I'll admit it. I've gotten seriously out of shape. I've put on way too many pounds since moving to Texas (30lbs or there abouts). All them giant portions, bad food, and pop that comes in a bloody bucket have been catching up to me. And I'm not getting any younger either. Sure, I've weeded out most pop and drinks that contain High Fructose Corn Syrup, but the stuff with real sugar still helps pack on the pounds. It's a good thing I bike the two miles each way to work, or else I'm sure I'd have packed on even more.

I'll also admit that I'm lazy too. But I'm working on it. I biked the 25 mile Mission Trail a few weeks ago with no trouble at all. I'm considering doing it once a month throughout the winter while the weather is tolerable to me and I actually CAN be outside exerting myself. But I also think that I need a serious goal to work towards. A goal to really knock me out of my laziness. A goal to help me get healthier. A goal to help me lose weight through exercise.

So I've decided that next year I'm running the Rock-N-Roll half marathon. Back in August, I met up with an old friend who was in Dallas for a few days. Compared to me, he was looking pretty good. Turns out he runs. I noted this, but then my lazy ass did its very best to help my brain to forget about that.

Then our friend Amanda who hosts our weekly Pub Quiz was telling us about her decision to start running in order to get her ass off the couch. And then later told us she was going to run the half marathon this year. And then I learned that a guy I know from work was going to run the full marathon this year. Both were successful, and it got me thinking. It got me motivated. It got me to decide that I was going to give it a shot next year. I was going to start running. I was going to start training, since I had a full year to do it, there was no way I was going to NOT be able to do it.

And then I spent the next 3 days sitting on the couch at every available minute that I wasn't at work. Off to a roaring start, eh?

I made sure to mention this goal to co-workers in the hopes that if I abandon this adventure, they'll shame me relentlessly. lol.

My wife has been giving me subtle nudges all this week. I love her to death for that. I can see she'll be nudging me in the future if I start to slack off. First was opening my email to find she'd found a Garmin GPS watch thingy that will track heart rate speed, track your progress with some software (which appeals to the geek in me)calories burned and a whole pile of other stuff. Hell, this thing does everything but drag your fat ass off the couch, strap your shoes on and toss your lazy butt out the door.

Then she emailed me with a link to a site with a massive sale on running shoes the next day. hint, hint, nudge nudge.

So, today, I decided to pull the trigger and buy that crazy GPS watch. Why? Added incentive. I hate spending money, so I know that I'll be really pissed at myself if I spend the $150 on this thing and then not put it to use. This is a tactic I've learned from my wife and I've seen it work. Besides, since she's posted the link to the sale of this item on Monday I've seen the price increase from $147 to $154. If I didn't act now I'd never get it since the retail price is about double that. So, now I'm committed.

Also today, I went over to Woodlawn Lake. They have a great running track around the lake that's 1.3miles with markers every 1/10 of a mile, and it's flat. I figured that this would give me a good baseline, to see just how much work this was going to be. 4 words: Oh. Fuck. I'm. Screwed.

I ran the first half mile. Then I walked two tenths. Ran one tenth. Walked two tenths. Then I ran one of the final 3 tenths to get me to the end. Sad. Very. Sad.

But it's a start. Part of my problem is that I had what I'd call a severe back problem about 8 years ago. It when it got to its worst, it took me about 6 months of continued work with a chiropractor to get myself back to normal and free of the pain that I can only call the worst pain I've ever experienced in my life. And that pain was 24 hours a day for about 18 months. It still bothers me if I stand for long periods. So it's going to be a long process.

Put me on a bike and I can go 25 miles and not really feel it. Put me on an eliptical machine and I can go for about 20-25min before my back starts to ache. Put me on a hard surface and have me run...well...you saw the results.

I'm just going to have to work at it. Baby steps. I'm going to go back to the lake tomorrow and see if I can run just a little bit further. And I'll keep this up until I can do the full lap in one go. And just keep building from there.

I'm also going to have to work my upper body and lower back and get them strengthened up. I've said it before....I'm a mess. lol. But I think I can do this.

I'll try to write about my progress as I make some.

Six years ago, today, at a gorgeous little gazebo in Alamo Plaza, P and I got married. It was a quiet affair, with my two closest friends, my parents and a few of P's good friends as well. It marked the end of a very long journey for us. We were separated by long distance for an amount of time long enough that would have destroyed most relationships, we kept with it, and we stuck it out because we knew that in the end it would be worth it. We finally took the leap and we've never looked back.

It also marked the beginning of some new journeys on that day. For me it was a journey into a new country, and in a state that I had never, ever set foot in before. I was leaving behind all my friends and family for unknown circumstances, unknown adventures and unknown well.....everythings really. But I knew that in P I had both friend and family, as well as lover and wife, and I knew that things would be ok. And I've never looked back.

And of course, most importantly, it was the beginning of a new journey for P and I. One of husband and wife; one of full partners in life's adventure. The journey has not always been paved with rose petals and candy, nor has it always been an easy road, but for the most part, it has been about as close to it as two people could ever hope for. And we've never looked back.

We've made a pretty damn good life for ourselves thusfar in this past six years, and I can't wait to see what the next 6 have in store for us, and the 6 after that, and the 6 after that.

Thank you P for 6 fantastic years of love, laughter, adventures and oh so much more. "You're the one I want to be with, and the one I want to end with." And here's looking at the rest of our lives.

Aheri,
Shane.

DAY III

Got up and got ready to check out. Only a few things on tap for today before heading home. Being fans of Asian culture we decided to visit the Crow Collection of Asian Art. It was a rather small display, but there was some really great pieces there. Lots of statues decorated the area and it was a really neat place to visit. We spent a lot more time there than we thought we would.

And old friend of P’s lives in the North end of Dallas and we made plans to give her a quick visit. Our friend Julio has family that own a Mexican restaurant, which turns out is near P’s friend, so we told Julio we’d stop in there for lunch and visit with his aunt. The food at this place was really good! P and I both enjoyed our lunches. And they even gave us the family discount! That was really sweet of her to do for us.

There was still a long drive ahead of us so the visit with P's friend was fairly short. They'd been at Notre Dame together for their first year, and it had been since 2000 since they'd last seen eachother. She'd just had a baby 7 weeks prior and they were in the middle of MAJOR renovations to boot. Geez, talk about a busy household.

Anyway, after our visit with her we hit the open road on our way back to San Antonio with an estimated arrival back home of about 8pm. P had to get up early in the morning for work, so we wanted to get home as early as possible but still do the things we'd wanted to do in Dallas. We had decided that once we got out of Dallas, I'd drive the rest of the way home to give P time to relax and recharge a bit. After we'd driven for about an hour South of Dallas, it turns out both of us were about to suggest pulling over to the shoulder and I'd drive. This is when the trip took a really shitty turn. At that moment, the front passenger tire ripped apart!!! We pulled off to the shoulder to check out what the fuck had just happened. Yep. The tire's tred had torn completely off! WONDERFUL! The saddest part of this situation? We'd planned on getting new tires for the car weeks ago, since they were most likely due, but we kept putting it off. And we'd just finished discussing getting new tires very soon just moments before our situation!

So there we are on the side of the road, in the middle of BFE with a stripped tire and very limited options. Fortunately there was a guy also pulled over to the side of the road about 500yards up the road from us. Turns out he was in his pickup, hauling a large trailer full of hay for his boss when he first got one tire blowout, then a second! His luck was even worse than ours. He told us that his boss had called a tire company in Dallas to bring him two new tires. P got the number and figured we'd check them out and see what they could do for us. While she walked off to do that, the guy basically told me to prepare to get boned really hard, since these guys make a lot of money bailing out stranded motorists.

As it turned out this company didn't have a tire for our car, but put us in touch with someone else that might. And they did. They were going to charge $100/h with a two hour minimum charge, plus the cost of the tire. So we're looking at about $300. At which P told them she'd have to consult with me first. So we sat there for a minute, and then I looked over at the sign pointing to an exit to Waxahatchi, Texas. So I suggested to P that we call information and find out if there's a Wal-Mart in Waxahatchi. We could put the little doughnut tire on the car, and limp our way there and that way we'd only have to buy a new tire. Turns out there WAS a Wal-Mart located there, about 5 miles from where we were stranded. BUT, we only had 90min before they close for the night. So there I was in 100F+ heat, getting backed on the hot Texas ashfault changing the tire. We had to limp our way about 5 miles in our previous direction just to find a damn turn around so we could limp back to this Walmart. It was slow going, but we made it with about half an hour to spare. ha ha spare. And for $70 be got a brand new tire put on Pilar the Wonder Car. But we'd now lost about 2.5 hours. Fuck.

We got as far as the south of Austin before pulling over because we were both starving and we went to Steak N' Shake for dinner.

When all was said and done it was almost 11 before we got home, exhausted. I'm just glad our tire ripped apart where and when it did. Any further down the road or any later in the day and we would've been S.O.L. since it was 60miles to Waco at that point.

Not exactly the way I would've liked to end what was otherwise a fantastic trip to Dallas. Saw and old friend, saw some great sights and took tons of pictures. Awesome.

Dallas part II

Got up the next morning feeling a tad rough after drinking a shitload of beer. Met up with Ed in the lobby to grab breakfast and some time killing before P and I were going to drive him up to the airport for noonish.

Grabbed a good breakfast at the deli next door to our hotel and decided to check out the 6th floor museum which of course highlights the 6th floor window of the former School Book Depository where Oswald is said to have shot Kennedy from.

We got there and saw the $13.50 price tag per head in order to in our opinion look out a window that’s glassed in anyway, and felt that that was more money than we’d care to spend. Sorry tourist trap, you’ll have to sucker someone else this day.

Got Ed safely to what later turned out to be the wrong terminal (oops) and got him on his way. It was so great to see him again and we vowed that it would not be another 10 years until we’d meet up again. It’s just a shame that we had so little time to catch up.

Upon getting back into the city, P and I decided to hit the Dallas Central Library, because we’d heard that the “lost” copy of the Declaration of Independence was on display there, as well as Shakespeare’s first folio. The dimly lit display room of the Declaration was a golden opportunity for me to check out the settings on the camera P bought me for my birthday. This little camera has a setting for damn near any situation. I was very impressed with its versatility.

Once we did that we checked out a massive “sculpture” which is essentially a life sized replica of a longhorn cattle drive. There were literally over a hundred longhorn statues, and each one completely unique. We followed the entire cattle drive through a little creek, and up a trail to a ridge overlook. Way cool! And all this in the heart of downtown Dallas! We also stopped at the cemetery there checking out some 130+ year old stones.

After that we cruised over to the artsy district where we saw some great murals, and encountered an area below an underpass where artists were painting on these giant concrete slabs. Deep Ellum is the name of the area, and the art is what they were doing to decorate the entry into this section of the city. I’ll be posting pictures of some of my favorite pieces soon.

While we were there we encountered a burger place called Twisted Root. We were drawn by the following that was painted on one of their windows: “It’s a Slap-Yo-Mama Good Burger” as well as other comical musings. We decided to go back there later in the evening for a late dinner, and boy, were we glad we did!

The atmosphere is very lively, lots of funny signs all over the place, and everyone gets a funny name-tag handed to them instead of giving their own name upon placing the order. So while waiting in line, we heard orders ready for the likes of Chris Tucker, and others. P was given the moniker of Little Miss Sunshine. Heehee.

P had a burger and I tried their all-beef dog, and neither disappointed! The combination of funny environment and good food, definitely make this a place to eat at if you end up in Dallas. Definitely worth it! There will be lots of pics added to Facebook from this place coming soon.

4:00am:
I realize that when one tries to fall asleep, one counts sheep. When one is desperately trying to stay awake in a San Antonio Greyhound station, one should count neck tattoos. There were so many Mexicans with names tattooed on their necks, I ended up stopping my game after hitting 23.

7:00am:
Get to Austin Greyhound station. All is well, but I'm really tired. Finish talking to P on the phone, who is getting ready for work. As I finish the call a giant black woman, I'm talking HUGE decides that I'm going to be her seat partner for the rest of the trip. GREAT. She takes up way too much room, and she smells heavy of perfume. GAG. AND she's texting on her iphone all the way there. I'm left cluthing my netbook bag, trying to take up as little space as possible. SOOO comfy.

8:30am-10am:
I become facinated in watching this one guy about 5 rows over and on the other side of the aisle. He's got a simple phone, with no texting keyboard. And he's texting....and texting....and TEXTING. NONSTOP. I swear he's texting a novel to someone, one long text message at a time. He's holding up the phone in the taking a picture style, thumb moving and moving. He's moving his head and looking up at his screen, then glancing back down at the phone pad. Up, down...up, down....up, down. Long text done....send. Within 30 seconds....new message. And repeat. For well over an hour!!! It was crazy.

10:00am:
Large woman LEAVES! Gets off just south of Dallas. Oh well. At least I'll have the remaining 30min ride in comfort. NOPE! That's when BIG BUBBA THE REDNECK TEXAN gets on board, and decides i'm going to be his seating partner. YAY! This dude was so Redneck Texan. 300 lbs, cammo hat, big 'ol drawl, and big huge fat roll on the back of his neck.

10:40am:
Getting off the bus, I walk the couple blocks to Dealey Plaza to check out the place where Kennedy was assassinated. It was a bit of a trip standing there. I've heard about this place all my life, and here I was, seeing the places I'd read about so many times over the years. Very cool.

1:00pm:
After walking several miles and the sun now diabolically oppressive, I stop at a deli next door to my hotel. Served a teeny tiny grilled cheese with bacon and fries. Head next door after for check in.

2:00pm:
Round the corner to get to the hotel entrance. There's an equipment trailer pulling up to the curb. There is a ghost busting type show coming here for the weekend to shoot an upcoming episode. I can't make this shit up! They're unloading and running cables etc. Seems there have been hauntings on the 8th and 10th floors over the years. Luckily or unluckily? I'm on the 5th floor.

3:45pm:
Ed calls. He's done with his work for the day and it's time to get together for beer, and remembering old times. It's funny how quickly we fall into old patterns and it's almost like we've only been separated for a week or so. It's so great to see him. I've had few really close friends in my life, ones that I know I'll still be good friends with in another 30 years. I can count them probably on one hand. Ed is one such friend.

4:15pm:
Back to my room, in what seems like minutes half a 12 pack is reduced to empties. Geez! After that, it's off to Dealey Plaza so Ed can check it out before he leaves for Canada in the morning. Several more miles are walked as we go find dinner, have more beer, and check out some really cool buildings, taking tons of pictures. Silly antics galore. I've missed how well we riff off eachother. So glad that after 10 years I get to see him again. Who would've thought that 10 years would go by since our last get together we'd end up meeting up again in Dallas, Texas. Weird where life takes us, sometimes.

9:40pm - 12:30am:
P calls from down the street. We gather her stuff and hang back at our room for while. Beer supplies depleted rather quickly. We ring downstairs to find out when the restaurant/bar closes. Apparently it closed to hours ago, at 10pm. WTF?!? P orders pizza while Ed and I are sent out for more beer at the Seven 11. DENIED. Dude tells us that we can't buy beer because it's after midnight. WTF?!? We also find out that the bars have last call at 1am, and it would take us about 15min to walk to any such bar anyway. Bigtime FAIL. The three of us determine that Dallas is indeed very LAME.

2:00am:

Ed goes back to his hotel, and will meet us in the morning for breakfast and another trip to Dealey Plaza this time for P to check it out. What a crazy day.

A Toast To Old Friends.

A couple of weeks ago, I got a message on Facebook from an old friend. It turns out he was going to be coming to Dallas near the end of this month. And he wanted to know how far away San Antonio was from Dallas. The only answer I could possibly give was, “not far enough that I couldn’t try and find a way to get up there.”

You see, I met Ed during one of what I’d have to say was one of the most interesting times of my life. I was barely 19 years old, and I had left the nest to move about 9 hours away from home to live in a town that I was born in, but only lived there for a month. I knew virtually nobody. I left with few belongings and a promise of a job at a local movie theatre that my aunt was going to get me.

During my time in Timmins I met Ed. Ed was the brother of one of my friends from work and we begame friends really easily. My Timmins years were my lean years, and it was a pretty big struggle, but it was friends like Ed and the gang from work that made it a lot easier to get through.

Anyway, it’s been 15 years almost since I left Timmins and Ed and I parted ways. It was not until about 10 years ago that that we had a chance to get together through some bullshit luck and this crazy thing called the internet which was still kinda new. In ’99 there was no Facebook or any of the other social networking sites so I lost track of so many people, and locating them again was damn near impossible. He was working in Ottawa and was going to be in Toronto for a short while. So we had a chance to get together along with his sister to have some drinks and catch up. That was the last time the three of us were in the same room. We lost touch again until I was already living Stateside.

So now Ed is coming to Dallas and I’m really looking forward to seeing him again. It’s been so long since I’ve been able to go back to Canada so the fact that a part of the past that I miss is coming here is so awesome. It’s a definite pick me up, to say the least and a nice relief to some serious homesickness.

I’m going to head up to Dallas on an overnight train, getting into Dallas sometime in the morning. Paulina, who can’t get away from work will be coming up to join us sometime Friday night. I can’t wait for her to meet Ed. She’s not met any of my friends from any part of my life further back than my college days. Ed will be busy with work stuff and I’ll meet up with him for what I imagine will be a shitload of beer and catching up on the last 10 years.

I’m very excited about this trip for several reasons. Obviously having the chance to visit with one of my oldest friends a guy that became like a brother to me in those days is tops of that list. One thing I’m looking forward to is that I’ll be traveling by train. I fell in love with train travel during the days when Paulina and I were dating and it was the most cost effective way to visit each other. Now for the most part I’ll be sleeping the entire trip, but that’s fine. I miss train travel and look forward to heading out on the rails again.

One of the other things I’m looking forward to is coming to a city I’ve never been in before, and having about 6 hours to just wander around and get into some adventures. I LOVE being in a strange city and just exploring. I plan on spending the day looking around and experiencing the city. I have a few places I wasn’t to check out, but other than that I’m just going to wing it. See, I can’t check into my hotel until 4pm, so I can’t be a pussy like a lot of people I know and just curl up in a hotel room and not see any of the city. I NEVER do that. I’ve got things to see and places to visit. People that don’t take advantage of new surroundings are lame.

When I’m in a strange city I have two rules that Paulina and I have developed. One is no chain restaurants! At least no chain restaurants that are in the city we live in. We want to sample local eateries. The other rule is NO MALLS! If we can go to the same stores in our city, why the fuck would we go to a whole new city and check out the same stores? LAME! It would be like going to Toronto and going to the Eaton Centre and totally bypassing Queen St. West.
If I want to shop, I’ll go to the local artsy district and see what funky shops are there.

I also look forward to Paulina’s eventual arrival. It’s been quite some time since we’ve had a weekend to get away from San Antonio and explore new surroundings. There’s a couple places that I want to explore while I’m here that I will only do once she’s with me.

It’s too bad that Paulina can’t take the train with me though. However, all that means is that one of these days we’ll have to take a train to some city together at another time. If not Dallas, some other place.

I’m really looking forward to this trip and I’m sure I’ll have lots to write about once I get back. Maybe even while I’m there, since Paulina and I have dueling netbooks! Photo uploads and Facebook updates galore! .

What have we become as a society.

A few evenings ago, my wife and I decided to take in a movie at a local theatre. We’d wanted to go see District 9, so we figured that that was what we’d go see. All was fine for the first half hour or so, and then, off behind us, about 5 rows back, we could hear a toddler yakking away in a voice loud enough that we could hear her talking. Normally I can tune out such distractions, but every so often the voice would break through the dialogue just enough to really cause a distraction. Several times I turned around in my seat to glare daggers at the woman who belonged to this distraction in pig-tails. I’m certain she caught my gaze several times, but alas, though I heard her shush the child a few times, it never kept her quiet for very long.

And it only got worse. I really wanted to yell out for these parents to quiet their child, but in situations like that I always feel that my outburst would be an even BIGGER distraction and I don’t want to disrupt things any more than the are already. So I bit my tongue, even though as the movie got closer to the end, this child kept taking me out of the movie with her blabbering on.

When the movie was over, instead of staying through the credits as we usually do, I got up out of my seat and went out of the aisle to intercept this couple on their way out of the theatre. As they were passing by, I simply said, “Sir, if you are unable to keep your child quiet in a movie, don’t bring her.” At this, the woman said, “Well, I’m sorry that my daughter was disturbing you.” But she said it in a very haughty way. So I replied to her that, she should have taken the child out into the lobby to quiet her so she wouldn’t disturb everyone. Well this must’ve pissed her off because she decided to make it clear to me that if I had a problem with the noise her daughter was making that it was I that should have left the theatre!. I was absolutely gob-smacked, and turned around to walk away, lest I say anything I might regret and cause a scene.

Now, before I go any further, my wife and I have a long running discussion about my inability to speak up when situations occur that annoy me. I’m a very easy going guy that would rather just keep quiet and not get into any sort of confrontation with people. And we always talk about how people are too hesitant to admonish people/children when they misbehave. We grit our teeth, we mutter under our breaths and we simply deal. Then when we get away from the situation….THEN we vent about our annoyance. Once we are safely away from the situation. But in this one case I decided to take a stand, and what follows is WHY I never speak up.

After my “discussion” with this woman, my wife calmly took me by the arm, and led me away to the opposite exit. I’m a very easy going guy, as I said, but when I do FINALLY get angry, I go supernova. She she helpfully stepped in, lest I really put my foot in a steamy pile of shit by shooting my mouth off, which I’m wont to do.

Still angry, I went to the washroom to take a step back and relax. Unfortunately this couple and their daughter were standing by the washrooms. So I shot them a look as I walked by and went into the washroom.

When I came out a few minutes later having of cooling down, I was going to wait for my wife to return from her trip to the washroom. I walked towards the middle of the lobby when I heard the husband say from a few feet behind me, “Is that the (unintelligible) over there that was talking shit”. Knowing it was me, and certain that the word I didn’t quite here was not very nice I very quickly wheeled around at him and said, “Excuse me?” Then this big tub of shit said, “I can’t tell if you’re a man or a woman”. That’s when this woman….this human-cow hybrid decided to give me a piece of her mind. She had the gall to tell me, that if I was disturbed by her daughter I should’ve left the theatre. That’s when my temper went from really annoyed to super-nova in about half a second. I looked at her and told her, that she should’ve had the courtesy to take her child into the lobby. At this point this fat fucking sow decided that she would again tell me that if had had a problem with her child, that I should’ve left. I looked her square in the eye, and said, “What. The. Fuck?!? Why should I leave the theatre when YOUR child is being a disruption? She then yelled over at me, while her fat fuck of a husband decided to look all hard and tough at me, that she’d paid for her ticket to this movie, as if this gave her and her offspring to do whatever the hell they pleased in that theatre as if it was their own living room. So I told her that I’d paid for my ticket too. At this point she said that I seemed to have been the only person that had a problem with her child, so I should just shut up and mind my own fucking business. Something tells me that there were plenty of people that were bothered. They just opted to bite their tongues and not cause a problem.

“Nice parenting”, I replied. “And what kind of parent takes a toddler to a movie like District 9 anyway?’ I swear that this child was 3 years old at most.

My wife came from the washroom at this point and left before things got any more heated. Once we got outside, my wife decided to take a stand of her own and ask the box office person what the policy was on children that young being allowed into a “Rated R” movie. We were told that they leave that up to the discretion of the parents. HUH? It sure doesn’t work that was in Canada. If a movie is rated R, if you aren’t 18 years old, you aren’t getting in, even if you’re there with your parents. I worked at a movie theatre as an usher and projectionist for a few years when I was in my late teens/early twenties, and when there were Restricted movies we were to stand outside the doors to make sure no under aged kids got in. Americans need to take a page out of the Canadian playbook on this one, in my opinion. So we asked to see a manager to voice our displeasure. We asked the manger again about the policy and then asked why there were no ushers around in the theatre to have interceded and ask the parents to shush up their child. He said that he’d bring up to the staff that they need to be in the theatres more to take care of situations. Back when I was an usher we were required to spent a large part of our night going from theatre to theatre to be available to assist patrons and to quiet rowdy viewers. In the end, the manager gave us each a voucher for a free movie next time we come, which to me was a classy thing to do. Personally I could’ve cared less about a free movie, it was more a matter of making them aware of our displeasure. It was especially classy since we’d seen the entire movie, so why give us our money back in a sense.

I know this blog post is already long, but I write all this in order to get to a bigger point. What has become of this society when we’re willing to eat a bunch of shit in order to not rock the boat. It didn’t used to be this way. You could feel confident in telling someone to reign in their rowdy kids, and be apologized to instead of being told to mind our own fucking business. And what has become of this society where the person causing a problem feels entitled to do whatever they please at the expense of others and to have their behaviour tolerated by others and not be called out on it. Why is it that these fucks can be angry at me, for politely voicing my displeasure, when I’m the one inconvenienced by their inconsiderate behaviour.

I mean, seriously, this woman, this living example of human sloth and the “I got mine, so fuck you” mentality told ME that if I didn’t like the fact that her child was causing a disruption, I should leave and just shut the fuck up and mind my own business. Instead of her doing the proper thing and telling her child not to disturb other people in a movie by talking all through it. You know….being a fucking parent!

Seriously, I highly doubt that this 3 year old sat their parents down the other day and said, “Hey mom and dad, you know, I’ve seen the previews for this District 9 movie, and I gotta say, I really want to see this movie. How about we go Saturday evening. Can we? Please? No. What happened was that these assholes were too fucking cheap to hire a sitter and dragged this child to a movie that they would have NO interest in, and therefore would not sit still for, and would therefore be a disruption to all those around her.

I see parents that do this ALL THE TIME. They drag their way too young children to movies that are far beyond their ability to understand and enjoy rather than be inconvenienced in THEIR lives because they’re PARENTS and have responsibilities now. They’re selfish and don’t care to realize that they may not be able to do everything they want to do in life now. I can’t count how many times I see parents out and about at midnight with 4 year olds, who should be long in bed, so that they can party it up and hand out with their friends.

It’s because of assclowns like this dynamic douche-o that my wife and I usually spend a lot more money on our nights out and go to the Alamo Drafthouse to see certain movies. It’s because no one under age can even walk into the place!k We just got fed up with going to movies all the time and being surrounded by parents with 4 or 5 little kids in totally age inappropriate movies who ruin our movie experience.

We as a society really have to stop being so self absorbed and show a little courtesy to our fellow human beings. I really don’t know where it all went wrong, as there’s probably a zillion reasons why. But I think that we all need to stop and take a second here and there and ask ourselves a few questions. Am what I’m doing going to inconvenience other people? Is there some way I can go about what I’m doing so that I don’t inconvenience other people? Would it be so bad if I did things this other way? Really? It’s just that simple people. Really.

Shane and P go wireless.

The other day Paulina was telling me that she was thinking of getting a netbook so that she can work on things during a part of her job that gives her a lot of downtime but not really near a computer. As she told me about the netbook she was thinking of getting I was really impressed, and by the time she was done telling me about it, and after I’d slept on it, I decided that I wanted one too.

Paulina and I are usually a tiny bit behind the curve with new technology, mainly because we don’t feel the need to have the latest and greatest, newest and best that technology has to offer. Though we’re fairly internet savvy, we just don’t do it with the most up to date equipment. Hell, up until a few years ago we were battling the internets with a computer that would be better off as a museum piece than a functioning computer. Lol. I didn’t have a cell phone until about a year and a half ago. Serious! And my phone is not wired to the internet. It has a camera that I really don’t use. My phone is a phone. I just find that stuff to be unnecessary.

I’ve wanted a laptop for probably about 5 years now. However, I always found they were kind of expensive, they were kind of heavy and bulky and it looked to me that they were more bother to lug around than anything else. And in my opinion 0% of people have more laptop than they’ll ever need or use.

So anyway, the toy P told me about was the Acer Aspire One 10.1. This little jobby is absolutely perfect as far as I’m concerned. 160G hard drive, 1.6Ghz processor, 1G ram, upgradeable to 2G. 2 USB 2.0 ports. Wi fi and Ethernet capable. It’s got slots for damn near any memory chip you can name and this thing weighs less than 3 pounds!

I don’t do any gaming on the computer, and viewing uploads of HBO and Showtime series online is about the hardest this thing will need to work. If anything I’m hoping it will get me back to blogging more regularly.

One of the main things that P said that sold me was that when we go on road trips, we could upload pictures as we travel, look up things to do wherever we are, and if we decide to do any Geocaching while on the road, we can check that stuff out while on the road too, instead of spending hour looking up all that stuff before we even get out of the house.

And with our coming trip to Dallas, they could’ve come at a better time to test them out.

My netbook came in on Thursday, and P’s is expected in the next few days. Wireless mini mouses have been ordered, carrying cases and bags have been ordered and extra RAM and stronger batteries are being planned.

P and I have officially entered the wireless age! Lol.

I get homesick. A lot. Canada Day always brings me down because I miss Canada so much. Missing family, missing friends. Missing so much.

Not so much this time though. I've assembled a tiny Canadian Assault Force, to invade a local park for lots of good times and good food. Canadians need to stick together. We're all homesick, and I'm sure a lot of us down here just want to reconnect with our countrymen on this day especially. This year I have something to look forward to for Canada Day. I'm excited.

I'm sure I'll be lucky if a dozen people show up, but that's not really the point for me. It's the commraderie with fellow Canadians that I've been missing.

Of all the people coming, I've met two. The rest have been located through the awesomeness of the "internets" and the "facebooks". I think there's something cool about total strangers getting together in unity and a love of their former homeland. Especially on Canada Day.

Have a great Canada Day everyone.

Some of you may already know about this if you follow me on facebook, but if you don't, here's what I've been up to:

I'm throwing a Canada Day party at a park here in San Antonio. I've been wanting to do this for a few years now, but hadn't really located any Canadians in the city here that might be interested in such a thing. Over the past year I've been slowy finding some on facebook. So I figure now's as good a time as any. There's already been a few people interested, so that's a good start. Some I've met a few times, and some I've not met but have corresponded with here and there.

One of the things for this party I've been working on is a gigantic "mix tape" of all Canadian artists. It started out small, but then I decided, "fuck it, let's see if I can fill my 4G mp3 player with a massive playlist spanning all eras, artists, genres, etc. I've now discovered that 4G is a LOT. lol.

The other thing I've discovered is just how much amazing music has come out of my country. Growing up in Canada, I heard a lot of American music interspersed with Canadian music so in the end it all became one big culture of North American music, (my apologies to Mexico, as I didn't become aquainted with your music until I moved to Texas) so to speak. It wasn't until I isolated Canadian music unto itself that I realized just how many artists I had to chose from. And in order to really do it right and put together a really great sampling, it was going to take a lot of songs! And a lot of different artists, and a lot of different musical styles.

So, I really only gave myself one rule, I was not going to discriminate based on my own personal likes and taste. So as much as I hate to do it and say it here, Celine Dion WILL be in there somewhere, even if it's only a song of two. One of which will be in french, and it's one I actually kinda liked back in the day, although secretly. lol. If they were Canadian, and of any degree of fame (or infamy), be it only in Canada or worldwide, they were in, provided I could locate their music on Rhapsody. In some cases, this has proven to be an obstacle, but not as bad as I thought it would be. Some artists I was surprised to see on Rhapsody, like Dayglo Abortions, and utterly dismayed but the omission of others, like STOMPIN' TOM FREAKIN' CONNORS!!! The man is a Canadian icon and an institution, but sadly, not enough fame in the U.S. to warrant them having any of his music available. So the quest continues for Stompin' Tom songs. It's the one gaping hole in my playlist.

Oh, and the other rule I gave myself was to do my best to favour upbeat, fun songs and avoid ballads. I mean, it's a party and it's festive afterall, right?

So, if anyone out there has any of his music in MP3, PLEASE let me know and email them to me.

Onward.

I've got hip hop, ska, classic rock, folk, punk metal and country for example. I've got music from many decades, and from all parts of the country...though getting Innuit music has been proving to be a bit of a task. lol. It's pretty well balanced I think.

I've even located the themesongs of some iconic Canadian television shows to throw in the at random.

My list is almost complete and I can actually begin to download and put this mamoth compilation on my MP3 player. I've already had requests by some of my friends to get a copy of the actual playlist once it's completed. That's kinda cool that they wanna see what I've come up with.

And I want to thank my friend Jayme for locating some molson Canadian commercials on MP3 that In wanted to toss in there.

And I also want to thank my Uncle Morey who's over in Israel these days, because he's really gone out of his way for me in locating, and uploading songs for me that he felt needed inclusion. And he's right some of them were definitely needed in there. I've always respected his musical knowledge. Were it not for him, I probably would've never discovered the Pixies when I was a wee lad of 13 or 14.

Anyway, I've had such a good time in this musical journey, rediscovering old favourites as well as opening some new doors musically for me. I've got a new respect and appreciation of the music of my homeland. It makes me proud to see such diversity in the music, and was such a wonderful experience as it helped me reconnect with Canada in a way. I'll always love Canada, and I'll always miss living there, but it will always be there in my heart, and in my musical appreciation.

Though it's still a few weeks away....happy Canada Day everyone.

Tips on how to prevent snoring:

Elevate your head by sleeping on a thicker pillow or multiple pillows will help reduce your snoring.

My pillow is quite thick and this has not helped me at all...

Don't drink alcoholic beverages, take sleeping pills, tranquilizers, or antihistamines right before going to sleep, they will cause your muscles to relax and limit your air passage way.

I almost never drink alcohol before bed, I never take any drugs either that would relax me.....and still I snore....

Avoid dairy products, which can cause mucus build-up right before you go to sleep.

This was a new one to me....but I stopped my nightly glass of milk....didn't help.

Sleeping on your side instead of your back will help to prevent snoring.

I NEVER sleep on my back, as it's uncomfortable for me now....I always sleep on my side....and yet....I snore.

Don't eat a big meal right before bed, if your stomach is full it will push up on your diaphragm and limit breathing passage ways.

This is hard for me, because I'm a night snacker. But tonight I made a conscious effort to not eat before bed.....no luck....

Sleep on a firmer pillow, a pillow that's too soft encourages your throat muscles to relax and narrows your air passageway.

my pillow is like a freakin' rock, which is what I find most comfortable anyway. And yet, I still snore.

Purchase some nasal strips and put them on before going to sleep. Nasal strips will open up your nostrils and allow more air to come in, thus reduce snoring.

I put them on before bed tonight, even though I HATE them and how they feel on my face.....30 minutes later P fled the bedroom because I was snoring.

use anti-snoring nasal spray.
I have a throat spray.....used it before bed tonight WITH the nasal strips.....*sigh*


If you are overweight, losing some weight will reduce snoring by increasing the space in your air passage way.

I've put on 20 lbs since around August and we both figure that it's the weight gain that's contributing to the increased snoring. I'm hitting the eliptical and riding my bike more....gotta lose the weight. It's the only other thing I can think of to do.

Hi. My name is Shane and I'm have a terrible, horrible, loud and obnoxious snoring problem. And it only seems to be getting worse. It's driving both my wife and myself crazy.

Sleep used to be something I absolutely LOVED! Lately, it's something I dread. If I volunteer to sleep on the couch ahead of time, I sleep poorly. I worry that I'll fuck up my back again and I hate myself. But I do this because I want P to have a good night sleep, and would rather she get a good night sleep at the expense of my own. She gets up early for work. I do not, so I can get my sleep after she leaves for work and before I go to work. I'm sure this stress I put on myself doesn't help either.

Other nights I sleep in our bed, and P up and leaves to sleep on the couch because my snoring is keeping her awake. Tonight it was half an hour after I fell asleep, Half an hour. On those nights I don't sleep well because I feel like a giant fucking douchebag, I feel tremendous guilt for forcing my wife from our bed, and yes, I usually cry...like tonight....again.

Nothing hurts more than coming home from work at midnight and finding your pillows waiting for you on the couch. I don't blame her one bit. If they weren't already there, I'd probably go get them myself to save her from a crappy night of sleep with me beside her. Like last night. I'd already decided on my way home from work to go and get them. But she'd already done that for me. But whether I do it myself, or it's done for me.....the hurt and the guilt is still the same.

It's the weekend, and I so desperately wanted to sleep in our bed....with my wife. I miss her at night. I miss not having her near me. I love her so much and I hate sleeping apart from her. So I put on the breathing strips I fucking hate. I sprayed my throat liberally, for all the fucking good this did me. Within 30 minutes P got up and left. I'm alone again, can't sleep now, feel like an asshole, feel guilty and hate myself because I get the comfy bed tonight and she doesn't. And I'm crying.

What's the next step? I see mouth guards online and these ugly elastic contraptions to put on your face.....Some sites say they're the best thing since sliced bread....others say they're a piece of shit and they don't work. Who to believe? I don't want to waste my money if they don't work....but at this point, what choice do I have?

I need help. Other than losing the extra weight I've gained, I don't know what to do. I want my wife back. I want to enjoy sleeping again. I want to not feel like an asshole. I want the guilt to go away. None of this will happen until my snoring either stops completely or at least is lessened to a large degree.

So, as of late, P and I have been stepping out a bit more, and instead of just going out on our own, we're socializing with actual other people. I know! Big step for us. heehee. Personally, I think P is getting sick of hanging out with me and is looking for an escape. lol.

Anyway, one thing we've been wanting to do for a few months now is participate in a night of Geeks That Drink. Geeks That Drink is a trivia competition that a few of the local pubs do. the Lion and Rose that's located closest to us does it every Tuesda night. However, for the past 3 months I'm sure, I've worked every damn Tuesday. But then we discovered another pub called Tap Exchange that does it every Wednesday. P found out about this on Wednesday and asked me if I wanted to go. So we went.

P often refers to me as some sort of receptical of all useless knowledge. My brain is like where all useless trivia goes to die. I love trivia and couldn't wait to go.

When we got there, P started talking to these two women sitting at a table, asking them general questions about how the game works etc. Turns out their friends that they were going to partner up with weren't coming, so asked us if we'd like to team up. You can have a team of up to six players, so sayeth the rules. So we said sure, and dove right in.

The quizmaster in my opinion left something to be desired. He was kinda bland and not very engaging. The good news is that he was a fill in for the regular guy who apparently is really cool.

So anyway, you get answer sheets, and there's 8 rounds consisting of 8 questions each. Some rounds have bonus questions. Winning team of the bonus question gets a free pint. SWEET!

Anyway, turns out that our little team, calling ourselves "There's An App For That" was chugging along pretty well. We were able to get most of the answers to most of the rounds. As we're entering the final round, the quiz guy finally decides to actually tally the scores as they stood going into the final round. Turns out we were in second place! At this point our partners tell us that the team that's in first is ALWAYS the winning team. Seriously. Every. Fucking. Week. They. Win. Well this just tweaks my competitive side. No team should EVER win every damn week. That just screams for new champions. I then decide right then and there, I will dethrone them. Plus they took their name from a Seinfeld episode. I HATE THAT SHOW! They must go down!

We do the last round, and what happens......a tie for first place. Us vs. them. GRRRR. So, then the quiz monkey tells us that HE breaks a tie by rock paper scissors. WTF?!? Seriously? Are you fucking kidding me? No tie beaking question? So sudden death round? No steel-cage deathmatch? Rock, paper, scissors? Not even with lizard and spock? BOOOOOOOOO!

So our team decides that I'm going to be the one to throw. We're going to throw paper. The reigning champs throw........SCISSORS! FUCK!

I'm already annoyed that the tie breaker is rock, paper, scissors, and losing in such a manner is even worse.

But it was decided then and there that P and I would return to fight it out again next week, with our partners from this week and take. them. the. fuck. down.

Plus, our team won second place which was a $20 gift certificate to the pub. We're splitting it with our teammates next week, which means a free round of beers essentially. Yummy!

Wish us luck.

65 Questions You've Probably Never Been Asked

you know the rules. tag people in this note (including the person who tagged you!) to learn more about people. Also, try to tag people who you've tagged in other notes, sometimes you learn things in new notes that you didn't know before about them.......

1. First thing you wash in the shower? Arms

2. What color is your favorite hoodie? black.

3. Would you kiss the last person you kissed again? Every chance I get. It's my wife.

4. Do you plan outfits? yeah, about 10 seconds before I get dressed.

5. How are you feeling RIGHT now? A bit sleepy, but I'm doing this because I might forget if I don't do it now.

6. Whats the closest thing to you that's red? A glowing diode on our telephone.

7. Tell me about the last dream you remember having? no idea.

8. Did you meet anybody new today? nope.

9. What are you craving right now? Cheetos "Puffcorn" or a coffee crisp from the fridge.

10. Do you floss? no.

11. What comes to mind when I say cabbage? The poor cabbage merchant from the cartoon Avatar who always gets his cart of cabbages destroyed.

12. Are you emotional? Sure.

13. Have you ever counted to 1,000? Yeah, probably.

14. Do you bite into your ice cream or just lick it? no. Makes me teeth hurt.

15. Do you like your hair? Only until it gets to that annoying length where the slightest humidity turns it to shite.

16. Do you like yourself? Yeah.

17. Would you go out to eat with George W. Bush? Nope. I'd have no appetite if I was within 100 yards.

18. What are you listening to right now? The AC that the neighbour has on.

19. Are your parents strict? My dad used to be. Then he mellowed out a lot in his older age.

20. Would you go sky diving? No way.

21. Do you like cottage cheese? not really, no.

22. Have you ever met a celebrity? Several. Morgan Spurlock. Kinky Friedman. Two most recent.

23. Do you rent movies often? Netflix for close to 4 years.

24. Is there anything sparkly in the room you're in? Just that vampire in the corner. Oh wait, VAMPIRES DON'T FUCKING SPARKLE. *snicker*

25. How many countries have you visited? Two.

26. Have you made a prank phone call? um....when I was 7!

27. Ever been on a train? Yup. Love taking the train.

28. Brown or white eggs? Doesn't matter. I hate them equally.

29.Do you have a cell-phone? Yes.

30. Do you use chap stick? Sometimes.

31. Do you own a gun? No.

32. Can you use chop sticks? Yup. I used to practice by using them to eat popcorn.

33. Who are you going to be with tonight? My wife.

34. Are you too forgiving? Mostly.

35. Ever been in love? Yes. Every day.

36. What is your best friend(s) doing tomorrow? She's stuck with me. Apparently we're going to Austin.

37. Ever have cream puffs? I think so.

38. Last time you cried? Not sure.

39. What was the last question you asked? "Who the fuck is attacking me?" I was playing Vampire Wars on Facebook.

40. Favorite time of the year? Now that I'm in Texas.....Winter.It used to be fall.

41. Do you have any tattoos? One. Thinking about getting one more.

42. Are you sarcastic? Is the pope Catholic? Does a bear shit in the woods?

43. Have you ever seen The Butterfly Effect? Yeah.

44. Ever walked into a wall? Yeah...more than once too.

45. Favorite color? Purple and black.

46. Have you ever slapped someone? Yeah.

47. Is your hair curly? nope.

48. What was the last CD you bought? Geez, uh...Bastard Fairies and that was over a year ago.

49. Do looks matter? To some extent, yes.

50. Could you ever forgive a cheater? No.

51. Is your phone bill sky high? Nope. I buy cheap calling cards to call Canada.

52. Do you like your life right now? It's been worse.

53. Do you sleep with the TV on? No.

54. Can you handle the truth? Yeah, but it isn't always fun.

55. Do you have good vision? See #44, then see #42. heh heh.

56. Do you hate or dislike more than 3 people? Sure.

57. How often do you talk on the phone? Only to my family now and then, and to my wife.

58. The last person you held hands with? Paulina

59. What are you wearing? Black cargo pants and an Aqua Teen Hunger Force T-shirt.

60.What is your favorite animal? cats I guess.

61. Where was your default picture taken at? It's stolen.
62. Can you hula hoop? No.

63. Do you have a job? Yes.

64. What was the most recent thing you bought? Other than dinner, a replacement Sansa since my old one seems to think half a song is all that a full battery charge should be able to play.

65. Have you ever crawled through a window? Tons of times.

P and I live close to downtown San Antonio. We like living downtown. We both grew up in neighbourhoods where you could walk a block and there was the corner store. There were small businesses all around where you could get the day to day stuff done, and done by people that were proud of what they did for a living, proud of the business they'd built in the neighbourhood.

P and I hate suburbs. I mean REALLY hate suburbs. We have a general dislike for "big box" stores and chains and opt to visit the mom & pops in the neighbourhood when at all possible. We could never live in an area where there's no sidewalks, and no stores of any sort within a two mile radius, and the stores that are nearby are nothing but big boxes anyway.

The suburbs and urban sprawl are slowly (or not so slowly) making their way into the downtown core. Buildings are being razed to make way for condos, displacing the current residents that will never be able to afford the new housing going up all around them. Living in fear that their neighbourhood will be demolished next.

About a year or so ago, there was a nice large-ish mom and pop style restaurant that we'd been to a few times. The food wasn't the best, but it was alright. Then suddenly it shut down. It stayed empty for seveal months until it was suddenly torn down. Eventually they started building on the spot. When it was nearing completion we asked someone that worked next door to there what was going in. She beamed replying, "a Starbucks, and we can't wait!!!" Nevermind that there's already a Starbucks a short distance away.

Then there was the nearby McDonalds. It was a McDonalds the screamed old school. It was the McDonalds you'd go in when you were a kid. Then one day there was a sign saying closed for renovations. Then two days later IT WAS LEVELED!!! Sheesh, talk about more than just "renovating". In it's place was a brand new hip and cool looking McDonalds. One of those ones that tries to look like a coffee shop or something.

We knew what was coming for the sorry little mom and pops on the block. A massive increase in property taxes for sure!

Anyway, my reason for going into all this:

Ever since P and I got our precious Pilar the Wonder Car, we've taken her in to this place called Tune-Up masters. The place has probably been there for 50 years. The prices were really good, they treated us well, and most importantly, the place ALWAYS had steady business. I don't think we ever dropped the car off where there wasn't several cars being done already ahead of us. But they always worked fast and tried to get us back on our way as quickly as possible. We liked them. We went to them for everything.

A few days ago, while biking to work, I was at the stoplight and looked over at Tuneup Masters and saw to my horror that all the doors and windows were boarded up. There's no sign up saying what happened. And we'd planned on taking Pilar in for an oil change this weekend. While I biked by, I recalled the last time we were there for our last oil change, and Paulina and I were talking to the guy that usually serviced our car. She mentioned to him that with the McDonalds and Starbucks, they may wanna look into working someplace else, cause they probably won't be in business much longer. He just shrugged and said that this place has been here forever. I'm betting they couldn't handle the increase in property taxes. Because like I said, this place was a succesful business will tons of loyal customers.

And a message to the suburbanites that are trying to come back into the city. You're free to come back, but damnit, leave the big boxes, big chains and higher taxes where you came from. I'm sorry there's not enough Starbucks for you here if you move back into the city, but tough shit. Try the mom and pop around the corner. You might actually like it there. And quit razing the properties because they're not new enough or big enough for your 3 SUV's. The McMansions you're building are pushing the people that grew up here out.

Support your local mom&pops. Please. I'm tired of seeing the casualties.

Back in 1993 or early '94, I can't remember which my roommate Rob introduced me to a graphic novel called The Watchmen. He had previously introduced me to Sandman comics after handing me a copy of Preludes and Nocturnes. And since I loved that series, I gave The Watchmen a try. I devoured it over a couple of evenings, and I gotta tell ya, it was such an amazing read. It was by far one of the best, if not THE best comic/graphic novel I'd ever read. Sandman and Watchmen have been at the top of my all time favourite things I've ever read every since.

When I heard that Watchmen was finally going to be made into a movie, I must say I was kinda scared. It would be SO easy to fuck this one up. It's dark, it's complex, and it's tightly crafted that I was sure that anyone taking up this project would fail miserably. How many adaptations have you have loved, manifest themselves on the big screen as a huge, gigantic turd, forever scarring you? I can think of many, but the one that sticks out as being one of the most recent was The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, or The Office, though that's the small screen. I'm always wary when Americans try to adapt British stories. They have a long history of totally fucking up the material.

This time, from what I've been seeing, they may have finally gotten it right. But we'll see.

Paulina and I got tickets in advance for the special midnight screening of The Watchmen tonight at the Alamo Drafthouse. Paulina and I save the drafthouse for special occasions for one reason and one reason only. NOBODY UNDER 18 IS ALLOWED! PERIOD! We get so tired of going to movies that are clearly made for adults and seeing a legion of parents dragging their infants into the theatre, or worse, slightly older kids that won't fucking sit still, or just make noise in general.

I NEVER, EVER go to movies of this magnitude on opening night, or midnight screenings. I just don't. Not even when Phantom Menace came out. And definitely not for the other two turds Lucas laid. I've just never been that excited to see a movie immediately. Until now I guess. And even as excited as I am, I really didn't NEED to see it at the midnight screening, I just figured if I was ever going to, this would be the movie I'd go see.

I'm pretty optimistic that the people going to the drafthouse tonight are hardcore fans of the series and will be there to enjoy the movie. I hope. I also hope that Paulina enjoys it too. She knows next to nothing about the movie, hasn't read the comics or anything. I hope I haven't built it up too much with my excitement and have her not really like it.

I'll more than likely post about the movie tomorrow.

I've been lacking in the new experiences so far this year, but I did experience a few things for the first time in the past few weeks that I figure I'd better blog about before I forget.

New experience #2:

Back just before Valentines Day, I took Paulina to a Darwin's Birthday party up in San Marcos which is quite a distance outside San Antonio. The new experience was doing all the driving myself, and experiencing first had rush hour traffic on I-35 at 4:30pm with me behind he wheel. Yikes. Now that was some scary stuff. I've never done that before (since you know I never even drove a vehicle before until not all that long ago. P offered to drive, but I told her no because it was high time I did it. So I did.

New Experience #3:

I saw Coraline at the theatre a few weeks ago. It was a new experience because it was 3D and I'd never seen a movie in 3D at the theatre before. Seriously. I've seen them in 3D on TV when I was a kid, but that's it. So, not really a major thing, but it was a new experience and I'm glad I saw it in 3D.

Took me wahile, but I finally experienced something new worth noting. This of course is part of my New Years not really resolution. I decided that instead of the usually "I'm not going to..." I decided that I'd try doing/experiencing 25 new things this year. To say the least, I'm either not really off to a roaring start, or I'm just not observant enough to notice new experiences. Dunno. Onward....

Last week P and I decided to try this Korean restaurant she'd heard about. First off, I'd say the place was way pricier than it should be. I mean, I paid $14 for what was basically a breaded chicken breast, some assorted carrots and zuccini and some sort of dipping sauce. WTF?!?

But what WAS interesting was the close to a dozen little dishes with little samples of various unnamed foods. I looked at all these dishes and decided right there and then that I would try every single one of those items, and once I'd done that, and decided what I liked and didn't like, I'd ask the server what it all was. Turns out that among the dishes I tried:

-dried squid. I didn't mind this, probably because it was dried actually.
-fish cakes. These were alright.
-kim chi. Didn't really like this.
-little tiny anchovies. These were alright I guess.
-little potatoes with some sort of bean paste. Liked it.
-some sort of white pickle/relish thing, which was also quite good.

Then there was other stfff that I'd tried before, broccoli, pickel, cucumber etc. Nothing really worth mentioning there.

SO there we go. New experience. only uh.....24 left to go.

So, first off, congrats for the Americans for electing someone that I really think will better their country. Already I'm liking what I'm seeing from Obama. He seems to be very much a "no fucking around" kind of guy, and already chipping away at the damage Bush has done in the past 8 years.

That said, P and I decided to catch a viewing party for the swearing in ceremony. It was nice, but I can now say I've officially met some of the rabid, crazy, nutso people on the left. Some of these people were waaaaaaaaay over the top. I mean, did we really need Obama chants? there was maybe 40 people in the place. And as much as I hate Bush and his cronies, we really didn't need a ton of booing and people frothing at the mouth and screaming at the tv. Geez. They totally kept taking me out of the moment and it was really tiresome.

Anyway, after that I had to come to work, so I came in with my Obama pin on my jacket. I get to work and one of the women I work with says to me, "You can't vote, right?" "Right." I replied.

She then askes me, "then why are you wearing a pin?"

"Because I support Obama as president and support the policies she intents to implement?"

She then goes on to basically ponder if I'm even ALLOWED to wear a pin since I'm not an American and can't vote. I'm not kidding, she was actually trying to say that it should be like, against the law or something. WTF?!? I was seriously getting really pissed off at her for her inane stupidity, and the sheer hubris. I just couldn't wrap my head around it. Fortunately for her my boss came by requesting my presence in the studio because he needed me to run the studio cameras for some tests they were doing. Good thing too.

I mean seriously, I may be Canadian, but what happens in this country DOES effect me. I SHOULD care about what happens here. I DO care about what happens here and who are people like her to basically say that I have no right to an opinion one way or the other? And to imply that it's somehow illegal or at the very least SHOULD be illegal? So, are the people in Nigeria that are celebrating somehow not allowed to do so? But let's face it, I follow what happens here a lot more closely than the average American.

Ah bien. Either way, she's one of those Christians for Israel types anyway and a very hardcore Conservative. But I'll betcha if I was wearing a Bush pin orf a Palin pin, that would be just peachy keen in her world. GRRRRR.

Last week, P sent me an email highlighting $9 San Antonio Rampage tickets. ALL levels! Pretty sweet. Then I looked further and noticed that they'd be playing the Toronto Marlies. Double sweet! Definitely a good time to catch an AHL game in my opinion.

So we got the tickets and they were pretty good seats. When the Marlies came out I was waving my Canadian flag, when a guy behind me comments, "I like your flag". Turns out he's from Kenora and is living her in San Antonio. Very cool.

As the game wore on, it became very apparent that there were quite a few Canadians in the house. We were indeed a rowdy bunch, as we usually are about our hockey. "let's go Marlies" chants were springing up in our section, and lots of funny trash talking was going on between the Canucks and the Americans. Apparently, if the Rampage score 4 goals in a game, everyone gets a voucher for free waffle fries from Chic-fil-a. So after the Rampage scored 3 goals, chants of "we want waffle fries" were erupting from our section from the Americans, which was a funny counterpoint to our Marlies chants. I wanted to know, if we could get gravy for those waffle fries, if the Marlies scored 4 goals too. And cheese curds. Gotta have me some poutine damn it. Then someone started with the inevitable U-S-A chants. To which someone pipes up, "You do know that most of the Rampage are Canadian, right?" Then someone else busted out with, "Yeah, and the rest of them are Swedes!" Then an American piped up with, "Hey, we do have ONE Russian!" Good fun. I think it was the fun being had in our section that really made this game more enjoyable than the last time we went to a game. Even if the Marlies did lose by 2 this time around. With about 2min left they pulled their goalie when they were down by one, and the fuckin' Rampage scored an empty net goal to cement their lead with only a minute left. UGH!

I believe during the last period, someone piped up, "Come one Marlies, get off your knees, you're blowing the game!!!" Not being a huge sports guy, I thought that was hillarious, though I'm sure it's used a lot in hockey. *shrug*

I do recall during the closing minutes, tempers flared, and a fight broke out between two guys right before a faceoff. Some old dude wearing a vet had from some war looks right at me and my Canadian flag and yells, "They're just a bunch of sore losers". Since the Marlies were down a goal or two at this point, and I'm pretty sure a Marlie started the scuffle. But I just looked at the old dude and smirked. Obviously this guy knows nothing about hockey. Being sore losers had nothing to do with it. Sometimes, they just fight cause they wanna fight. Maybe the Rampage guy trash talked the Marlie guy. But the score of the game was probably far from any reason for a fight.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the game, and plan on going a bit more often I think when the opportunity presents itself.

I posted photos on my facebook page, and one of the girls from work told me that she has a friend that gets tickets all the time and is always offering her free tickets to games, and someetimes she can't use them. Sometimes they're the big expensive box seats even. Sometimes she gets four tickets and two go unused and her and her boyfriend only use two of the four. So, apparently,I'm now on her list of people she can pass free tickets to now and then. SWEET! I'd definitely be up for free tickets in the future.

I'm not really going to go the traditional route with a resolution this year. They never quite turn out. So I've opted for something a little different this time around.

This year, I'm going to promise myself to experience 25 new things this year. I will have 25 brand spanking new experiences. They could be as simple as trying a new food, or seeing something special for the first time. But either way, I'm going to try this, instead of the "I promise to not do this" "or I promise to do that" for the coming year.

This makes it more open ended, leaving me open for many new possibilities.

To me at least, it sounds like fun.

Happy New Year all.

I would want to live in the mountains. I think it stems from my Northern Ontario roots. I would like the clean air, and the awesome views. And the quiet.

I've been doing a lot of reading on the current situation in Canadian Parliament, and I figure I've suitably got my thoughts, opinions and facts organized enough to actually talk about it.

To some of my American friends, you may have no idea what's going on. Here's a highly biased summation:

Stephen Harper called an election a few months ago that actually violated his own election laws. In short he broke his own laws and managed to call what I would consider an ill-timed, and kinda illegal election.

Harper ran on a basic platform of cooperation with the other parties in order to get Her Majesty's business accomplished. Harper won yet another minority government. The combination of the seats won by Liberals, Bloq, NDP and Green were more than what he won.

During the campaign he did more or less what McCain did. Going from the 'economy is fundementally sound' to 'oh crap the sky is falling!' in no time flat.

Last week, this current session of Parliament opened, and in his throne speech, he pretty much said fuck you to his opposition. He had no plans for helping the economy, he announced that he would see massive public service cuts, sell offs of goverment assets, wage rollbacks, and remove the right of free collective bargaining for the unions, oh yeah, and would take away their right to strike! WTF?!? Yeah, that's a way to stimulate the economy huh? There was nothing in his agenda for this session to do anything of substance regarding the economy. Oh, and they were also going to make it nearly impossible for women to sue for pay equity.

But not just that, he was going to take away all subsidies to political parties. That's fine and good when the main source of your coffers comes from big business, like his party. But what about the Green Party? Or the NDP party? Their survival depends on the subsidy!

See, the way it works is this....when the votes come in from an election, every vote that a party gets results in a $1.95 subsity to the party. So if I vote NDP, $1.95 of my taxes paid goes to them every year till the next election. I rather like this idea. But the Conservatives are painting it like it's some crazy handout at taxpayers expense. But it's not if you think about it. It's MY $1.95, going to the party that I voted for!

Oh, and the "savings" that this will give the Canadian taxpayer? About $25million. Seriously? That's it? And this is a big deal, why? It has nothing to do with reducing the deficit and everything to do with crushing political opponents at your first opportunity. It's a lot easier to rule if the other parties can't survive.

So, the other three parties, basically took Harpers, "Fuck You", and said, no....FUCK YOU! and have formed a coalition of NDP and Liberals to oust Harper onto his petard and vote his ass out on a non confidence motion, and for a goverment themselves if the Governor General says it's OK. The Bloq will serve as a back up of sorts, pledging to support the coalition in any non confidence votes until I believe June 2010. SWEET!

There have been cries of how they're trying to overthrow the government, and how this is unconstitutional, but if they'd actually read their consitition, they would see that this is in fact totally legal, and in my opinion EXPECTED of them.

Since Harper took power in 2006, he's stuck his chin out at the opposition, basically daring them to take a swing at him, and well.....they've wound up and haymakered him right in the snot box.

But the best is that Harper said he was going to do these things, AGAINST his own party's suggestions. So even they are pissed at him and what he's wrought.

Now comes the part that pisses me off. The Harper Conservatives have been screaming blah blah separatist, blah blah socialist, blah blah separatist, blah blah blah. I take great offence in their using socialist and separatist in a manner that indicates not being fit to govern, or in essence treasonous. First off, the Bloq's stand on many issues (Quebec issues excluded) I highly agree with. And if anything the party has become more sovereigntist than separatist. There's a BIG difference, but yet it's better to call them filthy separatists to generate the proper amount of fear.

Anyway, I'm going to finish this off for now....I got some news regarding someone special to me that I need to deal with and I'm losing my focus on this post/rant.

Here's a few good things to read if you want to learn more:

A Really well done view from an American living in Canada

A Great Canadian Blog talking about Harper's speech to the nation last night

We were sitting around in the control room and someone mentioned how Scrubs is going to be airing on our network starting in January, after jumping over from NBC.

Then someone remarked how big this is, because how often does a show skip networks during its run.

Me, being the guy with tons of useless knowledge in my head immediately busted out with:

Well, Taxi did it.

I had also said Welcome Back Kotter but upon a bit of research, turns out I was wrong on that one.

Then I though about David Letterman taking his show to CBC.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer did it. Same with Family Matters,

I found a list of maybe a dozen shows that have switched over from one Network to another during its run. So, it's not uncommon but it definitely isn't something that happens all the time.

So P told me how I can import this journal into my facebook page, and thought that that was just the coolest thing. So I'm going to test this out and see how long it takes for this post to show up there.

Not much going on these days. Cooked turkey dinner the other day as a surprise for P. I think it went over alright.

I'm enjoying falling into facebook more now that P is on it. It's fun to send eachother mountains of crap. heehee.

Anyway, test over.

I read an article the other day on a blog that was talking about making the shittiest mix CD ever, and what would be on it.

I thought about this, and thought maybe I'd try to put together a really shitty mix, but then I thought I'd do this instead.

10 songs on my MP3 player that you might be surprised that I like. I'm totally going to fuck up any "punk rock" cred I could possibly have at this point. lmao. Here we go!





Ok, so Ladytron isn't really a surprise, it's just that I really like that song, and wanted to change things up a little bit in the middle.

And yeah, the last track isn't much of a stretch either, but I heard this one a while back and liked it, and then lost my shit when I actually heard it in Zack and Miri Make a Porno. Maybe it's just cause I like Boba Fett. lol. We all know Boba Fett was a badass gangsta. lmao.

Hope y'all enjoyed! Or at least got a good laugh at me. heehee.

So, there was a story on the news last night that we did that was about bicycles. The premise of the story was that a reportr used a hidden cameras to witness cyclists breaking traffic rules. With the increase in bike riders, they want he police to start cracking down on cyclists that don't obey traffic laws.

That's all fine and good, but I can't go out on my bike most days without getting almost killed on my bike due to motorists that don't obey traffic laws. Where's the crackdown there? In the five years I've been here I've:

- been half a block away from a man when he was hit by a transport truck. The man was coming down a hill and the truck was pulling onto the street and literally sideswiped him. The man on the bike died.

- Been pushed off to the side of the road by motorists not giving me ANY part of the road, and in so doing they edged me into a curb and knocked me off my bike.

- Been at a red light waiting for it to go green (obeying the traffic laws). While waiting, a car pulls up beside me. We wait. Motorist is not signaling so it's safe to assume they're going straight when the light turns. When the light turns green, they accelerate, and TURN RIGHT! Totally cutting me off by INCHES, almost hitting me.

- Gone through an intersection with a green light in my favour and had cars go through the same intersection on the green coming tward me, and making a left hand turn RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME, almost hitting me. I believe that people turning have to give the right away to those that have the green coming towards them, do they not?

- Almost been hit while driving through an intersection because someone decided to blow their stopsign and blowing through the intersection right in front of me nearly t-boning me.

-Actually been hit by someone's mirror because they decided to cut in front of me to get into a parking area, they also bend my front tire. But that's ok, I pretty much ripped off their mirror.

- Had cut in front of me and then slow down to nothing to make a right hand turn almost giving me the pleasure of having their rear bumper as a snack.

And I could go on!

In every one of these cases, the MOTORIST was in the wrong here and wasn't obeying the traffic laws.

But we all know that 90% of San Antonio drivers don't know how to fucking drive, anyway.

It just kinda pissed me off with them going after bike riders.

I'll admit, I've blown through stop signs, but when you're travelling at about 5mph anyway and there's no traffic? *shrug*

Can we have a few ground rules here?

- Old people: Seriously. It's 2008. MUST you pay for your $4 grocery order with a fucking cheque? A cheque? for $4? UGH. And could you at least have the cheque OUT and pen in hand WHILE if not BEFORE the checkout girl has rung your shit up? You are wasting my time.

-Do you people really need a big honkin' Texas sized cart for your 2 tomatoes,carton of eggs and two cans of frozen juice? You get 5 of you fuckers in the 10 items or less line like this and I'm standing at the other end of the fucking store cause you take up so much damn room. You are wasting my time while you maneuver your way around.

-lastly, if you need cigarettes, PLEASE don't go to the checkout counter 5 fucking miles from the locked up area where they keep the smokes? You are wasting my fucking time because now this poor girl has to trek TEN miles to get them for you, and therefore not able to ring up MY shit in a timely manner.

Cashier girl: You fucking rock because you crammed all my shit into ONE BAG!, and asking me if that was cool with me. You didn't give me 7 bags for 5 items! You are awesome!

The rest of the world....fuck you.
I hate people.

Bonus track: I was in that line 5 times longer than it took me to write this entry.

There are literally a zillion things going on in my brain this morning, as I try to digest and sort out what happend last night, because to put it mildly, it was HUGE!

I was speechless last night for several minutes. All I could do was get misty eyed, hold onto P for dear life and well....smile.

I watched it all unravel on MSNBC last night, and in the 15 minutes before the polls closed on the west coast, you could feel it and see it on the faces of Olberman, Maddow, Matthews and the others. They knew that in a few short minutes, they'd be able to say in no uncertain terms that Barack Obama would become the 44th president of the United States. I felt it too. Actually, I felt it as soon as the results came in from Ohio. When Ohio fell to Obama, I knew then and there, that history was about to be made. And now.....MY special comment...

America, you did something monumental last night. You are less than a handful of generations away from slavery, and you have elected a black man president of the United States. Yes, he's only half black if you want to split hairs, but in the greater scheme of things there's really no distinction. He is a black man, and you have made him presidnt. There is so much racism in your past that it is awe inspiring that such a large number of you have seen past that, and done what I believe is truly best for your country.

The world is looking upon you with new eyes today. They are looking to you with a hope that you will once again become a country to admire, and a country to expect good things from. I know I do. There has been a lot of damage done to your standing in the international community. Now is the time to begin to repair that damage, and once again become respected, and not feared.

It's like you all collectively woke up from a night of binge drinking next to that really ugly girl and gasped, "what have I done", and have chosen to (hopefully) never drink like that again. I'm sure there's a better analogy in there somewhere, but I've slept little since last night, so that's the best I can do.

America, you have called out for change.

But, America, you have to understand that much like the slogan that a lot of you exclaim, "Freedom isn't free", neither is change. You will have to make some sacrifices. You will have to do your share to right this capsized ship. But most of all, you will have to cut your new president some slack. At least for a little while. Your country, your infrastructure, your ideals, and your Constitution are in tatters. There's no "reset" button. It will take time to come back from the past 8 years. It won't be pretty. But now is truly the time for Americans on all sides of the political spectrum to work together, to achieve something great. Bush claimed to be a uniter and not a divider....how did that work for ya? But Obama has shown that he truly IS a uniter in the wide assortment of Americans who have voted for him. Uniting this country is indeed possible. He's already achieved so much already just in his being elected.

[TURNING TO FACE ANOTHER "CAMERA"]

And to you Senator McCain: I watched your concession speech. You showed just how inspiring a speaker you are. You showed a lot of class, and poise, and you've left me with only one question. We've seen many facets of you during this election, sir, but where was THAT McCain on the campaign trail? THAT McCain could've won this election. THAT McCain could've become president. Instead you squandered away so much of the good will you've accumulated in your long poltical career in an attempt to win the White House. Instead of taking the high road, you chose to play the "fear" card. You chose to sling mud around like it was tax dollars going towards a corporate bailout. You chose to play on deep rooted fears. You chose to avoid talking about the issues in order to attack the character of your opponent. Well, Senator. How'd that work for ya? You reap what you sow, n'est pas? I have no sympathy for you.

[ANOTHER "CAMERA" TURN}

And to you President-elect Obama. All eyes are now on you, sir. The world, quite litereally is watching. You have asked the American people to put their faith in you. You've promised them change, and you've promised them hope. You have a lot of work ahead of you. I just hope that the men and women who have given you this opportunity, give you the time needed to get the job done. You will need to work quickly, yet you will need to be careful. Americans can't take much more hardship, though I'm sure there will be a lot more of it in store before things can get better. You sir, should be so proud of what you've accomplished. You have managed to unite so many to your cause. Rich, poor, young, old, black, white and brown. You have shown that a man from low beginnings can indeed accomplish great things. Black children all over America can now believe what their parents have told them. They CAN do great things. You've given them someone to aspire to be that isn't a sports hero or a rapper. Show them what you can do, sir. Show them that this great thing you have accomplished is just the tip of the iceberg.

Your electoral win has brought tears of joy to so many, myself included. I congratulate you, and can't wait to see what you can do with the lousy hand you've been delt courtesy of President Bush. The American people have given you a true mandate. Do not squander it. And best of luck. This Canadian is looking forward to living in your vision of America.

[ONE MORE CAMERA TURN]

And lastly, to Malia and Sasha...

Congratulations.....it's a puppy!



One of the blogs I read regularly, a Canadian based out of Japan posted this this morning and I couldn't resist sharing it with you all:

Halloween is my favourite holiday. I dunno why. I like it more than Christmas and the fact that P likes it just as much makes it even more fun for me. With the new porch, decorating this year has been a blast, and I can't wait to be out there handing out candy to all the little beggers tonight. I just hope we get kids. At the old apartment, there was never much point because no kids ever came to our building. But the porch will be awesomely lit with strobe lights, black lights, pumpkins and the like, so it should prove inviting for the kiddos.

For now I'm going to share a few clips in lieu of Halloween. The first one is of Count Floyd from SCTV. If you don't know Count Floyd, he was the host of Monster Chiller Horror Theatre. He would do promo pieces for the show and show clips from the coming week's scary movie. Though the movie clips were always so benign and unscary, the he'd do his best to try to promote how scary that clip was. I loved it. And the cheezy "3-D" of the clips was hilarious. I remember "3-D House of Stewardeses" and "3-D House of Slave Chicks". YouTube was unkind in results for Dr. Tongue. They have House of Stewardeses (if you zip to the 1:40 mark on the clip they have up). But here is "E-HOP" enjoy.



Next up is the Hilarious House of Frightenstein. I LOVED LOVED LOVED this show when I was a kid. To the point that I'd wake up at 6am ON A SATURDAY, because that's the only time it aired. The castle was loaded with crazy characters like Grizelda the witch, the Librarian, the Oracle, and of course The Count and Igor. Other than Igor all characters were played by Billy West, and yes, that was Vincent Price in there too! Here's a clip to share.



Since we're on the subject of ghoulish tv hosts and campy horror, we can't leave out this darling, now can we?

Was just watching Rachel Maddow's show, which P and I have really made part of our nightly viewing and I saw perhaps the most disgusting Republican shot at Obama I've ever seen. So much so that I am physically sickened by it.

Nope, it wasn't that chants of "kill him" or "terrorist"

It wasn't the "oops" of fox news putting his name up as Barack Osama

Nope, not the constant stressing of his middle name, as if it makes him the same as Saddam Hussein.

Nope, it's THIS:



My jaw hit the floor, and steam nearly came out of my ears.

Yes, folks, that's an image of Barack Obama being surrounded by watermelon, fried chicken, Kool-Aid, and ribs. WHAT. THE. FUCK.

Can ya squeeze any more racist images in there? Just when I hope that America has gotten past this sort of shit, and we've reached the bottom of the barrel, some asshole lifts up the goddamn barrel!

Maybe it's because of where I come from, I dunno. But shit like this just isn't in my frame of reference. So I have a hard time understanding what makes people think of these things. UGH.

Here's a story about this disgusting display of dirty pool.

From Michael Moore's web site.

So, Canada was forced to vote in yet another federal election yesteday, and well.....they basically decided "fuck you and your endless string of stupid elections, I'm not buying."

Voter turnout: 59% The lowest ever!

I think there are many factors for this. First off, there was absolutely no reason for this election. No reason at all. Sure Harper had a minority government, but the Liberals were so busy wetting their pants that an election might be called that they were essentially rolling over, playing dead and letting Little Stevie has his way and allowing some nasty legislation pass in the process. See, they didn't want to vote against Harper becaue if he got too many no votes on things like budgets or legislation, it would be a no confidence vote and force an election.

Harper called an election in violation of his own election laws. Law that he put into place as PM to apparently save the Canadian people the financial cost and aggravation of endless elections. He sought to basically etch in stone election dates just like in the U.S. The exception being that of course non confidence votes could spark elections against a minority government. However......he broke his own freakin' laws and called an election after basically running a stealth campaign of sleeze for the past year already. And he was pretty much taunting the Liberals to call a no confidence vote. When that didn't happen Harper decided to call an election himself because as he put it, the government was not getting anything done. It was a disgrace. This despite him pretty much getting his way on everything for the past 2 years. HUH?!? Yup. Conservative logic at its finest. So the Canadian electorate were kinda pissed at this to say the least.

Nobody worth voting for would be the next reason why a lot of voters didn't vote. When Paul Martin lost the election in 2006 to Harper, he immediately stepped down and the reigns were taken up by Stephane Dion. He had very little support from the rest of the party. There's the first of their problems. His English is poor at best, and well.....as a leader of a National party, he pretty much sucked ass. He rolled over and played dead, as I mentioned before. I always saw him as the transitional leader, until the Liberals could get their shit together, reorganize, figure out what direction the party was going to go in and get a better leader. Well....they put in Dion, didn't get their shit together, didn't really reorganize, had no direction and were a disgrace as the leaders of the opposition party.

Well anyway, what essentially happend last night was that Harper STILL has a minority government. But they've picked up bunch of seats (19). CRAP! Of the seats lost they were all Liberal seats. The NDP picked up about 8 of those. Pre- election the NDP and Liberals could defeat Con legislation if they voted together as a block. Now that's gone. Not enough seats to do this. Harper blew it in Quebec. If he hadn't screwed over Quebec in the weeks leading up to the election, the MIGHT have squeeked out a Majority. Never thought I'd be happy that we have the Bloq Quebecois.

Let's see....oh yeah, Dion will probably have to step down in the months ahead, cause he's now seen as a huge fuckup. This will further cause the Liberal to flounder directionless while they try to figure out who's going to lead, and what they stand for. All the while Harper inches in his agenda bit by bit. Not good!

I'm happy to see that the NDP are gaining ground once again.

I'm happy that Harper didn't get a majority.

I'm happy that from all this maybe the Liberal party will oust Dion and find something better and re-invent the party.

But the overall picture to me looks bleak. Harper shored up power, moved the ball down the field and will probaby start revealing some of his darker legislation now. Fuck.

Oh yeah, and I almost forgot! I'm extremely proud of Megan Leslie. Who's she? She's a girl I went to high school with. We weren't friends of anything, but I knew her and knew who she was. Anyway, last night she was elected as MP in her riding in Halifax for the NDP!!!! How freakin' cool is that! So she'll be representing her riding in Ottawa now. Holy crap. Small town girl does good!

I'm sure I'm not the only one that's absolutely sickened by the antics of the McCain campaign over the past week or so, or more specifically his supporters.

The hate being spewed from those crowds is frightening. It's like they're salivating for blood. Hate to bring up the Nazis but shit man....the parallel is astonishing.

That woman calling Obama an arab. WTF?!? The stupid out there are still flogging that retarded chestunt? This is why I fear for this country. The stupidest of the stupid are allowed to vote, and it's idiots like them that put and keep people like Bush and McCain in positions of power.

To hear these crowds yelling "terrorist" or "kill him" really makes me fear for Obama's safety. I'm sorry, but I have no faith in the bottom feeders in this country. When I first heard he was running, my toughts were "oh, that ain't going to happen, they'll never elect a black man as president". And now that it becomes more and more of a reality that they WILL elect him, my thoughts now turn to, "he'll more than likely be assassinated, or there'll be an attempt, and if there isn't one during his term I'll be very surprised."

I really like to hope that Americans are beyond this kind of hatred, but I remain unconvinced when I hear the chants coming from the McCain camp calling for Obama's death.

But what gets me is Palin and others going out there and refering to him as "Barack HUSSEIN Obama", with enough emphasis on Hussein as to be a verbal sledgehammer on the subconscious of the weak minded. Seriously? You think that when Barack was born his mom said, "ya know? There's this guy in Iraq that's going to be a horrible dictator in another decade or so....I'm going to name by boy after him! Cause I hate America, so does this guy, and what a great way to demonstrate that!"

And then I laughed my ass off when some pundit tried to deflect this shit by saying, "how many times have we made reference to William Jefferson Clinton. It's no different." But I beg to differ because they never said, William JEFFERSON Clinton. It was never emphasised. This dirty trick is to simply attempt to draw a parallel between Barack Obama and an evil dictator from Iraq. No other reason. Do you think if his name was Barack James Obama that they'd be yelling the middle name like that. Hardly. And anyone that can't see that is among the dimwits out there.

Ugh.

It's getting to the point that after I see footage from a McCain or Palin speech I need to take a shower. Cause I just feel like I've been slimed.

In other news Canada will be having (yet another) federal election tomorrow. How many is that now? 17 in the past 5 years or something? The leading contenders are "Bush Jr." and "Guy who barely speaks English" It's really not looking good for my country, that's for sure. Polls are showing that Harper may secure YET ANOTHER minority government. WTF?!? Then why call an election you fuckwit? You either call an election because you know you can secure your power and expand on it, or in the case of many minority governments the opposition parties call a vote of non confidence on your ass. With the Liberals and NDP basically letting you steamroll your legislation through unopposed anyway, what the fuck were you thinking by calling this election? Beats the shit out of me.

So anyway, I keep checking CSPAN to see if they'll be providing coverage of the returns. So far they've not updated their schedule for tomorrow. In the meantime, I guess I'll stay glued to CBC tomorrow to see if I need to start weeping for my country some more.

In still other news from back home, apparently on Saturday night, CBC unveiled the new theme for Hockey Night In Canada. Seems they had a nation wide contest to pick the new theme. Kind of a neat idea I guess. So, I tracked down the winning submission and I must say, I'm kinda blah about it. It starts out good (me likes me the pipes) but then kinda gets blah and reminds me of "corporate recruiting video track#56" or canned action sports #12", then gets a bit better to the end. *shrug* Check it out here if you're interested:

This was the original submission

Seems when I embedded it from the CBC website, I got this version below, which I assume is the finished sweetened version. It's missing the "agony bags", but it's alright. The more I listen to it, the more I like it. It does seem to have invoked the spirit of the old theme. Yeah, I think I like it.

It's that time of year again. P and I love Halloween more than any other holiday. And this year we have the added bonus of having our very own front porch with which to decorate! This is a freakin' dream come true for us, because at our old place we just had no place to decorate outdoors, and we were in an area where you were lucky to get a handful of kids trick or treating. BOOOOOOOOOO! I remember the first year we were together down here, we were literally standing on the sidewalk with a bowl of candy trying to get kids to come. It was rather sad really.

But now we have our porch, we've told our upstairs neighbours to come down and pass out candy, have some beers and scare some kiddies.

To go with the new porch it was time to do some shopping to get it set up really nice. Floating skeleton heads that scream, bloody hand prints, dripping blood, ghosts, window clingys, spider webs and all kinds of goodies. I'm especially loving the medusa fake stone bust with glowing eyes that sits perfectly on a post on our porch. YES! I'm going to get another one for the other post. The medusa is one side and a pretty maiden on the flip side. We never even noticed the reverse side until we took it off the shelf to take with us to the checkout. It's really cool. check it out here!

I'm going to wear my jester costume again, just cause I love it so much and it's so creepy looking. P is talking about a mad scientist look this year, which I think could be really cool. Once we get the porch decked out, we'll have to post some pics. I'm going to LOVE Halloween this year, just cause I think we can have a lot of fun with it this year cause of the porch.


In other news, I'm wondering what the fuck is wrong with my jester userpic. It's broken?

It's fucking prounounced NU-CLE-AR not Nu-Q-Ler. Get that shit fucking right!!!!!

Secondly, you need to support your arguments with actual facts and figures, because it's better to be subdued and RIGHT (Biden) than whimsical and "folksy" and dead fucking wrong.

Oh, and when asked a question about health care, you don't go on a rant about how you were kickass at working on energy policy in your podunk state of Alaska at every possible opportunity.

The often-used phrase "all hat and no cattle" applies to you Gov. Palin.

Fuck you. You were PWNED by Biden.

And yes, I've been indulging in the beers. They were yum, and they made her ramblings a bit more tolerable!

*double finger guns, hand on chin and gleaming tooth* a la Tina Fey. *grin*

- I'm pretty sure that my 7 year old nephew could outdebate Sara Palin on the issues. And he's be apt to use phrases like "you're ugly" "dumb-dumb head" and saying that she talks funny. Though somehow, something tells me that this will be the extent of Palin's debating skills against Biden as well. So maybe my nephew and Palin would be a pretty even match. I really think she'll be falling down flat on her face, and I'll be looking for a strange lump on her back similar to the one the Chimpster had on his back when he debated in the 2004 race. I may even have to make popcorn to fully enjoy this debate!

- If one more person in a car zips in front of me on my bike and then immediately makes a hard right hand turn so closely to me that I have to jam on my brakes for fear of ending up in their backseat I swear I'm going to throw a rock at their car. It happend TWICE within 5 minutes last week, and happened again today. Seriously, I want to be legally permitted to slash their tires.

- Got a message from this guy named Ben today. We've been loosely keeping in touch since Canada Day. He's a Canadian living here in San Antonio with his wife. They just got back from their cottage back home and want to get together with P and myself for pints o' beer at this place that has hundreds of different beers available. It's an oasis for a beer loving Canadian in this desert of Coors Lite. I think that will be a lovely way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Followed by maybe a movie so that we can go all the way out there and still be able to drive home in a more sober state.

In other news, October is breast cancer awareness month, and in order to help spread awareness I've designed a few T-shirts. Please give them a peep? One of them is getting so many high ratings it's literally the first one you see when you go the the link at zazzle for breast cancer awareness shirts. WEEEE!

Breast Cancer Awareness

Wow, this actually worked.....sorta. I've been trying various "promotional" widgets and doodads for my various blogs, facebook etc. And so far this is the only one that doesn't look like complete shite. At least SOMETHING worked today. UGH.

So, I've been hard at work on yet another online store at Zazzle.com. I'm really liking it a lot. Way better than Cafepress. Plus, this site doesn't cost me shit, like cafepress does. And it look a lot nicer! The fact that it's got forums to help me promote with, and also get advice from experienced sellers is a total plus. With cafepress I feel like I'm yelling into the storm, with no way of knowing if anyone can hear me.

With this new store, I can tell that I'm getting close to 100 page views. I've had comments made on my designs, and people have rated them too. With the cafepress store, I dont' get any of that information. Though, so far the current totals are 4 shirts sold at cafepress, zero sold at zazzle. Though the zazzle store isn't even a week old.

But anyway, I felt like sharing some of my election shirts, as a way of trying out their cool flash panels, that I can past into my journal. Feel free to comment, or rate.

I finally got the gallery page looking spiffy too. All in all, I'm feeling like I'm accomplishing something over there.


create custom t-shirts at Zazzle

I've been pretty busy working on designs etc. this week. It's all P's fault! She found another online site that allows you to create designs for products called zazzle.com. At first glance, I thought it was better than cafepress.com, and upon wading into the thing, I'm convinced of it. The storefront is a bit clunky, and I haven't quite figured out how to make it look all snappy and cool yet, but I'll be working on that. I've tried to edit the content on the page but every time I try to save it, it sends me to an error page, saying there was a problem.....for the past two days!!!! WTF?!? So, it's currently displaying my earliest designs, and the best ones I have and the newest ones I have are stuck way back on like page two or something. UGH.

But what I'm liking is that they have cool widgets for Facebook and for blogs that allow me to promote my stuff. Again, I'm trying to get my best stuff into these things, and hope to get them up later.

In other news, my thoughts:

-Anyone that doesn't think Obama was refering to McCain and Palin's claims of real change etc. and being a "new" Republican party are the lipstick on the same old Republican party (the pig) is an idiot. Are people so incapable of really examining what's said and not making snap knee-jerk fake outcries over everything?

-Palin scares the fuck out of me. It's like the ultra right wing bible bashing freaks finally decided, "Fuck it, let's throw someone out there that's so over the top dominionist and see what happens". Well, what happens is that dump people are so caught up in her being a woman and a very sarcastic and kinda annoying one at that, they they're literally putting their heads in the sand regarding her stance on women's issues, creationism, book banning, her possible misuse of her power as governor, and the list grows by the day. Seriously, she can NOT be allowed to be one step away from leading this country.

It also scares me how many times I've heard women on the news being interviewed on the streed about how how they feel about Palin, and damn near every time they say how much they love her and they're totally going to vote for her. Then when asked how they feel about her stand on the issues, they simply state that they haven't really looked into it. WTF?!? So....you're voting for her cause she's a woman? Do you know her stance on abortion? Probably now. In a show of solidarity with the sane, rational thinking women of America, I created this shirt:

check it out

Saw some horrible train wreck tv last night. Something called "Hole In The Wall" on Fox. It's a ripoff of the Japanese game show where contestants have to fit their way through walls being sent at them with crazy cutouts for them to fit through. If you fail, the wall pushes you into the water. You seen that on youtube? I have. Anyway, I saw it last night and they should call the show, "fat women in unflattering spandex trying to fit themselves through WAY TOO SMALL shapes." I mean, I figure these walls were made in Japan for the Japanese, because the shapes were SO SKINNY. These women could NEVER fit. Sad. Sad. Even more sad that I actually watched most of this show in disbelief.