Life Under a Rock

Looks like the work in Edmonton is for sure now. I have yet to set my exact schedule, and so get my flights, hotel and car rental arranged, but that will come. I'll probably fly out next Friday morning and back the Tuesday immediately after, not exactly a vacation by any stretch, and working an overnight job somewhere in there is gonna mess with my clock but hey, it should be worth it.

I'm one of those people who has managed to live 20 some years without being in a plane. Not for fear of flying, but the fact that I've really never had anywhere to fly to, or lately, the money to fly where I'd like to. This one's being paid for by the company, so why not take advantage. It will also, ashamedly, be the farthest west in Canada I've ever been (previously Windsor). I made it down to New Mexico and Arizona a couple few years ago (how the time flies), but that was a straight line drive right through the heart of America. Oh, and my childhood hero #33 made the Hall of Fame in the first year of eligibility with little surprise.

Chad Ciavarro experience seems to have it that Edmonton is quite the bore. I mentioned in the last post that all I know of them having is a mall. I'll be working less than 3 blocks from said mall, so I'm sure I'll end up seeing that, but the past few days haven't produced any interesting suggestions, besides driving 9 hours to Calgary, which is simply not an option for me.

A friend of mine just said that she thought the stampede was on now, and a quick google tells me that the Calgary Stampede does infact start the day I plan on flying out. I guess that's one good thing Edmonton has going for it. Since Calgary is out, so too is the more interesting Banff. Word has it that Jasper is only a 3 to 4 hour road trip though, so I think that's what I'll do on the Monday if Murphy's Law of fieldwork decides to give me a break on the work I'll be doing Saturday and Sunday.

Edmonton also recently had a hockey team going for it, but that's all done and over with now. Mr. Minutesman Pronger apparently wants out, and well...Jason Smith and Ryan Smyth are getting a bit aged too and can't carry that team themselves. Also in hockey news, the Laffs signed Bryan McCabe to a five year deal, none of which will see him win a cup, nor will it hopefully see him make the Vancouver 2010 Olympic team.

Roberto Luongo also signed a deal, with the Canucks, that hopefully WILL see him, and more importantly the Canucks win a cup in the next 4, even if it has to be at the expense of my Avs. And in the Avs-Nucks saga, Steve Moore needs to just give up his grasping at straws; this time a suit against Bertuzzi transferring the title of his mansion here in town to his wife. If it weren't for that whole concussion thing, Steve Moore would be one of those never-was's that would be bound for a B-list celebrity boxing, or a hockey fight night gimmick. Bertuzzi probably won't have a cup shot down in Florida, unless getting out of the Canadian spotlight lets him step up a little bit more and maybe make the team a competitor (especially since the NHL Southeast tends to be a real crapshoot). And my childhood hero #33 made the Hall in his first year of eligibility with no surprise.

And now with hockey tired, any last ditch suggestions for things exciting in Edmonton?

UPDATE: I just checked my Technorati 'Who Links Me' link, and apparently this (NSFW) site domain lost its old owner...is this my break in the porn industry??

Cutting Glass

Its almost July already. Daily 20 degree highs, with typical southwestern Ontario humidity. And along with those muggy days come the businesses that insist on keeping their establishment feeling like an ice rink so as you don't dare venture back outside. Now, I can appreciate a THO just like the next guy, its just one of those things you notice, but lets get realistic people. Every place I went into today made me feel like I was being punished for not bringing a hoodie in with me.

When the air circulation is so quick that you can smell that distinctive odour of the air conditioning unit, you've got it cranked way the hell too high people. I understand its nice to have a reprieve from the heat. Infact its a necessity for those with children to look after or the elderly, but I am pretty sure they could handle a nice dry 23 or 24 degrees and not drop over dead. At least not with heat as a cause (cue paranoia over West Nile or Bird Flu?). It is entirely unnecessary to make me feel like its a cool day in September when I'm grabbing a coffee or browsing through some CD's. And its even moreso when I am vigorously involved in sitting idly at my desk. Am I alone on this one?

Anyways, the forecast is looking great for Saturday night, although true to form, people are being non-committal or backing out altogether so I don't know that I'll have the turnout to make a keg cost effective. Sure I could keep it on ice for the remainder of the weekend, but even I can't drink a keg, less a few pitchers, by myself in 3 days. I suppose I could just store it in the nearest Timmys since they're halfway to a walk-in refrigerator in there anyways.

A Gift to the Crown

Portugal just won in what has to be the most appalling displays of football, almost equally by both sides, in a long time. What makes it worse? The fact that save for maybe 2 chances, one of which turned into a goal, the Portugese were out played as evidenced by both ball possession and shots on net.

Add to that, a massive coaching blunder to bench Ruud van Niistelroij who surely would have put away some of the chances that the replacement kid Kuyt had, and its been a very disappointing afternoon.

The only good I see coming of this is that a number of the Portugese team is sitting either disqualified from the next game by red cards or injury. I'm all for Christiano Ronaldo who's showman play has done wonders for the Manchester U side, and to be fair, a kid who goes off hurt, in tears, before the ridiculousness that ensued deserves as much respect as possible. But beyond that, here's to Wayne Rooney, David Beckham and friends marching all over Portugal in the next game.

And as I type this, two cars drive down the street with portugese flags waving and horns honking...typical, but not stereotypical if its true. This wasn't a game to celebrate no matter the outcome.

Ebb and Flow

After the extended dead period at the office, the work has picked up a little. Whether that stays constant remains to be seen, but an hour before leaving the office yesterday I was asked if I'd be available to fly out to Edmonton to do some work over night on a Saturday in a few weeks. Shitty deal for sleep? Sure. But it'll also be a free trip out west for me and something to do.

Ideally I'll also be able to extend the trip to have a day or two of personal time out there. If it goes down it'll be the furthest west in Canada I've been, which I plan on changing next spring with a road trip anyways. Now one issue seems to stick out from the other possible work related, logistical ones....what the hell is there to do in Edmonton? They have a big mall...anything else, since I'm really not the mall type? A couple people have suggested road trips to Jasper (~3 hours?) if I have the time. If you've got any ideas for me, I'd love to hear em.

Anyways, between that possible trip in 2 weeks, and the long weekend festivities next weekend, this will be my last weekend to really kick back for a little while. Its my bet that most of that kicking back will have to be done tonight, since tomorrow's Netherlands-Portugal game sets up to be pretty tight. There better not be any similarity to Euro 2004's matchup.

Its Too Big

...the blog. It takes forever to update no when I make changes to things like my links at the right. Yes I could take advantage of one of those external apps like Blogrolling, but...okay so I have no good excuse other than I don't feel like it. But something will need to change soon.

Anyways, that Matt Good link is once again updated, and he's back at writing the quality material that at least some of us have come to expect. I've got another few ideas for the sidebar again too, but we'll see what transpires.

Work picked up in the slightest of ways this week, and even time in the office is going a bit more smoothly now that I control my home PC via a handy little app and can kill some of my time cruising blogs and my fantasy sports rosters without them showing up in the work history (which probably doesn't get checked anyways) and while being easily minimized. The sad part about the whole thing is that it is actually quicker for me to do most things, like open pdf's remotely with the internet lag, than it is to open them on the slow ass computer at the office.

The long weekend is coming up quickly, and plans look like they're falling into place for a bonfire, barbecue and beer bonanza (this alliteration brought to you by the good people at The Sac). Long weekend history would seem to suggest that some kind of obscene weather will hit, whether it be cold, windy, or rainy...but any real dedicated Canadians will be ready to get it on under all circumstances to celebrate their nation's birthday. Consider that a call out to anyone local for the long weekend Saturday, you all know where I live, or how to reach me.

And now to see if the Jays can finally seal the deal on a series sweep this season.

Day in the Sun

The early week forecasts for heat and sun this weekend actually held out, and so I took full advantage, making a road trip with some buddies up to Boiler Beach where I spent a lot of time with my cousins as a kid.

For the most part the area was unchanged; some renovations and new signs for the campgrounds on the way in, some redressed cottages along the beach road, the same nice wide, sandy beach mostly free of the pebbles you have to deal with along other stretches of Lake Huron. The sun was warm, and the wind coming across the lake served as nice relief and produced some mild waves coming in, although none of the storm spawned kind that we'd rush down to the beach for as kids when I stayed with my aunt and uncle a few blocks away.

But time does its little tiptoe, families break apart and you stop going to the beach, natural wave action and longshore drift all but silt in the old boiler namesake from an 1880's steamer that used to sit at least 50 yards out in the water, and smog hangs over the water to the point that you can't see the nuclear power plant a few kilometers up the shoreline, that for its own part serves to keep the smog down, instead creating longer term, although more containable issues. Infact, a couple farmers on the drive out to the beach seem to have recognized the same kind of changes, or at least recognized some economic benefit, and have installed wind turbines and solar panels on their lots.

I'm not trying to wax tree-hugger, but as I sit here roasting in my second story room sans air conditioning, with the added heat of a sunburn from poor sunblock coverage, I have to wonder if our day in the sun collectively is on its way out. With seemingly poor uptake of any kind of initiatives by governments, pointing the finger at the lack of definitive theories for global warming, in North America, I have to wonder what that beach is going to look like in another 10 years should it take me that long to return (which I highly doubt).

While I see some of the holes in the links between certain anthropogenic emissions and warming, and while I keep my mind open to natural cyclicity in global climate, its pretty clear that there is at least some human effect. Even if that effect is small, there should be more imposed on the social conscience to do something about it. My part for the day? Sitting here sweating my ass off....As opposed to driving an hour and a half each way to soak up some sun, sand and waves yesterday, or the 20 minutes each way I'll drive to work this week. Maybe I can use that as added justification to quit a month early?

And back in the short-term frame of mind, I'm going to have to remember to bring a barbecue and a girl the next time I hit the beach. One to assist me in cooking, and one to prevent me from cooking, because everyone knows its just wrong to get a non-blood related dude to rub lotion on your back.

Clocks in Reverse

Today has been the longest day ever....except for the hour I spent at the nearby sports bar watching the first half of the Netherlands game. I was hoping to stick around for all of it, but again, you win some and lose some. It happened to be the bar I spent most of my pre-kindergarten childhood in with my parents, and has stayed successful enough to keep staff around for 20 some years.

Of course, being the prick that I am, I did my best to make the people I recognized feel old by letting them know who I was after not having been there much since I was maybe 10. Since that timeframe also precludes my parents split and subsequent divorce, there were some interesting and awkward moments to be had.

And then Cote D'Ivoire scored and cut the Dutch lead in half and I had to divert some attention back to the game until halftime. I was hoping to come back to the office and find a live stream, but unless I find a way to proxy myself as a UK resident and grab the BBC stream, I think I'm shit out of luck for doing that in the future. The Netherlands won, and have advanced to the round of 16, that's all that matters for now anyways.

Now I have to find a way to turn all the clocks in this office here forward a couple hours.

Finding Netherlands

There are commercials to the tune that during world cup in europe coincides with the highest incidence of people skipping out on work 'sick'. I think for Friday's Netherlands - Ivory Coast game I may have to skew the North American statistics as well. Odds are I'll be sitting on my ass in the office accomplishing nothing but reviewing some boring, dry and repetitive pdfs that likely won't really apply to anything I'll ever run into in my work.

Yesterday I managed to squeeze out into the field just long enough to take an extended lunch at a Boston Pizza and see the Czechs feed it to the U.S. in high def. Of course the North American media skews it as something shocking being as the American team has worked hard to get themselves up to a world ranking of 5th.

While 3-0 is a pretty bad whipping, people seem to forget that the Czechs are currently number 2. I'm not exactly sure how they're ahead of the Netherlands at 3rd spot who beat them twice 2-0 in qualifying for the cup, but generally rankings don't mean much anyways. And they won't when it comes down to a Dutch versus Brazil final either. You heard it here first. I've got money on it...but you probably shouldn't follow suit. Gambling is bad mmmmmk?

The one sure bet is that this week is going to drag on forever. Hopefully the weather stays alright for a beach road trip this weekend.

Sanitary Sewer, Now There's a Misnomer

Its funny how you can go weeks and months at a time only seeing one or two close buddies, and then within a week run into two friends that you barely ever see, and an ex-girlfriend that you haven't run into in even longer.

The two buddies I ran into I hadn't seen in a sober state in at least 2 years, but I still manage to catch up with at parties here and there. One was one of my friends since back in our kindergarten years but the circles of friends changed enough by the end of highschool it was only rare football or pond hockey outings that we caught up. When I went into a lab in town yesterday to pick up some sample bottles for a job today I was half expecting to maybe see someone I knew from the university collection of people that all go off and do their thing. As I stepped out of the foyer of the ultra modern open concept lab (read typical sterile lab environment with mostly windows as dividers) with a cooler full of bottles I thought I heard someone call me, but after a quick glance I kept going.

When I came back inside I looked around again and caught the eye of an apparent stranger before taking probably 2 full seconds to realize it was the old buddy in an out of context (read non keg beer in hand) setting there doing some wiring after just completing his electricians apprenticeship a few weeks back. Like everyone else I know that's gone through college in 2 years less time, some starting a year earlier, he's probably making more money now than I will for years. And contrary to the typical belief instilled in kids these days, university really isn't the be all and end all for happiness. Not like I thought it was and had reinforced growing up.

Infact I've lately been thinking I wouldn't mind a job at all being a field technician. Between the outdoors and the mobility to keep my attention, but not killing yourself with heavy work, it wouldn't be a bad gig. A job like that doesn't take a Masters degree to fill adequately, or even above standard with a bit of common sense. One thing I know for certain is that I don't want to end up behind a desk pushing paper and forwarding e-mails until i'm too old to hack it at the very earliest.

Although, days where you have to sample water in which you can see floaters and toilet paper washing on by is a bit more motivation to keep going with academia. The more qualified I make myself, the easier it will be to delegate the shit jobs (pun very much intended) onto someone else. Sanitary sewers are about as far from being sanitary as I could possibly imagine, short of finding bags of blood in the pipe as well?

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Some fun reading for you all over at Thought Mechanics: Why Can't I Own a Canadian?

Excitement in Destruction

When there's no-one around its a lot easier to get shit done. No people getting in your way, or nagging or interruptions. I have an empty house to myself today and got the lawn mowed, dishes done, and a new screen built for the door that opens from my room to the upstairs balcony.

The thing about having an upstairs porch out of your room is that heat rises. That, coupled with my computer running 24/7, means windows and doors need to stay open as much as possible. But the flies and mosquitos are starting to come out in force, and while I'm not particularly concerned about my brain swelling from a West Nile infection, the little bastards buzzin around your ears is annoying. Enter the screen.

I think my mom and brother went to some circus today. Not Toronto with the DVP and Gardiner shut down, not the increasingly busy big box store plazas around here which are poppin up like zits on that boy who they say eats too many chocolate bars, but the kind that sells you cotton candy and comes complete with clowns and all that colourful crap.

Sure I liked the circus as a kid, but now I know better. The only real excitement I can see is in hoping for those trapeze artists to fall and break something or a tiger to go all nuts on Sigfried and Roy wannabes in the centre ring. The joy isn't actually there in the planned event, but what could happen. Nascar is akin to the circus, in that they only have one real reason to watch. And with the safety nets under the big top and all these shock absorbing cars now, even that is diminished.

For the kids sure, stick to the plan, but I don't know what my mom and brother were hoping to expect? Maybe it will end up being the one time I missed something great. Oh well, back to watching the Jays blow yet another chance at a series sweep, this will be three in a row. They don't quite have that killer instinct they need just yet.