• Woke up. Ran 29km. Time of 1:23:28. I need to drink more water on these runs.
• Went to brunch, but it was more of a lunch when it happens after Noon.
• Went home and read the newspaper.
• Phoned to catch up and give the birthday phone call that had gotten messed up previously.
• Read a bit.
• Went for a walk to flush the lactic acid out of my legs.
• Purchased some vaguely fetish shirt from “Mars and Venus”. Joanne is a good fashion consultant.
• Relaxed a bit before figuring out that I have to make a dinner tonight because otherwise the meat will go bad.
• Notice that I’m not hungry, so stalled.
• Currently waiting for meat to chill before cooking Wiener Schnitzel.

Nothing happened yesterday so there is nothing to report.
Today, the day seemed to drag on forever. I had a lot of trouble concentrating. So a co-worker and I decided to make the best of it. We left work around 3:30 and went to see Hellboy. The theatre was pretty empty considering it was released today. Then again, it isn’t Lord of the Rings.
It was a good movie, but not a great one. Better than Daredevil. The best part was when hellboy is stalking his girlfriend, and has a nice talk with a nine year old boy.
After the movie, I went back to work to make up for the missing time.
Then I went out to see the Cannes best commercials. After something like that, I try to remember what the best commercials were, and then I try and find them on the internet and download them. It would be easier if I paid to use AdCritic, but I don’t think it is right to pay to see commercials. (I’m aware of the hypocritical nature of that statement, considering I paid to see the Cannes.) The Nike-Presto ones were good, and I had seen them before.
After the second movie, I spent time in a coffee place working on my laptop. I’m trying to figure out the history of my D&D world, and I do that by ripping off other sources. So I need to mesh it in nicely, and that requires some tweaking.
Anyway, that’s it for now.

Okay, the last entry ended in a lie. Something did happen on Tuesday. I had entered my journal into the website and finished the spell check. Before I could submit it, my screen went wavy. Nothing seemed to be doing anything. I turned off my computer, and then tried to turn it on again.
It wouldn’t.
So for the rest of the evening I was concerned that my computer had died, taking the hard drive with it. I had nothing else pressing, so I went to bed early. Since I was well rested, I woke up earlier than I wanted. I couldn’t get back to sleep because I was thinking about all the data I had lost. I decided I would skip running tonight and take the computer back to where I had bought it.
After breakfast I did a last check. The thing started and booted up without a problem. So I quickly started copying the important files onto other media. I was late for work, but I got most of the irreplaceable stuff saved.
This was the first time I have ever backed up.
At least it was very intuitive what needed to be done.
So this evening I recreated my last entry from memory, posted it. Then I wrote this.
Strangely, I’m back to only posting on days that I run.

So much for promises.
I said I would write more often, trying to do it more than just on the days I go running. Then what do I do? I don’t even write on the running days. That’s just sad. At least I got an entry in on Monday, but that was just musings, and not an update as to what has been happening to me.
So here is what has happened.
Nothing happened on Thursday, so there is nothing to report.
Nothing happened on Friday, so there is nothing to report. There was no D&D game because there was an Oiler’s hockey game that several people had to attend. It’s getting near playoff time so they’re a little on edge. Instead the game was postponed.
On Saturday, I kept busy. In the morning I went to get my hair cut. They redid the colors so the blue is now more vibrant. After some banking, I had the D&D game at 2:00. The player’s fought a lot of purple worms, and I nearly killed a few at the “hands” of an air elemental. I shut the game down at 9:00 and then headed off to New City to get some non-nerd socialization in.
Unfortunately, there was no one I knew there. Usually Jake and his group are there by 10:00, but there was no sign of them. So I just stood around. I did see two people I recognized. Christine and Carrie were there. They were the two beautiful girls who were dressed perfectly for the special night last month. I was able to apologize to Christine for accidentally knocking a cigarette into her lap the last time I saw her. She was cool about it and said she was pretty plastered at the time. That was a load of my chest; The pretty girl doesn’t think I’m a total idiot. However, after talking with her, I did the typical Erik thing and continued standing around, not talking to anyone.
On Sunday the morning run was 21km. It was supposed to be 23km but they still aren’t honest with us about distance. Anyway, that is effectively a half-marathon. I ran it in 1:42:28, which makes it the fastest I’ve ever run a half-marathon. Especially good considering that it was a training run and not a race. The rest of the day was maintenance.
On Monday there was the usual Chianti and Die-Nasty. I did get some affirmation that a scooter is good for picking up chicks. During dinner, I was updating my friends on the state of my scooter purchase. The waitress overheard and said “You’re getting a scooter? Cool!” I’m taking that as a good sign.
Nothing happened on Tuesday, so there is nothing to report.

From the subject line, I’m not saying the environment is stupid; I’m saying I’m stupid about the environment. Let me explain.
Epcor, the energy monopoly in Alberta, has a program where you can pay more for your electricity, and then it will come from renewable energy sources. i.e. wind and solar. I believe I still get the same electricity as everyone else, just that more of that pool will come from renewable energy.
According to today’s newspaper: “Alberta is the largest producer of wind power in Canada and is the only province where consumers can choose to buy wind-generated electricity.” – Edmonton Journal 2004-3-29
When this program started, I was living in an apartment where electricity was covered within the rent. Supposedly I could have run a particle accelerator in my place and not paid any more. Since I had no say in how the power was made, I didn’t worry about it. I was too lazy to lobby for it. I did think that if I had a choice, I would choose the renewable energy plan.
Now I’ve lived in a condo for a year, and I pay for my own power. I had totally forgotten about the option. And I do have a choice.
See! Stupid!
I’ve got to get on this now.

I don’t seem to be updating this journal as often as I thought I would. Have I grown tired of it? I seem to only write in it on Sundays and Wednesdays… Both days I go out for runs. Take that how you will.
Maybe it’s because not that much interesting happens to me. I can summarize what has happened since Sunday, but it’s rather flat. Oh wait, there is something interesting!
Yesterday I purchased a scooter.
There is this small scooter store next to where I live. So I pass it all the time. The scooters look fun. I rented one last summer, but my sister wouldn’t let me drive. She had a nice death grip on the steering. Then when I walked in in January, they gave me a nice sales pitch. I think the clincher was that it was great for picking up girls. I find that hard to believe, because nothing I do ever impresses women. But I try not to think about it, otherwise I get depressed.
Going off on a tangent there. Sorry.
So yesterday I went and gave them the down payment. They said they would give me 5% off if I did buy before it came in. Everything about this screams “bad idea!”. That money would make a nice dent in my mortgage. But it looks fun, and I’m only young once. Right now I don’t have enough life experiences to make me happy, so I’ve got to make some more.
Had a fast run today. On the way back, I saw a former co-worker. She was let go when the company was bought out by the big American one. I could only talk while the light was red, but she seemed to be fine.
I’ll try and update tomorrow. Hopefully I’ll be interesting by then.

Every so often I remember a good friend from my days in Winnipeg, Alex. He had a term he used every so often: Apex of stupidity. Every time he thought he had done the dumbest thing possible, i.e. reached his apex of stupidity, he would go and do something dumber. So he never reached his apex. Alex wasn’t in any way stupid, but it was a good joke.
He was also a bit of a musician. So he had a song he started writing.

I’m as dumb as can be
I can’t count to three.
Got no brains.

My car keys I lose
I can’t tie my shoes.
Got no brains.

They took my license away
‘Cause I drove through Safeway
Got no brains.

Any time I do something stupid, I remember that song.
The plan today was to use a cesar salad kit and some chicken to make chicken cesar salad. I need garlic for it so I went out of my way to pick some up. ($0.10 at Save-on-Foods, and that was my only purchase.) Then at 6:30 I decided to start making it. So I take the salad kit out of the fridge. I then notice carrots in it. That’s not right. Close inspection showed this was not a cesar supreme kit, but a taco supreme kit. A slight, but very important, difference.
Dumb as can be.
Other than that, everything proceeds.
On Friday I had a D&D game. I gave my players some self-esteem by letting them kill lots of undead, instead of the usual big monster that takes forever to kill.
On Saturday I went to see the play “Enigma Variations”. It started out simply with a reporter coming to interview a reclusive writer. But with just those two characters they had a surprising number of plot twists. I didn’t care for the actor portraying the reporter though.
This morning I ran 30km. It was supposed to be 32km, but the people who organize the runs can’t seem to keep track of distances. You would think after all this time they would, but studies show, we ran 30km.
My legs hurt.

I wore the token green today. I don’t want to talk about it.
I did not sleep well last night. At about two in the morning, my toe started to hurt. I think I’m getting an ingrown toenail there. I had an operation to correct that on my left foot, but my right foot is still susceptible. My toe nails are really wide so I have to be careful about this. I don’t want to get an operation to fix it now because I’m in training for a marathon. I don’t want to throw away all that work because I’ve got to give my feet a rest for two weeks..
Anyway, a dull throbbing pain in your toe does not let you sleep well. In the past, I used to use some topical liquid that I think sedated the pain. I don’t have that anymore. (It eventually expires.) So at around three in the morning I started rummaging through the medicine cabinet for anything. I grabbed some anti-inflammatory from last year. (At least I think it was an anti-inflammatory) and put some on the toe. Standards of safety drop like a brick at three in the morning. A while later the pain stopped, and I’ve been fine since.
Today at work I found out that a co-worker is leaving the company. Alex was always nice to have around, because he had a little fame about him. In his younger days he won the yellow jersey in the Tour de France. He is now going to be reporting on the Tour de France. With his departure though, I get to claim the spot as the healthiest person at the company. When I say healthiest, I refer to exercising. Not eating. I’m on the eat whatever I want diet.
Speaking of running, I’ve noticed that the Wednesday runs aren’t very encouraging. They only last about forty minutes. It takes me about half an hour to warm up. So for most of the run I’m not feeling relaxed. I feel like I’m just plodding along. But for the last ten to fifteen minutes I feel great. I was really motoring along and I felt like I had good form. But still, most of the time, plodding.

On Saturday I was strangely organized. I got up and started my laundry, then went back to bed to read the newspaper while the machine churned away. I was done fairly quickly which left me with the rest of the day to do with as I pleased. This brings me to the common problem; I don’t have enough to do to keep me occupied. After I did a bit of book shopping I went back to my suite. I changed into shorts and then went onto the balcony and sunned myself, while reading. It was just that warm.
In the evening I decided to try out my bathtub with the water jets. I took a book with me and soaked in warm water for two and a half hours. The hope was that it would help relax my tight calf.
After dinner I went to New City. I don’t have anything exciting to report about that place. It really is just a bar. I only go to that one because there are people I know there. I don’t care for the music and I don’t drink. But I do get to go out and socialize.
This morning I went on a 30km run. The entire time I was focusing on how my calf felt. It seemed to grow tighter throughout, but not enough for me to stop. I tried changing my stride. Usually my run becomes a long plod, but I tried to be bouncier. I think it helped. I ended strongly.
Monica showed up for the run too. She only did the 16km run, but it’s good to see her getting past her injury. I recapped all the people I had met who knew her.
Then there was the brunch. I went home after with intention of going grocery shopping. I never did get around to it. I was still to full to motivate myself to buy any food. I can probably survive until Tuesday, so I should be okay.
For dinner I had a quarter pounder with cheese. They’re on sale on Sundays. That’s the advantage of running. I can eat anything I want. In fact I should probably eat more. Instead I choose to just eat faster.

Today there was a small party to get to know the people in the Ceridian company. They are our partner company in corporate challenge. We’re a little too small to compete effectively, so we’ve teamed up with Ceridian to better our chances. We’re still in the pool of the smallest companies.
Anyway, I talked to a woman, Patty I believe, who is also doing the five mile challenge event. Surprise surprise, she knows Monica too. Ever since Monica stopped showing up for running, I keep meeting people who know her. Well this is the second person. But I’m surprised to find just one person in that category.
Yesterday I submitted by income tax forms. I’m concerned that I’ll now get some extra T-slips. The investment companies always seem to take their sweet time in sending out the forms. Since I have a refund coming, I don’t want to wait any more than I have to.
I’m not going to worry about it. The amount on those slips will be so small that it probably woudn’t change my taxes significantly. Not that I expect to get any. Most of my investments are in RRSPs, since I’ve liquidated most everything else to go after my mortgage aggressively.
On another note we got a message from our corporate overlords recently. There is a new policy concerning vacations. You have to take all the vacation time you accrue in a year, during that year. So I’ve now got to plan out three weeks of vacation for myself. I had hoped to go to Europe this year, but the person I was hoping to go with is trying to buy a house. So I’m trying to save up more vacation time for next year. Regardless, I’ve got to think up some ways to waste time this year. I was thinking of a week in June so I could do the Manitoba Marathon. It doesn’t sound like a relaxing vacation, but I was thinking it was the place to do a marathon. In Winnipeg I’ll at least have family to support me.
My calf musle still feels tight. I’m going to try out my condo’s bathtub tomorrow. It’s got water jets. I’ve never used it, but my sister and mother both enjoyed it.

So today I thought I would try something different. I decided to try running with a faster group for the Wednesday night run. Usually I’m at the front of the five minute (per km) group and in danger of getting ahead of them. But the next faster group (the Speedsters) go a lot faster. I decided to try and keep up with them.
It was only a 7km run, but I quickly found out that they don’t take as many rest breaks as the other groups. I’m not even sure if they take any. If they don’t, I lucked out and got a short break before a hill today.
I was at the back of the group most of the time. But I didn’t completely embarrass myself.
But now that it is a few hours later, my right calf is feeling tight. I’m trying to stretch it some more and massage it. This is the same kind of pain that happened last year that caused my injury that effectively took me out of running for half a year.
Let’s see what happens tomorrow.

So I wake up this morning, fairly early, and realize my legs really hurt. I guess they still haven’t recovered from the long run. I could still function perfectly well, but it was hard to get back to sleep when your legs feel like someone opened them up and is letting them air out.
Once I got up and active, the aches disappeared. But thank you for the attention.
I’ve been looking for an accountant to handle my taxes this year. Because of that large influx of capital from my company’s buyout, there are some details I have to work out. So I checked with the accounting firm that handled the buyout. It was quickly determined by all parties involved that using them would be overkill. Their rates start at $500. For that amount, I’ll try doing it myself. I can screw up multiple times and still be ahead.
There is something I’ve been pondering lately.
Why is (President) Bush considered the leader of the free world?
I could understand that if I voted for him, but I didn’t even have the chance.

So this has been a busy theatre weekend for me. After I did my journal on Friday I went to the play “The Vile Governess and other psychodramas”. Since I worked the concession, I got in free. It was three plays by a local playwright. The first one wasn’t very good, more just weird. But the other two were quite entertaining. I really felt for the governess in question as she was ruining the lives of everyone around her.
On Saturday, I was lazy. I read my book club’s book all day. In the evening I went to see “The Winter’s Tale Project”. It was a musical based on a Shakespeare play. That’s two strikes against it. I despise musicals. When the actors break out into song, all plot development stops. And if I don’t enjoy the song (common occurrence) I’ve got to amuse myself until it’s over. I find Shakespeare.
Now having said all that, this was a fantastic play. The music was always good, and the plot went humming along at all times. By the end there was even a tear in my eye. (Was that a bad thing to admit to?) I would recommend it to a friend, except that the last show was yesterday.
The advantage of seeing the play on Saturday was that I couldn’t go to the bar. So I got a decent night’s sleep for once on a Saturday. The next day I ran 30 km. I did it in 2:30:03. So I missed my goal by three seconds. Well it gives me something to shoot for when I’m doing the same distance next week. Right now my leg muscles are still aching.
In the evening I saw the movie “Lost in Translation”. It was good, but the trailers make it look a lot funnier than it actually was. I’ve read complaints in the newspaper that it portrays the Japanese poorly. Frankly, I thought it made the Americans look worse. Interestingly, a co-worker, Keith, who is a caucasian who knows Japanese and lived there for a few years, said that the Japanese portray the Americans poorly all the time. So we’re still good on the karma scale.
My previous investment broker retired recently. I was never that pleased with him. But today I met the replacement. He was nice enough to visit me at work, and we had an hour long discussion of my finances. I’ve got $5000 I need to invest in something. He seems to be recommending China. It’s a booming economy now. I asked, and Spain isn’t on his radar.
Well, now I’m off to dinner at Chianti. Then I’ll see another play (Die-Nasty). Afterwards I’ll go to the exercise room and stretch my muscles. (They still hurt, remember.)

For the past few days, a co-worker has been bringing her dog into work. The dog has just been through an operation, so needs to be watched. This isn’t usually allowed, but this was deemed an exception. So she has a nice friendly dog in her office.
For most of my life, I’ve had dogs in the family. When I moved to Edmonton and started living on my own, I realized that I cannot have a dog. Being single, the dog would be left at home most of the day. I can’t subject an animal to my lifestyle. So when I do get a chance to interact with a dog, it feels special.
Every so often, at work, I would take a Dog break. I would go to her office and give the dog a good scratching. This was the last day that the dog will be there. But it was really nice to see her. Now I want to take a healthy dog out for a good long run. I do mean healthy, because my runs don’t work on dogs that aren’t in good form.
On another note, I found out that they have rearranged the buzzer codes on the front entrance of my condo building. You know, the list of people and numbers you have to press if you want to talk to them. Normally I don’t pass through the front entrance, because I go to the parking area. When I do pass through, I don’t usually stop and sightsee.
Then how do I know that they rearranged them?
Because now instead of listing them by order of occupancy, they’ve gone to alphabetical order. That puts me right at the top. So if someone is stuck and needs to get in, without knowing who to call, they will ALWAYS pick the first name on the list. So at 11:00 at night, I get ringed up by people wanting in. It happened a few days ago and I wimped out and let the person in. At least I looked at him on the screen to make sure he didn’t look dangerous. But I should have gone down and made sure he wasn’t doing anything wrong as I follow him throughout the building.
This is going to start being annoying. I don’t need this kind of guilt.
If I do start following people around, maybe I should start charging. “Oh you want in? It’s two bucks for the trouble. Think of it as a security deposit.”
But do I have the backbone to try that?

Well I’m feeling bad. I haven’t updated this journal since Friday. Technically it was Saturday, but that is only because I was up really really late on Friday. I must be lazy to have slacked off this long.
Anyway, let’s recap!
On Saturday I did nothing much. Wandered around the condo in a daze. I did get around to doing laundry. In the evening though, I went back to the bar. Jake was there too. I wasn’t much to talk to, as I was still dealing with a lack of sleep. I went home at 11:00, because, as usual, on Sunday I run.
I did something different with the run this week. Lately I’ve been feeling my group was going too slowly. So when a rogue group (not part of any organized Running Room clinic) went past us, I left and joined them. I still only went the distance I was supposed to (19 km) but this time I did it non-stop instead of 10 and 1s. So for the next few days my legs ached. They haven’t ached in awhile, so I take that as a good sign toward building muscles.
After the run I went for brunch. This time Mike was the center of attention, giving everyone history and culture lessons. Apparently the British people really hate the Americans. Something about, during World War II, the Americans having tea with the local girls in England, while all the men were dying in northern Africa. There were also comparisons between Hitler and Bush. Generally stuff that the politically correct wouldn’t talk about.
Sunday evening I went to a coffee place, had a hot chocolate, and tried to clean up my D&D campaign notes.
Monday really doesn’t deserve any mention.
On Tuesday I went to my Improv class. Much to my surprise, the door was locked. Last month’s classmate, Jenny, showed up a minute later. She knows practically every actor in Edmonton, so she phoned the instructor to find out what was going on. Not enough people had signed up, so it was canceled. It would have been nice to know that before.
So I bought Jenny a drink at a coffee place next door and we talked a bit. She eventually convinced me to go with her to see “The Underpants”, a play adapted by Steve Martin. It took convincing because I had, that day, purchased tickets for the Thursday show. So we went, and I had my ticket transferred to Tuesday. A bit of a loss, since I paid Thursday prices for a cheap Tuesday ticket.
The show was good, and it was fun to hang out with Jenny. She seems to know the entire theatre community. The play wasn’t as funny as Roxanne, but it was still something I would recommend.
After, Jenny convinced me (I’m very pliable) to come with her to a birthday party of one of her friends at the Sidetrack Cafe. So we went. After paying the cover charge to get in, we found that the band we were there for was gone, and the party was rapidly shutting down. So we only stayed for half an hour.
Wednesday was a running day. It was colder than I expected.
Today, there isn’t much to report. I had a coupon for $5 off of an Amazon purchase, so I spent half an hour trying to find another book I wanted so I could get free shipping. In the end though, I found that the coupon had expired yesterday. D’oh! Well, Shaw will probably send me another one eventually. They seem to do so every couple of months.
So that brings us up to date. I’ll try and write more often though, so I don’t have to do these long epics.
Speaking of which, I’ve noticed something. If I look at someone at random’s journal, there is usually just a few sentences of information in each entry. Whereas I’ve been raised on ‘s entries which are usually short novels. So I suppose I shouldn’t feel pressured to be like Jeff, when everybody else’s entries are so small.

So the company went bowling today. I was on the worst team. I can’t complain though, the teams were made randomly and I wound up on a team with nobody who was very good at bowling. Interestingly, everyone else had a name starting with “Ma”. I called the team “Erik and the Mas”. It was just five pin bowling. On the first round I got 108, then 113, and finally 127. Daunting when the best bowler I saw got 234.
I didn’t go running today. I didn’t even pretend by going to the gym. This is the only time I have to make an adventure for Friday night’s D&D game. I’m hoping to stall the players with monsters. But I feel obligated to come up with a history to the desert so that I can give better encounters with some substance behind them. So I have to get back to work now.

I walked past one of my neighbors’ door this evening. On the doorstop was a catalog from the Running Room. I find this amusing because he is the last person I can think of that will do exercise. I don’t know him personally, but he looks like the kind of person who will always take the elevator to go up one floor. Ah the joy of stereotyping.
This morning I was depressed. Really depressed. I think I was too tired yesterday to realized I had been rejected by women once again. So it kicked in this morning leaving me cranky and irritable over my mortality and the thought of dying alone. I grew out of it by late afternoon.
It is my father’s birthday today. I’ll be honest that I don’t know how old he is. If I knew I would probably get depressed. And think more about mortality. Let’s not go there.
Improv class was good today. I did a number of scenes, with some that I’m actually not embarrassed about. The instructor complemented me on one skill. I’m always realistic. When I was taking a pizza order, I didn’t try and make it weird, but just a double pepperoni, extra cheese and green pepper. This is odd because he pointed out previously, two weeks ago, that I was doing things that were not realistic. I guess I’m progressing as an improviser.
Tomorrow my work is having a social event. We get off of work early so we can go bowling. I don’t really know the point of the social events, but I’m not going to complain. I haven’t bowled in a long time. Technically, I should be running tomorrow, but this will give me an opportunity to give my knee a rest.
At work this morning I was investigating trying to get a compiler to do an automated task. It fought me tooth and nail, and in the end it won. Metrowerks has gotten really complacent with their product. They believe they have a monopoly (and to a certain extent they do) and they have got a good scam going. Every time the Mac OS is updated, you need to get a new version of the compiler from Metrowerks. This is not a free upgrade, but a rather expensive one. Since they practically have a guaranteed income, without significant work, there seems to be no motivation to make the compiler better. Just a bit more Applescript support is all I’m asking for.

Well, I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up on that one girl. I had no matches. The organizers are recommending that I try with a younger group. I agree, but I don’t see any events for younger people that fit my schedule. Plus the whole thing seems like a magnet for killing self-esteem. It was good to know that the women are a LOT picker than the men.
I don’t really care right now. I’m tired, and it is only Monday.

I have succeeded in making myself busy on weekends. I don’t know if that Improv class was the kicker that did it, but this seems to be the first free time I have after the game on Friday.
I use CIBC for my banking, There is one two blocks from where I live, but I consider it a joke. I have never seen it open. In theory it is a working branch, but the hours it is open are during normal work hours, and never on the weekend. So I consider it a vacant store, except for it’s instant teller. Instead I go to one near where I used to live. It’s a friendly place and the financial advisor I see once or twice a year still recognizes me. I did the transactions I needed, then went home. I should have enough to put a serious dent in the amount of RRSPs I can buy. With maybe a thousand dollar difference, which I’m not going to worry about. As long as I don’t allow it to grow too much, I should be able to kill it eventually. (Or is this how deficit spending starts.) If I start earning more it will help more later.
After that I did a bit of personal shopping. Then I caught up with some computer work I needed to do. I still need to figure out what to do for the D&D game next Friday. I should develop the ancient history of a long forgotten desert empire. Or I could follow my favorite phrase: “Throw monsters at the problem.” The problem is usually the players. Since combat is a huge time suck, it lets me stall the game. And the players get a steady supply of XP, which they rarely complain about.
In the evening I went to New City. I’m starting to enjoy that bar more and more. Since I am parasitic on Jake, I get to meet his friends, and it has helped me expand my social circle more. Sarah was there, and I danced with her a bit. I guess my D&D playing doesn’t make me a total pariah. She has an interesting way of dancing, which involves keeping her eyes shut most of the time. I got to know Shay and his friend Morgan. Both work for a tech support company called Convergys. (Sounds familiar.) Shay is also a Mac person who plays Halo on the Xbox. So we got geeky. I left at around 11:30 so I could get up early the next day.
Sunday morning run was 26km. It took about two and a half hours. Then I went to a brunch at around noon. I tried to eat more protein than carbohydrates this time. I’ve been getting sleepy from previous ones, so I’m hoping this helps. Note: I don’t believe in the Atkins diet. If you want to lose weight, exercise. If you can’t drink orange juice, that’s just wrong.
Then after the brunch, I finished reading the newspaper, and then it was off to the Rapid Fire Theater general meeting. I volunteer for this group of improvisers at a casino, giving them a LOT of money. This allows me to attend their annual meeting. I enjoy their works and it’s cool to hang out with a bunch of actors. Especially at a semi-serious meeting. They all want to be the center of attention so there are a lot of… “antics”. The race to see who can forward a motion first and who can second it is quite fierce. Then there is free food afterwords.
By now it was a bit past six. So I was off to the speed dating. This event only allowed men over six feet tall to come in. Unfortunately the age limit was under 38. Mein godt! The women there were a lot older than me. They weren’t all as attractive as the people organizing it had tempted me with. But I still feel good about this one. I was able to say I did NOT want to meet many people. It felt empowering that I got to reject people instead of it happening the other way around. There was one girl there that I did enjoy, who was about my age. I would like to think we connected, but my track record isn’t that good.
I talked to the organizers after. Apparently men usually want to meet most of the women they interview. Whereas the women would pick maybe one or two men. What does that say about them.

So the CN workers are on strike. I have no strong opinion about this, but I’m wondering if that is why the trains were extra loud early this morning. I was having a nice dream when the train-yard let its presence be known.
Other than that it’s been a beautiful day. It was nice enough that I was out on my balcony, in shorts, reading a magazine. My balcony is south facing, so it gets a lot of sunlight, and it seems to absorb heat. So it was quite comfortable.
I cashed in some GICs and closed my savings account today. Both were opened last April when I had extra money and hadn’t gotten the idea to buy a condo yet (with the accompanying mortgage). But right now I need to buy some more RRSPs. I could also put it towards the mortgage, but RRSPs will come first. I’m going to be draining my bank account to a low level, so I’m hoping I’ve gotten my tax calculations right. I would hate to have to suddenly need to pay taxes when I’ve bought all these mutual funds.

It’s been awhile since I updated. I’m fine, but nothing terribly interesting is happening with me.
Monday I went to Die-Nasty. The regular director has come back, so plot development appears to have stopped.
Tuesday I went to Improv class. I don’t think I performed that well. But I’m there to learn.
Wednesday I went running. It was very warm, so I could have worn shorts. But my knee has been acting up so I want to try and prevent undue stress. People complained that they expected me to be in shorts. It’s my shtick. The Running Room was having a meeting, so all the managers from all over North America were there, and they took part in the run. I even met the store manager for the Winnipeg location closest to my parents. She was nice enough and told me about the Manitoba Marathon route. I’m thinking of doing my first marathon there. That way I will have family to cheer me on, as opposed to Edmonton where there is no family. My mother doesn’t think I should ever do a marathon so I’ll need to sneak it past her.
Thursday I sold one of my D&D books to a friend, Jake. I didn’t like the Dragonlance Campaign setting book when I got it. The content wasn’t that interesting, but the killing stroke was the huge illustrations on the sides of each and every page. They took up about 20% of each page. I would have preferred actual content. The best part of the book was the time-line, and I only liked that because it gave a good example of how one should be displayed. I use the same format now in my campaign guide.
Friday. i.e Today. At work we learned that a co-worker was leaving for another company. He had only been with our company for six months, and he seemed able to get away with one day’s notice. As soon as he was out of the cubicle, the vultures descended. People started looking through the remnants for stuff to loot for their cubicle. It sounds grisly, but it is one of the best ways to upgrade your peripherals. It’s hard to get a manager to agree to replace a perfectly good keyboard, for a slightly different ergonomic one. It’s all around easier to just take it from a departing co-worker.
This evening we had another game of Empire Builder. It ended sooner because we were more on the ball of how to play. In the end I won, by a nose. The lowest denomination in the game is 1 million dollars. The goal is to get $250 million and connect six cities. If multiple people are above $250 million, the highest total wins. So I ended with $256 million, while one of my opponents had $255 million.
Tomorrow I’m going to see about scrounging up some money from the bank to buy RRSPs. I’ve squirreled away some in various accounts where it isn’t doing me as good as an RRSP would.
On Sunday I have a run, then an annual meeting of a local theater company. In the evening I have one more attempt at speed dating. Fun fun fun!

I finally got the response from Valentine’s Night massacre.

Hi Erik
Hope you had fun at Edmontondatenight !!!
You did not receive any matches on Feb 14th Valentine’s social.
Many people did not hand in thier cards…boo… Anyway
check out our website www.edmontondatenight.com
for upcoming events that might interest you.  

Thanks for coming we enjoyed having you !!

  As expected. Hope the one next Sunday goes better.

So this evening I was in a local coffee place having a hot chocolate when I wind up meeting Alice from the Improv class. That is the advantage of having blue hair. People are more likely to recognize you.
She was more interesting than the the computer I was working on, so we ended up talking for a couple of hours. She’s Wes Borg’s girlfriend so nothing is going to happen, but she is a fascinating person. She took nine months to go to clown college in California. Although she struck me as confident, she claims she doesn’t have any confidence either. Does anyone in the class have it?

So, I’m guessing my reader(s) will want details of what happened last night.
I get to the bar at 7:00. I wasn’t sure whether it was supposed to start at 7:00 or 7:30 so, as always, I erred on the side of caution. I sign up, pay my money, and hear the spiel. This wasn’t speed dating. This was actually just a plan to get a whole bunch of single people into a bar together, with no age restrictions. i.e. There were some really old people there. They did have some speed dating off in the corner. I signed up for that and met with six women for four minutes each. I hope I was pleasant, but past experiences have proven I’m not charming.
Beyond that, it was just a bar. I suck at bars. If I don’t know anyone, I really suck. All the classic bar experiences were there.
As usual, the girls traveled in packs. I’m not sure they realize how intimidating that is. I did suck it up and talk to a pair of nice looking girls. But I don’t think they were that interested. I confessed being nervous and, in a nice cliche, one said, “Don’t worry. We don’t bite.” I can’t help but thinking life would be easier if that was the worst they could do to me. I really couldn’t sustain a conversation with them, which I take as a bad sign. I asked them questions, but they never asked me questions. I’m probably a creepy stalker in their minds.
They didn’t have any security there, so after awhile, the people who are regulars at the bar came in. So you no longer had the comfort of knowing that everyone was single.
There were some nice girls that I had met during the speed dating portion of the evening. But after that, they either disappeared, were absorbed into their pack, or spent the entire evening talking to someone else I assume they hooked up with.
I did talk to the radio personality that was there, Karly Kincaid. She was nice, but technically not part of the festivities. I sent her a valentine (we were all given one to give to anyone else there) because no one else there seemed interested in me. So I can now say I tried to mingle with a celebrity. I would have sent the valentine to the cute pair of girls, but they left before I had a chance. They seemed to be the center of attention, so I doubt I would stand out.
I actually find it easier to talk to waitresses and coat check girls. There is no pressure talking to them, and I think that I’m actually pleasant to talk to at those times. But all the other women, I just can’t sustain a conversation with.
The newspaper yesterday covered the single people gathered together by the Edmonton Journal. I read some interesting observations. 1) On Valentine’s day: “It’s a couples day. You can be non-Irish and participate in St. Patrick’s Day, but Valentine’s makes you feel left out. 2) “…the best place to meet people is through hobbies or interests, such as running. When they do find someone they like, it’s even harder asking for that phone number of coffee date.”

I just got back from the speed dating.
Self-esteem gone: check
Ego draining away in a small puddle: check
Temptation to go to a prostitute: check
This announcement has been brought to you by the Erik whining network.

So it is Valentine’s Day.
Tonight I go to the speed dating. The event:

“THE NIGHT OF 200 HEARTS”        Saturday, February 14th 
At this special event, 200 singles will meet in a fun, relaxed, and low-pressure environment.  Your $25 admission includes appetizers from 7:30pm to 8:30pm, one drink and your first “heart”.  Partial proceeds of this event will support the Heart & Stroke Foundation.  Edmonton Date Night has reserved the entire premises and EVERYONE will get a date card and a wristband.  We will have opportunities to speed date and you may just meet that special someone you have been looking for!  Located at the NEW south side location of The Overtime Broiler and Taproom (formerly Scruffy Murphy’s) at Whitemud Crossing. 

So far I haven’t been thinking about it much, but it starts in half an hour, so the butterflies are starting to churn. I hope I look presentable. (Yep. Hair is still blue.) I expect my self-esteem will take a major hit by the time this is all over.
I’ll try and post an update when I get back. But remember, I’m running 23 km tomorrow, so I may want to sleep first.

I’ve finally caught up. I’ve been writing journal entries on my computer for the past week and I finally got around to posting them all. So if you are reading this, you might want to check my previous entries in case you missed them. It was hectic and tiring, but I still made sure to enter them. I suppose the more hectic your life is, the harder it is to post entries, but also more important that you do so.
I have no idea how canticle does it. He seems to be able to write massive essays every day. I simply don’t have the time to do that. And all of his entries are thought provoking editorials on today’s society. All I do is whine and complain about lack of self-esteem and girlfriend. Blah!
I’ve got to try and perk up and be more upbeat. I have that speed dating on Saturday.
I got the nose tabs repaired on my glasses. It wasn’t an emergency because they were the ones I used for computer use, but it’s nice to have them stable again.
I’m finally beginning to relax. I guess I was tired from stressing over the project.
It’s far to late now, so I’m going to bed.

This entry was added on the 12th. But I wrote it on the correct date. I just didn’t post it until I had all the previous entries in.
Finally done. At 5:00 today we finished testing and sent the project off to whatever circle of hell it is destined for. I feel less tired, and definitely less stressed.
There was a free lunch at work today because there was a webcast from the head office in Costa Mesa. The announcement was that they were trying to lower R&D costs to be more in-line with the rest of the industry. They were going to do that by moving some operations offshore. The entire time they were saying they didn’t want to, but all the other companies were. (Do we want to be like to cool companies.) They have reiterated that they consider Edmonton offshore. Apparently this city doesn’t pay their programmers much.
I went to improv class today. Everyone was a little mellow, so we weren’t doing zany antics. Instead we were doing characters. First they had everyone tell a story about themselves, interesting or not. Then everyone else analyzed how the person told the story. Then the story was told again, but with suggestions as to how to make it look like a different person had told it.
For my turn, I told them what my Sunday mornings are usually like. They pointed out that I talked with a higher pitched voice when I was telling it. And that I was very “architecturally strict” in my posture. So the next time I had to lower my voice and be in a far more relaxed position. It ended up looking like I actually had just done a run. I was complemented on the severity of the change. I wish I could take credit for it all, but the long breath I took that they liked was actually just me trying to remember what came next in the story.
For the second part of the class, we had to come up with a character and be interviewed as them. I made a character I thought would be very different from me; someone with confidence. Curtis was a bartender at a top 40 bar. I had a few affectations that were good (checking myself in the mirror, being friendly with the girls), but I could have done the posture better. And my hands were doing their own thing. But that is why I’m taking the course, to learn how to be better.
Jenny, another student, said she could use more confidence too. This was odd because she always seemed like a confident person to me. I’d like to get to know her better, but as we have covered, I don’t have the confidence.
One girl, Alice, had a very good character. A teenager who was dating an older boy. What was interesting was that she was chipper with most of the questions. But when she got one that was too probing she suddenly became more intense, ready to snap. Then just as quickly, she went back to cheerful.