A Halloween musing

I'm sitting here, left with the task of doling out candy to children (or pretending I'm not home, but I've got the candy, so that would be a waste). And I just had a thought.

When I was a kid, I'd be at least getting ready to go out by now, if not out already, and some really young kids would have likely been by already (possibly cousins showing off their costumes).

But not only has nobody been by yet...there's no way I ever went out trick-or-treating when the sun was still shining so brightly. Or at all.

I pondered this oddness for a moment.

Then I realized the culprit - last year, daylight savings time was pushed back a few weeks. Oh sure, it's great for farmers, and allegedly for heart attacks (my thinking on that one is that it's the extra hour of sleep gained/lost that causes the drop/rise in heart attacks, nothing else), but what about the kids who are now going out an hour later, returning home an hour later, gorging themselves to the point of a sugar high an hour later, and crashing an hour later?

WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!?

--Ryan

Brawl in the Family

Brawl in the Family is a webcomic I found not that long ago, which proves a simple truth - namely, Nintendo characters are funny. Originally showing the results of Kirby sucking up various objects, the strip has expanded to cover all of Nintendo (including a very simple, yet very funny premise for Captain Falcon). Go through the archives, you won't regret it!

(For those of you who need a little help with the comic above, Mario punts Squirtle because he thinks it's a Koopa. Squirtle's trainer is unhappy. The end.)

--Ryan

Channel surfing

11:21 PM.

Former prime minister Paul Martin is being interviewed by George Strombolopolous (no, I didn't look that up) on CBC.

I wonder if the Daily Show is back from commercials yet.

It is!

Jon Stewart is interviewing actor/comedian Steve Martin.

I wonder if they're related.

I doubt it.

Although they do both have prominent noses.

I wonder which one of of them is older.

Paul looks older, but Steve's a hollywood guy, so it's hard to tell.

That must really be quite the family reunion.

I wonder which one's funnier.

Steve's getting more laughs, but The Hour's audience is generally small and sober, in stark contrast to the Daily Show's pack of hyenas. The CBC audience seem more willing to laugh at worse jokes.

I hope Steve doesn't start getting jealous of Paul.

I think I need some sleep.

--Ryan

Words fail me

When I first got a GMail account, I signed up to a lot of newsletters. I forget why, I think there may have been a myth at the time that they'd close your account if it didn't get a certain amount of traffic. But that's not important.

What is important is that one of the mailing lists I signed up for was the Dictionary.com Word Of The Day. I rarely read the actual e-mails, but I've noticed a marked change from four years ago to today - I think they've run out of words.

I mean, I used to recognize the word of the day every once in a while, but those words were few and far between. Take a look at this sampling of recent words:

• genuflect (Oct. 27)
• corroborate (Oct. 26)
• malfeasance (Oct. 20)
• waylay (Oct. 15)
• aficionado (Oct. 9)
• verbiage (Sept. 29)
• panache (Sept. 28)
• melee (Sept. 26)
• proponent (Sept. 20)
• vociferous (Sept. 17)

Get the picture? You might not recognize every single word in that list, but I'll bet you know a good deal of them, and maybe a couple of the ones I didn't.

And just think of how many people are in the same situation I am - receiving e-mails they don't particularly want and will never read, but will also never unsubscribe from! No wonder the tubes are clogging!

--Ryan

Schoolhouse Rock has nothing on this

And if you thought that was something, this will blow your mind.

--Ryan

Who'd want to go to Winnipeg?

The Office, for one.

(And no, I have no idea what that picture is, other than that you eventually run across it if you GIS "Winnipeg" and look through the results long enough.)

The American version of The Office isn't technically headed to Winnipeg per se, but at least one character is going to a conference in Winnipeg, and The Office's producers are trying to make their Winnipeg sets as realistic as possible. So reports - who else? - the Canadian Press.

Hopefully this creates less of a frenzy than the Simpsons going to Toronto a few years ago did, and isn't quite as much of a disappointment.

And while I'm here, a quick comment on The Office as a show. If I hadn't been watching it for a few years, I wouldn't be watching it now. If I stumbled across it and started watching it for the first time this week, I wouldn't watch it again.

It used to be a good, clever, funny show. It used to be about the goings-on of an office, and the people who work therein. Now, it's about a bunch of people who happen to work at a certain office.

I mean, I know it's hard to think of 24 good premises each year, but surely they could have done a little better than "put a bunch of people in relationships so people watch Pam and Jim be cute/Michael and whoever be awkward/Andy and Angela be whatever they are"?

It's the exact same turn that was taken by Scrubs, Studio 60, and probably a bunch of other shows I've never seen that were originally about a subject, not about the relationships between the main cast, only it's bothering me even more with The Office.

I've heard the original British version was really good, maybe I'll try finding that. British comedy's generally something a little drier than Wedding Crashers, right?

--Ryan

Flickr

You may have heard of the photo-sharing website Flickr. What you may not heard of are the fun and exciting things that people are making that take advantage of flicker.

I heard of these from Ze Frank (famed video-blogger from a couple of years back), who made this memory game. It requires the name of a set (or public album), and the username of the person who made the set.

He also linked this neat search engine which searches for colours instead of words. Try it out!

--

D. Phillips

Whistle while you work

And tickle while you type.

That is, tickle in the sense of tickling the ivories.

KeyBored is a new program which turns your computer keyboard into a piano keyboard! Simply download it, have it running in the background, and everything you type will be accompanied by a lovely piano flourish!

I'm kind of amazed that nobody thought of this until now. It's awesome.

--Ryan

Never again...

...will I claim that something will be my 'last entry' on politics.

Because you never know when something like Warren Kinsella announcing his return to the Liberal strategy team will pop up.

Kinsella, of course, is a former top strategist for Jean Chretien, who later became a blogger and has become a regular spot on my tours of the Internet. Besides the fact that he's intelligent, informed, and regularly consults the opinion of his goldfish, he's good at what he does. Case in point, taken from today's post:

I'm now looking forward to doing to the federal Tories what we did to the Ontario ones, with all that means.

I think this is going to be good.

--Ryan

(P.S. I really do have a lot of really neat things lined up for the next while, including something that will revolutionize how you write essays, something that will revolutionize how you listen to music, and a really funny webcomic. By "really funny", I mean "really funny, unlike anything Dan might link to".)

The wheels on the bus

(Before I begin, a quick shoutout to Hell, Upside Down for linking to one of my election posts in a section entitled "thoughts from blogs I've never heard of"! It might be a technicality, but I'm officially part of the blogosphere!)

Today's Brantford Expositor contains some very good news for anybody who ever uses Brantford Transit. In short, city council is looking to spend about $20 million (most of that money coming from Toronto and Ottawa) to replace older buses, upgrade the bus terminal, and increase the number of routes and runs.

The best news of all? The proposed phasing out of Dial-A-Bus.

For anybody fortunate enough to have not lived in Brantford and thus know nothing about Dial-A-Bus...I've lived here for over two years now, and I don't know any more than you do. The entire Sputnik news team was unable to figure it out, and when we asked Brantford Transit for information, they gave us a map.

Of course, I'm not that picky - the three routes that run overnight and on weekends get me anywhere I'd ever need to go by bus, so I've never had to use Dial-A-Bus. But the Expositor argues that West Brant and the northwest corner of the city both need expanded service - and since I never visit either of those parts of town, who am I to disagree?

I also like the idea of improving the downtown terminal - I'm originally from Kitchener, where we have a real downtown bus terminal. One gets the impression that were Tim Horton's not interested in having a location in the terminal, the 'terminal' would simply be a ticket window.

And unlike Kitchener, people seem to actually ride the bus in Brantford. This is a good thing - who'd have thought that the most dangerous city in Ontario would do their part for the environment?

--Ryan

We made it! (Though I guess we already knew that...)

This is my first time using Bloggers post-dated system. I know I was looking forward to it at first, but I guess I never got around to it.

So, this is the original LHC doomsday. (Thankfully, it busted.)

I just thought I'd remind you all that we've been through this sort of thing before.

Western Religion's Genesis

Benefit: Eating delicious forbidden fruit of knowledge!

Risk: Eternal damnation!

1800s - Vaccinations

Benefit: Curing diseases!

Risk: Spreading the end-all plague!

1960s - Nukes

Benefit: Blowing up dirty commies!

Risk: Blowing ourselves up in the process!

2000 - The Y2K Bug  

Benefit: Free space on early computers by using two-digits for the year in dates!

Risk : What comes after 99 on a Bank's computer?

2006 - World Jump Day

Benefit: No more global warming!

Risk: The Earth spins into space!

2008 - LHC

Benefit: Make a super-cool black hole!

Risk: Sucking ourselves in a super-cool black hole!

2054 - Cyborg Implants

Benefit: Chainsaw arms are better than real arms!

Risk: Oops! We're all robots!

--

D. Phillips

Last note on politics

Of course, I've said that before. In fact, this entire week for me has been mostly "I don't need to be posting every day, I'll do something tomorrow" followed by "something election-related has led to me wanting to make a post", and the cycle continuing.

Two quick points, then that's it. Promise.

1) If you can get a copy of it, and have the hour to spend reading it, pick up the latest issue of Maclean's. It's weird for me to say I enjoyed an issue of that magazine in a non-perverse fashion, but Paul Wells' 36-page recap of the campaign was the most evenhanded analysis I've seen yet. And I learned a few things!

2) Stephane Dion has called a press conference for tomorrow, at which it's expected that he'll announce he's stepping down as Liberal leader. That's really too bad - I think Dion had finally figured out this campaigning stuff by the last few days, and if given another chance, he'd surprise a lot of people.

I'm done now. Seriously.

--Ryan

Many have come, but I like you the best!

During his show, I was a huge fan of Ze Frank... I wanted to share this experience with others, but they never seemed to get the same thrill out of it.

Now, some two years later, I'd like to plug him again. He still does some creative works. I'd like to ask you, dear reader, to go to his website and click around on his projects.

Some episodes of his show are silly, and others rude... some too political, and of those too obsolete.

So before you try those, just take a gander at the rest of his page.


stumpy_version1 from ze frank on Vimeo.


Something will make you feel warm and fuzzy.

Or your money back.

--
D. Phillips

Two tidbits, both alike in dignity

Hey! Remember when Stephen Harper was criticizing Stephane Dion for saying if he were elected, he'd call a meeting with all the First Ministers? Remember how Harper said it was proof that Dion didn't have a plan and people should instead vote for the Conservatives, who did had a plan? I sure remember that! In fact, it seems like it was just a few days ago!

If you, too, remember it, then this story might surprise you. Unless you're cynical, psychic, or saw this elsewhere and thus know what I'm getting at.

In other news, music composer Neil Hefti has passed away. Now, you might have never heard of Neil Hefti, and that's certainly fair. However, you're sure to recognize his most famous ditty...



--Ryan

You have got to be kidding me

Taken from today's Expositor:

Phil McColeman says that his first step as the Conservative MPelect for Brant will be to arrange a meeting with political and community leaders to discuss how to find a solution to the thorny issues surrounding native land claims.

You see, it's perfectly acceptable for McColeman to do this, because it's good to solicit a wide range of informed opinions on difficult issues. However, should it be Stephane Dion meeting with a wide range of economic experts to figure out what to do there, that's completely unacceptable, because...um, help me out here.

--Ryan

So much for "no blog until morning"

(Although it's 1:07 AM, so technically it *is* the next day.)

The election's in the bag, and while a couple seats might yet change hands (it was maybe an hour ago I saw Andrew Telegdi, with the little "elected" checkmark, in second place), we have a pretty good idea of our new government.

Spoiler alert:

Conservatives. Lots of Conservatives. Like, a scary number of Conservatives, winning by disheartening numbers.

I don't know what caused it, I'm not going to pretend to examime the numbers and come up with nothing of substance - can we agree yet that polling is a crock?

Instead, I want to make note of two moments from tonight which satisfied my surrealist sense of humour.

9:20 EST, ten minutes before polls closed in Ontario, Craig Oliver is on CTV explaining that the reason he doesn't look directly at the camera (like every other trained seal in the TV reporting business) is because he's legally blind due to glaucoma.

Fine. I have glaucoma, and know that although my case is mild, it's definitely a serious disease.

Problem: Craig Oliver was diagnosed with glaucoma 35 years ago. It's not like it was a recent health problem which might have prompted a suddenly different behaviour. He's been the same way for as long as most people can remember. What was the point of this, other than to fill time before results started coming in?

Moment number two, which I suspect Mike Duffy will have a field day with, would bring a smile to my face and a bounce to my step as I raced to type out the exact quote before I forgot it:

As soon as the theme of the night (Liberal losses begetting mostly Conservative gains) became apparent, CTV - particularly the aforementioned Oliver - began opining incessantly that this was the end for Dion, there was no way he could lead the Liberals after tonight. Whenever they interviewed another Liberal, leadership was the first question they asked. CTV even went so far as to put Rae and Ignatieff on at the same time, hoping for some potential conflict between the two presumed front-runners in the Dion replacement sweepstakes. CBC did none of this, at least from what I saw.

So you can imagine my delight when Dion was walking into an auditorium to give his concession speech, CTV's Roger Smith asked him if he'd be stepping down, and Dion replied with a dismissive "the last one I want to speak to now is CTV, you understand that?".

In the few minutes of Dion's speech, CTV quickly readied their plan of attack - the most passive-agressive journalism I've ever seen. After the speech, Oliver, Smith, Tom Clark, and even Lloyd Robertson openly declared that there was no way Dion could continue on as Liberal leader, with Smith pretending to frame Dion as simply being disheartened from the results, while ever-so-subtly calling him a bad politician, naive, "focusing too much on policy" (seriously???), and other things I can't remember at the moment. It was truly a sight to see.

CTV News - fair and balanced. :)

--Ryan

Election Night in Canada

Polls have already closed out east, an hour left in Ontario and Quebec, two hours for BC.

I was toying with the idea of watching the coverage and liveblogging as I went along (it's fun to liveblog things), but I decided against it - I'd rather be able to take in everything that's going on.

I'll probably be watching mostly CTV, with a bit of CBC thrown in - although CBC will no doubt do a better job, CTV's familiar to me, plus they have the local station they'll throw to every so often, so I'll get to hear whether Lloyd manages to hold on to Brant, whether Karen's toppled in Kitchener Centre, things like that.

I watched the CKCO - excuse me, CTV Southwestern Ontario - newscast at six tonight, and something caught my attention. I thought they said they'd have reporters in 22 different ridings, which seems a little unlikely to me - they'd have to bust out every reporter they've got, and probably a couple they don't, to get that number. But I'm starting to think maybe they said "we'll be covering 22 ridings" and I misunderstood.

Predictionss? Democraticspace has it at CON 126, LIB 92, BLOC 52, GRN 0, OTH 2. Doing my own analysis of their numbers, it's going to be pretty close to that - maybe a couple fewer conservative seats, but certainly not enough to give the Liberals first place without some sort of crisis destroying the entire concept of polling. Which wouldn't be a bad thing.

Election postmortem tomorrow? Maybe.

--Ryan

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Mis(thanks)givings

What Thanksgiving dinner should be: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, squash, cranberries, carrots, bread, and often a couple other salads or vegetables. Pumpkin pie and one other cake or pie for dessert. Appetizers are less rigid, but are generally of the vegetable tray/bowl of chips/cheese and crackers variety.

What Thanksgiving dinner should not be: lamb with garlic potatoes and assorted vegetables. Calamari appetizer and chocolate cake for dessert. Nothing that sounds like it could have been ordered off a menu. Nothing that *was* ordered off a menu. Nothing where you don't have some personal connection to the cook. Different people eating different things.

Thanksgiving is the one holiday where tradition still trumps commercialism.

Let's not do this again.

--Ryan

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