Quick Update from Me & Don

[trouble]

I'm just popping my head up a bit to share some good news, in chronological rather than order of importance.

1) The Student Loan issue has been "solved" in that I now owe thousands of dollars to family and not to a collection agency that will randomly have my bank account frozen. We've also ending our banking relationship with the previous bank. Not because they froze my bank account on the 30th of the month. That bit I disagree with but understand. No, because I called them up to have them take money out of my account to apply to the loan, they took the money out of my account electronically and then froze my account for 10 days to see whether or not the money would clear. This was not what was discussed over the phone, and it makes no sense because the money was taken from my account before they froze it again. So, you know. I bank elsewhere now, and most of Don's investments have been moved as well. (The only things not moved are long-term investments that are locked in for another year, but those will go as well.)

2) Don's vocal cords are getting better! He saw the doctor, and this is what he says: "Whet he thinks is happening is that the nerves have come back but the ones that tell the cord to close and the ones that tell it to open are all firing at once. This is resulting in the chord mostly staying rigid which is why its worlds better but not 100% of pre surgery. The nerves might sort them out a bit more so that the chord starts to move a little more but the important thing is that its not going to get weaker." I know I've mentioned this before but having actual medical doctors say "yes, it's getting better, no, it's not a fluke, and it won't get worse" has been a huge weight off his mind.

3) My PhD apps are almost ready to go. I've got two more days for my UofA transcripts to arrive, but all of my letters of reference are packed and ready to go, as is my writing sample, CV, various bits of paperwork, thesis proposal, statement of intent, etc etc etc. The post office tells me I can have it shipped Priority Next Day AM if I get to the post office before 4pm Thursday. (The technical deadline for both universities is January 15th. [The last one is January 31st.] January 15th is a Saturday. *sigh*)

So, yay for me. Things are coming along nicely. Chapter 2 is doing really well. My sleep is a bit screwed up (I stayed up too late last night and thus couldn't get myself out of bed this morning to hit the Leg Library), but generally things are Good. My wee laptop is totally a goner, but I'm taking advantage of the university's computers. (Right now that's irritating me because there are many students here who have confused "quiet conversation" with "Make a lot of noise" but I just need to wait them out.) I'm a bit lonely (I misssssss youuuuu) but I've been working and reading a lot, so I guess that's good.

♥

Comments

[trouble]

Oh my gosh, I was just beside myself this week with the transcript thing. My UofA transcripts hadn't arrived but everyone else's had, including the ones that didn't allow you to pay extra to have them expressed shipped, and then I found out they sent them in the same sealed envelop as my AUC transcripts. Which makes sense, because AUC was bought out by UofA over a decade ago, but why didn't they tell me that????

[tea]

That's ridiculous, but also sounds totally par for the course. How are you supposed to know what's inside those sealed envelopes?

I finally found out that McGill'd processed my requests on friday, printed the transcripts on monday, but then for some reason wouldn't be mailing them until thursday. Because it really takes four days to put something in the mail box.

On the other hand, McGill doesn't charge anything. I've spent 60 bucks on uOttawa transcripts (last minute oh-whoops couriering not included), so I guess you get what you pay for.

[tea]

PS. Where did you end up applying to in the end? Just Toronto?

[trouble]

York & McGill, actually. >.> Although your tales of woe are making me nervous!

I'm also applying at Dal as well (I know, I hate it here, but I wanted to apply to three places and Dal does have the appropriate stuff for my needs) but their deadline isn't until January 31st.

I only figured out what was in the envelopes because I ordered enough for Dal as well and our department secretary told me I didn't need to get them for Dal because they had all my transcripts on file and didn't need yet more copies (of course I'd already paid to have them couriered at that point) so I opened one of the envelopes for Dal. *sigh*

[tea]

Ah, right, I was remembering the prof *in* Toronto you'd talked about, not at Toronto. And I actually found McGill was better at supporting its students (at a first-year level, at any rate) with things like departmental advisors and whatnot, than Ottawa is.
I left mostly for personal reasons, but I think I would have enjoyed the university otherwise.

I can't imagine there are too many options for disability history in Canada, although I suppose that becomes true once you specialize enough in any field! The nice thing for me, now, is that I don't know exactly what I want to be doing, so I can apply most anywhere with a big enough physics department, but if I had picked a more narrow discipline I doubt I'd find more than three schools that would be right. (Unless it was one of the major, popular research areas.)