Via: Term Life Insurance

I’m finally getting around to writing a long overdue blog post about what’s been going on in my life lately.  Why my life has been so hectic is that I took a new full time position as a web designer for a local Cambridge company.  I choose not to divulge where here, but if you really need to know IM me or ask me in person. I was hired on a couple weeks ago and started last Tuesday.

So you might think to yourself, well if James took a new job, where does that leave my company SlideawayMedia?  And if you’re that on the ball with your questions, I commend you.  Basically what is happening with Slideaway is it is being moved to the back burner.  I have a few projects still in the air that I am attempting to finish off at the moment.  I intend on continuing doing freelance work, but at a decidedly scaled back level.  I have a a few personal projects that I’d love to spend some more time on as well that will factor into things.  But more then anything I’d like to find some time to enjoy my summer.

For roughly the last year freelancing I’ve learned a lot about myself and the world as a whole.  Taking this new job was definitely a difficult choice for me.  It essentially meant giving up the freedom and flexibility of the freelance world for the more structured life of being back in the corporate world.  Tipping the scales to the other side in many ways was the convenience of a steady paycheque versus hustling to bring in new clients and worrying about whether the job I invoiced for will be paid in time to pay my bills.  After almost a year of it I decided I wanted stability.  All along I had said if the right opportunity came along that I would jump at it.  During that year I sent out 3 resumés to companies that interested me, got 2 interviews and 1 job out of it.

So at this point my life has taken a turn in a new direction.  I’m looking forward to the new challenges that this job will offer.  I’ve worked at my new company for a week and a half and I’m already feeling like I made the right decision.  Lots of good talented people excited about the company and what they do.  Having co-workers again and not having my own office has taken some getting used to, but it definitely brings a positive energy to the work day for sure.

Here’s the unboxing video that a few people had wanted me to do when I got my iPad. I did some editing to the video, as it took me forever to unwrap the bubble wrap with one hand.  I think the back design by Colorware looks gorgeous with the matte finish and everything.  Thanks so much to Digg, TapTapTap and Colorware for this very excellent prize.

So far I’ve had the device for a day and my impressions are pretty mixed.  Here’s a quick run down of my thoughts

What I like

• Very snappy device.  Makes my iPhone look like chop liver with regards to speed
• The iPhone games are actually better on the iPad.  I find I’ve played games I didn’t really bother with previously because of the cramped controls on the iPhone
• The screen looks gorgeous under the right lighting conditions
• Downloaded Air Video application and it streams my media flawlessly over my network.  Saves converting my media to another format which is a total pain.  Definitely looking forward to watching stuff while I cook as we don’t have a TV on our main floor.

Here’s what I didn’t like

• No iBooks available in Canada.  Since Apple hasn’t actually launched the book selling features in Canada they have held back the iBooks app from the Canadian iTunes store.  I had a bunch of ePub books I bought in anticipation of receiving my iPad and the only free solution that I found was using Stanza, which is still iPhone only
• While the games convert well to iPad, the apps like Facebook, Stanza etc. look really crappy when blown up on the big screen.  I know this problem will be resolved when more devs get their iPad compatible versions of the apps out.
• As I know many have complained about, the smudgy screen.  As soon as you’re anywhere with sun exposure the problem becomes pretty apparent
• Since Apple hasn’t launched the iPad enabled iTunes store in Canada there is really no way of finding top iPad apps or anything.  Some apps are available through iTunes, but not really organized at all.  You can’t even download apps from the device yet for this reason, which is a pain.
• Seems odd Apple omitted a silent switch.  Have to turn the volume all the way down. Having my iPhone, iPad and iMac all notify of the same email is a bit annoying

Since my iPad is a Wifi only version and Apple saw fit to keep the device from data tethering with my iPhone. Luckily since iPhone is jailbroken I was able to buy the app MyWi and create a local wireless network to give my iPad data on the go.  Gave it a spin last night and it seemed to work pretty well, though given my iPhone is in need of a new battery I’m not sure how viable that method is for a long usage period.

I found almost instantly that all the features I miss from my iPhone are the jailbreak customizations I’ve made to my phone.  The biggest is GriP, which enables Growl style notifications for the iPhone.  Seriously I don’t know how a regular iPhone users cope without it.  Makes me wonder how long I’ll hold out before I jailbreak my iPad.

I’d say so far I like the device, but don’t love it yet.  Probably once the full app store is available to us Canucks later this month I’ll be happier with the functionality it offers.

I know I’m getting old and all, but this to me seems shocking.  Almost without question the definitive song of the 1990′s and the Grunge era as a whole is Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit.  The Google bar suggests possible popular searches that might be what you’re looking for, so the fact that out of the 10 results not a single one is the actual name of the song just astounds me.  It’s not the first time I’ve heard this misnomer before, but I am just shocked how prevalent it is given these results.  And given Google’s search algorithm is smart they also just send you to results for Smells Like Teen Spirit, what the person was actually looking for.

I understand there’s now a whole generation of kids who weren’t even alive when that song came out, or even get the reference it was making.  When Kurt Cobain wrote the song he was referencing a brand of deodorant that was being marketed towards teenage girls in the early 1990′s called Teen Spirit.  I believe it was written about an ex-girlfriend who wore the stuff.  I know this because I read the biography Heavier Then Heaven, but I also know this because I totally remember the commercials.  Being 11 years old I did watch my fair share of MuchMusic.  And now that everything old is new again given the advent of YouTube, here is that iconic commercial.

Infomercials have long been something that have amused me quite a bit. I always found it hilarious it was watching how inept the people in the commercial were at the given task this new miracle device being shilled would magically solved.  All set to the sounds of The Beatles HELP!

The playoffs kick off tonight with my Senators playing the defending champs, the Pittsburgh Penguins. I’m so looking forward to the Sens kicking some Penguin butt. All year watching the standings I was hoping the Sens would get a crack at the champs in the playoffs.

Many of the series previews I’ve read point to the ill fated 2008 playoff matchup where the Senators were skunked 4-0 in their Conference Quarterfinal matchup. The problem with using this as a gauge is that the Senators were a mess at that point. Daniel Alfredsson had received a concussion by Mark Bell of the Maple Leafs in the second to last game of the season. The team had been on a swoon pretty much the whole calendar of 2008 after a torrid start to the season. John Paddock, their coach to start the season had been canned with with less then 20 games to go in the season. The dressing room was mess, with many personal player rifts and rumours of drug issues. The reality is this team was sinking fast and probably wouldn’t have made the playoffs had the season extended another week. Every team in the Eastern Conference wanted to play the Sens in the first round. So much so that the Penguins actually threw the last game of the year to assure themselves a matchup with the Sens.

So luckily for Ottawa much of what ailed the team at that point has been resolved. Bryan Murray shipped out much of the negative dressing room elements and built a much more gritty, hard nosed team for the 2010 edition of the Senators. This also isn’t the same Penguins team that Ottawa faced in 2008. Now this is a still young, but now experienced group of players looking to get the their third consecutive Stanley Cup finals appearance.

It’s going to be an uphill battle, but I think the Senators have it in them to beat the Pens. After watching this team tear off 11 and 6 game winning streaks toward the end of the season I’m inclined to believe this team definitely has another gear to their game. They no longer rely as heavily on their first line as they once did, now getting contributions from their top 3 lines on a regular basis. While on these streaks the team was winning by playing a total team game and doing all the little stuff well. This was exactly the type of hockey the Sens played during their 2007 playoff run. The 2007 Senators were unheralded as well, with many analysts picking the up and coming Penguins to pull the upset in the first round.

What the Sens really need to win this series is solid goaltending. Ottawa is pinning their hopes on rookie Brian Elliott to pull them through. While I think every Sens fan wishes they had a tender with playoff experience, obviously we don’t have that luxury. Looking at Elliott’s stats as compared to Marc-Andre Fleury’s, Elliott actually has a better save percentage and goals against average then Fleury this year.

The Sens have done a good job neutralizing Sidney Crosby over his career. With the shutdown pairing of Phillips and Volchenkov the Sens should be able to contain Sid The Kid. That just means their other pairings have to contain Malkin, who is just back from an injury and the rest of the Pens lineup. This does seem quite possible. The Sens and Pens split their season series, with both teams getting a blowout win and each picking up a 4-1 win along the way. It’ll be an interesting series as neither team has actually played a close scoring game against the other, as it typically the case with playoff hockey.

My Pick
Senators in 6

Just makes me wonder how he actually thought this was a good idea to upload this to the internet.

Today has been a pretty lucky day for myself.  Earlier today I won a bowling party at Frederick Lanes in Kitchener.  This was quite funny because I had just dropped my business card off 2 days earlier, after attending a free bowling party that a Twitter friend had won and invited me to.  This is a party with free bowling for up to 25 people, which is pretty awesome.  I think on any other day I would have been content with winning a bowling party and call it my lucky day.

As it turns out that was just the first thing I won.  At roughly 4pm I receive a direct message from @taptaptap telling me I won an iPad.

My first reaction to this was to source out whether this was in fact a scammer just trying to pull one over on me.  Checked the Twitter account, definitely legit.  I had entered the contest through TapTapTap to win an iPad. It was one of those follow this account, then tweet this message to win types of contests that are so popular on Twitter these days.  I entered once on the first day, then probably would have forgotten to enter any of the other days.  The contest was to promote the new Digg iPhone app that launched this week.

I’m not 100% sure whether it’s a case or some type of skin, but the iPad comes with a custom, individually numbered Colorware exterior which looks fantastic.  I’ve been a daily Digg user since 2005, so this will be quite the awesome item to own.

Once I got that DM from TapTapTap things just pretty much became a flurry of emails and activity.  They had announced that I was the first winner over Twitter, so basically my username got broadcast out to 70,000+ Twitter users.  At this point I started getting a deluge of congratulations from kindly Twitter users about my win, lots of friendly jibes about how jealous people were and how they were going to win one of the other 13 iPads that were up for grabs.  I started getting a deluge of notifications as people started following me on Twitter.  Up to this point I have roughly 40 new followers, which is pretty crazy.

I wrote a blog awhile back addressing some of the perceived shortcomings of the iPad, but never did I anticipate I’d actually end up getting one.  I kinda figured I’d wait until the second generation when the price dropped a bit.  As it is I’ve still got at least a month of painful waiting for my new iPad to arrive.  They told me it’ll be roughly 3-6 weeks after the promotion ends, which means since I won on day 1 it’ll be 5-8 weeks wait.  They have to wait to get the iPads from Apple, then they need time to do the customization, then send it out.

There has recently been quite the uproar lately about what is happening in Downtown Brantford. The City Council has been planning to knock down 41 old building as part of their downtown revitalization project. These building date back to before Canada was even founded in 1867, so you can imagine there are more then a few people ticked off with this type of city planning.

Photo credit to Oliver Casarsa from the Facebook group

My original thought on the project was to tear them down. I lived in Paris, just down the road from Brantford and spent a good amount of my formative teenage years hanging out in Browntown. I moved to the area in 1994 and bore witness to the slow decline of the Brantford Core. There used to be comic book shops and book stores that I’d frequent, or memorable nights spent playing video games at Funtown then checking out a movie at the old $2 Cineplex. All of those things are gone. Purdy’s, a favourite among friends of mine for their weekly Monday music trivia. Long gone. Since this stretch of Colborne Street had been dead or dying for at least 10 years now, my thinking was what is there worth saving down there?

After doing some reading through the Facebook group called Save The South Side of Colborne Street, a couple things came clear to me. Originally when I heard they were knocking these buildings down I assumed they had a plan in tow that would utilize this space and help the ongoing revitalization process going on in downtown Brantford. As it turns out, not so much. All they really have planned is a spot for a combined athletic facility to be jointly used by the YMCA, Laurier University, Nippissing University and Mohawk College, who all have campuses in Brantford, which will occupy only 1/3 of the cleared space. The City Council is essentially rushing headlong into this project because it has government money to burn as part of Canadian stimulus spending. They don’t have a full plan for how this land is going to be used, they just want to raze the land in hopes that developers will come running to build projects on the land. The City claims that nobody has been willing to redevelop the area in the last 20 years, so they’re just going to knock them down. The Province of Ontario has told the City Council to reconsider their decision on this issue, yet they wish to soldier on.

Personally I think that this is just a big gambit by the City to force the issue of redevelopment within the core. In the end they have expropriated the buildings, moved everyone out and now have a large amount of empty buildings with a lot less strings attached then before. I think the city all along has wanted a white knight-type developer to swoop in and save the day here. By threatening to knock down 41 pre-confederation buildings, they’ve brought the downtown redevelopment to the forefront, garnering a lot of mainstream coverage of the issue. Their goal here has been to find a developer to take this project on, so raising the profile of the issue could enable them to pull on the heart strings of some developer, get them to open their wallet and get involved.

Think of the public relations victory for the City Council, the incoming developers and Brantford as a whole if the buildings get saved and properly redeveloped? Guess we can just hope this is what actually comes to pass.

Photo credit to Erich Davies

On this past Saturday Corina, Erich and I made our way to the Personal Computing Museum in Brantford, Ontario where they were having an open house. The reason for the event was that Syd, the owner of the museum had written an application for a Commodore VIC-20, an almost 30 year old computer, to enable it to send status updates or tweets, to Twitter. Essentially it was bridging the gap between ancient and modern computing technologies. I took a video of the historic tweet on my iPhone. Not the greatest quality, but at least you can hear Syd give the explanation of the difficulties of being able to write such an application for such an old device.

This was the first time I’ve been to the PC Museum and I have to say I was quite impressed. They have a wide array of perfectly functional, classic computers that people are allowed to use. Many had classic games like Space Invaders, Arkanoid and even text based classics like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. I personally was fascinated with the back wall of the museum, which featured many of the original boxes from classic video game consoles and computers, and loads of old software boxes, cartridges, tapes and floppy disks for every sort of computer. It was pretty impressive. There was mention that they have a games night there twice a year, which I’d definitely be interested in checking out.

If you’d like to follow the Personal Computing Museum on Twitter, follow @vintagePC