i will go to hell
But I thought this was really funny. So I’ll share.
crackd
Well, fuck.
Seems I have a wee bit of a problem with my new camera. It looks like the glass filter that covers the CMOS is cracked (the lens is sparkling, and when I look at the sensor I see a line going side to side that matches the shape I see in the pics exactly, and it’s not a hair). Here’s a sample of the pretty pictures it takes now. No I have not dropped it. Yes I’ve been way super careful with it. And no I did not leave it in the hot sun and then popped it in the freezer to cool it down.
Goddamn it. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. Warranty repairs in Montreal, eh?
if england played brazil
It is just before the England v Brazil match. Ronaldinho goes into the Brazilian changing room to find all his teammates looking a bit glum. “What’s up?” he asks.
“Well, we’re having trouble getting motivated for this game. We know it’s important but it’s only England. They’re rubbish and we can’t be bothered.”
Ronaldinho looks at them and says, “Well, I reckon I can beat them by myself-you lads go down the pub.” So Ronaldinho goes out to play England by himself and the rest of the Brazilian team go off for a few jars. After a few pints they wonder how the game is going, so they get the landlord to put the teletext on.
A big cheer goes up as the screen reads “Brazil 1 (Ronaldinho 10 minutes) – England 0”. He is beating England all by himself! A few pints later and the game is forgotten until someone remembers, “It must be full time now, let’s see how he got on.” They put the teletext on.
“Result from the Stadium ‘Brazil 1 (Ronaldinho 10 minutes) – England 1 (Lampard 89 minutes)’.”
They can’t believe it; he has single-handedly got a draw against England!!! They rush back to the Stadium to congratulate Ronaldinho. They find him in the dressing room, still in his gear, sitting with his head in his hands. He refuses to look at them. “I’ve let you down, I’ve let you down.”
“Don’t be daft, you got a draw against England, all by yourself. And they only scored at the very, very end!”
“No, no, I have. I’ve let you down…I got sent off after 12 minutes.”
and while I’m bitching about expenses
I was mostly ok (as in I wasn’t going to cry, but I’m still somewhat pissed about it) with my nano getting nicked, because I had a year old 4G that has never been dropped, and has been working like a champ. Bad things started happening last week, and now the champ is down and out for the count. $200 to fix. Teh yay, looks like I may cry, then cave and get a new nano, after all.
But certainly not this month.
priceless, my ass
1 sore foot that is driving me around the bend
1 sore knee from the sore foot that is driving me around the bend
6 trips to the sports medicine clinic
1 surgery put on and taken off the table twice
2 different sets of orthotics at $300/set
2 new pairs of shoes at $200/pair
This better work.
new feature on threadless
Well… it may not be new, but I just noticed it today. Check out the “A song about this tee…” link on the upper-right-hand side of this page. Have a look at the tee first, then play the song. If you’re sufficiently twisted like me, you’ll giggle.
Yet another reason why threadless is the best t-shirt store on the planet.
standing o
I think the meaning of the standing ovation has been lost somewhere along the way, or it might just be that in Ottawa people don’t get it. That sounds pretty pretentious, but I can’t remember the last performance of any kind in Ottawa where people didn’t stand and applaud at the end. I like the tradition of the standing ovation, but think it should be used sparingly. Otherwise, it’s just another form of clapping and a way to stretch your legs 3 minutes earlier than you would normally.
I went with the Wed night crowd to see Cirqe du Soleil’s Quidam show here in Ottawa. It was fun: colorful and creative with a good variety of acts that blended together well. The technical production values were excellent, and the live music and lighting which accompanied the performers was really well done.
So well done that the choreography seemed to trump the performance itself, as the show seemed a little too routine for me. It is, however, close to the end of the run here, so familiarity and routine is understandable. The parts I enjoyed the most were the parts that introduced a little randomness: the “clown” scenes with audience participation. Exceptionally funny, and all of the members of the audience who went up on stage got right into it.
Where I’m going with this is that the performance was very enjoyable, but it wasn’t exceptional. The show was certainly worth the price of admission, but I wasn’t blown away.
When the performers came out to take their bow, everyone stayed in their seats. After 10 seconds or so, a couple small groups stood up, and the cascade effect took over. You could see a number of folks looking left and right to see how many other people were standing, quickly followed by that “Oh, all right.” or “Oh, I guess I should stand, too.” look. I ended up standing after realising everyone else was going to, because I wanted to see the performers without the costumes and lighting that obscured them.
It was more lemmings at play than anything else. It wasn’t a “Standing O” calibre performance, and I’m kind of sorry to see how that particular form of compliment has become part of the applause instead of the special tip of the hat to an extraorindary performance. Still, I was entertained, and I really shouldn’t complain.
refreshing sand
Look! A manual exposure! By me! Not involving a trench coat and a bus! And it looks like I may even have a clue! And how about all them exclamation marks!!! (damn you, prii)
Thank you Canon for making it easy to fake it, and thank you even more Bryan Peterson for an outstanding reference on exposure. Of course, this particular pic was dead simple lighting-wise, but I’m starting to understand the whole ISO/shutter/aperture relationship, and I’m a lot less scared of the big “M” on the program dial. When I go out in the morning or late in the day we’ll see if I can still take a couple that don’t completely suck.
I have no idea why, but I like this one. I’m not crazy about how flickr auto-formats entries, so I’ll have to muck with templates a little. Still, it’s a quick way to fire a pic up, and it saves on my bandwidth and disk space on cthulhu. The idea is to get out once every two days for an hour or more and just play. Yay playtime!
van: confirmed
Alrighty, I’m gonna go see shesa get hitched to that crazy-but-excellent beau of hers at the end of August. This means a trip back to Vancouver, and I’m totally stoked about going. Tickets are booked, the hotel is booked, and now all I need to do is make sure I get to see all the people I wanna see. Breakfast/brunch at Burgoo will be required at some point on Saturday or Sunday (mmm… Southwestern Bowl breakfast), and I really, really, really wanna get some qwality sushi whilst in town. We’ll also have to convince some other folks from the area to go for bevvies and/or Disc Golf over the weekend (‘jen, you’re invited as well, just in case you happen to be slumming the last weekend in Aug.).
Two months to go!