First Harvest

Today, after several months of waiting, I harvested my first batch of yellow beans. Not surprisingly, as the beans were grown inside during the fall, the harvest wasn't as large as I might have liked. For some reason many of the beans failed to develop and those that did failed to grow to particularly large sizes. Hopefully once spring rolls around and I have a chance to plant a few more bean plants these problems will find a way to resolve themselves.

For those of you that are interested, I am still holding out some hope that the corn will produce some kind of consumable product, though I imagine that this is not particularly to occur.

A Few Quick Notes 240

-Yesterday and today have both been quite wet. Both days have been marked by periods of heavy precipitation. Fortunately, I seem to have managed to avoid some of these downpours on my way to school, which is nice as I am never a big fan of starting my day wet.

-A few days ago Neil, Rebecca, and I watched the documentary American Movie. The film follows Mark Borchardt as he attempts to complete Coven, an independently produced and financed short film. While there are many moments of humour, the film is in many ways strikingly sad. Not only does the viewer witness the mental and physical deterioration of the the protagonist's uncle, but the viewer also gets a rather close look

-It seems that the New York Times is reporting that in the near future the Christian Science Monitor will transition from a daily newspaper to an online newspaper with a regularly published magazine component. While this is not the largest of daily newspapers in the US, this change may be a sign of things to come in the very near future. One wonders how long other papers will be able to hold out in an era of declining circulation and increased competition from the online news media.

-My uncle was kind enough to forward me Gerard Damiano's obituary. For those of you who are not porn aficionados, Damiano was the director of the classic porn film Deep Throat. Surely fans of the film will be saddened by this news.

I am now curious to see if the Globe will carry his obituary, and if so how long it will take to appear.

-I managed to get through my lecture on Monday. While it likely wasn't the world's best lecture, I also don't think that it was the world's worst lecture. I am hoping that tomorrow's lecture on the American presidential system and elections will generate at least a modicum of excitement in the class. On Friday I will get the pleasure of talking to the class about writing and citing, with particular reference to the assignment that they have to do for me.

-For much of the evening I have been reading critiques of the work of George Grant, a Canadian political philosopher. Unfortunately, I haven't found these works particularly illuminating or accessible. I keep skimming my eyes over the page without getting much information. Hopefully I will eventually get some sense of what is going on by the time I decide to pack it in later tonight.

Turkey tan lines

A few years ago I was shown a picture of a turkey that had been tampered with during the roasting process in such a way that it appeared that the turkey had tan lines. While I didn't attempt this trick on the turkey I prepared for Thanksgiving a few weeks ago (mainly because of the mild embarrassment that such a stunt might cause) I decided to give it a try on the turkey I prepared today.









To start, I arranged the turkey in the pan and then coated it with olive oil. I then cut out some tin foil pieces to lay on the turkey. Unfortunately, I didn't plan the attempt all that well and thus had a difficult time visualizing the shape of the bikini top cut-out. Once I had the cut-outs they were laid on the turkey and the turkey was placed in the oven to roast.





After the several hours of roasting time that were required the turkey was removed from the oven for consumption and examination. At first I was quite impressed to see that the tin foil seemed to be quite intact and hadn't managed to move or become damaged during the roasting process. I also learned that, unfortunately, it didn't really do all that much on the tan line front either. It seems that the tin foil had at best a minimal effect. Maybe on the next go around I need to find some way to plan a little more and think about a way to get crisper tan lines.

A Few Quick Notes 239

-Today has been slightly overcast, but nothing particularly bad. I just hope that any rain holds off long enough for me to make it to the library tonight without too much hassle.

-Because our last turkey was so successful we decided to try another, which is cooking right now. While the last turkey was stuffed and accompanied by a rather full spread, this one will be a little more bare bones with just a few vegetables and some mashed potatoes. Hopefully things turn out well, otherwise we will have about 12 pounds of sub-par turkey to get through in the next week.

-A few days ago I was looking around the apartment for something easy to read and I happened to come upon Advanced Calculus of Murder by Erik Rosenthal. After a quick examination I learned that the book was a murder mystery written by a math professor about a crime solving sessional lecturer (and part-time private investigator). What was particularly fun about the book was the way in which the university life was treated. Based on my experiences, many elements included in the book rang true (though as it was written in a time before email and the internet there are a few aspects of university life that don't work quite the same way today). Anyway, if you are interested in books about crime-solving mathematicians written by mathematicians I would recommend that you check this one out.

-I managed to spend a few hours on both Friday and Saturday evening at the library. Amazingly, the place wasn't deserted. I guess Dalhousie student like to study. It is still a bit of a toss up whether or not I will try to head in tonight. Instead of heading in I may just try to stay at home and work on a few things, though I tend to be more focused while in my carrel. The prison like conditions don't give me much to focus on other than school work.

-I have to give my first lectures tomorrow. Hopefully I have spent my time preparing the right content. I guess I will find out how things go tomorrow morning.

Amazingly, much the time I have spent preparing has been focused on content, not the creation of topical jokes. I think I have spent more time thinking about creation of jokes for the lectures than actually working on any such material. If nothing comes effortlessly tonight the students may just have to go without such content for the next few days.

Window Plants

A few day ago I posted this photo to show the progress of the plants that I have growing in my bedroom window, progress that has been largely mirrored by the plants growing in the rest of the apartment.

As you can see, in the past two weeks the beans and corn have really taken off, each growing several inches. The beans and corn now take a fair portion of the window and are likely to continue to take up more in the days and weeks to come.

Though less noticeable in through an examination of these photos, the banana plant (the plant furthest to the left) and the aloe droplets (in the empty looking pot next to the banana plant) are also making surprising progress, especially considering that we are heading into Winter in Halifax and these are both plants that are used to much sunnier climes.


The thyme and bay tree, while holding their own, haven't really exhibited spectacular growth. I am hoping that they both make it through to the Spring and then start to really thrive.

A Few Quick Notes 238

-The past few days have been on the cool side, which isn't all that bad as it means that I am sweating less on my walk to school. Today, unlike some of the days earlier in the week, is quite nice with clear skies and little wind.

-I still don't have any good on one liners or jokes for my upcoming lectures. As my first lecture is on Monday my time is running short, though maybe it is more appropriate that I spend my time preparing the actual content of the lecture rather than the jokes that I don't expect anyone to get.

For those of you who are curious, I don't expect that I will go to my Friday class in costume, though my short-shorts and pink top probably would help them to remember my lecture for years to come.

-Is it just me or have all Halloween costumes taken a turn for the slutty? No longer can one just go as a French maid, one must go as a slutty French maid.

If I can get my hands on a Dick Nixon mask I am thinking about trying to go (where I don't know) as "Slutty Richard Nixon," the side of Richard Nixon you have always wanted to see.

-Due to illness my presentation originally scheduled for last week went ahead yesterday. Though not superb, I think it was passable. My general problem with presentations is that they don't scare me enough to actually try and prepare for them. I always assume that I will just be able to wing it rather effectively, and as it turns out, this isn't a skill that I have.

After the presentation, while the professor was leading a discussion on the topic of the presentation, my pen started to leak all over my hands. I found this rather amusing because just a few days ago I was wondering if pens still did this, or whether pen design had moved so far in recent years that this phenomenon was a thing of the past. It seems that the answer is that pen design has not moved to a stage in which leaks are impossible, though they do seem rarer than even a few years ago.

-Based on a trend I am witnessing in my apartment I am starting to wonder if pork chops are the new ramen when it comes to cheap student eating. Though I have only witnessed an increase of pork consumption in this apartment, I presume that the frequent pork sales are a sign that other students are also doing their best to make sure that this is a trend, not just a blip in our apartment.

-Due to school work I have recently been falling behind on my newspaper reading. This is a little disappointing as I quite enjoy reading the newspaper.

-For a second Friday night in a row I will likely have to head into my library carrel to crank out a few hours of reading and work. On the up side, while at the library I will be able to pick up an inter-library loan book that came in, and maybe find a few materials for my upcoming lecture.

A Few Quick Notes 237

-While today was passable for the better part of the day things eventually managed to go downhill. By this evening we were experiencing intermittent showers and gusts of wind, though this was nothing that I couldn't deal with.

-It seems that the video of the shopping cart races at Bubbles Mansion has been posted in a Trailer Park Boys forum. I am pretty impressed that within 24 hours someone had been searching for such videos and found mine. As far as I can tell it was the first one on YouTube to cover this year's event.

-As of today I have started to prepare my lectures for next week. Fortunately it seems that I will be speaking on a topic with which I feel relatively comfortable. On the other hand, I am still somewhat nervous about giving three hour long lectures. Hopefully they will be as successful as I imagine is possible. I guess as soon as I figure out the content I will have to start working on a few obscure jokes to fit in the lectures (it really is too bad that I am not covering the chapter on 'cleavages').

-Yesterday we purchased a full pork loin. At the moment it is rammed into the bottom of our fridge. It is likely that by tomorrow I will have to chop it up into pork chops so that we have some space and so that it doesn't go bad. I can't say that I am really looking forward to the idea of wrestling a 3 piece of meat on a counter that is only about 2.5 feet wide. The up side is that we should get about 30 pork chops out of the piece of meat. And it turns out that pork chops are very easy to cook.

"Bold Move by the Shit Hawks"

This evening while my mother, Neil, Rebecca and I were walking around downtown looking for a restaurant we noticed that there was some activity on a street just below Citadel Hill. I suggested that we try to head up and find out what it was. As we approached it became clear that the event was associated with Bubbles' Mansion and that the event was hosted by Bubbles himself.

Within a few minutes we figured out that Bubbles' Mansion was hosting a series of shopping cart races and that Bubbles was officiating and hosting the event. We were able to stake out a good position at the bottom of the course and watch a few of the heats.

In the first race we saw (and the one that is posted below) the Shit Hawks make a daring move and cut off their opponents. Bubbles was quite clearly shocked that they had made such an aggressive move, suggesting that it was a "Bold move by the Shit Hawks." For some number of minutes after the race he continued to comment on the gutsy/dangerous move made by the Shit Hawks.

Within a few minutes we were on to the final race. The teams made it down the hill without incident and headed towards one of the turn-around sections. Though we couldn't see it, it soon became clear that something happened on the turn and that the team that emerged second was less than pleased. As the second place team neared the finish line it was clear that one of their wheels was damaged and no longer fully functional.

Hopefully I will hear about Bubbles' cart races before they happen in the future as it would be nice to see a few more of the heats, and maybe even free up the evening so that I could attend the after party at Bubbles' Mansion.

A Few Quick Notes 236

-It is presently a little overcast. Though the more noticeable feature of the weather is that the temperatures have finally dropped to just above freezing. While my computer is telling me that it is near 10 degrees this is not the case, it is really much closer to 0, as Environment Canada is reporting.

-Shortly after my mother arrived yesterday morning we went for breakfast. After breakfast we made a trip to the local farmers market. Not surprisingly, the farmers' offerings are now significantly reduced I didn't see a single stall selling celery, though most did have things like carrots and beets. Though I don't think I will be making weekly visits, I am somewhat curious to see what happens in the place in the winter (I guess the butchers and bakers can sell just as easily in the Winter as the Summer).

-On Friday night I was trying to do some reading but was particularly distracted by some of the unfounded assumptions that were made by the authors. For some reason this really distracted me and prevented me from working.

-Yesterday, in preparation for one of my classes I read an article about anarchy and was surprised by the relative size of the portion of the article devoted to religious anarchy, particularly when this didn't seem to be a particularly influential component of anarchy. Even after the reading I am not particularly convinced that I am ready to lump these groups in with the other anarchists, almost everything about their beliefs seems different than more traditional anarchist thought. I almost feel that the author had some special affinity for these groups and thus included them in his review article.

-For several hours each of the past two nights I have had the pleasure of spending a few hours reading in my library carrel. What was particularly striking about my visits to the library on these two nights was number of people present. While not every table was taken, as would be the case on a normal weeknight, enough were taken though you wouldn't be so bold as to consider yourself alone and start talking to yourself or acting erratically. Presumably if I head back tonight (which is my plan) I will find the library in a similar state.

Neil, Rebecca, and are wondering if the consistency of the library hours are what is leading to this use of the facility. Each night the library is open until 12:00. The result is that people don't have to know have to guess about when the library is open late or if it will be open. Most other academic libraries I have visited have different hours on Fridays or the weekend, something that may cause confusion among users (though of course we have no evidence to suggest that this is the case other than my observations on two nights).

A Few Quick Notes 235

-While we had some rain yesterday, things seem to have turned around today. We had a pretty nice fall day as far as I can remember, though I feel as though I spent much of it inside.

-Yesterday my class was canceled. It seems that my professor was ill. The result is that the presentation that I was supposed to give yesterday has been postponed until next week, which is fine with me. Now, instead of preparing for a new topic I can spend this time trying to catch up on other work that has started to pile up.

-Because some of my time was freed up because of the canceled class I felt that I could take the time to head to Point Pleasant Park for a stroll, which is a trip that I have been meaning to take since I arrived. As expected, the visit was quite nice, though it would have been even better had the skies not been overcast and threatening showers. Maybe I will try to head back at some point in the coming weeks, but I can see that I might be on the busy side.

-Yesterday Neil and I got around to mailing absentee ballots for the upcoming American election. It ended up costing us $2.17 per envelop to send our ballots to US. This seems a little high as they weren't particularly big envelops, and as it only cost the New York Board of Elections 97 cents to send them to us. Can it really cost that much more to send things from Canada to the US than from the US to Canada?

-It seems that I can avoid my TA obligations no more, I will finally have to start working on the three lectures that I have to give at the end of October. On Monday I will get a final confirmation of the topics/unit that I will be covering. Unfortunately, this really doesn't give me all that much time to prepare, and as I still don't have a copy of the text book I imagine that I will even have less time. Anyway, how long can it possibly take to prepare for three one hour lectures that I have never given before? Surely not more than 2 or 3 hours and I can probably count on the class jumping in with contributions to fill up any extra time I have. Oh, I also need to come up with an assignment/essay topic that relates to the as of yet unknown lecture topics.

-I recently had a few ideas about the recent Canadian election and proportionality, if they come to anything I may try to post them here. Basically I am trying to find a way of determining if the elections are becoming more proportional or not, or if there is even a trend in either direction.

A Few Quick Notes 234

-Today was pretty beautiful. The sun was out in full force and the temperature quite nice for walking.

While I feel as though I keep indicating that it is superb weather we actually have had a little sub-par weather recently. Notably, on Thanksgiving we had some rain, and we might get some later in the week (meaning as early as tomorrow), not that I am looking for this to end or meaning to complain.

-On Monday evening we had three people over for Thanksgiving dinner. While I was somewhat apprehensive about this decision, mainly because I had a paper due on Tuesday, it turned out quite well. Actually, that I had something to take a break from may have made the evening more enjoyable.

We had what I consider a pretty standard Thanksgiving meal, meaning turkey, vegetables, potatoes, gravy, and stuffing. For my first turkey I was quite pleased with the results, especially considering that I did it without the ideal roasting equipment.

-As some of you may know, there was an election in Canada yesterday. After about four hours of library work and a notification that the building would soon be closing I decided to call it a night and head over to the Grad House and watch the election coverage with Neil and a few of his friends. By the time I arrived, which was at about midnight, most people had cleared out and the results of the election were largely known, though CBC held off on officially calling it a minority government win for the Conservatives for some time.

Unfortunately, the CBC coverage was pretty bad. Not only did they not provide us with the information we wanted (like how people were doing outside of Atlantic Canada) the broadcast was simply not well put together. At one point we watched in disbelief as one of the presenters stood in front of a screen and gave a very hastily prepared presentation on election related Twitter activity. This stood out because they didn't even use the normal technology that would have allowed them to directly broadcast the images, or green-screen technology that would have allowed the woman to stand in front of the image. Instead she stood in front of a TV screen and manually flipped through the pages of a presentation, all the while the guts of the program were available to views. I won't continue any further complaints as I don't think my complaints about the coverage will be particularly useful to anyone, nor will they be pleasant to read.

-Yesterday my American ballot finally arrived. While I was quite pleased to see that it had finally arrived, I was quite disappointed to learn that like in the Canadian case I have to provide my own stamp to return my completed ballot (though to be fair I didn't expect that this would work from Canada). I guess what I found particularly shocking about the return envelope is that there appear to be several spelling mistakes, though it is possible that I am just not reading things correctly. Anyway, if you can figure out why the spelling in the adjacent picture is I would be quite interested in hearing about it.


Anyway, I guess I will have to figure out how I am going to vote and then find an appropriate stamp and send it back before it is to late.

Do you see what I see?

This image, originally part of a larger picture, was on the front page of a local free daily newspaper a few days ago. Almost as soon as I saw this section of the picture I felt as though they had gone a little further than normal by putting such a risque image on the front page. While I am willing to accept that the intent wasn't to be suggestive, they surely should have been aware that someone would either take offense or delight in such a positioning of individuals

[Embedded image]

A Few Quick Notes 233

-Today has been beautiful so far. Hopefully this weather will manage to hold for the next several days.

-While at the grocery store yesterday afternoon I noticed that they were experiencing a celery shortage, it seems as though they were out of regular celery. When I went to their competitor I found that the situation wasn't much better. While they had celery in the second store it was some of the worst celery that I have ever seen. Much of the celery was yellow instead of green and just generally unappetizing. Unfortunately, as I really wanted celery I was forced to settle for a distinctly sub-par option.

-For the past few weeks I have not been able to motivate myself to read recreationally (aside from newspapers). A few days ago I was listening to an interview on The Sound of Young America with Chip Kidd and realized that we had one of the authors book at our apartment. Almost as soon as I located the book I started reading it and am now almost done. It is great to be reading recreationally again. My next problem will be to find something to read once I am done with this book.


-Several more of my beans have sprouted. While dealing with the newly sprouted plants I decided that I would like one of the pots in my room. This means that I can now spend my time watching my beans grow instead of doing work. The picture is of the variety of plants are presently in my window (left to right: banana plant, aloe droplets, corn, thyme, yellow beans, bay tree).

-Last night we had chicken rice soup for dinner. In a divergence from my normal pattern, the pieces of meat were actually large enough to identify as meat, and there was more than one piece per bowl. Though I might be biased, I thought it was pretty passable.

-Google Analytics seems to be showing an increase in search activity for our blog in the past few days. Not exactly sure what is causing the surge in interest or why it all seems to be because of people finding us through web searches.

-On Thursday night the fire alarm in our building sounded at about 11:00. Once we had gathered things like our pass-ports we made our way outside. Within a few minutes a few fire trucks arrived to check out the building. Fortunately, nothing was on fire and we were able to head back in. Though as this was taking place Neil and Rebecca decided to go to Video Difference to rent a movie. I quickly decided to tag along (though only after I dropped off my belongings).


-Last night, while trying to work on a project I started to play around with some of the features associated with my computer's built-in camera. The following is one of the ways I was busy wasting my time.

Friendly neighbourhood spider

A few weeks ago Rebecca and Neil noticed that a spider had taken up residence in our balcony area. Since its arrival the spider has had to build a number of webs, such as the one shown in this picture. What is particularly impressive is how quickly the spider is able to reproduce a web once the previous web is destroyed, and that the spider somehow manages to survive the various forms of web-destruction that beset it and have the will/energy to continue re-building.

I think that all of us are curious to see how long the spider will be in this location and what happens when the colder temperatures start to set in. Also, I can't imagine that the blowing leaves of fall will be particularly beneficial to the web, and seeing as it is in a debris friendly area I imagine that this will be a problem that the spider will have to encounter sooner rather than later.

A Few Quick Notes 232

-We had a little rain this afternoon. While it hasn't continued the skies haven't really cleared so I am a little worried that we may get more this evening. On the other hand, one forecast I examined seems to suggest that we should have clear skies for the next couple of days.

-While in class today the professor mentioned the British television series Yes, Minister. This means that this particular show has now come up in all three courses I am taking. It might also mean that I should probably get around to watching an episode or two. (It seems that I should be able to get my hands on the first season of Yes, Prime Minister).

-A few days ago I purchased a new rain jacket at Mountain Equipment Co-op. I was able to test it for the first time in today's brief rainfall. So far it seems to work pretty well, which is good.

Now that I know that it works I am particularly pleased that I purchased the discounted model rather than the somewhat pricier fancy model.

-Several weeks ago I had the pleasure of getting to do a short project on Marxist theory, now I get the pleasure of looking into rational choice related material. I am not sure how I am so lucky to get my two favourite topics in such quick succession.

-Neil and I didn't manage to win our Ultimate game last night, though we did come within striking distance in the second half. Unfortunately, I don't feel that I played particularly well or was of much use to the team. On the other hand, I do think that I played well on the last point (though by this point we weren't in a position to be able to win).

First lard, now lemon juice

In late 2004, while I was living in England, I came across a few stories about a lard shortage in Western Europe. Apparently the impending expansion of the EU lead to all kinds of cheap pork going to the new countries instead of towards lard production. The result was that all kinds of British grocery stores were out of lard in the weeks leading up to Christmas. The newspapers managed to get interviews with people worried that this shortage would wreck their Christmas baking.

Soon after I started reading about the Europe-wide lard shortage I started going to grocery stores to see if this shortage was as drastic as reported. It turned out that most stores were actually out of lard. To be sure I would ask store employees, many of whom were quite shocked when they couldn't find the lard (clearly they hadn't been following the lard shortage news as closely as I).

I was reminded of this product shortage a few days ago when Neil told me about the world-wide lemon juice shortage. Apparently, some kind of weather condition wiped out a big portion the lemon crop, thus reducing the number of lemons available for juicing.

The parallels are striking, a standard, but little used, product that you expect grocery stores to have and would be at somewhat of a loss if they didn't have what you were looking for. Hopefully not to many people have been put out by this shortage (or the lard shortage of 04/05).

A Few Quick Notes 231

-We had another nice day today in Halifax. Unfortunately, as the sun has started to set the temperatures have really begun to drop. Hopefully we will stay above freezing.

-Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending a talk in the anthropology department at Dalhousie given by an acquaintance from New York (though I met him in St. John's). The talk covered a fair bit of ground, giving me lots to think about, and included several well-placed swipes at sociology (which were well received).

After the talk I ended up joining the speaker and a number of the anthropology graduate students for coffee. While I wasn't able to contribute too much to the conversation it was informative to see how things are done in different, but related, departments.

-Last night we went over to Sobey's and purchased a turkey. Soon after we returned to our apartment Neil rammed it into the freezer. Each time the freezer is open one gets to examine the precariously balanced turkey, with its feet almost protruding from the freezer.

-I had to cram in a fair bit of reading to prepare for class today. It is likely that I will have to go through a similar experience tonight, though I can't imagine that I will be able to get as much in tonight as I did last night.

-My reading will likely be somewhat hampered because of my plans to play Ultimate with Neil's team tonight. It seems that they need an additional male player. This should be good because I have been a bit short on physical activity since I arrived, and it is nice to have a one or two social encounters a week that extend beyond my school of home lives.

-Since arriving in Halifax I have been hitting the non-alcoholic beer hard. Neil is worried that I might be turning into a non-alcoholic, and he might be right.

Watson finished 3rd in EPT £1 Million Showdown

Shortly we went out for dinner Michael Watson was eliminated from the EPT £1 Million Showdown. His third place finish should be good for about £241 000 (about $460 000 CDN).

For those of you that care, the live video feed of the event was pretty good, certainly better than getting text based updates minutes after the action. Furthermore, the commentators were seemingly pretty competent and made more complimentary comments about the online players than many other poker commentators that I have seen.

SirWatts eliminates two more

Michael Watson has now eliminated all three players that have busted at the final table. He first eliminated David Benyamine who called Watson push with pocket aces. Then Watson eliminated Masaaki Kagawa. Watson went in ahead with AK vs. AQ and dodged the Q that he wasn't able to dodge in an earlier hand against Kagawa. Watson is now guaranteed at least £103,000.

Watson is one of eight left at the EPT £1 Million Showdown

Watson's elimination of Isabelle Mercier means that there are now only 8 player at the EPT £1 Million Showdown final table. This means that he is now guaranteed at least £59 000.

Watson at final table of EPT £1 Million Showdown

It seems that Michael Watson has made it to the final table of the EPT £1 Million Showdown. Making the final table means a guaranteed payout of at least £51 000, with the chance to win as much as £516 000.

The final table will get under way shortly. Live coverage is available at eptlive.com. It seems as though they will be streaming the event live.

Update: One can also get events through the PokerStars blog, and as these are text based they might be easier to access for some of you.

A Few Quick Notes 230

-We had another nice day today. The sky was clear and the temperature pleasant. The only problem was that I didn't get enough of a chance to experience it from the outdoors.

-I am glad that Neil picked up on our 2nd anniversary, otherwise I would have completely missed it. It seems hard to believe that it was two years ago that this started (and that we haven't really gotten any better but have continued to keep at it). Strange that our 2nd anniversary and 500th post happened so close to each other. I wonder what the second anniversary gift is and if it is considered standard to give one to one's blogging partner on such occasions?

-It seems that today also happens to be the anniversary of Alexander Keith's birth (commonly called his birthday). To celebrate the brewery/beer baring his name hosted a concert headlined by Wintersleep. While I didn't manage to attend the show I was able to hear some of it from my window. Unfortunately, I think that I managed to hear the opening acts but not Wintersleep, thus continuing my run of opportunities to hear them play live that I have missed.

-My father is in town so we were able to take a trip to a shopping district on the edge of town. Unfortunately, I didn't end up buying a filing cabinet as I intended to. It seems that they were a little more expensive than I would have liked. I was able to buy a few other office-type supplies, which was nice. Were were also able to make a stop at a club store to pick a few groceries. The most impressive purchase might be the pork loin for $23 (which I then ended up carrying in by flopping it over my shoulder).

Two years

Hi faithful readers,

This is your not-so-faithful blogger. Today, October 5th 2008, is the 2nd anniversary of the first post on this blog. It wasn't a momentous post (this one is already longer), but it was still the first. Cameron no longer posts from Montreal but I guess that's okay because someone had to post from Halifax.

In other news, our landlord gave us an update on the competitive food drive. We're told we are in 3rd place. It's good to have an update, but I doubt it is accurate because it would have been quite an effort to weigh everything in all the buildings and then return the items to the boxes. Our apartment is certainly giving its fair share, having donated another 3kg since seeing the notice. The contest ends on Wednesday.

A Few Quick Notes 229

-Today has been a rather beautiful day. The sun is out and the skies are clear. To top it all off the temperature is just about right for a nice fall day.

-Today I was thinking about going to Point Pleasant park for a walk. In the end Neil and I ended up going to the grocery store instead.

The grocery store was particularly tempting because of the wide range of meats that they had on sale. Not only did they have the more usual meats such as beef and pork on sale, but they also had turkey, duck, and lamb available at reduced prices. While we ended up only purchasing beef today I imagine that I will have to pick up some lamb and turkey before the week is over.

-As I mentioned previously, Neil is quite interested in winning the food bank donation competition. So while were were at the grocery store we picked up a few items to donate. Aside from some straight forward canned goods we picked up an 8 KG bag of rice and a 2 L bottle of apple juice. Hopefully these contributions will go a long way towards helping our building secure the victory.

-Last night I attended the Ransom A Myers Lecture at Dalhousie. When I first arrived it seemed that I was quite under-dressed, basically everyone there was in a suit (or the female equivalent). I on the other hand was wearing my 'I 'club' baby seals' shirt, a sport coat, shorts, and steel-toed boots (clearly dressed to impress). Furthermore, not only did I feel under-dressed I was somewhat worried about how my shirt would be received by the members of the audience (as it was a lecture about conserving fish stocks).

As it turned out, I was just on the early side so the only people present were the individuals running the event (including the acting Dean of Science and the speaker). As time passed the auditorium filled up quite nicely.

The event went quite smoothly. Afterwards there was a reception with free beverages (including wine) and food. As I was planning on doing some more work and as I didn't really know anyone present I decided to just have a glass of juice and head out.

-It seems that some of the bean plants have finally started to produce beans, though they are still very small. Judging by the number of blooms we may actually have beans to allow all three of us to have a taste of the harvest.

Buoyed by these modest successes, I planted 11 more bean seeds this morning. Hopefully these newly planted seeds will be as successful as their forerunners.

The other food crops really haven't been so effective when it comes to producing food. The radishes really don't seem to be fattening up, though the foliage is definitely improving. The same goes for the beets and corn, if we get anything edible from either of these I will be shocked.

-I should try to get some reading done today. I think the first agenda item will be to continue reading about new social movements and interest groups, then I will have to move on to readings about the media and politics.

So You Juggle Mighty Young Joe?

Yesterday, while looking through the list of databases that Dalhousie provides I came across one called 'Street Terms,' which is maintained by the US Office of National Drug Control Policy. It seems that this resource, I don't think I would actually call it a database, provides drug related terminology and definitions. (To access the content you need to scroll down to the bottom of the page, they also provide a PDF version of the content).

Some of these are remarkably amusing. For instance, apparently 'juggle' means to sell drugs while 'mighty young joe' refers to depressants. I am pretty sure that you can use any of them in a sentence as I did, I can't imagine that there are regional variations or community specific terms (if there were they surely would have been noted in the source).

My first thought was how this could possibly be up to date. I would imagine that almost as soon as such data could be collected, compiled, and published that it would be out of date. How long is 'mighty young joe' really going to be used to refer to depressants? Providing a static list like this seems to be a little bit less than useful. It seems a much better tool might be the development of some kind of user moderated list that members of the law enforcement and prevention/counseling communities could access and update on a regular basis. The simple slowness of the current approach surely impacts its effectiveness.

Anyway, check it out so that you can be up to speed with the latest in drug related terminology.

Elective Dictatorship vs. Elected Dictatorship

Recently I have noticed what seems to be a difference of usage in the United Kingdom and Canada. In writings from the UK one frequently finds the term 'elective dictatorship' used while in Canada it seems that the synonym 'elected dictatorship' is preferred.

The other thing that is rather noticeable about the difference is that in the United Kingdom the phrase is associated with a particular individual, Lord Halisham. I feel that this phrase, and the name of the person to whom it is attributed, came up in almost every class I took during my year at Keele. One seemingly couldn't say 'elective dicatorship' without referencing good old Lord Halisham.

In Canada we don't ever refer to the origin of the phrase 'elected dictatorship,' we just use it. Presumably, though I don't have any evidence to support my claim, this phrase is a bastardization of Lord Halisham's original. The crossing of the Atlantic caused it to become corroded and slightly reduced in elegance.

I think that I prefer 'elective dictatorship,' though I don't have a particularly good reason. Maybe it is because 'elective dictatorship' seems to indicated that the process doesn't happen just one time, we continue to use the system. 'Elected dictatorship,' on the other hand, could mean an instance in which a dictator was elected and then remained for as long as they saw fit. There was no assumption that as dictator they would ever face another election.

On a related note, I finally found the source and text of a quote that I read some number of years ago and have been since misquoting.

"I have heard many arguments which influenced my opinion, but never one which influenced my vote." attributed to Sir James Ferguson, 1832-1907. The quote was included as an epigraph in the article Constitutional Reform: A Modest Proposal By Leonard Tivey.

A Few Quick Notes 228

-Today started off overcast, kind of like many of the other days this week, but then turned to rain in the later afternoon. Amazingly, the rain almost perfectly coincided with my walk home from school, and since then it has been dry (but still overcast). Apparently the forecast I read yesterday about sun for the rest of the rest of the week wasn't quite accurate.

-Based on further research (conducted by Neil) I feel relatively comfortable saying that Brad Kilpatrick will be playing with Holy Fuck on Q tomorrow. Unfortunately, Brad will not be with Holy Fuck when they play in Halifax on October 23 (though this hasn't discouraged Neil and I from thinking about going).

-This evening, Neil, Rebecca, and I went to see Burn After Reading at the local cinema. Though I didn't know all that much about the film before I saw it (aside from the fact that there was something about the CIA) I was quite satisfied with the experience. It was particularly nice to take an evening away from reading (though this means that I will likely have to pay for it tomorrow and Saturday).

-Thinking of reading, I seem to be spending several hours a day reading for my various classes. My guess is that this is how I will spend much of my day tomorrow.

-Several days ago I received a notice that I had been assigned a study carrel in the library. This was somewhat surprising as I hadn't asked for one (though I did want one). Today, after some number of days, I finally got around to heading to the library to pick up my key.

While the carrel isn't particularly large it is at least a place for me to leave my coat once winter hits. Also, it should be useful once I start using the library a little more.

-Funny that I should mention libraries as today I happened to check a book out for the first time this academic year. More impressive that it took me until October to do this is that I didn't check the book out from a Dalhousie library, but from the King's library (one of the nicer looking libraries I have encountered). The only problem is that I don't have the book for as long a period of time as I would had I checked it out from a Dalhousie library.

-For those of you in Halifax area tomorrow night you may be interested in knowing that Dalhousie will be hosting the first Ransom A. Myers lecture. The lecture, which is to be given by Andy Rosenberg on the future of the fisheries, will be held in the Ondaatje Auditorium in the McCain building at 7:00 PM. Ram, formerly of St. John's and DFO, studied the decline of fish stocks at Dalhousie until unfortunate passing in 2007.

[Update: This was our 500th post.]

Competitive Charity

Today we received a notice from our superintendent about a Thanksgiving food drive. Apparently all of the buildings owned by the same company in this part of town will be competing against each other to see who can give the most food (by weight) in the next week. The winning building will receive a free (Autumnal) BBQ.

Soon after I finished skimming the flier Neil informed me that he was in it to win, he didn't even consider coming in second place.

We then started strategerizing about possible paths to victory. The obvious dollar/weight winner is a 5 gallon jug of water. Unfortunately, I would imagine that this would be both disqualified and beyond the spirit of the event. It seems that things such as flour and sugar might be in bounds ethically and according to the judges. The borderline move would be to try to slip a few bottles of pop in, but not so many that it would look as though the weight was being intentionally tweaked.

Already it seems as though there are more canned goods than dry goods, indicating that others in the building are also playing the game and in it to win.

I will let you know how it turns out. (I guess I could have said "I will let you know when we will be having our BBQ.")

A Few Quick Notes 227

-Today has been overcast all day. For most of the day I have been expecting it to rain at any minute, though this hasn't happened yet. Apparently, things are supposed to be rather nice for the rest of the week.

-Holy Fuck will be performing on Friday morning's episode of the CBC Radio 1 show Q (though I imagine that the host will call them 'Holy F'). This might be of interest to those Brad Kilpatrick fans out there (or to fans of the band). Actually now that I have looked into it a little more, I am not so sure if Brad is with the band or if he will be with them on Friday as it seems he has a series of concerts with another performer.

-The .docx file format is really frustrating me. Never before have I had so much trouble opening files from classmates. I hope that either this file format falls out of fashion or is modified in such a way that would allow individuals without the newest word processing software to open it.

-This evening I went for a nice walk on Barrington and Spring Garden. At one point on my walk I stopped at a CD store for a few minutes. Fortunately, their selection was somewhat poor so I wasn't tempted to buy anything.