Author: Dan Dickinson

Mad dogs and religious men

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Two troubling things in the news today:

First, Ontario conservative party leader John Tory wants to fund religious schools.

Taxpayers should fund Islamic, Hindu, Jewish and other faith-based schools just like public and Catholic ones, Opposition Leader John Tory says.

If I thought there was any more to this than shameless pandering for votes I’d be concerned. The trouble is, it’s hard to justify not having an Islamic or Hindu school system as long as the senseless Catholic school system still exists. If no Catholic school board existed, the Ontario government could simply fall back on rationality and common sense; as it is, they look like hypocrites.

Second, the Michael Vick situation. For those who don’t know the story, Vick — star quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons — has been indicted on dogfighting charges. The ensuing backlash against Vick has been fierce, from protesters outside Falcons headquarters to the NFL commissioner barring Vick from training camp.

Now, it’s no secret I’m an animal lover. The idea of dogfighting turns my stomach. If Michael Vick is found guilty of this, then I hope they hang him by his thumbs and leave him to rot in prison. But…he hasn’t been found guilty. He’s been indicted, and while the evidence seems damning, no verdict has been handed down. Until then, Michael Vick is innocent. PETA, who I usually support pretty strongly, is getting a little ahead of itself here:

The NFL said Vick would be continue to be paid. PETA took issue with that policy. “Vick should not be paid to sit at home and work on his defense,” the organization said.

In fact, that’s exactly what he should be paid to do. You can’t terminate someone because of accusations or trials. You terminate him if he’s found guilty. And if that happens, every last penny of his hard-earned money should be donated to animal shelters. Vick won’t need it behind bars.

[tags]john tory, religious schools, michael vick, PETA[/tags]

The sweetest beep that ever there was

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Well, the gas leak saga seems to be nearly over. Today some people from the building came by with a new dude. This new dude had an actual piece of gas-detecting equipment…how novel. Anyway, he climbs up on the stepladder and sticks the device into the wall panel…nothing. The other three get smug looks of satisfaction, and comment on how there’s no smell so there’s clearly no leak. But then the new dude turns on the gas (the shutoff valve has been closed), puts the device back in the wall and…oh, what’s that, a beep? A FUCKING BEEP? Yeah, a beep. Within seconds this thing went off. Then the guy did the “soap test”, where you spray a little soapy water on the pipe to see if it bubbles. This is the test the building guys have been doing for the last few weeks, swearing up and down that there’s no leak. The new dude does it once and five seconds later has bubbles. The other guy gives it a try…nothing. The new dude explains that it’s because he just emptied half a bottle of water onto it and temporarily sealed it up. Twenty seconds later…beeeeeeep. Hooray for technology.

It was all I could do not to go put on a track suit and do a Will Farrell style cheer. For the last month these people have ignored us, talked down to us, bitched at us, told us we’re wrong and, let’s face it, put us in danger. Seriously, I couldn’t even look at them; I wouldn’t have been able to refrain from just giving them the finger at close range. But I didn’t want to be that guy. I figured I’d just blog about their snotty incompetence instead.

The one time I wasn’t able to contain myself was when the new dude told them the leak was on the trac pipe adapter to the supply line. I said, “Oh really? Cool. ‘Cause that’s exactly what it says right here on this notice from Enbridge. You know, the big red one labeled ‘WARNING’ that’s been stuck to the wall by the access panel? That’s dated June 18th? That says, ‘MSA POS AT TRAC PIPE FITTING ADAPTER ON SUPPLY LINE’? Yeah, that one.”

One of the ladies from customer service, who’s been pretty bipolar about this whole thing (one minute she seems helpful, the next she seems annoyed) couldn’t even stay after new dude discovered the leak. She just left. Who knows, maybe she had somewhere to be, but I think she just couldn’t handle being that stupendously wrong. I hope she went downstairs and told the rest of them how colossally they’ve fucked up for the last month. I hope they’re all scared for their jobs. Not because we’re the kind of people who would try to have them fired, but because it might convince them to actually give a shit the next time someone complains about a problem with their unit. Especially a gas leak.

Anyway, the guy came up and fixed it. Took him less than half an hour. He probably spent more time in here spraying it with Palmolive for the last month than he did actually fixing it, but it’s done. He got the new dude to test it again, and it seemed fine.

To celebrate, we barbecued. And every bite tasted like triumphant morsels of fuck you.

.:.

Other good news: my computer’s almost back up to speed. Still no sound card, but the USB is 2.0 again and the internet connection’s back. I used said connection to download two new albums tonight: Spoon‘s Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga and Stars‘ In Our Bedroom After the War.

.:.

Also, after the disaster that was last week, it’s felt good to do three things today: 1) go for a run; 2) get home by 6:30; 3) not do a scrap of work or school tonight. None…on a weeknight! Truant! Truant!

[tags]spire condominium, gas leak, enbridge, spoon, stars[/tags]

I turned red there many, many times

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2islands.JPG

That’s a shot from the beach (fairly) near my home where my nephew and nieces were playing earlier today.  Something that never struck me as remarkable until today is how the land goes from woods to cliff to beach in just a few yards.

That’s the Bay of Fundy, by the way, in case you’re wondering why the tide is out so far.

.:.

I finished about 7 pages of my paper tonight, and have another 1.5 or so planned. Not quite what I was supposed to turn it but it’ll have to do for now. I can write no more; I have to get up at 6 for a run and my ass is sore from sitting in front of this damned computer all day.

[tags]bay of fundy, two islands[/tags]

Half a step back

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Another fatblogging check-in:

  • Original weight: 233
  • Weight last week: 229
  • Weight this week: 229.5

Not a great week, clearly. I’m not surprised; work eliminated pretty much all opportunity for exercise, and also made it all too easy to eat like crap. I’m hopeful, though not terribly optimistic, that this week will be better.

.:.

I finally fixed the connection problem with my desktop. And by “fixed” I mean reinstalled Windows. There were obviously other problems going on anyway, and I’d always been annoyed that it shipped with XP Home, so I installed Pro. I didn’t do a completely clean install though, so I can foresee problems popping up before too long. Still, I needed a working computer by today so I could get to work on my paper. The only problem now: the sound card doesn’t work.

[UPDATE] It also seems to recognize my USB2.0 controller as only 1.1.

[tags]fatblogging, xp home, xo pro[/tags]

Man, did I ever need that

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Here’s how the last 22.5 hours have gone for me:

  • 8:15 PM: leave work. Assaulted by awful reggae band and throngs of Harry Potter nerds outside the Indigo on Bay Street. What those two have in common is beyond me; maybe if I read the books I’d understand.
  • 8:30 PM: arrive at Fieramosca to meet Nellie, CBGB and two other friends. See M2H2 eating dinner there as well.
  • 8:35 PM: finish first glass of wine. Did I mention it’s been a long week?
  • 12:30 AM: finish spectacular meal and close down restaurant.
  • 1:00 AM: arrive home for sleep. Glorious, glorious sleep.
  • 9:00 AM: wake up, read half of the newspaper, answer some emails.
  • 10:00 AM: go back to bed. Wrestle sleeping cats & wife for some space and a pillow.
  • 2:00 PM: get out of bed. Literally cannot remember the last time I slept this late. Eat, shower, try to summon energy.
  • 3:30 PM: get haircut. My head feels like someone pulled a prickly towel off of it.
  • 4:00 PM: stop by the office to get my laptop. Run into PC and his son on the way out. Pick up cat food.
  • 5:00 PM: grab treat from Starbucks, come home, plant ass on chair, get caught up on world happenings.
  • 6:45 PM: write this blog post.

I suppose I should have taken it easy last night, gotten up early today and done some work, but I think this approach will pay off in the long run. I needed a night off, and taking a day off feels pretty goddamn good as well.

[tags]day off[/tags]

Nailed it

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Someone at work just commented that I seem like a zombie today. I was going to protest or make a witty rejoinder but I had no energy, so I just moaned and shuffled away instead.

I may well tear off somebody’s arm before the day is out too.

[tags]zombies[/tags]

"And chew…and chew…8 more…7 more…"

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If you’re a Battlestar Galactica fan and you’re reading this article over on the TV show blog, you might be thinking to yourself, “Who knew Katee Sackhoff was such a girly-girl? And where did THOSE come from?!!!?!” *

.:.

I managed to run about 1.5 miles this morning and then just barely made it work on time. I have an 8AM meeting tomorrow, so clearly there will be no early morning run. I think my only workout of the day will be PowerEating at Fieramosca.

.:.

 

[Brilliance from Indexed, by Jessica Hagy]

.:.

I think that if I were to somehow narrow down my all-time favourite songs, “NYC” by Interpol would be on there.

.:.

* You would probably only think this if you’re a guy. Or my wife, who has a girlcrush on Starbuck.

[tags]battlestar galactica, katee sackhoff, indexed, jessica hagy, interpol[/tags]

C

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

100 days ago we took possession of our condo. Let’s recap: I love the location & neighbourhood even more than I thought I would. The view’s even better than I expected, and Nellie’s gotten used to the balcony. In general I love almost everything about the unit and the building.

However, we’ve had some major problems. The toilet backed up two days in a row; I wasn’t here for that, but Nellie went through hell. Our floors still haven’t been replaced. We’re still missing blinds in our living room. The elevators have been very, very spotty and in various states of disrepair. But most frustrating of all has been the gas leak.

I blogged about it recently. Since then nothing’s improved; in fact, customer service has just pissed us off more. They seem to have two settings: ignoring us or scolding us. Because of work and school I’ve had little time to deal with this, but something’s gotta give soon. The people in charge of fixing what could potentially be a serious safety risk seem to be either incompetent or stupid. I don’t want to threaten them with legal action, but unless they can extract their heads from their asses it may come to that.

None of this has made me not love my new home. I’d just like to be able to love all of it, including the den and the barbecue.

[tags]condo, gas leak, context, spire[/tags]