It was nice to get outof the apartment this afternoon

About 10:30am this morning Pledges scrambles up over my face nearly taking out my left eye. It was hard to sleep after that so I got up to read more out of ICB. I tried having a cat nap after that but that never amounted to anything. I got up at noon to read and to fix a coffee. Nathan and his wife would be here at about 1:15pm. I went to wait out side about 1:10pm. Anne came down saying Nathan is tied up in traffic along the

Yellowhead. She brought the desert down and our bag of stuff like pop and that sort of thing. Sure enough Nathan came by but without his wife and daughter. He’d get them later. That was a long drive out to the Shrine club and we looked around. Dale showed up and others as well. It was nice. Anne was a bit board because she didn’t know anyone. We explored the building a bit. Very nice. I had a beer and a great steak. I should have had a larger one. We were talking with John and his wife about possibly joining The Eastern Star, (Star). Anne likes the idea. They meet twice a month. First meeting is business and the 2nd meeting is entertainment like card games that sort of thing. Most of the members are of Star are people our age. I didn’t et very much but I enjoyed the fellowship. John called one of the Star people out of Highlands on our behalf saying he’d sponsor us. I have his phone number and I’ll call tomorrow night. Anne’s up for it. Dues are only $35/year. Anne and I need to get out more anyway.

Nathan drove us back home with his wife and daughter. She’s 3 years old. I brought my camera along to take pictures but who wants to see a bunch of people sitting around eating? Our last Lodge meeting until we break for the Summer will be this Thursday and it’s just going to be a regular night. No balloting, nothing. Anne made me a nice chicken KFC bun type thing and fries and then she headed out for her 8pm-midnight job. I want to go in for tomorrow for 1:30pm-9pm but Anne talked me out of it. I’ll go Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday instead.

So while Anne went to work I stayed home and watched the Detroit Red Wings take on the Pittsburgh Penguins. The Pens got the first goal but there after it was almost a repeat of last nights game. Detroit is such a good team. I don’t think Crosby and his gang can hold them back. If Detroit wins this series and there’s a good chance they will, then this will be their 12th Stanley Cup. This will be their 3rd in the last 9 years.

I’m slowly trying to weed out a lot of the Vampire links in my list of links page. Nothing wrong with Vampire stores but that’s not the focus of this blog. This Blog is Mainly about science fiction/fantasy and how it impacts upon my life. I like Gothic horror as well but I read it a couple of times a week.

From the “Oh brother” files-it seems that the people that brought us the “Aliens” movie franchise wants to get in on the prequel bandwagon like Star Trek did this summer. According to SF Signal Aliens wants to get into the prequel game as well. I thought the whole franchise was boring and deserved to be put in the “Backburner” files along with Buckaroo banzai.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

Today is our annual Lodge BBQ and this is a first time for me in an outing with the Lodge away from the Lodge with my lovely wife.

I’m writing this at about 10:30pm so this will be fore Sunday. As soon as I get inside I get a call from Anne, then again at 6pm and around 8:30pm and I’m making calls, trying to get a ride to the Lodge BBQ. Nathan is picking us up at 1:15pm. Should be a good time. I’m going to have a a steak and some pot luck and a couple of beers. We should be home about 6:30pm ish. Anne works at 8pm so I’ll have a few hours to myself when she leaves.

I didn’t win on tonight’s 6/49 draw but I got 1 number right out of 6 and nothing on the Extra as well. They didn’t post any winners for the draw this evening either.

This week I hope to have my stat pay on my next cheque and my vacation pay. If HO Doesn’t come up with another excuse as to why they aren’t going to release my vacation pay. Anne and I are curios what if anything they’ll come up with this time on Friday. But I laid down the law to Anne saying that I’m in the office Monday afternoon. If Rob wants me to work, I will and I’m going to try like hell to put 34.5 hours in. That and my vacation and stat pay will be pretty good. That should be almost double my paycheque if they don’t screw me over.

I’m seriously looking at the ITC Magic touch phone. It’s not as big as an I phone but apparently has more Apps then an I phone. The data plan is 500mb for $25/month on a 3 year contract. However the “Revolution” is coming soon in a few days. I prefer the virtual keyboard then the sliding one.

Game #1 of the Detroit/Pens game is in the bank. It wasn‘t bad. The way the Wings are playing looks like they’ll have this thing wrapped up in 5.

I’m in Tim’s this morning trying to get my breakfast. They being a little slow this morning. A nice young gal asks me if I’m waiting? Kind of sort of. I’ve never seen her before and that was that. Then in Audrey’s as she’s helping Russell with the desk computer she mentioned me by name. Does she know me from somewhere? People (why I have no clue) read my dribble here in the City. I’ve got about 8-10 people following me on Twitter. Like I mentioned this to Markus, this is not content for the masses but if you get some “value” from reading this, great. All part of my banal life as a science fiction fan and wanabe writer carving out a meager existence here in the big city.

Has anyone else around here in Edmonton noticed how dry it’s been lately or is it just me? I’m originally from the lower (here since 1978) mainland Vancouver area where we get 155mm (about 6 inches) of rain in a single weekend. We’re lucky if we get that all year.
Anne wanted me to put that chicken in the over at 9:30pm. So far it’s been

Sitting there for over an hour now. She got off work at 10pm and she most likely has been off the Clairview train about by 10:30pm. I don’t know I hope she’s timing all of this well.

I Haven’t been to a good old family picnic/BBQ in years so this should be kind of nice. I hope they have some beer. I could use a cold beer about now. We’re going to be up about noon ish or so. It’s going to be an all afternoon event and I don’t know what to expect since this is my first ever Lodge BBQ.

For a site billing itself as Sci-fi guy.ca, it sure has been focusing a lot on Urban fantasy lately. Sci-fi chick at least tries to put some emphases on
Sci-fi.

My favorite website to go to is of course SF Signal. They don’t talk about Urban Fantasy. At least not much. I also like Pat’s Fantasy hotlist. I go there a lot too. Today pat’s been talking about a new book Blood of Ambrose by James Enge. It looks like a pretty good medieval fantasy and possibly a trilogy. However my fav fantasy writer of all time is RA Salvatore. You Can’t go wrong with a Salvatore novel.

One thing I’m going to do as soon as I have a few weeks of 34.5 hours in under my belt, is hit Rob up for a raise. After all I’ll be putting in the same hours as Dave and I’m just as good as anyone else doing taps (consider what we have to work with that is.) After I get that raise I’m going to insist on having Saturday’s off. I hope to have this established by the end of June.

One thing I’ve been wanting to get is one of those Google Followers widgets for my website, I put one together for my Blogger. I don’t expect this to work over night or anything.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

This weekend could be a good one after all

headed into work a little early and got the empties on the evening side of the business section. Super wanted me to sit in the back. I was a little apprehensive. A few of the others from the front 20 joined us. Some of them were doing strictly sponsorships, others were doing ASB the right way. The first half went by and I got 0 sales. A real first for me. About 6:30pm Super pulled me off “Taps” and over to the CWF/magic show. I had no sales up to break. I got more empties and in the 2nd half I finally got my first sale. Then I sold a family price. I was at $65 around break. Then I got some more sales and a CC sale for a total of $165. I did better then even the back “tap” section. I felt a lot better about doing my job. They sent a lot of people home because they weren’t trying. They weren’t sending people home that were putting in an effort and trying. Even though the first half sucked I rallied in the 2nd half and did a lot better. Imagine if I did the CWF in the first half. I would have been a lot further ahead.

I called Anne walking across the street and through the parkade to Corona and had a 10 minute wait for my train while I read and read some more on the way home. I read a good 10 pages from ICB. I’m really enjoying this.

I fired up the computer when I got in and saw an email from one of my Lodge officers. Dan was asking me about an old phone number and if I was coming out to the Lodge BBQ. Anne said she’d like to come along. It’s $5 for a steak or chicken breast and I replied saying that we’d each like a steak. The rest is pot luck. It starts Sunday at about 2pm. Anne has too work Sunday night from 8-midnight, and I have game #1 of the Detroit/Pens game on at 6pm Saturday night then again on Sunday night. So hopefully we’ll be all but done by 5-7pm. I don’t mind if I miss a little of it.

Basically it’s work tomorrow night, get my paycheque rush up to my bank and do my banking and home to watch Smackdown. Then Saturday I’m at work 10-2pm and over for my Saturday book buying thing at Audrey’s. After work I’m going to try and make it over to Happy Harbor comics to check out a game of “Magic the Gathering” in progress if they have one in progress that is and check out the store. If I get that far, it’s have a nap and watch game #1. Then Sunday it’s off to the lodge annual BBQ and have fun with that and maybe watch what’s left of game #2.

Of course I’ll be blogging Saturday morning etc reading more out of ICB. This weekend promises to be a busy weekend. I’m going to try and get a ride from George Sunday to the Lodge BBQ.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

Going down memory lane and ceaning up

I shut it all down and headed out of here shortly before 4pm, with no jacket as it was very mild and warm out there. I read a bit on the way in and noticed just before Rexall place the empty lot before coming to the overpass how it was all gated off. I got into the office shortly before 4:30pm and got a bunch of cans and bottles from the afternoon shift and got the end dialer. My mistake because it was very blurry, I couldn’t read the names. In the 2nd half Super went and moved a bunch of us but I had 2 sales and $60 by break. Not good. Super moved me to do the CWF and my 2nd call I got a sale and then nothing for almost an hour. Finally I got one sale and I ended up with a measly $108. Not good but during the afternoon other staff along the back were struggling with low totals as well. As dismal as that was I was glad to get to Corona station to crack open my book and escape a little. Anne came home shortly after I got in. She made me some lunch and we watched the local news.

Greg won our little $5 bet but I’m going to go him double or nothing for Pittsburgh/Detroit. I’m saying Detroit. This way it will give me some leeway.

On this day 29 years ago, I recall Richard and I getting on a Greyhound bus for Vancouver. This would still be at the old Greyhound bus station where it was occupying the North side of City Center Mall. In those days they had the milk run and it took us a good 18 hours to get to downtown Vancouver. The SCA in those days had virtually no Rattan, which was the preferred material of choice to make practice fighting swords for tournaments. This was Richards first brush with Vancouver as he was trying to organize his “House of Khonsu” as he liked to call it back in Edmonton. My progress towards “membership” in this enterprise was stalled going nowhere and I thought about resigning my petition. When we got to Vancouver I wish I had the inclination to go back to downtown New Westminster and take a couple of photos. The Courthouse was just being developed and I think my old apartment building the last place I lived in while in New West, was being torn down at this time. It was to make way for the new Douglas College which currently sits on that site. I don’t know if Richard knew anyone in Vancouver but the idea was to contact the SCA since we were also on SCA “unofficial business.” We looked up the SCA North Shore Vancouver Chapter while rummaging through a couple of occult bookstores. We also made contact with the SCA and they housed us up for Friday/Saturday night as long as we attended their chapter classes on medieval fighting and assorted lectures. We stayed at this young lady’s house. Her name was Kelly. She was maybe all but 17 at the time. Richard warmed up to her right away. That Friday afternoon we found ourselves in the Kitsilina area at a quaint occult book store where I found my first copy of 777- Magick in theory and Practice and another copy of the Thoth deck and some other stuff at that store. Then we found our Rattan, We Didn’t get a lot of it. Our home base for that weekend was Kelly’s place. I often wondered if Richard ever re connected with her when he ended up moving to the kits area in 1983. The lectures were worth it as we got a lot of great information to take back with us when we left that Sunday afternoon. I think I had about $350 with me on that trip and $400 in those days bought a lot. Again we were on the milk run back.

So it’s going to be Detroit Red Wings/Pittsburgh penguins again for part 2. It was mentioned on the news last night that the last time the same 2 teams that made back to back playoff appearances in 2 consecutive years was The New York Islanders and The Edmonton Oiler’s. How’s that for an omen? Game #1 of that series starts on Saturday night. I can’t wait. Game #2 is on Sunday.

I also cleaned up my welcome block, the one with my photo in it. Top left corner. It reads a lot better indicating my hobbies what I’m into. Next time Anne’s sister is here I’m going to ask her to take a photo of both of us, where she’s sort of standing behind my left shoulder with the same kind of pose only where I’m wearing my Edmonton Oiler shirt. Something like that. But that wont be until the next time she comes here.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

I love this time of year but its so dry out there.

I left out of here at my usual time 4pm. Anne’s shift was 7-11pm and they cut her hours back again but she was able to pick up another shift. All she’s getting is 20 hours/week. Not good. I’m going to go in on Thursday and Friday. At least that’s the plan. I got a whack of empties and found a dialer near where I was yesterday. But I ended up between Daryl and Eddie. We had all 10 dialers opened where the other tap shooters sit. All night it was ASB. I had $140 by break and in the break I got the rest of all the rest of the empties and in the 2nd half no sales from 7-8. Finally I figured I’d get creative and I got a $45 CC sale and $270 on the rest. I was glad to get out of the office and outside to a breezy somewhat cloudy evening.

I had a brief wait for my train while reading ICB and more ICB on the way home up to about Belvedere. I was getting a headache. I got home and relaxed a little and Anne came in while I was watching the news.

I watched this earlier. Pat Quinn beside Steve Tambellini and ex NY Ranger coach Tom Renney? Yes indeed. Oh and Kelley Buchburger as well. Nice. Now all the Oiler’s have to do is get some players that can score goals. Anyway at least that question is answered. So behind the bench its Pat Quinn, Tom Renney, and Kelley Buchburger. I would have kept Huddy and Billy Moores but maybe a complete change is for the best. Now if they can get a couple of marquee players. Mike Cammalleri, and get back Petr Sykora and keep Ales Kotalik, Dwayne Roloson make a couple of trades and the Oiler’s might make the playoffs…………… 12:50pm> You reap what you sow is the old adage that Premier Ed Stelmach might be realizing just now. A year or so ago the East was asking Alberta share it’s oil revenue wealth with other provinces. Alberta said No. On the surface this made sense because at the time, and to some extent even right now, Alberta is still creating jobs. There has never been a sign on the wall that said “help wanted Albertans only.” With rising unemployment here in Alberta at 166% from a year ago, Ed said no to oil revenue sharing. Now he’s asking Ottawa for a share in the equalization payments the Federal Government dishes out. To be fair to Ed, this is the first time Alberta has asked for equalization payments decades. The 2 are unrelated of course and Ed makes a solid case because the farmers here in Alberta could be in trouble because it’s so dry out there. I Haven’t seen it this dry since about 2002. Speaking about unemployment here in Edmonton last year there was something like 5,000 unemployed. Our unemployment rate was something like 3.4%, which is almost zero % unemployment or full employment. Anyone could walk off a Greyhound bus and walk through any door with a help wanted sign and get a job. Not today, 1 year later. And I could see it coming as well when oil went up to $147/barrel. I was telling people in the office at work, “watch, in 6 months from now we’ll be in a recession.” People thought I was crazy. Getting back to Premier Ed, whether or not he gets his equalization payments remains to be seen. The economy might rebound in January of 2010 but recovery might be a long way away yet.

I went through an article from the Coast to Coast website about US Government documents saying that the materials found at Roswell in 1947 were of extraterrestrial origin. Yeah right. The full articleis here along with some interesting discussion at the bottom of the page. Personally I’m skeptical.

I don’t talk a lot about it here but one anthology I’m excited about getting into when it comes out is Ellen Datlow’s “Best horror of the year #1” Most likely it’s going to be in hardcover but I don’t mind Trade. I like short horror, not the long drawn out stuff found in novels today. But this book looks really good. For short horror fiction lately I’ve been going here once a day.

This afternoon its off to the job thing and put in my 4 hours, ugh. We’re going to be doing this ASB for at lest another month but we might take a break from it for awhile. Dave was mentioning last night how we’re going to be do CPA again. I’m not looking for ward to this. We did this campaign last November.

Tonight, I’m kind of hoping Chicago can stay off elimination when they face Detroit this evening. Pittsburgh won their series with Carolina last night. I’m glad the Cane’s are out and Anaheim.

Rats. This week is the Lodge BBQ and I don’t think I can make it. I need to know how much it costs. If it’s free, I will attend but I doubt it’s free. I’d love to go. In all the years I’ve been in the Lodge I’ve never been out to this traditional event.

Over the past few days I’ve been doing some “research” on the card game MTG. or “Magic the Gathering.” I used to think this was just a kids game and I still have this notion on the periphery of my thoughts that MTG is a kids game. You don’t see many 50-60 year olds playing this thing. YouTube fortunately provides me with some nice “How to’s” on the game. The process isn’t that complicated but the playing of the game is rich in detail. Being a baby boomer I am often told I don’t look my age. I could fit right in with the 30 somethings. At our local Happy Harbor games store they are holding weekend events on Saturdays. Now since I’m working until 2pm on Saturday I’d kind of like to run over there to the store and as a shopper sitting around and look at what they have and see if there’s a game in progress. I think they play Wednesdays and Saturdays.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

it's another meh kind of a Monday

We watched “The Valkyrie” with Ton Cruise last night. On a scale from 1-10 I’d rate it a 7. I thought the scenes were really good especially the North Africa and Prussia scenes. The DVD shows Tom in desert khaki on the back. It was a war movie and had it’s obligatory battle scenes in it. I’m a WW2 buff from way back cutting my education teeth on SPI and Avlon Hill wargames. What with this being memorial day in the US, Happy memorial day to all my American readers. I hope your l having a great day off. As for my wife and I we got to work this afternoon.

Anne’s sister is arriving shortly to pick her up and their going off to do a few things this afternoon as they’re going out and about to pick up a few things and Anne’s going to go to Wendy’s to pick me up a bacon cheese burger combo for my lunch today. Anne goes into work from 7-11 and I work from 5-9 today. So when I get home I’ll be watching my Monday night Raw by the time she gets home it’ll all be but over.

I’m right in the first 60 pages or so “ICB.” So far it’s holding it’s own. Anne’s sister should be pulling up shortly. As the gals are going out to do their thing. As for me, I’m going to post this and read some more from my book and check my email.

However there are 13 people here in Edmonton that made National news Friday that most likely don’t have to work today either. I doubt they’d get up and quite their jobs like that but I think they might have taken a few days off. Their replacements would need to be trained. I’m of course referring to the lucky 13 from the ATB bank that won last Wednesday‘s $49M historic draw here in Edmonton In case you haven’t heard these people worked on the 13th floor of the building they worked in. Wow. Lotto Canada held a press conference on this last Friday afternoon with the 13 winners and I gather they either all got cheques or one got the cheque and split 13 ways. I wonder if they all held bank accounts at the ATB bank where they worked. It’d make it easier for 13 people to split $49M. They each got $3.7M. Imagine say the employee that went around to the others every Monday and Friday to people that even worked on their floor. “Hey were all going in for the big $49M, do you want to put your $2 in?” I never win on those things>“No thanks.” Imagine how they must feel. “Doh!” The banks happy because it now has 13 millionaires as depositors. There was even one couple that was getting married. They gal won and her boyfriend is probably thinking, “Honey, lets hurry up and do this thing.” So to all the lucky 13 that won last Wednesday’s draw, good for you. I don’t think they went in to work today. I know if that was me at the press conference behind the table with the rest sharing that $49M. I wouldn’t be at work today either little alone Saturday. I’d split my share with my wife so we’d each get $1.8M on our bank cards. First thing we’d do is look for a condo. Anne’s been looking at one a few blocks away SE from us by the school. We’d be looking at buying today if that was one of us that won the share of the $49M. I’d get myself a new computer and the extras. I’d certainly pick up all my books at Audrey’s. Also I’d get all my ASL missing modules as well. Also a nice piano would be in the forecast as well. All the bills would be paid off, new cloths etc. What a great weekend those lucky 13 must have had. I wonder if they had a staff party or will have one this weekend. I know I couldn’t spend $1.8M in one weekend little alone in a year. I’d just live off the interest of what would be left over. And what a great time to win it to right in the middle of a recession. The bank will have no problem filling those vacancies that’s for sure. As for me and my wife, we just live from pay cheque-to-pay cheque. I’m lucky if I have $20 bucks in my pocket on a Saturday afternoon. But the odds of winning the 6/49 jackpot in itself are huge.

Pure Speculation has a new webpage up for 2009 and yes its confirmed Spider Robinson will be here October 2nd -4th. I’d love to go to see this one. I like their new motto: “In space no one can hear you geek.” That’s cute.

This day in strangeness……Lord Edward Bulwer-Lytton, the English dramatist, novelist, politician and Rosicrucian was born. He wrote the famous line (plagiarized by many) “It was a dark and stormy night.”

The good folks over there at SF Signal are giving away a copy of Rachel Caine's “Carpe Corpus.” While I’m not really into the vampire genre thing and since my comment a few weeks back on their site suggesting they consider more book give-a-way’s seemed to work. Also at Pats Fantasy hotlist, he’s giving away a copy of Bruce Sterling’s “The Caryatids” to one lucky winner.

Sci-fi chick is talking about the recent ABC upcoming remake of the series “V.” I’m looking at the shot of the cast of characters and there doesn’t appear to be one person to be over 30. What do science fictions fans peak out and drop off at the age of thirty something? Hollywood casting would seem to think so. Or even if there is anyone over 30 in these shows they are in supportive roles. Ok, granted a show about Mr. and Mrs. Kent in Smallville might be a bit boring but geese already. I’m a sci-fan from way back when but I can’t relate to all the kids out there and I feel kind of disenfranchised by the “youth movement” in sci-fi and I understand the casting trends and political correctness and all that. It’s all fine and well to see ABC doing a remake of V but this 57 year old will not be tuning in.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

Sorry if this seems to be a bit disjointed and poorly written today, im not quite myself this afternoon.

I had a nice couple of days off. Saturday night Anne made us each a rack of baby back ribs baked potato, beans and a nice piece of dark chocolate cake all this while she rented us out “Quantum of Solis,” the 22nd installment of James Bond. On a scale of 1-10 I’d rate this an 8.5. It was better then the last one, however the quality of our DVD copy was scratched in some places. This was the first DVD title that I’ve ever watched. This movie was really good and I enjoyed it. And yesterday while Anne was at work, I watched the Carolina at Pittsburgh game 1 and then Monday night Raw.

Since 1984 the Edmonton Oiler’s had won their first Stanley Cup 25 years ago today. That was on a Saturday night May 19th. Global News had talked about the anniversary of that event. It was great seeing glimpses of downtown Edmonton as it was 25 years ago as the Cup was paraded around the downtown core. I was 31 years old at the time. I was thin and I had teeth! LoL. I recall watching that game on that Saturday night. I recall how I wrote in that diary, which is stored away in the closet but I have a recollection of that night quite vividly. I had a small room in Trudy’s house no larger then this room and paying $150/month. I had a desk my TV and a bed and at one time I even had a phone in there. I was working at the Army & Navy at Cobogo warehouse now called the Cobogo lofts and had been working there for about a year. Little was I to realize 25 years latter the Oiler‘s would trade off Wayne Gretzky and go on to win another 4 Stanley Cups their last being in 1990. The last of the true dynasty teams in the NHL.

Speaking of hockey, tomorrow a Phoenix Judge will decide the case of the bankrupt Phoenix Coyotes and the bid by Blackberry billionaire Jim Balsillie to move the team to Hamilton. The right thing to do is what‘s governed by free enterprise. It‘s not the NHL that owns the team its Jim Moyes. I hope the Judge does the right thing and lets Balsillie keep the team to do what he wants with it but there is another player in this drama, Chicago Bulls Owner Jerry Reinsdorf also wants to buy the Coyotes and apparently he’s also happens to be a pretty good friend of Bettman. Now if Reinsdorf wants to move the team to Winnipeg, then great. I’d rather see an NHL team in Winnipeg then in Hamilton. I doubt it very likely that a decision will be reached this week. This thing could drag out for a long time.

There was bit on the news about the Chinese auto company “Build Your Dreams,” producing the first ever commercial electric car. The car can go 250 miles on one charge. They call it the e6. I think they said the cost would be anywhere from $21,000-$25,000. They should be hitting the North American market soon.

Why are the auto manufactures having so much trouble selling cars? There are about 8-10 million new cars being sold each year in the US and possibly world wide. This is down by half. It’s kind of hard to buy a car when you don’t have a job. You know that song, “I can’t get a girl cause I don’t have a car and I can’t get the car cause I don’t have a job,” Of course the banks these days are reluctant to lend money to consumers because they’re not doing well themselves. Here in Canada there is supposed to be a deadline to which the auto manufacturers here can qualify for some of the huge bail out money. Yeah like on the backs of its workers that got them so successful in the first place.

Sci-fi guy.ca is pushing the Young Adult theme again. Some authors are jumping on the Young Adult band wagon. I wont read YA but occasionally I get sucked into buying one. The YA market took off thanks to JK Rawlings but Harry potter isn’t YA. It’s a story for kids. And I’m wondering exactly who is reading YA? Is it the adults or young adults? The term YA is misleading because it’s a murky phrase. When I was a teenager I read science fiction. What because the term YA comes along and now I can’t read regular science fiction anymore? What’s next an ESRB rating system for books like they do for the gaming industry? Actually this would seem more palatable then having to fish for books that look really good only to find they’re YA. At least with an ESRB rating type system for novels would make it easier for the consumer to sort through all the genre’s and stuff bogging down SFF these days. I wish there was some kind of regulatory board like the Comics Code authority that lists books for what they are. They could do this right on the spine or back cover. SF = science fiction, Steam punk= SFCP, type thing. Fantasy F rated “T” for teen. I think I’m going somewhere with this. More on this latter.

Hubble finally gets a refit. It’s about time. They’ve been in space now for a few days and the HST is now a whole new instrument. I wonder if its going to work with the current Kepler mission?

Dan Brown’s “Angles and Demons” opens up this weekend. Looks like a pretty good movie. I had issues with the “DaVinci code,” and one day I’ll be putting this in my “On….” topics……………12:50pm> Climbing the Eiffel tower stair by stair might be good exercise but the 120 year old structure does have an elevator and as soon as I win the 6/49 jackpot is one of the first countries I want to visit. Speaking about the Eiffel it’s the anniversary of this structure. Wiki it for the details.

Two days now of the Dow moving up. Oil is at $59.90 struggling to reach $60. This number is my magic number, not anyone else’s. High oil prices are good here in Alberta and that translates into jobs but with a world wide recession going on $60 oil doesn’t mean much when companies are laying off workers by the thousands.

Oh, I added a bunch more links to my link list of sites. I also find a great site called “Canadian Science Fiction.” I put that near the bottom of the books I plan on reading next. Also I added “Fantastic Fiction” underneath that as well.

Anne left up the street for chicken. It’s “Tooney Tuesday” KFC’s big sales day here in Canada. I think its 3 pieces of chicken for $2 and tax of course.

It’s a pretty good deal but I cant stand the stuff. I Haven’t had any KFC in years thanks to biting on a vein and almost bringing it up because it was so greasy.

I’m in for my 5-9 this afternoon. That’s okay Tuesday’s are good days and the shift will go by fast.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

A day spent reading a book but i'm to much into this read to chuck it just yet.

This morning I headed out of here with lunch in tow and my stuff. I took a couple of pictures of the trees by our place and this tree for example should be loaded with light colored green leaves. I’ve never seen a Spring season like this before.

I got out at Belvedere because I wanted to scoop up to the higher level pedway that looks onto the construction going on and take a photo but the glare on the glass from the outside and inside kind of wrecks the photo but you can get a good idea of what’s going on here.
I had a wait for the train the rest of the way and read a bit on the way in. I got my original dialer and settled into the job. We had a full crew. I had a slow start but I ended up with $240 in the middle of the pack. I got some bottles and cans and Lucian (spelling?) mentioned how owners of the Kindle DX can buy my blog at $3/month and read it on their Kindle’s. I’m sure I have to sign up for this. But why would Kindle owners pay me/Amazon (their cut) about $3/month when they can sign up and subscribe for free? The kindle is a nice idea but the device is way to expensive. It’s not a must have item and I don’t think this is going to be the killer app that will spell the death of publishing as we know it. J Rock wasn‘t there and in a way I was relieved she was a no show because I wasn’t in t h e mood for going out of my way this afternoon.

I ended up with $330 and finally a $45 CC sale and a few more bottles and cans and headed for Corona and after a wait I got my ride home. I no sooner got through the door when Anne called for a few minutes.

I had my nap and relaxed and around 6pm I got into reading more of “TLE.” Anne called again while she was on her break. She’s getting an extra day next week which falls on Monday so she’ll be getting time and a half. I’m still going into the office Tuesday-Friday and on Saturday. I have books I want to get.

My 6/49 numbers didn’t pan out. I didn’t even get 1 number. I should have bought a quick pick. I didn’t even win on the extra. They’re not posting any winners yet. Maybe nobody won first place. We’ll see.

As bsl readings go mine a few minutes ago read 7.4. This isn’t bad considering I ate a can of stew half an hour ago with the idea I’d take my insulin only to discover my cartridge empty. Yikes. But I got distracted somehow and forgot to take my shot. The last time I took this was 13 hours ago. The shot should be taken about ever 12 hours or so. Anne had some yogurt so I consumed some of that and took my insulin.

Nobody last night won the $40M jackpot. Actually it broke down to $39,621,456.00 million. However 9 winners won 2nd place, which is 5 numbers including the bonus number for $115,069.30. Then there were 425 winners that won $2,012.90, On Saturday the draw gets increased to an estimated $49M. 16, 17, 23, 27, 30, 45 Bonus 39. So to get 2nd place you needed to have 5 of the above numbers and 39 in your mix of 6. It’s all tax free.

A bit of “good news” today for a change, Anne tells me that Alberta monitoring will cover needles. I didn’t know this before. A box of 100 costs $25 bucks. My total budget for my diabetes if I was to do this properly would be $1200/year, test strips. $131 lancets/year, $380/year in needles, $720/year for insulin. Total to me is $2,431. out of that, I’m grateful that Alberta monitoring gives me $550 towards monitoring. I have to take out of my pocket $1,881/year. This translates into $156.75/month. I get no help from Alberta health care. My place of work has a medical plan but as soon as they hear I have diabetes, forget it. I might be able to get some help from Alberta monitoring but because my wife has a little stashed away from an RRSP, we probably wont be able to qualify.

I’ve been reading for most of the night last night “The legend that was earth,” it’s not bad. Not one of JPH’s best works and I’ve read a few. But I’m not going to drop it. I‘m not a diehard James P. Hogan fan even though this story has aliens which are ancillary to the story. Today, I’m going to try and finish this story.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

Left overs

I felt horrible this morning with a headache that made me feel nausea in spots. I took a cold shower after I deposited some freaky crap in the toilet. The shower helped a little and breathing shallow breaths helped as well. I passed out and now I feel a whole lot better. I’m wondering if I have the Swine flu that’s been going around lately. I’m feeling alright now with Boots sleeping comfortably beside me.


Yesterday while I was trying to fix my computer, thanks to Justin in Nanaimo BC through my ISP, Anne was out getting some peroxide to help Boots get rid of those ear mites that drive him crazy.


This morning as I was recovering from my little virus/headache that went through me the Sun was out it was beautiful out there and now it’s over cast as a cold front is about to pass through our system. So I’m relaxing with a coffee. It seems we have a long weekend coming up what it being Victoria Day and all. We don’t usually get this Holiday the last Sunday in May. I get Sunday and Monday off. Great. All that and there’s playoff hockey despite Vancouver being knocked out of the 2nd round. Chicago was too fast for them. Will we see #88 against #8? I sure hope so.


So I’m sitting here relaxing with my coffee feeling ok, for now. I took my bsl reading about 2am and it read 16.1. I took it again just now and it read 10.1.


The problem is we eat to late. I think from now on after dinner, even though it is dark out there I’m going to go for a nice little walk around the block.

About 4pm I’m off to work and I’ll put my 4 hours in and come home. Not much going on right now. I want to read a little before work.


Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

I had a nasty couple of days what with the trouble I

had with my PC. After a few hours my ISP and I were able to get my computer working again.

Also I added some photos over at my website and a more complete Blog posting. Sorry but I'm too exhausted to post it here this morning.

Anyway gang, that's all for now

e. Jim

Yikes!

it took me about 4o minutes and 3 attempts after a cold boot to get to this point. The first effort as I was making coffee , I got as far as the back up icon on my desktop and no processing of my Ram. I had to shut my PC off manually. I rebooted my PC again and this time my Ram couldn’t get my task bar fully loaded. Shut down. I tried again and everything came on and Ram is still processing and I’ve got accesses to this my word processor, so far so good.

Yesterday afternoon I locked everything up and headed for my bus stop and then to Clairview station. I was able to read a bit on the train in. I asked Greg if he could get my pay cheque but he said sure give him a minute and conveniently for got but Super was hanging about the area. Unusually early. I got to work on a several things. I asked Super for my cheque several times but as always I get the run around. At break the run-a-round again. He was playing games with me because I wasn’t in Thursday after saying Wednesday I wouldn’t be in because of Lodge. I had a slow night on the job. No CC sales at all. All we’ve got to work with is WCS, ASB and CBF and we’re calling the same people over and over. Occasionally we’ll throw AES in there but even then. And then we get these people that say for CBF for example, “I already sent my pledge in.” But according to our pay history, they gave in August of last year. They gave to something else that sounds similar and they still insist it’s the organization were calling on behalf of. That pisses me off the most. I don’t know how many $50’s, $35’s I lost because of that. But I collected a bunch of bottles and cans and about 10 minutes before the end of shift, I got my cheque. Everything was correct of course, no problem there.

I got out of there feeling alright even though best I could come up with on a slow Friday night is $220 and no CC sales. I almost got one but the customerCouldn’t find her card. I hurried across the street and headed over to Audrey’s to get myself a book. EMS vehicles had flashing lights on the corner by Audrey’s. Inside apparently someone had passed out. A senior. But I had about $13 with me and I picked up “Eberron-Sea of Death”

I headed out to my bus stop across the street by Tim’s and after a long wait my #5 came by. I probably had a chance to read but my bus could have snuck up on me at anytime and I wanted to get to my bank to cash my cheque. At my bank, there was a homeless guy curdled up in the foyer tucked away in the corner. I just wanted to get out of there with my cash and to the LRT below. With cans and bottles in my bag in tow I hurried to Central station and my 9:20pm train came by right on time. I was home by 9:45pm and ready to watch Smackdown and catch up on the NHL playoff scores.

Anne came in and made me some burritos and mexi fries. I watched ECW and went to bed and about a half hour later I was passed out. The alarm woke me up at my 6:40am and here I am.

This morning in an hour I’m off for my 10-2pm. Anne’s working from 2-midnight. They cut back their 2 am shift so they don’t have to give their late night staff a ride home. She still won’t get in until about 1am. I worry about here when she’s out after midnight like that. As for me after work I’m going home and if the Redimart is open I’ll get a 6/49 ticket a bag of chips at Rogers and home for a nap until 6pm, have a bite to eat and then watch the Chicago at Vancouver game. I think it’s game #5/7.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

I've added a few social networking buttons

that I'm not all that comfortable with. I like the Twit This button and the Digg button but I'm not sure about the Buzz button. The thing is I need to have these buttons at the bottom of the page along side the Twit this! I'll figure it out somehow.

My wife Anne is quirky if anything. Her place of work last week reset her hours for this week and then they said she can make up for those missing hours by going in Monday for just 2 hours. So she goes in and takes care of that. Yesterday morning she has me getting her up at noon. Ok. I wake her and I'm about to ask what time she goes in for today but she's like half awake. She ends up leaving out of here at 2pm. About 2:15pm I'm getting a call from her thinking, uh oh, is she laid off? Did she lose her job? What gives? She told me that she wasn't scheduled to be in until around 4pm. She was mad at herself for going in 2 hours earlier then was needed. I could have had a nice lunch but I had to eat ravioli instead. When I got home from work she later told me all she did was ride the train from Clairview to South Campus a couple of times and that killed time for her. Me I'd have no problem with killing time. Give me 2 hours to read a book and I'd be happy.

I had a slow evening on the job last night. We did CBF and the taps were not very kind to me. I got zero CC sales and a measly $310 in sales. But its a Wednesday. Need I say more about that!

To say I'm a little nervous about my gig in the Lodge later this evening is putting it mildly. But we're going to have a bit of a practice session before we get underway. I'd be nice if the fellow ends up being a no show. Yeah like that's going to happen.

And I didn't win on my 6/49 draw yesterday either. I even bought a quick pick with no Extra added to it. Strange though, the Quick pick and my ticket both had the number 44 at the end.

Over there at SF Signal, they're talking about the Kindle DX. I don't know much about this device except the following: It is set for a Summer release, it looks huge, Price around $500 and its supposed to replace newspapers. Fat chance. But what about the Canadian market? Are we going to be shut out due to the US credit card thing, again? There is a work-around this for Canadian consumers but there shouldn't need to be.

Anyway gang, that's about all for now

e. Jim

Sunday, Monday and yesterday had left their toll on me. A lot of things went down at once.

Just before my shower, I called Audrey's books and I asked Trevor if he could order the 1st several novels of “The Dresden files” by Jim Butcher (Urban Fantasy) for me and the next 3 in Elizabeth Haydon’s "Symphony of Ages series": Requiem for the Sun, Elegy for a Lost Star, The Assassin King. He did that and I should have those books this month sometime.

My wife had left to Superstore across the street to get me a sandwich for my lunch about 3:30pm yesterday as I was getting ready to leave for work. Just as I was leaving she comes in and packs my lunch away for me. I barely get my bus and I got myself a 6/49 ticket with the extra for today’s draw and a bottle of diet cola at the Redimart. I’m on the train relaxing and reading “The Legend that was Earth,” or TLE heading into the job.

I got off at Corona and crossing the parkade there it began to rain a bit. We need the moisture as its very dry out there. But the rain didn’t amount to very much.

I had a decent night on the job. I think I pulled in around $700 and 2 CC sales and I got a lot of cans and bottles in the 2nd half. DC paid everyone a visit and I got him to settle up with me. Greg’s working evenings now so I don’t have to fight with Subvere for the hockey game for his NBA. So I settled in and watched the Vancouver at Chicago NHL game. At break it was something 2-0, then 3-0 and then 3-1. From what little I did see I it looked like a pretty good game. I had Dave R sit beside me in JT’s day dialer. I got a lot of bottles and cans and hurried for the train after I packed everything up. If I do this I can get the early train shortly after 9pm, like I’ve been doing for the last 2 nights now after work.

There was a lot of smoke in the air from what Anne told me when I called her on my cell on the way to Corona. My train came and I read for a bit on the way home. I was able to call Nathan from the Lodge and to let him know, Anne didn’t know about the Eastern Star and that’s understandable. I’m already for my part for tomorrow night. The FC is a short ritual even with the exam.

I was able to catch the last 2 periods of the Wings at Anaheim game and the Ducks are leading the series 2-1. Odds look pretty good for a Vancouver/Ducks Western semi final. Vancouver and Washington in the finale? Quite possible.

On Coast to Coast this evening George Noory has Richard C Hoagland on this evening. Good stuff.........1:32am> About 40 minutes ago I checked my BSL reading and my BSL was ay 18.9! Yikes. So I got some cloths on and I decided to go out for a bit of a run in the park just beside us here. I was out there for about 20 minutes or so but the air quality was bad due to smoke from grass fires in the area. I built up a bit of a sweat so in about an hour my bsl should drop, I hope. 2:10am> I took a bsl reading just now and what a difference 20 minutes of exercise can make and 45 minutes later. My bsl has dropped down to 10.5! Better then it was at 18.9 an hour ago. What I need to do is when I go into the office I should walk down to Clairview station and then take my bsl reading after lunch. I can even run down to the train but I don’t like going into the office all sweaty and like. 1:05pm> Ok, it seems Phoenix Coyotes owner Jerry Moyes has filed the hockey club for bankruptcy protection. Jim Balsillie out of “Research in motion” (RIM) steps up to the plate with a $216M offer to buy the team and relocate it to Southern Ontario. It’ll never happen. Not because of Gary Bettman, the Commissioner but because the NHL board of Governors doesn’t want a team in that market. The 2 factions against this would be Toronto maple Leafs and the Buffalo Sabres. Reasons for this is the fan base that would be divided between the 2 clubs if a 3rd club would be in that region. However there is a 50 mile rule that states there can be no 2 teams within 50 miles of each other. Even New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils are at least 50 miles apart. Also, moving a team is a last resort. They’d rather fix the problem then move a team out of a city. That‘s what happened with Nashville a few years ago.

Also, I heard today that Ebay is closing it’s Vancouver office to consolidate and as a result 700 jobs there will be gone by September. Wow. But on the other hand oil has reached up to $55 so that’s a good sign. The TSE has reached the 10k level. Yet in the US 1-9 homes are empty. That translates into 19 million homes in the US left vacant. Another wow.

My wife ran out of here to her job for her 2-10. I’ve got a few hours here by myself to Blog and maybe read a bit before I need to get ready to get out of here for my job. I’ve got to let Super know I won’t be here for Thursday because of Lodge, which suits me just fine.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

It's been an interesting week, sort of

Alright I decided to cut a lot out of the Blog post some of you might have seen me rant earlier. I’m grateful for the delete key. Some people liked the post.


I had a pretty good night on the job yesterday.

Anyway getting back to last night on the way home I was able to finish reading “The blood red harp,” by Elaine Cunningham. Here’s my “review” as it were:

Synopsis: A necromancer wants to know why a dark elf vampire is looking for a blood red harp. The necromancer has the harp but he needs a bard to uncover its secrets. Our elf heroine tends to exaggerate the telling of tales and the necromancer puts a curse on our heroine so she can learn to play the harp/tales properly.

Pros: The authors use of language against a backdrop of fantasy lends credibility and realism to this superb story. The scenes are rich with characterization sprinkled in with a generous amount of world building still leave me with an aftertaste wanting for more.
Cons: None that I can think of.

Bottom line: I enjoyed this book and Elaine Cunninghams use of language made a game franchise novel worth reading. The author clearly put a lot of effort into this ambitious novel. I highly recommend any reader of fantasy turn to the works of Elaine Cunningham. The future of this genre is in excellent hands. I just wish there was a sequel. I wrote to the authors LJ Blog and she responded back with this. Elaine Cunningham’s “The Blood red harp,” made this reader an instant fan of her writing.

My Rating: I give “The Blood ed harp” 9.5 e. Jim’s out of 10.
Now it’s off to read James P Hogan’s “The legend that was earth.”

I had a good shift earlier today and I got 4 CC sales. Not that they do me any good. I’m glad I’m home

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim