What a week! I managed to convince my bosses that it'd be a good idea to send me to Fredericton for a course on fish research. Only got the final OK on the day before the course, giving me just enough time to find a rental and a place to stay. Left the office an hour early Tuesday to begin the 7 hour drive there, and arrived shortly after midnight after managing to get lost in Freddy (I hate driving in unfamiliar cities!). Woke up to a snowy morning...leading me to wonder why it is that every time I leave Nova Scotia, it snows on me. The course was great--very interesting. Afterward, I got to hang out with some of the biologists in our New Brunswick offices (I so rarely get to spend time with other biologists!), spent a little bit of time shopping (we have no proper bookstores OR coffeeshops here in Sydney, so I always spend time in a Chapters when I have a chance), and hit the road again. Made it home shortly before midnight on Wednesday.
The worst part about the drive was that the CD player in the rental played MP3s, but not WMA files (which is how I store most of my music). So, I had two play-able albums to last me over 14 hours. That was not going to work, so I stopped at the nearest place where I could buy music, and do you know how hard it is to find a music place around here? The best selection I could find was at the electronics section of the Antigonish Wal-Mart. Ugh, I hate shopping at Wal-Mart, but desperate times, people. I grabbed a few CDs of bands I'd heard about but hadn't yet listened to: Weezer, Alexisonfire, Sloan (pretty bad--they're from Nova Scotia and I've never listened to them!)...plus "best-of"s from from Radiohead (had one song that I didn't already have), and Simon & Garfunkel (had a few songs that I didn't). Turns out I enjoy Weezer, Sloan was pretty good on first blush and is really growing on me, Alexisonfire is...um....not my thing at all, but I must say that it's perfect music for driving when you're tired. The Radiohead best-of is great, of course (and since one of my two MP3 discs was In Rainbows, I had their whole career represented), and you can just never go wrong with Simon & Garfunkel. So pretty. However, I didn't put that one on until the return trip--it's much too soothing for driving after dark.
Along with these, I also have a few albums on order based on Che and Jeremy's suggestions (thanks, guys!), so my music collection is finally getting some new blood.
Spending 14 hours driving (actually closer to 16 for me, it was dark and raining most of the way) in a 30-hour period requires a hell of a lot of coffee. I had so much coffee (much of it the extra strong "double-blast" stuff from Irving gas stations) that I had an honest-to-goodness caffiene hangover on Thursday. Even though I was pretty close to falling asleep at my desk, I just couldn't bear the thought of drinking any! Happily, that didn't last.
Upon returing to the office, I got a message that I might be needed for some field work in northern Ontario next month. Wow, never a dull moment....
Controversial, anyone?
11 years ago
4 comments:
Ooo, neat trip there, Meaux, honey! But seriously, Walmart? Wow, you must have been REEEEEEEally desperate, huh? Oh well, I can never judge you too harshly. Also, yay for Alexisonfire! Which CDs have I convinced you to get?
Hate to say it meaux, but it serves you right using wma's. They're a microsoft proprietary format, whereas mp3s are generically ubiquitous and supported just about anywhere. Do yourself a favour, use the google and find mediacoder, then convert your music to mp3. Yeah it may not be technically the best but it works well and works just about anywhere!
(Don't even get me started on the iPod's format stupidity!)
I'm on it, lordhelmet--been re-ripping everything I own to MP3 (with FreeRip) since I got back.
*sigh* Should have listened to my cute and ridiculously intelligent husband in the first place; I just figured that letting Media Player do the ripping would be easier than trying to figure out new software. He won't let me use iTunes either; I didn't argue with him on that one!
You can use mediaplayer to rip music no problems, but you've gotta change the default format - get into Tools->Options->Rip Music->Rip Settings->Format:=mp3 (use a birate of 192 and that should be good enough). Listen to the hubby, I'm sure he's right on things like this!
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