Still postdating. It is still the 12th.
We’re still not done. We got hung up on testing to make sure everything worked. Of course not everything worked. So we are still fixing it. We were able to extend the deadline by another day. If we can get it done early tomorrow morning, then we’ll be able to get it to the localizers in Ireland while it is still Tuesday there.
Die-Nasty was great. The usual director was gone and was replaced by someone who understands that things need to happen and plot is needed to move the story forward. It was like the classic Die-Nasty under Trevor Anderson. I’m sure the usual director will be back next week, but at least we got some stuff happening.
I’m really tired by this point. I treated myself to a dose of caffeine with a coke at dinner. I need it. This project is totally draining me.
I need a vacation.

Once again, this entry is postdated. It is actually the 12th for me.
So, functioning on very little sleep, I went running.
Mike is leading the running group I’m in. He was given the job of being leader for the 3:30 marathon group. Before that, I was informally leading. Which was great because I didn’t have to answer to anyone and I could make the others go faster if I wanted. Apparently runners have no backbone and follow orders quite easily. Mike has more restrictions as he actually does have to answer to the person teaching the current marathon clinic.
Anyway, while we were running, Mike was given a lecture by Jason, an actual employee for the Running Room. Mike was apparently running too fast, and Jason knew because he had been running for a long time. We might even have been going race pace. (Heaven forbid!)
But later on, we did some math in our heads (a dubious process at best, but bear with me) and we figured that we were right on the mark. Not going too fast. So I commented “So should we go club that guy?”
Apparently Jason overheard this and was very offended. I apologized and proceeded to feel bad about it for the rest of the run. (I seem to always be able to focus on the things that crush my self-esteem.) That is until it was pointed out that Jason was far too sensitive. We make remarks like that all the time and never mean any of it. That same run we said “Let’s beat him up and take his shoes” about someone who was ahead of the group.
It should have been clear that I was joking.
At brunch later we had the final calculations that showed that over a 19 kilometer run we were off the correct time by eight seconds. So the rest of the meal was spent complaining about Jason. Mike would admit if he was wrong, but was offended that he was lectured when he in the right the entire time. And Jason’s complaint that people were breaking off from the group near the end was silly. All runners speed up at the end of a run. Heck, Jason’s girlfriend did it today.
After brunch I went back to work. Cameron showed up soon after to help. We finished most of the project, but there is still a bit to do. After four hours though, I wasn’t able to focus. I went out for dinner for some sushi, and spent the evening trying to relax. I finally got around to reading Thursday through to Sunday’s newspapers.

Once again a postdated entry. It is still the 12th, and I’m hoping to get up to today… um, today.
My hairstylist at Swizzlesticks is Melissa. I trust her completely. I tell her every time that I have no sense of style and that she should do whatever she thinks is best. (I don’t have to look at my hair.) So if she wants to color it or bleach it, I let her go ahead. Through this all, I’ve always been suggesting the color blue. Five years ago I had colored all my hair blue, and then on to different colors over the next year.
Well my goading of her finally kicked in and I have blue hair again. I wasn’t sure she was going to do it, but there it is. Blue. It isn’t completely blue, but there are small chunks of blue throughout. The rest is natural hair color.
I can’t blame her. I did cross the line when for Christmas I gave her blue hair dye to do with as she pleased. But up until the time I walked into Swizzlesticks today I was sure she wouldn’t do it.
Ten minutes after leaving the salon, and walking home, I had someone complement me on my hair. I’ve missed that. I like having attention. When it was completely blue I could always get a reaction. It isn’t as eye-catching, but it’s something.
In the afternoon, after a half hour of relaxing, I went back to work and tried to finish up the project. I worked four hours, plus a break to grab a lunch/dinner (lupper?) from McDonalds, Then I went home. I’m still not done. I’ll be back in tomorrow.
While I was at work the front button on my watch fell off. I’ve had this one for less than two years. My last watch lasted half a lifetime (at the time that was 14 years). The glasses I use for computer use are eight years old, and the nose tabs have fallen off. I need to get organized and get these all repaired.
After work I went home and tried to relax. I’m feeling stressed with this deadline though. At around 9:00 I went to New City. I met Jake there and again used his table as a home base. I talked to a girl there named Sarah. I believe she was a friend of Leanne, Jake’s girlfriend.
She was nice, but she knew I played D&D. She didn’t have a lot of respect for the game. She said that all the people who play it have no families and… basically she described the stereotypical D&D nerd. What hurt was that I fit that stereotype. I don’t have a girlfriend, and I use computers. I’d like to think I’ve moved beyond it, but it’s hard to ignore the facts. That was a downer for the rest of the evening.
Apparently Sarah knows Monica (the person I used to run with). I wonder if it will get back to Monica that I have D&D as a hobby. It’s a small aspect of my life that I don’t feel the need to talk about constantly. But at least I can give Sarah some evidence that I’m not just a D&D stereotype.
I got home at around 1:00. I have to get up early tomorrow to go running. (Not D&D!)

I entered this journal entry on the 12th. I’m trying to catch up to the current day while still listing all the things that have happened to me. So this is a little weird. I’ll try speaking in the present tense about things that happened in the past.
I worked late again to try and get the product ready for Monday. Thankfully I haven’t been told when on Monday, so I’m hoping for some leeway there. It looks like I’ll need to come in on the weekend to get everything done.
However I had planned my first “Random Acts of Gaming” for the new year today. RAOG is an event I have occasionally where some friends get together and play some games. Not D&D, but anything that someone brings. It’s a fun way to force myself to play all the games I’ve purchased over the years.
So tonight we decided to finally play “Empire Builder”. We started at 7:00 with just three players. From the first turn Cameron was saying he was going to lose. He had made a mistake that essentially made him lose a turn. Of course in the end he won. That’s because I kept drawing disasters that effectively made Andrew and me lose a turn.
We finished the game at 2:30 in the morning. The box said it was a three hour game. After midnight you could tell our decisions were getting loopier. I watched Cameron determine he had to build a straight railroad line to Regina, despite having previously built one nearby, so that he could save a bit of time on one delivery. He probably spent more making the railroad than he did on the delivery.
Being up so late was a problem, because I have an appointment at 10:15 on Saturday morning to get my hair cut.

I’m writing this entry on February 8th, because I’ve been too busy to actually enter anything here. On Tuesday I was asked when a project I was working on would be done. I said it would be on Friday. Since then I found that the devil is in the details. Each little part of this is taking longer than expected. So I was behind schedule, but only by one or two days. Then on Thursday I found out that the “powers that be” decided that Monday would be a good day to release. I worked late on Thursday to try and catch up. I’m sure you can tell what is going to happen based off of when I’m posting this.
I got around to signing up for an Edmonton Date Night. i.e. Speed dating. The event is going to take place on Valentine’s day. It seemed appropriate. It beats my usual plan of going to an Italian restaurant and watching/glaring the happy couples. 🙂 I’m not sure I can attend because the Edmonton Journal event is taking place at the same time, but if they do decide they want me for that, I can cancel this event.
I also mentioned my interest in an event where the men had to be six feet tall. The person who took my appointment said that there were gorgeous women signing up for it, but not enough men. This sounds interesting.
I still have to catch up on the other LiveJournal entries, but right now I’m exhausted. I would put Tired as my current mood, but that isn’t correct for when this entry is supposed to take place. So I’ll leave it blank.

Right, after that disastrous wasted weekend I’ve decided for a change. I’ve come to the realization I’m a boring person. If I don’t have any plans for a weekend, I obviously don’t have enough to do. I know I could prepare for a D&D game, but I’ve got to start living again.
So yesterday I went back to Improv class. I’ve taken these classes every so ofter, but now I’m going to commit myself to taking them regularly. My hope is that it will help me be a more interesting person, help me learn to socialize, and keep me busy. A boost to the self-esteem would be a plus too. It still isn’t giving me something to do on weekends, but it’s a start.
The class was fun, and there were two lines that I wish I had been the one to say them.
1) “Get out of my life… but be back in five minutes.”
2) The last words of a dying man to the woman who shot him: “If you go back in time, don’t touch anything.”
I really have to work on the self-esteem. It sucks not having any. There are friends I have that I really like. I think they are incredibly cool. But in my head I think that they are really just annoyed with me and are too polite to tell me to go away. I feel like the little dog in the Looney Toons who is constantly hanging around the big tough bulldog and saying how great the bulldog is. I’m sure you know the one I’m talking about.
Maybe I should take some drugs for depression? I’ve talked to someone recently who is taking them and they sound, well… groovy. (Clockwork Erik?)
Or I could start drinking.
Anyway, on to less depressing subjects.
I got home from work and saw the temperature was only -4 celsius. That’s warm enough for wearing shorts while running. Unfortunately that was right before the sun went down, and didn’t take into account that within the river valley, the warm air has risen away. In other words, I shouldn’t have been wearing shorts. I think it got down to -10 while I was out there. That’ll learn me
Further updates as they warrant.

So the other day I discovered that my email at work has some filters on it. This came up when I was emailing a friend to see if they would like to see a play. I mentioned that it was at a theatre where we had seen another play. He replied back promptly, but I never got the message. I didn’t even get a warning that there was a message. As near as I can tell it is because the play I had mentioned in passing was called “Pornstar”. An enjoyable work with no nudity. I’m not even sure if there was coarse language. When my friend replied, he included my message in it. So email with the word “pornstar” gets deleted before I see it.
I have another friend who was working a booth at the “Everything to do with sex” show this weekend. I wanted to ask him how the experience was.
I used my home email for that.

Well this weekend has been a waste.
Friday was fine. We even got out of work early because of a snowstorm that was covering Edmonton with snow. So it gave me a bit longer to prepare for a D&D game. The game started out well. the player’s discovered some aftereffects of the power of ancient wizards. Specifically someone had drilled a trough through several mountains. Then the player’s got cranky when they discovered another relic of power that transported them far and away to a desert. So much for that quest. In my defense it was getting harder to make believable challenges for my players in their current stomping ground. If they encounter a monster tough enough to provide them with a challenge, why hasn’t it conquered the small human settlement in the valley. So off to the desert of purple sand.
But the rest of the weekend wasn’t productive. I did the standard sleeping in and reading the newspaper on Saturday. But after that I didn’t do much. I wandered Whyte Avenue a bit, but didn’t really do anything memorable. Then I decided to play an X-Box game (Splinter Cell) and did that until late in the evening. Made myself a quick dinner and went to bed.
The next day I convinced myself to sleep in and not go running. It was -23 so it was warm enough that I should have gone, but I just didn’t have the energy. I slept in, read the paper, ate half a breakfast and then used the Condo’s treadmill. I hadn’t given myself time to digest, so I broke down after only two miles. I went back to playing Splinter Cell and just started feeling blah. At around 3:00 I decided to go to McDonalds and get something to eat. (It’s really cheap if you get the daily special.) It was then that I noticed that I had forgotten to eat the other half of breakfast that morning (explaining why I felt blah). I went to Chapters and looked through some books, before going back to playing Splinter Cell. Then I made dinner (Fajitas) and now I’ve gone to a coffee place to have a hot chocolate and write in my journal. (No I don’t have remote access to the internet, but I can save a file and post it later.)
So, in boring detail, that is what I did. A wasted weekend.
I could have gone to the “Everything to do with Sex” show that is in town now. But it feels kind of pointless when you haven’t had any sex. I’m pretty sure they don’t give free samples. 🙂
I played video games most of the time. I have a problem with them. I think I like them more than I actually do. So I’ll buy a game and never play it. I have to force myself to get around to playing them, which makes it feel like work instead of fun. Then I’ll binge on the game, hoping to get as much done as possible. It does take me awhile to give up on a game. I think I’ve decided that Master of Orion III is not worth the effort and I’m not enjoying it. But I still feel I should play it to get my money’s worth.
I don’t have another D&D game for four weeks, so I think I’m going to try and address some of my other interests. I want to get back into writing a Fractal World generator program. I keep letting that slip in the face of other commitments.
I saw Canticle‘s description of how he would like Dueling to come back into style. I’m sure I’m misinterpreting what he meant, but I can’t think of a scarier idea. Well I can (end of separation of church and state?) but this is the one I’m thinking of. If we started using duels to decide matters, then the skill of dueling becomes more important than ANYTHING. You can just imagine the effects.
“I have just discovered the answer to the Unified Field theory!”
“No! I have discovered it. It involves Twinkies!”
“I find that hard to believe. I have been studying physics for twenty years, and Twinkies are not going to solve anything.”
“Well, I don’t care. I challenge you to a duel to prove who is right.”
“What?”
“Agreed then! Have at you!”
“Wait, No- Ack” Thud.
“Right. We’re all in agreement now. Twinkies!”
Even if we take out the sword requirement, and change it to some video game, it still remains a problem. An otherwise useless skill (useless towards the advancement of humanity) is suddenly given weight it doesn’t deserve. That’s why people hate lawyers. They have taken a useless skill (arguing over technicalities) and abuse it’s artificial power.
In other words, all that would be accomplished would be to replace lawyers with duelists.

I watched the Best Superbowl commercials on TV yesterday. I always want to see the Superbowl so I can see the great commercials. From anecdotal evidence I believe other people would agree with me. So I watched that program. Man it was terrible. They targeted the football people. So they had many football commentaries and very few commercials. Then they treated me like an idiot, explaining in voice overs what was going on.
I hate commentators. They always seem to think they are more important than what they are supposed to be commentating on. This is why I hate disc jockey’s too. Stop talking and play the music!
I am obviously in a cheerful mood today…

The problem with this journal is that when I try and write the day’s summary, I forget details I wanted to include. Yesterday for instance. Before I go to Die-Nasty, I go to the restaurant Chianti which has a cheap pasta night. It’s good food and a cheap price. I’ve gotten faster service there than at McDonald’s.
Anyway, I was there yesterday and I was talking to the cute waitress, Cara. She described how her boyfriend was coming in that evening from Amsterdam. I just laughed.
Now if the above was written in yesterday’s journal, it would have made sense, because I would have been talking about how cold it is. Here, it is out of context, and just looks weird. I’m thinking that I should keep a notepad with me so that I can remember what I should write in my Journal.
This evening I went to see the play “The Last Train”. The acting was good. The set was very well done. The actual play was lousy. There was very little plot, and ended up being about five women telling about their relationships with painters and whining. It was tedious. I wouldn’t recommend it.
So I’ve been trying to give eHarmony some money for awhile now. But they keep thinking that my postal code doesn’t exist, so they refuse to accept my billing information. I’ve been wanting to contact a girl named “Angela” who is apparently a good match for me. She has a cat, which is a big strike against her, but the rest of her profile makes her sound interesting.
I got a message today from eHarmony’s tech support as to what to try. When I logged in though, Angela has decided, based off of my profile, that she never wants to hear from me.
That hurts.
I’m now rethinking the whole eHarmony idea. The only other person they have put on the list of people I should contact has said barely anything about herself. I’ll mull this over for awhile. I’m thinking of going back to trying speed dating. I still haven’t heard from the Edmonton Journal to see if they want to embarrass me in front of all of Edmonton again.
It’s still insanely cold here. I know I’m not going to run outside tomorrow. I’ll give the treadmill a try. It’s boring, but at least it isn’t -30.

The weather here has been -33 all day. With the windchill it’s been down to -47.
If this keeps up, I’m not going to go running outside. There is a treadmill in my building and I will use it if I have to.

So I finally organized myself enough to go out to New City again. Surprisingly I found someone I knew there, Jake. He is actually the one who gave me the advice that I repeated in my first LiveJournal entry: “I think someone mentioned to me once that you have to go to a bar several times before they start accepting you. ” I wasn’t expecting him to be there, but now that I think of it, he may have mentioned that New City was his regular bar. I didn’t actually expect to run into him. So, being the social parasite that I am, I used his table as a home base. I talked to some of the other people there. It was by far the most successful trip to a bar that I have ever had. But still, it takes a lot for me to start talking to a person I don’t know.
I’m actually worried that I’m not an interesting person. When I’m talking to someone I have a tendency to not talk about myself. I’ll happily listen to the other person, but I don’t add much to the conversation. Not very interesting. I would like to think that I could talk about myself, but I need to learn to force myself to do that. I noticed it today at brunch where I was listening to other people talk and not adding anything myself. (Social Parasite?) That might have been from lack of sleep though. I’ve got to come up with some anecdotes. I was even asked questions that would have been a good opening. I was put on the spot for not drinking coffee, tea, or alcoholic beverages. They tried to see about getting me out and forcing me to drink. I’ve had that offer countless times before. Friends who know me have an easy time being polite by offering me a beer they know I won’t accept.
I don’t think my running club knows me at all. I used to run with a girl name Monica (used to because she injured herself and hasn’t shown up for a run or a brunch in quite some time) who would happily talk about her work and education. But the more I think about it, she really didn’t know anything about me. I never mentioned my hobbies to her. Maybe I’m embarrassed about playing D&D?
One of the problems I had last night was that a person I was talking to was a smoker. Edmonton doesn’t have a bylaw yet that says no smoking in public. She lit up several times while I was talking to her so I got a good dose of secondhand smoke. So when I woke up this morning, I felt congested. My throat felt scratchy and still does. That latter part may have been from trying to talk over the loud music, but I don’t think so.
So under these conditions I went for a 16 km run. It was only -19, but the wind chill pushed that down to -31. It wasn’t actually that bad. I layered enough, and traction was actually quite good. From all the snow we’ve gotten recently, I wouldn’t expect that, but the sidewalk sweepers had done a good job.

So this evening I decided that I would tackle some of the mess left over from when I moved into my condo. There were some boxes of papers that I decided to go through and see what I needed to keep.
There were old notes from a D&D campaign in there. I’m probably going to save those for sentimental reasons. I also found all the notes I made from old computer games. There was a map to a Civilization I game from long ago. I found maps for Ultima 4. I loved that game and actually made myself a large poster map of the entire world. I found my maps from Ultima 6. That was a lot harder to map, but I still did a pretty good job. I still remember Jeff (probably the only person who reads this journal) playing that game while I mapped everything. Whenever he took us to the other world, he would sing the “Gargoyle land” song. I’m sure I’ll be embarrassing him with that memory if he ever becomes famous and they interview me to dig up dirt.
I also found a collection of the Syllogist. At the time it was the Faculty of Arts periodical. Jeff wrote some articles for it. I did to (despite being in the Faculty of Science) so I could be just as cool as Jeff.
So I was looking through these old issues and I come across an article titled “The Golden Rule”. A diatribe by one Jeff Franzmann. It’s all about America’s Manifest Destiny and how it relates to the war on Iraq. Keep in mind that this was published on March 27th, 1992. (12 years ago! I feel old.) It reads surprisingly topical. It helps that the president has the same name. One line looked interesting:

The citizens and government of the United States seem to think of themselves as moral paragons. They talk of “New World Order” and being the “911 of the world” (George Bush).

Eerie.
I read that and I look at his LiveJournal, and realize that Jeff has remained very dependable. He is still making great rants. He still has a bone to pick with the Unitied States. I’d copy out the entire article and post it here, but I don’t have a scanner or OCR. So you are better off asking the original author if he still has a copy hanging around.

For the first few year of my life in Edmonton I walked everywhere. I didn’t have a car, and I didn’t like having a bus dictate my schedule for me. It was just a half hour to get to work, and it kept me healthy. Work back then was much the same as it is now: Sitting down all day.
Anyway, on the way to work there was a lumber yard that had two german shepherds guarding it. Every time I walked by they would bark and growl at me. I missed the family dog so I actually liked this. I would try encouraging them. As near as I could tell, the gate to they lumber yard was always open at that time, so they could have come out and ripped me to shreds if they wanted. But they seemed happy enough to just bark at me from the safety of behind the fence.
Eventually I got a job at a different company and I stopped walking past the lumber yard.
The point? I saw today that they had renamed that place “Big dog lumber”.

I make no secret that on Wednesdays I go running with the Running Room run club. (Sorry, I couldn’t fit more “run”s in there.) So that’s what happened today. It was only -9, so it wasn’t too bad. I didn’t mind the sleet, but the real pain in the neck (legs) was the loose snow that covered everything. Running up a hill is not fun when you can’t trust that every step won’t take you forward the appropriate distance to the energy expended. (F=MV)
An interesting aspect of the Running Room that I go to, is that it is located right next door to a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant. So before and after every run there is the sweet scent of grease. I’m not being sarcastic. After a run, it smells really good. My problem is that I hate KFC. Every couple of years though, I forget that I hate it, so I go out and buy some. Then feel stupid for forgetting that I hate it. So far I’ve never gone to that KFC.
Good news on my condo. I finally complained to the right people about things that weren’t finished. So when I came home today I found doors fixed, lightbulbs installed and latches applied. But still there are those scrapes in the bathroom. Well, we’re making progress.

So I went for the public humiliation. I signed up, once again, for the singles mingle that the Edmonton Journal is setting up. I was up front and honest with the webpage and cited my past history with their contests. So now I just wait and see what happens.
Earlier today I had posed the question “What do my friend’s think of me” to a co-worker/friend. He didn’t want to answer, but eventually I got “Meticulous and strait-laced.” I can’t argue with that, so I put it on the application.
I’d ask the peanut-gallery here what they think of me, but as near as I can tell, I only have one person reading this. If he hasn’t responded by now… well it’s too late in either case.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I am programmer at heart. I’ve become enthralled at how this web page is working. That I can “click here” and suddenly have more options appear. I want to know how I can program this. So I’ve taken time and started playing with Javascript to figure out how I can abuse this system.
Anyway, about three years ago I opted for some nice public scrutiny/humiliation. The Edmonton Journal published that they were having I dating game. I decided to apply, having nothing better to do, and being lonely. In the end I was picked to go on a date with Kimberly Bigl. I had a good time, but I read in the paper the next day that her response was “I had an awesome time. He was so nice and nice looking, but I just don’t think we’re compatible.” Shot down in front of the greater Edmonton area. The newspaper said that even if it didn’t work out, that other people would probably be interested in contacting me. But I’ve heard nothing. And that has pretty much been my love life for the past three years.
Why is this relevant?
I read in the Edmonton Journal this sunday that they are doing a similar experiment of trying to fix up single people. I have not learned my lesson, I have nothing better to do, and I am lonely. I just need to apply. The question I’m stumped at is “How do your friends describe you?” It’s very open and I haven’t gotten a serious answer from co-workers. (Any suggestions?)
At the same time, some people in my running club decided that they need to try and fix me up with someone. I’ve heard that story before, so I’m not holding my breath.
I also recently decided to try eHarmony.com. They claim that they probe your personality and determine who would be my perfect fit. So I did the personality test, and now I have several people I need to contact to see if we’re really compatible.
But will any of this lead anywhere?

So I DM’d another game of Dungeons and Dragons today. Not much happened. They were finally in town after being gone for months (for a year in the real world) so most of the game was taken up with selling loot and doing the downtime stuff. I tried to make it interesting by sprinkling in some minor town encounters with the locals. What really hit the group hard was the fact that their home base is a small town. They couldn’t get nearly what they wanted for their stuff, because no one had the money for such valuable items.

One of my players wanted to play a new character. He had been playing someone else’s and now wanted to make his own. We decided to try and sneak the character on the party with a bait and switch tactic. So I had a non-player character introduce himself and imply that he wanted to join the party. I was planning to switch him with the real character at the last minute. So I’m role-playing this man, while the person they think is going to play him is sitting next to me.

I couldn’t help but think of an old Bloom County comic. The one where Opus and Michael Jackson have switched places. At one point, while Mr. Jackson’s accountant is talking, Opus is thinking, “Surely this man must suspect something.” To which the accountant eventually says “Michael, did you get another nose job?” I felt like the Opus in that comic. The players bought it hook, line and sinker. The switch happened and they were all suitably surprised.

If that’s the high light of my day, I’ve really got to get a better hobby.

I’m going to try and insert some HTML into this entry. I hope it comes out correctly.
I received the latest issue (January 19, 2004) of Time magazine today. In the Verbatim they had an interesting quote.

“I believe the reason I smoke and drink and my wife is overweight is because we watched TV every day for the last four years.”
—Timothy Dumouchel, who threatened to sue a cable company for providing free cable for four years after he asked that it be canceled.

I shared that with the people at work. Especially since the chief programmer has been receiving free cable from Shaw for quite some time. So he determined that “I should sue shaw.” It quickly became apparent that he had just created a fairly good tongue-twister.
He went on to conclude that they probably picked the name deliberately. “What’s the hardest word to sue?”
Continuing on that idea… “You go to the lawyer and say ‘I want to shoe Shaw.’ By the time the lawyer figures out what you want to do, you’re out of money.”
I keep telling the chief programmer that he needs a radio show, or at least to take his rants on the road.
At work they’re looking at moving us out of out current building. Apparently the server room doesn’t have enough cooling and is starting to melt the servers. So I may actually have an honest to god commute I’ll have to deal with. We still might stay in our current facilities because they are cheap compared to other rates in the neighborhood. But we need to find a way to cool that server room.
The temperature is still warm here. It’s warm enough that yesterday, when I went running, I did it in shorts. Of course there is still lots of snow and ice on the ground, and I was the only one in the Running Room store who was in shorts. So I was mocked. But as usual, halfway through the run other people were saying they wished they had chosen shorts too. I know it’s petty, but I feel really good after having mocked choices justified.

It’s warm here, but thankfully the city has gotten used to it enough that the sidewalks aren’t doubling as a skating rink anymore. So when I went running today it was fairly good. I think I’m getting back into it again. My moment of doubt is over.
Anyway, I’ve been thinking about music again. The timing of yesterday’s post was interesting. That same day, one of the radio stations I listen to completely changed their format. They’re targeting the older people now, which I am sad to say is what I am now. In other words they are playing songs from the 80’s forward. And they don’t seem to be talking either. I listened to them on the way to work and not once did I hear a DJ. It was a nice change of pace. That doesn’t mean I like the songs they were playing, but it was nice that I knew I only had to wait four minutes before a different song would come on. In fact, I was enjoying the song that just started when I pulled into work. I couldn’t listen to it, but I liked it.
Which brings me to another interesting facet of myself. When I go running, it seems that the last song I listened to, that I liked, will play in my head for the entire run. So while I was running seven kilometers today, I had an early Dido song going through my skull. When I do a long run on Sundays those songs can last a long time, and picked from the briefest moment of listening to the radio on the way to the Kinsmen sports center.
The most interesting time this happened was when I had a song, I didn’t recognize at the time, with the words “Running through my head” running through my head the entire time I was running.

Well I think it’s interesting.

Life continues to… continue.
As usual for Monday, I went out for dinner and then saw Die-Nasty. Nothing special to report.
Today (Tuesday) has nothing exciting or unusual to discuss.
Some things have struck me recently and I’m wondering about their validity.
When I listen to music, do I do it in the same as everyone else? I see some people who get totally into music and can’t actually function in life without it. Most people seem to care deeply about it. Yet, I do not. I listen to music, and there are songs that I like. But I can just as easily tune it out. In fact, I do.
When I drive somewhere, I’ll turn on the radio. If the music stations are having the DJs talking, I’ll switch to the talking of CBC AM. Unless the CBC is playing music, then I’ll just turn it off. When will the stations learn. If you specialize in music, stick to it. Don’t yammer about news events and contests for dumb people. If your station specializes in talking, don’t play music. It’s not a hard concept.
Anyway, if there is a song on, and I don’t care for it. Chances are I’ll just tune it out and not even notice I’m listening to it. Occasionally there is a moment of lucidity and I’ll suddenly notice, “Hey, I hate this song!” and switch the station. But even with music I like, I’ll tune out. I have to actively force myself to listen to music and try not to have my mind wander off. Otherwise, it’s like it isn’t even on. I use iTunes to play my music collection, and I’ve seen it happen where I’ll look at a list of the music I played in the last hour and not remember listening to half of them.
I don’t even listen to the words in songs. I’ll pay more attention to the tune. Chances are, if, after hearing a song, I was quizzed about the subject matter and character development inherent in the plot, I’ll have a nice blank expression that you could share with the whole family.
Does this happen to other people?
On a similar note, I’m known in the office as the person who hates Christmas carols. I’ve gotten snarky when I hear someone’s cell phone is set to play “Jingle Bells” for its ring. The only time I do enjoy carols is in August. When there is snow on the ground, I associate carols with attempts to make me spend money. In summer though, they feel more devoted to the religious experience they were meant for. Last year the documentation department tried to taunt me by, each day, singing their own version of the Twelve Days of Christmas at me. They were weak and couldn’t keep it up. They had started about fifteen days before Christmas and then flaked out after only singing about twelve days. If you are going to be annoying, be committed to it.
I did discover recently that I don’t hate all carols. I only hate the cheery ones that you hear on commercials or in shopping malls. The exception that changed my opinion was the “Carol of the Bells”. That is a nice song! It’s got that really creepy tune that really does not say “Buy me”. More like, “Doom is coming… for Christmas!” I checked the iTunes store for it and found that you can get pop singers, like Destiny’s Child, trying to make it more cheery or something, and that just ruined it. You need a good choir to properly do it justice.
Well that’s enough ranting today. Actually, this was probably my first real rant on LiveJournal. I’m so proud. I think I have another intangible subject for the next time.

Yesterday it was below zero, but barely. So it didn’t stop it from raining. Everything was covered in a nice layer of ice. The thought of driving in those conditions was scary.
This morning though, I went out running. It sucked. Big time. I ran about 24 km, and there was barely every any traction. I got back home somewhat depressed. I hadn’t done a long run for four weeks before, but I really felt out of shape. And I hadn’t enjoyed that run. I was thinking I wasn’t cut out for doing a marathon. After awhile though I figured that it was just a bad day for running. If I had traction I would have been fine. So I’m going to be a poor workman and blame my tools.
I remember earlier today thinking of some things that I would mention in this journal. But now they have completely slipped my mind. Maybe I’ll remember them later.

I got the mortgage for my condo in May of 2003. I chose Bank of Montreal for it, partly because I had been accidentally accumulating FirstHome Dollars with my MasterCard for the past nine years. What this meant was that I could cash out those dollars if I got a mortgage with Bank of Montreal when I purchased my first home. Over the years I accumulated over 3500 points. However, when I asked about it, I was told that I could only use up to 2500 points, and then only for 2.5% of my mortgage. Since I had a large influx of capital when I got my condo, I didn’t need a large mortgage. Certainly not the $100,000+ that would need to max out the FirstHome dollars. So I could only get cash in 1850 points. And the other points will never be usable by me, because I will never have a first home again.
Anyway, Bank of Montreal had completely forgotten how to handle FirstHome dollars. It was a promotion from nearly a decade ago. So it’s taken them nine months to figure out how to get me my money. I got it today.
If I was an interesting person, I would blow it on something (Drugs, beer, fast and loose women). But I am a boring person. It’s going to go into RRSPs, which I’ve been neglecting in my goal of killing this mortgage as quickly as possible. I’m hoping to get myself to a lower tax bracket and get a refund which I can direct into the mortgage.
Or possible a vacation to a sunny place. I haven’t had a vacation in a long time… But then I would be an interesting person, and not a boring one. Decisions, decisions.
Anyway, today there was a wine and cheese party in the lobby so that we can get to know the neighbors. There are a lot of runners in this building. There was Jim and Brenda at the party. Jim is one of the few people who can actually wear an IronMan watch and not be lying. Brenda has run seven marathons. I run in a faster group than her, but I’ve never run a marathon. (Just a half-marathon last February.) A girl named Sheena is trying to run further distances too. I think her problem is that she is running too fast. If you can’t talk while you are running, you’re going too fast. I’ve also seen one or two other runners outside of parties. Anyway, it was nice to meet some of the people I barely ever see in the halls. I was able to put a name (Danielle) to the top of head I see on the balcony two floors below me. I talked to a cute girl who was there for awhile (Amanda). She has a boyfriend, but I don’t have the self-confidence to ask someone out, so that really doesn’t matter.
The party went later than I expected. So afterward I had to scramble to finish more D&D stuff for the new character in the campaign. I’m staying up later than I would like. (And yet I am still updating this journal.)
It was my mother’s birthday today. She’s going to go see Return of the King to celebrate. I hope she likes it, but that’s like saying “I hope the sun rises tomorrow.” Hope implies a chance of it not happening.

I’ve missed the last couple of days for updating, and I feel bad. But that’s in the past. Let’s concentrate on the thoughts right now. And I will start that by reviewing anything interesting that’s happened in the last couple of days.
I went to the live improvised soap opera, Die-Nasty on Monday. The show was good, but not great. They seemed to be missing several cast members that night.
Other than that I’ve been busy with D&D. One of my players is making a new character. He has been playing someone else’s character, but now that we are in a good spot, we determined he could make his own. I’ve been liking what he’s been coming up with. But since he wants to play a cleric, I have to quickly sort out my religions in the game. Thats the one area of my world that I don’t think I’ve fleshed out enough. So I’ve been scrambling to give him something to work with.
This evening I went running with the Running club. I’ve been slacking off lately so I felt a little more out of breath than usual. I’m hoping that goes away soon. I tried out my heart rate monitor, and it felt strange. I think it may either be affecting my heart, or it’s giving me tiny electric shocks. Neither option sounds good.
After the run, I had to rush off, because tonight was my book club meeting. It’s a very informal club that only reads science-fiction and fantasy. We don’t do deep discussions. It actually seems more like an excuse to go out and eat at a restaurant, while nominally discussing the book. We had just finished Joan D. Vinge’s “The Snow Queen”. It was a good book. It took me awhile to get into it, but once I got past the start and knew who the various characters were, I sailed through it. In an interview with the author she said she based it loosely off the snow queen story by Hans Christian Anderson. I was the only one in the group familiar with that story. My heritage is Danish, so I had it forced down my throat at an early age. 🙂
The next book is going to be “In Conquest Born” by C.S. Friedmann. I didn’t see it at Chapters, so I’m going to have to look elsewhere.
So that’s the update of my life. I have no deep interesting thoughts to share with anyone. I’m feeling very shallow right now.

At about 7:00 this morning I checked the temperature. -26 degrees. That’s too cold. I’m not going running outside.
So instead I had the guilty pleasure of sleeping in. After an hour and a half of that luxury I got up, ate part of a breakfast, and then went to the gym in the condo to use the treadmill. I did a fast pace and I think I’ve improved from the last treadmill. It doesn’t count as real running, but at least it gets me exercise.
After that, I went out for brunch with some people who did real running outside. I didn’t eat much. I didn’t think I deserved it. Then I went calendar shopping. I picked up some comics. I went home and read the comics. Then I read the newspaper. Now I’m here updating this journal.
Most people would probably put deep thoughts down here, but I seem to just itemize what happened that day. As near as I can tell no one is reading this. If they did they would think it was pretty boring. I’ve got to start thinking deeper thoughts, or take up some interesting hobbies.

According to the weather office, Sunday is having a low of -28 degrees. I’m not sure I want to go running tomorrow. Technically I’m supposed to be running 32km. (Actually it’s 33km, but the Running Room has been lying about the distance. According to their own studies it’s 33km.) I remember the last time I ran a long distance in weather that cold. It was last February for the Hypothermic Half-marathon. The one where I hurt my knee. That injury kept me from doing a long run for over half a year. I’ve heard theories that it was because it was so cold and a long distance that did it in. But it also could be that I tried to do the IT band stretch for the first time and that gummed up my knee which wasn’t used to it. A similar thing happened to a runner friend recently.
Is it worth doing the run and possibly injuring myself? I’m not actually training for a race. Plus I’ve already shown that I can run 33km.
Decision, decisions.
Other than that, I spent the day at a New Year party. It was a small affair at one of my D&D player’s house. We just talked a lot and ate party snacks. I tried to avoid talking about D&D because the host’s fiance doesn’t play. There is only so much nerdage that one can put up with.

So it’s finally friday. I don’t have much to say here. The biggest thing of interest since I last updated was that I ran my bi-weekly D&D game. I expected to be writing in this journal that my player’s were a bunch of morons. Surprisingly, they didn’t do anything too stupid this session! It was an important game tonight, the culmination of a long adventure. The players had been stuck on the same adventure since November 2002. They finally completed all the hard stuff and are finally able to return home. The next session is probably just going to be a denouement. Sort of like the last half hour of Return of the King. The wrapping up of the loose ends.
I try and give my players the feel that the world doesn’t revolve around them. So I always try and think of what the ramifications of their actions are, and how that is affecting the world around them. Then I have the world bite back. That happened tonight. The players were talking about a quest they had never gotten around to: Finding a gem supposedly hidden in the valley. As planned, they returned home and found out another adventuring party had beaten them to it. That’s what happens when you leave a quest hanging for half a year (game time).
I generally have a low opinion of my players. But that’s my fault. I’ve tried to give them a world with many secrets that I’m continually leaving hints about. They never pick up on those hints. So my respect for them isn’t great. But it’s a poor workman who blames his tools. (Is that all the player’s are? Tools?)
The game ended at midnight. The temperature outside is -27. Brrr. When I got home, I went to my condo’s exercise room and tried out the treadmill. As a rule I don’t like treadmills. You spend all the time running and looking at a wall. It’s mind numbing. But, I just purchased some new sneakers and I needed to test them out, and the store doesn’t accept returns if they’ve been used outside. Also, I wanted to see if I could improve my pace from the race on New Year’s Day. I ran 3.2 miles in 22:40. I think that’s about the same pace. But I would have thought I would improve since I wasn’t slogging through snow. I don’t think I could have run any faster. Well that’s treadmills for you. You can’t trust them.
I got a bit of a thrill recently. My friend, Jeff (AKA Canticle), mentioned me in his Live Journal. It’s a small claim to fame, but it feels nice to have someone else think of you.
Since it is now almost 2:00. I’ve publicly admitted I’m a nerd that plays D&D. I’m going to bed.

So my friend suggested I start a livejournal. Having no backbone, here I am. Looking at the name I chose for myself, I’m sure my creativity is at an all time low. I blame society. From what I can gather, I just write out whatever is on my mind. So essentially this will be an Erik dump. (Similar to a file dump; nothing to do with waste management.) I read an Onion article recently about a mother finding her son’s weblog, so my writing is probably going to be colored by that.
Yesterday was New Year’s Eve. I always have low expectations of that day. If I go out, it’s always disappointing. However, staying at home alone is depressing. Given a choice between the two, I chose to go out. However, with the above attitude, I waffled a lot before forcing myself out the door. I decided to head to New City Likwid Lounge (Yes, I check for spelling before I post.)
I’ve been wanting to find myself a bar I can go to regularly (where everyone knows your name) but it’s hampered by several facts: I don’t drink. I don’t smoke. I suck at socializing with people I don’t know. Since none of the friends I made in Edmonton seem to want to go out to socialize at a bar (if the bar is not showing hockey, they’re not going) I just stand there awkwardly hoping to fit in, but not. I probably shouldn’t be going to bars, but society has raised me to believe that that is where you go to make new friends (and influence people?) I had heard that New City was interesting. I think it’s a goth bar. I’m not goth myself, but I find some of the goth women attractive. So at least the view will be nice. I went there before Christmas and surveyed the place once. Nothing wrong with it. I think someone mentioned to me once that you have to go to a bar several times before they start accepting you. So that is why I decided to try and go back for New Year’s Eve.
Long story short, I had waffled too long and the place was full by 10:00.
I drove home, and then walked to a nearby bar called the Armoury. It was a top 40 place, so I enjoyed the music. A lot of the people were younger than me, and the women seemed to all want to be Britney Spears. I drank some overpriced coke that was mostly ice and awkwardly tried to fit in. This involved standing at the bar and trying to say hello to people who came to order drinks. But on the whole it was disappointing. I went home before 1:00.
I really shouldn’t go to bars. I’m not comfortable in them and I can’t help but think of the saying about being alone in a crowded room.
So that was my New Year’s Eve.
New Year’s Day has been better. A month ago I had signed up for a short New Year’s Day run at a local YMCA. I think I joined more for the free heart rate monitor, cleverly hidden in the price of the run. Anyway it’s a reason to get up and do something. I went and by 11:00, I was starting to run five kilometres. Conditions were bad. It was -16 out, but I was dressed for that. At times the wind was strong, but that didn’t bother me. My problem was that it had been snowing all night. There was a nice layer of snow all along the course. Traction was non-existent. I still came through with a decent time of 22:20. I didn’t win anything, but I was just behind the woman who came in second. i.e. If I was a girl, I would have placed third. If I was a motivated girl, I could have come in second. The last fifty meters though was all loose snow. I couldn’t sprint properly. But I think I did ten seconds better than last year.
Afterwards there was a pancake breakfast. The advantage of finishing the race quickly is that you get first crack at the pancakes. After I had finished my second course of pancakes, the place was packed and getting more required a long wait.
There were some door prizes, but I didn’t win any. I shouldn’t expect to. The chance of winning is less than 1%, but there is always the hope that you will.
Well, that’s it for now. The first Erik dump of the new year. Looking it over it sounds rather depressing. So I guess I better pick that as my mood. Although I’m wondering if writing this is the cause of that emotion. If I hadn’t written this would I be happy? I’m sure the philosophers would like to debate that. Or the physicists. (Is the act of observing the mood, changing the mood?)
P.S. I saw that I could pick Disappointed for my mood. That sounds much more appropriate. That or “Meets Expectations”.