Man, That Is Very Good: April 2005

A better picture of the mystery beam

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Even if I get up at 5:30 AM with Allie to see her off to work, it will still be like sleeping in compared to my 4:15 AM alarm from the past six days. Perspective is everything.

Monday is gonna suck. Think of the excercise. And using the paychecks to fund our Disney passes in July.

*sigh* No word from All Star at all on Friday. Nothing Saturday..until noon. I did my papers, came home and went back to bed, woke up at 10AM, puttered then finally went for a shower. At noon, after the shower, was the waiting voice mail that the guy I was supposed to meet spent the morning surveying the site, and it isn't ready for wiring yet, that's why he didn't call. Since I'd been waiting for 24 hours for a call, it would have been nice to know this earlier.

Now they say they'll call me Monday or Tuesday to let me know what's up. I will let Future Shop and the Best Western know that I am no longer tied up this week, and if they have something for me, I can start anytime. If I had known that Friday wasn't for sure, I wouldn't have een mentioned it in the interviews.

By the way, I hate the Friday and Saturday papers..more damn flyers than newspaper. I tried a pretty good routine of walking, loading and driving to get them done, as my route covers many blocks, and 30 papers wouldn't even fit in my bag, if I wanted to carry them all the way..which I don't. It's a drag, it isn't nearly as good excercise to do it this way, but the weight of them prohibits doing it the way I did every other day. Oh well.

Went to Safeway, spent carefully and got 175 bonus air miles, and din't really buy anything we don't need, which is an air miles trap I often fall into. "Yes, I will buy six boxes of cereal that I don't really like, just to get the bonus 75 miles!" Not this time, thankfully. We alreday have about 3 months supply of beef, pork, and chicken in the freezer from my last major air miles induced shopping trip.

Had lunch, cleaned the bathroom. That was my day until Allie gets home in, oh, ten minutes or so. Not sure what's up tonight.

Watched MST3K's Mitchell the other day, one of my favourites. Makes me want to see friends, get drunk and watch more. Somebody come visit.

I would love it if the entire world embraced Vote for the Worst and made sure the worst guy is voted American Idol. I love it when mockeries are made of American (and other) Pop Culture Institutions..like when Hank the Angry Druken Dwarf was voted Most Beautiful Person in America in People Magazine's online poll. Also making the list were wrestler Ric Flair and They Might Be Giants' John Linnel.

PS, yes, 3PM and I am still home. Guy from All Star hasn't called me, left him a message a few hours ago on his cell..so he's not here yet? Does the fun ever start? Will see what happens tomorrow, I suppose.

I'm starting to get interview burnout. I'm sick of them. Someone just offer me something decent, please, so I don't have to jump through hoops anymore?

It continues. I deliver papers from 4:30 AM until 6:00 AM tomorrow morning, then an interview at 8:00 AM at the Best Western for a front desk position, then sometime around 12PM or so until whenever, I guss I start pulling cable at the Esplanade.

This will be along week of this. If BW offers me full time starting right away, the Esplanade gig won't last long. 'll hang onto the papers as long as I can though. Good excercise.

Finally broke down and applied at Future Shop. Not my ideal job, but ideal isn't happening rght now, and I can't sit still waiting to hear from anyone. They called right away, had one interview this morning, and i go back at 4PM for another one with a different manager.

But, over the weekend, I e-mailed All Star Show Industries, to see if they had started pulling cable in the Esplanade yet. The boss called me today, said they're starting Friday, and am I still available?

You betcha, and it pays better than Future Shop, so I'll get at least a week of work to start with, and then they'll evaluate how I'm doing and see what I can do for the rest of the summer. Time to impress...I'll try to make myself so indispensible that maybe I can get a raise out of them sooner rather than later.

Just watch, Future Shop will offer me something, and I'll have to choose, or one of the others I appled for will come through as well. These things always happen like that.

If that happens, I'll just try to put them off, or weigh the better money vs future employment vs good experience vs work environment against each other, and see who comes out the winnner.

Either way, it looks like I've got something to do outside the house! Yay me!

Speaking of something to do, I am now an adult newspaper carrier. No Get A Life jokes, please.

It doesn't pay a hell of a lot, but I took it more for the excercise than anything. Two routes, 60-odd papers around my neighbourhood, and I should be able to stick a few bucks away towards the Florida holiday (plus drop a few pounds prior to the trip as well)

Printed off my proposed tattoo design, too..I would like to be slimmer, healthier, a little bit tanned, and newly tattooed before the trip.

Oh yeah, and maybe glasses-free as well, if the sale is extended?

Man, I better get another paper route.

Took me long enough, but I finally wrote my first quiz for Psyc 290, my corespondence course from Athabasca University. The multple choice questions were graded immediately..28/30 or 93 percent. Not too shabby. Just have to wait for my assigned tutor to grade the short answer questions. I'm not a good corespondence student, I do better in a classroom environment with a good instructor. I's taken me too long to get over the mental block of home study and just do the damn exam. I will try to do the rest in a more timely fashion, and it should be easier now.

When I finish this, it will be 3 courses down towards a BA. It's not much, but a good start. I'm hoping that I can be at Medicine Hat College full-time this fall to finish up my first year (and if I can squeeze in two more courses, either through Athabasca or elsewhere, I'll be a year and a half in by this time next year).

If I end up getting a decent job this summer, I will likely keep it and concentrate on getting us in better shape financially, and stick with PT courses, and save FT school for next year. I kinda have a long term goal now, but it depends on my marks when the BA is done. I wish I could fast-forward the process, and be done the BA in like two or three years in order to get going on Phase Two, and thus be on the way to an actual career again, not just the jobs to pass time and make money that I've been after since moving here.

We're going to Florida!

OK, here's some pictures I've been telling you I've been going to post. First, "the thing", the post and beam that used to sit in our living room before we cut it out. This is the only picture I could find that shows it, I think I have another, but for now it will have to do.

Now, showing that the post is gone, here is a cat-free picture of our new chairs. Wait, maybe this one is cat free..no? This one? Well, close. I give up.

The Tree. The dreaded Halloween tree. And this one shows it in relation to the house. On the left is the huge spruce that we decided to take out at the last minute.

Down came the Halloween tree.
Down came the spruce. Also (not shown) down came the birch in the backyard, leaving room for Molly to run around happily. And the front of the house now looks like this. It's amazing how huge our lot looks now, front and back, and how bright everything seems.

Doctor Tongue doesn't care.

My wife's mom was anoyed at me when I suggested that Camilla Parker-Bowles could press her face in soe dough and make gorilla cookies. Allison gets annoyed at me when I say Coronation Street has the ugliest people in the world on it.

I'm just in trouble all over the place.

My niece's hubby peed on the sign outside Hanna, AB that states "Proud to be the Home Of Nickelback!"

I am so proud.

If only we could pass by Creed's hometown.

So.."Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger of Germany is the new leader of the Roman Catholic Church -- elected after just a handful of ballots. He has taken the name Pope Benedict XVI."

Ratzinger, eh? They should have elected John Ratzenberger instead. Cliff from Cheers would have been an awesome Pope!

My niece and her hubby came to visit us here in the Hat over the weekend. We love having visitors, and we love C&D so much. they're a ton of fun to have around. Getting C laughing like crazy every few minutes without really trying reminds me of old times. Well, recent times too, it just never stops! Come visit us again anytime, you guys!

That goes for everyone else, too! We need a good excuse to go to Swirls. Come for the visiting, stay for the ice cream.

Yes, a real estate listing is the only link I could find for Swirls. If we were in a position to borrow money, and if I had a lifelong dream to own an ice cream store, I'd say we should buy it. But mostly the money part. Lifelong dream is to own a profitable business..ice cream wouldn't be so bad, especially the "work half the year" part.

These are pretty funny.

Remember that RCMP job awhile back where they ambushed me with a proficiency test instead of the interview I thought I was going for? The one where I figurd I bombed on half the test because I rarely use Wordperfect and the test instructions were vague?

I passed..I have the interview on Wednesday. I am stunned and excited, I really want to land this one. it would be a huge load off my mind for the next little while.

Jokes with realistic endings #1:
A duck walks into a 7-11 and says "Give me some chapstick, put it on my bill!" But the cash register attendee doesn't speak English and cannot understand him. He does, however, question whether his God is punishing him because as all people know, Ducks cannot speak, however, this hallucination must be punishment for a horrid misdeed. THe employee breaks down into tears and begins reciting prayer. The duck, slightly miffed, walks out, pondering why he'd need chapstick anyway, since he has no lips.

More here.

On the same page is a link to the Ultimate Warrior's threatened lawsuit against Something Awful.

New movie review site: Pajiba.

I liked their review of Sin City, for the most part, and their review of The Notebook, with a tagline of "Weep, A**hole, Weep!" perfectly captured what this ovie meant to me. Just a hint, Allie swatted me and was genuinely pissed at me for a few minutes when during a key heart-tugging scene near the end, I put my hands over my face and mocked a "BWWWOOOOO-Hoooo -hooooo!!" howl of what I thought heart-felt weeping would sound like.

I so desperately wanted to see Sin City on opening night, but it wasn't to be. Nor in the first week, actually. I did, however, get to finally see it with someone that wanted to see it (Nathan) as opposed to the wifey, who would have begrudgingly gone with me.

I liked it, at first. I didn't love it, but I did like it. I'm not sure why, it was exactly the comic..maybe that is the problem. After all these years of "It's not the comic, it's a version of the comic, get over it!" said to fan boys who never like the movie versions of their favourite books, I think this illustrates that it doesn't always translate. I mean, it does, but it doesn't..know what I mean? That's why I said I liked it, but not loved it.

That being said, I have now seen it again (thanks to modern tehnology..how many poor stunt people lost their jobs because of me? I weep for the poor stunt people). I think now that the shock of seeing it has worn off, I like it a bit more than I initially did. I was the same way with Napoleon Dynamite.

Still, it was awesome to finally see live-action Marv. He was made to be live action, whether a direct translation like Sin City was, or "interpreted" into film. Needed to be done. Had he not died a few years ago, I would have loved to have seen Lenny MacLean (The Guv'nah) from Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels as an older Marv. I have his autobiography, and have also seen the documentary he was in about bouncers, "Behind the Velvet Rope"..shitty doc about unlikeable people, but he was interesting, especially the acting aspirations he never was able to realize due to his dying of brain cancer. Oh Lenny, we hardly knew ye...Mickey Rourke did ya proud.

Sitting at the upstairs compuetr in the office, getting Florida hotel info for the planned "family trip to hot weather and theme parks" adventure this coming July. Angel followed me in, looking for cuddles. She always was affectionate, but she's downright puppy-like in her ways these days, following me around, squawking away. RIley jumped up here as well, also very affectionate these days. Angel took one look down at him, squinted, folded her ears back, and bit him in the head.

She's been very protective of what she perceives as her cuddle time-and-space. On the bed, on the chair, if someone gets too close, it's whap-whap-whap with the paws, or a chomp on the melon.

I got Riley calmed down, as there is room on the chair for all three of us. The look on his face said it all..it said "I want to stay, and I'm enjoying the scratches on my chin, but don't let her bite me on the head."

Back from a weekend trip to Edmonton. Had an early birthday party for my soon-to-be four year old niece, and a surprise "good luck" party for her parents (my brother and sister-in-law) as they prepare to move to the Toronto area (Waterloo, actually).

On Friday, I got offered a job at the casino, customer service rep. I had applied for slot attendant, thinking the ash responsibility would be more money. I turned it down, for what thye offered in pay, wasn't worth the health rosks and discomfort of the smoky environment.

The community rehab place also called, but I am having so many doubts about it. Personally, I don't think the offer of on-the-job training will be enough to prepare me to work with developmentally-challenged adults, I really don't. I know that they must be confident or they wouldn't offer it to me, but I am not so sure. Also not sure that I am the right person to do this kind of work. There is also the factor that if I take it, the first job that comes along that is higher pay/lower stress/more career potential, I will take it. No question. I don't want to leave any employer that would actually offer me a job in a position where I take it and leave it, especially something as important as community work. Lower jobs for minimum wage, well, no real loyalty there, but I don't want to treat a good organization unfairly.

Applying for more today..will see what happens.

Does anyone want one or two purebred Rottweilers?

Friends of ours just discovered that their six-year-old son is allergic to the dogs, and they're trying to find good homes for "the girls". We would take them if we could. They are absolutely beautiful, Storm is six (I think, maybe seven) and Kira is three.

If anyone out there knows of homes they would trust with their own pets, pass on my ontact info.

Man, they're gorgeous dogs. Maybe we could give away Buzz and Molly, instead, and we could take the girls? Nahhh...I guess not.

What a day of tree removal. No, din't do any o the actual work myself, but it is fairly stressful watching a team of workers saw down three giant trees on your property, wondering if they're going to come crashing through the windows or the side of the house.

Luckily, we picked an awesome contractor to do it, they were professional and experienced, and it went off without a hitch. We got the big dead tree (the halloween tree, I call it) from the side of the house removed, that was the key to the whole situtation. It was rotting, and huge branches were broken, just waiting to come down onto the house, the neighbours house, our heads perhaps..very dangerous. While we had them there, it was just a bit more to get them to take down the wasp-maget weeping birch in the back yard (which resulted in a nice pile or firewood for the fire pit). Lastly, at the last minute we asked if they could take the yard-killer spruce fromt he front of the house, and they did. We are now treeless, and that is a good thing.

We're in one of those older neighbourhoods where the trees have really taken over the property, to the point of being dangerous. We like trees. Just not these ones.
I'm sure that 30 years ago, they were fine.

Pics to follow...

More "Choose Your Own Adventure Books That Never Made It" here.

I used to love those books when I was a kid.

Holy crap! Busy last few days. I had applied for a detachment clerk position at the RCMP in Recliff, (actually two, one part time and one full time). I got a letter from them saying that one position had been cancelled (not sure which, the PT or FT). I had assumed I wasn't getting a call for the other, when, surprise, they called.

I thought I was going in for an interview yesterday, and as it turned out, I was ambushed by a Wordperfect proficiency test and a proofreading test. No interview yet, that comes after they evaluate the test. I followed the instructions, but they were pretty vague, I don't know ANY command codes for Wordperfect (could have used some of Mukey's admin training on that one), but I still finished well under the time limit. So, we'll see about that one.

Same day, had an interview at the casino for a customer service job. Pay is weak, but when EI runs out it would be better than nothing until something else comes up.

I have an interview today at CORE Association, a community rehab place, sems to deal with getting disables people back into the workforce, and other social work-typ stuff. Will find out more today. I had heard they were starving for people, and fired off a resume, since they said the magic words, "No experience necessary, will train". That's enough for me.

Also going to pop by the Totem job fair tomorrow. etail, yes, but $14 per hour, which is enough incentive for me right now. Ideal case, work FT over the summer, go to PT and go back to school in the fall.

Oh yeah, I also sent in a resume to Home Depot for a "computer room/vault associate", doing deposits, troubleshooting POS sustems, etc. They called within ten minutes of my sending it in, and it was then passed to the next level, so we'll see if that goes any further as well.

When in rain, it pours....wish me luck!

Despite CTV News reporting that he has unofficially died, Fark reports the following:
Papal update: Pope apparently less dead than previously indicated. Church has removed ad from RomeItalyPopeWanted Dot Com.

Gotta love everone trying to be the first to break the story. reminds me of the time some station ran a "Queen Mum Has Died" story by mistake, since they keep them prepped and ready to go at any time. The college did the same thing for tribute videos for Grant MacEwan, so there wouldn't be any lag time between his going and the tribute availability.

According to this news site,and I quote:
As late as 1903, at the death of Pope Leo XIII, a pope's death was verified by striking the pontiff's forehead with a silver hammer. It may also have been used on John XXIII, who died in 1963, according to America weekly's website.

I wish someone would whack Michael Jackson on the head with a sledgehammer.

I hope the new Pope will be slightly more liberal, and able to bring the RC's into modern times.

People ask me what I am. I say I was raisd Catholic, and I guess because of that, I still feel I am, although I have major issues with many aspects of the church. I haven't talked about it much for many years, so this may surprise some of you.

I have lots of issues with all organized religion, still feeling that whatever you have is between you and God at the end of the day, and other people don't really have much to say about it. But, people need to learn somewhere, if they feel that driving need to ask questions. So, where. I don't know. Who's right, who's wrong. We'll find out someday.

RIP JPII.

Very few things could have surprised me more the other night than walking in on Allie not only watching, but enjoying, TKO Mixed Martial Arts. She liked it better than a) pro wrestling, because it's real, b) better than boxing because the fights are shorter and less boring, and c) than UFC beacuse it wasn't as brutal.

She didn't belive me that UFC was basically the same thing, just in a cage instead of a ring. I found some UFC on TV last night to show her the difference, and it illustrated that it isn't really a level-of-brutality thing, it's a level-of-competition thing. TKO was a bunch of local Montreal fighters..UFC is the best of the best..hard core guys, MUCH larger and tougher. Like the difference between a beer league hockey game and the pros. (What pros? Once upon a time, there was a pro hockey league called the NHL...you may or may not remember them...)

Still..my wife, watching MMA...weird.

Man, That Is Very Good

Saturday, April 30, 2005

A better picture of the mystery beam

Friday, April 29, 2005

Thursday, April 28, 2005

Monday, April 25, 2005

Sunday, April 24, 2005

Saturday, April 23, 2005

Friday, April 22, 2005

Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Tuesday, April 19, 2005

Friday, April 15, 2005

Thursday, April 14, 2005

Wednesday, April 13, 2005

Tuesday, April 12, 2005

Friday, April 08, 2005

Thursday, April 07, 2005

Tuesday, April 05, 2005

Friday, April 01, 2005

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