Updates from Al

Well, well, well… the last couple of weeks have been quite an adventure, to say the least. To begin, I would like to formally announce that I’m looking for work in and around Montreal. I got the news last week that there just isn’t any money in the budget to maintain my position, so at the end of the fiscal year (May 31) I’ll be handing in my keys and bidding a fond farewell to my little office space. While this is hardly the sort of news I wanted to hear, I was only ever promised a year here so getting an extra 2 and a half months is actually pretty decent. So if any of my readers know of any jobs for Anglophones out there (and though I shouldn’t NEED to emphasize this, I will anyway: NO CALL CENTRES), please feel free to drop me a line.

The next blow to the ol’ ego came last night in the form of a rather thin envelope from McGill’s Department of History. Contained therein was notice that I had been rejected from the Masters program and that my interest in the “highly competitive” program was appreciated. Um, thanks for that, I think… so I guess that clears up any fears I had about how I was going to pay for the MA, huh? Oh well. The next challenge awaits, I guess.

So let’s try and end off on a positive note, shall we? Last night I had the final exam for the French to English Translation course I’ve been blasting through this term. It’s hard to believe that 12 weeks have gone by so quickly, but evidently it has. Now I don’t know if I just got handed something different from everyone else in the room or if my classmates are just far more cautious than I am, but I was done that exam in record time. Sure, I had to look up the occasional word, but otherwise the translation seemed to write itself. All told, in a 90 minute exam, I was done in 45 minutes—and that includes the time I spent re-writing my rough draft! So either I tanked it or I rocked that baby til the break of dawn. We’ll be getting the results back next week, so I guess I’ll find out then if I’m as clever as I believe I am at the moment. Maybe I’ll get lucky on the English to French exam after Easter? Anything’s possible, right? Til next time…