adrian's home

gears.google.com

2007-12-17T20:18:49Z

For a while, before I was in-the-know, I tried different RSS aggregators under Windows and OSX, including Outlook 2007, Vienna and netNewsWire. They're pretty nice, but then I found Google Reader. Like everything else Google these days, it's a Web 2.0 application and since most of the time you're online when you're wanting to look through your plethora of RSS feeds, it's very convenient. No more worrying about synchronization and cross-platform feed settings. You can even import and export OPML files to and from Google Reader in case you still want to synchronize your Reader and non-reader feeds. So, as per typical google style, you can easily search through all of your feeds, it supports keyboard shortcuts for quick and dirty navigation, and even trends what you read. It constantly recommends other feeds that you might find interesting too, and my feed list has been growing because of it. One of the really cool features is integration with Google Gears, which allows you to even use reader in "offline" mode. You can click the "offline" mode button in reader, and it will download the most recent 2000 feed items for your viewing pleasure in a disconnected state.

You Know Those Technical Support Stories?

2007-09-04T13:14:19Z

We bought a new ceiling fan from HomeDepot the other day. The remote only allows you to dim the light once it's on, but you can't start from light off and gradually increase light levels. I sent the company an email because I saw that there was another remote that had seperate controls for both light level down, and up. Here's what I sent (at the very bottom) and what I got back:


Dear Adrian,
 
Thank you for your email.  The Stonebridge is a remote controlled fan.  A receiver and hand-held transmitter were included in the box with the fan.  You cannot add another type of remote or wall control to this fan.  Model 27187 is not compatible to this fan.  Model 27148 is for a fan that does not come with a remote control.  
 
If a receiver and hand-held transmitter were not included in the box with the fan, please let us know.
 
When calling from Canada, please phone toll free 866-268-1936 for missing parts.  Our hours are 7:00am -7:00pm (Central) on weekdays and 8:00am -5:00pm on Saturdays.  Any representative can assist you.
 
Our non-peak hours are between 7am-9am CST. 
 
Sincerely,
 
Tara W. 
Technical Support Representative
Hunter Fan Company

-----Original Message-----
From: Adrian Chung [mailto:ad..com] 
Sent: Wednesday, August 22, 2007 10:58 PM
To: Batts, Larry
Cc: Technical Support
Subject: Dimmer control question for Hunter Stonebridge Fan.

Hi there,

We recently bought a Hunter Stonebridge Fan from HomeDepot here in
Toronto, Canada.

One thing we're disappointed about is that the light dimming functionality
only allows for maximum brightness on, then dim-to-off, but there's no way
to go from off to increasing light levels -- at least not with the
packaged 27187 remote.

The wall switch where the fan is connected is a two-wire only control, so
that limits our options in terms of separating fan and light controls with
a wall switch.

I notice that for the Prestige line of fans, and specifically for remote
27148, there is an ability to control light levels in both directions,
both up and down.

Question is, can this remote be used with the Stonebridge 60" fan I bought
(model 27575A) to provide the functionality we're looking for?  

Or does the 27148 remote need to be paired with a different type of
receiver that can't fit inside the Stonebridge canopy housing?

Reason I ask is that the manual for the 27148 remote says "not recommended
for use with Hunter Original Fans", but not that it won't work.

Thanks!

I later called the number and spoke to someone else who told me that it should work to increase light levels, and that if it doesn't likely the receiver unit in the fan is malfunctioning. Which is odd, because the manual clearly states that the remote only dims, and doesn't do the opposite. The person on the phone however, does think that the 27148 remote with both up and down light-level controls will work just fine. Now to find one.

The Legend of Trixie.

2007-07-11T01:45:35Z

Our dog Lucy, who's now 6 and a half years old was rescued from the Ottawa Humane Society. When it comes to food, Lucy doesn't mess around -- she finishes everything, eats anything and is done before you can look twice. If ever food kernels end up missing the bowl on the delivery, she makes sure she finds them all and takes care of them. We're spending a couple of days in Sarnia, with both Lucy and Ella. At the dinner table tonight, Kelly and her folks were talking about their late dog Trixie, who Lucy apparently bears quite a resemblance to. Specifically, when it came to food, Trixie would always eat when the rest of the family ate, and she'd always leave two or three kernels of food in her bowl for a rainy day. Kelly and I were mentioning how funny it was that Trixie would do that, since Lucy would never leave a fallen kernel behind. So we watched Lucy eat, with her water and food bowls situated in the same place Trixie's used to be -- and lo and behold, Lucy left two kernels of food behind in her bowl, then went and lay down. Go figure.

The Curve.

2007-06-14T04:35:20Z

As an early birthday present, Kelly bought me a new BlackBerry Curve. It replaced my old 8700R which was a great device for the year and a half or so that I had it. The Curve feels like much more than a BlackBerry. Its got expandable storage in the form of a MicroSD socket, and a media player which can manage fullscreen video in a variety of formats, MP3s, ringtones and the multitude of photos captured with the built-in 2MP camera. One personally long awaited feature over the 8700R is the Curve's Bluetooth Dial-Up Networking profile, which finally allows me to wirelessly tether my laptop and use the Curve as a modem to connect to the Internet when on the run, or train as the case often happens to be. The upgrade itself from the 8700R to the Curve was surprisingly easy and painless -- having our own BlackBerry Enterprise Server means that besides our Outlook email, contacts, calendars, memos and tasks synchronizing wirelessly in near realtime, after activating the new device even call logs and settings were synchronized. Pleasantly, the Curve also acts as a USB Mass Storage Device when a MicroSD card is installed. No special DRM software is required for importing or converting MP3s prior to transferring them onto the device, simple drag-and-drop works for MP3s, ringtones (which can be MP3s), video and photos. The media player also reads ID3 tags, and organizes your tunes by genre, artist and album. There's even a 3.5" stereo headphone jack, the first of it's kind on a BlackBerry. We're still getting acquainted with each other, but so far, so good!

Announcing: Ella Jade Chung

2007-05-22T04:13:41Z

Born at 23:45 on May 18th, 2007 and weighing in at a compact 7lbs, 8oz and 20 inches long. Mom, Dad and Ella are home safe and sound, doing our best to get her used to her new surroundings. Her latest images can be found here

To Terminate Or Not To Terminate?

2007-04-26T22:51:12Z

In my work life, I'm involved in the design and architecture of systems and network solutions; I'm also primarily tasked with the implementation of these solutions. In all but rare instances, there's always more than one way to accommodate requirements and choosing the best option becomes the real challenge. I personally favour options which provide the customer with the most flexibility and control; and it should go without saying that choosing the right tools for the job goes a long way to providing this. Lots of applications which are Internet facing, or primarily web-based utilize load balancing to distribute load across a farm of servers. This provides fault-tolerance and higher performance. Dedicated hardware load balancers usually perform the role of monitoring the servers in the farm, and distributing incoming requests across them; they can also provide HTTPS and SSL offloading so that the servers in the farm don't have to deal with the processing overhead of generating session keys for encryption. This is a good thing for reasons including but not limited to:

It allows the server farm to concentrate on serving web requests and not on performing encryption which is processor intensive, increasing overall application performance
It simplifies SSL configuration for websites by centralizing SSL certificates on the load balancer instead of on every server in the farm
Wherever security policy allows an HTTPS connection can be terminated on the load balancer, and then sent over HTTP to the server farm, allowing for Intrusion Detection/Prevention systems to inspect the request for malicious content and potentially prevent the server farm from being compromised
Since the load balancer can see the unencrypted request, it has a greater variety of options available to it to accomplish sticky or persistent style configurations where an application requires that a particular web client or browser is always served by the same server in the farm

Because the load balancer is translating HTTPS requests into HTTP requests, the servers in the farm don't know whether the original client request was HTTP or HTTPS. For applications that are security sensitive, this can be an issue. Some common workarounds:

Stop terminating SSL on the load balancer, and instead pass it through to the server farm
Have the load balancer send a redirect to an HTTPS version of the same URL if the original request was to an HTTP URL
Have the server send a redirect to an HTTPS version of the same URL if the original request was to an HTTP URL

1) Should be used as a last resort, since it negates all of the aforementioned benefits of offloading SSL. 2) Isn't always possible depending on what type of hardware load balancer is used. It's convenient, but moves control and responsibility away from the customer's application logic to the load balancer. In many hosted customer environments, load balancers are not under direct customer administration. 3) Is marginally more difficult because the server can't tell whether or not the original request was HTTP or HTTPS. This can be fixed easily by having the load balancer insert a custom HTTP header when the request is an HTTPS request, and having the server-side application logic check for the header and send a redirect if it isn't present. It's about 3 lines of code. Since the decision to have to redirect is based on application-driven security requirements, and the customer is responsible for the application, it would seem to make the most sense to perform and code the redirect logic at the application level. In the real world, this isn't a common perspective.

T-Minus 3.5 Weeks and Counting!

2007-04-16T02:17:12Z

It's almost game time -- another 3 and a half weeks, and if everyone's on the money, Tony and Rob will have someone else to contend with on their birthday. And a girl, no less! Unless of course, the ultrasounds are wrong. We've been busily getting the nursery ready and assembling all manner of baby gadgetry and furniture; though Facebook is managing to consume way too much time for both Kelly and I. It's so addictive in fact that I had to finally bite the bullet and move my blog from a home-grown solution to MovableType just so that I can import blog entries into my facebook profile like Anthony does. It's been a long time coming though, MovableType is really well designed, and has all the things my blog's needed like trackbacks, permalinks, comments, and of course RSS/ATOM.

To Someone Special: Chances Are.

2007-02-27T06:04:56Z

Chances are you'll find me Somewhere on your road tonight Seems I always end up driving by Ever since I've known you It seems you're on my way All the rules of logic don't apply I long to see you in the night Be with you 'til morning light I remember clearly how you looked The night we met I recall your laughter and your smile I remember how you made me Feel so at ease I remember all your grace and your style And now you're all I long to see You've come to mean so much to me Chances are I'll see you In my dreams tonight You'll be smiling like the night we met Chances are I'll hold you and I'll offer All I have You're the only one I can't forget Baby you're the best I've ever met And I'll be dreaming of the future And hoping you'll be by my side And in the morning I'll be longing for the night For the night Chances are I'll see you Somewhere in my dreams tonight You'll be smiling like the night we met Chances are I'll hold you and I'll offer All I have You're the only one I can't forget Baby you're the best I've ever met

The Sky IS Falling.

2007-01-17T16:43:55Z

Lately, it has been quite disheartening to witness evidence of a significant decline in common sense in the general population. Personally, I can't help but think that evolutionary processes have shifted into reverse, and in tens of millions of years to come we will once again be reduced to single-cell organisms. Truth be told, I'm quite certain that this re-evolution is a requirement for survival and it has become apparent that as an allegedly intelligent species we are becoming more incapable of rational thought and action, yet excel at programmed and reactive behaviours. To further the notion of re-evolution, albeit with little to no scientific studies, I'm almost certain that a rising percentage of our species already operate with the arguably decreased mental capacity of an amoeba; there are of course those who would argue that amoebas are more "fit" and actually have an increased mental capacity with relation to a subset of our species. Let's examine some real-world examples:
Once Upon A Child:
Someone recommended we check out this chain of stores, which specialize in "gently" used and new goods for babies and children. So, we went to check it out. The store isn't bad, your typical run of the mill used store, with lots of clothes, toys, strollers, etc. I checked out their website which had a couple of items that caught my attention. The first was a moonlight madness advertisement which says something about 10% off, and lists store hours during which items are discounted to different amounts. There's no date. The second was a 10% coupon which you can print out and bring to the store. Good until end of January 2007 sometime. We'd seen a glider and ottoman for a decent price at the store, and decided to go back and pick it up. So I printed out the coupon, forgot to get it from the printer, and then while we were out, we decided to drop in at the store. There were two women working at the store, and realizing I'd forgotten to bring the coupon, I explained to them that I'd printed out the coupon, and forgotten to bring it, did we really need to drive all the way home to pick it up and come back, or could they just print one out. Of course, the answer was, you need to bring the coupon in. As we're leaving the store, the second woman wanted to confirm where the coupon was from, and we told her it was from the website. So she answers, "yes, that's valid". Off we go, back home to pick up the coupon. Later, back at the store, we hand in the coupon to get our 10% off, and they ask if we can print a name on the coupon and sign it. There's no spot on the printed coupon to do this, so you need to randomly pick a spot and sign your name. I imagine this is for the "limit one coupon per customer". The coupon is readily available on the website. There's nothing special about it. It's a big page you print out that says "save 10%". Anyone could print it. In fact, I could have printed it right in the store had I had a bluetooth printer to connect my blackberry to, since I could easily bring it up on my blackberry. But brains work best in small boxes. I'll remember to print out a 500-page stack of coupons and leave them in the store if we ever decide to go back.
The CRA:
The Federal Government has a wonderful online service called MyAccount. Using it, you can check on the status of your tax return, change your address with the CRA, check to see what your RRSP deduction limit is, and perform some other useful administrative items. Putting aside the fact that the Ontario Government just last year saw it appropriate to stop using social insurance numbers as employee identification numbers, the Federal Goverment sees security and confidentiality as an issue not to be taken lightly. MyAccount requires what the government calls an "ePass" -- it's a fancy term given to the idea of throwing lots of money at a commercial product which promises security. After signing up for an ePass, you need to wait for a security code to be sent to you in the mail. The security code then gives you full access to the services behind MyAccount. I must have signed up for ePass accounts for both Kelly and I just prior to us moving back in March. So, we never received Kelly's CRA security code. Figuring it pertinent to change her address on file with the CRA, I decided I'd try and find out what we'd need to do to have the security code reissued in the mail and her address updated. To save some time, while realizing that ultimately she'd need to be the one to call in the make the request, I called the CRA's MyAccount helpdesk.
- "Hi there, I'm calling on behalf of my wife, who needs her authorization code reissued. I'm not asking for you to make any changes, or for any information with regard to her account, just wanting to know what she needs to do to get this done"
- "Well, for one, she needs to call in to make the request. And why is it that you don't have the authorization code? Did you move? Lost it?"
- "I think we moved shortly after requesting the account be created, and Canada Post chooses to redirect only certain items that you guys send."
- "Canada Post isn't supposed to redirect anything we send."
- "Ok, so to change our address and get it reissued, do we need to call that other 800 number?"
- "First, your wife needs to call to make the request and we'll ask her some security questions. We can change the address here."
- "Okay, great. So when she calls in later, is there any particular information or documentation she should have on hand that you guys might require aside from a SIN number?"
- "Sir, I can't tell you what answers she's going to be asked to give because that would be a breach of confidentiality."
- "I'm not asking for the questions you're going to ask, but for example, is she going to require last years tax return?"
- "I can't tell you that sir, but it might be handy to have."
So they won't tell you what information you should have at your disposal. Suppose she'd called in and they'd asked for line 247 from last years tax return -- that's about a 20 minute job to find. Moreover, if she doesn't do the taxes, what are the chances she even knows what they're asking for? And why is it confidential that you might need last years tax return? Identity theft is on the up and up, and yet the Federal Government thinks a tax return is going to protect someone?
We decide to call in after work since the line is open till 8PM, and obviously, Kelly needed to make the call. So Kelly put the phone on speaker, and called in. A representative answered eventually, and Kelly proceeds to tell her that she needs to change her address and also have the authorization code reissued. The representative says that they don't do that at this number. So I said I'm looking at the webpage and it says to call this number to have the security code reissued. The individual then tells Kelly that she needs to get off the speaker phone, or I need to leave the room for security purposes. So Kelly switches off the speaker phone and then proceeds to give the woman some information which I'd deem common knowledge even for people outside of our household, and the woman tells us that the code should come in the mail to the address we just gave her in about a week. Turns out the address was already up to date in any case.
RBC VISA:
When I ordered my laptop, Lenovo told me that the credit card validation wouldn't succeed if the ship to address didn't match what the bank had on file; they recommend that if you are shipping to an address that differs from your address on file with the bank, you call the bank and have the additional address added to the card. So, just to be sure I didn't have to wait any longer for my laptop due to payment delays, I made sure I did this. Not only did the bank manage to add the additional address to the account, they've actually made it the primary address, and now my statements all go to that address too. Nevermind that the registered address for the credit card as appears in online banking is our proper home address.
Sears:
We spent the weekend registering for baby gifts. One would think that a store that stands to make hundreds of dollars, perhaps even thousands just by virtue of the fact that someone has chosen your store to register with would have the foresight to dedicate some staff to those wanting to open or update their registry. Instead, there is one staff member working in the baby section on a Sunday. There are 5 others behind the customer service desk, which is in the baby section, none of whom are offering to help customers. So, there's a huge line of people waiting to speak to the single staff member who is going into grave detail about each and every product she's asked about. Great if you're the one asking the question, not great if you're waiting in line. We were waiting to ask how you register for particular colours of clothing items and blankets when the SKU is exactly the same regardless of the colour. Apparently you don't. You get whatever random colours people decide you want. My favourite recollection of this particular experience is when someone approaches one of the staff members behind the customer service desk and asks if they can help: they continue to rifle through whatever paperwork they're immersed in and say that someone else will help. Welcome to retail. You are in customer service. Service the customer, your paperwork isn't going anywhere.
Home Depot:
- "Would you like cashback with your purchase?"
- "Yes please, how about $100?"
- "Oh, not many people have been paying with cash today. I hope you like change."
- "You're kidding right? Can't you get change from someone else?"
- "No, unfortunately we're all responsible for our own tills."
I left the store with $60 in 5s and 10s and 22 twoonies. I didn't complain.
Seagate Technologies: I decided to buy Seagate hard drives recently for our PVR solely because they have 5 year manufacturer warranties. Little did I know that Seagate, unlike Western Digital, has no advanced exchange program. So unlike Western Digital who will ship you a drive in a couple of days and ask you to ship the old drive back in the new packaging, Seagate expects you to send them your old drive first, to very exacting packaging specifications. They then process your RMA and say that within 3-5 days after receiving your drive, they'll send you a replacement.
Drive failed on 2006/12/27. They received it at their warehouse on 2007/01/03. As of today, I still haven't received the replacement, although their online RMA system says the replacement has been ready to ship for a week and a half. I called them today, and they say that they don't have any of these drives in stock. Nice of them to let me know. They expect them next week sometime, and then within 3-5 days after that, they'll ship it out to me. So that's almost an entire month for a replacement drive.

Happy GNU Year!

2007-01-02T16:13:54Z

Happy New Year! We spent the new year in Guelph with some friends, had a pretty low-key evening and played Cranium. There are pictures, but Tony's red eyes still need to be edited, so they'll follow shortly. Update: They're here.
I was looking for something unrelated recently, and came across the transcript from a small claims case back in 2000. The case was actually between me and a guy named Alen Bubic. It is a very funny transcript if you can make it through the whole thing, it's 43 pages long.
The abridged version is that I picked up a summer job coding for a guy who knew nothing, refused to pay, counter-sued, and then hired a lawyer to represent him in small claims court. He'd originally subcontracted me to work with him on contract to another company 701.com, which is now a Torstar subsidiary. Shortly after initiation of the contract, he started as CTO at 701.com, shortly after which he left.
Interestingly, it looks like he's currently behind a TV show on the Comedy Network named "Keys to the VIP" all about teaching guys how to pick up chicks, probably still about the only thing he thinks he's capable of.

Happy Holidays From GO Transit.

2006-12-21T22:33:41Z

As it happens, I'm on my way to Richmond Hill tonight to meet up with Kelly and to drop by Wendy & Neal's house. So I decided to catch the 5:00PM train -- left work early, bought my ticket, and am standing on the platform waiting for the train. Of course the usual idiocy takes place, with people forming a thousand lines instead a single line, somehow hoping that the doors to get ON the train have gotten significantly wider. 4:59 rolls around and the train still hasn't arrived, but an announcement airs that the train will be arriving momentarily.
About a minute later, the announcement airs again, then within 30 seconds, another announcement airs stating that the train is now going to be 10 minutes late.
5 minutes later, another announcement airs stating that the 5:15 Georgetown train is going to arrive first, passengers are going to board, and THEN the 5:00 Richmond Hill train will immediately arrive, board and depart. Oh, and by the way, the delay was as a result of switch problems west of the city. Would all Richmond Hill passengers please move back to allow the Georgetown passengers to board.
To top things off, the 5:30 Richmond Hill passengers start making their way to the platform as well. It's now 5:20 and I'm just getting on the train, which of course is packed.
Yesterday morning I was standing at the Meadowvale GO station waiting for the 8:10 train, which they finally announced was going to be 9 minutes late at 8:11. Thanks for the heads up!
I've been riding GO Transit now for over 3 years, and every single winter it's either switch problems or door problems -- things never change.
I'd be upset, but then again how could any organization this size actually do things in an efficient and organized manner? After all, it is probably a substantially under-funded service.
(this message brought to you courtesy of thumbs banging away on my blackberry)

'Tis The Season

2006-12-20T12:31:56Z

Welcome to another time of gift-crazed Christmas-shopping drivers! Seems like not long ago that we were celebrating our first Christmas in a new house, and here we are again, doing the exact same thing once again, but in a different new house. The tree is up and illuminated, as is our house. I managed to put up some new LED lights around the front of the house, though somehow half of one string of lights is completely dark. Figures they worked before they went up on the eavestrough.
By next Christmas, we'll have a new addition to our family, so there will be four Chungs! We're very excited to be expecting a little one somewhere near May 9th, 2007.
I recently bought a new laptop to replace my T42, which I sold; a new Lenovo (was IBM) X60. It's a great little laptop, weighing in at somewhere around 3.5lbs with a Core Duo CPU, 2 gigs of RAM, and a 100 gig hard drive. Initially I was skeptical of the move from a 15" 1400x1050 panel to a 12.1" 1024x768 panel, but I'm finding now that I'll gladly give up the extra screen resolution and bigger screen for the portability and battery life of the X60. The new X60 tablet has an option for a 12.1" 1400x1050 panel, though I'm thinking that that might be a wee-bit small and hard on the eyes. Too bad there aren't anymore of those IBM stores where you could go touch and feel IBM personal computing gear!
With the launch of Windows Vista around the corner, I decided to give it a whirl. I can't say I'm all that impressed with it. I managed to install it, then started to install a whole slew of the applicaitons I use on a regular basis under XP, rebooted, and witnessed my very own Vista blue screen! The eye candy is nice, with Flip3D and the new Aero interface, though I find that the window frames are gigantic. I found a Vista Expose clone called MyExpose which is actually very cool -- not only does it scale the windows down, but they're all fully live, so if you're watching a DVD or movie clip, and you hit F9, the media player window gets scaled down, but continues to play in realtime. On top of that, the original windows at the original sizes are still visible in the background, but made very transparent so you end up seeing the original cluttered desktop (albeit faded and not very visible) and the newly scaled and spaced out live windows. Amazing how it's taken an entirely new version of Windows to be able to deliver the same functionality Mac OS X has had for quite some time now.
Since eye candy and expose seems to be the rage these days, I also tested out the LiveCD/DVD for Sabayon Linux, a derivative of Gentoo. It includes AIXGL and the beryl window manager which leverages OpenGL hardware acceleration to deliver some stunning visual effects. Four virtual desktops appear as the faces of a cube, which can be rotated (while still displaying all windows contents in realtime) and flattened so they are all visible at the same time. Expose-like functionality is also there. It's quite amazing, and quite a step forward for Linux as a desktop OS.

Business, As Usual.

2006-08-04T16:11:51Z

Our television menu has changed for the summertime while all of the usual suspects are between seasons -- so we've taken to watching and catching up on other shows we don't usually watch during prime TV season, like 24. 24 is a very intense and gripping show. Very far-fetched, especially when it comes to any of the technology-related scenes; for example, a government organization that can crack any encryption scheme in a matter of minutes... They can even blanket subnets... But even while all of this makes very little sense, the show has some undertones which might be a figment of my imagination, but we don't think so.
- Take for example Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland), star of the show. The guy is a machine. Nevermind that the US government only dreams that they could even find people like Jack to work for them, but he's the only one in the show that seems to be capable of making decisions, thinking outside the box, and delivering results. Best part is, in every season, he either gets demoted, stripped of all credentials, or tortured with the president turning his back; he even has to stage his own death for the good of the country. Contrast this with the constant churn in management at the Counter Terrorist Unit and Division who not only can't get anything right, but also manage to bungle at least one major decision point in every season. The incompetence comes right down from the top, and appears to get worse every season.
- Then there's the President of the United States. In the first couple of seasons, David Palmer was great. A bit stiff, but a great leader. Roll forward a couple of years to season 4 (around 2004) and in comes a President who is incapable of making any sensible decision on his own. Not only that, but he's got a short temper, breaks down in the spotlight a number of times and is just portrayed as a complete loser.
- And then of course, there's the fact that every season revolves around a terrorist plot to kill millions of US citizens.
So anyways, what's the point of all of this? The points are quite clear.
1. Nobody really understands technology, but hackers and terrorists with computers can do almost anything (including reformatting an entire server room of servers and bringing them back online not only while people are working on them, but while in a car, on a laptop).
2. Smart, results-oriented people in an organization always rise to the bottom, while even smarter "leaders" sink to the top.
3. Maybe, just maybe, the show is making a commentary on the quality of current US Presidents. They even have similar physiques.
4. We can never turn our back on our fight against the axis of evil.
So that's keeping us busy at night, while during the waking hours, we're once again aspiring to be Olympic Ballroom Dance competitors, and improving our golf swings. We're taking dance lessons again at a place in Mississauga called Continental Dance School. Aside from the fact that it's a slight building in the middle of an industrial area, which actually belongs to Ernest Torner, C.A, and has a teeny office in the front, and a huge dance floor in the back, it's a great place. The pace is good, teaching is great.
Our golf game is coming along too. We're still conquering the driving range, but at least when we're not watching 24, we can take golf lessons from a guy that looks just like Kiefer Sutherland with some badder highlights.
Then there's work, of course, which is work. The more notable part about work is the getting TO and FROM work. GO Transit never ceases to amaze. Did you know that trains have to travel half the speed when it's really hot outside? And we're also lucky that they run in the winter when it's really cold because the switches and doors freeze. I would be able to understand the situation more if someone was to tell me that the trains are really built for GO Transit but designed somewhere where it's not too hot and not too cold. Last time I checked though, Bombardier was a Canadian company, so that doesn't hold. Not that you can blame all of the service problems on poorly designed equipment; I got on the bus the other day at Meadowvale station to go downtown. It was 36 degrees and with the humidity somewhere around 45. The bus had a broken air conditioner. Broken air conditioner, windows don't open, the tiny fans blowing around stale, hot, humid air... I actually felt faint at points during the trip and looking around, it looked like some people were about to pass out. Why GO wouldn't have either cancelled the bus or sent a different bus, is beyond me.
Stepping off the bus, the outside air felt like it was air conditioned.

Mississauga: Home To Shopping Cart Thieves?

2006-03-28T02:27:36Z

Thanks to three and a half strong and hard working movers from Tippet-Richardson, our move went very smoothly. Three and a half, because really there were four, but one of them was highly irritable and less than mannerly on occasion. In any case, nothing got broken, and we're lucky to have been able to get our treadmill and freezer into the basement of the new house on account of some narrow basement stairs.
Stores aren't quite as close as they used to be in Richmond Hill, but they're far less busy. We ventured out to Superstore (another Loblaws brand) over the weekend to pick up some groceries, and as I pushed the cart around the store, I noticed the sign prominently posted in the cart which claimed that the cart was protected by an anti-theft device! If moved beyond the yellow lines in the parking lot, the cart would lock, so that you couldn't have your way with it.
Having to see this for myself, after we'd checked out, we made our way back to the car, which happened to be parked about 20 feet away from one of these yellow boundaries. Charging up to the yellow line on the pavement, everything seemed fine -- until a few seconds later, when the front wheels locked completely. The smart thing to do would have been to empty the groceries from the cart first, before having it rendered inoperable. So we ended up dragging the cart to the car to unload it. On closer examination, only the front wheels lock. But one back wheel has a sizable steel bracket angled towards the ground which only touches and impedes the back wheel if you pick the front of the cart up off the ground. The thing is, the wheels don't unlock when you move the cart away from the yellow line and back inside the boundaries. I'm surprised there were no sirens, and no cart police!
It's good to see that Loblaws is making so much money that they can't properly stock their store shelves, but they can afford to invest in "cart protection" systems for their stores. How many carts have to find their way to people's front lawns for stores to adopt a system like this?

Mississauga, Here We Come!

2006-03-15T02:41:02Z

In a little over a week we'll be moving out of Richmond Hill and into a new house in Mississauga. We've been slowly getting everything in order for the move since early January when we bought the place -- it's in a nice neighbourhood in between the 407 and 401 off of Derry Road, behind Microsoft's Canadian headquarters and GlaxoSmithKline.