stretch-mark supper club

While I think it’s great for the Strip Tease Artitsts Australia union (no, I am not making that up) to win the right to lunch breaks, overtime, and leave, one of the quotes from the union spokeswoman Mystical Melody (again, I’m not making that up) gave me pause.

“The majority of workers in the industry are women,” Melody said, “so it’s probably a really great thing for them to be able to feel confident of having a job after they’ve had their babies.”

I just look at that quote and think “isn’t that wrong?”

If you’re a pregnant stripper, when do you stop working? Is it like any other job where you go late into the third trimester? Would your earning potential increase because you can now work at fetish clubs? Would the stress from worrying about water breaking at inopportune times get you stress-leave before mat leave, with the new leave rights? What kind of day (night?) care options are there? What do you do for career day at your little tot’s school?

I think I’ll stop there, before I put my foot in my mouth any more, as the questions can only get worse. I guess I’m just old-fashioned when I figure having a child kind of changes the career path, what with the hours and all, and that mom probably won’t be returning (although, I’d probably be surprised to see how many do). That said, it doesn’t sound like all the strippers like the SAA so much, so maybe it’s not as big a deal as it could be… but who knows?

In any event, congrats… I think.

blanky

misccrap/blog/the_network.png

We were talking about Visio diagrams the other day, spurred on by bobo’s “I hate Visio” statement, made while trying to use the damn program. Some files were exchanged, and I came across this one in my doc directory while saving and looking at the file I had been sent. I had forgotten all about it, but it was a slide I used to use to discuss with folks on understanding the value of their information, and defining policy vs. throwing technology at information security (which is what most places do, sadly).

I won’t get into too much, because it can be boring. There was one C-level I will never forget, though. He looked at the diagram and asked what company made the “Blanky” firewall.

I said “Well, Linus, of course.”

He paused for a second, and then his eyes lit up and he said “Oh! It’s an open-source thing!”

*sigh*

I did giggle a little, but he left it at that, and when I explained it a couple slides later, the lights came on again for the right reason (thankfully).

blood, sweat, but no tears

I’m going slightly mental these days from cabin fever, and have little tolerance for anything that annoy me. This is not good, because a lot of things annoy me of late. The worst part, which personally I find troubling, is that instead of dealing with the annoyances, I just walk away. Problem there is I’m walking away a lot more than dealing, and it adds up, which annoys me, and you get the rambling picture about how the cycle renews.

Compunding the problem is the fact that my foot, despite orthotics and stretching and rehab and all that happy crappy the doctor suggested, still hurts. Some days are good, some suck. I can run, but I can’t run for the distances or times where I feel good. There’s nothing quite like running for 60 minutes straight to clear your mind and just feel better about the world. Endorphin releases are the best tranqs in the world, I suppose. Not having this avenue available has made me a really unhappy camper.

So, last night, I signed off in a reasonably foul mood, and karma stepped in. My office is downstairs and I wanted nothing to do with it so upstairs I went. My living room is upstairs, and the table in it has well-defined corners. Because I was in a not-so-good mood I was moving at a good clip and not really paying a lot of attention to where I was walking. Enter karma, stage left, to remind me of what I should be paying attention to. While walking through the living room, the path of my right knee intersected squarely with one of those table corners. Fucking ow. Once I could breathe I swore a lot more at considerable volume (it’s a good thing the place next door is vacant). I also bled a fair bit, as my table appears to be a carnivore, and had a little snack from my knee.

I had moved from reasonably foul mood to really-nasty-foul mood. I wanted to run, but couldn’t. I needed to purge, so I did the next best thing; I got on my excercise bike, loaded up a high-intensity program I hadn’t used in well over 18 months, and pedalled for over an hour. After I finished pedalling, I discovered that pretty much everything had loosened up, and that I felt pretty good. So, instead of doing the smart thing and quitting while I was ahead, I went for a 30 minute, light jog. Amazingly enough, I didn’t die.

It was awesome. I lost 3lbs of water from the combined activities. This is a good thing, as it means I’m working. After that, I went out and had dinner with the Wed night crew, and felt a whole lot better about the world.

I don’t just like to run, I need to run. If I have to loosen up for an hour beforehand, so be it, because I haven’t felt that good in way, way, way too long (and the foot feels pretty good this morning, so if it feels as good tomorrow, I’ll repeat the process).

woohoo!

Kristina and Coop had a little boy late last night. It sounds like it was not a whole pile of fun for Kris, so here’s hoping there are chocolates and bottles of wine aplenty.

Congrats Kris and Chris, awesome news!

distractions: off

So, I am having a really hard time with focus. I think a big part of it is that I work from home and live alone, and thus have very limited social interaction with real people. Almost all my interaction is electronic, and all the modes of communication can be very intrusive on a day to day basis.

To that end, I’m going to try and limit my distractions. I’ll check email on a schedule, and have turned the notification messages off. I’ve set my IRC client to only flag me if someone privmsgs me, and the IM client is out the door during working hours. I’m also going to limit my morning entertainment and reading to pre-8am, as that’s too easy a procrastination to succumb to. I’ll be working on a few other things as well, but will spare you those gory details.

Here’s hoping this actually helps.

I’m going to go back to the Running Room, too, and start doing run clubs on Sundays, because I am all cabin-fevery, and it’s not a good thing at all.

dear leafs nation head-honcho-types

Please put Pat Quinn out of my misery, and get a real coach. While you’re at it, please replace Cement Head Jr. with someone who can actually manage a team and get real players when they’re available. At least during the Ballard days the guys actually looked like they were trying.

Ok?

Ok.

Thanks.

(I can’t wait to see the soundbytes of Pat blaming someone not on his team, backed up by Tucker and Domi whining. It’s a routine now, almost a schtick – ptp)

12 years

Twelve years is a long time.

In twelve years, your kids can turn into adults. They can marry that nice guy they met, graduate from medical school, move to Calgary, have a great little boy, and start a family. They can marry that nice girl they met, become a police officer, move up North, and have a wonderful little girl and boy who are oh-so-much like their daddy. They might also wander around the world playing with computers for a while, and not really figure anything else out, but at least they’ll have stories to share.

Twelve Christmases, Anniversaries, Birthdays, Springs, Summers, Falls, and Winters, New Years and more. Twelve years of happiness, joy, wonder, pain, sorrow, and caring. That’s a lot of time, and all the while the family gets bigger, the memories get longer, and life keeps on passing by at its unrelenting pace. Unfortunately, my mom missed all this, as today marks the twelfth year of her passing.

I have very few regrets about where life has put me, despite my constant bitching about it. One of those regrets is that my mom hasn’t been able to share these last twelve years with us (directly, at least). Some days it just smacks me out of the blue for no apparent reason, and I’m overcome with grief along with anger about how unfair it all can be.

That all quickly fades, however, when I stop to think. My mom, undeniably, lives on inside all of my family. She was a huge influence in our lives, and she and my father taught us how to live, laugh, cry, and nurture one another. There were bad times for sure, but that’s not what I remember most.

I remember her smile. I remember her sense of right and wrong. I remember her sneaking out to drive the car (when she wasn’t allowed) to the store because dammit, she wanted a glass of milk, and when we came home that day she was sitting at the table with a big smile on her face with a big glass of milk, and all she said was “that’s a good glass of milk” and giggled. I remember the one time I heard her swear (she said “shit” after a guy cut her off when we lived in Bells Corners) and then blushing a little and laughing about it. I remember her telling me the story of when, as young parents, how they had forgotton to bring juice for their three year old on a picnic, so fed him white wine instead, and then agonized over how bad a mother she was for getting her three year old smashed (I call it good training). I remember her cheering the loudest out of all the other moms and dads. I remember her being a calming influence, and saving my life when my dad found out what idiotic thing his first born had done this time. I remember so much more, but mostly I remember her sacrificing everything so her kids would have every chance to make the most out of life.

I remember.

More importantly, I think I understand. A huge chunk of who and what I am came from (and still comes from) her. She is in me, and my brother, and my sister, and my dad, and we in turn all try to pass a little of that along to the people we care about. How cool is that? It sure makes me realise that what I gained is so much more than what I lost. Believe it or not, I learned.

I owe my mom a huge debt, and I just wish she hadn’t gone before I had the chance to thank her for it. I especially wish that I had been able to send her on that cruise we’d always talked about. When I was “trouble(d)”, and was apologising after understanding just how badly I’d hurt her from doing something stupid and selfish, she’d always tell me not to worry, and that when I was successful I could send her on a cruise. After that, all was forgiven, and we’d try and figure out how to pick up the pieces and put them back together the right way.

She understood us all and gave us her unflagging support, never doubting that any of us would succeed. She was a cheerleader, a mentor, a crutch, a confidante, and a friend, and I’m amazed at how much love she was able to pack into the time we were with her.

To embrace the wealth of the spirit,
To revel in the wonders of life,
To think, to remember, to dream –
This is to know happiness.

– Giancarlo Di Gratsi

Today’s a day to remember but, more importantly, it’s also a day to celebrate the lasting gifts my mom gave to me, and how much I treasure them.

Thanks mom, I miss you.

running again

It’s been a while, but I’m finally running and exercising on a regular basis again. I’m a loooooong way from doing 20km Sunday runs on a regular basis again, but I’m getting there. Over the past month I’ve been cycling on a regular basis, stretching, and have started gym workouts again. My feet hurt still, but a big part of that is stretching underused muscles from piloting a desk, and sitting properly while I work. It’s getting there.

I have invested in a treadmill, as the ice in Ottawa continues to be an impediment, as well as an excuse. It’s a great piece of gear, and goes well with the semi-recumbant bike I use for cross training. Coupled with some core training and pilates/yoga-ish stretching, I’m starting to feel good again. I have a long way to go, though, and need to drop about 20 pounds to get back where I feel great. I’ll get there.

Sadly, I think my ultimate days are pretty much done. It’s not the game, it’s just my approach to the game. When I play, I forget that I don’t heal as fast as I did twenty years ago, and go at it with the same level of cement-headedness I did with everything else when I was 18. This has led to the tearing of my soleus, a severe strain of my lower back, and a severe sprain of my right ankle which did some ligament damage – all from playing the game. Because I can’t seem to tone it down, I’ll cut it out entirely.

I’m getting better/stronger, and that’s more important to me than playing a single game, because staying healthy will allow me to enjoy everything else I like to play. The weekly mileage is only 20km/week right now, but it’s a great start. 40-60km/week is in my near future, and that makes me happy.

clanspiel

So. I had a ridiculous amount of fun yesterday. I was curling. No, seriously. Heaving heavy things in the vicinity of my dad, and not once was I tempted to heave them in anything more than the vicinity.

My dad and Sue are members of the Huntley Curling Club, which had a clanspiel yesterday. The idea of the clanspiel is that you field a team whose members are all related (only 3 have to actually be related, and you can adopt-an-aunt/uncle for the fourth, which we did), and the object is to have a little fun. I had fun. I was surprised.

We all played two games, and there were 16 teams participating. Don’t ask me how they figured out who won, because I’m really not sure. We got smoked in the first game, and made it close in the second, but still lost. I have to say, I didn’t really care how we played, as I was having a pretty darn good time.

Curling is a social game, as you chat with everyone around you between shots. It’s also a civilised game, in that the bar extends into the playing area (provided you use plastic cups, and don’t do something foolish like bring your bevvie onto the ice). I met a whole bunch of super-nice people, along with some folks I knew of in high school, but never really knew, and now I’m kinda sorry I didn’t, but I do now, so that’s something… right?

Long story short, I did all right. I only hogged twice, both the opening shots of the game, and I was lead both times. I think I put three through the house, and the rest were either in the house or taking out others. Sue and Ann worked with me for a little bit before the game, and showed me the mechanics of the whole thing. Halfway through the game, they explained that the first time the broom was tapped to the ice the skip was showing where they wanted the rock to go, and the second was the aiming point. My accuracy got a hell of a lot better after that 🙂

Spending time with Dad and Sue was great, and I’m really happy they invited me along. I think they were a little surprised when I said “ok”, but we all had a great time. The folks at Huntley are awesome, and if I manage to be here in Ottawa as much as I’d like to, I just may play in the social league next year. It was that much fun.

Serious props to Fern Boyd, who at 80 years of age is still playing, and has a broom with a hollow handle from which she dispenses drams on the occasion of a well-placed shot. If I have half the energy she does at 80, I’ll be pretty impressed.

In any event, if I can’t play on a regular basis next year, I’ll definitely be clanning it up. Ideally, by that time, I’ll be able to understand how the scoring system on the board works. 🙂

just in case you folks in ontario and quebec forgot…

So, how many people pay attention to the bill stuffers that Bell Canada sends you? Didn’t think so. When I worked there, it was identified as the preferred method to send any information that wouldn’t be well received by the customer as studies showed a ridiculous percentage of customers tossed all the extra material without looking. But that’s another story…

A gentle reminder that a number of folks in Ontario and Quebec will be forced to switch to 10-digit dialing in the coming months. Those lazy, hazy, hedonistic times where you only needed seven keypresses to connect to someone in your local calling area is coming to an end.

I’m reasonably sure we’ll be seeing more ads for it in the coming months, but in the interim you can have a gander at the Candian 10-digit dialing website. Apparently Stentor was replaced with the “Telecommunications Alliance”, but I’m betting they only present themselves that way because the CRTC told them they had to.

In any event, get ready, as it’ll start working June 17th, and will become mandatory on October 21st or October 28th (dependant upon which area code you’re dialing from).

Powered by WordPress. Reyl Lite designed by Quema Labs.