evanroberts.com

It’s supposed to be a high of 25C here in Toronto today… and I’ll be stuck inside.

Ah well. This evening is looking good with a high of 22C, and the weekend is supposed to be pretty nice too.

Already it is 13C and sunny, which makes for some excellent biking-to-work weather. I’d better hop to it! I need to pick me up a Caesar salad!

Seagulls. I fucking hate them.

What a completely useless species. What purpose in the universe could they possibly serve? What is the point of their existence? They are loud, they shit everywhere, and are a general nuisance. The bullies of the bird world, they will eat every scrap of food that they can find, and they usually do so in flocks. They’re not pretty to look at either.

Molly and I were heading to Loblaws to pick up dinner tonight, and while we were walking across the parking lot, the shithawks were out in full force. I’m always wary of them when they’re flying by, as they for some reason prefer to fly over peoples’ heads rather than on some random trajectory. Seriously, if you’ve never noticed before, if they are flying by, they will make a course correction to try and fly right over your head. I think they do it as we all look like targets to them.

Anyway, we were walking across the parking lot, and I noticed a few as they flew over head. I started to say to Molly, “I hate these birds as you never know when they’re gonna–” *SPLAT*. I was hit. Man down.

I wouldn’t have been as angry if it had hit my shirt, or my hat, or any article of clothing that I could simply throw into the laundry and clean, but NO, this precision bomb had to hit my backpack’s shoulder strap. Some of it got onto my shirt, and some of it hit Molly too. Splash damage, in the most foulest of terms. At that moment, if I had the ability to do so with a single thought, every shithawk on the planet would have dropped dead.

I seriously think that they do it on purpose. Something within their genetic code drives them to take a crap on those below, like some sort of sick “fly-by dumping”. How could something like this exist in Nature? Disgusting creatures.

If there is one thing I have to laugh at when it comes to home theatre systems, it’s the amount of money some people will part with to try and get the best picture and sound. If there was one other thing I have to laugh at when it comes to home theatre systems, it’s the fact that Monster expects such a large price for it’s cables… and people actually pay it.

Sure, with analog systems, you need all the shielding you can get to ensure that you get the best possible picture and sound between the system and the display or speakers. All sorts of electromagnetic interference could distort or diminish the quality of the signal, so that’s why you’d want to pay for the good cables. Gas-infused, gold-plated, silver-coated cables from Monster will apparently ensure the everything looks and sounds perfect… for $100 plus. Considering that we’re talking about analog signal here, if you’re that hardcore, and you have the cash to burn, I say go for it.

But, when it comes to digital systems, paying for Monster cables is about the dumbest thing someone can do, in my opinion. This is a digital signal, no different than packets over Ethernet when you get down to it, and yet people will spend at least $100 or so to get a one metre HDMI cable from Monster. The fact that Monster makes great analog cables is one thing, but they’ve somehow sold some people to the ridiculous idea that a gas-infused HDMI cable is better than one you can get for $20. Picture clarity and sound quality doesn’t suffer with a cheaper HDMI cable; this is a digital signal we’re talking about. It’s like saying that if I was to use a “cheaper” Ethernet cable to connect my Mac to the network to stream some music from Bassdrive, that the sound would be of lower quality than if I used a more expensive gas-infused, gold-plated, silver-coated Ethernet cable. The entire notion makes me laugh, and reminds me of the age old saying:

A fool and his money are soon parted.

Still, you have to hand it to Monster. They’re raking in the dough through this misconception, and you’d be hard pressed to convince a die-hard home theatre systems “guru” of anything else. I fully believe that you get what you pay for, but in some cases, shelling out more cash for something is not necessary in obtaining a quality product.

And before anyone else fires back a smart-ass comment about Apple with regards to this post, don’t bother. Apple has some pretty expensive hardware but for the most part has fewer headaches. To me, that is worth the cost.

It’s about bloody time, but Spring seems to be finally around the corner.

This has been six months of cold, and while I like the cold, this winter has been a little much. I’m looking forward to riding my bike again (once I get it all fixed up, that is), playing Ultimate Frisbee, and also walking around without a jacket on… perhaps a few more weeks before that last one is constant.

Still… throughout all the cold, San Francisco has been looking pretty sweet. 

One of the extensions that I have installed for Firefox has proven it’s worth time and time again, with the most recent being ever since I started my blog again.

Here is the official site:

http://www.getfirebug.com/

Basically, this plugin will let you inspect the code for whatever page you’re looking at (in this case, mine), and allow you to see how the page is laid out, what part of the HTML (or PHP, CSS, etc) does what, where certain calls to other files are made (which occurs frequently in PHP), and it even allows you to make on-the-fly changes to the code to see what it would look like if you were to actually make the change.

As I didn’t write this theme from the ground up, and also seeing as how I’m fairly green when it comes to CSS, yet have a partial understanding of PHP, I have found Firebug very useful in figuring out what part of the theme’s code to change as I customise it. When something doesn’t display as I would think it should, for example, when I was putting together the “Foods” page of all the foods I can and can’t have during this diet, I have been able to figure out what was wrong rather quickly by trying out a certain change to the code within Firebug, and when all looked well, made the actual change to the files. Very useful.

Anyway, for those of you who code pages from scratch, I’m sure this won’t be useful to you as you already know what the hell you’re doing. But, if you’re clueless like me, and want to change the look of your site slightly, or want to make a few changes to it’s layout but don’t know where to begin as you didn’t write the theme, then this tool is for you.

When Molly and I lived in our one bedroom apartment last year, I rarely heard anything from our neighbours. Sure, there was the odd thing dropped on the floor upstairs, or the occasional muffled sex cry from one of the girls in the apartment to the north, but other than that, it was pretty quiet. In this building, the walls are made of concrete, which is quite nice for containing sound. In the one bedroom apartment, I could blast my music or play games really loudly until 1am and not have to worry about anyone complaining.

Ever since moving into this two bedroom apartment, I’ve noticed that either sound carries a lot easier, or the neighbours are a LOT louder. Upstairs, there must be a family with at least a kid or two, as they are constantly running around, yelling, stomping their feet, and doing what kids to. Below us, now, that is a different story.

There is a couple living below us, and I think one of them is a DJ, as they are constantly blasting their music. It’s not so bad, as I can only really hear the bass beats, and they are usually playing either house or techno, so it doesn’t matter to me; I happen to like either. However, I think the guy might be a little off-kilter. He is constantly screaming at the top of his lungs about trivial things, and once in a while will get into a shouting match with his girlfriend. It’s actually kind of like listening to a soap opera, and since I don’t have TV anymore (I canceled it as I was never watching it, so there is no sense paying for it), I find it quite entertaining.

Previous episode plots from “The Neighbours Below”:

• The dude is high on something, angry and upset, and he cannot find his winter jacket which he needs for tomorrow as it is going to be freezing outside. He frequently begs his girlfriend to help him find his jacket, or make him one out of some scraps of material they have.
• The dude and the girl are shouting at each other for some reason (I tuned in too late), and he rants and raves how she has ruined his life, and that he is constantly doing things for other people and just needs an hour or two to himself.
• The dude is yelling and screaming about how tickets were there two minutes ago, but now they have quadrupled in price, and frequently shouts “WHO THE FUCK DOES THIS??!! FUCK!!!”. Occasionally rants about how they should have gotten up earlier, and then starts pounding his desk.

When we first moved into this apartment, we heard some yelling from below, but thought it was our fault and a one-time thing. We were setting up Molly’s desk in the Nerdlab on Saturday morning, and we figured we would wait until after 10:30am to do so. It’s a weekend, and generally you should be allowed to sleep in, so we were thinking of our neighbours. It was almost 11am, and we were almost done with the desk (just a tiny bit of hammering) when we heard a shout from below: “FUCK!!!”. We paused, wondering if that was directed to us or just someone smashing their toe against a table or something, and after a few minutes, continued. Shortly afterwards, we heard shouting again from below: “FUCK!!! IT’S 11AM!!!”. Molly and I looked at each other and snickered, as we were *almost* done. Instead of hammering the last piece home, I just shoved it in (hey, that sounds pretty rude, but not intentional). With the desk done, we attempted to quietly pick it up and put it into place, but there were a few bangs on the floor. Thankfully, we weren’t shouted at again. However, once in a while when we make a loud sound, like accidentally drop something, we’ll look at the other and quietly yell “FUCK!!! IT’S (whatever time it is)!!!”. Too funny.

It might be fun to blog about their shouting matches below, or rather, just when he flies off the handle. Some of you might be thinking this is a breach of their privacy on my part, but I’m of the belief that if they are going to scream and yell, they obviously want to be heard.

Across the street since I started at easyDNS, we have always been treated to posters of various musical celebrities. Some have been good, and some have been bad, but they’ve been nice to look at when I happened to gaze out the window.

As of this past weekend, Sony BMG apparently moved out of the building without even saying goodbye, and they took their posters away with them. The wall looks quite empty without those posters there.

Goodbye Carrie Underwood. (Damn!!)

Goodbye Alanis Morrisette. (Meh.)

Goodbye Celine Dion. (Yuck!)

Today I was saddened to hear that a friend I haven’t seen in quite some time, Andrew McCallum, was involved in a serious accident this past Saturday, and is currently in hospital within the intensive care unit. He is unfortunately in a coma having suffered severe head trauma, but as of this morning was responding to some stimulus, which is definitely a good thing.

I met Andrew through various friends that made up the group that I hung out with during my Interlog days, and he was always such a great guy to hang out with. Also known as Mental Floss, he is quite an awesome DJ. He works across the street from easyDNS, at Tucows, whom we use for domain management services, and on occasion when I would have to call them, I would usually get Andrew and we’d chat for a bit, catch up, and make plans to hang out, which unfortunately never came through due to conflicting schedules and the like. I truly hope make plans with him in the near future to hang out, as all it takes it is for something like this to happen to a friend to really make you realise how precious the time is that we have with each other.

Andrew, you are a strong person, full of energy, and full of life. I have no doubt in my mind that you’ll pull through this, and when you do, it would be a privilege to hang out with you again. My thoughts are with you, and your family.

After one hell of a week, and also after suffering without a beer at all, I decided to join Molly and her friends, and we went to the Dance Cave.

I must say, this place has changed since I’ve been there last. The music is okay, and even Sue the bartender is still there (goodness… she was there when I used to go to the Dance Cave almost every Wednesday back in 1998-2000), but the atmosphere is different. The place seems to have gone to shit, as the tables and seats were practically falling apart. The bathrooms didn’t even have soap in them, and one of the mens rooms didn’t even have a working hand dryer. There are hired security goons wandering around, one of them is an asshole, and the DJ, while playing some okay music, seemed to be full of himself. Personally, I can’t even call him a DJ, as all he does is put CDs into the machine, and presses “play”. A monkey could do that. To me, a DJ is someone like my friend Cvon, who has at LEAST two decks, and spins vinyl. THAT requires skill.

Anyway, other than those few gripes, it was an enjoyable night. I was buying pitchers, and proceeded to get loaded, and had fun dancing to a bunch of the songs. The crowd is a somewhat different, but that is to be expected after almost 10 years. It really struck me when two girls tried to sit at our booth next to all our coats and bags, and I asked them politely to leave. One of them said “We’re not going to steal your stuff. I pinkie-swear.” to which I was dumbfounded as I wanted to ask “How old are you? Did you use fake ID to get in here?”. I was about to say “Sure. Whatever. Stay if you wish.” but I guess the initial look on my face put her off, as they both got up and left. That was cool, as we all sat down a few minutes later. The rest of the night was a blur. That never happens.

Oh… and out of the group, I was the oldest one. I am NOT used to this!!!

Here I am… yet again… installing a fresh version of Wordpress. Why oh why do I do this?

I do not know.

It would appear that I *just* can’t get into the groove of posting daily like I used to. Eventually, I get bored of the idea of posting, or someone doesn’t like what I post, or I start to realise that I’m sounding like I bigot, and I stop updating the site altogether.

Perhaps this time will be different? I always say that.

Who knows if I mean it now.