Cowboys & separatists
I covered the indoor rodeo this weekend and someone asked me there was anything noteworthy like an accident, to which I replied, ‘it seems to me all rodeo rides are accidents, if a horse starts jumping out of control, that would be unintentional for most people, ie. an accident.’
Speaking of which it was a lot of fun trying to shoot action shots in a dark arena surrounded by dark dirt and cowboys wearing dark clothes! The darker the lighting the slower the film speed, so catching a bucking bronc was almost impossible. It took like 300 shots, a nice camera and lens and a fair bit of previous experience, to get 5 barely useable photos.
Otherwise the weekend was full of more photogenic (outdoor) events: bbq’s, horse parade, bbq’s, kids activities, bbq’s, arts & crafts show etc etc etc. It was VERY exciting stuff and another wonderful use of a weekend.
To change the subject they just pointed out a surprising fact on the news I have on in the background, over 25% of all the police killed in Alberta’s history were killed this year, ie. those 5 shot near Mayerthorpe bring the total to 19.
On a completely different subject does it seem odd to anyone else that our new Governor General has separatist sympathies? There’s actual video of her toasting Quebec independence. Now I don’t know anything about her and don’t necessarily think she has to be some kind of staunch lifelong federalist or whatever, but she’s out there celebrating the idea of destroying the country – that doesn’t seem to fit with the job description. Just a thought.
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Monday, September 19, 2005
This entry is roughly in the general vicinity of 711 words long
I was gazing out across the prairie the other day (cause that’s what you do when the TV’s off) and had a scary moment where I was thought of the slight waves in the horizon as “hills.” I need to see mountains!
People have been asking about another entry, which is nice, cause I work at a newspaper so nobody reads my writing, or they skim it and forget it in 20 minutes. It’s nice to hear someone actually reads something I write, even if it is just rambling. The glitch is I tend to wait until I have good news, or at least something funny to say, which doesn’t seem to happen often.
My Kamloops friends probably won’t even believe me when I say this, but I’ve never been good at making friends, that period was an anomaly. So I’ve been stuck out here for four months without making a single friend. Sure I’ve met everyone in town but aside from the dearth of interesting social activities or places to hang out, I have to cover every event so I can’t take part. Plus people seem distant with me as “media”.
I’m just no good at making friends. It’s like I’m missing a step. It’s always mystified me how people actually become friends. I think I missed that day in kindergarten. I struggle with it at the best of times but here it seems impossible.
I realised the other day that in 16 years in the workforce I’ve never made a friend at work. Ever. I mean I’ve been friendly with people at work, and I have what I suppose you’d call “work friends,” on rare occasions we may even socialise outside work, but we never become friends. Every friend I’ve ever had has come from school, or roommates, or travel.
Anyway, aside from moving 1000 km from home to be poorer and lonelier, I keep stumbling into crap that doesn’t help. At the moment, for example, I’m facing charges for having my car parked on the street without insurance – which was almost unavoidable. Apparently the best case scenario (after my court appearance) is a $280 fine, the worst is jail time. Of course jail time seems extremely unlikely, it’s just the fact that it’d be included that bums me out. Did I really need that added?
OK I did think of one funny thing. There’s a cool commercial for HP photo paper, which you may have seen, the ones with cool picture frame effects and good music. I enjoy the commercials enough that it took me a while to catch the stupid part. They claim the paper will “resist fading for up to 108 years”… What the fuck?!
I mean seriously, what? That breaks down on so many levels it’s mind boggling. “Resists fading” is as vague as you can be. “Hey, it faded!” “Yeah I know but it tried not to.” And what counts as “fading” exactly? And it makes this attempt at not fading for “up to” a time…so it may or may not resist this vague thing for that long, but it may only do it for half that? And my brain starts to tickle when I try to apply all this overlapping vagueness to “108 years”.
I checked the web for clues to this astonishing statement and found they have other papers that “resist fading for up to” 82 years and 115 years respectively. No explanation of what the PR people were smoking when they came up with it.
Oh, I have an unrelated question for you that’s been bugging me. Why do we only use the term Latino to describe people of Spanish decent when Italians are in fact more Latin?
In yet another unrelated thought, I was going to go off on a rant against the U.S. and the evils of the capitalism but I’m tired and have already put out my share of negativity so I’ll just leave you with this thought: in capitalism if a company’s not growing it’s dying, the foundation of the entire structure and thought system is growth…so where does it end?
Parting quote: “Canada? Why should we leave America to visit America Jr.?” - Homer
Thursday, September 08, 2005
Ghoti spells fish
I am now the embarrassed owner of a 1978 Olds Ninety-eight, the silliest boat of a car ever, and I mean that literally. Seriously, try it, get a clear image in your mind when I say “biggest silliest boat of a car ever,” it’s grey, then click on ‘my pics’ at the bottom of the ‘Friends’ list at right. Go a head do it now, I'll wait.
Right! I'm reminded of the line about Rainier Wolfcastle's Humvee mileage on the Simpson's "one highway, zero city." It’s the type of car 87-year-olds drive 42 km/h to a dinner buffet at 3pm in Boca Raton.
Now that I got my boat I can go fishing, or ghoti’ing. That’s the "gh" from cough, the "o" from women and the "ti" from nation.
Ode to Pepé
So I walked out my front door the other day only to discover an empty street where Pepé the Wondercar should have been. I was a bit confused. I’d never park it anywhere else, for a second I wondered if I’d gotten drunk and forgotten it somewhere. Nope.
I looked up and down the street and around the corner to be sure. Nothing. I wracked my brain about when I'd last seen it and drew a blank. I hadn’t left the house all day and it's often obscured by a bush so I don’t know if I’d have noticed if it’d been gone first thing in the morning.
I hadn’t driven it all weekend but I’d gone out on foot a couple times and would certainly have noticed it missing the last time I came in. After pondering for several minutes to make sure there wasn’t an obvious answer, I called the cops. They took a missing car report.
Ten minutes later the cop called back to say it had been towed because the insurance expired, no warning, no knock on the door, they just came and took it which means I’ll never see it again.
Normally I’d be able to renew the insurance, pay the $80 tow charge and that’d be that, but to insure an out of province car I’d have to have it inspected, which I know it won’t pass, so that’s the end of the story—time to speed up the new (used) car search. I knew the insurance was running out, so I was looking, I just didn’t expect it to happen so abruptly. Luckily I could walk to most interviews around this small, busless town for a few days.
I’ve said this a thousand times, but that car was about THE best purchase I’ve ever made. I bought it for my Chilliwack job, just hoping it’d last the summer, after which I’d happily trash it knowing I’d gotten good value. I had a strict no-spending policy, I’d drive it till it died, period.
Over the summer I put 10,000 km on it racing around Chilliwack and Vancouver city traffic and back and forth over the Coquihalla almost weekly, it still ran great, felt great at top highways speeds, got great mileage and never cost a cent (other than one highway tire blow-out).
At the end of the summer I thought about putting some money into it but a mechanic said it was on the verge of falling apart and no mechanic would work on it. After that I took it easy and avoided highway trips, but ended up driving it to school all winter, then hauling a shit load of crap 900 km out here.
Despite endless and growing eccentricities it still hummed, I’d still never put a cent into it and it had only cost me $400. I’ll miss it.
I am now the embarrassed owner of a 1978 Olds Ninety-eight, the silliest boat of a car ever, and I mean that literally. Seriously, try it, get a clear image in your mind when I say “biggest silliest boat of a car ever,” it’s grey, then click on ‘my pics’ at the bottom of the ‘Friends’ list at right. Go a head do it now, I'll wait.
Right! I'm reminded of the line about Rainier Wolfcastle's Humvee mileage on the Simpson's "one highway, zero city." It’s the type of car 87-year-olds drive 42 km/h to a dinner buffet at 3pm in Boca Raton.
Now that I got my boat I can go fishing, or ghoti’ing. That’s the "gh" from cough, the "o" from women and the "ti" from nation.
Ode to Pepé
So I walked out my front door the other day only to discover an empty street where Pepé the Wondercar should have been. I was a bit confused. I’d never park it anywhere else, for a second I wondered if I’d gotten drunk and forgotten it somewhere. Nope.
I looked up and down the street and around the corner to be sure. Nothing. I wracked my brain about when I'd last seen it and drew a blank. I hadn’t left the house all day and it's often obscured by a bush so I don’t know if I’d have noticed if it’d been gone first thing in the morning.
I hadn’t driven it all weekend but I’d gone out on foot a couple times and would certainly have noticed it missing the last time I came in. After pondering for several minutes to make sure there wasn’t an obvious answer, I called the cops. They took a missing car report.
Ten minutes later the cop called back to say it had been towed because the insurance expired, no warning, no knock on the door, they just came and took it which means I’ll never see it again.
Normally I’d be able to renew the insurance, pay the $80 tow charge and that’d be that, but to insure an out of province car I’d have to have it inspected, which I know it won’t pass, so that’s the end of the story—time to speed up the new (used) car search. I knew the insurance was running out, so I was looking, I just didn’t expect it to happen so abruptly. Luckily I could walk to most interviews around this small, busless town for a few days.
I’ve said this a thousand times, but that car was about THE best purchase I’ve ever made. I bought it for my Chilliwack job, just hoping it’d last the summer, after which I’d happily trash it knowing I’d gotten good value. I had a strict no-spending policy, I’d drive it till it died, period.
Over the summer I put 10,000 km on it racing around Chilliwack and Vancouver city traffic and back and forth over the Coquihalla almost weekly, it still ran great, felt great at top highways speeds, got great mileage and never cost a cent (other than one highway tire blow-out).
At the end of the summer I thought about putting some money into it but a mechanic said it was on the verge of falling apart and no mechanic would work on it. After that I took it easy and avoided highway trips, but ended up driving it to school all winter, then hauling a shit load of crap 900 km out here.
Despite endless and growing eccentricities it still hummed, I’d still never put a cent into it and it had only cost me $400. I’ll miss it.
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
How are we going to talk to the neighbours?
Non-geeks will not likely enjoy this entry; you should skip to the previous one and take the quiz. Maybe I’ve been particularly bored but I’ve been thinking about life on other planets again. It seems to me a mathematical impossibility that there isn’t other life in the Universe.
The International Astronomical Union estimates there to be 70 sextillion stars in the known Universe, minimum.
Cosmologists now say planetary formation is common, most stars seem to have planets, but even imagining there is only 1 planet per million stars, and that only 1 out of every million planets is capable of supporting life that leaves 70 billion planets capable of supporting life.
Even if only 1 out of every million planets capable of supporting life happens to develop complex life, that still leaves, by the most conservative estimate possible, 70,000 planets with complex life forms in the known Universe.
Some respected estimates, such as that of Frank Drake (of the famous Drake Equation), even put the potential number of “communicating civilisations” (ie. intelligent) in our Galaxy alone at 10,000, which would mean there were trillions in the known Universe!
If the development of life on Earth was basically an accident and there are 70 billion planets with similar conditions, how is it possible that ours is the only place it happened? And if it happened one single other time wouldn’t that prove it’s not a once in a Universe anomaly? If it’s happened more than once it likely happened many times.
So it seems almost certain there is (or was) other life out there, and probably many occurrences, the only question then is the whether it’s life that we’d recognise and whether we could ever communicate with it.
For this the same basic math estimations work in reverse. Even if there are billions of intelligent civilisations out there the odds that we’d ever communicate with them starts to look small. SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) searches for radio signals and while that is the most logical form of contact, what are the odds that a civilisation would be using the same technology at the same time—the history of human high-tech being the tinniest blip of a micro-second on the scale of cosmic history.
Human’s have only been using radio signals for 100+ years and may very well move onto something better and different within 100 years. Earth is estimated to be about 5 billion years old, the Universe anywhere from 12 to 20 billion years old. Two hundred years is not a long time on that kind of scale (comic understatement). That doesn’t even take into account the complicating factor that it takes light 50,000 years to cross half our own little Galaxy, therefore the window of opportunity for civilisations to communicate seems small.
Also, the nearest Galaxy is 2 million light years away, meaning if we got a signal from a roughly technologically equivalent civilisation, they would be 2 million years more advanced when we recieved it—or long gone of course. Considering all of human history is only about 100,000 years what would a civilisation 2 million years more advanced look like? Let alone a billion years more advanced. I don’t know what any of this means, just some thoughts, just having fun blathering. I’ll stop.
Non-geeks will not likely enjoy this entry; you should skip to the previous one and take the quiz. Maybe I’ve been particularly bored but I’ve been thinking about life on other planets again. It seems to me a mathematical impossibility that there isn’t other life in the Universe.
The International Astronomical Union estimates there to be 70 sextillion stars in the known Universe, minimum.
Cosmologists now say planetary formation is common, most stars seem to have planets, but even imagining there is only 1 planet per million stars, and that only 1 out of every million planets is capable of supporting life that leaves 70 billion planets capable of supporting life.
Even if only 1 out of every million planets capable of supporting life happens to develop complex life, that still leaves, by the most conservative estimate possible, 70,000 planets with complex life forms in the known Universe.
Some respected estimates, such as that of Frank Drake (of the famous Drake Equation), even put the potential number of “communicating civilisations” (ie. intelligent) in our Galaxy alone at 10,000, which would mean there were trillions in the known Universe!
If the development of life on Earth was basically an accident and there are 70 billion planets with similar conditions, how is it possible that ours is the only place it happened? And if it happened one single other time wouldn’t that prove it’s not a once in a Universe anomaly? If it’s happened more than once it likely happened many times.
So it seems almost certain there is (or was) other life out there, and probably many occurrences, the only question then is the whether it’s life that we’d recognise and whether we could ever communicate with it.
For this the same basic math estimations work in reverse. Even if there are billions of intelligent civilisations out there the odds that we’d ever communicate with them starts to look small. SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) searches for radio signals and while that is the most logical form of contact, what are the odds that a civilisation would be using the same technology at the same time—the history of human high-tech being the tinniest blip of a micro-second on the scale of cosmic history.
Human’s have only been using radio signals for 100+ years and may very well move onto something better and different within 100 years. Earth is estimated to be about 5 billion years old, the Universe anywhere from 12 to 20 billion years old. Two hundred years is not a long time on that kind of scale (comic understatement). That doesn’t even take into account the complicating factor that it takes light 50,000 years to cross half our own little Galaxy, therefore the window of opportunity for civilisations to communicate seems small.
Also, the nearest Galaxy is 2 million light years away, meaning if we got a signal from a roughly technologically equivalent civilisation, they would be 2 million years more advanced when we recieved it—or long gone of course. Considering all of human history is only about 100,000 years what would a civilisation 2 million years more advanced look like? Let alone a billion years more advanced. I don’t know what any of this means, just some thoughts, just having fun blathering. I’ll stop.
Monday, September 05, 2005
How thrilling is your life?
The quiz below originally ran in The Oregonian & was reprinted in Harrower. It’s an interesting way to look at your life, as this commentator put it, it’s either way too easy or I’m way more fascinating than I ever dreamt—as are most of the people I know. I’d be curious for other people to take it & see some results, you don’t have to admit specifics, but be honest.
I found I could take it very conservatively, in which case I get 250 pts, which puts me firmly in “awesome, probably known as a ‘colourful character’ & lots of fun at parties full of good anecdotes.” Or if I’m more generous interpreting the questions I get 400, which according to their scale would put me somewhere ahead of James Bond.
Some examples of the generous marking option: I’ve never been SCUBA diving, so I didn’t take those pts, but I’ve been snorkelling in the tropics many times & swam with sharks, porpoises, sea lions, giant stingrays, piranha, anaconda etc etc & feel I should get some credit.
Like wise I’m obviously not a daredevil but I’ve done enough things (bridge jumping, stupid 16 yr old car racing etc) that I feel I should get a few more points. I didn’t initially give myself any pts for “cutting a record or music video” but in my music days I was recorded several times (school band etc), so I could take some points there. Similarly I didn’t give myself any points for being “the subject of a news article” even though I’ve been the subject of pieces I’ve written myself.
I didn’t give myself any pts for surviving disasters etc, but I have been in enough hairy situations (being in towns shelled by Khmer Rouge etc) that I could probably take some there. Political scandal? Does getting our college student president kicked out & charged financially for buying us beer with student funds count? Been in a gang? Does it count that we were 12, there were only 5 of us, we only lasted 9 months & the biggest crime we ever undertook was stealing a dirty magazine?
Anyway, good fun. Some of the questions are absurdly wide & generous: “ever committed a crime & gotten away with it?” – isn’t jaywalking a crime? Or “ever taken dangerous or illegal drugs?” – alcohol & tobacco are dangerous! Some are a little too specific: ever been in a Turkish prison? SOLO ocean voyage!? Seriously? How many people have EVER done that? If you’re that kind of person you’re not taking newspaper quizzes, you’re dining with Bono before you head off on your solo summit of Everest.
(add up points, only count once for each item)
Thrills
Ever gone:
Hang gliding 15
Parachuting 15
Windsurfing 10
SCUBA diving 15
Bungee jumping 20
White water rafting 10
Mountain climbing 10
Have you ever:
Set a sports record 20
Run a marathon 10
Competed in sports event seen by over 1,000 people 10
10 pts for each other daredevil activity (cliff jumping, drag racing etc?)
Travel
Ever:
Piloted an aircraft 10
Stowed away on a boat, plane, train 10
Hitchhiked cross country 10
Hiked or biked more than 150 km at one time 10
Sailed on a solo ocean voyage 30
Run off to join the circus 10
Visited a foreign country 1pt each
Add 1 pt for every city you’ve lived in & 5 pts per country
Twighlight zone
Ever:
Seen a ghost 10
Seen a UFO 10 (abduction 30)
Died & come back to life 20
Had an evil twin 10 (2pt for regular twin)
Been a member of a cult 10
Had a profound religious experience 20
Displayed extraordinary psychic powers 10
Fame & fortune
Ever:
Won more than $10,000 at once 20
Been extremely rich 10
Been homeless 20
Been on TV (5pts anonymous; 10pts name, face, voice; 30pts if you’re a star)
Been in a Hollywood movie (10pts extra, 20pts speaking)
Performed on a stage before more than 1,000 people 20
Cut a record or music video 20
Been the subject of a news article 10
Had something named after you (building, product, disease etc) 20
Been close friends with someone famous 5
Disasters etc
Ever survived:
Plane crash 20
Hurricane 10
Tornado 10
Major earthquake 5
Shipwreck 10
Serious auto accident 10
Ever:
Overcome a serious disease or disability 20
Fought in a war 20
Been attacked by deadly animal, insect, reptile 5
Witnessed a nuclear blast 20
Been the victim of a felony 5
Add 10pts for each disaster etc survived, not mentioned (avalanche, volcano etc)
Dark Side
Ever:
Been arrested 5
Been in prison 10 (add 50 for Turkish prison)
Escaped from prison 50
Committed a crime & gotten away with it 5
Been in a fight or brawl 10
Had anybody try to kill you 10
Had an extramarital affair 5
Taken dangerous or illegal drugs 5
Gone underground or undercover 10
Been involved in a political scandal 10
Been in a gang, crime family or outlaw group 10
Been in a high speed chase 5
Been a member of the Communist party 5
Fulfilled some forbidden fantasy too lurid to mention here 10
Good Deeds
Saved someone’s life 20
Saved an animals life 5
Joined a monastic order or done missionary work 20
Run for public office 10 (won 20)
Won a major award (local 5, provincial 10, national 20)
Regularly do volunteer/charity work 20
Everyday life
Ever:
Given birth 10 pts for each
Been married 10 pts each
Quit a job in protest or anger 5
Been fired 5
Been sued 5
Dropped out or been kicked out of school 5
Panhandled 5
Taken part in public protest 5 (add 20pts for riot)
Visited a nude beach/colony 5
Ever worked as a nurse, teacher, doctor, cop, fire-fighter, judge, clergy 20
Penalties
Minus 2 for every TV you own
Minus 1 for every hr of TV you watch in ave. week
Minus 5 if you sit behind a desk for more than 20hrs per week
Minus 2 if you own a video game system
Minus 2 if you wear music headphones in public
Minus 2 if you spend more than 2 hrs a week in a mall
Results
0-100: a quieter gentler life than some, but we can’t all be Indiana Jones
101-200: a good start, now it’s time to turn off the TV & start wracking up some points
201-300: fairly awesome, probably known as a “colourful character” & lots of fun at parties full of
good anecdotes. Or you cheated.
Over 300: Wow! Consider yourself lucky to be alive.
The quiz below originally ran in The Oregonian & was reprinted in Harrower. It’s an interesting way to look at your life, as this commentator put it, it’s either way too easy or I’m way more fascinating than I ever dreamt—as are most of the people I know. I’d be curious for other people to take it & see some results, you don’t have to admit specifics, but be honest.
I found I could take it very conservatively, in which case I get 250 pts, which puts me firmly in “awesome, probably known as a ‘colourful character’ & lots of fun at parties full of good anecdotes.” Or if I’m more generous interpreting the questions I get 400, which according to their scale would put me somewhere ahead of James Bond.
Some examples of the generous marking option: I’ve never been SCUBA diving, so I didn’t take those pts, but I’ve been snorkelling in the tropics many times & swam with sharks, porpoises, sea lions, giant stingrays, piranha, anaconda etc etc & feel I should get some credit.
Like wise I’m obviously not a daredevil but I’ve done enough things (bridge jumping, stupid 16 yr old car racing etc) that I feel I should get a few more points. I didn’t initially give myself any pts for “cutting a record or music video” but in my music days I was recorded several times (school band etc), so I could take some points there. Similarly I didn’t give myself any points for being “the subject of a news article” even though I’ve been the subject of pieces I’ve written myself.
I didn’t give myself any pts for surviving disasters etc, but I have been in enough hairy situations (being in towns shelled by Khmer Rouge etc) that I could probably take some there. Political scandal? Does getting our college student president kicked out & charged financially for buying us beer with student funds count? Been in a gang? Does it count that we were 12, there were only 5 of us, we only lasted 9 months & the biggest crime we ever undertook was stealing a dirty magazine?
Anyway, good fun. Some of the questions are absurdly wide & generous: “ever committed a crime & gotten away with it?” – isn’t jaywalking a crime? Or “ever taken dangerous or illegal drugs?” – alcohol & tobacco are dangerous! Some are a little too specific: ever been in a Turkish prison? SOLO ocean voyage!? Seriously? How many people have EVER done that? If you’re that kind of person you’re not taking newspaper quizzes, you’re dining with Bono before you head off on your solo summit of Everest.
(add up points, only count once for each item)
Thrills
Ever gone:
Hang gliding 15
Parachuting 15
Windsurfing 10
SCUBA diving 15
Bungee jumping 20
White water rafting 10
Mountain climbing 10
Have you ever:
Set a sports record 20
Run a marathon 10
Competed in sports event seen by over 1,000 people 10
10 pts for each other daredevil activity (cliff jumping, drag racing etc?)
Travel
Ever:
Piloted an aircraft 10
Stowed away on a boat, plane, train 10
Hitchhiked cross country 10
Hiked or biked more than 150 km at one time 10
Sailed on a solo ocean voyage 30
Run off to join the circus 10
Visited a foreign country 1pt each
Add 1 pt for every city you’ve lived in & 5 pts per country
Twighlight zone
Ever:
Seen a ghost 10
Seen a UFO 10 (abduction 30)
Died & come back to life 20
Had an evil twin 10 (2pt for regular twin)
Been a member of a cult 10
Had a profound religious experience 20
Displayed extraordinary psychic powers 10
Fame & fortune
Ever:
Won more than $10,000 at once 20
Been extremely rich 10
Been homeless 20
Been on TV (5pts anonymous; 10pts name, face, voice; 30pts if you’re a star)
Been in a Hollywood movie (10pts extra, 20pts speaking)
Performed on a stage before more than 1,000 people 20
Cut a record or music video 20
Been the subject of a news article 10
Had something named after you (building, product, disease etc) 20
Been close friends with someone famous 5
Disasters etc
Ever survived:
Plane crash 20
Hurricane 10
Tornado 10
Major earthquake 5
Shipwreck 10
Serious auto accident 10
Ever:
Overcome a serious disease or disability 20
Fought in a war 20
Been attacked by deadly animal, insect, reptile 5
Witnessed a nuclear blast 20
Been the victim of a felony 5
Add 10pts for each disaster etc survived, not mentioned (avalanche, volcano etc)
Dark Side
Ever:
Been arrested 5
Been in prison 10 (add 50 for Turkish prison)
Escaped from prison 50
Committed a crime & gotten away with it 5
Been in a fight or brawl 10
Had anybody try to kill you 10
Had an extramarital affair 5
Taken dangerous or illegal drugs 5
Gone underground or undercover 10
Been involved in a political scandal 10
Been in a gang, crime family or outlaw group 10
Been in a high speed chase 5
Been a member of the Communist party 5
Fulfilled some forbidden fantasy too lurid to mention here 10
Good Deeds
Saved someone’s life 20
Saved an animals life 5
Joined a monastic order or done missionary work 20
Run for public office 10 (won 20)
Won a major award (local 5, provincial 10, national 20)
Regularly do volunteer/charity work 20
Everyday life
Ever:
Given birth 10 pts for each
Been married 10 pts each
Quit a job in protest or anger 5
Been fired 5
Been sued 5
Dropped out or been kicked out of school 5
Panhandled 5
Taken part in public protest 5 (add 20pts for riot)
Visited a nude beach/colony 5
Ever worked as a nurse, teacher, doctor, cop, fire-fighter, judge, clergy 20
Penalties
Minus 2 for every TV you own
Minus 1 for every hr of TV you watch in ave. week
Minus 5 if you sit behind a desk for more than 20hrs per week
Minus 2 if you own a video game system
Minus 2 if you wear music headphones in public
Minus 2 if you spend more than 2 hrs a week in a mall
Results
0-100: a quieter gentler life than some, but we can’t all be Indiana Jones
101-200: a good start, now it’s time to turn off the TV & start wracking up some points
201-300: fairly awesome, probably known as a “colourful character” & lots of fun at parties full of
good anecdotes. Or you cheated.
Over 300: Wow! Consider yourself lucky to be alive.
Sunday, September 04, 2005
What the hell do you know?
There’s something strange going on here, people may not even believe these, but I swear they are as close to verbatim as I can remember, and I won’t soon forget them.
The other week I had trouble finding the number for the pizza place so I made a point of grabbing a take-out menu so I’d have the number right on it, no confusion… Yesterday I called the number on the menu and got a confused teen.
“Hello?”
“I’d like to order a pizza.”
“Hello?”
“Hi…, um, I’d like to order a pizza.”
“Who is this?”
“Oh, sorry I must have the wrong number, I was trying to order a pizza.”
“You wanna order a pizza?”
“Yes.”
“Who is this?”
“Never mind, thank you-“
“Hang on I’ll give you the pizza guy”
(very long pause) older guy answers
“Hello?”
“Hi, I’m trying to order a pizza”
“Are you in the hotel?”
“No…”
“You’d like to order a pizza?”
“Yes.”
“Who is this?”
“My name’s Auren and I’m just trying to order a pizza.”
“You’d like to order a pizza?”
“That’s the idea, who am I talking to isn’t this the pizza place?”
“Yes, but if you want to order pizza you have to call the restaurant directly, the cell phone isn’t in the restaurant.”
(pause)
“So can you patch me through to the restaurant or give me the number?”
“Where’d you get this number?”
“Off your menu!”
“No, I’m not sure where you got that, you’ll have to call the restaurant…”
“And…?! How do I do that?”
He gave me a number and I called it and the guy answers properly with the name and everything, whew, I found it!
“I’d like to order a pizza.”
“OK what can I get you…OH, sorry we just ran out.”
“Of pizza?”
“Yes.”
“You ran out of pizza?”
“Yes…I think we’ll put some more on soon.”
“How long will that take?”
“An hour or two.”
“OK thanks,” (click).
That was strange but a call a week or so ago weirded me out more. I was trying to get a hold of the school principle, who I’m on good terms with and who was expecting my call. I dial:
“Is Audrey available?”
“This is Audrey.”
“Hi, Audrey, this is Auren, I was hoping to talk to you about back to school, maybe talk to some teachers, all that, is now a good time for me to stop by?”
“OK” her voice didn’t sound right for the usually upbeat principle in her office mid-morning, kind of slow and sleepy.
“Now’s a good time to stop by?”
“OK”
(pause)
“We can arrange a time, whatever’s convenient for you…”
“Now’s OK,” she said sounding strange, almost drugged.
“And do you know if there are some teachers around right now I might be able to talk to?”
“I dunno.”
“You don’t know if there are any other teachers in the school?”
“I dunno.”
“Are there likely to be teachers around? With school starting next week I thought most of them would be?”
“I think so.”
“You think there are teachers around?”
“I dunno.”
“What do you think the chances are I might find one if I come by?”
“I dunno.”
“But I should come over right now?”
“What’s this going to involve?”
By this point it was clear something was definitely not right but I couldn’t figure out what, or how to get out of it without risking embarrassing the principle. To make it worse the weirdness had made me blank out on her last name.
“I was hoping to come and talk to you for a bit and hopefully some other teachers, maybe take some pictures…”
“OK fine.”
“That’s OK? I should come over and do that now?”
“OK.”
Finally I just had to ask:
“Is this really Audrey?”
“Yes.”
“The school principle?”
“No.”
“This isn’t the school principal?”
“No.”
(long pause)
“This is a different Audrey?”
“I dunno.”
“OK thanks,” (click).
What are the odds of a wrong number with the same, not so common name, and why did she keep answering questions?
There’s something strange going on here, people may not even believe these, but I swear they are as close to verbatim as I can remember, and I won’t soon forget them.
The other week I had trouble finding the number for the pizza place so I made a point of grabbing a take-out menu so I’d have the number right on it, no confusion… Yesterday I called the number on the menu and got a confused teen.
“Hello?”
“I’d like to order a pizza.”
“Hello?”
“Hi…, um, I’d like to order a pizza.”
“Who is this?”
“Oh, sorry I must have the wrong number, I was trying to order a pizza.”
“You wanna order a pizza?”
“Yes.”
“Who is this?”
“Never mind, thank you-“
“Hang on I’ll give you the pizza guy”
(very long pause) older guy answers
“Hello?”
“Hi, I’m trying to order a pizza”
“Are you in the hotel?”
“No…”
“You’d like to order a pizza?”
“Yes.”
“Who is this?”
“My name’s Auren and I’m just trying to order a pizza.”
“You’d like to order a pizza?”
“That’s the idea, who am I talking to isn’t this the pizza place?”
“Yes, but if you want to order pizza you have to call the restaurant directly, the cell phone isn’t in the restaurant.”
(pause)
“So can you patch me through to the restaurant or give me the number?”
“Where’d you get this number?”
“Off your menu!”
“No, I’m not sure where you got that, you’ll have to call the restaurant…”
“And…?! How do I do that?”
He gave me a number and I called it and the guy answers properly with the name and everything, whew, I found it!
“I’d like to order a pizza.”
“OK what can I get you…OH, sorry we just ran out.”
“Of pizza?”
“Yes.”
“You ran out of pizza?”
“Yes…I think we’ll put some more on soon.”
“How long will that take?”
“An hour or two.”
“OK thanks,” (click).
That was strange but a call a week or so ago weirded me out more. I was trying to get a hold of the school principle, who I’m on good terms with and who was expecting my call. I dial:
“Is Audrey available?”
“This is Audrey.”
“Hi, Audrey, this is Auren, I was hoping to talk to you about back to school, maybe talk to some teachers, all that, is now a good time for me to stop by?”
“OK” her voice didn’t sound right for the usually upbeat principle in her office mid-morning, kind of slow and sleepy.
“Now’s a good time to stop by?”
“OK”
(pause)
“We can arrange a time, whatever’s convenient for you…”
“Now’s OK,” she said sounding strange, almost drugged.
“And do you know if there are some teachers around right now I might be able to talk to?”
“I dunno.”
“You don’t know if there are any other teachers in the school?”
“I dunno.”
“Are there likely to be teachers around? With school starting next week I thought most of them would be?”
“I think so.”
“You think there are teachers around?”
“I dunno.”
“What do you think the chances are I might find one if I come by?”
“I dunno.”
“But I should come over right now?”
“What’s this going to involve?”
By this point it was clear something was definitely not right but I couldn’t figure out what, or how to get out of it without risking embarrassing the principle. To make it worse the weirdness had made me blank out on her last name.
“I was hoping to come and talk to you for a bit and hopefully some other teachers, maybe take some pictures…”
“OK fine.”
“That’s OK? I should come over and do that now?”
“OK.”
Finally I just had to ask:
“Is this really Audrey?”
“Yes.”
“The school principle?”
“No.”
“This isn’t the school principal?”
“No.”
(long pause)
“This is a different Audrey?”
“I dunno.”
“OK thanks,” (click).
What are the odds of a wrong number with the same, not so common name, and why did she keep answering questions?
Saturday, September 03, 2005
‘New Orleans is Sinking’ The Hip (banned from radio)
The New Orleans hurricane, flooding, looting, fires, disease etc struck me hard, I dunno if I’m just a big stupid sap but things like that and the tsunami seem to affect me more now than they used to. Maybe it’s a sense of mortality that comes with age.
One of the few disasters that jumps to mind from my childhood was an earthquake in Iran (maybe?) that killed like 60,000. I remember being shocked but I also remember a sense of unreal distance. It was sad but it didn’t have anything to do with me. Now I have a deeper sense of empathy for people struck by tsunami’s etc. Watching news of that I remember a very vivid sense that those were just normal neighbourhood people like me & my friends & family, who’d unexpectedly and unavoidably had their lives destroyed. It gave me a real sense of my own mortality and the relative fragileness of human life.
The earth will survive whatever we do to it, not necessarily the other life, but the earth and some sort of life will survive, humans won’t. I don’t mean to get into a philosophical thing about how quickly we’re destroying the planet, but the fact is there has been life on earth for like 4 billion years and humans as we exist today have been around for a few hundred thousand. I like the example of the history of life on earth condensed to a 24 hour day: dinosaurs appeared at 10:46pm, the first human like ape ancestors at 11:57pm, and the first “civilisations” at about a 10th of a second before midnight.
So I feel for the people of New Orleans but then when I see Martin leaping to send every resource we have available before even being asked, I get a bit pissed. This is the country after all that has been doing everything they can to rape & pillage the rest of the planet, including us, why are we so much quicker and more generous with them than we were with the poor countries of Asia who actually needed that kind of response and never got it.
If the US wants to be the sole super power and wants to do everything alone, let them take care of their own citizens. If Canadians want to donate privately, then by all means they should, but I don’t think it’s our government’s responsibility to decide for us that that’s our main priority rather than our own endless problems that could use some of that attention.
Anyway that’s my 1.5 cents (I don't have the focus for a full 2 cents at the moment), I’ll try to write again sooner than later.
The New Orleans hurricane, flooding, looting, fires, disease etc struck me hard, I dunno if I’m just a big stupid sap but things like that and the tsunami seem to affect me more now than they used to. Maybe it’s a sense of mortality that comes with age.
One of the few disasters that jumps to mind from my childhood was an earthquake in Iran (maybe?) that killed like 60,000. I remember being shocked but I also remember a sense of unreal distance. It was sad but it didn’t have anything to do with me. Now I have a deeper sense of empathy for people struck by tsunami’s etc. Watching news of that I remember a very vivid sense that those were just normal neighbourhood people like me & my friends & family, who’d unexpectedly and unavoidably had their lives destroyed. It gave me a real sense of my own mortality and the relative fragileness of human life.
The earth will survive whatever we do to it, not necessarily the other life, but the earth and some sort of life will survive, humans won’t. I don’t mean to get into a philosophical thing about how quickly we’re destroying the planet, but the fact is there has been life on earth for like 4 billion years and humans as we exist today have been around for a few hundred thousand. I like the example of the history of life on earth condensed to a 24 hour day: dinosaurs appeared at 10:46pm, the first human like ape ancestors at 11:57pm, and the first “civilisations” at about a 10th of a second before midnight.
So I feel for the people of New Orleans but then when I see Martin leaping to send every resource we have available before even being asked, I get a bit pissed. This is the country after all that has been doing everything they can to rape & pillage the rest of the planet, including us, why are we so much quicker and more generous with them than we were with the poor countries of Asia who actually needed that kind of response and never got it.
If the US wants to be the sole super power and wants to do everything alone, let them take care of their own citizens. If Canadians want to donate privately, then by all means they should, but I don’t think it’s our government’s responsibility to decide for us that that’s our main priority rather than our own endless problems that could use some of that attention.
Anyway that’s my 1.5 cents (I don't have the focus for a full 2 cents at the moment), I’ll try to write again sooner than later.
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