The word of the week is modicum. Because it got me noticed.
Oct 18- Life Episodes
Things are going better lately: I’ve been holding on with both hands to my sanity and my wallet, so my grip’s loosened on the one and held firm on the other as things have improved. I’ll be able to travel to Niagara on more than a shoestring budget this time, which will be great as I really want to get out and see as many people as I can while I’m back next week. Assuming that my tickets show up on time... they’re standby tickets, so once they arrive I’ll make a call to secure my flight reservations.
Monday nights, when I can, I try to catch the latest episode of Castle, with Nathan Fillon. It’s smart, funny and well-written, with great characters who can surprise you sometimes with wise nuggets. Like tonight, when Castle’s partner Beckett is asked “How do you know when you’re in love?” She thinks for just a moment, then says “All the songs make sense.” Succinct! Especially compared to Castle’s own long-winded fumbling trying to answer the same question a minute prior, made all the more amusing by the fact he’s a writer. Shouldn’t he know these things?
Oct 19 – Lost Girl and Riese
A few weeks after the fact, I finally managed to watch the first episode of Lost Girl, starring Anna Silk. I’d downloaded it weeks ago from iTunes to my iPod Nano( nice little gadget! )and it sat there unwatched until today. It was fairly polished, plodded slightly in places, but got the job done in introducing the characters, setting and story in general. It’s got supernatural elements, a few cool fight scenes, mysterious backstories and more – I gave in and bought the first season this week, quite a bargain at $20.99 CDN. Here’s hoping!
Wahoo! More good TV! A week today on Oct. 26th, SyFy.com will be streaming the webseries Riese to the world – finally! Riese is a steampunk-themed series that follows a female heroine through her journeys as she tries to discover a way to save her dying world. Perfect for me, as I love most things steampunk and apocalyptic ... can’t wait for that one. *grins*
Oct 20 – Watch Tron!
Death and cyberspace: is there a way to live on, in some way, electronically after one’s gone? I’m not talking about some weird low-code avatar of yourself reading from your journal( though that would be creepy if they programmed it to answer questions )but rather what would your silicon remains be? I’d like to think that should I pass on suddenly, that some greater or lesser part of what I was would be available to people for the future, whether they knew me or not. Digital archaeology may just be a viable job in the near future, depending on what one is looking for... Wired magazine posited that thought a little while ago. Fascinating.
I don’t wear watches, as I’ve said before... but this one may make me change my mind: The Tron Watch. It’s simple, elegant stylish and functional – everything I need in a watch, and nothing more. To go from the extreme of loving the calculator watch in its day to this minimalist ideal is, well, liberating. I hope, I hope, that the design will make it from prototype concept to production – I’d wear it proudly!
Oct 21 – Can There Be Too Much Good TV?
There’s a ton of shows out there that I try vainly to keep up with – Fringe, Sanctuary, Stargate Universe... and now The Big Bang Theory. It’s a smart sitcom about two brilliant physicist roomies who learn to deal with life outside of quarks and string theory. Renee introduced me to the show and I love it – especially as she also likes to talk about string theory on occasion. Anyone for a game of Cat’s Cradle with the universe? Anyone?
Yes, more cars with guns – well, armour at least, this time. Plus: it’s made in Toronto! Let me introduce you to the Knight XV, the toughest non-military vehicle you can buy. For a cool $310,000 USD, one of the only 100 being made can be yours, thanks to Conquest Vehicle Inc’s limited production run. Options run the range from FLIR night vision to flat-screen TV’s to a cigar humidor – why not have the best in your rolling armoured cocoon? Pretty cool to have a Canadian flag on this one, even if it does fly in the face of all sanity when it comes to cost and fuel efficiency. Then again, if you have to ask...
Oct 22 – Tickets! Dating! TGIF!
Apart from my plane tickets FINALLY arriving today( WHEW! )the final day of work for the week kinda dragged – there were a few last-minute errors of the kind that usually pop up when closing that delayed my heading home. Other than those, it was a decent day – my staff are really pulling together into a solid, confident team. So much so that they insisted several times today that I turn OFF my manager’s phone for the duration of my vacation... which I found both endearing and amusing. I can’t turn it off completely, as I have to be available in case of a serious emergency... but I won’t be checking it more than once a day. And I refuse to push email to it – no way!
After work, I met up with Renee to try and find a good pub to hang out at for the evening... much harder than it looks, in Langford. We tried The Loghouse... then Station House, then The Waterwheel Pub. All three were blasting tunes so loud inside that you couldn’t hear anyone across the table from you talk – are you serious? So we headed into town over to Esquimalt, where we had a lovely time chatting over white wine – a great way to spend your evening, even though I know very, very little about wine.
Oct 23 - Passages
Erk... I woke up early today, despite my admonition to sleep in on the first day of my vacation. Five hours sleep is just too little to enjoy a morning, but I tried anyway – there’s nothing good on Saturday Morning Television these days, not even a Ninja Turtle or two to distract one during breakfast. I puttered about a bit, then headed over to The Mountain Bean for some hours in the afternoon to relax while surfing my favourite sites. Vanilla tea and peanut butter cookies go a long, long way to relaxing me.
When I was a kid, I loved secret passages and rooms. A few of the houses my relatives lived in had hidden rooms or tucked-away storage areas that I liked to pretend were undiscovered areas of the home. Even a side-split place across the street on Westgate Park Drive had a set of shelves cleverly designed to hide the half-height storage area in the basement – that was so cool! Looking for things along that topic today, I came across Hiddenpassageway.com, where they make all the things you need to create access to such spaces in your own home. There was apparently a TV special on earlier today called ‘Secret Spaces’ that I’ll have to try to catch again another day; it had the Munster’s house in it!
Oct 24 – DVR Zombies
Now that I have a little time, I’ve taken over the DVR in the other room and am skimming through the many, many shows I’ve set it to record these past few months... and not had the time to watch. I have a ton of Batman: The Animated Series, as well as quite a few Castle and Stargate: Universe episodes I want to see – but I’m leaving on Monday and will be away from the DVR. One solution would be to get a Slingbox, but really: what kind of fool would I be to travel thousands of km’s across the country just to spend most of my time in a Starbuck’s to watch streaming television during my vacation? No thanks.
One week from today, AMC will premiere the new zombie TV series The Walking Dead, based on the acclaimed comic book series. You can catch the latest trailer here at AVClub.com, which hints at the broad scope and character development that the series promises to reveal to us. Quite cool that it’s going to premiere on Halloween, though it may be a challenge to find it streaming online soon after.
Ah... s’been a great weekend, just relaxing, catching up on some TV and not thinking about work. I’ll be arriving late, late Monday night Oct 25th and picking up my rental car Tues AM. I’ll be staying at Simon’s place, and have no set plans for the week – suggestions, please! *grin* My flight out leaves Nov. 1st at 4pm, so between now and then, let’s get together and catch up! I’ll have my BC cell with me, my laptop available and my local Niagara number handy( see my FBook page )so call me!
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