Trailer Park Boys: Workin' Man (Season Finale)

I barely made it home last night to watch Trailer Park Boys, my very favourite show on earth. Overall, I think the episode was really no better or no worse than the remainder of the season, which in total was pretty lack lustre. It still had some pretty funny moments if you ask me:

In the field, though, Cory and Trevor realize that they've forgotten to do household chores for Sara and decide to go back to the park—they'll finish harvesting the weed later. On the drive back, Cory and Trevor's car collides with the courier truck. The force of the blow has the two idiots pinned inside and when Julian discovers the dope hasn't been harvested, he panics.

There were also some horrible parts. Why was Rita McNeil on the show? What did she contribute? She barely had a line, and didn't really look like she wanted to be there. She was just standing there in the frame, taking up space (yeah... something's she's good at). I wish they wouldn't have just squeezed her into a small cameo role - it detracted more from the episode then it added. Overall, it was alright, but I'm so excited about the ways things turned out in the end. There were two great things that happened which are going to set up some humour for next season. First off, Bubbles ended up in jail. That's never happened before, and there's going to be a funny joke or two about living there, with one of his cats in his cell at the beginning of the next season. Secondly, Cory and Trevor stole the money from the big drug deal that the boys made, and bought the trailer park for themselves. Here's how all that happened:

Plus, when the Boys get out, they'll be property owners. They tracked the courier shipment on the Internet and when they're released from prison, the Boys are confident they'll own Sunnyvale Trailer Park. However, Cory and Trevor have a surprise for them. Sick and tired of being mistreated by the Boys and with Sara and Lucy's encouragement, Cory and Trevor pull a fast one—they've taken the money from the dope scheme and bought the park for themselves!

This is great because they're going to be totally running shit the next year. This is going to piss off Julian and Ricky to no end. I can't freaking wait.

Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

All week I was planning on heading to the Skydome on Sunday to check out the Blue Jays. At the last minute, I got sidetracked and ended up visiting a friend instead. All I can say is... God damn. Little did I know that the William Hung was performing at the game. That would have changed my entire plan. Looks like I missed a great time.

Hung may be a nerd, a geek and a dork, as some suggest, but he's also a very successful one — living his little life large, getting and giving a charge by singing, as atonally and stiffly as one might have expected, "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," in front of a paid attendance yesterday of 22,225. The Jays scored a run in the bottom of the seventh, immediately after Hung's croon, but lost — perhaps fittingly — to the Texas Rangers 4-2 to end a four-game winning streak.

I will forever live in regret.

The Hacker's Diet

The Hacker's Diet is an interesting look at dieting and nutrition for people on the go who don't necessarily have the time and energy to devout to dieting and exercise. The tagline is "How to lose weight and hair through stress and poor nutrition".That maybe a little over the top, but it's still a worthwile look none the less. It's written by John Walker, one of the designers of AutoCAD. He knows all about being busy on the computer and unable to follow a dedicated regime.

Howard Stern Download

I've talked about the Red Skunk Tracker before, a great site for up to date Howard Stern Show downloads, assorted audio files, or E! Show Clips. Yesterday, I found another great source for Stern downloads: LINK REMOVED EMAIL FOR DETAILS it's not pretty, but the downloads are FAST! Yesterday, I was downloading at around 200 k/sec. That's great for me. This is especially great because I'm working on archiving all the Stern material I can find, just to have. If anyone can point me to any other Stern download sites that would be great.

Stalin World

It seems that there is a new amusement park opening up in Lithuania - Stalin World. It is a museum that's been dediated to Stalin, Lenin and other important leaders of the USSR. iIt seems to attempt to mimic the look and feel of a Soviet prison camp - complete with barbed wire and guard towers. Here's an exciting scenario of what goes on there - it seems it put Disney World to shame.... ha

During a recent gala opening, thousands of invited guests were greeted at the gate by an actor dressed as Stalin; a Lenin look-a-like, complete with a goatee and cap, sat fishing by a nearby pond. Guests were invited to drink shots of vodka and eat cold borscht soup from tin bowls, while loud speakers blared old communist hymns. Nearby, red Soviet propaganda posters read: "There's No Happier Youth in the World Than Soviet Youth!"

Obviously, many Lithuanians are completely outraged by the fact that these people are profiting off of the horrors of the Soviet era, especially under Stalin's reign. I think it's summed up pretty well here:

magine that in your country, one day armed KGB men come to your door. They beat your neighbor, rape your sister, your mother, kill your brothers...and exile your family,” Kerosierius was quoted by The National Post newspaper. “And now someone is building monuments to these killers, these rapists? No country has ever built monuments for tyrants. Are there any monuments for Hitler or Goebbles?”

Maxtor One Touch

Well, I got my Maxtor One Touch today. I was really excited all day at work, having been checking the UPS tracking number every second. It arrived at my house at 10:41 this morning, and I was more than aware all day. I got home, opened the box, installed the software, hooked up the power and then realized: I have a problem. Turns out that the firewire cable that comes with the drive has 6 pins, the slot on my laptop has only 4. Turns out that I need to buy an exciting 6Pin/4Pin adaptor or a new able. God damn... I could always hook it up via USB (not 2.0), but that's what I bought it for. I refuse to lower myself to that standard. Guess I'm waiting to the weekend to play with it.

Freak Injuries

ESPN has an interesting article on baseball's freak injuries. This all came to light because Sammy Sosa recently was forced to admit that his back injury came as the result of a violent sneezing episode. The article is full of interesting stories of players, my favourite is what happened to Wage Boggs in the Mid-80's:

Wade Boggs knows about the shoes. In the mid-'80s, Boggs was in a Toronto hotel as Red Sox were in town to play the Blue Jays. When Boggs attempted to pull off his cowboy boots, he lost his balance, fell hard against the couch in the room and sprained the muscles in his back.

Interesting stuff - it's nice to know that these guys are perfectly human after all.

Maxtor One Touch

I wrote about the my ponderings surrounding a purchase of a Maxtor One Touch drive the other day. I finally pulled the trigger. I bought the 250 GB Firewire/USB 2.0 drive for $377 CDN via TigerDirect.ca. It seems like a good deal to me - I was able to get 50 extra gigs over my budgeted purchase for only $8 - with free shipping to boot. It should be coming by Thursday or Friday, I'll let you guys know what I think when it arrives. In the meantime, I'm amassing a wealth of stuff that I've always wanted to keep on hand (Movies, Music etc.) that I never have had space before. How long before I need another 250 Gb? That's the real question

Work's out!

My oh my, seems that my long weekend just got a little bit longer. I showed up at work today and we were having serious computer problems. It seems that our main server/firewall (?) was completely fried over the weekend. We had a crazy amount of rain/thunderstorms over the weekend, so I think that lightning's currently being blamed for it all. I can't believe that we don't have proper surge protection, but what do I know? That mess got me sent home (with pay!) for the day. Being a kinda dot Com company, everything is based so heavily on the internet, so without that server, things completely fall apart. It's really kind of crappy for me... I was so set on buckling down and just getting some work done this week. Only 3 more days until the weekend.

Did They Read it? Part 2

Seems that DidTheyReadit is really not as scary as was first thought by me and members of the mainstream media. I wrote about many of these fears in a previous post on this site. An anonymous reader comments in that post to dispell many of those worries and to properly explain to you why you shouldn't be afraid. I think it's worth posting here on the main page:

It's worth noting that this service -- like all the other companies trying to do this -- is really just using a web bug graphic. It only works if (1) you're reading the mail in HTML, not plaintext and (2) you allow your mail reader to load web content. I do neither, and I'm by no means alone; if you get more than a couple sexually explicit spams, you'll turn off automatic image loading, too. Even better, new versions of Outlook, Thunderbird, and others actually default to not loading external graphics in HTML emails, meaning services like DTRI are basically dead on arrival. They can't work reliably, and they're trivial to circumvent. Tell your friends...

Consider the changes made on my puter.

"Andy Kaufman Returns" Was A Hoax

It turns out that the entire Andy Kaufman Returns blog was just a big hoax. ....Who knew? The author, Enrique Proust of Burbank, CA explains his great prank:

"I faked the whole thing", Proust explained, "it was very easy to do. I am deeply sorry for any distress I have caused to the Kaufman family and any of Andy's closest friends". He continued, "it was my intention to continue the spirit of Andy Kaufman alive and to provoke debate about his possible whereabouts, but I did not anticipate the feelings of those closest to him, and for that I'm very sorry."

Sure, I guess it might be be disrespectful to Andy's family, but honestly did any one actually think that the website was true? Is it really worth stressing about?

Quiet Day

I'm bored, tired and just distracted. I plan on spending my Victoria Day doing absolutely nothing. I haven't had just a day to relax in quite a while, it's going to be great, just great.

Trailer Park Boys: Propane, Propane

I don't know whether I liked last night's episode of Trailer Park Boys or not. It all seemed to be very complicated and crazy. All the loose ends that I had previous written about: Lahey/ Randy, and Sara/Cory/Trevor seem to be coming together, but it was done it such a roundabout why that it was a little bit overwhelming. Here was my favourite part of the episode:

To be sure that the propane truck is legal, they steal some old licence plates from Ray. Julian tells Barb that they'll soon have the money to buy the park; she's pleased. The Boys then arrange for Bubbles to take his rig-driving test because they need a driver with a licence to drive the truck. Bubbles fails his driving test due to his poor eyesight. He's very upset but Ricky lies and tells Julian that Bubbles passed. Ricky can get Bubbles a fake licence.

At the end of the episode I was left with just one question: RICKY AND BARB ARE TOGETHER? WHAT THE HELL? I think I'm going to reserve judgement until the second part of the episode next week. It might end up great in the end, but I wasn't overly impressed with this epsode, or really any of them this year. It's really all cinematic and complicated now - it just used to be straightforward, in your face and hilarious. I miss the good old days.... (last year).

Maxtor OneTouch

I've currently in the market for an external hard drive. My currently being burdened by my crappy laptop 40GB harddrive that is more than full with my 25+ Gigs of MP3's. I really don't have room for any of the movies, documents and other files that I wouldn't mind having on hand all the time, but instead they're now buried in stacks upon stacks of CDR's. My laptop has firewire capability, so I think I'm going in that direction. I've been scouring around to decide which to buy, I think I've settled on a Maxtor OneTouch 200 Gig drive. It seems to be reliable and capable of the kind of speed that I'm really looking for. As well, the price seems right to me. Only $369 CDN at my local computer store (lowest price I could find on a reputable site or another store). Any feedback that anyone can share on that drive, or any suggestions for any alternate external drives worth looking at would be very much appreciated.

History of Roller Coaster

Just caught an interesting timeline of roller coasters over on Britannica.com, entitled Roller Coasters: Inventing the Scream Machine is an interesting look at the history of this great form of entertainment. Ron Toomer, an American roller coaster designer who was at the forefront of the development of steel coasters, sums up much of the appeal:

"A big part of the attraction of roller coasters is that people know that unlike with hang-gliding or skydiving, the train is definitely going to come back"

All this talk makes me want to go to Canada's Wonderland - too bad it's such a crappy, rainy long weekend here.

Lightning Win

I'm really happy that the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Flyers last night in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference final last night. I'm happy for four basic reasons:

1. I hate Philadelphia because they are constantly destroying the Toronto Maple Leafs
2. The Stantley Cup final is now going to be really high flying and exciting
3. I think that Calgary will be more able to beat the Lightning than the brusing Flyers. Go Canada!
4. Dave Andreychuk is finally making it to the dance.

I can't wait until Tuesday... The finals are going to be great.

Guide to Friendship

Viceland Magainze is a really cool magazine that I've been reading religously over the last couple of months. It has a really funny, witty and interesting writing style that is really difficult to describe, but damn funny to read. Of particular interest today is The Vice Guide to Friendship which sets out a number of critera to apply to your friends to see if they're really your friends forever. The article describes its purpose better than I ever could:

Here are some surefire guidelines to tell if the type of person you're hanging out with is a friend or just some douchebag using you for your car/other friends/money/couch.

Here is my favourite qualification:

FRIENDS BEAT PEOPLE UP FOR YOU I was at a show, standing on a chair, and I didn't know where to put the bottle cap from my beer. I thought it would be hilarious if I silently placed it on top of this random dude's head. And it was! Until the guy saw me laughing hysterically and realized what I'd done. Then he was like, "Stop laughing at my expense!" (He literally said that.) And he pushed me off my chair onto the floor. My friend Gus got right up in his grill and was like, "Dude!" and he pounded him, even though Gus just got out of jail. Now that guy and everyone around him know that shoving a girl is different.

There are many other intersting points in the article, but they've done little more than confirm my suspicion that some of my friends aren't as good as I have always thought.... Still I good read though.

Recent Furl Entries

Just thought I would post my recent Furl entries, just because I really like Furl and I really think that I have some interesting stuff buried in there that will likely never see the light of the day on the site. Stuff that I think is really worth seeing. Another reason is just to see how all this site integration stuff works within Furl - just to say I can. Here we go:

In case you forgot, I've wrote about Furl in the past

World's Longest Alphabetical Email Address

You can now sign up for a free email address at the great domain name abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijk.com. Imagine, impress your friends and confuse the masses with this horrible address. Here's my favourite reason for getting signing up:

Companies think that your email address is fake Companies nowadays love to send spam to people's email boxes, but imagine what they would think of your email address when they see it; they might think that it is fake and don't even bother sending you any spam mail! This is the only email address that would actually encourage companies to stop sending spam to you!

It's totally useless, but entertaining none the less.

Did They Read it?

Do you ever send an email and sit there worrying for days that the person never recieved it? Is that special someone ignoring you? Can they really say 'I never got the messge'? An intersting new service, DidTheyReadit has recently opened its doors to answer these questions and more. This program invisibly allows the user to see when, where and how long that their messages were viewed. It seems like a useful service, although it really sort of blurs the lines of privacy. The reciever of the message has no idea what's going on in the background. All the information is secretly sent back to DidTheyReadIt. This USA Today article sums up many of these fears:

The reaction could be harsh. "It will freak people out," says Internet expert Esther Dyson. "It violates our electronic space in a way that's as uncomfortable as someone violating our physical space," says Mitchell Kertzman, a partner at technology investment firm Hummer Winblad. "Add this company to the long list of people who are making the Internet a less attractive place to live and work."

Andy Kaufman is Alive

I wrote about the possiblity of Andy Kaufman's return last week, and it turns out that it's all true. It seems that Andy has been writing a blog to document his return to the spotlight. The dream is now a reality. Here's part of my favourite post so far:

I care about my fans, the ones who understood my rare form of comedy meets performance art spectacle. That's why I'm going to give back to you guys only, and tour the country appearing unexpectedly at local Starbucks and Wal-Marts.

Keep an eye on this one.. I know I will be.

Lasso Trickery

The Lasso: A Rational Guide to Trick Roping is an interesting online book that shows you the finer arts of rope tricks. I'm sure you've all seen the convential flat loop, but it seems there is so much more to the lasso than that. There are crazy tricks like the Texas skip, the Butterfly, and even interesting catches. I don't understand a single thing on the page, but it seems pretty damn impressive to me. Generally speaking though, the lasso seems much much cooler than I thought. But if the thought of impressing the opposite sex with your crazy rope skills isn't enough. The author provides further insight to motivate:

Over the years I've taught trick roping to many people and I feel that my knowledge of the underlying physical principles has greatly aided my students to more rapidly learn lasso tricks. The objective of this book is to describe these principles in an intuitive way. Don't worry you won't have to be a rocket scientist to understand them! Once you're familiar with them you'll have the know-how to learn any lasso trick.

Googlewar

Yet another interesting use of Google is Googlewar. In this great battle you enter two words and find out which one has more entries. It's pretty.... useless, but interesting none the less. I guess Bush wins.

Re: Pee on the Hands

Moises Alou pees on his hands to tougen them up, and he's none to happy about the world knowing about it. I wrote about it in a post yesterday in case you missed it. Seems that Moises Alou was none to impressed with reporter Gary Miller who wrote a story about a private ancedote they shared during spring training. I read the details over in a Ben Maller story with the very witty title of 'Alou "peed off" at ESPN reporter' ha ha. Here are some details:

Only in this sad world of reality TV, where phony sincerity is the norm, would a true apology be filmed. But that was the surreal scene Wednesday at Wrigley when ESPN's Gary Miller, who had broken a confidence with Cubs left fielder Moises Alou in late April when he reported that Alou urinates on his hands before games for a better bat grip, tried to hash out and settle his differences with Alou on the field during batting practice.

Pictures

I was thinking about maybe posting a picture of myself on this site and then I saw this: Why you should never put your picture on the Internet ... Now you'll never see me. Via scratch & sniff

Hasselhoff Rapping?

The Sky is falling! The Sky is falling. Apparently Ice-T's teaching David Hasselhoff to rap. I think the article says it all:

Rap legend Ice-T is risking his massive reputation on his latest recruit - middle-aged former beach bum David Hasselhoff.The original gangsta believes he can turn the ex-Baywatch star into hip hop's next big thing.Ice and Hasselhoff, 51, are neighbours in Los Angeles and have struck up a close friendship.

I don't know if this is true... but god I hope so.

Why Athletes Pee on Their Hands

I just read an interesting article about the merits of using urine to toughen up the skin on your hands. It seems that professional athletes including Moises Alou, Jorge Posada and Kerry Wood have all peed on their hands to cure what ailes them. Here's an interesting look:

In a recent interview with ESPN's Gary Miller, Chicago Cubs outfielder Moises Alou revealed that during baseball season he urinates on his hands to toughen them up. Alou, one of the few major leaguers who doesn't wear gloves while batting, is backed up by Yankees catcher Jorge Posada, who says, "You don't want to shake my hand during spring training." Even Cubs hurler Kerry Wood mentioned on a local radio show that he's tried the technique to remedy blisters on his pitching hand

Who knew? Seems that there have even been world conferences on urine therapy Via kottke.org

Troy in 15 minutes

Troy seems like a pretty interesting movie to me... too bad I basicallly have ADD and can't sit through the nearly 3 hours of film. Troy in Fifteen minutes is just perfect for me. Here's a taste:

Achilles’ Hut of Sensitive Warriors He tries to clean her off, they bicker, she tries to kill him. BRISEIS: I KILL YOU! ACHILLES: How about we do the freaknasty instead? BRISEIS: ...okay, sure. PATROCLUS: But Achilleeees, I wanna fiiiiiiight. ACHILLES: Whatever, kid. We’re goin’ home. Call me in the morning.

I guess I just gained 3 hours and saved 12 dollars. That's fine by me via Metafilter

Redemption theorists

I just read an interesting article via Fark relating to a interesting black seperatist group called the Moors who believe in what they call "redemption theory." Here's the basis of the theory:

When the United States went off the gold standard in 1933, the government went bankrupt. Government leaders, in order to secure credit from foreign powers, secretly pledged the "lifetime worth" of American citizens as collateral. The government began trading birth certificates on the open market as a form of capital. Each certificate is worth between $600,000 and $1 million and sits in a U.S. Treasury account. Any American is entitled to "redeem" the value of his certificate and write checks on his account.

It's all pretty interesting to me - Guess I learned something today. Seems that attempting to pass large cheques against these accounts is against the law, and a couple of people have went to jail and such. This is my very favourite conspiracy theory of all time. If it's true, I would wish I was American... I could really use a million... ha

Which City am I?

I saw this interesting quiz over on Downlove Wasted. Turns out that I'm Las Vegas.

Take the quiz: "Which American City Are You?"

Las Vegas
You Shine bright and partake in all the vices. You'd rather burn out then fade away.

I don't know if that's really good for me. One of my coworkers spent the weekend in Vegas and hearing about it yesterday just got my gambling blood flowing. God, I can't wait until I'm 21... 2 months to go. I've got money to lose - Baseball gambling just isn't holding me over anymore.

100 Worst Porn Movie Titles

I just reading a very interesting examination of the 100 Worst Porn Movie Titles out there. Here's a breakdown:

First off, let's set out the criteria : a BAD porn movie title does the opposite of its intention, which is to arouse your interests and convince you to buy the tape. Nope, these titles work against them -- they disgust, confuse or just plain turn you off. I've divided them up into 5 categories : 1) Gross, 2) Groan, 3) Stupid, 4) What The Hell, and 5) The Porn Store Clerk Laughed At Me. I'll elaborate later.

It's pretty funny to see all the crazy titles that are out there. I just don't understand how weird names like these are really suesposed to turn people on. My personal favourites are CLIMAX SHOTS #70 - MY BROWN EYE, NOT THE WINKER, THE STINKER and MAY THE FORESKIN BE WITH YOU. It doesn't get any better than that.... Via Monkeyfilter

Trailer Torrents

I've noticed that in the last little while there have been a number of people stumbling across this site in search of bit torrent files for the recent Trailer Park Boys episodes. I download all the episodes via Suprnova, a great torrent resource. Seems that most of them are linked to the #digitaldistractions tracker. The quality seems to be really good - it is definetely THE spot to look if you missed the episode or if you're outside the great lands of Canada where you're unable to watch the new episodes via television. It's especially great if you love Trailer Park Boys as much as I do.

Trailer Park Boys: If You Love Something, Set It Free:

I for one was really disapointed in last night's episode of the Trailer Park Boys. Is it just me or has the show lost something? I'm tired of silly one off episodes dealing with the intricate details of Bubbles' personality. Last week, the stupid puppet Conky, this week the stoned mountain lion he falls in love with. It's just too much the same for my liking. You can find a brief synopsis here. Here's my favourite part of the episdodet:

This time, Steve attacks Trevor in Lahey's tent-trailer. Trevor runs away traumatised and Jim says he's had enough—he's calling animal control. When Julian produces the Viagra bottle, Jim sings a different tune.

All in all, it was alright. I gotta say, I hope that the last couple of episodes of the season deal with this Viagara issue. I love how they've left the Lahey/Randy gay love affair so low key all this time, it would be really funny if Lahey's having some problems in the bedroom. As well, I really want to figure out the details of the relationship that Sarah has with Cory and Trevor. In last night's episode, she made reference to them being her 'boyfriends'. They've totally glazed over that one for the entire seaons, and I hope to god they'll explain it better. It's obvious that she's running that show, and I hope that we figure out all the nitty gritty details of the relationship. I just love Cory and Trevor.

Stalking the Bogeyman

I just read a very moving article that shows the horrible struggle that I man went through, plotting the death of the man who raped him when he was seven years old. It's really a very emotional story, and I think the author sums it up better than I ever could:

This time last year I was plotting to kill a man. I was going to walk up to him, reintroduce myself and then blow his balls off. I was going to watch him writhe like a poisoned cockroach for a few seconds, then kick him onto his stomach and put three bullets in the back of his head. This time last year I had a gun, and a silencer, and a plan. I had staked out the man's tract home in Broomfield -- the gray, two-story one with the maroon trim and the American flag hanging above the doorstep. I had followed him to and from his job as an electrical engineer. I was confident I would get away with murder, because there was nothing in recent history to connect me to him. Homicide investigators look for motive, and mine was buried 25 years in the past.

It really makes one wonder how they would react if you were put in a similar situation. How does someone deal with a traumatic event like this that they've been living with in secret for their entire life. Is such a killing justified? Via Metafilter

Blog Tools

I don't know how much of a difference that it makes (if any), but everytime I update this site I use the Ping-o-Matic! to inform the masses about the exciting details. It's really just too easy not too. The site places a cookie that remembers your URL and site title, so with a single click (well two - 1 to submit and 1 to open the bookmark) you can ping all the major sites out there. Are there any other useful tools in the blogging world that would help me out, but that I'm totally missing? I'm new to this whole game... so please share an insight you might have.

Online Conversion

I'm always looking for a site to tell me how many millimeters are in a fathom (1,828.8), or how many shots are in a cubic kilometer (33,814,022,558,919.48). Online Conversion provides me with all this useless information, but it also provides some more useful information as well. The site is described as being able to convert 'just about anything to anything else. Over 5,000 units, and 50,000 conversions.' It's kinda nerdy, but it's handy to have bookmarked.

Drinking fun with Google

It's Friday, so why not play a great drinking game? The Google Drinking Game is simply exciting. Here are the basic rules:

Google: A party game for three or more players. Pick a player to go first. The player who goes first picks two words, which are fed to the Google search page. After this, play passes to the left, and each player adds a word. Words may be misspelled or made up. If a search turns up no hits, the player who added the last word is out. The last player in the game, or the first player to reach a search with only one result, wins. Play resumes with the person on the left of the previous winner. Count points however you want.

Sounds like fun to me.. Have fun

New Music Canada

New Music Canada is a nice website that's out there to promote independent Canadian acts. They're website sums it up pretty well for me:

Fresh, current, recently recorded music is what you'll find here. Independent bands, underground DJs, and just-about-to-be-discovered artists make up the eclectic sound mix on NMC.

It's a really good resource - I especially like how they compare many of the bands on the site to actual bands that you know by for example: If you like Linkin Park (I don't), you'll like: Insert Band. It allows you to at least pick music that's somewhat interesting to you. Even if you're not Canadian... check it out. There's plenty of interesting independent music to go around.

Guess my age?

I'm sure that everyone has seen the guy at the local carnival who's able to guess your age and weight - They're usually bang on, and i'm left in total disbelief, because I totally suck. I came across ageproject, where you are able to play along at home and guess the age of people. It's not helping me get any better... in fact... I suck even more.

Tired and Uninspired

God... I had big writing plans for around these parts tonight, but damn... I'm freaking tired. I had my first full day of *REAL* work and I'm totally spent. I've been working since last Monday, but I've been totally riddled with pointless busy work and stupid menial tasks. Today, we finally got down to business and I spent almost the entire day on the phone to assorted places in BC and Alberta. We've been trying to update the contact database that the company I work for uses to update and publish a directory of retirement care, but people can sure be rude. I had so many people flat out refuse to give me information today - We're a reputable product, reconginzed by like 8 billion not for profit organaztions and the like. We're the official directory of many of them. They still won't trust us. It's really bizarre. I have do however have a new found respect for telemarketers. If people can be that rude to you when they know your product, I can't even begin to imagine how rude they'd be if you're calling out the the blue. Maybe I'll post some more later.Right now, I'm taking an early evening nap....

SSCrabble

Like Scrabble? Hate people? Then SSCrabble is for you. It's a nice online, solo play Scrabble game that's pretty handy. The basic goal is to try to use up all of the letters but It's damn tricky. It's sure a good way to waste a minute or two - Good luck.

Link Trading

I know I've posted this like 10 million time, but guess what? I'm doing it again! I'm really looking for sites to trade links with - to increase traffic and help out everyone. If you have an interesting blog of any sort and you'd like to trade links with me, post a comment or email me . You know you want to...... PLEASE!!

Nearly a third of 10 year olds Dieting?

I just read a rather disrubing article from yesterday's Toronto Star, it outlined a study showed that nearly a third of girls aged 10 to 14 are dieting. Here's a summary from the article:

Their study of 2,279 girls aged 10 to 14 showed that while the vast majority had healthy weights, nearly a third felt they were overweight and were trying to shed pounds. Even at the tender age of 10, nearly 32 per cent of girls felt "too fat" and 31 per cent said they were trying to diet.

A detailed study of the girls showed a different story:

Nearly 80 per cent of the girls had a healthy body weight and only 7.2 per cent were considered overweight using standard weight-to-height ratios. Most researchers suggest the rate of overweight or obese children in this country is several times higher than that figure

This article really shows a real lot about our society in this day and age. Everyone's concerned about child obesity - what where do you draw the line? How do you enstill in your children the interest in eating healthy and caring about your body without making them crazy obsessed with being skinny? Questions like these are important things that we, as a society need to conisder. It's really something to think about.

Unproduced Screenplays

kuro5hin.org has an interesting article surrounding unproduced screenplays which reflect a lot about the nature of the movie industry today. I think the article describes it well:

The Writers Guild of America registers approximately 30,000 screenplays every year, most of which never make it anywhere near the silver screen. Some of these are by "big name" writers like James Cameron and The Wachowski Brothers

Avatar sounds particuarly interesting to me. Written by James Cameron, it seems it would be a very interesting sci-fi movie if it's ever produced. It's really rather disapointing that so many horrible movies are made each year and really interesting, thought provoking films are constantly ignored. If James Cameron can't get a movie like this produced, I wonder what amazing stories are left in the background by unknown and underappreciated writers in this world. It's sad really.

New Look, I like it

I couldn't wait until I got home today. I was able to set up a whole new look - of course it's a very similar look to the old layout, but it just looks a little more fixed up. I'm happy with the new look. The only problem I can think of is the comments. I'm using the new Blogger comment system. You must have either a blogger account or post as an anonomyous. That's alright though, I think that'll be alright. We'll see I guess. Please let me know what you guys think about the whole new look, I'm more than open to suggestions.

Big Day

Seems that blogger has finally got around to updating and providing the basic services of bloggery. All the details are here. What a day - I'm so happy I could dance. I've already enabled post specific pages so each one will have it's own pretty page that will allow for easy linking and remembering, instead of the crappy old system. I'm sure there are tons of other changes I'm going to make. Right now, I should be working - so I can't get to invovled. I'm just too damn excited!!!

Is Andy Kaufman Alive?

Sure, Andy Kaufman died from lung cancer on May 16, 1984 - but not everyone is so sure. It seems that a party is being held for him because according to legend, said that if he was faking his death he would return 20 years to the day of his death. I guess it's possible, but highly unlikely - there being a death certificate and all. While we're at it, here are some more legends surrounding Kaufman's life:

• Andy died from a broken neck suffered during a professional wrestling match.
• Andy's bizarre performances/behavior were due to a brain tumor.
• Andy hated women.
• Andy was banned from future appearances on Saturday Night Live
• Andy was insane.
• His ghost haunts "The Comedy Store" in Los Angeles.
• Andy was married.
• Andy and Tony Clifton were the same person.

UPDATE:LA Weekly has an excellent feature on the May 16 tribute entitled, Uncle Andy’s Fun Afterlife

From the 'Boring History Department'

The Chicago Sun-Times has an interesting article entitled, Ex-Nazi corporal says Germany attempted to kidnap Ike. It seems that in the days after the Allied Invasion, Hitler, desperate to prevent an invasion of Germany, hatched a final extraordinary plan: infiltrate the U.S. Army and take General Dwight D. Eisenhower, dead or alive. Seems the German plan hit a snag or two along the way. They were poorly trained in English, and out of the 600 or so soldiers - only 10 were fluent. This language barrier led to some hilarious situations:

Fritz Christ, then a 21-year-old German air force lance corporal, said many of his comrades were hopelessly ill-equipped. "Those with no English were instructed to exclaim, 'Sorry,' if they were approached by Americans, and then to open their trousers and hurry off feigning an attack of diarrhea.

Seems they had a fair bit of poor training along the way as well:

Christ was transformed into "Lt. Charles Smith" from Detroit. The troops were trained to salute, shoot and even smoke like GIs, but there were fatal gaps in their coaching. Many turned up at U.S. Army supply depots and asked for "petrol" instead of "gas." They mistakenly rode four to a Jeep instead of two, as was standard U.S. Army practice.

It's pretty interesting to me, in a horrible, revionisary kind of way to think about what would have happened if something like this had occured. Would the war have ended the way it did? While it's unlikely that this would have resulted in us speaking German now.... but we'll never really know. UPDATE: Wikipedia has some more excellent background on Operation Greif.

Time Wasting

I'm busy trying to avoid helping my father paint and redo our living room, so I found this interesting Java game to help pass the time. Snakejump at SFCave.com is a great little game that's already helped me pass an hour or so. I really suck, my high score is just over 12,000, but I don't care. It's just fun

Quotes...

Rummaging around today, I found a nice quote that suits my current mood well:

Why be something to everybody when you can be everything to somebody?" -- GK Chesterton

I'm really not in a great place right now and it really just seemed to hit me.

Link Trading

I'm still looking for sites to trade links with me. Please email me if you want to trade. Don't be shy - I know you want to. Thanks guys

Howard Stern

I've been listening to Howard Stern more and more in recent days. I really am not very interested in his political endeaviours against the FCC - but the show is damn funny. I found a great BitTorrent Tracker, Red Skunk Tracker, where you can download all the recent radio and TV shows. It's Stern only and they have has an amazing turnaround where you can download the morning's show within 3 to 4 hours of it finishing. I just can't get enough of it all... If you're looking for a BitTorrent Client, download BitTornado. It's great.

John Kerry a Douchebag?

I'm not American, nor do I really take an active interest in American politics (I watch CNN, and the Daily show if that counts), but this site just made me laugh my ass off. Maybe it's the fact that the word douchebag has been stuck in my brain for weeks, and ends up being every third word I say to my friends, but whatever. It's JohnKerryIsADoucheBagNutImVotingForHimAnyway.com, which pretty much sums up the feelings of many Americans. This quote is great:

John Kerry is a douchebag, but I'm voting for him anyway. Well, not really. That is to say, he's not actually a douchebag, or not nearly as much of one as what the media, George W., and even perhaps John Kerry himself have made him out to be. It seemed that every time I saw, heard, or read something about Kerry, his doucheness factor increased. It wasn't until I did just a little research on my own that it became clear that most of these occurrences could be explained as lies, deception, media excess, or simply poor campaigning strategy. It is beyond vital that we all overlook these minor blemishes and unpleasantries, and unite in electing John Kerry to be the next president of the United States of America

.

Stalin vs. Hitler

A very interesting Russian comic that shows the battle of Stalin vs. Hitler. It's all very curious.... very curious.

Enough is Enough

Just saw an interesting Boing Boing Post about common story plots that are seen by Strange Horizons, a speculative fiction magazine. It's really interesting to see that there really are so many story lines out there. Reading this list, it seemed that so many movies that I've seen recently, not to mention the stories that I've read have followed these basic archetypes. The question that I was left with really was: "Is there anyone doing anything orignal anymore?" Here's my favourite:

A surprise twist ending occurs. (Note that we do like endings that were unexpected as long as they derive naturally from character action.) 1. The characters are described as if they are humans, but in the end it turns out they're not humans. 2. Creatures are described as "vermin" or "pests" or "monsters," but in the end it turns out they're humans. 3. The author conceals some essential piece of information from the reader that would be obvious if the reader were present at the scene. (This can be done well, but rarely is.) 4. Person is floating in a formless void; in the end, they're born.

It's really interesting for any aspiring writers out there (I hope to be one some day).

Work Day

Work is going on well... I hope that things really get down to business on Monday - I'd really like to buckle down and get some stuff done. Today we had a great work lunch. All 8 of us were going to go to Lonestar for a 'Lunch Meeting' (gotta love those tax reasons), for some delightful Tex-Mex food. They were totally rude, and didn't really want our business because they already had another couple of large groups - so we went to a small English pub place next door called Henry's Arms. It was alright, I had a Rueben that was pretty solid, but the Fish and Chips looked totally lame. The lunch was great fun - we played two truths and a lie, and talked about what song you would bring with you to a desert island (Maybe I'll talk some more about that later) and stuff. I've never laughed so freaking hard in my entire life. I really like everyone who works there - It's really starting to feel like home. I think it's going to be a great summer.

Rembrandts Ungrateful?

Sure I know that everyone is going to be watching the Friends finale tonight, but not me. I really don't find the show interesting or entertaining - but I know I'm in the minority. I just read an interesting article about the Rembrandts. We ONLY know them as a result of the 45 second theme song that they wrote, 'I'll be there for you' which then compounded into a huge hit back in the day. I'm sure they made more than a few bucks of the whole deal, but they don't seem to be too grateful. This quote really caught me off guard:

Our record label said we had to finish the song and record it. There was no way to get out of it," said Solem, who has written reams of music in his 47 years. Without the song, The Rembrandts may not have sold as many albums, Solem said. But there was a downside: "We lost a lot of hard-core, original fans because they thought we'd decided to take the easy way, but we felt forced to be press monkeys."

If it's all about the music, I'm sure they could have stood up. Turns out they have a greatest hit album coming out soon - I'm guessing that it will have um...... 1 song.

The Price of a Gallon

Cockeyed.com has an interesting look at the price of a gallon of exciting liquids. It's explained well in the introduction:

Everyone complains when the price of gasoline goes up, but it remains one of the cheapest liquids available for sale. Here are 47 liquids and their prices, in order, from cheapest to most expensive.

Turns out that a gallon of scorpion venoms costs $38,858,507.46... god damn.

Whew!

I'm not dead guys, trust me. I've just been in really really low gear this whole week. I'm really not used to waking up at 6:45, and being GO GO GO all day long. It's really going to take me a while to get back into the swing of work and stuff. I have a bunch of thoughts on what I saw at retirement homes the other day, but to be honest I'm really just too damn tired to talk about it now. It was really an interesting experience that taught me a lot, so I'll be sure to write about it later. All in all though, things are good. Work is fun, everyone gets along really well. I have a big research project to delve into about the nature of the elderly's frailities. It should prove interesting.

Work Day 1

Just got back from work and I'm totally beat. I basically spent the day getting to know everyone else and becoming familar with the industry. The company operates within the retirement home field, so there are lots of little details that I'm totally unfamilar with. We read page after page of complicated data relating to the supply/demand of the industry. It was really kind of overwhelming at first, but I really learned a lot about it all works. All I can say is that this this province is totally fucked up. I was totally nervous going into the place this morning, but once I got in there things were more than fine. Everyone seems to be really interesting and fun, so work should be a good time. Tomorrow we're going a field trip to a bunch of homes, and we'll even be eating lunch at one of the places - I've never really been to any of those homes. I've never had family in one or anything, so I have no idea what to expect. We're going to some nice, upper class places so I think they're going to be nice. It will be nice to see what all these people are faced with before we get down to business. I'll keep you guys posted on the happenings. For next little while, updates are going to be sporaditic and crazy around here. I'll try to post so actually interesting internet content - but we'll see how crazy work gets.

Isn't Technology Grand?

Wow... what an exhausting day. I woke up and my computer (Toshiba notebook) just wasn't work how I like it. I've been having problems for weeks now - first standby wouldn't work, then it was getting really hot and the fan wasn't kicking in, now it's just so incredibly slow that I can't even function. I finally pulled the trigger and decided to run the recovery disks to give me a nice, fresh install of Windows XP. That was quite the job in itself - first I had to backup all the school work that I wouldn't mind looking back on sometime in the future, my favourites, software and most importantly my mp3's. I have over 35 gigs of pure music excitement, so copying to my secondary computer via the network too a while... a long while. Everything was going great. Install worked well, everything was working fine - then I remembered. I had passwords saved in my browser that I had didn't know what they were. Sure that's usually not a problem, just fill out the 'I forgot my password' form and get it sent to your email in 5-10 minutes - but it wasn't that easy for me. See, most of these passwords are for things that don't have that functionality, especially a couple for school - so I guess I'm pretty much screwed right about now. TThat's not to mention the 3 or 4 interesting links that I had saved to post on the site today. That'll teach me to try to fix a problem. From now on I'm just going to stop and leave well enough alone. I'm also a bit scared. I start my new co op job tomorrow and I have no idea how it's going to be. It's not really in a field that I'm at all interested in, so I'm guessing that I'm either going to love it or hate it. It's right on my mom's way to work, which is awesome because I don't have to buy a new car or wait or anything. I guess we'll just see how it goes... I'll keep you guys posted.

RegScrubXP

I've been trying to clean up some things on my computer for a while. It really hasn't been running as nice as it should. After running the usual virus scan, Ad Aware, and Spy Bot things weren't still right. I don't know if it's going to help, but I downloaded RegScrubXP to clean out the registry. Check it out if you're having problems, maybe it will help. It found 279 errors... that can't be good. Maybe I should have looked into something like this a long time ago.

Batman Begins

I'm really looking forward to the new Batman movie, Batman Begins. It's being released in 2005 - and I cannot freaking wait. It's being directed by Christopher Nolan, the director of the often underappreciated movie Momento. Batman Begins is insired by the classic comic Batman:Year One by Frank Miller. The story of the movie basically outlines how Bruce Wayne became Batman, and is deeply involved in the inner struggles of the man behind the mask. Here's a brief clip from IMDB:

When fate prevents him from avenging the deaths of his parents, young Bruce Wayne (Bale) flees to Asia where he seeks counsel from a dangerous ninja cult leader known as Ra's al Ghul (Watanabe). When he returns, Bruce finds that Gotham City has become overrun with crime and corruption, and that there are forces at work trying to remove him from his inherited place as the owner of Wayne Industries. Discovering a cave under Wayne Manor, Bruce assumes a new identity as a secret detective and guardian of the people of Gotham City against the criminals that plague them...

There are lots of cool stuff that's around the internet about the movie. The official website has AMAZING pictures of the new Batmobile type tank vehicle that's looks really cool. Sure, I might be a nerd - but I love Batman. I've been pretty disapointed by the other recent movies (Everything since Batman Returns), so I'm hoping that Nolan can create a darker, more mysterious Batman that really reflects more of his image from the comics.

Mailinator

Mailinator is an interesting service that allows you to avoid spam. It's quick and easy - but don't use the address for anything important though, anyone can check any address at any time. Their website describes how it all works:

You are on the web, at a party, or talking to your favorite insurance salesman. Whereever you are, someone (or some webpage) asks for your email. You know if you give it, you'll be on their spam list. On the other hand, you do want at least one message from that person. The answer is to give them a mailinator address. You don't need to sign-up. You just make it up on the spot. Pick jonesy@mailinator.com or bipster@mailinator.com - pick anything you want (up to 15 characters before the @ sign). Later, come to this site and check that account. Its that easy. Mailinator accounts are created when mail arrives for them. No signup, no personal information, and when you're done - you can walk away - an instant solution to one way spammers get your address. The emails will automatically be deleted for you after a few hours.

It's really useful, I've used it for many sites that I would otherwise be very uneasy about signing up for. I don't want to sully my new Gmail account already!