Jeannie Carson

            On Wednesday morning I translated another three rhyming lines of "Complainte du progrès" by Boris Vian.

            I started memorizing "Kawasaki" by Serge Gainsbourg but once I was singing along with the song I realized that the words I’d chosen for my translation didn’t fit the rhythm and so I went back to work on that. It would probably take another session to get it right and then go back to the memorization.

            I washed another eight boards of the living room floor behind my couch. 

            I think it’ll take another six or seven cleaning sessions to finish the room and so I won’t be done before school starts. I found out that school starts on Thursday of this week but I wouldn't have any classes until Monday.

            I had three corn crackers with cheese for lunch and some Greek yogourt with a granola bar.

            I worked on my online application for the Noah Meltz grant. I had to upload my financial files and so I’d photographed all of my Ontario works deposit receipts. But the application says not to upload more than five files and each file couldn’t be more than two megabytes and so I had to shrink the financial statements down to about 150 kilobytes each so I could put them all into one manageable file. I had downloaded pdfs of my 2019 pay slips from OCADU but then I had to find a way to put them all into one pdf. I used Cloud Convert and got it done in about two minutes. When I tried to submit the application it wouldn’t save and change and highlighted a field that was unfinished. I remembered that I’d had this problem in February with my winter grant and so I checked my journal for that time to refresh my memory as to the solution. It turned out that I’d needed to put a "zero" beside “Number of dependent children" and "Childcare costs". After that it went through. I called up Admissions to se if I have to apply for OSAP like I did last year and it looks like I don’t, which is a relief. I also don't have to apply twice to get my winter courses paid for. But then again, the person I spoke with might be wrong.

            In the afternoon I took my bike out to the roof to put the derailleur and the wheel back on. I got confused about how to properly thread the chain but then I realized it was a moot point since the bolt that attaches the derailleur to the frame had snapped. I had to put my bike and my wheel back in the apartment until Thursday at noon when Bike Pirates would be open.

            I did some exercises while listening to an episode of Amos and Andy.

            In this story Andy is invited to a party where a famous ichthyologist and his beautiful daughter are the guests of honour. Andy tries to impress the girl by claiming to also be an ichthyologist. Meanwhile one of Amos’s cab fares has left his briefcase in his taxi and he asks Andy to look inside to see whom it belongs to and then deliver it. It belongs to Phil Baker, the host of the game show, “The 64 dollar Question". In the briefcase are the answers to this week’s questions and so Andy decides to try to impress Amanda by studying the answers and winning the game. But the questions are changed and so he answers, the question, “What does an elephant never do?" with "Goes up the Columbia River to spawn" which is right but that was the only one he got correct. I think I’d actually listened to this one before.

            I got caught up on my journal.

            I tried to ask for a fee deferral online but my request was rejected. I think it's just a glitch or there might be a delay because I only just applied for the grant.

            I tried to find the site where I click to request that my financial account be charged a per course fee instead of  $7,611.86 but like almost every year I couldn’t find it. I’ll have to call my registrar’s office on Thursday and clear those things up.

            I had a fried egg, a piece of toast and a beer for dinner and then I baked the chocolate pizza that I got from the food bank a few weeks ago. I had a quarter of it with strawberry yogourt and coffee.

            During dinner I watched an episode of Wagon Train. The wagon train comes across a clan of Scotsmen travelling to California on their own. A wheel on their wagon is broken and impossible to fix and yet their leader, Angus MacGregor is too proud to accept the Major’s offer of another wheel. When one of the Major’s crew takes a liking to Angus’s daughter Annie, it doesn’t help because Jason’s last name is Campbell, which the name of a clan that in Angus’s homeland has been involved in a feud with the MacGregors for generations. Jason sneaks into the MacGregor camp and fixes their wagon. This angers Angus, but worse still the rest of the clan wants to join the wagon train. Angus has issues of trust with wagon trains because the clan started out with one but there was a cultural clash with the other passengers that could not accept the MacGregor’s clothing and their bagpipes. The MacGregors join the wagon train and the first night there is bagpipe music and dancing but the livestock is spooked by the bagpipes and so the Major has to ask them to not play them during the journey. This causes the clan to once again split from the train. Going through a pass the train is attacked by Natives but when the MacGregors come marching in playing their bagpipes they think they are hearing evil spirits and they run away. Jason marries Annie with his blessing.

            Annie was played by Yorkshire born Jeannie Carson, who became a star on the London stage with “Love From Judy”. In the US she had a sitcom called “Hey Jeannie”, which only lasted for one season. She never made it big in film or television but starred successfully in “Finian’s Rainbow” on Broadway.