Month: November 2011

How to do birthday candles in Binary

When candles are in short supply, or you don’t really want to have your age on your cake, here’s a neat dodge.

http://www.mathsisfun.com/binary-decimal-hexadecimal-converter.html

First, convert the birthday of the person to binary from decimal, using the handy converter above.

Second, light ONLY the candles showing as one.  So, for my last birthday (53) you put up 6 candles and light the first, second, fourth and sixth. 

I’m 35 in hex, by the way.

 

Well I had a lovely vacation but now it’s over

Some things that happened that I didn’t mention.

Lots of practicing, maybe a new song.  It will emerge from its cocoon eventually I s’pose.

Straightening out some songwriting stuff.

Working on the December 4 homily.

Lots of hanging out with Katie, which was marvellous.  And is. She got VERY drunk for her birthday but managed to bring home the remains of the ‘penis cake’ which Jessica La Diva made for her.  (Much consternation in the girls’ circle “How come you never made a cake like that for me?”)

Purchased a slide whistle.  I think it will be useful in the nice echoey atrium at work during town halls.  Also, a pickup for the acoustic.  Now I need batteries for all the pedals Jim E loaned me.

On a sad note, those (insert slur here) at work have still not paid me the 2500 bucks they owe me for getting Mike on board – since September, and it’s now almost December.  Could use the money, chaps.

In talks with a guy I met on Craigslist.  I am hopeful merely for civility; nothing else on my wish list seems to be practical or reasonable.

Got to go down to the Fraser and by accident (Katie Sharpeyes “contact lens edition”) saw a seal, which morphed into two seals, who promptly had a full on “Let’s frolic and leap about where people can see us” until a speedboat turned up, at which point they promptly disappeared.  Given that I had just written a song about selkies it was pretty freaky.

Jeff IS AWESOME.  The inertnets dieded for a while and he got it back up by going out to the junction box and PM’ing it.  No, not Private Messaging it.  Percussive Maintenance.  He beat its sorry little head like a gong, and it WORKED.

Helped out with coffee at church and never saw so many newcomers at once.

Watched Lost Girls last night and laughed quite immoderately…. it was a good episode and my unholy crush on Kris Holden Reid continues.

Lovely long walk in Deer Lake Park earlier this week – no achy joints afterwards, I’m loving the new anti inflammatory.

Now to make coffee and shower and go back to work.  I wasn’t ignoring you, the internet was down.

erk

God almighty.  I was two hours later and a bit than I expected getting onto the ferry.  The weather was foul and my tires are bald, and crossing the Alex Fraser the wet snow on the two tall bridge pylons was letting go in percussive little chunks.  The first pylon dropped what felt like many pounds of icy slush on my windshield with a godawful sound like glass breaking – and then the windshield wipers sedately cleared away the mess and I could see again, and me going at least 75 k.  The second pylon dropped another slushball, this one much less noisy and scary.  My heart was still leaping about like a small jungle frog when I got home.

Bwa ha ha! Signs that you are working for “My Company”

This is from 11 years ago. How much, how little has changed.

You’re half way through a meeting before you realize you’re in the wrong

one.

You know there is test equipment around, you just don’t know where it is

or who’s using it.

All the available power supplies are broken. (What do we make again?)

You can monopolize three test benches and nobody cares as long as it looks

neat.

When you meet co-workers at the bar on Friday there is always a new face.

The waitress at the golf course knows you better than your co-workers.

You go to a meeting after working at the company for three months and are

jolted out of a pleasant doze when your manager refers to you as “one of

the old hands”.

The temps last longer than the salaried employees.

Nothing makes sense, but it’s consistent.

You are told in a meeting to embrace change, and when you raise your hand

to say you’d rather fuck it doggy style, half the room nods, but nobody

laughs.

Your idea of a good joke is to send a new employee up to “The Dude We Don’t Name who used to be the CEO”  to slap him on the back and call him Mo.

Half the employees can’t make road trips to the States because of what’s

in the ashtrays.  “Better use your car, sir.”

 

At any given time, at least one of the following is down or MIA:

 

1.        The security system

2.        The bathrooms

3.        The coffee machine

4,        The switchboard

5.        The speakerphone in the boardroom

6.        The photocopier

7.        Morale

8.        Air quality

But the network is up all the time…..

 

We already know how much we could be making in the States…. the same as

now, in US dollars.

Nobody knows who’s repping what account, but somehow the orders get

entered.

You’re used to taking customer calls with nailguns going off in the

background.

The one place you can be sure not to run into your boss is the gym.

Following someone into the bathroom to continue a conversation is normal.

Following a member of the opposite sex into the bathroom is still frowned

on.

People don’t talk about cubicles…. they talk about Territorial

Ambitions.

You hate the people who can still laugh at work.

There seems to be a “Most annoying cellphone ringing contest” but nobody

has told the contestants that first prize is having a filing cabinet

tipped over on them.

 

You have 4 stages of employment:

1.        Chipper, but up to the challenge

2.        Deer in the headlights, brink of panic

3.        Full blown hysteria.

4.        Amusement at the people going through the first 3 stages.