Thursday, December 29, 2005

A merry Christmas, finally another mad holiday rush is over. All in all Christmas was relatively peaceful, oh sure there was the occasional family fight, but everyone still has all their limbs and virtually no property damage. The most stressful part of the whole 'X-mas' experience was deciding on gifts and last minute shopping (I'm a consumer whore). As much as one would want to take a moral stand and say "No gifts this year... I'm putting the Christ back into Christmas!" or some such noble sentiment, if you are the only one who doesn't give anything... well you kind of look like the biggest jerk in the world. Like it or not, giving Christmas gifts is an important part of the holidays and the best one can hope to do is to put some thought into gifts instead of last minute bargain shopping (though some of those boxing day deals are awesome). Personally I think giving gifts is great, its only when you get to wrapped up in the hype and senseless consumerism that meaning gets lost.

Saturday, December 03, 2005

I've been thinking, which is hardly a productive event yet nevertheless usually some partially interesting thoughts are given expression. Lately my belief that 'humanity is neither inherently good or evil - just incredibly stupid', is starting to depress me, as all idiotic behavior does. It's not that I have any real sympathy toward the idiots of the world, more its that cleaning up after idiots is extremely tiring. So for someone as lazy as myself even the thought of someone out there just creating unnecessary work is enough reason break out the alcohol and binge McDonald's. Lest I seem to be judgmental, I count myself amoung the throngs of idiots. It is with certainty that there is someone working a little harder than they should, because of some idiotic thing I have done. There isn't anyone innocent of being idiotic, (which according to some dictionary is: showing a complete lack of thought or common sense) seriously who has the energy to think through every decision in their life? I guess the problem isn't with people making mistakes, its the willingness to repeat ones own idiocy over and over again. Most of us know when we're doing something completely stupid, unfortunately it is actually pretty comfortable being an idiot. To an idiot the world doesn't have to make sense, nothing has to be taken seriously and as long as they get what they want - how and why doesn't really matter. Though I suppose ignorance contributes much to the idiocy of the world, the whole "If only we knew then what we know now" bullshit. Honestly I like being ignorant of a lot of things, especially if knowing about something means I have to deal with it. Society doesn't help matters much either, much of our economy is idiot based. If people bought only what they really needed probably 99% of the companies out there would go bankrupt. This isn't a condemnation of our economy or anything, just a bit of inane rambling on my part. I guess being idiotic is just another part of daily life, though one would be much happier if they were ignorant of that.

Friday, December 02, 2005

Another late night, I honestly tried to publish a post that was well researched and had pictures links.. the whole nine yards, but by the time I was finished the issue was pretty much closed. So now I'm trying to decide if I should rewrite the entire post or back publish it. Now I understand why so many sites disappear after about a year... unless you're making money or don't really have a life (I might be able to claim the latter) it doesn't make much sense to invest a lot of time in a personal website. Though I guess avoiding real work could count as a vaild excuse as well, ah well. Personally I enjoy writing occasionally in an 'unstructured' manner every now and then so unless blogspot starts charging for webspace will probably at least keep this site up, if not really updated frequantly.

Saturday, November 05, 2005


So the Telus strike continues, it would be funny if it wasn't so... well, y'know. Everyone seems a little stunned from the union employees vote to reject the Telus offer (which was basically the same deal they had before) and of course the finger pointing began shortly after. The union blames Telus, Telus blames the Union, BC employees blame Alberta employees, striking workers blame the picket crossers... picket crossers are probably trying hard to avoid the whole situation. The circle of blame complete it is back to the bargaining table, now the question is who is in a better bargaining position now? Telus who openly declared that they could go on indefinitely or the Union who agreed to the contract and is running out of strike funds. I wonder how tempting it would be for the negotiator to just resubmit the old proposal and hope it is taken a bit more seriously this time. At this point I'm sure everybody involved just wants to get the whole thing over with and start the wonderful stress that is the Christmas holidays. If I had the energy this would be the perfect time to rant about the pressure of holidays overtaking any real significance they once had... but that is for another time (pretty soon hopefully).

Friday, October 21, 2005

Bootwhistle
After my last post I realized that while blogging this site is definately fun, my writing style is becoming increasingly juvenille. Not really a bad thing for a weblog however it would be nice to have a more professional sound. Unfortunately that would mean more work, editing entries and actually looking for and quoting sources, creating links and so forth. As well I've been advised that a few visual aids may make the page look better... *sigh* (wonder if that is proper style) anyway, with the next post it should be easy to see any changes. Though the prospect of outsourcing sounds appealing, wonder if there are any bloggers in need of some extra ranting space.

Thursday, October 20, 2005

Bootwhistle
Life is stranger than fiction, in most cases anyway - haven't seen any penguins riding unicorns lately (must be the wrong season). Anyway a while back a very loud and... well loud lawyer by the name of Jack Thompson started a crusade against violent and obscene video games/media. He got especially upset with the GTA series of games lambasting (hehe lambasting) the creator Rockstar games for making a 'cop killing simulator' and was representing the families of cops shot in the line of duty. Well for the most part Jack seemed like the good ol'crusader of decency/medical malpractice lawyer however the more he opens his mouth one realizes that he is about six different kinds of crazy. If what I've read can be believed (its like a 50/50 chance anyway) Thompson has a bit of a persecution complex... to put it mildly. The deal closer is an interesting tale, at some press conference Jack challenged developers to make a game where:
[t]he CEO of fictional company Take This, Paula Eibel, is murdered along with her husband and children. Should any developer agree to make the game, Thompson will donate $10,000 to the charity of choice of Paul Eibeler, the CEO of Take Two.
(http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=12259)

Now challenging computer geeks isn't really a good idea, unless it involves some form of physical activity. Of course his challenge resulted in a slew of games ranging from text based adventures to a mod of GTA: San Andreas. Jack declared that his statements were meant as satire, and not to be taken literally... I can understand the part of the CEO killing game being satire but donating to charity doesn't seem like 'satire', then again I'm not a lawyer.
Here is where it gets really interesting, a couple of guys from the online comic/store Penny Arcade decided to donate the $10 000 to charity and even put the donation in Jack Thompson's name! Surprisingly Jack didn't take this too well and wrote a letter to the police demanding the guys from Penny Arcade be arrested for defamation and threatening him!? Clearly any credibility this guy had is slowly (make that super turbo nitro speed) circling the drain, even the National Institute on Media and the Family of whom Jack claimed support decided they really wanted nothing to do with this raving madman, even demanding he take links to their site from his webpage.
Looking at all of this the real question I have to ask is - why on earth did anyone pay attention to this weirdo in the first place?

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

Bootwhistle
Just testing, lost a post... f'n technology.
Bootwhistle
Quick blog today... Choice. Decisions, destiny, fate - the diverging of options stemming from a singular action. The results are unknown only possible realities. According to some sciencey theory an infinite number of universes exist wherein the different paths of reality are played out. Unfortunately those dimensions have yet to develop reality TV so there is as yet no way to discover how things would have been different. So probably the only thing people can count on is the expected outcome vs risk... a simple analytical program we all run everyday from judging whether or not to cross the street to ...uhm, fighting the impulse to run naked through the streets yelling 'I love Telus, unions suck, and don't eat at Joey's seafood' (actually sound advice). Hmm, okay getting on with a point... is that... huh, actually haven't a clue, just thought I'd choose to type a few words. No clue at all.

Sunday, October 16, 2005

Bootwhistle
The world turns, well at least that what science tells us. It's probably old news but I don't think I've blogged about the creationism vs evolution fad. From what I gather (usually second hand) there are a number of 'religious' groups trying to get creationism... oops I mean 'Intelligent design' taught in science class as an alternative to evolution. This really annoys me, though honestly I could care less if the world was created through random mutations or the Flying spaghetti Monster, however don't pass off religion as a science and pretend you're not shovelling it out with both hands. If people want to push religion into schools do it the honorable way, and if the parents really want religion taught, petition for a religious studies class. Seriously if religion can't handle evolution as a valid scientific theory (at least according to my breakfast cereal) then there are deeper problems than worrying about being related to a monkey (it would probably be insulting to the monkeys). I guess what really scares me is that normal people could have such amazingly narrow minds and claim to promote science!, while I could even accept the blind faith in Bush on some level since politics is so full of bullshit usually people don't bother sorting through it anymore. But to twist science to push ... Lets be real a Christian agenda, is underhanded in a way that couldn't be something a truly enlightened 'religion' should be capable of. Do the ends really justify the means - what would Jesus do?

Monday, October 10, 2005

Bootwhistle
For some reason the later I stay up the more creative I feel, hmmm maybe shutting down some parts of the brain helps one be more uninhibited... or makes things seem like a good idea. Anyway honestly I have not looked at any news in almost a week, the only thing I can say for sure is that the weather is getting colder... global warming ? what warming? (I apologize for that overused joke) Well one thing that's is pretty visible is the Telus strike which doesn't seem to show much sign of stopping. What puzzles me is that niether side seems to be doing much to really end the strike, for the longest time they didn't even negotiate with each other. Each side prefering preasure tactics to make the other side capitulate... and unfortunately for better or worse the union is at a 'slight' disadvantage here. Telus has already taken this opportunity to cut back on jobs, deciding to open call centers in India and closing down the ones the operate in Canada. It probably is smart buisness and will save the company in the long run, but one can't help but sypmathize with the workers who are going to lose their jobs because the union doesn't know what its doing... well at least it seems that way, it could be some master chess-like strategy but somehow I doubt the people in charge are ever that bright.

Friday, September 16, 2005

Turn of the seasons, unfortunately there has been a lot going on in the world, so much that an infrequent blogger such as myself can barely keep up. Of course the biggest news right now is hurricane Katrina and the resulting boondoggle (love that word... boooondoggle) care of the higher levels of government. Honestly besides feeling sympathetic to the people in the states... I'm not really in tears over it. Around the world more people die from less monumental events which are easily preventable, and for some reason it does annoy me a little when people talk about how "this is the states... something like this shouldn't happen here". Not to say that anyone anywhere deserves to be put through that kind of suffering, but isn't it the height of conciet to believe oneself better and therefore immune from problems the 'third' world countries face... maybe people will realize that the distance from 'first' to 'third' really isn't that far.

Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Bootwhistle
After trying my darnedest (I'm aware of the language) to avoid reading any news, I became so bored that I spent about an hour looking at news stories from the wonderful world wide web. It seems blogging has come under scrutiny in a number of incidents, Apple sued to find the identity of bloggers who released product information, bloggers attacked the mainstream media and the media of course fired back, and microsoft is implementing censorship on blogs originating in China. My favourite quote concerned salivating morons (bloggers) who made up a lynch mob prevailing, this was due to harsh critisism from the blogging community (really why do people care?) over some comment made by a CNN news executive that was take out of context. After reading the article I realized that while blogging is quite an easy way to voice opinions... it reminded me of my previously expressed beliefs... en masse people are 'salivating morons'. Nowadays having access to a computer and internet does not an intelligent person make. On the one hand I'm flabbergasted that a community of bloggers could force the resignation of an respected news exec, but then was that really an effective or even purposefull use of that power. Blogging is great but I have to admit it doesn't require much thought or forces bloggers to in any way think about what they are writing. While I'm sure that there are some bloggers who carefully review issues before ranting like foaming madmen (no disrespect intended to actual raving madmen), most seem to take a more reactionary - dare I say American, approach. The same sort of issues surrounded email and perhaps still do, people would often send of emails without thinking about the consequences, in many cases out of anger or a misguided sense of humor. The unlucky found themselves unemployed since they never stopped to think about what they were saying in their mails. That's the problem with technology, everything is so instant that people need to step back and realize that we have a brain to reason... not enable a return to animalistic reactionary impulses. Speaking of which I think I'm hungry, maybe I'll go hunt a rabbit.

Monday, June 13, 2005

Sometimes there are things that are just too much, or really I get upset because I watch too much tv... but anyway, on the BBC today there was an inordinate amount of time spent on a news story that I couldn't really care that much about. I even refuse to acknowledge the name and subject as that would perpetuate an already overblown coverage of this case (lets just say it involves a celebrity acting inappropriately). What galled me to no end is that they even went so far as to interview the jurors in the trial... what the hell is going on? Am I alone in thinking that there is no possible way that could be a good thing, and the media had the idea that maybe they didn't get enough access since the judge read the jurors notes in private. If only as much interest was shown in events that truly mattered *cough* iraq *cough*. Then after thinking a while, I remembered why the media covered this 'circus' in the first place... the masses are friggin idiots. I do include myself in that category, it is increasingly becoming my opinion that no matter how intelligent individuals are as a collective they are dumber than a sack of rotten potatoes. Democracy is great, a wonderful ideal for a utopian world... which is why it doesn't really work in reality. It is based on the idea that there is an informed and engaged electorate, which is hardly ever the case. While dealing with daily life keeping up with politics and screening out bullshit takes a back seat to earning a decent wage, taking care of family and then trying to enjoy what little time there is left for some relaxation. When people show up at a voting booth whatever opinions they have are made from quick impressions and various political ads, which are about the biggest piles of bullshit around - with news being a close second. Seriously, to consider any televised news fact is akin to drilling holes in your head because you have a headache. All news is biased, next time you listen to the news and listen carefully to the wording, the language used couches opinions that try to put forth a particular viewpoint... some stations are a little better than others but none are guilt free. One has to always questions what is being said and especially what is being left out of the conversation. Ahem, getting back to my original point... uhm, lets see... it was about the media being controlled by the influences of ratings and how stupid people are to demand news about the fake lives of celebrities rather than the life and death struggles taking place around the world. So I repeat, the masses have the collective intelligence of a rotten sack of potatoes... on acid... or crack... whichever is worse... ah lets just say both.

Thursday, June 09, 2005

Bootwhistle
Time seems to be flying at an alarmingly fast rate recently, it almost seems like yesterday I was taking an ungodly bus ride to come to Victoria BC. Now almost a year has past and am currently living in summer residence with a few other people from the same floor of my building... actually I really don't have too much worth blogging about personally... politically and internationally there are some incredibly stupid and annoying things going on but I don't have the energy right now to actually get angry over them. Is this a sign of the times? The fact that governments can get away with so much is that people aren't able to summon enough energy to care? It makes sense, people rarely know what they are even voting about, a case in point occured when I was working as a voting clerk at the BC provincial elections. There was a referendum vote about whether or not there should be a reformation of the voting system, we were told before hand what it was about but then also told we could not in any explain it to people to asked what it was. Apparently there wasn't even any advertising about it! Of course most people hadn't a clue about what the heck this thing was about so I'm sure they just guessed and did their ballot, a few people declined the ballot since they didn't know what it was about but to state again that was a minority. Actually I probably should make an effort to find out the results of that referendum... nah, too much effort to take an interest in politics, besides what does it matter anyway?

Sunday, June 05, 2005

I would like to say that nothing much is going on, in a sense that is true when looking from one persepective... unfortunately an object seemingly at rest is still under the influence of a number of forces. Bah, enough with the metaphors they give me a headache... I suppose I've recently requestioned the puprose of existance, not that I"m in any way qualified to do so... just have a lot of time on my hands. The further one steps back to look at the "big picture" the more one loses a sense of self.. or perhaps realizes the insignificance of their own existance. Then again why should people be worries about whether or not their lives have any meaning, not being particularly religious I don't prescribe to the "god's will" thing... in fact I'm more of the opinion god really has no plan for us... so while I still believe in god that doesn't mean I think he has a personal stake in who wins this years grammies.
Ranting is fun, you honestly don't have to make much sense as long as it is semi-literate and has a bit of an angry edge to it... moving on. I believe I started this post in order to crystalize my thoughts on existance, to that end this post has failed utterly, sigh, well let's take another look at our life's purpose from a societal view.

Step 1: Be born, learn how to conform and integrate into society, learn skills to
benifit said society

Step 2: Find employment in order to survive in society and buy goods in order to support the economy.

Step 3: Decide on a socially acceptable life partner and procreate as much as financially viable.

Step 4: Procede to die in a manner that causes the least amount of expense and inconvience to society.

This might be a little cynical but when you get right down to it... that's basically the sum of ones expected existance. I've noticed more and more that the idea of our place in society is to be an individual block that is self-sustaining and easily replacable... and in one sense that is logical from a purely mechanical view of our civilization. Whether or not it is the best or 'right' view is not for me to question, rather it is "do I want to be another block in society?". Sure one can live ones life in total fufillment, have a nice job a beautifal wife a couple of kids , throw in a dog and maybe a weekend cottage... but is that the purpose of my existance? Just to perpetuate the society I live in? And society isn't something that you can live outside of and exist very comfortably... I love my modern convieninces, and computer games, and television, and yes even McDonalds... what I can't decide on is how I can live in society without falling into my own little block, or replacable cog. Ah well, this is making my head hurt so maybe I'll just go and watch fight club or something. later.

Friday, May 13, 2005

Ah, life is getting comfortable... unfortunately not very progressive. I tend to find that I don't like pushing the limits of my talents... need a serious will power overhaul. But I digress (not sure what digressing actually is but hey.. sounds good), currently living at the Univeristy of Victoria cluster residence for the summer and later in september. This place is pretty nice, I love having a kitchen to work in and being able to quickly cook is somehow relaxing for me, only taking one course so I can work full time and earn some money and hopefully for next semester (though some computer upgrades wouldn't be too bad). My roomates are pretty good as well, we all lived on the same floor in single room residence last couple of semesters. Probably the biggest problem is just organizing space for the cooking implements, and maybe dividing up the kitchen duties or something... eh, not that big a deal though. Actually managed to excercise a little the past few days, planning to lose some weight this summer to look good for next year (yeah right). Not much else going on... later.

Monday, April 04, 2005

Bootwhistle
Only 22 days 5 hours 53 minutes and wait for it... 35 seconds left in the school year. Not that I don't enjoy studying about stuff and whatever (or mechanics and dynamics) but it would be nice to really be able to do absolutely nothing - and without study guilt.
Well, enough about the obvious confusion of my priorities as I'm here to praise the best movie I've seen come out of the Hollywood bung hole in a while (though I have High hopes for Miss congeniality 2)... _sin city_ good cast, lots of humor, plot, graphic violence though as a guy I found the constant dismembering of certain anatomy a bit excessive. While some parts of the dialogue was kind of comic book corny it could be forgiven because of the visual style used... they really went all out to make this look like a comic book ... and what is suprising is that they did it really well, so an experimental sucess I suppose. Well moving on from the world of entertainment (sort of) and taking a look a recent news, probably the biggest is the pope died, and I mean no offense to anybody but it isn't like it was a suprise. Also the Schiavo thing... really I don't know what to think on this one... in all honesty I think Micheal Schiavo is a jerk but at the same time I can't understand why people are forcing someone to live like a vegatable, personally it seems like a fate worse than death to just hang around as a brain dead moron (no offense to americans). Seriously how pleasant could it possibly be to slowly deteriorate into something only slightly more reactive than a pet rock?
Well at least the whole thing is over... still a part of me is wondering if they would have done the same thing for the pope. Then the evil part of me wonders would the pope still be considered on the job if he was in a persistant vegitative state, being wheeled out in front of crowds on special occasions and... ah well guess I'm going to hell.

Sunday, March 27, 2005

Bootwhistle
Well the school year is winding down pretty rapidly and I'm beginning to feel a little stressed, the year has gone by pretty fast and its like time is flowing faster than I care to keep track of. Honestly though there isn't a whole lot of important stuff I've missed such as the latest fashion trends and insipid celebrity gossip however one has to wonder how much useful infortmation actually passes us by. When you hear news about some distant part of the world one can't help but wonder what the whole story is, honestly news we are fed is packaged to be as entertaining as possible (which is why it is watchable), real hard fact news would probably give have the audience rigor mortis from the shear overload of information. What I think scares me more than anything else though is how most people seem to form unwavering opinions based on very little actual fact and mostly on opinion, impressions and Fox news (yes, even in Canada). I'm okay with people having different opinions but they should at least be able to acknowledge that it doesn't make them automatically right and everyone wrong *cough* bush *cough*.

Tuesday, March 15, 2005

Bootwhistle
Well, it seems apathy is spreading throughout the campus... or maybe its just me, eh. My theory is the weather here makes everyone really mellow and I mean reeaaally mellow, either that or there is so much pot smoke its part of the natural environment now.. visit Victoria BC, get high by breathing :D Uhm, I know that's bad but that was the best I could come up with. But getting back to my feelings of apathy, it seems everyone has work and is doing their darnest to avoid it. When it comes right down to it maybe its better to avoid doing work altogther and don't stress it while having fun... short term solution long term repercussions *sigh*. While that is what I know its is awfully tempting to blow off studies to fry ones brain on tv and computer games, I think the main problem is there are too many distractions in today's world. We need to be entertained every minute of every day or we begin to think about all the problems in the world (the news reminds us of) and get depressed. One can now truly appreciate the phrase ignorance is bliss, that raises an interesting question... given the choice of living happily but dumb as a post or Smarty McPants but depressed from being surrounded by idiots. As for myself it depends on the day of the week, today its uhm... I like cheese.

Friday, January 28, 2005

Not really sure where to start as this is a pretty late blog, a month since my last entry and nothing has happened really... I guess never got out of the vacation mode and still feeling a bit lazy, though apparently quite a few people around have the same problem. Anyway this is just a little writing to keep the appearance that I can actually update a blog once in a while.
Bootwhistle