-If you are wondering why these entries are numbered in such a way you need only look back at my newspaper reading past, as well as my current course of study. In the Guardian particular features are numbered. This means that after a few years they might have Crossword No. 5567, or my favourite in the Saturday Review, the review of movies that were based on books (in the 600’s when I left).
It seems that in library school having a unique entry is a good thing, it allows the user to distinguish one item from the other. Also, they are big on series, numbered series in particular. So I guess I am putting my education to use.
-The more I think about it the more I am disappointed with the response time of the fire department yesterday. 10-12 minutes is a long time in the life of a fire. If it had been a real fire my apartment would likely have been ruined. I guess it raises the question of what is an acceptable response time, and how does one account for traffic fluctuations.
-As I was walking to class this morning I noticed a large Red Bull tent on the sports field. As I learned after class, it seems that today at McGill Red Bull sponsored a pumpkin launching contest.
The three entered teams had to try to launch a pumpkin several yards and hit a Red Bull target. There was supposed to be a way to vote for one’s favourite team and then get a free can of Red Bull. Unfortunately, I couldn’t figure this out and get my free tasty treat.
I stayed to watch a few of the launched pumpkins and was rather under-whelmed by the distances that they were being launched. In all likelihood I should be more forgiving of these home made pumpkin launchers.
-This morning I had my first Cataloging test. It was also my first university level open book test. In the end I feel that my hours of studying were well spent and on appropriate topics.
-The Newfoundland by-election is tomorrow. Lorraine Michaels (NDP) against Jerome Kennedy (PC). I will let you know who the winner is.
-For the first time in a few weeks I was able to get a game of Settlers in. Nithum arranged the game with a few of his classmates. It was a good game. At least four of us had 8 points and maybe could have had more if we had not played the development card game.
-Val’s sister will be coming to town tonight for a few days. This means that tomorrow I will be able to meet her for the first time. I am looking forward to this event, which is to take tomorrow at lunch time.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Monday, October 30, 2006
Fire Alarm
Just a few minutes ago I was able to enter my building. For a while I had been kept out because of a fire alarm.
The fire alarm was actually going when I returned from class. It had obviously been going a while as the building had emptied and I didn’t see new people coming out. As there was nothing that I could do I continued on with my usual trip to the gym to pick up my free copy of the Gazette.
By the time I returned the alarm was still going and the fire trucks had not yet arrived. After a few more minutes the first fire truck arrived, the guys jumped out and went in to check the scene out. Shortly thereafter, about four more trucks arrived. I believe that about two more guys went in.
After what seemed like ten minutes or so (it is more likely that it was 5) a fireman came down and talked to us. It seemed that an apartment dweller on the fourth floor had overcooked something. It then came out that it was apartment 46, the one next to Nithum and I. We were then allowed to re-enter the building.
As I approached our apartment I was able to look in the open door our neighbours, apartment and see how close they in fact are to us. If anything had happened in their apartment it looks as though my room would be the first place of spread. Unlike the rest of the walls in our building it does not seem that the wall between our apartments is cement.
The fire alarm was actually going when I returned from class. It had obviously been going a while as the building had emptied and I didn’t see new people coming out. As there was nothing that I could do I continued on with my usual trip to the gym to pick up my free copy of the Gazette.
By the time I returned the alarm was still going and the fire trucks had not yet arrived. After a few more minutes the first fire truck arrived, the guys jumped out and went in to check the scene out. Shortly thereafter, about four more trucks arrived. I believe that about two more guys went in.
After what seemed like ten minutes or so (it is more likely that it was 5) a fireman came down and talked to us. It seemed that an apartment dweller on the fourth floor had overcooked something. It then came out that it was apartment 46, the one next to Nithum and I. We were then allowed to re-enter the building.
As I approached our apartment I was able to look in the open door our neighbours, apartment and see how close they in fact are to us. If anything had happened in their apartment it looks as though my room would be the first place of spread. Unlike the rest of the walls in our building it does not seem that the wall between our apartments is cement.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
A Few Quick Notes 5
-Here in Montreal it seems to have really cooled down over the past few days. When I was out this evening I really felt the chill. This is made all the worse by the high wind that we are having today. Ok, maybe I shouldn’t call it high, but it is enough that it can be felt quite vividly.
-Back to class tomorrow after my nice week long study break. I am enjoying my program but I can’t say that I am looking forward to getting up nice and early tomorrow morning.
-I am down to my last loaf of home baked bread. You may recall that several weeks ago I baked a monster batch. It was quite nice to have nice tasty bread for such a long time. Hopefully I will find a few hours some afternoon this week during which I can bake another batch.
-TGIF (thank god it’s finished) in reference to the bean sludge of a few days ago.
-For several days now I have been preparing for my cataloguing exam. This test is on Tuesday and will be a chance to see how much I have picked up. I think that today was a very good study day. I found a few MARC sources that have really clarified a few things and filled in a few gaps in my knowledge. Hopefully my studying tomorrow will add a little more knowledge to the mix.
-For the past few weeks I have not been able to find the weekly grocery store fliers. I find these quite useful as they allow me to sale hop from one store to the next. In my current situation it is very important to me to know where I can find a $0.79 bag of potatoes.
-Back to class tomorrow after my nice week long study break. I am enjoying my program but I can’t say that I am looking forward to getting up nice and early tomorrow morning.
-I am down to my last loaf of home baked bread. You may recall that several weeks ago I baked a monster batch. It was quite nice to have nice tasty bread for such a long time. Hopefully I will find a few hours some afternoon this week during which I can bake another batch.
-TGIF (thank god it’s finished) in reference to the bean sludge of a few days ago.
-For several days now I have been preparing for my cataloguing exam. This test is on Tuesday and will be a chance to see how much I have picked up. I think that today was a very good study day. I found a few MARC sources that have really clarified a few things and filled in a few gaps in my knowledge. Hopefully my studying tomorrow will add a little more knowledge to the mix.
-For the past few weeks I have not been able to find the weekly grocery store fliers. I find these quite useful as they allow me to sale hop from one store to the next. In my current situation it is very important to me to know where I can find a $0.79 bag of potatoes.
Halloween Party at Thomson House
The Thomson House Halloween party seemed to go pretty well. From my vantage point it also seemed quite full, I guess most of the 600 people that purchased tickets likely did show up at some point during the evening.
For the duration of the party I was posted to the bar in the basement. This meant that for the first hour and a half or so after the party started that we didn't really have to do anything, as no one seemed to be able to locate our bar. Gradually, as the upper floors filled up our section took off. Because of the late start I only had about 3 hours or less of solid bussing, which was not bad at all. Much of the work was also reduced by the use of plastic pint and shot glasses.
We were also lucky on the keg front. We had very few to change throughout the evening. Much of this was due not to luck but the precautions that we had taken the night before in ensuring that all kegs in use would be full.
It took a while for us to get people out, but for the most part things started to wrap up at 2:00. I had been fearful that it would ooze over until 3:00 or 3:30, which would mean a very late start to my evening's sleep.
Once people had cleared out we were able to survey the damage. There was crap everywhere. Many of the decorations were all over the floor, beer and drinks had been spilled, and there was other garbage everywhere. Fortunately for me there is a cleaning staff that was faced with this task and I was able to head out and be home and in bed by 4:00.
Note: Last night I met to young women from Newfoundland, St. John's to be exact. Nithum seemed interested in figuring out who they were.
The details that I have are that they studied psychology and linguistics and graduated in May. They are now in masters programs here at McGill.
They seem to have been at Stephen's New Year's party last January.
A friend of theirs went on a few dates with Jon Montes (during university).
One of their names is Laura(The one that was at the party).
For the duration of the party I was posted to the bar in the basement. This meant that for the first hour and a half or so after the party started that we didn't really have to do anything, as no one seemed to be able to locate our bar. Gradually, as the upper floors filled up our section took off. Because of the late start I only had about 3 hours or less of solid bussing, which was not bad at all. Much of the work was also reduced by the use of plastic pint and shot glasses.
We were also lucky on the keg front. We had very few to change throughout the evening. Much of this was due not to luck but the precautions that we had taken the night before in ensuring that all kegs in use would be full.
It took a while for us to get people out, but for the most part things started to wrap up at 2:00. I had been fearful that it would ooze over until 3:00 or 3:30, which would mean a very late start to my evening's sleep.
Once people had cleared out we were able to survey the damage. There was crap everywhere. Many of the decorations were all over the floor, beer and drinks had been spilled, and there was other garbage everywhere. Fortunately for me there is a cleaning staff that was faced with this task and I was able to head out and be home and in bed by 4:00.
Note: Last night I met to young women from Newfoundland, St. John's to be exact. Nithum seemed interested in figuring out who they were.
The details that I have are that they studied psychology and linguistics and graduated in May. They are now in masters programs here at McGill.
They seem to have been at Stephen's New Year's party last January.
A friend of theirs went on a few dates with Jon Montes (during university).
One of their names is Laura(The one that was at the party).
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Saturday Afternoon Update
As is now my regular Friday routine, I went out to Thomson House for six and stayed until about 2:30. All things considered this was not bad. It had been a slow night so we were able to keep on top of things.
The only major delay was actually preparing for tonight’s festivities. All kinds of kegs had to be changed and extras brought it so that we would have plenty of cold beer ready for all of the Halloween revelers.
We are expecting a pretty fair turnout as about 700 tickets have been sold. Obviously we are hoping that no more that 400 of these ticket holders show up at any one time as the capacity of the building is 400. All I know is that we have sold enough tickets for this to be a very busy evening of busing, keg changing, and bouncing.
Just moments ago I put the finishing touches on my white board costume. I will let you know how this goes down.
The only major delay was actually preparing for tonight’s festivities. All kinds of kegs had to be changed and extras brought it so that we would have plenty of cold beer ready for all of the Halloween revelers.
We are expecting a pretty fair turnout as about 700 tickets have been sold. Obviously we are hoping that no more that 400 of these ticket holders show up at any one time as the capacity of the building is 400. All I know is that we have sold enough tickets for this to be a very busy evening of busing, keg changing, and bouncing.
Just moments ago I put the finishing touches on my white board costume. I will let you know how this goes down.
Thursday, October 26, 2006
I Can’t Cook for Beans
Prior to moving to England in 2004 I decided that, for financial reasons, I would make beans and legumes a major part of my diet. At the time it seemed that I could replace much of my meat consumption with beans to reduce my food costs. I hoped to save fistfuls of money with this scheme.
Shortly after arriving I purchased all kinds of beans and related foodstuffs. Included in my purchases were bags of kidney beans, chickpeas, yellow split peas, mung beans and at least two varieties of lentils. During my stay I also purchased several varieties of canned beans (though not baked beans).
With a great deal of passion and ingenuity I slipped these items into my diet. For weeks if not months I frequently had soups, stews, and curries made with bean bases. The end result was quite similar for all of these products; they could only be eaten with great intent and an ignorance of flavor and texture. As indicated, for weeks I plodded on with this great mission. My belief was that if I kept at it I would save money, be healthy, and fail to contract mad cow. The world, as least as far as bean related dishes went, was my BSE free oyster.
This program of self-torture continued until my parents came to visit me at Christmas. For the first time in months I was served normal, bean free meal, cooked by someone with a culinary aptitude. It was wonderful. We had turkey and chicken and haggis, and many other bean free meals. Food had not tasted so good to me for years. I very quickly decided budget or not, the bean program would have to end once I returned to cooking for myself.
Immediately upon my return these dastardly foods were stricken from my diet, with the exception of my weekly batch of pea soup. I realized that I could actually find inexpensive meat-containing bean free alternatives. A particular favorite of mine, then and now, is the quarter-chicken (leg and thigh), which can usually be purchased for a reasonable price.
For the rest of my stay in England, I will go so far as to say that I started eating well, especially once I started making my own bread. The beans were gone and I wasn’t missing them. Amazingly, my budget did not seem to suffer after the abandonment of those nasty beans.
Though beans were banished from my diet almost two years ago, they are slowly starting to make their way back into my diet, or at least my shopping basket. When I go to the grocery store I can’t help but noticing the beans, especially if they are on sale. Beans in the bag and can format attract my attention, even though I am equally unqualified to cook either type.
Over the past few days, cans of mixed beans have tempted me. These cans have nice pictures of the contents, which are 5-6 different varieties of beans. For about a dollar I can have this flashy can of beans in my very own kitchen and then pot!
Even though the contents are presented in a flashier manner, I am still having the same problem, which is that I just can’t get beans to come out well. My bean dishes always seem to taste the same and have a very off-putting texture. The odd thing about this all is that many people, and cultures generally, do quite amazing things with beans. For some reason I just don’t have the touch with beans.
My mixed bean soup of tonight was no different. The end result was a product with the same crappy texture contaminated by the same crappy flavor. The can looked flashy but it sure didn’t make the soup any tastier.
Anyway, I am hoping I have learned my lesson: I can’t cook with beans. Odds are I haven’t, but at least I am stuck on poorly cooking a relatively inexpensive food.
Shortly after arriving I purchased all kinds of beans and related foodstuffs. Included in my purchases were bags of kidney beans, chickpeas, yellow split peas, mung beans and at least two varieties of lentils. During my stay I also purchased several varieties of canned beans (though not baked beans).
With a great deal of passion and ingenuity I slipped these items into my diet. For weeks if not months I frequently had soups, stews, and curries made with bean bases. The end result was quite similar for all of these products; they could only be eaten with great intent and an ignorance of flavor and texture. As indicated, for weeks I plodded on with this great mission. My belief was that if I kept at it I would save money, be healthy, and fail to contract mad cow. The world, as least as far as bean related dishes went, was my BSE free oyster.
This program of self-torture continued until my parents came to visit me at Christmas. For the first time in months I was served normal, bean free meal, cooked by someone with a culinary aptitude. It was wonderful. We had turkey and chicken and haggis, and many other bean free meals. Food had not tasted so good to me for years. I very quickly decided budget or not, the bean program would have to end once I returned to cooking for myself.
Immediately upon my return these dastardly foods were stricken from my diet, with the exception of my weekly batch of pea soup. I realized that I could actually find inexpensive meat-containing bean free alternatives. A particular favorite of mine, then and now, is the quarter-chicken (leg and thigh), which can usually be purchased for a reasonable price.
For the rest of my stay in England, I will go so far as to say that I started eating well, especially once I started making my own bread. The beans were gone and I wasn’t missing them. Amazingly, my budget did not seem to suffer after the abandonment of those nasty beans.
Though beans were banished from my diet almost two years ago, they are slowly starting to make their way back into my diet, or at least my shopping basket. When I go to the grocery store I can’t help but noticing the beans, especially if they are on sale. Beans in the bag and can format attract my attention, even though I am equally unqualified to cook either type.
Over the past few days, cans of mixed beans have tempted me. These cans have nice pictures of the contents, which are 5-6 different varieties of beans. For about a dollar I can have this flashy can of beans in my very own kitchen and then pot!
Even though the contents are presented in a flashier manner, I am still having the same problem, which is that I just can’t get beans to come out well. My bean dishes always seem to taste the same and have a very off-putting texture. The odd thing about this all is that many people, and cultures generally, do quite amazing things with beans. For some reason I just don’t have the touch with beans.
My mixed bean soup of tonight was no different. The end result was a product with the same crappy texture contaminated by the same crappy flavor. The can looked flashy but it sure didn’t make the soup any tastier.
Anyway, I am hoping I have learned my lesson: I can’t cook with beans. Odds are I haven’t, but at least I am stuck on poorly cooking a relatively inexpensive food.
Upcoming events
I'm hoping to get a hair cut today. The last time I had it cut was in July.
Something a little more exciting is the Grad Society Halloween party tomorrow. I'll be going as Steve Bartman. I bought a Cubs hat and a baseball yesterday. The rest of the costume will be a sweatshirt and jeans. I'm hoping to have at least two people recognize me.
Next week I have two midterms, one on Monday and one on Wednesday. The one on Monday is Graph Theory, the one of Wednesday is Measure Theory and Integration (which also has a take-home portion in the 24-48 hours following the inclass exam). I was also supposed to have a Game Theory take-home starting on Tuesday and running for a week, but that has been postponed for a week. The good news is I only have one assignment due next week, and I already have all the questions figured out.
I best be going now though, every Thursday afternoon the people in Graphs and Games meet in an informal setting (called a 'coffee klatch') to discuss graphs and games, and this week's meeting is starting soon.
Something a little more exciting is the Grad Society Halloween party tomorrow. I'll be going as Steve Bartman. I bought a Cubs hat and a baseball yesterday. The rest of the costume will be a sweatshirt and jeans. I'm hoping to have at least two people recognize me.
Next week I have two midterms, one on Monday and one on Wednesday. The one on Monday is Graph Theory, the one of Wednesday is Measure Theory and Integration (which also has a take-home portion in the 24-48 hours following the inclass exam). I was also supposed to have a Game Theory take-home starting on Tuesday and running for a week, but that has been postponed for a week. The good news is I only have one assignment due next week, and I already have all the questions figured out.
I best be going now though, every Thursday afternoon the people in Graphs and Games meet in an informal setting (called a 'coffee klatch') to discuss graphs and games, and this week's meeting is starting soon.
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
A Few Quick Notes 4, pt. 2
-My tasty meal tonight consisted of a grilled chicken breast, garlic fried potatoes, and a can of yellow beans. While the potatoes were frying and the chicken grilling I was able to continue my reading of the AACR2.
-Earlier today, just after the trip to the Atwater Library, I went to Zellers and purchased the materials I needed for my Halloween costume. As I believe I may have indicated, this year I will be going as a whiteboard. For the costume I purchased a pair of long white underwear, as well as a long-sleeved undershirt.
-For those of you in Montreal, the book sale will continue tomorrow from 9:00AM until 6:00PM. I will probably stop by at least one more time before it closes tomorrow.
-It has been raining too much in Montreal. It seems that for more than a week it has rained every day. It is getting rather annoying. As someone without a car these downpours are rather inconvenient. Hopefully we have seen the end of the rainy season here, though I don’t know that I will be so lucky.
-Earlier today, just after the trip to the Atwater Library, I went to Zellers and purchased the materials I needed for my Halloween costume. As I believe I may have indicated, this year I will be going as a whiteboard. For the costume I purchased a pair of long white underwear, as well as a long-sleeved undershirt.
-For those of you in Montreal, the book sale will continue tomorrow from 9:00AM until 6:00PM. I will probably stop by at least one more time before it closes tomorrow.
-It has been raining too much in Montreal. It seems that for more than a week it has rained every day. It is getting rather annoying. As someone without a car these downpours are rather inconvenient. Hopefully we have seen the end of the rainy season here, though I don’t know that I will be so lucky.
A Few Quick Notes 4, pt. 1
-I seem to be grocery shopping by sale items now. For the most part this works out. Stores usually have a few meats, vegetables, cereals, cookies, and such things on sale. It just means that I eat chicken when it is sold (or when I thaw it) instead of when I might naturally want chicken. It also means that there are events like last night, when I bought 4 packages of cookies because they were on sale 2/5$.
-I can’t get my peggle off. It is quite annoying. I think that I will need to find a longer wrench to get more leverage.
-The McGill book started today. I went to the bank last night so that I would have some cash for this event. As you may recall, the discards have been plumping up my personal library for the past few months.
-The book sale lived up to its reputation. Hundreds of people lined up to enter Redpath Hall before nine o’clock, the line reached past the Redpath Museum. Once in the customer could go either upstairs or stay on the main floor. Unfortunately, I chose to stay on the main floor and wasted a while looking at books in which I had no interest. Disappointed and ready to leave, I thought that I should at least give the upstairs section a quick once over. Almost as soon as I arrived upstairs I realized that that was where the main contents of the sale were. Once one made it past the teaming hoards, it was possible to find many good books at reasonable prices. It seems that most books were in the 1 – 2$ range, many as low as 0.50$.
-After the book sale I attended a reading at the Atwater Library. It was at 12:30 and by Joan Cook, a Newfoundland based writer, who I have heard is a good reader. I am glad I went, though I stood out as they youngest audience member. It seems that males also were a rather large minority.
-The reading brought me to a public library for the first time in years, certainly the first time since I have had any real knowledge of libraries and their workings. It was certainly quite different than an academic library.
-Val comes back tonight. I am looking forward to seeing her. It sounds as though her trip to St. John’s went well.
-For those of you with TVs and CBC access, the mini-series in which I was an extra, Above and Beyond, is finally airing. It will be shown on CBC at 8:00, 8:30 in Newfoundland, on October 29th and 30th. If I made the cut it will be in the garden party scene. Unfortunately, I have no idea where in the story arc this scene falls. For more information one can go to http://www.cbc.ca/aboveandbeyond/
-On the subject of films, it seems that a multi-day filming project is taking play just up the street from me. The cast and crew are scheduled to be here for about 5 or 6 days. The movie appears to be entitled “Toi.” I was thinking I should see if they need an experienced extra for any of the garden party scenes but I didn’t get around to it, maybe tomorrow.
-Just before arriving at the reading I noticed a new innovation in the food services industry, the McCafe. Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to try a double soy latte with my large fries and chicken McNuggets. The McCafe was surprising like other cafes in terms of price and the fact that they had all kinds of desert items available. This new fast food operation is ironically just about 20 feet away from a Starbucks. Will experience in fast food or experience in coffee win out in this battle of the multi-nationals?
-I need to go and hit the books.
-I can’t get my peggle off. It is quite annoying. I think that I will need to find a longer wrench to get more leverage.
-The McGill book started today. I went to the bank last night so that I would have some cash for this event. As you may recall, the discards have been plumping up my personal library for the past few months.
-The book sale lived up to its reputation. Hundreds of people lined up to enter Redpath Hall before nine o’clock, the line reached past the Redpath Museum. Once in the customer could go either upstairs or stay on the main floor. Unfortunately, I chose to stay on the main floor and wasted a while looking at books in which I had no interest. Disappointed and ready to leave, I thought that I should at least give the upstairs section a quick once over. Almost as soon as I arrived upstairs I realized that that was where the main contents of the sale were. Once one made it past the teaming hoards, it was possible to find many good books at reasonable prices. It seems that most books were in the 1 – 2$ range, many as low as 0.50$.
-After the book sale I attended a reading at the Atwater Library. It was at 12:30 and by Joan Cook, a Newfoundland based writer, who I have heard is a good reader. I am glad I went, though I stood out as they youngest audience member. It seems that males also were a rather large minority.
-The reading brought me to a public library for the first time in years, certainly the first time since I have had any real knowledge of libraries and their workings. It was certainly quite different than an academic library.
-Val comes back tonight. I am looking forward to seeing her. It sounds as though her trip to St. John’s went well.
-For those of you with TVs and CBC access, the mini-series in which I was an extra, Above and Beyond, is finally airing. It will be shown on CBC at 8:00, 8:30 in Newfoundland, on October 29th and 30th. If I made the cut it will be in the garden party scene. Unfortunately, I have no idea where in the story arc this scene falls. For more information one can go to http://www.cbc.ca/aboveandbeyond/
-On the subject of films, it seems that a multi-day filming project is taking play just up the street from me. The cast and crew are scheduled to be here for about 5 or 6 days. The movie appears to be entitled “Toi.” I was thinking I should see if they need an experienced extra for any of the garden party scenes but I didn’t get around to it, maybe tomorrow.
-Just before arriving at the reading I noticed a new innovation in the food services industry, the McCafe. Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to try a double soy latte with my large fries and chicken McNuggets. The McCafe was surprising like other cafes in terms of price and the fact that they had all kinds of desert items available. This new fast food operation is ironically just about 20 feet away from a Starbucks. Will experience in fast food or experience in coffee win out in this battle of the multi-nationals?
-I need to go and hit the books.
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Travels to the East of Montreal
For the past several weeks Val has been putting together an application for graduate funding. Just days before her trip basically everything was together, proposals written, letters received, forms filled, that is all except for one letter. As she was going on a trip and the deadline would pass while she was a way she was eager to have the letter as quickly as possible. The original just did not come so a second copy was sent, as back up, by courier to ensure that a copy would arrive before the deadline. As of Thursday, Val’s departure day, this letter had still not arrived and it was left to me to keep checking on the mail and then drop the letter off as soon as it arrived.
When I checked the mail yesterday morning I finally found evidence that the couriered copy was in the province. It seems that they had attempted to deliver it at 9:37 AM and that because no one was there it would be sent back to the distribution centre in deepest East Montreal.
(One has to wonder if anyone is able to receive their domestic packages as this delivery schedule has clearly not been designed with the working person in mind. Evening deliveries in residential areas, or a local pick up spot, would seem like reasonable alternatives)
As Val is not in Montreal it fell to me to head out to pick this item up. My first step was to ride my bike over to Val’s place to pick up the delivery slip that I stupidly left on her kitchen table. I then walked to the subway. As I was going down the escalator I realized that I did not have the directions to the Political Science Department that Val had given me but I didn't want to turn around add time to what I already knew would be a long trip. Pretty soon I was on the Green Line heading east. It wasn't that long and I was all the way to Honore-Beaugrand, the end of the line. From there I needed to take the 28 bus.
It was pretty obvious from the station where the buses were, though there seemed to be a north or south choice. As I couldn't remember the area all that well from my examination of a map the night before I checked a nearby map on the wall and found that I needed the north bound bus. I went outside to wait and was pleasantly surprised to find that the bus arrived in a few minutes. Once on the bus I was able to get directions from an STM (public transit) employee who was not then working. At the right place I got off the bus and walked around the (rather large industrial park) block and found the courier centre. I think that I was just about the only person walking in the industrial park, there were not even sidewalks that I could take advantage of.
Once inside the courier centre, I was quickly able to get the package. I just gave the employee a letter that Val had written that gave me permission to pick up the package and showed the employee my ID. Soon I had the package in my hand. It was pretty easy, at least much easier than I thought that it would be. From there I walked back to the bus stop, though this time I picked up the bus on the corner of Jarry (instead of Grenache) and Ray Lawson. This was a good choice because the bus came about 2 minutes later. It was actually the same bus and bus driver that I had taken on the way there. Once at Honore-Beaugrand I then hoped on the train and headed back to civilization.
While on the train heading back to town I decided to get of at Berri-UQAM and deliver the letter, even though I did not have the directions. I thought that I would be able to find the spot anyway. Unfortunately, after getting off of the train I realized that the office would be closed for lunch, I would need to come back at some point after 1:30. I then walked up to Val’s place to get the directions to the office, stopping to buy a baguette on the way.
Once I reached Val’s place it was almost 1:00 PM, so I went out and picked up my bike and rode down to UQAM, this time with directions in hand.
As I was parking my bike on the corner of St. Denis and St. Catherine a photography student asked to take my picture for a project. I agreed, and he did this in about 30 seconds or less. This is a first for me. On the whole I would say that it was a pleasant experience, though it might be nice to know what, if anything, becomes of my photos.
Once I arrived UQAM I was pretty quickly able to find what I was looking for, though it seemed that they were late to return from their lunch break. I sat around for a few minutes. Shortly thereafter, I noticed that people had returned so I went down and was able to hand in the letter.
All totaled, it only took me about 4 hours from the time that I set out until that I returned back. This isn’t so bad, especially considering that I expected to get lost in the industrial park and then not be able to find the bus back. With this expectation in mind, I purposely didn’t take any cash with me so that I wouldn’t wimp out and take a cab back to the Metro station, as it turned out it was quite easy to find the bus back.
When I checked the mail yesterday morning I finally found evidence that the couriered copy was in the province. It seems that they had attempted to deliver it at 9:37 AM and that because no one was there it would be sent back to the distribution centre in deepest East Montreal.
(One has to wonder if anyone is able to receive their domestic packages as this delivery schedule has clearly not been designed with the working person in mind. Evening deliveries in residential areas, or a local pick up spot, would seem like reasonable alternatives)
As Val is not in Montreal it fell to me to head out to pick this item up. My first step was to ride my bike over to Val’s place to pick up the delivery slip that I stupidly left on her kitchen table. I then walked to the subway. As I was going down the escalator I realized that I did not have the directions to the Political Science Department that Val had given me but I didn't want to turn around add time to what I already knew would be a long trip. Pretty soon I was on the Green Line heading east. It wasn't that long and I was all the way to Honore-Beaugrand, the end of the line. From there I needed to take the 28 bus.
It was pretty obvious from the station where the buses were, though there seemed to be a north or south choice. As I couldn't remember the area all that well from my examination of a map the night before I checked a nearby map on the wall and found that I needed the north bound bus. I went outside to wait and was pleasantly surprised to find that the bus arrived in a few minutes. Once on the bus I was able to get directions from an STM (public transit) employee who was not then working. At the right place I got off the bus and walked around the (rather large industrial park) block and found the courier centre. I think that I was just about the only person walking in the industrial park, there were not even sidewalks that I could take advantage of.
Once inside the courier centre, I was quickly able to get the package. I just gave the employee a letter that Val had written that gave me permission to pick up the package and showed the employee my ID. Soon I had the package in my hand. It was pretty easy, at least much easier than I thought that it would be. From there I walked back to the bus stop, though this time I picked up the bus on the corner of Jarry (instead of Grenache) and Ray Lawson. This was a good choice because the bus came about 2 minutes later. It was actually the same bus and bus driver that I had taken on the way there. Once at Honore-Beaugrand I then hoped on the train and headed back to civilization.
While on the train heading back to town I decided to get of at Berri-UQAM and deliver the letter, even though I did not have the directions. I thought that I would be able to find the spot anyway. Unfortunately, after getting off of the train I realized that the office would be closed for lunch, I would need to come back at some point after 1:30. I then walked up to Val’s place to get the directions to the office, stopping to buy a baguette on the way.
Once I reached Val’s place it was almost 1:00 PM, so I went out and picked up my bike and rode down to UQAM, this time with directions in hand.
As I was parking my bike on the corner of St. Denis and St. Catherine a photography student asked to take my picture for a project. I agreed, and he did this in about 30 seconds or less. This is a first for me. On the whole I would say that it was a pleasant experience, though it might be nice to know what, if anything, becomes of my photos.
Once I arrived UQAM I was pretty quickly able to find what I was looking for, though it seemed that they were late to return from their lunch break. I sat around for a few minutes. Shortly thereafter, I noticed that people had returned so I went down and was able to hand in the letter.
All totaled, it only took me about 4 hours from the time that I set out until that I returned back. This isn’t so bad, especially considering that I expected to get lost in the industrial park and then not be able to find the bus back. With this expectation in mind, I purposely didn’t take any cash with me so that I wouldn’t wimp out and take a cab back to the Metro station, as it turned out it was quite easy to find the bus back.
Monday, October 23, 2006
My Peggle Bike
Today I had to head over to the Plateau to run a few errands for myself, and also for Val. As it would have been about a 40-minute walk in rather unpleasant weather I decided to ride my peggle bike over.
My trip over wasn’t too bad. As it was a bit wet my foot had the usual tendency to slip off of the peggle. On top of that my speed has to be reduced because of this foot-slipping problem.
After just a few minutes I made it over to the Plateau area and locked my bike at Val’s apartment. From there I headed out on foot. First I went east on Mont Royal all the way to the Mini-Max Variete before turning around and heading west to St. Denis where I visited the Valet D’Coeur. From this final destination I headed back to my bike and started my journey home.
Just as I started to make my way back home the precipitation changed from a light mist to a proper rain, making peggle biking decidedly more difficult.
As made my way back I was faced with more foot slipping and had to once again reduce my speed. This speed reduction was probably a good idea, as my brakes weren’t really functioning all that well at the moment either. The entire trip just did not seem to start on a good note.
I made my way south on the west side of Parc la Fontaine. As I was crossing from the park to the cross street, pushing a yellow further than it should have been pushed, I once again experienced peggle foot slippage. Oddly, this experience with my right foot seemed to throw me completely off balance in a way that has not occurred in the past. My left foot then popped off of my left peddle and my chain somehow popped out of place. I was now left with a disabled bike in the middle of an intersection with traffic going the wrong way. Fortunately, I was able to walk my bike to the side of the street and examine the situation.
After a quick examination I was able to see that everything, except for the peggle and the chain, seemed fine, or at least as fine as I could reasonably expect. Quickly I set to work at putting the chain back on. Stupidly, with my dominant hand I quickly reached for the chain and put it back on. Only after doing this did I realize that I had just greased up my right hand, the same hand that I would have to use to get the key from my pocket and perform other standard tasks. My attempt at rubbing some of the grease off on nearby wet leaves was not all that successful.
After this short delay I was back in the saddle and peggling slowly along. Once just past the restaurant section of Prince Arthur I was almost bumped by a car that failed to stop and give me the right of way. Fortunately I was able to stop quickly enough, though I did have to speed up the process by using my feet as brakes.
Once again, I got back on my bike and kept going. I was quickly on Milton heading directly towards McGill’s Milton gate when I noticed that the bike in front of me was also a peggle bike, though this time he had left peggle instead of a right peggle. Unfortunately, I don’t think that he noticed that I had a peggle, a failure that resulted in us not forming a mutual bond as peggle bike riders.
Anyway, this green peggle bike and I eventually separated and I made my way back home. Fortunately, I was able to do this and remain in one piece. Near the end of this trek I just wanted to be finished with the ride and in the comfort of my apartment.
My trip over wasn’t too bad. As it was a bit wet my foot had the usual tendency to slip off of the peggle. On top of that my speed has to be reduced because of this foot-slipping problem.
After just a few minutes I made it over to the Plateau area and locked my bike at Val’s apartment. From there I headed out on foot. First I went east on Mont Royal all the way to the Mini-Max Variete before turning around and heading west to St. Denis where I visited the Valet D’Coeur. From this final destination I headed back to my bike and started my journey home.
Just as I started to make my way back home the precipitation changed from a light mist to a proper rain, making peggle biking decidedly more difficult.
As made my way back I was faced with more foot slipping and had to once again reduce my speed. This speed reduction was probably a good idea, as my brakes weren’t really functioning all that well at the moment either. The entire trip just did not seem to start on a good note.
I made my way south on the west side of Parc la Fontaine. As I was crossing from the park to the cross street, pushing a yellow further than it should have been pushed, I once again experienced peggle foot slippage. Oddly, this experience with my right foot seemed to throw me completely off balance in a way that has not occurred in the past. My left foot then popped off of my left peddle and my chain somehow popped out of place. I was now left with a disabled bike in the middle of an intersection with traffic going the wrong way. Fortunately, I was able to walk my bike to the side of the street and examine the situation.
After a quick examination I was able to see that everything, except for the peggle and the chain, seemed fine, or at least as fine as I could reasonably expect. Quickly I set to work at putting the chain back on. Stupidly, with my dominant hand I quickly reached for the chain and put it back on. Only after doing this did I realize that I had just greased up my right hand, the same hand that I would have to use to get the key from my pocket and perform other standard tasks. My attempt at rubbing some of the grease off on nearby wet leaves was not all that successful.
After this short delay I was back in the saddle and peggling slowly along. Once just past the restaurant section of Prince Arthur I was almost bumped by a car that failed to stop and give me the right of way. Fortunately I was able to stop quickly enough, though I did have to speed up the process by using my feet as brakes.
Once again, I got back on my bike and kept going. I was quickly on Milton heading directly towards McGill’s Milton gate when I noticed that the bike in front of me was also a peggle bike, though this time he had left peggle instead of a right peggle. Unfortunately, I don’t think that he noticed that I had a peggle, a failure that resulted in us not forming a mutual bond as peggle bike riders.
Anyway, this green peggle bike and I eventually separated and I made my way back home. Fortunately, I was able to do this and remain in one piece. Near the end of this trek I just wanted to be finished with the ride and in the comfort of my apartment.
A Few Quick Notes 3
-For the past few days I have been reading a biography of Thomas de Quincey. It is my understanding that he wrote one of the first drug/addiction memoirs. It was my initial intention just to read his most famous work, Confessions of an Opium Eater, but I picked up a biography that was near the original work on the shelf. So far I am about a third of the way through the biography and Mr. de Quincey has just picked up his nasty habit. Having read some of Mr. H. S. Thompson’s work it will be interesting to see what addiction looks like coming from the perspective of someone from the early 19th century.
-On Sunday one of my classmates had a brunch-type affair at her apartment on Sunday. Aside from the fact that it was quite pleasant, I was glad to take the opportunity to talk to some people in my class that I had not yet met. I also enjoyed my conversation/s with Maya’s husband, Walter. This visit led me to believe that many people in my class actually have living rooms. Maybe next year I will be able to move up in the world, this is more likely if I am willing to allow myself a bit more of a commute.
-As I mentioned earlier, some game testing went on yesterday. Today I hope to pick up some proper equipment and give the game design some more thought. Maybe in a few days I will be ready for the game test that should be happening with Nithum. The best option would be with Nithum, Val, myself, and a fourth player. So if you are in Montreal and looking to play a new, semi-formed game let me know.
-This week is study week for me. Ah, that is wonderful. I think that I will be sleeping in tomorrow.
-A few days ago I purchased some more Hek beer. It seems that this beer is sold by % alc. My initial purchase was of a doz. of 4.9%, I have now moved up to 6.2%, though I think it am actually more a fan of the weaker beer, as this just tastes of more alc.
-Writing at least 500 words seems like a worthy goal for this post so I will do my best to get there.
-Since I have started writing this blog I have noticed that I have started writing in 300 word, or less, increments. In some regards this is quite nice. Get to the point and get out. In others it is lacking, particularly in cases where I would like to develop an argument. I fear that I am losing my ability to go beyond the “new normal.” Maybe this will mean that I will have to plan a few longer, prose based posts.
-Cataloging is priority number 1 for studying today. Unfortunately, this has been the course that has been left behind so that the needs for other courses can be met (501). From my discussions with others in my classes, it seems that this has been the norm. This seems unfortunate as this is a course in which output will be improved my practice, experience, and familiarity.
-On Sunday one of my classmates had a brunch-type affair at her apartment on Sunday. Aside from the fact that it was quite pleasant, I was glad to take the opportunity to talk to some people in my class that I had not yet met. I also enjoyed my conversation/s with Maya’s husband, Walter. This visit led me to believe that many people in my class actually have living rooms. Maybe next year I will be able to move up in the world, this is more likely if I am willing to allow myself a bit more of a commute.
-As I mentioned earlier, some game testing went on yesterday. Today I hope to pick up some proper equipment and give the game design some more thought. Maybe in a few days I will be ready for the game test that should be happening with Nithum. The best option would be with Nithum, Val, myself, and a fourth player. So if you are in Montreal and looking to play a new, semi-formed game let me know.
-This week is study week for me. Ah, that is wonderful. I think that I will be sleeping in tomorrow.
-A few days ago I purchased some more Hek beer. It seems that this beer is sold by % alc. My initial purchase was of a doz. of 4.9%, I have now moved up to 6.2%, though I think it am actually more a fan of the weaker beer, as this just tastes of more alc.
-Writing at least 500 words seems like a worthy goal for this post so I will do my best to get there.
-Since I have started writing this blog I have noticed that I have started writing in 300 word, or less, increments. In some regards this is quite nice. Get to the point and get out. In others it is lacking, particularly in cases where I would like to develop an argument. I fear that I am losing my ability to go beyond the “new normal.” Maybe this will mean that I will have to plan a few longer, prose based posts.
-Cataloging is priority number 1 for studying today. Unfortunately, this has been the course that has been left behind so that the needs for other courses can be met (501). From my discussions with others in my classes, it seems that this has been the norm. This seems unfortunate as this is a course in which output will be improved my practice, experience, and familiarity.
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Montifax Game: play testing and notes
Tonight, for the first time, I gave a preliminary version of Montifax: The Board Game a try. Unfortunately it was not as successful as I had hoped, though I did learn several things. Most importantly, I need a 20 sided die for proper distribution of event locations.
I think that I will have the board set at 20 pieces. In the style used by Carcassonne, they will be placed by the players, though in this case before the game begins. Each will be unique and identifiable, in the test version this meant numbers 1-20. I am leaning towards 1 being the Administration building, and it always being placed first. The McDal campus would then be built form their. Choosing to have a dispersed or compact campus would be up to the players.
Instead of cash being used to buy cards from a side deck I think that the one shift of “work” a cycle that players have will just give them a card from the side deck. Every 7 will give the player nearest to the event a card from the side deck.
Preliminary point values per event
7 = side deck card
6 = 10
8 = 20
5 = 30
9 = 40
10 = 50
4 = 60
3 = 70
11 = 80
12 = 90
2 = 100
Point value acquired, based on distance away from event
Player on location of event = 100%
Player 1 spot away from event = 80%
Player 2 spot away from event = 60%
Player 3 spot away from event = 40%
Player 4 spot away from event = 20%
Points are allocated only to the closest player; ties mean that no one gets point for a particular event.
The number of locations should be divided by the number of players. A simple division for a four-player game would be player 1 getting 1-5, player 2 getting 6-10, player 3 getting 11-15, and player 4 getting 16-20. Players would cycle through these locations, trading cycle locations as they see fit, though before the role of the event die on their turn. I am thinking that if there are only three players two pieces are removed, though I don’t know how this would affect the game. It is possible that board placement should occur before players are aware of their daily schedule.
I am not really sure if I want to have the end game set at a number of points or a number of cycles. Both have their advantages, though I believe that I am leaning towards points, arguments on either side are welcomed.
For the side deck I am thinking of things such as increasing the strength of an event for a player for one turn, increasing their ability to experience certain types of events, disallowing other players from experiencing certain types of events, pre-selecting 1 of the event die or the location die, a set number of points being awarded to the holder, etc. Concrete suggestions are welcomed.
In a few days Nithum and I are hoping to have a more elaborate test. This should give me/us a better feel for the game and its needs. As the game reaches a more finalized version various elements can be assigned humorous and whimsical names, that just wouldn’t make sense to assign right now.
I think that I will have the board set at 20 pieces. In the style used by Carcassonne, they will be placed by the players, though in this case before the game begins. Each will be unique and identifiable, in the test version this meant numbers 1-20. I am leaning towards 1 being the Administration building, and it always being placed first. The McDal campus would then be built form their. Choosing to have a dispersed or compact campus would be up to the players.
Instead of cash being used to buy cards from a side deck I think that the one shift of “work” a cycle that players have will just give them a card from the side deck. Every 7 will give the player nearest to the event a card from the side deck.
Preliminary point values per event
7 = side deck card
6 = 10
8 = 20
5 = 30
9 = 40
10 = 50
4 = 60
3 = 70
11 = 80
12 = 90
2 = 100
Point value acquired, based on distance away from event
Player on location of event = 100%
Player 1 spot away from event = 80%
Player 2 spot away from event = 60%
Player 3 spot away from event = 40%
Player 4 spot away from event = 20%
Points are allocated only to the closest player; ties mean that no one gets point for a particular event.
The number of locations should be divided by the number of players. A simple division for a four-player game would be player 1 getting 1-5, player 2 getting 6-10, player 3 getting 11-15, and player 4 getting 16-20. Players would cycle through these locations, trading cycle locations as they see fit, though before the role of the event die on their turn. I am thinking that if there are only three players two pieces are removed, though I don’t know how this would affect the game. It is possible that board placement should occur before players are aware of their daily schedule.
I am not really sure if I want to have the end game set at a number of points or a number of cycles. Both have their advantages, though I believe that I am leaning towards points, arguments on either side are welcomed.
For the side deck I am thinking of things such as increasing the strength of an event for a player for one turn, increasing their ability to experience certain types of events, disallowing other players from experiencing certain types of events, pre-selecting 1 of the event die or the location die, a set number of points being awarded to the holder, etc. Concrete suggestions are welcomed.
In a few days Nithum and I are hoping to have a more elaborate test. This should give me/us a better feel for the game and its needs. As the game reaches a more finalized version various elements can be assigned humorous and whimsical names, that just wouldn’t make sense to assign right now.
Convocation at Dal
This an overview of convocation at Dal. I'm a little fuzzy on some of the details of the MUN convocation, mostly I'm not sure I have the order of things correctly.
For Rebecca's 2:30 convocation the audience had tickets that said the audience was to be seated by 2:10. This didn't really happen and I believe we started late because of it. The programme was 5.5in x 8.5in, a nice size to fit in one's hand.
First, the "platform party" enters from the back of the room and walks onto the stage. Immediately following the graduands enter. The graduands have to wait standing for some time before entering. Presumably they have been given instructions outside while waiting. When everyone is in place we have the President's Welcome (by Dr. Tom Traves, president). It was much more complimentary to Dal than the equivalent speech at MUN is to MUN. However, there was no promotional video. The graduands were organized by faculty, but when they cross the stage their department of major is mentioned. The undergrads (sans hat and already wearing their hoods) move to the middle of the stage, kneel in front of the Chancellor to have him confer the degree by touching them on the should with an mortarboard. The graduate then rises and moves from the middle of the stage to the other side where it is handed its degree in a gold coloured tube before exiting the stage. It is similar for the graduands receiving their Master's degrees, expect they have mortarboards on, and I believe they only shake the hand of the Chancellor. The PhD is a different, the supervisor comes on stage to hood the graduate and then after receiving their degree they sit on stage as opposed to leaving it.
For the honourary graduate there is an introduction that is read out from the programme, not the same as the oration at MUN. There is no procession either, the graduate just walks to the podium and then returns to its seat.
The ceremony ends with the singing of O Canada. The platform party exits first, followed by the graduates, followed closely by the audience. Refreshments are served in the lobby afterwards.
One big difference that isn't mentioned above is that the audience is encouraged to move around and take photographs, which is somewhat disruptive and it causes a lot of graduates to hang out on stage while being handed their degree to pose for a nice photo-op.
For Rebecca's 2:30 convocation the audience had tickets that said the audience was to be seated by 2:10. This didn't really happen and I believe we started late because of it. The programme was 5.5in x 8.5in, a nice size to fit in one's hand.
First, the "platform party" enters from the back of the room and walks onto the stage. Immediately following the graduands enter. The graduands have to wait standing for some time before entering. Presumably they have been given instructions outside while waiting. When everyone is in place we have the President's Welcome (by Dr. Tom Traves, president). It was much more complimentary to Dal than the equivalent speech at MUN is to MUN. However, there was no promotional video. The graduands were organized by faculty, but when they cross the stage their department of major is mentioned. The undergrads (sans hat and already wearing their hoods) move to the middle of the stage, kneel in front of the Chancellor to have him confer the degree by touching them on the should with an mortarboard. The graduate then rises and moves from the middle of the stage to the other side where it is handed its degree in a gold coloured tube before exiting the stage. It is similar for the graduands receiving their Master's degrees, expect they have mortarboards on, and I believe they only shake the hand of the Chancellor. The PhD is a different, the supervisor comes on stage to hood the graduate and then after receiving their degree they sit on stage as opposed to leaving it.
For the honourary graduate there is an introduction that is read out from the programme, not the same as the oration at MUN. There is no procession either, the graduate just walks to the podium and then returns to its seat.
The ceremony ends with the singing of O Canada. The platform party exits first, followed by the graduates, followed closely by the audience. Refreshments are served in the lobby afterwards.
One big difference that isn't mentioned above is that the audience is encouraged to move around and take photographs, which is somewhat disruptive and it causes a lot of graduates to hang out on stage while being handed their degree to pose for a nice photo-op.
Saturday, October 21, 2006
Yesterday
Yesterday started of normally enough, I had my normal 9:00 AM class, followed by a lab at 1:00 PM. Immediately after the lab is when things began to change a little. Instead of going home, as would be normal for me, I met my father and headed out with him for the few hours that he was in town.
When we eventually headed out to get some food it was raining heavily. Normally this wouldn’t be such a big deal. The problem was that we had chosen a rather bad time to go out, approximately 3:00 PM. It seems that most restaurants are closed at this time. We most have gone to four or five at continually further distances before we found a little Thai place on St. Laurent that both looked ok and was open.
After our tasty, and inexpensive meal, we returned to my place on our way to Thomson House, a place that my father had wanted to see last time he was in town but was able to because it was closed. This time it was not closed and we were able to have a nice visit. At about 5:45 I switched into work mode and my father headed out, on his way back the airport, and eventually Vancouver.
Much of the night proceeded rather normally. It wasn’t supper busy but eventually began to pick up. It also turned out that the 3rd floor ballroom was to be home to the Queer McGill Homo Coming, which would be ending at 3:00 AM, an hour after our usual closing time. This information was kept in the back of my head, though I wasn’t exactly sure how it would effect me.
A while later we learned that the Harvard Rugby team would be showing up with some MBA students. Would cultures clash? Turns out they did not.
The night was pretty normal, just a bit longer than usual. I didn’t get out until 4:00 AM this morning.
When we eventually headed out to get some food it was raining heavily. Normally this wouldn’t be such a big deal. The problem was that we had chosen a rather bad time to go out, approximately 3:00 PM. It seems that most restaurants are closed at this time. We most have gone to four or five at continually further distances before we found a little Thai place on St. Laurent that both looked ok and was open.
After our tasty, and inexpensive meal, we returned to my place on our way to Thomson House, a place that my father had wanted to see last time he was in town but was able to because it was closed. This time it was not closed and we were able to have a nice visit. At about 5:45 I switched into work mode and my father headed out, on his way back the airport, and eventually Vancouver.
Much of the night proceeded rather normally. It wasn’t supper busy but eventually began to pick up. It also turned out that the 3rd floor ballroom was to be home to the Queer McGill Homo Coming, which would be ending at 3:00 AM, an hour after our usual closing time. This information was kept in the back of my head, though I wasn’t exactly sure how it would effect me.
A while later we learned that the Harvard Rugby team would be showing up with some MBA students. Would cultures clash? Turns out they did not.
The night was pretty normal, just a bit longer than usual. I didn’t get out until 4:00 AM this morning.
Halloween Costume
Contrary to my personal desires, it looks as though I will be dressing up for a Halloween party this year. This state of affairs means that I have to develop a costume to wear to the Thomson House Halloween Party, as it expected of staff. On top of this, it should be good as there is a competition to be won.
So far I have had two ideas, here they are:
1) Go as Postmodernism. To do this I would have a tee-shirt made with something along the lines of “Hello, I am postmodernism on the front.” I could then wear my steel-toed boots to symbolize the knocking down of past standards. My head would be covered in an attempt to keep all the “lose ends” of postmodernism in.
2) Go as a white board. Buy a cheap white long-sleeved tee-shirt and some matching long johns, to these items of clothing a few markers would be attached so that users could write on the whiteboard. I don’t think that I would go as far as painting my face and hair white.
Other suggestions or improvements to my ideas are welcomed.
So far I have had two ideas, here they are:
1) Go as Postmodernism. To do this I would have a tee-shirt made with something along the lines of “Hello, I am postmodernism on the front.” I could then wear my steel-toed boots to symbolize the knocking down of past standards. My head would be covered in an attempt to keep all the “lose ends” of postmodernism in.
2) Go as a white board. Buy a cheap white long-sleeved tee-shirt and some matching long johns, to these items of clothing a few markers would be attached so that users could write on the whiteboard. I don’t think that I would go as far as painting my face and hair white.
Other suggestions or improvements to my ideas are welcomed.
Congratulations Rebecca
and congratulations Val!
Val convocated with an M.A. yesterday. For those of you who don't think 'convocated' is a word, I'll point out that new words don't get added to the dictionary if people don't use them first. My plan is to encourage use of the word until someday it is a word. I had work and class yesterday so I didn't get to watch her on the webcast.
Rebecca convocates today with an M.Sc. For those of you wishing to watch Rebecca on a webcast, too bad. Dal doesn't have one. Fortunately for us though, Dal does have a 25% off sale on merchandise in the bookstore that has the Dalhousie logo. Unfortunately, the Dal bookstore didn't get the message from the convocation team, so we had to show an employee the website that listed the sale. In the end Rebecca bought a pen for herself as a gift from her grandmother and I picked up a zippered folder and a $6 shirt.
Rebecca's ceremony starts in 2.5 hours, so I best be going as I have lots to do before then. Afterwards there is a reception for the graduates which we will be attending. For dinner we're going out with Rebecca's Mom and in the evening Rebecca and I have a wedding reception to go to for Garrett MacLean and Sable McKeil, two fellow Master's students in math. Garrett had the same supervisor as Rebecca had and Sable has the same supervisor as I do currently.
Val convocated with an M.A. yesterday. For those of you who don't think 'convocated' is a word, I'll point out that new words don't get added to the dictionary if people don't use them first. My plan is to encourage use of the word until someday it is a word. I had work and class yesterday so I didn't get to watch her on the webcast.
Rebecca convocates today with an M.Sc. For those of you wishing to watch Rebecca on a webcast, too bad. Dal doesn't have one. Fortunately for us though, Dal does have a 25% off sale on merchandise in the bookstore that has the Dalhousie logo. Unfortunately, the Dal bookstore didn't get the message from the convocation team, so we had to show an employee the website that listed the sale. In the end Rebecca bought a pen for herself as a gift from her grandmother and I picked up a zippered folder and a $6 shirt.
Rebecca's ceremony starts in 2.5 hours, so I best be going as I have lots to do before then. Afterwards there is a reception for the graduates which we will be attending. For dinner we're going out with Rebecca's Mom and in the evening Rebecca and I have a wedding reception to go to for Garrett MacLean and Sable McKeil, two fellow Master's students in math. Garrett had the same supervisor as Rebecca had and Sable has the same supervisor as I do currently.
Montifax is back on top
Very early on it was reported by me that googling 'montifax' returned our page as the first link. That was actually the case for about a day. Then it stopped happening and that fact was reported to us by many. For a while montifax was returning nothing but about 20 genealogy pages. We made a little progress then with the third result being the word montifax appearing in the sidebar of Graham Case's webpage, and the sixth or seventh result being my links at del.icio.us. I'm pleased to report that as of right now we are back on top. I'm also happy to say that the blogger profiles for both Cameron and myself are returned in that same search, just below Graham's page. I'll keep you posted.
Cameron makes long posts
I've been bumped off the first 1o pages of the blog with Cameron's megaposts, so here I am bumping my life to the top of the heap. I was moving all the time with my Mom here, we did lots of shopping, some touristy things and my Mom tried to teach me how to knit.
Most of the shopping was done at Bayers Lake, the big box store part of town. My most expensive purchase was an external (USB) TV tuner for my computer to take advantage of the cable that comes included with my room. I can also record with the included software and even burn DVDs of TV shows if I want. I also did some regular shopping, picking up some new shoes and some TP. My apartment is well-outfitted now as well, after having picked up some extra strong fridge magnets from Lee Valley, a compost bucket, a vegetable peeler and a pepper grinder.
The knitting is going alright. I'm basing that on the fact that my Mom says I'm doing well but I don't really have a clue what to do. I can continue with the algorithm she gave me, but I won't actually be able to turn my wool napkin looking thing into a slipper.
My Mom returned safely home on Wednesday, then all was quiet. Until Thursday, on which Rebecca's Dad and his posse arrived for Rebecca's convocation. Last night we hit Bayers lake again and we went out to "Rebecca's convocation dinner".
Most of the shopping was done at Bayers Lake, the big box store part of town. My most expensive purchase was an external (USB) TV tuner for my computer to take advantage of the cable that comes included with my room. I can also record with the included software and even burn DVDs of TV shows if I want. I also did some regular shopping, picking up some new shoes and some TP. My apartment is well-outfitted now as well, after having picked up some extra strong fridge magnets from Lee Valley, a compost bucket, a vegetable peeler and a pepper grinder.
The knitting is going alright. I'm basing that on the fact that my Mom says I'm doing well but I don't really have a clue what to do. I can continue with the algorithm she gave me, but I won't actually be able to turn my wool napkin looking thing into a slipper.
My Mom returned safely home on Wednesday, then all was quiet. Until Thursday, on which Rebecca's Dad and his posse arrived for Rebecca's convocation. Last night we hit Bayers lake again and we went out to "Rebecca's convocation dinner".
Friday, October 20, 2006
A Few Quick Notes 2
-My father will be coming to town for a few hours this afternoon. This happens to be homecoming week at McGill so he will get to see the campus in all its glory, though under a cloudy sky.
-In a few hours minutes I will be heading of to start using an “information retrieval” utility that was first created in the 1960’s, called Dialog. Apparently it is still going strong even though some of the databases charge over $300 an hour to search. A very simple search can easily cost over $2.00. Fortunately we don’t have to pay because the company is giving us free access.
-I am still thinking about the Montifax Board game. Hopefully in the next few weeks I will have a prototype of some sort or another. Suggestions would still be helpful.
-Parc Avenue in Montreal will have its name changed to Robert Bourassa Avenue in about the next year or so. Some of you may know that I live just a few blocks away from Parc, so this may affect me.
-In about 1 hour and 40 minutes my weeklong study break begins.
-Val convocated today.
-I have to work tonight, my third shift on door at Thomson House. Should be good. Last week a few of my classmates were there, I am curious to see if I will recognize anyone this week.
-In a few hours minutes I will be heading of to start using an “information retrieval” utility that was first created in the 1960’s, called Dialog. Apparently it is still going strong even though some of the databases charge over $300 an hour to search. A very simple search can easily cost over $2.00. Fortunately we don’t have to pay because the company is giving us free access.
-I am still thinking about the Montifax Board game. Hopefully in the next few weeks I will have a prototype of some sort or another. Suggestions would still be helpful.
-Parc Avenue in Montreal will have its name changed to Robert Bourassa Avenue in about the next year or so. Some of you may know that I live just a few blocks away from Parc, so this may affect me.
-In about 1 hour and 40 minutes my weeklong study break begins.
-Val convocated today.
-I have to work tonight, my third shift on door at Thomson House. Should be good. Last week a few of my classmates were there, I am curious to see if I will recognize anyone this week.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Montifax Board Game - Preliminary Ideas
If you recall the results our recent survey you may remember that a Montifax board game seemed to be the most popular of the merchandizing options. As I am interested in making a buck as well as board games I thought that I should try to design such a game, as there is proven market interest.
It seems that the obvious goal of the game should be to create the best blog post. The obvious players would be Cameron and Neil, with third and fourth players and Val and Rebecca. The game should be set on the McDal campus and surrounding areas in Montifax. After this the ideas have become a bit vague, I will include them below.
Ideas for game play
-One can have a good blog post by experiencing events. One’s proximity increases the quality of the experience. Through the game these experiences are accumulated and then, based on type and proximity, given a point value. All events experienced by a player are given a point value and then totaled, the player with the highest point total being the winner.
-There would be 2 six sided event die, capable of creating numbers 2-12. The value allocation would be reverse Settlers, so 2 and 12 would be the most valuable because they would be the rarest, 7, 6, and 8 would be mundane events.
-Maybe a large multi-sided (like approx. 24-36) that would correspond to the number of board pieces. This would dictate where each event occurred.
-Each player would be allocated a “schedule” (classes, lunch, drinking, emailing, library time, etc.) that they would cycle through, causing them to move about the board. I think that people should be able to trade schedule events, creating an interactive element. This would be done before the event and location dice were cast.
-Each player would be able to accumulate only so many of any one type of event, thereby making schedule trading relevant. All board locations would have to be covered by the various schedules, obviously a 2 player schedule would then be longer than a 4 player schedule, or the board smaller.
-Elements of travel and proximity need to be added. Just hoping all over campus doesn’t make sense. Trying to be in the right place to collect a certain type of event does.
-Proximity should be along the same lines of “degree of difficulty,” shared events should also be less valuable than those experienced along. The closest person should get the event. In the event of a tie the event goes to no one.
Preliminary Supplies
-personal score sheets
-board
-location pieces
-2 six sided dice
-1 large number die
-player pieces
I guess I imagine this game’s form to be relatively simple. PDFs or other such files could be used to transmit the board, score sheets, rules, and location pieces. Players could be expected to assemble the remaining pieces themselves (I guess this would mean that I wouldn’t be making a buck in the end, too bad.)
Suggestions are encouraged. I would like to make it a bit more interactive. At the moment I don’t think the mechanics are that great, as they are in the very early stages of development.
Several minutes ago I spoke with Nithum and we came up with the following.
-Side deck (cards that allow paradigm changes, or are similiar to Development Cards) can be purchased by cash, which can be earned through working (would be on schedule). When working one does not experience any events that transpire. Side deck will allow people to do such things as experience events from further away, determine event die, change location out of turn, etc. Final and full list will need to be developed. Shifts could be traded to experience more events, and vice versa, player would have to make a decision about what they want to do.
It seems that the obvious goal of the game should be to create the best blog post. The obvious players would be Cameron and Neil, with third and fourth players and Val and Rebecca. The game should be set on the McDal campus and surrounding areas in Montifax. After this the ideas have become a bit vague, I will include them below.
Ideas for game play
-One can have a good blog post by experiencing events. One’s proximity increases the quality of the experience. Through the game these experiences are accumulated and then, based on type and proximity, given a point value. All events experienced by a player are given a point value and then totaled, the player with the highest point total being the winner.
-There would be 2 six sided event die, capable of creating numbers 2-12. The value allocation would be reverse Settlers, so 2 and 12 would be the most valuable because they would be the rarest, 7, 6, and 8 would be mundane events.
-Maybe a large multi-sided (like approx. 24-36) that would correspond to the number of board pieces. This would dictate where each event occurred.
-Each player would be allocated a “schedule” (classes, lunch, drinking, emailing, library time, etc.) that they would cycle through, causing them to move about the board. I think that people should be able to trade schedule events, creating an interactive element. This would be done before the event and location dice were cast.
-Each player would be able to accumulate only so many of any one type of event, thereby making schedule trading relevant. All board locations would have to be covered by the various schedules, obviously a 2 player schedule would then be longer than a 4 player schedule, or the board smaller.
-Elements of travel and proximity need to be added. Just hoping all over campus doesn’t make sense. Trying to be in the right place to collect a certain type of event does.
-Proximity should be along the same lines of “degree of difficulty,” shared events should also be less valuable than those experienced along. The closest person should get the event. In the event of a tie the event goes to no one.
Preliminary Supplies
-personal score sheets
-board
-location pieces
-2 six sided dice
-1 large number die
-player pieces
I guess I imagine this game’s form to be relatively simple. PDFs or other such files could be used to transmit the board, score sheets, rules, and location pieces. Players could be expected to assemble the remaining pieces themselves (I guess this would mean that I wouldn’t be making a buck in the end, too bad.)
Suggestions are encouraged. I would like to make it a bit more interactive. At the moment I don’t think the mechanics are that great, as they are in the very early stages of development.
Several minutes ago I spoke with Nithum and we came up with the following.
-Side deck (cards that allow paradigm changes, or are similiar to Development Cards) can be purchased by cash, which can be earned through working (would be on schedule). When working one does not experience any events that transpire. Side deck will allow people to do such things as experience events from further away, determine event die, change location out of turn, etc. Final and full list will need to be developed. Shifts could be traded to experience more events, and vice versa, player would have to make a decision about what they want to do.
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Survey Results - 1
Thanks to those of you that took the time to fill out our survey. Hopefully it wasn’t to painful, as there were a few rather harsh grammatical mistakes.
Below you will find the results in their relatively raw form. Though these results may suggest the existence of certain trends, such as the existence of a small segment of society that find matheletes sexy, we suggest that further research is conducted to ascertain the full extent of any such trends.
1. All posts should be written in
A) 1st person because blame can then be easily assigned to the appropriate author.
70.6%
B) 2nd person because for years I have been wondering what this is and a few examples would help me get my head around it.
17.6%
C) 3rd person because the authors are dreamy and I want an excuse to read multiple physical descriptions of them.
5.9%
D) 3rd person omniscient because I want to be able to understand the inner workings of the authors.
5.9%
2. Posts should have more
A) Sex because one can never get enough.
25%
B) Sports because I am to lazy to read the sports section in the paper.
0%
C) References to Muppets as these are diminishing as exposure to the Muppets show grows more distant.
37.5%
D) Literary criticism that I can quote at parties so that I will look smart.
37.5%
3. I have come to this blog because
A) Cameron is a superb example of buffoonery.
33.3%
B) Neil’s mathematical prowess rocks my world.
33.3%
C) I searched for “Montifax” and found this crap.
6.7%
D) Drugs somehow got in the way and this just appeared on my computer.
26.7%
4. Which is cooler; math or library science?
A) Math, because I get to see the matheletes running around in their tight shorts.
25%
B) Library science because the librarians know where the books about sex, drugs, and sports are.
6.2%
C) Can there be two duller fields?
31.2%
D) Library science and math embody, in equal proportions, the essential elements of cool.
37.5%
5. If merchandise were to be offered by this blog which type of product would you be most likely to buy?
A) Condoms, because they get sucked into black holes, just like this blog should be.
18.8%
B) A Montifax key chain because I will get to handle it each day.
6.2%
C) An authorized history of the Montifax blog because it would likely be about 2 pages but I could still count it as a book read.
12.5%
D) A Montifax board game because it would likely be the world’s first board game based on a blog which will make it likely to be a collector’s item in the future.
62.5%
6. In a recent Times of London survey McGill ranked as the best Canadian university. What is your response to this occurrence?
A) Always knew it, wasn’t it obvious?
5.9%
B) Ahem, I think they must have forgotten Dal and all of its East Coast prominence.
5.9%
C) If Massachusetts joined Canada then where would McGill be?
17.6%
D) The idea of ranking universities is ridiculous, it is an incredibly subjective objective that cannot be completed in any accurate fashion.
70.6%
7. Nuclear proliferation, as recently practiced by North Korea, India, and Pakistan, is
A) Kind of fun, it kind of reminds me of reality TV, but it’s real.
17.6%
B) Scary.
41.2%
C) The way of the future.
29.4%
D) A good thing for the US to get itself distracted with.
11.8%
8. Libraries are best used for
A) Napping.
41.2%
B) Surfing the web.
23.5%
C) Reading.
17.6%
D) Hooking up with the ladies.
17.6%
9. I expect to check the blog
A) Maybe once more and then I will likely forget about it.
11.8%
B) Two to three more times and then I will forget about it.
17.6%
C) Every day.
35.3%
D) 10 to 12 times a day, as new posts are my heroin(e).
35.3%
Below you will find the results in their relatively raw form. Though these results may suggest the existence of certain trends, such as the existence of a small segment of society that find matheletes sexy, we suggest that further research is conducted to ascertain the full extent of any such trends.
1. All posts should be written in
A) 1st person because blame can then be easily assigned to the appropriate author.
70.6%
B) 2nd person because for years I have been wondering what this is and a few examples would help me get my head around it.
17.6%
C) 3rd person because the authors are dreamy and I want an excuse to read multiple physical descriptions of them.
5.9%
D) 3rd person omniscient because I want to be able to understand the inner workings of the authors.
5.9%
2. Posts should have more
A) Sex because one can never get enough.
25%
B) Sports because I am to lazy to read the sports section in the paper.
0%
C) References to Muppets as these are diminishing as exposure to the Muppets show grows more distant.
37.5%
D) Literary criticism that I can quote at parties so that I will look smart.
37.5%
3. I have come to this blog because
A) Cameron is a superb example of buffoonery.
33.3%
B) Neil’s mathematical prowess rocks my world.
33.3%
C) I searched for “Montifax” and found this crap.
6.7%
D) Drugs somehow got in the way and this just appeared on my computer.
26.7%
4. Which is cooler; math or library science?
A) Math, because I get to see the matheletes running around in their tight shorts.
25%
B) Library science because the librarians know where the books about sex, drugs, and sports are.
6.2%
C) Can there be two duller fields?
31.2%
D) Library science and math embody, in equal proportions, the essential elements of cool.
37.5%
5. If merchandise were to be offered by this blog which type of product would you be most likely to buy?
A) Condoms, because they get sucked into black holes, just like this blog should be.
18.8%
B) A Montifax key chain because I will get to handle it each day.
6.2%
C) An authorized history of the Montifax blog because it would likely be about 2 pages but I could still count it as a book read.
12.5%
D) A Montifax board game because it would likely be the world’s first board game based on a blog which will make it likely to be a collector’s item in the future.
62.5%
6. In a recent Times of London survey McGill ranked as the best Canadian university. What is your response to this occurrence?
A) Always knew it, wasn’t it obvious?
5.9%
B) Ahem, I think they must have forgotten Dal and all of its East Coast prominence.
5.9%
C) If Massachusetts joined Canada then where would McGill be?
17.6%
D) The idea of ranking universities is ridiculous, it is an incredibly subjective objective that cannot be completed in any accurate fashion.
70.6%
7. Nuclear proliferation, as recently practiced by North Korea, India, and Pakistan, is
A) Kind of fun, it kind of reminds me of reality TV, but it’s real.
17.6%
B) Scary.
41.2%
C) The way of the future.
29.4%
D) A good thing for the US to get itself distracted with.
11.8%
8. Libraries are best used for
A) Napping.
41.2%
B) Surfing the web.
23.5%
C) Reading.
17.6%
D) Hooking up with the ladies.
17.6%
9. I expect to check the blog
A) Maybe once more and then I will likely forget about it.
11.8%
B) Two to three more times and then I will forget about it.
17.6%
C) Every day.
35.3%
D) 10 to 12 times a day, as new posts are my heroin(e).
35.3%
A Few Quick Notes 1
- Val will be leaving for St. John’s tomorrow. She will be heading back to convocate, her first time east of Quebec.
- As I was riding my bike back from school I pulled out of the bike parking area on to McTavish heading north. Just in front of me a truck was driving up the street in the same direction that I was heading. As it passed a van on its right it clipped the street-side mirror, causing it to twist backwards, pop out, and shatter as it hit the ground. I got the impression that the truck driver did not see that this had even happened.
- It has been a rainy day today. When I was going to school (I almost typed “work”) I thought it was just a bit damp but it turned out that the raindrops were just very small, though plentiful. Fortunately, I had planned ahead, in case it got worse, and wore my sandals so that I would not have wet feet for several hours.
- The free book box was out today but I was not impressed with the selections so I didn’t take anything. Maybe I will cruise by later today if I head back in that direction.
- I need to go grocery shopping. Nithum and I both seem to be out of fridge type foods, though we are good on freezer content. Vegetables are particularly important.
- My peggle is still around, I haven’t had the heart to take the peddles from my unicycle. Hopefully by either Friday, or early next week, I will have some replacement peddles from St. John’s. Until then I will likely be stuck with my peggle that keeps causing me to scratch my legs as my foot slips off. I really don’t think that I will miss my peggle at all.
- As I was riding my bike back from school I pulled out of the bike parking area on to McTavish heading north. Just in front of me a truck was driving up the street in the same direction that I was heading. As it passed a van on its right it clipped the street-side mirror, causing it to twist backwards, pop out, and shatter as it hit the ground. I got the impression that the truck driver did not see that this had even happened.
- It has been a rainy day today. When I was going to school (I almost typed “work”) I thought it was just a bit damp but it turned out that the raindrops were just very small, though plentiful. Fortunately, I had planned ahead, in case it got worse, and wore my sandals so that I would not have wet feet for several hours.
- The free book box was out today but I was not impressed with the selections so I didn’t take anything. Maybe I will cruise by later today if I head back in that direction.
- I need to go grocery shopping. Nithum and I both seem to be out of fridge type foods, though we are good on freezer content. Vegetables are particularly important.
- My peggle is still around, I haven’t had the heart to take the peddles from my unicycle. Hopefully by either Friday, or early next week, I will have some replacement peddles from St. John’s. Until then I will likely be stuck with my peggle that keeps causing me to scratch my legs as my foot slips off. I really don’t think that I will miss my peggle at all.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Books, wonderful books
For the past few months boxes of free books have been appearing near the Redpath Library at McGill. For months I have been checking these book boxes out and taking books that piqued my interest.
It seems that each year at McGill a fundraising group holds a major book sale that takes months of preparation. These free books in boxes are the books that are believed to be unsaleable by the sales organizers.
Each day on my walk to school I look out for the boxes. On days when they are out I try to check back several times throughout the day as new items are constantly being added. To too great a degree these free books are setting the patterns of my life. Moreover, most of the contents of these boxes really is unsaleable. My standards have been lowered in accordance with the price.
Since I picked up my first free book up in June (when I was hear apartment hunting) I have amassed more than 40 titles. Some of these are worth mentioning, others are not.
Below you will find a partly annotated list of most of the books that I have picked up from this source.
1. Miami and the Siege of Chicago : an informal history of the Republican and Democratic conventions of 1968 by Norman Mailer
2. The Naïve and Sentimental Lover by John LeCarre (I have read the first few pages and am not that impressed as of yet, I don’t think that I will keep going)
3. Danny Dunn and the Heat Ray by Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin
( I picked this one up because it reminded me of a few books in this series that my Mother had when she was a girl. The plan is to send it to her when I get a chance.)
4. Our Game by John LeCarre
(I read this one. Very much a spy novel.)
5. Cat’s Eye by Margaret Atwood
(I was pleasantly surprised with this book. For years I have avoided this author for some reason. I preferred this than Edible Woman)
6. Harry Vernon at Prep by Franc Smith
(Tried to start reading this but it was harsh on the eyes, maybe in a few years I will give it another shot.)
7. Nest in the Wind : adventures in anthropology on a tropical island by Martha C. Ward
8. How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
(Read about the first hundred pages of this one so far. Not as sinister as the title would suggest.)
9. Maurice by E. M. Forster
10. Silas Marner by George Eliot
(George is really a woman!)
11. One Clear Call by Upton Sinclair
(This book is part of an eleven part series that follows “Lanny Budd” from 1913-1949.)
12. Catalina by W. Somerset Maugham
13. Ambassador’s Journal by John Kenneth Galbraith
(I was wondering if a former Professor of mine, Stephen Keller, would be in the index as he know the author during the period, alas, he is not.)
14. For the New Intellectual by Ayn Rand
(It was free so why not?)
15. The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis
(I think that I actually paid for a copy of this a few years ago.)
16. The Best and the Brightest by David Halberstam
(This one I picked up because the author is a Pulitzer Prize winner, though it does not seem to have been because of this book.)
17. Outlines of the History of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick
18. Footballers Don’t Cry by Brian Glanville
(It was free, I was cold and wet and wanted to come back with a free book.)
19. The Children by Edith Wharton
20. This England : selection of pieces from the New Statesman edited by Michael Bateman
21. The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
22. Langenscheidt’s German-English English-German Dictionary
23. Pluckoon by Spike Milligan
(I have wondered what Spike Milligan “was about” for a few years so I thought that this would be a good starting place.)
24. Perry Mason Solves the Case of the Screaming Woman by Erle Stanley Gardner
(This author was mentioned in my cataloging class so I thought that I might check him out, on top of that this names appears in crossword puzzles all the time and it would be nice to be able to place the name.)
25. Perry Mason Solves the Case of the Fenced-in Woman by Erle Stanley Gardner
(See above. There were two there at the same time.)
26. Surfacing by Margaret Atwood
(She seems like a famous author.)
27. The Adventurers by Harold Robbins
( I have no idea what this book is about, but I picked it up for some reason or another.)
28. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
(Pretty famous book that won’t hurt one’s collection.)
29. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
(See above.)
30. Famous Last Words by Timothy Findley
(I am still trying to figure out if this is the same author as of the book “Last of the Crazy People.” If it is I have heard good things about him, if not I could probably ditch this book.)
31. The Club of Queer Trades by G.K. Chesterton
(My grandmother used to have a quote from this guy on her bathroom wall, might as well see what his books are about.)
32. Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All by Allan Gurganus
33. Galahad at Blandings by P. G. Wodehouse
34. The Bad News Bears by Richard Woodley
(It wasn’t until after I returned home that I realized that the book had been based on the screenplay, the screen play from the 1970s that is.)
35. Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin
36. Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
37. A Perfect Spy by John LeCarre
38. The Looking Glass War by John LeCarre
(The last of the four LeCarre books that I have picked up. I think that I might be going for the entire collection, though I can’t say that he is my favourite author. Maybe I will try to read Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and then base my evaluation of his oeuvre on that.)
Two books were picked up and given away so their titles aren’t available.
Hopefully over the next few days before the sale, and maybe for a few days afterwards, I will be able to extend my collection of free books even further.
It seems that each year at McGill a fundraising group holds a major book sale that takes months of preparation. These free books in boxes are the books that are believed to be unsaleable by the sales organizers.
Each day on my walk to school I look out for the boxes. On days when they are out I try to check back several times throughout the day as new items are constantly being added. To too great a degree these free books are setting the patterns of my life. Moreover, most of the contents of these boxes really is unsaleable. My standards have been lowered in accordance with the price.
Since I picked up my first free book up in June (when I was hear apartment hunting) I have amassed more than 40 titles. Some of these are worth mentioning, others are not.
Below you will find a partly annotated list of most of the books that I have picked up from this source.
1. Miami and the Siege of Chicago : an informal history of the Republican and Democratic conventions of 1968 by Norman Mailer
2. The Naïve and Sentimental Lover by John LeCarre (I have read the first few pages and am not that impressed as of yet, I don’t think that I will keep going)
3. Danny Dunn and the Heat Ray by Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin
( I picked this one up because it reminded me of a few books in this series that my Mother had when she was a girl. The plan is to send it to her when I get a chance.)
4. Our Game by John LeCarre
(I read this one. Very much a spy novel.)
5. Cat’s Eye by Margaret Atwood
(I was pleasantly surprised with this book. For years I have avoided this author for some reason. I preferred this than Edible Woman)
6. Harry Vernon at Prep by Franc Smith
(Tried to start reading this but it was harsh on the eyes, maybe in a few years I will give it another shot.)
7. Nest in the Wind : adventures in anthropology on a tropical island by Martha C. Ward
8. How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
(Read about the first hundred pages of this one so far. Not as sinister as the title would suggest.)
9. Maurice by E. M. Forster
10. Silas Marner by George Eliot
(George is really a woman!)
11. One Clear Call by Upton Sinclair
(This book is part of an eleven part series that follows “Lanny Budd” from 1913-1949.)
12. Catalina by W. Somerset Maugham
13. Ambassador’s Journal by John Kenneth Galbraith
(I was wondering if a former Professor of mine, Stephen Keller, would be in the index as he know the author during the period, alas, he is not.)
14. For the New Intellectual by Ayn Rand
(It was free so why not?)
15. The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis
(I think that I actually paid for a copy of this a few years ago.)
16. The Best and the Brightest by David Halberstam
(This one I picked up because the author is a Pulitzer Prize winner, though it does not seem to have been because of this book.)
17. Outlines of the History of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick
18. Footballers Don’t Cry by Brian Glanville
(It was free, I was cold and wet and wanted to come back with a free book.)
19. The Children by Edith Wharton
20. This England : selection of pieces from the New Statesman edited by Michael Bateman
21. The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
22. Langenscheidt’s German-English English-German Dictionary
23. Pluckoon by Spike Milligan
(I have wondered what Spike Milligan “was about” for a few years so I thought that this would be a good starting place.)
24. Perry Mason Solves the Case of the Screaming Woman by Erle Stanley Gardner
(This author was mentioned in my cataloging class so I thought that I might check him out, on top of that this names appears in crossword puzzles all the time and it would be nice to be able to place the name.)
25. Perry Mason Solves the Case of the Fenced-in Woman by Erle Stanley Gardner
(See above. There were two there at the same time.)
26. Surfacing by Margaret Atwood
(She seems like a famous author.)
27. The Adventurers by Harold Robbins
( I have no idea what this book is about, but I picked it up for some reason or another.)
28. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
(Pretty famous book that won’t hurt one’s collection.)
29. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
(See above.)
30. Famous Last Words by Timothy Findley
(I am still trying to figure out if this is the same author as of the book “Last of the Crazy People.” If it is I have heard good things about him, if not I could probably ditch this book.)
31. The Club of Queer Trades by G.K. Chesterton
(My grandmother used to have a quote from this guy on her bathroom wall, might as well see what his books are about.)
32. Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All by Allan Gurganus
33. Galahad at Blandings by P. G. Wodehouse
34. The Bad News Bears by Richard Woodley
(It wasn’t until after I returned home that I realized that the book had been based on the screenplay, the screen play from the 1970s that is.)
35. Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin
36. Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
37. A Perfect Spy by John LeCarre
38. The Looking Glass War by John LeCarre
(The last of the four LeCarre books that I have picked up. I think that I might be going for the entire collection, though I can’t say that he is my favourite author. Maybe I will try to read Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and then base my evaluation of his oeuvre on that.)
Two books were picked up and given away so their titles aren’t available.
Hopefully over the next few days before the sale, and maybe for a few days afterwards, I will be able to extend my collection of free books even further.
Settlers
With my Mom in town I've been busy, but I did convince both her and Rebeccca to squeeze in a game of Settlers tonight. It was really close, with my Mom in charge for most of the game. In the end I pulled out the win having 5 settlements, longest road and 3 victory points. Also of note is that Rebecca played with purple pieces for the first time; I only received them when my Mom came.
Also very enjoyable this evening was the Jalapeno (there's no eñe because I pronounce it like Ricky from TPB) beer from Garrison breweries. It has all the flavour of beer and of jalapeños.
I should post a little more after my Mom goes, as I've been spending more time "on the go".
Also very enjoyable this evening was the Jalapeno (there's no eñe because I pronounce it like Ricky from TPB) beer from Garrison breweries. It has all the flavour of beer and of jalapeños.
I should post a little more after my Mom goes, as I've been spending more time "on the go".
Monday, October 16, 2006
Feeling it
Whoa. I am exhausted.
For each of the past several days I have spent many hours plodding away at various projects. Each of them is nearing the end. One is due on Wednesday, the other Thursday. This should make for a somewhat relaxing weekend.
Fortunately, my partner and I for the one due on Wednesday were quite diligent and basically finished a few days ago. All we have had to do are make a few formatting changes over the past few days. For the other project it has not been exactly the same, though I can't say that we were complete slackers. The problem has been that for the past week or so my partner has been ill and not as productive as usual. It will be done, I made huge strides yesterday adding a number of pages to the report.
Can't wait until Thursday at 4:01, assuming that we have submitted everything successfully.
For each of the past several days I have spent many hours plodding away at various projects. Each of them is nearing the end. One is due on Wednesday, the other Thursday. This should make for a somewhat relaxing weekend.
Fortunately, my partner and I for the one due on Wednesday were quite diligent and basically finished a few days ago. All we have had to do are make a few formatting changes over the past few days. For the other project it has not been exactly the same, though I can't say that we were complete slackers. The problem has been that for the past week or so my partner has been ill and not as productive as usual. It will be done, I made huge strides yesterday adding a number of pages to the report.
Can't wait until Thursday at 4:01, assuming that we have submitted everything successfully.
Testing a new feature
I thought I should see if I could figure out how to post videos to our blog. If I can figure this out, I might then be able to take videos, post them to YouTube, and then post them to our blog. Sounds like fun, dosen't it?
By the way, I should say that I have not seen the video clip that I just posted, which might not be such a good idea, but anyway, here it is.
Sunday, October 15, 2006
Dude, where's my tax cut?
If I recall properly we were supposed to receive some type of tax break in July. 1% off sales tax, if I am not mistaken.
The problem that I am having with the supposed tax cut is that I can’t find it. Most of the items I buy are purchased at the same time as several others, making it hard to determine exactly how much I have “saved.”
What is interesting about he tax cut is that in the instances when I should notice the tax cut, I have not. This has been observance related particularly to my purchases of coffee and papers, two items that I tend to buy alone, allowing me to be aware of price variations.
It seems to me that before the tax cut my Saturday Globe and Mail cost $2.25, exactly the same as it cost on Saturday past. For a while it went down to $2.24, but now it is back up at its pre-cut price.
At Tim Horton’s it seems that a similar arrangement is taking place. Before the tax cut I was paying $1.70 for my x-large black coffee. Immediately post cut I was paying $1.69. Then a few days ago I think that I was back at $1.70, and now I seem to have jumped all the way to $1.75.
Something about these situations strikes me as off. My impression of what has occurred is that many of the places that sell single items that had prices on the fives were totally annoyed, and possibly their customers were annoyed, with all the pennies they now had to deal with. Even if this is not the case, it seems that something has snuck in and caused prices to rise by a cent in very short order.
I can’t say that I am surprised by any of this. I expected this to occur. How long did one really expect it to take for the prices of these small items to come back up to some nice looking price? The result seems to be that instead of the consumers paying a billion less the retailer will be able to take in a “free” billion by milking the fact that we were willing to pay the old prices and won’t kick up a stink about a few pennies here and there.
The best thing about is all is that I get to watch it happen all over again in a few months when we get our second “tax cut.”
The problem that I am having with the supposed tax cut is that I can’t find it. Most of the items I buy are purchased at the same time as several others, making it hard to determine exactly how much I have “saved.”
What is interesting about he tax cut is that in the instances when I should notice the tax cut, I have not. This has been observance related particularly to my purchases of coffee and papers, two items that I tend to buy alone, allowing me to be aware of price variations.
It seems to me that before the tax cut my Saturday Globe and Mail cost $2.25, exactly the same as it cost on Saturday past. For a while it went down to $2.24, but now it is back up at its pre-cut price.
At Tim Horton’s it seems that a similar arrangement is taking place. Before the tax cut I was paying $1.70 for my x-large black coffee. Immediately post cut I was paying $1.69. Then a few days ago I think that I was back at $1.70, and now I seem to have jumped all the way to $1.75.
Something about these situations strikes me as off. My impression of what has occurred is that many of the places that sell single items that had prices on the fives were totally annoyed, and possibly their customers were annoyed, with all the pennies they now had to deal with. Even if this is not the case, it seems that something has snuck in and caused prices to rise by a cent in very short order.
I can’t say that I am surprised by any of this. I expected this to occur. How long did one really expect it to take for the prices of these small items to come back up to some nice looking price? The result seems to be that instead of the consumers paying a billion less the retailer will be able to take in a “free” billion by milking the fact that we were willing to pay the old prices and won’t kick up a stink about a few pennies here and there.
The best thing about is all is that I get to watch it happen all over again in a few months when we get our second “tax cut.”
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Voting Season
On Friday, or yesterday, I was walking out of my apartment building when I noticed a piece of mail in the "no longer living here" pile. From a distance this reeked of election materials. I went to investigate. It turns out that it was in fact an American absentee ballot, though not from New York. If I recall correctly it was from one of the Carolinas.
This ballot got me thinking about my own absentee ballot. Had my application reached the New York Board of Elections? Had the Board of Elections accepted my modified application form?
When I returned from class a few hours later the first thing that I did was check the mail box. It turned out that we had quite a haul. My absentee was one of the several items that had arrived.
Within a few hours I had filled out my ballot and sealed it in the various envelops, as it called for in the instructions.
In case you are curious, I did vote correctly in all races.
This ballot got me thinking about my own absentee ballot. Had my application reached the New York Board of Elections? Had the Board of Elections accepted my modified application form?
When I returned from class a few hours later the first thing that I did was check the mail box. It turned out that we had quite a haul. My absentee was one of the several items that had arrived.
Within a few hours I had filled out my ballot and sealed it in the various envelops, as it called for in the instructions.
In case you are curious, I did vote correctly in all races.
He would have been my co-worker, but he is not, because he quit
Last night I ran into someone that used to have my job. The difference between he and I is that he was smart enough to quit, at least this is how he would see it.
He thought that the job wasn't very good and exciting. Sure, basically being a bus boy is not the most exciting or mentally challenging job in the world, but it seems to pay the bills. This last element he didn't seem to get, that some people have to work to make money, in particular many students have to work to pay for their education.
What I found the most striking about all of this is why a past employee would go back to his old place of work to tell new employees that he used to work there and that their job sucked. He has really moved on nicely. Maybe by the time he is 50 he will have written a book about the experience so we know how little the job meant to him.
He thought that the job wasn't very good and exciting. Sure, basically being a bus boy is not the most exciting or mentally challenging job in the world, but it seems to pay the bills. This last element he didn't seem to get, that some people have to work to make money, in particular many students have to work to pay for their education.
What I found the most striking about all of this is why a past employee would go back to his old place of work to tell new employees that he used to work there and that their job sucked. He has really moved on nicely. Maybe by the time he is 50 he will have written a book about the experience so we know how little the job meant to him.
Mr. Lidle's Plane
It seems that shortly after Mr. Lidle’s small, single engine plane crashed into the side of a building in New York that fighter jets were put in the skies over several major American cities. This concept strikes me as absurd, as it did when it first appear in late 2001.
Firstly, why the other cities? Maybe there was some evidence to suggest this was some larger plot, but I have not heard it mentioned. If there was not evidence to suggest a plot why would this be your next action? Moreover, the plane seems to have made a mayday call shortly before crashing. To me this incident reeks of a one-off tragic accident. I pretty confidant that little evidence will come to light to suggest otherwise.
The larger problem with alerting the fighter jets is how we might expect these crime-fighting machines to actually be used.
A major problem in places like New York City is the limited distance from the airport to the city centre. The heart of New York is just moments away from La Guardia, JFK, and Newark. So if we stick with the jet fighter approach it means that the powers that be must determine that something is amiss and then conclude that it is serious enough for them to counter the threat with serious firepower. Of course, one would likely have less than five minutes to make this decision in situations that count. So one has to wonder if the fighter jet is not in the air can it be of any use at all?
The next major problem is what the fighter jet does while it is up in the sky fighting off risks for the frightened public. Does the pilot just strafe the plane with machine gun fire, not really worrying about the millions below? Or maybe the pilot fires a few missiles? I can’t see either of these being really good options.
The next problem occurs when we think about what happens if a plane is actually hit. Where does it go? Wall Street seems like a possibility in the fighter jet scenario. I don’t see have having falling planes as a particularly safe activity. And which government employee has the authority to authorize a fighter jet to shoot down a plane, which may have only briefly left its flight path. The larger the plane the more complex the problem. I don’t think that I am aware of a western politician or government that would stand behind the active killing of all aboard a commercial airline flight to Florida. If this action did occur it would likely take the government under which it occurred out of office.
So at the end of the day it seems that this is a plan that just won’t work, even under the best of circumstances. It seems to fall flat in terms of logistics as well as political feasibility. The main questions that are left are why such a program exists and how it has not come under intense criticism. I think that we may find it is safe to conclude that this program, surely costing millions of dollars, can only be for optics. It appears to be created as a non-starter, never able to do what it was created to do. The funny thing is that I am not sure that it works. Do I really feel safer to be in a large American city if there are loaded fighter jets flying overhead?
Firstly, why the other cities? Maybe there was some evidence to suggest this was some larger plot, but I have not heard it mentioned. If there was not evidence to suggest a plot why would this be your next action? Moreover, the plane seems to have made a mayday call shortly before crashing. To me this incident reeks of a one-off tragic accident. I pretty confidant that little evidence will come to light to suggest otherwise.
The larger problem with alerting the fighter jets is how we might expect these crime-fighting machines to actually be used.
A major problem in places like New York City is the limited distance from the airport to the city centre. The heart of New York is just moments away from La Guardia, JFK, and Newark. So if we stick with the jet fighter approach it means that the powers that be must determine that something is amiss and then conclude that it is serious enough for them to counter the threat with serious firepower. Of course, one would likely have less than five minutes to make this decision in situations that count. So one has to wonder if the fighter jet is not in the air can it be of any use at all?
The next major problem is what the fighter jet does while it is up in the sky fighting off risks for the frightened public. Does the pilot just strafe the plane with machine gun fire, not really worrying about the millions below? Or maybe the pilot fires a few missiles? I can’t see either of these being really good options.
The next problem occurs when we think about what happens if a plane is actually hit. Where does it go? Wall Street seems like a possibility in the fighter jet scenario. I don’t see have having falling planes as a particularly safe activity. And which government employee has the authority to authorize a fighter jet to shoot down a plane, which may have only briefly left its flight path. The larger the plane the more complex the problem. I don’t think that I am aware of a western politician or government that would stand behind the active killing of all aboard a commercial airline flight to Florida. If this action did occur it would likely take the government under which it occurred out of office.
So at the end of the day it seems that this is a plan that just won’t work, even under the best of circumstances. It seems to fall flat in terms of logistics as well as political feasibility. The main questions that are left are why such a program exists and how it has not come under intense criticism. I think that we may find it is safe to conclude that this program, surely costing millions of dollars, can only be for optics. It appears to be created as a non-starter, never able to do what it was created to do. The funny thing is that I am not sure that it works. Do I really feel safer to be in a large American city if there are loaded fighter jets flying overhead?
Mac people
I own a Dell and I use a Windows machine at school. At MUN I used Linux a bit. I've never really used a Mac. Some people have Macs as well as other computers. However, it seems that when someone owns a Mac they become a "Mac person" (or that they were already). Being a Mac person means that they can meet new people only to discover that the other person is a Mac owner and sigh with a sense of relief that someone else knows Macs are better. This is a little overstated, but it is something I have observed. Most interestingly it doesn't matter that the Mac owner might also own 6 Windows machines. It seems Mac is the dominant gene in people's computer preference.
I was really tired today. It's hard to believe I went through the whole thing without sleeping in class or at work. I have a little break now called the weekend. Hopefully I'll get a little jump on my Measure Theory assignment so next week will be more relaxed. It's late here, I'm off to bed.
I was really tired today. It's hard to believe I went through the whole thing without sleeping in class or at work. I have a little break now called the weekend. Hopefully I'll get a little jump on my Measure Theory assignment so next week will be more relaxed. It's late here, I'm off to bed.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Dilbertization
For one of my classes I have to diagram the "information flow" of an archives, library, or corporate resource centre, though we were told to be creative in our presentation. When first assigned the only way I could think of presenting the project was as a pot of soup. The pot would be the physical structure of the archive, the broth the information, the other bits would each represent another element of the process.
Eventually I was able to move past the soup idea and started doing a bit of reading on the functioning of archives. With my partner, of course this is a group project, we started to make some headway. One problem we faced was that each time we would get a solid idea it would seem to clash with the three page assignment outline, which would conflict with what we were told in class.
Once we had amassed about five diagrams, and thought we were pretty near finished, we headed off to meet with the professor to make sure that we were on the right path. At the meeting we learned that, while we were not wrong, we still had a long way to go. Most of the nodes on our diagram had to be expanded into their own diagrams. This was done after more preparation and work. We were also told that arrows were good, very good. Tables, it turns out, are bad, very bad. These ideas were integrated into the diagrams.
After the updates we thought that another pre-hand-in assessment would be an ok idea, just to make sure as we still had a few concerns about what we should do. This time, actually just yesterday, we again had our project reviewed, this time by the TA. Once again it seems that there are more elements to be added, particularly more arrows.
Every time we meet we get the impression that much of the work is hoop-jumping. They want arrows, so we give them arrows. The problem with all of this is that we tend to get rather cynical (which is where the Dilbert element comes in). If they want arrows should the whole damn thing be arrows. If they want to see where there are budgetary restrictions do we just add all kinds of limitations? We have begun to get away from what I perceived to be the original goal of the project. Instead of trying to create a series of diagrams that would explain the information flow of an archives to an outsider we have just started adding elements to satisfy the grading schemes.
The term "two points" is no longer just a basketball term, it refers to each "budgetary restraints" arrow that we add. Each new diagram section is probably more like a three point shot. Slowly and surely we are collecting our rebounds and sinking shots in our futile attempt to score 100.
We may not be handing in a board game as a project but we have certainly been playing one type of game or another for the past month.
Eventually I was able to move past the soup idea and started doing a bit of reading on the functioning of archives. With my partner, of course this is a group project, we started to make some headway. One problem we faced was that each time we would get a solid idea it would seem to clash with the three page assignment outline, which would conflict with what we were told in class.
Once we had amassed about five diagrams, and thought we were pretty near finished, we headed off to meet with the professor to make sure that we were on the right path. At the meeting we learned that, while we were not wrong, we still had a long way to go. Most of the nodes on our diagram had to be expanded into their own diagrams. This was done after more preparation and work. We were also told that arrows were good, very good. Tables, it turns out, are bad, very bad. These ideas were integrated into the diagrams.
After the updates we thought that another pre-hand-in assessment would be an ok idea, just to make sure as we still had a few concerns about what we should do. This time, actually just yesterday, we again had our project reviewed, this time by the TA. Once again it seems that there are more elements to be added, particularly more arrows.
Every time we meet we get the impression that much of the work is hoop-jumping. They want arrows, so we give them arrows. The problem with all of this is that we tend to get rather cynical (which is where the Dilbert element comes in). If they want arrows should the whole damn thing be arrows. If they want to see where there are budgetary restrictions do we just add all kinds of limitations? We have begun to get away from what I perceived to be the original goal of the project. Instead of trying to create a series of diagrams that would explain the information flow of an archives to an outsider we have just started adding elements to satisfy the grading schemes.
The term "two points" is no longer just a basketball term, it refers to each "budgetary restraints" arrow that we add. Each new diagram section is probably more like a three point shot. Slowly and surely we are collecting our rebounds and sinking shots in our futile attempt to score 100.
We may not be handing in a board game as a project but we have certainly been playing one type of game or another for the past month.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
RIP Cory Lidle
Several news sources are now reporting that Cory Lidle was the pilot of a plane that crashed into an apartment building in New York earlier today.
It seems that the total number of fatalities has not yet been finalized, as I have heard from between 2 and 4.
It seems that the total number of fatalities has not yet been finalized, as I have heard from between 2 and 4.
Visitors
Today, my Mom arrives for a week's stay in Halifax. Part of reason for her visit is because my Aunt Carol, my Mom's sister, and Uncle Fred are in town on a cruise tomorrow. I should have lots planned for us to do, but I don't.
On my way home I went to Sobeys to pick up some oranges for my Mom to have with breakfast. When I was there I remember I had a coupon in my pocket from yesterday where I was over-charged ($4.69 instead of $3.99) for some Raisin Bran Crunch (that had a coupon on the inside). So I went to the customer service desk, showed them my receipt and was reimbursed $4.69; the best part is I checked out with the other employee while I was waiting.
To save on cooking time (so that I could use it for blogging and cleaning) I decided to try the Lebanese restaurant across the street call Tarboosh. I really like the name. I took the recommendation of the employee on what to have. It was very tasty and a bit slower than I would have thought, but obviously cooked to order. If I go again I'll have the Tarboosh platter with two skewers, which I think is probably tastier and a better value. Also good was that it wasn't spicy at all, so Rebecca might even like it.
I tried to internet as soon as I got back, but was foiled by the McAfee that Dal requires for access to their network. I guess fortunately, I'd had the same problem in July (which at the time took me about 3 hours to fix with the help of the computer support guy), and I was able to replicate our work this time in about 5 minutes.
That's my story today so far. Now I'm off to prepare for my mother.
On my way home I went to Sobeys to pick up some oranges for my Mom to have with breakfast. When I was there I remember I had a coupon in my pocket from yesterday where I was over-charged ($4.69 instead of $3.99) for some Raisin Bran Crunch (that had a coupon on the inside). So I went to the customer service desk, showed them my receipt and was reimbursed $4.69; the best part is I checked out with the other employee while I was waiting.
To save on cooking time (so that I could use it for blogging and cleaning) I decided to try the Lebanese restaurant across the street call Tarboosh. I really like the name. I took the recommendation of the employee on what to have. It was very tasty and a bit slower than I would have thought, but obviously cooked to order. If I go again I'll have the Tarboosh platter with two skewers, which I think is probably tastier and a better value. Also good was that it wasn't spicy at all, so Rebecca might even like it.
I tried to internet as soon as I got back, but was foiled by the McAfee that Dal requires for access to their network. I guess fortunately, I'd had the same problem in July (which at the time took me about 3 hours to fix with the help of the computer support guy), and I was able to replicate our work this time in about 5 minutes.
That's my story today so far. Now I'm off to prepare for my mother.
User Survey
As some of you may be aware, on occassion I like to write surveys to gather opinions about certain matters, in this case about this blog. If you would be kind enough it would be appriciated if you would take a few moments to fill out our survey. The link below will take you right there.
Click here for Survey
Click here for Survey
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Traffic Woes
When I walked out of my building this morning I was immediately struck by the number of cars on Prince Arthur. It seemed as though there were many more than ususal, so many more that it was a challenge to cross the street. I took this information and filed it away without thinking much more about it.
After class this morning when I returned home I again noticed a huge number of cars. Traffic was at a stand-still on a normally free flowing street. Once again I found this a little odd. As I was going to the gym before I returned home I walke up Aylmer, the North South stree to the West of my building to the cross street Pins. I then noticed the problem. Pins had been blocked off due to construction work. All traffic that would normally be going along the normally busy Pins would be heading down Aylmer and along Prince Arthur. Things were starting to make sense. Though it is incredible that it was possibly busier at 12:00 than it was at 8:40.
Shortly I will have to head out again and face the bumper to bumper traffic on what is normally a quiet residential street. Hopefully things will go well.
After class this morning when I returned home I again noticed a huge number of cars. Traffic was at a stand-still on a normally free flowing street. Once again I found this a little odd. As I was going to the gym before I returned home I walke up Aylmer, the North South stree to the West of my building to the cross street Pins. I then noticed the problem. Pins had been blocked off due to construction work. All traffic that would normally be going along the normally busy Pins would be heading down Aylmer and along Prince Arthur. Things were starting to make sense. Though it is incredible that it was possibly busier at 12:00 than it was at 8:40.
Shortly I will have to head out again and face the bumper to bumper traffic on what is normally a quiet residential street. Hopefully things will go well.
Monday, October 09, 2006
Trip up North
Today, as it was a holiday, I was able to take advantage of a little extra free time and go for a bike ride with Val. Though when I left my apartment it look a little overcast, it brightened up shortly after we started. From Val's apartment we headed North, our goal was the St. Lawrence.
I did not really know how far away the St. Lawrence was, it turns out it is a good few kilometers away. All in all it wasn't too bad except that the right pedal on my $50 bike was acting up and kept flipping over as I was peddling, it was also on a slightly odd angle.
Anyway, we continued up North. We stopped along the way to visit Val's old apartment. This apartment is obviously much larger than mine and the rent significantly less, though it is a bit too far away as far as I am concerned.
Eventually we could see the river, and the death trap city of Laval on the other side. Apparently this was not our final destination. We continued on for what was a few kilometers until we reached a bridge, which we crossed, and then an island. Here we stopped for a while and had lunch. I climbed down the rocks and put my foot in the water, Terry Fox style, though because the water look a little unhealthy I left my shoe on.
We then began the trek back. Instead of taking the bike paths as we had on the first half of our journey we took main arteries to save on time and distance. One such main road we took was Berri. Near the beginning of our time on Berri my peddle seemed to be getting just a bit looser. I looked down to see that my pedal was falling off. I quickly tried to signal Val to stop so that we could deal with my pedal situation, but I wasn't fast enough. My pedal fell off right on Berri. Fortunately a greasy little peg remained. With this little peg I was able to get home. The bad part was that because the peg was greasy my foot kept slipping off and I would then have to readjust my foot, my max speed was greatly reduced.
We stopped at Jean Talon market where Val purchased a few items, including ten lemons for $2.50. We also had some really nasty coffees. They were so bad that neither of us could finish them. From their it was back to Val's place. I believe that our trip left us both a sense of accomplishment.
I did not really know how far away the St. Lawrence was, it turns out it is a good few kilometers away. All in all it wasn't too bad except that the right pedal on my $50 bike was acting up and kept flipping over as I was peddling, it was also on a slightly odd angle.
Anyway, we continued up North. We stopped along the way to visit Val's old apartment. This apartment is obviously much larger than mine and the rent significantly less, though it is a bit too far away as far as I am concerned.
Eventually we could see the river, and the death trap city of Laval on the other side. Apparently this was not our final destination. We continued on for what was a few kilometers until we reached a bridge, which we crossed, and then an island. Here we stopped for a while and had lunch. I climbed down the rocks and put my foot in the water, Terry Fox style, though because the water look a little unhealthy I left my shoe on.
We then began the trek back. Instead of taking the bike paths as we had on the first half of our journey we took main arteries to save on time and distance. One such main road we took was Berri. Near the beginning of our time on Berri my peddle seemed to be getting just a bit looser. I looked down to see that my pedal was falling off. I quickly tried to signal Val to stop so that we could deal with my pedal situation, but I wasn't fast enough. My pedal fell off right on Berri. Fortunately a greasy little peg remained. With this little peg I was able to get home. The bad part was that because the peg was greasy my foot kept slipping off and I would then have to readjust my foot, my max speed was greatly reduced.
We stopped at Jean Talon market where Val purchased a few items, including ten lemons for $2.50. We also had some really nasty coffees. They were so bad that neither of us could finish them. From their it was back to Val's place. I believe that our trip left us both a sense of accomplishment.
Montifax
I'm pleased to report that we are the top search result on Google if you search for "montifax". For those doubters out there: Yes, there are other sites with the string "montifax" in them. I'm still hoping someday we'll get first for McDal too, but that could take a while.
Sunday, October 08, 2006
My Weekend Was Better Than His
After all of the cooking yesterday I started off the day with a fun trip to find a current newspaper. Unfortunately I was not successful. I ended up purchasing a National Post from yesterday to complement my Globe and Mail from the same day.
After this early morning errand I came back for some food and drink (coffee). While eating I read a bit of the paper and did a few squares of the various puzzles (cross word, quote in a box, and sodoku) though completed none of them.
A bit of hanging around, iTunes managment, and web surfing was done in the late morning and early afternoon. In particular I found a new website for a band my friend Paul is in called Firestorm. The are a metal band from London. If you are interested, the address is something along the lines of http://www.firestormrock.co.uk.
Eventually I motivated myself enough to head out on the day's major errand, to pick up some printer paper from Staples. I guess it was about 16:00 when I finally headed out to the Staples in the Gare Centrale. It is really not a bad walk, just south west of here. On my way into the Gare I noticed that they had a rather extensive set of food providers. In particular the Saint Cinnamon's caught my eye. This reminded me of my youth when there was one of these places in the Mall. I was not tempted, or more accuately, I did not have any cash. On to Staples.
In Staples I found some paper and folders, the two things I had set out to buy. While at the checkout I was informed by the cashier that paper was on sale that week and that if I purchased two I would get a third pack of 500 sheets free. This was great. I ended up getting exactly what I wanted and more for a great price. The folders I purchased were also a great deal, 100 for less than $7.00. I was able to take advantage of the checking out experience and get a bit of cash back.
With my purchases and cash in hand I went back the way I came and stopped at the Saint Cinnamon's and picked up two pecan cinnamon rolls and a medium coffee. While it was a bit pricey, I am pleased that I made the purchase. Hopefully it is enough of an inconvenience that I won't head over too much as it is a pleasure that I can't afford on a regular basis.
The walk back, even though I was loaded down, was pleasant. In some ways it was almost a bit too warm. Hopefully the weather keeps up for the next few days. Tomorrow Val and I are hoping to go on a bike ride, which will be much better without rain.
Studying really should be my next stop this weekend, though I feel a nap and a final cinnamon roll are calling. The AACR2 will have to wait until this evening.
After this early morning errand I came back for some food and drink (coffee). While eating I read a bit of the paper and did a few squares of the various puzzles (cross word, quote in a box, and sodoku) though completed none of them.
A bit of hanging around, iTunes managment, and web surfing was done in the late morning and early afternoon. In particular I found a new website for a band my friend Paul is in called Firestorm. The are a metal band from London. If you are interested, the address is something along the lines of http://www.firestormrock.co.uk.
Eventually I motivated myself enough to head out on the day's major errand, to pick up some printer paper from Staples. I guess it was about 16:00 when I finally headed out to the Staples in the Gare Centrale. It is really not a bad walk, just south west of here. On my way into the Gare I noticed that they had a rather extensive set of food providers. In particular the Saint Cinnamon's caught my eye. This reminded me of my youth when there was one of these places in the Mall. I was not tempted, or more accuately, I did not have any cash. On to Staples.
In Staples I found some paper and folders, the two things I had set out to buy. While at the checkout I was informed by the cashier that paper was on sale that week and that if I purchased two I would get a third pack of 500 sheets free. This was great. I ended up getting exactly what I wanted and more for a great price. The folders I purchased were also a great deal, 100 for less than $7.00. I was able to take advantage of the checking out experience and get a bit of cash back.
With my purchases and cash in hand I went back the way I came and stopped at the Saint Cinnamon's and picked up two pecan cinnamon rolls and a medium coffee. While it was a bit pricey, I am pleased that I made the purchase. Hopefully it is enough of an inconvenience that I won't head over too much as it is a pleasure that I can't afford on a regular basis.
The walk back, even though I was loaded down, was pleasant. In some ways it was almost a bit too warm. Hopefully the weather keeps up for the next few days. Tomorrow Val and I are hoping to go on a bike ride, which will be much better without rain.
Studying really should be my next stop this weekend, though I feel a nap and a final cinnamon roll are calling. The AACR2 will have to wait until this evening.
My holiday weekend so far
My weekend started off on a high note by passing in my NSERC application. Rebecca and I then went to see Trailer Park Boys: The Move at Park Lane. It was well worth it, especially considering we used a 2 for 1 coupon. The two worst aspects of the movie were the rehashing of basic story lines (which I understand was necessary) and the new actor that played Trinity (but I guess you can't expect good acting from 10 year-olds in crude movies). Afterwards we went to the Thirsty Duck on Spring Garden Rd. I had the two-pattied lamb burger for $9 and Rebecca had the Spring Garden Salad with chicken. The service was very fast so we were only there for about 30 minutes, in which time Andrew and his girlfriend came in.
At 4:30 I got up to walk Rebecca up to the Lord Nelson to catch the Airporter. There were 5 people already waiting when we got there, many of whom turned out to be on Rebecca's flight. I then returned to Fenwick where I slept until 2:30. The afternoon filled itself up pretty well culminating in buttermilk pancakes for breakfast at 7:30. At this point I didn't have much time to get ready and visit the NSLC before going to Andrew's for a party, but I made it there (with my Carling Black Label) about the same time other people were showing up. The crowd was almost exclusively Newfoundlanders, some of which knew Cameron (e.g. Luke Gaulton says "Hi"). The party was good. Just about as good as the 12 hours of sleep I had after I got home.
I went to Dominion this afternoon to find that much more of their store is open on Sunday (compared to Sobeys). For those of you who don't know, half of Sobeys has plastic and caution tape over it (so that it is 'closed') for purposes of abiding by provincial Sunday shopping laws. I also found salsa that is low in sodium at reasonable price (President's Choice of course).
Now I'm off to get a jump on next week's assignments.
At 4:30 I got up to walk Rebecca up to the Lord Nelson to catch the Airporter. There were 5 people already waiting when we got there, many of whom turned out to be on Rebecca's flight. I then returned to Fenwick where I slept until 2:30. The afternoon filled itself up pretty well culminating in buttermilk pancakes for breakfast at 7:30. At this point I didn't have much time to get ready and visit the NSLC before going to Andrew's for a party, but I made it there (with my Carling Black Label) about the same time other people were showing up. The crowd was almost exclusively Newfoundlanders, some of which knew Cameron (e.g. Luke Gaulton says "Hi"). The party was good. Just about as good as the 12 hours of sleep I had after I got home.
I went to Dominion this afternoon to find that much more of their store is open on Sunday (compared to Sobeys). For those of you who don't know, half of Sobeys has plastic and caution tape over it (so that it is 'closed') for purposes of abiding by provincial Sunday shopping laws. I also found salsa that is low in sodium at reasonable price (President's Choice of course).
Now I'm off to get a jump on next week's assignments.
Cooking
As I already mentioned, yesterday I baked 6 loaves of bread. This was not the only cooking/food preparation that I did though.
In addition to the baking I also prepared a cranberry salad and some leek and potato soup. This means that I spent a pretty fair portion of the day involved in food preparation. What is odd about all of this is that I don’t really have plans for any of this food. Furthermore, I haven’t actually had any of it yet, unless you count parts of the bread that stuck to the pans.
I am not really sure why all of this ended up being made today, it just seemed to happen.
The bread is the most obvious. I finished my last loaf and needed more. I can make a few loaves and freeze them until they are needed. This isn’t that much work and it saves a bit of money. Additionally, I think that I enjoy making bread.
The leek and potato soup and been in the works for a few days, at least from a conceptual point of view. I had purchased the leeks on sale at the Provigo early in the week and needed to use them. The potatoes were purchased the week before on sale at the Metro. Clearly this needed to be made at some point, but why today?
The cranberry salad came about today when I was visiting Lobos, a local grocery store, and noticed that they had cranberries. They looked to be of a good quality and a reasonable price so I purchased them. Once they were purchased I had to do something with them. Since the only thing that I know to do with cranberries is this salad recipe that is what happened.
So I guess there is a reason for each of these things being made today, though it is surprising that they all three reasons materialized on the same day when I live in apartment with an almost non-existent kitchen.
Even though I don’t have any plans for Thanksgiving I guess I will be already to go if someone does come over.
In addition to the baking I also prepared a cranberry salad and some leek and potato soup. This means that I spent a pretty fair portion of the day involved in food preparation. What is odd about all of this is that I don’t really have plans for any of this food. Furthermore, I haven’t actually had any of it yet, unless you count parts of the bread that stuck to the pans.
I am not really sure why all of this ended up being made today, it just seemed to happen.
The bread is the most obvious. I finished my last loaf and needed more. I can make a few loaves and freeze them until they are needed. This isn’t that much work and it saves a bit of money. Additionally, I think that I enjoy making bread.
The leek and potato soup and been in the works for a few days, at least from a conceptual point of view. I had purchased the leeks on sale at the Provigo early in the week and needed to use them. The potatoes were purchased the week before on sale at the Metro. Clearly this needed to be made at some point, but why today?
The cranberry salad came about today when I was visiting Lobos, a local grocery store, and noticed that they had cranberries. They looked to be of a good quality and a reasonable price so I purchased them. Once they were purchased I had to do something with them. Since the only thing that I know to do with cranberries is this salad recipe that is what happened.
So I guess there is a reason for each of these things being made today, though it is surprising that they all three reasons materialized on the same day when I live in apartment with an almost non-existent kitchen.
Even though I don’t have any plans for Thanksgiving I guess I will be already to go if someone does come over.
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Making Bread
More bread making today. It will be about 6 loaves. Last time it was 4. I guess that means next week it should be 8.
First Night
So I had my first shift at Thomson House last night. Work was certainly exhausting. The job was relatively straight forward but the shift was long, especially for a slow night. Even though my position title is that of “door person” it turns out the job is basically that of a busboy, though I am also responsible for security. This means that we door people pick up
glasses and restock the bar until people need to be kicked out or reigned in, in which we case we switch to that function. Because it was a slow night last night it meant that we basically focused on busing tables until we had to notify people that we were closing.
Just prior to finally kicking people out for the night we I had the pleasure of cleaning out the sink. The nastiness of this is that people have been dumping drinks, including lemons, limes, and oranges, and cherries, all day long. On top of this already nasty mix add remnants of various dips, soups, and pizza cheese. There seemed to be a few unidentifiable items that had been thrown in throughout the day. Yum! In theory much of the junk is supposed to be caught in a strainer, in reality this is only partially true. The entire area, after the yucky bits have been removed, gets a full Ajaxing.
One job perk is that we get a meal each shift. The downside was that last Night was, and every Friday will be, pizza night. The good side was the kitchen made me a cheese and tomato free pizza. Instead of the regular toppings it had only ground beef, pepperoni, onions, and mushrooms. It was very tasty. We also get tea/coffee/pop throughout the night as we want it or need it. I took great advantage of the unlimited pints of free ice water.
Looks as though Friday night will be my regular shift. On the whole this is pretty good because I can get most of my work out of the way on a night when I won’t be doing much serious studying anyway. I look forward to future Fridays and shifts at Thomson House.
glasses and restock the bar until people need to be kicked out or reigned in, in which we case we switch to that function. Because it was a slow night last night it meant that we basically focused on busing tables until we had to notify people that we were closing.
Just prior to finally kicking people out for the night we I had the pleasure of cleaning out the sink. The nastiness of this is that people have been dumping drinks, including lemons, limes, and oranges, and cherries, all day long. On top of this already nasty mix add remnants of various dips, soups, and pizza cheese. There seemed to be a few unidentifiable items that had been thrown in throughout the day. Yum! In theory much of the junk is supposed to be caught in a strainer, in reality this is only partially true. The entire area, after the yucky bits have been removed, gets a full Ajaxing.
One job perk is that we get a meal each shift. The downside was that last Night was, and every Friday will be, pizza night. The good side was the kitchen made me a cheese and tomato free pizza. Instead of the regular toppings it had only ground beef, pepperoni, onions, and mushrooms. It was very tasty. We also get tea/coffee/pop throughout the night as we want it or need it. I took great advantage of the unlimited pints of free ice water.
Looks as though Friday night will be my regular shift. On the whole this is pretty good because I can get most of my work out of the way on a night when I won’t be doing much serious studying anyway. I look forward to future Fridays and shifts at Thomson House.
Friday, October 06, 2006
First Day of Work
After almost two months I (Cameron) will be heading back to work.
The last time that I worked it was in a library, this time it will be in a Mansion. Some might say that I am moving up in the world. I am not so sure about that assessment.
The mansion in which I will be working is called Thomson House. This mansion functions as a bar/restaurant as well as a graduate student union office.
My understanding is that my new post is that of "Door Person." I think that this will also involve several other functions that one wouldn't normally associate with that of a person working the door. Changing beer kegs is likely to be an important role, especially on a Friday night like tonight.
The last time that I worked it was in a library, this time it will be in a Mansion. Some might say that I am moving up in the world. I am not so sure about that assessment.
The mansion in which I will be working is called Thomson House. This mansion functions as a bar/restaurant as well as a graduate student union office.
My understanding is that my new post is that of "Door Person." I think that this will also involve several other functions that one wouldn't normally associate with that of a person working the door. Changing beer kegs is likely to be an important role, especially on a Friday night like tonight.
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Welcome
Hi everybody,
Cameron and I have decided to start a joint blog so our friends and family can hear our stories. Spread the link.
Neil
Cameron and I have decided to start a joint blog so our friends and family can hear our stories. Spread the link.
Neil
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