inbetween

I got to work this morning. It probably would have been just as easy for me to ice skate to SUBtext today, but oh well. I like snow. It makes me happy.

That's right, I'm back at SUBtext. It's a little odd, but fun, nonetheless. I like Norm. We have the same sort of philosophy for the store, but he has business skills and experience.

I look around the store and things have changed, but only slightly. When Norm started here, he didn't really make any significant changes. He didn't feel the need to completely change the store and make it his. He didn't rip down any of the interesting things that Cathy had done (did she actually do anything interesting with the store?) and make the store in his image.

When I left, and Cathy took over, that's exactly what she did. She ripped the hand painted murals from the windows. Took down the posters. Changed all the forms, and the advertising. The staff complained to me, but I told them that it was her store, and they should give her the chance to proove herself. I did everything I could to support her.

Just before she quit, everyone in the store and the other departments realized one very important thing. There had been no advertising for two months, and there would be no advertising in August or September. Her staff claimed that she had forgotten. They told me that Cathy had been saying that I had spent all the advertising budget before I had left. That was in a previous budget year, and she was on her own budget. That's when her supervisors realized that it was time for her to go.

And now there's Norm. He's reasonable, doesn't condescend to the customers or the staff, is very laid back and fun to work with.

I think things will finally be different.

Thou hast angered me, damnable Adobe. I did not give you permission to install software on my computer. I did not ask you to take permissions and kibitz with my hard drive. You and your stupid little "Download Manager" have fouled my system with your unnecessary bloat and vile crap!

There is no point to the "Adobe Download Manager". I don't need help downloading a single file. I can click on the file to open it. I'm surprisingly good at clicking a mouse button or two. In highschool, I was awared Best Clicker of the Year. After the stupid manager does its thing, there's a new file on my desktop that I have to copy anyway. There isn't an Installer (which would have been a good idea!) to smooth the process along, but there is a Download Manager program, to smooth the already braindead process of clicking and waiting.

Grr... I should have had coffee this morning.

I bought tools today! Woo... I'm so manly and masculine. Rawr.

Ok, it was a set of little tiny screwdrivers, for screwing little tiny things (mostly screws) but it was a big thing for me.

I have some alone time finally. Elvis has left the building and has taken my mother with him. I am very happy.

As I write this, I am sitting in the living room (a very rare occasion) listening to Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz. It is very loud. The neighbours must be wondering. Ah well, they can't see me sitting here naked watching the Naked Chef on TV. I figure one must be naked to watch the Naked Chef, as he isn't. I was promised nudity in the title and I will have nudity! But I digress...

In a few moments I will do laundry (naked of course) with nobody in my way. Then I will make a good strong cup of naked espresso, and contemplate donning underwear for the first time today. I would pee with the bathroom door open, but the bathroom door faces the front door to the house, and the neighbours really are begining to wonder.

Once the Symphonie is done being Fantastique, I shall play very loud Bach organ music. I have a wonderful CD of Russian Chants for Verspers. I have always wanted to listen to it loud. Maybe the neighbours will think realize I've become a socialist.

Everyone needs a little time alone to listen to stupidly loud classical music in their underwear.

Firday. Froday. Friday. There we go.

It's been a long, long week. I did more than forty hours of homework this week. It has been a long week. And I forgot to pick up my paycheck. Grr...

Anyway, time to stop with the homework for an hour or two and call the lawyer. Be right back.

...
again, he isn't in... grr...
...

CBC News: No evidence of WMDs in Iraq: chief U.S weapons inspector

The title really does tell it all. Even the American Weapons Inspectors don't think that there are weapons in Iraq.

My favourite quote:

David Kay, who stepped down as chief weapons inspector last week, told National Public Radio in the U.S. that "it's an issue of the capabilities of one's intelligence service to collect valid, truthful information."

And of course, The White House has said that it remains confident that WMD will be found.

Adbusters: TV Turnoff Week

TV Turnoff Week 2003 (April 21-27) - I'll be participating I think. It is at the end of exams, so maybe I'll be studying. I've added the dates to my calendar.

Perhaps there should be a "sucky-website-stoppage" or something that keeps me from mindlessly wasting my time surfing through random poorly written blogs and op-ed sites (like this one!), but I've gone off...

The average person watches four hours of television per day which is probably far too much to be healthy. I wonder how much more productive I could be if I had an extra four hours? I could cook more, and finally get the garden growing. I've got the steaming pile of compost in my back yard, but I still haven't done anything with it.

Adbusters: The Zen TV Experiment "How many of you know how to watch television?" - a simple idea really. Do you know how to analyze what you see on TV? Do you understand the difference between seeing the TV, watching it, and digesting it? Yet more reasons not to watch the constant stream of pulp, throw-away, drivel produced by large American corporations designed only to sell advertisements and placate the TV watching public. A school teacher asked his students to not only watch the TV, but to observe the content.

Stupid Damn Bad Ram
Another day of crashes
Restart, Anger, Bing

After a very long, but productive meeting with the lawyer, I finally feel like I'm getting control on the death beauracracy. No, I'm not going to try to spell that again; I just don't want to.

We talked about probate, ownership, tennancy, beneficiaries, and death benefits (there are benefits to death!). It was, exhausting.

Before going to Kevins rather lovely office, I found the courage to deal with The Federal Government. It felt a little like a game show, probably the Gong Show, really. Anyone recieving a Pension from the feds may be entitiled to a post-mortem death benefit (I suppose a pre-mortem benefit would be silly. We know you're going to die, so we'll give you this ahead of time!). To apply for the death benefit on behalf of his estate, I must:

1. send a certified copy of his death certificate
2. send a certified copy of his will
3. send a certified copy of his birth certificate. I guess they don't trust me when I tell them that he was born. If he hadn't been born, then they wouldn't be paying him, would they? I don't even know when he was born. Not even the year.
4. send a certified copy of the power of attourney
5. send a certified copy of the mariage license. Again, I don't know when they were married. Neither does my mother.
6. send a certified copy of the ten page certified from that I downloaded from the certified website on the certified internet to certify that he is, in fact, certifiably dead.

All this has to be sent in a certified envelope with sufficient certified postage, to a certified address via certified carrier pigeon so a certified Canada Pension Plan Death Benefit Administrator can certify that (1) he was born, (2) he was married to his wife, (3) he died. Then they toss a certified coin or something and decide if his estate should be given the benefit of his death.

odd.

very odd.

certifiably odd

This entry has not been certified by any notaries, lawyers, pharmacists, or dental hygenists. The pizza delivery guy did proof read it, but wouldn't certifiy that the information was correct. He was certifiably useless, I don't think he even knew his name.

good: danke schein

good: Chipolte
bad: raisin

good: fancy chicken friday
bad: spastic tuna tuesday

good: i am the very model of a modern major general. I have information animal, vegetable, and mineral. I know the kings of england and I quote the fights historical from Marathon to Waterloo in order categorical.
bad: chum

good: salad dressing, undressing
bad: please remove your clothes so that we may proceed with a session of intercourse on this bed.

good: domicile
bad: irregardless
good: irrespective.

I had a about an hour to spare yesterday, so I went to the bank to finish off the banking for the dead man. Damn... that was... wow...

The people at the banks (I've now been to six of them for the dead guy) have been really helpful and understanding. Explaining to them that, "no, I can't really ask his sisters for that, they don't want to talk to me" seems to get a lot accomplished.

So I went to close out his chequing account. And the friendly Personal Banker and I filled out forms and made things kosher. Then she asked me to wait a moment, she had a couple of photocopies for me from the last time I was there.

I waited, and listened to muffled whispers. And a little shuffling of paper. She returned, her hands slightly atremble.

I was given photocopies of cheques that were written three days before he died. Turns out that one of his crazy sisters (the one with the criminal record!) had written herself a cheque for four thousand ($4,000) dollars. She also wrote a cheque to "N.S. Visa" for five thousand ($5,000) dollars with "Visa Payment, Crazy Sister#1" in the memo line. There was only $500 left.

So, three days before he off-ed it, his sister took a lot of money from him. I doubt he would have been able to agree to it. Seems to me like she took advantage of the stupid, dying fool. Crazy Sister#2 tells me that for the last month or so, he wasn't coherent, or sensible and didn't know where he was. Doesn't seem like he could have agreed to pay off someone else's VISA.