Research on the Road, Day one

I’ve decided to record some notes and thoughts about my time in New Brunswick and PEI, and possibly the rest of my research on the road.

So in one day, here are the lessons I have learned thus far from one day travelling and in Saint John:

Lesson One:
Small Planes smell, really bad ‘nuff said.

Lesson Two
Planning for research is more work than actually doing research. Organizing, finding places to stay, budgeting enough to eat, recruiting interviewees, scheduling, getting your questions set up were all much more difficult than actually doing any interview or transcribing it.

Lesson Three:
Hotels are nice, especially fancy hotels. I am in a hotel with my husband for three days and let me tell you, I could get used to this. Having stayed in places where you are afraid that the shower will make you more dirty, a clean bathroom and an included breakfast (which by the way, if your pockets are deep enough can stretch to lunch and dinner) might just soften me up a bit two much for the next two weeks. However I maintain what I always told Andrea’s Mom. “If I eat enough of your food here, I won’t have to feed myself for at least two weeks.”

Lesson Four:
Blend in with the local culture. When someone says, “Are you going to the Lobster Boil Tuesday?” Particularly if said person is a Maritimer, never answer that you don’t like lobster; you might as well claim to not like air. However, a surprising number of the Toronto people on the shuttle agreed with me. It’s not that the taste of lobster is unpleasant, it is just too much work. If a lobster shell were more like an eggshell, then perhaps I would be more inclined to eat it.


Those are my lessons thus far. I only have boring plans for today, doing school work, going out and buying a map of the province, maybe going to see the reversing falls. I brought some textbooks that I am hoping to send home with my husband so I am going to get to writing my paper for the CSSR.

FYI for all who care, my race time for the Half Marathon was 2:36:23. The Elites ran the full Marathon faster than this, but I am happy to have finished with no major injuries. If I do it again next year I will aim to get under 2:30.