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April 29, 2006
done it again
My time for the CN tower climb this time around was 17:34. Off my best by more than a minute but still reasonable. I knew from almost the beginning that I wasn't going to be able to keep up a record setting pace. By the 20th landing I was already walking and my legs felt like lead. Only the reassuring presence of EMT people (including one EMT babe wearing sexy glasses ... have they always hired supermodels?) allowed me to keep any sort of decent pace without worrying about dropping dead of a heart attack. I am truly out of shape. Mind you, I was still passing most people .. including people way younger than myself ... no doubt they got in shape with the XBox CN Tower climb game.
They ran out of tshirts (they're mailing me one) so they wrote my time on a card instead. The guy who wrote mine was either trying to do it upside down or is dyslexic; he wrote it as 17:E4. If was actually writing my time in hex it would be 20:48. Yikes.
Posted by John at 04:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 28, 2006
Internet update
You may have noticed that connection to my website has been spotty this week. The issue is that my DSL modem is on its last legs and drops the internet connection periodically. To get back online I have to turn the modem off for a period of time and then turn it back on. Even with intense vigilance I don't always notice the the modem is offline immediately so there is often a delay in my performing the necessary steps to get it back online. A new modem is being shipped so this will only be short term spottiness, I hope.
Posted by John at 12:42 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
April 26, 2006
It's over
My annual foray into the wilderness of Las Vegas is over. An abbreviated trip this year, although I managed to fit in everything I usually do in a week into three days ... right down to getting a sore back and sore feet from wandering the show. I won $70 in roulette. Not enough to retire on but better than losing. I arrived home at 7:30am yesterday morning after about 12 hours of travel ... including four hours sitting in airports staring at my shoes (and watching other people sitting around staring at their shoes). It was easy to pick out fellow travelers who were in sales. All with short meticulously groomed hair, pleated shirts and slacks; the rest of us in wrinkled tshirts and jeans (or in my case paint stained shorts with patch pockets). At least half the people in the waiting area spent a good portion of their time talking on their cellphones. As soon as each plane landed there were flashes of blue light all over the cabin as people fired up their phones and checked in again after being offline for one or four hours. "Just landed at the airport." Well, duh.
I didn't take my SLR, just poked around with just my point and shoot. Everything looks pretty much the same as always but the neon McDonald's caught my eye.
Posted by John at 01:46 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
April 21, 2006
... except the waiting
Everything is done except the waiting. I'm packed and just waiting for the time to cab it to the airport.
We're off to our annual pilgrimage to Mecc... I mean Las Vegas for the NAB trade show. This is the first time in 9 years that I haven't been there for the full week. I'll be there for the weekend set up and then fly home on Monday night. I have sort of mixed feelings about this. On one hand I'm kinda ticked that I won't be there for all the stuff that happens in the evenings and the camaraderie, but, most of the time during most of the trips I do feel unneeded. Once the show is on, unless there is really big failure, we do not touch the machines. So, every day I would show up and then sort of wander around aimlessly looking at other booths and just basically fill a volume of space until tear down. So, really my leaving after the set up makes perfect sense. Really.
Posted by John at 01:11 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
J*ggling
Chris Bliss Juggling
Joggling
Is jiggling a sport?
Posted by John at 12:16 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
April 17, 2006
So, we went to see
So, we went to see Battle In Heaven last night. One good thing about the movie is seeing way too many shots of naked fat guys has made me appreciate the guys in Humpback ... I mean Brokeback ... Mountain a lot more. At least they were attractive and dressed well.
I didn't really care for this movie but I did appreciate how the director kept a consistent style through the whole flick. He definitely knew what he was doing. It just moved way too slow for me. And I don't need to see fat guy penises on a sunday night...it disturbs the sleep!
Most of us gave this movie a score of 1 star so I don't know how the final score ended up being 4 out of 5.
Posted by John at 01:59 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
April 12, 2006
TMI ...
I seriously need to laundry here ... I'm down to my backup undies.
Posted by John at 04:22 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
April 11, 2006
CN Tower climb
I'll be climbing the CN Tower again on April 29th. Please sponsor me if you have a mind to. Click here and do a search for my name. The climb is hosted by WWF and rather than looking to merely save fuzzy animals this time they're going for something more lofty: saving the planet. Can't have a grander goal than that.
Posted by John at 04:32 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Company curling
We had so much fun on our second curling evening that we're actually talking about having our company Christmas party at the Leaside Curling rink so we can all play again. Tonight though it was boys against the girls and, um, the boys won. (Decidedly.) Oh, did I mention there were three boys and four girls? I probably didn't. I probably also didn't mention that curling is an *impossible* sport. Shotting the rock at exactly the right velocity and with exactly the right spin is very hard! Who knew.
Posted by John at 12:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 10, 2006
Rochester
Here are some pictures from the TUEM trip to Rochester this past weekend. It was a great trip (busy, of course). I was experimenting with light painting which is when you use a long shutter speeds and then use a flashlight to illuminate certain things in the image. Some images turned out very well. Others were a bit of a disappointment. I'd like to keep experimenting with this technique though.
Posted by John at 05:42 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
April 07, 2006
Eureka moment
This morning I've made a startling revelation. I would call it a Eureka moment but since it occurred to me in the shower and not in the bath it's not technically correct. Unless in the thousands of years since the original eureka moment they've made allowances for discoveries in other sorts of watery conditions. Anyway, all at once I had this startling thought: the shampoo people don't make their own bottles. Yes, I know; shocking.
This discovery will forever alter my shower time. For years I'd thought of working at a shampoo company, being involved in creating the hair concoctions, designing the labels, marketing, helping with distribution and, yes, designing the bottles. The pop open stopper on these bottles is amazing: it pops open easily (with a comforting pop sound) and yet closes tightly enough that none of the viscous liquid escapes ... even when stored upside down so all the leftover blobs can flow down to the opening. And to have been part (ok, leader) of that team would have been quite the thrill.
Now, when I think about working for a shampoo company I'll have to imagine contracting out the bottles. Calling some guy on the phone and merely *saying* that we want bottles with stoppers that pop. Now that the floodgates are open I will probably have to start imagining that the labels are designed out of house too; the cases of product delivered by some third party trucking company; the shampoo itself could just be requested from yet another company. What's left? Sitting around talking to other people on the phone. Talking to the people who are doing the jobs that *I* want to do. Eureka indeed.
Posted by John at 10:10 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
April 05, 2006
OK, I have to write this ...
... if only because it's unlikely to happen again any time soon.
I won three of the four games I played at pool last night ... for some inexplicable reason I was completely relaxed and just let things progress on their own and, boom, I won.
So, yes, compared to last week it was a much less sucky evening.
Posted by John at 10:21 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
April 04, 2006
Another day, another article
There is an article in today's Star mentioning the Toronto Photography Meetup Group. Previous articles in the Star covered the place I play pool and the Toronto Urban Exploration Meetup Group. Do I know how to pick them or what?
(Yes, I realize there are some other folks who share the same affiliations, but hey, this blog is all about *me*!!)
Posted by John at 03:57 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Interesting
My brother Mark sent this (via our dad) :
On Wednesday of this week, at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00 in the morning, the time and date will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.
This won't ever happen again.....the date being m/d/y
Posted by John at 12:17 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
April 03, 2006
Two events
To things today to report:
1) Did my taxes ... for, uh, 2004. Doing taxes is just as annoying as I remember.
2) Saw Brokeback Mountain. Good thing it was with a group ... I was uncomfortable during parts of it... I admire the guts of the actors playing those roles.
Posted by John at 01:04 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack