Going Corporate

Thu, 12 Dec 2002 16:52:48 GMT

Canada needs only 3 big banks, Ottawa told

Great, then it should be no problem dissolving, say, TD and Scotia Bank and distributing their wealth evenly amongst all Canadians. This is fabulous news!

[The Globe And Mail - National]

Fri, 06 Dec 2002 18:54:43 GMT

Strangest spam I've seen yet...

I'm guessing that this is a rather motivated seller. I guess he's done his homework though, after all our design firm is located only 1 block away from the Harbour here in Vancouver. :)

Subject: 100 t. MARINE SELF-PROPELLED FLOATING
         CRANE FOR SALE: from UKRAINE; 
         COMMISSION-5%!

Dear Sir,
We would like to offer you for sale 100 ton. MARINE SELF PROPELLED
FLOATING CRANE, specification please find below.
This crane is located in Ukraine, port Sevastopol.
The crane is in excellent condition.
Now we are looking for buyer and would like kindly
to offer your company this 100 ton. floating crane. 
Please be advised that our company "Bosfor" is not a intermediary.

Sat, 16 Nov 2002 22:26:13 GMT

Voting Day in Vancouver

Civic election day here in Vancouver, the city with the screwiest electoral rules anywhere. Vancouver is, to my knowledge, the only city in North America with an elected Parks Board, in addition to the usual Mayoralty race, Aldermen, School Board and a range of spending initiatives.

The ballot is a single sheet of double sized legal paper (8.5x14), just crammed with info you've got to vote on. Vancouver, Canada's third largest city, has an at large system, so each voter is expected to be able to choose 10 aldermen, 9 school board members, 7 parks board members and the mayor from dozens of candidates. I was glad to see that this year locally infamous Brian Godzilla Salmi, perhaps best known for creating the splinter Gnu Democratic Rhino Reform Party of Canada, was running as an independent for alderman. I was glad to be able to fill a slot on my voters card with him. In the past, he's run for Mayor, Member of Parliament and, I believe, MLA hence I haven't felt I could use my vote for him previously.

This is a very important election in Vancouver, what with the fallout from the Piggy's Palace serial killings yet to come, the Vancouver police ever eager to start a riot every time more than 6 Vancouverites gather in the streets, and Safe Injection Sites making even the New York Times, it seems as though people want a change.

I was rather glad to see a lineup at the polling place. Normally Vancouver elections get atrocious turnout (15 to 20%). Hopefully that won't be the case this time.

Thu, 14 Nov 2002 14:19:22 GMT

And on with the drivel...

We're in the process of switching from my beloved Webstar to Apache as part of our move to Lasso 6. So, me being the only webmaster on the face of the world who's never used apache wanders our to get the designated O'Reilly book to get up to speed.

Well, it turns out that the book is out of print. A new edition will be coming in December but until then, I'm pretty much hosed. I found Ralph Engelschall's excellent Apache Desktop Reference, for which he graciously makes a PDF available, but it is more of a general reference as opposed to a 'How the bleep do I make this thing do what I want!!!' book. It also seems to be out of print at the moment. The Apache list is pretty good but I like to start out with a good overview book to get my bearings on a new subject.

In my desperation, I was led to look at O'Reilly's Safari service again. I've been tempted to try it out in the past, but something about it just didn't seem like a good value for reasons I could never quite quantify. Boy, was I wrong.

They've got a free 14 day trial offer right now and I tell you, I was sold on the service after a couple of hours. I'll be keeping up my membership after the trial runs out for sure.

There's tons of books, not just O'Reilly ones. They're well presented and, I think they've done a wonderful job of balancing between protecting their copyright and providing fair use of the books to subscribers. It's really easy to save / print / bookmark any section you want and their search engine works really well but it's not easy to save/print out the entire books. The only real disadvantage I can see is not being able to read the books offline.

If you haven't already tried it out, give it a whirl.

Thu, 14 Nov 2002 13:56:04 GMT

I've been waiting for a great idea for an overarching theme for this weblog. I don't want to be one of those bloggers that just mindlessly echos the latest items from Slashdot or Metafilter. Problem is, the more I've waited for that inspiration, the harder it's been to get off my lazy but and start blogging again. Look for more than semi-annual updates from this point forward.

It may be just meaningless drivel but, damnit, it's my meaningless drivel!

Thu, 14 Nov 2002 13:51:37 GMT

I'm back...

A couple of weeks ago, I got an email from Phil Wolff of a klog apart wondering if I was still blogging.

Imagine that, someone actually missed my ramblings. Who would've thunk? I've been very busy since summer with:

our new office (the credit check came back good and we moved in on July 1)
setting up and maintaining our data centre (We're not huge, but sometimes I begin to think that 12 computers is too much for one man to manage)
Enjoying our new apartment (Right by Stanley Park, complete with a fireplace and a roof-top pool, like all good supervillains should have. I must admit though, the pool was much cooler in the summer!)
Generally digging life (3+ years of working 12 and more hour days less than 20 feet from your bed can really drain a guy, I never thought I'd actually enjoy commuting to work.)

Fri, 31 May 2002 00:55:34 GMT

And So It Begins...

Well, the offer has been approved. Just the formality of a credit cheque and we'll be moving into the shiny, modernist confines of the UK Building.

The purpose of this journal is to outline the hijinks of Tom and Lisa as we take our little business out of our dining room and into a real live office.