Dec 6 – Stoked?
Have you ever wondered about what's happened previously today, in history? Check out today's date at Brainy History.com – sadly, today is the 20th anniversary of the Montreal Massacre, but I'm sure there are far more happier events lurking in the lists than that. Though if we fail to learn the lessons of history, we're screwed – to paraphrase things a bit.
Last week was a long, long week at work getting my new employee up to speed with things – three days clocked in around 11 hours on average, with phone calls off-shift adding to the total. Still, I'm pleased with their progress – I am confident the details will follow as they get more experience with the open-concept branch operations. Tiring though - very tiring.
I'm still waiting for the rest of Stoked to become available on iTunes... my Season's Pass seems rather worthless to me, with only TWO episodes available for the ENTIRE 'season' for download. Very, very frustrating. For now, I'm going to cruise through all the shows that MetaCafe.com has to offer( for free! )since they're not US-based and so don't deny most everything to people outside of their borders.
Dec 7 – Northward Travel
Dec 7 – Northward Travel
Today I worked a shift at our Duncan store, which is less than an hour away( on a good day )from Langford on the Trans-Canada Highway. It was a nice drive up during the day... on dry roads( and signs are up now stating cars in winter on the Malahat MUST have snow tires or chains ). It was a different story on the way home: the scenic Malahat is a twisting, curving ribbon of road that is extremely hazardous to your health in bad weather, or at night in good weather. Here in BC there are far fewer guardrails on major roadways – as I've mentioned before, it seems that all these trees are meant to subsitutute for said safety features. It's still not nearly as dangerous as the Yungas Road in Brazil – I saw a TV special on that earlier this year that made my hair stand on end.
Tm Horton's was in the news again today, this time in the town of Kingston ON, which has it in for the franchise's drive-thrus. Seems that Kingston doesn't want all those idling cars polluting, and is battling Timmy's over it. Weird, eh?
Tm Horton's was in the news again today, this time in the town of Kingston ON, which has it in for the franchise's drive-thrus. Seems that Kingston doesn't want all those idling cars polluting, and is battling Timmy's over it. Weird, eh?
Maybe they should flip a coin to settle the matter – or not! Today a study was released that showed the traditional coin-toss is far less impartial than you might think. According to researchers, only a few minutes of training with a person was necessary to adversely affect the results of coin tosses, so much so that some people could achieve incredibly skewed results. Darn it.
Dec 8 – Spaceship 'splosions!
Dec 8 – Spaceship 'splosions!
What's with all the rebooting? According to io9.com, these last ten years could very well be called the Decade of the Reboot, with the huge number of old shows and movies that were mined to create new profit and further the franchises therein.
Space battles... ever since the days of colour television, they've steadily improved along with visual effects technology. Io9.com has a great article( with video examples! )of some of the best space battles of all time, and why we love them so. I've been playing Gratuitous Space Battles on and off a few times a week, as new ship design ideas come to me – so far I've beaten most of the battles and am concentrating now on the 'infinite' scenarios to try and get my fleet to survive a little longer each time.
With my recent discovery that my eyes are changing focus( again ), I found my thoughts turning to other aspects of the inevitable aging process, including memory. Ironically, I remembered a site I bookmarked a long while back, called MindTools.com, which has a great set of articles on how to improve your memory. Worth a look, so don't forget to check them out – you can also try this interesting flash game designed to test your ability to separate words from colours; it's harder than you think.
Dec 9 – Touch The Apple
News came down the pipe today that Apple is launching a handheld touchscreen computer in Spring 2010, looking to compete with the recent e-book readers that have come out from Amazon and Sony. So instead of an iPhone, you will get a much more functional machine... that is less portable. Kind of like an Apple Netbook, but with a touchscreen instead.
With my recent discovery that my eyes are changing focus( again ), I found my thoughts turning to other aspects of the inevitable aging process, including memory. Ironically, I remembered a site I bookmarked a long while back, called MindTools.com, which has a great set of articles on how to improve your memory. Worth a look, so don't forget to check them out – you can also try this interesting flash game designed to test your ability to separate words from colours; it's harder than you think.
Dec 9 – Touch The Apple
News came down the pipe today that Apple is launching a handheld touchscreen computer in Spring 2010, looking to compete with the recent e-book readers that have come out from Amazon and Sony. So instead of an iPhone, you will get a much more functional machine... that is less portable. Kind of like an Apple Netbook, but with a touchscreen instead.
Here's something else that is quite portable: the Swiss Bike. Over the years, I've often wished I could just toss my bike into the back of the car some days, whenever the situation warranted my needing to use the car and not the bicycle – like driving to a great park for an afternoon of trail riding, for example. With the Swiss Bike, the whole thing folds up to stow neatly away in the trunk... and for a not-unreasonable price, compared to quality bikes costing thousands that are frankly more than I'll ever need.
This one's for you Mike: collectable fast-food glass sets from yesteryear. Ah, the glory days of Star Wars, when Vader was evil AND cool, and not a whiny teenager gone bad...
Dec 10 – Mechs? Bricks? Aliens?
Who doesn't like giant robots? I mean, they're just... cool. Nothing But Mech is a great blog that has lots of amazing mech / robot material posted on it all the time – check out some of the designs there! Those robots may be running on batteries though, as to date nobody's been able to figure out a way to power them. For about ten years now, I've been using rechargeable batteries for most of my electronic gear, starting with Pure Energy AA and AAA's from Walmart. Unfortunately, Pure Energy products tended to fizzle, fade and even explode messily after a few years, so after moving to BC I switched to the Hybrid Rechargable batteries from Rayovac. These Hybrids are unique in several ways: they can be recharged in any battery charger, can be charged thousands of times, have no memory effect and most importantly retain their charge over periods of 6 months or more between charges! So far, the last claim has proven to be quite true, as I have flashlights that I use once every few weeks or so that take many months before needing to be charged again.
This one's for you Mike: collectable fast-food glass sets from yesteryear. Ah, the glory days of Star Wars, when Vader was evil AND cool, and not a whiny teenager gone bad...
Dec 10 – Mechs? Bricks? Aliens?
Who doesn't like giant robots? I mean, they're just... cool. Nothing But Mech is a great blog that has lots of amazing mech / robot material posted on it all the time – check out some of the designs there! Those robots may be running on batteries though, as to date nobody's been able to figure out a way to power them. For about ten years now, I've been using rechargeable batteries for most of my electronic gear, starting with Pure Energy AA and AAA's from Walmart. Unfortunately, Pure Energy products tended to fizzle, fade and even explode messily after a few years, so after moving to BC I switched to the Hybrid Rechargable batteries from Rayovac. These Hybrids are unique in several ways: they can be recharged in any battery charger, can be charged thousands of times, have no memory effect and most importantly retain their charge over periods of 6 months or more between charges! So far, the last claim has proven to be quite true, as I have flashlights that I use once every few weeks or so that take many months before needing to be charged again.
A blast from the past today too: it seems that an old Amiga gaming favourite of mine, Alien Breed, is being brought to Xbox Live Arcade on Dec 16th. Called Alien Breed: Evolution, the game is from the same folks who made the original back in 1991: Team 17. Check out this short video comparing the two – the quantum leaps video game technology have made in twenty years are quite apparent.
And what's with this? Apparently someone stole a brick from an art gallery in the UK ... an ordinary brick that's worth thousands of pounds, accoding to the artist. Reminds me of the hubbub about Voice of Fire back in 1989, when the National Gallery of Canada bought it for $1.8 million... your tax dollars at work.
And what's with this? Apparently someone stole a brick from an art gallery in the UK ... an ordinary brick that's worth thousands of pounds, accoding to the artist. Reminds me of the hubbub about Voice of Fire back in 1989, when the National Gallery of Canada bought it for $1.8 million... your tax dollars at work.
Dec 11 – Mall Fallout
This wouldn't fit into the news from yesterday, so I'll mention it here: Natalie Portman( a fave actress of mine )will be starring in, and producing Pride and Prejudice and Zombies which is exactly what it sounds like. I mean, Portman and zombies? Excellent... too bad I had to hear about it from Variety magazine – I feel like I was standing in line at the grocery store for too long and picked over the mags on the rack at the checkout. Ick.
This wouldn't fit into the news from yesterday, so I'll mention it here: Natalie Portman( a fave actress of mine )will be starring in, and producing Pride and Prejudice and Zombies which is exactly what it sounds like. I mean, Portman and zombies? Excellent... too bad I had to hear about it from Variety magazine – I feel like I was standing in line at the grocery store for too long and picked over the mags on the rack at the checkout. Ick.
Fallout3: Game of the Year Edition went on sale today at Future Shop for $29.99 – an incredible price! Which explains why they were immediately sold out, offline and on... of course. I'll see if I can pick it up later in the week, which means I'll have to check daily to see if any stock comes in – no rainchecks and no competitors will price-match if there's none in stock. Of course.
Part of the apocalyptic theme today: Ghost Malls of America. Yes, you read it right... creepy, and they'd make a zombie feel right at home.
Dec 12 – To the Moon, Alice!
Tonight I finally got around to watching Stargate: Continuum, which was the second of the Stargate SG-1 made-for-DVD movies to come out( the first being The Ark of Truth ). Overall, I thought the special effects were good, the story so-so, and the acting excellent.
Part of the apocalyptic theme today: Ghost Malls of America. Yes, you read it right... creepy, and they'd make a zombie feel right at home.
Dec 12 – To the Moon, Alice!
Tonight I finally got around to watching Stargate: Continuum, which was the second of the Stargate SG-1 made-for-DVD movies to come out( the first being The Ark of Truth ). Overall, I thought the special effects were good, the story so-so, and the acting excellent.
Closer to reality: the first commercial space flight service was announced yesterday by Virgin Galactic. Slated to start in 2011, the one-hour flight has a ticket cost of $200,000 USD, which is incredibly cheap compared to the millions previously paid to date by private citizens to get into space. I'll add it to my 'Things to Do When I Win The Lottery' list.
Christmas this year is going to be a quiet affair; my sister is unable to visit and we are not going anywhere ourselves as all our relatives and friends are back east. WE're not big on gift-giving, and if anything have scaled down even more after moving out west. Still, a few small somethings will change hands, and I've been looking at digital picture frames as one of the things to get for my parents – they have literally thousands of pictures that they don't look at as often as they'd like to. What better way than to have a digital display? My own television can display pictures via a USB key, but it's wasteful of power to leave it on all day displaying images in a room they don't usually go into. Some of those frames are rather pricey, and the cheaper ones have so-so resolution, so I'll have to shop carefully to avoid getting a dud... not to mention TEST it first to find out of there are any stuck pixels.
Dec 13 – Let the Renovations... continue!
The new landlords got to work early today, getting the renovations running downstairs at 8:45am. On their list today? Knocking a hole in the east foundation wall to make room for a window, allowing a second bedroom to be added in the apartment. According to local bylaws, bedrooms in any addition HAVE to have a window, or cannot be used as such. So for most of the day, there was banging, jackhammering and generally loud goings-on down there, which drove my parents out of the house. As for me, I was too busy all day playing MW2 to really notice, save for the jackhammer vibrations every so often, and the few times that power had to be shut off while they checked connections in the wall.
On the weather side, it snowed here for the first time today – until now, it's only been a layer of frost on the coldest mornings for the last few weeks that's vanished as the morning warmed up. Today it took until noon for the snow to say goodbye, and the skies remained leaden grey all day long – a sign that we may have a white Christmas here after all. I hope that we don't get as much as we did last year around this time as I mentioned in my blog then – we'll see. It might mean I'll be spending more time indoors – but not as much as today, when I spent around 12 hours sitting on my couch overall – yikes!
Overall? This week was over before I noticed – quite a few days had me going solid from sunup to snooze-time and everywhere in between. My energy levels have held fairly steady, though I've noticed that my lack of cycling( it's cold out there! )has brought things down a bit for me. I'm still exploring various food options, and may even look into a more balanced alkai diet, depending on my consultations with my doctor. For now, it's sleep, de-stressing and some sunlamp time for the winter.
zzzzZZZzzzZzzz
Christmas this year is going to be a quiet affair; my sister is unable to visit and we are not going anywhere ourselves as all our relatives and friends are back east. WE're not big on gift-giving, and if anything have scaled down even more after moving out west. Still, a few small somethings will change hands, and I've been looking at digital picture frames as one of the things to get for my parents – they have literally thousands of pictures that they don't look at as often as they'd like to. What better way than to have a digital display? My own television can display pictures via a USB key, but it's wasteful of power to leave it on all day displaying images in a room they don't usually go into. Some of those frames are rather pricey, and the cheaper ones have so-so resolution, so I'll have to shop carefully to avoid getting a dud... not to mention TEST it first to find out of there are any stuck pixels.
Dec 13 – Let the Renovations... continue!
The new landlords got to work early today, getting the renovations running downstairs at 8:45am. On their list today? Knocking a hole in the east foundation wall to make room for a window, allowing a second bedroom to be added in the apartment. According to local bylaws, bedrooms in any addition HAVE to have a window, or cannot be used as such. So for most of the day, there was banging, jackhammering and generally loud goings-on down there, which drove my parents out of the house. As for me, I was too busy all day playing MW2 to really notice, save for the jackhammer vibrations every so often, and the few times that power had to be shut off while they checked connections in the wall.
On the weather side, it snowed here for the first time today – until now, it's only been a layer of frost on the coldest mornings for the last few weeks that's vanished as the morning warmed up. Today it took until noon for the snow to say goodbye, and the skies remained leaden grey all day long – a sign that we may have a white Christmas here after all. I hope that we don't get as much as we did last year around this time as I mentioned in my blog then – we'll see. It might mean I'll be spending more time indoors – but not as much as today, when I spent around 12 hours sitting on my couch overall – yikes!
Overall? This week was over before I noticed – quite a few days had me going solid from sunup to snooze-time and everywhere in between. My energy levels have held fairly steady, though I've noticed that my lack of cycling( it's cold out there! )has brought things down a bit for me. I'm still exploring various food options, and may even look into a more balanced alkai diet, depending on my consultations with my doctor. For now, it's sleep, de-stressing and some sunlamp time for the winter.
zzzzZZZzzzZzzz
