Author: gfox (old content)

Annual Market

Holy crap. I got the Voice Mobility annual report today. I took a look through it out of morbid curiosity.

What a read! in 2006 they burned another $3.3 million USD. That is a lot of dough. To date they have a net operating loss of $46.6 million USD. I still cannot fathom why that company is still operating. I still cannot fathom why any institution or individual would willing invest in them. They are a money pit.

They have an excellent product, but they lack something: a competent sales force.

What company in their right mind would purchase from them now? They have been operating for over 8 years, and haven’t had a single significant sale. If I was in the market to buy, I would steer clear of them.

I still want to see them succeed, but I doubt they will. All that hard work down the drain.

Training Push

I got out for an awesome ride today. I rode with a buddy of mine that is a much stronger rider than me. This pushed me a lot, and I certainly noticed it. I was out of breath way more than when I ride alone. We covered almost the same route as my last training ride, but time-wise it was shorter.

It was a little breezy so a couple sections were a tough slog, but the sun was out so that raised my spirits. Add in a warm temp and it was almost bliss.

I almost overdressed though. I was going to wear a jacket, but as I left the driveway I remembered that I had forgotten some food. As I went back into the house I made a snap decision to swap my jacket for a vest. Good call! I would have been way too warm in the jacket.

Over 20KM in less than an hour. I have a feeling that was a short, slow ride for T, but it was a good push for me.

Gross Motoring

In the last week I have lost two of my Tiger Barbs. For a few days, three of the four of them were acting strange. Those three were swimming slowly or just floating, while the fourth seemed normal and actually seemed a little overactive. It was getting close to the water changing time, so I think the water got a little too gross for them.

I changed the water last night, and the tank looks a whole lot better. All the fish seem to be more active, and the snail was motoring around tonight eating algae off the glass. It was very cool to see the snails mouth extend and munch on the glass.

I guess this means that I get to buy more fish this weekend since the barbs like to school, and when there isn’t enough of a school, then can get nippy.

Quickly Hillier

Thursday I rode to work. This came hot on the heels of a blood donation, and I actually felt pretty good for the ride to and from work, although I noticed my heart rate sure spiked quickly on the hills. I have my HRM set to beep when I crest 170 bpm. A few times on the way to work I reached 170, and on the way home I hit it quite a few since I took a hillier route home (I had to stop at the bike shop to pick up my new leg armour).

Letting Minutes

Wednesday I headed off to the Blood Donor clinic for my latest round of blood letting. For the first time ever (I think) I went after eating dinner, and not before. I hoped this would be a good thing.

When filling out the questions I noticed a new one about contact with monkeys. I remembered to ask about that question, and it turns out that there is some ailment you can get from handling monkeys or their waste. That was the first of many changes since I was there last. All of the changes were good too.

The donation itself went quickly (around 5 minutes), and then it was off to cookies and juice after making sure I had stopped bleeding. I was in and out in about 45 minutes.

Woodpecker Nest

We have new pets in our yard. We don’t feed them but they still seem happy. A woodpecker couple has taken up residence in the dead tree in our yard. I was hoping to get rid of the tree this summer, but in the space of a few days that woodpecker drilled a hole large enough to get himself into it.

The birds confirmed my biggest fear that this tree is rotten inside. As I watch the male push mouthfuls of sawdust to the ground, I have a feeling this tree should be taken down. We don’t want to disturb the birds though, so we are going to wait until they vacate the nest.

Ride Gathered

Sunday morning is ride morning. This morning was beautiful out. Warm, sunny, and no breeze.

And yet I had no inclination to get out and ride. I wasn’t feeling into it. I used Sox’s old trick of just getting out for half an hour, and see how I feel.

I hadn’t drank enough water yesterday and today, and my breakfast wasn’t great for a ride, but I gathered my gear, and headed out with a route in mind. I actually added the out and back on the fly since I wasn’t feeling too bad and thought I should push myself a little.

According to the map maker this route was almost 24 km, and apparently I burned 2123 calories in the hour that I was out. That seems high.

I’m glad I did go outside and ride, since it was nice to feel the sun, but I could have used slightly warmer clothing. Now I have eaten, and showered, and am waiting for Sprout to wake up so we can play.

Police Baffling

not an attack dog

Thursday evening while driving home, I saw an unmarked police truck parked in a driveway. As I passed it, they pulled onto Lampson behind me, and turned onto Bewdley as well. They then pulled a U turn on Bewdley and sped off in the other direction.

Half an hour later I could hear some noise on the street in front of the house, and when I looked there were 3 officers standing there watching a fourth with his dog. The dog was in the scrub bushes across the street and was barking up a storm. Then I saw a guy behind the chain link fence and he was yelling at the dog and swinging a stick at it.

I was thinking that this guy was trying to outrun the dog, then I noticed the guy had a padded arm, and a very bulky jacket. These cops were doing a training exercise on our street.

For the next 10 minutes we watched as the dog apprehended the guy, another officer came in and arrested the suspect, then the suspect broke free and the dog re-apprehended the suspect. It was interesting to see this with such good seats, but I was a little baffled that the police never informed us this was happening in our neighbourhood.

Sure enough at one point a car drove through their exercise and the people in the car looked a little confused.

Also, Sprout watched with great intensity since he loves dogs right now, but if he were older we would have to prevent him from seeing that. I can’t see how explaining why a dog is biting a man on the arm would be easy.

This was all very interesting, yet baffling.