Quarkomatic Central

Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard: First Impressions

2009-09-19T17:55:00.001-04:00

Yes, I admit it. I am one of those geeks who pre-ordered Apple's newest operating system, Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, on the first day possible and eagerly awaited its arrival. I installed it as soon as it arrived, on Monday, August 31, which took about 55 minutes and freed up about 10 or 12 GB of hard disk space. It's taken me awhile to get around to finishing this post, but these are my rambly first impressions.

Initially, I thought it was quite a bit faster overall. Startup and shutdown were and still are a bit faster. At first, Safari felt zippier, and Dashboard widgets were a bit faster to initialize on the first use after a restart. But lately I am getting spinning beach balls quite often. I know the new iTunes 9 makes use of Safari, and perhaps that's what has caused the more recent slow down. But the main speed increase I noticed was and still is with Time Machine.

Time Machine is definitely much faster. I've been using it since I got my MacBook in November of 2007. It was reasonably fast originally when I was connecting via USB to my external hard drive. But eventually I got it working wirelessly using the AirPort Disk feature on our AirPort Extreme router. While it has been convenient not to have to plug in a cable every time I want to perform a backup, it can be excruciatingly slow at times and very inconsistent. So far in Snow Leopard it has been consistently quick, and it has been improved to give more feedback as to what it's actually doing while it's grinding away. Previously, in the Time Machine preferences pane, an indeterminate progress bar was displayed at the beginning of the backup reading "Preparing..." Sometimes it would stay in this state for over an hour before finally starting to send data to the backup disk! Now during that time it instead displays "Calculating changes..." under an actual progress bar which seems to be pretty accurate. So far, "calculating changes" has been much faster than "preparing," usually completing within a few seconds. Another nice touch - the name of the AirPort Extreme router (or presumably Time Capsule if you have one) is displayed below the disk name. I'm pretty sure it wasn't there in Leopard.

Another thing I like is that the date can now be displayed along with the day of the week and time in the menu bar:

Granted, my menu bar is already over-crowed with stuff, so I quickly turned this back off when I remembered that the iCal icon shows the current date in the dock. More recently I realized that I usually know what day of the week it is anyway, so I'm now displaying just the date and time.

One thing I didn't like in Leopard was the Energy Saver. It offered 3 predefined profiles for various power settings - Better Performance, Better Battery Life, and Normal. There was also the Custom profile where you could set up your own preferences - but just one set. You couldn't define your own profiles like Movie or Presentation; you just had to remember how you had tuned your Custom profile. In Snow Leopard it is even worse. The predefined profiles are gone. You can adjust the settings, and you can restore the defaults, and that is it.

As a user of everything Google, I appreciate that Address Book now syncs with Google Contacts, and Mail and iCal now have automatic setup for Google accounts.

A small improvement that I appreciate is the option to assign Spaces to hot corner in Expose preferences. I always intended to make better use of spaces, but without a dedicated key for it, I never got into the habit of it. The problem of course, is that I already had all 4 hot corners assigned to other functions and ingrained in me. Now I have replaced Dashboard with Spaces, since Dashboard does have a dedicated key.

The new stacks design is much improved with the ability to scroll grid view and navigate into folders. Unfortunately, some of the beautiful animations that once accompanied stacks have been scaled back somewhat, and I'm not exactly sure why. Fan view is unchanged, but the animation for grid view has been simplified. In 10.5 Leopard, each icon in the grid would follow its own trajectory into position as the background expanded behind it. This can be seen by holding the Shift key when opening a stack in grid view. I found this video on YouTube that shows it (play from the 35 s mark). The video is pretty crappy, but will allow you to imagine how neat the animation looked in 10.5.

In 10.6 Snow Leopard, the grid just expands as a single unit. Here's a video I made using the new screen recording feature in QuickTime X (it's a little wonky at the beginning on YouTube, but the slow-mo part is clear):

How did I upload this to YouTube? You might think I used the built-in export to YouTube feature in QuickTime X, but actually it failed to work for me! That's rather disappointing. It said that YouTube returned invalid data. Maybe something has changed on the YouTube side that broke this feature. Or maybe it never worked. Who knows?

As far as my existing applications, the only things that didn't work were Dropbox and Squeeze Center - but both of them already had beta builds available with Snow Leopard support, so I just installed those without a hitch.

Finally, I will leave you with a small creation that you might find useful. On Windows XP machines, I have always installed the Windows XP Power Toys. Some of them can be quite useful. One of these is the "Open Command Window Here" Explorer plug-in. It adds a context menu item in Explorer that will give you a command prompt with the working directory already changed to that of the selected folder.

I had looked into creating a Finder plug-in like this for 10.5 Leopard, and it was on my list of things to do but seemed like it could prove quite difficult. In Snow Leopard, the whole Services architecture has been redesigned. For example, the services menu is now context sensitive, and services can appear directly in context menus. Also, Automator now allows you to create workflows that can be used as services. I have created an "Open Terminal Here" service that acts on Finder files and folders. If I have one folder selected, selecting "Open Terminal Here" in the context menu will open a Terminal window and cd to its directory. If I have a file or multiple items selected, the Terminal window will open in the directory containing those items. You can see the AppleScript in the following screen shot. Although it reads like English, it took me awhile to work out exactly how to do it.

I have included the workflow below. You can install it by dropping it in your ~/Library/Services folder, or you can open it with Automator to see how it works or customize it to your liking. Enjoy!

Subsidies to Political Parties are about Fairness

2008-11-28T11:29:00.002-05:00

I often find myself reading the comments on news articles on CBC.ca. And I often find myself enraged. Surprisingly, I have yet to create an account and start posting my own comments. That might just suck up way too much of my time.

In response to the Harper goverenment's plan to cancel the $30-million in subsidies that federal political parties receive, I have seen so many people saying things like "put your wallet where your mouth is" or "I don't want my tax dollars supporting some leftist commie party."

Are these people for real? Do they really believe that the rich have a greater right to have their voice heard than the poor? Also, the funding to the parties is based on how many votes they receive, so your tax dollars are only going to the party you voted for. Sure, you might argue that you pay more taxes than most of the poor people who vote for these "leftist commie" parties... but that's the whole point of taxes. They're not your tax dollars. If they were, we'd just let you keep them in the first place. Revenue collected by the government is owned by everyone, to be used for the greater good of all Canadians equally.

I'm not sure what's going to happen now, but I hope that the public see this for what it is - a blatant attack on democracy. I think the Conservatives will be forced to reconsider, given that the talks of a Liberal-NDP coalition are starting to sound pretty serious. Unless they can spin this as the other parties being greedy. But I'm hoping Canadians are intelligent enough to understand that that is not the case. There are many other things of far less consequence that could be cut to reduce spending by a mere $30-million.

Liberal Ridings Lost by the Green Vote

2008-10-19T20:59:00.002-04:00

There were at least 20 ridings in the 40th General Canadian Federal Election where the Liberals would have won with the help of some or all Green supporters in that riding. Most of these were won by the Conservatives, with a handful going to the Bloc and NDP (including Trinity--Spadina!).

Egmont
West Nova
Saint John
Ahuntsic
Brome--Missisquoi
Brossard--La Prairie
Haute-Gaspésie--La Mitis--Matane--Matapédia
Jeanne-Le Ber
Kitchener Centre
Kitchener--Waterloo
London West
Mississauga--Erindale
Oak Ridges--Markham
Ottawa--Orléans
Sudbury
Trinity--Spadina
North Vancouver
Saanich--Gulf Islands
Vancouver Kingsway
Nunavut

List of Harper Faux-Pas

2008-10-14T11:04:00.001-04:00

Commenter Salem5 on CBC.ca writes:

Is it ethical, moral or right to:
- bribe a dying a man, then lie about it and drag his family through mud and back;
- To fire a Liberal appointed Nuclear watch-dog for doing her job when the Conservative appointed head of Atomic Energy of Canada is at fault;
- to lose Canadians millions over a broken promise on income trusts;
- To claw back on resource royalties from have-not provinces through a broken promise on the Atlantic Accord;
- To fix elections then call one, siting parliament as disfunctional despite passing every bit of legislation you want;
- To brand your opponent as not a leader, without any knowledge in support, only days after his appointment;
- To welcome a floor-crosser to your party, having just spent Liberal money to get elected, and make him a minister;
- To take the electorate for granted by not realing a plan until days before the election;
- To run disgusting and defamatory ads;
- To use scare tactics to discredit your opponents platforms despite the fact that they are signficantly supported by the scientific and economic communities;
- To commit election fraud;
- To squander a surplus, running a budget that will trun a deficit, then suggesting your opponents will run a deficit;
- To suggest the economy is fine, that we aren't headed for a recession, while simultaneously saying that we are in uncertain times;
- To bride families with tax cuts and $100 child allowance when clearly that won't buy you shorter waits times for health care or a child care spot;
- To lie to Canadians, suggesting your opponents are raising taxes when;
- To suggest the environment is fine when scientists say otherwise and the Alberta Oil Sands environmental devastation is visible from space;
-To publicly humiliate someone with a hearing impairment;
- To stand behind your ministers, when they leave classified information behind, call your opponents dogs in the House, make jokes about Listeriosis...;

Ladies and gentlemen, I could go on but my character limite is looming. The Harpers have accomplished the above and more in only two and three-quarter years in power. To my neighbour who still sites the Sponsorship Scandal as a reason to vote Harper, if you add the costs associated with all Steve's gaffs, scandals and controversies, the Sponsorship Scandal is literally just pennies in a pot. Does that justify a Liberal vote? Not really. But Dion has conducted himself with dignity and respect, two words Harper is unfamiliar with.

Cap and Trade

2008-10-09T23:44:00.003-04:00

For all you NDP supporters out there, I have a question. Have you stopped to consider how a cap and trade system would actually be implemented? Thousands of auditors would be needed to assess the carbon footprints of every company, and enforcement would be needed to ensure that polluters are operating within their cap or purchasing sufficient credits from greener companies. The cost of implementing such a program could be enormous. A carbon tax is much simpler to implement; we can start now while figure out the logistics of a cap and trade system with real limits on green house gas emissions. Saying you support cap and trade is not a plan. The Liberal platform, and specifically the Green Shift component, is specific and lists the amount of tax one would pay on each type of fuel - typically pennies per unit. There will be no additional tax on gasoline, as it is already taxed the equivalent of $42 a tonne. In the 4th year, home heating oil would have a tax of 11.3 cents per litre (the price has increased by 57.5 cents, or 71.5%, in the last 2 years due to market forces alone). For a typical home, this amounts to under $250 a year in the 4th year in taxes, which is way more than offset by income tax cuts.

How much would cap and trade cost consumers? No one knows. With a carbon tax, consumers and business know what to expect. The Liberal plan also phases in the taxes over 4 years so adjustments can be made gradually. With cap and trade, a market is created for carbon credits. If companies are having difficulty cutting their emissions, carbon credits will be scarce, making them expensive. These costs will be passed on to the consumer.

Quotations from the Campaign Trail

2008-09-26T14:43:00.007-04:00

Here are some of my favourite quotations from the campaign trail so far. I was planning trying to dig some up for all of the national party leaders, but that is proving difficult. Please comment with any gems you've heard!

This is just a small sampling, as almost everything I've heard from Stéphane Dion in his interviews with the media has been logical and inspiring. I'm sure there are lots more scathing remarks from the likes of Harper as well.

Stéphane Dion

"Nobody muzzles Janine Krieber; it's one of the reasons why I love her" - in response to the supposed media restrictions on his wife, also a political science professor.

On the Conservative's recent cuts to arts funding: "There is more culture in a container of yogurt than in this Conservative government."

Couldn't find an exact quotation of this one, but speaking about the fiscal merits of the Green Shift and Liberal platform, Dion said something like "Economists call this plan small-c conservative. I guess that's a compliment coming from an economist."

Stephen Harper

"I think when ordinary working people come home, turn on the TV and see a gala of a bunch of people, you know, at a rich gala all subsidized by taxpayers claiming their subsidies aren't high enough when they know those subsidies have actually gone up - I'm not sure that's something that resonates with ordinary people."

Twitter Users Are Nerds

2007-10-15T20:34:00.000-04:00

Twitter users are nerds (and that includes me). Twitter has a new feature called Twitter Tracking. You can track search terms, and you'll get tweets from any user whose update matches the terms. I just tried the terms sex, MacBook, and Leopard and the first two results I got were for Leopard - and yes, they were referring to Mac OS X 10.5. The third result matched MacBook. Where are all the dirty Twitter users talking about sex?

Are you voting for MMP?

2007-10-09T10:27:00.000-04:00

As part of Ontario's provincial election tomorrow, we are having a referendum on electoral system reform. We must choose between the existing "First Past The Post" (or FPTP) system and a "Mixed Member Proportional" system, MMP. I have been waffling on which I will choose for a few days now. Initially, I jumped on the MMP bandwagon, but after watching a debate about the alternatives on TVO, I've started considering things more carefully.

I do have a few issues with the existing system:

The number of seats won by each party does not reflect the popular vote.
This is exactly the issue that proportional representation systems are designed to address. Although only 39 of the 129 seats in MMP would be elected based on party vote, this is enough in many cases to guarantee that each party receives a number of seats proportional to the percentage of votes they received.
Voters feel compelled to vote strategically to prevent certain parties from winning seats.
Suppose parties A and B mostly share an ideology that I support, but I prefer party B whereas party A tends to be more popular. If a third party C has a completely different set of values, I may feel that I need to vote for party A just to prevent party C from winning the seat. Parties A and B are splitting the vote.
Women and minorities are under-represented.
I'm not fully convinced that this last problem is directly related to the electoral system. Rather, I think it stems from the fact that parties themselves use FPTP in nominating their local candidates. Men and majority groups will usually garner the highest level of support, and so parties tend to run fewer female and minority candidates.

So how well does MMP address each of these?

Clearly, MMP solves or at least lessens the severity of the first problem. One caveat is that MMP cannot take away seats from a party that has won an inordinate number for its level of popular support; it can only address the imbalance by awarding the list seats to the party's opponents. For example, in some elections, I believe parties have managed to win in excess of 90% of the seats with about 40% of the popular vote. 90% of 90 seats is 81, which is almost 63% of the 129 seats in the provincial parliament. For me, this is not a huge concern, as having a majority government does help move legislation along more quickly. In fact, this scenario probably makes MMP seem less scary to a lot of people, since minority and coalition governments can be shaky. I think the idea of parties cooperating is nice, but sometimes this means that a small, relatively unpopular party can hold the balance of power. Granted, this example is extreme, and I think we would likely have mostly minority governments under MMP. Even in the extreme cases, other parties still get a voice in the legislature, even if they ultimately hold no power.

MMP doesn't do much to address issue #2. Advocates of the new system will say that it does, since, in my above example, I could vote for my local representative from party A while voting for B in the party vote. It is still possible, however, that party A will get more seats than it deserves, meaning the 39 list seats will not be sufficient for party B and the other parties to have fully proportional representation.

A better system for addressing issue #2 is the Single Transferable Vote (STV) system, which was proposed in a B.C. referendum in 2005 but did not receive enough votes and was not implemented. In this system, candidates are ranked. If no candidate has majority (50% + 1) support using the voters' first choices, the lowest vote-getter is removed from consideration. Then, the votes of those people who voted for this candidate are transfered to another candidate, their second choice. This is repeated until one candidate has majority support. In my three-party example, I could rank the candidate from party B as my first choice followed by the candidate from party A, any other candidates, and lastly the candidate from party C. That way there is no worry about splitting the vote, and I can vote with my conscience. If it so happens that lots of other people felt the same way I did, the candidate from party B will win. Alternatively, perhaps the candidate will be dropped in the first round, and my support will be transfered to party A.

MMP advocates say that proportional representation (or PR) systems always elect more women and minorities. As I mentioned before, I think this has to do with how parties choose their candidates. I can see how choosing candidates for a list would likely result in a broader range of representation. When forced to choose just one candidate in each riding, a white man is likely to win almost every time. So on the one hand, I can't really argue with the statistics. On the other hand, I don't really think it's fair to blame the system. If we got more women and minorities interested in and involved with politics, especially at the party level, we would nominate more diverse candidates.

My biggest concerns about MMP are related to the party lists. One problem is the granularity of choice. When voting for a party, we get to see the list of list seat candidates in advance. But what happens if we disagree with a party's top choices, even though on the whole we support that party? Assuming parties will use open and democratic processes for compiling the lists, one could join his or her party of choice and vote for better candidates, although that is probably more involvement than most people care to have.

Another problem with the party lists is in deciding which candidates will run locally, and which will be on the general list. I didn't do an exhaustive search, but I was unable to find out if the party list can include individuals who are also running in a riding, so I am assuming that this is not allowed. Consider a small party like the Green Party with low popular vote and geographically dispersed support. It would be in their best interest to run their strongest candidates on the list, and perhaps not even bother to run any local candidates in the ridings. With the Liberals, the situation is very different. They are likely to run their best candidates in local ridings, scraping the bottom of the barrel to fill the party list. What about other parties between these two ends of the spectrum? I think choosing the list members could result in some political in-fighting, and I think that in many cases, having two types of candidates will mean that we don't always elect the best ones.

My ideal system is something of a hybrid system that addresses issue #2 that I have with FPTP and also eliminates the party lists and the concerns I have about them. I like to think that I invented it myself, but I am not well-read in electoral systems, so it's likely that others have thought of this before. In my system, which I'll call Transferable Vote Listless Mixed Member Proportional (TVLMMP), each person still gets 2 votes - one for a local representative and one for a party - but the vote for the local representative is a ranking, as in STV. This eliminates vote splitting and strategic voting. There would still be 90 ridings and 39 list seats, but rather than choosing the list seat representatives from a list, the seats would be awarded to the local representatives who received the highest proportions of votes in their ridings without winning the seat. (I guess that necessitates a new name for "list seats"... perhaps "general seats.") This way, there is basically a single ranking of the candidates that is determined democratically by the public, rather than having a separate ranking that is determined (hopefully) democratically within parties. Without a list, I don't have to worry about supporting an unliked candidate that the party felt deserving of a spot on the list. If I don't support my local candidate, but I do support his or her party, not voting for the candidate will decrease his or her chances of getting one of the general seats, while my vote for the party will help to get the next best candidate, as decided by my peers, elected should any general seats be required.

In the end, I think I will probably support MMP, because I still think it is better than FPTP in many ways, even though it doesn't address all of the problems. Another factor is that I don't have much interest in provincial Ontario politics, and so I don't mind experimenting with it. Finally, since MMP will require 60% support and majority support in 60% of the ridings, I think it is unlikely to pass. And somehow in my twisted logic, that makes it the endearing underdog.

Pownce

2007-09-18T12:28:00.000-04:00

Does anyone want a Pownce invitation? I have 6, so let me know and I can invite you. If you don't know what Pownce is, I'm not going to explain (perhaps you should Google it) because I probably wouldn't do a very good job, as I haven't used it much myself. But it might be interesting to have more people I know on it.

For what it's worth, I'm also on Twitter, but it seems to be even less popular and not as useful.

Please Sponsor Me!

2007-06-15T14:37:00.001-04:00

As many of you already know, from July 29 to August 3, I'm doing the Friends for Life Bike Rally, which is a bike ride from Toronto to Montreal to raise money for the Toronto People With AIDS Foundation.

I need to raise $2000 minimum by June 30, and I would really appreciate your support. The money goes directly into providing support services for men, women, and children living with HIV and AIDS.

You can make a donation online here:

https://secure.e2rm.com/registrant/StartUp.aspx?SID=1407510

My friend Stu is also doing the ride, and we've set up a blog where you can check on our training and fundraising progress. You'll also find links there if you are interested in learning more about the Toronto PWA Foundation or about the bike rally.

Thanks in advance!

Random Chat

2007-04-12T16:36:00.000-04:00

Kevin:: [smile]; What did people do at work before the internet?
Luke:: i think they wanted to kill themselves a lot more than they do now
Kevin:: LOL

Alanis Morissette Parodies "My Humps"

2007-04-09T11:11:00.000-04:00

I assume that by now most of you have seen Alanis Morissette's parody/cover of the Black Eyed Peas' "My Humps" on YouTube. I think the video is hilarious, and the song is really funny to hear sung slowly with clear enunciation. It also justplainsoundsgood (because of Alanis' amazing voice), so I can actually take it seriously and sing along to it just as earnestly as Alanis does. If my iPod wasn't sadly underused now that I have a car, I'm sure I'd be listening to it constantly.

I've been trying to figure out why she did this, but so far all I've come up with is that it was an April Fool's joke. I'm wondering if (and hoping that) this means she's ready to start making music again. I read on her MySpace page that she was taking a break for personal reasons, but there was no date associated with that text, so I don't know if it's current or not. Her official site hasn't been updated with any news in months.

I guess I'd be sad too if I had recently broken up with Ryan Reynolds. Dave says she needs to channel those emotions into music, though. At least she still has a sense of humour.

Too Funny

2007-03-26T09:29:00.000-04:00

Wow, I can't believe this lady would actually admit to doing this. Cuckoo!

Let Elizabeth Speak

2007-03-21T09:32:00.000-04:00

As I was browsing news articles this morning, I eventually found myself at this website called Let Elizabeth Speak. It's a petition asking that the leader of the Green Party, Elizabeth May, be included in the nationally-televised leaders' debates.

I realize that they can't let just anyone participate in these debates, but I think the Green Party has demonstrated enough national support (4.5% of popular vote in the last election) to make their voice important.

Online Resurgence

2007-03-19T22:01:00.000-04:00

So, I know that 16 months is a ridiculously long hiatus from blogging. Even before that, it seemed that every post began with some apology about how long it had been since the last post. I've been planning to get set up on Blogger for quite a long time. Transferring the posts and setting the correct date on all of them was a bit of a chore, but honestly I was finished with that ages ago. Being the perfectionist and procrastinator that I am, I was hoping to have everything set up perfectly and I never got around to it. You might notice that all the entries are labeled as "Not Reviewed." That means that I'm planning to go through each of them, reminiscing along the way, fixing up broken links and restoring missing images.

Ideally I'd like to get photos and applications and stuff back online eventually, but getting my blog entries into Blogger is the most important part. I used to manually edit HTML and then upload it to an FTP server, so I wasn't inclined to blog very often. This resulted in long streches between posts and long, boring posts that rambled on about everything that happened in the preceding month or three.

Blogging isn't the only thing that I haven't been doing online I haven't been chatting much in the last year or writing e-mail, and I feel a bit like I've neglected some of my online and long-distance friends. I sit in front of a computer all day, so in some ways, being online less appeals to me. But in reality, when I'm online less, it's not like I'm any more social in real life. So lately I've been IM a bit more. If you see me, say hello! I've also just joined Facebook. I'm not sure how "into it" I'm going to get, but it's amusing for the time-being at least.

2005-11-20T20:57:00.000-05:00

There's just something special about prancing around in your kitchen in nothing but tiny little underwear, listening to music you forgot you had, and sipping coffee all morning, isn't there?

Granted, it's been awhile since I've done that because I actually wrote that opening line for this post nearly 3 months ago. I guess it just goes to show how much of a procrastinator I really am.

Six months have gone by since I last posted, but fortunately, I was keeping a list of things to write about over that period. Of course, I'm not going to recount all my tales as thoroughly as I would have were I writing about them the day after. But I will try to remember the important things.

I have had quite an action-packed spring, summer, and fall, which is probably at least part of the reason why I've found it so hard to get back into school things this fall.

Things are generally okay with school, but I could be putting in quite a bit more effort. I finished off my courses in the spring, and somehow I managed to get an A+, an A, and an A-, even though this was right around the time I'd decided to withdraw from the program. Since then, the focus has been research, but even now I don't have a confirmed topic for my thesis, and as my advisor said recently, "the clock is ticking."

About a month ago, I had a brainwave in a weekly meeting with my advisor, but I needed to do some experiments to determine if the idea makes any sense. Well, I've finally implemented the experiment, and now I've been working on analyzing the results. To be honest, it really wasn't all that difficult, but the fear that it would be held me back from attacking the results. Now that I'm close to finding out if my idea holds any merit, the fear that it doesn't is holding me back a bit. I mean, if this idea is bogus, what on earth am I going to do for my thesis? So far, the results I'm getting don't seem to be all that great, but I'm going to try some more tests, and I'm also going to go back and enhance my implementation of the original experiment.

Now back to my action-packed, extended summer. The first big thing was a road trip to Montreal with my friends Stu and Stephen. Stu has a car, so we all chipped in for gas money and a hotel room and headed up for Victoria Day weekend. I had never been to Montreal, unless you count driving through in a U-Haul when I moved to Toronto, so it was good to see the city. I didn't fall in love with it like most people seem to, but I think that was to largely to a resentment I have towards the way people always rag on Toronto and romanticize Montreal. To me, it felt more like a large town than a city. While I thought the people seemed a bit friendlier, I also found them to be pretentious, if that makes any sense. We didn't do a whole lot of stuff in Montreal, but you can be sure we got out to the gay clubs. We also fit in a fair amount of shopping and saw a few of the sites like the mountain, St. Joseph's Oratory, and the Biosphere on Ile Sainte-Helene (not to be confused with the Biodome at Olympic Park). I had a good time. There are some photos here.

On the way home, I got to drive Stu's car for a good part of the journey. I've been learning to drive standard in bits and pieces, so that was really only my third time ever, spread out over about probably 3 or 4 years. But it went fairly well.

And now I've tired of writing, but I'm hoping to get back into the habit of it. Besides, I still have a ton of stuff to write about before this blog catches up with my present-day life.

2005-05-17T21:05:00.000-04:00

Over the last couple weeks I have seen 3 very good movies that I'd like to share with you.

Saved! [IMDB]

This movie is a hilarious look at Evangelical Christianism, set in a Christian high school. If you find unmediated blind faith annoying, then this movie is for you. There are so many laugh-out-loud funny parts. I loved it. Mandy Moore is great in it, and so is Macaulay Culkin. The lead role is played by Jena Malone, who I wasn't familiar with before seeing the movie. She does an excellent job though. And she reminds me of an East Coast girl, which is fitting because she has a role in The Ballad of Jack and Rose [IMDB], which was filmed on PEI, and which I consequently must see at some point.

Mad Hot Ballroom [IMDB]

This movie actually hadn't been released when I saw it last night, but a friend of Luke and me invited us to attend a screening. So that's pretty exciting. They told us that movies such as this one depend on word-of-mouth, so to tell all of our friends to go see it. Of course, they made this announcement before we saw the film, but I did indeed enjoy it enough to do so.

The film is a documentary, so right off the bat you know that it's not for everyone, but it is a very charming story. It's about a ballroom dancing program that they have for fifth grade students in New York public schools. There is something very amusing about watching kids learn to ballroom dance. It's hard to explain, but you'll certainly understand if you see the movie. Of course, there are interviews with the children throughout the story. And, well, kids say the darnedest things. They really do.

Les Triplettes de Belleville [IMDB]

This one is from awhile back (2003), but Luke rented it recently. It's an animated, silent film. By silent, I mean that there is virtually no dialogue. There are lots of sound effects, mind you, and lots of great music. It's a French film, but because there is basically no dialogue, it really doesn't matter. I think in the English subtitled version, there are maybe 3 times during the whole movie when subtitles are used. Anyways, the plot is a very bizarre one, but the animation (specifically the characters) is so interesting. It's a unique creation, and it's a joy to just sit back and watch it. I should also mention that there are many many funny parts. The movie messes with reality a bit, and so there are some really bizarre things that catch you by surprise and make you laugh. It's a must-see. In fact, I think I may even try to watch it once more before it has to be returned.

In other news, I'm heading to Montreal for the long weekend with Stu and Stephen! Stu owns a car, so it will be a comfortable trip. We're going to go clubbing and do some shopping. We're leaving early on Saturday morning and staying 2 nights. Of course, I made sure that on Sunday night we can stay in from 9 to 10 pm to watch the season finale of Desperate Housewives. I seriously think that I wouldn't go on the trip if I wasn't fairly certain that I'd get to see it. Yes, that is the extent to which I'm addicted. But it should be a fun trip. I've never visited Montreal — I've only driven through and had a stop-over at the airport. So I'm very excited.

2005-05-12T21:10:00.000-04:00

I didn't want to disrupt the coherent theme of my last post, so I'm posting separately to announce that I have put up a new Links page, also accessible via the site menu. It currently lists sites that I browse daily, friends' blogs, and flash animation sites that amuse me, and I plan to add some more categories eventually. If you'd like me to link to your blog, just let me know.

2005-05-12T21:02:00.000-04:00

Before I eat an apple, I always recite the alphabet as I twist off the stem, one letter per twist. Perhaps you remember playing this game as a child — when the stem finally detaches, the corresponding letter is supposed to be the first initial of the person you are going to marry. Of course, it's highly biased toward letters in the middle of the alphabet, but childhood games don't have to make sense.

Lately I've been getting E a lot. I found this strange at first, because I didn't think I knew any boys whose first names started with E. Obviously I didn't think about this very thoroughly, as I have friends named Erik and Eric, and a gay landlord named Ed. I have also been flirting with an E-boy (who also happens to be an e-boy — I haven't met him in real life yet). I'm not going to say his name here. He may be reading this for one thing, and oddly enough, I suspect you may not believe that the name I know him by is his real one.

Anyways, this whole E-business is not the point of this post. The point is that I really want a boyfriend — badly. So just like I did when I was young and wanted a TV in my room, I'm going to make a list of reasons why I should have one. (In the first case, I think reasons 6 thru 10 were just "Because I really, really want one," so for this list, I'll just stop when I run out of reasons, rather than committing to ten.)

I'm lonely.

I need someone to hang out with and to share my innermost thoughts with. Now don't get me wrong — I have a lot of really great friends who I can tell just about anything. But there aren’t many I can just hang out with (and sometimes I feel like a burden on the few that I can just hang out with, unless I'm sure they're benefiting from the time together too). Normally there has to be some sort of event, which is most often going out to drink and dance, or very rarely going to or renting a movie. Of course geography is an issue here — you can't just drop by your friend's place for a visit when they live a half-hour transit ride away. When this person is your boyfriend, you make a bigger effort. (Remember, you're going to get laid.) This is one area where Charlottetown beats Toronto hands down. Most likely you're within a half-hour walk of all your friends, or one of you has a car.

I need a regular sex life.

Studies have proven that regular sexual activity is good for you. I'm too lazy to look them up and reference them here, but take my word for it. I'm 24. I want to be in a steady relationship before my twenty-something power-house libido becomes a distant memory. Also, when I haven't had sex in a month or two, I'm like Toucan Sam, except it's not my nose I'm following. I'm more likely to do silly things like sleep with someone right after meeting them. In particularly bad cases, I may even have a hunch that the guy is sketchy, but I'll give him a chance to redeem himself with amazing sex. (Aside — amazing-sex redemptions to-date: zero)

I need someone to get my ass out of bed in the morning.

I've been struggling with motivation lately, and probably the worst way this struggle manifests itself is in my inability to get out of bed and face the world in the mornings. A typical morning goes like this. My alarm radio comes on at 9 am. I feel alert, but not quite ready to get up, so I press snooze a few times. Eventually this causes grogginess, and I get into a weird delirious state where I have these nonsense dreams. They usually relate to some task that I need to do in real life, but the details of them only make sense in this transitional phase between sleeping and being awake. I look at the clock frequently during this time. Usually I'll notice a time like 9:51 am, for example. "That's exactly one 9-minute snooze away from 10 am," I'll think and decide to get up then. Of course, at 10 am I'll allow myself "just one more" snooze.

Another thing I do sometimes is notice the time on the clock and realize that I just pressed snooze 2 or 3 minutes ago. I think to myself, "I'm going to have to press snooze again in 6 or 7 minutes, so I might as well press it now and get a full 9 minutes of rest." And I do.

Eventually I feel ready to get up, but then there is another problem. The fresh "morning" air is cool, and I'll be cold if I get out from under the covers in just my underwear. Fortunately, I have conveniently placed pyjamas near my bed the night before, but they are also too cool to just throw on. I ponder a solution to the dilemma, and sooner or (more likely) later, I slip on the pyjamas but get back under the covers to warm them up. I get up soon after this, sometime between 11 am and 1 pm. The day feels almost over.

There are a few things that will get me up in the morning, with varying degrees of success. A breakfast date with a friend or my roommate, Luke, always works. In fact, I may even be up earlier than necessary. (Breakfast is my favourite meal.) Another tactic I sometimes use is to pick out my outfit for the next day, and have it laid out next to my bed so that I'm ready to jump into the shower in the morning. This has about a 30% chance of working. Awhile back, I tried putting a little sign on top of my alarm clock. It featured an angry face saying something like "GET OUT OF BED, KEVIN!" It worked for a day or two but quickly lost effectiveness. I also asked Luke once to wake me up. He didn't. I'm not sure if he simply forgot, or if he just didn't feel comfortable doing it. I know it can be hard to disturb someone when they're sleeping.

I think if I were sharing a bed with my boyfriend, I'd have an easier time getting up in the morning. Surely he would have to get up, because any boyfriend of mine is going to be a successful person who has some sort of responsibilities to attend to each day. And so I would get up with him, to share breakfast and a perhaps a shower, and see him off for the day. You may be thinking that this would require my boyfriend to be of the live-in variety, but this is not the case. You see, keeping my twenty-something power-house libido in check would require at least 2 or 3 sleepovers per week, in addition to weekends.

I need motivation to work at my research diligently.

Having a boyfriend would require me to free up my evenings and weekends by treating school as a full-time job. If I put in a few good hours of work each day, I'll be able to enjoy those times guilt-free. But if there's no particular reason to keep those times open, I can plan to use them for school work, and that rarely goes as planned.

I need someone to liberate my adventurous side.

I do have an adventurous side, but often times I'm too shy or apathetic to try new things on my own. In particular, I'd like to be more active. Someone who works out from time to time might be able to show me the ropes (I stress from time to time; I'm not looking for a muscle bunny). Or I may find someone who enjoys cycling or maybe even badminton — a sport I enjoy but haven't played in years.

I'd also like to travel more, but it's not something I'd enjoy doing on my own. Add some romance, however, and I'd absolutely love it.

I would enjoy cooking meals for someone.

Someone once told me that the key to keeping a man is to keep his stomach full and his balls empty. I enjoy cooking and baking, but I haven't done it much the last couple years, excepting the occasional carrot cake. It's hard to justify making a nice meal for one person, and I have simple tastes, so I'm usually happy with my chicken fingers and fries. Unfortunately, convenience foods are not particularly healthy. Having someone to cook for would satisfy my desire to do things for people (I love helping people — just running errands for them or whatever) and be beneficial for my health.

I need motivation to maintain the appearance of my surroundings and myself.

My apartment (particularly my end of it) is quite messy, as I've lamented before. In fact, I think I'd be somewhat embarrassed to show my room to a potential love interest. It's not exactly representative of who I am. I think I am a neat freak at heart — I've just fallen by the wayside a bit lately.

I'd also enjoy having someone to look pretty for. I don't neglect my personal hygiene or grooming, but despite a recent shopping spree, my wardrobe is fairly stagnant and limited. (If you've known me for a couple months, chances are you've seen me wear all of my favourite items at least once.) Of course, I don't want to date a snob who is going to judge me by the labels on my clothes, but a guy with a bit of fashion sense could really help me out with my wardrobe.

I need a date for school functions and weddings.

That one is pretty self-explanatory. I hate attending functions where I don't know many people. I'm not social enough to initiate conversation with people, unless I've had quite a bit to drink. Even so, small talk often bores me. Oh, someone to waltz with in the kitchen would also be nice.

As much as I want a boyfriend, it may not be appropriate for where I am in my life. For one thing, I seem to want one so desperately that it could be a huge turn off (although that doesn't seem to be the case — more on that in a bit). I haven't been very happy lately. People often say that a relationship is not the solution, but I think that's at least partially bullshit. It's something people say so that single people don't feel so bad. With that said, I do feel that I could be a happier single person than I am. I don't feel incomplete, but I do feel that I will not be my happiest until I have someone to share my life with.

Something that has been on my mind lately is rejection. I have been very fortunate in that area. I think I've only been seriously rejected three times. The first time was by the person I lost my virginity to. It was easy to chalk it up to distance though, as he lived in Halifax and I lived in Charlottetown. So it didn't hurt me all that much. The second time I felt rejected was frustrating, but I don't think I was ever in love with the person, so it wasn't at all devastating. The third time was by far the worst, but in this case, we both rejected each other numerous times, on several different levels and in various capacities. So I'm not sure it really counts.

Lately, I have been rejected several times, but only in that I express interest in someone, and they do not express any interest in return. It never seems to happen that someone expresses interest in me, gets to know me a bit, and then loses interest. Actually, I hadn't had a crush of any sort in ages until recently. Unfortunately I became infatuated with a guy I'd met online — but before I ever met him in person. Since then I ran into him at a bar, and though he seemed like a nice fellow, he didn't quite match my mental impression of him, so the crush has waned somewhat.

On the other hand, I feel like I'm rejecting boys all the time. Most often I am simply not interested in them at all, but sometimes I think I am interested but then lose interest after I get to know them a bit. Rejecting people is a very difficult thing to do. Now, I know I shouldn't complain about this, because despite my limited experience, I know that being rejected is far worse. I also realize that I'm lucky to be presented with so many opportunities. But I'm starting to wonder if something is wrong with me. I mean, if I want a boyfriend so badly, shouldn't I be getting desperate by now?

My friend Erik had an interesting thing to say on the matter. He says that because I have had a serious relationship in the past and I know what it's like, I want to be at that point with someone new immediately, and hence I don't give new relationships enough of a chance. I think this might be partially true. I do look for instant or near-instant chemistry with guys, because in the past it has been my experience that I always click really well with guys that I like right from the beginning. So really, I may be doing these boys a favour by dumping them sooner rather than later. If you're not sure if you like someone, what are the chances that you actually do? I think every boy deserves to have someone who is crazy about him, and not just someone who settled for him.

So what is the moral of the story? Well, for one thing, I'm going to start believing what my friends tell me. Boys like me, and I will eventually find one that I am fond of in return. I'm going to relax; I'm not going to worry that I'm getting old and that I need to settle down with "the one." Nevertheless, I'm not going to terminate my search. My friend Alex once said, "You won't find love if you don't go looking for it," and I truly believe that he is right.

2005-05-08T21:01:00.000-04:00

Happy Spring, everyone! The weather has been absolutely gorgeous the past couple days, and I've been feeling rather good the past little while. I haven't been out to enjoy it much, but I hope to start getting out a bit more in the near future. I will certainly need to get out on my bike lots. I'm a bit out of practice, and in just under a month I'm doing the Becel Ride for Heart. I'll be riding 50 km on Sunday, June 5th to raise money for the Heart and Stroke foundation. They close down the Gardiner and the Don Valley Parkway for us to ride on, so it's going to be exciting, because those highways are normally off-limits for cyclists. If any one is so inclined, you can actually sponsor me online. I'm doing well. So far I've raised $250!

So my mood is improving as of late for a few reasons. For starters, I recently finished up my semester at school. My exams went okay. There were no stellar performances on my part, but that was to be expected, because I really didn't put much into my studying. At this point, marks don't really matter much to me. As long as I pass I'll be satisfied. (Though good ones still do get me excited - remember that ray traced image from last post? I got full marks on the programming portion of that assignment.) In one course, my term project was basically a disaster, but the professor (who also happens to be my supervisor) suggested that we just turn the project into an investigation into some software we'd been using. So my partner and I pulled a couple of near all-nighters completing a poster and a project report for the course. It's all over now, and I think we'll have done okay. I'm also finished (I think) with my TA duties for the semester, unless I get called in to help with marking the final exam.

Another reason for my lifted spirits lately is that I have so much to look forward to this spring. There's the Ride for Heart, which I already mentioned. Around the same time, Chris is coming up to Toronto for a visit. Now, there is a special reason for his visit. On June 7th, we're going (along with my friend Dave as well) to see Alanis Morissette in concert! She's playing at the Hummingbird Centre for her Jagged Little Pill Acoustic Tour. I've been a fan of hers for so long, yet I've never seen her in concert. So it's going to be great. I fear I may get a bit emotional. Opening for Alanis will be Jason Mraz, another crooner I quite enjoy. I should also mention that in November I'm going with Dave to see Jann Arden at Massey Hall. That will be another great concert to look forward to. (Dave is a huge "Fann," and he's actually going to see her twice when she's in town.) I'm not usually much of a concert goer, but by that point I'll have seen Scissor Sisters, Alanis, and Jann in concert! Woot!

But the fun does not stop there! I've been planning a trip home to PEI, and so the current plan is to travel back with Chris. If all works out, we'll stop in Moncton to visit with Bride for a couple days. I have a few things planned for while I'm at home as well. My high school friends Louis and Kim are getting married. I'm still figuring out who I'm going to take as my date, but hopefully I'll figure something out because they're trying to keep the wedding small, and consequently if I don't bring a date, I'm not going to know many people there. Another activity planned for my time at home is a family trip to Rainbow Valley, an amusement park in Cavendish. This is the last season it will be open because the owners have decided to retire and sell the land to the government, which plans to sell off the amusement equipment and put in some recreation trails. This is very sad. Everyone from PEI has wonderful childhood memories from Rainbow Valley. Every spring, schools have year-end field trips to the park. It's such a great tradition, and I don't know what they'll do from now on to replace it. I mean, there are other parks, but to me they don't have the sense of wonder and magic that Rainbow Valley does. Anyways, I'm glad that I'll get one last chance to enjoy it.

I don't have my travel arrangements made yet, but I hope to get that done soon. I should be home for about two weeks, and I'll probably be back in Toronto for the last weekend of Pride. The arrangements depend on a few things. I've applied for a summer TAship, so I kind of have to make sure that it's okay for me to be away at that time. (My heart is set on this trip though, so I can't imagine me changing much about it because of a TAship.) It also depends on when Bride has time off of work. I'm sure it will all work out though. I kind of wish I could be home longer, but as it stands, I've decided to keep going with this school stuff. So that means I've got responsibilities.

I have been taking it easy for the weekend, but now it's time to start tackling this whole "thesis" thing. My plan is to do some reading and poking around here and there to find a thesis topic. If I can get that done before I take my little vacation, that will be awesome. Then I'll be ready to dive in to my background reading and get this thing rolling. Something I'd also like to do is read a few of my classmates' theses, because I've never actually read one before. All I see are conference papers mostly. It seems like a month is a long time to pin down a topic, but it really is going to be a difficult thing to do. I'm unsure how large a masters project has to be, for one thing. Another problem is that sometimes in computer science it's hard to know if your idea makes sense until you actually try it. But you can't just try it, because doing so would probably take months of programming. Hopefully my supervisor will be able to help me with this, but I'd like to come up with a few of my own ideas before we meet to discuss a thesis topic specifically.

Although I've been feeling better lately, I did feel somewhat alone this weekend. Ainsley just headed to PEI for the summer last week. It also happened that my friend Erik left for Sudbury for a week on Friday. So I just lounged around and did some chores around the house... nothing too strenuous. Tonight I watched Saved!, which Luke had rented. I must say it is an awesome movie. It's very funny, and I must say that Jena Malone and Mandy Moore are both excellent actors. Oh, I also made a pretty big to-do list this weekend, and I did some work on this site. You'll notice there are some new photos posted, and there are more to come. In addition, I have a ton of ideas for things I want to do with this site, as well as a long list of topics to write about. So that's all for now (it's getting late!) but I'll have more soon.

2005-04-12T21:10:00.000-04:00

So things have been sucking pretty hardcore for quite awhile now. Not too long ago, I decided to quit school. Of course, my supervisor soon talked me out of it, suggesting that I finish the semester at least and then take some time off to think about it. So I started working again, finished a project in 3 days and one very long night. (More on that later.) At present though, I'm stuck on a rather small task that I just can't seem to make myself tackle. I just have to read three papers and write short summaries on them - like half a page each. And I CAN'T DO IT! So far all I've done is read the first article. So, since I don't have anything particularly fun to talk about, I'm going to share some random stuff with you.

First up, www.makingfiends.com. Surprise surprise, this is another flash animation site. I find it very amusing. I watched every single episode one afternoon in one sitting. I think I was having a bad day, and it cheered me up. I love so many online flash animation things now, that I think I could officially list flash animation as one of my interests on things like online dating profiles and my resume.

Some quiz results. I took these a few days before my birthday (I turned 24 on March 30th) when I was thinking a lot about age and maturity...

You Are 18 Years Old

18

Under 12: You are a kid at heart. You still have an optimistic life view - and you look at the world with awe.

13-19: You are a teenager at heart. You question authority and are still trying to find your place in this world.

20-29: You are a twentysomething at heart. You feel excited about what's to come... love, work, and new experiences.

30-39: You are a thirtysomething at heart. You've had a taste of success and true love, but you want more!

40+: You are a mature adult. You've been through most of the ups and downs of life already. Now you get to sit back and relax.

What Age Do You Act?

You Belong in 1981

1981

If you scored...

1950 - 1959: You're fun loving, romantic, and more than a little innocent. See you at the drive in!

1960 - 1969: You are a free spirit with a huge heart. Love, peace, and happiness rule - oh, and drugs too.

1970 - 1979: Bold and brash, you take life by the horns. Whether you're partying or protesting, you give it your all!

1980 - 1989: Wild, over the top, and just a little bit cheesy. You're colorful at night - and successful during the day.

1990 - 1999: With you anything goes! You're grunge one day, ghetto fabulous the next. It's all good!

What Year Do You Belong In?

I can see my age being younger than I am. I'm a kid at heart. But I'm 1981? At least I wasn't a year that happened before I was born, I guess.

Recently I made a mix CD that I think just might be my best ever. Here is the track list along with my favourite lyrics / commentary.

The Power of Orange Knickers, Tori Amos

"Shame shame for letting me think that I would be the one"
This song is a little cheesy sounding in the beginning, but it gets really good. Damien Rice sings with Tori in this one. His voice gives the song a nice full sound.
Retour a Vega, The Stills

This song is French, and honestly I don't have a clue what they're saying. (But I don't have a clue about the lyrics in most English songs either - I look them up.) It is a beautiful song though, I assure you. Oh, one line that I can make out is "Je pense a toi souvent." Perhaps there are others, but it's unimportant.
Elevator Man, The Golden Dogs

"Well as soon as he can, gonna save up some money, gonna take himself down to the Tijuana sun"
This is a very busy song. I want to say it has a Calypso beat, but I fear that I don't know what I'm talking about. Anyways, if you listen to it, you'll know what I mean. It's very fun, energetic, and uplifting. (Get it? It's about elevators?)
One of These Days, Michelle Branch

"Was I not deserving, one second of your touch? And one of these days, I won't be afraid of staying with you"
I love the simple piano chords in this one. Just beautiful.
Waiting, Chantal Kreviazuk

"And its hard to believe that you couldn't recognize my tears / I glued them on for you"
She's waiting to fall apart, by the way. Lately I really love songs with a sense of urgency. Ones that you can just belt out. Assuming you know the words, that is.
Secret Heart, Feist

"Could it have something to do with admitting that you just can't go through it alone?"
"This very secret that you're trying to conceal is the very same one that you're dying to reveal"
It took me several listens to get the lyrical beat of this one down. I kept trying to sing along and messing up the timing. But I've got it down now! The line about secrets is so true, don't you think? Well, it reminds me of wanting to come out of the closet, but being afraid to.
Don't Marry Her (Fuck Me), The Beautiful South

"And the Sunday sun shines down on San Francisco Bay, and you realize you can't make it anyway"
A fun little ditty that's painfully honest.
Cars and Guitars, Tori Amos

"If I choke boy, you start me up again - restring my wires"
This song is one big mixed metaphor, and I have no clue what she's talking about. Example: "'Yeah that whip has skirt', you said it proud" Like WTF? But it's still pretty. Ch ch cha, ch ch cha cha.
They, Jem

"Who made up all the rules? We follow them like fools"
I like this one because it is funky. Bump baa daa. (Operatic:) Bump baa daa. My version of it has children singing in it, which a friend of mine finds creepy. I like it. But apparently there is another version without it if you find it creepy.
Monkey Baby, Scissor Sisters

"Monkey Baby like my big fat ass"
One messed up song, for sure. But that line is just so fun to say.
Do Your Thing, Basement Jaxx

I dare you not to dance.
The Power of Goodbye, Madonna

"You were my lesson I had to learn / I was your fortress you had to burn"
This song is totally underappreciated. I was reminded of it one day when I was waiting in line for food at Harvey's.
Till I Get Over You, Michelle Branch

The primary appeal of this song is the cheesy bad French in the chorus. I loves it. Also has some nice lines.
"We both know we can't change it / But we both know we'll just have to face it"
Ready for Your Love, Chantal Kreviazuk

"But that's the best part of love - when it's brand new"
I love the Asian and Irish influences in this song. They go surprisingly well together. It's a somewhat exotic song, and as always with Chantal, a wonderful song.
Sleeps With Butterflies, Tori Amos

My goodness, three tracks from Tori Amos!
"Are you having regrets about last night?" - because really, aren't there always regrets?
"This girl only sleeps with butterflies, so go on and fly then, boy"
24 Hours, Alexz Johnson

Okay, before you groan and realize that this is the star of CTV's Instant Star, give the song a listen. (A friend said he would have not listened to it if I told him who sang it first.) It's really quite good. Although the lyrics aren't exactly profound.
Inside and Out, Feist

"Love you forever but you're driving me insane"
"Too many lovers in one lifetime ain't good for you"
This is a good song. At times though, I feel that it is a bit too cheery, though you wouldn't exactly guess that from the sample lyrics I gave you. You must be curious now, eh? ;)
Song for Whoever, The Beautiful South

"I'll love you from the bottom of my pencil case"
"Jennifer, Allison, Phillipa, Sue / Deborah, Annabel too... I forget your name"
I'll let the lyrics speak for themselves here.
24, Jem

I like the strings in this one, but none of the lyrics stand out that much. The vocals are breathy and not overly loud. I might describe it as avant-garde, but I'm not an articulate person. I have a bizarre and often blatantly mistaken sense of what many words mean.
Lonely No More, Rob Thomas

"So when you tell that you love me, know for sure - I don't wanna be lonely any more"
They're playing this song like crazy on the radio, so I'm sure you've all heard it.
Paper Bag, Fiona Apple

"I went crazy again today"
STORY OF MY LIFE!

So that concludes the CD. I hope it sparks your interest.

The project that I mentioned way back in the first paragraph was a ray tracer for the graphics course I'm taking. Ray tracing is a method of rendering images that works by modelling how rays of light bounce around off of 3-dimensional objects in a scene. It involves a lot of linear algebra and analytical geometry. Anyways, the end result was this image. It took about 2.5 hours for Tompkins to render it, but I've since realized that there are a few optimizations that I can make to my program run a lot faster. I plan to do that eventually, and then to add some more objects and render a 1024 by 768 version for my desktop wallpaper. Notice the shadows, reflections, and smooth edges. I'm quite satisfied with the end result.

Oh, before I forget... last time I promised apartment photos of my messy room. I've decided not to do that. I have cleaned up slightly, and why put my slobbiness on display, anyhow? I will eventually post some pictures from the apartment and around Toronto though.

2005-03-18T21:17:00.000-05:00

I have come to the realization that I am a weekend alcoholic. I had been wondering lately if I am an alcoholic, but I was under the assumption that in order to be termed an alcoholic, your condition must interfere with your day-to-day activities. This is clearly not the case, since I only drink on weekends. However, I do tend to drink every weekend, often two or even three nights, and this certainly does interfere with any plans to be productive over the weekend.

Walking home from Woody's tonight, I wondered if I will always be this way, or if drinking is just necessitated by this particularly trying time of my life. I can certainly see myself being an older gay man with a well stocked liquor cabinet. And I don't have a problem with that. I don't need liquor to have a good time. Generally, I am happy when I'm around people. I especially like one-on-one conversation.

I guess my drinking habit would probably go out the window if I ever became a parent. (As if it's something precious to lose.) I am almost 24 now, and if I were going to have kids, I imagine it happening before I turn 34, ten years from now. I'm not sure why exactly. I wouldn't want to be raising kids when I'm too old, although I don't think it's a bad thing for the children. My parents (my dad especially) were older than most of my friends' parents, but they were excellent parents. Really, they may not have been as fun or cool as some parents, but I love them so much and they fostered a strong sense of family in me. I truly believe that my sisters and I are some of the most well-raised people you will meet.

Anyways, ten years doesn't seem so far in the future, and right now I can't imagine having kids. On the other hand, ten years ago I was 14 and I thought that I was straight and that I was ready to have children. Seriously, I remember a teacher asking who in the class thought they were ready to have children, and I remember raising my hand. And I thought that I was very mature for my age. CAN YOU IMAGINE? Actually, I probably was mature enough to have taken on the responsibility. It's just that now I realize that the responsibility would be so incredibly stifling.

Also on the way home from Woody's tonight, I got stopped by a bum who told me his life story. I finally just gave him the spare change that was in my pocket. But you know what? I swear these days that bums are insulted if you just give them a few cents. It's like, hello - you're the one that's on the street begging for money and telling anyone who will listen your life story. This guy was particularly scary. He had been recently released from prison after SEVENTEEN YEARS. You have to do something pretty bad to spend that much time in the slammer. I'm so glad that I'm callous enough to just ignore and keep walking when I'm sober.

But back to the issue of why I drink. I don't particularly enjoy school right now. In fact, one of the main reasons I'm still begrudgingly plugging away at it is that I get paid for doing it, and it's easier to just keep doing it than to try to find a job. But sometimes I think I'd be happy to work at Starbucks. After awhile I'm sure the customers would get sick of me explaining concepts like object-oriented programming and recursion, and I'd be fired. But it would be fun and mindless while it lasted.

Seriously though, one of the main reasons why I don't just quit is that I think it would kill my dream of someday teaching at a university level. I really enjoy explaining things to people. This is probably because it makes me feel smart, and that fact that I enjoy that feeling is probably why I've been an overachiever all my life. (Actually, this is probably more a result of my perfectionism.) In fact, it doesn't even matter to me if I am smart, or if I just seem smart in comparison to other people, you stupid bitch. For example, the other day I took an IQ test from some website, and I scored 161, placing me in the highest category - extraordinary genius! It made me smile, even if the questions were stupid and the test is not of reputable origin.

So that's all for now folks. Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for next time, when we take a photographic tour of my apartment and see how big of a slob I've become. No really - you won't believe this!

2005-03-16T21:14:00.000-05:00

I've been sick with a cold since Monday. On Monday, it was just starting out, so I went to class anyways. Yesterday I skipped class, and I did so again today. I'm not horribly ill, but lately my motivational level is such that it doesn't take much of an excuse for me stay in bed nearly all day. It's the same old story as last fall I guess. School just doesn't get me very excited. Although, I must admit that things are going much better than last fall. Two of my courses are going quite well considering. But in my third course we basically haven't really started the term project, and that is worrisome. So I really should be working on that, but whatever.

Outside of school, I'm as much of a party animal as I ever was before. I go out pretty much every weekend, and often two or three nights per weekend. Clearly I can't afford this, but it helps me keep my sanity. Often I go out with Ainsley, who has been in Toronto since sometime in January. It's super great having her in the city. Sadly, she'll be leaving sometime in the spring. I have met quite a few other friends here, but unfortunately they're not really forming a cohesive posse. Don't get me wrong though - they're great people and I'm lucky to have met them. In one case, however, it's rather awkward, because he's a boy I once dated, and now he's off dating other boys, and for some reason this makes me kind of jealous, even though I was the one who ended it in the first place. I know how stupid this is, and I was very angry with myself when I noticed that it was making me uncomfortable. He's a very nice guy, and I should be happy for him because he deserves it. I guess the most troubling part was that this whole episode made me question the root of a lot of my other feelings. But on some level I have come to accept that my feelings are often selfishly motivated, and I suppose it is a good thing to take ownership of them and acknowledge where they come from.

While we're on the topic of boys and feelings and jealousy and all that, I should mention that my love life has been rather bleak. Since I've moved to Toronto, I've dated (read: slept with) 4 guys, and nothing has come out of it, except of course for one superficial awkward friendship, one good friendship, and an MSN contact that is never online (an out-of-towner that I didn't expect anything from anyways). I'm hoping to have a proper date with the latest one at some point in the near future, but I really don't know how that's going to go. The sex was the best of the lot, but I think I already know that he's not really my type. I need to find out for sure though. I guess I'm turning into a bit of a slut, although I think I've always been fairly easy. These have been rough times, and every so often I just need some human contact. This is not to say that I do anything stupid or that I lower my standards.

A lot of stuff has happened since I last wrote, needless to say. I've also spent a lot of money. I finally built Tompkins, my pet computer project that I'd started on last fall. I never really use him, but he's cute. (Oh, I did do my computer graphics assignment on him, so I suppose he has come in handy in that regard, though it might be better for me to be spending time in the lab at school, actually doing work there.) Then not too too long ago, Ainsley, Jenn, Kelly, and Laura took me shopping. I was to meet that at H&M at the Eaton Centre one Saturday afternoon. By the time I arrived, they already had armloads of stuff for me to try on. It was rather fun, and they had good taste for the most part. After a trip to the Gap for jeans, I left the mall with three complete outfits (including two upper layers) and a t-shirt. Total price - $400. I'm sure that must have been the most money I've ever spent on clothes at once. But I did get a lot of stuff. H&M is relatively cheap.

Jenn, by the way, is Ainsley's girlfriend. She is at university in Newfoundland, but she came to visit for 10 days last month. While she was here, we also went to see a musical called tick, tick... BOOM!. It's by Jonathan Larson, the guy who wrote Rent, and it's about his life as a composer before he had written Rent. I have become addicted to the soundtrack. I listen to a few of the songs from it all the time, and Ainsley and I are even thinking of learning one of them (a little ditty called Therapy) so we can perform it at parties. Tee hee!

Well, I should go attempt to do some work. I doubt that it will really happen tonight, as this cold has me feeling zonked, and I tend to squander the times when I feel good to do things like update this site and take online quizzes. Ah well, no pressure.

2004-12-05T14:17:00.000-05:00

It's Sunday, and I was up at 9 am! I'm very proud of myself, yes indeed. Today I plan to get some work done on an assignment. It's due on Wednesday, and I have 2.5 questions to do. So it shouldn't be too bad.

I don't often do online quizzes. Well, I do, but not that type where you share your answers with friends via an e-mail forward or something. But this particular one I saw on Troy's journal interested me for some reason.

But before I share my answers with you, I feel that I should explain an inside joke that has given me a new catch phrase. I'll explain it via two example conversations:

Me:: So what's up for today?
Luke:: Oh, I think I'm going to clean my room, find a cure for AIDs, write my thesis, and maybe catch a movie later. Nothing special.
Me:: I'm going to have some juice.
Luke:: Wow, that's ambitious!

Me:: So what did you do today?
Other-type Person:: Oh, not much. Did some shopping, walked around, went out to lunch with a friend.
<<...pause...>>
Other-type Person:: You?
Me:: I had some juice.
Other-type Person:: Hmmm, okay. *weirded out*

And now, the quiz...

THREE NAMES YOU GO BY:

Kevin
Quarkomatic
Kevy Wevy

THREE THINGS YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF:

My quirky personality
The fact that I'm easy to please
My body

THREE THINGS YOU HATE ABOUT YOURSELF:

My laziness
The fact that I can be very inarticulate at times
My body

THREE PARTS OF YOUR HERITAGE:

French
French
French

THREE THINGS THAT SCARE YOU:

Hatred
George W. Bush
Failure

THREE OF YOUR EVERYDAY ESSENTIALS:

Music
CBC Newsworld
Computer

THREE THINGS YOU ARE WEARING RIGHT NOW:

T-shirt
Jeans
Glasses

THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE BANDS (or artists) AT THE MOMENT:

Belle and Sebastian
Avril Lavigne
Rockapella

THREE REASONS YOU'VE BROKEN UP WITH EXES:

Constant arguing
Class incompatibility
Distance

THREE THINGS YOU WOULD WANT IN A RELATIONSHIP:

Love
Sex
More sex

THREE THINGS ABOUT THE OPPOSITE SEX THAT APPEAL TO YOU:

Compassion
Open-mindedness
Fashion sense

THREE THINGS ABOUT THE SAME SEX THAT APPEAL TO YOU:

Loyalty
Strength
Genitalia

THREE THINGS YOU CAN'T DO:

Swim
Knit
Use the washroom (I'm currently constipated)

THREE OF YOUR FAVORITE PASTIMES:

Listening to music
Walking
Staring blankly

THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO REALLY BAD RIGHT NOW:

Eat breakfast (Luke )
Finish filling out this quiz
Drink coffee

THREE CAREERS YOU'RE CONSIDERING:

Software developer
Professor
Subway sandwich artist

THREE PLACES YOU WOULD GO ON VACATION:

France
Cuba, si
Switzerland

THREE THINGS YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE:

Eat breakfast
Get married
Have some juice

2004-11-24T14:27:00.000-05:00

So I guess it was the very next day after I posted last time that I got back my first assignment in my really hard class. It was not a very good mark. It was a mark that has made me wonder if I am going to pass this course. Since then, I've handed in my second assignment, but there was a lot of it I didn't understand, and so I'm expecting another similar mark.

I can't just give up, partly because it was past the drop date when I got back my first assignment, but mostly because I'm only in two courses and I have to pass two to be deemed as making "satisfactory progress." If I don't pass, it's not entirely clear what will happen. I could lose some of my funding and privileges, but it seems like they assess these things on a case-by-case basis. So, I'm not throwing in the towel, but I do find it difficult to muster up any motivation for this course. If I'm lucky, the legend that everyone passes grad school courses as long as they do reasonably well will turn out to be true. I am getting passing grades in the traditional sense (above 50%) although not by much, so hopefully that will scale up to the required B- in the end. The third assignment for the course was posted today, but I wasn't able to bring myself to even read it, let alone start working on it. So I'm doing this instead. Yay! Three cheers. Oh, I also posted my old applets on the Software page.

One more related note to the depressing stuff, and then I'll move on to bluer skies. Because there's a possibility that I could lose some of my funding, I'm putting my new computer project on hold. The barebones kit arrived a few days ago, but I'm doing the responsible thing and not spending any more money to buy the rest of the parts I need until I find out for sure that I can afford it.

I mentioned last time that I could potentially talk about politics, music, and websites I've been reading. Well, I'm skipping the politics part because I think we're all getting tired of complaining about George W. Bush winning the election. I'm not saying that we're not still bitter about it, because we definitely are, but I just feel that everything that could be said about it has already been said, and more eloquently than I could say it.

So, websites I've been reading. Well, there's really just one. It's the personal blog of Jason Mulgrew, a self-proclaimed Internet quasi-celebrity. This man is a comedic genius. I can't even begin to describe why I find him so funny. I recommend that you read just one of his posts, and that will probably be enough to have you permanently hooked. I guess I should mention that he swears and talks about boobies an awful lot. So if you don't find that sort of thing funny, you'll probably want to skip this one.

Oh, I guess there are some other sites I could mention. I recently joined Freecycle TO, which is an online community where people give away free stuff that they don't want via a mailing list. You can also request items, but that gets pretty annoying. So far I haven't found anything I was particularly interested in, but I did use it to get rid of some Gmail invites no one I knew personally wanted. Even though I haven't gotten much out of it, I think it's a great idea. It saves perfectly good things from ending up in the trash. You can find out if there is a group in your area by checking the site freecycle.org. For example, I know there is one in Charlottetown, but it only had 2 members when I checked last. Still, it wouldn't hurt to join and spread the word! Secondly, if you live in the Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, or Vancouver and you want to buy something used or search of other classifieds-type stuff, check out craigslist.org. It's got a plain-Jane interface, but it does the job, and tons of items are posted everyday.

In the past few days, I've been focusing more on holiday music, because I am so looking forward to going home. And hopefully there will be snow, because I love snow! But other than Christmas music, I must recommend a few songs to you:

Rockapella - Semi Charmed Life

Obviously, this is an a cappella cover of the original by Third Eye Blind. And it's very catchy... jem jemma jemma, jemma jemma jemma...

Sarah Slean - Lucky Me

I love pop-rock with a piano. This girl is great. I've only listened to a few other songs of hers, but I liked them as well, so I wish I had checked her out sooner. I still haven't heard enough to know if all her songs are this great, or if she just has really good singles, though.

Kings of Convenience - I'd Rather Dance With You

A friend introduced me to this song via the video on Yahoo's Launch. While the video is quite cute, the song is really great too. Very fun.

Frou Frou - Breathe In

This girl is truly talented. She is considered an electronica artist, but I'm pretty sure that those funny things she does with her voice aren't computer effects. I think it's all natural. In either case, it's a spine-tingling sound. Also, I just love how she says "I'm so spot on."

The Beautiful South - You're the One that I Want

Another cover, this time from Grease. Unlike a lot of other covers, they truly made this their own song, bringing down the tempo significantly and changing the entire mood. At times it feels like it's just going to die because it's going so slowly compared to the original, but it really is a neat song once you get over that.

Anyways, these are all absolutely stellar tracks, so I highly recommend checking them out.

I guess that's all I have for now. Remember, there's still time to get yourself onto Santa's naughty list, so be good!

2004-11-08T14:24:00.000-05:00

Wow, 5 months since my last update. I'm a very, very bad blogger. I apologize. [The rest of this paragraph rambles on about why I haven't been updating, so feel free to skip to the next paragraph.] I guess for awhile, I just didn't have any interest in writing about my life, since there wasn't too much interesting going on. But in the long run, I don't think I want to totally abandon this site. It is fun to have, and often times it's easier to write once about events in my life, rather than retelling them to everyone who is interested (even if that isn't very many people). Oh, and I'm not a fan of mass e-mails. So I guess that's why this works for me, or has worked for me in the past. (Obviously it hasn't been working lately.) People can read it if they wish, and I still try to correspond personally with friends, even if I don't get around to doing so very often.

So, lots has happened since I last updated. I had been living at home for the summer, but I got to Charlottetown often, where I stayed with my sister but hung around with Bride, Chris, Eric, and Aaron practically non-stop. Truly, my summer was awesome. Great friends, great little projects to keep me busy when I was at home, and the prospect of moving to Toronto when it was all over. So many people warned me about moving back in with my parents after living on my own for five years, but it wasn't bad at all. Perhaps it would have been if I'd not been able to get out of the house once in awhile, but for the most part it was nice to spend time with my parents. Not to mention the fact that I had access to a car for the summer! As for the projects I mentioned, they included re-typesetting a (rather long) family genealogy document, re-finishing my parents' kitchen table and chair set, re-finishing an old family tricycle that I'm giving to my nephew for Christmas, and digitizing all the family photo albums. Oh, I also touched up some rusty spots on the car. Even though I got so many things done, I feel like it was a very relaxing summer, and that it should have left me refreshed and ready to tackle grad school.

Well, fast forward to now, and my productivity hasn't been all that great. I moved to Toronto, as I think you all know, to start my masters in computer science at U of T. The city itself is fine, apart from the fact that I still don't really know that many people here. I've been meeting a few people here and there, mostly boys for the purposes of dating. So far I haven't really clicked with anyone. Though plenty seem to have clicked with me, somehow. I really don't see how I'm appealing at all lately!

Basically, I've had a bit of a rough time adjusting to all of this, and I can't even really say that I'm fully adjusted yet. The main thing is that I don't feel that I'm being integrated into the community consisting of the others in my research group. I'm shy. And no one has really made much of an effort to try to get to know me. Not even my supervisor. (But I think she's a bit shy too.) One problem is that I don't have a desk in our lab yet. My desk is still in a generic area with other random graduate students. There is space for me in our lab, but they want to move me in at the same time as they do a shuffling of desk assignments, and that process is taking a long time to complete.

So for now, I'm kind of in my own little world, attending classes and one reading group, and completing my assignments as best I can. Next semester I have a course with my supervisor, so I think that will be the catalyst to opening up our communication. This semester I had a very hard time choosing courses. Finally, I ended up in three courses, but I ended up dropping one about Machine Learning because I was finding it very difficult, and there was no way I was going to get the required B- in the course. So I'm in two courses now: Theory of Distributed Computing and Introduction to Computational Complexity. Both are very theoretical, and the grade in both courses is based solely on assignments. So all my schoolwork consists of proofs. Or devising an algorithm and then proving it correct. And this can be very difficult sometimes, especially if you don't understand why what you're trying to prove is correct. Also, if I want to make satisfactory process towards my degree, I have to pass two courses by the end of this semester, so there is some pressure now.

My only other work involves reading papers for a reading group I attend and TAing. The reading group is actually quite interesting at times, and it's at least getting my feet a little wet in terms of what is out there in my line of research (which I forgot to mention is Computer Systems - things like operating systems, computer architecture, compilers). My TAship only involves marking assignments, tests, and exams. I had to attend a lab session and help students with a Java assignment once, but since then I've had a course conflict with that time. So I'm not doing any teaching as a part of my TAship. Hopefully I will be able to TA next semester as well, because it is fun and it pays very well, but I'm not sure if I'll have the time, since I might take 3 courses, and the 2 courses that I want to take for sure are more applied and involve significant projects.

As I said, I've had a bit of a rough time since I arrived. I've had serious thoughts about quitting on several occasions, and I was quite stressed out for awhile. Dropping the Machine Learning course was a big relief, even though it added the pressure of having to pass my current courses (with a B-). While I continued to be in a rut for awhile after that, more recently I've started maintaining a task list in Outlook of things I want to accomplish, both in school and at home. I find it really helps to motivate me when I can actually check things off. So, I think that for the most part, my bout of depression is over. I still have days when I feel totally disconnected from everything around me, but I'm more relaxed about things now. I don't let the stress get to me as much. It won't be the end of the world if I fail, and moreover, I think I'm more confident now that I won't.

Just this past week, Luke (my roommate) was gone to Taiwan for a conference. I thought that I was going to be quite lonely while he was gone, but actually, this was the week in which I re-instituted to-do lists, and the week just flew by. I think I was fairly productive, too. One thing I'm still struggling with, though, I must mention, is my sleeping pattern. I only have courses two days a week (three if you count reading group), and these are all in the afternoon (12 noon at the earliest), so I've fallen into a pattern of going to bed at 2 am or 3 am and then getting up around 11 am or noon. I'd really like to change this, because I feel that I would be more productive in the mornings. There are fewer distractions, and my brain is fresh, if I've been well rested. One morning I managed to get up at 6:30 am, but in order to do so, Luke and I had to agree that we would get up and go get breakfast at McDonald's. That's right, folks, I had to bribe myself to get out of bed with McDonald's breakfast. Luckily it worked, because I had an assignment due that afternoon that I wasn't quite finished. Of course, I finished it with a few hours to spare, so I could have slept later after all.

Right now, while I am being somewhat productive because updating my website has been on my to-do list for quite some time, I am still in a way procrastinating, because I have assignments to work on, and they should be higher priority than this. However, the good news is that I've gotten a head start on these assignments, so there's not a lot of stress right now pushing me to work on them. I worked out today that if I do one problem every day on these assignments, I'll be finished with 4 or 5 days to spare. So I probably don't have too too much to worry about, as long as I don't hit any snags.

I do plan to update this site more often, but I'm not making any promises. It's definitely more interesting to read when it's about individual daily events I think, rather than about general trends over a long period of time. And I feel like I've left out so many details about the past 5 months. Like, for example, how when I first moved to Toronto, Jeff was still living here, and we got to hang out quite a bit. He moved back to Fredericton around the end of September, and that had quite an impact on my life. Not to sound like a cry baby, but it left me without a friend that I would feel comfortable calling up any time just to hang out. (I mean, other than of course my roommate Luke.) I've made some progress in that area, but as I said before, I really haven't met all that many people that I want to continue spending time with. Wow, that sounds harsh, but it's true. Anyways, in regards to updating more often, another item on my to-do list is to implement some kind of system that will allow me to update this site more easily. Currently I do everything by hand. Can you believe it? Like, I'm supposed to be a programmer. I guess that is why I like to have my own site, rather than using some standard service, because there is quite a bit of JavaScript I've written that makes this site easy for me to maintain, but when I update, I still have to go in and edit files and cut and paste stuff into the archives, and map out which archives exist... so, I could definitely improve that process. Hopefully that will motivate me to post more often, and to post when funny observations about life strike me. Can't say that it happens all that often, but when it does, I tend to forget about it before I get around to posting.

I should also mention that a problem of using these to-do lists is that they make me ambitious, and things tend to balloon out of control. So I find myself constantly adding more items, and in turn, that means it's going to take me longer to get around to doing all of them. But in time, I think they'll get done.

Nearly forgot to mention... I'm building myself a second computer! I love my ThinkPad, but the system software came pre-installed on the hard drive, with no backup disks. Now, I would really like to have Linux installed at home so I can experiment, but I'm too afraid to mess up my hard drive and lose all my stuff in XP. So, after considering buying a larger hard drive for my ThinkPad and copying my partitions onto it, and then creating new ones for Linux, I decided that a separate computer would be better. And after considering buying an old used one, I decided it would be more fun to build a new computer. I'm getting a "barebones PC kit" which includes the case and power supply and a motherboard with lots of onboard features, like integrated VGA, audio, and LAN. I found one I liked at an online computer store, but then I found a slightly cheaper one on eBay. The case is a small form factor XPC from Shuttle, as shown. Pretty sweet looking, eh? You can even buy faceplates in other fun colours. I'd like to get a red one eventually. Now I just have to get a CPU, hard drive, RAM, optical drive, monitor, mouse, and keyboard. It's going to cost me a little over $1000 (with a crappy monitor, mouse, and keyboard for now), so I think that's pretty good for a computer with reasonable specs that could be very useful to me in my research. I think having my own computer running several distributions of Linux/UNIX will make me more comfortable in experimenting with things.

Once I get this computer up and running, it will be the fourth computer I have owned in my lifetime. Not so many for a computer scientist. My first was a Laser 486SX handed down to me from my brother-in-law. I never named that computer, but since then I've made a tradition of naming them all. My Compaq Presario 5330 with AMD K6-2 380MHz processor was affectionately called Penelope, and I refer to my IBM ThinkPad R40 with Intel Pentium 4-M 2.2GHz processor as Ajax. You can probably guess where I'm going with this... I already have a name picked out for my ShuttleX PC. It's inspired by the very small size of the system, and by Issue 7 of Teen Girl Squad. Yes, I'm going to call him Tompkins. (The Compaq, which I handed down to my sister, is a girl, but since then, my computers have been gay males. Yes, that's right, I give my computers names and sexual orientations. Hmmm, I'm thinking I might need a lesbian computer next.)

Well, I could go on about other topics, such as politics, music that I've been listening to, websites I've been reading, etc., but I'm getting tired, and I think this is enough for now. I don't want to strain any blogging-related muscles... you know, since it's been 5 months ;) See you all at the zoo!

2004-06-15T14:33:00.000-04:00

Tuesday, June 15, 2004

Today I was sitting in the living room when I heard Sarah Connor's "Bounce" playing on the radio in the kitchen. My mom and dad are the kind of people who have liked the same songs for 30 years. They always listen to country stations, except for this French station from Shediac that plays a mix of every type of music. So I wander out into the kitchen.

ME: You guys must know all the popular songs from listening to this station.

DAD: *is hard of hearing*

DAD: What?

ME: I said, you guys must know all the popular songs from listening to this station.

DAD: Oh, we don't pay much attention.

DAD: *turns off radio*

So, I think I've established before that I'm kind of political lately. Mom has been harping about it constantly. "Kevin, into politics! What next?" Anyways, for me the biggest issue is gay marriage. All the other issues are important too of course... education, health care, the environment... but really, no one is going to screw those up that badly. Now, I'm not the type who sends post cards to politicians or attends protests or anything like that. I guess I'm just not at the level of comfort with my sexuality that I'd need to put my name out there like that. (Though I have been tempted on several occasions to write in to the CBC and share my opinion.)

I'm getting to the point, really, I am. So I was watching this item on CBC where one of their handsome male reporters (and they do have so many of them, eh Jeff ;)... hehe, I'm kidding, sorry) was out and about interviewing people on the topic of same-sex marriage. It was Mark Kelley, who is cute enough, though I'd prefer David Common or even Cameron MacIntosh. Anyways, Mark found a whole lot of people who said to them it wasn't even an issue, and that they didn't understand why so many political parties were even addressing it. I understand that many Canadians couldn't care less, since this issue doesn't affect them directly. But the thing that made me angry was that some of them explained that the reason they felt that it isn't an issue is because it's not the government's mandate to deal with moral issues. On the one hand - WTF, are you calling gay sex a mortal sin activity? But no, that's not what gets me mad. The problem is that the way the legislation is written currently, the government is restricting marriage to a man and a woman, which is clearly messing with morality. So if these people truly believe that the goverment should not legislate morality, then they should be fighting to have this law removed or replaced with one that does not discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.

Oh Luke, turns out I'm Windows 98. I think once I was Windows CE... the PocketPC OS. Must be my bachelor's degree that made the difference

Which OS are You?

So then I took the test again, because there were many questions where two answers were appropriate.

Which OS are You?

Even the most patriotic of IBMers know that this is not something to be congratulated about. So what does this teach us? Don't mess with fate. Or Mojo Jojo. He's a cruel little fucker.

I watched the debate tonight of the major federal party leaders. It was quite interesting. Well, not so much during the debate, but the commentary afterwards. I could totally see where most people were coming from. But now, my cold has moved into my right ear. Yikes, eh! And it's getting late, so I think I'd better get to bed. G'night y'all!

2004-06-11T14:30:00.000-04:00

So where were we? Oh yes, my living situation. I moved out of my apartment at the Mayflower with Nick at the end of April. At this point classes were over of course, but since I still had stuff to do to get ready for convocation, I stayed at my sister's place in North River for the first week of May. My convocation was on Saturday, May 8 in the afternoon. The ceremony was kind of boring and it wasn't exactly a classy celebration. When I got a program, I was disappointed to see that I hadn't won the Governor General's medal. Basically I came in second place. I know a lot of people would probably think it funny that I was disappointed, but I was. Eventually though, I realized that the winner was from the Faculty of Arts, and that made me feel better since Arts and Sciences are basically two different worlds. On the one hand, I was thinking this guy must be brilliant since it's really hard to get good marks in Arts, and on the other I figured that we're in different realms. The whole thing got me to thinking. People probably think that I've been pushed by my family to do well, but the truth is that my parents barely say anything about it, and they'd be proud of me no matter what. If there is any external pressure on me, it stems from the fact that I've always done well and it's come to be expected. But really, I'm the one who places such high expectations on myself. And I guess that's why I do so well.

Anyways, I won some monetary prizes, which is always nice. I got $500 for being the top computer science student, $200 for being the top science student, and another $200 for having the highest aggregate in a faculty other than that of the Governor General's medal winner.

After convocation, I headed home to St. Hubert with my parents, where I'm living for the summer. Luke and I hope to find a place in Toronto for August, so I'm only here for a bit over a month and a half.

Luckily I was able to get a dial-up internet account here, so that gives me a way to pass the time. It was a bit difficult to do, given the whole Aliant strike, but I was only home a couple days before I got it. Besides surfing and chatting at a snail's pace, I have a few projects that I've been working on since I got here. The first was to digitally edit my graduation photo. My sister took a really great picture of me, but it had a black background. So I masked myself and put in a patchy navy blue background. I also removed glare from my glasses and did a few other minor touch ups. I'll put it in the photos section so you can see it, in the Me category.

Another project I've been working on is refinishing my parents' kitchen chairs and table. I completely finished 4 of the chairs, and now I'm working on the 2 remaining chairs the table legs. The table top has always been covered with a table cloth and is in mint condition, so I'm not touching it.

I recall writing about some other things I wanted to do this summer. So far I haven't done much on those fronts... I've been on 4 bike rides, and I played my keyboard one day for a couple of hours. Haven't done any programming. I find that I don't do much computing other than chatting. It's hard to just ignore my parents and do stuff on my own when they seem so happy to have my company. Lately I have described my life as being on pause. I don't do much, and the days pretty much run together. I came up with a theory today though. I think I need to feel independent and in charge of my life in order to feel that I'm living. I certainly don't feel that way when I'm living under someone else's roof.

Oh, story! One day at home, I was looking at this picture frame on the wall, filled with a bunch of paper clippings. At the top, it says "30 Years of Memories" - it was a gift from my sisters and me for my parents on their 30th wedding anniversary. Anyways, the clippings have memories on them. After reading for awhile, I noticed a theme. A couple of my memories had to do with Mom tricking me! When I was little and my ears were dirty, I never wanted my mother to clean them. So she would tell me that I had raccoons in my ears, and she had to get them out. Worked like a charm every time. How stupid was I? The other memory was from my sister Paulette's first day of school. You see, I am the youngest, so growing up, I had to watch my sisters go off to school everyday and be left with Mom. Jeanne was the first to go, and if I had been older I'm sure I would have been very very upset, because I was just in love with her. She took care of me and played with me all the time. But when I was a bit older, Paulette went to school, leaving me with no one to play with. So I went on a hunger strike. Yes, I refused to eat. And I was like 2. So my Mother, being the cunning lady that she is, made a sandwich "for herself," set it up in front of her rocking chair in the living room, and told me not to dare touch it because she was "very hungry." She then left the room and waited until she heard me giggling, at which point she came back to find that I had devoured "her" sandwich, just as she planned.

I've started reading the Harry Potter books. So far I'm about two thirds through The Philosopher's Stone. This comes just after I saw The Prisoner of Azkaban movie twice. Once on opening night, and again a few days later. It's so great. I wish I was a brilliant boy wizard. If you've seen the movie, you have to read this parody that Amy told me about. It'll have you rolling on the floor.

I guess that's all the news I have for now. Quite awhile ago, I took some online quizzes. Here are the results:

You're The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe!

by C.S. Lewis

You were just looking for some decent clothes when everything changed
quite dramatically. For the better or for the worse, it is still hard to tell. Now it
seems like winter will never end and you feel cursed. Soon there will be an epic
struggle between two forces in your life and you are very concerned about a betrayal
that could turn the balance. If this makes it sound like you're re-enacting Christian
theological events, that may or may not be coincidence. When in doubt, put your trust
in zoo animals.

Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

You're Madagascar!

Lots of people don't really know anything about you, making you
buried treasure of the rarest kind. You love nature, and could get lost in it
whenever possible. You're remote and exotic, and the few people who know you
value whatever they share with you a great deal. For some reason, you really
like the word "lemur".
Take
the Country Quiz at the Blue Pyramid

The Headphone Fiasco

2004-05-11T14:37:00.000-04:00

The Headphone Fiasco or A Review of JVC HA-B20-SL Headphones or A Review of JVC HA-B25 Headphones or A Review of Philips EARGEAR HS810 Headphones

Most of you have probably heard about my headphone fiasco by now, but I still feel the need to write about it. Also, I didn't really find many reviews of these headphones on the web, so I thought they might be useful to someone. (Hence all the titles.)

It all started earlier this spring when I was listening to music on my headphones when one speaker suddenly stopped working. I wiggled the cord and determined that there was a loose connection inside the junction where the cord met the neckband. At the time I was using a pair of JVC HA-B20-SL headphones. I had bought them in Toronto about a year before at the Bay, if I remember correctly, and I thought they were absolutely the best headphones in the world. As you can see, they were behind-the-head style, so they didn't mess up my hair, and they had nice cushy padding instead of cheap foam. They also had incredible sound quality and great bass. Well, I was determined to save these headphones, so the next time I was at my parents' place, I cut them apart and tried to solder the broken wire back together. This turned out to be a difficult job, because each insulated cord actually contains two wires that are coated with a special substance so they don't short circuit. So I had to melt this stuff with the soldering iron, and then solder the wires together and insulate them from each other (because of course the solder joints can't touch each other like the coated wires can). At a few points I had both speakers working again, but everytime I tried to package it all up, the connections would break. Eventually I ran out of wire and patience.

So after a bit of looking around, I decided to purchase a pair of JVC HA-B25s. I had the blue pair. The model I had didn't seem to be available any more, and this seemed to be the successor to it. I figured the actual speakers would be identical, but they weren't. The new model has way more base than the old model. With the old model, I normally used the bass boost feature on my CD player, but the new model was equally bassy with this feature turned off. Now, that wouldn't be a bad thing, except that the sound wasn't just more bassy... the tone of the music was much more dull. The new headphones weren't nearly as crisp sounding as the old ones. Basically, JVC sacrificed the mids and highs for booming bass, and I found that extremely disappointing.

I returned that pair of headphones and searched around for a pair with a behind-the-head band, good padding instead of that foam crap, and good sound. Eventually I found these Philips EARGEAR HS810 headphones on the web, which seemed to fit all the requirements. They have a nice fabric finishing on the speakers... light shiny metallic blue on the outside, and a darker blue on the ear-side. At first I was convinced that they are not available in North America, so I found a pair on eBay and bought them. But since then I have seen similar Philips headphones at Wal-Mart, and the packaging had UK/US specs on it. I hope they are just available in the UK though... I like to think I'm going to look unique walking down the street in Toronto wearing these. Anyways, I'm quite happy with them. The sound quality is on par with that original pair of JVCs I had that I loved so much, and they look so snazzy. They're like a work of art. Even the mini-plug has a custom sculpted shape with "Philips" stamped on it, and it, along with the cord, is blue, I might add. There is also a tag hanging off the right speaker (kind of like the red tab on Levi's jeans, only not red) which I enjoy. It's just another fine detail that makes these things cool. The headphones fold up for compact storage, and they have neodymium drivers, giving them great bass and clear sound.

2004-05-10T14:36:00.000-04:00

Wow... so yet again I missed a whole month between posts, and it has been nearly two months since the last one. A lot of things have happened since then. So instead of writing one giant entry that would bore everyone half to death, I'm going to break it up into several shorter ones. In today's episode, we revisit politics and the grad school application process.

If you recall, I ranted about being annoyed with the Paul Martin Liberals and wanting Belinda Stronach to win the New Conservative Party leadership. Well, the Liberals are still in power, and Belinda lost to Stephen Harper. Stephen is much more right-wing, whereas Belinda is more of a "Red Tory," and the party is bound to be influenced by the beliefs of its leader. Essentially, this leaves me with no choices in the next election. I don't like either of the two major alternatives very much, and voting for the NDP is not very realistic. So I may just abstain from voting. I imagine a lot of people feel the same way. And the funny thing is that I think a similar situation is happening in the states. People aren't happy with George Bush, but it's not clear that John Kerry would be all that much better. But time will tell. Okay, enough about politics.

Last time I wrote, I had been accepted to UBC. Since then, I have been accepted to U of A, McGill, and U of T. Also, my NSERC scholarship application was approved. So, I'm all set! I took a bit of time to make my decision, because in addition to the scholarship, most schools offer some top-up money. U of T has a pretty good package, but go figure - Alberta's was better. At first it just seemed ridiculous to turn down free money, and my perception of the computing science program at U of A was very good. However, in the end I couldn't see myself living in Edmonton, and Toronto had been my first choice all along. So that's where I'm going!

I've talked with some professors from U of T, and it looks like I'll be in the Computer Systems group. They do research in computer architecture, operating systems, compilers, parallel computing, and other related areas. Many people cringe when I tell them about this, but for me, it's right up my alley. I am a little nervous about school, but I have the whole summer to brush up on any topics I'm weak on. I'm also a bit nervous about it just because I haven't received much information from the school yet. (All the other schools had sent me big information packages.) But again, lots of time before I have to register and stuff.

And that's all I have to say about politics and grad school. More updates coming very soon!

2004-03-08T14:48:00.000-05:00

Over the past couple days I have taken a stronger-than-usual interest in politics. Perhaps this is just because it's the most interesting thing in the news right now.

First off, I was outraged this weekend to see Sheila Copps lose her nomination for the riding of Hamilton East - Stoney Creek. She lost against Tony Valeri, Martin's Transport Minister. For some reason, I just really like her, so to I was disappointed. She has been representing that riding for 20 years. She's just a part of Canadian politics, plain and simple. Now, it wouldn't be so bad, except that the results were apparently VERY close. So close in fact, that they haven't released the official vote count. I smell corruption. Rumor has it the margin was only 300 votes, and the Copps Campaign is aware of at least 400 of their voters that were not permitted to vote for trivial reasons. Also, there were 20 spoiled ballots. Sheila may contest the results, but if it's a party matter, and if there is a conspiracy within the Liberal party to get rid of her, she probably won't be successful.

Now this is what takes the case. In a similar situation where two Liberals were competing for the nomination in a re-zoned riding, the Paul Martin supporter, Carolyn Parrish, also won. Again, there were voting irregularities. For example, the officers conducting the vote challenged the other cadidate's wife's signature. Idiocy! Idiocy!

So, as perhaps you can tell, I've never really liked Paul Martin anyways. I do, however, like Belinda Stronach. On to political issue number two...

I can't believe that Stephen Harper and Tony Clement teamed up to criticize Belinda because she doesn't speak French! Last I heard, Belinda was leading in Quebec and New Brunswick, so apparently this isn't an issue with voters. Nor should it be. I'm sure she will learn French as quickly as she can if elected, and there are always translators to be used until she's fluent.

Another thing that makes me angry is Stephen Harper's website. It accuses Belinda of using negative campaigning against Stephen Harper. I haven't heard anything about this, or seen any disparaging comments about the other candidates on her website. The articles on Harper's site are extremely sarcastic, and they go on to question the accuracy of statements Belinda apparently made, all the while blatantly insulting her intelligence. Now, wasn't this supposed to be an article about how negative campaigning is wrong? This rubbish is just negative campaigning in disguise, and not a very good disguise if you ask me.

So all of this political mayhem made me really want to vote for Belinda. However, I missed the deadline to join the New Conservative Party by a week. I mean, I could still join, but I couldn't vote for her on March 20th. The membership is only $10 too! Then again, right now her numbers aren't looking great. Conservatives must be a bit stupid to be putting their support behind Stephen Harper, because I believe Belinda is correct when she says that she is the only candidate who has any chance of winning a federal election, because of her broad-based support. Stephen Harper has already failed once as a leader of the Canadian Alliance. So, on the plus side for not getting my membership early enough is that I don't run the risk of belonging to a party of which Stephen Harper is the leader! Ha! Take that, Mr. Harper! "Defeatist attitude" indeed.

I'm also wondering which leaders support same-sex marriage. I can't find anything directly from Belinda about the issue on her site, but the comments from visitors suggest that she thinks it is a fundamental human right but respects the views of everyone, since this is just her own opinion. I guess that's probably the best view out of all the potential leaders of the country. I will have to check with Luke, my political correspondent, for any information he may have on this topic. www.equalmarriage.ca may also have information on it, I suppose.

Okay, I'm sick of politics now. But more updates on the way real soon! Laterz.

2004-03-05T14:40:00.000-05:00

Wow, I totally missed February. But I think we're all better off for it. There was nothing interesting to talk about in February really. There isn't really much to talk about now either. I'm still very busy with school, although my stress level is a lot lower. In one way this is good, because I'm not as stressed out. However, I am also not being productive enough. The past few days I've only been working on things that are due really soon. I'm sure everything will work out okay in the end though. The semester will be over before I know it.

Unfortunately I haven't heard much about grad schools yet. I got in to UBC, but I still haven't heard from U of T, U of A, or McGill, nor from NSERC about the scholarship I applied for. Nevertheless, I'm optimistic that I will get NSERC funding. Also, I filed my income tax a few days ago, and I am due for a really big refund.

Where am I going with all of this? Well, since my finances are looking okay, I'm pretty sure I'm just going to move home for the summer and not work for once. I could really use a break from a structured work environment for awhile. Even so, I have big plans for the summer. They're all personal goals, so I'm not going to put too too much pressure on myself to achieve them. Plus my mother has lots of projects for me too, so I don't know that there'll be time to accomplish everything. But here's a run down of the main areas of my life I want to focus on and enhance this summer:

Cycling
I want to try to be out on my bike probably at least 3 times a week, for rides of 20+ km. It feels like it has been so long since I went on a good bike ride. I also hope to get in good enough shape that I can do a trip to Grand Tracadie to visit with my sister, brother-in-law, and new nephew. A few years ago (oh my gosh... it was 4 years!) I biked from Charlottetown to Richmond along the Trans Canada. It was a very long ride, but I did it, and I wasn't even really all that prepared. This one is longer, but I know I could do it with a bit of preparation. I forget exactly how long that ride was. I think aroun 90 km, though I don't have my cycling log with me so I can't check to be sure.

Music
I haven't had much time over this past school year to practice playing piano. I want to get through my grade two (hee!) piano book and learn to play all of the songs in my Vanessa Carlton songbook. Another thing I've been wanting to do is to write a Java application that will allow me to save the data on my keyboard to my computer. Why would I want to do this? Well, the keyboard loses it's memory if it's unplugged, so if you want to store anything long term you need a song filer. (Yamaha sells hardware for this, but I'm pretty sure I can implement the same functionality in software.) Finally, I want to write a song. I have written some short themes in the past, and I was quite pleased with how they turned out. This time though, I want to write a piece with lyrics, which will definitely be the hardest part for me. Hopefully I can write this software, and then I'll be able to try things out on my keyboard and save as many musical ideas as I want.

Computer Science
Another thing I want to do this summer is bite the bullet and learn C++. It's not that it's hard or anything. I just haven't taken the time to learn it, because I usually have the option to do things in straight C. Another thing I hope to do is review some CS concepts, especially any that I will need to know well for whatever courses I think I'll be taking in grad school.

I guess that's all I can think of for now. There are a few more little things I want to get done, but I won't bore you with the details. If I come up with anything else that is significant, I'll rant about it lately.

I'm going to finish up with some quiz results. Basically a personality test that gives you your Keirsey Temperament Sorter personality type. Once again I came up INTJ. For awhile I was getting something else on other tests. I forget what. Anyways, it's kind of interesting-ish...

Extroverted (E) 50% Introverted (I) 50%
Realistic (S) 50% Imaginative (N) 50%
Intellectual (T) 62.5% Emotional (F) 37.5%
Organized (J) 57.89% Easygoing (P) 42.11%

Your type is: INTJ

You are a Planner, possible professions include - management consultant, economist, scientist, computer programmer, environmental planner, new business developer, curriculum designer, administrator, mathematician, psychologist, neurologist, biomedical researcher, strategic planner, civil engineer, intellectual properties attorney, designer, editor/art director, inventor, informational-graphics designer, financial planner, judge.

Take Free Career Inventory Personality Test

2004-01-30T14:52:00.000-05:00

Receptionist: Hello. May I ask who is calling?

Caller: Personal life.

Receptionist: Please hold.

Year in Review

2004-01-13T14:49:00.000-05:00

Year in Review (or The Saga of Kevin and Jeff)

Sarah just burnt vegetables. Yucky. Anyways, I've decided to do a Year in Review entry, looking back at the trials and tribulations of 2003, not to mention the joys and jocularity - such as my introduction to HomestarRunner.com!

January of 2003 was a very cold month, just as it is shaping up to be this year. January was probably the most eventful month of the year - I moved to Toronto on Friday the 3rd to start my work term with IBM. Although I arrived in the middle of a snow storm, I wasn't really nervous about being there. It soon felt like home. Soon after I started at IBM, I met two very great friends - Mo and Noella. By the end of January, we were eating lunch and playing Scrabble together every day.

Okay, so I'm going to have to give my secret away... my memory sucks, so my plan was to re-read my journal entries over the year to see what happened each month. Turns out I didn't have any entries in that month. Okay. Well, I do remember that on Valentine's Day Jeff and I had a super expensive meal at Hair of the Dog. It was a Valentine's Day special, complete with a three-course meal and a bottle of wine. I forget exactly how much it cost... I think somewhere well over $100. Anyways, it was surely the most expensive meal I'd ever had. It was a very special evening though. Truly romantic.

March was a somewhat depressing month, apparently. I was feeling annoyed by the idea that living in Toronto would be a temporary thing, and I was somewhat frustrated by the lack of feedback and a sense of belonging at work. So along came the angsty punk song. On the plus side, I filed my income tax in this month and awaited a huge return.

April was a bit better, not so much on the work side of things, but just for my outlook on life in general. I placed my order for Ajax, my ThinkPad R40 computer during this month. Jeff and I were supposed to take Mo out to 5ive one night for dancing, but when the night came, we were tired and decided to watch Waking Life. Advice: do not watch this movie if you are tired. I could absolutely not stay awake. I'm not sure if I could even stay awake during it after several cups of coffee, but what do I know? I didn't really see much of the movie! Oh, I also went home for a few days over Easter weekend and thoroughly enjoyed myself.

In May, Mo left IBM to go back to Waterloo. Daily life at IBM would never be the same again. I also changed teams at work, so that was another adjustment. May was probably the most drama-filled month, with Jeff and me breaking up for the first time on May 12th. Ajax arrived in late May, nearly a month after I'd ordered him. I also met my friend Jordan in this month, and he introduced me to Tallulah's Cabaret at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, otherwise known as just Buddies.

There was more relationship drama in June, oh yes there was. We got back together on the 5th, broke up again on the 11th, then got back together on the 14th. I think Jeff described it as a "roller coaster."

In July, Jeff and I broke up for the last time, on the 12th to be exact, after a huge-ass fight. We were on speaking terms again, however, by the end of the month and got to hang out once before Jeff went to Fredericton for the rest of the summer. July was also the month that started my Canadian Idol obsession.

Jocelyn visited me in August as part of a two-city tour of Ontario (she also visited Andrew in Kingston). In July I worried a lot about my future, in particular about where I would live when I got back to Charlottetown. There were potential plans for getting an apartment with Luke for awhile, but they didn't pan out. I also had to pack up all my belongings and mail them back to PEI, as I headed back home on August 30th.

September was rough. I was living with my sister for the first couple weeks because I hadn't found a place to stay. We got along fine, but it was a bit annoying because I always had to get a ride to campus in the morning and then stay there until the end of the working day. After that I moved in with Nick and Sarah at the Mayflower, the same building I'd always lived at before - the most convenient location in Charlottetown, really. My grandfather passed away in September, at nearly 98 years old. But the rest of the month was better. I only had 4 courses, but I really put my all into them, making it into one of my toughest and busiest semesters ever. The outcome was very rewarding - I got great marks, and prepared an NSERC PGS-M application that successfully competed with my peers at UPEI and was forwarded on to the national level. I also bought my Canon MultiPass F20, which has proved to be a very useful tool, and I helped to revitalize the UPEI Rainbow Alliance. Of course, everyone was blown away by Hurricane Juan at the end of the month.

October was the other month in which I didn't happen to update my journal. Ooops. I do remember, however, that on Halloween I dressed as my heroine, the ugly one from Teen Girl Squad.

In November I went to visit Jocelyn in Halifax. It was bitterly cold on that weekend. And the rest of the month was rather blah. I was sick a lot of the time and depressed, but my business with school kept my mind off of it somewhat.

Classes were over very early in December (the 3rd I believe), but I still had 3 exams and a huge research paper to write. I got through it all somehow, but when I was finished, I still had something to stress about - Christmas! I still had all my shopping to do, but it turned out to be pretty easy actually, and I got some help on the shopping from Jocelyn. The biggest thing that happened in December, for everyone in my family, was the early birth of my nephew, Emery Charles, on December 20th. Christmas plans were a bit altered, but no one minded much. We spent Christmas Eve and most of Christmas Day at my sister Jeanne's place in Cornwall, and although Emery wasn't out of the hospital yet, Paulette (his mommy) got to come eat dinner with us on Christmas Eve and then come open gifts with us in the morning. I finally got to see Emery again on Saturday, and I can assure you he is just adorable! And my sister told me today that he has gained a full pound since he was born!

That brings me to 2004. So far 2004 has been unlike any other year. I wasn't really ready to go back to school, but after a week of classes, I'm pretty much into the swing of things again. Well, almost anyways. I have 5 fairly demanding courses, and I also took on a part time research assistant job so it's going to be another busy semester. Things were tense on campus the first few days, and still are to some extent. The UPEIFA (Faculty Association) has been trying to negotiate a collective agreement for the professors without much success. A strike is a possibility sometime this semester. The following cartoon appeared in the Cadre (our student newspaper). It was submitted by an anonymous student, and the people in the drawing are not meant to resemble any particular individuals. Now, I find this cartoon extremely amusing. I must mention, however, that it certainly does not reflect my opinion. After all, the UPEIFA is the sponsor of my scholarship!

Isn't that great? In one way, it's a bit annoying, because of the assumption that anal sex is not enjoyable, but if you just take it to be saying that the UPEIFA is screwing the students of UPEI... well, it's a humorous way of saying that. Do I think it's true? Not really. If they strike, it will have a negative impact on students, but I believe they deserve what they are asking for. Nevertheless, their demands, though fair, will be extremely difficult to meet on the current university budget, so I think they may well resort to a strike.

One final note on the cartoon - I still keep wondering why the administration isn't represented in this drawing. I mean, hello! Threesome!

2003-12-11T16:00:00.000-05:00

Everyone imagines possible scenarios and their potential outcomes, right? Well, tonight I was thinking about what might happen when my parents visit tomorrow morning. One possible scenario goes like this. After my parents arrive, Sarah comes down from the loft wearing only a nightie, and Devin follows behind. This leads to the following exchange between my mother and I:

Mom (glancing at Devin and whispering loudly into my ear): Who's THAT?

Me: Oh, that's just Sarah's Phoenician love slave.

At this point I was quite amused, but then I began to doubt the plausibility of this statement. After all, what the heck is a Phoenician, and what does one look like? This lead to the following revised exchange:

Mom (glancing at Devin and whispering loudly into my ear): Who's THAT?

Me: Oh, that's just Sarah's Irish love slave.

I slay me. I mean really... the concept of an Irish love slave just makes me giggle. Gosh, sometimes I'm a real hoot.

And then it occurred to me, no really, what the heck is a Phoenician? At first I was afraid I had had a mental lapse, and I was really thinking of a person from Venice, but then the Internet saved the day and explained to me that a Phoenician was someone from ancient Phoenicia. You know what they say - if it's not on the Internet, it doesn't exist.

Peace out!

2003-12-10T15:59:00.000-05:00

I have been reading for my term paper nearly all day, and I've finally come to the end of the day, where I hang out on the net for awhile before sleep. Oddly, there aren't many people online.

I was bored, so I took an online quiz that I saw on a friend's website. Though I don't usually do this, I feel like posting my results. The quiz gives you ratings for a number of different personality disorders, suggesting which ones you may suffer from. As you can see, what I should be concerned about is my Histrionic rating, which indicates an excessive need for attention. Is this me? I can't decide. Some of my other ratings suggest a bit of anti-socialism, which doesn't seem to fit with a need for attention. What do you think?

Disorder	Rating
Paranoid:	Moderate
Schizoid:	Low
Schizotypal:	Moderate
Antisocial:	Moderate
Borderline:	Low
Histrionic:	High
Narcissistic:	Moderate
Avoidant:	Low
Dependent:	Low
Obsessive-Compulsive:	Moderate
-- Personality Disorder Test - Take It! --

2003-12-10T11:42:00.000-05:00

Well, it's not quite 8 am, and I'm on a bus somewhere just outside of Dartmouth. I went to Halifax this past weekend to visit Jocelyn. It was a well deserved break from school.

Since I don't have any classes on Fridays, I left from PEI first thing on Friday morning. I have so much school stuff to do lately that I had to work really hard last week in order to take the weekend off, and I will have to work hard again this week to catch up. Given the circumstances, I was extremely sleep-deprived, so I slept for most of the bus ride, waking up after crossing the bridge, then again at Port Elgin, then again at Aulac. The trip went by quite quickly. Eventually I wrote a few e-mails and stuff, although the ride was kind of rough, and I joked to myself that the bus company should change is slogan to "Acadian Lines: We Never Said the Ride Would Be Smooth!" or something along that lines. Anyways, the bus I'm on right now has these big headrests that seem like they would hold your head up. (On the way here, my head kept falling over, and I'd wake up. I'm so not used to sleeping in chairs.) Hmm, I just looked out the window and saw the moon. It's close to the horizon, really big, and pale cause it's day time. Apparently there was a lunar eclipse on Saturday night. We were too drunk to care, but I'll get to that eventually...

Jocelyn met me at the bus station on Friday afternoon. After dropping my stuff off at her place, we went to Dal campus for a bit so that Jocelyn could check her e-mail and stuff. There we ran into her friend Luke. (This would become a common theme.) Luke said I looked really familiar, and that he thought we must have a mutual friend or something. I pondered about this for a bit, but we didn't discuss it further. Eventually we got some Subway. I hadn't had any in ages, but it was good, and I think I might get some as soon as I get back in Charlottetown, cause it was quite good, and I'm going to be very hungry by then I think. So where was I? Jocelyn and I were both quite tired. We lazed around for most of the afternoon/evening. I got hungry and needed McDonald's at some point. I think that's when we picked up that bottle of wine. Hehe. Because earlier, I had called up my friend Craig to tell him I was in town, and he said that he might be going to NRG later that evening. So Jocelyn and I prepared ourselves for dancing with a bit of wine. Oh, I also called up my friend Troy to tell him where we were going. As well, I called Jake, this boy I had met online who I was supposed to meet at some point. Turns out he was heading to NRG anyways.

Oh, I forgot to mention that at some point on Friday afternoon, Jocelyn and I had stopped at the Second Cup for coffee. After a few minutes, the girl who was serving us turned to me and said "Is your name Kevin?" She went on to explain that names often just pop into her head, and then it drives her nuts trying to figure out how she knows the person. Well, after a few minutes, we determined that she had gone to UPEI for a year, and I had met her in the community on the Island.

Well, sure enough this girl was at NRG, and that was only the beginning. I knew like EVERYONE there. There were several people there from PEI, and many I recognized from the big gay ski trip to Wentworth a couple years ago. I also remembered a bunch of Craig's friends. Actually, when I had called Craig earlier, I had a hunch that Luke was one of his friends, so sure enough that was the case, and it turned out I had gone to a party at his place with Craig back when I visited, at some point in history. Boy my memory is fuzzy... I just tend to say everything was "a couple years ago."

I am so bad when I'm drunk, I tell you. I went up to this guy from PEI, cause it was bugging me... you see, I was pretty sure I knew who he was, but I don't really know him that well. So eventually I built up the courage to talk to him, and I struck up a conversation. We talked all about a fiasco I'd had with an ex boyfriend of his last month. (Which reminds me, I haven't written here in over a month. My sincere apologies. I'm sure you've all heard all the stories anyways though.) Now here comes the bad part. After some time, I said to him something like, "You look great, by the way! I guess that's why I wasn't sure if it was you or not at first." Yeah. Perhaps this is why he stole my boy later in the evening.

Stole my boy, you ask? Well okay, not exactly. This online-guy I'd mentioned, Jake... well, he eventually showed up, and as soon as I saw him I ran over to introduce myself. Then I asked if he wanted to come meet my friends, and he said that he'd just arrived and he wanted to walk around a bit first. I was a bit put off, so I just left and went to dance with Craig and Jocelyn. I didn't see Jake again for a very long time, and I assumed he'd left. But eventually I found him again, and I asked if he'd been avoiding me. I said it was okay if he was but that I'd appreciate it if he'd just admit it. Well, of course he didn't, so I was all happy again. And then the guy from PEI whom I'd been chatting with asked Jake to dance, and I never talked to either of them again.

On the way to get pizza afterwards, Jake and his friends were in front of us. I was so tempted to call out "Bye-bye Jake!" sarcastically, but I restrained myself on Jocelyn and Luke's advice. In the end, I figure he didn't like my voice. And I guess that's okay. I can be shallow, too, sometimes. But I'll keep my bitter sentiments to myself. Besides, it's not like I truly held out much hope for anything to come of this. He lives in Halifax anyways, and he's only 20 years old. I've gained, like, 10 years worth of mental maturity in the time since I was 20. Heh. I amuse myself.

Saturday was the day of rest. Jocelyn and I didn't get out of bed until 4 pm. Her bed is like heaven. It doesn't even have any extra padding on top, and it's not a pillow-top mattress, but it's just so comfortable. That evening we met Craig for dinner at Gatsby's before meeting a bunch of people from Jocelyn's program at a pub. Well, that was the plan anyways, but the place was packed, and they weren't there yet, so we ended up going somewhere else. We found Troy at the Second Cup on his way there, so that was very convenient. After a mini pub crawl from the Thirsty Duck back to the Fireside (where we were supposed to meet originally) and then to the Economy Shoe Shop, we headed to Reflections. It was still only 11, and the place was empty, except for a drag queen named Star 69 impersonating Barbara Streisand. We immediately hit the bar (Jocelyn, Troy, and I at this point) and had fun joking around with the bar tender. I tried the new Red Rev, even though the bar tenders had heard it tasted like cough syrup. Turns out they were right, but I just had to try it.

I don't really remember a whole lot of the evening before it started picking up and we started hitting the dancefloor. For sure, the highlight of the evening was when I decided to use the "Hey Baby" route with some cute guy I had been watching. Well, it worked, and we even made out for a bit. He tasted like beer and cigarettes, but he had a hot little body. So other than the inevitable result of me feeling like a drunken slut, it was good times.

We stayed at Reflections until around 3:30 am. We also got pizza again with Luke, so we figure it must have been 5 am when we got to bed. We had arranged to meet Craig and his boyfriend Kyle for breakfast at 11 on Sunday morning. Despite us having issues finding the keys to the apartment in the morning and The Med not having a sign out front, Jocelyn and I found the place and were only 3 minutes late. Kyle and Craig were truly shocked to see us there. I suppose we did look a little disheveled. Did I mention that it was extremely cold out for most of the weekend? My winter jacket should be waiting for me now in Charlottetown, thank goodness.

Sunday was also a bit more sedate than is usual. We knew we had to get up early since I had to catch this early bus and Jocelyn had class, but we didn't want to stay in, so we went to see a movie with Troy. We saw Scary Movie 3, and if you're planning on seeing it, I guess I would say not to bother. There are some funny parts, but for the most part it's just more tasteless than you could imagine. Although if you have a crush on Simon Rex like I do, then it just might be worth your while. After the movie, we weren't quite ready to call it a night, so we headed once again to the Second Cup for some decaf on my part and assorted teas for Jocelyn and Troy. Troy read out palms, and we reminisced about the wild and crazy happenings from the two nights before. Of course, we randomly ran into Luke at the coffee shop. (I had said this was the theme of the weekend, and I assure you, though I didn't bother mentioning all the other times it happened, it did happen frequently.) I was kinda down for most of the day. Lack of sleep was catching up with me, and I still felt kinda drunk. For the most part though, I just tend to get depressed when I go out and I'm exposed to so many cute boys and such. I just end up getting down on myself, obsessing over my current relationship situation (non-existent). Inevitably, an internal struggle plays out in my head, as I try to figure out what I really feel and want.

And that pretty much sums it all up. Jocelyn and I had some girl talk before bed, and we both had a hard time getting to sleep. It was the first time in two days that we weren't basically passing out I guess, so that explains it. But all in all it was a great weekend. It totally took my mind off of school, and even now I'm not thinking about it at all. (Though hopefully that will kick in soon, because I do have a big week ahead.)

So now I realize that I need a bit more sleep. Zzzzzzz.

2003-12-03T15:57:00.000-05:00

Hello. I have now finished my classes, and the end of the semester is in sight. I have two exams on Friday, and one on Saturday. I don't really feel like I'm going to have quite enough time to study for them, but I think I'll do fine. So other than that, all that is left to do is write my term paper and finish up my grad school applications. I'm on top of the grad school application situation, for sure. The paper... well, I've had to push it to the side until I finish with exams. So I might be a little crazy between December 6th and the 17th, but I just have to remember that the course is an elective.

Enough about school. The other thing I need to do soon is buy Christmas gifts, but I think I'm just going to wait until the 18th or so, and then go nuts. I'm getting my hair cut tomorrow... looking forward to it. I was supposed to go today, but my stylist was sick and had to cancel her appointments. I hope she will actually be better tomorrow.

I'm feeling better since last time I wrote, both physically (I got over that cold for the most part) and mentally. Not much has really changed, I'm just dealing with it better, I guess. I am definitely looking forward to Christmas. It's going to be kind of a short one though, since I'm only going home around the 23rd of December, and I'll probably come back to Charlottetown for New Year's Eve.

I guess I don't have anything else to talk about right now, but I'll leave you with that last BQE entry. (Finally!!)

2003-11-17T11:46:00.000-05:00

So how is Kevin feeling lately? That is a good question. Recently, I believe last evening, I was chatting with a friend, and I explained to her that I was so busy with school, that it seemed like my life was on auto-pilot lately. I suggested this was a good thing, because I often have bouts of depression, or at least semi-depression. (I'm always reluctant to award myself the benefit of any weakness.) I mean, I'm always perky and in good humour on the surface, but sometimes my thoughts are fairly hopeless. Anyhow, I was explaining that being busy was a good thing. It's better to feel nothing than to be sad, right? But later I realized this was only one way of looking at it. Perhaps I am missing out on some joys in life. Certainly there are pains that I am avoiding, but might they be worth it for some joy here and there? Balance is better than neutrality, I think.

One problem I know of is that I've been so busy that I feel like I'm in my own little world. This is definitely the case with my roommates. I am short with them, and I often leave the apartment with no explanation of where I'm going, and barely a short "See ya later." Not that I owe them any explanation of where I'm going. But it seems like a nice gesture. I often seclude myself in my room, whether working on school stuff or just chatting with people online. In short, I'm very anti-social with my roommates. This even carried over when a mutual friend of ours was over on Saturday night. I guess I just felt kind of embarrassed because I was wearing a tight tank top.

Lately I feel like I have no social life, but this makes absolutely no sense. I have been out every weekend for as long as I can remember on at least two nights a weekend, up until this weekend when I only went out Saturday night. I feel like I am neglecting a lot of my friends and family. If anyone asks me to do something, I'm there, but am I really ever there? It's hard to crawl outside my head sometimes and join the rest of the world. Maybe this all stems from a skewed perception of time though. Like today I was thinking that I hadn't called my parents in ages, and my mom was probably getting annoyed. Then I realized that I just saw them on Tuesday. Also, I'm convinced that my phone hasn't rang in probably 5 days. On this point, I'm really unsure if I'm right or not. At first I think, that can't be right. My sister must have called me since then. But now, I can't remember speaking with her. Regardless, I may be out of the apartment a lot for whatever reasons, but I'm certain that I haven't had a message in my voice mail for at least a week.

There's another problem with this whole scheme. Being busy with school is a nice distraction from some things I guess, but it also means that most of the time I'm totally stressed out about everything I have left to do this semester. Right now I'm not really worried too much about anything other than my term paper on music cognition, and getting my applications for grad school ready. I haven't even looked at the application processes yet. Yikes! And the term paper - I just don't know where to begin. Hopefully when I meet with my professor he'll give me some more direction. I should also point out that while I say I am only worried about these two things, my other school obligations are definitely a factor in my overall stress level. BUT, I just have to think about how good I will feel come December 18th when I am totally finished of everything, and I look back and see how much I've accomplished. The big test will be whether I have any friends left at that point, or if I'll know what to do with myself. I'm thinking lots of sleep will be in order.

Not to be a total depressio, but did I mention that I have a cold? Yeah, in addition to the frog in my throat that has plagued me since I got back from Toronto (maybe MARS, you think?), I am now thoroughly congested, and I have an irritation on my lower gum. It's not fun, but at least I'm not totally out of commission with headaches and nausea or something.

I just saw Love Actually tonight with Amy, Luke, and Neil. It was quite good. Very funny and moving. An interesting combination, I know. About three quarters of the way through it, I was feeling a bit depressed about the state of things in the movie. Without giving too much away, I just want to say that though I was hopeful everything would be resolved at the end, it wasn't. So if you're expecting a happy ending, this might not be the movie for you. For the most part, however, the ending was a happy one. And it is really funny. I would still recommend it. If nothing else, it will make you laugh and think, which is more than I can say for Scary Movie 3.

2003-09-28T20:57:00.000-04:00

Walking down a perfectly straight sidewalk, eyes straight ahead. It's dark, and the car headlights and wind make my eyes water. The wind has blown my unzippered jacket off one of my shoulders. I am conscious of it, but don't bother to fix it. I walk uncharacteristically slowly. Rufus Wainwright's "Hallelujah" is playing. A single tear rolls down my cheek. Well, okay, scratch the single tear part. But everything else is true.

So a friend of mine got the UPEI Rainbow Alliance going again. She organized not one but two year-beginning meetings, so that we caught people who weren't available for the first meeting. This Tuesday we are going to elect a new executive and then register the organization with the Student Union again. This year we want to throw a big party at The Wave. I think it would be really cool, so I hope we can get our act together.

2003-09-28T11:55:00.000-04:00

Hello everybody. How are things? I'm doing all right. Finished an assignment today, so that's good. (It was the mini shell project, which I believe I mentioned last time.) I just have to do a bunch of reading for tomorrow, but I don't really feel like getting into it tonight. My class is only at 3 pm tomorrow, so I have most of the day for reading and making notes. As long as I don't stay up too late tonight, it'll be fine. So for now, let's relax, watch a bit of TV and surf the net!

Hurricane Juan is supposed to arrive soon. Around midnight, we should be experiencing 100 km/h winds. I love storms. As long as the rain is finished before I have to leave tomorrow, it should be fun. It may be the highlight of the weekend. I went to the Colours party last night, and there was a pretty good turn out, but overall I found it a bit boring. Not sure why. Perhaps it's the whole "small town boy goes to big city and returns a changed person" thing. I sure hope not. But I guess my 8 months here and whatever city I do my masters degree in will give me a better idea of where I want to be in the long run. I think what I really need is something (read: a boy) to root me in one location. I feel alone a lot of the time, no matter where I am.

I bought a new printer on Thursday. I hadn't had one for the past 8 months, because I didn't bother bringing mine with me, and then when I sold my old computer to my sister, I included my old printer. I thought it would be nice to have a scanner too, since my old one was sort of broken, so I bought a Canon MultiPASS F20. I didn't think I was going to be buying a multifunction centre at first, but the price was really good - $180 for a scanner, printer, and copier all in one. Plus the ink tanks are really affordable - $10 for black and $25 for colour. So yeah, that's my latest toy. It's so much faster than my old printer, and the print quality is way better. Also, it holds both the black and colour ink tanks at the same time. I know that sounds pretty basic, but on my old printer you had to swap the catridges. The colour catridge only had the three standard colours - cyan, magenta, and yellow - so if you printed any black with that cartridge it was a big waste of ink, since black was made by laying on all three colours very thickly.

Okay, more again soon...

2003-09-22T11:50:00.000-04:00

So I kind of disappeared from the Internet for awhile, huh? I moved in with Nick and Sarah last weekend, and I was supposed to get Cable/Internet/Telephone set up on Wednesday. But then my grandfather passed away, so I was up west with my family on Wednesday and Thursday. He was nearly 98, and he had been in the hospital for awhile, so we were expecting it. He's had a full life, but it was sad to see him go.

Now it's Monday, and the cable guy is supposed to come sometime today. It's an "all day appointment," which is really annoying. I'm a little nervous about how it's going to go, because I have this homemade-type cable jack in my room. Basically a cable hanging out of the wall that has been spliced with this splitter contraption. Surely he can fix it. I just hope the cost of any new splitters (because I'll need 3 connections all in my room) are included in the installation cost.

So what have I been up to? Well, not a whole lot. School is off to a fairly slow start. I've mostly just had reading to do, though now I have 2 assignments due in the not too distant future. One involves database design, and shouldn't be too difficult. It's using the Entity-Relationship Model, so it's not even at a practical level. The last question on the assignment, however, requires that we describe some data that we'd like to work with for the whole semester. Eventually we will set up a real database based on the design, so we are advised to pick something we are interested in. I think I will do something involving the recording industry. It has lots of concepts to model, like Artists, Songs, Labels, Albums, Singles, etc. The other assignment is for my operating systems course. It involves doing some C programming, so it will be good to see how much I remember. We're going to be creating a simple shell for UNIX systems. A shell in the Windows world is basically equivalent to the MS-DOS command prompt. That may sound quite complicated, but believe me, our shell is going to be very, VERY simple. Plus, the assignment question is actually a lab exercise from the book, so a lot of the code is given.

On the weekend I saw a couple movies with my friend Joe and also went to the ARC dance on Saturday night. On Friday, Joe and I and his friend Conor saw Underworld. It was pretty good. Vampires and werewolves aren't usually my thing, so that says a lot, I think. Then on Sunday, Joe and I saw Mambo Italiano. We both enjoyed it a lot. It's about a gay Italian boy coming out to his family. It's a Canadian movie, and knowing that may have biased me towards enjoying it whether it was good or not. But it actually was really good. I'm going to be encouraging all of my boys to go see it. (Probably once I get back on MSN Messenger.)

The dance on Saturday was kind of depressing. Got to see some old friends again, but the turn out was actually very low. It's like everyone is just picking up and leaving. It makes me want to do the same as soon as I graduate. But I've only been here 3 weeks, so I have to give it a bit of a chance. Maybe Colours next Saturday will be better. I sure hope so. Because there is even a rumour going around that the dance on Saturday may have been the last ARC dance.

I haven't been using the phone much since I've been sharing, and not at all for long distance. But that will change as soon as I get mine set up. So expect to receive a mass e-mail with my new contact info, and/or a personal phone call. Woo hoo! Imagine that!

Hmm, guess I should get started on that assignment, or maybe tidy up a bit more for the cable guy. *bowm-chicka-bowm* ;)

[NOTE: Both install guys (one for cable/telephone, and one for net) were old and yucky. Fun times.]

2003-09-07T11:49:00.000-04:00

So I'm back on PEI. Okay, I've actually been here for a week now, and I've had Internet access for most of that time, but I just wasn't in the mood to update this thingy. There were other reasons too, of course. I finally finished up that work term report. Put my nose to the grindstone last week and got it submitted on time. Then on Thursday and Friday evening I got to hang out with Tristan for a bit before he headed back to Sackville. On Friday night, we drank with John and Rodney and watched Trading Spaces. We even made it to 42nd Street for a bit. But I was so drunk. After returning to John and Tristan's place, I laid down on the couch, and the next thing I knew, it was 7 am Saturday morning! We got brunch at Town & Country, and then I got a ride back to my sister's place with Rodney.

I've been staying at my sister's place since I got home. Well, with the exception of the first night, which I spent at my parents' place, and Friday night, when I crashed on John's couch. But next weekend, if all goes well, I'm moving into a 2-bedroom place at my old building with my friend Nick and his girlfriend Sarah. It's a great deal, which I can't pass up. Plus it's a great location. And I won't have to worry about ever being too lonely! Although living with my sister and her husband has showed me that I really value my alone-time. So luckily I'm getting the room with the door on it in the apartment. (The other room is a loft, so you can see into it at all times... even if there was a door that was closed, because there is a half-wall overlooking the living room.)

Classes are going well so far. I've really only had one. The professor who teaches 2 of mine is gone away until Tuesday, and one of the others was cancelled for Founder's Day. So I just have some reading to do. 5 chapters of various books in all, and I've read 2 of them so far. 2 of the 3 left have to be read carefully though, cause I have to be able to discuss them in class. With the 2 other students in that class. Oy. So I will read them when I'm in the mood for taking notes. (Never?) I still have Monday off, and Wednesday morning before that class.

So I guess that's all I have to say for now. Hopefully PEI will hold some adventure for me in the next few months. If not, I can start making stuff up.

2003-08-26T18:16:00.000-04:00

So I just finished watching the Canadian Idol results show. I'm crushed. Jenny was by far my favourite. I really thought she was going all the way. In fact, my favourite two contestants, Jenny Gear and Ryan Malcolm, were the lowest vote getters. All the judges were shocked. But as I said, she is my favourite by far and at first I wasn't sure if Ryan's presence will be enough to keep me watching the show. But I'm going to be a good sport and keep watching. I kinda like Gary too anyways, and Audrey is usually enjoyable enough.

That brings me to Billy. I can't stand Billy one bit. So perhaps that will be my motivation to keep watching. To vote for Ryan an obscene amount of times each show, so that he beats out Billy. Or <insert devilish grin here> voting for everyone other than Billy an obscene amount of times each show. Which won't be too hard, because there are only 4 people left. There's always the possibility that I'll be crushed when he wins though. *cries* But Jenny will make an appearance on the finale, so I guess that settles it. You may still consider me a Canadian Idol fan. Just don't make the mistake of thinking I'm a fan of the results! Oh, it was consoling though, how at the end Toya ran up on stage and hugged Jenny for so so long. They totally understand how they were both robbed, I think.

Okay, so I have 4 more sleeps before I go home. Okay, technically 5, but I don't think I'll sleep much the last night, since my bedding will be gone, and I have to get up very early anyway on Sunday morning to catch my flight. Today I mailed off my keyboard (Yamaha musical keyboard, that is) and keyboard stand. Soon I'll send off the TV, because there isn't much left that I'll want to watch on TV this week. What about Canadian Idol, Best and Worst Of on Thursday evening, you ask? Well, I've already made plans with a friend to hang out that evening. And another friend back on PEI offered to tape it for me. Plus, I don't really care if I see it or not. I've watched every episode, so it's stuff that I've seen before. I also find watching the bad performances quite stressful. I just imagine what it would be like to be in that position. Doing something that you totally love, and being told that you suck at it. I think I'd die if I was in that position. Or laugh.

I have two more things to say.

One. Bell Canada is the devil. I submitted an online request to have my phone line disconnected right after I head back home. I got an automated reply, saying that I'd have to disconnect my high speed Internet separately, by contacting Bell Sympatico by phone or e-mail. Being the socio-phobic (is that a word?) Internet geek that I am, I chose e-mail. Well, due to the high volume of e-mails they've apparently been receiving, it was a couple days before I received a response. According to the response, I had to telephone Bell Sympatico so that they could verify my identity before disconnecting my Internet. So I called them. After waiting my turn for an operator, I was told that since I had a bundle with my long-distance plan, I actually had to call Bell Canada. They transferred me to the appropriate department. So I explained my story, and the lady promptly said, "Oh, you have to call Bell Sympatico to do that." Luckily I caught her in time to explain that I'd just been transferred from there, so I started explaining why, and she finished my sentence. Ah, someone does know what's going on. Good. So she put me on hold for two minutes, did some stuff, then told me she had to connect me with someone from Bell Sympatico who would explain how to return my modem. How complicated could it be? Oh, you won't believe it. She connects me with this guy who explains that 2 to 5 business days after I'm disconnected, I'll receive directions in the mail about how to return it. "Um, I'm moving to a different province the day before it's disconnected. Can't I just return it to a Bell World store?" Of course not. So in the end, the letter is on the way to me, so that hopefully I get it before Friday... but really it's in Canada Post's hands. Okay, hrrmm, I guess if I don't get it by then I'll ask my landlords to return it for me? Okey dokey then. I guess they mail you postage so you can mail the modem back to them. And if I don't return it, I either get charged $300 or $180. They couldn't seem to decide which. Total time on the telephone: 21 minutes.

Two. (I bet you forgot we were even counting by now, eh?) Isn't Jean Chretien great? I just have to say that I respect him so much for pushing forward with the same-sex marriage legislation, even when his religion is telling him that his own salvation is in jeopardy. I just think the whole debate is silly. For one thing, the law is invalid and violates the charter of rights, so they have to re-write it. The other silly thing is these people who try to say that they support the rights of same-sex couples, but they think there should be another term other than "marriage" for it, such as a "civil union." Well, what are you trying to do by calling it something else? You're trying to make it less significant. But if it is exactly the same, how can it be less significant with only a different name? From these homophobes' points of views, shouldn't just the fact that it's a marriage between two members of the same sex make it less significant whether it's called a marriage or not? And of course there's all this crap about the sanctity of marriage. How do two gay people getting married affect anyone else's marriage? On top of all this, the legislation recognizes religious freedom. If your religion doesn't believe two people who love each other should be united in "holy matrimony" unless they have the complete collectable set of genitalia, then they don't have to be allowed to. They'll be united in "legislative matrimony," or whatever it's called when you get married by a Justice of the Peace.

Okay, I think that's all. May be awhile before I update again, since there's no Internet access on Prince Edward Island. (My on-going joke with Ontarians.) Plus I have that little work term report to work on. Heh - with all my packing and end-of-work-term preparations this week, it has slipped to the back of my mind. Well, unfortunately it has to be addressed next week. So until next time, keep on smiling. And watch out for Jenny Gear!

P.S. - You can see pics of Jenny and download songs! here.

2003-08-12T18:14:00.000-04:00

So once again I'm bored at work and I decided to update my journal. Last time I just wrote the entry, then e-mailed it to myself and did the actual updating once I got home. But today, I'm using RealVNC to control my computer remotely, so I should actually be able to post this update as soon as I'm finished writing. (Sympatico only allows FTP access to your webspace when you are connected via their service.)

Like I said, I'm very bored. Which doesn't make sense at all, because counting this week, I only have three weeks left of work, so I should really be concentrating on making a good start on this project. It doesn't look like I'll be able to finish my part of the project in my time here, but I should at least have a good chunk started for the next person. I also have my work term report that I should be working on. I think I might try to get some books for it from the Skills Centre later today, if I can work up enough gumption. So I think you can see why it's puzzling that I'm bored.

Jocelyn's visit has come and gone, but her vacation lives on, since she has just moved on to Kingston to visit another friend there. I actually ended up taking Thursday and Friday off so we could spend a bit more time together. We had great time while she was here, but it went by super fast! And now that she's gone, I have to face the reality of ending my work term, writing the steenking report, moving all my stuff back home, and finding a place to live in Charlottetown. Nothing has changed as far as the apartment hunt is concerned. Well, it's going to be awhile before I find out if Luke gets his job or not, because the person making the hiring decision has gone on vacation.

But I don't really feel like I've earned the right to complain, because it's mostly all my fault, with me being so lazy and all. So let's talk about other things. Canadian Idol... based on last night's performances (but also taking into consideration past performances), I think Mikey Bustos and Tyler Hamilton should be the ones voted out. However, they seem to have a lot of support, so I think it's more likely to be Ryan Malcolm and Gary Beals who go. Gary did have a bad performance - he was really sharp. But I still think he deserves to stay. Same with Audrey. I thought she sounded out of breath, but her past performances show that she was just having an off-night. Oh, so who did I vote for? Jenny Gear. I have always liked her, though I haven't really picked a favourite yet. But I think that if she got voted off tonight, I would be upset, and that's more than I can say for most of the other contestants. I called in many many votes. And now I wish I'd counted so I'd have an idea of what kind of impact I actually made. In any case, I think she is safe for tonight. She had a really great performance last night. Well, I guess that's all I have to say for now. Things will probably get interesting soon as I get ready to return to the Island!

2003-08-05T18:12:00.000-04:00

I'm at work at the moment, enjoying a slow start to a Tuesday morning, the first day back to work after a long weekend. Jocelyn arrived in Toronto on Saturday evening, and she is visiting until Friday, so I'm going to be coming in to work early this week so that I get home at a decent time in the evenings. I arrived at 8:40 am today, thinking that I was feeling extraordinarily alert at the time. But since then I've come into a bit of a daze.

So far our visit has been fairly jam-packed. On Saturday we were late getting home from the airport after stopping for dinner at Swiss Chalet. We rented The Banger Sisters rather than going out. On Sunday we got organized - made breakfast, washed dishes, purchased copious amounts of alcohol, etc. That evening we went out with my friend Jordan to a couple gay bars. It was a nice evening, although I'm not used to being in smoky bars, so I felt pretty gross the next morning. And on Monday we did some shopping and went to the ROM. Tonight's plan is to go see Seabiscuit. It is two and a half hours long, and I think the late show is at 9:50 pm, so it's going to be a late night!

I've talked to Jeff a couple times since he headed home to New Brunswick, and we are getting along fine. It's still kind of strange to think that it'll probably be at least Christmas time before I see him again, but it is great that we are getting along and will keep in touch. I'm think I'm very lucky to not have a single ex I don't get along with. I get along with some better than others, sure, but it's not like any of them are my bitter enemies. Basically, I feel fine about everything. I don't have any regrets about the time we spent together. It was probably the best period of my life to date. It is a bit sad that that time is over now, but I feel like I've grown. I've lived more. The future is uncertain, yes, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Speaking of uncertain futures, I don't know where I'm going to live when I get back to Charlottetown. My old apartment building did not have any apartments open up for September, and I waited too long to call them and missed a bunch of openings for August. So then I considered looking for a roommate. My friend Luke applied for a job in Charlottetown, and we decided we would get a place together if he gets the job. The competition has been shortlisted to him and one other person, but there have been delays in making the final decision because it is taking awhile to get in contact with references. Anyways, this leaves me forced to make a decision soon: wait for Luke to find out if he gets the job (now it could be mid-August before he knows); try to get a 2-bedroom place and if Luke doesn't get the job, look for another roommate; or look for a one-bedroom place for myself.

If I wait for Luke to find out, I lessen the chances I'll find a place for myself for September if he doesn't get the job. And if he does get the job but only finds out in mid-August, it may be difficult for us to find a 2-bedroom place for September. I can stay at my sister's place for awhile if need be, but it's not an ideal situation, as it is outside of Charlottetown, and I'd have to spend my entire day on campus, even though the majority of my classes are on Tuesday and Thursday.

I could try to get a 2-bedroom place on my own at my old building - they said I could do that and move into a one-bedroom as soon as one comes available. But if Luke doesn't get the job, I don't think I want to look for a roommate. I'm not great at living with people. I have a feeling that Luke and I would get along famously, but it's rare to find someone like that. So this plan could be expensive if I end up waiting for a one-bedroom place.

Finally, I could just start looking on my own for a place. But if I find one, it will probably be more expensive in the long run than having a roommate. That's about the only disadvantage to that alternative I guess. I've never had a roommate though, so I guess I really want to try it. That's the thing.

So last night was Canadian Idol night again. I voted about 5 times each for Richie Wilcox and Jenny Gear, and about 10 times for Ryan Malcolm. I thought Richie sounded very professional and smooth, Jenny was enjoyable although I'd like to hear her tackle some more challenging songs, and Ryan's performance was just perfect. I'm not usually a fan of his either, but he had great song selection, and he nailed it.

I think that's about all that's new with me. Oh - surprisingly, I don't think I've ever mentioned my obsession with Homestar Runner dot com on this site. Nor have I ever posted my results to any of the numerous online quizzes I take. So let's get it over with all in one shot! I love Homestar and all his friends. And the Teen Girl Squad, of course. It is by far the funniest site on the Internet. And I know this, because I have visited every site on the Internet. Surprisingly, test says...

[Well, it said that I was The Cheat! Can you believe it? The image doesn't seem to be working anymore, but you can try the quiz. And if not, I'm sure you can find others out there.]

Which Homestar Runner character are you?

this quiz was made by jurjyfrort

That's all for now, but keep reading for another blast from the past - goodies from the BQE archive!

2003-07-21T18:27:00.000-04:00

Well, I've kind of been putting off this journal entry for awhile now. Anyone who knows me well probably knows by now that Jeff and I broke up again. I guess that makes it the third time in as many months. It all happened not this past weekend, but the one before. We got into a giant drunken fight on Friday after an otherwise normal evening. I don't really like to talk about it much. It's in the past now.

I was very relieved that we patched things up a bit before Jeff left the city. We were able to spend a little bit of time together, which was understandably a bit uncomfortable, but nice since it was the last time we're going to see each other in a long time

So now I'm in Toronto without any really really close friends, which was going to happen one way or the other no matter how things went between Jeff and me. As I wrote about in my last entry, it really is time to start considering my priorities. It's not like education and work and all that stuff is necessarily the most important thing in my life, but I think it kind of has to be right now. I've squandered too much of my time to give myself the luxury of goofing off further.

Nevertheless, the rest of my summer isn't going to be all doom and gloom. Jocelyn is coming to visit very soon and I am very excited. It's going to be fantabulous. Did I mention that last time? I probably did, so this is probably seeming like a repeat. Not too much is new since then though.

Just watched Canadian Idol tonight. Almost all of the contestants in group 3 were good, so I'm going to vote for Tyler Done, just cause he's cute. Anyways, that's all for now... stay tuned.

2003-07-12T18:25:00.000-04:00

What an odd day. The weather is very menacing. All cloudy and windy styles. I'm just having a quiet hangover day. (Something possessed me to have 3 cosmos last night.) Haven't had one of those days in ages. I was tempted to sleep most of the day, but I figured it would be better to stay up, and then get to bed early to try to get my sleep schedule more aligned with work. So instead of sleeping I've just been chatting, playing games, and ironing. And I just had lupper. Cream of Mushroom & Garlic - yuck! It's so strange, because original Cream of Mushroom is sooo good, but you add the garlic and the result is not so good.

As I guess I mentioned, I've been pretty down lately. Mostly about work. I think I need to start focusing more on my priorities. Right now I think there are 4 priorities in my life, but brain-laziness and just plain laziness has prevented me from making much progress. My priorities are: work, my work term report, my future, and saving money.

Now that I have some materials to work with, I need to start putting my nose to the grindstone at work. Otherwise things are going to get extremely busy near the end of my term. I need to make sure my workload is manageable when Jocelyn comes to visit, and also at the very end of my term so I have time to get ready for my move back to PEI.

The reasons for needing to focus on my work term report are very similar to those for needed to get busy at work. I have certain time constraints to deal with, though the work term report is only due a little while after I return to school. However, it would be nice to have it finished. One less thing to worry about.

I had spent some time researching grad school opportunities earlier this summer, but I haven't done much about it so far. I need to do more research, and make sure that I've made some decisions and start getting things done that I'll need to do... such as taking the GRE if I decide to apply to schools that require it or recommend it. I'm pretty sure at this point that I do want to do some more schooling. It's tempting to just start working when I graduate, but for me I think that would pretty much rule out getting a masters degree in the future. Plus, starting in the industry kind of ties you down to one place for a long time, until you pay off your debts and amass some savings anyways. Well, I guess one can always search for other jobs while employed, and then just move for work. Although there is something to be said for being tied down. Life in Toronto has felt so temporary. Nevertheless, I think my decision is made to pursue further education. I don't even know any more if I want to work in the industry. So this will be my chance to explore academia and see if it seems appealing. I definitely enjoy teaching - teaching mature, intelligent students that is. So maybe I should say professing :-)

Lastly, saving money. How does being lazy prevent me from saving money, you ask? Well, I find myself not packing lunches, just eating out more in general, and going out and spending money on booze and women - when I should be home working on moving these priorities further down my list. Because one can only have the same priorities for so long before it becomes maddening.

2003-07-09T18:23:00.000-04:00

Last night I had a fever and a headache. I wasn't feeling quite right this morning, so I decided to take the day off. I haven't been doing much at work anyways, so I figured it was better to stay home and get some extra rest. And that I did. Went back to bed until 1 pm, and even now that I'm up I'm taking it pretty easy. I'm getting hungry, though, so I think I'm going to make some cream of mushroom soup soon. (What am I saying, make some cream of mushroom soup? It's in a can, folks.) They say soup is good when you're not feeling well.

Work has got me really down in the dumps lately. When I first started on this project, I was very enthusiastic and I did my best to get the ball rolling. It was exciting to think that I'd actually make a visible impact on some software that would bear the IBM name. But since then I've had to wait for design documents from another IBM location, and it's just taking forever. Plus, they keep changing designs that were supposedly finalized, so I'm not sure how I'm supposed to keep on top of all of it. We are supposed to be basically finished a month from yesterday. Scary stuff.

Other than that, not too much is new. I'm very much into the financial planning these days, trying to save as much money as I can for when I go back to PEI. Granted taking a couple of days off work doesn't help. But it's going well. I'm saving quite a bit. I have to try to budget enough to have a good time when Jocelyn is here though! I'm going to try to plan lots of fun touristy activities. I'll be working for at least a few of the days she's here, so we will have to have stuff planned for the evenings. It's going to be very exciting. Just three and a half more weeks!

Well, as usual, I'm leaving you with another of those historical diary entries. Unfortunately, it's another short one. I don't think any of the remaining ones are near as interesting as the first. Being the first entry, I was really trying to do a good job of it. So don't expect too much, k? Later.

2003-07-06T18:22:00.000-04:00

Once again it's a quiet Sunday night and I'm updating my website. I spent the weekend at Jeff's, but now I'm home and just doing a few things before bed. As always, it is my goal to try to get to sleep relatively early so that I'll get to work early and get my schedule back on track. Work is still going very slowly. I just don't have any work to do for our project yet.

This weekend my brother-in-law was in Toronto for a concert. He stayed at Jeff's place with me. On Friday night we just got some dinner and then some ice cream later. On Saturday I went to the CN Tower with him, and then his concert was in the afternoon/evening. Jeff and I had an okay time. He was pretty busy with school work though, so I tried to keep myself amused and out of his way while he worked. I went for a walk around the waterfront and then to the Eaton Centre for a bit to do some shopping. I didn't buy anything though... the shorts that I wanted from Banana Republic which were too expensive are now on sale, but they are sold out of my size, so I'd have to go to Yorkdale to buy them.

I'm slowly working my way through my to-do list. I'm using the Outlook task feature. It's kinda fun. Most of the tasks are related to getting this website all set up again, so if I ever get it into my head to finish off the list, you'll see big changes around here :-)

Time to play some piani. My skills are fading. Toodles.

2003-06-29T18:36:00.000-04:00

Okay, so I was going to go to sleep, but then I read some stuff on the web and got annoyed. I go to Jeff's journal and read "Kevin sat down most of the time, refusing to have a good time." Then I go to April's journal and read "We had fun both nights even though Kevin seemed intent on bringing everyone down with his 'let's make the worst of every situation' attitude." She did concede that I didn't get to go to a gay bar on Pride weekend, but then went on to say that she had fun despite me. Nice choice of words.

I guess I should explain what happened in my eyes. On Saturday evening, we were going to go to the pride dance at Buddies. Well, we waited too late, and by the time we got there the line-up was really long, but I was willing to wait for awhile. Although Jeff and April said it was up to me, it was clear that they didn't want to stand in line. Jeff suggested we try 5ive. I figured this was a bad idea, since he had hated it the last time we went there. But we checked it out to find a high cover ($10) and no one around. Jeff and April were willing to go in, but I figured Jeff would only hate it as he did the last time, and it would just be a waste of money.

So then Jeff suggested Lee's Palace. Actually, at first we were just going to go look for a straight club. I didn't really know any other gay places to go, and the village was just packed with people.

I was skeptical that we'd find a good place to go, so I just agreed that we should go to Lee's. Jeff knows that I hate that place, so I wish he wouldn't have listened to me. But I didn't know what to do. I have never had a good time at that place. Well, there was once that it was okay, but I still left early... it was just that that time, Jeff came with me. Usually I storm off and get a set of keys. However, since Christine wasn't with us, that wasn't really an option. I could have gotten them to take me home first, that would have delayed the going out even further. Plus, I always find that it's not really that much fun to go out with just two people.

I now regret this decision a lot. Jeff and April claimed that they had a good time, but then later the truth always comes out. I felt horrible knowing that they probably weren't able to enjoy themselves because I was sitting by myself all grumpy-styles. But it wasn't that I was refusing to have a good time. I just happen to think that most of the music they play there is garbage, and it usually hurts my ears. I can't just stand on a dancefloor and move myself around to the beat for the heck of it. The music has to make me want to dance.

So for most of the evening I just sat feeling sad, unloved, and jealous. Jeff was too busy for me the week after we starting dating again - but he would have loved for April to come and visit. Jeff never wants to dance unless important friends are in town. And most of all, Jeff doesn't want to come to Niagara Falls with me before he goes home, but he's going to visit April in Montreal. Don't get me wrong - I know I don't deserve any better, but it still hurts. Especially when you've been drinking and it's easy to get into that frame of mind.

We stuck around at Lee's Palace until around 2:15 am. April and Jeff wanted food, but I wasn't hungry at all - the Smirnoff was sort of hurting my stomach. Plus I didn't feel like having to answer questions about my mood or being included in the conversation just in the hopes of cheering me up. So I got Jeff's keys and headed home, figuring it would be fine to just leave the door open until they got home, which surely wouldn't be too long. However, I somehow forgot to leave the door unlocked. Force of habit I guess. I felt so bad though, especially because it might have seemed that in my foul mood that I might have done it on purpose. They had to call from a pay phone when they got home, and I didn't answer the phone, cause I never do in someone else's house. No one answered the first time, so they had to call again, and then Christine woke up and answered. At this point, I had realized what had happened, threw on a pair of jeans and ran down to unlock the door.

Anyways, I guess there's not much more to say. I think I better vow never to go to Lee's Palace again - it's just not healthy for me or the people I'm with. If I don't promise myself to never go back, it will be just like picking strawberries. Eventually I'll forget how bad it is and go back, only to rediscover the pain again.

2003-06-29T18:35:00.000-04:00

A few days ago I came across an old journal that I used to keep on my computer. I never really intended for it to be public, but as I was reading it I didn't notice anything that was overly private. So I thought it would be interesting to post these entries one at a time as I post new entries, until I run out. That way you're not overwhelmed with everything to read all at once. I will mark these entries as BQE - Before the Quarkomatic Era.

Basically I just really like the style in which some of these entries are written. Really open, honest, and true to myself. I wonder if I'll ever be able to write that well again?

Although I have more stories to tell from the weekend, it is getting late, so I don't really have time to tell them now. But I will post some photos from Toronto Pride 2003 soon!

2003-06-23T18:34:00.000-04:00

So, I guess a lot must have happened since my last entry, since it's been 9 days. First up - new pics in the Photos section. They are flagged as new.

Okay, now that that's out of they way, let's see what has happened. Saturday before last, I was bored, so I went out to Buddies by myself, hoping I'd see Jordan or at least Dave there. Jordan wasn't there, but I did run into Dave after awhile, so I hung out with him and his friends. It was a pretty good time. I was going easy on the liquor. The funniest thing happened too - this guy came up to me and asked me if I worked at IBM. Turns out he is also a co-op student at the lab, and he recognized me from work. Later, I noticed a guy I thought was checking me out. Eventually he came over and struck up a conversation with me. But I think I bored him, or seemed aloof or something. Which was good, cause I wasn't at all interested. Sometimes when I'm not interested in someone, they find my attitude amusing and charming. What gives? Anyway, after awhile he said something like, "Well, I guess I shouldn't monopolize all your time... see ya later."

After the bar, I decided to give Jeff a call to see if I could crash at his place. It wasn't really intended as a booty-call, but that is the name it has come to bear. I was just curious as to what our status was, since, as I mentioned in my last entry, I was certainly confused about it. We got brunch the next day and walked around in little Italy. It was quite nice. We've been spending more time together since then... QAF and Canadian Idol on Monday night, dinner and a movie for Jeff's birthday on Tuesday. I also spent most of this past weekend at Jeff's place, even though he was very busy with school work. So I brought Ajax along and worked on designing some CD covers for 2 mix CDs I made my sister for her birthday. (Gee, I hope she hasn't discovered this site.) On Saturday night, Christine (Jeff's roommate) and I, got as close to Ontario Place as we could to see a fireworks display. It was quite good, and it lasted probably 20 minutes!

And that brings me to today. Work was slow as it has been, but I had a meeting for nearly all of the morning, so that passed the time a little. I really have to try to be more ambitious, and make work for myself where there is none. I also have to start in on my work term report again, come July.

Well, that's all for now. This day doesn't warrant any profound words anyhow. I was pretty zoned out for most of it. Did I mention it got up to 31 degrees today? Environment Canada is forecasting 33 degrees for tomorrow and the next day. Oy! Yes... sorry for being boring. More later.

2003-06-14T18:31:00.000-04:00

Okay, technically it is Saturday, but for me it's still Friday evening. First off - I have two more albums in the photos section. I've flagged them as new, so they should be easy to spot if you forget which ones you've looked at.

So, it's nice that the weekend is finally here. I had a fairly boring and slow week at work, until my team lead finally came to see me and gave me some things to work on. It is nice to have stuff to do. Granted, it is difficult to get back into the swing of working at a steady pace for sustained periods. Pretty soon I'll busy all around, as I need to start my actual work term report. In other co-op news, my old manager faxed another copy of my evaluation to UPEI, and I have now officially passed that work term. The first copy of my evaluation got lost in the mail. Just my luck. And of course my manager didn't actually save a copy, so he had to fill out a new one. I felt bad, because he hates paperwork with a passion. And it was one of those nagging things that kept him at work a tad later on the last day before his vacation! I also feel a bit bad for assuming that he had never actually done the evaluation in the first place. Anyways, I'm dwelling.

My personal life has certainly not been slow this week. Noella and I hung out a lot this week, which was nice because I feel like I haven't been able to spend much time with her, especially since she has become quite busy at work. On Tuesday we went shopping at Fairview Mall and I bought three new shirts at Le Chateau. Wednesday we went to Future Shop for a bit after work, and Thursday we checked out Winners, then rented Blue Crush on DVD and watched it on Ajax. And through all of this we had lots to talk about. Specifically, my love life...

So a little bit of background information first. Last Thursday I went to visit Jeff, and I told him that I missed him, and long story short - we decided to give our relationship another shot. Well, I thought things were going quite well, except that I wasn't getting any chances to spend time with him. His parents were in town, so when he didn't have night classes, he had stuff going on with them. And then on this Thursday his landlords were re-finishing the floors on the lower level of the house he lives in, so he was confined to his apartment for 24 hours.

On Wednesday evening, Jeff called me and we had a long talk about how things were going. As it turns out, he had been doing some thinking and concluded that we should not be in a relationship at this time. I guess I shouldn't really divulge all of the reasons. Anyhow, I was somewhat crushed. But I've been going through all these stages of recovery fairly quickly. Being miserable with Noella sure did help. Sometime late yesterday I transitioned into the aloof/indignant, bitchy dumpee. Armed with the tools of that mindset, I called up Jeff to see how his day in the fumes had been. At first I figured I wouldn't be able to handle being friends again, but I figured it was worth a shot. The conversation was about as normal as could be expected. No wait - it was much more normal than should be expected given the circumstances, actually. So then Jeff started asking me if I'd given any though to my grad school plans. From what I understood, he was gauging the possibility that we might end up going to the same place. This perplexes me. I don't understand what's going on in his head. Then again, do I really know what's going on in anyone's head, let alone my own?

So of course I found myself researching grad schools tonight. What can I say? I'm weak. I found the experience rather discouraging and depressing though. First of all, there is so much information to wade through. Why can't there just be some sort of standardized template for universities to fill out about their programs and admission procedures? I also have no idea what schools have good reputations. I mean, I have a bit of an idea, but really I'm just guessing. And it's not like reputation is really what matters to me, although I do want to go to a school with a decent reputation, so that my degree will actually mean something out in the real world. But the things that are important to me are to find a university where I am truly a person (not a number), and to find a university that is not academically snooty and will make me feel inadequate. Also, the program has to sound interesting and manageable, and the location has to be somewhat interesting. It would also help if I knew someone where I was going. I'm not an academic purist. Education is not the most important thing in my life. It might be a good idea to determine what is though. If you want to put me on the spot right now, I think I'd have to choose mental health.

Yes, well, I don't think I've covered everything I was planning to in this entry, but I think I got all the important stuff. It's getting very late and I need some sleep. Goodnight.

2003-06-11T18:30:00.000-04:00

Oh my gosh... guess what? I finally have some photos posted! It took me awhile because I wanted to organize them nicely in albums, and I didn't have the ambition at first to undertake that. But now I've posted 2 albums, and there will be more to come in the near future. Since it's getting late, I don't really have time for a full update, but I will write again soon.

2003-06-03T18:29:00.000-04:00

May flew by so fast. Everyone I know says so, too. It was unfortunate as far as work is concerned. Now we only have a little over 2 months for our project. It also means Jeff is going back to Fredericton in just a month and a half. We've been trying to be friends, but he's been really busy with school lately. On the positive side, hopefully June will bring warmer weather. It would be nice if we got some sun tomorrow instead of the forecasted rain, because it is FutureBlue day at work tomorrow. That means all the student employees basically get the day off to take part in activities and workshops. And we get a free lunch too. Yay!

Last Friday I finally went to Empress Walk to do those errands I mentioned, and I also got my hair cut. At first I thought I had been butchered, and I was planning on getting it fixed as soon as I could. But the next day I styled it myself, and now it seems acceptable at least for awhile. I guess next time I'll make an appointment and get the good stylist. On Saturday night I went to Buddies with my friend Joe. I ran into two guys I went to elementary school with. Isn't that insane! Even though I never really liked those guys, it was neat to have that kind of "small world" experience.

That pretty much brings me up to tonight. Nothing eventful ever really happens on Sunday or Monday. But tonight I packed up Penelope ready to send to my sister. It's nice to have all this desk space! I still have to clear off the desk and dust though. And then sweep underneath it. Yuck. So I'll probably try to get it mailed to her tomorrow.

I don't really know what kind of a mood I've been in lately. Just more of the same old Toronto apathy I guess. Well, I have been a bit more down than usual lately. It's frustrating me that I haven't been able to hang out with Jeff in so long. Plus he wrote something in his online journal that I didn't think was fair. He said that I'd had sex with someone just two weeks after we broke up. He just threw it out there, to stand on it's own without explaining anything. To me, what happened wasn't exactly sex. I admit that the implications are probably the same. But still, I felt awful about it. It was an error in judgment on my part. I saw his comments in a very negative light, which was hard to take, since when we discussed it, it didn't seem like too big of a deal.

Oh, I know another reason why it's bad that May is gone. I promised myself I'd get back to work on my work term report by mid-June. However, I am looking forward to August, when Jocelyn will be visiting, and Alex and Anthony might also be taking a trip to Ontario. Hopefully it will be a good summer and I'll get lots of chances to get out and enjoy it.

Anyways, it looks like I have a chance to get to bed at a decent hour tonight, so I should finish this up and have a snack. Later days.

2003-05-28T18:40:00.000-04:00

Well, my day has finally come! I'm writing this entry on my new IBM ThinkPad R40 notebook computer, which I've named Ajax. He's a boy, and a big boy at that. His 15" screen is larger than my old CRT monitor. So far everything about it is pretty great, save the internal speakers. But I was expecting that, so I picked up a pair with a subwoofer long ago.

So far I've just been working on getting all my old stuff transferred from my old computer (which was fairly fast and easy) and installing software I'm used to having. Oh, and I burned my first CD tonight. All Sophie Ellis Bextor. And it was so fast - about 5 minutes total.

Tonight I was going to go to Empress Walk, where there is a Staples and a Loblaws. I was also going to buy my transit passes for June. But time started going by so fast, and I didn't want to leave... I'm a bit addicted to this new computer. I was planning on getting groceries, a compressed air duster to clean out my old computer before I send it to my sister, and a long networking cable. I could have been writing this from my bed if I'd done that. Ah well, the time will come. I'm tempted to get wireless because my computer has built in antennas and a spot for an internal wireless card, but that would run me a few hundred dollars. So for now I'll go without. Besides, I'll probably be using it at my desk most of the time anyways.

I've been in a bit of a daze since the weekend though, with all the crazy stuff that happened, and the stress of not knowing what to do at work, not to mention not being able to concentrate because I was wondering when my computer would come. But now work is going quite well. I'm actually starting to design some GUI stuff, and that is much more fun than just studying. We were going to set up a meeting for me to speak with someone at an IBM location in California (we're working on this project with them) for Thursday, but we've postponed that until next week, because I think I'll have some substantial progress to show them and more useful questions to ask at that point.

I don't really have too many plans for the weekend yet. I imagine I'll still be setting up my new computer and getting my old one ready to send to my sister. A friend of mine wants me to go to a gay strip club tomorrow night. I guess I'll go, because you really need to experience something like that at least once in your life! I got a few DVD rentals from Blockbuster awhile back by redeeming some of my PC Points, so I'll probably want to rent one to watch on Ajax at some point over the weekend. And who knows... I might actually work on getting the rest of my site up and runnning.

Other than that, I guess it's business as usual. Not much news to report. Sorry if I'm a bit incoherent, by the way. I've been a bit sleep deprived lately. I'm sure you can imagine why. Time passes by so fast when I'm using Ajax, it's insane.

2003-05-25T18:39:00.000-04:00

There has been a lot of debate in the online journal community of my friends lately about censorship. Many are becoming uncomfortable with a completely public journal and censor themselves to the point that they have nothing interesting left to say. Well, for today at least, I'm going to try to forget that this is a public journal. Why shouldn't I be able to say whatever I want?

Well, last time I alluded to the possibility of turmoil in my life in the near future. As anyone who is reading this probably knows, Jeff and I broke up on Monday, May 12. It was my doing and it was probably mostly my fault, too. The past two weeks have probably been the most difficult I've ever had.

On the first two nights it was regret. I went through all of the issues I'd been having with our relationship, and came up with solutions for all of them, or alternate ways of looking at things. But I felt like this wasn't new knowledge - there had to have been something underneath it all that made me see things in this light. Plus it was too soon to ask Jeff if he'd take me back. I realized it would take time to be able to see things clearly. They usually say it takes half the length of the relationship to get over the other person when it ends.

So we've been trying to redefine our relationship as a friendship. It has gone reasonably well, but it is also difficult. A week afterwards, we hung out for the first time and watched QAF. The casualness of it all was very strange. I remember looking forward to leaving, just so I could hug Jeff goodbye. I miss that.

Meanwhile of course I had been somewhat actively trying to fill the void in my life. I have a lot of good friends helping me through all of this, but it's strange hearing the range of opinions they have, with some saying to go out and be single and whore it up, and others saying to take it slow because it's going to take a long time before I'm ready for anything again. Fortunately, I think, I haven't met anyone who really interests me, because I think the latter advice is probably the wisest. However, I did go out for coffee with one guy who seemed really interested in me. We had talked on the phone a few times before, and I wasn't sure that I wanted to meet him. Because he sounded downright odd. Strange. Creepy. But I was all about giving people second chances. Coffee confirmed my thoughts, but I was still "too nice" to just pass him off after a half hour with him or so. So I went to a movie with him, and it was easy to forget his personality in an environment where you don't typically talk much. There was some handholding and kissing and stuff like that, but after the movie I said I thought we should call it a night. I think that was the dumbest thing I've ever done. (The kissing, not the calling it a night.) But wait, it gets dumber.

Jeff invited me over to go out to a bar with him and a couple friends on Saturday night. I knew that I probably wouldn't like the bar, and I felt like it might be better if we did something that we'd both enjoy, in the interest of building our friendship. But I really wanted to hang out with him, and I couldn't ask the others to change their plans. So we started by having fajitas for dinner, Jeff's specialty. That was nice. However, after that came the awkward period between dinner and going out. Just me and him. Nothing to do really. Eventually I started helping him with some stuff on his computer, which took quite awhile. And then we watched a rerun of the Buffy finale on YTV. This was fine, although I kept having the urge to slide over on the couch and cuddle up with him.

Eventually it was going out time. I was quite intoxicated by this time. I was still in the mindset, however, that I wasn't going to enjoy this place. It didn't help that there was barely anyone there. I started thinking that I was soon going to tell the others I was leaving, but before I even did, Jeff suggested that I didn't look like I was having fun and that he would leave with me if I wanted. Well, I didn't want him to ditch his friends. And I figured it would be weird going back to his place with him. I'd have to sleep on the futon in the living room, and inevitable I would be tempted to go to his room and crawl into bed with him. So I said that I'd just go to Buddies to dance or go home, and then I left.

Why couldn't I just have given this place a bit more of a chance? I might have been there for 10 minutes it seemed, if even. Going to Buddies or going home was not what I did, however. I called up the aformentioned guy I'd had coffee and seen a movie with. I wanted someone to hold on to. So he was available, came to meet me, and then we headed to his place. As soon as I started talking with him, I remembered the things I didn't like about him, but that didn't make me turn around. Long story short, we fooled around for awhile, then were going to go to sleep, but while he was taking out his contacts I decided I couldn't handle it. I got dressed and told him something just didn't feel right. I didn't really feel anything for the guy. He was just a cheap substitute for what I really wanted.

So I started walking, jogging, running home. Trying to get as far away from that place as possible. I finally caught a street car. Then I had to take the Yonge bus up to Finch and then the Finch bus the rest of the way home. It was around 4:30 am when I got home, I think.

Anyways, that's just one thing I'm trying to figure out right now. In addition, work is really difficult right now. We don't really have clear instructions on what we're to do. And I'm always so distracted that I can't really concentrate on my work. The past few days I was distracted trying to get my ThinkPad order sorted out. There was a billing issue that needed to be addressed. Now it looks like I should get it on Monday. Finally!

Well, that's all I have for now. I don't feel like talking about it at all right now, although writing it down seems to have helped. I have a few things to do today, including groceries and some reading for work, so I should get to them.

2003-05-11T18:38:00.000-04:00

First of all, I'd like to apologize for calling you all stupid and saying that Noella had eaten a page that she clearly hadn't. But most of all I apologize for not updating this page in so long! I know it can be frustrating when a page you check often is never updated. But that hasn't happened to me lately, so I guess I can't really relate. Heh. I usually check www.cbc.ca and www.pei.cbc.ca on a regular basis, and that's about it.

Anyhoo, over a month since I updated this time, huh? The past month has been pretty strange for me. I've been quite depressed and apathetic. I mean, most people don't usually notice because I tend to have on my happy-go-lucky exterior. But I think my personal relationships with a lot of people have suffered. Today for awhile at least I had hope that tomorrow would be a brand new day, so to speak. See, I have the end of this paper I've been working on in sight. It's only a four page topic proposal that I have to do for my co-op supervisor, but it was still enough to get under my skin, just because I haven't had any motivation to do anything in so long. I blame work. When you have nothing to do and you sit around all day just surfing the web and whatnot, it becomes habit to just sit and do nothing.

So I will be finishing this little paper tonight, no matter how late I have to stay up to do so. But I still feel like there's going to be a lot of turmoil in my life over the next few months. You really can't just decide that tomorrow everything is going to change for the best. It takes time.

Let's see. Updates. Well, I went home for a little visit over Easter Weekend since last time I wrote. It was very nice. The more I think about it, I can't wait to go back to PEI. I like my simple little life there, where I don't feel isolated from everyone. If I want to hang out with someone, they are probably within walking distance, or if I just go out for a walk, I'm likely to see someone I know. My sisters are also near, which is nice.

We didn't end up going dancing with Mo that time. I was a bit sick at the time, and I didn't feel like going out. Of course I'm kicking myself now, because it was a very rare opportunity to go dancing, and I don't really remember how much I was opposed to going out at the time. We ended up watching Waking Life instead, an experimental movie about dreams and stuff. Well, actually Jeff and Mo watched it. I thought it sucked and slept through most of it. I just couldn't keep my eyes open. Mo is gone back to Waterloo now, but hopefully I can go there or he can come here sometime to visit.

On Friday I got a strong desire to dye my hair a funky colour again over the weekend. That didn't happen though, and maybe the urge has passed. I'm not sure if I'd have gone blue again, or tried something new, like red, orange, or purple. I guess I thought it would jumpstart me or something. But now I just don't feel like doing it. Plus it would cost quite a bit, and I already spent a lot of money this weekend - $100 just on random things. Like food, booze, and getting into Lee's Palace.

Well, you know how it is... if I don't want to be up all night, I better work on that report again. I have the content all written, but it needs serious revision now. I will also wash dishes and hit you doggy-style, a la Smoove B, eh Luke?

And who knows... maybe if my life changes directions tomorrow I'll start updating this site more often.

2003-04-08T18:44:00.000-04:00

Hello all. Just a quick update before I go to bed. I hope everyone likes the new design. I've added two more pages - Photos and About. BUT, before you go look at those pages, I'll warn you now that they don't have any content yet. Hehe. I just felt like making the new icons so the menu would be more complete. I've never had a photo section on my site before, so I think it will be interesting to share my (now rather large) collection of photos. I'm looking forward to seeing how I can use JavaScript to organize them like I did with the archives. But enough about the site...

This week has been pretty slack at work. My team is getting pretty close to a major release of our product, so it's mostly just tidy up work these days, and not much of it gets assigned to me. This has been driving me slightly nuts, but I'm going to try to use the time to start working on my topic proposal for my work term report. I wrote to my team asking if any one had any ideas, and one of my co-workers actually gave me a great suggestion for it. So that was nice.

I'm am getting so excited and anxious lately. I don't think I mentioned it before, but I'm buying a new computer with my income tax refund. It's an IBM ThinkPad R40, which I'm getting through the Employee Purchase Program. IBM computers are quite expensive, but I'm saving a whopping $1500 on it compared to the price for the public. That makes the price comparable to those of cheaper notebooks like Dells and HPs. It should be similar to the one pictured in this article. The estimated arrival date is sometime next week, so my fingers are crossed that it will come before I head home on Thursday (!) so that I'll have something to play with on the plane.

I am totally ready for this computer. I have a name picked out already, which I'll share with you later. (For those of you who don't know, I call my current computer, a Compaq Presario 5330, Penelope.) I bought a new set of really nice yet inexpensive Yamaha speakers since my old ones go with my old computer, which I'm selling to my sister. I also bought a crossover networking cable so I can transfer my files onto my ThinkPad. Finally, I redeemed some of my PC Points for some rentals from Blockbuster. My computer has a DVD/CD-RW drive, so I'm looking forward to watching movies and making my own music CDs.

There are 4 free rentals with the card I got, and up until tonight I knew exactly what movies I wanted to get. Most are based on Noella's suggestions. They are: The Rules of Attraction, The Ring, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, and Harry Potter: The Chamber of Secrets. Now I'm not so sure about The Ring. For starters, Jeff says he won't watch it with me because it is supposed to be super scary. And tonight I found a centipede in my apartment. It's the third one I've found so far, and I'm starting to get really creeped out. They have long skinny legs, and they scurry along the floor when they sense you. I mentioned this to Noella, and she says there is a scene in The Ring with centipedes. I'm not sure if I can handle that right now.

I haven't been out in ages, so I'm really looking forward to this Saturday. Jeff and I are taking Mo to a gay club. I believe it will be his first time. I really think it's something he needs to experience, and I'm glad that we'll have someone to go out with to a dance club, because no one else we know really likes that type of thing. I'm also looking forward to getting nicely liquored up. It's been awhile. Nope, they don't drink in the T-dot like the do on the east coast!

Well, I should get to bed. I'm hoping to get up early enough to wash dishes and get to work at a decent hour. As if. But I can dream. Oh, I hope I dream! Did I ever tell you how much I love dreaming? I guess it's because I don't dream much, or I just don't remember the dreams I do have. But my dreams are rarely too scary, so they usually just provide good entertainment. Here's wishing myself sweet ones :)

2003-04-06T18:44:00.000-04:00

Well, I finally got the gumption to put some work into my website. I have the archives all back up now, and I got the menu working how I want it to. Eventually I'll adjust the other parts of the site to match the new design and get them back online too. Unfortunately, I don't have time to write a full update because I'm going to Jeff's for the evening to watch the Junos. But I do want to get this work posted before I go. So, sorry, but this is all I have for now :) Expect more soon.

2003-03-19T18:51:00.000-05:00

And by the way, why doesn't anyone think I'm cool? I'm cool, people! Honest.

Well, this was meant to be a prelude to another piece of poetry (song lyrics really), but all I've got so far is a stream of conciousness. So expect more poetry at a later date.

2003-03-19T18:50:00.000-05:00

This week was supposed to be all about getting things done. On Monday I brought my day planner with me to work, and as I rode on the bus I started planning out things to do each evening. I soon had all my evenings planned out, though I left Friday evening open for possible plans with Jeff.

Lately I've felt like I'm not getting anything accomplished. All I do is veg out in the evenings. So I figured if I start getting things done on my own time, I'll build up enough motivation to tackle the things that really need to get done eventually, like my work term report proposal.

As I'm sure you can tell from my tone, I haven't done much. Updating the site and coming up with a title graphic were on yesterday's list (I just did those) along with getting my archives back up, which won't be finished tonight, at least not at this rate. I still have to finish laundry (Monday), and I doubt that I'll even start tonight's major task of cleaning the washroom. Oh, the life of a planner is one of angst.

So where did I go wrong? Let's see. On Monday night, after getting almost all of my planned tasks done, I stayed up later to relax for awhile. Because of this, I was unable, as usual, to get up at a decent time the next morning. So I had to stay at work later than planned on the next day. (Plus I'm working on something really frustrating that's taking up a lot of my time.)

But honestly, there are two main reasons why my to-do list has crumbled: I'm too ambitious and I'm too lazy. Both at the same time. Which really sucks.

On all other fronts, my week has been fairly decent. It's already Wednesday evening, which means only two more days until the weekend. Also, I finally got my income tax filed, and now I'm just anxiously waiting for my mega-refund. If you know me well, you probably know that I'm absolutely going crazy just waiting for it to arrive. I'm uber-excited.

And now, seeing that I didn't set a length requirement for this entry, I must get on with trying to complete the other tasks on my list. I haven't given up yet!

2003-03-11T18:48:00.000-05:00

love repellent

I know you cannot do it

I don't believe in you

I watch your every move

yes, you've got something to prove

I hate the clothes you wear

and the way you part your hair

you think you're something special

but you're just really scared

do you believe the words you're hearing?

can you tell if they're mine or yours?

I hope you know the difference, so...

wash off that love repellent

burn down those parapets

wash off that love repellent

and prepare to be bitten

I try to make you cry

you know the reason why

you are incompetent

go ahead and die!

you are somewhat neurotic

well, maybe that part's true

I don't know how to fix it

but here's one thing to do

take a good long look in the mirror

stop being so hard on yourself

try not to worry so much, and...

wash off that love repellent

lower that lead-lined wall

wash off that love repellent

and prepare to be bitten

wash off that love repellent

burn down those parapets

wash off that love repellent

and prepare to be bitten

2003-03-10T18:47:00.000-05:00

Usually I can't stand it when people post sites that are still under construction. I never said I wasn't a hypocrite. So this is the first step in the redesign of QuarkomaticCentral. New logo pending. I rationalized doing this by thinking that my readership (if I have any left) could give me feedback during the transition. To let me know what is and isn't working.

But I do feel that if anyone is reading this, I'm lucky, because I've really neglected the site in the past few months. Just as I never said I wasn't a hypocrite, I've never promised anything special on this site.

I'm at a place in my life right now that I've never experience before. I think a large part of it is that everything feels so temporary. I don't feel like I'm really living a lot of the times, and I think some of that is because I know that in 6 months I'll be packing up and heading back to PEI. I can't afford to get too attached to this place.

But it has been tough. Working for IBM is probably just like what you expect working for a megacorp would be like. I miss the positive feedback I got when I worked in small companies. Without it, I feel discouraged and like I can't do anything right. Sometimes it's nice to feel anonymous, but it can also make you feel unimportant. Perhaps another student could make a better situation out of this opportunity. I'm not a very outgoing person, so I find it hard to approach my co-workers sometimes. After two months, I expected that I'd feel like part of the team, but I really don't. Maybe that's okay, and maybe I should just accept that I'm a temp. Like I said, I realize that it's partly my fault - I should try my best to be outgoing and fit in with the team. But I'm the one coming into a strange situation. Couldn't anyone reach out to me? No. They're all too busy.

But enough doom and gloom. I should put this in perspective: I had a bad day today. When I arrived at work, I found out that I'd broken the nightly build. A file I had been working on on Friday wouldn't compile correctly. The day didn't get much better, although I did resolve that issue.

Back to that new place I'm at in my life... I think I've changed somewhat since I left home. So I think it's a fitting time to redesign my site. Also, having little pet projects gives me something to day dream about. Yes, no matter how bad it gets, I can always smile. I think while I'm working on this redesign I'll start writing more journal entries. Yes, maybe that's why I've been so blah lately... lack of writing-therapy. Well, I'd love to test this theory more right now, but another one of my pet projects is to start getting more of a little something called "sleep." I let myself get quite run down over the past week, and I'm trying to start getting into work earlier like I did when I first started. Okay, I'm stopping now. Goodnight.

2003-01-31T18:52:00.000-05:00

Well, I couldn't let all of January pass by without updating my website. I know it has been a long, long time, but I just didn't feel like writing anything. I guess the problem was that I expected that I'd have lots to say about my move to Toronto, but I really didn't, and so I remained silent. I was online the very first night I got there though... my computer and high speed Internet install kit had both arrived here before me.

So I'm living in a basement bachelor apartment in North York. It's quite nice. I love having my own space, even if the rent is a little steep. My neighbourhood is very nice too, and it seems safe. It's very suburban compared to downtown Toronto. I actually haven't seen a lot of downtown T.O. though because it has been so cold ever since I got here. But that all changed today, thankfully, with temperature approaching the melting point.

I do see on part of the downtown very often though, and that's Bathurst Street, where Jeff lives. I'm usually down there on the weekends. This is the first Friday night I haven't been down there, I think. It was a long day for both of us, so we decided to stay in. Jeff has two roommates, Dan and Christine, and they are both very nice. I always feel comfortable around them.

Recently we found out something very odd. Anders and Janice moved to Toronto to be actors, and the live just down the street from Jeff. What are the chances of them living so closely on the same street?!? I saw them last Saturday night at Lee's Palace for a bit. We've gone there a couple times already on Saturday nights.

I'm sure everyone is wondering about work. Well, it is going fairly well. I started off with some orientation on Thursday, January 9th, and then continued on from there. I got paid for the first two days awhile back, but today I got my first full pay. So it's quite a happy day for me. Working at IBM is quite different from any other working experience I've had. It is a secure site, so we have to wear magnetic-stripe badges that get us into the building. They have our pictures on them, which is bad because I hadn't gotten a hair cut in awhile when I had it taken! Another weird thing is the cubicles, or PWAs as we call them - Personal Work Areas. IBM is all about the acronyms. Anyways, cubicles can feel very isolating at times, but other times I like it because I can just shut my sliding door (they are more than just your ordinary cubicles in that regard) and get as comfy as I want to work. I've met some other co-op students, and they are really great. I eat lunch with Noella and Mohamed almost everyday, and they are both very nice. We often play Scrabble or pool over lunch or on our breaks, and we help each other stay sane. Noella and I frequently travel on the same bus, so it's nice to have someone to talk to.

The work itself is going fairly well, too. I haven't done a whole lot yet, because there's so much to learn about, and my co-workers are really busy lately, because our product is nearing a beta release. Once in awhile though I do something new that makes me feel like I'm really starting to know what I'm doing and contributing to the team. For example, when I was running test plans and I found some defects - well, that just made my day. And today I started actually fixing a defect. Oh, what progress I've made in just two weeks!

Anyhoo, time for me to get this posted and redirect you all to my new location on the web. See you in February!

2002-12-01T19:53:00.000-05:00

It has been a long semester, and I am glad it's finally over. I just have exams left, and although I haven't exactly started studying yet, I'm sure I'll do all right. I recently got my hair cut and highlighted, and I feel great now, as you can see. I hadn't been taking great care of myself this semester - it just didn't seem worth the bother. But now I realize that when you look good, you feel good.

Like I said, the semester was long. Not only was it long, it was boring and lonely. I did lots of doodling, especially in my geometry class, which I absolutely hated going to. I scanned in some of my doodling and put some neat effects on it. My drawings are featured here for you to enjoy. There were lots of other doodles, especially mushy KFC + JRM type stuff, but who really wants to see that? I'm going to see Jeff in just 10 days now, and I almost can't believe it. It is going to be so awesome.

Things are generally going well with my planning for Toronto. With Jeff's help, I found a lovely bachelor apartment. It's fully furnished (it even includes dishes and other kitchen goodies) and has its own washer and dryer as well as a fireplace! I also arranged to have my phone and Internet set up. Now all I have to do is book my flight and then do a bunch of mundane stuff, like changing my address with banks. And then there's moving out. I guess I'm going to store all my junk at my sister's place and my parents' place. I'm going to try to weed out as much as possible though. I can't wait until I'm also finished of exams so I can devote more time to getting things ready.

It makes things a little more complicated that Christmas is coming up. I have some of my shopping done, and I have a few more ideas for gifts I'm going to buy people. But it's always so hard to find the perfect gift. Although yesterday I was shopping, and I found the perfect gift for someone. I wasn't even thinking about the person at the time... it really just popped out at me, and I knew it was right. I wish I could find every gift like that. It just seems so right when it happens.

This new site is a temporary home for my web page, by the way. I'm losing my web space when I get my Internet turned off, but I'll be getting new space when I get to TO. So stay tuned for a new design at a new location. I'll give you the details when they are ready. Merry Christmas everyone.

2002-10-24T19:57:00.000-04:00

Okay, okay, I know a month is way too long to go between posts. I just haven't felt like I'd have much to say. But this morning I skipped class, so I'm feeling particularly at peace and ready to talk. Plus there is some news to report.

During the last month, I found out that I have a co-op term with IBM starting in January in Markham, ON. I was reluctant to write about this, because I still don't have the official letter of offer in my hand, so I guess part of me has an irrational fear that it's going to be taken away from me. But it really is good news. The job pays really well, and they are sending me a relocation package - it includes my flight to Toronto, but I'm not sure what else. It will be a great experience. I've been wanting to try working for a large company for quite some time now, but it just never panned out before. Plus, IBM really cares about it's co-op students and interns. They have 150 employed at any time, and they run a club called Future Blue that plans various activities for students. Apparently they may be able to help me out if I want to talk to some people about their experiences with IBM or if I decide to try to find roommates.

I'm really not sure what I want to do for accommodations yet. I like having an apartment filled with all my own junk, but a room would be much more economical, and it would be a pain to move all of my furniture and stuff. So I'm waiting to see exactly what the relocation package provides. There should also be some information about rentals in the area, so it could be a big help. It will definitely be exciting. It's going to be so cool living close to Jeff. I can't wait to get this semester over with, because it's a very blah time for me.

Luckily my exams are over relatively early, on December 9th. So Jeff is going to come to Charlottetown for a visit before I have to clean out my apartment and head home for the holidays. I'm hoping Jocelyn and Alex will be home so we can all hang out when he's here. Just one and a half months to go!

This past month I also discovered Las Ketchup - a sexy trio of latin women that sings cheesy europop. They sing "The Ketchup Song," which you've probably heard (would you believe I actually know all the words?), but I also like a few other songs of theirs. I'm such a sucker for cheese.

Last weekend was the APICS Conference for Math and Computer Science at Mount Allison University in Sackville. Brad, Ron, and I competed in the ACM Programming Competition, solving 2 of the 6 problems and not making it into the top 3. But we weren't last either, and we had fun. I got to hang out with Jocelyn for most of the weekend. On Friday night, Ron came with me, and we just sat around with Jocelyn and drank mostly. We also checked out the campus pub, called Tantramarsh Pub. All in all it was quite fun. There were paper presentations on Saturday, so I went to one given by a UPEI student, but afterwards I just went back to Jocelyn's and we did some shopping.

I'm trying to think of other exciting things that happened over the past month, but I'm drawing a blank. Yeah, basically that's it. Time to make lunch now. Toodles.

2002-09-24T20:04:00.000-04:00

I have two interesting things to write about today. First, on Sunday morning, I had a scary dream. In the dream, I awoke to a robber who was choking me with one massive hand. I couldn't breathe. I knew I had to kick him or something, but I couldn't move. And then I woke up for real, and there was no robber, of course. The cause of the nightmare was fairly obvious to me - the night before I had heard a story about a friend of mine who was almost robbed. He heard something one night, so he got up and found two guys in his kitchen. Luckily for him, they just said, "Uh, I guess we're in the wrong apartment," and left. There was also a third guy who he saw in the living room, starting to unhook his VCR. There is one thing I'm wondering about though. I wonder if I had stopped breathing in my sleep. That would explain the feeling of being choked or suffocated. If that was the case, it's interesting how the brain works. I do recall that I woke up lying on my back. I never sleep on my back, so that may be what woke me up. Last night I somehow started drifting off on my back. I was somewhere between conciousness and sleep, and then I woke up with a start. I'm starting to think that sleeping on my back somehow makes me stop breathing. Or makes my heart stop beating. At any rate, something happens that makes my body give me a shot of adrenaline.

Story number two. One of my biggest pet peeves is impatient drivers. I was reminded of that walking home from class today. I was waiting to cross University Avenue when all of a sudden I noticed this guy leaning out the window of his beat up old Ford Escort, yelling at the lady in the car ahead of him. "What the fuck are you doing, you fucking bitch? You FUCKING BITCH," he hollered. They were waiting in the left turning lane, and I guess by his judgement she missed an opportunity to turn, and now they had to wait for the next light. Well, I just wanted to go over and smack him, except that he was rather scary looking. I also wanted to go over and hug the lady, but that would have been odd. I did give her a sympathetic smile when I walked in front of her car. She seemed to appreciate it. It bothers me that there are people in the world with tempers like that. I think I had to time those traffic lights one time for a scavenger hunt question, and the total cycle is like 1 minute. So the most you have to wait is 30 seconds. If you are in a rush and need to be somewhere so important that 30 seconds is going to make a difference, you need to anticipate that and leave early. I don't care how many chances she missed to turn; she didn't deserve to be called a "fucking bitch." Perhaps a "cautious driver," but somehow I can't imagine the guy yelling, "Why are you being so cautious, you cautious driver? You CAUTIOUS DRIVER!"

2002-09-23T20:01:00.000-04:00

I just got home from my morning classes a few minutes ago, and I am starving. That's what happens when you sleep in so late that you only have time for a bit of cereal in the morning. But lunch is gonna take a few minutes, so here I am.

I find time is sort of blending into one moment lately. It's all the same... just school and more school. I'm in that period where you just cannot get ahead with school work. There is always something more to be done. But it does seem to make time pass a bit more quickly, I guess.

The most excitement in my life lately involves my job search for January. I've had one interview with IBM, and I have a second interview with them this afternoon. So I'm hoping that's a good sign. I want this so bad, and I don't know what I'm going to do if I don't get it. I feel like it will be so difficult to press ahead in the job search while I have all my school work and marking of papers to keep up with as well. But, let's stay on the side of optimism and remember that all indications are very good so far :-)

In spite of all the stuff going on, I did manage to take some time off this weekend. I went to an ARC dance on Saturday night, although I'm not sure it was worth it. It was kinda boring, and I might have had as much fun dancing in my living room. Then on Sunday I did the AIDS Walk. That was pretty fun, and thankfully the weather was good.

Anyways, lunch is ready. Farewell to thee.

2002-09-11T19:58:00.000-04:00

Well, the due date for my work term report has passed, and thankfully, I submitted it on time. It was a great feeling to be finished, but afterwards I went straight to bed for a long nap. Later that evening I went out with Tristan and a bunch of friends to celebrate Wade's birthday. It was a fun night - not too wild, not too tame. On Saturday night we were all tired, so we just rented a movie.

Being back in school is very strange. I'm thoroughly enjoying having afternoons and most evenings to myself to work on assignments or do my own thing. However, I feel much more isolated from the world, as I don't see people at these times. So it's going to be a quiet four months. I'm trying to save money, so I won't be going out much. Not that I will have many opportunities to go out. With Tristan being in Spain, I don't even know if I want to go to any gay events. Who will I hang out with? I suppose I still went over the winter when he was in Sackville. But times have changed.

In the scope of things, I think this fall is somehow going to be a turning point in my life, or at least part of the ongoing evolution of who I am. For one thing, as graduation nears closer and I don't know yet exactly what I want to do, if feels as though I'm becoming more and more unsure. Some days I feel like I really want to be a computer "scientist." Continue my education, and then maybe teach or work for a large company while doing advanced computing research. Other days I feel like I'm growing less and less intelligent, or that I don't I just don't have that type of academic aspirations in me, and that I'd rather just be a lowly coder for some software company. There are pros and cons to both scenarios, I suppose. In the former, I can see myself being proud of many accomplishments, being passionate about my work, and probably never having to worry much about money. In the latter, I see myself considering work as a necessity of life, but one that requires continual learning to stay current. I see myself just getting by financially. While this picture seams more bleak than the former, it suggests that other, perhaps more important things, are the focus of my life: hobbies, loved ones, and self-improvement, to name a few. On the other hand, working seems to take up an awful lot of one's time. Perhaps a more academic career prescribes a less regular and demanding schedule.

Another thing I've noticed is that I feel more in touch with my emotions. When I was in elementary and junior high, I recall locking myself in my room, turning up a stereo, and crying. I cried over a lot of things, but mostly about being picked on at school and trying to figure out why I felt so different from everyone else. After that I went several years without ever shedding a tear. I think when I finally realized that I was gay but when I was still too afraid to do anything about it, I shut myself down emotionally.

This year, on my birthday, I cried, for the first time in about 6 years. I was very drunk at the time, so perhaps it wasn't all that significant, but it sure seemed strange at the time. Since then I've cried twice, on a pair of similar occasions. Though these were sad times, it felt good to let it all out. And so I feel that I am again becoming aware of my feelings, and that's a good thing.

I was watching TV earlier, and Peter Mansbridge was interviewing an American Congressman. The congressman suggested that Osama bin Laden could obtain a fake ID, fly into Canada, and claim refugee status. This outraged me. I think it bothered Peter Mansbridge too, as he repeatedly asked the guy, "Do you really believe that?" He made the Congressman look a little silly for making unfounded claims. But the question remains, why do they think we are uncivilized and incompetent? We certainly trust them to carry out numerous duties that could have an effect on our country. Canada is probably the most respected country in the world, and they need to realize that. Yes, we regret what happened on September 11th one year ago. It angers and upsets us as it does the United States. Saying that we harbour terrorists or serve as a gateway for them to enter the US is hurtful.

2002-08-26T20:15:00.000-04:00

Well, I'm finally making some progress on my work term report. I put in an hour and a half tonight of note taking, and then I had to go buy bread and a few other things for my lunch tomorrow. Was planning to do a bit more work, but I'm tired now, and I have a few chores to do. The interesting part is that I almost enjoyed reading and taking notes tonight. So hopefully the more I get done, the more I'll be encouraged to put in more time each night.

So that is encouraging. Other than that, I feel like time is standing still. Jeff was here for the weekend and left yesterday around 3 pm. But it already seems like I haven't seen him in ages. We had a great time. We went to karaoke with Jeff's friend Sue, got brunch on Saturday at the Farmer's Market, had supper and played Trivial Pursuit with my sister and her husband, went to the dance at the Delta that evening, and then had dinner with Jeff's sister on Sunday. We dicussed the future a bit, but tried not to focus on it, as I tend to get emotional...

I'm heading into a very stressful time in my life. This is my last week at work, so I'm trying to finish up things for a project I've been working on since I started at Timeless. I'm also wondering if I'll be offered part-time work there during the school year, whether I'd accept it if I was offered, and if I should just try to get work marking papers in the fall. All of this is closely related to my budget. Making the adjustment from having a steady income to not having one is going to be tough. I looked at my finances tonight, and I was thinking they looked really good. Then I remembered that I have about $800 in university fees to pay for first sememster, and over $500 worth of books to buy unless I can find some of them used. This tells me that I better take any work I can get.

I am looking forward to going back to school. I haven't been in school full-time since December. I took one course in the winter, but it was a joke. However, who knows whether I'll like my courses and my professors? Mostly I'm looking forward to a better schedule than I currently have. The transition from work to school also means that my work term report has to be done. I have been worried about this for a long time, but now that I'm starting to move on it I have a bit more confidence that I can get it done on time and do a good job.

Finally, once that is taken care of, I have to start looking for a work term for January. I'm hoping to get one in Toronto. It is recommended that I do an off-Island term, and this way I can be closer to Jeff. Also, I've worked in small companies for both my work terms thus far, and I really want to experience working for a large company. Finding a job is always tough, and it's going to be tougher this time because I want a job in a very specific location. I tried to get an off-Island term last time, but I don't think I wanted it as badly that time as I do now. I was nervous about moving away. So I'm going to be quite disgruntled if I can't get work there. If I can't, I don't know if I want to move away for a work term. It might be too much to handle in addition to only getting to see Jeff at Christmas and then perhaps a couple times in May and June.

Another thing that's bothering me lately is the current state of the world. There is so much in the news lately about climate change and the environment, a failing economy, and possible war with Iraq. The climate change bugs me a lot. I used to have faith in the government to make fairly reasonable decisions, but I really wish they would ratify the Kyoto Accord. I mean, I don't really know the contents of the agreement in any detail, but it sounds like a good plan. I know there are a lot of things in it that could hurt the economy, but I think we need to take those risks. They interviewed people on the street about Kyoto today, and one guy said that the sweltering heat this summer and the fact that we had smog in the Maritimes should be a clear indicator that we need to make some changes. It really moved me, especially since the guy was in Toronto, but was so concerned about the smog in the Maritimes. But even though I wish we treated our environment better, I don't really do much myself to help it out. It's just so easy to say that one person doesn't make much difference, and we need a concerted global effort to fix the problem. So I can see why the government doesn't make ratifying Kyoto a priority - Canada is a small country in the context of the world, and what we do here doesn't make much of a difference. We just have to get past that attitude I guess. I read recently that Canada is one of the biggest polluters per capita in the world. I think that's awful and we could do a lot better.

Well, I'm rambling and wasting precious sleeping time. Sweet dreams, everyone!

2002-08-19T20:13:00.000-04:00

"We have the nastiest Cum Sucking Sluts Available Anywhere!"

Don't you just love junk mail? I thought that line was particularly humorous. I just got back from a bike ride. I left after sundown, and I had forgotten how quickly it gets dark. It was a bit scary nearing the end of the 20-km loop I did. It was a great way to cool off though. It feels great to have the relatively cool air (in comparison to my apartment) rushing past you. However, I just checked the current weather conditions on Environment Canada's site, and the humidity is at 98%. Not hard to believe given how sticky and foggy it was out. In one spot, it was so foggy that I had to slow down because of poor visibility, and this was on a bike! Must have been nasty in a fast-moving vehicle.

Another interesting thing I encountered was a big puddle on the side of the road. Now, there was nothing particularly interesting about the puddle itself, but it caught my attention out of the corner of my eye. You know how your eyes play tricks on you at night somtimes? Well, this puddle looked like a hole in the earth, but not an ordinary hole. It made it look as if the earth was a hollow sphere with just a thin crust at the surface. And the crust had been broken, like a ceramic vase might be broken. The water was a perfect black void which was also strangely reflective. It was truly freaky and amazing, for a split second at least, until I realized it was just a puddle. I was happy to get back into the amply-lit city.

I took a shower as soon as I got home, and I feel almost cool in my apartment for the first time in days. Granted, it's still not fit to wear clothes in here, but it is a definite improvement. I think I'm going to have some milk and cookies and then get to bed, because I am hungry and tired, not necessarily in that order, but alas it is the convenient one. Counting tonight, only 4 more sleeps until Jeff is here!!

2002-08-17T20:12:00.000-04:00

I woke up a 5:30 am this morning, still fully clothed, wearing my glasses, and lying on my back. It was the strangest thing. I never sleep on my back. But I guess I just passed out and then didn't move until I woke up. I found this incredibly funny. Especially the fact that I still had my glasses on. I hadn't been really drunk in a very long time, and I guess with being tired beforehand and also very hot due to the current heat wave, my body just couldn't handle it. But it was fun. I hadn't hung out with Tristan in a long time.

I'm up and about now... not really any signs of a hangover, luckily. But I'm going to drink lots of water to try to perk up and cool down a bit. I checked my e-mail a few minutes ago, and the word of the day from dictionary.com had arrived. It was procrastination, which I found a bit ironic. I'm not sure if I should take it as a hint to get to work on my report, or if it means I should procrastinate today. What do you think?

2002-08-11T20:09:00.000-04:00

My camping trip with Jeanne and Cory was pretty funny. I've said it before, and I'll say it again - those two are a hoot. We had a lot of fun. The first night we just set up camp (at Cabot Beach Provincial Park) and then watched the sunset before starting the campfire. It was a little chilly, but it was nice to sit around the fire and chat. It also felt great to snuggle up in a sleeping bag and an extra blanket. (Yes, it was that cold.) The only downside was that our biker neighbours from Quebec were being a bit noisy and farting a lot.

The next morning we had an amazing breakfast. Jeanne cooked eggs, bacon, hash browns, and toast. We did have a bit of trouble with the camp stove. A leak caused flames to shoot out of the side of it when we first tried to light it, but eventually we were able to plug the leak with a rubber band. That day we went to the beach, played frisbee, and had supper at the Frosty Treat in Kensington. The campfire was more fun that night, as it was a bit warmer and we had more wood to burn. The fire was a little slow to get going, but once it did we had the most amazing s'mores! They were super delicious. We used Aero bars for the chocolate.

This morning we had a simple breakfast of instant oatmeal and then packed up and headed for the city. I guess I didn't get as much sleep as I thought, because I was exhausted when I got here. After a nice shower in my own bathroom I took a nap from about noon to 3 pm. I felt really odd, as I often do after napping, when I first got up. I also had some weird dreams. In one of them, my friend Amy told me to pretend I was a cat. She then proceeded to film me. Her idea was that she and I would star in a tv show or movie (the choice was apparently mine) in which we would pretend to be animals. Afterwards we somehow ended up cuddling, and she began to rub her foot on my crotch. I don't think this was part of the film, unless it was supposed to be some sort of animal sex show. It was truly bizarre. I remember feeling sorry for her and thinking that she'd never be able to turn me straight. Dreams can be really messed up sometimes.

Other than that my day has been fairly bland. I picked up some over-priced groceries at the Quik-Pik so I can make lunch for tomorrow, and then I got a sub for supper. Right now I'm just folding some laundry, but I think I'm going to have to take a break and try to cool down somehow. It's gotten warm again in here over the last couple hours. Bye for now.

2002-08-08T20:07:00.000-04:00

Well, I'm procrastinating again, but at least at the moment I'm waiting for my garlic fingers to cook, so I'm not really wasting time. I haven't really started my work term report yet. I find this odd, because the thought of writing this report scares me and stresses me out a lot. I realize that the longer I wait to begin, the more stressful this process is going to be. However, this fact alone doesn't move me to put my nose to the grindstone. But enough about that for now. I'm going to do at least some work tonight, I promise myself.

My trip to Fredericton to visit Jeff finally came and sadly has passed. It was wonderful. Everything I hoped for and more. We didn't really do anything extraordinary - just the usual things like going dancing, eating out, touring the city and university, hanging out with friends, and watching movies - but it was great just the same to spend time with Jeff. I feel like we really bonded, because even though we've known each other over the Internet for nearly two years, we've only spent about 10 days together in person.

Jeff's coming to PEI again in two weeks for a weekend. I can't wait. It'll be a short visit, but we'll make the most of it. I already have a ton of things planned for us to do. Like last time, I'm counting the days (15 left).

Well, my supper is ready, so I must eat and get on with chores and my work term report. Unfortunately this update is much shorter and considerably less detailed than usual, but I think I've covered pretty much everything I think about lately. I'll try to write again soon, perhaps with tales from camping this weekend with my sister and brother-in-law. Bye for now.

2002-07-22T20:19:00.000-04:00

Just a quick update while I eat my lunch at work...

I haven't written in awhile, yet I'm still getting quite a few hits, so I feel a little guilty about not writing. Anyhow, not a whole lot has changed with my current life situation since the last update. I did have a few fun weekends though.

Pride week began the weekend after Canada Day weekend, so I went to a lot of the events... karaoke, literary reading, social at Beanz, baseball game, drag show/dance, and variety show/dance. It all seems like a bit of a blur looking back on it. Nothing of great consequence happened.

This past weekend was pretty fun. Nick had his birthday bash at my place. Alex, Jocelyn, Corey, Anthony, and Linda came over for some partying. Jocelyn decided to stay for the rest of the weekend, since she'd been planning to come visit me sometime this summer. We had a fairly relaxing remainder of the weekend. Did a bit of shopping, went to eat at East Side Mario's, and rented a couple movies. (They were The Royal Tenenbaums and Gosford Park, but I can't really recommend either of them. They just weren't very interesting. Tenenbaums had its moments, but overall was a let down from what I was expecting.)

Jocelyn was getting picked up on Sunday, so we basically just sat around all day. We also went out for ice cream. Oh, and we checked our e-mail frequently, being the internet addicts that we are.

That brings me to today. Work is going all right. However, I haven't had a lot of motivation to work the past few weeks, and it doesn't help that the boss is on vacation. What does help is that I'm writing a new system from scratch that is fairly interesting. It's a remote presentation system that allows you to direct another user to any web site you want, after they have logged-in to the system.

Today marks the beginning of my last week of work before a go on mini-vacation to visit Jeff in Fredericton. I have been looking forward to basically nothing other than this event for the past month. I wouldn't say I'm nervous, but I have spent so much time thinking about the weekend that it is going to be kind of odd when it finally happens. Probably even odder when it's over and I don't yet have something else to look forward to. But we'll not talk about the weekend ending. In my mind it doesn't end. Time just goes forward to the weekend and then stops. Yes, that's it. I've been making a new wallpaper for my computer at work everyday that counts down the days until the weekend. (Today we stand at 4.) They also feature a saying for the day... usually something humourously inspirational. One of my favourites was "Your body is at the highest level of bootyliciousness that still allows me to handle your jelly."

The only other thing I've been thinking about a bit is my work term report. I guess I'm waiting until after the weekend to start it, but then I'm really going to have to work my ass off to finish a 35-page professional quality report by September 6th. But surely I'll pull it off.

So there you have it. My life as of late, rolled up into one compact online literary package known as a blog.

2002-07-04T20:17:00.000-04:00

So, this weekend was the best one I've had in a long, long time. Let me tell you about it. On Friday night I decided to check out the Kindle and Crush concert at the Festival of Lights. I went with Rob, John, and John's niece, Rachel. It was pretty fun, although I didn't stay for the whole thing. Jeff was due to arrive at 10 pm, so I had to get home. I hurried home, and arrived just on time. Jeff wasn't there yet, but he arrived shortly after that.

That night we ended up going to a street dance on Victoria Row with Tristan and Cory. The dance itself was kind of boring, but it was more fun once Jeff and I started to drink and talk to catch up on things. Tristan's sister was there and she gave him some money to drink, which was really cool of her. We ran into Kim, a very nice girl who serves me coffee at Tim Horton's and is friends with another Jeff I know, and Jennifer, a girl I went to school with from grades 1 to 12 but hadn't seen in a very long time. I almost forgot - Mr. W was also around, and he was a bit of a sad sight. He was really drunk, and he said to Jeff, "I look really good in a bandanna." That still cracks me up.

I guess we must have gotten pretty drunk, because somewhere along the line we decided to go home early and make the long drunken walk from downtown to my place. I don't even know what time it was. The dance was pretty boring, but usually I have a blast once I get a few drinks in me. It must have been really boring though! Even so, I know we had fun.

On Saturday, we walked around downtown with Tristan and Cory, and we went to Value Village later that day to look for some deals. Then that night we went out to Myron's. Jeff, me, Tristan, and Jeff's friends Sarah and Greg. We had a lot of fun. Even Tristan did, and he was really surprised because he usually doesn't like Myron's. It was really hot in there though, and they kept using smoke effects. Sarah and I had a little dance we'd do when the smoke came out... we'd kind of twist down to the ground to avoid it. It was fun. We also ran into a lot of people we knew. For example, Kim and Jeff were there. Jeff has no belly button, and he showed this to us at the bar. It was so freaky. We stayed pretty much until close, and then made the trek home.

The next day we slept in pretty late. By the time we got going, we only had time to go for Cow's ice cream and walk around a bit downtown before the Jann Arden concert. The concert was really really good. Jann is great singing live - she's not just studio produced. And she is such a comedian. She was teasing the security guards, and making all sorts of hilarious jokes that would get the crowd roaring.

We didn't stay to see much of Tom Cochrane. He was pretty boring. So we stopped by Tristan and Wade's place and watched a bit of the stage production of Victor Victoria with them and a bunch of other people. Then we decided to head home though and rent a movie. We got The House of Yes with Parker Posey and Freddie Prinze Jr. Oh, and Tori Spelling, but who really cares about her? It was really twisted, but very good and funny. All about an insane family in which Parker Posey plays the daughter who thinks she is Jackie O.

Then came Monday, Canada Day. Nikki came over to do laundry and come out with us. Jeff's friend Sue invited us and Sarah to go to a community barbecue with her and her boyfriend. It was in this really rich area of the city, and it was crawling with little kids. We felt a tad out of place, but it was fun.

So then Jeff and I had to meet Tristan at 7:30 pm, so that we could head down for the big CBC concert, featuring Rufus Wainwright, who Tristan was determined to meet. It was a great show. The only low point was when a lady behind me freaked out about people trying to walk through the crowd. Luckily a lady in front of me took charge of the situation and kept things cooled. She pulled me away from the lady and made her calm down. It was just so exciting being a part of a national broadcast... cheering and waving flags. Fireworks were good too, but they didn't last very long, since they weren't the main event this year.

After the show, Tristan wanted to stay around, to see if he could meet Rufus. So we waited until around 12:20 am. It wasn't looking good, but finally Rufus came out! He even got to get his picture taken with him. He had higher hopes than that, if you get my drift, but that wasn't in the cards for that night. Rufus certainly liked Tristan's homemade shirt though, which read "Rufus" in shimmery gold letters.

Jeff and I were tired, but Tristan wanted to go out and he would have been left by himself otherwise. So we walked around for awhile. Checked out 42nd Street, but there was no one we knew there. We hung out for awhile longer and met up with some other friends, but nothing much happened. It was so bizarre to see drunk people around everywhere. Usually once I get a certain ways uptown, I never see any more staggerers, but they were everywhere on that night.

Jeff was being picked up at 10 on Tuesday morning, but I had to get to work, so I left had to leave him at 9:30 to head down. It was really sad. I didn't want to leave at all, or to have him leave the city. But the time had come. So I went to work and had a rather melancholy morning. As the day went on I cheered up a bit, and eventually I was all dreamy about the weekend again. And I still am, so that's pretty good.

I can't believe how fast the week goes by when you have just one day off. Tomorrow is Friday, and it's a pay day. Yay!

2002-06-27T20:24:00.000-04:00

WARNING: The following rant contains a lot of complaining.

I don't think my night could get any worse. I was supposed to meet a friend downtown tonight for coffee, so I had a quick supper and headed down. Said friend wasn't at the coffee place, but some people I knew were, so I sat and chatted with them on the patio. Awhile later, I see said friend approaching. I see said friend notice us sitting there, and continue walking by.

Said friend was with Mr. W, which didn't make things any better. I complained last time about the new love interest that turned out to be thoroughly retarded. Well, my opinion changes everyday on that matter, but anyhow, retarded love interest had a thing for Mr. W not too long ago. Anyhow, I don't care for Mr. W very much, as it seems that lately the whole world seems to revolve around Mr. W.

So I decided I would go for a walk to the waterfront. You know... sit on a bench, look over the water, ponder what had just happened. Of course part of Confederation Landing was blocked off. Before I knew it, I was cornered by said friend and Mr. W. There was no escape. I didn't know what to do.

So when we met, we said hello and whatnot. I think I seemed annoyed. At least I hope I did. Because said friend didn't apologize for standing me up. No, not at all.

So I looked at my watch and said I had to get home to do laundry. Which was quite true. The Festival of Lights is this weekend, so I won't have time to do laundry another night. And I have virtually no clothes. I headed home as fast as I could, still quite upset at this time. I don't have all the time in the world, and I took time out of my evening to walk all the way downtown for nothing.

But that's not all...

Finding washers turned out to be a challenge. I had to use one on second floor, and one on first. I live on third. This involved a lot of stair climbing. Once that was settled and some of my clothes were washed and in the dryer, I decided I'd go to the grocery store to pick up some food and a cold treat. (My apartment is like a sauna in the summer.) I felt so tired at this point. Being upset really drains energy from me. So I walked around the store filling my basket, and then it dawned on me that I had forgotten my bank card at home.

This is the second time this has happened to me this week! Last time I had enough cash on me to buy most of my stuff. This time I only had 5 bucks, so I walked around the store, putting stuff back as inconspicuously as I could. Then I waited in line at express to buy my lettuce. Yup, that's all I came home with. Lettuce. And I don't even have the other stuff I need to make a salad right now. I suppose I could have lettuce and dressing, but it just wouldn't be the same, you know?

So know it's 10:30, and I still have over an hour to go on laundry, plus folding. I have a feeling I'm not going to be very cheery at work tomorrow. But... Festival of Lights starts tomorrow, and my friend Jeff will be arriving from Fredericton, so hopefully I'll get to see him and he'll cheer me up.

I must get back to my misery now. At least I know I'll be exhausted and that means I should sleep well. Unless I just jinxed it. Damn.

2002-06-16T20:23:00.000-04:00

Well I guess I didn't knock on wood hard enough, because my new love interested turned out to be thoroughly retarded. I was a little upset at first when I learned this, but I'm better off not playing games with someone who's fucked in the head, I guess. Who knows... a new friendship might come out of this, now that I've calmed down and put things in perspective.

In other news, my grandfather broke his hip. He is 96 years old, but the surgeon who put in the hip-replacement said that he has very healthy bones. We're wishing him a speedy recovery, because being in the hospital - in a strange environment with lots of strange people - confuses him. My mother and some of his other children and grandchildren have been taking turns staying with him so he doesn't get frightened, as he often does, when he wakes up and doesn't know where he is. Actually, my mother is staying with him overnight, until someone comes to replace her. She could be here for awhile, since not everyone seems willing to take a turn. Ah well, I'm sure he'll be moved to a hospital closer to home soon.

I actually worked most of the weekend on enhancements to Sedule.com. Didn't go out or have one ounce of alcohol this weekend. That's the first time that's happened in quite awhile. But it's a good thing. I got a bit more practice in on my keyboard. Oh... did I mention I did a bit of composing recently? We're developing a game at work, so I tried my hand at composing some background music for it. It turned out quite nice. I'm proud of it. And everybody seems to like it. I'm just worried about subconcious plagiarism. Hehe. As far as I know, my melody is original, but how the heck can I really know that? I guess it doesn't really matter. I plan to do some more work on the piece this week, and perhaps I'll post my final version on here sometime so you can let me know what you think.

Now I better get to bed. Lately I've been sleeping in, and moving my whole working day forward, but I'd like to start getting in earlier if at all possible, so that I can enjoy more of the warm summer evenings... that should be arriving ANY DAY NOW. Hehe - my dad said today that global warming certainly isn't helping us any. We could really stand to benefit, don't you think?

I'm neurotic and paranoid like this... but I just have to clarify that I definitely was kidding on that last one. I love the environment, and think global warming is nasty. RATIFY KYOTO! Mwa ha ha haaaa.

2002-06-10T20:21:00.000-04:00

So once again, it's been way too long since I last updated. My online discipline has been fading I tell you... I have e-mails sitting in my inbox from months ago, and I used to always be so prompt at getting back to people. I really enjoy receiving e-mails, and that made writing them just as fun. But lately that has been largely replaced by chatting, I guess. My computer has become a glorified stereo and chatting machine.

Anyhow, I suppose a few things have happened since I wrote last. I finally got a work term report topic proposal passed in. It was pretty much crap, as I didn't do any research, but I think the writing was half decent. So lately I've been taking a break before to start working on the actual report. But I will begin soon.

I've been out for a few bike rides, which is fun. The weather keeps fluctuating between rainy/cold and seasonably warm. One day I was out riding - it was a Sunday when I was hung over - and I came across I guy I know rollerblading. We kept playing cat and mouse, which I though was really odd... I mean, the guy was on rollerblades, and I should have beaten him hands down. Granted I was slightly hung over and he was wearing the speed-skating style ones, but I still should have beaten him easily. Not that it was really a race or anything. Ah well. It was a good workout.

Tristan arrived in Charlottetown not too long ago and is sharing Wade's apartment. So we've been spending a lot of time together, mostly on the weekends. I can't remember a weekend where I didn't go out at least once.

I've always wanted to learn piano, and I started once upon a time back in junior high. But I didn't have access to anything big enough to play on. So I recently bought myself a keyboard, and I've been learning lots of delightful little tunes from my first grade piano book, such as "Lightly Row," "A Chord Frolic," and "The Fairies' Harp." It's quite fun, but it made a considerable dent in my bank account. I'm trying really hard to follow a few simple budgeting rules I decided on, but I'm not having much success.

Other than that, not much to report... but I shall keep you informed of any developing summer romances. Knock on wood.

2002-04-24T20:29:00.000-04:00

Okay, I said last time that I would have lots of things to say the next time I wrote. Well, there are still things to talk about, but I'm a bit busy for that right now. However, I'd like to leave you with a treat. I just got some photos developed, and I needed to scan some in. I downloaded a photo editor, and it came with some effects that I couldn't help trying. Okay, you can stop laughing now...

2002-04-08T20:27:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone. I'm back, after about a two-week absence. Some of you might have wondered if it was possible for a web site to be having technical difficulties for so long. Or you might have been curious as to why you were "forbidden" from accessing the page.

Actually, I removed my site from the web in a moment of anger. Basically, I was furious for a few days, for various evolving reasons that became apparent as I pieced things together. In the end, I was upset because a couple of my old friends were deceived by a new friend. But I soon realized that I couldn't really blame them. I wasn't there to tell them the truth. They never got to hear my side of the story, and they never will.

Other friends all seemed really upset when I told them the story. Moreso than I was even. They were practically plotting my revenge for me. I really wasn't very upset. Not at all in a sad way anyway; I was just angry. I made a few catty remarks, and that was that. I don't hold grudges. My identity as a gay man has been questioned because of it, but that's just not who I am. Nope, I'm not a fan of the drama.

I just figured I'd offer this explanation in case any one stumbled across the site in the next couple days. I notice that a couple people already have. But right now I really have to get to bed. Work has been really busy lately, and I was late yesterday, so I have to be sure to get myself out of bed on time tomorrow morning, and that's always a challenge on less than 6 hours sleep. There's lot's of stuff going on in my life though, so I should have things to say when I find the time to write. Cheerio!

2002-03-07T20:32:00.000-05:00

Okay. So I finally was able to buy "under rug sWept," the new album from Alanis Morissette. It was less than a week after the release date, but I had hoped to buy it the day it was released, like any true fan would do. Oh well. I'm enjoying it anyway, and I guess that's wHat counts. I listen to it constantly. It has all but replaced Shakira's spot in my listening patterns. I still enjoy Shakira of course, but Alanis will always be my first true love I guess. I'm thinking of starting to refer to myself as "Alanis Morissette's Platonic Lover." But enough about the "whiny Canadian bitch" as her detractors like to call her.

This week has gone by super fast. My parents came to town again on WednesdaY. Dad had an eye appointment with a specialist, and they also received some more forms that I'll need to do my tAxes. I need to do those soon. I like to have it submitted fairly early. But back to the story. We met for lunch, along with my sister Paulette, who I pRactically never see since she and her husband moved out to the country. Then they picked me up at work at the end of the day, and we went to my apartment and had meat pie for supper. I love my mommy's meat pie. She left some extra pieces for me, and I was disappointed to discover that after I'd alrEady eaten salad tonight. Oh well, it will make a good quick meal for some time when I'm in a rush.

Last night was also my last tai chi class. Next week there is a banquet where all the communitY school students showcase their newly learned skills. Jeanne and I are going to go. I don't think there'll be a whole lot of people there, but it should be interesting.

Tonight I have a UPEI Rainbow Alliance meeting. There is also a Math & CS Society event at the same time, so I'm kind of hoping I'll run into Brad or AarOn on campus so I can tell them where I'm going. I really have to find a way to come out gracefully to my co-workers. Today two of them were teasing me saying that Nikki must be my girlfriend because she gave me a pretty tight hUg the day she came to see me at work to dRop off my Valentine's Day card. I just laughed and said she wasn't. Some people can be so dEnse. So. Very. Dense. In fact, you'd think they were blind. Take a look at me, I'm not your kind! (Previous two sentences stolen from a Bette Midler song but modified to my own situation.)

So anywAys, after that I'll be watching Survivor and Will & Grace with Nikki. W&G is the seconD part of a continuIng story, so it should be really good. Karen's mother has been brought onto the show. "It has a mother??"

EXCELLENT NEWS: Jeanne and Cory are lettiNg me borrow the Geo for a weekend, so I'm goinG to Wolfville next weekend, if everything goes as planned, to see Anders and Luke. I can't wait. I wish it was this weekend, really. But I'll make iT. I'm so excited that I'll be going on my own. I've travelled on my own before, but on the shuttle. This time I'll have a car. Yay. And all tHey ask is that I bring it back with a full tank of gas. Can do!

Until next time, ask yourself this and ponder it deeply: is it odd that there are no words in the English language that start with the letters FW? It's not hard to say. In fact, one of my favourIte phrases is "speeshle fwend." Someone should definitely look into inventing some real words that at leaSt contain that letter combination.

2002-02-24T20:38:00.000-05:00

It's about 8:20 pm, and I'm just about ready to call it a night and get a good night's sleep so I'll be fresh tomorrow morning. I hate Monday mornings, but I can't really complain too much. Before I know it, the week will be over and it'll be pay day. I'm trying to figure out if the Olympic Closing Ceremonies are worth watching. I assume there is some sort of entertainment, and I'm quite pleased that Canada is in 4th place in the medal standings, so watching the closing ceremonies would be the least I could do to pledge my support to the athletes, I suppose.

I can't believe I actually watched the gold medal men's hockey game. Last night someone asked me if I was going to watch, and I think I said something like, "Me? Watch hockey? That's funny." But I did have the TV on to keep an eye on the score, even though I wasn't glued to the set the whole time, and I was so happy when Canada won. I let out a small shriek of delight, jumped up, and clapped thrice in rapid succession when they scored the 5th goal. And afterwards I kept having these sudden urges to cry out of patriotic joy, although I didn't actually do that. I haven't cried in years, and I wish I would some day. It would probably make my contacts feel really good too.

I just bought a chocolate bar at my door from a learning challenged person. (Is that the politically correct term these days? I feel out of the loop.) I'm not sure if I wanted the chocolate, or if I just can't say no. I have had to say no quite a bit lately though. Sometimes when I get a call from charities, if they do everything by mail, I agree to donate a few dollars. But I think these charities sell their lists, even though I specifically requested that my name not be shared. And ever since I donated money in that way to a couple charities, it seems like I've been receiving a lot more calls for similar donations. But I am glad to have some chocolate.

My parents came to visit my sisters and me on Saturday. They took me to return all my liquor bottles, which yielded a pathetic $4.25. Then we had lunch at Jeanne's place. My mom was talking about how my birthday is on Easter and she wants me to go home for the weekend. I kept asking if I could go home the weekend before or the weekend after, but not saying why. (There is a Colours Night dance the night of my birthday.) Then later one of my sisters suggested that we just go home on the Sunday after my birthday, and I said that would be cool. Someone said that I must have plans to go out that night, and I agreed. The shocker came when my dad said to my sisters, "Then if you can find him Sunday morning, you can all head home for the day." I thought it was very funny, but I'm kind of wondering what he thinks of me anyway. He probably didn't mean anything bad by it at all.

Saturday night was pretty fun. I went to the Purple Party, and danced harder and longer than I ever have in my life, I think. I went down with Tristan, after watching Trading Spaces and drinking some pre-party liquor at his place, at around 11 pm. We danced almost straight through until 2 am. Tristan had this little shirt for me to wear. It was white with black three-quarter length raglan sleeves, and it said "I WILL NOT TEASE THE BOYS" four times on the front. Everybody thought I looked so cute in it, and it went well with my new glasses.

The low point in the evening came around 1:30 am when the boy I had been planning to ask to dance with me for the last slow song left early. He's a new guy in the community, and he's one of those people who really emits the "good person" vibe. Anyway, I was a little drunk, but I don't think I was planning to try to pick him up or anything. I just thought it would be a nice way to let him know that I'd like to get to know him better.

Eventually we headed out for the ritualistic late night snack - China Garden for a combo plate. It was me, Tristan, Wade, and Adam. Luckily Wade has connections at that restaurant, since we arrived right at closing time, but they still let us in. After that we checked out an after hours party we'd heard about, but it had gone bust. So we went back to the bar and danced some more until nearly 6 am.

I was feeling a bit down by the end of the evening. I've been experiencing a need to feel loved lately, and for a long time I've gotten by on mental self-trickery alone. Just thinking about a special person in an optimistic light was enough. But last night I just felt like being held. And I did get that from some friends, which was nice. It's not quite the same as when it's coming from someone you are romantically attracted to, but it helps.

It's time to get all ready for bed and park myself in front of the television for the Olympic Closing Ceremonies, so this is all for now. I'll be sure to keep you up to date on the continuing saga of my love life. And I'm sure you look forward to reading more about how my job is going :) So until next time, do me a favour and remember that time is the most precious commodity of all.

2002-02-21T20:37:00.000-05:00

I had a strange night tonight. Very quiet. When I got home, I made supper, and then I actually ate it at the kitchen table. I didn't even turn on my computer or the TV. I did a bit of laundry and cleanup around the place, only stopping short of vacuuming before I turned on the computer and started downloading music and chatting. That pretty much brings me to now. It's been a relaxing evening though. Something I don't often get. On Monday nights it's QAF at 11 pm, so I'm up late. Tuesday nights I have anthropology class, and on Wednesdays I have tai chi. And I guess I'm usually quite wasteful of my time on other nights.

I started downloading a few songs tonight, because my computer seems like it just might be okay this time. That inexplicable thing where my hard drive suddenly became an invalid media type just kept happening constantly, but now I'm trying the drive on a different connector and everything is good so far. I can't wait to have everything set up how I like it again. Then I might actually get around to doing some programming just for fun. Lately I don't get to do a lot of programming at work besides web-based stuff, which they know I'm experienced in. But today, my boss gave me a bit of Windows application programming to do, so I'm looking forward to tackling that tomorrow. We also have a meeting with a new client who is interested in having us program a children's game, so it should be an interesting day. Plus it's Friday, so that always helps.

I can't wait for the weekend. It's the Colours Night Purple Party on Saturday, and I'm looking forward to letting loose and having a good time. Tristan is going to be home - I guess his spring break is next week rather than this week - so we're going to hang out a bit before the dance. Originally I was thinking of going over to Wolfville to see Anders and Luke, but I don't think I'd be able to get over there anyway. I've been talking with my sister about borrowing their second car, but I don't think we'd be ready to do that this weekend. And it all depends what the insurance company says. Plus I don't have much money available to me this weekend, so I'd be cutting it close. Especially if I happened to have car troubles.

Really that's probably a good thing though. I need some time to make sure I fully understand that I shouldn't get too attached to Anders. I'm never going to have a chance to spend any amount of time with him. So I think I need to wait until I can see it as just going to visit two of my best friends, and until I can handle that. It's always a challenge though.

Oh, the thing that promised to make last weekend interesting was that my friend Jeff from Fredericton, whom I've only known via the Internet but for over a year, was in Charlottetown for a family function. We did lunch, and then he came out with me on Saturday evening. I had a great time. He's a really good guy. After everything that's happened lately though, I'm starting to become very bitter.

It's just that I seem to have a knack for meeting great guys who don't live here. As I described it to Tristan, "I always find the ones who are smart, caring, and cute. The ones who believe in love, and want the same things I do. It makes it even worse that a couple of them even like me back, meaning that the ONLY thing keeping me from finding someone is the distance." I really don't understand why no one like that lives around here. I suppose I should be telling myself that Mr. Right does exist, but I just haven't met him yet. Yeah. But I'm skeptical.

Life just isn't fair like that.

2002-02-13T20:35:00.000-05:00

So I haven't written in awhile. I've been busy. I've barely had time to do anything. For example, I haven't changed my white board calendar to February yet, and I haven't vacuumed or scrubbed floors in eons. Some stuff has happened since last time I wrote though...

I've tried fixing my computer several times over the past couple weeks, but the same thing keeps happening. All of a sudden I get some weird errors, and then the next time I restart, nothing happens. So I sent my new hard drive to my brother-in-law tonight so he can have a look at it and see if it is causing the problem. For now I'm depending on my good old original hard drive.

I went for an eye examination last Tuesday and got contacts and new plastic-rimmed glasses. They are dark navy, and very retro chic. Kind of like my Atari, but even heavier on both the retro and the chic. So far the contacts are working out so-so. Some days they are fine, and other days my eyes get really tired and irritated. I've notice more blood vessels showing in the whites of my eyes, but I looked at my sister's eyes tonight, and hers are like that, so I guess it's normal when you wear contact lenses on a regular basis. I'm just on a trial pair right now, but my new ones should be in by now. I can't wait to try a new one on my left eye - the prescription is wrong on the trial pair I have (they had run out of the proper prescription) and the left one has been bugging me moreso than the right one, so I'm hoping a new lens will fix that.

This past weekend I went on the big gay ski trip to Wentworth. It was a pretty awesome time. Friday night and all day Saturday we just hung out in the hostel and did a few "get to know each other" activities. There were a lot of really nice people on the trip, but also some of the not-so-nice snobbish teenager sort. Skiing on Sunday was great, although I only had time to do 3 runs. I can't wait to go skiing again some weekend, probably just at Brookvale though.

In other news, it is Valentine's Day tomorrow. Although I am participating somewhat (by sending a humourous but cute e-card to my sweetheart), I'm going to stand by the conclusion I came to last year - Valentine's Day sucks!

I mean, really. For people who have been together for awhile, it seems like a bother. A forced expression of love. People often complain about how unromantic their partners are around this time of year. For singles, it just makes us feel alone, envious, and bitter. And for people who are newly in love - well, everyday is like Valentine's Day for them anyway, so they don't really need it.

I told my sister about this reasoning after tai chi class tonight, and she did not agree. She and her husband have been married for a few years and together as a couple for much longer. She still enjoys Valentine's Day. I insisted that they are the exception to the rule. Most couples are far more dysfunctional.

And that's all I have to say about that. Despite the fact that I'm totally broke, I think I'm going to have an interesting weekend. So perhaps I'll try to write again on Sunday night. But for now, it's time for me to get to sleep. I've been trying really hard to make sure I get at least 8 hours of sleep every night, so that I'm fresh for work. So far I'm achieving this goal far less often than not... which is why I really have to go to bed now. Goodnight, world.

2002-01-29T20:45:00.000-05:00

So, what else is new?... I'm in a rut! Time is flying by though, which would usually suggest that I'm happy, but I guess I'm just on autopilot. I'm so pressed for time lately, that I don't really have much time to mope about. Sometimes while I'm at work it hits me though, and it takes me a few moments to shake it off and be productive again. Today I found out that the ski trip now has a limit of 15 people, which I'm pretty sure means that my friends can't go. I was devastated. I'm still going to go, and I'll try to make the best of it. Now I just have to find out if any one is skiing. A lot of the people going are probably going to be tubing or tobogganing instead. Silly people. I really want to ski, but I don't want to do it alone.

I realized today that I'm quite over-sensitive. I take the little things that people do very seriously. I get upset over things that other people wouldn't even notice. And the fact that I'm paranoid means that sometimes when there is a logical explanation, and the person didn't mean to offend me at all, I still see things in the worst possible light. I never really thought of myself as paranoid, but I guess I am. For example, I noticed that I got a lot of visitors to my site from various PEI based domains today, and now I'm paranoid that someone is going to read my last update and start acting strange around me without even telling me why.

I guess life isn't so bad these days. At least time is going by very quickly. And I am getting paid, although it's still a bit difficult to manage my money comfortably. Time going by quickly could be a bad thing, however, if my work term only lasts for four months. I'm already one month into it, and that only leaves me three months for a work term report if I have to have one done for the end of April. Hopefully they'll keep me until next September though. My biggest problem lately has been getting enough sleep, followed by worrying about boys. Neither of which is life threatening, I suppose.

Today some song lyrics came into my head that I was going to modify a bit and post on here. I recall that they told the story of my life, but I forget which song they were from. So tonight during anthropology class I spent most of the time trying to go over lyrics from all of songs I've been listening to lately, but I couldn't remember which song it was that I had been thinking about. I also had an interesting chat with a girl in my class tonight. (Louis wasn't there so I had no one else to talk to.) Turns out she was in high school for one year with my sister. She said she remembered her, but I think her memory was a bit fuzzy, based on how she described my sister.

I ate a big supper last night, and a big breakfast this morning. I think I stretched my stomach a bit, because I've been very hungry ever since. However, I'm finished snacking on tortilla chips (I had a craving for calcium hydroxide), so I have to get some chores done now. I can't wait until Friday, not only because it's payday, but also because I have stuff to do every night this week until then. I've been so busy that I haven't bothered to fix up my computer since one of my hard drives failed. It's extremely rare for me to leave something broken for so long, but with working all day, and especially since I sit at a computer all day, coming home and doing tedious maintenance work on my computer doesn't exactly sound appealing.

I guess that means it will also be awhile until I get a chance to give some thought to this web site and figure out where I'm going with it. You've probably noticed that the other pages haven't been updated recently, but I never really intended for the site to become focused on my journal, since it's not really my strong suit. Given time constraints, it's probably not going to change much in the near future. Someday I'd like to have a pet software project to work on, with an accompanying web site. At the moment I wouldn't legally be able to do anything profitable, since that would be competition with my company, and I signed away my right to compete with the company when I took the job. Actually, I'd probably enjoy working on an open-source not-for-profit project more anyway, but that still leaves me with the problem of finding time to do something like this. I'd be a lousy businessman. I'm glad I'm not a businessman.

2002-01-25T20:43:00.000-05:00

Hi. First of all, I must say that I am drunk as a skunk. Which is rather sad, because I've only had two glasses of wine and a bit of my third. I'm writing now, because I feel that a lot of the time, drinking makes me act more like myself. I don't care what people think of me. I can be as crazy as I want without fear of being committed.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm sick of not being me on this website. Last update was an all-time low, with me referring to a certain Sweetie. The thing is, I'm gay, and my Sweetie is another boy. There. I said it. I came out on my website. If anyone who doesn't know reads this, well - it's their problem if they don't like it.

I went out to play pool with some of the CS boys, and I wanted to tell them so bad. In fact, one of them made a comment about something being gay, to which I replied, "I'm gay." When he asked, I clarified that I in fact meant gay as in homosexual. I think he still thought I was joking though. Ah well, what can you do?

Anyways, I feel like learning more of "Pies Descalzos, Sueños Blancos" by Shakira. I might write again later. Bye for now.

2002-01-22T20:41:00.000-05:00

Hello peoples. I'm having an odd day, but I suppose I can't complain too much, since instead of being at work, I'm at home listening to music and telling you all about it. See, we are having a snow storm. Well, it's pretty much over, but earlier this morning it was nasty. I was supposed to have an eye appointment (I'm getting contacts - so so excited!) but it got cancelled because of the weather. It will be rescheduled, hopefully for later today, but I'm doubtful I'd be that lucky.

When I found out it was cancelled, I tried to get to work. Aaron was snowed in at his subdivision. And the cab companies were being run off their feet. I finally got a cab, but when I got to work, I found that I was locked out, along with two other co-workers. So one of them gave us all a ride home. Now it turns out that someone was there all along, but the door got locked somehow. I'm just waiting to get a ride back in now, because I'm not spending my money on another cab.

It's been a little over a week since I wrote last. Since then a couple things have happened. I have good news and bad news. First the bad news. My computer's primary hard drive partition got messed up last Wednesday night, I believe it was. (I call my computer Penelope, in case you don't know already, and I was awfully disappointed in her.) I couldn't boot up at all. I just got a blank screen. So I switched back to my old hard drive, which took some tinkering to get going since I had installed and uninstalled Linux. Right now I'm running off my old hard drive, so I'm missing a lot of my stuff... mostly my music. *sniff* It looks like I'm going to be able to recover some of my files before I have to reformat my hard drive. But it's going to be frickin' tedious.

The good news is that the person I like right now, whom I'll call Sweetie just for privacy's sake, likes me back! Nikki was chatting online with me and Sweetie, but then she got me to leave so she could "get a feel for the situation." Not long after she called me up to give me the good news. I love my Nikki. She's so good at hooking people up. So Sweetie likes me, and I like Sweetie. (Obviously, since I call Sweetie "Sweetie." Otherwise I'd probably call Sweetie "Bitch" or something.) So that's great, and it makes me happy. But it's also difficult, and I don't really know what it means, since Sweetie goes to university off-Island.

Anyway, I should probably get ready to be heading into work. I think I might eat my lunch, actually. I've been extra hungry all morning, even though I had a good breakfast. Toodles.

2002-01-13T20:40:00.000-05:00

Well, it's the Sunday morning after, and I don't have a snake tattoo, my tongue is not pierced, and I did not wake up with a strange person in my bed. I'll consider myself lucky I guess. Last night was a strange night. I went to Colours Night (army green this time) with a friend of mine, but the atmosphere wasn't quite right at all. I had some wine, and some drinks at the bar, but I never got really drunk. For most of the night I was just really tired and melancholy, although I was hyper for a few minutes after I drank a double vodka and cranberry. Afterwards we headed to a party, but I was tired and bored, and you couldn't really call it a party. People were just sitting around talking. So around 4 am I decided to head home. It was a lot colder than I expected (my legs were numb by the time I got home), but I didn't have money for a cab, and I didn't feel like taking out another $20, so I just grinned and bore it. I got to bed around 4:30 am. So it wasn't such a great night.

The night before, however, was a little better. I had gone out to play pool with some buddies early in the evening. I was tired, so I got to bed around 11 pm. But a few minutes later, the phone rang, and it was Kelly inviting me to meet her, Laura, Jade, and Matt at Pal's. So being the party animal that I am, I jumped out of bed, put back on my clothes, called a cab, and was there in about ten minutes.

I did some karaoke (sang "Cruisin'" with Kelly) and I absolutely loved it. I also did some dancing. At one point, everyone else was sitting, and I was still dancing. I was really getting into it, using all my best moves. My friends were yelling "Go Kevin!" and other phrases of encouragement. It was great really, until this random drunk girl came up to me and tried to grind with me and stuff. It was weird, but now I can look back and laugh. My friends were certainly entertained.

And so this was a typical weekend of partying, sleeping in late, and not getting much accomplished. This afternoon I'm just staying in, watching the pending storm develop outside my window. I truly love snow. I think it's great. I doubt that I'll get much done today, but one thing I think I'll do is make up a "Things To Do" list and a "Things To Buy" list. That way when I actually do things, I can cross them off. That simple act gives me great satisfaction. Plus I'm not really in a "doing things" kind of mood today. I'd rather just try to think of all the things I need to do.

I haven't updated my page since before Christmas break, so I should say that I had a good Christmas break. Going home was just okay. Christmas wasn't much of a big deal for the family this year. Christmas Day was the only time everyone was home. But the rest of my time off from work and school was pretty good. I went to Halifax with Anders and Luke the Saturday before New Year's Eve. We had so much fun. I want to do it again soon. And I went out here in C-town with Anders and Luke on New Year's Eve. It was a blast as well, only I wish I hadn't been so drunk. Perhaps then I wouldn't have lain down on the floor of the coat closet, refusing to go home right away. And perhaps I wouldn't have asked Anders to throw out my old toaster on his way out after he and Luke dropped me off. Oy.

Since January 2nd, I've put in 8 days of work. It has absolutely flown by. My work is kind of boring so far. I'm working on a commercial web service that is mostly complete, so I'm just fixing bugs and adding bells and whistles. Bells and whistles that are giving me headaches. (If anyone knows how to get a DHTML layer to appear ON TOP of a select box in IE, PLEASE TELL ME!) It's generally a good place to work though, and the pay is good. I guess I can't complain.

I really don't know what to make of my current situation. I guess it's because my heart and mind have been in other places lately. I might appear to be in the "here and now" to most people, but most of the time I think I'm off in my own little fantasy world, where I don't have to make any decisions, or try to figure out what it is I really want out of life.

I started taking a tai chi class with my sister last Wednesday. It is pretty fun. I tried to practice some of the moves, but I couldn't remember very much. I can remember the "hands flowing over ball" part, the "hold the ball on the right" part, and then "ward off," or "pat the midget on the head," as our instructor likes to call it. I asked my sister, and she said that's exactly where she loses the flow of the set and can't continue. I think it's going to be really relaxing once we get into it a little more. I don't believe in any of the chi crap, so I guess that only leaves the tai, whatever that means. But it's fun, and good excercise.

As usual, I've got a few musical obsessions going on. If you can get your hands on ANYTHING by Shakira, get it. You'll love it. Also, check out Alanis Morissette's new single, "Hands Clean." It is fantabulous. I love how she's so honest. For example: "I might want to marry you one day if you watch that weight and you keep your firm body." How cool is that?

Enough babbling... I've got some to-do lists to write. I wish everyone good luck in the new year. Not to mention in your resolutions. Mine is to stop chewing my fingernails, because it's gross and gives me hangnails. So far I've only forgotten about it once, and chewed one nail. Not bad, considering I've tried many times before. You just need the right motivation I guess. (Thanks to the person who is serving as my motivation. I can't say you know who you are, but I appreciate your unintentional help in this matter. I feel better about my hands already!)

2001-12-23T11:55:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas everyone. If you're like me, you can't believe there are only two more sleeps until Christmas morning. Yet I'm not at all excited. I have a gut feeling that this Christmas isn't going to feel like Christmas normally does at all. And I have a suspicion that a lot of people feel that way this year. For one thing, I'm only going home tomorrow, Christmas Eve. Also, for the first time ever, my sister Paulette isn't going to be with us on Christmas Eve. She's coming early Christmas morning to open gifts, but she and her husband want to spend the night in their new house. My other sister, Jeanne, however, says she can't imagine being anywhere else on Christmas eve, so she will be home with us.

The funny part is that I'm not even Christian. I still like Christmas though. It's all about the giving. It makes people feel good all around. But I should have known that eventually the magic of Christmas would fade away. Theoretically it's still great, but my heart just doesn't seem to be in it this year.

Otherwise, I'm feeling pretty good. It must be because my social life is going fairly well. I usually find people to hang out with and things to do. On the flip side, my love life is still pathetic, but I guess friends make up for that a lot of the time. I just like being around people. Christmas break is good for having lots of people around. However, I've met a few people who are home for the holidays who will be leaving again in January, and I'm going to hate to see them go. I'll also miss some of my good old friends from high school who will be leaving the Island again come next semester.

So, in some ways I'm happy that I'm staying here come January. All I have to do start going to work instead of school. But I'm also getting sick of this place. There are certain people who I'd rather not have to hang out with, but it can't really be avoided on such a small Island, without causing unwarranted troubles that is. And I'm getting a bit nervous about work. I really hope it goes well. But this vacation time is going to be over much much sooner than I want it to be. And what do I have to show for it, except for a hazy memory of some good times? Oh well, I guess that's enough for me :)

2001-11-18T12:02:00.000-05:00

I think my last update was kinda cute. Just a simple doodling, standing alone by itself. Lately that's all I do in class... doodle. It's getting pretty bad, and I can't resist it. I think it was also appropriate because the little guy kind of looks like me, except for the head-dress thingie. I do admit that the posting before that one was rather pathetic, though.

I got a ride with Louis and went home last weekend. We hung out for awhile that evening before my parents came into town to get me. It was pretty fun. We rented N64 games (Mario Golf was our favourite) and ordered the largest pizza I have ever seen in my life. We attempted to conquer it between the two of us, but were inevitably unsuccessful. It was good pizza, but it made me feel ill afterwards... my body wasn't exactly designed to handle ten pieces of pizza in one sitting! Anyway, we hadn't done anything like that for awhile, so it was all good. We also visited Kim for a bit in the shoe department at Hellers. I hadn't seen her in ages! It all got me thinking about the times when Louis and Kim came to stay with me for a weekend. I hope we get to do that again, maybe over Christmas. Especially if I end up going away in January. I'm going to miss everyone so much if I do.

I was a bit disappointed with the weekend because I didn't get to see Jocelyn. She was home, but I couldn't get in touch with her. So on Saturday I had to drive my mom and her friend to the craft fair at Three Oaks. Louis said to stop by if I was in town, so I did, and he was in fact at home. We played some more N64 and even ate some left-over pizza. Then Kim came over, but I had to go pick up my mom, so they came to the craft fair too. Unfortunately I lost them in the crowd, and then my mom and her friend were ready to go home. Sorry guys :(

My brain must be totally fried. I have no sense of time lately. Well, of time of day, yes. But the passage of weeks and months doesn't seem to mean anything to me. Last week was hellish though, so maybe it distracted me. Lately I've been down about school, and about what I'm going to do in January. I just can't seem to muster up any enthusiasm for my studies, and I really wish I knew what was going to happen to me in the next couple months. I feel tired all the time, and it could be because the illness I had awhile back was probably mono. Or it could be that I, like my mom and sister, have hypothyroidism. (Mom insists that I get tested some time over Christmas break.) Alternatively, it could be that I just don't get enough sleep.

I partied a lot this weekend. It was kind of depressing last night, because I felt really alone. A lot of my friends are in relationships now. And why is it that the people I like never like me, and I never like the people who like me? For some reason, I seem to attract unwanted advances from really creepy, annoying, or otherwise somehow-undesirable peoples. But I'm feeling all right today. Just having a relaxing Sunday evening. I'm supposed to play Trivial Pursuit tonight with my sister, so she should be calling soon. Now I really get to see if my brain has gone to mush or if it's just an impression I acquired somewhere along the line.

Only two weeks of classes remain! And my finals will be all over within a span of 4 days. Yippee!!

2001-11-12T12:01:00.000-05:00

2001-11-09T11:59:00.000-05:00

What a dreary day. Even though it's not raining, it sure is overcast, and I can't imagine that playing golf on a day like this would be much fun. But Louis might be doing that right now. Of course I don't know exactly how long it takes to play 9 holes of golf, but I'd assume it takes an hour or two. After that, he's coming to pick me up and he's giving me a ride to Summerside, because I'm going home to see my parents for the weekend. We might play some pool or something first though, because we haven't done anything in ages. Things have been busy yet not busy. I don't think I've accomplished anything in relation to my classes since my last update. I don't see how this is possible! I guess you really have to try sometimes...

But Louis is here now, so I've got to go... until next time, keep fit and have fun.

2001-11-06T11:58:00.000-05:00

My real midterms are all over now. I have one more class test next Friday, and I'm so not prepared, so I'll have to cram on the weekend. Other than that, my physics course is a constant bother, and I have assignments now in artificial intelligence and algorithms. I'll deal with them, eventually. I just don't have any work ethic lately. But enough about school.

The other areas of my life are not making me much happier lately. Above all is the uncertainty of my future. I still have no idea what I'm going to do in January. I have applications out for two positions with the same company, but I haven't heard anything yet about an interview. I didn't apply to any jobs on the Island, so if I don't find work, I may have to do a study term. I really can't afford that, so I'd need to apply for a student loan, probably right now if I needed it for January, if it's not already too late. And even if I did manage to pull that off, I don't know if I could stand staying here much longer.

Another low point is my personal life. I've developed a bit of a crush on someone lately, and I really don't know how to deal with it. First of all, I don't even know exactly how I feel - is it really a crush, or is it just lust? Second, is the feeling mutual? That's really the biggest thing. I'm getting mixed advice from my friends - some say I deserve much better and am going to get hurt; others say I should just do whatever makes me happy and hope for the best. Anyway, I think I'm at the point where I can push it to the back of my mind and just see what happens. This is a good thing, since it will allow me to concentrate on school work and career moves, and it will also allow me to sleep at night again.

Not that I haven't been sleeping... oh, I've been sleeping excessively lately. I'm just so tired. I guess I shouldn't stay up so late. I have had a bit of trouble falling asleep, with everything that's on my mind, and I've also noticed a sharp increase in dream activities. I rarely dream, but lately I've been having sex dreams! This is truly rare. The funny and/or disturbing part is that they aren't about the individual with whom I've become infatuated. They actually seem kind of random. I've also had dreams about financial things - I went to the SuperStore in one dream and got a PC bank account. I'd been refused before (because according to credit agencies, I don't exist), but there was a nice old lady working, and she pulled a few strings for me. It seemed so real. I wonder what I'll dream about tonight...

Last night, the sum of all my troubles hit me, and I had to go out for a walk. I put some Alanis in my walkman and started marching furiously. By the time I got back, I had mellowed out significantly. I also got some counselling from a friend. It was nice to get it all out. As much as singing aloud while walking around Charlottetown's streets is concerned - well, I was more concerned about undergoing some sort of catharsis than being embarrassed. I was able to identify, in particular, with these lines:

Would I be whining if I said I needed a hug?	...because I need a hug
Would you feel slighted if I said your love's not enough?	...if your love was true it might be enough
How can I complain?	...I really do have a lot of good things going for me
How can I complain when I'm the one who reaches for it?	...we really are the creators of our own destiny, don't you think?

I guess that's all I have to say for now. I just figured it was time to update, and that's usually easiest to do when I'm emotionally charged, in one way or another.

2001-10-17T12:10:00.000-04:00

I just got back from my physics (electricity & magnetism) midterm. It was the easiest physics test, I think, that I have ever written. Including high school. He gives us all of the formulae, and many of the questions were Betty Crocker problems. You know, the kind where they give you a recipe, as in:

Here is problem x.
In order to do problem x, you will have to do subtask y.
So do it.
Now do this.
Combine those two to get the answer like this...
Now you have the solution. Wasn't that fun?

Even so, I don't know how well I did on the explanation questions. I'm better with math and numbers, although I didn't have to use my calculator once, except to find the exact value of a cosine, but that was just because I felt like being a keener. The only bad thing about it was that several questions depended on your answers to previous questions, so if I messed up anywhere, it could have started a chain reaction of errors.

This is a pretty busy week for me. First there was this midterm, which I was way too worried about considering how it turned out. Tomorrow I'm going to stop by work to pick up a cheque that's been waiting for me forever. And on Friday, I leave for Antigonish. St. Francis Xavier University, to be more precise. Some classmates and I decided to form a team and enter the programming competition for the APICS Conference. It should be pretty fun - I enjoy a challenge - and it's a free trip, so how could I refuse? The only down side is that I think we have to stay until Sunday, which means I miss the Orange Party on Saturday night. I also missed the Red Party when I was sick with that wretched, horrible illness. I guess me and Colours Night just weren't meant to go together. There is some hope though... if Brad decided to bring his car, we could probably come back Saturday night. UPEI would probably be pissed though if they paid for hotel rooms for Saturday night and we didn't even use them. Why couldn't they just get a refund though? Their deposit for a reservation would be gone, yes, but that's not the end of the world. Anyway, I'll try not to complain too much about it. Afterall, this competition IS more important to me than the Orange Party. And I'll get to party next weekend.

Other than that, I'm just busy with studying for my other three midterms, which take place next week and the week after. I'm not sure what to expect with those three courses. They are hard, but not hard, you know? Hopefully I'll get my artificial intelligence assignment back before the test so I know how I did, but our professor apparently does not like marking assignments. Our next assignment is going to be huge, apparently. It's a little something called “The Wumpus World,” and I think it's going to be fun. I just have to brush up on my Prolog, because right now, I have no idea how anyone would even go about programming an intelligent agent in Prolog. Yes, I realize it is one of the most-used languages in AI, but I just don't see how at the moment.

Listen to me going on! Almost all of that blather was about school work, and I am often angry with myself for not being enough of an academic. Well, I guess what it is is that I want to be more skilled in my own field. But I just can't seem to find the time or ambition to do many personal projects, or anything that doesn't absolutely have to be done, actually. Although, I did manage to code a solution to one of the sample problems for the APICS competition. It was admittedly fairly trivial though.

There isn't really much else to talk about. Oh - one thing that I forgot to mention is that I'm trying to hunt down a job in Halifax for my work term starting in January. So far, I don't really have any leads. The next round of postings will start Monday, and there are going to be postings for a position in Moncton and one in Ottawa. I might apply to the one in Ottawa. I really can't see myself in Moncton though. I don't like that city very much. Not for any particular reason, though.

Time to wash some dishes and then do some studying and reading... I finished my physics midterm early, and I should be taking advantage of that fact!

2001-10-07T12:09:00.000-04:00

Since last time I wrote, I've mostly gotten over the Sickness. At first it got worse, but in a differnt way. I went to the doctor for antibiotics, and after I started taking the penicillin, my rash exploded. It was horrible. A couple days later, I went to another clinic to see a doctor, figuring that I was allergic to the penicillin. This seemed odd, since I'd had other drugs from the penicillin family before without incident, but the doctor seemed to agree that I was having a reaction. He prescribed something else, and told me to take Benadryl until the rash subsided.

The rash eventually subsided, and now my skin is peeling all over. It's kind of gross. Not painful or anything though... just messy. A few days ago, I concluded that I must have had scarlet fever, a rare form of strep throat that causes all of the symptoms I had. However, the doctor had done a throat swab for strep, and it came back negative. At first I figured that the test was wrong - the nurse hadn't swabbed my throat very deeply, and perhaps these tests aren't 100% accurate.

But today I realized that my energy level is still very low. I slept almost all day yesterday, and a lot this morning. And I've been lethargic all day. So I did some research tonight about mono - technically know as infectious mononucleosis. And it turns out that my symptoms also match its symptoms. In fact, “the symptoms of mono and strep infection ... are very similar.” It also turns out that mono results in a rash similar to measles in 1 of 5 cases. However, when it is misdiagnosed as a throat infection and patients are given certain types of penicillin, the incidence of rash increases to 4 out of 5, and the rash is significantly darker and denser. So I guess that explains everything.

So I must get to sleep now! I'm exhausted, and the key to recovering from mono is to rest when your body tells you it needs to rest. Wish me luck :)

2001-09-27T12:16:00.000-04:00

I think I have strep throat. My head hurts, it's hard to swallow, and the glands in my neck are swollen. Last night I awoke in a cold sweat. It's pretty awful. I missed some classes yesterday, but managed to attend today. In my last class of the day, I noticed that I had a bit of a rash on the underside of my forearms. It was almost like hives, only the blotches were smaller, not raised, and not very itchy. At first I thought I was allergic to zinc lozenges, which I've been using for my sore throat. But when I got home, I did some research on the Internet and found out that there is a rare form of strep throat that gives you scarlet fever. And scarlet fever results in a "sandpaper-like rash" that covers the entire body. Yikes! So if I'm not significantly better by tomorrow, I think I'll be going to a clinic to get some antibiotics. Because I don't think strep goes away on its own. And that's a scary thought, since they say that bacteria are starting to become resistant to certain forms of antibiotics.

The Sickness has made me quite tired and lazy. I didn't get much work done over the past couple days, but for some reason I don't really feel all that busy. I guess it's just because I reached a sort of milestone with my stuff for Echotech, so now I just have my school stuff, which seems manageable for now. Tonight though, I'm just riding on my laziness wave, watching TV and stuff. I watched Inside Schwartz, which is actually pretty funny. Then I watched Will & Grace, and Just Shoot Me is on now. Oh, and two nights ago I saw the series premiere of Undeclared, a college sitcom. It was really funny, and I hope they can keep it up. New season programming is so great!

It's been raining off and on here since Tuesday. Wednesday I got caught walking in the rain, but it was nice. The rain was falling in big, widely spaced drops. And it wasn't too cold out. Today, however, it was a bit windier, the rain was finer - more like a mist - and I was feverish. But it was still fun. I got bundled up in my rain jacket, put up my hood, and braved the elements. I walked down to the bank this evening, after dark, and my glasses got splattered in rain drops. I could barely see. But the cool part was that the reflection on my glasses from car lights was absolutely beautiful! My walk home was quite enjoyable, as I was mesmerized by the intricate patterns that reminded me of mucous membranes or neurons, all in various shades of yellow-orange. This got me thinking again about whether or not I can get contacts this fall - whether or not I can afford it, I guess. So I started thinking about my finances.

That reminds me... what would you do if you had the opportunity to get a job that would pay upwards of $47 per hour with an employer that would also subsidize your housing and transportation? It sounds insane, doesn't it? Well, I'm thinking most people will tell me to go for it, except my family, when they find out where it is. Oh well, such is life. I'm not going to get too excited for the time being. It's just a possibility, and I'm not sure if I could handle it. But time will tell.

One last thing. I must see Ben Stiller's new movie, Zoolander. I guess I won't be going tomorrow, because I'll be busy with school work. Then Saturday is "Colours Night - the Red Party," so I'll be busy. And I don't usually see movies on Sundays. So we'll say sometime next week or the week after. I imagine my sister Jeanne will want to go, too, so she'll probably invite me.

Time to rest my weary body. I'll try to keep you informed of all the exciting events that are sure to crop up over the next few weeks.

2001-09-17T12:13:00.000-04:00

Hi again. Once more, this is going to be brief...

So right now I'm sitting in a computer lab on campus. I've been up since 6:30 this morning, because I had to do some of my contract work for ECHO. Ideally they wanted it to be finished by the middle of last week. I am now half a week late, and only half done.

But anyway, they didn't give me a tight deadline, and school is supposed to be my priority, so I'm not going to worry about it too much. My concern at this instant is getting something to eat! I always eat breakfast, but it has been over 5 hours since then, and I'm usually feeling hollow by lunch on a good day. So why am I still here?

Good question. Well, for one, I wanted to use Blogger away from home, because that is where it really becomes useful. And I had to check my e-mail before leaving campus, because I'm still waiting for a book to be shipped from Chapters-Indigo, but now I really need it to study for a quiz I'm going to have on Wednesday. Of course, there was no e-mail from them in my inbox, so I'm going to have to pick it up at the bookstore. And finally, I figure that since I'm already starving, I'm finished classes for the day, and I've been meaning to post an update for a long time, now is as good a time as any.

So here I am. (Does it concern you that most of my rant is about the logistics of posting my rant? Because it kind of makes me feel silly.) The last week, and specifically the time since I've started classes again at university has been very strange. Time is going by really slowly, probably because I've got so much to do. Although I'm already mostly settled into my schedule, it's still a little difficult to get into the swing of managing weekly readings, and weekly assignments and quizzes for some courses. Then of course there's the whole "Attack on America" thing. It was very disturbing at first. At times it really affected me, sending a chill up my spine, and a stab of sadness through me. But I was still glued to the television for the first couple days, and it was hard to concentrate on anything else.

I guess I'm having mixed feelings like everyone else. Sometimes I think we need to get revenge, but most often I think that we shouldn't stoop to that level. Destroy terrorists' resources and imprison their leaders - yes. But don't hurt innocent people. Another thing I've thought about is the source of terrorism. It doesn't seem to me like the news has made much of an attempt to explain it. Are there simply no motives, making the acts inexplicable? Or is it all deeply rooted in religiously motivated struggles that have been going on for centuries? I really do not know, and I wish the media would take the time to try to explain it, rather than constantly bombarding us with figures concerning the victims, and even with their pictures. No matter what the cause of terrorism, though, I have to agree that we must not let this event stir up any kind of discrimination based on race or religion.

And that's all I have to say on that issue for now, although I'm sure I'll have more opinions when the retaliation begins.

The only other thing I can think to mention right now is my new favourite song, "You Rock My World," by Michael Jackson. I'm telling you, I'm absolutely obsessed, and I wouldn't be surprised if I've listened to it as many as 20 times a day. Anyway, take my word for it and get a copy! Perhaps I'll post a short clip of it sometime later this week...