ShinyPlasticBag

Things that are not fun to wake up to (especially several hours before you had planned on getting up): a plea for you to come into work early due to a sick call, turning your unpleasant-but-dealable eight hour shift into a good-god-poke-my-eye-out twelve hour shift. Of course, I'm not a jerk, so I said yes, sacrificing my busy bee social life for the good of The Team.

Now, it's 5:02 am and I'm ready to explode. Obviously, working four extra hours isn't the end of the world. I don't have a physically exerting job, and I would have been awake during those extra four hours anyway (and probably still sitting in front of a computer, come to think of it). It's the principle of it, however. I was all excited to be doing my last shift before my trip (!!) so it's somewhat sucky that it became extra long.

At any rate, it's been a good night and I have had good company. I'm not sure what I'm going to do to keep myself awake for the next two hours, but I'm sure I'll think of something. My thumbdrive is providing endless hours of enthusiasm; I've got metapad and PHP installed on it so I can do Random Coding if I get really bored. Mostly, however, I've been cruising around del.icio.us. Speaking of which, does anyone else think that there is waaay too much CSS stuff posted to it? I mean, yeah, obviously geeks are the main demographic, but seriously, how many articles declaring the death of tables can you honestly find interesting enough to want to read again? I'm guessing something like, uh, zero.

I don't understand trends sometimes.

• Written on 31 July 2005 & posted at 05:06 AM.
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Well, another week is all wrapped up, and I'm once again steeling myself for another weekend of working (I continue to have good company, fortunately). The added bonus is that it's Natal Day weekend, and the Bridge Walk is on Monday. Bonus. I'm currently killing time before I leave to go see Sky High with Janet, Katie, and Pugsley. In fact, it's almost time to leave now, so I should hurry up.

Sadly, my Internet connection is very slow tonight. I just installed a copy of PortableFirefox on a USB thumbdrive that Mom loaned me. Should come in handy dandy for a myriad of applications. I used the no-install-necessary wonder a few days ago to convert a co-worker to Firefox. She has now drank the Kool-Aid quite fully — SpreadFirefox would be proud. Even with Internet Explorer 7 finally looming on the horizon, there's lots of room (and reason) for converts to the Mozilla cause. Brainwash someone you know today.

Anyway, it's most certainly time for me to leave for the movie. Enjoy your weekend.

• Written on 29 July 2005 & posted at 06:30 PM.
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There are few things in life that are predictable. That being said, most of the predictable things are very predictable, and with that in mind, I can say with some degree of confidence that nothing is as a constant as the annual ant infestations that denziens of Cole Harbour experience each summer. Some years, it's the back of the house, sometimes the front. Sometimes it's the back yard, sometimes it's the driveway. This year, it's the...sigh...living room. That's right, our living room has an ant problem. Gazing in a random direction and lazily focusing your eyes on something that doesn't exist will usually reveal one or two ants in your peripheral vision. Waking up this morning, I found dozens clustered around a lump of ant poison soaked paper towel, carrying away less fortunate relatives. I did the only logical thing: ignored the problem and dashed out the door.

You see, I had a job interview this morning. Although I'm not in need of a new job, I decided to send my resume to a company in Bedford that was looking for a web programmer. To my surprise, they called back and requested an interview for this morning. I went out and met the head of IT, but found out very quickly that the job wasn't right for me: due to school, I don't want more than two shifts a week. They were looking for three or four shifts a week, plus emergency calls as necessary. It was definitely too much, and besides, they needed someone who could start a lot sooner than I could. No harm, no foul: we parted ways on good terms and I headed home to deal with our little infestation.

Upon my return, things were just as they were before, although the dead ants were gone. The cat gave me a very foul look as I stepped through the living room, grabbed the vacuum cleaner, and sucked them to oblivion. No muss, no fuss, and no clean-up: I threw out the vaccuum cleaner bag and sprayed some more ant poison. Thus far, things have been pretty good. My tactics might not have the class of, say, Keddy's Febreeze attacks, but they work for me.

• Written on 26 July 2005 & posted at 04:51 PM.
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As previously mentioned, yesterday was the fabled trip to Magic Mountain, a water park in New Brunswick. Although I had never been there before, everyone else had — an unusual turn of events, especially since Janet (being a non-native) has usually not seen all of the local attractions.

Despite waking up at 7:30 am and not arriving home until almost 1:00 am, it was quite a fun day. Thanks to bountiful air conditioning and my Harry Potter book, the drive there was painless, and upon arriving, I found a fairly impressive array of water slides. This included a murderous slide called “Kamikaze” that was aimed at a 60° angle, which I (of course) forced myself and Janet to do. However, after about four hours of slipping and sliding, the sky grew dark and ominous and we found ourselves in the middle of a major storm, complete with thunder, lightning, and hail. It didn't take long for the park staff to shut down the slides, herding everyone under shelters. We found our own little spot, nestled among tables and chairs and freezing. Apparently, tornadoes touched down in other nearby places; despite insane winds, we never actually saw any tornado action. After waiting things out for about an hour, the slides were re-opened and we were allowed to play once again, this time, with far fewer people in our way.

Anyway, by the time we headed back, the weather had cleared up, and people were complaining about their sunburns, not the weather. Janet, of course, got an insane burn, and I'm toasty red today, even though I don't really burn. We stopped for a traditional Irving Big Stop supper (something I recommend everyone do at least once) on the way home and then highway'd it the rest of the way back. I guess having a day off every now and then can pay off.

• Written on 23 July 2005 & posted at 03:51 PM.
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Just as the insane Potter-mania of the past few weeks has begun to die down, my copy arrived in the mail from Amazon. It's always exciting to get things in the mail, and a new Harry Potter book is a special treat (I bought it online primarily because I thought it would be cheaper — I didn't anticipate the sharp discounts everywhere). When last we met, Simon had only recently arrived in Canada, and I was neglecting him in order to read Order of the Phoenix. This time, I don't have any pressing people needs, but I do have a whole lot of books on the go right now. Only a few short weeks ago, I was complaining about having nothing at all to read...it's funny how quickly things like that can change.

Anyway, I'm going to New Brunswick on Friday (weather permitting) to go to Magic Mountain. Despite the general lack of amusement parks in this neck of the woods, I have somehow managed to avoid ever visiting one of the largest ones. It will be a fairly rough deal, however, since I have to work that night. Maybe I can sleep in the car. (Ideally, I'd get the night off, which I'm trying to do, but I don't think anyone is going to take it.) I figure I might as well go in order to train myself for visiting a real amusement park when I'm in Denver. My trip, incidentally, is precisely two weeks away. Put in your orders for postcards.

Finally, Mom's eBay auction for her Russian dolls closed at around $70 Canadian. We packaged and mailed it this afternoon — I'm afraid we're both becoming eBay addicts. She's gotten into the habit of pointing out saleable things as she wanders around the house — a disconcerting development, I assure you. However, it's a good way to eliminate some of the clutter we have.

Anyway, I can't contain my urge to read Harry Potter for another second. I bid you adieu.

• Written on 19 July 2005 & posted at 08:09 PM.
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After a few aborted attempts at doing so, I've finally managed to complete a new layout. When I first started doing this site, I redesigned very frequently, about every second month. After a year or so of that, however, I slowed down significantly: my previous layout lasted five months, and the one before it lasted seven. Let's hope this one lasts at least that long.

This is my first attempt at a “big font” style, so beloved by Taylor and countless other web geeks. This layout is a bit of a homage to two of my favourite sites, SimpleBits and Niggle.

Hopefully, it'll be a bit more flexible for me. There never seemed to be enough room for my links, and Keddy's entries had a tendency of making things seem cramped, meanwhile, lots of space was wasted on entries that weren't really necessary. Also, I've finally devoted some more real estate to my friend's links.

Overall, I just think it's a lot better. I think it's a nice departure from the same basic look I've been tweaking for the past two years. I'd like to know what everyone else thinks, of course, and submissions for the motto that appears in the top right are also welcome.

• Written on 18 July 2005 & posted at 12:21 AM.
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You know, people get attached to strange things. Favourite sweaters or coffee mugs, or maybe a lucky pair of running shoes. I got attached to my cable modem, which was a large and heavy Terayon model from their 1998 line. It boasted an incredible speed rating of 5 Mbps, and was given to us when we originally signed up for high-speed Internet, which was January 1999. Over the years, my modem & I weathered some hard times: in 2000, for example, when Eastlink started charging people for having a second computer hooked up to the line. Only the ancient Terayon modems were exempt, too primitive to report the existence of a hub. I had my Terayon modem for 78 months.

Over the past six and a half years, I estimate that I've downloaded nearly 1 terabyte of data. It's been a good run, but it was finally time to let go: last week, my modem started dropping its connection. The receive light would mix red flashes in with the happy green flashes that I've loved for so long. Sure, a quick unplug/replug cycle would fix the problem, but that wasn't fun, especially when I was trying to access my computer from somewhere other than home. It had to go.

So, today, after complaining for a few days, I bit the bullet. I unplugged my modem and dragged it to Eastlink's kiosk at Mic Mac Mall, where they promptly exchanged it for a newer model (a Motorola SurfBoard, which, inexplicably, is covered in white paint splatters). The tiny new SurfBoard doesn't fit into the snug compartment that my Terayon sat in, and my long-lived IP address is no more (so long 24.138.2.178), but they told me things would be better now: I'd be on Eastlink's newer data network, which is twice as fast. I would have had to upgrade soon anyway. So, I guess it's not all bad. It was just a hassle.

• Written on 15 July 2005 & posted at 09:48 PM.
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There's a story that's been floating around the Internet that's causing quite a stir; namely, the fact that the United Nations has expressed an interest to take control of the Internet. This isn't a hostile takeover, rather, they would replace ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers). You see, right now, the Internet is basically under the control of the United States government, since they control the root DNS servers that make the Internet work. Geeks seem to be fairly sharply divided; the folks on Slashdot seem to fall into either “The Internet belongs to the world, and it should be government by the world” or “The Internet was created by us, The United States, and besides, the UN never gets anything right anyway.” I'm generally in the first group, which shouldn't surprise anyone, since I'm one of those zany “one world, one government” people.

That being said, I'm not necessarily wholeheartedly for the move. Some of the countries who've expressed a desire to wrench control from the Americans have motives that I personally find, well...suspect. Brazil is upset by the new .xxx top level domain, because they seem to find pornography offensive. This seems to imply that, if they had their way, content on the Internet would be more tightly controlled. China, as well, seems interested, and we know how highly they respect free speech. I think content control of any sort online is a mistake: the sensitivities of one group do not necessarily line up with those of another. Part of the success of the Internet has been the fact that no one set of opinions has been given preference; if this changes, it will surely be for the bad.

Basically, I think the issue needs to be examined more thoroughly. The hands-off management style of the US has worked for three decades — we have to decide whether or not the hassle of a change over, and the possibility of increased interference, outweighs the benefits of UN control. I guess we'll find out next year.

• Written on 14 July 2005 & posted at 03:40 PM.
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It's the twelth of July, which means several things: Pugsley has turned 22 (happy birthday), my hit counter has turned 2 (219306 hits thus far), and my grandmother is back from Ontario (visiting relatives). After sleeping in far too late, Keddy and I went out to the airport to pick her up. Upon return, we frantically wrapped the very ghetto gift I got for Pugsley (using Christmas wrapping paper and duct tape) and headed out to his parent's house for a barbecue. Arriving there, we found that we had missed all of the festivities. After about twenty minutes, everyone decided that they'd like to throw their money down the toilet, and bought paintball guns. I'm sitting in the basement of the Roomie's house waiting for them to return from injuring themselves. Nick and Pugsley both shot Janet more or less simultaneously, leading to matching bruises on her legs. I am of the opinion that paintball is stupid.

In other news, my first eBay auction is just about cleared up: I received payment yesterday and mailed the comics today (via airmail). All and all, it was a fairly painless experience. I got rid of something I didn't want and somebody got something that they wanted, so it seems to have balanced out. I want to sell lots more stuff...I just have to get around to it. In particular, I want to sell my novelty Super Mario Bros. telephone and possibly some old books. I love eBay — it's too bad that I'm about seven years behind the trend.

Anyway, that's all for today. Wish some excitement upon the world, will ya?

• Written on 12 July 2005 & posted at 09:46 PM.
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Ah, sweet confusion: what day of the week is it? I think it's Saturday. Is it Saturday? Yes, it's Saturday. Eep. I'm not sure what's wrong with me, but lately I have been distressingly unable to keep track of days. It's like that part of my brain melted or something. Very distressing — does anyone else have this problem? Maybe it's just a symptom of not having enough routine in my routine lately.

Anyway, I'm a bit humbled by the Internet at the moment. Have you ever seen something online that just boggles your mind? You're not sure why, in a million years, somebody would ever think of doing something, much less documenting the experience and sharing it with six and a half billion strangers? In that vein, have you ever thought of making your own prison hooch? No, me neither, but some guy named Steve did. He also documented it and decided to share it with six and a half billion strangers. It's interesting only because it seems to have worked. What would I do without Jason Kottke finding such gems?

In other gotta-love-the-Internet news, my first eBay auction (seven old Super Mario Bros. comic books from 1991) solid for $20. That's about the same amount that I'd hoped for, so I'm happy. Now, I just have to muddle through the payment and shipping phases (woohoo). Still, the process seems to have been pretty painless. Go eBay.

Alas, as much fun as online commerce is, I'm afraid that I must make a trip to the real-world mall. I need batteries, CDs, pony hair, sunshine...you get the idea.

• Written on 09 July 2005 & posted at 05:39 PM.
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Well, it was cleaning day at our house today. Unlike most normal people, we don't break our cleaning into small, managable chunks, but instead do the bare amount of work necessary to keep the house in one piece and periodically do epic attacks on the house, cleaning it from top to bottom in a single Herculean show of force. Our house, at the moment, sparkles.

Yesterday, Castro and I drove to Western Shore to hang out with Mom and Joey and Mary Ann, where we had barbecue, wandered on the beach, and ate chocolate chip cookie dough. Mm, chocolate chip cookie dough. The weather yesterday was absolutely perfect, especially by the water, where it was nice and breezy.

Today, I got my Threadless “I am analog” t-shirt. It's incredibly red and very awesome — I definitely want more cool t-shirts, to complement my very large collection of blank t-shirts.

Anyway, I'm just enjoying my last evening without working again — I've picked up an extra shift tomorrow night, since they were pretty desperate. It's not so bad, and I'm getting overtime for it, which is a definite bonus (I never, ever get overtime). My mini-vacation thing has been pretty great: I set off some fireworks, drank a lot of coffee, slept, barbequed. I've had a good run.

• Written on 06 July 2005 & posted at 10:17 PM.
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Fun fact of the day: there are 14,610 days in forty years, which just happens to be how long my aunt and uncle have been married. They had a whole gathering of the extended family last night to celebrate. Despite my generally unfavourable opinion of family gatherings, it wasn't so bad. As is traditional for gatherings at their house, things quickly split off into old people upstairs, younger people downstairs, where we watched Live8. Live8 was the stupidest thing I have ever seen in my life: how, exactly, are huge concerts featuring drugged-out artists from decades past going to help Africa? And shouldn't we maybe think about ending poverty in our own backyard, let alone on the other side of the world? Obviously, I want Africa to be healthy and out of debt, but I think we should be putting just as much, if not more, emphasis on ourselves. It's sort of like when you're on an airplace that's going down: you're supposed put your own oxygen mask on before you help anyone else.

Anyway, I'm just enjoying a day of comfy warmness at home. It's a nice day, not too hot and not cloudy. Rare and perfect. The Whole Nine Yards is on TBS, and it's an absolutely hilarious movie that I can't believe I've never seen before. I'm not sure how I missed seeing it — I love funny movies. And Harland Williams is in it. So awesome.

So, yeah. That's my day: finally a weekend off, and I spend it watching television. I'm so predictably lazy.

• Written on 03 July 2005 & posted at 04:24 PM.
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To all Canadians, I wish you a Happy Canada Day. (To everyone else, I wish you were Canadian.) It's that most wonderful day of the year, that which could easily be called Rainy Day or Fog Day, the only day of the year where you are virtually guaranteed to not see fireworks. Except, of course, this year: after finding out that the fireworks were cancelled due to weather yet again (with the exception of last year, every Canada Day I can remember had the fireworks post-poned due to weather) I decided to buy my own fireworks. I'm going to go buy them as soon as I'm done writing this, and boy, am I excited. I love nothing more than setting things on fire. Ahh.

In other news, I saw War of the Worlds on Wednesday. To sum it up, it's basically the same as Independence Day, only crappier. A brief comparison:

Plot device	Independence Day	War of the Worlds
High-tech aliens attack Earth for no reason	Check	Check
Snotty fifteen year old character that's not particularly important	Check	Check
Character using an Apple product	Check (PowerBook with virus on it)	Check (fifteen year old has an iPod)
Crazy character	Check (airplane guy)	Check (basement guy)
The importance of family is realized/strengthened by main character(s)	Check (Jeff Goldblum, ex-wife)	Check (Tom Cruise, kids)
Cameos by former Star Trek star	Check (Brent Spinder)	Nope
Visible destruction of well-known landmarks	Check (Whitehouse)	Nope
Good guys using the bad guy's technology against them	Check (space ship)	Nope
Destruction of the enemy via an implausible computer virus	Check	Nope

And the winner is...Independence Day. If you're thinking about going to see War of the Worlds, don't. Tom Cruise is creepy, and the movie has no plot. Go rent Independence Day and watch the aliens kill Data. It's awesome. Anyway, I've got to go buy fireworks. My work here is done.

• Written on 01 July 2005 & posted at 02:36 PM.
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