I'm of the mind that my clothes on my floor fit better and more comfortably than my clothes from my closet or dresser. Power to the wear-it-off-the-floorers.

I disagree with websites that require you to fill out an entire entry in their customer database just to get some access. It's one thing for name and email, but anything else -- phone numbers, job position, address -- those should not be required fields. Those are things companies should learn about you through building a relationship, not because they're lazy. Good for them for wanting a thorough database, but they can build that with their sales reps as they build the relationship.

Take YouSendIt.com, for example. It's a website where you can have them send a file that otherwise can't be sent by email. Their front page makes it seem easy: Your name, your email and you attach the file you want to send. But... if you click "add another file", they prompt you to register for a paid account, and if you click "back", you'll find the information you typed has been cleared. Type it again. Click "send", and then it takes you to another page where you have to register for a free account. Fine. Fill out a bunch of stuff that this company will never really use, such as my street address and my phone number entered twice (it happens to have a series of 5's in it) and after they send an email for me to click on in order to activate my account, I then have to log-in only to find nothing in the "sent" box. What the fuck.. I've filled out the file-send form twice now, the site is misleading, they coax you to click a "send" button which actually then makes you get an account, and they never save the file-send request for after you went ahead and filled out the form. My thoughts were that if I filled out the personal-info form and sent it, that they would then send the file. Back to the beginning.

I only went there because I'm having gift-cards printed for Splice and the printing company needs the 50MB file. I've asked for an FTP site from that company. Easier.

"Greco uses only Federally Inspected Beef"

Really. As opposed to Pizza Hut, who uses only Provincially Inspected Beef and King of Donair that uses uninspected roadkill in their foodstuffs.

Sitting at the office, trying to automate the reimaging of our Macs. yawn.

Need some new tunes.

iTunes Music Store, a few new selections:
- Alanis Morisette's cover of Seal's "Crazy". Sure, it was released a few years ago but I did not know that. 2006 is the new 2008. (And Barack Obama is the new black, so I've read.)
- A string quartet cover of the Jagged Little Pill album. I feel cultured, listening to a string quartet (cultured like a fungus, perhaps) and it's a good opposition to the poptastic tunes that were throbbin' out on the flec's dance floor just 13 hours ago.

- Barenaked Ladies. New album caled "Snacktime". It's a kids album. I listened to a couple tracks and laughed, so am downloading the album now.

Sample lyrics from the new Barenaked Ladies album:
"6 is afraid of 7, because 7 8 9."
"Raisins come from grapes, people come from apes, I come from Canada"

The hokeyness reminds me of $1 000 000.

Yay to new tunes.

"The information on this site is Copyright © 1996-2008 ConsumerNet, Inc. This site is solely for your personal use. You may link to these pages or print them out for your own personal use, but no parts of these pages can be reproduced, sold, or transmitted in any form without explicit written permission. By copying or paraphrasing the intellectual property on this site, you're automatically signing a binding contract and agreeing to pay a fee of $10,000 per instance per week payable immediately."
- http://www.carbuyingtips.com/canada.htm

By reading this LiveJournal entry, you're automatically signing a binding contract and agreeing to pay a fee of $10,000 per week payable immediately.

Cough it up, gents.

From:
To: info[@]splicetraning.ca
Subject: I AM A MAC GENIUS
[Resume.doc]
---

I view the document. Can't find any reference to Apple or Mac. Find lots about PCs and processor engineering. I reply:

"After reviewing your resume, we find your PC and hardware skills
commendable and believe you would make a good asset in the field of PC
sales & technical services. Unfortunately, we did not identify from
your resume any experience or qualifications for the Macintosh
platform or related Apple technologies. As we're an Apple Training
Center, this gives other candidates that possess Mac skills a
significant advantage. As such, we do not have a position for you at
this time."

I then receive a response, consisting only of this, to which I did not respond:
"I have apple certification."

------------------

Thoughts? Comments?

Sitting in a park in Basel, Switzerland.
Sunny. Working on my laptop.
Backpacker comes over, speaks in german.
"What?"
- "Do you have any money for me?"
"No, thanks."
- "Fuck you, then."
I continue to work, ignoring him,
He takes out a boxcutter. Slices a new branch from a tree trunk.
I'm a bit threatened. Laptop, me vs. crazy guy and his display of his knifeskills and his willingness to use them on woody things. I begin to put my Mac into standby so I can leave, but he picks up his bag. I resume working.

10' from me, a guy is in summer slumber, face covered by his jacket. i look over, crazy guy kneels down and is picking up coins that must have fallen from the guy's trousers. I yell at him "Eh!" The sleeping guy pulls his shirt from his eyes and looks at me. I knod upwardly, sharply, directing his attention to his other side. He seems the guy standing over him. Crazy guy smiles and walks away, looking at the coins in his hand.

- "What was he doing?"
- Taking coins that had fallen from your pocket.

Slumber-guy looks at him as he walks away, smirking.

- "Thanks."
And he puts his shirt back over his head and goes back to sleep.

I think I should have said "Oy!", it would have been more local than "Eh!", which is really just a "Hey!" minus the aspiration.

I overheard one flight attendant say to a passenger that the airline was having difficulties in filling Cabin Crew positions. Apparently now that gays are allowed to work as lawyers and property managers, the number of potential hires in our 5% of the population is too few to sustain the needs of Something Special in the Sky. That, and number of new positions resulting from the retiring en-mass of Air Canada's 55 year-old battle-axe Stewardesses. ("We were called Stewardesses when we signed up in 1973, and that's the way it's going to stay.")

With this in mind, it would seem British Airways - the Cattle Crew of the Sky Cabins - have opened the once ivory gates of their pastures to a new method of recruiting, YouTube style:

http://www.britishairwaysandpamann.com/

Tags: air transit

Why can't everyone be as efficient as I am at getting through security in an airport?

I mean, really: Put all your metal shit in your carry-on. Get rid of those ridiculous industrial chain necklaces.
Is it that difficult to have your laptop out of your luggage before you get to the counter? Take it out while waiting. Put your belt in your carry-on while in the line. Or, better yet, put it in the carry-on when you are at home, then put it on after clearing security.

Greater than 20-minute wait lines (Orlando MCO, London LHR) are only the result of incompetent travelers who shouldn't be allowed to fly. There should be a special line that routes them back out to the parking lot.

Or better yet, a line for those who have a clue. For those who have their liquids & gels in a 1L ziplock bag, who have their belt in their carry-on (coins & cell too!), and who have that baggie in one hand with their laptop (out of it's case) in the other. For me, basically.

I want my own line at the airport security gate.

Tags: air transit

Roads, that is.

I've made a bit more effort to connect with The Fraternity. You'd think with me being on campus just about every day, I'd stop into the fraternity house. Not yet. The brothers there, they're 18, 19. I feel a connection yet a disconnect from them. They're two generations removed: I was there in 2000, 8 years is twice a full undergraduate generation. Another approach..

Splice moved. I emailed the pledge class trainer and then offered the pledge class some cash to move the stuff. The old and new offices are in neighbouring buildings, so it wasn't a huge move but there was still plenty of work. Two purposes were served: Splice got moved, and I met some of the brothers-to-be. Some fraternity brothers don't like calling pledges "brothers-to-be." I disagree. I think it's motivating and encouraging to instill within the pledges that the membership wants them to succeed, just so long as they don't think it's an automatic acceptance, an honour bestowed upon them without the work of pledgeship. I think it also reminds would-be bossy bros that these younger lads will one day be referred to as "brother" and that certain actions and words are unfit to be used towards such men.

Of the 10 or 11 pledges currently in the Dal/SMU chapter of the fraternity, one stands out exceptionally, and two sort of (don't know them well enough yet), while the remaining 8 or 9, i've yet to meet.

A friend of mine, sort of a younger brother by some kind of diffusion or association (I suppose) has also pledged Sig in Tampa. That, too, may have been catalystic in the resurgence of my interest. Or it may, more simply, be a way in which I'm endevouring to retain the spirit of youth - by keeping in touch with it.