Author: gfox (old content)

Movember Important

Movember is done, and I still haven’t shaved. I have a couple job search related and Christmas party related functions to attend, and I really don’t like how I look clean shaven. I’ll keep what I have for a little while longer.

I’m pretty happy with the fact that I was able to raise $520 (my goal was $500). Surpassing that was good, but now I need to make a goal for next year. Speaking of next year. Next year I won’t have any supporting facial hair. I caught a lot of flack from Sox over that. She felt I was cheating. I don’t think the same way, but next year I will go for the Mo only.

This year I also managed to take a daily picture of my Mo progress. You can see the pics here.

All in all it was a fun month, and I managed to raise some funds for a very important cause.

Colorful Sides

I was needing something else to add to the aquarium these days, so I though I would head out and see about picking up some schooling fish. I was thinking neon tetras since they are pretty colorful.

At PetSmart the guy I talked to mentioned that they just got their neon tetra shipment and he was still seeing a big die off. It was likely that some or all the fish I bought wouldn’t make it.

Instead I got directed toward the Black Neon Tetra tank.

I watched them a few minutes and decided to get a group of five for the tank. So far I really like them. They mainly stick together, are a little smaller than the rest of the fish, but are just as active. In the store I couldn’t see it, but in my tank I see that they are a really cool silver color, with a blue and a black stripe down their sides.

Prevalent Events

The H1N1 flu is prevalent in the media today. There is a lot of hype about it, and it is very difficult to know how concerned we should be. Lots of people seem panicked about it, others don’t seem to care. I think I am in the middle somewhere. I read what I can, and try to take as many precautions as I can. More and more I am using those purell stands that are popping up everywhere.

I’ve heard about some changes to children’s sporting events. In hockey everyone gets their own water bottles to try and stop passing around germs. That makes sense, is pretty reasonable, and is economical. In soccer, they are stopping the after game handshake. I’m not such a fan of that one.

This CBC article is hilarious. They propose dropping the traditional handshake, and instead adopting the fist bump.

The handshake, with its potential to transfer the flu virus, should be replaced with the safer — and more contemporary — “pound,” says the dean of medicine at the University of Calgary.

Meeting someone and not shaking hands does seem strange. This is a long standing tradition, and I cannot fathom how one flu strain would make us rethink age old traditions.

However, add in the post bump explosion and I’d be all over it.

Spastic Toys

When we got back from the playground this morning, Yoshi was very happy to see us. He was quite spastic since he hadn’t been walked yet.

As the kids got settled in the house, Amy wanted a toy on the floor. We had used it on the couch to block Yoshi from sleeping there.

I then saw her sippy cup on his bed totally mangled. Bits and pieces everywhere. Aaargh. He had several of his toys all about and yet he rummaged through a cloth shopping bag to find this to chew on.

Apparently it had some leftover milk in it which made it extra tasty.

Purple Slippery

Today the fam headed off to the Purple Hay park (Elliot likes to name parks on his own, and this is the name he and I came up with). It was cold this morning, around 4 or 5 degrees, so we all bundled up.

This is all of us having a snack after playing for a bit.

The kids played on the swing, ran around, and went down the slide countless times. Amy was wearing fleece overalls which were pretty slippery on the twisting slide. Half the times she came down she got turned around backwards which caused all sorts of giggles.

At first neither of the kids had gloves on. When Amy got off the swing, I was alarmed at how purple her hands were, so I insisted she start wearing gloves. No fight there, and Elliot even wanted his on too.

Pilots Show

On Saturday night I got out to a concert. It was the most enjoyable concert I’ve seen in a very long time. I think I had the appropriate number of beer before hang to get me in the right mood.

Can you tell who it is? No? It is the Stone Temple Pilots. A while ago I had given up on concerts, but when I heard these guys were coming to town I jumped at the chance to go see them. I’ve been into these guys since their first album (92/93 era).

A buddy and I headed down to the show and had a few beers before they took the stage. Right from the first song I knew I was going to enjoy it. They have so many awesome songs that it was impossible for me to now have fun. Vasoline, Plush, Creep, Crackerman, Dead & Bloated, were all awesome. The standout song for me was Sour Girl though.

The TC writeup by Mike Devlin didn’t have much good to say about the show, felt like he didn’t put much effort into the article, yet still rated the show 4/5 stars. Weird mix there.

I felt bad for the guys in front of me though. They were having a good time at the show, but they were smoking. One third of the way through the show security came along and kicked them all out. They weren’t bothering anyone, they were just having a good time. Sucks to be them.

I’ve said it to many people, but I find Victoria concert goers to be pretty boring. Most people were sitting in their seats watching the show. A rock show like this needs to be experienced. I was standing the entire show, dancing, jumping, generally making a fool of myself, and damn it was fun. I haven’t done that in a long time.

Motorcycle Escort

On my way to downtown yesterday I got to see an interesting practice by the Victoria police. I was on Esquimalt road waiting to cross Tyee when a motorcycle cop roared up the hill with lights and sirens going. He then stopped in the intersection, got off his bike and stopped traffic in all directions.

Several motorcycles came ripping along acroos the bridge, and up the hill toward me (by ripping I would estimate 80-90KM/H). Then it dawned on me. Some of the royal family was in town. Hmm, I wondered where they were heading.

I got out my cell phone and got ready to snap a picture.

At the bottom of the hill I could see about 8 motorcycles coming, and they were going slow, and riding side by side. Behind them was a big police SUV, then nothing. As they proceeded past me I saw a sign on the back of the truck that said “Police escort, do not cross”. That was it though, no royal family sighting for me.

Staffers Painful

Yesterday I went out and did some clothes shopping. I’ve needed jeans for a long time, and now I need some nicer clothes for interviewing.

I though I would check out some of the higher end shops and get some help picking out something fashionable (something I am not). I started with Outlooks since they have a reputation. When I walked in there were at least four staffers wandering around, but noone greeted me. I looked at some of the racks, and one staffer walked right past me but never said a thing. From a store like this I expect impeccable service, but so far I got worse service than the Bay. I walked out.

Up the street was a store named Hughes. I went upstairs to the mens clothes and looked around a little, but again, the one staff member ignored me until I started to walk out of the store.

Since I needed jeans I headed over to the Levi’s store. When I walked in the store was dead, and the four staffers were at the front desk talking to a group of three friends. I browsed a bit, but didn’t really find anything. After a few minutes one of the staff people asked me if I was finding things, but I had already made up my mind to leave.

At Street Clothing I got greeted as I walked in the door. This was a good sign. I browsed the racks a little, but struck out finding something that I liked, and that was close to fitting.

Since it was in the neighbourhood I wandered into the Bay. Lo and behold I found some pants. I ended up buying 2 pairs of jeans, and a nice pair of pants and matching shirt. The staff there lived up to what I expected of them (which isn’t saying much).

I have always found clothes shopping a painful experience. Now it is getting to be something I dread. I easily get exhausted after a half hour of frustration. I hate browsing bargain racks looking for a gem. I’m also fairly particular about what I like, so I have a hard time finding clothes I like. This also means I can’t get someone else to do it for me. Frustrating.

LOTD – Green Possible

In recent years it has been very vogue to go green. More people think about it now which is awesome, but some companies now market their existing products as green. I try to do little changes to my life that over time can add up to a lot. Changing driving habits, refusing plastic bags as often as possible, reusing items when it is safe to do so. Every once in a while I come across a list that really makes me feel good about what I do.

This is one such list. 50 Ways to Help the Planet. When I first read the list I was suprised at how many of these I was already doing.

via Darren Barefoot

I ran across another list recently on reducing food waste. 50 Ways to Never Waste Food Again

For our family we don’t waste a lot of food because we do menu planning. For 95% of the grocery items we buy, we buy because we need them, and the other 5% are for sale items on things we use regularly. Still, there are some good ideas in there that I might like to try some time.