A Medley of Extemporanea And No, I'm Not Marie of Romania, but thanks for asking

Furthur at the Ottawa Bluesfest

Well, that was amazing.

I was right up against the stage too, so my ears are ringing, and I was next to this huge group of hilariously stoned teenagers.  It was a good time.  There was another guy standing next to me that I was chatting with a bit, then he took off, but I ran into him again on the way to the car, so that was cool .

Phil Lesh looks like how I imagine Dan at 70.  They replaced Jerry Garcia with his clone, seriously, he must have been vat grown, he looked like a 25-year-old Garcia, and sounded like him and guitared like him and all that.

Bob Weir looked like a hobo.

They played only about 10 songs (edit, found the playlist, actually 18 songs, but the last 10 only had one break between the music), but the concert was 3 hours long including the encore, which was a 15 minute version of “Touch of Gray”.

Beauty.  I stink of weed though now, thanks kids.

Living on my own: Day 3-7

That didn’t last long.  I decided that getting little bits and bobs out would just bore everyone, so I’ll digest my entries instead.

Wednesday (aka Day 3) was another bike in with Dan day.  Work, met Dan to taste test Kichesippi beer, work,  home to eat and change, then I went to the book launch of Hiking Trails of Ottawa, the National Capital Region, and Beyond. The author, Michael Haynes gave an interesting talk, and answered questions before signing copies for us.  I went on my own, and I felt that I possibly was the only person there that didn’t previously know Michael.

Thursday: another day, another bike in with Dan.  On Thursday, I reminded myself the hard was about integrating changes from one code base when you have one of the to-be-integrated-into files open for edit.  For those that don’t know, it doesn’t actually work the way you think it might.  That night I was supposed to go out with people from work for dinner and drinks, but it was a rainy evening, and I was on my bike, and I had to pick up my suit from the cleaners, so I begged off, and ended up going to IKEA and having bright ideas about storage, and a hot dog and lingonberry juice.  I also fixed the fiction section of my library.  It is very neat and streamlined now.

Friday:  I got the keg for the Phoques party.  Pretty good stuff! I robocleaned the pool.  I discovered that it doesn’t do a good job of cleaning up the dead algae, but it could be because I didn’t put the filter back on properly after cleaning it the last time.  I helped Dan move his deck frame back in place, then I went back to IKEA after making the requisite measurements and bought some new storage shelves.  Now I can make the non-fiction section of the library neat and streamlined.

After all that, Dan and Maria picked me up and we went to Dennis and Rachelle’s wedding!  Very fun, but it was kind of lonely being there on my own.  I also got a new DSL modem! Just in time for the weekend!

Saturday: Team Awesome was supposed to go to Penny’s Fudge Factory, but it was pouring out, and I was hung over from the wedding, and when Dan called saying that he didn’t think he was going to make it, I shouted hallelujah, and went back to bed.

I put the shelves together, bought food for the party, chatted with my family (finally!) and watched soccer.

Sunday: Party!!!  Whooo!  It was a good day for it too, sunny and warm, with a good turn out, good burgers, warmish pool and good times.

Good times are always accompanied by bad times, so I had trouble sleeping with an upset stomach.  Boo!

Living on my own: Day 2

Not too much on day two.  I biked in with Dan again, though we didn’t follow our original plan.  There was a kiosk handing out maps and brochures and stickers and the like in front of the War Museum, but we ended up leaving 30 minutes later than planned, and I had a 9am meeting to make. Boo.

Work work work.

Dan and I decided to try to meet up on the path on the way home.  We opted to meet at 5:35pm where our paths converge.  We both got there at precisely 5:35!  Sadly, our clocks were not synchronized, so Dan had to wait a minute.  Still pretty good though!

Leftover sausage and couscous for dinner, then off to the Oak, where I met up with Dan, Steve and Jen and had beers and wings and good conversation until fairly late (for a work night).

Liz, of my spinning class fame, put in a special guest appearance as she was there with some people too, after having cycled around in the forest behind the beaver pond.

Living on my own: Day 1

First off, a bunch of posts in a row, as my DSL modem died at home, so I have no access, and I have been too busy while at work to post these…

First full day of alone landed on the first day of bike-to-work week.  After trying and failing to chat with my sweet due to a bad modem,  I met up with Dan for the first half of my ride in.  Work work work work, and home.

I finally got around to mowing the lawn, which was halfway to my knees, and lucked out as I ran out of gas just as I finished.  Took the cover off the pool and discovered the colour green.  Sweep sweep sweep sweep, and shock.

Quick supper of merguez sausage and couscous, then off to my next job, the grinding of my fireplace to slot in the other bookcase that’s been sitting lonely in the basement for the last two years.  Meanwhile, I called my service provider to verify that my modem was actually fried, and didn’t just have to have an arcane series of button pushes to return it to a usable state.  Almost two hours later, I learned that the modem has died, and that the bookcase won’t fit in the spot I want it in without hacking it. Yes, I was on hold on tech support for 2 hours. Pain.  This is what hands-free phones are for.

Living on my own: Day 0

I dropped my wife and kids off at the airport yesterday.  They are on a two-and-a-half month trip to Croatia.  I plan on doing a bunch of stuff to keep me from going mental^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h occupied, and I’ll let you all (OK, this is mostly for Bojana) in on what I’ve done.

So, after the drop-off, I went to Canadian Tire and bought myself a new drill and a sanding bit for one of my upcoming projects.  Since it was Canadian Tire, I also got pool shock and a stand-alone Lightning McQueen wading pool for Trevor and Owen that was on sale (shhhh!).

Since I’m alone, I intend to not use the AC _at all_ this summer.  To that end, I moved ping 2.0, my beloved iMac to the basement, where I can bask in the cool, cool air.   I thought I was going to have to bring the infrastructure down as well, but the wireless has full bars where the computer is, so I’m not going to bother.

Paul and Charissa are also away this week, one to WWDC and the other to training in Dallas. Mike, their usual house-sitter-dog-walker-cat-wrangler was only available late Sunday night, so I walked and fed Chewie.  He is cute and fluffy and a fun dog to hang around with.

Before bed, I emptied out the PVR, as another thing I don’t intend on doing this summer is lounging in front of the TV.  I’m returning it this week and canceling cable, at least for the summer.

Where I reveal that I do stupid things for no good reason

This morning was nice; not too hot, not too cold.  Dan and I were cycling along Timm Road to work, looking for a fine example of the ridiculous potholes that line the bike lane.  I saw the perfect specimen on the other side of the road, one with a nice rubber tube sticking out of it (seriously).  Checked ahead, no cars. Shoulder check, no cars… Except there was one.  I did my u-turn to look at the pothole, heard a screech (it is an 80 km/h zone) and a honk and saw a bumper just missing my back tire.

To the driver, I’m sorry.  I don’t know why I didn’t see you, maybe I was tired and not paying attention, maybe I was distracted by the shiny thing (aka the pothole), point is, I didn’t.

Also, thank you for being attentive.  This is all I’ve been thinking about this morning. The what if.

Fun with Science!

Today I did some spring chores… erm, fall chores really. I changed the oil in the pressure washer (actual spring chore) and cleaned the solar blanket (yes, I put it away filthy… I also put it away really, really late and didn’t want to clean it).

Feeling good about the whole thing, I rewarded myself with a cold one. It was nice and cold, being right next to the freezer compartment in my cheap little bar fridge. It looked good and inviting so I pried the lid off, had a swig, and watched as the bottle froze in front of my eyes. Do _you_ know why that happened?

Show your work in the comments.

Early spring and milestones

Everyone knows it has been an early spring. I will not dwell. One thing that it has enabled me to do, however, is hit some milestones pretty quickly.

Last year, I started biking to work on April 14th; by the 1st of June, I had managed a total of 313.24 km (yes, I keep track). This year, I passed that mark last week on the 14th, and I should be over the 500km mark by the weekend.

I’ve also crossed the 2000km mark on my year old trip computer ( a while ago, actually) and the 100 hour mark. That last one kind of surprises me, as it feels like I’ve been on the bike more than that.

I will try to double both this year

A faint memory

Ever have one of those memories that tug at the very edge of your consciousness, poking you a little, but without being about to remember exactly what it is? I’ve had one of those solved this week.  I remember reading a comic book where the bad guy was called “The Googol”.  I had remembered it briefly when Google opened shop, but I couldn’t remember the reference.  It came back to me the other day, so I searched and searched on-line, convinced that it was a Tintin story.  It wasn’t.  It was this.

Glad I cleared it up.  Irritatingly, I should have just used Wikipedia, as there’s a reference to it in on the Googol page.

Bus driver relieved of duties after allegedly punching cyclist

One of the problems with the early spring, I guess.  Silly season has started early too.

Bus driver relieved of duties after allegedly punching cyclist.