Searching for Tao, 7573 Kilometres from Home

March 02, 2004 05:46 +0000 | Society & Culture 2

i met a nice girl in a quizno's today. and while she was obviously working hard, she was not handling the day well. she appologised for her clutsyness siting that she was tired:

me:	it's alright, it's monday
her:	EXACTLY. and i've been here since 7am.
me:	well that's good then! you should get off soon!
her:	not quite.
me:	really? when do you get off?
her:	[ pause ] ten
me:	[ pause ] PM??? that's insane!
[ sandwich conversation ]
me:	well at least you get overtime
her:	nope
me:	[ disbelief ] what?
her:	well i'm the manager here, so no overtime.
me:	tell me you're at least getting shares or something
her:	if it all works out...
me:	wow. how much you get paid?
her:	[ hesitation ] a reasonable amount.
me:	[ shake my head, thank her for the sandwich and go back to work ]

that's insane. this girl was younger than i am, and she's pulling 15 hour days WITHOUT overtime. is that even legal? i mean, i'm new to ontario, but i know that in bc, that's definitely illegal, but here, after the "common sense revolution"? regardless of legality though, i hope her boss' karma catches up with him quick.

February 29, 2004 20:07 +0000 | Geek Stuff Society & Culture 1

you know how all the car companies are saying that electric cars are a "nice idea" but are refusing to mass-produce them, citing supposed performance problems? they claim that "electric vehicles just don't have the power and range that the modern consumer demands". well it's all garbage:

http://www.kaz-style.com/en/

400m in 15.3seconds
and a top speed of 300km/hr
this limo-sized vehicle rivals many of the top sports cars out there. and it runs on electricity.

February 29, 2004 13:22 +0000 | Society & Culture 0

on my last trip to ottawa, angela & i checked out winterlude. a celbration of being frozen in ottawa ;-) it came complete with some stunning ice sculptures and HUGE snow sculptures, all on the front lawn of city hall. you can check them out on my imager here.

o. and happy leap day!

February 29, 2004 10:04 +0000 | Nifty Links Society & Culture 1

i found this on deviantart tonight and thought that i'd share.

February 28, 2004 08:25 +0000 | Geek Stuff 0

you remember "command and conquer: red alert"? well i wanted to play it today and was rather upset at the fact that it won't install in windows xp. turns out, the program's apparently just too old. i thought i was s.o.l. until i remembered wine, the windows emulator for linux. (well it's not an emulator, it's a fake windows install, but that's harder to say). but it works! and it's as easy as:

# emerge wine winesetuptk
$ winesetuptk
$ mount /mnt/cdrom
$ wine /mnt/cdrom/setup.exe
$ wine ~/.wine/fake_windows/WESTWOOD/REDALERT/ra95.exe

it might look complicated for the non-geek, but it really was pretty easy. and now i can play any old games i like and not be bound by bill ;-)

February 26, 2004 03:49 +0000 | Nifty Links Society & Culture 3

those of you who are still interested in listening to your concience might want to check out american apparel. they're one of the first companies i've ever heard of (outside of mountain equipment co-op) that produces all of their clothing in north america, in unionised factories, with livable working conditions. they just recently opened a new retail store in montreal and as far as i'm concerned, if my order comes through looking good, i'll be buying all of my tshirt stuff from them. check them out yourself.

February 25, 2004 04:44 +0000 | Society & Culture 0

the american moron, the acting president is backing an amendment to the Constitution describing the term "marriage" as a union between a man and a woman. he, a man with questionable intellect and a stunted worldview is standing in front of the american public advocating more restrictions on individual freedom... in "the land of the free".

has anyone stopped to re-examine the term "republican" lately? aren't they supposed to stand for freedom of oppression from the state and church? sure, it's never worked out that way, but i think that if they're going to continue to push such a discriminatory agenda, they really should change the flag they're flying under. or maybe just dress up in fancy white hoods...

i'm angry -- fuming. but not worried. general ignorance like this always gets me this way. but i know deep down that his kind are only transitory. social change by it's very nature is a progressive thing. slavery was abolished and women got the vote... these things just don't go the other way. martin luther king jr. said it best:

How long will justice be crucified, and truth bear it? I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because 'truth crushed to earth will rise again.' How long? Not long, because 'no lie can live forever.' How long? Not long, because 'you shall reap what you sow.' How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

and for you christ-loving idiot sheep out there, i'll remind you that king was quoting from the bible.

February 25, 2004 01:28 +0000 | Miscellaneous 1

i learned on the space channel last night that for the next few nights, venus will be visible paralell to the crescent moon. you can't miss it. it's the brightest "star" in the sky.

February 24, 2004 02:01 +0000 | Society & Culture 1

some time ago -- well actually back in 1997, my buddy quinn wrote a re-make of shakespere's "romeo and juliet" -- in ebonics. entitled "romeleo and jewel" his english teacher reffered to it as "a revelation" and 7 years later, it's been adapted to the stage.

now the whole truth of it is that apparently someone else had this very same idea and came up with a play of their own out in jolly old england... and the show is coming to toronto. it just sounds cooler the way i put it.

February 23, 2004 06:14 +0000 | Personal Life 2

this has been one of the messier breakups i've ever had. all this pain... caused by me... and over a 3month relationship. am i an evil person? i don't think of myself as one. i don't seek out people with the express intention to do what i've done to poor angela. but nonetheless, there she is, crying herself to sleep tonight -- over me.

i'm not a heartless person. if i were, i wouldn't care. i wouldn't be writing this right now. and i probably wouldn't have even bothered to talk to her on msn tonight. so the real question then is: is this my fault? this isn't the first time i've done this to someone, but how else might i have acted? are these people just over-investing themselves because i'm the kind of person they feel they can do that with? does that mean that i have to be more careful than other people? i just don't want to hurt anyone anymore.