Unpacking and all. Guess what? I was selected to be the TSA’s Mr Random again! I detect a pattern …
More later, when I’ve unpacked.
Category: goatee-stroking musing, or something
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Deep Thoughts from the St Louis HIExpress
From the wireless internet instructions at the St Louis Holiday Inn Express at S. Jefferson & Lafayette:
Do I need to pay for it?
No you do not have to pay anything. It is Free. Poo Management is offering it for free for all the guests for all hotels.It would seem that Poo Management, Inc., is a hotel franchise holder in St Louis. No, really.
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Meet Mr Random
It seems that, every time I fly to the US, I get to be chosen as the randomly searched guy. I try not to look too terroristy, but it seems those security folks just love to pat me down. Thanks, but they’re not really my type. They also always look in my shoes, which are always teh stinky, tee hee.
Flying into Washington, to the ridiculously-named Reagan International (I much preferred the old name, as in: dull, duller, Dulles), not merely was I the designated Mr Random (comme toujours), but everyone who flies into DCA has to go through the pat down anyway. So I was searched twice, within five minutes. Oh, and you have to get to your gate super-early, as they hold you for ages in a windowless room, as a sort of this-is-what-it-feels to-be-a-bad-person simulation.
I noticed that someone was knitting. Not merely could they have flipped out and killed people with the needles in the Knitting Ninja style, but they could also have stood up in mid-flight and announced, “This plane goes to Cuba, or I knit the Holiday Robin Motif o’ Doom! Bwahaha!”
When I got my checked luggage back, I saw that they’d opened it, searched it, and left a little note to the effect of: “If anything is missing or broken due to this search, we are so not liable! Have a nice day!”
Welcome to the War on Terror, folks. Make sure you’re extra scared when you travel. And if your travel plans include terrorism, please ensure you don’t go via Reagan International.
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Pencils of 2005
My best music of 2005 list isn’t ready yet, so here are my Great Pencils of 2005:
- Faber-Castell 9000 — 125 years old, and still the smoothest writer out there. Still alarmingly expensive; I can buy 8 tri-writes for the price of two 9000s
- Ticonderoga tri-write — a great low-fatigue triangular pencil. Writes smoothly, sharpens cleanly, and keeps its point well
- Lee Valley HB — there are just nice British-made pencils
- Staedtler Mars Lumograph — the efficient German drawing-office pencil
- Dixon Primary Printer — meant for little kids, this chunky pencil works for big hands too. Unfortunately, it’s round, so it rolls off the desk.
The Papermate Mirado Classic just missed the cut. It’s a whole load of pencil for very little money, a sixth of the price of the Faber-Castell. Yes, it’s a yellow American office pencil with an eraser, but so’s the tri-write. Maybe I’m getting more used to this continent.
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Stewart’s long walk
After picking up my UK passport form at Bay & College, I walked to Spadina Subway. Not far, you’d say. It is if you go via College all the way to Dufferin, and back. 7.3 km, I make it, from the amazing Gmaps Pedometer. I went via Canada Computers (where I got a fantastically quiet Vantec case fan) and Soundscapes (where, of course, I bought too many CDs).
And you know why it was such a long walk? I was looking for a Timmy’s. Sad, isn’t it? It would seem that Little Italy is almost totally free of Tim’s. Yes, I know I could have had fantastic espresso and some kind of pastry there, but I wanted Tim’s, and I was prepared to walk for over an hour in sub-zero temperatures to get it, dammit.
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I (heart) languagehat
languagehat, on begging the question:
This is one of those issues that is catnip to the adolescent language-lover but which a sensible person grows out of. I too used to enjoy tormenting people with the “truth” about the phrase, but I eventually realized that, whatever its origins … I had never seen or heard the phrase used “correctly” except by people making a point of doing so (cf. “hoi polloi”); in current English usage, “beg the question” means ‘raise the question,’ and that’s that. I got over it …
[T]his … is a sign that the language has sailed on, leaving wistful archaists treading water and clutching at the stern. -
the monopoly on free money
It’s a licence to print money! Well, Monopoly® money, that is. But you can’t have everything; it doesn’t stop people from trying, though.The above image is copyrighted, trademarked, service-marked and intellectually-propertized 15-ways-to-Sunday by Hasbro. I hereby acknowledge that I’m a very naughty person to have nicked it for my website, and have felt good and contrite for at least the last 5 (five) seconds. But then, since Hasbro own the rights to my earliest published writings (long story: they bought Database Publications, for whom I used to write) and are sitting on the goldmine that is the film rights to Stardodger (my first, and only, game), I think they’ve done okay from me.
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EcoBunk Unplugged: the 15th Annual EcoBunk Awards
TEA sez:EcoBunk Unplugged
the 15th Annual EcoBunk Awards
For advertising excellence in confusing the public & compromising the environment.Our annual fundraiser and comedy show pokes fun at the most outrageous corporate green advertising of 2005. Sometimes we even point the finger at ourselves. We present nominated ads under nine different categories and reveal the winner. The laughter lasts for two full hours.
Of course, we don’t actually send awards to the winning companies.
Come celebrate with us! Ecobunk is a popular and favourite event among the environmentally-minded in Toronto, Waterloo and points beyond.
Thursday, December 8th, 2005
Plaza Flamingo
423 College Street
Show starts at 8:00pm
Doors & Cash Bar opens at 6:30pm
Tickets: $20
To reserve your seat(s) call TEA 416-596-0660*** Note we are asking for prepayment this year and can accept credit cards or cheques. ***
Don’t miss the event this year!
I’ll be there. Will you?
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grown up
Even though I haven’t seen him for more than 20 years, I’m pretty sure that Dr Euan K. Brechin is the same person who used to visit his grandfather (and my next door neighbour) in Newton Mearns.
He’s grown a bit since then …
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found book
I found a copy of Linda McQuaig’s It’s the Crude, Dude on the GO train last night. I’ve been meaning to read it for a while. I don’t know what I’ll do with it when I’ve read it — Bookcrossing?
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An evening with Mr Gosse
I’ve just been listening to BBC Radio 4‘s dramatisation of Edmund Gosse’s Father and Son. It’s rather good.
I think I can safely say that this household knows more about Edmund Gosse than any other in Scarborough. Catherine‘s PhD was based on on the Gosse family, and I’ve read the book and proof-read the thesis. I suspect we’re also the only household in Scarborough that relates episodes from the young life of Edmund Gosse as if they were family anecdotes.
I know, we must get a life …
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halloween fallout
One forgets how quickly — and how extravagantly — a carved pumpkin goes mouldy. It’s positively fluffy.
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review of CanWEA 2005 swag bag
So I’m at the 2005 CanWEA conference for the next few days. The swag bag is a standard nondescript nylon thing, thankfully big enough to take my iBook and a few other bits and pieces. The contents are a bit disappointing, though:
- a very plasticky flashlight that I may discard after harvesting its batteries.
- a small bag of jujubes.
- a copy of North American Windpower magazine (which in itself is quite a decent magazine, so is actually one of the highlights).
- a trade show guide, but no conference program (they were held up in customs; can’t we print ’em here?)
- various company brochures, zzzz.
You’ll note an absence of useful pens, pads, USB keys, model turbines, or other special swag. I was hoping for more …
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decemberists
The Decemberists were as great as ever last night. We snagged comfy sofas up on the balcony at The Phoenix, so it made up for the usually dire venue.
I’m definitely showing my age, though. When they played a demento-rock version of ELO’s Mr Blue Sky, I was about the only person who could sing along.
Hope that Derek got his laguiole back; it was confiscated at the door …
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Echidna Afraid of Spooning
— from the very wonderful Animals Have Problems Too.
(the above image is copyright 2005, Zach VandeZande, btw) -
the search for fair trade coffee @ SB’s
got a tall Estima (supposedly fair trade — they didn’t know) at the First Canadian Place branch at Adelaide & York, Toronto. It’s okay, but most fair trade coffees are too light for me.
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timely quotation
Anent George W. Bush’s “God Told Me To Do It …” revelation, was it purely coincidence that the week’s quotation in Catherine‘s Women Artists Datebook is:
I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires.
— Susan B. Anthony
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my last adbusters
I used to be an avid reader of Adbusters, but now I’m letting my subscription slip. It used to be quite amusing, but it’s taken itself far too seriously for the last couple of years. When the stuff about subvertising went, so did my interest.
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R. Bruce Hoadley says …
(Identifying Wood is a real book. Speech bubble made using Technoid Balloon Gimp Script.)