If you’re like me and don’t like waiting, Asa Dotzler brings word that Mozilla Firebird v0.7 and Thunderbird v0.3 release candidates are available. These are not official releases, but close to it. I haven’t run into any troubles yet, nor have I noticed any glaring improvements, but there’s gotta be something right?
Reid argues in favour of the ‘Do Not Call List’, and I agree with what he has to say. If I was still living in the US, you can bet that my telephone number would have been on that list within hours of its inception. Telemarketers rank only a smidge higher than spammers on my list of scum-sucking oxygen thieves.
A few artists that have made my rush hour driving more passive aggressive than ever: Beautiful Mistake, Finch, Something Corporate, Taking Back Sunday, Tragically Hip, The Used.
As always, I’m in the market for new music suggestions. Your recommendations please?
Andy Baio is launching a humdinger of a new project:
“Upcoming.org is a collaborative event calendar, completely driven by people like you. Enter in the events you’re attending, comment on events entered by others…”
This is just the kind of thing I’ve been hoping for. Supposing enough people from your ‘metro’ sign up to make it lively, you now have centralised source for keeping pace with the numerous goings-on in your region. Far more convenient than straining to keep abreast of the concert listings in newspapers, and cultural event listings published elsewhere. Thanks Andy!
I’ve been drooling over the Sony Ericsson T616 ever since I spotted it in a technology magazine back in April. So it’s encouraging to see Justin give it the thumbs up. It features tri-band, bluetooth, phonecam, 65k color, and more — this phone really has it all. I’m looking forward to laying my grubby hands on one when I finally get my own cell phone contract.
I haven’t purchased a music CD in over two years. Well actually, I did buy 3 or so as gifts to family and friends, but that was with a very heavy heart; I won’t do it again. Neither should you. Don’t buy plastic.
There you have it: snow in the middle of September. I didn’t give much credit to snowfall warnings on the weather report last night, but they weren’t kidding. It’s still coming down, with a total of 10-15cm predicted over the course of the day.
Didn’t get far at all when I tried to leave for class on Tuesday evening. As I walked out to the rental car, I noticed something hanging from the steering column: I had locked the keys inside the car after returning from lunch! Brilliant.
I called up the Enterprise location where I’d rented the car, imagining that they would have a second key on hand. Fat chance. Their ‘toll-free 24-hour’ roadside assistance service didn’t prove to be of much immediate help either: they reported that it would be over an hour before they could send someone out me to unlock the car.
So I ended up taking a cab to MRC and back. $80 right there people! You can bet yourself I won’t be making that little mistake again anytime soon.
Funnily enough, the guy sitting behind me in that class had done the same thing with his car that afternoon. Go figure.
In an attempt to organize my online dealings, I’ve taken steps to have this site’s domain name moved away from the current registrar; and transfer it to register.com, where — by some twist of fate — the bulk of my domains are registered. As can be expected with operations of this nature, things may go awry, outages may occur. Now you know.
I should have seen it coming, but I didn’t. I should have been prepared, but I wasn’t. They say it happens to lots of guys, which makes me feel a little better about it. Still, I wish it didn’t happen to me. I just can’t do it anymore… I’m out of space on my hard drive!
Heh! I’ve already managed to eat up 34Gb worth of space with downloads this week. Not a record by any means, but it puts me in the curios situation of needing to ration the remaining 3Gb. At least until tomorrow morning, when I can run out and pick up some blank CD-Rs, and start burning.
The movies I watched this week — for the first time — and that are now taking up precious space on my hard drive:
Plus a few others I’ve seen before; episodes of Friends, Futurama, Seinfeld; and 1000+ mp3s. Gotta love broadband.
Chris has put the finishing touches on his most recent short story The Last People, and handsomely presents it for your reading pleasure. Scoot on over, and take a gander why don’t you.
So! I’m studying part-time at Mount Royal College; trying to get my sh** in order to join the BComm programme at the University of Calgary sometime in the *cough* near *cough* future.
One of the things that crystallizes when you begin paying for your own education is the outrageous cost of textbooks. Where do they get off selling the most rudimentary of texts for $100+ dollars?! I’m not a med student for pete’s sake. Oh sure, they’ll but it back at the end of the semester you say… if it’ll be used in the next session’s course that is — and then only at a third of the price. Highway robbery.
I had to do a double-take in my business communications class today. In her response to one of my questions, the lecturer correctly used the term ‘usability’ — not just in an offhand, buzzword sense! Stopping just short of falling off my chair and having to reel my tongue back in from across the floor, I smiled to myself knowing that ‘the force is strong with this one’.
I can’t understand how anyone got this so screwed up. From the brochures/websites I’ve read, and the sales representatives I’ve spoken to, Canada’s wireless (cell phone) providers need their head examined — smacked with a baseball bat is more like it.
My biggest gripe has to be that call charges are split between callers! For instance, if you call me on my cell phone, then both of us will pay a part of the call — no, I’m not talking about roaming. I mean what moron dreamed up that idea?! And how do people stand for it?!!
There are other issues too, Rogers AT&T (and other providers too I suppose) don’t even provide international text messaging (SMS). You have to pay extra for caller ID and voicemail. Oh yeah, and it seems that you have to pay when using voice dialling.
The European providers’ services are light years ahead of what I see here. What’s more is that people actually put up with this ridiculous crap. You’re getting ripped off people!! Put those wallets away and demand something better.
After viewing more than 50 houses in Calgary’s Northwest and Southwest, I’m sure our realtor was starting to wonder if we were ever going to find anything. Each and every house that really ‘grabbed’ us had some sort of major detractor, e.g. high-voltage powerlines right next to it, a school next door, major roadways etc. I was starting to get quite dismayed, and began entertaining thoughts of just buying something that would suffice for the short-term, and re-sell in a year or so.
Then, quite by chance really, we were driving through our favourite neighbourhood the weekend before last, and came across a new listing that had just made its way onto the market. The price was right, the house was great, and the location superb. We signed, and should be moving in at the end of September.
The house is a real gem! Brand spanking new — just built in December 2002 — the seller is a realtor with a passion for interior design, so everything has been tastefully finished, and the layout/design/colours really flows. They’re still busy landscaping the gardens, that’s why you see no grass where the front lawn should be. Oh, and the cars in the picture aren’t ours either.
Phew, what a relief! No more worrying about having to make ridiculous compromises, or the lose-lose ‘ickiness’ of renting and not really feeling like you’re permanently situated yet. We got lucky.
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