Friends, Fools and Floppies

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March 30 - MoN-DaY Off

My good friend Mike has created a link to The Jinx Project which he will be covering during its creation in a Production Journal, to culminate in a finished animated short by Christmas 2009. I am thrilled to see Mike finally being able to pursue this project that he has talked about for some time, and will wait with bated breath to see the final glorious production. Check out his website too, at MikeHogue.com... tons of great stuff there!

In case some of you don't already know, Brian has also posted a site containing some of his amazing artistic work - check it out at BrianThomasWoods.com!

Unfortunately, not much went on today as I spent most of my day off installing a railing, several door bolts and some replacement cabinet lights. The lights took up the most time, as the display cabinet I now have used the stupidest style of halogen lights - little bulbs with two fragile metal socket pins that are impossible to get into place without bending or eventually snapping. So I snapped too, went down to Home Depot and came back with a set of replacement under-counter light pucks that went in after I removed the useless old ones. Not perfect, but now at least I can replace the bulbs more easily AND the cabinet is brighter, to better show off my selection of collectibles in a dust-free environment. Argh...

On the bright side, I got a last-minute call from one of my former neighbours: it was her boyfriend's birthday and they would love to have me down at May St. to celebrate. So I headed out into a dark, rainy night to drive the 20 minutes to Victoria, and was rewarded with a light, happy few hours basking in the company of good people. I even managed to work in some speedy YouTube video searches at the end, though my performance could not match my last evening spent at Pierre & Faith's place before I left Niagara in late 2007. A good night - with mini apple pies made from local-grown apples right here on Vancouver Island.

March 31 - Beating Family Cancer

One of my cousins has been battling breast cancer for the last few months, since it was diagnosed by a routine exam. I have been amazed at her strength and positive attitude, for she has gone through a lot in an incredibly short period of time. We are all happy here that she is pulling through, and that the internet has allowed the family to remain constantly updated as to her status, moreso than any phone calls might have done. Kudos to the doctors and their treatments... which in Canada won't put you in debt for the rest of your now-spared life.

My money tree seems to be doing well, even though the light here is not the same intensity as it was getting in the window at May St. The official name is Pachira Aquatica, an asian swamp plant which can apparently grow up to nearly 60ft tall in the wild and has been a popular ornamental plant only since 1986. Who knew I was being trendy? I wonder if anyone grows kite-eating trees...

April 1st - Foolish

April Fool's Day... and I had nobody to enjoy a little joke with at work. Last year, I sent around a tiny hoax about a group of scammers dressed as clowns trying to pass bad cheques. This year? Nada.

I always like to check up on how the world is doing by logging into NewsOfTheWeird.com, where you can get your fill of seeing how people manage to mess up reality, large or small.

Another site for odd happenings is at Canoe.ca here you can satisfy your cravings for odd news from around the world. My favourite one to date is

This idea started out as an April Fool's joke, but apparently there was an overwhelming response of people wanting to buy. Just goes to show that sometimes the joke is on the joker.

April 2 - And you thought I'd forgotten!

No joke here: what would the blog be without bacon? In this case, we're talking Squeez Bacon, an invention from( of all places )Sweden... not somewhere I would have picked for bacon know-how.

Thoughts...

Nope. Not this week. Too tired from work, really. Lots going on and frankly, I spend about 11 hours most days away from home, so just BEING at home is enough to make me want to nap on the nearest couch. Not feeling well most days doesn't help, but I DID get some good news today: my gall bladder operation is a go. I go under the knife( scalpel? )May 29th, and so will finally be able to remove THAT little medical issue from my checklist.

I hope it will take the nausea with it when it goes. I really, really do.

If not, then it's back to trial, error and elimination - in more ways than one.

April 3 - Positive Day

I headed into Victoria early this morning, so I could have breakfast at the Shine Cafe on Fort St( their website appears to be down ). I dug into a half-stack of apple cinnamon pancakes, which were delicious and in such quantity that I couldn't finish them in the time I had before needing to be at work. I ate there today because this will be my second-last day at the branch; I am being moved to the Millstream location, which is going to be interesting as it is a glassless location. Makes my fingers twitch just thinking about it as I type.

However, today turned out to be a really good day at work, for many reasons. It was bright & sunny out, so I think that helped a lot. Also, most of the people who came in were regulars, whom I have been telling about my branch transfer as I see them - the nice ones, anyway, and there's a surprisingly large number of those who said they would miss me or even come out to see me when they were in the Millstream area. It was great day, despite the long hours I have spent this week catching things up to hand over the branch to its new manager this weekend. Tired but happy.

Our head office here also received a spectacularly positive customer comment about me today too... it practically glowed when I read it( more than a few times! )with the phrase "If he were my employee, I have no doubt my business would flourish," standing out. The comment was picked up on by the head honcho for all the BC stores and sent out across Canada, with the notation that "This is the kind of positive feedback we want people to give when they come into MMart as customers." Tickled, I was, really... as it's so rare for such comments to be made; a hundred people will take the time to complain than just one to send in a positive note.

Which are you?

April 4 - Floppy what?

Sometimes I feel a little nostalgic about tech, like when I look at my old PC and see there's still a floppy disk drive in it - newer computers are almost all diskless, with even DVD's eventually going to vanish when some new and better flash medium comes along. Still, some tech ideas refuse to die... and my old favourite is on that list - see if you can figure out which of the 25 it is.

Saturdays... y'know, I cannot recall the last time I had a Saturday off without consulting my work calendar. I just don't seem to do things anymore on Saturdays... not that I did much this last year on Saturdays, but thinking about it now, I am going to browse through my blog and see what stands out.

I know I didn't watch a lot of cartoons, that's for sure.

April 5 - 16 hours of Relaxation!

I started the day out right today: Josh called, and before we knew it 45 mins had ticked by while we caught up on things.

Part of my day was spent outside, sitting on the deck and just enjoying the weather - turned out to be 16 degrees C out there mid-afternoon, plus warmth from lovely sunny skies. I even had my cat wandering around the deck, enjoying the weather in perfect safety with no gaps in the railings for him to try wot wriggle through. A few hummingbirds also stopped by, sounding like giant-size wasps as they buzzed in for a drink from the sugar-water feeders.

Other parts of my day were used up working on this new NWN project with a few people... made possible by today's advances in communication. While one of my friends was remotely accessing my old PC to get things installed, I was conferencing with a few others over MSN about various details. Turns out one of those folk has spent 3 years in university taking Game Design, and I cannot believe our luck that he's willing to spend so much of his time helping to shape the initial Design Document to spell out how this new world will be built. It's just lovely to work on this with such talented, energetic people... I only wish we could all pay ourselves for our time, but I guess that's why it's called a labour of love.

I finished off the day by alternatively working on my blog and finally watching The Dark Knight, where I have to say I was impressed with Heath Ledger's final performance. It was a well-deserved Oscar win, and I am sad that it had to be posthumous.

Ta for now!

TC3, TDI and TNG

After fighting with my PC yesterday, I spent today( Mon )doing a ton of necessary handy-fixy things around the house today, which took up far too $%#@! much of my day off. Hence the late-evening blog.


March 23 - Say, wasn't that whatshername...?

Apparently my previous Destroy the World with Science blog section wasn't up to some ppl's standards. So, this week I present their choice on how to go about it, as well as a rather more in-depth list of 11 items, 6 fall-back methods and 8 not-so-probable alternatives. Take that, mother earth! And for those of you not wanting to wait for one of the methods listed above, you can always destroy the earth... with a coffee can. Who knew?

On a lighter note: just in case you missed it from last week, here's the Code Monkey video by Jonathan Coulton - I've had the tune in my head for the past 7 days, so you've been warned.

Now that I have cable TV again, I've been noticing some things while watching it. Have you ever wondered "Hey, haven't I seen that person before?" when watching a commercial? Obviously actors will work on as many jobs as they can get, and I found it funny that the first time I remember seeing Carrie Dobro was dressed up as Wonder Woman in one of the first Listerine commercials with Christian Potenza, of Total Drama Island fame, whom I mention later on in this blog. Another one that was hard to track down was Kate Kelton, the TicTac girl... whom I haven't seen in anything else.

March 24 - Hanging Out

It's been some time since I last attended a WorldCon, but I've been giving serious thought to attending this year's, which is being held in Montreal. Called Anticipation, it has quite a few top names on the attendee list, including Neil Gaiman and Julie Czerneda, both of whom I last saw at TorCon in 2003 in Toronto.

Among some of the site's I've StumbledUpon, there was GeekStreet.ca. Although not the prettiest site out there, it IS Canadian which I like. There's also EarthAndBeyond.ca, which I talk about a little more below.

I spent the evening out with a friend, part of it just people-watching from the second-floor Starbuck's at Chapters in downtown Victoria. Kind of a blah afternoon weather-wise, but it was enjoyable to sip some tea while watching other people scurry about their business for a change. I had dinner down the road at The Sticky Wicket, which looks to be quite the summer hangout spot coming up. Too bad I live outside of town in Langford... but hey, this town has quite a few of its own charms too, most of them being outdoor activities, which is fine by me.

March 25 - MMO... what?

Age of Conan: Hyborean Adventures is a recently-released MMORPG that's proven quite popular this past year, mainly because it finds new ways to make chopping people into bits more fun.

Quite different from one of my favourite classic multiplayer games of yesteryear: Battlefield 1942. While it had no roleplaying to speak of, the fun lay in the then-new concept of teamwork with other people: even today, AI has still not developed to the point where your squadmates won't get stuck on a wall, wander around in the open to get killed, or even kill you... by mistake, of course.

A spiritual sequel is coming out this summer: Battlefield 1943. While not in the same vein as the 1st-person shooter that BF: 1942 was, the same addictive gameplay and quick jump-in to make it a fun and fast experience.

Another game I am keeping an eye on is Jumpgate: Evolution, which is a space sim with vast potential... if it catches on. While games such as World of Warcraft and Everquest seem destined for longevity, the MMO world is littered with failed starts, such as Tabula Rasa and my own lamented choice: Earth & Beyond( which is actually being revived in stages here by a small, dedicated community - way to go! ). I happen to LOVE the concept of exploring a vast and complicated universe set in a sci-fi space sim; too many MMO's these days are focused on combat, not exploration.

March 26 - Routing Work

So far, my new Dlink-655 router seems to be living up to my expectations, both for speed and configurability. Which is good, as just this very night I've started a rebel roleplaying group on my long-term NWN server... as a good many of us are dissatisfied with how that particular world is turning out. I've enjoyed my time there, but a lack of focus, rules enforcement and regular story / plot progression has seen quite a few people stop gaming there. Tonight, I was asked by one former DM if I would lead a group of the top players in a new direction: creating our OWN place to game, with our own rules, focus and so forth. Needless to say, I was floored as well as flattered, to be chosen by a group of what amounts to to the top gamers on the server... most of whom are my friends already. A dozen of us had an hours-long chat tonight, and you could feel the excitement as we aired out our ideas and tossed around plans for the future. It will be a lot of work, but I am proud to have been chosen by acclaim to lead such a talented, energized group of fun folk towards our common goal.

That's about all I have for today. Work is going well; I'm getting the hang of the manager thing, despite some expected snags. Nice that I've managed to move along as well as I have on my own, which is the usual way I've learned things with this company after my initial training. It also looks like I'll be moving branches in the next few weeks, closer to my new home here in Langford. Yay!

March 27 - TV and DVD

While watching the not-so-good movie Van Helsing, I discovered that Kate Beckinsale is a mere 1 week younger than me... which is interesting, when one considers where each of us is in life. More interesting in that I can say I've never made a bad movie... or any major motion picture, at that.

It has been a while since I followed the Family Guy TV show, but I found something today about an upcoming show that may make me tune in. io9.com has a clip here about it - the entire cast of Star Trek: Next Gen is reuniting for the Family Guy episode this Sunday the 29th.

I also popped my Venture Brothers DVD series back in for viewing this week - the show is a sendup of the old Johnny Quest cartoon show from the 1960's with modern twists and a TON of satirical and black humour. Just my thing, really, and it's just so darn funny at times too.

Total Drama Action is the sequel to the cartoon hit Total Drama Island, which followed the antics of 22 animated young adults competing for a million-dollar grand prize. It has some great voice actors, as well as a fast-paced story and eye-pleasing animation - flash, of course, as everyone's doing these days.

March 28 - Earth Hour

At 8:30pm PST tonight, we turned off all our nonessential lighting and electrical gear, to participate in Earth Hour. I was heartened to see that it was an event participated in globally, that shows people are interested in DOING something, however small to start with.

Driving along the highway, I can't help but notice all the streetlights as I pass by... especially one just outside of Victoria. Located below the highway, between two bridges over an underpass below. This solitary light has a cover, a shield over it that blocks light from blinding drivers on the highway, who are at the same height as the top of the streetlight. While the shield was obviously placed there for this purpose, it also serves to block stray light from rising up, contributing to light pollution in the city. Too bad it's only one light.

Just a block away from my place here in Langford is a recycling centre, that takes practically anything that can be recycled. Here in BC there is an Environmental Handling Fee charged on ALL new electronics sold, 100% of which goes towards the Return-It Electronics program, disposing of the old stuff that has reached end-of-life, like floppy disk-based computers( won't miss those, really ). Anyway, it's incredibly convenient to be able to recycle some of the stuff I've dragged around instead of throwing out; the landfills are too full of things that could have been recycled. I remember being rather put out during a Hazardous Waste Day in Niagara, when I was told the 50+ fluorescent tubes I'd collected from work were not on the 'accepted' list... I was annoyed because nobody could tell me where TO dispose of them properly, apart from dumping them. Nice to see they've got their heads together here in BC on the topic.

March 29th - Beer Can Fishing

Sundays... lovely days to relax, to do what is needed and not worry about things too much.

That was the plan anyway, and I managed to stick to it for some of the day. Some morning cartoons after sleeping in, a nice breakfast and some quality Me Time - though I don't drink coffee.

I did have to politely remind some fishermen to keep off the dock down the end of the yard; the fence doesn't quite reach the shore of Langford Lake, and we're right next to a small park with its own fishing dock. I guess it was a little crowded on the public side, so some folks decided to use our dock too. I've no problem with that... except when one smart alec decided to start crushing beer cans on the wooden deck. They left quickly once I stood in view on the back deck, coughed loudly once and waited with crossed arms for them to pack up and move. Smarter than your average bear, they were, as I didn't have to say anything... which was appreciated, as I was trying to relax today and didn't want to see it develop into a "get off mah land" conversation. Nice that people around here are so relaxed and accommodating... too bad they had to bring the beer along, or they could have stayed.


I'm writing this late Monday night, after a last-minute invite to attend a friend's birthday party in Victoria. Now that I'm back home, I'm listening to the wind howl outside again... seems to do that a LOT here on the south shore of Langford Lake.

Shazam, Superheroes and Simultenaity

Well, this is what you get when you combine a day off with being too tired to do more than sit on the couch... a link-heavy blog. Try not to let the monitor tilt forward from the weight...

March 16 - Man Caves?

As some of you know, I have a penchant for the apocalyptic... which is odd, as I have NO desire to try to survive post-holocaust mutant attacks with only roasted rat and crunchy cockroaches for food. Still, there are many ways to destroy the world with science( and even random asteroids )so you never know if something will just creep up on us all unawares...

These days, the phrase 'rec room' seems to have died off, to be replaced with things like 'home theater' or 'family room' or even the ubiquitous 'den' ... any of those describe a place where people gather to relax, to entertain themselves and to socialize.

So where does a Man Cave fit into the above categories? I have to admit, I'd rather tell people we'll be watching a movie in a home theater than a man cave... sounds like a place where one goes to hide from the world. Still, there are TV shows about the subject, and there's debate on which term to use to describe such a place( Man Cave or Manctuary ). Since the term Man Cave has made it into the Urban Dictionary, I guess it will be with us for a while... though hopefully not as long as wassup has been.

Then we have the ultimate Man Cave... well, at least if you're feeling somewhat insecure.

March 17 - Green Day! No, wait a sec...

Happy St. Patrick's Day to y'all... in case you thought you knew all about the holiday, this site has some facts about today's celebrations that perhaps you didn't know. There are a few more by this guy who is odd in his own unique way. A more official site is here, which may be more towards the mainstream taste.... if you're feeling green - I wonder if Oscar The Grouch is Irish?

I guess I have a soft spot for St. Paddy's Day, as my favourite colour is green. Though I don't have as much of a fondness for Oscar The Grouch, despite this excellent pic that my friend Mike made of me as Oscar a little while back. Maybe because I am less of a grouch than I was back then? Hmmm.

Last year, I posted about how McDonald's was bringing back the Shamrock Shake in 2008 "for a limited time" only. Have a look a little further down that page... the ingredients may make your eyes pop and your heart stutter in fear - yikes! Sadly, or perhaps not so sadly, McDonald's did not offer the Shamrock Shake to the public this year... so no memories of minty-green goodness were formed.

I guess that's what all the green beer is supposed to substitute for. Probably better, in the long run... especially in this, the age of the iPhone, where people have created programs like the Green Beer Finder to help thirsty iPhone owners out on St. Paddy's day. My, how the times are a-changin' ... though it's REALLY COOL that iPhone users now have Shazam, an app that can identify ANY song you hear playing simply by holding the iPhone up to the music! Incredible!!!!

March 18 - Super Funny

Almost everyone, at one time or another, has dreamed about having superpowers. This thread here has people talking about what superpowers they would have, if they could have them. Of course, most superhero origins are ones beyond the soon-to-be-hero's control... I can't think of a superhero in any media that chose his/her superpowers; radioactive spiders don't take direction very well, y'know.

And, since today is mid-week hump day, and I can't let a blog entry go baconless, I present... bacon porn! It's family-safe, surprisingly.

Also humping nicely along is Arrested Development... well, the series is. Put it a different way: I'm really enjoying it so far, and that's only the first season... dry, witty humour tossed around zany dysfunctional family units... love it! I'm watching it on my PS2( thanks Rene! )which is working surprisingly well with a DVD remote and looks great on the big screen... sure beats swapping DVD's in and out all the time. Too bad DVD changers were always too expensive... which I guess really isn't too bad after all, as it's lead to media being stored on hard drives and not easily-scratched or lost discs... which have to be swapped out all the time to watch things. The Rise of the PVR, friends... or TiVO in the US: trend, or Evil Plan? You decide.

March 19 - Two Calls at once!

In the midst of work's grinding fatigue, some good news today, somewhat indirectly: Crazy Lady's hubby came in today to send some funds back home... where he apparently is going too! Not that I disliked him, really, but it gives me hope that his wacko wife will follow shortly and so leave my sphere of interaction forever. One can cope... I still have flashbacks of her head starting to spin around, moments away from emitting streams of vomit while voices chanted unholy dirges in the darkening lobby... oh wait, that was from The Exorcist. You get the point.

Some more good timing: as I finished work today, later than I'd have liked( as usual )my just-now turned-back-on cell rang: it was Josh! I'd not managed to talk to him for some time, so I was delighted... except that I was trying to leave and that meant I needed to talk to my security company. So I asked him to call me back in 10 mins and hung up... only to have my phone ring AGAIN before I could dial - would you believe it was BRIAN? Imagine what the odds are that two good friends of mine BOTH decide to call me with ten seconds of each other, after months of no contact?

So that was a nice evening... I managed to talk to both Brian and Josh in detail, which was great given the time difference. Brian and I chatted on Skype, which ran rather well on my laptop... until the router choked - see the entry for the 22nd below on that. All in all, a great end to a crappy day.

March 20 - Watching the weather

Today was the first day of spring, and it was a doozy. Sun, rain, wind... all within an hour's period. I've heard a few of the long-time residents here say "If you don't like the weather in Victoria, wait 30 mins." It's true: living on an island, large as it is, does make for changeable weather. Plus, having the massive heatsinks of the Olympic Mountains to the south keeps things cool sometimes, if the wind is from that direction... brrr! Some people disagree with this assessment however; this one in particular, who like me lived in the Great Lakes region for a long spell before moving to Victoria.

Also, Watchmen opened 2 weeks ago, and apparently hasn't done as well as everyone had expected. Perhaps they should have released this alternate trailer... which has footage from Wall-E set to the music from Watchmen. It clicks rather well, actually... a dark, edgy Wall-E? Come on, you wanna watch it...

March 21 - On Gaming

I was thinking recently that I don't have anyone to game with out here, and that it's been years since I last gamed with a group. My last gaming group kind of fizzled out, for various reasons, and I've missed it - I grew up playing things like DnD, Heroes Unlimited and TMNT. I can see that part of the reason I liked gaming was being able to tell a story as much as participate in one... the interactivity between the storyteller and the audience was very personal and fulfilling, at times. Other times, it was intensely frustrating and quite often boring... but then, life is like that too, right?

There's quite a few things that've been written about gaming, that are out there in the wilds of the 'net. Some are funny, and creative. Others aren't.

Then again, when things get a little TOO nerdy, this happens.

March 22 - On Routers

I went out and purchased a new router today, as I've HAD it with my Belkin N router. Over the past year that I've owned it, it's become increasingly flakier: for no reason, it will lose connection to the 'net and I'll have to reset it. This is VERY annoying when gaming, downloading, surfing... anything, really. So after the router did it to me several times a day for the last week, and didn't respond to ANY of the tech tips I dredged up from various support forums, I packed it in - apparently I'm not the only one who's had issues with this model. Good riddance; I now have a new, expensive doorstop.

The replacement? Not this one by Dlink - while I'd love to splurge on it, I won't use a lot of what it is capable of. Instead, my pre-purchase research led me to the Dlink DIR-655 - not much of a name, but it's a solid router with a lot of good reviews. After a fairly simply setup, getting the other PC's hooked in and the other routers configured was less painful then I had thought, and the results speak for themselves - holy speed increase! If I was a twitch gamer I'd be dancing for joy, for my ping times dropped down into the teens, legitimizing my claim( if I wanted it )as an LPB. Which, back in the early days of cable modems, was around 50ms... snail-slow these days.


TTFN...

Fans, Fraggles and Fatigue

I dozed off early last night, and didn't quite feel up to updating the blog until tonight. That meant I could spend some time on it throughout the day, and not struggle with it late Sunday night.


March 9 - HOW long have I been on the payroll?

I forgot to mention in last week's blog that last week marked my ninth year with MMart - hard to believe. It's the longest I've ever been with any employer, though looking back at my various terms with companies, I do tend to be at places in terms of years, not months like some. I've worked in fast food, retail, and entertainment... and have yet to find my niche, really. I have to say though, that my experience with MMart, while quite stressful at times, has provided me with a window into human social interaction - my ability to judge people's intent based on things other than words has been honed to a fine edge. While I claim no ability to read minds, I do find it easy now to tell when someone is not being truthful, or to tell when folks are presenting a face different from the one they normally wear. I've learned many things about myself as well, and generally find that something new presents itself every day of the week, though not always what I would wish to learn each day.

Modern careers are hardly that though; the notion of people spending 20+ years with one company no longer seems to be the major factor for employers. Instead, contract workers and temporary employment for workers seem to be the way things are leaning these days. I am not sure this is for the better, but in today's economic times companies have to be able to be flexible, and having the ability to quickly pare down a workforce is sadly something that many a company thinks necessary. Not to mention that today's jobs are increasingly bad for your health.

March 10 - Nerd Nesting

After enjoying living on my own for a spell back in university, as well as for my first year here in BC, I am back in the fold again, as most of you know already. While it was my choice, it is not how I plan to spend the rest of my life... at least until such time as I figure out what's wrong with my plumbing, among other things. Thoughts about living at home have been running through my head incessantly these last few months, preying on my mind about choices, of my future and things as yet to do.

Still, I am here, and will remain until I leave again. There are many people out there who have never left in the first place; some discussion on that topic can be found here, and is worth reading for the many opinions people present on the topic.

One sometimes finds oneself far from where you had pictured years ago; in my case, I am thousands of miles away from the city of my birth, away from friends and almost all of my family. I had thought I would be working as a journalist, or as a writer for a gaming company... heck, at one point I wanted to be an astronaut, like many a boy dreamed of. Now I find myself literally on the shores of a new land, starting anew in some ways and backtracking in others. Such is life.

March 11 - New Muziic

Anyone remember the old days of Napster, when the RIAA was tearing out its collective hair trying to figure out a way to stop people from illegally trading music? Well, those days are long past, in that peer-to-peer networks like Bittorrent have decentralized file sharing, making it more difficult( but far from impossible )for legal action to be taken against individuals.

But why take the illegal route? A recent newcomer to the online music scene is, well, Muziic, which is a collaboration between a father and his son. Best of it, in addition to being 100% free, it is 100% legal, as the player uses YouTube to build its file list. Try it out, you may just enjoy it... like I enjoyed Pandora, before legal issues meant that program's use was restricted to IP addresses within the USA only.

March 12 - Bust and Boom

I went in to Subway today and received a small disappointment: no more Daily Specials. I can only surmise that this is a result of the current economy, but to have it manifest in such small things really tweaks my sense of personal.

I did however, find something that had been eluding me for years, something that I had looked for on and off since I saw it on the 'net in the late nineties. I laughed long and loud when I saw it last:

Safety grenades.

Yes, that's right, it's an oxymoron... and it's based off an old Star Trek meme: that of the exploding control console. The ones that go up in a shower of sparks every time there's a battle, tossing red-shirted crewman across compartments and bridges without regard to physics. Read it and laugh, for I am glad that the person who reposted it managed to track it down again for others to enjoy.

Speaking of tracking things down: this was found in a pond recently in England. Is it proof that aliens have landed, or that Doctor Who was based on things not entirely fictional? You decide.

Lastly, good news on the battery front: engineers from MIT have discovered a new way to build batteries. If the research pans out, then it means batteries can be recharged in full in a matter of seconds, not hours, thus solving the major problem with today's high-tech devices: the blasted batteries just don't last.

March 13 - Feeling lucky punk?

Today is the second month in a row with a Friday the 13th, and there's one more coming up in November, for a total of three this year. For some, it is an unlucky day, but for others, luck finds them ... in spades. I try to keep up with news from Niagara, and the rescue today of a jumper over the Falls struck me as proof that dumb luck can be right up there with superstition on days like today.

The unknown can be quite scary, but I've been able to sleep better at night knowing that The SCP Foundation is working hard to keep the world safe. Much like the Men In Black and The Plumbers, it is secret organizations like these that ensure that the world never falls under the influence of things that go bump in the night. Hard to apply for employment though, and one has to wonder about their medical plans... do they include bacta treatment?

Sometimes though, one needs protection from the smaller things in life, like those annoying scratches that build up on one's car over time. Whether from rocks of the road or inconsiderate parking lot passersby, protection has usually meant waxing and polishing a few times a year, as well as trying one of hundreds of scratch-fixing products on the market. Well, it seems that scientists have been busy this week, as a team has come up with self-healing paint for vehicles - rejoice, car owners!

March 14 - Windy like Oz, Dorothy!

Homelessness is a hot-button topic here on Vancouver Island, when people see it every day in downtown Victoria. While Stew Young, the mayor of Langford has often stated that his city will not tolerate homelessness, he does not have a plan for solving the problem other than exporting it to other municipalities. Several people have commented on this policy of late, though again no real solution has been found, for like most cities these days homelessness is on the rise. Alberta has thrown down the gauntlet however, announcing a 3.3 billion-dollar plan to end homelessness in the province within 10 years - quite a challenge, and one the western world will be watching closely.

After work tonight, the winds from the north picked up, blasting across Langford Lake at up to 90 km/h ... which tossed a lot of branches around, though not as badly as when I visited Niagara back in September. I was mainly concerned about the cat-shield I had built for the back deck, to protect the birds who come to the birdfeeder. As you can see from this picture, the setup proved to be rather robust, as it flexed in the winds but did not break under the strain. I'm quite proud of it, as it shows I'm capable of putting something together to meet a need that won't fall apart in the real world.

March 15 - Not a Fan of Meetings

Today is my Saturday - as in, I don't have to go to work, like most people do Mon to Fri. I can't complain really, as I start work most days later than most, at 10:30 or so. I do enjoy watching a few of the new crop of 'toon shows Sundays of late, though I still have a soft spot for my perennial favourite Reboot - it makes me grin to see that it's now a staple of the TeleToon Retro channel, right alongside Superfriends and Fat Albert. Fraggle Rock is on there too, a show I loved watching on Sunday nights down in the family room... the wacky humour and upbeat singing always picked me up for another week at school the next day.

I spent a few hours today replacing all the fans in my Blue Frankenstein PC, as the ones inside had all begin to rattle or simply stopped working due to age. Sadly, while most fans list a MTBF of around 50,000 hours, my experience has been more like 10,000 hours, which equates to about a year of 24/7 operation. Since I leave my PC on to run things like BOINC, this is rather annoying to me, so I will be keeping an eye on these new ones from CoolerMaster - at least they aren't all that expensive. The main benefit is that my PC is now almost completely silent even when running at top speed - the fan noise is faint enough that I can read a book on the couch next to it and not be irritated by the sound.

I had a meeting tonight at work, from 5-8, for all the area managers - I just love meetings on my days off. While I can't of course go into details, the gist of it means more daily stress for myself and others. Every minute of every day at work will be spent at a multitude of tasks, juggling like a madman... already I find it wearing, and I hope that once the tax season slows down then I will be able to catch a breath. As it stands now, I come home every day exhausted, and only the fact that I am able to go to bed early and sleep in has staved off accumulated fatigue. Add that to my plumbing issues, and I begin to dream of vacations more than anything else of late... my pictures of my trips to Mexico and St. Maartens are now making their way across my PC monitor to ease my mind's eye.


All for now... looking forward to Spring next week, I can tell you that! I am not alone in that, I am sure.

Terminators, Taxes and Testing

I knew I shouldn't have mentioned the lack of snow in last week's blog: you never know who is listening. Glad to hear from you too, Jen... nice to see you're still dropping by the blog!


March 2 - Monday Madness

Ergh.... man, today was BUSY at work, so much so that at the end of felt like I had jogged in place for the entire time. Which, considering I worked almost 10 hours, was really wearing on me... yadda yadda, I know, everyone has to work. When you're alone though, there's nobody to complain to, so you have to suck it up and do your best despite the crowds of people who of a sudden all decide to show up within ten minutes of each other... damned strange, that. I've also noticed that when it's sunny out, MANY people seem to let that decide them if they've been waffling on whether or not to go anywhere. "Sun's shining? Hooray, let's head out then!" And where do you think they stop first? MMart, for cash, of course... *grins* Keeps me in a job though, so that's good in MY books!

A lot of people seem to confuse Vancouver Island with the City of Vancouver, especially when told I live in Victoria( Langford now, close enough )which is on Van.Island. While Vancouver has a mild climate, I would not want to live there due to the size of the city and the increasing crime rate, including shootings. Still, some people really do seem to like the place, and I can't speak to it fully until I've had the chance to visit sometime soon.

And WOW, did we EVER get a windstorm tonight! Out of nowhere, 75km/hr winds whipped up from the north, blasting everything on the deck and nearly causing my carefully-constructed anti-cat bird saving structure to flip through the living room window. Thankfully, the plastic sheets were quite heavy to begin with and landed on the deck, only cracking the corner of one of them. T'was scary though, so have the wind rise to such a howl that it made the chimney moan like a tortured beast... and to die down again after less than half an hour. Weird weather, reminded me slightly of the time when Niagara was hit by a small twister back in the nineties... though today the sky didn't turn green and the rain didn't blast down as though from God's pressure cleaner.

March 3 - RAID Failure

The day off today was pretty good, all told. An order from Monoprice.com arrived today, so I was able to wire up my ancient laser printer finally, along with replacing the power cable for the Canon Pixma printer. While easy to find online, neither of these specialized cables are stocked by local PC retailers, so I was relieved I found them online, cheaply too. Now that I have printing capability again, I feel an odd sense of relief, especially since I can't print things at work and the local Staples charges an indecent amount for printing things like PDF docs... I mean, really, $0.49 per page for colour? Sheesh!

I also managed, after exhaustive testing, to fix my Blue Frankenstein of a computer. After running down the list of possible reasons for it NOT wanting to boot, it turns out my paranoia from years ago has paid off. Years ago after losing several former PC's to drive failure, I had installed a pair of redundant hard drives in THIS computer that mirrored each other's data - so if one went wacky, then the other would still work. Turns out that WAS the case, and unplugging one of the drives( the second choice )let the system boot happily. Which meant I spent the rest of the evening backing up all the recent data from the remaining drive to other external sources, just in case... you can't be too careful. I was really, really happy that the RAID setup worked so well, and will have to figure out a way to replace the drive ASAP - since it's a Seagate, it may STILL be under warranty. Though they recently went from 5 years to only 3, it's still best in the industry, despite recent concerns about some of their drives experiencing far higher failure rates than is acceptable for consumers.

March 4 - Talking Taxes

For those of you who are anxious about doing your taxes, take heart: aside from EasyTax at MMart, there are a ton of other solutions to juggling those numbers to take form in your favour. One I prefer over all others is QuickTax.ca, which has the added bonus of being linked to from most major banks for an additional 20% off... which means you can do your own taxes online for less than $20.00. That's assuming that your tax situation is not too complex and doesn't involve things like owning your own business or long-distance trucking mileage. And is it mileage if you live in a country that measures things in metric, like Canada? Wouldn't it be 'klickage' ? Nevermind... that's straying back into Made Up Wordz territory.

Not that I advocate making up words will-nilly, or mashing a few together to make a new one. Unfortunately, I seem to be in the minority in this regard, as evidenced by the newest media ads for the Apple iPhone... "The Funnest iPhone Ever!" - made me want to write stacks of angry letters using famous english grade-school teachers as pseudonyms. This person has also taken exception to the slow degradation of the language, much like my posting last week for Feb 23rd. Language has to evolve, but I would rather not see it delve into offshoots like Ebonics or the unusual cross-cultural effort of Esperanto, the most popular of the constructed languages to date. I also snuck a look at Sindarin, which is one of several fantasy languages derived from Tolkein's works which has several online translators and thousands of fluent speakers worldwide.

But you can't order a hamburger at your local Wendy's in it... heck, I've still got to get to the point where I can do that in french, Italian or Spanish. One of many things to do when I find the time.

March 5 - Thursday in Brief

Having grown up with syndicated reruns of the old Star Trek series, I was pleased to hear that a new 'reboot' of the show was happening. The most recent trailer looks amazing, though it obviously tries to break new ground and steer away from the campy elements of the original series.

Merchandising has always been a core part of Star Trek, though I wonder why they've recently decided to branch out into... colognes?

I miss my Babylon 5.... but things like the new Battlestar Galactica reboot have been amazing. Many fans have wondered though: what would the old series title sequence have looked like with the new cast?

March 6 - Movie Time

Today Watchmen was released in theatres, and though I really want to see it, I just can't bear to share the same space as the Massed Public Hordes for over 2 hours. Reviews of the film at RottenTomatoes.com are mixed, with the main complaints being that it's "too complex" and "slavish to the original material" - neither of which are bad things in my book.

Related to that, I've been watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles in bits and pieces over the last few months, and was disappointed to hear that tonight's ratings were rather low. Yet i09.com has posted the obvious answer: everyone was out watching Watchmen. Which is a cool way of putting it, actually...

Well, that's it for a Friday. Not much to do out here in Langford on one's ownsome, though I am working on seeing some of my Victoria friends more regularly come the spring. Perhaps I will be able to take up a few more outdoor hobbies come the summer as well, as I do miss my biking and the Galloping Goose Trail is close by.

March 7 - Da Weekend

Not so bad a Saturday, really... except it snowed four separate times today. Typical Victoria weather, changeable three times or more an hour. Snowing, then sunny skies, then snowing again; we're talking heavy clouds and masses of white drifting flakes that fortunately did little more than melt when they hit the ground.

After work today I did something different: I went out to a pub just down the street - it has a striking home page here. Christie's Carriage House Pub has been around for over a century, though the building was only turned into a pub in the late 80's. It was quite crowded when I arrived, as there was a hockey game of some kind on - I didn't bother to pay much attention, as is my wont. Instead, I dug into a turkey sandwich with fries and gravy, with two pints of Guinness to wash it down over the course of several hours as I read through Pierre Burton's The Joy Of Writing, which I've never managed( until now )to actually open and read through. It was quite enlightening, moreso as I had no idea of the sheer volume that people could produce with only ancient typewriters, pencils and steno pads. While not containing any revelations about the craft, it did emphasize to me the importance of perseverance, hard work and finding one's own style, as well as reading as much of the work of other good authors as possible.

Which also begs the question of motivation. Working as I have been for the last while has left me little energy, feeling the way I do, to put towards other things. I find myself in dire need of decompression / de-stress time, and my creative processes of late have been stretched in just trying to come to the blog each week with something new aside from purchasing new socks.

March 8 - Sunny Sunday at last!

I spent most of the afternoon attending to my Blue Frankenstein PC, backing up data to various drives before reworking the interior setup - added a video card so I can run 2 monitors at once, as well as ensuring my now-unmirrored main drive was hooked up a little differently to make room for the video card. I am surprised that now the main bottleneck in my storage setup is speed: having a sizable external drive is great, but with standard USB 2.0 speeds, it takes hours to copy massive amounts of data. One of my external drives does have an eSata connector, so I think that I will invest in some cabling to take advantage of that fairly soon - I hate waiting to copy data around.

Nice to see the sun, despite the cold outside. Sitting in the rear family room it's amazing just to bask in the evening sunshine and watch the sunset reflect on the clouds behind the hills to the northwest. The colours it creates on the lake are incredible, and I'll post some pictures soon.


Lastly: I am narrowing down possibilities in regards to my health issues, thankfully. My doctor has been very attentive, and together we've eliminated( pun intended )quite a few avenues and continue to do so with various tests. Nothing concrete yet, but allergies to gluten are a possibility, as are several other sources of indigestion, including IBS - more as I find out solid medical facts from tests.

Birds, Bats and Blammo

Ducks on a lake in winter... have to love that! A total lack of snow!


Feb 23 - Wurdz

This week's favourite invented phrase: Doom Loop... which was not to be found in the Urban Dictionary.

Everyone has words they've invented, private things and names they use for places, friends, things in general. Pet names, nicknames, joke names... the list goes on and on, the results of silliness, odd events or deeds or just boredom. Some sites celebrate the inevitable evolution of the English language, while others lament the loss of 'The King's English' over time. Myself, knowing that English is an ever-evolving language, wonder at how different today's version will be in a century, when words like l33t and lifequake have been part of the lexicon for a few decades. Will it rawk? We'll see.

Not much going on this week for me, outside of work... things are very busy, and I am out of the house for about 10 hours a day. While this means I do get to sleep in past 8am, the end of the day tends to see me dragging from lack of energy and the demands of the job. So if I want to get anything accomplished, it has to be in the mornings, or wait until one of my rare days off... like Sundays, which so far have all vanished all too quickly, even without any recent road trips.

Feb 24 - Southern Trawl

Brian's on a trip to New Orleans, which sounds like a blast... now that they've rebuilt somewhat. I saw a TV special today about the city and the results of Katrina's assault on it in 2005, which had a large segment on the Superdome and how it successfully sheltered 30,000 people from the storm's fury. Some of them have posted their stories about conditions inside the dome during the storm, which makes for some intense reading. I recall that a former editor of mine from university took a road trip down to N'orleans back in the early 90's, and said the thing that stuck with him most were the dozens of bullet-ridden road signs on the local roadways in the state of Louisiana. Scary.

All of which means Brian probably hasn't checked up on BaconToday.com, which is my weekly bacon blog offering. BaconToday has a cornucopia of bacony goodness, so grease up and dive into the taste!

Feb 25 - Fire logs

I've been burning fire logs in the fireplace here for a few weeks now, and in general they're great: just sawdust and petroleum wax that give off a steady flame over the space of a few hours.

Unless they break in half and flare up - whoa!

I'd bought a new style of log, called 'Crackling logs' that contained tiny bits of whatnot to make the log 'crackle' like a regular tree log would, or so I thought. Instead, the log refused to burn like the others did, becoming a sullen spongy mass of embers that gave off a lot of smoke and very little flame, taking FAR longer to burn than I had thought. After far too long, the log sagged in the middle and then the whole thing burst into a brilliant conflagration - a furnace-like flare of flame! I feared for the structure of the chimney and raced to grab the fire extinguisher, but fortunately the flames only lasted a minute or so... after that I was able to open the glass doors and spread the flaring bits apart from each other to reduce the overall intensity. NOT a good feeling, that, watching this huge fire appear from nowhere and feeling hot enough to melt its way through the fireplace. Sheesh!!!

I enjoyed the fireplaces that I had when I was living in Fonthill: a pair of wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling wood-burning fireplaces that really brought home the ancient thrill of taming fire, in the comfort of your home.

But what about if things went really south? As in, your firelog exploded with the force of a nuclear weapon? What would be the effects?

Thanks to this app available for GoogleMaps, you can now look up any place in the world, and see what effects dropping a nuclear weapon( or even an asteroid )on it would have. Having lived next to the power-generating Niagara Falls for most of my life, I always wondered if it was a priority target on somebody's list, and what would happen if a nuke did go off there... guess it's the post-apocalyptic g33k in me, but books like After The Bomb and Wasteland are always on my shelves for flip-throughs every few years. Plus, shows like Jericho and The Sarah Connor Chronicles also catch my eye year to year...

Feb 26 - Bat-Dates

Today I shut down or suspended whatever online dating accounts I had, after some few weeks of thought. Considering that I've had some of those accounts for years with no noticeable results, I'm going to be spending my time better elsewhere, not to mention saving the fees from the few sites that charge for the privilege. I have to say that overall, I've been disappointed with the sites, as few people respond to even the politest of emails, and the ones that contact me are for the most part not people I would be interested in even casually. So that says I am either far too picky, or like most, simply have not found 'the right person' ... if there is such a one. Compromise? Not in the cards. Yet.

Along the lines of making you laugh, the new animated Batman: The Brave & The Bold is a great show for simply entertaining you. Hearkening back to the visual style of the 1960's Batman, this new animated series aims to entertain without the camp and without getting too 'dark' with its story. From the two episode's I've seen so far, it does a fine job and is eminently watchable.

Feb 27 - Taxing my time

Work today was insane... I'm fine working by myself, but when the taxes are piling up, it becomes almost impossible to do everything. Phone calls and other customers poke at me like hot knives while trying to get through a tax file, each of which takes about fifteen minutes to complete and send in. The next two weeks are going to be much of the same, as this is the time of the year when everyone's T4's are arriving in the mail. So that means as soon as they do, they run in to get the cash. Sadly, not everyone will get a cash return... depending on how much a person paid in taxes during the year, combined with their deductions and credits, some folk may still owe $ to the government. Having to explain this to people reminds me of digging a tunnel in concrete with an old spoon... difficult, dangerous and time-consuming.

Feb 28 - Get Busy Finding

Apparently one can't find everything online... eBay let me down in my search for a cable for my monster-sized laser printer, as did all my usual( and some un-usual )tech shopping sites. So before work today I stopped in at Boomer's computers in Victoria... and was amazed! Barely 60 seconds after I stepped in the door, I had the cable in hand... for five bucks, no less! I had envisioned having to call up every computer store on Vancouver Island, but this astounded me... like pulling a copy of Action Comics #1 out of a pile of used comics at the local shop.

Now that I live out in Langford, I find myself wanting to go and visit downtown Victoria a little less, which is odd, as I really haven't take a day to simply wander around the many great shops there are there. Perhaps when the weather is warmer I'll devote a precious day off to doing just that, stopping in at one or two of the non-franchised cafes there for lunch. Hopefully by then some of my friends here will have some free time as well, though it seems I've managed to pick a fairly busy bunch.

Which is pretty much the same story back in Niagara: everyone gets busy, weeks or months go by and suddenly you realise the last time you saw a few folk was at a Christmas get-together last year... and it's now getting closer to Christmas again. Being busy stinks, sometimes.

March 1st - For da 'boids

Birdfeeders: source of inexpensive entertainment, food and ...

Deathtraps.

Seems that a neighbourhood cat has discovered that our new birdfeeder on the back deck is a great way to feed itself. I saw the grey blur miss two birds by inches this morning, which upset my mom as she wants to watch birds feeding, not being fed upon. So I spent several hours devising a blocking defence and setting it up on the deck - basically a see-through plastic shield to prevent the cat from coming up the back steps to launch itself at the birds at the top. I have to say I am rather proud of it, as the setup doesn't block the view from inside, is weatherproof and still allows people to use the back stairs easily if necessary. I finished just as rainclouds moved in and soaked things thoroughly.

I watched an episode of Total Drama Action tonight, basically season 2 of Total Drama Island from 2007 which I enjoyed immensely. The writing is quirky, the characters are diverse and it manages to be funny at the right times... unlike the animated Clone Wars series, which five minutes in I was tempted to mute and make up my own dialogue. The narrator for the series easily has one of the most annoying voices I've ever heard. Apart from that, the animation itself is excellent - there was a trans-atmospheric battle that had spectacular visuals and effects, but those can't save the show from rather mediocre writing or plots.

I also watched Who Killed the Electric Car? on CBC's The Passionate Eye, which had many eye-opening revelations about how GM's EV-1 program was scrapped as of June 2003. The fact that the cars needed so little maintenance( and thus lost profits for things like oil changes )scared both car companies and oil companies alike, who feared for their profit margins. I also discovered that the many trolley networks that cities in the 50's had were scrapped by automakers to pave the way for expensive fuel-guzzling fleets of buses... with large profits for the automakers again. It was an enlightening hour, and I highly suggest finding it online for a watch-through. Edutainment!


Still haven't had time to get some pictures of the place yet, but I am hoping next week to get a few into the blog. Everything is basically to rights since the move a month ago, and is quite livable.