An intense day of reading and discovery!

Firstly we had our arses frozen off at the Farmer’s Market (where’d that fierce icy wind blow in from?), we, being the delightful Mme Beespeaker (Lori W) and meself, as we ate eggs and pulled pork, followed by catch up, discussion and exchange on my impending project Rereading the Riot Act. Helpful and inspiring as ever is Lori and add tales of tea on top of all that.

I spent the latter part of the day and evening in the basements of UBC libraries rummaging through rarities and old newspaper reports, which it took me most of the time to figure out how to turn that blessed machine on. It reminded me of a cotton mill trying to fathom how to thread the yoke into the other yoke to discover the newspaper was back to front?!

The young fella beside me had a dreadful cold, but I shared my front page discoveries with him. He told me he had taken a BC  History course but had never heard of the 1935 incident I was waving my hands over. There was a lovely moment where when I stood up to leave, a young woman approached me, firm and frantic, initially demanding my services. “I need a Reference Librarian,” she said. I was rather chuffed to be mistaken for a Reference Librarian given my problems turning the machine on. (This having used identical machines in four other cities on numerous occasions … but some technicals never quite make an impression on me).

I am still confused about how biting that wind was this morning. There wasn’t much of a hint of it on leaving the house, and then…Lord I felt it in the old fingers and bones.

To G Perec et Jean Michel Basquiat maintenant.