Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 12:08:40 -0800 (PST)
Subject: We have a winner...

Well, we have our winner in the "Spot a Blooming Flower" contest.  The
winner is my Mom of Brunaby B.C., who on Feb. 3rd wrote: "I have primroses
out in the garden--they obviously have been out for a few days as they are
in full open stage--more to come and bulbs are pushing up."  For winning
the contest my parents are off to Mexico for a week. (Okay, so they were
going anyway, but it sure makes the contest sound better :)

If anyone else has also seen blooming flowers, you should have gotten your
entries in sooner and maybe you'd be off to Mexico.

I discovered the other day that by touching the antenna of my radio
headset I could double the number of stations I could tune in.  However,
all this really did was increase the number of Polka stations I found.  At
any given time, a scan of the AM or FM band finds at least 3 stations
playing polkas.  I always though polkas were for family reunions, German
weddings and Oktoberfest, but apparently not.  I guess it's like the dance
music special, but for old German people :)  Fortunately, they don't seem
to have any of that CFNY crap :)  I still haven't found that elusive
station that caters to 17 year old girls that I want to listen to.  

Last weekend was pretty darn exciting as my weekends go.  On Saturday I
went to the mall in the burbs.  On this particular day they were giving
out free wine samples, in real wine glasses no less.  Pitty I don't drink.
I bought some necessities and even ventured into the glasses store,
considering the possibilty of buying some Euro-glasses.  While wandering
around in the basement Migros (Migros is a way cool store here.  The one
in the basement is for computers, sporting goods, electronics, furniture,
gardenning, do it yourself stuff and books - the upstairs one is
groceries, clothes, dishes and daily necesssites.  They also have a
jewelry store in the same mall) they were selling off all their German
books (I know not why they ever had them as I have yet to meet anyone here
who speaks German).  I found this perfect one for my brother and I even
went to the cute cashier to buy it.  That was the social peak of last week
:)

On Sunday I caught the funicular up the mountain to see the sunshine.  It
was beuatifully clear up there.  First time I had seen the sun in ages.
Which reminds me, I have another contest idea: who had the minimum amount
of sunshine in January.  I bet I'll win with 1 hour and 9 minutes of
sunshine for the entire month of January.  I'm not sure when that 1:09
was, but I was either sleeping or in Rome because I missed it :)  Anyway,
while I was up there I set about taking a GPS reading with my newly
purchased $8 worth of batteries.  Although the GPS will tell you where you
are with no starting information, it works much faster if you give it a
rough idea of where you are.  Unfortunately, I accidentily entered 47
degrees South instead of North and wasted 20 minutes woth of my batteries.
This also explains how I killed my batteries in Rome before I got a
reading.  Oh well.  For anyone who wants to know, there is a very nice 4
star hotel with an unbelievable view of the Alps located at N47*1.626'
E6*57.346'  (And if you have French blood flowing in you veins (and
arteries too one would think) that's E4*37'27" of Paris since the French
never much liked Greenwich.)

Down here, in the land of the fog, we had an amazing change in weather.
On Wednesday, although it was cloudy, the fog had become clouds and I
could once again see the Alps on the far side of the lake.  Then, On
Thursday, I woke up to a sunlit day.  Of course, I could no longer see the
Alps because of generally poor visibility, but the sky was blue and there
were shadows and everything.

Having a blue sky and shadows without going up the mountain was a bit of a
novel experience, but what really took the cake was when I was going home.
As I was walking home on Thursday, something caught my eye, and I looked
up, and I saw... hmmmm... what are those things... oh, I remember, those
are stars.  I had truly forgotten such things exist.  Even though I could
not see the sun directly during the day, it still made things bright, but
when you live in a fog bank, stars are something you can totally forget
about.  For the first time in in a long time I was truly awestruck by the
stars.

Well, I won't be repeating last weeks social adventures because I'm down
to 14.30 CHF and there's not too many things you can buy from the cute
cashiers for that much :)  (Well atleast not now that I bought their
really cheap German book :) I actually still have 50 in the bank, but I
think if I take it out the Swiss bankers will get angry with me.  I hope
either the bank draft from my Mom or the reimbursment cheque from the
university here for my trip to Rome arrive soon.

Tiny, the dog where I live, is a racist.  You may recall that two kittens
have been living at my place since christmas.  One, is white with light
brown patches and the other is black with white feet, stomach and face.
Tiny, who is tan, has absolutely no problem with the brown and white cat,
but hates the black one.  She barks at it continuously and chases it and
is generally mean.  Anyway, this necessitated the giving away of this
kitten, so now we only have one kitten.  Unfortunately, I prefered the
black one because it was more friendly, even though it twice spilled my
water bottle, knocked my almost dead plant off the table and always
insisted on poking it's nose into my breakfast.  C'est la vie.

I have a favour to ask the Vancouverites and Torontonians.  If anyone
happens to be near the Art Gallery and wants to kill a few minutes, could
you poke your head into the gift shop and see if you can find a "Group of
Seven" book with lots of pictures and (here's the killer) the text in
French.  If you find one, I'd just like to know the cost.  Thanks.

Life is a bean farm.  (G. Linn - sometime around 1987 I think)

Aaron de Neuchatel