I turned 35 the other day...yup...35... It's amazing how it doesn't seem all that old anymore.

Oh, well. Decided that I should get back to this again, so here I am. I can hear the cheers around the world.

I was walking back to the office a little while ago, and I saw a guy talking to a girl. Nothing unusual about that, but he was doing the imaginary golf swing thing. You know, where someone holds their hands like they have a golf club and then they take a swing?
I've seen people do that before, but this time it sort of hit me that this is an absolutely rediculous thing to be doing. Usually people do things while they're talking, absentmindedly, without realizing that they're doing it. Like playing with keys, or the change in their pocket etc. Is this what golf-swing guy was doing? Is it that he golfs sooo much, that out of habit he just goes into golf-swing mode when his hands have nothing to do? If that's the case, my hands should just start typing an imaginary keyboard, because that the thing I do most. But they don't.
That leaves me with one conclusion; he was doing it to show off. Did it impress the girl? I hope not.

Woa, over a month since my last post! Forgive me ...

Cold here today -14C, and not a lot to say. Maybe my brain is frozen. However, I thought that I should at least post something so that all of you loyal readers (ha, ha, ha, I kill me) wouldn't stop coming by.

One of the people I work with has a poster in his office of G.W.B. with infamous quotes all over it. It got us to discussing the fact that Jean Chretien (that's Canada's Prime Minister), has probably just as many, or more, of these barely comprehendable quotes. Maybe I'll put together a comparison... I think they could have a good argument over who was the biggest moron.

Hmmm, what else... Oh yeah, I'm off to San Francisco in a couple of weeks. I'm going to the king of the acronyms conference - I'll be doing GIAC training at the SANS CDI to get a GCFW. My father-in-law (CEO of BAN - that's Ban Acronyms Now) would be shuddering at that sentence. I haven't been to San Francisco for years, so although I'll be spending 8 hours a day in a meeting room, I'm still looking forward to the trip.

That's it for now, things at work have been so crazy, and continue to be, that I may not post very regularly. I'll try to though.

I've been reading the historical novels of Michael and Jeff Shaara over the last few months. They are excellent books, and even if you aren't a history buff, you'll find them a great read.

One of the things I find amazing is how small the world really was back then. If someone was to write a movie about guys who fought side-by-side in a war (or more than one), only to end up in battles against each other a few years later I would find it a little contrived. But this happened a lot in the U.S. The civil war truly pitted best friends against each other.

Up here in Canada we learned some American history, but it really wasn't very interesting (although neither was Canadian). Reading it in this context, however, really brings it home. The way men thought about war was so different from today. War was nothing like it is today, or even was in the First and Second World wars. Thousands of men marching into the onslaught of musket fire and cannon, many knowing they'd be killed, and they just kept on going.

I have often thought about what kind of mindset you'd have to have in order to have the excitement of going off to war that was in soldiers even in the 2nd world war. It's such a foreign concept to North Americans today. I think for the most part, even professional soldiers don't have the enthusiasm that the volunteers did back in the 1940's and earlier in the wars of the 18th and 19th centuries. Maybe it's the media (I can always finger the media, but this time it's not bad necessarily). Back before the advent of T.V. and even radio, the only way people new about what was or had happened was through the stories of the survivors. It seems that most veterans are reluctant to talk about the bad things that happened. They're more comfortable talking about the epic battles, the triumphs, rather than the horrors and defeats. However, with the advent of movies and T.V. in particualr we can see first hand the horrors of war. We don't need to have verterans tell us how miserable the conditions were, we can see it. We don't need them to tell us how many men died, what it was like to have your buddy blown-up beside you. We've seen it all and more. If I was to volunteer for a war, I'd be going in with my eyes already open to the horror. It would have to be a pretty horrible threat to my family to make me go and do that. Back in the 1850's though, it was all about idealism. I guess war back then was much more like the religious wars of today. The belief in your cause (or hatred of the enemy's) is so strong that you'll do anything to advance or protect those beliefs.

I've thought a lot about this before and now that I've been writing I'll be thinking about it a lot more. The religion theme reminds me of another book I'm reading right now, The Salmon of Doubt, the posthumous collection of writings by Douglas Adams. He has some very interesting views on religion. I'll have to explore all this stuff a little more.

Well I have lots of things to talk about but no time to do it.

I received feedback! A reader of my American Idol post suggested I checkout the Idol thread on his site. Go to perotheus.com and click around. The link to the discussion groups is "on the right side column, way at the bottom under the webrings and stuff is a picture/link to a message board".

Vancouver was nice. After an hour and a half delay here in the snow we arrived to a sunny, warm day in Vancouver. Had a pound of muscles overlooking False Creek on Ganville Island. Oh yeah, did the Windows 2000 Gold Standard cert. too.

I'm going to try my darndest to write a few times this week.

Thought for the day:

"Beware the leader who bangs the drums of war
in order to whip the citizenry into a patriotic
fervor, for patriotism is indeed a double-edged
sword. It both emboldens the blood, just as it
narrows the mind...And when the drums of war have
reached a fever pitch and the blood boils with hate
and the mind has closed, the leader will have no
need in seizing the rights of the citizenry.
Rather, the citizenry, infused with fear and blinded
with patriotism, will offer up all of their rights
unto the leader, and gladly so. How do I know?
For this is what I have done. And I am Caesar"
- William Shakespeare

Busy week! I can't believe it's Thursday already.

I discovered last week that I've actually had visitors to this blog! I don't think they've ever come back...

Off to Vancouver tomorrow for the day. I'm going for a course and it's in Richmond. That means I may make the trip all the way to Vancouver and not smell or see the ocean. That'll be a bummer, but I'm going to try to get to the water for at least a few minutes.

I'm now working from home 3 mornings a week. It's to enable me to take my daughter to preschool. It's working out pretty well (and that reminds me of a topic for another post!) and I like it for the most part. I haven't even been tempted to slack off yet. We'll see though.

There I've updated, bye for now.

I'm not quite getting this blog everyday thing done, but I'm doing it a lot more frequently than before.

I noticed the other day that there's going to be an American Idol 2-hour special where everyone gets back together for one last show (bilk the advertisers out of more stupidly spent money). It started me thinking (again) about this whole show. I'm not one for reality shows so I'm probably biased on this anyway, but I have a couple of big questions regarding this show.

1. Who thought up the idea that an idol could be produced in this manner?
2. Why does the idol have to be a pop star?

I've just rewritten a huge chunk of this because I just looked up the definition of idol. You really do learn something new every day. What I learned today is that this show fits the definition of idol perfectly. Dictionary.com includes as one possible definiton "One that is adored, often blindly or excessively" and "Something visible but without substance". What could be a better definition of this show's product than this?

That still leaves the pop star part. Although I guess if there's anything that could be defined as "Something visible but without substance" it's many of today's pop stars. Maybe they'll have an athletic one next where they try to prove who can jump highest, swim farthest, and lift the most weight.

This was a pretty pointless post, although that's the point isn't it? Just write down my thoughts. Oh well, I still don't like reality TV, so I guess I'm not destined to buy into any of these things anyway.

Frost on the roofs of houses this morning. Yikes! Fall is really just around the corner isn't it?

Oops missed a day or two there...

When I started to wirte this post, it was going to be about how much I love fall. That changed as I love all the season's (I think that's why I love living here, where we actually get 4 different seasons, sometimes all in one day, but those are the risks. Anyway...), but I think what it is is that I love the transistions more than anything. September is the month where you can have a hot day where you're in shorts working in the yard. The next day might be chilly, but fresh. The grass is still green but the leaves are starting to change and so the contrast between the green grass and the yellow and red leaves is very striking. You can still have your window open at night, but by the morning, you'll be burried under the covers to ward off the early morning chill. It stays light late enough that you can still go for a daylight walk after dinner.

I don't understand how poeple can live in climates where nothing ever changes, it seems like it would become very monotonous after a while. To each his own.

I love this time of year.

Played flag football last night for the corporate challenge. What a blast! Played at the stadium on artificial turf. Ouch, that hurts! Won one, lost one, no finals for us. But it was a perfect night for football, tonight - not so much. It's going to take me a few days to recover, I feel a bit like I've been run over by a truck (I think one of the guys that I ran into was that big). Sunday is the goofy obstacle course. I'm glad I was able to prove to people that I have some athletic ability prior to making a fool of myslef in flippers sifting through a pile of sand.

Do you say Pop or Soda? Apparently this is a large enough debate that a guy from CalTech is doing a mapping study. He's doing an online survey of what term people use to describe carbonated beverages (non-alchoholic of course). Go here to add your self to the map. It's quite interesting how regional it is, who knew people referred to them as "coke"?

After seeing the effect of the Sept. 11 attacks on the WTC on the North American (and world I suppose) population, I have to wonder about countires where this happens all the time.

Obviously you would get somewhat desensitised to it, but it must be an awful stress in people's lives. Somewhere like Isreal or India (just 2 of many possible examples), at least once a week, sometimes much more often, there is a tragedy where innocent people have lost their lives because of someone elses narrow-minded hatred towards them.

How do these people deal with this? They go back to their "normal" lives within days of these kind of events. Maybe part of the reason for ongoing fights like these are that people become unaffected by the events, so the memories of particular tragedies don't stay in their minds. It's easy for me to say I remember many details of my day on Sept. 11, 2001, but how many Palestinians can say the same thing of attacks on them a year ago? I guess it could be a coping mechanism too, if they don't hang on to the memories their lives are less tragic.

I'm sure it's one of those things that you can't understand until you are in the situation. I hope I will never fully understand.

A few days ago, James Lileks talked about what it was that he liked about blogs versus the general media. One of those things was that he felt most bloggers write just for the sake of writing, where columninsts must satisfy many people and come up with topical things to write about. It's this slice-of-life sort of banality that he felt really set blogs apart from other forms of media. At least, I think I paraphrased well enough, you'll have to read it.

Anyway, my resaon for the long intro is that it made me realize that I don't write unless I have something really inportant to say. I should just write for the sake of writing. So from now on I resolve to write at least once a day whether I have anything brilliant to say or not (of course you're probably saying "He hasn't written anything brilliant yet...").

WIll I do it? We'll see.

When I awoke this morning to the unending drivel on the radio marking the 1 year anniversary of the "attacks", I was more determined than ever to criticize the way this anniversary is being handled by people. Really, how many times to we have to hear "Imagine" edited to include news clips of the latest disaster.

I still feel that way, however after reading a number of blogs and news sites, I've decided that this isn't really the time to do that. Mostly it's just the media choosing to do what they think will boost their ratings and get more people to watch them rebroadcast the images of planes flying into the WTC than the other network.

I guess in some ways I should feel relieved with that. What's more American than replaying tragedy over and over and over again until you are completely sick and tired of it. It's good to see that this tragedy hasn't changed the American media.

On a more personal and sympathetic note; I always remember people talking about where they were the day that... As a kid I could never understand how something could affect you so deeply that you would remember not only the event, but where you were on when it happened. It wasn't until the Challenger disaster that I realized how this happens. Now as a 30-something adult, I can also say the same thing about when Princess Diana died, probably because we'd just finished watching the movie Evita. We couldn't understand what people must have felt for that lady that her death would affect them so deeply. Turned off the movie and there was the news showing people's reactions to Diana's death. I didn't feel that way, but it's something I 'll never forget.

Now I add the WTC disaster to that (unfortunately) growing list. And maybe that's why I tire of the never ending tributes etc that have been shown over the last week. I will never forget that day, ever. I remember hearing the first news report about a plane crashing into the WTC like it was yesterday. I remember thinking of Tom Clancy's Debt of Honor when I heard that a second jet had flown into the towers and that they were passenger jets, not private small planes. I remember everyone being in a daze at work and that all we did was surf news sites (when they weren't down) and watch TV. I remember getting a call from my wife saying that a friend of ours was in the WTC but had gotten out safely. I remember trying to avoid it while watching TV with my daughter so that she didn't have to see all the footage of buildings collapsing and people screaming and crying.

I remember all this and more so vividly. I will never forget that day, or where I was, or how it made me feel. So please media, don't bombard me with your memories; I have more than enough of my own.

Boy, that's a little disgusting, almost a month between posts. I know from all of the feedback (LOL) that you have all missed me terribly. I'll try to think up something usefull to say.

Summer colds are another reminder of what's in store when summer's over. It's kind of like snow in August (see my post from 8/6/2002), and yes they are once again forcasting snow tonight.

A summer cold is more than just a warning though. It is also a reminder of days gone by. Ahhh... Oh yeah. Remember when you were a kid and you got sick in the summer? There really was nothing worse. You couldn't go outside and play with your friends, you felt crappy, and it was probably 150 degrees in your room. At least as an adult (apparently I am) you are old enough to make the choice as to whether you can still go outside and play, even if you're sick.

Oh well, thank-you whomever, I'm remembering that in a few months I'll probably get the flu. I'm also remembering that just as I dislike being sick now, I disliked it when I was a kid.

Maybe I'm supposed to look on the bright side, I don't get to sleep all day in the summer anymore either.

This is very cool, I think I'm going to make it permanent.



Click on it to go get your own.

Anyone who comes in here now after I've replaced the template, will think that my last two template comments are a little bizzarre. What was I thinking? Oh well, no one is reading anyway, so who cares?

Had a great weekend. I missed the snow that everyone (well not quite) is bitching and complaining about. It's just snow, it's not the end of the world. I think it's just Mother Nature's way of telling us not to take the nice warm weather for granted. "Fall's just around the corner, and don't you forget it Sonny!"

Okay, that wasn't quite as painful as I had expected.

This template is a little more me.

I hope you're taking note of how cool this new template is...
I'll get to it eventually.

James Lileks mentions something in his blog today that is a big pet peeve of mine too. The whole seasonal stock thing in stores. Why is it that they can't have the current season's stuff in the store during the season?
We encountered a really typical example of this a couple of summers ago. We're visiting relatives at a lake in B.C. and while we're out on the water, my daughter's hat blows off and disappears into the lake. No problem we thought, we'll just go to the Wal-Mart in town and buy a new one. Well, apparently at Wal-Mart (and every other store) the end of July is fall not summer. They don't have any summer hats! They've got all their fall merchandise in stock, summer merchandise is gone.
Yeah, well I think you see where I'm going. The only exception seems to be Christmas stuff. They start putting it out in October and it stays in the stores until after Christmas. Why can't they figure out that this would work well all the time? Is it because people would never go back if they stopped carrying Christmas stuff at the end of November? Probably, but no one seems to care that all the other seasons are screwed.
Oh well. It's cold here today, maybe I'll go buy some new fall clothes 'cause that what it feels like. They say it might even SNOW!!!!! tonight! Welcome to August.
At least it's a long weekend.

Well, today is World System Administrator Appreciation Day. Don't believe me? Go here. So hooray for me and the others like me. For me I get to realize how lucky I am to work someplace where people voice their appreciation all the time.
Enough of that stuff. I'm thinking about changing the template, I think I need something a little less stark. What do you think? Hello...? Hmmm, I guess it doesn't matter anyway 'cause I'm just talking to myself.
Me: You should really do something with this template.
Me: Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.
Me: Whoa, cool.
Happy Friday!

Have you ever had one of those days when you realize just how messy your desk is? Today's my day. Yikes!

OK, this is the last of the WorldCom whining, honest.
Hello, investors! Did you not think they would file for chapter 11?!
What's with all the panic now that they have? This has got to have been the worst case of lemmings I've ever seen. These people really need to get away from the office and check back into reality. Get it together people, I'd like to retire before I'm 150 and with the way you're killing my mutual funds it doesn't look likely.

Oh well, slow and steady wins the race right? At least I can say I'm enjoying my life no matter what the stupid markets are doing.