Ratsofrass

And so it begins:

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I had just ordered a Mac mini to be the first component in what will ultimately be my new multimedia entertainment system, plus a wireless Apple mouse and keyboard. I ordered the keyboard mouse despite some misgivings about the quality of the keyboard versus the price, but the old school techie in me still thinks that you can’t have an IBM keyboard touch a Mac device (the Mac would be dirtied). I *know* better, but sometimes emotions will cloud the judgment of even the most die-hard spec-comparing-component-configuring- geek. Who am I kidding - geeks are just as ruled by emotion as anyone else. I wanted a “pure” Apple system, and by Jobs, I was going to have one!

Sure enough, as the order acknowledgment warned, my keyboard and mouse showed up this last week, a good week before my Mac mini (base model, with 1GB RAM upgrade for you scccg’s out there).

Now, you have to understand where this next part comes from. I’ve always liked Apple computers. The first computer I ever used was a black Apple ][. When I was young I wanted an Apple ][, //, //e, //c; I was really close to buying one until my Dad offered to pay for 1/2 a computer because he needed one to help run his business. You can guess what we ended up with. When I grew up and had to use computers for a living, I always wanted to buy an Apple computer, but could never justify the extra cost of a Mac, especially for something that wasn’t mainstream for the kind of computing I was doing - games, spreadsheets, and databases. Now, finally, I have both a reason and enough spare income to justify this little extravagance - I mean, it’s going to be mostly to watch bitto- I mean legally downloaded videos and streaming stuff off of the ‘net upstairs away from my “work” computer.

So, I’m just a little bit like a kid opening a Christmas present, my first Apple component of my very own. First the box it came in was *light*. We are talking so light I was wondering if Apple just shipped me an empty box to fuck with my mind. I open the box. Inside are two iWhite smaller boxes, that also feel like empty boxes that Apple shipped to me to fuck with my mind. I start with what would be the mouse. Lo - a mouse is inside! Part of the reason it’s so light is that it comes with Lithium AA’s - should last a long time, and feel like they’d float away compared to regular AA’s. The mouse iWhite, with that understated design that just looks like something organic. It feels pretty good to click, the whole mouse actually pivots forward when you click, so I have no idea how it picks up left vs. right click. I’ll need to use it to actually see how good it is.

There actually was a keyboard in the box that looked like it might hold a keyboard. I wasn’t sure at the time because the box was so darn small, and you guessed it, so is the keyboard. It was one of those times where shopping online just doesn’t prepare you for what you are getting. Yes, I saw a picture of it from the top and poo-pooed the chicklet looking keyboard, saw the side profile and went, oh it’s kind of thin, but I didn’t actually look at the dimensions. My first reaction was ‘holy crap - it’s small!!!” Oh, and if you didn’t guess, it’s light too. It’s a solid little sucker, being made of actual anodized aluminum frame, and iWhite chicklet keys. I’m not expecting to actually have to type more that www.blahblahblah.com on this thing, so I wasn’t too worried about the feel, but it’s actually pretty good, not the full travel of a real keyboard, but pretty good feed back, an actually a bit clicky versus mushy. Also none of this binding you get with some cheap keyboards if you don’t hit the keys right on the center. Oh, when I say it’s small, the keys are not small, it just doesn’t take up any more space that it has to for a query set of keys and a set of function keys on the top plus the option / modifier keys on the bottom. I opened up the battery component and was again impressed with the solidness of the components. Apple started with a solid piece of round steel bolt for the battery cover, then machined out the grooves and the tensioned ball bearings that keep the cover in place. I showed the thing to my Dad, and even he said, “oh yah, dat is very nice”. So if an old German thinks it’s solid, it’s *solid* let me tell you. It’s very pretty too, the shiny anodized aluminum with the white keys looks very stylish. But I’m a sucker for solid simple design too.

So after having played with this thing for about ten minutes, I got to the next stage: lets fire this wireless puppy up and connect it to the iMac… Drat. I want to play with this thing - it’s not just a tool that sometimes gets in the way of getting stuff done - this actually might be *fun* to use, something I haven’t really felt for some time with computers now.

I can feel my Mac weenie growing already.

So last week I flew Westjet east to Ottawa and returned west on Air Canada. That sounds like it’s backwards, but hey, it’s the way it worked out. The situation being such that Westjet didn’t have a flight at a time I wanted, it’s been a while since I’ve flown with the airline. I hadn’t seen the leather seats and in-seat-back screens they have been harping about, but I had an experience with an early version of Air Canada’s screens - which favorably impressed me.
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Calgary has the distinction of being one of the few places in the world where you can go “WTF?” when reading a weather forecast. I give you tonight’s forecast:

It would seem that from the -18 C we are right now, it is going to rise to +2 C by midnight, with a wind chill of -25 this evening, then the temperature is supposed to fall to -11 C by Tuesday afternoon. Sometimes the weather in Calgary is so ass-backwards I don’t even know what the hell is up and I’m born ‘n bred here!

Occasionally, a politician does something so monumentally stupid that with a single act, they kill any hope of their being elected. Sometimes they just do something to honk me off and permanently loose any chance of getting my vote. I don’t know quite where this falls yet.

I first heard of Alnoor from his attention grabbing posters at LRT stations talking about building west LRT now, not years from now. Smart move, promising LRT improvements and talking about it in the exact location where people would be sympathetic.

So I check out his web site Seems pretty reasonable, not too much detail at the time, but this was early in the campaign. Perhaps some reasonable alternative to vote for come election day.

Then I start hearing about his previous business dealings in Kenya - not exactly a shining “Business Leader”. Furthermore, his line on his site “A city is no different than a business: it has an annual operating budget of $2 billion, 12 thousand employees and 1 million customers.” doesn’t exactly strike me as very compassionate - so as a “business” should Calgary kick out anyone that is not paying there way in this city?

The final straw is he’s just honked me off by leaving a phone spam message on my answering machine, showing a total lack of respect for my private phone line, which I don’t care to have turn into an auditory spam repository like, say, email these days. If that’s how Alnoor runs things when he’s trying show how great he is, I don’t want to even contemplate how he’d be if he was running the city. As far as how big a mistake this is, well, then depends on how many phones he’s left his message on - anyone out there get one of these on their cell phone?

I’m browsing my way through the B5 stuff at Future Shop when I run across this little gem:

” In 1994 Star Trek had to take a backseat to this science fiction series, created by Michael…”

Uhhh, I don’t know what you guys are smoking over there, but pass some over to me, ‘cuz that’s some fine tripp’n you are doing over there.

Oh, and prices have dropped on the original series now: $68 per season, finally cheaper than when purchased originally. But when is the 5 season set coming out?

So there I was on the 5ish pm train going “WTF? why are there so many people on this train?” We were packed in like sardines, which doesn’t tend to happen so much in the summer. Thinking on it, I noted that it had been a really long wait for a train, so naturally, it was packed as a result. Oh well, it’s a short ride for me out to Barlow Max Bell Station.

Yeah, right. It was a weird day on the train. Normally, people get off and hardly anyone gets on, so the lack of breathing room tends to clear up relatively quickly. Not today. For the first two stops out of downtown, one person got off, two people got on. That doesn’t seem like much, but we are already packed in. Oh, I didn’t mention that today was my day carrying the laptop which is a huge case on top of my small backpack, so I can’t so much as turn without wacking someone with either my backpack or laptop case.

So we get to the Zoo station where a young lady talking on a cell phone get on. Annoying loud talker type, but whatever, I’m getting off next stop. We don’t move. We still don’t move. An announcement comes over the barely audible PA: Warbel frebre door ipfre foerry. Someone is blocking the door. We still don’t move. The next PA announcement is slightly more clear to the effect of hold on while I get out and check the door.

The train driver comes walking past and I notice that the door in question is the one next to where I am squished in. They spend about 5 minutes playing Homer Simpson’s favorite game “Door goes open, Door goes closed” I don’t get it because the door seems to close. But hey, maybe I’m missing something because I’m having to crane my neck over to near breaking to see what’s going on since I can’t turn around with laptop and backpack in tow.

The train driver walks back to the front. “Good”, I’m thinking, “he got it fixed and I can finally get out of this sardine can and away from loud talker cell phone girl who hasn’t even figured out why the train isn’t moving yet because she’s concentrating so hard on her phone. Then the power goes out on the train. Oh shit. Then the power comes back on. Whew! Seems that power cycling the train is one tricks they try to get things working again. Wonder if they use M$ Windows on these-Nawww.

So now the driver comes on the PA again saying there is still a problem with the door, going to try to override it manually, sorry for the inconvenience, blah blah blah. He comes walking back again, and plays round #2 of Homer Simpson’s favorite game. Cell phone girl is still blabbing on the phone going on about how it’s just stupid that this train hasn’t gotten moving yet and she has no idea why. Meanwhile another girl opposite me is text messengering someone: “My train is broke”. Heh, heh - not everyone on the train was a total idjit.

Finally, the train driver goes walking back to the front. Comes on the PA saying that he can’t get the sensor to confirm that the door is closed, so he will have to take the train out of service and remove the train from the main track in emergency mode, so all the other trains backed up behind can get moving again. We can all get off the train and wait for the next one or two or three that it will take to fit all of us on there.

I say, “screw this” and start walking the long convoluted path to the Barlow Max Bell station. Three trains pass me while I’m walking, but I don’t care - I’m out of the train. Besides, I gots to pee - If I can’t hold it I can find a convenient bush along the way at least. I make it to the Barlow station, and as I’m passing through, the PA comes on: “Your attention please, warble mble smrset south mble themb ten minute delay mble thwe wthrn dom north east mfboe mnt delay mboe ” Well, you get the idea - evidently Calgary Transit was having other major train delays along the whole system. Evidently, the echo in the Barlow station is so sever you can’t understand dick on the PA - even though it’s loud enough in there.

So to really rub salt in my wounds, I have to make a pit stop at the Family Foods along the way (not to pee - still holding that in). Need food so I can eat tomorrow type of shopping. I get to the checkout counter, no line up (yes!) and get my stuff rung through. “I need a price check on till #1″ Great. “This is gonna take a bit” says the clerk. Shit. The kid who comes to do the price check looks like, twelve and doesn’t come back. The clerk send another kid, who at least looks like he’s 16 after kid #1. I finally get my groceries and get the hell out of dodge.

Lessons learned:

1) Being stuck on a train in rush hour is worse than being stuck in traffic.

2) Pee before you go home if there is any doubt.

3) Calgary Transit PA systems suck.

4) Walking between the Zoo and Barlow takes longer than you’d think

5) Next time, take the bus, err, walk, err I guess there is no good way to get around in Calgary anymore.

Since I’m posting this rant on Flickr’s discussion boards, I’ll blog it as well, cuz, well, it’s too good not to blog as well.

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Personally, I want the “cosmopolitan” character we have now with about half the people. I’m born and bred Calgarian and let me tell you, this city is a lot more “cosmopolitan” than what it was when I was growing up.

Now as to what that word means to me, I expect to be able to go eat / drink and have a choice to partake in most world cuisines. I expect that the nightlife will also have a selection of cultural events that span the world. I expect different architectural styles in different parts of the city. I expect there to be little Italys and Chinatowns. I expect to be able to find other people with my own interests and tastes, be they common, or on the more eccentric side. And, from this site’s POV, I expect there to be endless opportunities for photos on a range of subjects.

Are we there yet? Hell no! We will never be there in some respects - New York is New York partly because it’s had the time to develop all the interesting facets it has, unlike Toronto, or Calgary. But, we do have more of the good stuff that makes a big city a tourist attraction than we had 20 years ago. Unfortunately, we have more of the problems too.

I rode home on my bicycle from downtown for the first time today during “rush hour” and I just can’t believe how stressful it is now compared to the last time I would’ve done that oh, 15 years ago or so. *Most* people are fine and reasonable, it’s the assholes and idjits that you remember, and their are enough people on the paths now that the 2% human scum factor is getting to be a real problem. OTOH, I can have a nice ride home along the Bow River (even with the idjits) and not have to fight with the traffic for a good part of the ride home. Not too many cities where you can do that, for sure.

Let me comment on Trever’s original thought, specifically

“anybody coming in that does not have a place to live and a job already, can get turned away.”

What the hell is wrong with that? He’s pretty much stating Ralph Klein’s Creeps and Bums speech in a different way - why would you move to another city without a job and a place is beyond me - but people do it all the time - and in Calgary right now, if you try it, you are more likely that not to get burned. Turning them away would be doing them a favor - there are enough people with jobs but can’t afford a place who end up living on the street as it is. The word has to be gotten out to the rest of the country that a $10/hr job alone is not enough to dig up roots and come out here - you’d better have your living space covered too, and while you’re at it, get a $15/hr job.

Darwin Awards - anyone who has had internet access for the last ten years must surely know about them. In the last month I have received two emails regarding this year’s Darwin Awards. One was a link to the Darwin Awards site’s 2006 awards winners.

The other seem to be part bogus email, and part truth, as the “winner” in this email was actually the 1995 winner, now proved to be an urban legend that fooled even the Darwin people.

I got thinking about how many times I have received bogus Darwin award winner emails over the years and further more was thinking ‘why do people create these things in the first place?’ I can only come to the conclusion that there are quite a few pathological liars out there who just have to email all their friends with the cool stuff they are finding out on the internet. I’ve experienced only one of these liars and the stories they come up with can on the surface sound quite plausible - but once you dig into them a bit, they fall apart - sound familiar?

The problems start when these pathological liars send emails out to their naive friends - who might be naive about internet lore in general, and/or be naive in general and just buy everything their pathological friend tells them. The naive friend will likely have other naive friends, who have even less of a chance of knowing the reliably of the previous source. And they tell two friends, and they tell two friends, and so on, and so on…

… causing those of us who have been on the ‘net a long time to periodically get these bogus or semi-bogus emails, from those that we love but whose computer we must often support.

So what I end up doing is heading over to the real Darwin Award site, and checking out any email I get claiming to be “This Years Darwin Awards”, then going and informing said naive friend about the bogus nature of the email they sent me. I do this because I hate mis-information, especially its rapid spread through emails from trusted friends.

I think at some point, proven pathological liars are just going to have to be denied publishing privileges by any means on the internet. Either that or Darwin Awards are going to have to stop so I can just fire back an instant “This is bogus…” email without having to check into the veracity of the email I have just been sent. But that would be selfish of me. I can’t explain why Darwin Awards seem to be a more frequent target of “bogusification”. Perhaps pathological liars feel the need to one up the stupidity level told in the real stories?

On the other hand, Darwin Awards do present some useful use other than their obvious entertainment value. I can instantly peg someone’s “‘net cluefullness” by what kind of Darwin Awards email they send me. Something along the lines of “This year’s Darwin Awards are up {link to real Darwin Awards site}” tells me that they are cluefull and on top of it, assume I am cluefull. The ones who send me emails with some pasted text in them: definitely less cluefull. Not necessarily stupid, just not as experienced in what kind of crap floats around in the toilet bowl of email these days. I definitely use the BS filter on future emails from these people, because even if they thought it was worth sending, it could still be just another form of chain letter, scam, or well, BS.

I suppose I should answer my original question; good idea or tool of Satan.
I guess it’s good, overall, at least I get some useful information out of these emails, even if the email itself is crud.

Here’s a guy who decided to experience for himself one aspect of being poor: living on $30 for a month for food ($US I hasten to add) Read from the bottom up for proper chronology.
Hungry for a month

My background lends well to being frugal to start with - both of my parents went through WWII in Berlin, where there was next to nothing to eat in the waning days of the war and the early years following. Consequently, my upbringing always re-enforced the idea of never wasting food and being a glutenous pig. Even though money was never that tight, at home food was never splurged on - a steak was a treat, with stew and meatloaf being more typical staple food.

Once on my own, I never was that tight for money that I had to do the Ramen noodle diet to get by to the next pay cheque. I certainly know people who have done it, especially to get to the end of a semester of school. Compared to some of those stories, this guy had it good. I recall stories like having $10 left over for food for the month after covering rent, and a bus pass. Try living on that - it’s all Ramen noodle and rice then.
Oh yeah, you’re going to school too, and have finals to deal with, so you have to actually use your brain to it’s max despite the total lack of anything nutrients being eaten. But there is always someone who has it harder than you.

I do have to comment after reading what he did that his primary complaint was lack of spice. Well, if you had to do your $30 a month long term, spice can be added quite easily. He figured he was spending closer to $25/month, accounting for leftover food and $, that would cover 1-2 spice items a month, easily. He also was less that creative on what cheap food he bought - but to his credit, he didn’t plan things out and didn’t have any previous experience - so what he did would be typical of what a first time kid on a budget might do.

If you know what you’re doing cooking-wise, you can make some pretty decent tasting food for next to nothing budget wize. Budgeting to add a few flavor items can do much to make crap food at least taste palatable - things like chicken stock soup cubes - cheap, last a long time and gets you “chicken soup” noodles rather than crap Ramen flavors. Eating nutritious on the other hand - that’s much tougher. Yeah, you can buy ground beef and cheap meat deal of the week to get protein, but you just can’t buy much in terms of vegetables and live cheap, especially in the middle of winter in these parts when vegetables get darn expensive.
I found it interesting that the guy had no idea that you can live on $30/month, indefinitely if you have to. Interesting, in that he had no idea of what he needed for food, what he *needed* to survive, rather than what he wanted. Pretty typical side effect of living with fat in the budget I guess. I went though the exercise of figuring out my minimum last year - I had a good idea but I hadn’t crunched the numbers out for a reasonably precise value. I wonder how many people know how much money they need to survive a month - not that many I’d guess.

So a couple of months ago I tried out the new self - serve checkouts at Home Despot. You know, the ones where you scan your own stuff. They even have evil blinky green lights to try and get your attention. Not like lately you don’t have plenty of time to ponder other things while waiting to get through a till in Calgary.

Now, Home Despot had four of these things, often empty or with one person using them during slow times. The ONE till they had open was lined up with people each buying half a house. So I was bound to try one of these things the first time I only had one or two items to scan. Since then I’ve used them a few times.

They work pretty good - a few things need improvement. 1) Better descriptions so you know what you just scanned. 2) A very obvious beep when you scan something, so I don’t scan things twice. 3) An undo, for when I still manage to screw up. Right now an accociate has to do the undo for you. 4) The interface kinda sucks. They put the signature pad way the hell over to the right, so you have to sign your credit card auth. and take two steps to the left to see if your scrawl is something you’d recognise as your own if it ever came down to a dispute. I don’t even what to think about signature forging with this thing.

Other than that, I love them and I hate them. I love the fact that I can get through the tills quickly especially if I have only one or two items. I hate the fact that shopping has gotten yet more impersonal. On the other had, I love the fact that shopping has gotten more impersonal because sometimes I just want to kill the person that is trying to serve me.

Fast forward to today. “I am trying to find Season 3 of Corner Gas” I tell the Wallrat employee. “You want season 3,” he burbles back, in a voice and manner I can only describe as a carbon copy of Peter Sellers from “The Party” (Think goofy Indian accent if you havn’t seen this movie). “Yes, Season 3″. He grabs something else that was season 3 yes, but not “Corner Gas”. “No, I want Season 3, *Corner* *Gas*” He goes to ask someone if they have this. I hear him get an explanation from the more senior Wallrat in the next isle that it will be with the TV shows, in the “C” shows, between the “B” shows and the “D” shows.

Okay. I’m guessing they’re out at this point, me having checked this already. But now I have to wait for Buddy to figure this out for himself, which is rather amusing to watch him recite his ABCD’s. He then proceeds to offer me CSI:Season 3. Deep breath. Look at shelves myself, this time checking the labels. “Look, it has spots Corner Gas here for Seasons 1 and 2, which are empty so you must be out of season 3 as well”, I explain to him. “Oh yes, we must be all out, bad luck for you then”. Right, birdy num-num, bad luck for me, good luck for you that I didn’t loose my cool.

Did I mention Wallrat is evil? Not only do they sucker me into buying stuff sometimes because it’s so cheap (Futurama, Season 1 $18) but then they make me put up with not being able to find shit because they can’t keep they’re stock in reasonable order (not the only store in town with this problem by far). Then I have to line up forever to give them my money.

You see where this is going don’t you? There I am waiting in line, and these blinky green lights get my attention. Oh no, Wallrat has installed self-serve tills as well. Do I go try them? Hmmm. I have a lot of stuff. Clothes. Might have problems finding / scanning the tags. Can’t see if there is a line or not, with the 15 tills between me and the self-serves. Plus I’ve got this bitch’n spot in line - only two people in front of me, with full shopping carts, but only two of ‘em! I decide to give them a pass this time, however, I do check them out on the way out the door, so see what the lineups are like. Great. The self-serve tills are lined up too. I doubt I would’ve saved more than a minute of my five in line.
Well, now I just hate self-serve tills.