Category: Internet

Katie back

I am feeling underslept, which is odd because it was lights out just after 9 last night.  Katie and I are drinking fresh coffee and contemplating the week ahead.  Katie’s going in early to rearrange her locker.  Let us contemplate the wonder and romance of this amazing factoid.

Keith was here last night and we had an NCIS blowout, yet again.  GRRR.  The episode I was most looking forward to, in which Ziva loses her heart to a guy dying of thallium poisoning, had spooky pause and pixelation problems. After some messing about Jeff got it to play but I was pouty there for a while.  I guess I am now officially spoiled rotten; I was raised to believe that I deserve to live with a tech support god who will instantly solve all of my wiring, small weapons and silicon problems with a cheery “Next time don’t smash all of the buttons in rapid succession and then pitch the remote through the window, m’kay?”  I’m living with Jeff so my delusion continues unabated.  How he puts up with me can be summed up in one simple, heartfelt phrase: “Supper’s ready!”

I drop things a lot too, which gets Jeff twitching.  He has this way of appearing, silently and instantaneously, like a cartoon character, eyes wide, to ask, “What was THAT?” while I recover my scattered kitchen implements from the floor, muttering, “Sorry, sorry,” while he patiently informs me that we have downstairs neighbours.  I’m going to have to learn not to cackle when I’m listening to stuff in the morning on headphones, but I can’t help it, I’m a born cackler.

I fed Keith and Jeff pork roast, sauerkraut and ‘other veg’ last night, and I would have fed Paul but he wanted to go home and nap.  Thank you for taking me shopping!  Thank you Keith for the 10% discount!  Their cats are driving them buggo, especially Zeek!, who is having noise management problems.

There’s lotso fun on the inertnets these days:

Me too, pal, me too. (link removed for safety)

Do you feel like an imposter?

Jeff’s cats have been going nuts, running up and down and crying like little buggers. I suspect earthquakes.

I have a friend who actually talks like this. He doesn’t read this blog, thank heavens.

No kiddums.  I try to have a calm looking blog. Then again…..

GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY Okay, I’m not guilty of all of them, but my preoccupations have made my blogs boring as paste these last few weeks.  I am trying to go for excitement and novelty, and end up eating in front of the tv, which no matter how you dress it up is still catatonia inducing.

Remarkable story about the trek from belief to atheism.

I did practice my mandolin (I can has F major?), and I did sort some papers, and I did a shop, but mostly I sat about staring off into space, thinking despairing thoughts about the musical, or sleeping.  Ah, winter.

Today I am going to go into work a bit early and see if my computer, etc., are where they are supposed to be and functioning.  Moves really do suck and they do narsty things to productivity.  And then our new squid overlords, er, owners as per the regulatory approvals which have recently come in, will come in and change everything again, but that probably won’t be for months.

I light a candle for Dr Filk’s healing – he’s had tooth issues and we all know what a big owie that can be.  I light a candle for the peace of all beings.  And I leave you with this excerpt from Dr. Filk’s last missive:

In other news the fall folk season is under way. Played at the Sooke Folk Music Society last night, and shared the occasion with six Kenyan exchange students who did traditional Kikuyu song-and-dance. The highlight for me was a contemporary trad number honoring the heroes of the Mau Mau uprising, in which the performers mimed machine-gunning the audience!

Ah, Kultur!

Minister Prentice sends me an email

The Government of Canada has introduced Bill C-61, An Act to Amend the Copyright Act. The proposed legislation is a made-in-Canada approach that balances the needs of Canadian consumers and copyright owners, promoting culture, innovation and competition in the digital age.
What does Bill C-61 mean to Canadians?
Specifically, it includes measures that would:
expressly allow you to record TV shows for later viewing; copy legally purchased music onto other devices, such as MP3 players or cell phones; make back-up copies of legally purchased books, newspapers, videocassettes and photographs onto devices you own; and limit the “statutory damages” a court could award for all private use copyright infringements;

implement new rights and protections for copyright holders, tailored to the Internet, to encourage participation in the online economy, as well as stronger legal remedies to address Internet piracy;

clarify the roles and responsibilities of Internet Service Providers related to the copyright content flowing over their network facilities; and

provide photographers with the same rights as other creators.

What Bill C-61 does not do:
it would not empower border agents to seize your iPod or laptop at border crossings, contrary to recent public speculation

What this Bill is not:
it is not a mirror image of U.S. copyright laws. Our Bill is made-in-Canada with different exceptions for educators, consumers and others and brings us into line with more than 60 countries including Japan, France, Germany and Australia

Bill C-61 was introduced in the Commons on June 12, 2008 by Industry Minister Jim Prentice and Heritage Minister Josée Verner.
For more information, please visit the Copyright Reform Process website at www.ic.gc.ca/epic/site/crp-prda.nsf/en/home
Thank you for sharing your views on this important matter.

The Honourable Jim Prentice, P.C., Q.C., M.P.
Minister of Industry
The Honourable Josée Verner, P.C., M.P.
Minister of Canadian Heritage, Status of Women
and Official Languages and Minister for
La Francophonie

Duh

Some female is posting her marital grievances on Youtube.

I keep tripping over it on the inertnest (click here and see this), and I’m just not going to go there.  I won’t watch it, I won’t comment on it.  I just really don’t know how many more apocalyptic signs we’re supposed to absorb before whatever happens happens, y’know?
I am Legend is playing, and you know, I just can’t deal with these critters always jumping out at Will so I’m playing on my computer instead.  It’s not a bad movie, I just am jumpy right now.

Ha! My first ad offer!

Hi Allegra,

I was looking at your page on stupid criminals (some people just don’t think!) and I’m interested in paying you $30 to place a text ad on http://allegrasloman.com/?p=1594.  The ad will link to a site offering online criminal background checks.

I can pay you immediately via paypal or check once the ad has been posted.  Please let me know if you are interested and I will send you the ad.  Thanks!! 🙂

Best,
Suzy Leonard

DIMACC

 

It’s too bad I’m not commercializing my blog anytime soon, but this made me smile, and they appear to be a reputable company, so here’s a little plug for them anyway.

Clichés so totally rock my world

I was horrified to read a list of clichés on gawker… and I’ve used almost every one.

I will try to “use my words” in future.  If I do any LOLcats stuff I’ll put in my Livejournal, how’s that?  And perhaps I will be more judicious in my use of italics.

I draw the line at my ‘Inertnests’ neologizm going away, though.  I thought it was a nice play on words, all those people in their little inert nests, smashing the stumble button, playing around with reddit, watching Noam Chomsky interviews on youtube….

Today I will do a bundle buggy shop.  I want to see how hard it is to shop locally…..

Oh my god.  I went to the Chinese greasy spoon at the corner of 22nd and Rupert yesterday am.  I ordered scrambled eggs and sausage and got scrambled eggs and fried wieners.  While I was contemplating this horkworthy attempt at breakfast, a trembling, staggering cockroach meandered down the far wall next to the kitchen.

I dropped by Planet Bachelor where the boys had a full house – Jessica W and Katie were there for brekky.  Christ, I should have gone there first.  I hung around long enough to suck back some coffee and pick up some more tax return stuff and then went home, where I stared at the walls and did zero packing for about six hours.  To intersperse with staring at the walls I re-read Curse of Chalion and read Oryx and Crake, which is like holy crap, how many dystopian novels does the world actually require?
Then I came back here on the bus… which only runs every half hour after supper on weekends.  Gizmo and Eddie are starting to get used to me and they are certainly handsome cats.  Eddie will walk right up to you and give you a shove when he’s hungry, with his paw.  It was quite funny.  Both of the cats snore; Giz is wheezing quietly right now.

I’m contemplating the pile of remotes and wondering if I dare try to turn something on.  I need coffee.

Happy

Despite everything I’m happy.  Things are clicking along very well in my personal life.  It’s Facebook style complicated but loads of fun.  The Luddite has sent me a number of Muppet Show links, including Shirley Bassey singing Goldfinger.  With Turkish subtitles.  All Hail the Inertnests!

Also the last line of his last email he made me laugh so hard I had a five minute coughing spasm afterwards. I am however getting better and I figured out which cough medicine to buy so I’m getting less coughing and fewer side effects from the cough medicine, all a good thing.  Also in the email was a querulous “Why would your daughter want to meet me? If she wants to inspect me she can come on down to the shop and I won’t even know who she is.”  Men, o my god.  The answer to that question is “Because I never shut up about you, how’s that?”
My apartment is somewhat cleaner, but with all the boxes, quite cluttered.  I am trying, in the midst of the chaos, to keep all my tax receipts in one place…..

Two more days and Jeff is here!!!! For good.  Katie says, “It’ll be weird having him here,” and I said, “Like you swapped uncles.”  For Dr. Filk is in Victoria, and Jeff is here.  “I’m used to him being far away.”  For me it will be weird getting through the “Meet my crazy friends stage.”  I know he’ll like Kung Fu Mike and vice versa – the rest of them who the hell knows.  It’s not like ALL of my friends are crazy (I can HARDLY WAIT until he meets ScaryClown, he’ll either like him or loathe him, and versy vice) but they are certainly pegged out against the smarter end of the spectrum and they have that delightful Fun Loving, Common Decency, Brutally Practical combination that makes me melt. Melt Melt Melt.  I heart my friends.

My Buffy Valentines are all over the office.  Te hee.

I’m thinking of giving cooking lessons once I’m in the new place.  Everybody tells me I can cook.  Then they wish they could do it.  Oh, I guess this is not the time to start fantasizing about lesson plans. I learned how to cook an omelette in the nuker from Keith the other day…. he fed me last weekend, I guess I forgot to mention it.  Did I mention that I was happy?  Stressed, but happy.

I light a candle for my grannie.  Without going into details, she was in and out of hospital on a pre-existing condition and everything is managed and she slept in her own bed last night.  I am very grateful that she’s living in the same town as relatives who adore her and help her every chance they get. I light a candle for all the grannies who face old age without much help or sympathy.

Map of cut cables

mapofcutcables.JPG

There have now been six undersea internet cables cut since December 2007.  I had been having a hard time visualizing where they were, but ScaryClown, as always comes through.

Anybody who thinks these events aren’t sabotage is probably a professional pundit.  There are apparently 25 ships that cruise the globe fixing cable wear 24/7 and there’s a cable break on average every 3 days.  What triggered the hysteria, including mine, was the size of the original break – it took down about 70 percent of Egypt’s traffic, and Egypt is not a small country. 

So I can go back to worrying about something else, like uploading my videos.

 

 

 

snore

My wretched night’s sleep was not improved by the fax that chimed in around 1:40 in the morning.  I curse you, Imperial Data!

I am always so pumped when I get home I can’t sleep right away.  I spent a happy couple of hours downloading cheap Mac software and then cursing 12 ways from Sunday trying to get it authenticated and installed, but this morning I have much cool software, including some games.

Salmon Chanted Evening

Well, that was entirely a slice of life. I mean, how many women in Vancouver had a date last night that included:

  • a threat to be serenaded – on triangle? (He plays well; he even has an album credit!) He plays other percussion instruments <<<--- wOOt, Catherine!  and pennywhistle too. I wants me some triangle loving from Ward's Music now. Actually today I'm buying a snare head and brushes but that's another story.
  • a listen to the album, which is lively English trad tunes?  To preserve his privacy, no link alas.
  • a trip upstairs to view…to view not etchings, but Shuffle Demon videos? Like, more than one. I got to watch Out of my House, Roach! (more than once, I loved it so much) and Spadina Bus, and there were more yet. I countered with the Dudley Moore Beethoven Sonata version of the Colonel Bogey March, which is brilliant (I think rOn sent me that link). For the life of us we couldn’t find an audio of the Peter Cook Coal Miner/Judge skit but we found the text. He countered with the Shirt Sketch from early John Cleese Graham Chapman days. And there was some other stuff in there but it was jolly good fun, like his Morris dancing road trip picture.
  • Double Chocolate Stout beer? Quoth he, I don’t know why I got given this, I never touch beer. Well I did in a rather total war kind of way, and it was yummy…
  • Leftover Chinese food from a splendid meal at Angel on Fraser? (Except the soup, the soup bit sand). Quoth he, I don’t like leftovers.  Hmmm.
  • A wonderful hour poking around books from the thirties about engineering marvels and archaeological digs?

I am now contemplating moving furniture some more and then Keith’s going to come over and we’re going to shop and try to find the Serenity DVD (director’s cut/special edition).  Tomorrow, Kopper and I will hang out.

At some point I have to figure out what the hell I’m doing for New Year’s Eve.  I have six different prospects, but I want to do stannomancy at the Dalai Jarmo’s again, and the folks say they are up for having me…. it’s also the closest.  Always a consideration.