has anyone ever read this thing?

This is me begging for comments from strangers. Maybe it would help if I told more than two people about my online journal.

Perhaps I need to make porn and post it here. That's all people use the net for anyways. That and sending huge files to each other via email. Usually that's just porn, as well.

random thoughts

National Geographic- good to read, too interesting to throw out, too bulky to store- the ulitmate white elephant.

Sloan- the best Canadian 70s band ever. Even though they were snotnosed brats like me when the boys were in their Bright White Sportscar or Carol was having her High School Confidential or when Business was being Take(i)n Care Of.

There is a history to the ever-changing medium of the WWW- the internet wayback machine -find out what a website looked like back in 1998- ancient history in brave new world of internet.

I want to read Cyrillic.

I am still embarrased by the fact that I have to prove I can drive to the government again, cause I let my license expire. I can operate most vehicles better than most people out there AND more safely. I've extensive experience cycling and some motorcycling. You learn to look far ahead.

I'm thinking about switching to Livejournal.

I saw Dancer in the Dark. What a beautiful movie. Damn, what a sad movie. One of the best btw a rock and hard place decisions I have ever seen anyone put into in any movie. A very human story. Life is sometimes beautiful in it's cruelty. Finding that beauty makes it worthwhile. I could relate to Selma's view of the world.

What I really loved about the movie was the music she found in everyday sounds, the sounds of industry, sounds of the machinery of our society that surround us and how these sounds formed the soundtrack of the musicals in her head.

I loved how the movie criticised so many things, like musicals from Hollywood's golden age, but paid tribute to them at the same time.

The only living boy in New York

I live in a multi-cultural city, in fact today I was the only white person on the bus during afternoon rush hour. Interestingly, only me and the driver were non-asian- he was indo-canadian. I was the only whitey, though.

Sometimes parts of Vancouver feel like microcosms of Asia. We are multi-ethnic, but seem dominated by particular nationalities. In my visits to Germany, that country has always felt more truly multi-ethnic than Vancouver to me, despite the misconceptions those who have never been visited might have about it being some kind of racist, all white society. It's more mixed and no less racist than Vancouver. We just hide our intolerance better behind our outwardly multi-cultural sleeves.

Never been to Belgium

Going to Amsterdam, Brussels and touring through Germany in April/May. I may take side trips to other towns in Benelux and/or France. Exciting.

I just renewed my EU passport at the German consulate this morning. It's much easier than a Canadian. No guarantor required. Just a couple of photos and a photocopied form and $63.00. Plus the little bastard' s good for 10 years, not 5!

Good to see that 9/11 hasn't driven the whole world crazy- just North America.

a cryptic message

011101110110010101101100011000110110111101101101011001010010000001110100011011110010000001101101011110010010000001101010011011110111010101110010011011100110000101101100001011000010000001110010011011110110001001101111011101000010110101101101011010010110111001100100






hint: http://www.networkofminds.com/networkofminds/binary.cfm

arggh!

Object-oriented programming! Classes! inheritance! singleton design! I didn't ask for this! yes I did! This was only the second class!

Why does it hurt?

bloggerspot

Does this blog system have communities the way that Livejournal does? Anyone out there wanna sponsor me for a Livejournal?

(may you live in) exciting times

The snow has completely melted in all nooks and crannies. Even the mountains don't look very snowy right now. Instead of it being -10 celsius, it is +10. I am still dressing for cold snaps, so am getting very warm when walking around.

I just applied for my first job in 4.5 years, since getting the one I work now. Have other jobs in mind. I have no choice but to leave here to further my career, even though I like my coworkers. Well, actually I'm sick of them, but they are nice people for the most part. Except for a few complete bastards that would have been sent packing anywhere else, that is. Anyways, I am making changes.

I start another programming course tonight as well (advanced PHP), so many changes are afoot, as I pave the path my life will take the next 4-6 months. I need some changes, but I need some stability as well. I can't walk away from things like I used to be able to when I had committments, no mortgage, no career and no relationship. I've grown up. Now I have to try to make sure and not get boring. That's ok, my tastes have matured along with me. I will never be one of those men who tries to be 21 the rest of his life. That only works for a few decades, then starts to get ridiculous. ;-)

snowland, homeland

Hey Idiot,

Your 4-wheel drive doesn't make you stop any better.

----------------
What's new in the new year? Not the job, but that will change as I slowly begin the process of applying for work elsewhere. They've given me no choice and even the HR director tells me that I may have to leave to further my career. In the same conversation, she told me that I haven't got the personality for management. Bullshit. The person they did choose has the respect of no one. Funny that.

In other news, I have gotten to the mountains to go snowshoeing and x-country skiing a couple of times. I'm running again, with a 10K run in april in mind and I have been running several kilometres in the snow in the last week. I feel really hardcore when there is snow on the ground crunching beneath my shoes as I run. It feels good.

dear sucky product maker...

Kamenstein, Inc.

Elmsford, NY

10523

Dear Company that made that piece of crap cooking oil sprayer that I purchased,

We purchased your product from a local department store several years ago, hoping it would be the miracle kitchen gadget it was made out to be. We filled it with water and tested it out, only to be met with a pathetic wheeze and slight dribble of water from the nozzle. Thinking that a more viscous fluid might be required, we filled it with cooking oil, which was also a waste of our time, as we were only met with a squeak and a wheeze.

Even when the pump was a fully primed as it could possibly be, it did nothing but wheeze. No spray, just wheeze.

Unfortunately, we had discarded both the receipt and the original packaging by the time we threw this into the darkest, most distant corner of a cabinet to live with all the other useless kitchen devices. In a recent purging of our cabinets, I rediscovered this device and thought I’d write you a letter to tell you how bad this sprayer was, as your name and mailing address were proudly embossed on the base of the sprayer.

This sprayer is single-handedly the most useless kitchen device I have ever purchased.

Do your products have any sort of satisfaction guarantee? I was dissatisfied with your product immediately upon bringing it home, to say the least.

Sincerely,

thundershower

this morning, thunder- it never thunders where I live and is impressive when it does. now at ten to three, the sun is out again and i sit at my keyboard thinking about all the constructive things i could do if i just rushed around like crazy in the time left during my lunch break and did them.

i get so unmotivated in the office. i mean to use my 1 hour lunch, but once I am done my eating, I just feel like getting back to it. i prefer taking a late afternoon break, but scheduling does not permit. today i will.

sometimes i go to the seawall and read my book and watch girls jog by. seems more useful than trying to get shopping done. especially when i have a good book on the go. lately the olympics has absorbed much of my spare time.

write more, dammit!!!

This blog was created to get me thinking about writing something, anything, every day and put it out there for someone to stumble across. Obviously, I've been pretty diligent at keeping that promise to myself. Anyways, this is my entry for the day.

Ice cream vs. better salary: I appreciate the morale-building aspects of free ice cream day at work, but wouldn't mind if there was no ice cream and the pay higher. My morale in this job at this point needs more than ice cream to rescue it. I was passed over for a promotion to team lead and at this point I am the only person who has been here for four years and hasn't seen a promotion of some sort. I've got five years of full-time experience in the industry, am known widely (and am not imagining this) as the most all-round technically knowledgable person in my department and they choose over me someone who comes to me for help with their work. But I guess having been an assistant manager at a fast food franchise means something to the VPs who end up making these decisions. Or, and I shudder at this thought, it was purely based on reasons of personality. I'd rather not think about that, as it depresses me.

Off for seconds of fudge ripple. Then work on my resume on company time.

i like to view a Pile of Slush.

Slushpile

i have had a few friends get art, etc on Zed.

Zed-providing exposure to mainly Vancouver artists since at least two months ago.

cardio

Cardio fitness appears the fastest to gain and the fastest to lose. Being a non-runner for a few weeks has meant the difference btw running 5K with no soreness afterwards and running less than 5K (3 laps around Trout Lake -a 1.25 km distance) with legs of lead immmediately afterward and legs of soreness the nest day sitting at my desk writing this.

I think about the need for muscular exercise frequently- but have been more concerned about my heart and lungs and all the years I was a casual smoker. For years I got winded running up a steep escalator or long staircase. I am of the opinion that people can look fairly fit, but actual be in terrible shape inside.

My benchmarks are: running up stairs, running 5K and not getting winded during 30 min line drills in Hapkido class.

supersize me- food thought for the day

I saw Supersize Me last night and the creator/star really did hold nothing back. I was considerably digusted by the thought of McDonald's food when I left the theatre. Checked out the website and some guy is posting on the forum, about doing a 90-day McD's diet- and losing weight and cholesterol in the process! I'm more than a bit skeptical.

Fortunately, today's lunch was catered by the amazingly sweet and considerate wife of a coworker. She is an amazing cook, if a little unconcerned about fat content.

I went back to forage for seconds and when she noticed me picking the radishes off the veggie plate, she handed me a ziplock filled with radishes, because she remembered that "someone liked radishes" and she wanted to make sure they got their radishes. I mentioned I liked radishes about a year ago, the last time she catered one of our lunches and she remembered!

Food is a complex issue in humans- cravings, nurture, comfort, addiction, excess, expressing caring for one another - food plays a role in all these things. Oh and I almost forgot: profit margins, too.

first post

The purpose to this blog is to get me writing again. And to paste my personal life all over the internet, only to be discovered a la Washingtonienne, whose lines of sexual bravado were deleted from this very site for being a little too politically sensitive.