Dalmond's Stories

Redirect to new site

2011-02-01T20:45:00.001-05:00

I've moved my blog to lingwhatics.wordpress.com.

New RAA song/video

2011-01-25T23:12:00.003-05:00

Great outdoors Sunday

2011-01-24T22:13:00.000-05:00

Looked around the shops of the Distillery District before getting some groceries at T&T. The sun was brilliant and once on the south side of the Distillery the wind died out.

Snow covered and frozen Keating Channel

Outside Joy

2011-01-22T16:32:00.000-05:00

I left my office yesterday and was really quite happy to be walking outside. It was a clear afternoon and still a bit of sun lingering from behind the buildings. Being winter, it was cold, but I know when I go out to walk home, to the store or anywhere else that I chose to live here with whatever weather is to be expected.

I have spent many days out in much colder weather than we ever see in Toronto, and was frequently doing work that not many people appreciated. I thought it was wonderful being outside and let's say encouraging people to follow the rules.

However, it seems to me that this is not how many, if not most, people feel about winter in Canada or even the milder variety we encounter in Toronto. I have yet to figure out what people's real complaint is, because "it is cold" doesn't resonate with me and makes me think they should dress appropriately and wouldn't notice the cold. I'm not talking about people in unfortunate circumstances who by little or no choice of their own are forced out into the cold, I understand a complaint from them. I'm thinking more of people who by their own choice work in well paying jobs or are studying at the university.

It seems to me that a winter spent indoors "safe from the cold" is just as much a waste as a summer spent indoors to avoid the heat and humidity, which are infrequently avoided indoors anyway. Winter gives an opportunity to explore the outdoors from another perspective. A hot summer forces you to slather on sunscreen and wear almost nothing, and still you may be uncomfortable. Winter allows you to layer up to just the right level to keep you warm while pursuing your activity whether it be walking, running, skiing or whatever else.

So don't stay inside all winter fretting about the awful cold the radio announcer keeps mentioning, snowsuit up and enjoy what your city has to offer you. The waterfront is beautiful in the winter, but remember to cover your face as the wind is strong. If you want a calmer, less windy adventure, consider your local ravine or a trip to the Don Valley paths. Work up to a longer period outside by taking a walk around your block, you might even meet a neighbour along the way. Finally, you might go skating on your local rink. The ice is more enjoyable when it isn't melting and the crowds are smaller.

Let's wish for some clear sunny days, even if the temperature dips because there's nothing better in the winter than a sunny day when your boots aren't being soaked by salty water.

Fare Increase and Empty Service Cuts

2011-01-10T22:02:00.000-05:00

It is the truth that Chris Selley writes in TTC fare hike makes sense. Transit fares should go up because the city's taxpayers are paying them one way or another. But they should also be planned in advance. We should know that it will be going up 10 cents Feb 1 and 5 cents June 1, 2012, etc, beyond the end of the current mayors term.

And some routes should be cut at night because they are empty. I have three such routes within walking distance of my house that are only slightly closer than the subways I can use as an alternative. One of these routes runs from Queen's Park station to Eglinton and at no point is further from the Yonge subway (about a 10 minute walk) than when it begins at Queen's Park station.

I don't like the seeming desperation to balance each year's budget with a mix of service cuts and fare increases every year, and then to have service cuts rescinded come September because "more people are riding than we thought would". But that is what you get when you ask an agency/department to budget for this year and any budget they don't use gets taken away never to be seen again.

Snow Morning

2011-01-08T09:54:00.001-05:00

Woke up to a winder wonderland today. I knew it was going to snow, but you never really think those large flakes will hang around after hitting the ground.

The visibility is a bit limited, but that's ok since everything is covered in white.

Good day to hang about, though I will go out and enjoy walking in the snow.

Book: The Public Domain by James Boyle (Read it free at http://www.thepublicdomain.org/)

Happy New Year!

2011-01-03T18:47:00.000-05:00

Just winding down the vacation and packing our bags to head back to Toronto. I have a bunch of photos from the time in Alberta and will post some of them later. Maybe even tomorrow.

Night Bus

2010-12-21T17:07:00.000-05:00

I love being able to stroll out in the middle of the night and catch a bus. There should be more awareness of the Blue Night Network in this city.

Temporarily Disabling Flash

2010-12-18T15:18:00.000-05:00

Decided I liked browsing without Flash on all the time. I don't mind ads on websites. I just hate when they take over the page and screw with the formatting. So I started disabling Flash in the Firefox plugins, but it was annoying needing to have the plugins window always open. I found an add-on called QuickJava works well. It puts buttons in the bottom right of the window so I can easily disable javascript, java, Flash, Silverlight, images and styles. Much nicer than having the window open in the background.

Fun Video

2010-12-16T21:38:00.001-05:00

It has been a bit. The school term is just winding down. I have a couple of more days before the university is closed for the holidays. We've been busy in December. I was pet santa again this year. Another location had a tarantula brought in and I'm glad where I was didn't have anything so exotic.

I have recently rediscovered I had this song on my computer, and I quite enjoy the video.

I'm looking forward to holidays, so I can get outside and rock my down sweater and take photos.

P.S.
This video is also really cool.

New Jacket and other things

2010-11-28T22:21:00.000-05:00

Had a mostly calm weekend, after a productive week. Friday night, I went out for a walk to take some photos and look at a few shops. Woke up Saturday to snow which lasted about an hour before clearing up. Then it was sunny and all the snow melted away, unless it was on the north side of a street or shaded by a shrub.

Later Saturday, I went out around the town to look at more shops for Christmas presents. That was a less productive trip than I had hoped. I did, however, walk in the new Dufferin tunnel/underpass. It looks pretty nice. There are so many lights, which will need to be well maintained.

Spent the evening watching hockey. I was a bit disappointed that Edmonton didn't come back but it was mostly a good game.

Sunday, we went out for lunch with friends to get dumplings, which were tasty as usual. Afterward, we tried for Christmas things in Kensington, but only found a couple small things. Before dinner at my grandma's, we went to Higher Ground (again) to look at winter jackets, and we both got new ones. I got Patagonia's Down Sweater in Autumn Leaf and Heather got Lole's Zoa Parka.

You can also see my moustache is still going.

End of Week Three

2010-11-21T22:02:00.001-05:00

It's been a couple of weeks. The moustache is growing in nicely. This is one of the many photos that Heather has kindly taken of me and my mo. Of course, I was trying to dust the lens in this one. Thus far, the moustache has raised $533 for the cause.

I have been busy at school working on my project and have written quite a bit. I am realizing that my life would've been much easier for the last several years if I had just read the calculus book at the start. I spent an enjoyable hour in the library Friday reading calculus and reminding myself of things I should just remember. It is fine though. I can't really change what I did not do before.

My experiment using LaTeX is going well. I have some quibbles with how it renders a few pages, but the document is already over 30 pages, which seems to be the limit for guaranteeing Word's cooperation, so I'll take small layout issues, and eventually solve them. The amazing ability of bibTeX to change style with such simplicity is great. My proposal, done in Word, was missing a couple full references that cited in-text and had an extra or two that I did not cite, so no longer needing to do the reference accounting is better.

Yesterday, I made a hand strap for my camera using simple directions that Heather found. It turned out well. I think it is a bit better suited to a larger SLR than my G11, but is an improvement over both its neck strap and the plain wrist strap from my GPS. The neck strap really seems over-kill to me, but I could imagine why people would like it. Most people I see use their neck strap with SLRs but I rarely used it for anything other than a complicated wrist strap.

I am still enjoying the G11, though at times I'm torn between wishing I had the S90/95 instead and a new Rebel. It cooperates with my shooting style well, even in low light. It's ISO performance is better than my XT, which is to be expected after so many years.

I took this one on the way to meet Heather on Friday after school.

I think that is enough for the moment.

It's been one week...

2010-11-07T16:02:00.000-05:00

Here is my progress thus far.

It is coming along and does not seem too bad as a moustache alone. Up to this point, people have donated $403 to the Prostate Cancer Canada through my growing efforts. You can donate too by going to my Movember space. You can also look at all the progress photos on flickr.

Happy Movember to all and I hope your Mo is on the grow.

Book: Eating the Dinosaur by Chuck Klosterman

The Creamsicle show

2010-11-06T09:55:00.000-04:00

We were just about to go to bed and saw Creamsicle was ready to put on a show on the radiator. She kept peeking out from behind the curtains.

All cleaned up

2010-10-31T20:08:00.001-04:00

Out and about

2010-10-24T14:41:00.000-04:00

It has been a slow couple weeks. Not much new going on.

Saw this while walking home from doing some errands on Saturday afternoon.

No Moose yet

2010-10-16T21:27:00.000-04:00

On my way to the grocery store today, I passed several squirrels collecting food. This one seemed to have something hidden at the front of a house. Perhaps something in the planter.

Disabled Streetcar on Spadina

2010-10-09T16:05:00.001-04:00

Arrived at Spadina and Queen to find a streetcar with a constantly dinging gong and a supervisor in the driver's seat trying to get it to stop making noise. It had begun to turn onto Queen. The front turning oh so slightly to the left. Thankfully it wasn't further otherwise the southbound service couldn't have gotten through.

Eventually, they got it all hooked up and ready for the next car to push the disabled one.

It was pushed through the intersection and continued down Queen Street. Presumably, it was pushed to Roncesvalles.

Then the supervisor did a good job of spreading out the service, which had bunched up a bit in the meanwhile.

Moustache

2010-10-08T21:30:00.000-04:00

I will be participating in Movember this year. "But Daley," you say, "you don't wear hair on your face." That is generally true, except for the last few weeks, when it has made an appearance. It may have even been trimmed.

That really isn't the important part. The important part is that you should all donate to the cause, which is men's health specifically fighting prostate cancer. You can donate in support of my efforts on my Movember site. I will, of course, remove this moustache and beard just before the start of November and post progress photos over the month. I'm also thinking that this should be a moustache only affair because the full package is easy to pull off well. It takes style to wear a moustache alone.

To recap: I will grow a moustache in November, which is why they call it Movember. And you will donate to Prostate Cancer Canada in support of my rocking a moustache.

LaTeX documents for me

2010-10-07T12:21:00.000-04:00

I have been learning to use LaTeX so that I can use it for my thesis. Knowing how to use it earlier could have make so many previous reports so much easier to put together. (Thinking of my fourth year group project where they "lost" the formatting not long before the midterm report was due to be turned in. Thankfully, I was not involved in fixing it.) I also wish I had started this last year when I was writing a final paper for a course that had long arrays of equations. It is the natural order of things that one discovers a better tool right after being finished the job it would've simplified.

As a test project, I made a new resume by modifying a template, and I like the result. Of course, the first place I wanted to send my resume to wanted plain text or un-formatted Word, but that's their, strange, choice. I'm still not sure why companies want applicants to send them word files, as PDFs are much better for keeping the author's intended formatting across platforms. Though, I read on the Office 2011:Mac blog that they were working hard on that. Any deviations when printing the same document on Windows and Mac and overlaying the sheets was considered a bug to be fixed.

The last large part I figured out how to use was BibTeX and I quite enjoy not having to manually check that I have included all the references I used. And being able to reformat it simply by selecting a different style and re-making the document. No need to change the entries individually or risk corrupting your word file by having it convert incomprehensible macros into correct references. Thankfully, I was able to export my refworks database to an appropriate file to easily convert my reference collection.

It seems that in the Civil department, most people still use Word as the default for all work. A friend's supervisor even suggested that not doing a thesis in Word would be undesirable because the industry uses it. This view doesn't exactly surprise me because most students I talk to do not even know what cross-references are in Word, let alone how to use them to save time and frustration. Styles, other than 'normal' and 'heading 2', are not well understood by most, who still manually type out their tables of contents, tables and figures oblivious to the capabilities of Word.

However, over in the Mechanical and Industrial department there is a tutorial run to give grad students the basics they need to get going with LaTeX. I imagine that its use is more than a niche because the School of Graduate Studies provides a LaTeX template that conforms to their thesis requirements. Anyway, I am thus far happy with my plan to use it and am enjoying discovering new capabilities all the time.

Sunlight

2010-10-05T20:29:00.000-04:00

Was playing around with colour selection.

New Shoes

2010-10-04T20:35:00.000-04:00

Creamsicle has adopted the box.

Oops... This is the right photo.

Dupont St and Avenue Rd, looking north

2010-10-03T22:37:00.001-04:00

Dupont St and Avenue Rd, looking north, originally uploaded by Toronto History.

So different now.

Posing for a stamp

2010-10-02T11:23:00.001-04:00

The other day whilst I was posing for a stamp, I glanced over and became the first man to see a velociraptor.

(thanks to Jamie, Kaarina and Linda for the parts of my story)

U of T saving trees?

2010-09-30T10:31:00.000-04:00

The U of T, in its campus news email, informed me today that a pilot project had saved paper. I am glad to hear that they are saving paper, though not so much under the guise of "sustainability" because it does not sound sustainable to me.

The project involved setting the default of library printers as double-sided printing, which would be nice to have in my office sometimes. Of course, the results are nice to see but essentially meaningless based on the provided information. It is likely that the 30% drop in paper usage can be attributed to making double-sided the default, but they do not tell if usage went up or down in other libraries over the same time. If it went down the results would be less dramatic; if it went up the results are better. It is nice to see that a group has started on the first of the three Rs, as so many begin with the last and then pat their own back.

The part that bothers me is that they state that expanding the project to all libraries:

has the potential to save over 500,000 sheets of paper each year at the central libraries, with possible savings of an additional 100,000 sheets at the three federated college libraries. This would result, each year, in saving over 75 trees, avoiding 8 tonnes of greenhouse gases, and preventing the discharge of 250,000 litres of wastewater from pulp and paper mills (based on the Environmental Defense Fund Paper Calculator).

To really reduce paper use, it would make more sense to also set an "environmental break-even" price. It may already be in the price because 75 trees is not really many trees to replace. This type of break-even price spent on replacing lost trees, offsetting the greenhouse gases, and ensuring that the water is treated adequately could actually help the environment.

In other news, the university started having reusable take-out containers last week. So far I'm the only person I've talked to who read that. This is great. Now if more people knew about them, it would be better.

Census Revisit

2010-09-17T11:39:00.001-04:00

The following commentaries are from Canadian Public Policy, and represent thoughts about why the mandatory long form census is important to our country. Good decisions are based on good information, without a source of reliable and trustworthy statistics decision-takers are likely to shop around for information/statistics that suit their position. Having an independent, reliable and trustworthy statistics agency enables all parties to a decision to make their case in an equally informed context. Without symmetrical information, a market system becomes less efficient and probably less equitable.

The Politics of the Census: Lessons from Abroad
The Importance of the Long Form Census to Canada (more statistic discussion, but important information)
The Value of the Long Form Canadian Census for Long Term National and International Research
2B or Not 2B? What Should Have Happened with the Canadian Long Form Census? What Should Happen Now? (possible mitigation of risk in voluntary long form. I like the idea of having a mandatory sign-off for people who choose not to fill out the voluntary questionnaire, thus forcing them to accept that they are not helping society as a whole through lack of time, lack of care or any other reason)

I would argue that if you are scared to tell the government how many bedrooms are in your house then you have a misunderstanding of what the government we have in Canada.

Also, I would venture that a minister such as former Minister of Industry Jim Prentice would not have allowed this to happen. I have faith that there are some in the current government who can and would stand up against the arguments advanced against the census.

Beards

2010-09-16T22:59:00.000-04:00

Neat house

2010-09-05T12:48:00.001-04:00

We found this neat/strange house on a walk our last day in Halifax. I thought it was pretty neat. I would imagine it is inexpensive to run. No giant walls of windows and plants on most sides.

The photos have arrived

2010-09-02T00:19:00.000-04:00

Halifotos many of the adventures around Halifax

A fun trip!

Vacation

2010-08-29T18:40:00.002-04:00

In Halifax at this time. Photos to follow.

Humidity and riding

2010-08-15T14:16:00.000-04:00

Went out for a quick errand on the bike in the 31 degree afternoon (humidex of 41), and got home feeling like I might have taken a shower while riding. Though it is still beautiful out and I would prefer this to being rain while riding.

Exam Over

2010-08-14T20:23:00.001-04:00

Today, I wrote my professional practice exam, so if all went well I won't have to write more exams any time soon. I am now going to get my thesis going at a faster speed. Working on rain derived inflow and infiltration into sanitary sewer pipes is going well, and it is nice to get out of developing a proposal mode and on to the building mode.

In other news, we got new sidewalks around our place. They have been sort of cut up and patched since before we moved in last year. They also appear to be repaving the road as well and it will be nice to have the utility work done.

Hopefully, something fun will happen tomorrow and it will still be nice out.

Book: Post Office by Charles Bukowski
Also: Ironic Sea Shanties

It's been a bit

2010-08-11T22:09:00.000-04:00

So I have been a bit delinquent in posting anything for the past 10 days or so. I have finished a few things and done some other stuff. I know quite specific. The long weekend was pretty calm. We went up to Owen Sound to see my sister and get some farm fresh veggies. On the way, we passed this Ferris wheel on one of the slow stretches as we approached a town or a traffic light.

We got to see my sister community garden plot. It is quite large and she is growing many types of veggies (tomato, carrot, pumpkin, peas, lettuce, Swiss char, various herbs, sunflowers, broccoli, onions, etc.). She also has some Mexican sunflowers, which she is standing behind in this photo picking pea pods (I think).

The rest of the weekend, we hung around Toronto. Heather had to work on Monday so I got some reading done and walked around. This past weekend was also quiet. We watched Canadian Bacon, which I had recorded from TV at some point, took a walk in the ravine nearby, had a lovely dinner at Victory Cafe (once it finally arrived), and made falafels.

I read a book, by Joseph Heath, called Filthy Lucre: Economics for people who hate capitalism, and it was an enjoyable collection of ideas. The premise was to point out fallacies that are presented by those on both the right and left of the political spectrum to support their particular way of thinking. It succeeded in pointing out several ideas that have bothered me and some that hadn't occurred to me.

This weekend will be just as exciting too. I'm writing my Engineering Professional Practice and Ethics exam. Thankfully, I have read the books and have gone through many of my notes. Also, my thesis project has a direction and should be progressing more quickly now.

Book: Post Office by Charles Bukowski

Another week.

2010-07-29T15:49:00.000-04:00

I had been writing my proposal for my thesis, when I thought about something not belonging and all the progress crashed. So I guess I'll say what I've been up to. Last Friday, we headed up to Heather's work party. It was a nice day that looked like it would be cloudy and cool.

Saturday was rainy and slow. We went out for groceries and took a meandering route home. Sunday, we went out to Pedestrian Sunday in Kensington and for dumplings. Later in the afternoon, we saw Library Voices at the Harbourfront Centre. It was a really fun show.

Last night, we took in the Blue Jays beat the Orioles. It was really a nice night after the roof was opened and the wind came in.

I suppose I should get back to putting proposal words into my document.

New Camera

2010-07-21T08:17:00.000-04:00

I have finally bought a new camera: Canon Power Shot G11. It took me a while. I've been looking at this one pretty much since it was released last September, but I'm not that good at actually buying things. I almost got a LX3 instead but they only had a show model left and they are not carrying it anymore (it is a few years old).

Anyway, I hope it does everything I try to make it do.

Posting 901

2010-07-10T18:46:00.000-04:00

So last weekend was a good long weekend. Didn't get much done work-wise, but that's not what holidays are for. I did eventually get a good chunk of work done at the end of this week.

Friday was a day of soccer watching and some dinner and drinks with some of Heather's work people. Saturday, we again watched soccer and went on a bike ride. Sunday was the pride parade.

The week started hot. It was 33 to 35 from Monday to Thursday. Thankfully, it got cool on Thursday evening. I attended a meeting out in Etobicoke, where it was much cooler than at home. The police college has a really nice bed of flowers.

On the way home, I had a subway car to myself from Royal York for about 4 stops. I don't really like photos of people I don't know, so it was nice to be alone on the train. I'm sitting at the driver end of the train for this photo.

Friday night, we had dinner with Cas and took in a free show by Kid Koala at the Harbourfront Centre. It was a good show. Lots of people were smoking under the covered seats, but c'est la vie.

Canada Day

2010-07-02T14:31:00.000-04:00

Dear Ontario... unless you were driving yesterday, you probably didn't pay more because of HST. If you went to a restaurant you paid less on drinks and the same on good. I guess you could've gotten a manicure but that wasn't really necessary was it? Anything you got at the mall was the same price; there wasn't a new HST on your jeans, those had PST+GST before so the price was the same.

Yesterday was a well spend Canada Day. In the morning, we headed down to the tall ship festival on the harbourfront. We didn't bother with going on board. The crowds were quite large.

After a walk home past a Chinese community Canada Day parade, we got home for an calm afternoon before the Toronto FC game. It wasn't a great game, but there was a dust-up giving two players red cards and another a yellow.

The day ended with a show by the Sadies at the Harbourfront Centre. It was a good time. Once the Ontario Place fireworks started enough people left the seating area, so we could sit for the end of the show.

Summer time

2010-06-29T20:51:00.000-04:00

So it is really summer and it has been pretty nice here. I think 3 degrees warmer would be better, but it isn't raining so this is much better than the alternatives. Last week, the university was closed Thursday and Friday because of G8/G20. So I tried to work at home and that didn't work very well. I did however have lunch with my old co-workers and had a nice walk with Heather on Friday. We saw this lovely truck.

Friday night, we went to the final show of CBC Radio One's Go! It was a good time. Fun show.

On the way home I saw my first streetcar losing its power on a turn. That I remember at least. In all the time I have been here I had only seen it at junctions where the car had been going straight.

Also on the way home we waited for the Spadina streetcar and many of the buildings had been boarded up in anticipation of the G20 protesters. (Who did show up the next couple days.)

Saturday, there was the Na-Me-Res pow wow across from Loblaws. After leaving Loblaws on St Clair we found that all the TTC service was shut down south of Bloor from Broadview to Spadina. (But really to Bathurst cause the 511 wasn't running.) We decided to use our newly discovered bus route to the TFC game. I'm pretty sure it took less time to take two buses to BMO Field than it usually takes on the streetcar and subway. The game wasn't very well attended and neither team really seemed like they wanted to win, but it was nice to be away from the downtown non-sense.

Pre-game crowd (with a couple Sûreté du Québec officers on security detail)

For some unknown reason they made us go around the Food building to get out.

From here we went under the train tracks to Liberty Village to catch our new bus. It rained for about 20 minutes near the end of the game and leaving. People seemed to be pretty happy to be enjoying themselves at the game.

Just after I took this picture, we passed 5 Toronto police with helmets on their belts and a bunch of plain clothes RCMP and diplomatic security for King Abdullah and all his diplomatic cars. Then we passed the LA Galaxy who just got off their bus from BMO field. I think we made pretty good time getting from BMO on the bus/subway in the same time they did on their own tour bus.

Quaking and Shaking

2010-06-23T20:20:00.000-04:00

We felt an earthquake today. That is all. It was an interesting feeling. Nothing fell on me in my office, so that was good.

Baseball and more

2010-06-20T21:32:00.000-04:00

Since fixing my computer on Wednesday night/Thursday morning, I have done quite a bit. Friday afternoon it was decided that we should go to the Jays game against San Fransisco. So, I used their lovely ticket site and (most of) their pricing practices. It really blows ticketmaster's layers of in explicable fees out of the water.

The Jays pulled out a 3-2 win. Afterwards, we navigated the fence building along Front street to get to C'est What for some beers. It was quite a fun night.

Saturday, I got up bright and early to watch soccer. My mum was in town so we went to Scarborough Bluffs. None of us had ever been.

The view was pretty great. After a trek back to find a bus to the subway, we had lunch at The Central on Markham Street just south of Bloor. The burgers were good, even if the veggie burger was a bit unusual. I actually had a nap in the late afternoon, which was probably the result of the hot afternoon and having slept 5 hours each of the previous 3 nights. I had been watching the early morning soccer games.

Sunday was more low key. Watched the world cup matches and helped Heather make some blankets. We then went up to my grandma's to see my mum off.

This week promises to be just as exciting and hopefully will not involve too much interference from the G20. We're attending the last episode of Go! (CBC Radio One) and are taking in the TFC-LA Galaxy match on Saturday. Before all that I should get some work accomplished so that my research progresses in a direction I feel is... well... forward progress.

Book: The Wayfinders - Wade Davis

OS X lets me down again

2010-06-17T08:02:00.000-04:00

Went to install 10.6.4 release and it gave me a javascript error. So search around for a solution and it seemed that something else had installed incorrectly. Not a clue what... After repairing my hard drive since it seems to lose a file whenever I boot into Windows 7, OS X wouldn't start anymore and I had to reinstall it. BOOOOO!

Another week

2010-06-13T22:47:00.001-04:00

First, I think this is the new design. The new template designer is vastly better than what was on offer before. I was much too lazy to build my own template and this has solved my problem.

Next, it has been eventful. Thursday, I went to a local planning meeting to discuss some stormwater things. We didn't end up talking about that much because another party did not show up for the discussion. However, it was interesting to see what goes on at community group meetings.

Friday, was a quiet night at home and a walk.

Saturday, we got up early to watch World Cup. I had to take a computer for my sister up to my grandma's and we did some grocery shopping. Of course, we watched England-US in the afternoon. After a delicious pizza, we went down to the Harbourfront Centre for a concert by Les Trois Accords, part of Franco-Fête.

Les Trois Accords

Hanging above the seats at the Harbourfront's stage

The nicely lit entrance beside the ACC

Today, was a street festival on Bloor. We rode over to that and took in the street scenes. We got home in time to see Germany-Australia. It was then time to go through my photos from the weekend.

Book: The Wayfinders - Wade Davis

Fun Times

2010-06-09T22:12:00.002-04:00

Last weekend was a busy one it seems. It wasn't really crazy. Friday night was low key. We had David and Lex over for dinner, hockey and cards.

Saturday, Heather went out in the morning and I took a ride up to St. Clair to get some tortillas and a tamarind Jarrito. I found that riding a bit further down Davenport gives a much shorter and less steep hill. In the evening, we went up to Thornhill for a birthday dinner.

Sunday, we went to the Blue Jays-Yankees game. We were up in the 500 level, so it was a good view of the field. Sadly, it wasn't very nice out so the roof was closed.

I haven't played with my Lensbaby for a while, so I took that with me. I got a few shots I like.

Afterwards, we had a lovely dinner at C'est What.

Changes

2010-06-08T21:18:00.000-04:00

I'm slowly trying to make the blog look a bit different. Thus far I've upped the font size a bit. More to come... (I think)

Another Sunday and another bike ride

2010-05-30T20:38:00.001-04:00

With a forecast of 31 we got up fairly early for a Sunday and adjusted Heather's new bike seat before heading off for a ride to the Distillery District. On the way, part of the clasp for Heather's bike fender fell off, so it was a noisy ride along Parliament, which is by no stretch of the imagination a smooth road. At the Distillery we went in a couple of buildings for Doors Open and had a chocolate fudge brownie.

This door was in a new stairwell in the first building we went in (#61). Obviously, not used anymore.

This is from the top of the gallery in the second building (#5)

Finally, a closer look at the lights, which are visible along the gallery wall.

After finishing up the Distillery District, we headed North to a bike shop to see if they could fix the broken fender clasp. We stopped at one shop but they were quite busy fixing flats. Before arriving at the second shop we did a quick stop in my office building to fill the water bottle and find out that my id card really can open the door on Sundays.

At the Bike Joint, on Harbord Street, the ladies working looked through their bench and found a bracket that fit on the fender. Heather, also, got her own lock so it would be easier to lock up while out on adventures. The service there has always been good in my experience and I would recommend it if you need bike repairs or some advice.

It has been a good weekend. Last night, we dined at Mitzi's Sister. It was a slow trip on the streetcar as there were inexplicable bottlenecks along Queen, but the food and service were good. Have to go back again to try more of the food.

Book: Into the Hurricane: Attacking Socialism and the CCF - John Boyko

Doors Open 2010

2010-05-29T18:14:00.003-04:00

Today is Doors Open in Toronto, and other places but I'm here. We started out our day at Redpath Sugar. It was one of the cooler places we went. This year we cut down on how many places we planned to go. I had a list and we only ended up doing 5 of them. Maybe do a few more tomorrow.

So Redpath is where they process your sugar. They showed us a video of where they get the raw sugar from (not like "raw" sugar they have at cafes). This factory gets its raw sugar from cane. Though in other parts of Canada they use sugar beets; they do this in Taber.

Some fuel storage (or something like that)

The mound of sugar in the raw sugar shack

They use a front-end loader to move the sugar around the warehouse.

The sugar is moved between buildings in sealed conveyor tunnels

Finally, they take it to market in their truck... ok not this one, but it is packaged and transported by truck or else transported unpackaged in tanker trucks. The ladies leaning on the back of the truck gave us cookies on the way out, to top off a lovely tour.

After this, we went to Roundhouse Park, just south of the CN Tower, to see the newly opened Toronto Railway Heritage Centre. We have seen many of the locomotives and rail cars before visiting there before it was open as a museum.

Next, we hopped on the subway to head over to the TTC's Greenwood Yard, where they maintain much of the subway fleet. There were various assemblies from the subway cars taken apart to see their components. The work cars were on display, like the the line below.

and this backhoe attached to one of them.

Returning to downtown, we went to the du Toit Allsopp Hillier office on Park Road. It was a very neat building that used to house the Ontario Association of Architects. The building is very bright inside on the upper and lower floors. After this we went to another architect's office Moriyama & Teshima Architects on Davenport. We've been by this office many times and it looks like a nice single storey building. Well once inside there is a koi pond and there are three levels in the back with large windows and lots of space. The building is deceivingly small from the front. I will have to go down the side street to see what the back actually looks like.

Overall, it was a successful Doors Open trip. I would have liked to see Stantec's McGregor Sock factory offices again and the Ontario Legislature, but they just didn't seem to be on our path. Maybe next time.

Today was a good temperature for being out and about. Tomorrow is looking to be a scorcher, 31 again.

Here I'll try again

2010-05-28T13:41:00.000-04:00

I had really intended to update this more but apparently in the last 10 days I haven't gotten around to it. Since last time, I have been to the university library where they are renovating. This is the scene on one of the stacks levels. Some of the parts that are updated are quite nice. Though I rarely go to that one.

Heather and I went on some walks on the long weekend. Saturday afternoon was spent enjoying soccer and hockey on TV. Sunday, we went on another ride down to Cherry Beach. This time we took some lunch with use and sat on a bench there.

The weather was hot but the breeze was nice along the water.

This week has been above normal temperature-wise. We have had several days of 30 degree weather and clear skies. It hasn't been that humid so going outside hasn't felt like getting into a sauna.

Doors Open is this weekend and I hope it is as good as it has been in past years. I have found all the buildings I want to visit. With such a nice forecast, I fully expect all the buildings to be very busy.

If you want to read a nice political story, there is a well done blog post over at The Parallel Parliament about Jean Chretien's portrait hanging.

Book: From Hope to Higher Ground - Mike Huckabee (I have finished this book. I liked the first 8 chapters or so and thought the book should have ended there, but that may be partly because I don't share the author's need to make America great again. The first chapters were more applicable to anywhere.)

Zebra crossing

2010-05-18T19:48:00.004-04:00

Zebra crossing, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Had a busy weekend. Saturday, we had a nice walk down along Wellesley. Then Sunday, we had a bike ride down to Cherry Beach and the along a bike path to Tommy Thompson Park.

Thinking about reviving this blog on a more regular basis. We'll see if that happens

Book: From Hope to Higher Ground - Mike Huckabee

Endless path

2010-04-27T20:33:00.001-04:00

Endless path, originally uploaded by dalmond.

I'm done my courses now. Had my last exam this afternoon. The next couple days will be spent grading, but then I'm hoping it will be nice out. After marking, I'm starting my research.

This photo is from a trip I took to Humber's Lake Shore campus on Saturday with Heather and Cas. I didn't feel like sitting in an info session so I took photos outside. Quite a nice campus.

Old Off-ramp

2010-04-11T22:42:00.002-04:00

Old Off-ramp, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Last weekend in the wind, we walked along Lake Shore out to Leslie. It was a pretty nice walk. Next time, I'd go for a bike ride out there and then perhaps down the spit.

This weekend was mostly at home working on a project and studying for my first exam on Wednesday. I hope next weekend is as nice as this one and I can get out and enjoying it more.

946 and a half

2010-04-04T00:29:00.002-04:00

946 and a half, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Motorcyles

2010-04-02T16:45:00.003-04:00

I hear the motorcycles coming
They're coming down the hill
They're waiting for the light to change
I hope it never will

I hear the motorcycles coming
Their mufflers blaring full
The groups are getting larger
In summer they're larger still

I hear the motorcycles coming
They never seem to stop
All day and night to their delight
Up and down the hill they chop.

Broken Toys $1

2010-03-30T21:36:00.002-04:00

Broken Toys $1, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Seen along Spadina Avenue. Sadly, at the end of my walk they did not have the loaf of bread I wanted.

Approaching the end

2010-03-28T22:48:00.001-04:00

Freewheel, originally uploaded by dalmond.

My courses are nearly done (2 weeks). I have a project in each of them. I will have to work pretty hard this week to get them done so I won't need to spend my Easter weekend working on them.

New Bike

2010-03-25T23:24:00.003-04:00

New Bike, originally uploaded by dalmond.

I got it today. It is very nice to ride.

New helmet

2010-03-22T20:39:00.004-04:00

New helmet, originally uploaded by dalmond.

My old helmet was missing some of the padding and didn't exactly stay where it was supposed to. This one is much better and my lights attach to it more easily.

It'll go well with my new bike when I get it on Thursday. For those who haven't seen on FB, I got a KHS Urban Soul.

Bridge over Creek

2010-03-14T10:53:00.001-04:00

Bridge over Creek, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Two weeks ago, we headed down to a ravine so I could do an assignment for a course. The assignment was to observe a water system and think about how to model it. It was kind of fun.

The ravine was snowy and the trees were dripping water on us most of the time. Glad I went that weekend because it is raining and is very windy this weekend.

Snow branch red

2010-02-27T11:41:00.002-05:00

Snow branch red, originally uploaded by dalmond.

It has been snowing for the last couple days. The largest accumulation we have managed to get all winter. This is the sub-station across the street from St. George Subway.

Iced over Keating Channel

2010-02-27T11:14:00.001-05:00

Iced over Keating Channel, originally uploaded by dalmond.

It wasn't too cold out last weekend. We went for a trip to T & T, which hasn't yet been ruined by Loblaws ownership. I need to find a bit of flowing water for a course assignment. This one is both too large and frozen.

I will likely go into a ravine to find an open stream. It is snowing/raining quite hard today so I might not do that today, but should really get that done sooner rather than later.

Field Trip

2010-02-04T20:26:00.002-05:00

Update: Apparently not. Security doesn't allow for such things. :(

Treatment plant, originally uploaded by dalmond.

I get to take students here (R.C. Harris Water Treatment Plant) on some field trips. I'm excited to see inside.

Urban Design

2010-01-02T17:06:00.001-05:00

Urban Design, originally uploaded by dalmond.

One of my favorite photos from last year.

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-24T16:07:00.001-05:00

Our Tree, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Have a Merry Christmas everybody.

Winding Down

2009-11-29T17:47:00.001-05:00

Writing, originally uploaded by dalmond.

The semester is winding down. Some days faster than I would like and others slower. Oh well. I have a few assignments left and a project then just 3 exams.

And unpacked

2009-11-06T15:14:00.002-05:00

And unpacked, originally uploaded by dalmond.

The new couch finally arrive. It is as comfy as I remember it.

Ham from Grade AAA Beef?

2009-10-24T15:48:00.002-04:00

Ham from Grade AAA Beef?, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Sign from the Yorkville Whole Foods

Cut from Canada AAA Grade Beef
Baretta Smoked
Boneless Hams

Deskilled staff: Is that like deveined shrimp? Fans of Toronto Public Library

2009-10-20T23:06:00.001-04:00

Deskilled staff: Is that like deveined shrimp? Fans of Toronto Public Library

Let the part-timers check in and out books and let the librarians do what they presumably went to school to learn, which is help me find the information that I seek. I would think they would prefer to (re-)search more than deal with repetitive tasks that self-checkout can almost certain do without getting bored or surly

A new chair

2009-09-29T22:44:00.004-04:00

It was an action packed weekend. Saturday, we went up to Eglinton to pick me out some new glasses. The pair I have been wearing before bed and other infrequent times are very old. I know I have had the lenses replaced at least once and the frames are, I believe, form before I started wearing contacts. Anyway, I picked out some moderner ones, which I should get by the weekend. Just in time to sport them for Nuit Blanche. Heather's computer needed fixing again. This time it was the speaker cable that had become unseated. I suspect when the DC board was replaced they didn't clip the cable in correctly and over the past few months it has slowly manoeuvred its way out of place to stop the right speaker from functioning.

We also had a tasty dinner at Crown & Dragon, which is just north of Davenport/Church and Yonge on the west side. They also have a large selection of really good wings. It was fairly empty when we arrived and the Leafs game was just about to start. There were about 5 people around the bar watching the game and a few other tables. As we were getting ready to leave a large group was forming at an adjacent table, but we couldn't figure out why they were meeting. None of them seemed to know anybody else until the last person arrived who about 3 of the 10 or 11 seemed to know. Anyway, it was a nice place to eat and they even put the main event on the overhead speakers but it isn't too loud.

On Sunday, Word on the Street was happening on Queen's Park Circle. There seem to be more and more people at these events each year and they seem less and less interested in the event. I think many of them attend just to say that they did. I ran into somebody who used to work at Arup with me. After Heather found everything she wanted, we went off to the university so I could show her my "office". Really it is a cubicle/large study carrel in a room with 7 other desks. There aren't usually that many people in the office and even when there are I hardly notice. The office even has windows, which many other grad offices don't have.

My new chair c/o of my grandma, who is moving and doesn't have space for it anymore (she says, I think she would but I will gladly accept a very nice chair). I think I will fix the seat because the padding is a bit flattened from years of use. Apart from that it is a very nice chair.

Tomorrow, we are off to see Jerry Springer - The Opera. The Hart House theatre is putting it on again after success last year, and I can't wait. I was disappointed last year when I wasn't in Toronto during its run.

Busy Saturday

2009-09-20T14:13:00.003-04:00

Yesterday, we were planning on going on a walk in High Park, but ended up doing so much more. After a detour to union station to get a pass for Heather, we saw an ad on the subway for the Bloor West Ukrainian Festival. So we got off at Jane and exited to the loud voice of the MPP telling the crowd about passing a bill on some genocide and that "for the first time ever in Ontario justice had been done." Perhaps she was being a bit over the top with that statement because I believe that's what we have courts for and if in all the cases before this bill was passed justice was not served then we have been wasting a large amount of money on optics. I suspect she was just being dramatic and noisy as MPPs like to be. The festival was neat, and we stopped at a bakery, had tasty donuts and continued along Bloor to High Park.

We did walk through High Park for a while and came out of the park at Garden Avenue. From here we walked up to Roncesvalles, where to our surprise there was a Polish Festival going on. I was actually hoping for large trenches from utility construction, but a festival is fun too. Walking up Roncesvalles, we happened upon a stage with a lady speaking forcefully into a microphone and who was it but the same MPP as at the Ukrainian festival, but this time she was promising a Pope John Paul II day for Ontario. Apparently, this is a non-partisan issue; though I'm sure there are lots of people who would oppose it as being unnecessary.

Another long walk on Dundas West took us to Bathurst where we caught the streetcar towards home.

They have been digging up many streets nearby and replacing the water service. This on e was just off Bay street. It was a busy day, but likely more exciting than if we hadn't head out to wander around High Park.

Calm weekend

2009-09-13T18:51:00.003-04:00

Last night, Heather and I went for a walk downtown after a streetcar ride on the King car and we found out that the sidewalk in front of Canada Life on University Avenue is very dark. Though while trying to capture that darkness, I did manage to get a neat photo.

Today, we went out to the island and had a nice walk around. There was a disc golf tournament going on. I can't say that I have ever seen so many Frisbees at one time before. I bothered a dragonfly for a bit to get this shot.

School really starts this week and things should become more organized. This past week was less organized that I would've liked but sometimes the beginning is like that. I'm TAing a course that sounds like it will be very interesting, and though I have never taken it before the subject is interesting enough that I believe it will be fine anyway.

A map in error

2009-09-13T18:50:00.001-04:00

Closer on the error, originally uploaded by dalmond.

The new local map in Summerhill doesn't have the right station location, which is a bit worrisome. I would hope that if they did this internally that all involved were new and didn't know better; and if it were done externally that somebody new at the TTC gave out bad info. However, both those options would be letting the TTC off too easily. It isn't a new station and has only been open in that location since 1954.

The last bit

2009-08-31T12:11:00.004-04:00

Just after I posted last, there was a rather large storm through Southern Ontario and this photo is the sunset after the storm had passed.

There was some sort of fire behind a building on St. Clair Ave West. It was a 2 alarm fire, though I couldn't see much from where I got to. This is a bit more than an hour after the incident started.

Yesterday, Heather and I walked down to Dundas Square to see a green expo thing. Lots of city booths and then various vendors of bamboo products, solar panels, and glass bottles. At Yonge and Queen there were these break dancers. They were fun to watch. We walked to Church and Queen to look at the track reconstruction in the intersection.

After this, we bought Snow Leopard and Heather got me an Xbox 360. We cloned both our hard drives before installing and so everything seems to have installed as it should. Heather's computer acted a bit strange but is over it now, and mine went through like a charm and I reclaimed about 5 GB of hard drive space in the process. I'm happy that all my programs still work, except Parallels but I don't use it much now that I have windows installed.

The xbox is lots of fun. I have been playing Call of Duty: World at War. The system came with Halo3 but I haven't even opened it yet. Thanks to Heather for the lovely gift.

I have a week and a half left before my classes start. The time is both not going fast enough and disappearing too quickly. It really depends on what I'm doing at the moment. Right now it is time for lunch, then I'm off to package a painting.

Growing in the wood

2009-08-19T20:12:00.001-04:00

Growing in the wood, originally uploaded by dalmond.

It has been hot, but that seems to be over now. Went on another 17 km bike ride today. Sort of sitting and waiting for my courses to begin 3 weeks from today. Hopefully, my book I'm waiting for will come into the library tomorrow.

New Internet

2009-08-10T21:05:00.002-04:00

We got new internet today. We are now using TekSavvy and the transition was seamless.

Took this among 170 or so other shots last night and got 4 with lightning strikes in them.

It is ready...

2009-07-16T15:15:00.003-04:00

So I have been working on the bike and having a few problems. I can't get the old freewheel off the bent rim, but I don't need it since I only wanted one gear anyway.

Today, I went out for a walk with my non working bike (I couldn't pedal because of the lack of rear cog(s) for the chain) and got myself a Dicta Brand freewheel to use on the bike and I got a locking nut for the rear brake. So after that walk I returned home to install my new parts.

Now the bike is waiting to be tested, which I will do after posting this.

Update 7:15pm
It works. I have a few things to tighten and some reflectors and fenders to put on but it rides very nicely.

A new old new bike

2009-07-14T21:32:00.003-04:00

I got my sister to send me an old bike from the garage instead of buying a brand new one here. I'm making the bike into a singlespeed because it is basically flat around me to the south to most places that I don't go on the subway.

There are several things that I have to do to it before it will be ready including replacing the bent rear rim, moving the rear gears to the new rim, aligning the brakes, removing the gears and derailleurs, replacing the tire tubes (and maybe tires), and maybe getting a new seat post (this one might be a bit short for me). But I will post the photos when it is complete.

Japan in Toronto

2009-07-09T22:00:00.003-04:00

I didn't have a plan for what I would do today, so I just wandered around downtown for several hours. On my way home the Japanese motorcade was still at Queen's Park so I stopped to see the Japanese Emperor and Empress come out. About an hour after I got there they came out.

After coming down and waving to the clapping crowd, they came to shake hands and talk to some of the people. Many in the crowd had been there for a few hours wanting to be right at the front in case he came to greet them in person, which he graciously did.

While this went on, the premier stood by and chatted up some of the crowd. "Thanks for recognizing me. I'm just here with the two movie stars." Friendly and amusing.

Afterwards, the motorcade headed off down University Avenue just as it had last night. Though last night it came from further up on Avenue Road past my apartment. I really wish I could capture all the red and blue lights filling the street a bit more readily with my camera; without resorting to a video mode.

Bilevel Sleeper

2009-07-04T23:17:00.001-04:00

Bilevel Sleeper, originally uploaded by dalmond.

Almost as soon as the shelves were put up Creamsicle stopped taking the top spot on the cat tree and moved over to the shelf to sleep.

Terrible (but free)

2009-06-27T17:11:00.002-04:00

This was on the street not far from the apartment when I was out on a walk this afternoon. I didn't take either but did enjoy the note.

Yahoo!

2009-06-09T00:40:00.000-04:00

I got my degrees today.

Ducks Escaping the Cat

2009-05-30T20:16:00.002-04:00

Loud ducks

in Calgary

2009-05-25T13:06:00.003-04:00

I'm in Calgary at the moment until June 13th. So send me a message of some sort.

Took this photo on a walk in Toronto yesterday.

Yay degrees

2009-05-21T20:03:00.002-04:00

By June 10th, I will have the following two degrees:

BACHELOR OF ARTS
IN LINGUISTICS

and

BACHELOR OF SCIENCE
WITH DISTINCTION
IN CIVIL ENGINEERING
INTERNSHIP PROGRAM

Glad they are both approved.

Conservative Non-sense

2009-05-18T09:55:00.003-04:00

If you watch the ad in the top right corner of this page. You should listen with a different set of words.
It starts the same... he's been away for 34 years.
Michael Ignatieff has lived in a different country, do you want a leader who has been elsewhere in the world?

The ad basically sums up the Conservative position that to be Canadian being white and rich isn't enough... you also have to have lived here forever. It also helps that if you were born in Ontario that you move to Alberta and hope that nobody remembers you are from Ontario.

Finally, these ads aren't just playing politics. Politics is a gentleman's sport and the discourse in Canada these days would disqualify most if not all the players.

Drawing

2009-05-15T15:31:00.002-04:00

I was testing out a program called Acorn for mac that I bought as part of a bundle. It is pretty neat. Sort of a stripped down photoshop that doesn't take very long to load. I think I will play with it more. It works nicely with my drawing tablet.

Quick Update

2009-05-05T23:54:00.001-04:00

Got all my grades back 3.6 GPA (A-,A+,A-,B+) [the B+ is a full course].

Yay, it is so done.

Boneless and drifting

2009-05-05T16:58:00.002-04:00

From the zoo on Sunday.

Slowly moving to a new apartment. Will be done Saturday when the bed and shelves get moved, and I guess the TV and kitchen stuff too.

Waiting on marks; somehow got a B+ in the group project, which is pretty good considering our midterm grade. I think I got an A- in ethics. That's what I should get based on the course outline, but I wouldn't complain if it were an A.

After moving and waiting for grades, I figure I will read some books before going back to Calgary. I finished Our Man in Havana last night. It was quite enjoyable. I have a few books that I brought or else a textbook to read, and I'll probably get through all of them.

Taken near the Leslie St Spit.

2009-04-24T18:55:00.001-04:00

I finished my last exam about an hour ago and for the moment, I'm done working at parking. So, I have a month off before I will return to Calgary to work during convocations at parking.

It should be a good time. I'm off to Toronto tomorrow and have a soccer game to attend Sunday afternoon.

Very funny star wars video

2009-04-17T21:58:00.001-04:00

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it) from Joe Nicolosi on Vimeo.

Blue candy

2009-04-14T23:27:00.003-04:00

When I got on the bus the other morning I had the strange feeling that I was leaving one of those stores where you get the blue fish candies. I really don't know why. I haven't had them forever. It is just a bus so I'm not sure how getting on have the sense of leaving a candy shop.

One lab is hard to start

2009-04-11T15:28:00.005-04:00

I shouldn't be writing here because I should be writing a lab up, but the problem really is that I don't feel like it. I want to be done the lab but apparently not enough to get it done.

Last night, we had Easter dinner at my house. It was a long evening that started with a late dinner (7.30 well late for my house). My aunt and her babies were over. So much of the time was spent chasing them around. I did edit a report portion sent to me by somebody in my design group. I was really just about to start working on my lab when everybody arrived and so that didn't even start yesterday. On my list of things to do it is an item for Wednesday. This weekend is supposed to be finishing a parking manual and organizing my notes so I can start studying.

I guess I will get back to the lab before the TFC game begins at 2.

Almost 12 is too long

2009-04-05T01:05:00.003-04:00

I spent the day at school today (8-7.30). I got quite a bit done but it was a long day. Thankfully, I got a ride there and home so I didn't spend all kinds of time waiting for the bus.

Over the day, I did have the TFC game and the Leafs on streaming from CBC, who still have a crappy streaming engine by the way. And I spent the rest of the evening chatting on the Internet and fending off baby cousins from tearing apart my room and stealing my video game controllers. Oddly, they liked the joystick on the game cube controller more than the blinking lights of the Wiimote.

I know what I'm doing

2009-04-03T23:16:00.006-04:00

It has been a bit of a hectic week, which really started last week sometime. I got an offer for a job, had an offer for school and was waiting and hoping that I would get another offer for school. I had a feeling that the second offer was somehow contingent on getting an NSERC scholarship; thankfully it wasn't cause "the committee that reviewed your application was unable to recommend [me] for an award."

All this had me a wee bit worried about which I should plan on doing or say "yes" to. I managed to make it to Wednesday and get an offer for the second school, which was way more work to apply to than the first. The application was long and at one point in applying I though about stopping. But at the time I was fairly sure, given the length of the application form, that there would be a different form I would have to complete to give up. In response to me saying:

Did you know the UofT doesn't want me to go there because their application is so long and lots of the things in it don't seem all that relevant, but I will jump through their hoops. Who knows it might be worth it in the end.

She said something to the effect of sometimes hoops are good to jump through. I'm glad that I did finish that long form.

I think I may have some summer work out of the happenings of this week, but it is too early to tell for sure. Well work apart from the 3 weeks I will be in Calgary doing Parking for all the convocations on campus this year.

In a sort of tangentially related thought, I was thinking about Toronto an how much I like it. What spurred this was one of those silly "25 things" lists on fb. On it one of my old classmates said she could live in Toronto forever (except for a year in NY) and I really think I agree (except for the NY part, but that can be changed for Calgary). It is great. There are so many places to explore, so many layers to see, so much to do. Of course, I only did some of the vast array of possible things when I lived there. So much time was spent exploring the city though somehow it always seemed to lead to the same places.

There would be a moment when you realize that you have walked this obscure side street before and wondered why or how you managed to end up there again. Even though this happened quite often, it was always nice to explore a new area. Ravines were the most interesting because you never knew what you would find next. Though it was safe to assume it would be a strange tree, stream or broken dam/weir/channel.

It is also nice to have public transit that can take you across the city in two moves or less at the same time as taking 45 minutes or less. In Calgary, it can take more than an hour in an ordeal that involves more transfers than desirable to take transit somewhere you could walk in slightly less time, and when walking you don't miss connections.

There is quite a bit of work to get down on paper for my group design project, but nothing that can't be accomplished in a day or two of hard work. I'm hoping it is just a day (tomorrow), so I can get other things done on Sunday.

If I'm lucky I will get to watch the TFC game tomorrow on my computer. That will be enjoyable but not nearly as nice as watching March Madness online using the new Silverlight option they have. The quality is amazing and it rarely gets into buffering problems. The CBC could learn a thing or two about live streaming from that service. Their streaming service often leaves much to be desired. Some recent broadcasts have had 16:9 proportions but not nearly the video quality; probably due to the compression they are using. If we're lucky MS will just stop supporting the Windows Media streaming technology and force CBC to use Silverlight, which is absolutely a superior product.

That is likely enough blog for now given that I haven't been keeping up this semester. Not from lack of time but from lack of bothering.

TheStar.com | Confusion on language proposal

2009-03-28T15:22:00.000-04:00

TheStar.com | Opinion | Confusion on language proposal

Finally somebody who understands what Kenney said in Calgary. He didn't say all immigrants had to speak English/French. He, in fact, said that if you want to be a citizen of our country with its two official languages then you had to be able to operated in at least one of them. This is a minimum that should be acceptable to a reasonable person. Why should anybody expect to be a citizen of a country in which they cannot interact with the government in its official language(s).

Lethbridge Evening

2009-03-21T18:47:00.003-04:00

I drove to Lethbridge yesterday afternoon to go to my sister's graduation recital. It was really amazing. Of course, I fit in some time to take a few photos of the scenery, before I got blow away by the wind.

Sub-$200 flight to T.

2009-03-18T01:23:00.001-04:00

Twitter / Daley Mikalson: Woo sub-$200 flight to Tor ...
That right I got a flight on WJ from Calgary to Toronto for $181 including taxes. I don't think I have ever paid less than $200 all-in.

Iron Ring

2009-03-07T20:54:00.002-05:00

Posing, originally uploaded by dalmond.

I got my ring today. I'm halfway through my last semester of UofC.

The mayoral opposition

2009-03-05T23:27:00.000-05:00

John Tory for Toronto mayor in 2010...

Street-view is great

2009-03-04T23:30:00.000-05:00

View Larger Map

What is the future of the CBC?

2009-03-01T18:33:00.000-05:00

Robert Paterson's Weblog: What is the future of the CBC? Become Vital or Die This is the CBC we should have.

Nearly Half Done

2009-02-28T16:14:00.002-05:00

I'm nearly half done this semester and finally we are making obvious progress on our design project. In fact, I'm working on it right now; well right now is a break but you get the idea.

Also, at this point, I have interest from two graduate programs. So in the next few weeks, I'm hoping that I will know what I'm going to be doing next year.

Just got back from a walk in Confederation Park with my mum. It was still chilly outside and I wish I had taken my neck tube but that's ok it was sunny. Back to work now.