playing my guitar, cause my door was open and you can hear my guitar in the hall, but no one asked me to go with them. which is not just something special to tonight, but i've found it typical of a bunch of nights. the only way i ever end up at dinner with them is if i hear them going to leave and follow them along. but i dont want to be a follower. :P i think i'm just gonna start a Brotherhood of Jewish Monks and bring back celibacy. just dont understand women....

so things now are really weird, i got a bunch of work to do, debates tonight, blah blah blah...not coming home now til december. and when in december is depndent on my exam schedule, but i wish people would come up and visit me. hah! fat chance. like anyone's gonna leave connecticut and drive up to montreal to see me. that will truly be the day. but i guess i cant complain since i knew i'd be in this situation. i'm not particularly homesick, i just wouldnt mind seeing a few people to break things up from what's starting to become a dynamic monotony.

i thought i had other stuff to say, but i cant remember what else there was so...oh yeah, and my grandfather's still workin on getting me habs/leafs tix for the 18th. he says he might get either 2 or 4, so that'd be cool and apparently they're near rinkside seats, but i'm not even sure who i'd invite to go with me.

Past reflections: