Net Dumplings

2010-08-30T10:01:00.004-06:00

Whenever I let Linz flip channels she picks something either girly (usually found on W network) or real and dramatic involving midgets or hoarders (usually found on TLC). The other day she was happy to stop on Golden Girls. So, just for fun, try to remember this episode from 1985.

Blanche’s nephew is coming to stay for a week or two because Blanche’s sibling’s rocky marriage is in repair mode somewhere warm and sunny. Dorothy fears this will put her out because she is studying for exams of some sort but agrees because, as Sophia, with her old Sicilian values, put it, “We do for family!” The little punk comes to stay, actually arriving under police escort, and is completely disrespectful to the girls and their household. He parties with random friends (who all have awesome mullets) and is insolent until, in one heated moment, Sophia slaps him. He storms out onto the veranda in a pouty rage and Blanche becomes upset with Sophia and asks her, “Is that all you Italians know how to do is yell and hit people?”

To which, she replies, “No. We also know how to…

What does Sophia say?

I Wore Two Sunglasseses

2010-04-13T12:20:00.012-06:00

What do you do if you’re a Sheik with a trillion-dollar float, an army of slave labour, a reputation to uphold, an ego to serve and coastal neighbours that try to one-up you all the time. You build Dubai!Between the reflection off the sea and the glass skyscrapers, Dubai is the shiniest place on Earth.

Instead of on the convergence of two rivers, or on the site of a historical settlement, Dubai is what a city would look like if it were founded on showmanship.

In Dubai, you don’t want to live where you can afford to live and you could never afford to live where you would want to.

It’s a giant playground for the rich. We had fun, are we aren't even rich, that's why we didn't go skiing, but we did enjoy a $15 cocktail at the base of the ski hill.

First Things First

2010-03-24T12:20:00.004-06:00

One of the first things I did in Abu Dhabi was get a haircut. I even saved up some growth for the event. I was told it was something I’d want to experience. The barber pulled the red curtain closed and turned up what looked like Arabic CSI on the crappy little TV. Heroes with thick black moustaches pointed empty guns and mimicked recoil at the bad guys in thick black moustaches as they sped off in a getaway goat milk truck. Then the heroes had fits in the street with really frustrated looks on their faces. Sometimes the barbers would all yell at each other from behind their curtains about a certain scene – they were all on the same channel. After a standard head shave he reclined the chair for my shave. He drew his straight razor and began stroking it across the leather strap while still watching his TV. I really hoped he was going to be looking at me for this part of the procedure. This is the only time in my adult life that I have used, to a T, the advice my mother gave when I was a child and getting my hair cut: “be still like a statue”. But the service went well, but for a few nicks. I felt like De Niro as Capone in the opening scene to The Untouchables. This was followed by the barber slapping five separate layers of goop on my face for my (I guess customary) man-facial. It tingled, it was nice. So I sat there patiently with a giant goop beard watching all moustache TV before I was toweled off and sent on my way. The 30 degree breeze was actually cool across my face during the walk home.

How We Deal

2010-01-27T13:46:00.005-06:00

So the entire 0.43% of the Earth’s land surface known as Saskatchewan suffered a 4-day, sideways blizzard which brought in a couple feet of snow. It blocked highways, cut power to communities, dehydrated cows and strained people’s relationships with their cars. But nothing brings otherwise indifferent humans together like being in the same boat. No car remains stuck on city road because people literally leap to push or shovel you out. It’s just standard procedure.

Speaking of which, here are the steps to successfully enter the roadway from your driveway after a snow storm.
1. Start car with remote start and let warm up for 15 minutes.
2. Get in car and back up just slightly past the neighbour’s house, snowman, tree, snow bank, etc, so that you can confirm no cars are coming from either direction.
3. Pull ahead again as far as you can.
4. Put vehicle in reverse and floor it so that you’re travelling at least 40 kmh by the time you reach the end of your driveway.
5. Plow back of car into snow shovelled onto road the night before.
6. At sidewalk, crank wheel in desired direction. This should launch the vehicle into a healthy sideways skid landing it in the middle of the road where other vehicles have bravely made tire ruts.
7. Put car in drive.
8. Get stuck.
9. Roll down window and thank neighbourhood kids for the push.
10. Continue driving.

This morning there was a guy whose truck had become stuck randomly SIDEWAYS at the end of our street. When I rolled up I got out to help push but it was a lost cause. It was a rear wheel drive pick up with no weight in the back and bald tires. He simply couldn’t get over the small bump in the packed snow that sat in front of his front tire. And he wasn’t helping because he just kept spinning his tires, creating enough friction to melt the very top of the snow which promptly refroze into smooth ice. Someone had even joined me pushing but had to leave to catch the bus. Finally he got out, flustered and agitated and started telling me about how he had been clean for the last few days in preparation for a surgery and this was the last thing he needed, “Maybe this will help.” He said jokingly, then added, “So if you see this truck abandoned later, you know where I’ll be”. The tire store, I hoped. He then grabbed the only thing he had in the back of his truck that could be used for digging which was some flimsy piece of metal siding and started hacking at the ice around his back tires. At this point I had to tell him I had to leave or I was going to be late for work. And that double-double wasn’t going to ordering itself on the way. Luckily we had pushed him back far enough for me to get around him.

Somehow, in the process of pushing his truck, I kinked my neck and can’t turn my head one way so have made a chiropractic appointment. Except I don’t like how chiropractors have turned into pussies. I liked when they used to twist you up and crack the shit out of you. Now it’s all about little baby pushes and tapping you with little plastic toys.

2009-12-23T16:19:00.003-06:00

So we opened gifts the other night since Linz and I won’t be together on Christmas (at some point I’ll have to leave my family tradition and we’ll start one of our own). And watching the boy reminded me of the spectacle that is a child unwrapping gifts. Children virtually douse themselves with impatient gasoline sitting next to the tree and when a gift is handed to them it may as well be a road flare, setting them on fire with anticipation as they're rip into the paper, the sum of their imaginative wishes filling the contents of the package. It’s truly a magical event. It does makes some gifts anticlimactic, though. You can see the tension loosen in the wires that hold their excited face when all the paper comes off and it’s not the magic item they failed to will into the box but, say, tube socks. But the hugging is still fun, even though it may just be an exercise to them after gifts like those.

2009-12-04T16:44:00.003-06:00

I went to the rental property after work to do a few minor repairs for the new tenants moving in that day, mirror, towel rack, drywall holes, shower head, paint. Then I helped the dude tetris in his couch while gouging every wall and scraping every corner, stuff that we would normally charge damages for if the tenant had done themselves. I took the very last of my stuff home including my junk trunk which contains stuff I’ve accumulated over my entire life. You know, little flotsam & jetsam of memorabilia, including a zillion wallet-sized pictures of people that have come and gone (some now Facebook friends), a torch lighter someone got me from Australia, pieces of paper with passwords to websites probably now extinct, a 9mm casing from an outing at the gun range, the earring I used to wear, textbooks, hockey trophies from childhood, etc. And a dusty picture of me with the ex and her boys which was tossed but not before Lindsey had a look.

Me: Oh my god, look at this.
Linz: You guys had a “family” portrait done? Hee hee.
Me: Yeah. That once, I think.
Linz: This thing is terrible! You still have that ugly shirt!
Me: Oh, right.
Linz: How come she doesn’t smile?
Me: That’s just the way she smiled, never with an open mouth.
Linz: In fact, it doesn’t look like any of you are smiling.
Me (laughing): That’s cause we were all miserable!

I was kidding, or course.

When Linz and I finally made separate meals for ourselves it was 9:30. We ate while watching a couple episodes of our newly and collectively favourite show, Californication. Then she went to bed and I proceeded to get meleed by suburban teenage or pothead 20-something Americans. In other words, I brought a gun to a knife fight and lost.

2009-11-26T11:57:00.001-06:00

Last night? I went and sat at my house for a final open house session. No one came so we awarded the suite to a young couple, one of only two parties that came to view it and fill out an application this past Sunday. Then I went home and ate. The new tenants showed up to pay some of their damage deposit. Vance had a bath. I did some event work on Crackbook for our upcoming hockey team pub crawl, took down the ads for the suite from Kijiji. The dishwasher shot water everywhere so I took it apart, right down to the core to see if I could find the source of the clog, among other problems (I felt quite handy) then put it all back together while Lindsey manually washed dishes and surfed her laptop for a new dishwasher. Then I watched the Flames tie Anaheim with 18 seconds left to force overtime. I screamed when they did and Linz sent me a text from upstairs in bed saying I scared the shit out of her and to shut up. They eventually lost in a shootout. Then I played some Modern Warfare 2 online and slowly started to improve from my usual routine of getting INSTANTLY SLAIN UPON DISCOVERY by other players. Then I had a smoke and went to bed. You?

2009-11-25T09:25:00.002-06:00

Last night? We had a delicious Thai rice & beef dish that Linz made for dinner. A neighbouring boy came over to play with Vance. He has ADHD and so it was fun to watch how he played. “WOW! Cool car tracks! Can we make some paper airplanes? I’m hungry!” When Vance went to bed Linz and I watched Land of the Lost with Will Ferrell. A few laughs but entertaining throughout (we’ve become impatient with unentertaining movies since we just ~~download~~ rent them for free by the dozen and often shut them off half way through). She went to bed and I made some toast. Downloaded an update for FlightPlan on her iTouch. Watched John Stewart and a bit of Colbert then went to bed. You?

Home Version Soon To Be Released

2009-09-11T15:59:00.010-06:00

For a year I lived on the ranch with my good buddy Charlie. Okay, it wasn’t a ranch, it was a 3-acre acreage but we lovingly called it the ranch. We were thinking of calling it other things too, like “El Rancho de la Muerte” and “Live Fire Test Range”, but none of them stuck.

It was an adjustment. I’d been evicted from my apartment as the result of a drunk and destructive roommate – evicted from the rush and livelihood of downtown Calgary. The unpredictability of life had wrenched my unwilling fingers off the pulse of big city night life and the Red Mile. So I packed all my toys and did what any city boy would do and moved to the middle of armpit-fuck-nowhere, to the ranch with Charlie. There, in the rolling hills of rural Alberta, no dwelling was in sight – and, luckily, .22 caliber range – of another. I used to gently fall asleep serenaded by the hum of the streets, the hush of traffic, the honking, pedestrians shouting, the occasional glass breaking, now I was laying in bed wide-eyed to the deafening sound of… absolutely nothing.

But it wasn’t long after that my neck got a little redder. I started to see the appeal of country living. I resigned to my current destiny and embraced being a billy of the hills. It wasn’t uncommon for Charlie to drive up the gravel road to the house to see me sitting on the porch in my straw hat with the rifle in one hand and a beer in the other. We both spent that summer unemployed, I can’t imagine doing it any other way. Most of our days started like this:

Charlie wakes up off his couch.
I wake up off my couch, put on my straw hat.
Charlie: What do ya figure we git done today?
Me: Let’s done git drunk and blast things.
Charlie: I’ll done git the gun.
Me: I’ll done git the beer.

Give two miscreants enough time and alcohol and they will find other dangerous and nonsensical ways to entertain (and injure) themselves. For example, I don’t think there exists a type of molecule chain, natural or artificial, that we didn’t attempt to burn in a gasoline-assisted fire. In fact, I don’t think we had any fires that weren’t gasoline-assisted.

Then there were the more creative, beer-fueled, limb-endangering activities. If you've ever seen Cowboy Poker you'd know it's a ballsy rodeo event that involves cowboys playing poker at a table in the middle of the arena in which there is a loose, angry and unpredictable bull. The last one to flee the table wins the hand. We played Hillbilly Cowboy Poker in which you fire up the ride-a-mower and rig it to run full speed on its own with the steering wheel turned and tied off to one direction. Then set up the poker table in the middle of its turning circumference. The mower will jerkily deviate from its orbit and dive inwards toward the table. The last one to dive-roll out of its way wins.

But the piece de resistance, my friends, was a game we called Mailbox Roulette. See if you can guess how it’s played with this list of materials:
- 6 large size mailboxes and 6 fence posts on which to nail them (representing the 6 barrels in a six shooter)
- First aid kit (read: bottle of whiskey)
- 5 friends
- 1 pickup truck
- 1 baseball bat
- One die cube
- And one cindercrete block

Can you say STINGER? Forget connecting with an inside fastball just above the hands, trying hitting a mailbox with a cindercrete in it block at 60 kph. "Woo hoo! Ha ha! Fuck, that hurt. Pass me the first aid."

So next time you see a hillbilly with, say, a missing a finger, go ahead and ask him how he lost it. I guarantee it’s nothing Hasbro ever thought of.

Want Something To Do Tonight?

2009-08-12T16:03:00.007-06:00

Every day the paperboy rides his bike along his paper route. Each morning he comes to my country house to deliver my paper. To get to my house each morning he has to cross the gravel road. Dust is always kicked up from the gravel road from a truck that occasionally drives along it. When the paperboy crosses the gravel road dust always hits him in the face. He does this each morning at the same time.

Tonight, August 12th, the dust will hit him hard in the face and create one heavenly show, where a day is actually a year, and the paperboy’s face is actually

And my country house is actually

And the dusty gravel road is actually the trail of debris left behind by what the truck is actually

Swift-Tuttle Comet

And each speck of dust is actually

So tonight’s the night to remember to look up and catch a few. One to two a minute, they say.

Smell My Finger

2009-08-12T13:38:00.000-06:00

You know those company-wide emails that remind you that you can’t wear anything scented because it irritates your coworkers? When I get them I always wonder, “who are these people and why do these complain-aholics have so much clout when it comes to lowering the common denominator?” Well I finally met one. My supervisor is one of these people that react violently to any kind of fragrance. One time she was in my cube and her eyes started tearing and she started coughing. She asked me what scent I was wearing, I said “uhh, pit stick”. This morning I went to ask her a question and after a couple seconds she started recoiling in her chair as I was standing next to her. It was a strange thing to watch, as if a ghostly hand had extended from my body to slap her about the ears and face. Then she actually asked me to find and start wearing unscented pit stick as a favour to her. My thought was, “Uhh, no. I’m not going shopping for you. This is deodorant, not odorant. Anyway, I don’t think you want the alternative.”

There has to be a principle involved here. Cologne, after shave, perfume, even Binaca, fine, I can consider them unnecessary but I’m not going to scale back this already basal level of personal hygiene to exclude the only basic defense I employ against smelling like four straight days in the desert. At some point, the level of freshness I have to maintain must outweigh your unusual aversion to anything with a scent. What are we talking here, 1, 2 parts per million? Is she a freakin’ shark? Chopping onions must knock her right out. One day I should hang out in her cubicle reeking of B. O.

Oh man, that reminds me of the worst case I’ve ever encountered of an odour coming from a human body not yet deceased. My buddy and I were on a flight from Kingston, Jamaica to Toronto and we got seated across the aisle from this giant black woman who, no word of a lie, smelled like she was smuggling fish into Canada under her arms. We sat there inhaling our ties, wondering if the pilot would let us crack a window at 35,000 feet, until her eyes met ours. “Lots of fish in Canada, dude. Don’t have to bring your own.” Luckily the flight was a relatively open so after takeoff, when the stewardess gave us an understanding nod, we leapt out of our seats and moved about 20 rows back.

So what shall it be, my over-sensitive coworkers, pit fish or “ocean surf” Right Guard?

All Around The Mulberry Bush The Monkey Chased The Weasel

2009-06-22T16:18:00.007-06:00

This week at work will be wonderfully serene since the whirlwind of spaz, known as our boss, is away on holidays. She’s diminutive but a tough old bat. I don’t think you could bring her down with a sock full o’ rocks. And she’s very good at one thing: half her job. The technical half, not the managerial half.

The door that separates her from our work group has a stiff latch and its loud opening snap is the harbinger of child-scolding, turkey-like gobbling. About four or five times a day we encounter this spring-loaded scenario:
- Door snaps open.
- We cringe at its percussive report.
- Boss flies out like a jack-in-the-box.
- Boss turns on the fire hose of shrill tones like we’re a rioting crowd.
- She does accompanying dance which includes spinning in place, flailing arms, pointing fingers, eye rolling and random warnings.
- Boss loses train of thought; spring recoils and pulls her back into her room mid-mumble.
- We continue working.

Just the absence of that periodic slap to the back of the head is making me more productive. I’ve already learned how to respond to emails using only my mouse by dragging in place letters from the previously typed, randomly fonted soup below. The problem is they look like this:

I just farted and my coworker dry heaved into her garbage.

Guest Post: Mom & Dad

2009-05-26T16:58:00.005-06:00

[The parentals are in England rubbing elbows with the stinking rich at a posh society wedding and then touring the old stomping grounds in Belgium. The following is submitted by faithful commenter and mother of Net Dumplings, Pour The Wine and Kate and Mike Abroad: J Le.]

We're here and our livers are the worse for it. We ate last night in Jean and David's garden (back yard) and it was sooooo warm and calm. Then a storm hit like a wall at about 2:00 a.m. and their basement/garage flooded. It has rained all day. We went by our old house yesterday. A young man was mowing the lawn. His family bought the house in 2001 and completely renovated it and painted the outside and put in a pool where the pond used to be.

You wouldn't believe the wedding and the old money. All the men on Gina's side were in morning suits. I was in two fabulous heritage protected mansions. On the second day we had lunch in Boxted Hall which is Gina's uncle's house and it was on a heritage garden tour and people had to pay for a ticket to go and I was on the inside at a table set for twenty having lunch. I wasn't on the outside looking in......I was IN!!! Heard of The Barclay Bank in England? Gina's mother is a Barclay. Their house, built in the 1500's has it's own postal code...they have a postal code all to themselves!

Hopefully tomorrow it will be nice and we can go down to the Grande Place [in the center of Brussels]. The following day we go to Paris on the train and I can honestly say that walking the streets of Paris is one of my favorite things to do in the world as is sitting at their cafes and then eating in a cafe. Love love love. Haven't done it for two years and I miss it.

Send this on to your sisters as my skills are dodgy on a foreign computer. If you reply in, oh, say, 36 hours, I will read it.

Love
Mom

I Bet You Never Knew That A $13 Appliance From Wal-Mart Would Save The World

2009-05-26T16:42:00.006-06:00

We print an insane amount of drawings for our contractors here at site. It’s unusual if the plotter isn’t smoking by the end of the day. The amount of paper we distribute in a month could wallpaper West Edmonton Mall, including the paint store. The company that pays us would be wise to have shares in the tree re-forestation industry.

But yesterday we ran out of toner and it has literally ground most of our operation to a halt. We tried to order some but the supplier said it wouldn’t come before an undisclosed amount of time. We tried to get some couriered from a sister office in another city, they were out too. We found a Montreal-based distributor but they had a mere 13 bottles left but were shipping them out to someone else. Then it was confirmed today – there is no where in North America that has toner. That’s right, the entire continent is out of toner. The well is dry. And the down time is nurturing visions of dystopia. Entire construction projects from coast to coast will be put on hold because no printing means no plans from which to construct. Cityscapes will remain unchanged, urbania will stop sprawling, the lack of new homes and businesses will no longer be able to accommodate the increase and moss-like spread of world population. A restriction will be put on the number of children a family can have. The fertility drug market will crash. John & Kate (Plus 8) and Octomom will become posthumously canonized by a woeful, spawnless society. Strange dogs and cats will have to live together.

Enter the humble coffee grinder, the one that’s in the lunch room. With it we can grind all the toner we need. All we need is a nice blend of dark matter that can be found around the site and we should be good to go. Let’s see, some coffee beans, some pencil leads, if he’s willing, some dandruff rubbings from that black safety guy, some floor dirt, a few of those black spiders that runs across the floor of the office, welding dust, butts from the ashtray, some pepper packets and some of that crap on the floor of the raw ore building. That should do it.

Document control: preserving the advancement of the human race, one blend at a time.

Wait, I've Seen That Before

2009-04-26T17:59:00.009-06:00

In grade two I had one awful bitch of a teacher. (I hope you google your own name and stumble across this post, Mme. Beaulieu from Madaleine d’Houet). At best she was terse, at worst she made you want to cower under your desk. And she didn’t like me; she was extra bitchy to me. Her disdain for me was specific and focused, so much so that it was palatable and disconcerting to the other students. She would never call on me when my hand was raised, even if it was the only one, and she would call on me when no one’s hand was raised, singling me out. One time students were being called up to the front of the class individually to collect papers that had been graded. When I got to the front to retrieve mine, her outstretched hand deliberately let fall my paper about a foot before I could reach it. Once I brought my notebook up to her desk to ask her a question. She noticed that I had boxed off some notes in pen and saw her chance. She scolded me for “boxing off notes”, put a big red X through it and sent me back to my desk before I could ask my question. She was a miserable scrunt and had no business being within 100 feet of children, especially ones in their developmental years. She would have been more in her element slithering in a pile hissing snakes.

On one memorable day I was eating lunch with the other students in the gymnasium and I had to urinate like I had never had to urinate before, it was big and it was now. One problem, Mme. Beaulieu was monitoring the door and I would have to ask her for permission to leave the gym. No matter how much I tried to convey urgency, pressure, direness and fear to her in seven-year-old’s English she wouldn’t budge. I fought like hell to quietly make it to the bell but when it rang at the end of meal time it signified more than just the release of the students. Terror ran through my body while warm relief ran through my jeans. The subsequent recess was spent sitting on a heating vent in hopes of drying my pants while the other students played outside. The icing on the cake was that that afternoon I was paired up with the girl I had a crush on for a class assignment. I tried to charmingly contribute to the activity while subtly pulling my sweatshirt down to my knees to hide the giant wet spot.

It might have cost fortune in ~~further~~ child psychologist fees but I bet you Scrunt would have rushed me through if I had whipped it out and started pissing on her. She could very well be dead now, having only ever taught children cursive writing and that sometimes you can’t do anything right, no matter how hard you try. Nice legacy.

So I thought of Mme. Beaulieu yesterday during lunch when, much to the amusement of my female coworkers, I accidentally knocked my bowl off my desk with my arm, covering my crotch in cream of broccoli soup. The stain, I noticed, was the same pattern as the pee stain in grade two.

If any of you were wondering, cream of broccoli soup dries slightly slower than pee and leaves denim feeling like a stiff pad.

The House Rent Boogie

2009-03-19T15:24:00.013-06:00

Recently I joined the ranks of the unemployed. The axe came down, swift and unforeseen. I was looking left and it came from the right.

A combination of lyrics play over and over again in my head from George Thorogood's "1 Bourbon, 1 Scotch and 1 beer" and, it's predecessor, John Lee Hooker's "House Rent Boogie".

I come home last Friday, talk to the woman that I lost my job,
She says don't confront me as long as I have my rent next Friday

Except it was Tuesday. And of course the woman was sweet and supportive, albeit suffering from a required minimal amount of stress.

The first items on one's action list when they get fired are updating the resume, pounding the pavement and hitting up contacts. And yes, I did do some homework on day one, but I also went out for lunch and was playing xbox when the woman came home.

She said "I don't believe you're tryin' to find no job,
I seen you today you was standin' on a corner, Leaning up against a post."
I said "But I'm tired, I've been walkin' all day, I just can't find no job."

Of course what one knows they should do often differs from the first thing they actually do.

So I stop in the local bar you know people,
I go to the bar, I ring my coat, I call the bartender
Said "Look man, come down here!"
He got down there, "So what you want?"

And the rest is ~~foggy~~ lyrical history.

2009-03-13T09:59:00.002-06:00

We went high in the air and were able to see a lot of the island. We didn't know there were mountains to the south. Then they slowed down and dipped us, then they reeled us in. Parasailing is awesome.

2009-03-12T11:09:00.004-06:00

Yesterday I went all discovery channel in the giant lake. I swam with nurse sharks and mulit-coloured fish. There's a great photo taken of me holding a giant sting ray but it's probably in a Dominican landfill now because it would have cost me $13CAD to acquire it. Dominican landfills, by the way, exist as randomly dispersed piles of garbage by the side of the road.

Today we're going tandem parasailing on the beach. Our flight out is tomorrow but I don't think I'm ready to leave.

2009-03-10T11:51:00.004-06:00

We walked along the pristeen beach to a row of shops because we needed some junk to take home, a t-shirt, a painting, a wood carving. It was a nice walk, the sand is as white and soft as icing sugar, the giant lake is brilliant torquoise and blue. Walking into the water while the surf is receding creates a strange effect. The ground races away from you under your feet faster than you can walk so it looks like you're moving backwards but you're walking forwards.

Lindsey's a ruthless haggler. She'll walk into the first shop start dropping the price of a wanted item faster than a loosed coconut from a rotted stem. But he's only the set up man. Once she gets to a decent price she'll leave and take that with her to the next shops where she'll tell them that they now have to beat that price. There's a lot of arguing, turning away, eyelash batting and eventually smiling. She's a killer.

2009-03-09T10:54:00.005-06:00

Last night I flashed the old art and put these monkeys to shame. I shut down most of these other Canadians. People were dropping like flies around me. My sweetheart/trooper trucked on with me till about 4 or 5. Some of these pups have probably never yet been kicked around by a 40 I guess.

Wednesday we're going snorkling with sharks and sting rays. Right after I check myself for chum-leaking open wounds.

2009-03-08T11:47:00.002-06:00

There are a ton of Canadians here. They just keep busing them in. And there's at least 2 separate groups of about 10 drunk, 20 or 30 something guys that are fueling each other and going vacation crazy. By the poolside they sweep over females like locusts over a crop.

Linz was tired last night so we were back in the room by 10:45. As I was falling asleep around 4 AM and watching the ESPN rerun of 42,000 screaming fans at Skydome nearly cheer their Canadian squad back against the Americans in the top of the ninth in the Classico Mundial de Biesbol, I was serenaded by a mighty drunk and mighty loud chorus of O Canada coming from the bar. I slept like a baby.

2009-03-07T11:54:00.003-06:00

Lindsey told me that next time I can´t just watch the cucaracha skitter across the floor, I have to kill it. I didn`t bring a bat though.

2009-03-07T11:52:00.002-06:00

And god said let his olive run into and be smothered by his guacamole. And there was a tilt in his plate and it was so. And he ate it and it was good.

Erratum

2009-02-13T08:59:00.013-06:00

I have to follow up and correct myself after astute reader Chris pointed out an obvious and comical error in my last post. After which I figured I had probably heard the original recording wrong. Finally last night, in a different show, they mentioned it again, shedding light on my erroneous reference.

Indeed Nikola Tesla died in 1943, several decades before the first design of the AMC Pacer. What I had misheard was the make and model used in his electricar car experiment. He used the 1930's Pierce Arrow luxury car.

What's really interesting is that Tesla was developing the technology to harvest wireless radiant energy over a hundred years ago, technology that could have rid us of our reliance on fossil fuel. Considering factors like the greenhouse effect and wars over oil, I ponder how the last century could have been different if his primary financier, J. P. Morgan, had continued to finance Tesla's endeavours instead of pulling the plug (no pun intended) because there was no way to meter and therefore charge for the power consumed.

Neo-archaia

2009-02-02T16:11:00.013-06:00

I picked up from the bit torrent community a rare and complete collection of a radio show called Open Mind with Bill Jenkins. It was based in Los Angeles and ran for 7 years in the 1980’s. This ground-breaking show covered such subject matter as UFOs, alternative energy, spirituality, ancient religions, out-of-body and near-death experiences and more and was fraught with government conspiracies, cover-ups, media manipulation, military secrecy, etc. It’s great fodder for a heretic like me, I’ve been listening to different episodes every night.

What’s equally fascinating as the subject matter is how dated it is. Often it simply feels like I have the radio on until they say something like, “…as we continue to mourn the tragic loss of the astronauts in the Challenger explosion…” or “before Carter left office” or something regarding a task performed by some enigmatic device called a supercomputer. And since this was (perhaps) the first radio show if its kind some older topics had to be discussed anew like the Roswell incident and the Philadelphia experiment.

The one I listened to last night, from about 1984, involved discussion on this newly developed “theory” called the greenhouse effect. The new age thinkers on the show, however, claimed we were on the verge of a new energy era that would do away with the consumption of fossil fuel. Not so fast, boys (talk about optimism, or procrastination). Also mentioned was a revolutionary electric automobile that Nikola Tesla made for himself by gutting an AMC Pacer and dropping in a homemade battery. It seems Tesla was not without a sense of Garth.

What’s also funny, like looking at your hairstyle in an old photo, is the cold war-era paranoia. Some callers were very concerned that people in Alaska were suffering the ill effects of Soviet ultra-low frequency testing. (Something which Senator Palin could speak to?) Other well-informed patriots were very curious about how far along those damn commies were in their weather control technology.

One particular recording made my blood run ice cold while I was up late at night in the darkness of the house. It was brought in by a guest who was an authority on Electronic Voice Phenomenon. Remember the movie White Noise? On the air, they played a recording of a conversation between a researcher and someone they knew had been dead for 16 years. The ghostly voice was monotone yet tortured, almost straining to be heard on the magnetic tapes. Fucking creepy.

So I sit and listen in this 25 year old time warp cocoon to the state of affairs in modern science and new age research of the early 80’s. And I hear him repeat the phone number over and over again. And I listen to callers call in with related examples of personal events that happened just a couple days ago. And I think it would be so cool to call in and say, “Long time listener, first time caller.”

And then I would astound the shit out of them with prophetic knowledge of the future. I would tell them that there are no commercial hover cars but there are hybrid cars. And I would tell them about global warming and the Soviet break up and the Berlin Wall and their neighbours San Jose and Anaheim getting hockey teams and home computers which are all connected through an internet and that the Loch Ness Monster was a hoax. And I would tell them that everyone has their own personal pocket calculator on which you can tell time, set alarms, manage your calendar, record and playback video, send and receive silent letter messages, take and store pictures, manage contacts, listen to music, browse this internet thingy, and even talk to other people live just like a phone. Then they’d say, “Yeah, right. Beam me up, Scotty.” Then they’d laugh at me and high five while disconnecting the line to pocket calculator.

What would you tell those millions of unsuspecting listeners about the next 25 years if you could?

Technology is Cool

2009-01-30T13:48:00.020-06:00

I found the “3D Buildings” and “Terrain” buttons in Google Earth that turn flat maps into pop-up books with photo-realistic imagery. Much omnipotent fun ensued.

I buzzed the Eiffel Tower. (Not as fun as climbing it).

I meandered through the Grand Canyon.

I spilled over Niagra Falls.

I climbed Everest.

I took a trip to the Vatican and knocked on the Pope’s door.

I slalomed Stonehenge.

I stood at the plate at Wrigley and called my shot.

Then I took off and went flying through New York City, zipping in between buildings.

Speaking of flying, here is a time compression video of 24 hours of global air travel. You can see peak business hours, red eyes, hubs, great circles followed, etc. Heathrow looks like a vacuum. So cool.

Seasonal Affective Standard Procedure

2009-01-16T11:29:00.009-06:00

Today it’s like summer. There’s no sting because it’s only -13.

Even this blog suffers from Seasonal Affective Disorder. Which I don’t think is a disorder. It’s an order. It can be predicted and charted.

Summer: Hey, while we’re out we should also go to [another store] because I thought of something else we need.
Winter: We’re done out here. Let’s get the hell off these roads and back home and curl up under the giant blanket and wait until bedtime.

Summer: Wanna go rollerblading?
Winter: While you’re up can you get me some more needless, fattening crap to eat?

Here’s the debate, is it a disorder or just a phenomenon? I believe it is simply a procedural difference between summer and winter. The cold is undeniably debilitating, that doesn’t mean debilitation comes from within. In another example, I was reading about Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome on Wiki (Wiki suffers its share of public and pop culture scorn regarding its validity). This syndrome describes me to a tee but I’m still not convinced that it’s an actual affliction and not simply a report on observed commonalities in human behaviour. This debate is one of the stigmata Wiki suffers, at no fault to its contributors who have good intentions. Ultimately, I’m still hesitant to believe that it’s an infirmity because, if I do, I’ll resign to it, defend it and perpetuate it. On the other hand, a simple procedural change doesn’t account for why I can’t sum up enough creativity to think of anything to blog about for a month, even though I try to hold myself to strict constraints regarding not blogging about absolutely nothing for the sake of blogging. But like I said, today it’s only -13, so it’s like summer. Plus, I’m extra perky today because I got to bed early – before 2 AM! Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome sufferers (read: Delayed Sleep Phase Phenomenon perpetuators) know what I’m talking about.

Yesterday, I conquered. I broke the snowy chains and rose up from the sleepy deep freeze – with lots of help from my ~~personal trainer~~ beautiful girlfriend – and actually went running at an indoor track. And I did it against a scheduled beer-drinking session with coworkers. Take THAT dark winter!

It’s so cold…

2008-12-23T13:48:00.014-06:00

Fall teased us with near 0°C temperatures until the first week of December. Then, like it does here, it dropped to between -25C/-13F and -35C/-31F and it’s been that way ever since and it will stay like that until March. Don’t dawdle when in between buildings, plug in your car or it won’t start, don’t drop your mittens in the snow or you’ll lose your hand, type of shit. Repair shops are full of cars with cracked hoses and plug heads that have been ripped off from driving away with them still connected. The roads are such that you can see the brake light reflection of the car in front of you in the sheer ice. People who drive 60 in a 50 zone now drive 50. People who normally drive 40 in a 50 zone now drive 27 – apparently drivers' skill-self-trust/speed graphs are slightly curved. Planes that sit on the tarmac too long are de-iced a second time. Bellaclavas have a white goatee from frozen breath condensation. Your cheeks and nose feel a distinct bite in a subtle breeze. I have to thaw my hockey gear out with a blow dryer before every game because it doesn’t dry in the garage, it just freezes. And I just can’t keep my poor baby warm, she’s cold all the time.

They tell you to pack an emergency kit when traveling in your car. Why? Because this is all you see for hours when driving in this province.

It’s still beautiful country and I still like to watch the sunrise and sunset. I watch it rise during my first smoke break at work and watch it set during my next smoke break. (Where are my vitamin D pills?)

Anybrr, this post is interactive. If you drop in, you must post a punch line. I’ll get you started.

You wouldn’t believe how cold it is here.
(How cold is it?)
It’s so cold…

I saw a squirrel rubbing his nuts.

I tried peeing outside and ended up a tripod with a skinny yellow leg.

I can’t wait to get in from shoveling and get warmed up by a cold beer.

Some wild chill got in my mouth and made my molar ache. (That one is true).

Saskatoon hookers will pay you for a ride around the block.

Gave at the Office/Friends Lost

2008-12-10T14:35:00.010-06:00

Here’s a video explanation of a concept called the landing pad. What’s interesting about this is that it’s not so much a video about a particular space in your house as it is a video about a particular space within a woman’s mind. Like a voluntary tumour or a chunk she donated to her retarded brother. I do appreciate the rather large concession though, the allowance of temporary clutter. You can see her blood pressure rise as she begins to talk about what happens when the landing pad doesn’t get processed.

And she goes one beyond to suggest that it become like a “task driver” where anything on the pad that pertains to you is a task you must perform or an item you must process. That’s some pretty forward thinking. That’s the cutting edge in terms of accountability when you think abou– oh wait, we do that here at the office. Employing business practices at home is not revolutionary, it’s out of place. A business functions because its people are both masters of their domain and accountable to the product they put forth. Children are neither.

I used to have a landing pad in my old apartment, it was called the kitchen. Then I had a landing pad for clothes that were in flux between clean and dirty, it was called the entire bedroom. These were more permanent residences than temporary landing pads though. I loved clutter. Clutter was my roommate. Clutter always had my back. Because of clutter, shit was right THERE when I needed it, right where I had put it down (a convenience seldom enjoyed when living with a woman). Picking clothes to wear was easy because clutter ensured my entire wardrobe was always within sight. Me and clutter made some pretty cool discoveries every now and then too, like, “The fuck is that smell?” and “There that shit is!” When I went to sleep at night I knew clutter would watch over me, which was comforting, except that when I tried to walk around in the dark clutter always seemed to be sleeping right in my path. Clutter ensured that doing the dishes was slick and easy because clutter soaked them for a couple weeks. Me and clutter used to laugh at people who were such neat freaks it got to be counterintuitive. “Like when you sit down to turn on the TV only to realize the remote has been ‘put away’ – on top of the TV!” Clutter would say and we would laugh and laugh. *SIGH* I kinda miss clutter. We were tight. Clutter will always have a special place in my heart.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Vinz Clortho

2008-11-25T15:50:00.009-06:00

Vinz here is the faithful servant of Gozer, a moldy Sumerian god whose destructive will on Earth is carried out by a victim-chosen incarnation called the Traveller. Vinz, who was present during the previous two times the traveler visited, loves to tell you about them at any given chance. The first, of course, was during the rectification of the Vuldronaii. That time he came as a very large and moving torb. I bet you the Vuldronaii picked a torb because it was probably something small, harmless and immobile, like a root vegetable. Not that day! Then the second time was during the third and what would be the final reconciliation of the Meketrex supplicants. He turned up as a giant sloar!!! Gozer obviously had some sort of beef with Meketrex and, having given his own wayward worshippers two previous chances to reconcile, vengefully roasted all the Meketrex-loving Shubs and Zuuls in the pit of the Sloar.

I don’t think Gozer was a very merciful god. Every time he slipped in the polls a little it was crush this and slaughter that. Then he seemingly disappeared from history. He might even have happily spent the rest of eternity in the nearest parallel dimension if it weren’t for that one nutcase that played to his vanity and reminded him what it was like to be worshipped again 8000 years later. Of course I’m talking about the influential and certifiable Ivo Shandor. Here’s a guy who, after seeing the bloodshed of WWI, figured society was too sick and no one deserved to live. I guess if you’re going to pick a figurehead for your new society that’s based on death and descturction, what better choice than Gozer? So Shandor built what can be described as a lightning rod (in the form of 55 Central Park West, whose ironwork extends through 50 feet of bedrock and touches the water table) for the purpose of drawing in cross-dimensional paranormal turbulence in hopes of attracting Gozer. Then he litters the spiritual landscape with the malignant spirits of those he sacrificed through bizarre yet purposeful rituals on its rooftop. Shandor, as it turns out, was quite the visionary, his legacy nearly came to fruition some 60 years after his death with the third coming of the Traveller. That’s when we met...

This dude!

Works Every Time

2008-11-24T14:27:00.006-06:00

When I was in grade 1 we were lined up at the door to come back into school after recess in our little grade 1 line, as we were told. While waiting in line, the back of the line would always push the line forward into the door and then spring back so the grade 1 line would look like an accordion before they let us inside. Well this one time the teachers popped the doors open just as we were springing back and reloading the next compression, when, the front person tripped over the metal door frame and the second person didn’t have time to think and tripped over the first person and the third person didn’t have time to think and so on. After a few seconds there was a pile up of about 20 kids that had ALL tripped over the person in front of them. I don't know how it happened so perfectly but there was a heap of squirming and groaning kids and me pissing myself laughing with the teacher standing over us yelling at us and giving us shit. It may have been the funniest clumsy gong show I've ever been a part of and thinking about it still makes me laugh till this day.

When I was in College I was rocking back in my chair at the back of my computer class until finally I did it. I got too cocky and rocked back just beyond the tilt apex of the back legs and, with silent flailing arms, went ass-over-teakettle and smashed the back of the chair into the hard tile floor. Pieces of the plastic chair went flying and every one of my classmates turned around to see the source of the noise just in time to see my legs flying up in the air. I couldn’t keep from laughing as I righted the chair and sat back down in it. I leaned forward and buried my face in my arms on the table while my shoulders quietly bounced up and down in a breathless church giggle. I guess I was laughing at the fact that no one saw me doing the backstroke of terror while on my way to horizontalhood. When I had finally regained my composure I sat up and leaned against the chair back which, weakened from the previous impact, promptly snapped off dumping me on my ass again.

Watch The Skies!

2008-11-21T11:03:00.007-06:00

Helmet Sales Have Risen In St. Walburg...

Last night I witnessed the most amazing clash between Earth and a menacing celestial wonderchunk. Linz and I were driving around the north end of Saskatoon at 6:26 when the pitch black sky suddenly grew white, lighting up the landscape and the interior of the car. It was as if God himself bent down to take a flash photo of the entire city. I turned my head in the lucky direction to witness, in the distance, a huge red fireball descend from the sky. It was so large and close that individual flames could be seen thrashing from the falling mass. Fiery fragments were breaking off and burning up. The sight was purely apocalyptic. Now, I’ve seen Armageddon and Deep Impact and admittedly I thought “Oh shit” as it rocketed towards the ground at a ridiculous speed. But then all of a sudden the fireball disappeared seemingly a few hundred feet above the ground.

On the radio this morning reports were coming in from eye witness accounts as far as Manitoba and Alberta. A lot of them were sure it hit the ground since, from that distance, it dropped below the horizon. A rumbling could be heard all over an area near the AB-SK border and it rattled windows of homes in Lloydminster.

Despite that the fireball stopped above the ground it is likely that fragments did hit the ground. Once the mass slows down enough due to the friction of the atmosphere and the gas surrounding the object is no longer ionized the object stops burning and dark pieces of rock continue to fall the rest of the way to Earth.

This. Is. Simply. Amazing.

I thought of the “Uhh, Houston… Whoopsie!” incident that occurred a few days ago when astronaut Piper lost her shit while spacewalking outside the Endeavor. A wily grease gun escaped her clutches while working on the International Space Station. But apparently NORAD has confirmed the falling debris to be natural and not man-made.

Tangent:

That was a close one. Is it just a matter of time?

The Mayan Calendar hints toward an event on December 21, 2012. Some blindly say doomsday. Some say that's just when the Mayan odometer rolls all its 9's over to 0's. That is, however, the next time the sun will pass back through the spiral plane of the Milky Way at its densest, an event which some argue coincides with mass extinctions on Earth, perhaps due to increased impact events.

2008-11-17T11:36:00.001-06:00

Trying to blog on Monday is like trying to mow the lawn in the snow.

Knock ‘em dead

2008-10-30T13:09:00.008-06:00

I know what you’re like, I’m that way too. It’s hard to talk about yourself/sell yourself without getting an ill feeling. It’s like, I hate putting on this fucking smiley smiley fake up whore face. But it is a skill I learned having to go and find another job so many times – to be the bright smiling, gushing whore so that a company will like you. Scraping out pumpkin guts probably once gave you the same icky feeling but now you rip them out with a purpose. To fake the appearance of genuine interest and enthusiasm is tough for simple, honest people but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing to learn. What we want to say is usually what we should never say during an interview, “Look, you need me, I need the cheque. Let’s wrap this up.”

So put on the face and do the song and dance and do it bloody well because when it’s all over and you feel like you need a shower you just may have landed the job.

Mouse Trap Music Inc.

2008-10-30T11:49:00.020-06:00

And I was at my desk, knee deep in work, focusing on the task at hand, which was trying to remember who sang the song Echo Beach and I was rolling through band names like The Headpins, The B-52’s, The Go-Go’s, and then I was trying to think of Sweeney Todd and came up with Moxy Fruvous (wtf?) perhaps trying to think of Molly Hatchet or Mott The Hoople (wtff?). So on a tangent I looked up Moxy Fruivous, curious about what one-hit abomination they released upon this good earth and it was that stupid song that goes “Once I waaaas the king of Spain, now I eeeeat humble pie…” Remember that prancing gay piece of shit? Well thanks to youtube it’s now in my random song mouse trap on repeat. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtPkDhM1Brs

Anycrap, Echo Beach was done by Martha & the Muffins.

As it turns out, a good cure for a pranc-y, a capella music clog is some Zach de la Rocha drano.

2008-10-27T12:07:00.002-06:00

After in impressive participant turn out, I shall reveal the much awaited answers to the corporate ethics quiz - and on the heels of last night's episode of The Office which featured the staff taking their corporate ethics training! (Which also featured an impressive rendition of "Let's Get Ethical" to the tune of the Olivia Newton John gem.) The right answers are modeled after their true-to-life counterpart in the actual quiz. Pass your papers to the left for grading.

1.C
2.B
3.C
4.B
5.C

Delve into the mind delving into the woman's

2008-10-24T17:27:00.009-06:00

You know how men are always wondering what the hell women are thinking, or more importantly, how they think? Reading blogs have given me a unique insight. Since a lot of people’s approach to writing blogs is similar to writing in their diary, I’ve been reading a lot of women’s diaries lately. In the end it’s the difference that matters. It is the variation, individuality and intellect that charms. But there are definitely some emerging patterns. I’ll share them. Note: These are not generalizations, they are neither good nor bad and I offer no explanation. They are simply observed patterns.

- The "About Me" section reads like a disclaimer and usually tells the reader that the author is humble and her writings are random but that she is sweet and what she writes is worth reading. A smaller percentage of others will have a cheeky statement about how they are slowly or incrementally taking over the world.
- There is an obsession, at least a very involved hobby, with the acquisition, display and consumption of shoes, lipstick, nail polish, and other self-decorating products. New acquisitions are newsworthy and pictures often accompany breaking stories.
- There is a love of nostalgia. Memories of love are loved as much as the loved themselves.
- Children and a significant other are often talked about but do not seem to constitute the reader base of the blog.
- For others, loneliness is described a sickness that can and must be cured.
- The writing is in one-sided conversation format, as if talking to the reader, as opposed to perhaps essay, editorial, point form or news article.
- Office jobs and stay-at-home’s are common, hence the computer access.

All of these combined paint a clear picture of womanhood. It’s clear now what should have been obvious a long time ago. After all this reading and data gathering and observing, here’s what I’ve learned about women: nothing. I only know now what I already knew. Women are dynamic creatures. They are beautiful and fragile and need love and protection but they’re also capable of taking the world by storm and you by the balls. They’ve always been.

Test Your Corporate Ethics

2008-10-22T17:02:00.006-06:00

Recently my company was taken over by a huge, global corporation. Part of the integration process is the reeducation of employees on some basic company principles, the company Code of Conduct and Ethics, for example. Nowadays, this is an interactive instructional video conveniently viewed at your desk. Although I kinda miss the old days of getting time off work to crowd into a room and snickering with your buddies at third rate reenactments on VHS.

It occurred to me watching this production that something odd happens to common sense when you try to teach it to large groups of people, it appears far less common. A lower denominator has to be found and the material dumbed down to a level that will surely be understood by absolutely every employee. After all, it is fundamental to human nature that we are dumber, more scared, more alarmist, more violent and less accepting in groups than we are as individuals, which explains the approach of this code of conduct production: they try to preserve, and appeal to, the individual.

What’s also palatable is an eerie Big Brother/McCarthyism tone to the videos with one “reenactor” usually the proponent of some vaguely unlawful activity and the other unsure of the consequences.

Here are some helpful hints to be ethical employees:
- Keep it very, very simple, dumbass. (Quote: “If you are unsure of any particular point or issue in the code of conduct, the good news is you don’t have to know! Just contact your manager.” Thank Christ, fumbling around in this ethical grey area was killing me. It's nice to know I can go and see that fat ass in the corner office who they made an ethical oracle.)
- Don’t even bother interacting with anyone else for fear of saying or doing something offensive.
- Dutifully rat out your friends.
- Lay down for the witch hunt.

Examples of quiz questions:

1. Doug made an investment in a company that his firm eventually acquired. His decision to invest was based not on any specific information, but on clues he pieced together. He believed his clever detective work was different from insider trading. Is Doug breaking the law if he plays his hunch and buys options on shares of said company’s stock?
a) No. Doug’s ignorance will set him free.
b) Doug will get to keep what he’s earned because he was resourceful and proactive.
c) Doug will get roasted and rendered destitute because no one ever told him what insider trading was.

2. Louis is always telling jokes and stories of chick’s bazangas. Unfortunately, some of his work colleagues don't always appreciate them. He believes he is bringing humour to the office, and continues telling jokes and stories even when coworkers have objected. What does this demonstrate?
a) There’s one in every office.
b) Louis was never accepted by his peers as a child and adolescent. He tries too hard to fit in and, as a result, comes across as a jerk. He doesn’t have a clue.
c) Louis wouldn’t piss down his coworkers’ necks if their guts were on fire.
d) Come on, good old Louis is just trying to make the work day a little less stressful.

3. Rival consultants Jerry and Larry run into one another in a hotel lobby. Jerry is proposing to Larry that their two companies save themselves time and expense by not competing aggressively for business with one another's core clients. Is his suggestion appropriate? Why or why not?
a) Hell yeah. They can run up their prices and use the profits to spend more time on the golf course together.
b) What’s the difference? They were just talking.
c) No. Jerry's suggestion, informal or not, could be seen as an attempt to allocate customers. Larry should stop talking, back slowly out of the room while locked in nervous eye contact with Jerry.
d) In case of eavesdropping, Jerry should spare Larry any legal persecution and steer the conversation towards bumblebees or car racing.
e) Jerry should shout, “You’re goin’ down, motherfucker!” and run away while dialing the police on his cell phone.

4. Outside of work, Eric is a volunteer. Today, Eric had to redesign a charity flyer on his work computer and, at the end of the day, he printed hundreds of copies which broke the printer, preventing Susie from printing her important report. How did Eric misuse company resources?
a) Come on, lay off. Eric volunteers with kids!
b) Eric is the slowest flyer designer I’ve ever seen and that printer was bloody cheap, it otherwise wouldn’t have been a problem.
c) Really, Eric doesn’t do any work anyway. He was hired because he has a degree and the other applicant didn’t. Every company has some dead weight. It will be easy to cut him loose.
d) Fuck Susie anyway.

5. When a business partner (and a pretty one, in the video) drops by Nigel’s office to offer him a hard-to-find item as a gift, he has a decision to make. What is the purpose of the gift? The gift is not being offered in the context of a business opportunity, rather it is being presented as a harmless gesture of thanks. Should Nigel accept the gift?
a) Why not? His kid would love it.
b) Nigel doesn’t want to feel obligated by accepting the gift and should consider other ways in which she could thank him. He should ask her to go over and close and lock his office door.
c) Nigel should terminate all dealings between their businesses and have her escorted out. The police will be waiting downstairs.

Submit your answers for reeducation. Correct answers will be given next week.

The Benefits of Taking Grade 11 Algebra Twice

2008-10-14T14:13:00.011-06:00

The fundamental differences between men and women have been summarized many different ways, rational/emotional, logical/intuitive, douchebag/biotch, etc.

Sometimes we men have to use that logic to prove we're not total douchebags.

For example, in what will ultimately be a doomed attempt to prove that I am not any more of a douchebag than the next douchebag, here is the mathematical equation for figuring out the number of men that look at other women despite being in a relationship. I have it on good authority that these men are called assholes, we'll use that term for the purpose of this equation.

The function (f) of men who look at other women is equal to the amount of assholes divided by the number of men on the planet:

Assholes

(f)men who look = ---------------------------------------

All men on the planet

Given that all men look at other women since it is hard wired into our genetic code as primal seeders (or other metaphysical reasoning), regardless of relationship status, all men in the world must therefore be assholes:

Assholes

(f)men who look = -----------------------------------------

All men on the planet(Assholes)

If we cancel the like terms:

~~Assholes~~

(f)men who look = ------------------------------------------

All men on the planet~~(Assholes)~~

We find that:

(f)men who look = All men on the planet

It has now become redundant to call men assholes since they all share that common denominator. The term “asshole”, which is synonymous with “man”, is now a useless word. Further, any woman who catches her man wandering his eyes and calls him an asshole in a genuine tone is not aware of this equation.

You can now use this prove to your girlfriend, on a piece of paper, that she doesn't have a leg to stand on (good luck) when she asks you if you need a neck brace. You're welcome, douchebag.

Where has the time gone?

2008-10-10T10:41:00.029-06:00

So many memories...

Had quite a tan in the early 70's. Experimented with the hair a little in '74.

I think my volume peaked in '84.

My olympic hair.

Gained a little weight there in '98.

I love old Top Tens

2008-10-01T12:55:00.003-06:00

Marianne: http://www.knbc.com/slideshow/entertainment/14378935/detail.html

Me: Creepy. What got you on that one?

Marianne: Searching google images for something.

Me: Did you find it?

Marianne: I don't remember what I was looking for.

Me: Were you looking for "ghost eating a bologna and cheese sandwich"?

Marianne: Yes!

Me: Ghosts love bologna.

A classic from Letterman in the 80’s.

Top Ten Ways People Pronounce Bologna
10. Balogna (Ba Lo Nah)
9. Baloney (Ba Lo Nee)
8. Balonia (Bas Lo Nya)
7. Balloning (Ba Lun Ing)
6. Fellini (Fe Lee Nee)
5. Abalone (A Buh Lo Nee)
4. Papillon (Pa Pee Yon)
3. Aloney-bae (Uh Lo Nee Bay)
2. Bloney (Blo Nee)
1. Bumoney (Buh Mo Nee)

Marianne: Ha! Also:
Babylon
Alimony
Ball hockey
Gnocchi
Bla bla bla

Me: Ha! Also:
Hanna Barbara
Bubble pony
Hullabulloo
Bun labia
Burnoose
Able bodied
Balloon day

Marianne: Ha! Also:
Alabammy
Gogo ballet
Schmaloney
Brian Mulrooney
Bubble boy

Me: Ha! Also:
Bump phony
Lonely
Banally
Bull on Nair
Billy Flanagan
Fill her hubby
Blow me

Marianne: Also:
****** *****
***** *******
******** ********

Me: Now you’re just being dirty.

Fence Post

2008-09-26T10:46:00.037-06:00

(Kate's email) Re: discussion you had with Mom about Lindsey's fabulous blog: edit your blog, by all means, but don't force your tone; it comes through in your writing.

(My email) Don’t force your tone because it already amply comes through in your writing? Or, don’t force your tone because it’s obvious that you’re forcing it in your writing and you don’t want that?

My blog is scarce due to a lack of tone. I generally don’t have a tone about much that’s worth writing about. I need the tone. Lol. Am I showing hints of being contrived as opposed to impassioned?

I’ve also been exploring the blog world. I look at a lot of blogs, some just skimming them. I can’t believe how many blogs there are out there that are purposeless and boring. Like human tofu, blandly blogging about which tea they had that morning, their cats, the trip to the grocery store, the meal they made. Holy crap! This stuff is noteworthy? Now, therein lies the question – noteworthy to whom? If they have a specific reader base that’s eating that shit up then they’ve satisfied their blog’s purpose. Blogs, even more so than other writing, are chiefly driven by who their audience is. The people for whom you write govern the purpose of your blog. If your perception of your audience morphs, so does your blog. Like Brain, who, originally, was giving the family updates as a means to not have to send multiple tailored emails to everyone who asked her how it was going, her blog has morphed into an entity of its own because of its expanded audience. Its original purpose is now a component of its sum purpose.

You have exemplified a different and equally organic approach to blogging by remaining true to your audience throughout. When I started mine I had no idea who I wanted my audience to be. Family only? That’s special but begs unique restrictions on content. Strange readers? A blog without a reader base would serve little purpose. Friends only? Maybe a little attention-desperate. There was this exercise we were taught to do way back in junior high English. Whenever we wrote, creatively or otherwise, we always had to write three lines at the top of our first empty page answering these questions: In this writing, what are my audience, purpose and message? It’s clear so many blogs are written without the answers these questions. The proof: The amount of blogs that are titled “random ramblings” or “just the thoughts and scribblings of a. . .” This approach gives people an excuse to write about nothing and, boy, do some of them write about nothing. This stamp of non-commitment seems to say, “If you don’t find my writing or what I’m writing about interesting, don’t blame me, my disclaimer is at the top of my blog.” (I conveyed this to Lindsey and she changed her title to Kiss My Ass. Ha ha. What a girl!)

I don’t agree with this vagrant modus operandi when it comes to writing. One should have a purpose, take a stand, have an attitude, a tone. Fuck it. Maybe I’ll blog this email, it’s got tone. Effective writers are not just read but are agreed with and disagreed with as well. The only way to get away with writing about next to nothing is if it’s humourous. Don’t tell me about what it’s like to sit on the fence post unless you’re telling me about the splinters in your ass. (Dave Barry’s blog is a great example of topical and humourous. Of course, he’s a Pulitzer Prize winner.) And don’t say shit like, “That’s just my opinion.” How redundant is that statement in a blog? You don't have to defend that your blog is subjective, that's the charm.

If you’re a fan of tea drinkers or cat lovers I guess there are blogs out there for you. But there are some clearly well written ones out there and I want to find more of them.

But that's just my opinion.

Warning, Contains Nudity

2008-09-16T17:00:00.016-06:00

I have a problem with faith – well, fanaticism - when it's manifested at the expense of intellect. The two may very well be mutually exclusive.

I think for the most part humans follow a code of live and let live. It’s when this code is violated that folks start to get ornery. Unless you’re trading a cup of cream for a bag of crabapples or forming a block watch community, there’s no real reason to go and fuck with your neighbour, hence, occupation -> convoy bombing. But people get especially riled up when it comes to matters of faith. That includes messing with the way god-fearing people believe the way their future will unfold. Imagine being entitled to such a thing!

Lately, the religious ranks, including the laic, have been coming out of the woodwork with a very concerned collective voice. So what’s gotten them so agitated? Who violated the code first?

The scientific community, of course, who are mere weeks away from switching on their biggest and, some say, most irresponsible toy to date. The Large Hadron Collider is the world’s largest particle accelerator and is built in a 27 km circumference underground at the Franco-Swiss border. It is intended to smash together beams of protons at nearly the speed of light and have a multitude of readings and pictures taken of those collisions. It is expected to recreate on, a sub-microscopic scale, conditions that may have existed only a few nanoseconds after the big bang. A universe baby photo, if you will. Scientists are also hoping to create the first observable circumstance of the Higgs boson particle which is theorized to give otherwise massless elementary particles their mass, given that particles are made up of smaller particles which are made up of smaller particles, etc., which are made up in the end of only energy. It should be noted that the Higgs boson particle is also known as the “God particle”.

And the fear has been rolling in. Cowering troglodytes have been ringing in with their two cents ever since the machine’s completion. Everything from saying "leave well enough alone" to the rehashing of Nostradamus’ doomsday prophecies to detailed video animations depicting exactly how, get this, the earth will get sucked into a black whole created by the LHC. (Apparently fanaticism and computer graphics animation are not mutually exclusive.) I especially enjoy those diatribes that, claiming science is doing nothing but hurtling humanity towards its own destruction, are themselves based on science, albeit erroneous. Some simply ask the scientific community how we are going to be fundamentally better off by knowing just a little bit more about the universe, sounding like a plea to turn off the scary bright light of the future. Others appear to think we’ve tinkered under the hood to create a 6th gear in a car for which there is not enough safe road – and everyone is in the back seat. Perhaps hanging a rosary from the rearview mirror would help. At any rate, every argument seems to come from deeper within the holy cave.

Godspeak from small children is tolerable because they’re cute, and at their age it’s understood they’ve not stood a chance against the imposition of fully subscribed parents. Growth-stunting, back woods, paranoid propaganda is dumbfounding, however, from adults, especially ones who hold teaching and political positions.

So why the armageddon attitude? Is it simply a fear of dying? I can certainly understand that. But then why bathe it in religious rhetoric? Are there Christian soldiers out there who are not ready to be judged by their maker? Or is there something they don’t want the world to learn, like Creation may be nothing more than a cool story with nudity, for instance? One thing seems to be certain, every religious doomsday alarmist is grossly under-informed about the function and capabilities of the LHC, to say nothing of the nonsensical theories they purport. So I ask, why must fanaticism come at the expense of intellect?

Olympic Highlights

2008-08-28T16:57:00.002-06:00

Watching olympics is more fun when drinking with family than when not.

Regarding the American gymnastics team:
"All big legs and no tits."
"Oh wait, that one has tits."
"They're sewn in as part of her uniform."

Regarding the diminutive Chinese gymnast:
"She looks like she's 4 years old."
"No. She's just small, she's actually 30."
The next Chinese gymnast appears and on the heals of joking about the Michelle/Jodi/Marv's Karen tradition of having kids as a pre-teen (during which Marv called them "sluts"),
"Here's her granddaughter."

In the swimming event a graphic appears over each swimmer's lane with their flag and name. The graphic disappears as the swimmers launch in to the pool.
"How do they pull back that tarp so quick?"

Then an ad ran for a show called "Stump the Schwab" featuring regular think-they-know-it-all sports buffs who go against a guy with an eerily encyclopedic knowledge of all things sports.
Uncle Mark: "I think I'd rather schwab the stump!"

I now pronounce you man and wife

2008-08-14T15:49:00.007-06:00

Every now and then some lazy genius gets sick of doing two separate things at two separate times and marries two pieces of technology. We all remember the guy who got sick of having to lift his arm to check his watch while writing and so stuck a clock in his pen. Or the guy who got sick of having to put down his beer to high five his buddies and so taped them to his head with straws. The other night I downloaded the last season of Sex And The City, converted it to 3g2 portable video format, dragged all the episodes onto my SDmicro card (which acts like a flash drive when connected to the computer) and put the card in my phone. Now Lindsey can watch the last season of SATC at work on my mini TV so she can get caught up and we can finally watch the movie.

Soup-de-mois

2008-08-11T16:27:00.003-06:00

In July I may have set an unprovable and unmatchable record of eating hot & sour soup for lunch for 16 business days in a row. I wonder if the Chinese even do that.

Evolutionary leftovers

2008-08-11T15:53:00.005-06:00

Vestigial organs are leftovers from a previous era and represent functions that were once necessary for survival. Over time, those functions become nonexistent and the organs atrophy. Sometimes, to prevent complications, these anatomical relics must be removed. Which is why, at some point, every city should go under the knife and have its crosswalk buttons and elevator ashtrays cut out.

Tela Rutilus

2008-08-11T15:50:00.007-06:00

Well it’s been said by many people that Saskatoon, with a population of 2.06 X 10⁵, is the biggest small town in the world. The citizens here form a familiar, tightly woven, plasmatic network. Where have we seen it before? That’s right, say it with me – in the sun’s core. The attraction to this place causes these friendly hydrogen and helium folks to group, split apart, interact and shine, which actually is the attraction.

When Brain arrived in town for her week here she hadn’t even left the airport before Joe happened to pull the bus over and say hello. After splitting off that night, many atoms grouped together to shine the following night at the celebration. Last week my temporary officemate turned around and, after having contemplated my last name, told me he was married to Mary Jane’s sister and already knew that Michael was coming to town. Different atoms will group together and shine for the mini-reunion next week.

My Dumplings

2008-07-07T17:22:00.004-06:00

A cookie keeps track of my recent Google searches. Here are some of them. Some names have been removed to protect the Google-stalked.

Acronymize
airport codes
c7 rifle
call it ritual wolf
drank a carboy
change convert gif to jpg
China beichuan
china earthquake
coma
countermeasured
cr6 1a4,exe
cubicle happy office network
dark populace
deep fryer
eephus pitch
eielson afb
esse est percipi
excel bold formula
facebook proxy
feel like stretching all the time
flash cheat engine
front series
funny motivational posters
gaim
grover's mill NJ
heart's content
Hoegaarden brewery
homer crazy floor spin
hoplite
html code strikethrough
indextrous
jabber
kajiji
keith haring
Kristen Hager
latin phrases
lyrics if you be happy for the rest of your life never make a pretty woman
slippers and a bath robe
mafiacoders
mami
marvin o’gravel balloon face
men with brooms
mlb 2K8 batting
moon river saskatchewan
mosquitoes Iisterine
online arcade
productivity
proletariat
proof positive
radiusim
remap keyboard
run from zombies
russian english spelling
safeway isle map
show desktop button
sophistry
spanish english dictionary
Tangjiashan china
The Coathangers Parking Lot
twitch city
Ursula Lidstrom
vancouver canucks death
vicious circle band
vtunnel
wage
war of the worlds
wax
web 2,0
whining
xeno tactic hints
youtube deep fry coke

Funny how “productivity” is right after “online arcade”.

And count slowly

2008-06-20T15:28:00.017-06:00

People enjoy griping about the way people drive in their city, and here I go. Saskatoon has its share of problems but unlike any city I’ve seen before. Unlike Calgary, my chief annoyance with Saskatoon drivers is that they drive too slowly. The unposted and average speed limit of Saskatoon is 40 km/h. I don’t advocate speeding, but there should be a collective effort to get from A to B. Driving should be like dropping onto a stream, flowing towards your destination and dropping out at the right eddy. In Saskatoon it’s like trudging through waist deep water. I’ve never seen a more complacent populace of motorists. There is a customary delay of 1 Mississippi... 2 Mississippi... 3 Mississippi... 4 Mississippi... 5 Mississippi... before releasing the brake when the light turns green. And proof positive of this custom is that people consistently drive through aging yellow lights with the surety of a cannon-baller who knows there’s water in the pool. Then there’s the four-way face ballet. That’s when four drivers are at a four-way stop and are all looking at each other trying to decide, with a series of subtle eyebrow raises, which one of them should proceed next.

Travelling through this culture of the driving dead is not without its advantages. Like the last remaining able-bodied punk in a town overrun by zombies, I move briskly through the motorcoma. It’s not uncommon to see five cars lined up in one lane and the lane next to it empty at a red light. The driver of the fifth car must know that they’ll be waiting 25 mississippi’s before carefully inching forward. Of course, they’re not worried, they’ll just roll through when it’s yellow. And I’ve mastered the eyebrow twitch that entitles me first passage at the four-way stop.

I think I enjoy driving in Europe the most. There seems to be an understanding there. There’s a flow. You must take your opportunities when they come or they’ll be taken from you. And, as mother fearlessly demonstrated, following the rules over there is purely optional and you can drive wherever you want. One way street? I don’t think so. Tram tracks? No problem! Pulling into traffic and hitting the brakes? Mastered. License? Pff. And with a forward-shooting water canon on the front of her car she never had to master the eyebrow twitch.

Release the hounds!

2008-06-05T15:22:00.038-06:00

Since the first time the corporate computer network was connected to the information superhighway, curious and internet savvy employees have been surreptitiously reaching out beyond the company firewall to interact with the world. Early on in this era, their browsing was quite innocent, exploring what the cyber world had to offer, perhaps since there was no internet at home. This of course ate up company time causing a cascade of reduced productivity and eventually a drop in net capital gain. Since no company wants to pay an employee for two weeks for what could be done in one week, managers had IT implement countermeasures such as restricting internet access to its employees to certain times and certain work-based sites. This meant those employees had to find other methods of getting what they needed from the net, which meant IT had to find other ways of implementing restrictions, ad vitam aut culpum.

Much like the race between virus programmers and antivirus programmers who exchange leading each other by a nose, there is a race at the office between Instant Messenger users and Information Technology departments. It is a race between good and evil. On one side you have people for honest and unrestricted communication at the office (PHUC OFF) who enjoy chatting with loved ones and long distance family members while their workload permits. On the other side you have Big Brother whose primary task is to remove all elements of potential distraction so as to allow the employee’s focus to be but on his task. These elements include but are not limited to sunlight, oxygen, peripheral vision, hair space, humour, opinion, blinking slowly, foot tapping, coffee refilling, window out-looking, face scratching and confirming dinner plans. A babysat worker is a productive worker! People are now free to delete the ubiquitous resume line “Able to work proficiently without supervision”, be it spurious or not. It's no longer applicable.

Over my years, many a trusty chat client has fallen at the end of a hoplITe spear. MSN, Trillian, Skype, Gaim, Meebo and Jabber to name a few. They each seem to last a few months before they are spotted by sentries and the hounds are loosed. I am currently winning this race thanks to a neat, little web-based messaging service called RadiusIM. So with my alert sounds turned down to a two foot audible radius I can chat away again ~~to my heart’s content~~ work permitting. At least for now the sun is shining and I'm tapping my feet. We’ll see how long this one lasts before Big Brother slaps my hand and takes the toy from this baby again.

Trafficking Safety

2008-05-23T13:02:00.015-06:00

51st street sees its normal amount of congestion in the morning as people commute (which, in Saskatoon, is a 12 minute drive at most) to their jobs but today it was unusually backed up. Why? Because the Saskatoon police had a check stop set up and were pulling cars over for inspection. What they were looking for, according to stories leaked to radio stations, were “safety violations”. As Source approached the check stop she observed a car having its wheel well inspected. For unsafe mud? Upon reaching the check stop she happened to be waved through without inspection. Safety profiling? That’s a new one.

There are so many things wrong with this police action. Let’s break them down.

Personally, this irks me because I can’t count the number of non-moving violations I could rack up in a sting like this. Busted out signal lights, no parking brake, faulty power steering, cracked windshield, non-functional wiper blades. Not to mention body damage and enough bullet holes that my truck could assist in a reenactment of the Battle of Batoche. They’d probably see what a threat I was to public safety and draw their guns and yell at me to exit the vehicle. Then I would stand there with my hands up while my idling truck slowly rolled into a police car.

For all the shameless ways a city makes money by fining its well-meaning citizens for violations Jesus himself probably committed in his time (leaving his sandals in a no sandal zone), this would stoop to a new low, unworthy of any city council elected by its people. This grabasstic cash cow would be eclipsed by the GDP lost by people being delayed on their way to work.

Okay, so it’s not about vehicular safety. And if you’re like me you’re probably thinking the cops received a tip or an ongoing investigation has led them to an attempt at seizing a car loaded with drugs. But during morning rush hour? I guess I’d feel bad for Bill who’s dutifully bringing the hash brick in his briefcase because it’s his week for “Bong Friday” at the office.

We don’t quite have the knack the American government has for manipulating the press with “everything is alright, go back to sleep” propaganda but this is still a pitiful attempt. We also don’t have that all purpose, hot button “T” word that can be used to front random, privacy-violating police action. This may have been more like, (police chief on phone to press core) “I dunno, tell ‘em it’s uhh, it’s uhh, safety something-er-other.”

Did I miss anything?

There's something to be said for "been there, done that"

2008-05-09T15:15:00.001-06:00

In my random internet travels I came across the most pathetic picture ever.

Apparently, this is a picture of two 19-year-olds trying to have an 80's PARTY.

WTF? What is 80's about this party? That your jumping on your parents' couches? That you're drinking out of a lava lamp? That’s just as 80’s as the "Unbelievable" by EMF or "What's the frequency, Kenneth?" by R.E.M. they have blasting from the stereo.

The only thing 80's about this is that’s when the Oilers won all their cups. Otherwise, I think you had to have been then to get it right.

Know her ass from his elbow

2008-05-09T14:51:00.000-06:00

Sometimes when you’re watching a cop show on tv the coroner, upon examining a skeleton, will say to the cop, “Well, the victim was female as you can tell by the ***** of the pelvic bone.” To which I always respond internally, “I can’t tell, you bastards! Show me!” So here it is: both skeletons have those looping bones at the bottom of the pelvis. The loops of the female (against the white background) seem to flare out more than the male's, seemingly "out of the way" for pushing out other humans. The female pelvis is also wider and shallower.

Inaugural entry

2008-05-09T14:06:00.000-06:00

Not sure what to expect? Me neither. Stay tuned.

At any rate, this will be a sure-fire way to reduce productivity at work. I’m kidding, it couldn't possibly be reduced any further.

Thanks to Marianne and Kate for their inspiration through their fantastic blogs. As soon as I know how to display links to yours I will. Thanks to Lindsey for sweetly convincing me that surely someone will find what I have to write about interesting. And thanks to Mom and Dad for suggesting I have one.

Let’s see now…