so quebec...what's with your metro system? you walk into an entryway and instead of seeing anything resembling what looks like a subway and/or other kind of transportation system...you see a set of stairs...that leads into a food court. so i went back outside, figuring i went into the wrong set of doors...no...so i go downstairs and, yeah, i'm in a food court and this giant underground mall that reminded me a lot of taipei, only there you did at least have some signs here and there that you were going past shops but headed towards a subway stop.

so i'm walking around, asking as many retail workers as i can find in case i can find one that understands that i'm looking for this fabled transportation system. finally i get to a station stop...kind of. i'm expecting that there will be some kind of machines where, oh, one could buy a ticket. nope. just a desk. and it seems that where i was trying to go was one stop away...yet cost $2.50! shit i could have walked if i weren't in period hell pain. even with the pain...$2.50!?! and that wasn't roundtrip. then it turns out that i'm not even going where i thought i was going.

where was i trying to go? well, it seems that the conference people wrote me a check in canadian dollars from a canadian bank (or banque) that my bank in the us is gonna be SUPER happy about (how many weeks/months do you think it will take them to clear that check when it takes them 13 days to clear my direct deposit checks from university payroll? so since it's my last day in canada, i thought that i'd go to the bank that issued the check and see if they can do a direct deposit into my us account and/or recut the check in a more accessible format like travellers checks (cheques) or an international money order. nope. same as everywhere...you have to open an account and there was no fucking way i wanted to open a checking account in another country and then wait for 40 days for the check to clear and try to transfer that money to some other format...%($#*%(#(@*$(#@

anyway, it was a total waste of 4 hours and then i got caught in a rain downpour. so while i was getting soaked, i took pix of the cool and what has to be amazingly expensive xmas lights that are on every fucking tree in this fucking city. and i ran into this guy who works in the hotel and was laughing at my taking pictures of city stickers and signs who gave me ideas about the coolest picture taking places in the area -- earlier we'd had a conversation about how "mooning" and the fact that we have homeless camped out down the street from the white house is such an "american" statement and that seattle was pretty close to montreal in look and feel. this after my asking all the staff why everyone was wearing a red posey today (tomorrow is canada's version of veteran's day and they are dealing with the first generation in a long time of children remembering their parents who were recently killed in a war, lost in the iraq disaster.

and i'm so fucking glad the us house and senate is out of republican control. fuck, i think the whole world might feel that way. and my moods are way out of control and it doesn't have anything to do with the us house or senate that i know of...i'm really, really, really tired of my period. and i'm really, really, really sick of it meaning that i've had to miss out on fun things, like everything at the conference that wasn't my talk.

my latest art project is completely disgusting and could, possible, land me in a whole heap of trouble coming back through customs tomorrow. and, no, it doesn't have anything to do with the canadian flag...oddly i haven't seen any of them for sale anywhere. but i'm not really in a souvenir part of town...more like the expensive stores that i can't afford to even enter. maybe i'll find some bulk flags on sale at the airport tomorrow so that i can play the fun with customs game..."do you have flags in your bag?"