Wishes

HAPPY HALLOWEEN.

(almost missed today.)

Things to do on Halloween eve....

shoveling isn't one of them.

In honour of receiving our first snowfall last night I thought I would title todays post appropriately. You have read it right, last night we received about 2 inches of snow, now its bad enough that I was working at 7am this morning, but the last thing that I wanted to do was to clean off the car. Actually, the last thing I wanted to do this morning was get up and go to work, but alas, here I am.

The spirit of winter, though, has yet to awaken from it summer slumber and the “Fall Guy” has decided that he was going to bitch his entire way through the day.

Generally, I'm all about winter. Its my 2^nd favourite season to take pictures in, Fall being the first with all of the colours. The first snowfall of the year, makes the trees, in particular the Pine and Fir, stand out from the rest of the forest. My new work environment is completely surrounded on the back by forest so I have spent a good portion of the morning looking out at the trees and the way that the snow is hanging on the branches.

The downfall of the winter, now that I own a car, is the expense of maintaining it in the winter. Seeing as how the East Coast of Canada gets a lot of snow and freezing temperatures the general consensus of people around is to put “winter tires” on the car. Now, really, who the hell can afford to put winter tires on the car? Not me. Though I am looking forward to the first time that I have to shovel my driveway when I own a house, that novelty will wear off once I figure out that it means that I have to get up an hour earlier to get myself *out* of the driveway.

There is one more thing about winter that I like, normally people are happier in the winter. Yes, people love the sunshine and the warmth of the summer, but you will hear more people complaining about the stickiness and how they can't enjoy anything outside because of the heat. In the winter, everyone already expects to not do anything because of the weather so they are accepting of this and walk around with rosy red cheeks and a smile on their face when they reach the comfort of indoors.

Just thinking about going outside after work and taking in the fresh air is making me smile and is turning my day around already. I think that today just might be a great day...

Being off the grid...

something I really and truly suck at. For once.

So, you may or may not have noticed that my apparent news of going “off the grid” seems to not be going that well. Not only am I still frequently using MSN (btw, if you see me there say Hi), I'm still not using this newfound “time away” from technology to complete the tasks that I want to do. Boy am I ever slacking with this, but on the plus side, I've managed to only reactivate my Facebook account once within this time. And the only reason I had done that was to clean out my friends list, though I may have deleted a few too many people and you may inadvertently been one of them, if you find this the case let me know if/when I reactivate my account.

Thats right, I'm admitting that I suck at this, damnit all to hell. I'm a geek and taking away my toys doesn't really work that well.

I'm sitting here at the keyboard staring at the screen trying to find something to say, when really, I've got nothing. My fingers are poised at the kyboard hovering over the keys just waiting for something inspirational to enter into my mind so that I can show the world how smart and witty I am. I'm left sitting here with a blank stare on my face looking like a child who's just been told that there is no toothferry. This isn't a new occurrence though, I'm frequently looking blankly at the screen first thing in the morning, must have something to do with Caffeine withdrawl or something.

Though as we all know the tooth ferry does exist, she's the main cause of tooth aches when eating ice cream. True fact!

Another true fact....

Motivation

lacking the proper words.

Today I am totally lacking any kind of motivation for anything at present. I have lots of ideas of things that I want to say, write about and document but there seems to be a complete lack of words going through my mind right now its kind of funny actually.

I started something this morning actually, a small little paragraph about my drive to work and how driving while exhausted just isn't as much fun as it used to be when I was 'younger'. I'm not the same kind of person that I once was, there was a time when I could stay up all night and function more or less as a normal part of society on about 4 hours of sleep. Now, I'm lucky if I can keep my eyes open after having only 6 hours of sleep. Whatever happened to those days? The days when there wasn't a care in the world and there was nothing holding you back? Oh right, I apparently grew up and joined the real world.

If there is something to be said about my current line of work, its this: working night-shifts has really started to make me appreciate those people who work full-time nights and raise children. I have the utmost respect for those people who can balance that and still function.

But I digress, I guess I was originally going to mention how much you mind can play tricks on you when you are experiencing some serious sleep deprivation, but I suppose I already proved that already with the scatterbrainedness (and made up words) of the post. Personally, I love being sleep deprived somedays as it leaves your other senses heightened trying to catch the things that the rest of you just may miss.

With that I will get back to sleeping with my eyes open....

Clarification

or some more confusing words to hide the point of it all.

As my valued reader(s) [which I'm assuming to this point is just me.] may or may not have noticed, I've essentially dropped off the face of the planet in an online instance. No more Facebook. No more chats. Nothing. Well, except maybe for this.

The thing that you may want to understand is my reasoning for this, I may not have written the clearest explanation possible earlier. It may seem as though I'm just abandoning everything and everyone that I'm close to (AD has gotten a few emails/messages from people asking why I'm not longer their friend on Facebook). That is not the case, all I have done with my Facebook is deactivated my account, it still exists and all of my contacts and information remain there but I'm hidden from everyone while I get everything together again.

There are a few things that I'm trying to accomplish with this. The first and foremost is to spend some more quality time with my wife, I feel as though I have been neglecting her these past few months spending more time getting in touch with old and new friends than I have with her.

Also, I have been sitting on a website and potential business opportunity for the past few months (since August I do believe) that I have done nothing with. I'm shelling out all of this money for something and yet I can't seem to get it off of the ground. There are all kinds of ideas in my head that I want to get out and get on paper but have yet to find the motivation and time to get it done.

Its never an excuse to blame an incomplete project on the lack of time and resources to get the job done (well thats what many companies blame it on), I'm still going to use it for my case though. A few years back I started writing a little story, simply called The Lumberjack. It was a modern day horror with some throwbacks to the story telling of cheesy classics. Simply stated it was an imaginative story surrounding survival, past-lives, and a close encounter with some seedy individuals. I have visions for this story to be completed at a running length of 90 – 100 pages, its nothing by modern story lengths but I'm new to writing fiction so I'm allowed to be ambitious.

On top of this there is a second story that I have on the go, which may end up getting scrapped in the near future simply for my lack of ambition in continuing on with the recent string of horror related items that I've been writing. I've picked up the proverbial pen a few times in the last couple of years but could not muster up anything more than a few scattered sentences surrounding a keyword that I had in my mind.

I'd really like to utilize this time to write something worthy, something heartwarming. Though as we all know, heartwarming is harder and more time consuming to write than anything else simply for the fact that you have to make people care about what happens to your characters. Its easy enough to write a story involving a couples love for one another and a hardship that they endure; its harder to make those characters dynamic enough that you actually want to see them make it through their ordeal.

What I'm really trying to say is this: there are so many things in life that are worth doing, why are we so preoccupied with flashy gizmo's and convenient technology that we put the things that are most important to us so far away?

Off the grid

As you may or may not have noticed, I have deactivated my Facebook account and have been using MSN Messenger less frequently.

There is one simple reason for this. I have lost touch with myself and the things that I stand for in the last few months with my obsessive use of the above mentioned applications/sites. I am ceasing to use these in an attempt to correct my life and become one with the things that I have long forgotten how to do.

Those things would be writing and reading. I have two started stories/novellas which have been sitting on the back burner for the past two years that I would like to finish at some point. There is also a continuing stack of books on my shelf that I frequently pick up but have yet to open and read.

I will still frequently update this area of my life as there are some things that require me to say and you can always reach me via email: ajyates AT gmail DOT com.

Photography....

Or something like it.

Driving down the road today after dropping my wife off at class made me realize that I've missed almost 90% of the good fall pictures simply because I've forgotten about taking my camera when I go out side. All of the lovely fall colours seem to have fallen from the trees and are rotting in the gutters on the side of the road while I lay indoors staring at the ceiling wondering what tomorrow will bring.

Well, no more, from this day forward, my camera will no longer leave my side. I have already made plans to go out tomorrow afternoon driving around the city looking for scenes that require pictures to be taken.

Since I have been thinking about pictures today, I thought about posting some here within this area, but then realized that this would be pointless as I plan on having a Photo gallery within my site when it is designed eventually. In any case, there may be a few pictures cropping up here and there in the next few days.

Peaceful and serene...

with a touch of chaos.

One of the most peaceful things that I can think of doing at any point in time is driving. Just you and the open road before you as you attempt to reach your destination within a certain time frame, if you are so inclined. The only thing that matter and keeps you company is the little voices inside your head, or a talkative passenger.

The drive home from Sussex last night was one of those calm moments. The patter of the rain on the car; the sound of the water as it splashes on the underside of the car. Its one of those moments that you want to capture on tape and listen to over and over again in your most stressful times.

The lights shine up ahead of you revealing bits and pieces of the road, essentially showing you your future. Up ahead, a sign informing you that highway 880 is to the left and coincidentally to the right as well. Just past the sign on the side of the road the leaves jump up from their rest on the side of the road and begin their dance with the wind. As you drive past the leaves continue to dance in their upward spiral trying to climb up high one more time.

Theres something to be said about the naivety of the night. It may be dark and cold but it does not know what it contains on the outskirts of your circle of light. Around the corner there may be a dear waiting for it to be safe to cross the road, there may be nothing. An intense feeling creeps over you as you being to make the gradual movement in the turn. You're attention turns everywhere as you try to determine the safeness of this particular turn. As you exit the corner, you breathe a sign of relief, you are safe again.

When you're in the car with me, I am determined to keep you safe; to prove to you that there is nothing out there that can harm you.

What the F....

cuk!?

I opened my eyes this morning after my nice refreshing sleep, I glanced over at the clock to see what time it was. To my utter horror I had discovered that time is mocking me. Every now and then, without realizing it, Mother Nature and Father Time get together to frolic in the bushes. When they do that the whole world goes to hell. Disco? Their fault. 80s Hair bands? Their fault. My last girlfriend? Their fault.

If you notice any bizarre occurrences happening in your life, things that normally otherwise wouldn't happen. For example, a lapse in judgment causes you to buy purple socks to go with your brown pants, something that you normally wouldn't do; you can totally blame that on their fornication.

Back to this morning. What I discovered this morning was that not only was I a little chilli, I also discovered that it was 6am and I was AWAKE. Normally, this is the time I get up when I go to work for 7. But today is a special day, it was my day off, and I'm up!? How the hell did that happen? I lay there watching the ceiling, listening to the cats run around the apartment chasing each other, listening to the annoying clicking noise that the ceiling fan makes as it spins on it pre-determined cycle, and counting the minutes down until it was a reasonable time for me to get up. One last look, after what seemed to be an eternity, to check my progress is when it happens. I glance over and see 5:58. What the hell!? Time didn't go backwards did it. I squint my eyes hard and try to focus on the the digits. To my relief Father Time had finished in just enough time to set the correct time, it was really 6:12. Phew. I still had a lot of time to go.... and many more annoying things to listen to.

Whats the point anyways?

Now, I'm not really much of a fan-boy for much of anything these days. My loyalty with software, hardware, and computers in general is only limited by what is going to offer me the best bang for my buck.

Case 1: I own an iPod. Yes, I caved and spent the money to get a 30GB iPod for myself after years of “thinking” about getting one. I absolutely love it. I especially love the scrolling wheel it makes playing with the settings that much funner. But, I've also been looking at other devices on the market, and at the time when I purchased mine there wasn't much in the way of competition to the iPod in a feature for feature comparison. In about 3 months I'll have changed my tune because I know there are newer items in development soon to be released to the market place that I would gladly replace for my iPod.

Case 2: I own my very first official copy of Windows. I loathe XP, and all subsequent Operating Systems offered by Microsoft. Its not the fact that they're the dominant OS on the market. I spent two solid weeks searching the Internet for drivers to replace my wifes installation of Vista with the more user friendly XP. I had almost given up and installed the latest version of Ubuntu Linux when I found one in a last ditch effort.

Case 3: I won't use Office 2007, ever. Now, I know that O2k7 was developed to be integerated seemlessly into the Vista environment, but you think they might have included a guided tour of how the new interface and “menu” structure correspond to the older interface. I know many people who can't find a bloody thing in the software and have given up completely on it. A good solid recommendation for someone like that would be OpenOffice, it fully supports Office 2003 files and even has a built-in export to PDF.

Case 4: OOXML. I'm of course referring to Office Open XML, which is Microsoft's attempt at an international standard for documents. Notice how its OpenOffice backwards? I think that they did that so that they could try to hook users of OpenOffice without knowing. Their first attempt at a standard failed as many of the voting countries refused to adopt it (Canada, India, China). The main problem, you can't have an open standard that requires a user to use one and only one product, that defeats the point of being open. Note: you should be informed that OpenOffice had their document format approved by ISO almost 2 years ago.

If you couldn't tell I'm a huge fan of Open Source software. Software should be free, hell, many people pirate software to begin with because it is too expensive to buy. Open Source software allows a community of users to develop and provide input in creating alternatives to off the shelf software. What people are scared of with Open Source is they feel it is not secure and contains spyware, Open Source contains less spyware and harmful code than regular off the shelf software. If thats true, what is everyone scared of? Their own shadow? Or Change?

I've given XP a deadline of 3 months to get the hell off of my systems so that I can use something a little more “real” and affordable. I'm referring to installing Linux on my computer. The only thing at this point that is holding back from installing is the lack of Wi-Fi support for my wireless card. I have a newer card that is not readily available, if I had a standard wireless card the installation of Linux would pick it up in most cases. The problem with mine is that there are NO drivers at all for me to use. My iPod works great, my camera card reader works great.

I've got time to kill while waiting for the new files to become available, until then I plan on finding all of the replacement software that I can find.

Things that go bump...

in your head.

Sitting in the car today I was looking around the road at the lights near my house when out of the corner of my eye, I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I quickly snapped my head to the right to see what was moving when I saw the tiniest little thing running across the road. The blurry shape didn't stop moving for what seemed like an eternity, scurrying this way and that, finally coming to rest on top of the front steps a of a little grey house. Perched on the top step like he was the king of the world was a chubby grey squirrel.

Staring off into the darkness, the squirrel was trying to determine the level of danger in the area. Unaware of his surroundings he tore off into the darkness underneath the step.

What was a squirrel doing up this early in the morning? I didn't know that they started their work day the same time that I did. He could have been coming home after a long night of heavy drinking. A little over ambition never really could hurt anyone, especially a little squirrel who needs to hide his nuts. You never know what those tricky guys are up to....

As I drove away, I kept checking in my rearview mirror to see if I could see the brave little squirrel. I wonder if I'll ever see him again. As the house gets further and further away the squirrel leaves my mind and floats off into the darkness.

Yeah, so I'm full of crap. I made that shit up.

Bumbling through the morning....

talking to myself. <-- This is the rest of my title. I do weird shit like that from time to time.

So, here I am back at writing here again. When do you think I'll get over the novelty of having a blog that noone reads? Probably in a week when I start waking up and try to force myself to write something here.

The only problem that I can foresee myself having with this thing is feeling the necessity to keep it upto date and free of lies. Yeah, right.

Something else that I may point out, is that when the mood strikes I may end up writing somethings that resemble poetry here. I haven't really decided if/where I will keep those items, but the good ones, or the really bad ones may end up making its way onto this blog. Just as a heads up.

I sometimes have the creative urge to put words together. Case in point:

Standing at the side of the road
tall white horse beside me,
my trusted companion,
spent years helping me to cross
the endless desert.

What am is this person doing with a horse? I dunno.
Who is this person? I dunno. You? Me? Everyone?
Why is the desert endless? Had you wandered there from somewhere else? If so, then its not endless, just long.

Also, at times the words that I put here may end up coming across as dark, dreary, negative, sad. This does not necessarily mean that I'm depressed, it just means that I'm having a bad day, and feel like taking my frustrations out on my vocabulary. I think that everyone should have a blog for themselves, even if its just for themselves. Its a great way to rid yourself of some stress and frustration.

Ciao.

Initial Rambling

It seems fitting that I open up a blog again to keep myself entertained and amused while I should be working. What is the point of it? I haven't decided what I will say here but if I get some kind of idea, I will sure as hell put it here.

Starting off I should mention that I woke up this morning thinking it was Monday and that it was my last day of work for the week. Boy was I sadly mistaken. I guess it helps that I've been completely out of it for the last few days. I don't know whether up is down and down is up. The only thing I know is that play on my iPod tends to make me happy.

I guess I should mention something personally about myself. Screw it. I don't want to.

Ciao