The word of the week is facetious, as its use surprised and thrilled me during a film this week.
Sept 27 – Niagara In October? Really???
Really, really exciting news, folks: a friend of my sister’s has come forward to return a big favour that she was able to help him with... and he works for WestJet. So you can see where this is going: I might just be getting tickets to let me visit Niagara- just in time for my vacation at the end of THIS MONTH! More on this breaking news story as it develops... I’ve scheduled myself off from Oct. 23rd to Nov 1st, so I’ll likely be going from the 25th to the 1st inclusive – I’m so excited I can hardly stand it! So I sat down to write this.
Some things are too good to last, darn it. Such is the case with Xmarks, a free service that syncs bookmarks across ALL browsers on ALL the computers that you use – until you use it, you can’t imagine how great it is. Being able to pop open any browser( Chrome, FireFox, IE, Opera )and have access to the same bookmarks, even ones you’ve just updated, is very liberating. Until the news comes down that Xmarks is closing up shop soon due to a declining business model – read the sad story here, and lament its impending loss in 2011.
Sept 28 – Minecraft starships?
Jeepers, something I’ve thought about doing( briefly and without much aforethought ): building up a spaceship in a 3D modelling program for my own amusement. Well, someone’s done that one better plus a million - he built a 1:1 scale model of the Enterprise-D inside a game called Minecraft, which makes it easy to make things out of meter-square polygon blocks. Check out the video below, and the comments section on the link( if you click it ) – it’s stunning to ponder how much time this must have taken!
For all those with some spare time who are aspiring writers out there, of all walks and words, here’s something I ran across: How To Write A Book. It’s technical in parts, but it has some excellent advice, including the bits that every writer should know, like patience and perseverance. Oh, and have something good to talk about – nobody wants to read a book about socks, unless you really, really know socks. Write what you know, right?
Sept 29 – Finances and Family Thoughts
What do you think about parenthood, those of you who are parents? I’ve had a thought jogging around in my head for years, that’s had no solid answer – it’s about liscencing. We teach people to drive and certify them with a liscence; we issue a liscences for fishing, for firearms and for medical practice. Why, then, don’t we liscence people to have kids? Now, before your brain clamps down on that thought, think about it: we all know people who would make lousy parents, as well as people who make great ones. Who’s to say that basic courses in parenting might not make the world a better place? After all, kids take similar courses in high school; why not make things official with a Bureau of Parenting? Any thoughts?
Every so often I throw this back into the blog, as I think it’s vitally important that people take the time each week to think about their finances. Not planning ahead, even a little, can easily lead to a fiscal stumble when you least want or need it. Free Financial Advice.net is a great place to add to your fiscal toolbox, even if it’s just to perk up your basic budgeting tips. Sadly, most people would rather book a dental drilling appointment than make a budget... which would tell them they can’t afford a dentist. Ironic, no?
Sept 30 – Date Numero Duex
Being in a rush is not a great way to start a second date, but tonight timing( as always )was everything. Rush straight from work to clean off the car, rush home to freshen up, rush out to grab a bite to eat on the way to the movie theatre... in plenty of time to meet the lovely Renee to see Inception. She had already seen it twice before but was eager to see it again, due to the high level of complexity to the plot – it’s enough to warrant its own visual Inception infographic, based as it is on multiple levels of dreams. We had a great time talking about the film, especially the concept of limbo and dreams, and we definitely want to see each other again. Now it’s just a question of when, and where. Hangliding, maybe? Maybe not; not a lot of opportunity to talk, there. We shall just have to see!
Yes! News today that the 2003 game Beyond Good & Evil is being re-released for the Xbox in 2011! If you’ve never played the original, you’ve missed out as it’s a fantastic game – and I’ve missed out too, as the darn thing never wanted to get past the first chapter on any of the systems I’ve installed it on. Good ol’ defective discs, but at last I’ll be able to enjoy it in HD-quality when it comes out next year. The voice acting in the game was stellar, so that will be a highlight to experience again in 5.1-ish sound – I’ve packed away my Logitech stereo while I am in my current place, so headphones will have to suffice. For now.
Oct 1 – No Clouds and Cars
What a gorgeous day it was today outside – I saw it well through the many windows at work! Seems that Summer decided to grace us with some stunning sunny weather outside; it went up to 23 degrees outside and hordes of people strode by just soaking it up. Since I worked a split shift, I took a few hours off and sat outside myself, enjoying some root beer at the nearby Colwood A&W while watching the world go by. As days go, it was about as mellow a start to the month as it gets – thanks, Mama Nature! You can see how kind she is to Victoria here – we get enough sunshine that we export it some years.
Those of you who know me well, know that I have a fascination with combining cars and guns( and rockets and minedroppers and... )inspired by the old Car Wars game system. So when I heard that there’s soon going to be a direct-to-DVD release of Death Race 2, I was rather jubilant. The fact that it stars Ving Rhames( Surrogates ), Danny Trejo( Machete )and Sean Bean( Lord Of The Rings )is just icing on the bullet-riddled napalm-soaked cake. Can’t wait for this one; pass the cheese!
Oct 2 – Warrior Clay and Characters
Oh, fer cryin’ out loud... I was looking forward to next year’s Chinese Terracotta Army exhibition at the Royal Museum of BC here in Victoria, but I found out today that China has decided to cancel the tour after it finishes this coming year in Montreal. This is very disappointing, as the Terracotta Soldiers are some of the most amazing artifacts discovered anywhere in the world this century. I recall several visits to the ROM in Toronto as a child, to see Egyptian mummies and dinosaur skeletons; those exhibits filled me with a wonder about the world that I still carry with me to this very day. Maybe I can plan on a trip to Montreal before next summer? Hmmm.
Tonight, I retired an online persona, one I’ve used for some years online in MSN and a character some of you may be familiar with in passing: Nichneven. It’s been a blast to use her as an avatar, but as the years piled on I felt it was unfair to my NWN friends to continue to use a facade instead of my ‘real’ persona, despite many aspects of Nichneven being my own – the offbeat sense of humour most of all. In the end, I simply folded Nich away like a well-loved set of clothes and put her away for a while to rest, with the help of a good friend in MSN. We’ll see when she comes out next, but for now I am happy to just be myself... moreso than I have been for a while.
Oct 3 – Shadows and Silliness
This morning I watched Man On The Moon with Jim Carey, which was quite different than I expected – Jim’s manic energy really came through on the screen in his depiction of comic genius Andy Kauffman. It was hard to tear my eyes away from the screen in parts; separating the joke from the reality was very difficult and the old “Never Cry Wolf” adage came to mind at the end, when his cancer was announced. Definitely not a date movie, that’s for sure – I’ve been compiling a short list of those of late. *grin*
Aha, found at last! As I was digging through what I thought was a bag of newspaper clippings, I stumbled across a whole pile of books and magazines from my childhood. Fondly remembered is the February 1983 issue of Epic Illustrated, for its mix of great tales and fanciful illustrations, along with... my cherished copy of Ambassador Of The Shadows! I’ve been searching for years for that book( even on eBay and elsewhere! )yet all this time it’s been residing safely quiet between stacks of old papers – I had the foresight back then to bag all my papers with desiccant paks, so there’s not a hint of must or mildew from their long storage. I’m settling in tonight to read through Ambassador, which was echoed a decade later in the storyline of Babylon 5 – strange how life works like that, sometimes. Go nostalgia!
Sometimes things startle you; this weekend I bought a few new pairs of jeans for the first time in a long while, as I’ve dropped down to a 32 waist this year. Amazing what stress and exercise combined can do to a person. Not that I’m thrilled with the reasons, but it’s nice to be trimmer than I’ve been for a bit.
