theblackwidower

Last night I was on YouTube and found something interesting. A pilot to a canceled WB show called Nobody's Watching. Once the pilot was leaked on YouTube it gained publicity and they created a series of webisodes. But the show was never made it into an actual TV show because according to Wikipedia: "test audiences seemed to be confused by its premise." My responce to this: FUCK YOU!!! This show gets cancelled and American Idol is still on the air? Because I'm confused by the premise, specifically the fact no ones killed Simon. That and it's stupid! Only two (Daughtry and David Cook) people on that show actually have viable careers, the rest suck.

Anyway it's also ironic because this show is about two guys who tell all the major networks their shows suck and they can make a better one, and they did, it's called Nobody's Watching and they don't air it. I think network executives want internet to take over. They keep cancelling shows that are awesome, such as Moonlight and Journeyman, after only one season, but continue to air crap, a fact explained at the end of Nobody's Watching, no matter how bad the show is as long as people like it, it will stay on the air...Coach!

Moving on, last night I had a dream and was inspired to create my own sitcom. So here it goes:

It's called Best Friends Forever...but that name sucks so I'll have to rethink it. Anyway, the main character, 25-year-old Alex, has a great life. He is a sysadmin for a small company in Columbus, Ohio, where he met his girlfriend Liz who works in a different department at the same company. His roommate, Jake, is a webdesigner and author. They live in a large house and have another roommate, Pete...or did until he robbed them blind.

[Alex and Jake return home to an empty house...everything missing]
Alex: We had furniture this morning right?

Thankfully Alex's brother, Darren, works for an insurance company and they begin to file the necessary forms for Darren to put on rush order. As Jake and Darren are taking care of things, Alex, having a hard time dealing with the situation, takes off.

[Alex starts walking out of the house]
Jake: Where are you going?
Alex: We need to eat tonight.
[Alex is out the door]
Jake: We also need a new stove.
Alex: SON OF A-
[Jake closes door]

So Alex is walking down the streets of downtown and stops at a pizza store. He orders a pizza, sits down to wait and then a women exits from a job interview in the back of the store and Alex quickly recognizes her as Melissa, an old childhood friend whom he has not seen in ten years, she recognizes him too. Alex invites her to his place for dinner and she says she'll meet him there.

That night Alex returns home with pizza and Melissa is already there. Jake is suspicious of this mystery girl but Darren vouches for her. Liz arrives and seems to be worried about Alex. They all sit down on the floor and eat pizza.

That night Melissa tells them about how she just moved back a month ago but is living with another friend, Sarah, who has six kids. Melissa says she would like to find her own house, so they try to convince Melissa to be Alex and Darren's third roommate. Melissa is reluctant but changes her mind, kinda, after they show her around. She is particularly interested in their now-empty home gym which they never use, it was used by the roommate they had before Pete, Luke, who was a personal trainer who died of a heart attack and left them his gym.

If you think you know where this is going...you are either a genius, half right, or a moron. So the foursome arrive at Sarah's house that weekend to move Melissa into her new home. There Melissa introduces Alex to 10-year-old Christine.

Melissa: Alex this is my daughter, Christine.
Alex: Well this is unexpected.
[Alex gets down and shakes Christine's hand]
Alex: Hi, nice to meet you.
Melissa: Christine, this is your father.
[smile drops from Alex's face]
Darren: No, THIS is unexpected.

So you can see where this is going. Little back story, they did it once. They both used to live in Columbus, but when they were 15 Melissa's family was moving to Arizona. Then, who knows why, probably some crazy adolescent hormones are to blame, her last night in town, the two of them had sex. So once on the other side of the country it would be hard to tell him she got pregnant. Even if he did, he couldn't cross the country to be with them, he was still in high school. So Alex finds out 10 years later and decides to do right, make up for 10 years of absence. There is some jealousy from Liz but Alex explains there is nothing to be jealous about, so it subsides or probably gets buried down.

Some may say it's been done before, but I doubt it, and if it is, then it wouldn't be the first time a concept is reused...Til' Death.

Anyway I think it would work. Several plot lines could fly off it. Like Alex goes to Arizona and talks to Melissa's parents to thank them and try to make amends. Alex finds out his Mother knew for the past 10 years and neither he nor Darren take it particularly well. Someone more creative can come with other plot lines.

What do you think? Can I sell it to Hollywood? Please comment I feel like their is no point anymore...but that doesn't mean I am going to stop.

Ahh dreams. They can inspire and confuse in one swoop. Recently I had a dream and it certainly was inspiring.

It was an episode of Heroes. Yes I know, I am that much of a loser, I dream about TV shows. Most dream about sex, I dream about TV. It isn't the first time. Which reminds me, minor end-of-volume-three spoilers.

Anyway, the heroes were fugitives, as foreshadowed in volume four's opening scene. This is during volume four. Me and a still-depowered Hiro Nakamura were hiding out on top of a decrepit old building and out of nowhere we met two girls. Don't know why they were there, but dreams are crazy like that. They didn't look homeless or anything. Maybe they thought it was cool and haunted or whatever. Anyway I started making out with one of them when I suddenly told Hiro we need to move. Then I woke up.

So this gave me an idea for a Heroes character, we'll call him...Elix. He's a ladies man who has an odd ability: he can identify superhumans. Some use the term evolved human but I like superhuman because it's more succinct. So he's kind of like a walking hero-dar. He can also identify what he calls "potentials." Those superhumans who have no abilities yet, but will develop them, like Daphne before the fateful Eclipse she talked about.

The range and refinement of this ability, ie. whether he can track individual heroes or abilities and whether it works across the city or across the planet, I'm still not sure about. I guess it depends on how much power he should have. I'm thinking he can only detect if they are superhumans and whether or not they have abilities within a very short range, like within one block or something. But if he meditates deeply enough, which he does do, he can track a specific ability across...maybe a continent. But only the ability, he can track fliers but he would not be able to tell the difference between Nathan Petrelli and West Rosen. To him they are interchangeable.

But there is another aspect to his ability. He can "awaken" "potentials." "Awaken" means give them abilities. Now this won't on any human. It was revealed in volume three, episode five, "Angels and Monsters," Arthur and Angela both knew Nathan did not have an ability when he was born. They used the formula to give him an ability. So it is determined from birth, whether you have or will have abilities. If Nathan was never given the formula, Elix would not be able to give him an ability, he also cannot give Noah an ability, or for that matter, any other human who does not or will never have an ability naturally. He is not the formula. He works kind of like the Eclipse, in that after it's over, more people gain abilities. But no one can gain abilities if they don't have the genes for it, that is unless they modify their DNA.

So how does he "awaken" "potentials?" By having sex with them. I told you he was a ladies man, and yes he is very straight, so by the time the story gets to him he has only "awakened" females of the species. But later on his abilities develop and it is discovered he simply needs a strong emotional and physical connection. A kiss works well.

His history is kind of interesting, in the past he would go to bars and pick up woman who were "potentials" and have sex with them, awakening their ability. He would then tell them it's nothing to be afraid of and it is a gift.

I like the idea. An interesting character with an interesting ability. He and his ability can evolve as the story goes on.

I want to know your comments. Can I make this character more interesting? Do you think he's not even worth bothering with? Send me your thoughts.

As you may or may not know: I have given up on love. It's been a while now, I think it started over a year ago. I realized I have enough problems in life without dealing with women. However, last night something happened that made me think. I had a dream.

Now I know what you're thinking, "Oh my god, you had a dream, so did the rest of the planet asshole." Well, yeah, a lot of people have dreams and a lot of people have dreams they don't forget the moment they wake up, and a lot of people have dreams they can't get out of their head. But I'm still going to write about it so bite me.

There are few dreams that I can remember years later. One was when I was a little kid. In the dream I saved a girl after she got kidnapped by this fat bitch, and my two best friends (at the time), Jessica and Andrew, were at my side. What does that mean? I didn't know then and I don't know now.

More recently I had a dream about the Superstack. I guess it was made of Jell-o because I grabbed it, shook it, and it wobbled. Come up with your own theory on that one.

But this dream, it's different. Unlike those dreams, this one has a history. There seems to be some type of story. Basically, there is a girl, I called her Nodoka in the dream. Literally, in the dream I called her by her name, Nodoka. For those who don't know, Nodoka is the name of a character from Negima!, a Japanese Anime, who, I must admit, I think is quite hot. Yes she is young but I'm ignoring her age here. Plus, we don't know when the story takes place, she could be older then me. Anyway, she's smart, she's shy, and she's a hopeless romantic who's in love with her teacher who's 3 years younger then her. It's Japanese, Japanese culture is the definition of fucked up. Anyway, I think she's hot.

Now for those who are going to ridicule me for having the hots for a fictional character, like: "Hey you perv try looking for chicks from this reality." All I have to say is: Bite me. There are other fictional characters I think are hot, Selphie Tilmitt from Final Fantasy VIII, and to a lesser degree, Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter series. But I digress.

This girl looked a lot like Nodoka, she had the hair, and the outfit. However, this afternoon, as I was playing Guitar Hero: On Tour, I noticed this girl also looked like Pandora, one of the game's player characters, wearing her Bad Apple outfit. That's the character I use when I play. It's possible that the only reason I dreamed about a girl who looked like those two is because I see that likeness every time I play Guitar Hero or open my phone (the wallpaper is Nodoka reading a Linux book...HOT!). So nothing weird about that.

So anyway, this girl, apparently me and her had a bit of history. She once had strong feelings for me, but I brushed her off (this is in the dream). However by the time the dream takes place, for some reason, the roles are reversed. I felt strong romantic feelings for her, but she brushed me off.

I have had my heart broken a few times, rejection is really good at that, and in the dream, that's what I felt. To me, this dream means that timing is important. I can't let a dozen bad experiences cause me to completely brush off all females. I could be pushing away someone who could make me happy and not even know it, and I may only have one chance...now.

Some may say dreams mean nothing and are simply random firings of synapses in the brain. While that is possible, it could also be ones subconscious attempting to communicate with them. I hate existential bullshit, trying to find meaning in everything, but this... Something tells me I should take it to heart, I felt something, something different.

Anyway, comment, tell me what you think, please I insist.

In the Shield offices at college we use Macs exclusively. I recently asked Chris if we could get at least one Windows machine in the office, he said no because our industry uses Macs. So I am more or less forced to use it. Now as one would expect, I have standard user privileges, I am locked out of adjusting many features and the console. But even taking that into consideration I notice something. Despite Apple's advertisements, despite the aesthetic appearances, and despite the word of my peers praising the platform, the Mac just plain sucks.

This is merely part one of my Apple bashing series focusing on why I dislike the company. I'd like to begin by stating that they are not a technology company, they are a design and marketing company. They seem to focus more on the product's appearance then it's functionality, and they spend a lot of time saying their products are the best, rather them actually making them the best. I shall begin with the iMac Personal Computer, and I don't care what anyone says, the Mac is a PC, it's not a server or mainframe, it's a PC, but that is mere semantics.

There are two components to every personal computer, the hardware and the software. There are further subdivisions but we will stick with this for now. Let us begin with the hardware.

When one looks at the Mac one might notice its elegant simplicity. It's all one system, so no ugly external CPU, and the front of the machine is simple, all you see is a screen and the Apple logo. When I first saw the Mac my first thought was, "How do I turn it on?" Well actually, that's not true because it was already on, but the first time I had to turn it on that's what I thought. You ever see that cartoon where the guy is under his computer desk looking for a way to turn on the computer...that was me with the Mac, and that was the first time in ever that I did that. They place the power button behind the system, where you can't see, on the bottom left (when facing the screen) corner. Would it not make more sense to put it on the front? Oh, no, because that would ruin the pretty. Bill Maher said it best: "Right now that little button is harder to find then the g-spot." He was referring to televisions but it's the same idea.

Another problem with the Mac hardware is the lack of an important tool I use often on all other computer systems, the status indicators. That being the two lights on the front of the CPU, one indicating whether or not the system is on, the other indicating whether or not the hard drive is doing anything. Mac doesn't have either of these, but it does have a stand-by indicator, when the screen is off due to a power saving time-out, you can tell the system is still on due to the slowly blinking white light in the bottom right corner. The light is located behind the frosted glass on the front of the system so it does not ruin the pretty, so the question remains: Why not do the same for power and disk activity?

One may say: "Why do you need them?" Well let's begin with power indication. While it is true that the Mac already has a very large power indicator called an LCD screen, but what if the screen is busted? You power it on and nothing happens, you might hear something but you see nothing. How can you fix a problem if you can't diagnose it? And how can you diagnose the problem if you don't know the symptoms? A power indicator gives you that extra bit of information saying "power is getting to the motherboard" that will help you diagnose the problem. But this is a minor issue.

The bigger issue is disk activity. The purpose of this is so you know that the system is actually doing something and hasn't locked up. The only indicator on the Mac is a spinning pinwheel on the screen and all that tells you is that you can't do anything right now. You may wait for hours waiting for the system to free up only to realize: "...Hmmm...I think it's dead," aaaand reboot! Some may say this isn't an issue because Macs don't crash. That is a software issue, not a hardware issue, I will deal with that in my next entry, but I'll give you a preview: They do crash.

One final note on this issue, the stand-by indicator I mentioned earlier was on the "Core Duo" models with a white polycarbonate casing. The newest "Core 2 Duo" model with an aluminum casing lacks the stand-by indicator. That means that the only indicator on the case has been dropped. They truly do think appearance is more important then functionality

Next is the CD-ROM drive. Now one might ask: "What do you have against the CD-ROM drives?" Only one thing: they are slot-loading. In 1998, the original iMac G3 had a tray loading drive but that was dropped a year later in favor of a slot loading drive. In the G4 model a few years later, the tray returned, but (as far as I can tell) it lacked a critical feature which I will talk about in a moment. In the G5 they returned to slot loading, which continued through the Intel line.

So what is the problem with slot-loading? Well it does work fine, until something goes wrong. Allow me to give an example: One day I had to burn a CD on a Mac for a final assignment, I thought, "piece of cake." I placed all the files in a "burn folder" which is the way it's done in OS X, then I inserted my blank CD and then I clicked the "burn" button, then it asked me to insert my blank CD... I thought, "Okay...how do I eject it so I can start over?" I couldn't. The typical way to eject a CD in OS X in to drag the desktop icon into the trash, but there was no desktop icon. The CD was blank so OS X did not mount it, and the disk can only eject if it has been mounted. My next thought was "eject button." But no, that would be easy. There is no eject button of any kind, not even an emergency eject button, which is typically accessed with a paper clip and is on every other CD-ROM drive in the world. This is the feature I mentioned earlier that the G4 lacked, eject buttons. So it was stuck, I could not eject.

I then went to an old stand-by...reboot. I didn't actually think it would work but it did. When the system booted back up, OS X recognised the blank CD and asked if I wanted to eject it, so I did. So the problem being, why jump through hoops to eject a fucking disk? And what if I can't reboot? What if there is suddenly a kernel panic or some other problem. My CD is stuck and the only way to recover it would be to completely reinstall OS X, except to do that I would need to insert the OS X DVD and there is already a disk in the drive, so I can't.

Another problem is that these CD drives can break. Can this happen on a Windows machine? Yeah, but you can easily change it out.

Another extremely vital issue is that one cannot upgrade an iMac. The only way to upgrade a Macintosh is to spend over $2,000 on a Mac Pro. Both iMacs and Mac minis are built so that you are stuck with the factory settings, that may be fine for some but the truly 1337 would never waste their time. As for laptops, well Windows laptops are also non-upgradeable for the most part. The only thing you can upgrade is the RAM, the WiFi, the hard drive, the disc drive, and the battery. The most you can upgrade on Mac laptops is the battery, except on the MacBook air.

The point being that Apple cares more about appearance then functionality. They believe that it doesn't matter if a product would work better if a particular feature was added, if it means that feature would make the product less pretty they won't add it. The lack of a power button on the front, status indicators, eject buttons, and making it possible to upgrade just proves it. While these features would make the products better they are not added because the products would not be as pretty. I'm not saying that appearance is not important but it is not as important as functionality. A silver marble is pretty, but it doesn't help me write a blog entry.

There is one more thing that I would like to mention and that is Apple's business practices, this can be stated quite simply in a simple YouTube video I posted:

( Video from CrankyGeeks Episode 116 )

Being a journalist...in training, one of the essential habits I need to develop is paying attention to the news. I'm working on it. When you do, you realise that there is a lot going on in the world, and it is fucking crazy.

One big thing that occurred was an issue dubbed "Ticketgate". As you might be able to tell from the name, it was a political scandal.

It all started with a big announcement: Elton John is coming to Sudbury!!! One of two Canadian stops. Apparently he likes playing small venues. Me and my classmates first heard about it from our coordinator on The Cambrian Shield, Chris. One of my classmates, Shaun, was assigned to the story and Chris tried to get him an interview with the man himself...no such luck...apparently Elton don't talk to the press. Chris tried mentioning that we were not mainstream media...and outing Shaun (he's not actually gay, which is why it's so goddamn funny), didn't work. I guess one wouldn't expect that to work, but at least he tried. I guess Elton had some bad experiences and he hates us now or something...just like Steven Harper.

But I digress. The journalist on the city hall beat for the Sudbury Star, Denis St. Pierre (I think that's his name, I'm workin' off of memory here), broke the story that after people waited outside in the freezing cold (this was in winter by the way) for several hours, some leaving empty handed because of how quickly they sold out, 100 tickets were reserved for city council members...I'll repeat that...100 tickets were distributed among 13 people before being released to the general public...100...divided by 13...that's a little under 8 tickets each.

Now, I understand reserving tickets for arena employees, prevents conflict of interest and is one of those sweet perks that come with the job.

I also understand giving the council advance tickets. These people represent us, or at least they're supposed to, and they need to make appearances at stuff like this. I mean Elton is big name, if a councillor doesn't show up it looks like they're snubbing the guy. That's a big deal, I mean no one gives a shit if they snub Def Leppard or Brian Adams (I'm a fan of those two by the way) and it would be expected if they snubbed Avril Lavigne (she sucks), but Elton John is a fucking knight for god's sake, that's like flipping off the Queen, and that may be fine for the United States, but Canadians show fuckin' respect, unless it's Avril Lavigne.

I also understand giving more then one ticket each, I mean I've been to a concert alone and it sucked...the being alone part-not the concert, the concert kicked ass, but it sucked that there was no one there to experience it with. Anyway, you also never hear them giving only one ticket away in those radio contests, imagine that:

DJ: You just won a single ticket to the Elton John concert
Winner: Oh great, 'cus that's exactly the type of thing I want to see alone. That way all my friends are pissed, my girlfriend feels like I'm blowing her off, during the concert I can turn to the person next to me and mention how exciting this is and they can respond with "get the fuck away from me," and when a balled starts I'll get to make-out with a guy named Biff. Yes, this is exactly what I want, thank you.

You never hear that do you?

However, here's what I don't understand: Eight tickets each? Really? Eight? I've been to a City Council meeting...none of them are that fat. Eight tickets-that enough for you, your best friend, your spouse, their spouse, your grandfather, your second uncle, your fifth cousin twice removed, and a stranger off the street. They don't need that many tickets, they can live with two, and if their friend really wants one-they can tell them to stand outside in the cold for three hours, like the rest of the population!!!

Now at this point you're thinking: "This is pretty bad." Or, you're thinking: "So what? It's not like they tried to hide it." Well, no. You see the law states that all city council meetings must be open to the public, with only a few narrow exceptions, and council discussed this whole ticket thing in a closed door meeting...that's right, they broke the law, they went out of their way to hide it, they knew it was wrong.

Also, it seems that council also spent $14,000 in taxpayers money to pay for media consultants to deal with the fallout. They used our money to try and fix their mistake. Talk about adding insult to injury.

And finally, this is where it gets good, after the story broke, Denis, once again the man, intercepted a relatively interesting e-mail. Where a high ranking civil servant suggests to council that they blackball The Sudbury Star from all advertising by the city (papers earn most of their money through advertising). This is what laymen call, malicious. A few councillors responded and approved the idea...not too bright.

Now of course, they denied it, but this is typical of politicians, they don't care about justice, they don't care about serving the community, they care about getting as many perks as possible and getting re-elected. Now I know what your thinking: "That's unfair, there has got to be at least one honest person on council, I doubt people suck that much." If that was true, don't you think that one would say: "Are you sure we really need eight tickets each?" or "Don't you think it's a bit assholish to blackball The Star for doing their job?" I'm telling you, it's too bad that the election is not for another two years, because I can virtually guarantee that not a single councillor, nor the mayor, will be reelected.

Thankfully this scandal does have a silver lining because in the end they returned 71 tickets. The remaining tickets were already sold to friends and family or donated to charity so they could not be returned. I believe the remaining tickets were given to radio stations. But it still annoys me that they took the tickets to begin with. Not one councillor or civil servant said, "This is a bad idea." Or maybe they did and the councillors replied with a polite, "Go Fuck Yourself."

One final point of interest, according to CBC News, council took 100 tickets, however according to CBC News, council took 120 tickets. Same news source, two different totals...something is wrong here. We'll say 100 tickets, that way council looks just a little bit better.

Finally, I just wast to say I hold nothing personal against them. I once interviewed the mayor, he's a great guy, and I doubt any of them intended to be malicious. But the thing about these scandals is that you learn from them. Now they know that if you take unnecessary advantage of a perk, people are going to get pissed. But my point is, they should have known that. Hopefully they learn from it and never do it again, and if they do (learn from it), they are definitely smarter then the current U.S. President...seriously, I doubt he even knows people are pissed about the shit he did.

You know, now that I think about it, they probably will get reelected...that's just how fucked up the system is.

So after that high school mess I signed up for Journalism at Cambrian College. I went to Cambrian to save money by living at home.

Journalism is interesting, but I must say at this particular college they had this odd thing called an independent study course. We pay for a course they don't teach, instead we buy a book, separately, and they test us on it twice during the semester. What are we paying for? The test? I didn't come to college to be tested...I came to learn. Courses cost money to pay for equipment (that are not books) and teachers, but there is no equipment and they are not actually teaching us. We were supposed to take two "courses" in our first year (one per semester), I ended up failing the first course I was to take by missing both tests, so I had to take the two "courses" simultaneously during my second semester. Now my first 21 credit courses are included in the tuition, so I can take extra courses during the semester for no extra cost, as long as the total credits on my schedule does not exceed 21 credits. That particular semester I already had a full 21 credits before that "course", so technically I was supposed to pay for that "course". My thought was, well technically it's no real cost to them to them so they probably won't charge me for it...they did. I believe it was $81 and I literally got nothing out of it.

Some may ask why I simply did not take it next semester. Well if I did I would have an F on my transcript for next semester. I can't have an F because if I did I would lose my RESP...Registered Education Savings Plan...it's a government subsidized college fund.

Looking outside the college for a minute, an interesting event occurred across the Provence during my time here, a referendum. For those that don't know, a referendum is a rare occurrence in Canada. It happens whenever an issue is so important, and so critical, that instead of simply having the parliament/legislature vote on the issue, it is turned to the people to directly vote on the issue. The last referendum I remember was in Quebec. The Quebec people voted on whether or not they wanted to secede. The proposition failed with 50.58 percent voting "No", Canada was 0.58 percent away from being split in half...talk about every vote counting.

This time the referendum was about the electoral system: should we continue with the current system where the representative in each riding is the one with the most votes? Or should we use Mixed-Member Proportional, a system where 70 percent of the legislature (90 seats) is elected using the old system, and the remaining 30 percent (39 seats) would be selected based on the percentage of the popular vote their party received such that the end result would be the popular vote being as close as possible to the final makeup of the legislature.

It sounds complicated, I know, but I'm not sure I did a good job explaining it. Let me try again: in the new system people would still be elected the old fashioned way, however a second ballot in the voting booth would allow one to vote for the individual party who may or may not be the same as their candidate. This allows two things: it allows someone to elect a candidate they agree with and a different party they agree with who is different from their candidate, probably the candidate wasn't towing the party line on certain issues. Not everyone fits into partisan categories...I don't.

Anyway, that second ballot is tabulated in a province-wide popular vote and the 39 seats would be filled according to lists the parties created and how many seats each party would require to bring their size in the legislature to be as close as mathematically possible to the tallies of the second ballot. For example, if a party gets 75 seats in the ridings and 48 percent of the second ballot then they would get nothing because they already have 58 percent of the legislature, now if another party fails to win a single riding but gets 5.2 percent of the second ballot they win seven seats and those seats go to the first seven members on that party's list. That was probably pretty bad too. If you really want to know the details, may I recommend Wikipedia.

So the idea is that the legislature more accurately represents the opinion of the people. Our local representative, Rick Bartillucci, said he was against it because these "list members" would be representing no one. Where does he get this? They are representing something, they are representing an ideology. The problem is that people think locally, they believe that where you are born is more important then what you believe. I moved around a lot as a kid so I felt no bond to where I lived. I would love to pick up and move somewhere else but there's really nowhere to go. Right now I have no one representing my beliefs in the legislature. I voted Green in the last election as did 8.02 percent of the population, and we don't have a single representative representing our ideology. At 8 percent one would expect us to have eight out of 107 representatives...we have zero. The only reason we have zero representatives is because we are too thinly spread out across the country, in no one riding do we have a significant percentage of support. So, because we aren't clustered together we get no representation.

As you may have guessed I was for the new electoral system. It required 60 percent support across the province and 50 percent support in 64 out of 107 ridings for the resolution to pass. It got 36.9 percent support and five ridings, and all five of those ridings were in Downtown Toronto on the waterfront, (Beaches—East York, Davenport, Parkdale—High Park, Toronto—Danforth and Trinity—Spadina) and almost formed a solid block of support, however Toronto Centre, which is right in the middle, rejected the proposition by 134 votes...not that it would have made a difference. What really blows my mind is how badly it was rejected. It felt like reason blew out the window.

I recently looked at an Anti-MMP website and it said that MMP would lead to: "Fringe parties holding the balance of power with 2 or 3 seats," as if that would be a bad thing, as if suddenly having more then three parties with any influence would tear the province apart. George Carlin was right, we have no choice, we have the illusion of choice. When it comes to unimportant stuff we have more selection then the important stuff. Fifty-two flavors of ice-cream, three political parties...well, four in Quebec. In my riding we had six candidates, one religious nut, one dip-shit (seriously, I got to sit in on a debate and the PC candidate was basically citing John Tory over and over, like he had Tourettes. I doubt he even had a mind of his own but was implanted with a device that recited the party's policies. What exactly is "leadership" anyway? Can anyone define it?), one I never really heard of until recently, and three real candidates, Rick Bartolucci (Liberal), Dave Battaino (NDP) and David Sylvestre (Green). I'm wondering why, when the issues are so numerous, we somehow find a way to simplify it for our tiny, tiny brains.

I'm not even close to done yet, there is so much more I must talk about. In case you haven't noticed I am moving away from the online-diary format and getting political. This is something that I think everyone will enjoy, primarily because I don't think anyone really cares what I had for breakfast, or when I took a shit. But more importantly this is something you need to read, because unless you hear all points of view, you are not really informed.

Hello all, I am back. The past couple years have been quite crazy. I'll give you the rundown of what happened. That camping trip I went on kinda sucked because it was cloudy. For those of you that forget, I went on that camping trip specifically for astronomy. Anyway, ignoring that, there was nothing extremely negative that I can remember. One of our "neighbours" had an accident where a child was burnt (I assume) and that caught my attention. From where I was standing it seemed pretty severe, however the child's parents were able to handle the situation pretty damn well. I hope if that happens to any hypothetical children I might have, I know what to do and I don't panic.

Anyways, that was 2 years ago. Since then I spent another year in high school, yes, I know, that would be seven years, I suck, but here's the rundown.

I took a World Issues class and the highlight was a scenario we ran. We split into groups and designed our own country. The next day our teacher said that in each of our countries, our entire population was being evacuated because another group of people, with every other nation on earth behind it, wanted to return to their homeland, our nation. My group came up with the idea of smoking them out, finding a way to get them to want to leave. For those of you who don't know, this is the same scenario encountered by Palestine when the Jews wanted to form the nation of Israel...so...yeah. I'm not sure why it happened to begin with, I guess because the Jews were widely disliked, but there are no talks to do that to any other faith. Maybe a factor was that the Christian Bible predicts that the Jewish people would return to their homeland. That's what I like to call a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now I don't think the Palestinians are right for bombing Israel, but it shouldn't have happened to begin with, and now that it has happened there's not a whole lot they can do.

Later on an interesting event happened. I can't remember when exactly but I believe it was two or three months before the end of the school year (which would be the end of June for those unfamiliar with the Canadian high school system). Our awesome principal, and our new vice principal, who started the beginning of that year, were both transferred. What irks me was not that they were transferred, that is not a big deal, what irks me is that they were transferred at such an odd time. They couldn't wait a few months? The main reason was apparently they don't like any one principal to stay in one seat for too long, (she's been in that position for 6 years), but I doubt anyone would have made a big fuss over her staying just a little while longer. Another factor was there was a principal at another school who was stepping down. So they needed to fill a position, our vice-principal could have taken that position over and our principal could have stayed, but that didn't happen. But what really stuck in my craw was that the teacher who was promoted to vice-principal once said, to my face, that I was not smart enough to be in her history class. Those were probably not her exact words, but that was the message that came across. That's what I like to call a bad first impression.

Another interesting event involved my Chemistry class. I will start by explaining the instigating event. It was a lab on temperature...something...thing...I forget. Anyway a lot of people were stupid and forgot goggles. It's noob-shit 101, bring goggles when working a chem lab. The lab we were working in didn't have community goggles, so they went next door with our teacher's permission. A lot of people grabbed goggles one at a time. A good idea would have been to get one person to grab an ass-load of goggles, but that didn't happen. Anyway, the teacher who was in the room text to us came into our class and started yelling at my classmates about interrupting her class. I told her she needed to calm down and my teacher kicked me out of class. You know the interesting thing is that when I told the vice-principal that there were better ways she could have handled the situation, The VP said it didn't matter and that that teacher had the right to do what she wanted to do. This is something I don't want anyone to ever forget: Having the right to do something doesn't make it the right thing to do. I have a right to say anything I want, including any racist comments, that doesn't make it the right thing to do. Fred Phelps, a pastor in Kansas who protests the funerals of American soldiers and gay people, has a right to do what he wants, it doesn't make it the right thing to do. So to this day I stand by what I did, the right thing, because if someone is yelling at my friend/colleague/associate/acquaintance, I will stand up to them. I don't care that they are not yelling at me, I don't care if it's none of my business, and I don't care if they are my so-called "superior," especially considering that if they were superior to me, they would know better.

Anyway that chemistry teacher, you know, the one that didn't yell at me but did kick me out of class, I began giving her the cold shoulder. Before that date, I considered us good friends, I was not nice to her because she was my teacher, I was nice to her because she was a nice person who I got along with, which is a good definition of friend if ever there was one. But after that incident, I felt betrayed. It wasn't long before this teacher wanted things to go "back to normal." How could they? She scheduled a meeting between me, her, and the new VP, you know, the one who called me an idiot a long time ago. Anyway I told them why I was acting different, and that I considered her a friend and felt betrayed and they said that me calling her a friend was "inappropriate."

I'm sure there are a lot of people out there who agree with them but let me explain something first, I would never ask a friend for preferential treatment, that would make me a bad friend. Let's say I'm conducting a job interview and the choice is between a friend with plenty of experience and skills or a stranger with the same experience and skills. I would hire the friend because I would get along with them and I would trust them. However if it was between a friend with little experience and skills or a stranger with more experience, I don't care if he was the best man at my wedding, I would hire the stranger. I would say, "Dude, I love you but you are simply not cut out for this job, someone else will hire you." The point being, a true friend never takes advantage of someones friendship. They would never ask or expect preferential treatment. So I would never have expected preferential from my chem teacher, I am not insane, however I would have expected them to stand up for me, at least slightly. I doubt her job would have been in jeopardy if she told the other teacher that she was sorry and she would take care of it, you know, diffuse the situation, instead of escalating it, so that is what I mean when I said she betrayed me.

Anyway, that single sentence got me to thinking (her saying that friendship is inappropriate). So I decided that I no longer felt betrayed, I felt like we weren't friends, so I treated her like anyone else, I maintained a professional relationship and no longer treated her like a friend. But because things weren't "back to normal" as she wanted, she kicked me out of class permanently. I didn't care, because I already had the credit, I was just there to earn a decent grade, and I am glad I retook it, even though I didn't get a grade this time, because things make more sense the second time around.

Another event that freaked me out involved my cat. He likes hanging his head out the window in the back of our house and breathe in the fresh air and look at the back yard. One day, late at night, I was reading for a very important assignment on apocalyptic literature, I was way behind so I was reading my ass off. Anyway as I was reading I heard kitty scratches and a plop. He fell out the window onto the ground, two stories below him. He apparently was trying to attack the moths that were congregating near the lamp. I panicked and ran down stairs and I think I scared him off. I was so worried that in his vulnerable state, a bear would eat him. I couldn't sleep so I continued reading and checking for the cat every so often. After an hour or so, I can't remember exactly, I heard a dingle-dingle of a kitty bell. So I went to look for him and I found him under the neighbour's shed. He was in shock and when I tried to grab him he got in defensive mode. I fought him and brought him in. That morning we went to the vet. He had a sprained paw but was pretty good otherwise. No broken bones or organs and a few weeks later he was back to normal. So we don't let him hang out the window anymore.

Moving on, I was reading a Scientific American when I ran across this little...I wouldn't call it a story...and it was too much to call it a brief...let's call it a thing, and it was about Linux, so I decided to give it a shot. I duel-booted my laptop with Fedora Core 6 and I fell in love. The things I learned...wow, I mean...it's free and can do almost everything Windows can. I'll admit I had problems, but all of them I was able to fix fairly easy, (most by switching from 64-bit to 32-bit), but the best part is the free. It can't play most games but a program called WINE can, it's a program that allows one to run programs with the Windows API under Linux. I also attempted to build a server to store all my data that I can access over the network but the hard drive I was using to boot from was apparently on its last legs. It worked well at first but the hard drive kept having problems and then the video processor gave out. Thankfully my data was on another drive that I got from eBay. Anyway, now I have nothing and more recently that hard drive I had all my data on, broke. So until I find an identical hard drive made in the same production run, I am screwed.

Also, I found this awesome ass show called Hak.5 and it is the best show on not television. It's IPTV which apparently got big when I wasn't looking. I hate being a late adopter, I feel inferior some how. Anyway I started watching at the end of its second season and they just finished season three which seemed to be kinda half-assed compared to their previous work. Their motto is "Trust your Technolust," and I do. Anyway, Hak.5 is partially responsible for my current interest in network security, which is a euphemism for hacking.

Anyway, that is all for now. I'll continue this post later but until then, I am hoping any grammar Nazis can proofread my stuff, I welcome it.

My LJ archives are secured...Friends Only. Kind of a long story involving the police and the violation of my right to free speech. New entries are not secured. Click here to get a LiveJournal account if you do not have one.



This banner features a scene from The Final 7.

Please tell me who you are and a bit about yourself.

I saw this in a chain letter and I love the message it sends. Read, then if you feel the need to pass on...do so.
ONE. Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.
TWO. Marry a man/woman you love to talk to. As you get older, their conversational skills will be as important as any other.
THREE. Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have or sleep all you want.
FOUR. When you say, "I love you," mean it.
FIVE. When you say, "I'm sorry," look the person in the eye.
SIX. Be engaged at least six months before you get married.
SEVEN. Believe in love at first sight.
EIGHT. Never laugh at anyone's dream. People who don't have dreams don't have much.
NINE. Love deeply and passionately. You might get hurt but it's the only way to live life completely.
TEN.. In disagreements, fight fairly. No name calling.
ELEVEN. Don't judge people by their relatives.
TWELVE. Talk slowly but think quickly.
THIRTEEN. When someone asks you a question you don't want to answer, smile and ask, "Why do you want to know?"
FOURTEEN. Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
FIFTEEN. Say "bless you" when you hear someone sneeze.
SIXTEEN. When you lose, don't lose the lesson
SEVENTEEN. Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; and responsibility for all your actions.
EIGHTEEN. Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.
NINETEEN. When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.
TWENTY. Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice.
TWENTY-ONE. Spend some time alone.

---

Oh what a dull weekend, I went to Chapters on Saturday and grabbed a Sudoku book and Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke. Then to the Grocery store where we got a bunch of stuff. The highlight was when Trista replied to my e-mail saying that if things don't work out between her and Logan she'll give me a change. I was so happy I started spinning Gizmo around celebrating. I'm such a geek. :D

Too short.



Sounds about right.



They wouldn't take BlackWidower.

I had a new Idea for The Final 7, but I need to finish this puzzle:

War is to Peace as
Death is to Life as
Famine is to ______ as
Economic Recession is to ______

But in honor of my idea:

( The Final 7 inspired cyborgs )

Ok so maybe I went a little overboard. You can make your own Cyborg Name right here. Oh and if you could comment this time that'd be great thanks. :D

This post, as you may or may not have noticed, is public. I have made a few public posts in the past for one reason and one reason only, because I want EVERYONE to read them...this one is no different. This one is about a major problem on LiveJournal...pedophilia.

Last night after updating my LiveJournal I wanted to check my email before going to bed, when I saw this in virginbychoice by a 40-year-old (apparently) not virgin who goes by peepingtommy. So I began looking around and noticed that he made this post as an insult to korean_guy_01...in a virgin community. I made several replies to several of his comments in the community. Then this one came to my attention, where he pretty much confessed to wanting to FUCK a 16 year old. So I immediately decided to go to the RCMP website and ended up here. I filed a report with CyberTip.ca and hopefully this will mean the end of this guys little escapade.

I am asking anyone who sees anything that might be considered pedophilia to not hesitate in filing a report with CyberTip.ca. I am pretty sure they will follow up on complaints from around the globe but just in case please, if you know of a tip line in another country please post it here. I want us to stomp out this crap, if we continue to allow it to happen when we know about it we are no better then the perpetrators.

Only real men know how to treat the woman he loves. This is the sweetest thing in the world. Read, Learn, and Put into good use.
1. Tell her she is beautiful, not hot.
2 . Hold her hand at any moment even if it just for a second.
3 . Kiss her on the forehead.
4 . Leave her voice messages to wake up to.
5 . Always tell her how beautiful she is, no matter what she's wearing.
6 . When she is upset, hold her tight and tell her how much she means to you.
7 . Recognize the small things . . . THEY USUALLY MEAN THE MOST!
8 . Call her baby.
9 . Sing to her no matter how horrible your voice is.
10 . Pick her over all the other girls you hang out with.
11 . Write her notes. {she loves them}
12 . Introduce her to family and friends as your girlfriend.
13 . Play with her hair.
14 . Pick her up, tickle her and play-wrestle with her.
15 . Sit in the park and just talk to her.
16 . Tell her funny jokes, tell her stupid jokes, just tell her jokes.
17 . Throw pebbles at her window in the middle of the night just because you missed her.
18 . Let her fall asleep in your arms.
19 . Carve your names into a tree.
20 . If she's mad at you, apologize because SHE is always right.
21 . CUDDLE.
22 . Bring her flowers just because.
23 . Treat her the same around your friends as you do when you're alone.
24 . Look her in the eyes and smile.
25 . Let her take as many pictures of you as she wants.
26 . Slow dance with her, even if there isn't any music playing.
27 . Kiss her in the rain.
28 . If your in love with her . . . tell her.
Girls - Repost if you think its true
Guys - Repost if you would treat a girl like this

---

I got a letter today explaining my suspension, turns out it's partly because of my LJ. I'm sure if I didn't have my LJ I'd be at school by now. I'M BEING PUNISHED FOR EXPRESSING MY THOUGHTS!!! The freedom of expression is guaranteed to me under the Canadian Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms. This is bull shit. I can't wait till I see that lawyer.

I finished my first Photoshop Graphic:

( A tribute to George Micheal and Maeby )

Now, I can get to work on my homework.

GIRLS

Find a guy who calls you beautiful instead of hot...
...who calls you back when you hang up on him...
...who will stay awake just to watch you sleep.

Wait for the boy who kisses your forehead...
...who wants to show you off to the world when you are in your sweats...
...who holds your hand in front of his friends...
...who thinks you're just as pretty without makeup on.

Wait for the one who is constantly reminding you of how much he cares about you and how lucky he is to have you.

Wait for the one who turns to his friends and says, "...that's her."


GUYS

Find a girl who calls you baby face instead of hot or sexy...
...who can't stand it when you hang up on her...
...who would sit there for hours looking into your eyes...

Wait for the one who doesn't care what you look like, but what's inside counts the most...
...who looks at you with the twinkle in her eyes and kisses you on the cheek instead of the lips...
...who wants to be with you in public...
...who makes you smile just by knowing she loves/likes you back.

Wait for the girl who is a constant reminder of your happiness and joy.

Wait for the girl who you give piggy back rides to in public and she still is in view of her friends, while she gets off and you hear her go: "you're the one for me, for always."

---

Thank you jenniferleighmd and xborn2flyx.

I gotta be honest, Katie fits like 6/7. But do I care? No. I'll tell you why this is.

Ok several minutes ago my computer crashed as I was talking to Katie on MSN. When I got back on she really didn't make a big deal about it. But now she's saying that she was worried. So, I correct myself. She is a 7/7. I love her more then anything.

Also something interesting just happened. I passed by a cardboard box in the hall and something caught my eye. I was like "HOLY SHIT!!!" because what caught my eye was the Duran Duran CD I lost. WOOT!!! So I ran back and grabbed it. I also grabbed an old Pentium processor out of an old computer, because my mom had a bunch of open computers downstairs. I wanna do something cool with it.

I'm making a pizza right now. I'm not getting canned spinach again. The baby spinach from the produce section will have to do.

Now, what can I do with the processor...any ideas? I'm not gonna break it.

I haven't talked to Katie in days. It feels like an eternity. I think I'm gonna die. Not talking to her feels like hell. Especially when I'm depressed. This computer sucks, while trying to catch up on my flist, the computer froze. The moment I get the Tablet will be bliss.

Anyway, Yesterday I was thinking about something while watching Dr. Phil, and this is the result. It's about a healthy relationship...The Holy Trinity of Love:

• Honesty
• Respect
• Communication

This applies to both sides. If your relationship is lacking in one of these three things, I can tell you right now, there is a problem that needs to be fixed. Call me Dr. Tim. :P Want my 2 cents? Contact me anywhere. I like helping people if I can.

I really need to learn how to spell Foreigner.

Ok, today in the library, I was on-line when the Librarian sneaked up behind me and scared the shit out of me. After the shock wore off I turned the tables and scared the shit out of her...long story short: I'm banned from the library computers.

So anyway I was talking to my friend Katie, and she asked me a question: How do you know if a man loves you? So I responded with the following:

• If he respects you in every endeavor.
• If he doesn't care if whether your ugly or hot.
• If he stays by your side no matter what.
• If he remains loyal to you and only you.
• If he never intentionally hurts you or your feelings.

Any thoughts? (this page may be updated if I think of more)

Visit Katie's blog: tinkerbelladict