This month is turning

out to be a long month. I’ll be glad when it’s over and when this snow is gone. Then I can go out visiting after work and stuff.

I took this image outside yesterday and I had it up on the blog but for some reason thee font had got changed so I changed this and the photo wouldn’t take. SO lets see if it will today.

Not a lot going on for today. It‘s overcast out there -3* but it‘s not overly cold or anything. It‘s probably a decent day for a walk around the block or up the street for a Tim‘s. Heck, even though there‘s a Tim Horton‘s just up the street about a mile away, (no bus service straight up the street) it‘s easier just to hop on a connector bus out here for the train catch the train to Corona Station and take the escalator upstairs to the street level and your there. (When the train isn’t shut down for upgrades.) Easy. The only lag time is the train leaving and the train/bus at Clairview home I still want to get that Vol. 3 of the Hammerslammer series waiting there for me at Audrey‘s. Even City Centre mall is faster to get to then anything around here as it‘s all on the same line.

I might just decide to stay home anyway and get my book tomorrow after work. Anne said she won on her “Roll up the Tim’s win” contest currently going on. She won a free coffee. Most responses when people roll up the rim of the coffee cup are “Thank you please play again.” I’ve never met anyone that said they’ve won a laptop or a widescreen TV. I Haven’t bought a Tim’s coffee yet this month to play anyway.

Other then that, it‘s a quiet weekend around here. I‘m to lazy to venture out for anything like a bite to eat. Anne‘s making us her Sunday brunch as our first meal for the day. We usually have a late brunch having it around 4-5pm. I haven‘t watched InnerSpace all week so maybe that‘s on. Anyway, that‘s about all for now.

I'm having a decent day for a Wednesday

I’m a little worried I’m losing a bit of my hearing. This could be age or having that head set attached to my left ear over the many years. The other thing is I do listen to a lot of music and that might have an affect on me. Hard to say. Some music I used to listen to a year ago sounded blaring. Now it’s like even turned up full blast on my Itouch, it sounds like digitally un mastered old music, where I’ve lost about 20% of the sound. Or I seem to have. I’m not sure.

I went into work as usual and Gerry didn’t say anything to me about the card from yesterday. So, I’m not going to broach the subject any further. I had another bag up day pulling in close to $700. At noon I got another Pro-line ticket and I put $3 on it for $3 games to win $20. I got a 6/49 quick pick and something I Haven’t played in years for $5 a Western. You get 8 draws for $5. Not to shabby.

The trains were backing up all afternoon and I needed to get off at Bay Station so I could take the train previous to the one I was on, which I could at least sit down on the way home. The one I was on was standing room only.

I got Van/Det, FLA/CHI,CGY/SJS. Van is leading 1-0 at the end of the 2nd. So far, so good. No score in the FLA/CHI game at the end of the 1st, another good sign and the late game hasn’t begun yet. I could win $20!

Lately I’ve been thinking about a logo for my site but I haven’t got an idea that immediately comes to mind.

I had a nice day saturday afternoon

at my first ever Canadian Rite Lodge yesterday afternoon from 1pm till about 5:30pm. I was so drained I did virtually nothing all night but vegetate and read. Today I'm going to play around with my new midi keyboard controller.


I've got this dry cough I haven't been able to get rid of lately but for the most part the flem is gone. Its so bloody annoying.

Monday Anne and I are going to head down to Edmonton Public Library to get our taxes done. Its a free service for low income families. I mentioned to the boss I could be gone for the day. I'm very close to getting the 4th Gen ITouch and the PS3 gaming system next month when I get my tax return later in April. I want to play Little big planet 2 and Bulletstorm.

Carol works in our office doing Res and she brought me over a pair of Cleats. I didn't think I'd need them anymore but when walking beside the Lodge most of the sidewalk was covered in a sheet of ice.

Over there at SF Signal, in the section on articles, James Wallace Harris asks How Can Bookstores Compete with Amazon.com? I replied: Easy, My bookstore doesn't ask to pay by credit card Anyhow that's about all for now.

Good day today

I had a post here for yesterday ready but it’s running up on Blogger and my website. I think I’m going to give my website 1 more year after this then go to Blogger permanently. I’m trying to eventually scan and upload my diary posts from 1980 to current. It‘s a massive undertaking. My website will last only as long as I pay for it but chances are, Google will be around long after I‘m dead and gone.

I just watched “InnerSpace” talking about their shows and the season finally of “V”. I’m not a big fan of this show. I’m anxiously waiting to the new season of “Doctor Who.” Anyway, I had a nice day today.
I picked up a Pro-line ticket for 3 games, Toronto/Carolina, Washington/Detroit, Colorado/Vancouver. My Toronto game won for me, Detroit won for me and I’m just waiting for the Aves in Vancouver. Avs are leading 2-0, which is a good sign. I’m on a good pace for winning $30 bucks for tonight.
Earlier I was mentioning the “project diary upload” to Blogger which is an ongoing archive project of my hand written material. It’s everything from 1980-September 2005. Pretty close to some 300 duo-tang covers of close to 40-60 pages each. Most of them are packed away in boxes and are in white/red magazine boxes as in the photo. The idea is to have my life archived up to Google, which will last a long time:
I read on the way in this morning and got my coffee at “Beans” and then upstairs to my dialler. I got dialler #9 but all day I got nothing. 2 of the guys went off to OTH to do some volunteer work and I asked if I could move over to s vacant dialler and after about half an hour I got a sale and then a $100 one on the cad. That made me feel a lot better.

I had a great day today

when I left the building. I could barely see across the street waiting for my bus to Clairview station. When the bus got to Rexall place about 820am the fog had lifted although it was tough sledding with all the ice on the sidewalks.

I got no sales this morning but at noon I did a callback and got $35 and latter about 3pm I sold some tickets on a $50 card, so I was happy about that. I was trying to get the $200 as Steve (Big Boss) was around but it didn't fall through. I was lucky I got the $50. The weather on my commute home was nice and mild.
Anne made me a bite to eat and we went over to the "dollarama" store across the street and i bought some Sunglasses. Handy to have on the LRT in the mornings when the morning Sun is blaring in my eyes. We walked over to the Clairview movies here on 50th st. The movie cost us about $2 but it was $5 pop $4 popcorn etc. Total was over $20 for the two of us. It took awhile for my eyes to get adjusted to the theater. The floaters in my eyes before the actual movie kind of soured the experience but as the movie was unfolding I got used to the floaters and it detracted very little from the movie. I was getting right into the plot and without warning the screen went funny. Anne and I looked at each other, "Here we go again." Sure enough the movie screen went blank but an usher said they were working on please bare with them. There must have been 15 of us in the theater. Four in front of us had left and shortly after that the film came back. during the climax part of the film my bladder was ready to burst but I didn't want to miss anything.


Review:


Synopsis: The long awaited sequel to the 1982 version of the original movie. The Son of the world of Tron is drawn into the world where he meets his father in a kind of a self imposed exile.


Cons: Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) seemed more like a washed up hippy without the long hair. His character seemed to be a hippy from the eighties into the 21st century. The plot was deep yet the scenes were predictable especially in the turret gun scene


Pros: The bad guys were very good if at times a little over the top but they could have been meaner. The world building was excellent. The way the movie was overall portrayed was excellent.

Bottom line. This is a must see movie for any Sci-fi fan, despite the film shutting down on us and the half hour wait we had I'm glad I was patient enough to wait through it. On a scale from 4-5, I'd rate this a 4.5. Also, despite me needing a bathroom in the worst way, the staff as we were coming out handed us each a free movie pass good for the rest of the year! If "Sucker punch" comes to this theater, I'm there.

It was to late to go to Tim's so we worked our way home along the patchy ice surface. Anne ventured across the street to Superstore and I was glad to get home. I checked my Pro-line ticket and nothing. Washington capitals have won an amazing 9 straight. I had Montreal at home to win.

After I post this, I'm having a bite to eat and watch the news and Inner Space On Space. My half hour before bed serving of Sci-fi. Anyway, that's about all for now.

I received my T4 today

handed to me at work and they show my old address on 156th st but have my current postal code.Huh?

I had a slow day today obtaining 1 sale all day for $25! It wasn't even on a credit card.

I did some more research on the Royal Arch degree and I think an applicant needs to be at least a Past Master and with any luck at all I hope to be PM 2014 or 2015 if I don't advance through the chairs and skip the JW role. 

On my Proline this evening, I picked Philly/Toronto, Phi to win and that game is in the bank, 3-2 is the finale. Ottawa is leading 1-0 in the 3rd. Blues is winning 2-1 over the Habs,no score Flames/Phoenix. Van/SJ is latter tonight but I think Ottawa is going to beat out Florida. I have Florida to win. Total pay out to win could get me $53! Anyway, that's all for tonight.

I'm having a nice night

off by myself even though watching a disaster of an Oiler/Wahington loss didn't do anything for me. i mean I want to see the Oiler's lose to keep last place so we can get the first round draft pick again. but losing 5-0?

Anyway, Anne's on her way home and if things go well, I'm going to have a nice, productive busy weekend coming up, anyway that's about all for now.

Job woes and such again

Sigh, the idea was to go into work leaving yesterday behind me and start fresh. I got, again 1 sale for the same ammount for $20. Gerry never said anything to me but I kind of knew he had it in the back of his mind. Most of the sales at the end of the day were something like in the $200-300 range. I began to tweak my pitch a bit more going for sponsorships only but after about 3pm the calls were coming so short and far and few between. I got a couple of nibbles and all and a few call backs for tomorrow. I was half expecting Gerry to call me into the office saying something like “Sorry Jim, but it’s not working out so I‘m moving you back to res until we clean this up. I‘ll have you back for our next campaign, etc.” But to my surprise, he didn‘t call me in. I‘m sure I‘ve got a few more days to pick it up a bit but if my whole week is one or two sales/day, I‘m sure he‘s not going to keep me around much longer in biz.



So, I was glad to be out of there and I got myself a Pro-line ticket for tonight picking 4 games. One of those Oiler‘s/Flyers and that game concluded about 30 minutes ago with the Oiler‘s losing 4-1. I though the Oiler‘s had a strong game but the turning point was a 5 minute major we got which they scored with 17 seconds left on their PP. I slept through most of the 3rd period dozing off on the couch for 40 minutes. So much for my Pro-line. If all 4 games would have come in, that would have net me $70 but I played mostly long shots. All my picks lost as I picked all visitor. Vancouver is losing the last of my games at the end of the 1st period 2-1 but that may be my only win but that wont be over for about an hour yet.


So most likely if my sales don’t pick up Gerry will call me into the office Friday night and wont even give me a warning. It‘s not like I‘m going to be without a job or anything. It means that I‘ll be back to working afternoons/evenings and I‘ll miss the last 15 Oiler games and a lot of the playoffs. I‘ll still be going out to Lodge and all that good stuff. If Friday I‘m getting like $20, $30, $50 totals yeah Friday after work, he‘ll call me in and say I‘m back in res. If not then maybe I bought myself another week. Anyway, that‘s all for now.

After about 3 attempts Ifinally

was able to get ahold of Freemason Hall's manager and he said he  knows all the Lodges that are in the building (something like 14 of them) and he claims he's never heard of the SRIA but I'm "welcome to check out the Hall's library." This tells me then that the SRIA might not even exist anymore or maybe they are at Highlands Hall after all.

My day at work really dragged on. I ended up though obtaining 1 sale for $20! Lowest on the board surrounded by $200's and up. I went home feeling dejected but the boss said I got a $35 bonus for my check (I hope this week) for that $700 page ad.

The weather is at least warming up somewhat. By next week we should be in single digit numbers -2's and -3's that sort of thing. The PS3, the midi controller, the ITouch 32Gb are 1 of the 3 of the toys I'm considering getting this month. I'm kind of leaning towards the PS3 even though I've got the old Xbox 360. I think the reason Fable 3 wouldn't work on my current Xbox (because last night Anne was playing Indiana Jones lego) Fable 3 was a game released for the black Xbox 360. I wouldn't mind though getting the midi controller though thing is according to Long & Mcquade, they didn't have one in stock at their Northside store but for a $50 deposit they would get it from their Southside store and I could pick it up Friday. I don't think I like the idea of going there twice this week. We'll see.

I just came off watching a really good Monday night Raw. Anyway, that's about all for now.  

I didn't sleep very well

overnight only because I had too much sleep this weekend. I went to bed about 12:40am and that became 1:40am and Anne said she was having trouble with Telus. Everything across the board was shut down. A service call later and Telus tech support said there was an outage in our area and the problem would be resolved soon. It was.

I might have got 4 hours if that but I'm not drained or wiped out or anything. Actually I feel pretty good.

Last night while doing some Masonic research I came across a group (Chapter here in Edmonton) called the SRIA and they are a Masonic Group that apparently meet out of Highlands Hall. The SRIA (Sounds like a terrorist org.) practices the Hermetic side of Masonry. Something I'm well versed in but you need to be a Master mason to qualify for entrance. I'm going to look them up today and to see if they are still active here in Edmonton. -31 with a wind chill out there. Where is Spring? Anyway, that's about all for now. 

Well its

a Sunday. Next weekend is going to be busy. I told Anne that I’m going to Ye Old craft for a rare morning Master Mason’s degree at 9am. She didn’t offer much resistance at all. She was more concerned that she gets the use of the bus pass, which she will as they’re done at 1pm festive board and all. But what I think I’ll just do is give her the bus pass and head over to Long & McQuade (the competition to Axe music) and get the midi keyboard Controller on my way home. I‘m getting the Oxygen 25 controller. It kind of looks like a toy keyboard but its very powerful. I like the tools it comes with like Strike, Velvet, Hybrid, and a few others and the price $130! So this week I‘m going to call and see if they have any in stock and ask them if I bring my laptop down could they make sure that the software is installed properly and hook up the midi settings because this is where I get lost. If they can do it for me that is.

Then after all that I’m going to rush back home and drop everything off change and head downtown as I’m meeting some friends after work for drinks and I don’t want to be carrying my laptop and the controller with me while I’m out. I want to also make sure that I have enough cash for taking my wife out for her birthday dinner on Sunday as we’re going to head off to the Ramada for supper. After that I can play around with my controller when we get home. Her birthday isn’t until Wednesday anyway. Also, next Sunday is daylight savings time again. The clocks move ahead 1 hour. I’ve got a fun but busy weekend next weekend and as rare as they are I like them a lot.

For the rest f the week, I have nothing pressing, just work and watching the Oiler’s. They won last night 5-1 in Denver. Since Hemsky, Hall & Penner are out with injuries and traded the Oiler’s called up this Giroux fellow from the AHL and he’s got 29 goals there this season. He’s been around for a few years as he played with NY Rangers and got pushed back to the minors and then with Washington and got pushed back. He’s never been in a steady line up except in the minors. With 17 games left and a beat up blue line,the Oiler’s need all the help they can get. Even if they win all their next 17 games, there’s no way they can get into the playoffs. Yet the Oiler’s played with spark and energy while the Av’s looked like a team that was just going through the motions, ok enough of that.

Speaking about Masonry and all earlier this post, I’m going to try and visit a lodge/week. This is going to be great because when I’m junior warden I would have visited most of the lodges if not once but twice and when it comes time to sell tickets to our Robbie Burns (Which I’m going to organize) night those Lodges that I have already visited will expect to have me there in January promoting our event and hopefully selling tickets. Also, I‘m going to ask in the Lodge at the festive board to visit other Lodges as well it’s my goal to have more then our current JW did. We had 40 people at the RB night in January. The JW (me 2012) I hope to have more of a turnout. Anyone including non Masons are allowed to attend the RB night. Also, as JW I organize the Lodge BBQ and I think Fort Edmonton park. I put my name up for that when it was announced Thursday. Our district basically facilitates this and our Lodge always has a couple of weekends representing itself there. I went a few years ago and had a great time. I signed up for the one on my birthday August 21st.

Despite the ammount of snow on the ground its this time of year we usually have what’s called the March run-off but it’s been colder longer and with more snow. Neil who drives me to Lodge was saying (and he’s lived here all his life) was saying that this is the worst winter he’s seen here since 1969. I was 19 years old at that time.

I haven’t heard anything yet about 2011 Doctor Who episodes with Matt Smith. Usually Space has them on this time of year. Anyway that‘s all for now

I had a great day today on the job

==I felt good going into work even though it was something like -25 with a wind chill out there. I had a decent morning with 2 sales by break and $100 bucks on the card. I realized to late but I had left my Itouch on for way to long draining out my battery. I was listening to some of the missed podcasts of SF Signal on the way into work. Gerry was saying “pitch them high gets them to buy, pitch them no gets a no.” So, I rewrote my script and began with a full page add. I got a nibble by afternoon break. I was invited to call back and got a run-a-round but the guy called me back saying the full page ad was a go and I got it on a card. I was kinds of hoping it would get under the skin of a certain little twerp that turned on me. I thought he was a friend but no way and I could (being on the other side of the cubicles) could feel his jealousy. The boss had left for the day as they are getting ready for a managers meeting in Calgary for Thursday. So I never got any recognition for it but if it is on cold and I get 25% of that then I’ll be enjoying the commission is all the recognition I need thank you very much.

Anyway the rest of the afternoon went along well and I packed everything up and headed out the building in the bitter cold. I think it was something like -35 with the wind chill on my way to Corona station. Fortunately I didn’t have very far to go. I got a seat all the way home feeling good about my days production with $830 on card. It kind of made up for missing Monday.

I’m not really comfortable with my vocal capabilities singing practice songs in FL Studio. I’ve got this nasal kind of a tone to my singing when I try to sing “high notes.” I know with vocal processing software I can change all of that. I have the basics ok, I just need to take all of that nasal bits out by doing some pitch correction.

I was seriously entertaining the idea of going to Redwood Lodge earlier this evening but its so cold out there I decided well, my Lodge is Thursday (tomorrow night so I stayed home.)Anyway, that‘s all for now.