University of Calgary Impliments a No-Idle Policy

The U of C is going to be cracking down on all vehicles left idling on campus, which I think is a great idea.  There's absolutely no reason to let your car sit idling when the temperature is above -10 C.

I was surprised by the amoutn of CO2 that actually gets released while idling a vehicle.  From the article:

The average mid-sized Canadian vehicle emits 2.3 kilograms of greenhouse gases when idling for just 10 minutes.

I'm looking for most of these

Any takers?

Writes of Passage

Gay.com has been doing a project for National Coming Out Day called "Writes of Passage" where they've asked gay celebrities to what they would say if they had the opportunity to write a letter to their younger selves.  The timing works out really well, since this is a great compliment to Dan Savage's new and worthy YouTube channel, It Gets Better.

If I was going to write a letter to the younger me, it would look a lot like this:

Dear Greg,

It's 2010 now, and I'm living the life that, right now, you don't believe you'll ever have.  I have a job I really enjoy, a solid group of fantastic friends, and the most wonderful man to share my life with.  I'm the happiest I've ever been.

You have a long journey ahead of you but soon enough, you'll get here too.

I only have one piece of advice:  COME OUT NOW.  I have very few regrets in my life, but at the top of the list is waiting so long to come out of the closet to those who are important in my life.  And here's the scoop:  your family will still love and support you, your friends won't ditch you (and for the few that might, you don't really want them around anyway), and you'll feel a million times better without having to lie to those you love.  The girl you're dating will be disappointed that her vision of the future isn't going to pan out, but she deserves to know the truth and you'll both be much happier afterward.  And your cat won't care either way.  I know it doesn't feel like it now, but being honest with the people in your life will be much easier than you think, and it's the most liberating feeling in the world!

I wish I could impress upon you how important this is, but I suppose everyone comes out when they're good and ready... and it's going to be a while before you feel like you are.

I'll see ya when you get here.  :o)

Things I Learned At The Hospital

Well, learned probably isn't the right word, since I already knew a few of these.  Perhaps reinforced would be a better word.  But I digress:

• Knowing what's actually wrong is much better than imagining all the horrible things it could be.  I've never really understood people who avoid the doctor because they're scared of what he'll tell them.
  
• The L.A. Times crossword puzzle is harder than the New York Times crossword puzzle.  Or at least, it was on August 16, 2010.
  
• No matter how bad things seem, chances are they could be worse.  The fella's eye was oozing and gross, but at least we weren't as bad off as crying, puking girl.
  
• I am desperately in love with my boyfriend.  Spending 7 hours in various waiting rooms of the hospital while I waited for him to get checked out certainly wasn't fun, but it also didn't feel like I was going out of my way or being inconvenienced; really, I couldn't have been anywhere else.  Holding his hand while we waited for the first round of intravenous medication to finish was a high point in a long day.
  
• Edmonton actually does have some hot cops.  And they all hang out in the Emergency room at the University Hospital.  There's no shortage of hot paramedics either.

This is as far as I could make it in my crossword puzzles without cheating.  Not bad, if I do say so myself:

Vancouver Pride 2010

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ARGRA Rodeo

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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WHAAAA!

Everyone is having a blast at the rodeo, but we're all ready to kill
the guys a couple tents down from us. They were noisy aaaaall night
long. One guy in particular, wwhen he laughs he starts out with
"WHAAAA!" and then breaks into the "haaaahahaha!" part. Put it all
together now, kids:

WHAAAAAhahahaha!

The "WHAAAA" isn't high-pitched, iit's low and it carries. Think
about a goose honking, or a cruise ship blowing its obnoxious annoying
horn.

Anyway, rodeo pics to follow later!

Sent from my iPhone

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A Stark Reminder

I LOVE Edmonton's weather in the summer... long, hot days often followed by thunderstorms in the evening.  We're having a fantastic storm right now; while I was sitting out on the deck enjoying it, one giant thunderclap set off the alarms on at least two cars in hearing distance.  Here's a pic of the view from the balcony... you can't really tell from the photo, but the sky is a very eerie shade of green/grey:

 I did get reminded today to get out there and enjoy it while I can... I saw this billboard while driving around today.  Y'know, they're probably right.

Murmel Murmel Murmel

Murmel Murmel Murmel.

That's the sound my guts are making today.

It's been a rough week, digestively speaking. On Tuesday, I went for wings n' beer with a friend of mine that I hadn't seen since high school. I had a great time catching up over a few pints, and when I went home around 10 PM I was in a great mood. That didn't last too long; I started feeling rumblings in my belly by 11:00, and by the time I went to bed at midnight I knew something was definitely wrong.

The Fella and I both ended up making rushed trips to the bathroom that night. He'd been feeling sick the previous day too, so I think whatever bug it was finally caught up to both of us. We both called in sick on Wednesday to recover.

Yesterday, we were both feeling much better so we decided not to cancel the birthday dinner he'd planned for me at Skinny Legs and Cowgirls, an organic bistro in downtown Edmonton. We started with the Three Cheese Salsa Bake, followed by the Signature Mixed Grill which turned out to be way more food than either of us could ever eat. It was delicious... a bit of rack of lamb, pork ribs, a steak, scalloped potatoes and a mound of fresh seasonal veggies. We worked our way through a pretty good chunk of it, having tiny mouthgasms the whole while. When we decided we had had more than enough of the entree, we still decided to brave the Creme Brulee for dessert.

The whole meal was incredibly delicious, but I think it may have been a little overly ambitious for my recently recovered digestive tract.

Hand dryer or vending machine?

Push button. Receive bacon. Eat bacon.

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Monday Wrap-Up

I was on my game at softball practice tonight, especially batting. Balls were actually going in the direction I wanted them to, which never happens. Normally I'm a happy camper with any sort of contact. Despite having a good practice, it was not all fun and games out on the field today. The mosquitoes have arrived in full force, and after basically having none last year, they were incredibly annoying. I've got to remember to pick up some bug spray before our game on Wednesday.

On the way home, I was behind a car with a beagle sticking his nose waaaay out the window and barking at all the cars going the opposite direction. So adorable!

All was not well when I got home... Our Internet connection has been really flakey for the last week or so, and we've been trying to figure out what's causing it. Some troubleshooting basically shows that it's got to be the router we're using, but after buying a new one we aren't having any better luck. I'm borrowing the neighbor's open wireless network to post this post, hehehe.

Adventures in Macdom

Whew! Almost half a year since my last post... let me just wipe some of the dust off the ol' blog here.

...

There all better! I've been taking Reactine for my allergies all week, so that should keep the coughing down to a minimum.

Anywho, on to the point. I've been using the fella's old Macbook for the last month or so, after being a Windows user for the last 15 years (and an MS-DOS user before that!). I did have some exposure to the old Mac Classic boxes back in high school, but it's pretty much been Windows all the way since then. I've used Mac OS X maybe a handful of times prior to this transition, so it has definitely been a learning experience.

There are definitely some things I really like about OS X, and quite a few things I don't like at all:

The Good

• Spotlight. I love Spotlight. It automatically indexes all my files, including names, content and meta data, and does a much better job of it than Windows ever did. Even Windows 7, which has search capabilities far, far beyond any previous version, doesn't come close to Spotlight.
  
  
• Application installation. All I have to do to install an application is drag the .app file into my Applications folder? Really?? And to uninstall I just delete the .app??? This pretty much blew me away at first, and I'm still incredibly impressed by it now that I'm more used to it. OK, there are still a few preference files and whatnot stored in various places by various programs, but compared to the thousands of registry entries and support files that Windows programs scatter all over the place, this is pretty sweet.
  
  
• Application / OS cohesiveness. Apple likes to have full control over all aspects of their produces, and it's very evident in a Macbook. First of all, since Apple controls the hardware, there are no driver compatibility issues. As Apple likes to say, everything just works. Second, software designers are given a relatively strict box within which to create their programs. The result is that applications generally work well together, look good, and don't typically cause problems.
  
  
• Multi-touch trackpad. Two-finger scrolling took a couple days to get used to, but I find myself missing it when I use Windows laptops now.
  

The Bad

• I've never had a laptop that didn't have Home and End keys before, and I'm really missing them. I never realized how much I used them when I'm typing. I'm also missing the forward-delete key.
  
  
• There are certain things that just don't work the way I expect them to. A lot of this has to do with my learning curve as a former Windows user, but a lot of it is just downright unintuitive, too. For example, using ⌘↑ to execute files from the GUI interface instead of Enter. I know it's Apple's OS and they can design it any way they want, but every other operating system uses Enter to, well, enter commands.
  
  
• Closing windows does not quit the program. I find this incredibly unintuitive. If I'm done with a window and I close it, it's because I'm done! Why should the program still be running?
  

The Ugly

• This is Apple, silly. Nothing is ugly.

This list is by no means comprehensive... every single day I find myself saying "This is so cool!" about some things and "I can't stand this" about others. I'm sure there will be similar follow-up posts in the not-too-distant future.

Dirtiest Tea Ever

This showed up in our cupboard at work the other day.

Mmmm, vanilla...





Incidentally, this is the first time I'm posting from my iPhone. I'm mobile, bitches!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

UPDATE: After looking at the post from an actual computer monitor, I see that the picture is waaaay too small to read easliy. I'll have to see what I can do about fixing that. If you couldn't squinch your eyes up enough to read it, the label on the tea says "Vanilla Nut Cream". Heh.

It’s beginning to look a lot like… not Christmas!

I walked out the door at work tonight and noticed something:  it’s much lighter out than it was at this time even last week.

Yay!!

I’m not a a fan of winter at all.  I don’t like the cold, I don’t like snow, and I REALLY don’t like going to work and then coming home from work in the dark.