Monica Grey

            On Thursday morning I memorized the second verse of “Lucette et Lucie” by Serge Gainsbourg. 

            My guitar tuning problem was worse than ever. Normally I used to be done by 8:30 after starting at 7:00. This morning when I still had several songs to go it was already 9:13. At that point I switched from the Fender tuner to the AT4 and I got the instrument in tune on the first try. But after that song I had problems with the AT4. I switched to the Fender and got it in tune but then after that I had problems again. The AT4 has an easier to read screen and needle. I figured if I could find exactly where the needle for the B string is when it’s in tune it would help. The thing with the B and small E strings is that if a tuner shows them dead on the note then it means they are out of tune. They have to be slightly down from the note with the needle fluctuating somewhat. It’s just a matter of how much. It seemed at least with the last few songs that if the needle was almost completely down from lighting up the B note but fluctuating slightly back to make it flicker, the string was in tune. I’ll see how it works on Friday. 

            At 11:00 I logged on for my Canadian Literature tutorial. On the final exam, on December 22, some students are in other time zones, especially in Vancouver and so adjustments will be made so that their exam starts at 9:00 their time. The assessment will be accessed through the “quiz" function on Quercus. We will have 48 hours to write it. 

            There will be no discussion question next week. That’s a relief. 

            The final essay is due on December 7. 1800-2500 words in MLA format but we won’t lose marks for not getting the format right. We don’t need to stick to the topic that we put in our essay outline. 

            I asked why the exam is so late in December. Since they don’t have to book physical testing centres it seems odd to me that they couldn’t overlap and have more exams at the same time. She didn't know why. 

            She asked for final comments on Cherie Dimaline’s The Marrow Thieves. I said it’s a pretty religious book, which is fine. I wouldn't want to take anyone’s faith away from them. But there seems to be a dig at the spirituality of European settlers in the book. Saying that if they had been more spiritual then they wouldn’t have lost the ability to dream. She challenged me to show her where it says that. I didn’t know the exact page but I said Miig said in one of the stories, I think the second, that white people lost touch with ceremony. Jason found the page as 88 and put it in the chat, adding a “sobbing” emoji, I assume in response to my point, which seemed pretty rude to me. The quote is about white people trying to get their dreams back and asking how to make ceremony better. She didn’t think that was a dig at white people's spirituality. I said the whole idea that dreams are part of Indigenous people's spirituality and white people not having them is a dig at white spirituality. She didn’t think so. She is so argumentative. Other TAs don't dismiss students' comments but rather try to see their point of view. She defends this book like she’s making money from it. She doesn't think that faith and religion are the same. I say it’s a religious belief or spiritual faith that dreams connect one with one's ancestors. She is so frustrating to argue with because she doesn’t argue reasonably and she’s in a position to always have the last word. 

            The idea of the braid and the weaving of stories. Someone said that dreams are tied up with hope for those who have lost it. 

            Someone compared dreams in this book and music in David Chariandy’s Brother. 

            Everybody and Kelly spent the rest of the class gushing over the book. 

            I said Isaac would have to teach everyone how to speak Cree in order for each person to be protected from the recruiters. 

            I had a chicken wing with yogourt and scotch bonnet sauce for lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took some self portraits of myself in my black hoody and black mask. 

            I went to Freshco where I bought four bags of grapes, a half pint of raspberries, some cheddar cheese with onion, two cans of sliced peaches, and kettle chips. The Maxwell House coffee was $5.99, cheaper than it’s been in a long time. For the last few weeks I haven't been able to find raspberry skyr at Freshco and I started to think they'd just stopped carrying that brand. It occurred to me this time to look in another part of the dairy section and there it was. The line-ups for all the cashiers were unusually long. Maybe because we’re back in lockdown and people are stocking up. 

            In the evening I received notice that my second short response assignment had been marked. I was shocked and extremely disappointed to find that my mark was only 50%. This is the lowest mark I have ever gotten on an English paper. She said that I did not follow the instructions properly. I put in a request with Professor Teramura for him to review my essay. This is a horrible year. How can I get "A”s on 4th year papers and a D minus on a 2nd year essay? It doesn't make sense. I never got anything less than a B when I was in 2nd year and now I'm in 4th year. Either I have sustained a brain injury or something is wrong with the evaluation criteria. Coming this far and having such a sudden drop in my score makes me feel like giving up. 

            I worked some more on my essay but I was depressed and discouraged because of my mark on the previous assignment. 

            I had a potato, a chicken leg and gravy while watching the first episode of Quatermass II. A chicken leg from a whole chicken tastes so much better than one from a pack of chicken legs. 

            This story begins a few years after Professor Quatermass’s first rocket encountered the alien life form that turned the three astronauts into one monster. The professor’s latest rocket exploded on the launch pad in Australia a few days before and the nuclear fuel caused an explosion like an atomic bomb. Quatermass has just told his daughter Paula and his colleague Leo Pugh that he is giving up. Meanwhile however a radar station in the English countryside tracks an object that lands not far away. It comes down in a farmer's field and the old man stops his tractor to investigate. Captain John Dillon arrives a little later to find the three pieces of the object. The farmer is in shock and can only say that the thing that fell smelled like “old stables". Dillon is under strict instructions to not report these kinds of occurrences but he is Paula's fiancé and he decides to break protocol and to take the three pieces to Quatermass. Pugh puts the pieces together and they form a hollow ovoid. Quatermass goes to see the farmer and his wife, Mr and Mrs Large. The farmer has a chill and he demands they leave. His wife says his behaviour is out of the ordinary. Quatermass and Dillon go to a local pub and learn that there used to be a village not far away where some things fell from the sky. The government bulldozed the village and turned it into a facility. As Quatermass and Dillon are approaching the area they see another object fall. They reach it before the facility alarm goes off. Dillon touches it and it releases a gas that does something to Dillon’s face. 

            Paula is played by Monica Grey, who co-starred in The Archers in 1950. She was the wife of Val Gielgud who was the head of BBC Radio Drama. A critic said she was less an actress than a finishing school on legs. 

            Mrs Large was played by Hilda Barry, who was born in 1884 and had a long career on stage, in movies and on television until her death at the age of 94.