A waste of bits and bandwidth

A series of random observations that alone would not be blogworthy. Put together they aren’t blogworthy either but it’s my site.

Put on a pot of coffee (or fire up the pipe if you roll that way), Firefox 1.0 will be available for download at 1 AM PDT, Tuesday morning. I’ll be getting up early to download mine! Actually, I’ll most likely get up at my normal time and go in to work a little late. Read more…

Not as exciting but still neat, Konfabulator is now out for Windows. Neat little widgets to clutter your desktop. No Mom, you don’t need it…

Now onto local news… A bus driver on the Main St. line was recently given a roadside suspension for operating his bus while corked. Anyone who has ridden the No. 3 will not find this surprising. I always figured it was sort of assumed…

Lastly, Olympia Pizza here in the West End is continuing to fight the Olympic Committee over their signage. When I first heard the story I felt for the owner getting squashed under the thumb of a huge corporation.

I’ve changed my tune lately. The IOC doesn’t take issue with the Olympia name but rather the rings. Buddy has the Olympic rings and the torch plastered all over the place and people are paying huge bucks to use the rings for the 2010 games.

You got away with it for 20-some years. The IOC is willing to pay you for the new signs so take your cheque and move on. The publicity has been great for you anyway. You make great food (Denman and Nelson if you’re in the area) but in this case, you’re wrong.

RLD

‘Nuff said…

RLD

For years an Akita dog named Hachiko followed his master, Professor Eisaburo Ueno, to the Shibuya train station in Tokyo, then waited at the station until the professor returned from work at night.

In 1925, Ueno died at the university and never returned home, Hachiko waited at the train station until midnight and then returned the next day and waited again. He returned to wait for his master every day until he died in 1934.

His loyalty made him famous throughout Japan and when he died, a statue honoring him was erected in Shibuya station. The station has held an annual memorial service ever since.

What’s up with all the dog related posts?

RLD

… pistolwhip a co-worker? I got an email, sent to a group, from an otherwise sane person in the office today. There was this line in the email: “They spoke at me thusly” What the hell is that? Is it talk like a thespian day?

Later I get an email from another, otherwise sane person who emailed another group list and declared the release dates and milestones for our project. This is 15 minutes after we all got out of a meeting where the dates and milestones were discussed.

I’m in a weird state, I’m officially on project ‘B’ and attend the meetings. However, they aren’t ready for me so I work on project ‘A’ but don’t bother with those meetings. So I sit there in the project ‘B’ meetings and have zero idea of what they’re talking about.

Is it just in tech that being on time to a meeting is a sin? When did 2 PM come to mean 2:10? Did I miss that email? I had 3 meetings today that took almost 3 hours but at least they served breakfast for the first one.

OK, good. I feel better that I’ve bored both my readers.

RLD

Much fun was had at the Shnewt’s this weekend; Halloween was good this year. Good friends, some food, drunken fooz and a fire. Yeah, the drunk folks playing fooz smelled smoke but you can ignore us if you like. We were in the middle of a game…

I nearly bought a TV this weekend. I was in Future Shop browsing stuff and found myself in the TV department. “Hmmm… this is nice and not too expensive. My TV is 15 years old. I should buy one.” I decided to mull it over but returned Sunday with every intention of buying the TV.

I didn’t do it though. I saw this one and it was the most beautiful picture I had ever seen. It’s $800 after tax which is reasonable for a TV, I guess but I don’t watch a lot of TV and it’s twice what I was planning on spending. On the other hand, if I keep it for 15 years like my current one, what’s the big deal? *rationalizing*

What has me hung up is that the TV is was going to get was not HDTV ready and when I thought about it, shouldn’t I be buying an HDTV if I decide to buy a TV? Doesn’t the switch happen in 2006? Don’t I have better things to be spending my money on? Don’t I work in tech?

Send your cash to M. Bach, Vancouver. Thanks.

RLD