Unless I'm tripping

WWE's Clash in Italy live event starts at 2:00 PM Edmonton time, which works out perfectly for me.

Right now, we are enjoying a nice, rainy Sundae afternoon. I am thinking about heading over to the Mill Woods McDonald's for a strawberry sunday.

Ice cream machines at some McDonald's locations can be hit-or-miss, but if the Mill Woods machine is broken, Dairy Queen is conveniently right across the street. I can always watch the WWE event later.

Flash fiction has become a compelling interest of mine. Yesterday, I came across an interesting outline concept for writing in this genre, specifically for the 500-word category. For my purposes, that length translates into a long blog post 🤣Everything I have written up to this point is about 100 words. I have been reading quite a bit of flash fiction lately, and I find it to be a truly fascinating format. More on that later. Anyway, that's all for now.

Underway at this moment is NAMM 2015

National Association of Music Merchants, commonly called NAMM in reference to the organization's popular NAMM trade shows. Every year its a different city. This year NAMM 2015 is in Anaheim, California. What I like so far from NAMM this year is Roland's JD-X1 synth. The price is something I can afford. Teenage Engineering has released these cool Pocket Operators. The size of a calculator these mini step sequencers fit in the pocket and have a big sound. They sync up to each other and can sync to a daw for about $60 bucks each. They have 3 units in their line up so far.

Saudi Arabia's King abdullah bin abdulaziz al saud passed away. The SA King was instrumental in having SA increase oil productivity last fall. How this will play out when Opec meets in June will be very interesting.

If I'm not working Sunday Anne wants me to go to the WEM Scotia bank theatre, and use our scene points so I can see Royal Rumble. That sounds like a great idea. I can get a bite to eat use my Chapters/Indigo $25 gift card to buy a Warhammer 40k book. Then go to the show. Sounds like fun. 

Finally we know what's going to happen to the old Greyhound bus depot location downtown: Cinneplex (after the site is demolished) is building an adults-only multiplex theatre where patrons can reserve seats and order food and beverage from them. There's going to be a bar in there etc. Tickets might cost more then the City Centre theatres at the CC mall. Its a good fit for the EAD as the new 50 story Delta hotel will be virtual across the street from the theatre district.

So if I don't get schedule for next week in my email later today, (I can take 3 days would be an exception) then Monday I'm making a few phone calls. I'm looking to get something to fill in for a couple of days instead. I know of a few disposable type jobs I can "sign up" for. If I can get them that is. Update: I got a schedule (of sorts) I've got 4 hours Wednesday, Thursday and 10-6 on Saturday. Anyway, that's all for now.

Last night Anne and I went to the

Horseshoe lounge just over here on 58th street and 137th Ave. It's just a little bar behind KFC there. Its been around for years. We checked it because they had WWE's Summer slam on pay per view. They charge $10/person but they couldn't get the sound working. My mood changed for the better as I was getting into the show. I was in a bad mood mainly because of the heat and I hadn't eaten and the heat of the day. We ordered pizza and pop but enjoyed the show anyway. They finally got the sound on about about 70% into the broadcast. They didn't charge for the show, which was a nice gesture. They had about 50 people. It's actually a nice little bar. The bus isn't that far away to take me home on a Saturday afternoon. I'm glad I went after all and I'll be back next pay per view. 

This weekend was kind of a good news bad news type weekend. Saturday morning the boss wants me in for a meeting. He gave me a 2 week notice to pick it up. It's telemarketing, what can I say? The other thing is I won on 3 of my cfl proline games. It's about enough to by a case of beer but at least I'm winning.

I'm looking at getting into the eBook reader business. After doing a bit of research I'm warming up to the 6" Kobo Aura. I'm using it for Warhammer 40k short stories and ebooks. Stuff I can't get at Audrey's. 

Tonight is Monday night Raw on the aftermath of last nights show. Looking forward to it. Anyway, that's all for now. 

I got 2 more days off

here before I go back to work. That's ok, at least I'm getting  (for now) steady hours. 

It was built in 1978 but satellite ISEE-3 is staying alive. Thanks to band of space enthusiasts that located the spacecraft and have managed to "talk to it" and to resurrect some of its instruments that can still provide useful data. The project is mostly a labour of love for the 75 team of scientists working on their own time, from the people (some in there 80's) that originally worked on the satellite to younger scientists in their 20's-30's. They raised about $140,000 to be able to work on this project. You can read more about it here.

Anne and I opted out of "Money in the bank" mainly because it would have cost us more money, which we don't have. We'll probably get the WWE network soon. That and my blood sugar readings were very unstable all day and by the time we would have come back, it would have been about 9pm and Anne needed to do Face Time with her sister.    

I'm heading out of here about noon today so I can get to my bank get the form for work and then across the street to get  my Eagles book. The only tough part about the job is the long distance getting there. It's not like I catch a train and walk a block and I'm there within 30 minutes. At least though, its steady. Anyway, that's all for now.

Anne went out and got me the

Brother MFC-J475DW all-in-one inkjet printer last night while I was at work. She went over to Northgate town Centre. It was the same one we were looking over at London Drugs and for $60 bucks it's a pretty good buy. For the most part I have it set up and registered. I made a test copy and it prints, so far pretty good. 

Some sad WWE news from earlier. The wrestler known as "The Ultimate Warrior" passed away and he was just on Monday night Raw speaking to the crowd in the ring. Almost as if he was saying goodbye one last time. 

This afternoon I have my appointment with my Ophthalmologist at 2pm and I'm going to have eye drops and probably ultrasound. If I have my vision un impaired,I'll go into work for my 4 hour shift. Anne suggested that since I have a 5.5 and 2 back to back 7.5 it might be a good idea for me to take tonight off. That might be a good idea but we'll see. Anyway, that's all for now.

I'm just about ready to wrap

up Stardoc #1. I found out from Fantastic Fiction, there are 3 more out of the 7 books I  have left in the Stardoc series. I hope to get the last 3 next month. 

I had every intention of heading out to Canada Place to get my CPP under way for next month but Canada Place has abbreviated hours this week. Today, Thursday and Friday they are open 8:30-10am and closed January 1st, naturally. It means I can't do anything until next week.  

Today marks the first day that we have had -20 as a high for the winter season since our first snow. It's not bad if you don't have to be out in it for a long period of time. My sister -in-law is getting ready to go on a 10 day cruise over the holidays that begins today. She's going on a Disney cruise and she says that Micky, Donald Duck etc are going to wish her nieces etc a Merry Christmas from the ship. They'll be in +25 we'll be in -25.  

Tonight is Christmas eve and we usually open our gifts tonight. We got a new budgie to replace poor Sugar #1.

Anne is getting us a little holiday Christmas platter from Safeway and I've got Monday night Raw (unless they're going to do one of their pre-recorded shows for the troops) which doesn't mean anything for me not being an American but I appreciate the effort WWE does for this but I hope its they're regular show.

It seems that The Black Library could be offering something for they're newsletter subscribers tomorrow. I'm going to check my inbox and see what it is. Maybe a free story? That's be nice.

Anyway it's time to finish the last 30 pages or so of this my 3rd novel I've read this year. Usually I read between 8-12 books/year but with all that's been going on over the last year It's been tough to find time to do much reading. Anyway, that's all for now.



 

Despite having been woken up to

an annoying stereo behind our bedroom wall where our bass board of our bed is at 9:30 this morning, I had a good day.

We had a real change in the weather as well as earlier this afternoon it was about +20 until the wind picked up.

Also, I found out how to remove photos/video off of my iPad, which gave me an extra 3 Gb of space on my iPad.

After the wind storm above Anne went to get us some Pizza from her staff discount and it was really nice. 

I've got a nice bag of "Crispers" chips here for Monday night Raw, which will get underway in about half an hour. That's one of the reasons why I don't like working Monday nights is because Raw now is a 3 hour show and I don't want to get the encore edition at 10pm and be up until 1am watching wrestling all night. 

My blood sugar reading is way to high right now sitting at 13.4! Too be fair though, I had just eaten a small pizza and a small piece of cake

This is the last week of standard time as ext weekend we go back to daylight savings. Anyway that's about all I have for now. 

Last night

I was enjoying Monday night Raw broadcast from Montreal when suddenly in mid match the broadcast went to Commercial, then it was explained by Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler's ring announcer partner that Lawler was having a heart attack and how ems workers were giving Jerry CPR and Lawler was rushed to a local hospital. Apparently he's undergoing a Cat scan. He's breathing on his own and seems to be doing ok. Like most people watching the show my wife and I at home thought it was all part of the entertainment or (my theory at the time) maybe a story line to give Jerry an exit strategy for some much needed time off. I hope he's Ok. Jerry is only a few years older then I am. 

I'm back at the job thing today. The afternoon clips by ok, it's just the evening after 7pm that drags but I'm in for a full week.

Last nights Coast was, boring. The topic was on parenting and voting, boring. Not every show though can be a UFO show. 

We had a nice storm move in through here over night. No Thunder or lightning or anything, just lots of wind and rain. It's nice out there now but windy.

My wife had a lot of fun fooling around with Face time last night talking with her sister. it's a great technology but it's not ubiquitous yet as a ones home phone but it's getting thee. Anyway, that's about all from me for today.

Wow

Monday night Raw ended with a bit of a wow factor. CM Punk riding in the front of a black car with the driver being Paul Hyman!

Sometime in the afternoon tomorrow I’m calling Service Canada to book an appointment to set up my CPP. I don’t think this is like a walk in service or anything. With so many Baby boomers like myself out there reaching 60 the more they can discourage, delay the Government from paying us out what we can get the better. I have no idea how many people will be turning 60 this year but my guess it’s probably a lot. Ottawa already delayed the OAS so what’s to stop them from delaying CPP next budget? I better grab it while I can.

Hard to believe that the CFL this year is celebrating it’s 100th Grey Cup in November and also this weekend the province is celebrating it’s 100th year as well. Two milestones. Sunday at the “Ledge” (Legislature as we here in Edmonton refer to call it.)

I had a nice Labor Day weekend with lots of Football a chance to winsome money and a nice relaxing day off. Anyway, that's about all for now.

Not much going on today

I was checking out this documentary on The Money pit on oak island. Fascinating subject but when I went to my topics page, I discovered I have 2 topic pages and the video's I put in there somehow vanished. I probably for got to save them but I'll try again and fix them. But here's the 5 part YouTube documentary on the money pit. This is part 1 

Later this afternoon the Esks are in Toronto playing the Argo's. Should be a good game but on a Monday?  As far as I know this is the only game in the CFL schedule that is being played on a Monday night, why?

Over this last weekend the Fringe festival wrapped up and Sunday at Giovanni park the Italian cultural club had an East meets West festival where you could be "Italian for a day." Looks like they had a lot of fun. Anne and I were talking about taking a bus out there to the Italian bakery I'd like to go there because it's one of the few places that I know of that has off track horse race betting here in Edmonton.

With so many festivals going on the City crams them all into a 2 month time frame to take advantage of the kids out of school. They go back after the Labor Day weekend, then I can get my ETS LRT schedule back that takes a break from July 1st to the end of the Labor Day weekend. But there's enough festivals out there to go from May 1st to the Labor Day weekend.

I'm making slow progress in my book that I'm reading but I read a bit each day. I'll probably have about 4 books read by the end of the year when usually I'll have between 8-10. It's not a race or anything.

Other then the CFL game this evening, I'm watching Monday night Raw wrapping up a few things and bed. Anyway, that's about all for now. 

Hoo boy, some exciting things going on in the

WWE this week. In reality Triple H is taking over the Day-to-day operations at WWE as Vince has been relieved of his duties. Well, that's the general storyline. Vince is 66 years old and maybe its time to pack it in. Anyway, that's all for now.