Category: Miscellaneous

If you ever get a 17-year-old roommate, who has never lived away from home before, please remember to tell him not to eat your food otherwise, if you are like me, you may wake up in the morning without any milk for breakfast.

Dave Barry has a solution for the tense relationship the American’s and the French are going through right now. From his article:

We simply cannot allow a close relationship like this to be destroyed because of some silly little dispute over who gets to run the world. That is why today I am calling upon you, my fellow Americans, to ”extend the olive jar” to our French brothers and sisters and yappy little dogs. I want you to deliberately approach French people wherever you can find them — on the street, on the Internet, in the ”Small World” ride at Disney World, in public restrooms — and make friendly overtures to them in their own language (French). To help you do this, here is a list of friendly French phrases:

”Bonjour, personne francaise!” (“Hello, French person!”)

”Je suis un Americain, et, dangue il, je vais vous donner une grande vieille etreinte!” (“I am an American and, dang it, I am going to give you a big old hug!”)

”Parole! Vous ne sentez pas demi aussi de mauvais que j’ai prevu!” (“Say! You do not smell half as bad as I expected!”)

”Qui s’inquiete qui court darned le monde?” (“Who cares who runs the darned world?”)

”Voulez-vous la gomme? Elle ketchup-est assaisonnee!” (“Do you want gum? It’s ketchup-flavored!”)

”Voulez que je vous porte au mail dans mon SUV?” (“Want me to take you to the mall in my SUV?”)

”Vous pouvez vous rendre au garde de securite!” (“You can surrender to the security guard!”)

”Ha ha, je suis badiner juste autour hors de l’amiti!” (“Ha ha, I am just kidding around out of friendship!”)

”Hey, revenez ici!” (“Hey, come back here!”)

”Il n’y a aucune cause pour l’alarme! Mon pistolet a une surete!” (“There is no cause for alarm! My gun has a safety!”)

Yes, fellow Americans, with a little effort, we can heal this rift between us and our old friends. Because, in the end, we have a lot more in common than we do separating us! Or, as the French would say, ”Je suis un grand gros menteur” (“I am a big fat liar”).

Ok, this link is what I like to call a “must read“. I expect to hear some feedback on this one as well.

“Federal investigators have arrested an enigmatic Wall Street wiz on insider-trading charges — and incredibly, he claims to be a time-traveler from the year 2256!” He started out with only $800, and in two weeks he had created a portfolio worth more than $350 million.

I kind of wish that this guy was for real, even though it’s obvious that he’s a lunatic or a really incredible liar. What I find the most interesting part of this article is that, “the Security and Exchange Commision source admits, “No one can find any record of any Andrew Carlssin existing anywhere before December 2002.”

Has anybody noticed that Fox’s new show, Oliver Beene, seems to be a rip-off of the Wonder Years? Everything about the show screams, “I wish I was Kevin Arnold!” The TV show not only copies The Wonder Years premise by following Oliver growing through his adolescent years in the 60’s but it also copies every other character in the show. You may think this comparison is pretty weak, but consider the following. The teacher drones on like Ben Stein, Oliver has friends that seem just like Winnie and Paul. Not even the trademark Wonder Year scenes of showing black & white newscasts in the background are cut from this cheap copy. Even the narrator’s voice sounds like it came straight out of The Wonder Years. They could have at least based the show in the early 80’s giving us Gen-X’s something to relate to. Who do they think their target audience is anyway?

Continuing with my rant about lame new TV shows, comes my take on The Pitts — it’s Fox’s other new show. I guess I never gave it much of a chance, but from what I did see (about the first 15 minutes) the show gets two enthusiastic thumbs down. The premise of this show is that a supposedly normal girl (who can’t act) lives with a family of psychotics that have very bad luck ? think Malcolm in the Middle but less funny. I didn’t watch the ending, so I don’t know if they are keeping all of the characters but in this particular episode they hired a nanny who has been obsessed with the Father ever since he stood her up on prom night 25 years ago. Why couldn’t he remember her when he hired her? Lame, lame, lame!

Where did all the good shows go? I’ll take the Internet over TV any day. Although, I must admit, I do like the occasional cartoon.

I just want to say how angry I am at one2host.com. My site is down AGAIN!!!! What a waste of money – I wish I could get my money back! The site is down, the email server is down, even when I try to contact them via their website I can’t get through. If I had the site running on an old computer with just a linux server and my DSL connection it would be better than the crappy service that One2host has given me. I hate those guys.

In my mortgage agreement with the bank I pay back my property taxes with each payment I make. I, therefore, will not have to pay a huge $1600.00 tax once a year. But thanks for looking out for me.

I know this isn’t really newsworthy, but I am so pleased with myself that I want to post that I finally fixed the leaky faucet that has been driving me nuts for months! It only cost me like $5.00 at Canadian tire to get the part I needed. I also bought a handsaw for installing a new outlet for the dryer and some needle nose pliers (it was an impulse buy but at $2.99 how could I resist?)

Wired Magazine is covering an interesting story about company that is refusing to sell it’s products to anyone living in Canada, France, Germany, or any other country opposed to the war in Iraq. Apparently the company had a laser printer on sale on EBay and when they found out that the highest bidder was from Vancouver, BC they changed their mind about the sale.

The Simpson family will be around for at least another couple of years making it the longest running comedy of all time. Simpsons creator Matt Groening also confirmed that a movie is in the works. “We’re talking about doing it. We just want to make sure, if we do, it doesn’t follow in the dismal footsteps of other currently-running TV shows turned into movies.” Of course it looks like the new Simpsons movie won’t be made for a long time, and maybe not even until after the show stops producing new episodes.

Yesterday I received a letter in the mail from The Alberta Heritage Fund. It was a cheque for $900 for the Jimmy Condon Scholorship. Taking part on the swim team was such a great decision! Not only have I had a great time, it hasn’t really cost me a lot monetarily speaking! I’m really glad to get the money, but I do still need to get a real job. Living from bursary to scholarship to GST cheques won’t last me forever.

I have been thinking about having a new roommate. I know I don’t like having people around much – it’s nice to have the house to myself, but this would make paying the bills a whole lot easier. I’ll find out soon if he’s really interested.

Here’s some more food for thought about dumbness. Bill Clinton, just as all Presidents do, made his share of mistakes. Most notably the affair with office intern Monica Lewinsky. The media had a feeding frenzy. Clinton was dragged through the mud, and yet when it was all over everyone still seemed to love Clinton. Bush on the other hand has also made his mistakes in office. Even though he cheated the election and started a war with Iraq in which hundreds of people will die, you don’t hear any mainstream media criticising his actions. According to the media Bush’s ratings are high, but frankly I don’t think that will be the case come election time. Now I dare to ask the question, who made the bigger mistake, Bush or Clinton? Whose mistakes cost more lives?