That's what I like about

Blogger they keep adding new things and all for free. Picasa, Google earth, Google maps, docs and many more apps, free. Well, not free but still interesting is the Google cell phone. Not only all the above but Google is about to launch their version of Apple's Ipad.

I have one Apple product and that's the ITouch. Its a cool device but with the ITouch I think Apple failed to miss the mark on a few things they could have added that would have made the ITouch better then it is but for some reason, they didn't. I think the ITouch is a gateway device for the Iphone. In a perfect world I would have liked to have seen on the ITouch with: A camera to shoot video and still images with all models of the ITouch 8Gb and up. Camera's are on almost every device these days. Apple has a camera on its IPhone. Ok, maybe its a marketing or price thing, I can understand that but Apple has a camera to shoot video on their Ipod nano and an FM radio included! Granted the nano doesn't have wifi, well you get the idea. The ITouch would have greatly benefited from this but sadly the 3rd Gen ITouch doesn't have this feature, why? The ITouch also could have included a microphone added right onto the device like a lot of smart phones and similar devices do but instead consumers need to buy either the 16Gb and up to get a microphone/headphone device. The pricing point (as of this writing) between the ITouch 8Gb and the 32Gb is like $100 more and Apple includes the head/microphone piece. It doesn't take a rocket surgeon to figure out that Apple wants to sell individual consumers all their products. "You want this feature? Then you'll need to buy this device," type thing. Apple's ITouch could have had a external speaker like their own Iphone or like on the Sony Walkman. Apple could have added slot for an external memory card but Apple is a propitiatory company. I would also like to have seen on the back of the ITouch, a little kick stand and maybe a stylus-wand option for those of us with less then nimble fingers. Also, I would like to see the ITouch support for a 3G network. Just a few of the features I'd like to have seen on the ITouch, but its not a perfect world.

I was going to go into work for the 12:30pm shift but Anne kind of wanted me home for today as we're short on a few things. I need to put one day in so I'll go in Friday for the early shift. This way, I'll have 27.5 hours in on my next check.

I wanted to get a bit more writing on DS today but with Anne all over the place and what limited time I have this afternoon, any writing on DS will have to wait until when I come home. Maybe I can get a 1,000 words in. Anyway, that's about all for now.

There is a bit of ranting in this post

I left out of here with barely time to spare yesterday morning. I felt alright heading into work on the train. I read a bit and got into the office about 8:30am. A few of our morning crew were sitting up by the other end where I set during my evening shift. We had 12 of us working cold doing OTH. One of the guys has a scalping/Oiler ticket side thing going on he was telling me. He says if your selling the tickets above cost it’s illegal. I might buy a ticket from him next month before the regular season games are over and done with. If I can get a lower bowl ticket for $35 I’ll go.

I had a pretty good Friday morning pulling in a $20 card and a total of $140. I was happy about that. Jerry never said anything about me missing the two days because I had said what was happening earlier. I got my pay check and it was a decent one at that.

Not only that but the weather was half decent as well for a Friday afternoon. In fact it was really mild out there heading up Jasper on the #5 to my bank. I did my banking and hopped aboard the Clairview train home. Weather wise, I’d say it was about -6 out there under overcast skies. It was like a winter wonderland out there. Very nice.

Anne was up and she made me a lunch and headed out to work. I wanted nap and I was in bed about 3:45pm for a 2 hour power snooze with Boot’s sleeping by my thigh on the bed, keeping his distance.

I’m slowly working my way through the 2006 “years best” Anthology. Most of the stories are well written but are kind of lame. The Joe Haldeman story is the best of the bunch. Short and sweet. The rest so far are bland and mediocre. They don’t work for this Blogger. I’m about half way through the book. Thing about anthologies is that you can’t establish a rhythm. There’s no string of great stories. At least not in this anthology. It’s going to take me a long time to finish this thing.

Most of you know that read this blog know I'm not the one to go jump on a bandwagon but I'll make an exception here because it is such a good cause. In case you've been hiding under a moon rock this week and tired of hearing all the Tiger Woods rehab and Jay Leno talk show woes and have shut off your media outlet because of the noise, you might have heard about the earthquake tragedy in Haiti recently. Being a broke poor telemarketer and aspiring author I've been looking at ways on how I could get involved and donate to Haiti relief. Thanks to SF Signal for a link in their post today: Crossed Genre "Post a story for Haiti." This is a good idea for all my fellow SFF authors out there that would like to donate to Haiti relief. It's a good idea and I'm going to work on story and upload it this weekend.

I had some chips diet cola and the Dallas/Oiler’s game was just getting underway. The Oiler’s were taking way to many penalties and got some bad breaks in the early part of the game. But there were again too many obvious calls throughout the game that should have been called but weren‘t. Here’s an example: Behind the play caught on camera a Dallas player swipes the feet out from underneath our goal tender to a chorus of boos. No penalty. Same play from the Oiler’s would have earned them a penalty guaranteed. This reminds me of the Mick Magoo incident of March 2008. I know it sounds like I’m whining but I’ve got 17,000 other people that witnessed seeing the blatant penalty in my corner. The officiating this year is terrible and I’ve seen lousy officiating across the league but the officiating over the years has degraded significantly. Why aren’t the referees being held accountable for missed calls? Maybe they should. How about for every penalty they miss they get docked part of their pay? Maybe this is already going on and I’m being a little naive here but the sloppy officiating is frustrating from a fan perspective. I blame Bettman for this. It’s almost like he’s having a tamper tantrum because of the Bacilli/Phoenix ordeal that went down earlier before the season kicked off and he’s taking it out on Canadian teams. I know that sounds silly but hey its my blog and I can rant if I want to. And it’s not just Canadian teams either that are on the receiving end of sloppy officiating. The Oiler’s owned the late second period and most of the third in last nights game and deserved better then they got for their efforts. The Dallas Stars tied the game and then with 22 seconds left as the Oiler’s well they couldn’t hang onto the puck in the defensive zone behind our blue line and Dallas scored to win the game 4-3 in another Oiler heart breaker losing their 10th straight loss and 16/16 losses. I thought the Oiler’s played a way better game then the one the other night. They are a competitive team just one of many teams on the wrong end of sloppy league officiating.

Ok enough ranting. At least it’s a mild weekend out there. Anne and I decided that if it looks like I’m getting line hour and qualify for the line hour bonus and I’m having a good day, I’ll stay until 4:30pm. If I’m sucking then I’ll leave at 2pm go get my book at Audrey’s and go home. Anyway that’s all for now.

I've got everythings all set up for tomorrow. Should be a great night out with my wife and I

I had a pretty good time playing Oblivion earlier. I got an upgrade to a better sword with an attack factor of 6. I love this stuff.

I haven’t told Super about missing Thursday night but I’ll drop the bomb on him tomorrow night. I wont lie, I’ll just say some personal stuff has come up.

I took a couple of photos about 2:30pm this afternoon. I like this time of year as I can see the street through the leafless branches. We had a good day today temperature wise at +21C. The warmest day of the year so far.

But man are we ever getting some gusting wind out there right now. We’re also supposed to get a change in the weather as it’s taking a turn for the “worse” coming up today. +9C isn’t bad but there’s a cold front coming in and we’ve had snow this time of year before. This photo is off our balcony looking SE.

From Conect2Edmonton there’s been a response to a post about the Fort Road revitalization project. Today the City sold a piece of land they’ve been holding on since when Gainers caught fire, I think 1989-1990. Anyway this is a big area of land the City owns and sold it to the developer for $5M. Apparently the deal went down last week and the developer wants to begin the project in 2010 (next year) They obviously feel confident about the economy as well. I’m really excited about this fort road project

Here’s another shot off the balcony. We got Burger King and Rogers video right across the street from us. Also beside Rogers is Bo Didlies the bar. It’s really nice in there. Lots of stained wood and brass and sports fixtures. I like living at this end of the City because of all the amenities but it is getting expensive to live here.

Also on Thursday I’ve got to run downtown to Alberta Works and that could take all afternoon. Danny at work earlier updated me on the disability tax credit. I can apply for this at anytime. I think he said it’s a T220 for or something like that……………1:10pm> We went to bed around 3:30am after we brought Boot’s back from outside. It was very windy out there blowing sand all over the place.

Rant alert: Today being “Earth Day” is supposed to bring awareness for conserving energy and doing something positive for the environment. I don’t have a problem with this. What I do have a problem with is how companies like the Real Canadian Superstore (Lablaw’s) now decides because today is Earth Day, that they are going to charge an extra penny from 4 cents to 5 cents on their plastic shopping bags. Not only that but they are making a ridiculous claim that this move will remove hundreds of millions of plastic bags from the landfills every year. More likely Superstore hopes that they can cash in on the environment by having shoppers think they are such a great environmental player for the community and at the same time come on in and buy Presidents Choice products ;-) In other words it’s a marketing ploy. If Superstore was so concerned about the environment they would get rid of plastic bags altogether. The worst part about this is that all the money spent on their plastic shopping bags goes towards the World Wildlife Fund. I hate this organization for 2 reasons. Firstly because it was the WWF and Greenpeace that favored a global ban on DDT use in the early 1970’s. Even WHO (the world health organization) warned against this. Before the Malaria pill was invented the only resource 3rd world countries could use to fight malaria was DDT. Google WWF and Malaria and see what I mean. Millions of poor people in the 3rd world died from Malaria because of lack of access to DDT. Now Greenpeace and WWF are saying “It’s ok to use DDT.” As a result of the efforts of WWF and Greenpeace a global ban on the use of DDT was issued, which caused the deaths of millions of people. The 2nd reason personally was the World Wildlife Fund noticed that wrestling was using the WWF initials. The Fund didn’t like this and saw a way to make money from wrestling and sued the WWE for about $360M. WWE decided to change the name to WWE. I’d prefer my wife shop up the street at Sobies but Superstore right across the street is really handy. Personally if I was on my own, I’d ban shopping at Superstore but most Presidents choice products are decent products.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

March madness at it again.

I was very apprehensive leaving out of the apartment yesterday afternoon. This grew more evident the closer I got downtown. But in the office I asked DC where do I sit? He said something like “how about in your usual spot?” Really? Bud moved and W was also leaving. Then JT said that the morning tap shooter crew are still working. It’s just the back 20 not working mornings. Instant relief. Rob said nothing to me. Everything is business as usual. JT etc stayed until 7pm. I decided to gather a bunch of cans and bottles for home. I did ok in the 1st half but only one CC sale. I think I was at $250 in the first half. I felt a lot better.
I tried calling Anne about the job situation but she wasn’t answering the phone. I had a slow 2nd half and the source we were doing was drying up and we had to do semies in the last hour. This is usually a 2 week campaign anyway. I made a 7pm pass at the bottles and cans and got a few more. I ended up with a $350 total. Nothing stellar that’s for sure.
I had a quiet train ride to Clairview and a brief wait on my bus. Anne was busy with housework when I came in. It was -10C on the way home. Not bad. I’m just happy I have my job, everything’s fine.

Monday night Raw had a few surprises in store. On a scale from 1-10, I’d rate the show about a 9, Anne made us a great dinner of pork chops and her tin foil wrap potato’s and ET. This was a great way to wrap up a day that had a bit to much drama in it for my liking.

I mentioned before this week has a lot of things going. My wife’s birthday yesterday, Saint Patrick’s day today, tomorrow is OTH, Spring is on Friday. It’s going to bean busy week…………1:10pm> The cat woke me up around 11:30 this morning. I could have slept for another hour, easy. Then my wife had to get up a couple times back to back. All the cats come in and I’m up feeling cheated of potentially an extra hour of sleep. Anne felt a need to go over to the pet store to get a cat house or some damn thing.

Again the local issue of homelessness was in the news this afternoon. Beware of rant: Apparently between the province and the City of Edmonton, there is now $3B put out to get rid of the homeless problem. But wait now, the same story said there are something like 3,000 homeless people on the streets here in my City. I don’t know how many in Calgary but I image it’s a bit more then 3,000. So, lets say there’s 8,000 homeless from all across the Province. That’s about $375,000 per person. I wonder how many of these homeless people have jobs? Maybe a year ago I’d guess maybe 2 thirds. Now I’d say about half. How many of these people are from out of Province that recently arrived? How many of these people were in halfway houses? Probably most of them in the major cities. So what happens when the City finds these people a home? Their monthly rent is going to be as high as ours. Is the Province going to pay for their rent as well? That’s a pretty good deal rent free and a new home. Most likely that comes with lights and water. What about food? Easy, that’s why we have food banks. Wait now, a roof over ones head, free power and water, free food! Meanwhile the working poor (Which I consider myself and my family.) are paying $850 rent on a 2 bedroom apartment. My wife has to go to the food bank down the street at least once a month, We have jobs both working part time hours and like most families were just getting by. Pardon me if I sound like I’m whining here. That’s not what I’m attempting to say but it seems to me that $3B is a lot of money for about 8,000 people that are homeless here in Alberta. Yes I can work more hours at 56 years old being diabetic and having scoliosis of the spine might be hard on me. My wife has her own health issues and it’d be hard on her but we shouldn’t have to when all these homeless people are getting such treatment. People may ask me if I’ve ever been homeless? Yes, once around 1976 for a few weeks in between the job I had at the Army & Navy store in New Westminster BC. But I was housed up in a big room with about 4 other guys and we got meal vouchers for the pacific café 3 times/day. I was waiting for my unemployment at the time. Sure I’ve never had to sleep on the streets or anything but that’s only because I’ve got to much pride in myself. Don’t get me wrong, I feel for homeless people but I have to wonder about this “$3B plan,” to eradicate homeless people here in Edmonton/Alberta. Of course there’s a lot more to it then that. More on this later.

Ok, onto other things. There’s been some discussion going on about the Sci-Fi channel and it’s seemingly lack of SF content these days. I don’t know about this since I don’t watch a lot of TV. I’m too busy doing other things like piano practicing, Lodge work, my job, reading and finding time to play some Oblivion etc, to really notice. Yes, I’ve noticed “Space,” our version of the Sci-Fi channel here in Canada, has been running some monster movies and other stuff not really related to Science Fiction. For example right now Space is running a STNG episode “The most Toys.” The only problem I have with these specialty channels is they seem to have about 10 episodes of anything. Except the new stuff and even then. I mean you can only run so much of anything but with so much Sci-fi out there you’d think that Space could just stick with SF content. There’s enough SF movies out there they could run those in the evenings and all the rest during the other times. I think it has something to do with licensing agreements here in Canada or Canadian content.

Anyway, as for me…I’m in for my usual 5-9 and hopefully they’ll have the hockey game on. I get to watch a bit of that. Then it’s home and more of the same. Sorry if this reads choppy today I‘m not quite awake.

Anyway, gang that’s all for now.

e. Jim