H1N1

Facelift

M |Central’s layout was getting long in the tooth so I decided it was time to refresh the layout. I decided to go with a lighter theme, “Garland” by Stefan Nagtegaal and Steven Wittens. Along with the new theme I added on a rating system for each blog posting and comments. The left hand column has the search, but now you can also filter by categories and you can sift through older blogs using the Archives dropdown. On the right hand side is a list of blogs I follow. Down the road I plan to start adding polls that visitors can vote on…

I welcome all your comments and feedback…

Hold that door…don’t hold your breath

Sometime between earlier that day and later that night I was headed to the mall, there was a chill in the air and while I wasn’t in any real rush there was a definite urgency in my stride as I reach the entrance. A few steps away I see an older gentleman walking towards the same entrance; though he’s several feet away, I open the door and hold it for him. His eyes widened with a smile “Why thank you young man” he says politely; he reminds me of the type of grandfather you would see on one of those made for TV holiday movies. “My pleasure” I say. Our exchange of pleasantries ends there, and though at the time I didn’t give it much thought, but I realized I rarely see this anymore. I look around I see people coming and going, and yes I see the door being held as the one passing through holds it with one hand for the person behind. But when it came to seniors, how many people stopped and let them go through? No one. For that matter what about our elders? I was raised to respect my elders – and holding the door to allow them to pass ahead of me was a given. So I’m a bit taken back by how rare a sight it is today. The world is moving forward and changing, old values are making way for new ideas…but I think some its important that we hold onto the essence of some of those old values, the ones that remind us to be thoughtful, courteous and respectful.

The Impel

As I reach the outskirts, the shimmer and sparkle of the city fade into my rearview mirror, the number of cars on the road become fewer and fewer. Almost symbolic that the sun sets behind me as my visit comes to end, I’m now left with my thoughts and the sound of the music barely audible in the background. If you want an inculcating experience I suggest you take a long drive; preferably one that traverses the void between municipalities. There’s something soothing; maybe it’s the combination of the humming engine and the sound of the wind passing over the cabin in tune with the vibration of the tires on the road. The sun’s all but set and the highway’s now a darken path lit only by my headlights. One could get lost counting the breaks in the yellow lines separating the lanes. It’s amazing the things that come to mind when you let it wander; thoughts on how people would drive these distances alone with no mobile phone, no GPS. Like a rapier through a shroud of cloth my car cuts through the night, I can feel the cool crisp evening air falling from the tilted opening in the moon roof. “How long would this take me on horseback” I wonder, they move pretty quick, and I don’t suppose they had speed limits…so accounting for the fact that they need to rest, would the time be comparable? Up ahead I can see the infamous red and blue lights, a reminder to keep an eye on my speed; so far so good, I’m above (as usual) but within the flow of traffic…all 4 cars in proximity. It’s late in the evening when I realize there’s no shoulder on this road; this prompts the thought “what would I do if I suddenly couldn’t drive…or I got something stuck in my eye and needed to pull over?” I start to wonder if any of the accidents you hear about on decollate roads was from something as innocuous as a piece of grit in the eye to a cramp in your leg, or even an urgent need to pee. En route with a little less than a quarter to go, my foot firmly on the throttle, the cabin is quiet…the radio’s off, and for the remainder of my journey I’m left with my thoughts…and an empty highway…

What if it all means somthing

Arguably one of the biggest debates of existentialism is whether or not we’re in control of our own life. At a distance there’s one of two camps you can side with; the one where we are not in control, everything outside of our direct ability to manipulate is a result of some unseen (perhaps divine) force, and the camp that subscribes to the belief that every direct action on your part has both direct and indirect consequences both to the individual and to countless 3^rd parties. While I won’t deny having myself experienced circumstances where “It was meant to be” could be applied, I’m still skeptical. We live in a world governed by the laws of physics, and those laws dictate is that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. This by the way is part of the second encampment, which also happens to be the one I belong to. What if the events that unfold are nothing more than a series of “reactions” set forth by a preceding set of reactions which were intern set forth a set preceding them…and so on and so forth? Using a game of pool as an example; just after the break the balls scatter each time they collide it creates a reaction causing them to collide with another ball…etc. Is life so different? Was the white ball meant to hit the 8 ball, or was it random chance? IMHO one of the many reasons it’s difficult to wrap our minds around this has partly to do with the fact that this process started long ago (birth of the universe) and we’re trying to play catch-up. Another aspect (again IMHO) is as a species we’re lazy and generally speaking have an inclination to believe we’re special, above all others including our peers. This could contribute to the hands off approach, “I didn’t get the job, it wasn’t meant to be” while negating the fact that perhaps you didn’t prep for your interview enough, or showed up in sweat pants and tank top, smacking gum while answering your questions.

Overall I wonder if as whole we lost sight of those actions we can control, and those we can’t. In life we’ll be presented with situations, some positive and some negative, how we handle them is up to us. I simply don’t think that those situations are the result of some predestined manifestation.  Without debating the existence of a higher power, if such a entity existed; wouldn’t they be far to occupied with greater issues than whether or not I got that job, or if my neighbor is going to get that new kidney? As I said, I can’t deny experiencing situations both good & bad where I couldn’t help wondering for second that it was meant to be, but this is me in my limited capacity of understanding trying to grasp a concept that for now is too big.

All Dressed & Nowhere to Go

The last time I ordered pizza I wondered if the small Parlors were in danger of being swallowed up by the Giant Chains…not likely.

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What ever happened to Pizza? I mean real old fashioned pizza, nowadays all I see is dominos & Pizza Hut promoting all kinds of new pizza’s made up of god only knows what. But here’s the messed up part, it doesn’t even taste like pizza, this stuff passes for frozen pizza at best. When I buy a pizza I want real sauce and toppings and I want it on real bread. Ok, so I can deal with the other combinations, I like all dressed and I’m not entirely put off by pepperoni & cheese; Vegetarian and even though I’m not a fan I can accept Hawaiian. My problem is when they start adding extra crap on it…why do I need the crust hollowed out and filled with cheese? Or maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if the ingredients were all natural. See Pizza is fairly inexpensive to make so imagine when a large corporation starts taking short cuts how much more they make in profits. Not to mention, the obvious fact that a large from domino’s or Pizza hut etc… is the size of medium at a real pizza parlor. I had a large delivered to my house from the latter and the guy had to almost tilt it to get it in the door. This offence goes up there with hamburger helper, Pop Tarts & canned/Jared Pasta Sauce.

After The Tone

Why is it that leaving a voice message has become more complicated, than leaving a voice message?

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I’m an information services specialist, and in my line of work communication is paramount, in fact I use every medium technology has to offer; Snail Mail,. Email, Chat, Fax, Telephone and Voice mail, the rule of thumb with technology is that it gets simpler over time, and with every new generation of a device the better it performs. Take a Palm Pilot for example …originally this thing had a calendar a phone book and not much else; now you can watch a movie while waiting for your flight and answer a call while jotting down an email. That said, voice mail’s been around for longer than I can remember and the concept was pretty simple in its inception, the automated response kicks in after a predetermined number of rings and you leave your message after the tone. Simple enough;  so why is it that now I have to listen to “Mr. Smith is not available please leave your message after the tone, when finished recording hang up or press # for more options, if you wish to play back your message press 1 if you wish to re record your message press 2 or…” Ok did I step through the looking glass? Who doesn’t know how to use voice mail? This evolution would have been great 30 years ago, since email and the internet were no where on the horizon…but now with chat, and email etc… this serves only to irritate me, Forgive my pretence, but any one who needs that much instruction on how to use voice mail should be near anything that generates a magnetic field… Voice mail should be the medium of choice used to identify to the receiver that you contacted them  then identify the subject of the call and request a call back, any thing more detailed…send an email.

Not So Fast

When the city speed limit is so slow that even a Police Officer won’t obey, it’s time to start asking “what’s the point”.

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No Secret, I suffer from “Pedis Crassus”, or roughly translated “Led Foot”. I enjoy driving at higher speeds, I’m usually 20kph over the posted limit,  Now I’m not advocating driving recklessly, but the irony is that in the city the highway speed limits are not much faster than a boulevard’s,  suddenly being “led footed” doesn’t seem to carry the same weight it used to. The Funny thing is that lately I noticed that our Law enforcement officials aren’t abiding by those limits either, and for the record I’m not talking about any that were involved in High speed chases. The ones I noticed were simply cruising with no need to go faster that the limit posted. On one occasion I was getting on the high way and I noticed that a Police car was behind me. So I decided since I had a little time on my hands I’d conduct an experiment. Once I reached the speed limit I engaged my cruise control, I wanted to see if the patrol car would pass me, if he did he would be violating the speed limit and guilty of breaking the law. Sure enough after only 3 minutes of trailing behind me the patrol car crossed over in to the passing lane (with out using his signals I might add) and accelerated to a speed of 110kph which is 40kph over the posted limit. How do I know his speed?  Easy once he was ahead of me I set my car to match his while keeping my distance, and presto the proof is in speed-O (speedometer that is).  So what? Well it’s no secret that driving at high speeds is dangerous but then any recognizable official should be bound to the constraints as regular motorists are. More so even since they’re the ones whose example we should be following. It is a tricky issue, if you raise the limit then people will go faster and the problem will still exist and while I’d love a speed limit that’s a little more reasonable, Id settle just to see our local law informant abide by the very laws they enforce.

A Tale of a Man, His Son & Their Cart

When I was in primary school my teacher told the class a story that always stuck with me, and of late has been running in my head. I decided it would be a good idea to share the parable.

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A man was walking pulling his cart with his son riding when a passerby mumbled “look at that, the son should be pulling the cart and letting his father ride it. Overhearing this, the son jumped down and he and his father switched places; not to long after another passerby remarked “why is that child pulling his father around on that cart when it would be so much easier for his father to pull the child”…the father embarrassed, jumped down and decided it was best if they both pull the cart. Shortly after another passerby commented “how foolish these two are…they have a perfectly good cart and neither one makes use of it”

The moral of the story | If you spend your life trying to please everyone, you will end up pleasing no one…including your self.

Collision Course

6:13, I’m sitting in traffic, this isn’t normal. I rolled down my windows and open the moon roof to let in the cool air. Its perfect weather, not a cloud in the sky and the cool air makes sitting in traffic tolerable…but I’m late and I really need to get going. I looked up to see between the cars, I can barely make out the flashing yellow lights of a highway patrol vehicle, we start to inch along a little more, I’m being careful not to get to close to guy in front of me since he’s on his bike. The morning traffic report comes on. An accident on the 20, she says; it’s in the center and right hand lane. At this time of the morning…two lanes affected? It been about 30 minutes, the just for laugh’s track finished playing I laugh at the skit …but I really need to get to the office at this rate I should get there by lunch. I start to see the road flares pushing everyone in to the left lane. I see a VW on the shoulder nothing serious from what I can, there’s another car…facing the opposite direction as I get closer I realize its not facing the other direction its front and back end are side by side. I’m in awe…as see more of the car I see that it’s been twisted, crushed and folded. Then I noticed It’s an Accord or what’s left of it…I drive an Accord…suddenly I associate with the driver and think consider the possibility that could have been me… and then I notice there isn’t anyone in the car? I’m moving slowly enough to count the number of police and firemen…where are the drivers? Then it hits me there’s no ambulance….just a fire truck. Did it leave already? I can still see what’s left of what used to be the Accord, I also see what looks like corn stalks, and there all over the highway…my stomach sinks at the thought of what happened to the occupants of the car? The VW couldn’t have caused that kind of damage to the car…this must have involved a truck, but there isn’t one in the accident zone…did it leave? I start to form a theory of what happened…speed was factor but odds are good that someone was “hot dogging” it, driving fast and tailgating between other motorists. We start clearing the scene and traffic speeds up, I’m in the clear and I start to accelerate, I raise the windows and tilt the moon roof. I’m cruising at about 120kph…the accident shrinks in my rearview mirror – I focus on getting to the office.