WalMart Revenge

This is pretty funny. I wouldn't have the stones to try something like this.

Linkage

Random OLPness

Courtesy of YouTube

Anti Bush Slideshow set to Wipe that Smile off Your Face

One of the best videos ever: In Repair

Somewhere Out There Live on Conan

Not Afraid Live at the Junos in 2003 - this may be the best song they never released (though Trapeze and Out of Here get nods as well)

OLP Holiday Greeting 2004 - an early version of Where Are You...I still miss the first set of lyrics that leaked before the song was even called "Where Are You". I still catch myself singing them sometimes instead of the final version.

I tried to find the Cars cover they did, but no one has it up. Ah well, that's why I have the DVD.

Kingston Trip: Part 2

Okay, so it's Friday morning. Check out isn't until noon and we don't have to be at the Conference Centre for our project management workshop until 1pm, so we both ended up sleeping until like 10am. Not something a grad student gets to do very often on a Friday, but I enjoyed it. We got our bags together, showered, and checked out. We then made the poor decision to walk to the conference centre from the hotel instead of taking a cab. It's not that it was a ridiculously long walk, I figured we'd be going for about 25 minutes or so. But we didn't think about the fact that it was already 20 degrees outside with a bright sun and we both had two pieces of luggage to carry. That, and it wasn't quite the straight line I thought it was to get there. It probably took us a bit over a half an hour. But we made it anyway. We got to the conference centre at about 12:30 or so, checked into our rooms, then grabbed some lunch provided by the course we were taking.

The course got started at about 2pm, and went until 9 that night, interspersed with some buffet style dinner that was better than most "sit-down" food you can get. It turned out the fantastic food would be a recurring theme. So, at about 9:30, group work started. We were randomly divided into groups and proceeded to analyze a case study about project management. An hour later we were finished, and were the first ones done. As we left the meeting room, we could see animated discussions and arguements going on in the other rooms. We had discussions, but basically agreed on everything afterward. So I grabbed my laptop and started to put together our group's presentation for the next morning with the help of a couple other group members. We got all our ideas down and into the presentation and I then took my laptop back to my room to practice and make it "look pretty". It was during this moment that I damn near had a heart attack. I was working on the presentation, when I heard a "pop" come from my laptop and it turned off. I started to freak out. It's almost 1am, I've got a presentation to give in less than 7 hours, and now if my computer is dead I have to redo it from scratch after finding some way of rebuilding it.

Luckily, I realized my comupter wasn't plugged in, so my battery had died. I plugged in my computer and was off to the races. I ended up going to bed at about 1:45 Saturday morning and got up at 6:30 that same moring to shower, do one last run-through, grab some breakfast, and be ready for 7:45 for our presentations. The presentation went really well, I even had a few compliments from other people (not in my group). All the presentations were really good. We then continued with project management lectures until lunch, and then after lunch. We broke at 5:30 for a one hour break, with cocktails scheduled for 6:30 and dinner for 7pm. It was "business attire", but I didn't feel like bringing my suit all the way to Kingston with me, so I got all fancied up with my shirt and tie and headed down to the room where cocktails were being served. Any establishment willing to give me free beer is good. Any establishment that sells Upper Canada Dark is good. This place did both, and so are amazing. I mingled some more, then sat down to dinner. The food was absolutely awesome. By far the best catered/banquet style meal I've ever had. There was this really cool two-coloured cheese and spinach soup, the two colours weren't mixed though, it looked like the yin-yang symbol without the dots. Then we had salad, and then some of the greatest chicken I've ever had...and I love chicken. It was a chicken leg topped with shaved ham and coated in this cream sauce that was soooooo good. The only thing that was out of place was the mushed beets that were served with it. Dessert was some of the richest cheesecake I've ever had. Then came the only real negative of the whole trip. And it wasn't so much a negative as it was a combination of circumstances. The nights activities were a guest speaker who works as a project manager. It was good to hear someone from the field who does the job on a day to day basis, but his talk was supposed to run from 8:30 - 9:30, and instead it ran to about 10pm. The information he gave was good (though a bit redundant at times), but starting at 2pm the previous day we had been working for about 25 of the last 32 hours, had just had a half hour of free cocktails, followed by a big meal (with endless wine supply). So it wasn't that the presentation wasn't good, we were all just exhausted. Needless to say I went straight to my room afterwards to get some much needed....hockey watching....then sleep.

The next day we had a bit more group work, again as smooth as could be, then finished at about 11:30. Our train didn't leave until 2pm so we had time to do yet more mingling over lunch. I met so many people over such a short time it was crazy. But it was good. Conference mingling is harder because most of the people are professors. Here it was all students so it was easy to just sit next to someone and strike up a conversation. Everyone was really friendly too.

After lunch we went to the train station by cab...and this guy might be the craziest cab driver I'd ever seen. He was weaving in and out of traffic and speeding, but we made it to the train station in record time :). We found out our train was running late and so would be about 45 mins late getting into Kingston and, subsequently, Toronto. But it was no big deal since we had a 3 hour wait in Toronto anyway. When we got to Toronto we went to BCE Place to the Richtree Market restaurant for dinner. This was such a cool concept, someone needs to open one of these in Windsor. Basically, when you walk in, they give you a debit card, and you walk around this market and get whatever you want for dinner. They had stations for sushi, fish, breads, pastas, steaks, stir frys, and a bunch of other stuff (including a bar). When you asked for food they just swiped your card and when you left you paid the balance off. I settled on some really good chicken alfredo with veggies after wandering around for 15 minutes considering my options. Most of the food was continuously being made, so you didn't have to wait long for your food and it was still fresh. Perfect for what was now a 2 hour layover in Toronto. We then went back to the train station and waited in another pointless line to get into a half empty train. It wasn't a total loss though, the woman behind us decided that we needed to know her life story even though we'd never met. Apparantly when someone asks me if they're in the right line, that's all they need to know about me to tell me their life story. Fortunately, she was going somewhere else and so didn't get on the same car as us. The rest of the trip was uneventful. We got in at about 11:15 or so into Windsor, cabbed it home, I crawled into bed, and was asleep about a minute later.

I'm almost caught up on my sleep, but the combination of a double overtime hockey game last night and some 8:30 proctoring this morning has caused me to be still a bit tired today. Ah well, as I kept saying to Xitao over the weekend, I'll have lots of time to sleep when I'm dead. :)

Kingston Trip: Part 1

Well, I'm back from Kingston. I'm not awake enough to do any actual work right now, so I thought I'd share my experiences from Kingston.

Wednesday

Xitao (my labmate) and I left Windsor right on time on Wednesday morning and had an uneventful train ride to Toronto. With only about an hour or so until our train from Toronto to Kingston left, we grabbed a quick bite at the Harvey's at Union Station, then went back to the gate to find a massively long line going into the gate, and it was still about 25 minutes before our until the train left. I do understand the amount of people, since the train eventually goes to Montreal, but this train had assigned seating. What's the use of waiting in line to get a good seat (if there even is such a thing on a train) if your seat is assigned anyway. But really, the ride to Kingston was uneventful as well. We got to the station right on time, hopped in a cab, and headed to our hotel.

I told our cab driver where we wanted to go, and he kept asking me which route I wanted to take. I said, "I'm not from here, so whichever is fastest", but he kept asking. Finally he managed to make a decision. So we set off for the hotel from the train station, only to find downtown in a bit of traffic chaos because of construction. Our cab driver was somehow unaware that multiple city blocks were closed to traffic (even local traffic). This did not make me feel good. But we got to the hotel and everything was fine. We checked in, got to our room (which was very nice), and after unwinding for about half an hour we decided to go get dinner. We considered the restaurant in the hotel, but decided that we would explore downtown Kingston a little and see what we could find. The only problem is that neither Xitao or I are capable of making a decision. We eventually settled on a restaurant that served Korean food and sushi and the like. We placed our orders and waited for our food....for a long time. It wouldn't have been a big deal, except I had made plans to grab a drink with Joe after dinner. Eventually our food came, and it was very good. Some of the most flavourful chicken I've ever had, served over a bed of rice and stir-fried veggies. Mmmm.

When we got back to our room it was about 7:30, so I gave Joe a call and we met down by the water (which was about a 1 minute walk from our hotel) and we grabbed a drink at the Kingston Brewing Co. which was right next door to our hotel. We caught up a bit, typical family stuff, and made plans to get everyone together for dinner the next night. I went back to my room and got a little work done before getting some much needed sleep.

Thursday

On Thursday Xitao and I were to meet with a couple of geotechnical people from Queen's who we collaborate with. We got up, figured out directions, and headed out. It was quite a productive meeting for something that had no preplanning. Actually, I've been in well planned meetings that were much less productive than this. We made some very good headway on integration of the work from our side and theirs, I got some excellent information and resources for my thesis work, and we were able to actually accomplish things. We also had some excellent Thai for lunch. The meeting ended in the mid to late afternoon and we went back to the hotel to get more work done. That night I met up with Joe, Dianne, and the kids and went for dinner at The Keg right near my hotel. Again, an excellent dinner. We went back to the hotel and Joe and the kids utilized the pool while I had access to it since we were moving to different accomodations the next day. We had a good night, then said our goodbyes since everyone had work/school in the morning, and I didn't figure I'd have more than a half a day or so to myself starting on Friday. And as it turned out, I had even less...

This is brilliant

Well, if you've never played the Final Fantasy games then you won't get it, otherwise read on.

The people that made this had waaaaay to much time on their hands. It's basically people acting out a Final Fantasy battle. They actually did a damn good job with it, complete with the music and sound effects.

Enjoy

Dani California

I absolutely love this new Chili Peppers song. They have a great feel for writing sing-along, driving in your car summer music. (You can get a listen at their myspace page).

The one thing I've noticed with them is that they tend to write a lot about California...but seeing as they're from there I guess that makes sense. I think I need to release an album of songs about Windsor. Possible song titles include:

"Ballad of the Lost Arena"
"Drink the Night Away"
"I Can't Breathe"
"Don't Drink the Water"

Any other suggestions?

Government at Work: Watch for Stupidity

Hydro Rates

So it appears the cost of electricity may be going up...I can live with that. I usually pay on the order of $30/month, and I know I could be more energy conscious if I needed to. I expect costs to rise every so often, so I'm not really concerned (though for people who have to pay for an entire home's worth it's a different story). However, one thing that bothered me was this statement:

Energy Minister Donna Cansfield says Ontarians have to pay the real cost of generating electricity.

The board will estimate what the cost to generate power will be over the next year, and factor in the 377 (m) million dollars Ontarians underpaid on their bills last year.

What the hell?

I'm not 100% sure what "underpaid" refers to in this case, but I figure it's one of two scenarios, both of which piss me off:

1) By "underpaid", they mean that some people basically haven't paid their bills in full (or at all), which means they're owed money. Well guess what? I pay my bills every month, in full, and on time. If this is what's meant by "underpaid", then go after the people that haven't paid their bills. Don't force me to pay for electricity that I never used.

2) By "underpaid", they could also mean that it ended up costing them more than they figured to supply people with electricity, and that their rates should have been higher, so they're going to make it back by charging us more this year. That doesn't fly in the real world, why should it work now? If I hire a roofer to redo the roof on my house and he charges me $1000 when it's finished, he can't come back to me 6 months later and say "well, you know what, it turns out that with overtime and extra supplies, it actually ended up costing me $1200, so I'm going to need you to pay me another $200." Yeah, that's gonna happen.

It's not my fault that other people don't pay their bills. It's not my fault you took on additional expense. Don't charge me for things that aren't my fault!

Strange Dream

Okay, so I'm not usually one to remember dreams. Typically they're nothing special and when I wake up, they're gone. But the one I had last night was just odd. Basically, I'm sitting in my apartment, and I get a call from the US gov't, they need me to go to the White House and kill a rat. Yes, a rat. I agree to do it, and now suddenly I'm worried, because mice/rats tend to freak me out. So a helicopter lands outside my building to escort me to the White House. As I'm flying there, I notice a TV in the chopper, and it's showing CNN. So now I'm flying to the White House to kill a rat while watching CNN in a military chopper. I see on CNN, however, the breaking news that 3 UFOs had just crashed on the White House lawn, so now I don't have to go kill the rat. The chopper gets orders to fly me back home, he drops me off, and that's the end of my dream.

Is anyone here a psychologist?

BoreIS on Google

Heh, when you type "BoreIS" into Google, my webpage comes up third on the list.

Granted, the chances of someone randomly typing "BoreIS" into Google are pretty slim, and the chances that the person actually has any interest in it are essentialy null, but I'm still happy. :-}

It's Official....finally

The Simpsons movie will be out on July 27, 2007. It should be interesting to see what they've got planned.