Welcome to the Hood

My parents and I spent yesterday and this morning putting finishing touches on my new place in Regina. A relatively full two days, with lots of sorting, organizing, buying new furniture, hanging pictures, moving furniture around, laundry, and so on and so forth.

Other friends were also in Regina, sorting out their respective new homes---Ray and Eddie were both down, and we all supped together at a quaint restaurant that was in a very obscure locale.

Interesting welcome to the city we had though. After a lovely visit with Eddie and Brea, Eddie walked me home the block and a half from his and Mark's appartment to mine, we saw a lively variety of the Regina night life that inhabits our neighbourhood. I quietly whispered under my breath "we really do live in the hood"...

Eddie called me around ten this morning to inform me he no longer has a vehicle--it was hit by a drunk driver, and he came out to his car to see it totalled and mounted on tow truck as well as the police arresting the woman who rammed into his car. On his first night in the city, it claims his car as the toll.

Silver lining in the cloud was that my parents were able to give Eddie a ride back to Saskatoon with us and he wasnt stranded in Regina alone for the last few days of vacation. On our way out of town we stopped at a Tim Hortens on Albert. I used the washroom facilities as preparation for the lengthy drive home; while there I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me but I really did see a sharps disposal container for needles in the T-Ho bathroom, complete with an improperly disposed needle still poking out of the container. I think my eyes grew as wide as saucers, and the thought "Oh my, what have I gotten myself into" echoed through my head.

And oh I know that this is only one flavor of Regina, and that these flavors are found in city--I have just never really had it so obvious and in my face before. Hopefully I will get to experience the more savory flavors--the music, the food, the church, the hockey before too long.

At any rate my Emergency rotation should be fun.