The Shortest Holiday Wrap-Up Ever!

Well holy crap, it's another year starting. Each year seems to go faster and faster. Before we know what hit us, Christmas will be here again and I'll be repeating the same stuff. I don't think this holiday update will be as huge as they usually are.

I'm happy to report that unlike last Christmas, there were absolutely no trips to the ER in either of our families. Also, although Steve has caught my bastard of a cold, I can't imagine him needing to visit an ER or chamber of fate anytime soon. This is very good. I have also survived my first four Christmas dinner hop. It was definitely busy, and kept us hopping.

Despite my best intentions, I did not whip that cold into submission. I apparently looked like death warmed over at Steve's family's Christmas Eve due, but I made it, and thanks to Buckly's cold and sinus pills, I didn't feel quite as bad as I looked. It was a good time, and the kids made it fun for sure. Damn are they getting big. I feel old.

Then it was Christmas Day, and I think the calmest day of the bunch. It was just the immediate family who hung out, and we spent the day snacking and opened presents when Steve's sister got home from work. I got some cool stuff, including more clothes I can wear to work, which is always appreciated, and lots of candy and fun stuff. Steve got a new office chair, which he has been enjoying quite a lot. For dinner, we had ribs, wings and stuff like that, to break up the monotony of turkey, turkey, turkey!

The next day, I started to wonder if I was a jynx in terms of power outages. Although last year was an exception, the two years before that, the power has gone out for my parents while I was home at Christmas, and this year, even though there were no storms or icy conditions to speak of, the power went out on Boxing Day, right before we were supposed to eat.

Steve's stepdad's family were all there. The turkey was merrily cooking and we were getting ready to put the vegetables on, when bammo! Lights out! We first wondered if we blew a breaker, but oh no, a phone call from Steve's sister who was working told us this was no breaker. She said the whole town had lost power. Hmmm! That puts a new spin on dinner, doesn't it?

Luckily the turkey had finished cooking, so it was turkey on a bun with stuffing for all! It was kind of funny watching people try to navigate in the dark until we got the candles lit.

For the next while, we played games by the fireplace. Thankfully the power came back on five hours later, so we didn't have to use the fireplace for heat through the night.

The next day it was off to Steve's dad's for another Christmas dinner. The poor guy, I think Trix terrorized him for most of the day. I don't know why she was so fascinated with him, but she would not leave him alone! While we were there, I played with the old Apple with that silly Echo voice, and made a recording of it which I'll put up soon. It's not the best, but maybe it's ok. That was really weird to see that old computer. It felt odd just flicking the off switch when we were done with it. I kept thinking "Um, don't we have to shut it down?"

Then, we came back here and tried to find homes for all our new stuff. You should see our little patio table. It is seriously stacked high with chocolates and other junk food. I'm sure we look weird.

So that was Christmas. For a while, since I didn't go home to my own family, I had a hard time believing that it was in fact here, and gone, but it is. Now it's on to the new year.

What a year 2011 was. From the news front, holy upheaval batman! Lots and lots and lots of uprisings and protests and earthquakes and tornados and death and change and...a whole lot of stuff that I'm probably forgetting. I can hope that maybe it felt more overwhelming because I was hearing about it super fast on Twitter, but I really think it was a pretty intense year.

As for me personally, it definitely had its fair share of ups and downs, but it sure ended on a high note with my new job. I look back on last year's wrap-up, and how I wanted to figure out how to do more of this accessibility stuff, and yea, I got my wish! I think this year will be a year of expanding my brain. I have a whole lot to learn. Now I just need to figure out the most efficient way to do it.

Really, is that all I have to say this go round? I think so. Happy New Year, and I hope this year brings us all nothing but good and happy things.

I DON'T LIKE THE CUBS!

I don't have a kid, but if I did or got tasked with buying a present for one, this is totally something I would do.

Merry Winter Time Celebrations To All!

Well, today's the day. Carin and I are doing the last of our packing and loose end tying and then will be heading off to spend our first ever Christmas together. I'm glad she gets to spend the time with my family on what looks like a rather light running around year. A couple of the parties are at my mom's place, so at least we get to stay put a little more than usual.

I had hoped to get a few more things put up here and a couple of small gift additions picked up before I took off, but a Subway sub gave me an early Christmas gift in the form of several round trip tickets to the can, so that didn't happen. Hmmm...round trip shit tickets? But I'm ok now and about as ready to go as I'm gonna get.

Before we're gone for days, I want to take a second to wish you all a merry Christmas and a happy every other festive event that might come up between now and whenever. We've gotten to know some pretty cool people over the years doing this, which is pretty damn awesome. We appreciate that you take the time to read and that a few of you even find us amusing.

If you want to get in touch over the holidays (you likely don't), Twitter is likely your best bet. My phone isn't smart but it's smart enough for text tweets, so if you mention me I should see it. If you like email or commenting here, feel free to do that. There's a computer where we'll be staying, but I'm not sure how much time I'll have to use it so you might not hear back for a while. Who am I kidding, you probably won't need me anyway. You're all old enough to take care of yourselves and if you haven't been mentioned in one of the bad tags, you're probably more than capable too. But feel free to say hi anyway. Most of you it's nice to hear from.

Whatever you're doing this next little while, have fun and be safe about it. We don't need any of you ending up on the wrong end of Festive RIDE.

Talk to you at the tail end of this year or maybe the beginning of the new one. Until then, enjoy the lovely sounds of this seasonal favourite.

Thought Explosions About #SpikeMobileCCC and other things.

Here comes another monster o thoughts. While I'm doing the laundry, I might as well write a blog post.

This whole being out of town part time thing has taught me that I suck at time-management. I was always able to get by since I had lots of flexibility to get stuff done. I didn't get to that today? Oh well I'll do it tomorrow. Now, I have to think ahead to make sure I get everything done on my off days.

Even laundry has become slightly more of a pain since our building has those inaccessible laundry card-filler-uppers. So, if I'm getting low on laundry money, I have to either a. coordinate like hell to be there when the huppy's mom is doing laundry, or b. pray to the lord above that someone will be down there to help me fill the damn card. I'm seriously thinking about rounding up an apartment-sized washer/dryer set. Seriously I am.

Since I don't have as much time/energy to look at Twitter as I did before, I've started organizing the people I follow into lists. As a result, I'm uber behind on the news, people's retweets and random folks I decided to follow. I really need to fix that giant news Twitter hole I've created though. That's just shameful.

And because I'm behind on people's retweets, I didn't notice in enough time that The guys who did Twittereen were at it again, with another contest, Countdown2Christmas.

I suck, and have missed out on two days of the contest, but I don't care. I'm still going to try. I mean, look at the prizes! They wrote 'em out. Yeah yeah yeah I would like a leak-proof travel mug and a Timmy's card. Sure I would.

So wish me good luck in what's left of this here contest, There aren't any iThings, but the contest is still cool.

Edit: looks like I didn't need the luck, since before I posted this, I won the prize I wanted. Yea! Gimme gimme gimme my Timmy Timmy Timmy's stuff!

Another sign that I obviously don't have this whole time-management thing down: I didn't get a happy birthday Steve post up like I try to do. Failbox! Well I guess I did pay for his dinner at Smokin' Tony's. Maybe that makes up for it.

By the way...Smokin' Tony's? Om nom nom! Check out their menu. They really give you a lot of food, and it's good. Mmm sweet potato casserole! When I first walked in I was afraid you could only take your food and go...but then I remembered. They serve beer, they must intend for people to sit down. And they did, and they were great.

Even though Steve and I are doing Christmas together, we figured for the sake of not lugging each other's gifts on the road, we'd exchange our gifts on Steve's birthday. That's probably a good idea, since I can't keep a secret at all. Out of the 6 things I got Steve, he knew what 3 of them were, and had guessed at a fourth. It kind of kills the surprise element when he knew what half the stuff was already. And he didn't snoop, it's because I can't keep a secret worth a damn...and an email came in which had the name of one of his gifts in the subject line..which just happened to read as he walked in the room. Damn JAWS, ya busted me. can't win for losin'.

But I'm happy to say that I own all the Austin Lounge Lizards CD's to date, and their concert DVD! Oooo that one's gonna be fun! Will have to review those when I get some time...so considering my big pile of comments about my lack of ability to time-manage...could be a while.

It is really hard to believe it's Christmas. I'm happy there's no snow, but it's hard to remember to wish people a merry Christmas and stuff when I'm not trompling through the snow. Christmas is going to be here and gone before I know what hit me.

And I think I've found the song that is as irritating to me as it's the most wonderful time of the year is to Steve. It's Do They Know It's Christmas.
I know it was a song raising money for people in Africa, but the line about "Do they know it's Christmas time" kinda bugs me. Maybe they don't care. What if they celebrate something else? And don't they need the money the rest of the year too? I don't know, there's something about that song that bugs me.

So they're starting a Go Train service out of Guelph. Right now it's designed to shuttle people to Toronto, but I hope some day it will go to Kitchener, giving me more options for travel to my awesome job. But as a preview, they gave everyone a free trip to Kitchener, and because a friend was also going, she asked me if I wanted to. Sure, what the heck!

So we headed for the train. She's a far bigger Go guru (goru?) than I am, so told me all about the accessible car, and how if I'm going to take the train, I'd be best to get on there. For one, there's always a person there watching for folks. For another, it always pulls up in the same spot, and third, it opens at every stop! Yup, sounds like a deal to me.

We got on, and actually got to talk to our MPP Liz Sandals. She was surprised that the bus service from Guelph to KW had deteriorated so badly. We talked for a little while to her about how awesome this whole Go service thing would be, because really it's the only truly accessible public transit service there is for folks in wheelchairs. Greyhound? Yeah right. Via? pfffft! Go Bus? Maybe if the drivers remember to do the fancy dancin' with a strip of seats. But with Go Trains, it's cool. A ramp comes out to close the gap between platform and train, and folks in wheelchairs just wheely wheely wheel onboard, and there's an area that's designated as accessible seating...although women with strollers think that means they're entitled, even though there are seniors with walkers and people with wheelchairs in plain sight. May you develop a disability making that seat necessary for you later in life and encounter a stroller-wheeling woman just like you. That is all. But the point is Go is really the only way to go for folks in wheelchairs, so let's start Go-ing in more directions.

The trip was wicked fast, like 20 minutes. Yup, I could deal with that. It's too bad poor Go got stuck behind a broken down freight train, which delayed their exit by an hour. But the trip itself was pretty cool.

In this rambling winding post of crazy, I have to give two gigantic woo's to a couple of folks in a couple of businesses. Let's start with Portions Canada. I heard about them through Twitter, the way I seem to hear about most things these days, and they were talking about having gluten-free food and prepared meals for folks with diabetes and stuff. I knew the shoe thief was kind of run ragged by a bunch of stuff, so I decided to get him a couple of frozen meals and some cookies. So off I went on a crazy adventure.

Can I say again that Google Transit is the worst thing known to man? Unless I'm an epic fail at using it, it always tells me the exactly wrong bus to get on to get to a given destination. I saw a link to it on the Portions Canada's Google map, so I thought I'd try it. "Take the 1 Woodlawn," it said. So I called Guelph Transit to get more details, and their response? "Um? 1 Woodlawn? To get there? Um, erm, not even close! You have to take the 22!"

But that's beside the point. I just couldn't miss the opportunity to rag on Google Transit. After going on a wild adventure through the city, being dumped on a giant grassy sidewalkless zone and being escorted across a busy parking lot to the store, the people *in* the store were nothing short of awesome. They told me next time, just call before I come and they'll come meet me at the bus stop! Not only that, but they went through things until I found the perfect combo of stuff. And to top it off, they delivered it to the shoe thief for me! Like, um, holy crap?

So if you're in the market for gluten-free goodies, stuff for folks with Diabetes or kidney disease, and I'm sure lots of other things, pop in there and see what you will find. But I have learned that if you're alergic to garlic, you should definitely not pop in there. All their meals and stuff have garlic in 'em. Ah well, how else are you going to flavour it without salt?

I have to also give a gigantic thankya to a very cool employee at Wind Mobile. Long story time. I have a blind friend who has been searching for a phone that he could at least possibly operate a little bit. Every phone he gets, he has been promised it talks, but all it has is voice recognition, i.e. "please say a command." That works to an extent, but you can't enter your own contacts, or operate most of the phone's functions. So, eventually, in frustration, he asked me to go with him to the store to see what we could see.

I first went in hoping they had something that could have the Nokia Screen Reader installed on it. I know it's free and kind of preliminary, but CodeFactory had their hand in it, I thought it would get us by. But they had nothing that would take that screen reader. So the woman from Wind Mobile toiled, talked to Samsung tech support, and twisted that phone into halfway working to the point that he might be able to at least get to voice command on his own.

This was no easy feat, but she did it. Not only that, but she taught me a few things about his phone, so I could continue helping him. Adrien from Wind Mobile in Old Quebec Street Mall in Guelph, you are the most awesome of awesome, and we appreciate all your hard work. Thanks to you, I was able to show him a couple more things. You deserve to get promoted yesterday.

You know, I have been buzzed by several colds and flus, and as each one zooms by, I thank my lucky stars. I did not want to be sick and need time off when I'm just starting work. But now, just before Christmas, I've got this wicked cough. Sometimes, when I cough, I sound like I'm pulling a Carl Barron. I can't find a damn clip of him doing it, but maybe others have heard him do that bit with the loud dry sounding cough. I'm hoping to beat it into submission before Friday when we head for Steve's family.

This got me to thinking. Why is it perfectly ok to come home for Christmas with your own family when you have a cold, but if you're going to someone else's family, that's just wrong? Why is it ok to infect your own family? Yup, we're weird.

I've been told by several people that Trixie has a lot more white around her muzzle. Um, eek? I don't like the physical reminders that she is getting older. I know she's still young, but well, it's just another reminder, like the pile of her city tags in the drawer, that time marches on.

I'm making a little something for Trixie's raisers this Christmas. I still don't know if they read here, so can't say what it is yet, but I hope they enjoy it. It'll have to arrive late this year, because I lost their address in the hard drive crash of doom in May, and I've emailed them but haven't heard back yet.

I got some very sad news yesterday. Don't worry, noone died, but it kind of feels like someone did. I just found out that the Fresh at Home program has suddenly been discontinued. You know what that means? No more easy to get local and awesome food. It's back to the grocery store for us, which is one big boo. It was cool that it was delivered, but the cooler part was how amazing it was. It truly was amazing. I don't know what happened to it, but one day, there was a program and the next it was gondo. It makes Steve and I very sad pandas.

And I think this monster has gone for quite long enough. I should be snoring, 6 a.m. comes early. So...I will post, fall down, and finish the thoughts I had left over in another post. Yes, I have more, and other posts that need a place up here. But I have to stop or I'll be no good to anyone tomorrow.

I Won the Right to Save Some Bills, I Saw Some Bills And Quickly Try To Save My Radio Sanity

Just a couple of small things I forgot to mention/didn't know I'd be mentioning while I was brain dumping away yesterday.

The WWE pay-per-view prediction contest I've mentioned here and there is over. And in an act completely uncharacteristic of me, I won! I managed to keep the 2 point lead I had going into the final month, which I fully expected to blow because that's just how I roll. As a result of my great triumph, a couple hundred dollars stays in my pocket in the form of subscription fees I don't have to pay for a few years! Excuse me as I pause a moment to savour what given my track record could be the last time I ever win anything!

...!!!

...!!!

...!!!

Yay!!!!!!!!!!

...!!!

And with that, we may move on.

These hundreds aren't related to the ones I just wrote about, but I got my hands on one of Canada's new $100 bills yesterday. They're weird and are going to take some getting used to.

I obviously can't describe the look of them, but the feel is not at all like money. The best way to explain them is that they feel a bit like receipts, but more like the shiny junk that company's stuff in with your bills and statements every month. If you're not paying attention, you could easily toss one out while cleaning up paper.

But on the bright side for people who find them useful on our current money, the Braille full cells seem to stand out better on these new ones. I can never remember how many cells are supposed to be on each denomination so this means little to me right now, but hey, there's that. Maybe better cells will help me over time since the proper number will actually stay there instead of being rubbed out within 5 minutes.

If the new design stops fraud I'm all for it, but right now I'm not sure how to feel. I want my money to feel like money, not like garbage. Lots of things feel like garbage, while very few things feel like money. I know me, and I'm sure the day will come when I toss out some cash because I made the mistake of setting it down and forgetting about it. I also know I'm not the only blind person who feels that way. I showed it to Carin and she said the same thing. Yes we have mind beams, but we don't agree on everything, believe it or not. she likes the money cells, for a start.


If you've never seen one of these new bills, Google Images tells me that this is a picture of one. I hope Google Images is correct. I know from the searches that some of you would appreciate photos of goats humping, but if I'm gonna post those I'd like to do it intentionally, you understand.

Before I go, I want to pass on a quick message to CJOY. Guys, there are more than 17 Christmas songs. Can you please start playing a few of them? If I hear All I Want for Christmas Is My 2 Front Teeth one more time... Thanks for your understanding.

Here, Have A Post

This is one of those posts where I start writing without much of an idea of what I'm going to write about and see where it takes me.

It's been a busy last few days. Friday consisted of some running around, a late lunch with my brother and sister and then seeing the Arrogant Worms again with Carin and that same brother. Carin and I have seen the Worms at least four times, and it's always great. And after all this time, we finally got to meet them! It's amazing how much easier it is to meet people when you happen to get into a long conversation with somebody who happens to have one of them as a family friend. Here, have a nice little Christmas song about a fellow you may not have heard of to help get you in the spirit. Christmas is just around the corner, you know. Raaaaaaaaaaaaar! That'll make sense if you were there, like we were. Speaking of which, the being there like we were thing will only truly make sense if you're me, Carin or Brad.



Question: With all the advancements we've made in so many ways in this world, when is somebody getting around to figuring out toilet paper that your finger isn't going through? Just wondering, because that sucks. I like surprises, but not that one.

Ok, so where was I? Saturday was a nice birthday breakfast with Carin and my brother, a visit with my grandparents and then an evening filled with Shoe Thieving Christmas cheer. The major takeaway from the night is that Innis and Gunn is some amazingly good beer, I must say.

Sunday was pretty relaxing, but it would have been much more enjoyable had I been able to sleep more than a couple of hours. I did have a strange dream during my little bits of sleep though. The weather fell over. Carin and I were lying in bed and there was a sound like electric guitars ending a song or playing an open chord, I can't remember which. We both looked at each other and went aww crap! Don't tell me the goddamn weather just fell over. Guess we'd better get out there and pick it up. So there we were, heading outside, trying to pick up the weather as if it were a Christmas tree of sorts. There was just the two of us out there trying to right things for the entire world, but it was like this wasn't out of the ordinary. We expected it would just be us. We first tried to get under the weather, but the sun was too hot so we couldn't touch it. But even if we could have grabbed onto it like we'd hoped, there was so much snow on top of it that we wouldn't have been able to lift it anyway. I'm not sure how it turned out because I woke up right then, but I'll assume things went ok since it's still weathering out there.

I was in a cab the other day and the station on the radio was plugging its commercial free Sundays. The guy said "commercial free Sundays are brought to you by..." and then listed a couple of sponsors. Call me crazy, but isn't that a commercial?

Yesterday was my birthday. Thanks to everybody for all of the good wishes, by the way. I appreciate it. I was surprised how many happy birthdays I got from Twitter. I think I got more tweets than I did emails, which is sort of odd to me. Not complaining at all, just something I noticed. Maybe there really is something to the idea that email is losing some favour. Not with me, but with other people. Either that or the Twitter folks just like me more. Naaah, it can't possibly be that.

I learned something yesterday. If you eat at Casey's and you can prove that it's your actual birthday, your meal is free. Mom made a birthday boy comment while the waitress was around to see if we could score one of those free desserts like most places will give you, and she said that if I had ID to prove that today was my birthday, it was on the house. I gave it to her, she took it away with her and when she came back with the bill, sure enough my stuff wasn't on it. I hope for their sake they take the IDs and put them in a system somewhere so people who aren't as nice as me won't game the system and ruin it for everyone.

I picked up my gift wrapped Amazon package from the post office the other day. the mail is so weird around here. Not only do you never know when something's going to the post office as opposed to coming to the door, but half the time you don't even know which post office it's going to. And helpfully, that bit of information never seems to come out when you run the little cards through the scanner. The gift wrapping is...interesting. It has flat ribbons on it and the gift is covered in what feels kind of like glossy cardboard. Picture a CD digipak. If you know what that is, you know what this stuff feels like. It's not what I was expecting. When I think wrapping, I think paper. But hey, as long as it looks ok, who cares, right? I guess I'll be finding that out soon.

Here's a question for people who use Amazon more than I do. Why would you bother choosing anything higher than the standard shipping? Whenever I buy from Amazon, I choose the regular and I'll get my stuff in a day, perhaps two. Do you really need stuff faster than that, and more importantly, how much faster can it get? Let's say for the sake of argument that my standard shipping always takes two days. If you choose the next level up...let's call it express since I can't remember what it actually is, maybe you get your packages the next day. And the third level, we'll call it priority, what's the point of that? You have the two day shipping and the one day shipping, so what can it possibly do? Do your things land on your doorstep before the thank you for ordering page finishes loading? Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems like a bit of a scam to me.

Question: Ever have one of those days where you totally want to tell somebody to F off, but you realize that it would actually make things less annoying and complicated to deal with if you didn't, and then you use your better judgment and do the smart thing and keep your mouth shut even though it's not as fun? I'm sure you all have. Well, that's so me today. But even though I'm not going to do it in real life, I here and now send out a gigantic, heartfelt and hearty go fuck yourself to the bane of my existence on this day from all of us here at Vomit Comet World HQ. You deserve it. Merry Christmas...koont. Ok, I feel a touch better now.

So I'm watching TV the other night and I see a commercial for a low dose, daily use version of Cialus. You take it every day like people take the low dose aspirin. The voiceover said something like, "it may not happen every day, but you can be ready when it does." Naturally, then comes the list of the horrible death that awaits you should you dare ingest the stuff. the first thing mentioned, swear to Christ, was headache. Bit of a mixed message, isn't it? Take this and be ready to go when she is...unless you're not up to it. Instead of performing, you're the one saying "not tonight honey, I have a headache."

I think that went well...ish. I'll talk to you all again soon. Oh, and before I forget, happy Hanukkah too all of our Jewish readers. Jewish people read websites, right? I'm not up on all these weird foreign cultures and customs that the world has now. Seriously, all the best of whatever season it is that you celebrate to all of you. Thanks for reading, especially if you made it through this garbage. We appreciate all of you.

Complaining, Christmas And Wrestling

You know what sucks? Migraines. You know what sucks more? Migraines that last for a couple of days and then leave you a worn out shell for another day after they're gone. And you know what else sucks? Getting over the migraine, feeling better for a day and then running smack into one of those colds that lays you flat and all you want to do and all you really have the energy to do is sleep. So yeah...that's why the blog's been quiet other than the odd joke and the stuff Carin wrote on the weekend. Hopefully we can stop sucking so much and get this thing going again...just in time to disappear for Christmas.

I think I'm ready for Christmas. I need to buy some more stuff for Carin, pick up the other half of the Shoe Thief's gift and wait for something to come in the mail, but I think aside from that, the shopping is all done. It's funny, because I'm never sure if the shopping is really done or not. This year Carin and I are spending Christmas together for the first time. Not together in our own place, but together. We figured we'd alternate between spending it with my family and her family, and for some reason we're starting with mine. Don't give me that typical selfish man stuff, it was Carin's choice.

Where was I? Right, shopping. Shopping is always interesting around here. For quite a few years, we threw a big New Year's Eve party. A lot of our good friends would come, and since they were close pals, we'd often exchange gifts. So every year we'd have to know who was coming ahead of time and shop accordingly. Then a couple of years ago we quit having the parties. They were fun, but too much damn work. Carin's family lives 6 hours away and while mine is closer, I'd come back and have to get ready to have a few days worth of guests immediately after being away for a week and going to something like 4 Christmas get togethers on consecutive days...sometimes two on the same day. There wouldn't even be time to unpack, and poor Carin would come off of a huge road trip and some years be dropped right into a party in progress. We're still young, but we're too old for this shit. We decided that it'd be a good idea to stop throwing the parties while they were still fun so that maybe we'd want to do them again someday. But one of the consequences of this is that it messes with my head. Do I need to buy something for that guy? NO, we're probably not seeing him until April. What about him, he'll be at the New year...oh yeah, we don't do that anymore. And this year is even worse. Not only am I still doing that with the usual suspects, but now Carin isn't going on her usual trip. That means I don't have to get anything for our friend up there right away, which is odd. And Carin's family can't decide if they're exchanging gifts or not, so I have no idea whether I'm supposed to be buying them things. My brain, which can be a real pain in the ass sometimes, is having a freaking field day with this. It keeps going over and over the list, stopping on all the people I have nothing for, making me feel worried about it and then reminding me that it's all good...only to do it all over again with the added vision of a giftless person handing me a present.

Speaking of presents, I did something this year that I never do. I paid Amazon to gift wrap something. I'm a horrible present wrapper and the timeline this year doesn't allow for getting somebody competent to do it for me, so I dropped a couple of bucks on having a gift done as a test. Has anybody gotten this done and if so, how does it look? The paper doesn't have gigantic Amazon logos all over it or some shit, does it? Please, tell me it doesn't. Ahh well, live and learn, I suppose.

On a totally different note, the WWE pay-per-view prediction contest is almost over. There's one show left, that being TLC this weekend. Guys, I seriously could win this thing. Right now I'm all alone in 1st place with a two point lead, but it's no sure thing. If I screw this up really bad, I could easily be toast. I didn't do super great on my Surviver Series picks, but I did well enough to keep myself ahead. All I have to do is hang on, but I know me and I know my record in online contests, so I'm scared.

I'm not sure how I'm doing in the TNA/ROH contest. There are a couple of shows I haven't seen and I didn't want to spoil them by checking the standings. But what I do know is that as of the last time I looked, I was in a pretty big tie for 9th place. that sounds kind of awful, but all that was separating 9th from 1st was 2 points, so it's not so bad.

One more wrestling thing before I go. I know I've harped on this before, but Jesus Christ the names on these guys in WWE!

I was watching some FCW the other day. There was a six man tag match that saw the team of Conor O'Brian, Tito Colon and Kenneth Cameron take on Colin Cassady, Mike Dalton and Jason Jordan. What I want you to do is look at those two sets of names and tell me without looking it up who the guys getting squashed are supposed to be. Indeed, one team is supposed to be a bunch of scary guys that strike fear into the hearts of their opponents while the other is there to be faceless geeks who's job it is to be beaten up by the scary guys. But if all you have to go by are the names, how would you ever know that? All six of those names sound like guys who would be getting massacred by the Undertaker or Hulk Hogan back in the days when Vince McMahon knew how to name a wrestler or when he was still smart enough to let them keep the ones they came in with. None of these names stand out in a good way. They either don't register at all or in the case of poor Conor O'Brian, they make you feel bad for him and for the people who lack so much creativity that they named him after a fucking talk show host.

I think that's going to be all for now. The cold is starting to bug me again so I'm going to find some soup and maybe watch some guys with awful names wrestle for a while.

Sploosh Splosh Swimmin' In A Thought Pool

It's random thought splatter time. Put on your rubber boots, this thought puddle's a doozer.

Like every year, I have to get my silly Christmas shopping talk in there. When December started, I was flipping out, I'd hardly bought anything, and it was...what was Steve's word? De-fucking-cember? I can't find it, but ya know. Anyway, in one whirlwind trip around the mall, thanks to Steve's mom, I had nearly everything bought. I'm on the hunt for a couple things, but for the most part, I'm all set.

But one crappy side-effect of that is I noticed just how much money I was spending. It was so bad that my brain was envisioning trails of money being left in my wake. But really I'm not that nuts. It just feels that way because I don't usually luck out that huge/do it all at once.

Maybe the reason I was done so fast is I bought a lot of gift cards this year. But I tried to pick ones from stores that I thought the recipients would like. But one particularly hard gift card to get was the Red Lobster one. I'm pretty sure the person who I bought it for doesn't read here, but if they do, well, there goes the element of surprise.

I went to Red Lobster's website, and got all excited. They had gift cards! Then I was stopped dead in my tracks by the fact that the "state/province" box only had states in it. Grrr!

So, I called the closest restaurant, which was in Kitchener, and I was told that the site didn't sell them to Canada, you had to come to the restaurant. Um, not gonna happen.

Luckily for me, I have smart friends on Twitter *coughcough* @MELISSAandRUBY *coughcough*. She linked me to the FAQ that told me where I could call and order a card...which I did. I'm still waiting for it to arrive, but it's been ordered.

We're starting our new traddition of spending Christmas together. This year, we're off to Steve's family. It should be an interesting experience going to 4 or something Christmas thingamabobs so close together. But it'll be so nice to spend Christmas together.

Remember back when I talked about the person I picked to donate to his Movember campaign? Well, who knew I'd end up getting thanked for it? He made a cheesecake, brought it in and said everybody who donated to him would be guaranteed a piece. How awesome is that? Damn it was a good cheesecake, and I needed it that morning since I didn't sleep worth shit the night before.

If anyone's curious, I'm making huuuuge progress getting around our new floor. That whole reference points from upstairs plan kinda got blown straight to hell since it's shaped just differently enough that I don't make the connection. But that's ok, I'm figuring it out. Thanks to my coworkers being extremely patient, and repeatedly pointing out the same landmarks, it started to click. In fact, on Thursday, I zooped around the second floor with very little help.

Trix puts me to shame. She had the damn place mastered in a day. I took about four days before things started to happen. But they're happening, so that's all that matters.

Our new floor is apparently gorgeous. It definitely has some very cool things about it. One thing I have to get used to, though, is that there's no sink nearby for me to dump Trix's water. But I have learned that there's usually a solution to every common problem, and I now own a pretty spill-proof water bowl. This means I can carry it from my desk to the bathroom, probably sloshing all the way, and not spill. Yeah!

But the process of learning a new floor has made me quite fascinated with my own brain. I have noticed that in the beginning stages of learning a place, I am incapable of noticing random details that usually end up being helpful. I'm so focused on listening to where I'm supposed to turn that I notice nothing else.

Then, gradually, I will notice things like the colour of a wall, the way a certain hallway feels, or the smell of coffee. But all these obvious details went completely unnoticed until I reached a certain point in my learning. It's so bizarre.

But I'm really disturbed by the flipside of all this new learning. I am noticing that more and more, I am getting lost in familiar areas. I'm making stupid mistakes, turning too soon, and once, I crossed a street, then turned and crossed the other way when I only intended to cross one way. The scary part about this is I have no conscious memory of making the second crossing. This is my memory of events the other day: walk up to pedestrian pole, push button to cross street, cross, continue to bus stop...bus stop? Hey? Bus stop? Where are you? They don't just tear down a shelter...or do they?

What really happened was after I crossed the first time, I turned and crossed the other way. I did it safely, but I have no memory of doing this and had to deduce what I had done based on playing that old hotter colder game with Trix where she goes faster as we approach familiar areas. This scared me so bad that I nearly stopped, pulled out my phone and scheduled an appointment to see my doctor because I wondered if I may have had some kind of bizarre seizure.

I'm starting to think that no, my brain has just been so busy absorbing so much knowledge that something had to give. I know that as it adapts, I will stop having these brain burps. But if I don't, the doc and I are going to have a long talk. Crossing streets and having no memory of doing so could get me and/or Trix killed, and I don't want to die anytime soon.

And I'm sad to report that my hopes of reviving my GPS didn't pan out so well. I got the new part, it was the right part, but it has the same sloppy connection problem the other one does...so I can only think that maybe something bent in the actual unit. I'm not going to give up until I have to. I might bring it to work and let someone who is the right kind of genius have a boo at it. There are enough different kinds of geniuses around there, someone might have an idea or six.

I watched the dumbest movie ever. If someone comes up to you and says "Let's watch 'The Happening'," tell them you'd rather not waste an hour and a half or so of your life. Believe me, watching that movie is...just dumb.

Ok, the premise is that this weird toxen is circulating through the air that's causing people to find funky ways to kill themselves. Freaky idea, but well, the ending totally suuucks. It couldn't be any more anticlimactic. And along the way, you could put a jeep down some of the plot holes in this movie. Oy. Just...why?

But I have run into a whole pack of people this weekend that have made me wonder if instead of there being a toxen out there turning people suicidal, there's one out there stealing people's ability to think...at all.

Let's back up to a couple of days ago. I went into the liquor store to pick up a gift card there. The woman who served me, after seeing someone show me to the counter, pointed at the gift cards. "We have that one, or that one, or that one." I had to tell her that I couldn't see anything, so she'd have to tell me what she was pointing at. Then, she proceeded to freak out, wondering how to put through a gift card. A manager had to walk her through every step of the process. In a final move of duh, she nearly swiped my gift card, which would have probably used it up before I'd even paid for it. Thankfully the supervisor stopped her.

Ok, whatever, a frazzled worker at a store. No big deal, right? Let's move on to yesterday. Trix needed another bath. For some reason her skin and coat got really oily really fast. I don't know if fish oil will do that or what. Since it was so cold out, I took a cab from the bathing place since I didn't want her to stand out in the cold, and even if I put a coat on her, it was her face I was worried about.

So, I paid debit for the cab. He swiped the card, pushed some buttons and waited. I asked him please give me the pin pad. "No," he says, "It's just waiting to go through." Um, hello? I need to specify the account and, um, enter my PIN. It took me a couple of attempts to get him to look at the screen, realize that I did in fact have to press some buttons, and give me the damn pad.

"Yeah," you say, "Whatever. Maybe he'd had a long day." But the parade continued this morning. I went to that Tim Hortons I talked about a little while ago. I had a craving for apple cider, so decided to get Steve and I some breakfast sandwiches and drinks. I arrived, and started to make my order. Before I finished, the girl started madly calling for a manager. I don't even know why. I think she thought they didn't sell cider or something. When someone could finally convince her that they did, she then said "Is that everything?" I asked her what she had heard, and basically she said nothing. So, how could that be everything if she doesn't remember a damn thing I ordered?

I went to pay with debit, since I can now, put the card in and punched the buttons. She then said she couldn't figure out if it had worked or not. She had to call someone over, and neither of them could figure it out. I had to actually call my bank and check that it had gone through.

Whatever, it's a new Tim's, they're a little frazzled. But while I was in the same store, a woman was very kind and offered to help me with my stuff. I told her what I had ordered and she handed me a bag and said that's everything. I said I had ordered a few sandwiches and a couple of drinks. She said "Yup." I knew the drinks weren't there because I didn't have a tray. Finally someone pointed out that the drinks were still sitting on the counter. She then said "Oh, I thought they were in the bag!" Um, what would have happened if they put the drinks in the bag with other things? They would have fallen over! Gaaaa!

The stupid virus wasn't confined to Guelph. I came home to my email, and found an email saying that a person had left a comment on this post about a USB stick. Just look at my first comment, and then Lilly's. Hello, did you actually think I was being completely serious? For real?

I ventured back out, and the stupid continued. As I was crossing the street, someone shot by and said "Is your dog doing better?" Huh? What is she even talking about? And why not stay around for the answer? Another person asked me what all Trix does for me, and then said "I have to run." Asking me what Trix does is a pretty complicated question. If you don't have the time, don't ask the question.

As I tried to find a place I'd never found before, I ran into a guy and thought I'd ask him. I was standing at the corner of two streets, let's call them Smith and Jones. I was looking for something on Jones. I asked him about the place, and said it was on Jones. His response? "I don't even know where Jones Street is." Uh, chief, take a gander at that there sign. He did, and still didn't know, so walked up to a woman and asked her where the place was. The response she gave him was a shriek that sounded like the woman a. didn't understand English and/or b. thought this man was out to rob or rape her. Instead of realizing this woman was not going to be of any help, he pressed on! I had to persuade him to leave her be, she was confused, and seemed scared.

At last, I was about to get on the bus and get home, hoping I wouldn't breathe in the stupid gas and start doing dumb things. An older fellow walked up to me and this is all he said. "Do you remember my voice? I met you on the bus." Well...that narrows it down in a hurry. He then told me he helped me find some place where an old theatre used to be. I still have no idea to what he was referring, nor do I remember him.

Ack. That is just too much weird in two days. I know if I show up at work tomorrow and people are acting stupid, I have something to fear.

I think that's about it for now. Hope you enjoyed the trip across my river of thoughts.

I'm Not Sure Why I Wrote This

There's snow outside. Not a lot of it, but it's honest to god snow, the stuff that sticks to the ground. I'm not impressed because I really can't stand winter anymore, but I know it's only going to get worse. Hopefully not so much worse that the services of the military are required like they were in 1999, but worse than it is now. Ug.

Remember that? If you don't and wonder why people sometimes make fun of Toronto, that's one of the reasons why. Yes it was a lot of snow, but more than 400 soldiers sent in to shovel it? Get a life!

I started writing this post for a reason...but what was it? I honestly can't remember. There was the snow thing...which I suppose can lead into Christmas shopping. I'm still not done, but I'm much further along than I was just a few days ago and I think I only have a few more things to buy before the big day. Some folks I'm not even going to think about until well after Christmas since I won't be seeing them until who knows when, which helps things along and makes me feel better about my slowness.

Speaking of shopping, the PINless chip and PIN credit card system is working well. I've used it at a restaurant and in a few stores without incident, which is nice and a trend I would like to see continue.

Let's see...I still can't remember what this post was supposed to be about. But did you know that when you're feeling even the slightest bit stressed/annoyed, the song It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year is enough to induce slight homicidal thoughts in even the nicest people? Go ahead, try it.



See?

If you don't at least want to give some one or some thing even the mildest of beatings, congratulations on your worry free existence. I really do mean that.

On a nicer musical note, I saw the Irish Rovers for the second time. I'm not recapping the whole experience again, so read this, add in some Christmas and a couple more people, subtract the part about Brantford's drinking policies, take out the references to Brantford altogether and replace them with Guelph and change the name of the new album and you've got the night in a nutshell. Indeed, fun times were had...and we even got to shake hands with a couple of Rovers! That was pretty cool. And just for fun, here's one of the songs they had us sing along to.



And props to the Rovers for being talented enough to make me enjoy Christmas music for a little while. I mostly can't stand the stuff and would be happy to only hear it for no more than a couple of days a year, but if it all sounded like them I might change my mind.

Next concert stop is the Arrogant Worms for the...um...I can't even remember how many times it's been, much like I still can't think of what in hell I started writing this post for. Maybe I should go and think about it since nothing else is coming to mind. did I even have a reason to begin with? I'm not sure anymore.

Anton And His Theatre Friends present...The Gift of the Magi

If you're looking for something to do really, really soon, our old pal Anton may have just the thing for you if you happen to be in the right area or aren't going to the Irish Rovers and having people stay with you this weekend like Carin and I are.

Join Out of Sight Productions for
a Special Christmas Presentation of
"The Gift of the Magi" 

London, Ontario, October 12, 2011 - To celebrate the spirit of the Christmas season, Out of Sight Productions is pleased to present "The Gift of the Magi", the classic tale by O. Henry adapted for our stage by London's Steve Stockwell. 

In this enduring tale of self-sacrifice we witness a love of such depth and understanding that it nurtures sustenance for a couple who, in a mad desire to please, have surrendered their most precious possessions while unwittingly ensuring a future on which their current dreams can be built. 

"The Gift of the Magi" at the CNIB Auditorium, 749 Base Line Road East:                  

Thursday, December 1 at 7:30pm                  

Friday, December 2 at 3:00pm and 7:30pm                  

Saturday, December 3 at 3:00pm and 7:30pm                  

Sunday, December 4 at 3:00pm 

Admission is Free - a small donation to help support the work of Out of Sight Productions would be greatly appreciated. 

For further information, please contact:
          Kelly MacDonald, Company Director, Out of Sight Productions       

Phone: 519-675-0379       

Email: info@oosproductions.com       

Web: www.oosproductions.com 

Out of Sight Productions thanks you for supporting our unique theatre initiative

Another Candidate For Festive RIDE Theme Song

If you listened to yesterday's big batch of audio, you know we had a hell of a fun time trying to come up with Festive RIDE Program Christmas songs. We didn't mention this one yesterday since we were thinking so hard that it slipped our minds, but it seems appropriate to share a seasonal classic from Bob Rivers that fits the theme nicely. Enjoy Police Stop My Car.

Have fun getting that out of your head.

It's The Occupy VC Cast

Update: The audio hasn't worked for a while here. Thank you Blind File Sharing for hosing us. So now, for all things cast, pop on over to our new site. There, you'll find audio that works!

Well, it is here. The Occupy VC Cast, the Occucast, whatever you want to call it, it's here...and it's about to occupy about 2 hours of your time. It would be awesome if you found it 99% funny.

We divided it into 4 parts. It would have been only 3, but well, ya see, I'm a giant moron and caused us to need to make a bonus part.

Part one lasts for about 25 minutes or so. In it, we spend some time on the whole Occupy VC thing, and how the Occupy movement has invaded my subconscious, because when I hear 1% or 99% from the computer as it's loading something, I immediately think of Occupy-related stuff. We mention Lunchupguelph, and ramble a while about the work Christmas party we went to, some about the odd weather, the Baker Street Station, and then we set off on our first major rant. Steve got very creative in making fun of the reasons people come up with for petting guide dogs when they know they shouldn't, and Trix got excited by his silly tone. I also did my best to describe the drink I tried at Baker Street Station, man that was awesome. Then after Steve talked in a funny voice, a joke next to noone will get, we brought this part of things to a sudden end.

In part two, which lasts about 42 minutes, Steve made me a drink and we talked about its ability to smack me around six ways from Sunday. We also talked about how Steve knows what drinks I'd like and has a pretty good track record. the story of the recent time where one of our Twitter buddies jokingly called Steve a douchebag came up, as well as the fact that someone seriously calls themselves Magnificent Douchebag as their Twitter name. We asked a question about something someone said who has gone lots of times to the Occupy Toronto movement, and Steve scared the hell out of me by mentioning this video. We lament the fact that BlindFileSharing's front end went splat, cutting off access to the files. Other topics talked about are the Occupy Movement's biggest curse, the stupidity of news media working people into a frenzy over nothing, Black Friday insanity, The mumbly new Tim Horton's slogan and general suckiness of Tim Hortons commercials, especially the use of the words "whipped topping". And before we break again, Steve talks about how much he loves the Grey Cup finals, and a few recent Grey Cup party memories.

And then, we really get silly in Part three, which goes about 50 minutes. This was the other half of our inspiration for audio. The story goes that the police in our area step up their efforts to watch out for impaired drivers. So, they pull everybody over on a stretch of road, ask them if they've had anything to drink, and if they think they have, they test them and deal with them. This is called the RIDE program (Reduce Impaired Driving Everywhere). But at Christmas, they call it the festive RIDE program. This always gave us an image of singing cops jingling bells and being full of jolly cheer while making people walk the line and blow into the breathalizer. We then wondered what sort of songs they would sing at the festive RIDE program...and that's what we spend the majority of the time doing. Part of the way through, I suddenly realize we need bells, and go off in search of something that would serve as bells. Since I can't find them, we have to settle for jingling our keys. At the very end, we wrap up by laughing at someone for thinking the Foo Fighters were called the Food Fighters, and there's a little joke in there for a fellow known on Twitter as @thedangillis.

And just when you think it's over, we make Part four, all because I found those pesky bells! This one only goes about 4 minutes or so.

We had a lot of fun doing this audio, so I hope you enjoy. Here's Part One, Part Two, Part Three, and finally, Part 4.

Enjoy, or something.

Weiland In A Winter Wonderland

For some reason, I feel the need to make note of the fact that the same guy who did this just did this.



I suppose I could give him credit for branching out and trying something different, but my ears would rather I say something about how ungood this is and how he sounds like one of those really hacky lounge singers who's the only one in the room that thinks he's any good.

Thoughts?

Pretty Pointless Post

Short, mostly pointless post about stuff many of you may or may not care about on the way because we sometimes do that kind of thing here.

First and foremost, first place is mine! Yes, with only 2 shows left to go, I've finally taken over sole possession of the top spot in the WWE pay-per-view pick 'em contest! It's only a 2 point lead so I don't feel very safe, but if I can keep on this nice hot streak I've been on, In just 2 short months I could find myself walking away with fabulous prizes!

I asked last week about how long it would take to give a giant metal balcony wall a makeover. Well, I have my answer now. Seems it takes right around two weeks. They took it just after Thanksgiving, and today they've been running around the building giving them back. Next on the list may be trying to get a new sliding screen door out of them since ours doesn't fit in the track right anymore and is kind of a piece of crap.

I may have asked this question before, but just in case I haven't, why does Rogers feel the need to charge you long distance to check your own cellphone voicemail from outside the city you live in? The phone the messages are meant for is right in my hand, and I don't even have to manually dial a number to get to them. Plus the last time I checked the number it automagically calls is in Toronto which is long distance from Guelph in every circumstance other than checking messages, so what makes being outside of Guelph and needing to pick up messages so different? Shouldn't long distance be long distance, and shouldn't calling voicemail be free from anywhere since I'm already paying a fee just to have it? They can obviously turn long distance on and off, so why can't they do us that one nice little good deed?

Carin and I are going to see Steven Page in a couple of weeks at River Run. I'm surprised we were able to get tickets at all at this point, let alone seats in a box so that Trix would have enough room to hang out without getting trampled. If you're in the area and wanting to go, it sounds like there are still quite a few seats available, so your odds are good.

I still have no ideas beyond the couple I said I had last week for Christmas presents, but I think I'm going to try to take care of at least one of those this week so I can say I started my shopping in October. Not sure why I like to say that, but I get a little upset with myself if I can't. I'll probably buy the first of who knows how many things for Carin, a fact I'm mentioning here simply for purposes of tormenting her.

That's all for the time being. I'll be back when I find something cool or stupid, or if I just feel like wasting a bit of your time like I've just finished doing.

Hey Look! It's A Post About Stuff!

It sure is rainy and crappy outside this morning. At least the wind we had during yesterday's rainy crappiness has died down. At times it felt like what's left of our balcony was going to come off the side of the building and fall to earth. It was brutal!

Speaking of what's left of the balcony, when they send those big metal panels away to get redone and prettied up, how long does that usually take? Right now we can't go out there because it's unsafe, but our patio furniture is still living outside. When I say we can't go out there, we literally can't without first taking a screwdriver to the screen door. the building folks have been screwing them shut for safety and likely legal reasons during the repair, so whatever's out there is stuck until they decide to open it again. Right now that's not a huge deal, but eventually it's going to snow, and then...yeah, big deal. I've seen what happens when you leave your shit out for a day too long, and it sucks. If you've never had the experience of prying frozen tables and chairs that are under a giant snowbank off of a concrete slab in freezing temperatures, don't. I'd rather not have it again, so I hope this doesn't take long.

While we're talking apartment building things, we got a new fridge this week. Not sure where that ranks on the Matt's front door scale of historical significance, but it's a nice fridge.

Nice as it is though, it's odd. I've never seen a fridge with so much space where nothing fits quite right. When you adjust the top shelf so that tall things like milk and water jugs will go in, it's hard to put things on the shelf below it. If you move that one down to fix that problem, good luck using the bottom. I may be missing something, but until I figure out what if anything that is, our milk and water are hanging out in the giant door space that I'm starting to think they put in when they realized they fucked up the shelving.

And it has no egg compartment! None! With all the room in this thing, whoever built it could have easily solved the not enough egg slots issue, but no! Guess it was more important to make sure the shelves were annoying.

I appreciate the extra room, but it's not the fridge I personally would have bought. Oh well, how much can I really complain when the building pays for it and it means I don't have to soak up water with paper towels a few times a day? I'll get used to it and probably even like it.

There's news on why TNA may have made the stupid Bobby Roode decision. According to PWInsider, it's Hulk Hogan's fault. TNA was going to do the smart thing and put the belt on Roode, but Hogan lobbied to have it changed and won. Makes sense given that he's said in interviews that he doesn't think Roode is ready to be a top guy. What doesn't make sense is why anybody still listens to Hulk Hogan in 2011. I'm sure he has good ideas to offer as far as how to get the most out of a crowd by doing next to nothing in a match and such, but as far as I know the only person he's ever booked well is himself, so why should his opinions on anybody else carry any weight whatsoever? We're talking about a guy who seems to think you can only be a star in TNA if you've worked in WWE in the 80's or 90's, or better yet, if you're *in* your 80's or 90's. Please, for the sake of the product, stop letting this guy make decisions on who's over. Leave that to the fans and the new clue-based writing crew you're putting together.

I helped my sister pick out a Christmas present for somebody this week. I guess that means I can't live in denial for much longer. It's coming, and I'd better do something about it. Problem is I have a grand total of two gift ideas right now and then I'm stuck. Maybe if I get those out of the way it'll inspire me, but I'm not holding out a lot of hope. Hope you like gift cards and beer, everyone. Both of those would make fine gifts as far as I'm concerned. Just throwing that last bit out there in case anybody who's stuck buying me something happens to be reading.

That's all for now. I'm going to have breakfast. Until we meet again and beyond, remember this: One man's trash is another man's treasure may be a nice saying, but it's a pretty terrible way to tell your kids they're adopted.

The One Where I Tell You To Vote And Then Ramble About Other Things For A While

I'll warn you right off the top that this post might be even more disjointed and sucky than usual. I'm a bit distracted by the pain in my right foot and it's making me cranky. The thing hates me, but if I were it and I'd been injured so many times by me, I'd probably hate me too. I wish I'd kept a log from the first time I hurt it when I was 8 or 9 up to now so I could see exactly how much I've put it through. I think it would be a little bit fascinating. It's kind of scary that I've done so much to it that I can't remember it all off the top of my head, isn't it? Usually hurting something that effects you that much is memorable, but perhaps after a certain number you just stop counting and forget about it all because it's too much to remember and maybe even a little bit routine...at least until the next thing happens to it. It's anything but routine in the moment, I assure you.

So what sort of heinous and horrible things did I do to it today, you ask. Well...I walked on it. Seriously, that's all it takes some days. I like long walks but it doesn't, and there seems to be no room for agreeing to disagree. I often need to walk to get around, and since its entire purpose in life is to serve as my right leg, it has no choice but to come along every time. For now I can take it, but with each passing year it gets a little worse. Man, getting old is gonna blow.

It's a beautiful sunny day here in lovely Guelph. A perfect day to get out and vote in the Ontario election if you haven't already done so. Carin and I did that this morning so that we could take advantage of the audio voting system that she's posted about here. If you want all of the info on that stuff, check the elections tag. Everything you need should be there. If you want to audio vote or sip and puff or any of the other options they have, you only have until the end of tomorrow to do it. For reasons nobody will ever get me to understand, these things are not available on election day proper, nor were they around for the regular advanced polls. You have to find your returning office and vote there. I'd love to see them try pulling that stunt with pencils. If you're in Guelph, the address is 292 Speedvale Avenue West, unit 1. It's in the plaza near the Speedvale and Silvercreek intersection. If you're anywhere else, the Elections Ontario site or 1-888-ONT-VOTE can help you find where you're supposed to go. Please, go there and use this stuff if you need it. I can tell you with certainty that they're keeping track of how well used it is. Every vote cast using these machines really is a vote for justifying their existence. It shouldn't have to be that way (see pencils, pulling that stunt with), but until a whole lot of attitudes change for the better, that's how it's going to be.

Carin and I had a very nice trip to Ottawa this weekend. I could have done without spending the better part of Friday and Sunday on buses since I really don't travel well, but the between time was great. We got to catch up with some old friends and even meet a couple of online ones in person. I'm not sure what's wrong with the folks in the latter camp, but for some reason they liked us enough to not let us pay for breakfast. Thanks again, guys. We'll be happy to return the favour any time. And thanks to the old friends for everything. Twas a great weekend, and trust me, never again will I make the mistake of calling your apple cinnamon coffee bread cinnamon coffee bread. I meant neither to underestimate or offend it. It was a lovely creation, and I deeply apologize to it.

For those of you who care about such things, I'm still tied for the lead in the PWInsider pay-per-view pick 'em contest. I'm tied with a different person, but still tied. I can't seem to get first place all to myself, but honestly I'm just happy I'm a contender with only 3 shows to go.

Since I'm insane, I'm thinking about signing up for the TNA/ROH version they're going to run. Yes, you read that correctly. These people are going to try to make figuring out TNA a thing. I figure what can it hurt? If I'm going to watch the shit anyway I might as well try getting some found money out of it.

On the subject of wrestling since I don't talk much about it anymore, Mark Henry is awesome lately. Somehow, after 15 years, WWE has finally figured out how to present him. Slowly but surely they're turning him into one of the only believable characters in the company. The more they let him mow through people and bust things up, the more it feels like indeed, this fellow could and would kick the living hell out of me if given the chance. Wrestling needs more of that sort of thing if it wants to keep people interested and paying.

One more thing before I get out of here. I think I may have mentioned this on one of the recent audios we did, but why are we in such a hurry to get rid of summer and bring on Christmas this year? Seriously, we didn't even make it through Labour Day before people were putting summer in the ground and talking about how there were only a hundred and whatever days to Christmas. Listen, people. I'm going to say this as nicely as I can. Fuck the fuck off with that, you irritating sonsofbitches! We shouldn't be hearing a peep about Christmas from absolutely anyone until the staying type of snow is on the ground or December starts, whichever comes first. Feel free to start your shopping before then if you'd like, that's fine. It never hurts to beat the crowds and it's nice to not have to do it all at once. But please, keep it to yourself. Some of us really can't stand winter and are beginning to feel similarly about Christmas, and you're not helping.

I hate to end things on kind of a downer, so I'll leave you with this instead.

What's the difference between a bad golfer and a bad skydiver?
Bad golfer: *Whack* "Aww shit!
Bad skydiver: "Aww shit!" *Whack*

Ahh, much better.

Enjoy today's baseball if that's your thing. I personally can't wait to watch what I hope will be the first round end of the Yankees. Between that and Boston not making it at all, there might be enough happiness to make me like Christmas again.

Long Weekend Audio: It's Nowhere Near Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

Happy Saturday!

Here's your first audio of the day. If you listen to these things mainly for Carin, you may hate this one. I'm all by myself this time. Don't worry, I only talk for about 8 minutes, so you won't have to put up with me long.

What we have here is just me killing a few minutes waiting for the Jays to start. I'm sitting outside drinking a beer and talking to you. We're talking about people wishing summer to an end, how Christmas is getting out of hand and another tword. There's also a word or 2 about Carin being kind of silly and dangerous. Enjoy.

If anybody needs me, I'll be outside with the game and my beer. I'll have Twitter with me out there, so feel free to say hi.

A Heapin' Helpin' Of Babble

Enough chomp chomp chomping for now. Let's just ramble. I haven't rambled in a little bit.

I had a weird thing happen to me yesterday. I went to the drug store to pick something up, and a girl that usually helps me out said "So, you're here for something for your eye?" My eye? No. I was here to get milk and things. I asked her why I would be here for my eye, and she said that almost the entire white of my right eye was bright red, and it was quite noticeable. Herm. That's weird, since I didn't feel a thing.

Thinking it was just a temporary thing, I asked the huppy's mom later if my right eye looked funny, and she said that it looked like someone took a red marker and drew all around the inside of my right eye. Eek. A kid was nearby and decided he would play doctor. He told me it was probably just a broken blood vessel, and it would go away on its own. Hmmm. I guess he's had a few of those in his day. I thought that was rather cute.

But now that she's said something, when I feel anything at all, I wonder what that is. If the other eye itches, I get really twitchy.

It's times like this that I wish I could see, just so I could look in a mirror and survey things. As it is now, I have to ask people. "What does my eye look like?" It is bugging me a little more, but I have to wonder if a big part of that is psychological. At any rate, I think I'm going to be calling my doctor tomorrow morning to see when I can get in to get her to have a boo at the ol' peepers.

Let's see. Trix updates. You know how I was worried about her weirdness around open stairs and her tendancy to yeep? Well, when we were home, she wouldn't play tug at all. When we got back here, she continued to not play tug. This worried me, because Trix loooves to play tug. But then I started to think maybe she felt she couldn't get a good grip on some of her old toys to play tug or something. So I bought her a new one, and she went nuts. But now, yet again, she's less keen than usual about this whole tug thing. I'll have to keep an eye on that. She seems to be fine walking around working, but I wonder about the tug thing. I also wonder about this new trend where she does not want to sit in the elevator. She'll willingly sit just on her own in the apartment, but in the elevator she's always trying to stand up again. It's times like these where you wonder what is behavioural and what is physical? I can't sort out a pattern.

She got a new tag. Now I just have to get the old tag off. I don't know why I'm such a tard with figuring out how to work little key rings, but I profoundly suck at it. If someone could show me a trick, I would love them forever. The vet folks usually put the new one on and take the old one off, but for some reason the tech thought I needed help putting the harness back on. This is nothing new. But she left the old tag on, and I can't for the life of me get it off.

Oh yeah, and vet techs, if I owe you money, don't let me walk out without at least asking me when I'm going to pay. I had a credit because I was overcharged for a service. I had been using it up. When I brought Trix in to get her anal glands expressed and her nails trimmed, I asked the girl at the desk if I owed money, or if I still had credit. She just muttered something about "$9 left." So, when they brought Trix back and I headed for the door, and she made no comment, I figured that meant I had $9 left of my credit. They have the file, not me. I had a hard time figuring how that could be possible, but what do I know?

Then a couple of weeks later, I get an invoice saying I owe $9. Well jeebers woman, speak up! I would have paid it! Oh well, whatever. As long as they don't tack on interest or anything silly. They said I could just pay it when I came in for whatever I came in for next. Maybe I'll have to come in if this tug thing continues to worry me.

Like I've mentioned a couple of times before, I'm working with the Guelph Barrier Free Committees researching recreational opportunities for people with disabilities. That means me and the phone are becoming good buds. It also means that I talk to a lot of interesting people, of all kinds.

I feel bad that in just asking if a leader of a given activity considers their activity to be accessible, I give some folks what sounds like a minor panic attack. I think I manage to calm lots of them down by the end, but I hate to watch them panic. I'm used to it, I see it all the time when I try and join certain things. I just hate watching it happen in rapid succession.

I also have talked to some people who, um, are a little awkward. When I ask if I'm speaking to a representative of a given club, an odd response would be "Depends who's asking," spoken in a creepy voice. Um, why? Is there something criminal going on? It appears that the guy's just odd. But you really speak to all kinds when doing tons of cold calls.

On the other side of the coin, people have some interesting ideas of what people with disabilities would want or need. Someone thought we should all be rounded up and placed in a compound where we could ride to all amenities and pet animals. Hmmm. Ok.

But I am learning a lot of interesting things about some recreational stuff around that I didn't know. I'm going to feel like an expert on ways to be active in Guelph in a big hurry.

I have said in a couple of places that this January is just full of suck for lots of people. But there is something weird about the way the barrel of sucktitude is dropping its piles of crap. It seems to be aiming for all the people you don't expect.

After the pile of misfortune that fell on Steve's family, I started bracing for the worst. When mom and dad would call, a small part of me would be worried. But all my grandparents and other elderly family are fine. Anyone who's been struggling with things seems to be ok. All the ones that are getting smacked around are otherwise healthy or reasonably active folks.

Take the case of Seth Webster, for example. I had seen him mentioned in a few places. He had been in a few Growing Up Guide Pup videos showing off his guide dog Bamboo, and he was volunteering for GDB. All seemed perfectly well. I admit I don't know him very well at all, but there were no signs of trouble that I noticed.

then, suddenly, he dies. What the? Who the? Huh?

Maybe January is giving me a giant, pound it into your head style lesson that life is precious, and you never know when it's your time to disappear. Ok ok ok, I got it. I think. Yeesh! Now, can you stop with the death and massive injury to tons of my friends and acquaintances thing? Please? Now?

I haven't written about the huppy in a while. Man is he ever learning a lot of stuff, and he's really, really trying to communicate. At one point, he decided that my coat had to be zipped, so he grabbed the top flaps, brought them together, and said "Please." Well, it sounded more like peeze, but ya know. I thought it was just too cute.

But there was one sentence he said that struck fear into my bones. I went with him and his mom in their car, and his mom wanted to run into a store and drop something off. I said I would stay with the huppy. She left, and a few seconds later, he said "Uh-oh, truck." Uh-oh, truck? Why uh-oh, truck. Was a truck coming for our car? I tried to stay calm, all the while wondering how I could best protect the huppy if the truck was going to hit us. Thankfully nothing happened, but who knew two words could be so scary?

He also imitates everything. Steve was chasing him around the house, and would jump out and go "Boo! Boo!" and he would go Boo! Boo! right back at him. He loves to hug, too, which is just super adorable.

You can see he's at that stage where the world is still purely logical for him. You can watch the wheels turning. "If that thing with a screen is a TV, then everything with a screen must be a TV." Actually he says TD, but I know what he's going for. "Also, the clicker controls the TV. So maybe it's a TV too. So clicker-like things and things with screens are TV's. Hmmm. Yeah. I think so."

Another thing I see his little brain working through is exactly what please means. His folks always get him to say please when he asks for something. But he has taken to thinking that please is some kind of command. So, if he wants to play with the clicker, he'll say "TD peeze." When we say no, he cannot figure it out. "But I said please! Hand it over! I said please!" Ah, the complexities one has to learn.

But he loves phones. He wants to grab any phone he can and say "call call". One time, we locked Steve's cell phone and let him look at it. Somehow, it came unlocked, and he managed to call call our house! It was pure luck that it was our house. He hit the send button which brought up the dialed numbers window, and we were at the top, so he hit that button again, and off went the phone. Oh boy. Keep your call call locked while near the huppy.

We gave him his Christmas present. I've said before that he likes to play with the mail slots in the building. So, I wondered if a toy mailbox existed. And holy crap, it does! I walked into Simply Wonderful Toys and fired off a whole bunch of choices. I thought I'd take a shot in the dark and ask if they had a mailbox, and my god, they did, complete with toy parcels and pieces of mail! I hope he likes it. I know for sure he liked the birthday bear that came in it.

I think that's about it for this round of babble. Everybody, stay safe and warm.

The Looong Holiday Post

Well, it's about the middle of January and I still haven't written my tradditional holiday epic. It's a doozer, like always.

First, updates about stuff I mentioned before. Mr. Postman never brought that last parcel. Oh well, if all works out, Steve can ask them to resend it and we'll be able to give it to its intended recipient next time he comes to see us.

I got away to catch the greyhound bright and early, although I think I looked pretty funny dragging two suitcases down the hall. Little me, big suitcases. I don't know what it is about me, but I always end up leaving in a panic no matter how hard I try to get things done. But all my luggage and I got on the bus, met up with my sister and company and got home without incident. The only thing of note was at the Greyhound station, I heard an announcement to the effect of "Attention all passengers. There are some items which are considered restricted and must be packed with your luggage and not carried onboard. Please consult the list or speak to a customer service agent." I bet this is all because of the Tim McLean incident. I would have loved to have seen that list.

The holidays always go so fast. Without fail, I want to see more people than I possibly can. Oh well, we do what we can.

It was a nice quiet Christmas, and I definitely got some cool stuff. The funniest moment in the present-giving happened between my mom, my sister and I. I had gotten my sister "Half Broke Horses" by Jeannette Walls. I had spent a bunch of time telling mom about the book and praying she hadn't already read it. My sister opened it and said she had not read it. Then, out of the corner of my ear, I heard her say to my brother "pay attention." Then my mom opened my sister's gift to her. And what was it? The same book! We all had a really good laugh. Here I was unintentionally building up the gift my sister had got for my mom!

I can't say the same for Steve's Christmas. As he said, in pretty quick succession, 2 of his family members had to make 3 ER visits and another one got a flu. Thankfully, none of them had anything life-threatening wrong with them. But that's way too many visits to the ER and way too much illness over the holidays.

We went over to my aunt's place to see my dad's side of the family, and those cute little twins I talk about so much. They're just so adorable. Two things they did that cracked me up: One of them was fascinated with Trixie and kept petting her and trying to get her to lick him. I took her harness off so he could. At one point he just stuck his finger right in her ear. She didn't even flinch. I told him that he probably shouldn't do that with most dogs and got him to pet the rest of her. It was fun.

The other thing he did was he decided he was going to make me a drawing, but it had to be out of glitter glue. He then told me that it was a potato, but it was raised up so I could feel it. Aww. How thoughtful! I could have just hugged him. I hardly ever see him, but he somehow got the blindness concept, at least for that moment.

Trix settled in as usual at mom's house. The only weird thing that happened that I'm still trying to figure out is one day, she decided that the two sets of open stairs at mom's house were just not climbable. She has never had a problem with them before, and then one day, she started scrambling up the front stairs. I first thought her paws were still wet and she slipped once, but I wiped her paws really carefully the next time. She still scrambled up.

Later, She went down the two open back stairs to get a drink of her water. Then, she stood at the bottom of those two stairs and looked up at us as if to say "Please, please help me. I can't do this." One morning she stood down there for 15 minutes! I thought maybe she just wanted to be down there, but then mom saw her looking up at us forlornly.

At first mom and I thought she had developed a fear of open stairs. So I started standing at the top of the stairs and calling her up while holding a treat. She would still scramble up the stairs. She would always go down them fine, but up was where the problem lay. So, the treating thing wasn't working. I tried it a few times, and at one point she wouldn't go back down. She couldn't figure out what the meaning of this was.

So, I started heeling her up the stairs on leash. I thought if I could show her again that they were cool, maybe we could stop the scrambling. That proved to be a bit more dangerous than I had planned, because she would still scramble, throwing me off balance, and then getting her down to do it again was kinda tricky too. But that seemed to be getting the message through a bit. Mom wanted to carry her up and down the stairs but I thought that was probably not a good option. She may need to guide me up open stairs at some point. We need to solve the problem, not skirt it.

Then we went to our buddy's place that we like to go visit, and he gave her a shoulder rub, and she yeeped! She yeeped at a shoulder rub? This got me worried that there was something physically wrong. But to make things even more perplexing, the next day, as magically as her aversion to open stairs had appeared, it went away!

So, my only theory is that she had pulled something ever so slightly and now it had worked itself out. But if it was something physically wrong with her, why wouldn't it hurt to go up the closed stairs? She had no problem with those. Trix, you puzzle me sometimes.

It's funny the things Trix does consistently at my parents' place that she never does here. For example, she goes back to the bedroom and puts herself to bed at about 10 each night. What's more, if I don't come to bed within the half hour, she comes out to get me, then walks back there again as if to say, "you! Bed, now." She also wants to keep tabs on the pack at home. If she hears the door, she runs out and walks between us as if to do a head count.

We fixed her doggy wagon when it came to exchanging gifts, and it was completely by accident. Every Christmas, without fail, Trix has run out and tried to run around with wrapping paper or tape or something. But this year, because we exchanged gifts so late, she put herself to bed! So, she would only come out on her mission to collect me for bed, and then leave. Sweet! I'm not saying that I would rearrange my schedule to do that again, but it was cool.

I really hope that Trixie's raisers like what I got them this year. It wasn't much, but I hope they liked it. All I did was get my mom to take some holiday pictures of Trix, some inside the house and some outside, and send them in a card. I hope they didn't think I cheaped out on them. But I think the most important thing I can give them are pictures of Trix as she gets older so they know she is well-cared-for.

As for Trix, she got a new bed for Christmas. that beloved bed that Trix's raisers got her is showing signs of wear. I haven't had the heart to throw it out yet, but I know I have to soon. So, my folks went out and got a new one. She seems to enjoy laying in it. She looks so cute when she's all nestled in there.

Before I knew it, it was time to head back here. As much as it's nice to go home and see everybody, it's so nice to get back to my own home too. I think we wore poor mom out, but that may have been due in part to whatever cold was refusing to leave her alone.

New Years was quiet again this year, and for the foreseeable future, I think that's how we prefer them. It's just too hard to come back and then throw a giant party.

Then...oh then! Poor Steve got struck with a flu the likes of which I have never seen. It was so bad that we decided to get him to the ER because he was beyond average flu guy sick and it was getting kinda scary. I mean, when the huppy's mom came to get us, she described him as yellow. By the way, thank you, huppy's mom, for your oodles and piles and heaps of help. It is super mucho appreciated. Then, after things were looking more hopeful, the lady in the ER described the way he looked when he arrived as "gross." Um, eek?

Thankfully, after waiting for what seemed like aeons, they saw him and started giving him fluids by IV. That seemed to pep him up from almost dead to just awfully sick. I never knew awfully sick was an improvement, but Steve that day proved that it could be seen as one.

And here's a little note to someone I'll only know as lipstick girl. You need to get your priorities straight.

1. You don't come to the emergency room just for the hell of it. If you need a little something checked out, go to your family doctor or a walk-in clinic. The ER the day after New Years is not the prime day to get a little something looked into.
2. Yes, you can live without your lipstick. It is not going to kill you to not have your lipstick.

and finally,
3. When sitting by a guy who can barely stand, please refrain from constantly whining about the wait to see the doctor and how badly you want to go home. There's the door, you know. Just let triage know you're leaving. You made me want to give you a reason to be in the ER.

But, I do have to thank lipstick girl for giving me practice in exercising restraint. At least she was useful for something.

But this flu is a humdinger. I thought that other flu was bad. It didn't take either of us to the ER, so this flu wins hands down. Also, poor Steve is still recovering from it, although I think we're close to saying he's completely cured. Very, very close.

I was holding off to write the holiday post until the huppy got his Christmas gift, but I think maybe this thing is becoming a monster without adding that in. Maybe his reaction to it will deserve a post of its own. If it doesn't, I could probably make a whole post about huppy updates. He's the cutest little guy.

What can I say about 2010? Hmmm. Not a whole heap. The most significant event was my sister getting married, which definitely is pretty significant. But for me personally, things have pretty much stayed the same. The one thing I regret is not working harder to figure out what training I would need to do this web accessibility stuff on a more serious basis. Hopefully this time next year I won't be saying the same thing.

What I wish for 2011 is that all this bad news slows down. This first week and a half or so of January has been so full of bad news that it gets a little overwhelming. Please, universe, level out. This is just too much, too much bad stuff.

So I hope everybody had a good Christmas, or at least a relatively peaceful one. More importantly, I hope everyone's year is, or soon becomes, a good one. There's still a whole lot of it to go, I hope it turns around!

A Sex Toy That'll Blow Your Mind...And Something Else Too!

Yikes! The one lesson we can all learn from this story is Don't get romantically involved with Terry Allen Lester. If things end badly, he may send you an explosive sex toy for Christmas. Yup, he took apart a sex toy and inserted gun powder, BB shot and buck shot and then connected wires to a trigger connected to a battery port.

What a sick individual, who thankfully was prevented from doing harm to anyone because his activities were reported to the police. But I do have to wonder, did he think his exes would use these sex toys? If things ended badly between me and a guy, and suddenly he sent me a sex toy, I probably would dispose of the thing, gagging all the while.

That's just evil.