My Life is A Drama Free Zone

As anyone who follows my twitter feed will probably already know, last weekend went actually quite well with myself and Jessica (samari76). She arived safely on Friday, and we spent the majority of that day just hanging around the apartment, talking. she ended up being a little more tired than she thought she'd be, so she caught a couple hours' sleep while I came out here to finish up with checking email and the like. We ended up just relaxing and enjoying ourselves for the rest of that evening. I threw together a little something for supper, and we just sort of talked and did a little listening to music. Saturday we slept in a little, and took our time getting to that point most people would call awake. Again, there was more just hanging out, and talking. We ended up ordering out for supper, after which we got into a bottle of lemmon rum I'd picked up a couple days before leaving Pembroke.

It was actually before we started drinking, though, when we got a call that my grandpa had been taken to the Ottawa hospital; he was having issues with his apendix and they weren't sure if it would require surgery or not. We stayed up most of the night waiting for news, but after being told my parents were enroute to Ottawa just behind him to make sure he was being looked after, we hadn't heard anything. Trish IMed me at that point to say she hadn't heard anything new, really, either. We ended up aranging to get together for breakfast the next day, since we'd not hung out in a while anyway and Jess was looking forward to seeing her again. Well, that, plus since we were waiting for information it made more sense to all be in one place when it came in. We ended up going to bed about 4:00 that morning, getting up again at an impressive 9:00. Cabbing it over there, we hung out with Trish, her husband and both her brothers for much of the morning. She made an awesome breakfast, which kind of reminded me a little of something you'd be able to order from any decent restaurant on Jessica's side of the border. Family started to trickle in shortly after, and we learned he wasn't actually going to get the surgery right yet; they wanted to see if they couldn't treat it with antibiotics first, which kind of makes sense to me. I mean, the guy *is* in his 80's. No sense in putting him through a surgery that may or may not be required. We got to see a goodly portion of my family, though. And Jess got to meet a few people we couldn't get around to visiting the last time we were both in that neighbourhood. We all sat around and talked, the older guys watching nascar on TV and everyone with something better to do just generally conversating/trying not to hear it. They ordered pizza and wings, some of which we both helped ourselves to (Hey, breakfast was good, but it's pizza and wings. Come on.). We spent the rest of the day just sort of hanging out. After everyone left, Trish, her husband, both brothers, plus myself and Jessica decided to go and check out one of the local carnivals in town that weekend. We got there just in time for it to start packing up, of course, but at least Jess got to get a brief look at some of what goes on around here this time of year. We didn't get home until about 9:00 or so, and stayed up for a bit longer just generally talking and the like.

Monday was a very low key day; we didn't even get dressed until that evening. we just enjoyed our last day together for a while, and recovered sort of from the day before. I took Jess to the bus station that night, and she made it across the border all in one piece, luggage and all. As for me, I went back home and did that thing where I fall into bed until 6 or 7 the next morning. I spent the rest of the week going through my usual routine; looking for work, not finding much, talking to Jess, and occasionally cursing technology. I did eventually finally hear that my grandpa was back home and doing well, the antibiotics seeming to be working thus far, so that was one less thing on my list of things to be paying attention to.

One thing I did finally get around to this week, that I'd been threatening to do before, is installing Gentoo linux on the formerly retired laptop. It actually didn't take too long when you break it down to time spent actually working on the system; the longest part of it all was the waiting for things to compile. I had it installed and running by yesterday morning, and talking by yesterday afternoon after I learned I missed a step in building the kernel so had to do that all over again. Lovely. I got that fixed up though, and it behaves beautifully now. I ended up playing around with Speakup, one of the screenreading packages available for linux, a bit yesterday and again this morning. Now, I'm waiting for the various Gnome packages to install, including its screenreader, so I can have a little bit of a look at that. Judging by the sheer number of packages that are needing instalation, and the fact they all need to be compiled, this could take a while. In the meantime, I have free time on my hands that I'm sure I'll put to good use ordering groceries. Or sleeping. Or something. I may or may not have missed something in my update. If I did, I'm sure Jess will remind me... she's good like that. As for now, though, I'm so gone it's not funny.

Because I've come to the shocking realization that Twitter is not, in fact, sufficient for updating in any amount of significant detail. Well, okay, so I already knew that. Oh well. Not a whole lot of any real significance has gone on of late that needs updating anyway. Spent Victoria day weekend in Pembroke with the family, only getting back just yesterday. And this time, aside from the fact I spent most of the weekend doing free tech support for my father, who's laptop decided it wanted to spend most of said weekend sideways, it was actually nice and uneventful. Not bad for a long weekend, I dare say. In the last week and a bit, I've found a grand total of 2 jobs (including the one I just applied for a few minutes ago). Not bad considering there was a report released not all that long ago saying over 30000 new jobs were created up here. Guess I shouldn't have expected they'd all be created in my particular industries of choice. Oh well, I've still got unemployment insurance.

No sooner did we end our long weekend up here than the folks south of the border are starting theirs. And with Jessica (samari76) having Monday off from class, we decided to spend the long weekend in style. So, she's presently on a bus and an hour and a half from the station, where I'll be meeting her. Neither of us likes to make any kind of detailed plans, but I can say the 3 or so days she's here are going to be enjoyed by both of us. And I do know that one of said days is going to be concluded with the consumption of things alcoholic. Because hey, all the cool kids are doing it. Can't guarantee we'll have a whole lot of time for LJ, but you can still keep up with us on Twitter if you're into that sorta thing (I'm over here, and she's over here.). I have this nasty habbit of paying more attention to that than LJ lately these days anyway. But today, well, and the rest of the weekend, I'll actually have a reason. Happy memorial day to those who cellebrate it, belated happy Victoria day to those who cellebrated it, and I'll catch yall on the flip side.

First off, because there will probably be at least one person asking why it is I'm posting about this, I'll just say right now, I'm doing it because that's what one does when they have access to a medium with which to do so. Names of the offending parties will be removed, to protect the guilty. Because contrary to the opinion of a small minority, I can occasionally be a nice guy. Somewhat.

Jess (samari76) and I haven't particularly cared a whole lot for a particular person she has the misfortune of working with since events, that have already been gone over either generally or specificly on her LJ, transpired a few months ago. Things were said, and whether they were meant in the spirit in which they were taken or not, they were things you just don't say to/about someone you're supposed to be friends with. This of course after said person pretty much invented a conversation between myself and them that never happened, and proceeded to fill Jess in on only the vaguest details as to what it was about before going into some explanation about why they couldn't go into specifics right then and there. Said person hadn't so much as tried to talk to either of us since then, until yesterday, when I received an email from them. The general point of that email pretty much consisted of "Tell Jess not to write about me in her LJ anymore.". Apparently, as we were to learn later, the supposedly unwanted entry was written a couple weeks ago, and friends locked, which kind of limits the people who had access to read it pretty significantly right there; this person isn't on LJ, never mind her flist, so they're automaticly ruled out.

I responded to the email this morning, letting them know in no uncertain terms that I wasn't about to tell her what it was she could and could not write in her own LJ. It *was*, after all, her LJ and I'm really not into the whole sensorship thing. Sorry. They wrote me back, because clearly I didn't understand them the first time and how dare she write about them on her LJ when they're not *on* LJ and have given her no reason to do so. So again, I responded, telling them exactly the same thing; it's *her* LJ, with *her* opinions on things that matter to or have quite irritated her. And neither myself, nor anyone else, is about to tell her, or anyone else, they're not supposed/allowed to write about such things in their own personal space. That *is*, after all, why we have our own personal space, y/n? I also added in this reply that if they didn't like what was being written about them, perhaps they aught to 1: stop doing whatever is prompting the entry in question, and 2: keep their and their friends' noses out of her/our LJ's.

I guess they thought third time's a charm, because they again responded, trying to play the "you don't understand" game. So again I restated my point, then told them to either deal with it, or whine to someone who cared. Because at that point, well... actually... long before that point, I seem to have forgotten how. All they said in their last reply to me was, "You're right.". And that was pretty much that.

The conversation in and of itself wasn't the problem, though. Actually, to be fair, the conversation didn't bother me at all. That was just this person's typical behaviour whenever they discovered we weren't going to be playing by their rules. The thing that irritated me to no end, though? Someone, and there are definite suspicions as to who, decided to share said entry with their significant other. Said significant other happens to be close friends with the person about whom the entry was written. So, the entry in question, or at least the general point behind said entry, ended up leaving the LJ flist, and showing up at Jess's place of work. The emphasis here, of course, is that this was *not* an entry that could have been accessed by just anyone at random. Someone decided to stick their nose in where it had no business being, just for the sake of trying very hard to stir the pot. And that, more than anything else, pisses me off to the third degree. If you're so bored that you can find some form of amusement in playing the part of the gossip girl, you are in desperate need of either a hobby or a job. Or both, if it'll help. And sorry, but being a proverbial pain in my ass does not constitute the makings of either. People need to seriously start acting their age, knock it off with the highschool bullshit, or crawl themselves into the nearest hole so the rest of the world can go on headache free. You can join the rest of the adults when you decide you can act like one.

You need look no farther than moments like this. Not mine, obviously, but good lord I wish I could take credit for this.

No Tickey, No Watchey
Call Center | Ontario, Canada

(I work in the billing department for a cable company. One day I took the following call.)

Me: “Thank you for calling ****, my name is ****, what can I help you with?”

Customer: “Hi, I need you turn my cable back on so I can watch the fight this weekend.”

Me: “OK, if I could get your phone number, I’ll bring up your account and see what’s up.”

(I proceed to bring up his account, and notice he had been installed 6 months ago, and had not once paid his bill.)

Me: “Sir, I’m afraid that we can’t turn anything back on for your account until there has been a payment made.”

Customer: “No, that’s not the agreement. I need to watch the fight this weekend, my boys are coming over.”

Me: “That’s all well and good, but you owe us over two thousand dollars for charges, pay per view and equipment. Nothing can be done until you are up to
date on payment.”

Customer: *angry* “I NEVER AGREED TO PAY YOU ANY F****** MONEY! GIVE ME MY GOD**** CABLE!

Me: “Sir, you obviously don’t understand how this works. We provide a service, and in return you pay a monthly fee. This is where we’re at; nothing can
be done until you pay your balance.”

Customer: “F*** YOU GUYS THEN! I’LL JUST WATCH IT ONLINE, SO THERE! WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?”

Me: “I think you forgot that we supply your internet as well. It won’t be reconnected until you pay your bill.”

Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce to you, the clue by four.

Due to the climate of political correctness now pervading Canada , Albertans will no longer be referred to as 'Rednecks.' You must now refer to them as Rocky Mountain/Prairie Canadians.

And furthermore


HOW TO SPEAK ABOUT WOMEN AND BE POLITICALLY CORRECT:
1. She is not a 'BABE' or a 'CHICK' - She is a ' BREASTED Canadian.'
2. She is not 'EASY' - She is 'HORIZONTALLY ACCESSIBLE.'
3. She is not a 'DUMB BLONDE' - She is a 'LIGHT-HAIRED DETOUR OFF THE INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY.'
4. She has not 'BEEN AROUND' - She is a 'PREVIOUSLY-ENJOYED COMPANION.'
5. She does not 'NAG' you - She becomes ' VERBALLY REPETITIVE.'
6. She is not a 'TWO-BIT HOOKER' - She is a ' LOW COST PROVIDER.'


HOW TO SPEAK ABOUT MEN AND BE POLITICALLY CORRECT:
1. He does not have a 'BEER GUT' - He has developed a 'LIQUID GRAIN STORAGE FACILITY.'
2. He is not a 'BAD DANCER' - He is ' OVERLY CAUCASIAN.'
3. He does not 'GET LOST ALL THE TIME' - He ' INVESTIGATES ALTERNATIVE DESTINATIONS.'
4. He is not 'BALDING' - He is in 'FOLLICLE REGRESSION.'
5. He does not act like a 'TOTAL ASS' - He develops a case of RECTAL-CRANIAL INVERSION.'
6. It's not his 'CRACK' you see hanging out of his pants - It's 'REAR CLEAVAGE.'

And the best thing about it? It's also employer friendly! Fire me for saying that, your royal prickness er, I mean...

I've always had a passing interest in politics. Following it, reading about it, commenting and/or debating it. I'd like to try my hand at blogging about it. I know at least one of you is going "Good god he wants somewhere *else* to spray his opinionated bs.". And, well, that's part of it. But more so, I'm thinking more along the lines of offering a place that could be used as a debating tool. I'm thinking something not too much different from this LJ, except a little bit more professional and, well, not necessarily on LJ. Very much unsensored, beyond the rules of common sense etc. Because really, media outlets and former political party members shouldn't be the only ones who get to get on a soapbox about crap like this.

It'd cover politics on both sides of the Canada/US border, so if anyone's interested in helping, I'd be curious to know that as well. Mostly because I don't know nearly as much as I probably should about US politics. I already have a general idea of how I want to structure the blog, mostly. Now, I just need to know if anyone would read/contribute to it. Because, y'know, a blog written by and read by one person isn't a very effective blog. See, this is what happens when I've been up for a while and up to my ears in news articles.

You may wake up one morning and see an answer like this in your morning paper.

Dear Mr. President,

Please find below my suggestion for fixing America's economy.

Instead of giving billions of dollars to companies that will squander the money on lavish parties and unearned bonuses, use the following plan. You can call it the Patriotic Retirement Plan:

There are about 40 million people over 50 in the work force. - Pay them $1 million apiece severance for early retirement with the following stipulations:

1) They MUST retire. Forty million job openings - Unemployment fixed.

2) They MUST buy a new American CAR. Forty million cars ordered - Auto Industry fixed.

3) They MUST either buy a house or pay off their mortgage - Housing crisis fixed.

It can't get any easier than that!

P.S. If more money is needed, have all members in Congress and their constituents pay their taxes...

And yall thought I was blunt/sarcastic/whatever. Not that I haven't thought this exact same thing for our political system. Wonder if I aughta mail an altered version of this to our beloved Prime Minister?

After having a quick read at this article about the bank of Canada cutting their interest rate yet again, and all the various... well, shall we say whining that goes about in the comments to it, it sort of left me wondering what the situation would be like on this side of the border if we had our own equivalent to the US's Barack Obama. Perhaps sans the historical significance of it, because really, even the Americans had to have been getting tired of it after a while But, is someone with his way of thinking what Canada needs to pull itself out of the economical suckerpunch that just slammed into us? Or, perhaps, do we all just need to line up outside the parliament buildings with clubs and say good morning to our fair politicians as they pull up for work?

Edit: On second thought, I'll take Obama, minus certain members of his staff.

... Definitely not the lack of malware. At least, not anymore according to Symantec. They say they believe they've discovered the first ever Mac botnet. According to the article (geek.com), it's supposedly already infected several (I think the article said thousands?) of macs, which are apparently being remotely controlled by a third party, though not necessarily the person(s) who created the malware in the first place. This sort of walks all over one of the major supposed benefits many mac users throw up in the faces of anyone still using Windows, that being the lack of any real need for antivirus/antimalware software. If Symantec is able to actually confirm the report, folks are gonna have to find a new excuse to switch from Windows. At least, if they're not switching to linux, who still remains malware free to this point.

Probably the headline title that went through someone's head after getting the initial report of 4 pythons that managed to escape containment aboard a flight in Australia. Now, sure, they might have been babies, but come on. How many people just sat there right now and said "Yep, saw that movie."?

I know Shon (thecrazykiwi) tagged me for some meme-type thinggy earlier, but to be blatantly honest, I don't even post consecutively in 8-day strings so it's just not getting done. that having been said, the day was not completely devoid of win. I got up this afternoon (yes, I slept until late afternoon. Sue me.), and found this email in my mailbox.

Hi James,



Please call me when you are available and we can schedule an interview.



Best regards,

Natalie

So, as soon as I can get this chicky to actually answer her phone, I'll schedule my interview for this coming Tuesday (it's when my wheels will actually be able to be my wheels). So to answer the unasked question of at least one person as to why I would dare to be so ungreatful/insensitive/whatever as to not change my return date so I might be able to stay in rochester longer (someone actually tried giving me that lecture before I left), that's why. Get over it, and yourself, plz. Kthx.

The interview is for a temp agency that Trish actually dropped my name in for reference purposes with a couple days after I fled the country. I've been trying to get a steady line of communication going with them since then, and they just now managed to respond to my email. tomorrow means phone calls, scheduling, and hopefully, god willing, employment. Or at least another door to open. Oh yes, and putting my foot in the asses of certain nosey people whom I barely know and who should, for that and other reasons, stay the hell out of my business. But that's for a whole other rant when I actually feel like ranting.

Since apparently, the folks over at Passport Canada have decided discontinuing the online application service is an awesome idea. Is it just that I'm supremely lazy to the point of it being nearly embarrassing, or does this seem like a kind of step backwards on the convenience/technological advancement part? Particularly since they're replacing the online system with an interactive (and presumeably PDF) form that you still need to print off and take to the passport office. Come on, Canada. We were making such good progress here.

That's at least according to this article, which goes into some detail as to how a man who ended up getting laid off from his previous job found himself moving to Texas to take up a publishing job with a different company. As long-time readers of this piece of randomness know, I'm a tweeter. But I, er, rather, never thought for a second about using it as a means of winding up gainfully employed. Perhaps I aught to start?

Ottawa's city council is once again being approached by two major developers regarding the building of a new sports arena. One wants to bring a soccer team to Ottawa, the other wants yet a third crack at football. I do have to wonder, though, has anyone ever considered the possibility of a MLB arena in Ottawa? Yes, we had the lynx for a time. One problem, though. They were Montreal's minor league team, and Montreal is now in Washington. So why not? We have the toronto versus Ottawa rivalry in hockey, and it's awesome as hell. As much as I rag on Ottawa fans for being Ottawa fans (hey, what can I say? Your team's falling apart at the seems), they do provide a wicked provincial battle. Why can't we have the same thing going on in baseball? Who knows? I might even cheer for *that* team rather than toronto. Although you'll never see me doing that where hockey's concerned. Sorry, folks.

If you fall under the following categories, you were removed from the friends list. Not that it should make a whole lot of difference, since I like to pretend LJ doesn't have such a thing as a friends only option.

• People who hardly ever post, and/or who haven't posted in forever


• People with whom I have very little in common with


• People who have previously either removed me, or not added me back

If you don't think you fall into any of the above categories, feel free to prove me wrong.

Still managed to update in less than a week; something funky must be going on. Last week was pretty uneventful, after my last update with actual substance. Jessica (samari76) has a pretty full schedule, that being primarily work and class, so not a whole hell of a lot was really done short of taking advantage of the time when she wasn't attending either to catch each other up on what's going on, and just generally enjoy ourselves. It was still a very wonderful way to spend a vacation. We decided to exclude the usual party crowd this past weekend (well, a third of the usual party crowd was out of town anyway), and on Friday, ordered food and just generally ate, drank and were happy. We had a nice long talk about a lot of things, listened to music, and just... well, for lack of a better way to put it, did the couple thing. Saturday was largely taken up with grocery shopping, picking up what she needed for this week plus a few things for the easter get together at the house of a coworker the next day. We had time left over, so Jess also got herself an MP3 player, which we spent much of that evening playing around with in an attempt to get it to work. Once we did, though, it very quickly became her newest addiction. The next day was, as said, the easter get together. We packed up a few things to cart over, and all manner of good times were had. There was a person or two there with an apparent talent for drama, but they managed to behave themselves rather admirably. At least that day. We managed to stuff ourselves silly, then both to avoid said talented people and attempt to walk some of it off, we decided to head it back home on foot. It was actually a whole lot nicer than the walk we took last Friday coming back from Selina's, with it being neither cold nor rainy that night. We got back to the apartment, talked for a bit, then crashed like nobody's business. Monday was back to the grind, so she went back to work and I puttered about with attempting to get things packed for my departure. Once work and class was over with, we stuck around the apartment and talked until it was time to call the cab. Then, at the bus station, we said our goodbyes, and I boarded the bus for my return trip across the border. It was fairly uneventful, with the only minor hick-up being about halfway between Toronto and Ottawa, when the driver (apparently he was new to the job?) was trying to figure out if we were supposed to change buses to go the rest of the way to Ottawa, or just change drivers. Turns out fortunately it was just changing drivers, but still, it was a tiny bit confusing even for the passengers. I got here at about 12:30 yesterday afternoon, and pretty much spent that day getting caught up on email and things. Today was a writeoff thus far, with me sleeping most of it away. And now, I'm posting this thing, finishing my coke, and... contemplating getting my hands on another. I love my visits to that side of the border, but let me tell ya, sometimies, it's good to be home.

News to me, but apparently, that's the thing to do up in here. So says this email I received, one in a long list of them debating whether or not entire school buildings should be redesigned because, ZOMG, outside distractions can interfere with classroom work.

James, I am glad you got to meet some decent teachers in your life. As for not having left-wing tendencies, You are forgiven. Nobody's perfect. Please, remind me, what did the right ever do for the disabled?

Well, thank you. And now that I have your permission, I will continue going on being realistic (note: I said I was more realistic in my views; she said right wing). I think I might have just figured out why it is no one ever really takes advocacy organizations seriously. Thank god I'm not a member of one.

Email has apparently decided to take a huge ass crap. I'm on MSN, and trying to figure out who I have to ninja kick to get nanswer on email things, but in the meantime... if you've emailed me, you may not get responded to as promptly as usual. Which... hasn't been prompt at all the last couple weeks anyway. I'm on vacation, whatcha want?

ETA: Appropriate tech people have been drop kicked. For the moment, email is again playing nice. God I hope it stays that way...

While discussing the questionable actions of certain questionable people over IM last night, one of us came up with perhaps the most expressive form of wtf and frustration I've heard in like ever. "Oh, Jesus Christ almighty on Satan's pogo stick." I LOLed. Hard. Never let it be said that even the stupid, though it does cause massive amounts of headachery, doesn't provide some form of offhanded yet unintentional entertainment value. Of course, it could just as easily have been the fact we were all bored to fucking tears. Whichever works.

Tonight's Toronto versus Detroit baseball game is apparently going to be a very dry one. At least on the alcohol front. Folks got a little too rough and loud during last night's game, so the alcohol and gaming commission suspended the stadium's license to serve alcohol for 3 games as a result. Woops. Too much pass-time goin' on with Canada's second favourite pass-time. In other slightly related news, my poor team is losing. Granted, it's only by a run, but... ow. Just ow.

Figured I'd break away from tradition a little bit and go *less* than a week since a fairly semi-successful string of updates before starting into the next one. Now hopefully the next one isn't a week or six after this update. All that really ended up happening since Saturday was exactly what we were sort of expecting to happen. We ordered supper from a local place that does everything from pizza to pasta to subs to burgers to god only knows what else, and proceeded to stuff ourselves silly. Then we cracked open and killed a bottle of vanilla vodka (mixed, of course; we're alcoholics, not suicidal). A lot of talking, generally about whatever, ended up happening that night. As well as a slow dance or few, because well, we do that kinda thing when our random selection of music decides to play something one can slow dance to. All told, Jess didn't end up going to bed until about 6:30 or so on Sunday morning. I stayed up to finish my drink, then joined her about an hour or so later. Sunday was pretty much recovery. The only real productive thing that was done ended up being a run to the grocery store for afore mentioned things on which we were running low. Other than that, very little was done that didn't involve cleaning house. I was eventually able to substitute JAWS for Window Eyes on this machine (Thanks, Krista (squeaky88)!). And that was about as technical as I felt like being post-alcohol. There was RP to be had, and there was recovery time to be had. And then there was this morning. Jess made her return to work, I scouted teh intarwebz for employment, which of course doesn't exist. And now, Jess should be on her way home, so I'm gonna go do that thing where I do stuff in time for her to get here. Or something.

Not that a whole lot really went on since the last time I posted something that wasn't a link, but y'know. Jessica (samari76) and I are still finding plenty of ways to have all kinds of good times over here. Tuesday it involved a tiny little sellebration here at home of her last test result in class, since the nice little coffee shop we wanted to go to apparently closed an hour earlier than we thought it did. Oops. Although, to be fair, I thought it did but could never really remember. So we just sat around here and cooked something up for foodage.

Wednesday was sort of a personal day of sorts, with us not really doing a whole lot beyond being awake. Mostly because it was just generally all manner of craptastical outside to the point of not really knowing whether or not our rather chaotic weather paterns were coming or going. We did decide, though, that since local weather was being a royal bitch and making it difficult for us to really enjoy ourselves in any kind of relaxing manner outside our own apartment, the first nice day or two we actually came across would be taken full advantage of.

That would be Thursday, and the advantage would be taken with a walk for coffee that couldn't be obtained the day before, or the night before that. We got ourselves a couple peppermint lattes (she in a moment of insanity got an ice latte, poor girl), and killed pretty close to an hour I'd imagine just sitting outside at the coffee shop talking and the like. We headed it back here, and I made an attempt at getting her computer to play nice with, like, everything while she got herself ready for and wandered on over to class. I eventually managed to convince this thing that yes, in fact, there are other ways of solving problems aside from choking horribly on itself and dying right before my very nonfunctional eyes.

Friday was the sellebration we were planning on having earlier in the week, only we went all out with this one. It started at about 9:00 or so, when we headed to the Cracker Barrel for breakfast. We spent the morning there, stuffed ourselves silly, did a little browsing, then sat outside for about an hour talking while we waited for our lift back home. Once back home, we thought about doing a real quick grocery run seeing as we were running a little low on a few things. And then promptly decided it could bloody well wait, and spent the afternoon fighting with food coma instead. We did manage to recover from that, and both of us were in a mood for Mexican. So, a 25 minute walk later, we were up at the school where Jessica's taking her massage therapy course (also where she is right now), which has on its downstairs level a quite deliciously awesome mexican place called Selina's (spelling may be off, but I could care less). An idea roughly of exactly how good the place is: it was packed as hell, to the point where when we did manage to get there (7:30 or so), they were predicting wait times of upwards of an hour and a quarter. We ended up not actually waiting that long, which was good, since we weren't looking forward to the prospect of it being within eyesight of 11:00 before we found our way back home.

It had been raining a fair bit when we walked up, but we were sort of halfway hoping it'd manage to let up when we were looking to come back. So we weren't overly concerned about the walk back, seeing as even if it hadn't really let up, it was still fairly nice out there, rain or not. The food there was, of course, holy fucking awesome. We thought about dessert, but only for maybe about 30 seconds. And instead, we asked for the bill.

The walk back was when things started to get really interesting. Instead of letting up as we'd originally thought it would, it was actually raining a little harder, I think. It had gotten a bit cooler as well, but that was both to be expected and nothing we hadn't prepared for. Problem is, it kept cooling. All told, by the time we got home, not only was Jess freezing, but I think so was the rain. I don't think I've been out in weather like that, particularly in April, in a very long time. And I could probably stand to go another very long time before doing it again. I don't mind the cold, but I so wasn't dressed for freezing rain and possibly snow. Which, according to some friends this morning, is precisely what we were getting hammered with when Jess took off at 8:00 for her all-day clinnic. And by the sounds of things right now, the crap factor outside has yet to do any sort of actual improving.

On the bright side, we did get a lot of things accomplished this past week, including my attempt at installing Freedom Scientific's JAWS for Windows screenreader, only to discover neither she nor I realized she was running XP pro. I don't have an authorization key for XP pro. That plan's been put on hold until such time as we can price out what it would cost, or... um... otherwise obtain a key for JAWS to run on XP pro. Other than that, though, there was a lot accomplished on a personal front as well. We were kind of using this past week or so as a means of getting to know each other even better than we already do. This relationship thing's still fairly new to me, so I'm still sort of learning my way around as I go. I'm sure she is too, which probably is what makes it easy. I haven't the slightest idea what if anything we have planned for tonight, or even if we're going to make an attempt to bother so much as stepping outside in that mess. But I do know there's still a thing or 6 we both kind of decided we want to do before I go running off to Ottawa again. So if not today, then definitely at some point this coming week, there will be some kind of hell raised. What that actually translates to on a productivity front is anyone's guess, but... oh well. So I won't win any awards. I'll live.

Seems they aren't even coming close to selling out to google, or at least, not yet. And not for anything less than $1000000000, either. I dunno. Think they heard me? No, I didn't think so either. Just checking.

Don't get me wrong, I love my google, and I'm just now starting to love my twitter. But I don't think I could get to love the idea of twitter.google.com or something. I'm all about supporting the newcomer to the field. You turned down being bought out by facebook, and I cheered (even though I didn't post about it here). I can only hope the talks you're entertaining now are solely to form some sort of partnership... google does not need any more services under its umbrella. I'm halfway inclined to think they've already spread themselves a little bit too thin in some areas.

Further proof that even in BC, where I wouldn't mind moving at some point assuming I can actually aford to do so, there are people full of wtf. Including certain highschool principals who seem to take a certain pride in pissing people off while at the same time breaking the law. To enforce a rule against the usage of cell phones in class, he's decided he'd just install a cell phone jammer. Conveniently ignoring and/or forgetting that, hey, dood? They is illegal. So now, not only does he look like an ass and a moronic one trying to maintain some semblence of controll over something that really shouldn't make a difference anyway IMHO, but he's left instead to fend for himself in the legal arena too in defense of the fact he so blatantly did exactly the wrong thing. The things folks will do to put a muzzle on a student or 6.

I give thee, Cheech and Chong - Up in Smoke (love the bandwidth, right click and download before playing). My uncle also used to do a somewhat interesting rendition of that song. Only I don't remember himi getting quite so fancy with the guitar. Of course, it was years ago, so it could be that I just haven't got a clue.

And some of them, well okay, a lot of them, occupy cells in a jail near you. But I never really and truely believed people could be quite this brainless. A UK prison, probably like most prisons in Canada/the US, doesn't allow innmates to have cell phones. So when an innmate was found with one, it was promptly removed from his possession. That cell phone is then used in a training exercise with police dogs, and subsequently destroyed. See, this is where common sense, which had sort of been tagging along up until this point, apparently decides to take a small vacation. The guy is now suing the prison because of it, saying they should have just put the phone in storage until he was released, and then given it back to him. Guess he doesn't know the definition of contraband? Or does he just think he's actually smarter than the general population (remember, he's the one in prison, not them). There's clueless, but then there's... wo, clueless. I expect him to lose that lawsuit just on basic principle. Unless they want to be having that exact same conversation about other, potentially less legal contraband items.

This needs to die in a goddamn grease fire. Dear LJ: You are not Facebook. You are not Twitter. Please to be not trying to be both Facebook and Twitter. No fucking love for that pile of epic fail, me.

PS: Show me which majority of users want this chanbe? ... Please?

ETA: Okay, my moment of duh has passed. Note to self: do not cruise LJ while distracted, or half awake. And do not do so on April 1st.

Or maybe not, but work with me here, dammit. Jessica (samari76) just kicked the royal shit out of her latest test, but I'll let her tell whoever she pleases all the gory details of that one. And in slightly more w00t style news, I can has repeat job opportunity plz? I wrote a while back about a job I'd applied for with a company owned by Momentus ltd, that I of course ended up not getting (stupid being overqualified and all that crapola). They told me then to keep an eye out, as they'd probably be looking to fill positions in the not too distant future that my qualifications would be more suited for. I wouldn't call it necessarily a position needing to be filled in the *immediate* future, but... hey, 8 months later isn't half bad in today's economy. This one's actually labled as a tech support job, so we shall see if that makes it automaticly within my realm of qualifications/abilities/skills/whatever and go from there. As for right now, Jess should be just about done with class and on her way home, and from there, I do believe we have some cellebrating to do.

As anyone who's been following the previously linked twitter page knows, I made it to Rochester in one piece on Friday. Got in at about 12:30 or quarter to 1 saturday morning, and pretty much hung out around here for a couple hours talking. We caught a few hours' sleep, and when the actual morning got around to being here, Jessica (samari76), Tasha and I headed it into Wallmart to pick up a few things. There was some talking and generous amounts of coffee to be had, as well as your typical grocery run. We managed to pick up a lot for our use during the week, and lugged it all back here to be appropriately tossed away. We also picked up various items for an eventual get-together at Candice's (acorna_cat), which ended up happening later that night.

Tasha went back to her place and we flaked out here for a few hours, before we had to go over to Julie's fiance's place to meet up with them, and her fiance's best man to go over wedding stuff. Or, rather, the idea *was* to go over wedding stuff, but it ended up being largely a shop talk session instead. Absolutely thrilled Jessica to no end, let me tell ya. Pizza was had, things were suggested and debated, and at about half past 8 or so we shoved off to go to the after party party at Candi's. By this point Tasha had already been there for a while, and they'd managed to eat something too. Jess started putting together her natcho dip so we could all manage to pull off a proper dessert. She wasn't overly thrilled with how it turned out, but it actually wasn't as bad as she thought it was. Of course we had to spend like 5 minutes debating that, because... well, we could. There was a not entirely unreasonable amount of drinking involved, until it came around to truth or dare time (I owe you, by the way, Candice. :P). I had a feeling things were going to get interesting after that, and when we started getting into taking shots, I already had a sneaking suspicion that evening was pretty much over. Maybe an hour or two after that, Jessica was passed out where we'd be sleeping, and Candi and I were trying to convince Tasha that she was, in fact, not about to become the endless fountain of puke she'd apparently invisioned.

I was slightly buzzed, Jess was what I call sleepily drunk, Tasha was... well, Tasha, and Candi... she was done. Like wo. After we finally managed to get Tasha to calm down, the best thing for everyone to do at that point was to pass out. So that's pretty much what we did. I didn't move until a little after 10 or so Sunday morning, and that was only because our ride was coming to get us between then and 11 or so. When all was said and done and we were packing to leave, 3 of us had hang overs and all of us were doing some serious wtf-ing. We got back here and pretty much wrote off the rest of the day, sleeping for most of it and being barely awake for the rest. By about 8:00 we decided we'd about had enough of that, so got up and ended up ordering pizza.

By this point, we hadn't heard anything from Tasha, and we knew Candi wasn't gonna be doing a whole lot of being useful, so we tried getting a hold of the former. She wasn't answering her phone, so we figured she was either still sleeping or... well... done with the world. We sat around talking for the better part of the night, and about midnight or so, decided to take a random walk just for the sake of randomly walking. So we hit up the local 711, got us a couple coke slurpees, and found ourselves somewhere to sit and talk for a bit. It was still bordering in too damn cold though, so we brought our act back to the apartment and kept on talking and generally goofing off until, oh, it must have been 7 or 8 or so before we decided to do that thing where we pass out. She got up once to try again and call Tasha, but other than that, we didn't move until upwards of 2:00 or so. Not much was accomplished here so far; leftover pizza was finished, Jess went to class, and now we're both just generally sitting here and doing that thing where we curse technology. At some point this week, I'm thinking I might switch out screenreaders for her, and convert her to Tech Hit's OutTwit plugin for Outlook and Twitter. As for now, though? ... I'll decide that when I get there. Jessica's back from class, and looks very much like she could use a little tlc. Off to go do that and shtuff.

PS: Email is working. Sort of. IM won't be. Deal with it.

PPS: Dear mother nature, pick a temperature already plz. I can has stability? Kthx.

... I've done pretty much everything but the dishes. Tears me up inside to let them go, it does. Really. Ah well, it's not like they're going anywhere while I'm gone, in the event I run out of time. As for right now, I'm waiting on only two things. A whole 3 sweaters to hurry up and dry already, and my wheels. As soon as I have both, she be go time. For the next two weeks or so, any further updating to this here thing will be happening from the dark side. Anyone wanting to follow my progress southwards, I'll be trying to update my Twitter page. Trying, that is, barring technical failures that result in half my updates either not making it or mysteriously going missing shortly after making it. If you have a twitter account and want to follow me, let me know who you are in the comments and when I get to checking my email at that there other end, I'll return the favour. As usual, IM won't be happening. Texting or calling will have to suffice while on the road. Email when I get there. Anything else? ... deal with it. Catch yall on the flip side.

You just need to be ultra intimidating and have absolutely no regard whatsoever for common sense. Or an appetite for scaring the living shit out of a couple highschool kids, whichever. A Pennsylvania DA decided it'd be fun to exercise the second option after getting a hold of a picture of two girls, 13 at the time of the picture having been taken (now 15), showing them from the waste up and wearing bras. That DA is now being sued for having violated the kids' first and fourth amendment rights on the grounds that he pretty much told them, and everyone else who had a copy of that picture (apparently the total was like 17 or 18) their choices were either to attend a 10-hour class on pornography, or get slapped with a sex abuse charge. For acting like a couple idiots with their cell phones at a slumber party. Now, I didn't finish my law course up here, and it was on Canadian law to boot, but... um, just on a periferal glance at the article, lawyer dood's got absolutely no leg to stand on whatsoever. I lay odds the suit either settles or ends up not going mister legal man's way. Either way, I'd really hate to be him right now.

ETA: Someone else weighs in on the case. Nice to know not everyone disagrees with me.

A guy I have the misfortune of having gone to highschool with has apparently decided we could always use some more negative publicity thrown our way. Keep in mind, he is *also* blind. I have no idea whatsoever if he's just bored or what, but... well, he's decided to rant in great detail about how cold hearted blind people are, particularly those in the US. Now, like I said, I went to highschool with this whack-a-mole. So I have absolutely no problem sending the below response directly to this idiot via email.

Subject: Your recording on sendspace.

This is a direct response to the blatant arrogance you unleashed upon the internet in the form of a much too long vocal rant against blind people in general, and those in the US in particular. Speaking as a blind person, though not a blind American, you have singlehandedly managed to prove whatever medication you're on right now clearly is *not* working. You have also, equally singlehandedly, succeeded in pissing me off. I have it on very good authority this is not the first time you've lashed out with absolutely no reason whatsoever, save perhaps for your own self-gratification. Let me make this abundantly clear to you. Gratification time is officially and 100% over. You maintain a mental illness is by no means an excuse for what you've done in the past, only to revert to that exact same behaviour shortly after the release of this incredibly long-winded recording that now amounts to absolutely nothing. And, in the exact same breath, expect forgiveness for doing this exact same thing. Here in the real world, where you're going to have to deal with living, it doesn't work that way. Live with it. You wanna fly off the handle, you get to deal with the response. Either suck it up princess and move on, or cancel the internet altogether, and crawl into the nearest deep, dark hole you can possibly find. Either way, the grown-ups don't have time for this crap. Where you see a crutch you can hide behind every time someone decides to give back what you've been giving, I see a pathetic attempt at looking for a scapegoat. Yes, I *will* circulate your message to every mailing list I'm on. And I'll attach to it a warning that you do not belong on any list where casual discussion is expected of you. Furthermore, you may consider yourself blacklisted from any and all mailing lists run by myself. You made your bed. Nighty night.

If anyone else wants to chime in as well, go right ahead and do so (maheen.wickramasinghe@sympatico.ca). Quite frankly, he can use all the kicks in the head he can get. This, ladies and gentlefolk, is a classic example of exactly what your typical Canadian is *not* like.

PS: I'm not trying to be insulting of anyone who's reading this *with* mental difficulties of their own. But, if you're gonna blow up then whine because no one understands you... well, then I guess that email applies to you, too.

And maybe, if I'm lucky, I'll get around to actually doing said things.

• Toss laundry in the machine


• Go through stuff I haven't unpacked yet from the trip to the parentals'


• Unpack anything I might need, and pack it with the road trip stuff


• Wash anything I forgot I didn't wash before coming back here (hey, it happens)


• Go clean out the downstairs mailbox, so the mail I won't be collecting for the next two weeks has somewhere to collect dust


• Double check my schedule


• Double check my mother's schedule


• Get a straight answer out of said mother as to when she'll be here, with whom and for how long


• Get dishes out of the way


• File yet another unemployment report (I'm really getting tired of doing that)


• Charge my cell phone


• Run by the bank


• Find my sanity, if I have any left

Gawd, in a way I'm glad I'm not moving. Life, thy name shall be chaos.

Though the CBC hasn't officially announced that's one of the things on the chopping block, they did pretty much cut out 800 or so jobs in the last couple days. And now, much to my relief, the government which I have so often mocked has made it rather abundantly clear there won't be any real overnight quick fixes for that network, or the broadcasting industry as a whole. for the purposes of full disclosure, I'll point out the only things I watch on TV nowadays anyway are hockey, baseball and, when I remember it's on, the Sarah Connor Chronicles. Occasionally, I'll see if I can catch a local news broadcast or two. Otherwise, my TV stays off and I pretty much download what I feel up to watching. While I understand there's still some folks claiming CBC has its cultural elements that should be defended pretty much to the death, they're not why I turn on my local station up here. So if'n you don't mind me saying so, it's been fun, HNIC. If it really is the end of the line for that on the CBC, I'll go back to hounding my cable co for access to channels that actually give me the content I give a damn about.

Myspace flags a musician for copyright violations. For uploading her own music. And, this is why you rarely hear of a police officer actually showing up to defend a contested speeding ticket. It just might be that the ticket itself is a little tiny bit out to lunch. Technology in the right hands? Awesome. Technology in *these* hands? Epic failure.

Before it completely slips my apparently protesting mind altogether, happy freakin' birthday, Katia (katia_chan)! Hopefully this trip around the sun's as good as or better than the last one for you. And goddammit, try and have a *little* fun, eh? Don't make me get a gang together and force good times upon you. Because I will. :P

For those of you who have issues with typing on your standard, more traditional keyboards, seems manufacturers are finally starting to listen. There's a large number of new keyboard designs being tossed about, and some of them seem quite... well, unusual. Of course, I have absolutely no clue how they'd effect someone with serious enough hand issues that typing in general becomes problematic, but you can't solve everything with a new invention. I like their idea for a potential one-handed keyboard, though.

After Wednesday's rather lengthy song and dance that got me absofuckinglutely nowhere that would be considered anywhere near productive, I pretty much prepared myself this morning for an impressive round or two of fisticuffs over the whole bus ticket incident. But when I got to the station, for the first time *evar*, there was actually no need to bloody anyone's nose. I walked in, paid for the ticket, got the ticket, promptly wtfed at their apparent need to swing by the Buffalow airport on the return trip only, and walked out. And then proceeded to nearly give Jessica (samari76) a heart attack, but that's just my style. So as it stands right at this particular moment, barring any future complications between now and the said date at the said time, t minus 7 days, 3.5 hours until go time. No, I'm not counting down at all. Honest. Greyhound, you aren't quite the epic failure you make yourself out to be. You're just heading that way.

house_mdtv. Also known as a syndicated account that will post torrents as they come in of new episodes of the series. Is an RSS feed of tvrss.net, for the curious.

Surprisingly enough, it's not to do with accessibility. It may or may not have anything to do specificly with customer service. But it's largely to do with their technological issues, of which they have a shitload. One that's been hanging around on the long term since at the very least my first attempt at getting myself from here to there is their decided inability to do, like, anything while using the Canadian version of their website. Specificly, when it comes to purchasing tickets. Up until my second attempt to do so, they decided it would be real fun to show me exactly how very broken their purchasing system actually was. Only at that point, it was broken from both my end and theirs. For example, you could see half of your trip (the half *leaving* the Ottawa terminal), but you couldn't see the return. But, if you went to the US version of same company's website, you could easily see both sides of your round trip. You just couldn't pay for them with a Canadian creditcard.

I was under the mistaken impression earlier this afternoon that such malfunctions had been corrected. I could schedule both ends of the round trip, and could even go so far as to see how much such a trip would cost me. I didn't want to try purchasing it at that point, though, since Jessica (samari76) didn't yet know what she could take off from work. Well, we found out today she does in fact have at least some of the time I'll be there off from work, so I thought I'd go ahead and pay for the ticket. Not quite.

As said, I could schedule the trip, I could see how much it cost me, and it even gave me their little disclaimer about how tickets won't be honoured for anything other than the date they were purchased for without a $15 admin fee to change said date. I gave 'em my creditcard number, and it all appeared to be halfway decent. Until I went to actually submit the purchase. Then their ever so helpful "we encountered a problem and your purchase could not be completed" error message came up. Well crap on a goddamn cracker. I thought we had this conversation already, Greyhound. Honestly.

I called their local office, thinking maybe I could bypass the online system altogether and go through that way. Way to oversimplify things, James. They tell me to either call their main line, or take a run into the station and pick it up that way. By this point, my usually not hard to piss off self was getting just a tiny bit pissed off. I decided, since I was here, to go ahead and call the main number... worst they could say was no, right? Wrong. Instead, they blamed my creditcard for not being able to purchase the ticket, saying they didn't get the authorization from said card. Say fucking what now? After dumping copious amounts of my tax time earned money on my card, it's *still* declined? I don't fucking think so.

I called up Visa, and by this point I'm about ready to tear someone a new asshole. Twice. They tell me the charge *did* go through, and there's an authorization code here to back that up. So now it's on. Somebody's blowing smoke up my ass, and I have a sneaking suspicion (no idea where it came from) that it's a Greyhound Canada employee. I called their customer service number, and pretty much got another clueless wonder. This one, at least, had the brains to confirm they hadn't even processed my ticket order. She told me the charges I was told were there should be cleared inside of 24 hours. I'll believe that when I see it. In the meantime, I still have no bus ticket, and may or may not have been charged for one. Sorry, greyhound. You just screwed up huge.

I thought about just saying fuck it and flying to Rochester. Only one problem. West Jet doesn't fly there, and Air Canada wants upwards of $500 minimum to fly there. I'll say this much though. If Greyhound can't get its shit together and soon, I'm halfway tempted to pony up the extra cashola and book a flight. It might be more expensive, but at least I'll get there without needing to drop kick half a dozen people first.

Update: I have a ride to the station on Friday. Here's hoping I actually get to come back with a bus ticket.

No. Hells freaking no. What you see online is almost exactly what you see in person. Worse in some ways. I've been accused of having very little restraint... see a moron, nail a moron. Sometimes, I epically fail at the whole diplomacy thing, choosing to instead go for the blatantly honest explain it in less than 5 minutes answer. Not always the best decision, I'll admit. They'll get over it.

ETA: Had to reread the question... it's what I get for being half awake and writing LJ. My answer doesn't look quite so contradictory now.

In list format, because lazy is me.

• Microsoft can, in fact, make a program that doesn't die horribly when you try to add something extra to it. They just don't do it very often.


• Clearly, some people's definition of accessibility is far different from mine. This is why we have issues, folks.


• I have incredible patience for technology that doesn't want to cooperate.


• I have no patience for people who don't want to cooperate.


• even greyhound.ca works sometimes. Now hopefully it'll work when I want to actually buy the ticket.


• Even when I have plenty of energy, list format is still for the win.


• PS: Job market, I still hate you.

On the bright side, I wasn't left chasing this chick for upwards of a month like I have been other times. On the not so bright side, though...

Good Afternoon,



Unfortunately we have just received word that our client has filled the allotted unilingual English opportunities with them and will only be considering bilingual French and English or unilingual French candidates going forward.



Any candidates who have already been interviewed with Bell will still be in consideration however those who are pending resume review or interviews with our office will not be able to be considered further.



You will remain in our pool of qualified technical representatives and we will continue to consider you for future opportunities with our other clients.



Please keep an eye on our website; Adecco.ca for future opportunities and be sure to check JobBank, Workopolis and Monster and to apply with other agencies as well.



If you have any questions please let me know.

Well, I guess that just leaves me with only one option. Who on that side of the border wants to put up with me for a couple weeks?

From a thread regarding a speech-friendly installer for another Linux distro:

There's definitely interest. I'd even learn the process for doing that for the sole purpose of contributing. Thanks for looking into it, William.

-----Original Message-----
From: speakup-bounces@braille.uwo.ca [mailto:speakup-bounces@braille.uwo.ca]
On Behalf Of William Hubbs
Sent: March 14, 2009 10:29 PM
To: Speakup is a screen review system for Linux.
Subject: Re: Speakup-enabled ArchLinux install CD, version 2!

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Hi all,

I would like to get this done on gentoo, I just haven't attempted to coordinate it with release engineering yet. My plan is for our latest version of speakup and espeakup to go stable, then I will work with release engineering to get it put onto our official cds.

I'm not sure how to build a minimal cd myself, but if there is interest, I can ask release engineering about how that would be done for testing.

On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 10:10:59PM -0400, James Homuth wrote:
Careful. Yall are making me consider playing with Arch Linux if only because of its Gentoo-like qualities, minus compiling. This is, IMHO, exactly the kind of CD that particular distro needs. Would anyone mind > if I forward this thread to gentoo's accessibility project?

I loves me some open source community talk, yo. Try doing *that* with Windows, or Mac.

PS: William = team lead for gentoo's accessibility project. Also known as the guys who maintain screenreader software's compatibility with that particular flavour of linux. Also, keep in mind, that entire discussion took place on a publicly accessible mailing list over the course of a few hours. You are not going to get that from Micro$oft.

My cousin IMs me, completely at random. Not with a hello, not with how's it going or have you heard anything about the job yet, but with fix my computer. Um, say that in my other ear? IM exerpt editted for readability only, because his spelling is absolutely made of epic fail.

him: i got a question about my computer  
me: call the manufacturer.  
him: thanks  
me: np. lol  
him: i would buy a new one but they cost money  
me: heh.  
him: i would get a new one but they cost $$$$  
me: yeah.  
him: do you know how to set it back to factory setting   
him: or wipe it  
me: it depends on the model. i've never actually done it myself, since the factory settings are usually what i'm trying to get the hell away from  
him: ok  
him: its running slower then hell and it keeps crashing saying hard were problem   
me: then whiping it probably won't be a whole lot of help. call the manufacturer.  
him: i'll go there on monday and see how much $ it will cost  
him: thanks 

Dood. *Not* tech support for $company. Your computer was made by $company. $company knows how to reset the bloody thing. $company has the ability to replace whatever component is fried or frying. And, $company has people who get paid to listen to you whine in that unreadable way you do. Why the hell are you asking me? Thank you for wasting 10 minutes of time I could have been spending doing anything else. No love, your irate older cousin.

PS: You had to know I was going to tell you to call $company anyway. I've been saying that since you got the damn machine. You, sir, fail at life.

Well, sort of. Y'see, I'm slowly beginning my exit from the coughy mchackencough school of hell, and instead I've enrolled in sniffle mcsneezy university. What 2 days ago was a semi-irritating chest thing is apparently morphing into a wicked evil head cold of d00m. Same thing happened with the motherling, which only confirms whatever this thing is was obtained either directly from or at the same time as her. Fortunately, this phase of whatever it is I got stuck with waited until now to show itself, as opposed to Thursday, so I didn't need to go into the interview with a pocket full of tissues and a constant appology. Also in slightly bright-side-ish news, I usually kill colds relatively quickly. So whatever it is that's making the rounds probably has another day or two at most. Which is just awesome, because while it's not the cold itself that usually bothers me, it's being restricted to remain near a source of tissue of some variety that does. I don't often wind up sick with anything, but when I do, it's usually one hell of a knockout punch. I think I've managed the worst of it though. Now if we can just convince the rest of it to get the hell out of me a little tiny bit faster, I'll be absolutely extatic.

And, in unrelated news, because this entry can't *all* be whining about the fact I have become sniffle mcsneezy, I've heard absolutely nothing thus far regarding said interview. I was supposed to hear something by end of day yesterday, but that didn't end up happening. Figure I'll give them a little bit more time, and if I hear nothing still, there will be a bus ticket purchased, and a girlfriend paid long overdue attention to. As for right now, though? I believe I need a coke.

Energy is at a premium right now, so this will be a short one. The interview went relatively well. They'd already filled one of the positions they were hiring for (figures it'd be the one that pays more), but I was able to stick my name on the list for the second. Yes, it's downtown and pays a little less, and yes it's for the *other* evil empire, but... eh. It's a paycheck that doesn't come from the government. *And* it's a permanent position (not bad for a temp agency). Which means said paycheck doesn't necessarily have a time limit. I'd of just liked to get my foot in the door with the other one at the same time. Ah well, can't have everything. But I can sure whine about not having everything.

My trip to Pembroke didn't leave me completely emptyhanded, though. I came back with some kind of congesty coughy hacky thing. Mom and I both ended up with it, though we haven't a clue where from (I blame her just on basic principle). I'm hoping I'm over it in the next couple days, though. I'd hate for a possible interview next week to be slightly made a tad more irritating than it needs to be by this damn thing. It's kicking mom's ass pretty good though. After dropping me off here post-interview, she headed it up back home. Where she promptly passed out on the coutch. She called me at a bit after 5 or so... or maybe it was 6... eh, one of those, anyway. And, I imagine, she probably went back to sleep not long after that. Which is what certain individuals say I should do, but... eh. I'm home now. Back to the keeping of odd hours. Plus, I'm kind of expecting groceries to come knocking. Even if they are about half an hour past when they were supposed to be here. So instead, I shall go attempt to find my lung. I think I left it in the bedroom...

Because I haven't done one of these in forever. And because I'm bored.

You Are the Communicator

You are a collector and facilitator of knowledge. You love storytelling and teaching. You light up when you're around other people, and you especially light up in front of a crowd. You are a charismatic person who's genuinely a joy to be with. You remind others to have fun. You love life, and you're wake up grateful for every new day. This attitude makes the people around you love life as well.

What's Your Life's Mission?

Clearly, this is a broken quiz.

I should know within the week...ish, if all goes according to plan. I applied for a position advertised by Adecco, another local temp agency in these here parts, at about the end of last week. I've been in almost constant contact with them since Monday about that and one other position they think, based on my resume, I just might qualify for. And, after a lot of back and forth over the phone and through email, I now officially have yet another interview with yet another temp agency tomorrow morning. Both jobs I'm up for consideration for will be covered in the interview, seeing as they're both fairly identical with the exception that one's doing IT support for employees of a company, whereas the other's putting me back in a position more similar to my days working for Dell. They both pay roughly the same base rate as well, so it ends up working out in the long run regardless which job I end up landing. The only real difference other than the end user to be supported? One's close to where the old office was, the other's downtown. So it looks like there will be a definite return to Ottawa tomorrow, now for two reasons. My return home, and my possible (as in, good lord I hope so) return to employment. Yes, it does mean I had to sort of postpone the seeing of the girlfriend if I land either job, but we both agree it's more than worth it in the long run. Just means I might be working rather than sleeping on easter Sunday. I'll get over it. As long as it means I'll be working.