The 2007 Archives

Just look at all of the great stuff that I wrote in 2007

(or move onto the literary gold from 2008 or the gems from 2006)

 

Driving Miss Ellie

Believe it or not, I had a hard time getting a straight answer on this. I wanted to know whether I can put my 8-year-old daughter in the front passenger seat (which has an air bag) of my car. (If you've read one of my past articles, you'll know that my wife's son is never allowed in any seat of my car ever again) So based on the below, It is legal, and government "recommendations" be damned.

In Ontario, booster seats are required for children under the age of eight, weighing more than 18 kg but less than 36 kg (40-80 lbs) and who stand less than 145 cm (4 feet 9 inches) tall.

A child can start using a seatbelt alone once any one of the following criteria is met:

• the child turns eight years old;
• the child weighs 36 kg (80 lbs); or,
• the child is 145 cm (4 feet 9 inches) tall.

You are required to use special protection devices for small children in your vehicle. The driver is responsible for the safety of all passengers under the age of 16 years. Children over 18 kg (40 pounds) must use either a regular lap seat belt or an equivalent booster seat. Children from 9 to 18 kg (20 to 40 pounds) must travel in a front-facing child restraint seat. Children from birth to 9 kg (to 20 pounds) must travel in a rear-facing child restraint system. It is recommended that all children under the age of 12 should be seated in the back seat of the vehicle where the front seat is equipped with an air-bag. Never place a rear-facing infant safety seat in a seating position where there is an air bag.

No Big Deal

To set up this next story, you need to know something – I bought a new car recently and I love my car. It’s a 2004 Toyota Echo, so it’s not technically new but it’s as new as I will ever be capable of owning and I treat it as if it just rolled off the lot. I am that guy parking at the very back of parking lots (miles away from the doors) when shopping and the guy who lovingly rubs wax on my car with a baby’s cloth diaper in the springtime. I love my car. I want to marry my car and have like ten thousand of its babies. You’ll need to know all that before I go on with this story, OK? “ Ich liebe mein auto.”

Alright, here we go…this past Saturday I treated my 7-year-old daughter and my wife’s 4-year-old son to a simply lovely day. It was a picture perfect, cold and wintery day. And there was lots of snow so we were all really feeling the season. We started the day off with breakfast at the Peterborough Airport watching the planes take off and land – well there were no planes taking off or landing because it was too cold but we had fun simply looking at the parked planes while we ate. Then in the afternoon we went to my new company’s children’s Xmas party, which was a really terrific affair – the company pulled out all of the stops and the kids had an absolutely fantastic time. Late in the afternoon, when it was time to leave we packed up my car with the kid’s gifts and candy; my wife took my daughter out with her on some errands, and I took my wife’s son with me to Home Depot to pick up a part for our new fridge (also not technically new either but it’s as new a fridge as I will ever be capable of owning.) The drive to Home Depot was uneventful, even pleasant with me and the boy chatting away. When we arrived at Home Depot, I parked my gorgeous car, and got out of the beautiful car, and opened the back door of the awesome car so I could pull the boy out of his child seat. As I reached in to get him, that’s when he vomited.

Evidently projectile vomiting is something genetically inherited and not acquired by way of environment or nurturing because at only 4-years-old my wife’s son is already an old pro at it. He vomited a column of evil with such force that it must have looked to passers-by like a paint bomb had gone off in the car. For me, time slowed. I screamed: “OH NOOOO!!” and thinking quickly I stood rooted to the spot like a total moron while the just-tossed cookies soaked into the seats and my wife’s hell-spawn reloaded for another cannon blast - which he again ejected, achieving blanket coverage a house painter would envy. I might have wet my pants in terror but it was hard to tell because even though it was minus 15 degrees outside I was sweating like a stuck pig. I’m sure you could’ve seen my shoulders slump from space. Bellowing like a wounded wildebeest, I jabbed for his seat belt release and then not really caring whether he was free or not, ripped him from the car and stood him up in the parking lot.

The rotten kid spent a minute in the classic position standing with his hands on his knees looking down at the ground spitting and catching his breath. Then he straightened up, looked down at himself briefly, then up at me and with a completely deadpan expression he said:

“I don’t want anyone to see me like this.”

Out of the mouths of despicable babes, eh? So I said to him (printable words only included here for space reasons:)

“Oh yeah? Well, I don’t give a _____ flying _____ what you ______ ______ mother- ______ ______ _____ you little _____ _____!!” … and with that good start I proceeded to weave for the boy the most intricate and elaborate tapestry of profanity, a true work of verbal art seldom heard by grown men 10 times his age. Then I picked him back up deposited him back in his own puke and we drove home, me grinding thousands of dollars of expensive dental work into powder the entire way.

We arrived back home and with a restraint I am now so proud of in retrospect, because I am sure Ghandi himself would have murdered the little b---ard, I placed the boy in the tub, stripped him down, showered him off, put him in his PJs and into our bed, put Family Guy on the TV, and deposited his dirty clothes, coat, and boots into the laundry tub for his mother to deal with when she got home. I then filled a bucket with boiling hot water and dish soap, grabbed some towels and my shop vac and headed outside to survey the damage.

Salvador Dali would have been proud of the boy’s use of his medium (chunk blowing) to create an abstract and surreal milieu. And his attention to detail was amazing. Not a single nook or cranny of the back of the car was missed. The boy’s choice of purple grape juice during the preceding Xmas party lent an almost berry bouquet to the aroma in the car and made the upholstery look almost festive. The chunks of hotdog added texture. I learned that chunder freezes within 90 seconds of hitting cold car seat at minus 15, and over the next hour I battled the elements to keep the wash water liquid long enough to vacuum it up. Despite this, despite my valiant efforts, despite my heroic attempts to reverse all evidence of the demon child voiding his rheum upon the only thing good and pure and sweet left in this world (my car), I am afraid to say I don’t think I was ever able to completely eradicate the horror from my backseat.

So, exhausted, filthy and defeated, I put the car away and went inside to finish off the boy once and for all, ostensibly to stop him from ever perpetrating such a crime against anyone else ever again. I walked into the bedroom and saw that he had fallen asleep. As I kneeled upon the bed to deliver the final blow, he opened his eyes and with the most cherubic visage, with the most angelic expression he said to me:

“Did you bring in my candy?”

And I thought, “Hey, it’s only a car.”

I can't take it anymore...

I've been using Bell Sympatico for at least the past 9 years. Back before there was ever DSL, Patti and I had the first dial-up offering of Bell's - something like 10-hours per month for FREE that's right.) After a year or so of that we received a letter one day stating that our free account was no longer and from on we could pay $5 per month. And so it's gone over the years right up until the present day where we’re paying ~$50 per month for “up to” 5 MBps DSL internet access. Included with this access is 5MB of personal web space – a place to put a web page.

Now, you wouldn’t know it by hanging around here, but I am fairly familiar with the web, web spaces, and other personal things – certainly the concept of a personal web space is not strange to me. I used to have the web space going, but over the years I forgot the login information as I paid more attention to other domains I own.

Anyway, (boy I can be so wordy!) since I moved to Peterborough, I’ve also noticed my access has been spotty and my speed has dwindled somewhat over what I was getting back in Sutton West. So I called 310-BELL for help and after not too much time I was connected to Peter in India. I wanted to find out from him how to get access to my personal web space. Actually, I’d already been able to intuit the host and username to use, I just needed him to reset the password for me. Right off, Peter would not help me until he first tried to sell me the new Sympatico Ultra-Hi-speed 7 MBps service. So, after listening to his spiel I said to him: “But Peter, my tests show I am only reliably getting speeds of around 1.9MBps...” So he “checked my line” and told me with regret that my tests were spot on – that in fact my phone line was only capable of delivering 2.4MBps max to me. Would I like to purchase the 7MBps anyway? So I said: “Rather than paying more for the 7MBps service, why don’t you instead drop me down to the 3 MBps service? I will then be getting the same 1.9MBps for about $20 less per month” Peter then said, “Sir, should you drop from the 5 MBps service to the 3MBps service, we will drop your line speed down from 1.9MBps to 1.1MBps…but if you buy the 7MBps package you get free security tools!”

That was so ludicrous I almost lost it at that point but I decided to at least finish the call by getting the personal web space thing worked out so that the call wasn’t a total waste. Peter dutifully looked into this situation and after a time said: “Your personal web space is already activated.” I said: “Very well then, please show me how to access it.” To which he replied: “You must consult with your local computer technician.” I said: “Peter, that statement is completely meaningless to me. What do you mean by my local computer technician?” But by this point, Peter had retreated into himself and resorted to simply chanting “I’m sorry…local computer technician” over and over, like some east-Indian Rainman. After a time, I realized I wouldn’t get anywhere (yet again) with this Bell tech support agent on this call so I thanked him for his time and wished him a wonderful day because after all – he’s just a guy with a job to do and a script to read – my problems are not his fault.

Let me say here that I have always been a grudging customer of Bell but at least I’ve been loyal. Their prices are not great, their DSL service is not the best and their tech support sucks to high heaven, but it’s easier to be complacent so I’ve never switched. But my last few interactions with Bell and this call in particular left me with a really bad taste in my mouth. Bell could care less about me. They seem to honestly have unlearned the simple concept that they exist solely because of me - that my remaining their customer is their privilege and not their right. And don’t they realize that out-sourcing customer service technicians and tech support to India is a really bad idea?! I don’t want to deal with poorly trained and incompetent east-Indians when I have problems with my Canadian telephone service, I want to deal with poorly trained and incompetent Canadians, dammit! It’s like Bell is literally telling me to screw off. I ask you - how could a so formerly grand company have become so clueless?

Don’t answer that. It was rhetorical, and Bell, screw you right back. I have finally cancelled my Sympatico 0.6 to 1.9MBps DSL service. My local cable provider is Cogeco and is in the top 10 nationally for Internet service speed so I’ve signed up for that. That’s $600 a year less you’ll be seeing. And just to make me feel a little less bad for taking your crap for so long, I’ve cancelled my POTS phone line as well. (Another $400.) Cogeco will give me the same quality line at with less headaches and less hassle. And I’ll now have Internet, Cable, and Phone on one single bill.

So to close this diatribe and for those of you contemplating the switch, I am regularly getting throughput on my Internet line now on the order of 8MBps!! Cogeco Customer Service are actual real live Canadians on Canadian soil (in Ottawa! How lovely to hear her crack her gum and pepper her dialogue with crutch words like “like” and “you know”.) I am satisfied with their cable package and am looking forward to the phone install, complete with rock-solid reliable service and 8-hour battery backup should the power go out.

Come to think of it, a wonderful Christmas present for me would be if someone – anyone – switched from Bell to anything else because of this article. I would love that. Just leave a comment and let me know about it.

6 Months Today!

6 months ago today, I quit smoking for good. I have been quit for 5 Months, 4 Weeks, 6 hours, 42 minutes and 59 seconds (181 days). I have saved $924.52 by not smoking 2,719 cigarettes. I have saved 1 Week, 6 Days, 5 hours and 13 minutes of my life. My Quit Date was 6/7/2007 11:20 PM

2,719 cigarettes! Just picture that. In only 6 months, that is the number of cigarettes I haven't smoked. Forget about visualizing what that number of butts looks like in a bucket, or how big a room filled with the smoke of 2,719 cigarettes would have to be, just think about the time I've saved not carrying around and managing 2,719 cigarettes over the last 6 months!

I was a smoker for more than 25 years, since I was 15 years old. Wow, 25 is a scary number when you use it in the same sentence as smoking. I wasn't planning on smoking that long! Over the years, I went from a high of maybe a pack and a half a day (Canadian packs - so that's about 37 cigarettes per day) to a low of about 8 cigarettes per day. I was arrogant enough to think that I had my addiction under control when I was smoking only 8 per day, but I seem to have spent most of my life at the 15-20 cigarette per day mark.

Prior to this, I've quit smoking about 30 times. I've used Zyban, inhalers, the patch, the gum, and combinations of everything. I even spent $100 on that useless Lifesigns device about 15 years ago. Once about 12 years ago, using a combination of cold-turkey, and some serious rationalization, I managed to quit for 3 years. I'm still proud of that because I managed to more or less quit, even if it was for all the wrong reasons. Aside from that one-time, I did quit for 5 months a few years after my daughter was born - just as she was starting to understand what it is I was doing with those cigarettes. In the end, I found it was much easier to simply hide my smoking from her rather than actually quitting. And aside from that, the other 28 quit attempts were barely one day affairs.

I think the kicker to quit smoking was my turning 40. That, and one day about a year ago, my daughter walked up to me and said: "Daddy, you know that thing we are not supposed to talk about? Well, you left a pack of them on the floor in the kitchen..." Some secret.

So 6 months ago today, I quit smoking for good. I consider myself a "smoker's ex-smoker" which is to say that I empathize and sympathize with the plight of the modern smoker. You can (maybe) smoke in my car if it's a long drive and you crack the window - but I myself have honestly kicked the habit. I have absolutely no desire for a cigarette any more. I'm still relieved that I was finally able to quit and I sure don't want to do anything to jeopardize that.

April 2016 - I'm still a non-smoker. It CAN be done. I owe everything to Joel Spitzer, a name I will never forget.

Dear Diary...

Today, I had my teeth whitened using the "dentist-delivered" Rembrandt Laser whitening system. This is how it worked for me: Last week, my genial and friendly dentist gravely recommended tooth whitening to me because for some reason I still cannot fathom, 25 years of smoking seems to have turned my teeth yellow. The procedure is not covered by insurance because it is considered "cosmetic" and costs $300. Though I'm sure I could make a case that I passed "cosmetic" about 10 years ago, I decided to take the plunge anyway. I reasoned I could use money from the grocery budget - the kids can eat dog food for another couple of weeks. Though the brochures in the dentist's lobby claim results on the order of "10 shades of whitening" my dentist told me to expect something more like 3 shades - he said this while shaking his head sadly and wondering (I'm sure) how some people can let themselves go so badly.

Upon arriving for my appointment, my hygienist, Melanie, took me back into "the whitening closet" - possibly the smallest room I have ever seen in a dentist's office. It contained the standard dentist chair and that freestanding octopus thing with angular metal tentacles emanating which I guess is all that's important. I was given a Standard Release Form to sign that warned me of some possible negative side-effects such as increased tooth sensitivity and gum bleaching, death, etc. The form made me a little paranoid because my teeth are already pretty sensitive; I'm not sure I could stand any more sensitivity for extended periods - but Melanie was very professional and reassuring. I should say that what she said was very professional and reassuring but she was evaluating me the whole time and her eyes said something like: "This crackpot is going to mentally snap 15 minutes into this procedure..."

So after the legalities were taken care of, we started. Melanie pumiced my teeth to clean them, then handed me a cup of something to gargle with - something to suppress my saliva production I think? Then she handed me a cotton swab covered in something and said something like: "you're mouth is going to be open for around an hour and a half so we ask you to apply this to your lips to prevent drying/chapping..." so I smeared what seemed like a half a pound of Vaseline over and around my lips. I should mention now that Melanie is good-looking, and though I am married and fat and old, I am still pretty good-looking comparatively speaking. And good-looking people like me don't like to look ugly around other attractive people. (Those of you out there who are ugly all of the time will have no idea what I am talking about, but all of you other hotties hear me, right?) The lip balm wasn't exactly making me look cool but I figured I could make the shiny lips work for me. But Melanie had other ideas. She next gave me to wear, a pair of yellow safety glasses styled in the 1980's. This was to prevent my eyes from getting aggravated by the laser light. So now, with the dry mouth, shiny Vaseline lips and the gayest glasses ever created, I was failing fast in the cool department.

But it was far from over. Melanie next adjusted the chair so that my feet were up and my head was low, causing my sinuses to instantly clog. She also pulled out this contraption called a "cheek spreader" and instructed me to flip over on my stomach so she could install it. No, I'm totally kidding. The cheek spreader was to hold my lips and cheeks away from my teeth while the bleach did it's work. Picture the eye spreader thing from A Clockwork Orange in your mouth. The inventor of the spreader however decided that this horrible medieval device was missing something - a tongue suppressor which is a snap-in addition, a sort of shot glass with wings that you tongue slides into - to prevent the tongue this time from coming into contact with the tooth bleach. The whole assembly was plastic and the sharp edges pinched my gums and dug-in to that skin-thing that fastens my tongue to my head. Next I received this vacuum tube to suck up the saliva that was collecting at the back of my throat. Then Melanie applied this blue stuff called Rubber Dental Dam to the edges of my gums so that any excess bleach would hit the rubber instead of my gums. So forget about me looking cool or sexy - instead by this point I think looked like Predator near the end of the movie after Arnold knocks off his helmet.

I couldn't believe I had endured all of this and we hadn't actually started whitening teeth yet. But thankfully that was next. Melanie applied some bleach-solution-gel-cream to my teeth in sections, and once she had done all of the top teeth she placed some Saran Wrap over the teeth to hold the bleach on. Then she applied bleach to the bottom teeth and another piece of Saran. Lastly, she flicked on this laser light that looked like some kind of gem (so that the laser light shoots out in multiple directions at the same time) and shoved the gem in my cranked-open mouth. Then she flipped me back upright, swung a television in front of my face, put a remote in my hands, and gave me a box of Kleenex because I guess I was crying pretty hard by that point. Melanie asked me if I was OK. I said "Unngh, Ack!" and threw in a few clicks like some central African tribesman. For good reason there were no mirrors in the room, but I could imagine what I looked like and sadly accepted that fact that Melanie and I will never date if Patti and I ever split up.

All of that took exactly 30 minutes. All that was left was an hour holding still with my face locked in the rictus of happy-horror. I watched Everybody Loves Raymond and Cheers. Ray's mother reminds me of my own, but without the humour or the kindness, and that Woody is quite the country bumpkin! Melanie had left a motion detector behind and told me to wave my hand in front of it if I needed any assistance - she would come check on me periodically. The damn detector went off every time I moved so eventually I turned it around to face away from me. After 10 minutes Melanie came into to check on my progress and noted that my Saran had fallen off. She asked if I was a mouth-breather and said, "Try to breathe through your nose so the Saran doesn't fall off" So, snorting like a fine-food critic dining at an A&W, I endured 10 solid minutes of pulling a thin and barely survivable stream if oxygen through my completely stopped-up nostrils, only to have Melanie return after 10 minutes and report with a sigh that the Saran had once again fallen off and that I must breathe through my nose to prevent this from happening. This statement didn't bode well for our blossoming relationship and I am sad to report it caused our first fight because I responded with something along the lines of "I can't breathe through my @#$@ nose! It's so plugged that when I try, it sounds like a pig farm at lunchtime, godd----t! But all she heard was "Unngh, Ack!"

After the hour was over, everything went quickly. The laser gem was pulled out, the horrible plastic spreader was removed; she pulled out the Saran, and the blue rubber dam material. I think I might have gargled again with something, then she handed me a mirror and...

...well, I don't know what I was expecting going in, but the utterly medieval and horrible procedure was offset by the fantastic results! It TOTALLY exceeded my expectations. I haven't had teeth like this since I was 20! My teeth look fantastic! So good in fact, that I don't want to drink coffee anymore. Or eat ketchup or anything else that could remotely stain my teeth. I brush my teeth three times a day now. Life is good. When I smile now, streams of God-like light radiate out from my mouth. Angels sing. Funny enough, I stood in front of the mirror with Patti afterwards to compare the whiteness and she is already the same shade of white as me. Wow, but it's way more dramatic for me because of how yellow I was before.

So the long and short of it, dear diary, is that I would recommend this to anyone contemplating it. Phenomenal!

It was a dark and stormy night

"While the nurse adjusted Achmed's body cast, he recounted that though he was a new arrival to the country and had never before driven anything faster than a cow, he was positively thrilled to obtain a new leased and loaded Chrysler mini-van; and so upon taking delivery of it from the dealership, promptly took the vehicle out on the 401 highway, set the cruise control, and then headed into the back to make breakfast."

That is going to be my entry into the 2008 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, where since 1982 the English Department at San Jose State University has sponsored the whimsical literary competition that challenges entrants to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels. These are an absolute riot - my favourite from the 2007 results:

I'll have a pack of cigarettes please.no, Marlboro 100's . . . lights please, in a box yeah, no, wait, give me a soft pack, no, not those, the ones right above them, no, no, right next to those, yeah, wait, make it two packs, no wait, how much are they . . . no, one pack will do me, and a lighter please, no the other one, yeah, that one will be fine, he said quickly.

Shane Spears Blytheville, AR

Tips to Eliminate SPAM

In my job as an athlete, supermodel, and IT consultant, I'm often asked how to eliminate spam email. I've had much success with the methods detailed heretofore (below):

But first of all, what is spam?

Spam is legitimate messages selling products which may not work regardless of how carefully you follow the instructions on the packaging. Also sadly, all email out of Nigeria is spam. There are no longer any opportunities to launder 20 million in U.S. dollars for some African diplomat trying to get out of the country. All email from Netherlands is spam as well. A little known fact is that all spam originates from countries that start with the letter "N", like North America and Nebraska.

It is said that 40% of all email is now spam. That's accurate, but the actual figure is much closer to 5%. Have you ever sent an email message that has been blocked by the intended recipient's spam filter? We ALL have. That message certainly wasn't spam, but unfortunately emails such as this get counted in those statistics your read about.

Much of what looks like spam is actually legitimate email from let's say - unsophisticated senders who lack the technical skills to make their email look less like spam.. Banks are notorious for this. One department will send out a message requesting your username and password for the purposes of updating their systems, however they will inadvertently fail to notify another department, who will then send out another message imploring you to ignore the first message. The irony is that your spam "filter" may block the legitimate (first) message, and then allow the spam (the second piece). Irregardless, I recommend sending the requested information in every case because I would hate to live in a world without trust, you know?

Know this: the single biggest contributor to spam is commercial spam filtering software (and free spam filtering software too - in fact free can be much worse). Getting into a technical explanation of why this is so is beyond the purview of this article, but let's just say, if nobody used spam blocking or spam filtering software ever again, the spammers would be out of business within ONE day. But sadly, there are still be gullible novices out there because there is still some spam on the Internet. And we all have to pay the price for this. Stop using this stuff people!

Third of all, how should we deal with spam?

• First and foremost, a firmly worded but polite email stating that you do not appreciate or tolerate spam can be very effective at reducing the amount of spam you receive. In your letter, be sure to list all of your various email addresses. Title your subject line: "Remove me from your spam list."
• If the method above doesn't work, a second more strongly worded email is called for. Feel free to let your frustration show at this point, for you are dealing with a particularly callous spammer, and stronger wording is definitely called for. The biggest expense for spammers is responding to complaint e-mails so send several copies of your complaint if possible. Make them waste a little time for the time they've taken from you!
• If an email receives no response, then an actual letter certainly will. A clearly typed letter with a SASE (self addresses stamped envelope) is sure to move the spammer into action - in your favour.
• Threats such as "does your mother know about this?" can be very effective by appealing to the spammers upbringing.
• Probably the single best method to eliminating spam from your life forever is also the simplest. Just make one, single purchase from a spammer. The reasoning is this: since you've already purchased, there is much more potential from someone who hasn't already made a purchase. I would have to characterize this as the single best method to eliminating spam from your life - forever!

 

The Echo of Doom

Well, my little red wagon finally gave up the ghost about 10-days ago at 270,000km. The car that never cost me a dime (more on that in a bit) reported to me via white smoke out of my tailpipe that its head gasket was shot. Well, either that or there was a new pope. After taking it in to my scumbag mechanic and agreeing to pay the $1000 for a new head gasket, I was informed a day later that the head was in fact cracked, the car was garbage and on its way to the wreckers - come and get my stuff out of it and pay the shop $200 for their troubles.

I took the whole family to strip my little car of all my possessions. It's funny actually that a car that still looks so good is ready for the garbage heap. I mean the interior is in excellent condition, there are no cracks in any of the glass, and the body has hardly any rust. I guess there is a lesson in there somewhere - something like "just because something looks good doesn't mean it's worth anything..." or something like that. For the record the crack in the head was very tiny! Just a barely visible half-centimetre crack in the head between cylinders one and two. Hard to believe that makes a whole car garbage.

For the next week I floundered a little. I ordered a copy of Lemon-Aid from Amazon, but then because I really needed it sooner, I spent an afternoon in Chapter's with their copy and a chai latte reading passages into my voice recorder. I drove my wife's van around, all the while acutely aware that her van really doesn't like the 320 kilometers I drive every day. And driving the van made my wife house-bound and somewhat persnickety let's say..as long as you garnish the word "persnickety" with about 50 swear words... I was also concerned I would end up killing both of our vehicles if I didn't hurry and find something to replace the Escort Wagon of Doom. (I call it the Escort Wagon of Doom because prior to the Escort I had 4 Tempos - I named each one "The Tempo of Doom". When I got the Escort, it seemed only natural to name it "The Escort Wagon of Doom" even though that doesn't make any sense any more...")

This time around, I wanted a car that would cost me very little, cost virtually nothing for fuel, be very luxurious, and be bullet-proof in it's reliability - like the Escort Wagon of Doom was. Near my home, I discovered a 99 Sable Wagon with 125,000km on it for $4000. At first glance I thought this might be the car and that it was a pretty good deal, except I could hardly believe that my replacement car would end up coming from someplace so close to home, and taxes meant that the price was closer to $4600, and the thing had a trailer hitch on the back which meant somebody had to be towing something with that car over the last 8 years - how long would the transmission last? So, I never even took the car for a spin. These concerns turned out to be the same ones that cropped up again and again over the next several days as I looked at used cars and tried to figure out not only which car I would be happy in, but whether I should buy it privately or from a car salesperson, etc. etc.

I spent two solid days looking for a Chevy Aveo before ducking into Chapter's for a second time and discovering its rating was only "average" And finally on Friday night I settled on a 1998 Suzuki Esteem Wagon. $4000 and 130,000km on it. Highly rated by lemon-aid and it met all of my personal criteria for a car.

On Saturday morning bright and early, I was out inspecting the Esteem from a list I printed off the Internet, with my daughter close by told to write down on her clipboard anything I called out to her. Over the next hour and a half my daughter busily jotted down:

mismatched tires

passenger door dent

rusty rotors

seized fuel release

To the car's credit, we took it out for a test drive and it handled well if a little uninspired. No real steering or suspension problems. Even Ellie said that she like the car and that we should get it...but the thing reeked of cat and I just couldn't get past the smell of it. I knew that if I bought the Esteem, I was just guaranteeing myself 4 more years of thrice yearly trips to the shop - if I was lucky enough to not have to be towed there...

So finally later that Saturday morning with nothing better to do, I called my brother-in-law at the local Toyota dealership, and told him (without much expectation and therefore without much enthusiasm) that I wanted a 5-speed Echo hatchback, with no more than 100k, with A/C, and not red or white. And he actually had one! A 2004. I knew as we walked up to it that this was the car I wanted. By the time I had gone 2 kilometers, I knew it was the car for me. Timing chain instead of timing belt. Variable-valve timing engine only requires oil changes every 8000kms instead of 5000 kms. Electrically assisted heating, and less than 6L/100KM! As I test-drove the Echo I imagined that this is a lot like what driving Thomas the tank engine would be like. I would say to the Echo: "go please" and the car would say: "Yes sir! Yes! Yes ! Yes! I can do this!" and then would give it everything it had to the cause. If I said: "stop car" The car would say: "Yes! Yes! Yes! I'll stop! I live to please you!"

Now in the Thomas stories, isn't there a grumpy old train engine that figures in some of the stories? Then that would be the Escort. To the Escort, if I said "go car" the wagon would say: "what the @$@# are you asking me to do that for? Here's 60%. And I would say, "You're a 4-cyl 2L DOHC engine! You can do better than that!" And the Escort would say. Alright fine. Here's 62%, but first let me rattle this steel cup full of cutlery under the hood for about a minute..." I'm saying the Echo tries and the Escort only grudgingly complies.

Anyway, after the test drive I decided that I definitely liked all that ECHO eagerness, but the car costs way, WAY more than I thought it should. But...I was out of time and energy, so I bought it. Because of this, I was not a happy customer initially. I went home after paying the big bucks, and for the rest of the afternoon I drank rye and cokes and miserably watched TV. Finally, my wife came downstairs and in her trademark voice that sounds like a cross between Barry White eating glass and Satan, she said to me: How long did you have the Escort for anyway? Have you ever added up how much it has cost you over the years?"

So I grabbed my file and checked it out. Let's see... $2700 for the car 3 years ago, $500 to certify and ...this can't be right...$4600 in repairs?! $8000 for just three years - I had to have the car towed three times, the A/C broke last year and I haven't been able to get the rear windows down since last Spring - much to the horror of my heat-stroked children in the back. What a piece of crap!

Now I find myself very happy with my Echo of Doom. I'm sure his cost of ownership will be less than $2700 per year, and I'll spend more time having fun driving and less time worrying about if I will make it to my destination. I'm going to get him pimped out with a moon roof and tinted windows and I'm getting Patti to make me those fuzzy dangly balls that run along the top of the windshield. I'll let you know how it goes.

Update: January 2010

Patti never made me the dangly balls, but I did get the cruise-control installed, the windows tinted, the thumping stereo and the GPS. I love running up and down through the 5-speeds on the country roads near my house, and I still feel spoiled by the quality and dependability I feel with this car. The paint is failing on the front bumper and Toyota is being scummy about it, but it's plastic underneath so I don't have to worry about rust. And that's the only issue I've had in more than two years now. And I'm still on the same half a tank of gas that the car originally came with. Well, almost.

It's my party and I'll cry if I want to

About a year ago, I received a call from my local MP's office. It went something like: "Mr. Hoppe, it seems like a federal election is imminent. The Conservative Party of Canada requires support from constituents such as yourself so that Prime Minister Harper can continue his primary goal of improving yours, Mr Hoppe's, life. Can we count on your vote on election day?" So I said: "Sure." So the nice person on the other end of the line said: "Care to give us some money?" I said: "How little can I give? $10? Done." ...and I gave $10 to the Conservative Party of Canada.

Now along with all of the other SPAM I receive, I now am getting spammed by the Conservative Party of Canada. They won't stop! I've tried to unsubscribe, but to no effect. Here is the latest letter from Doug Finley, National Campaign Director, Conservative Party of Canada whose email address is the rather uninspired: donate@conservative.ca

"Dear Mr. Hoppe,
You have been such a strong supporter of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister Stephen Harper that I was surprised when Irving Gerstein, our fundraising chair told me that we have not heard from you this year.
I am writing to ask you to please renew your support today with a $100 or perhaps even $200 contribution. You can make a contribution on line right now by following this link..."

Dougie! Irving! If I am your one of your strongest supporters and my year-old $10 donation got the attention of the fundraising chair, then I really don't want to be a supporter anymore. You've hit rock bottom, losers! You're a sinking ship, and I want off. I'm a conservative but that term applies only to my views, not to which Canadian political party I affiliate myself with. And as for the $10. I actually feel really stupid I gave you $10. At the time, it seemed like the fastest way to get back to my dinner. Now, if I gave you $100 or $200?! I wouldn't be able to face my family. The shame.

What a let down

What a let down. I really enjoy that show. This is a flash-back to Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom - years ago, I heard that while Marlon Perkins was claiming to be watching animals in the wild in Africa, they were really staging animal events on some game preserve in the U.S.A. More here: Man vs Wild or Survivor Man are fake...?

The Narcissism Doctrine

When I look at my 7-year old daughter, Ellie I simply cannot believe how beautifiul she is. From her gorgeous honey-hair to the tips of her cute little toes - objectively speaking she is the most prettiest little girl in the entire world. I am actually hesitant to show pictures of Ellie to other parents because once they see a picture of her, they must surely realize how ugly their own children are...Don't get me wrong, Elle is a sweet girl - beautiful on the inside too, but the subject of this entry is really more about my daughter's super-model good-looks.

My question is why, in the face of the incontrovertable evidence of my daughter's beauty, do other parent's still believe that their hideous and mal-formed children are beautiful too? I've wondered about this for a while and it's only recently that the answer has come to me:

1. I am inherently narcissistic.
2. I see myself in my daughter.
3. Therefore I think my daughter is beautiful.

That's the Hoppe Narcissim Doctrine™ coming into play. I know, I can hardly believe it myself. Me? Narcissistic? I'm not. I'm really not. But then consider my son, Nik. He's nowhere NEAR as good looking as Ellie. He's kind of ugly actually. And he looks a lot more like his mother than he does me....AND she thinks he's beautiful...so they too prove the immutableness (immutablivity?) of the Hoppe Narcissim Doctrine™

FutureShop Sucks

Emailed to service@futureshop.com  on September 5th, 2007:

Dear FutureShop:

I went into the Peterborough, Ontario Futureshop to buy the $749 HP laptop on the front page of your flyer. It was the first day of the sale. I wanted to just get in, get the laptop, and go - in and out of your store in 5 minutes, you know?

But, your computer tech told me that all of the machines had been "set up" and they had no "un-set up" machines in stock. I had two choices:

1. Pay another $100 and take a set-up machine.

2. Wait one hour while they un-set a previously set-up machine.

I asked the tech what he does for $100. The response I got was along the lines of "lots of stuff...recovery, firewall, webcam..." It was painfully obvious he had no idea what he was talking about. I'm guessing it's one of his colleagues who does the setting up...Whatever. I told him to just give me a "setup" one for the $749 and he reacted like that was the most ludicrous thing he'd ever heard. So, I fairly lost it and demanded to see the manager. The manager showed up and within a couple of minutes, magically located a factory-sealed box for me which is impressive since you apparently didn't have any of those.

I'm trying to keep this short because you already wasted enough of my time in the store. You should be ashamed of yourselves. I'm pretty sure it's not classy to extort extra dollars from your customers. That's a despicable tactic. You - FutureShop (and by relation, Best Buy) are very, very bad, and if your Peterborough store were one of my children, I would spank it so hard it would walk funny for a week.

Stephan Hoppe

How to Clean a Flat Panel Monitor

Dell recommends the following:

To clean your flat panel display screen, lightly dampen a soft, clean cloth with water or isopropyl alcohol. Never use methyl or ethyl alcohol, benzene, thinner, ammonia, abrasive cleaners, acids, lubricants, human excretions or effluvia, gasoline, maple syrup, christianity, ketchup or other condiments unless otherwise stated, sand, broken glass, other monitors, your tongue, concentrated heat (as from a lighter,) physical violence, flotsam, jetsam, pet urine, litigation, tears, tree sap, persuasive logical arguments, rotating knives, squids or octopii, solids, gases, thoughts, your bum, poo, oil-based paint, uranium, plutonium, communism, narcissism, dish-soap, or compressed air; these substances could damage the crystals that make up the flat panel display.

To clean the monitor cabinet, use a cloth lightly dampened with a mild detergent, but never use ....

A brush with stardom

Despite spending way too much time in various airports around North America, I only recently saw my first celebrity enroute to Chicago from St. Louis. It was Ron Jeremy. Honestly, of all the porn stars I lie in bed at night dreaming about bumping into - why did it have to turn out to be Ron Jeremy?!

 

Transcript

This is a recent transcript of a conversation between me and my son, Nik, when I called home this morning from St. Louis, Missouri.

 

Nik: Hi Daddy

Me: Hi Mr. Hoppe. How are you?

Nik: (giggling) Fine.

Me: Are you treating your sister nice?

Nik: Yes.

Me: Is she treating you nice?

Nik: No.

Nik: You are a orange peel!

Nik: You are a apple!

Me: You are a pumpkin. You are a cucumber!

Nik: You are a rotten chin!

Me: You are a pimple!

Nik: You are a firecracker!

Me: You are a...

Nik: You are a egg sandwich!

Me: When I get home I am going to @$#!, you little !@#!&...

Nik: (laughs, drops phone and runs outside to play with his sister.)

It's carefree moments like that, that I enjoy most with my kids. And I'm proud that together with my wife, Satan, we are able to give our children that sort of lifestyle.

Career Choices

Kids seem to know younger and younger what they want to do with their lives. It's funny because I'm 40 and I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up.

Case in point - Just the other day, my son Nik, who is almost four told me that when he grows up he wants to be a crash-test dummy. I'm not sure if he wants to be a NHTSA dummy or a freelance dummy, but he was adamant and I'm proud of him for it.

 

 

Deal RIM...

"cupping edge technology..."

My Unwilling Profligacy

T
he whole family went to see the Transformers yesterday at the theater, to Silver City in Newmarket, Ontario. It was the boy's first movie ever, so I did enjoy a few minutes watching him watching the movie - as well as watching the movie itself. And what a movie. What a fantastic, noisy spectacle of awesome robots! I really wanted my favourite robot to be one of the good guy autobots, but bad-guy decepticon Barricade totally rocked. Barricade is the police car when he's not transformed. If you go see the movie, look at what it says on the side of Barricade/Police Car where it's supposed to say "To Serve and Protect"...funny. Despite the length of the flick (almost 2 1/2 hours long) I really enjoyed it from beginning to end. The boy feel asleep for the last 45 minutes which amazed me because it was so loud in the theatre my ears were bleeding. I tried to wake him up a couple of times just to make sure he really wanted to sleep, and I wasn't too concerned - he got a good eyeful during the time he was awake. So, a good time was had by all.

Now, maybe I'm turning into a crusty old codger who is out of touch with reality but let's see what 2.5 hours in a movie theater cost me. Tickets for two adults, a 7-year old and a 3-year old - three small popcorn, three small soft drinks, a box of Glosettes and a bag of Swedish berries. SEVENTY-FIVE DOLLARS?!?!?

This is my vanity site - the site with my name on it where my employer, my clients, headhunters, and the tax man all end up when they google the name "Stephan Hoppe", so generally I really try to keep the content kind of safe and family friendly, but really...Famous Players Theaters and the MPAA can kiss my ASS. For $75 I could have BUILT the kids their very own Transformer. I could have had Josh Duhamel over for coffee (Patti would like that.) OK Famous Players, you got me though your doors once, you saw my small kids, saw that you had them hooked and then proceeded to bend me over and...take my wallet (let's say.) But those kids are not going to see the inside of a Famous Players Theater again until they have kids. That $75 is the last dollar you'll ever get from my family. From now on, I'll download a torrent and play it on my home theater and the experience will be equal if not better and I'll at least be able to pause the movie for bathroom breaks and turn the volume down to a tolerable level.

That explains a lot...

How to ensure nested DIVs stay within the parent DIV

What a pain. For a long time, I've been having a sporadic issue with nested divs that don't nest in Firefox. Said another way, the content in a nested div doesn't push out the containing div. Consider this example:

<div ID="container" style="border: 1px solid black">

<div ID="nest1" style="float:left;border: 1px solid blue">content</div><!--end nest1-->

<div ID="nest2" style="float:left;border: 1px solid blue">content</div><!--end nest2-->

</div> <!--end container-->

In this case, the words "content" should be side by side (because they be floated) with a container div surrounding the words. The container div will have a border around it. As I type in more content into the content divs, the container div with the border is supposed to expand. This elementary concept works fine in Internet Explorer but doesn't work in Firefox. In Firefox, I get my tiny bordered box above my content, as if the content is slipping outside of the containing div. Like so:

As I've said, this has been an issue for me for some time. Invariably I would encounter it and then hack around for a few hours until I stumbled across a solution, wihout really knowing what I did to fix things - I always just attributed the whole issue to Firefox's anal-retentive nature with respect to CSS. But CSS is supposed to be logical and this behaviour is certianly not that? Anyway, recently I decdied to get to the bottom of things once and for all, and figure out exactly what Firefox and CSS2 expected me to do.

It turns out the issue is this: The container is not stretching because the floats are "enclosed" but not "cleared." Something must clear the floats before parent end tag. And the reason I've never noticed this behaviour in IE because IE automatically encloses and clears content floats due to its "non-standard auto-enclosing behavior". In order for a container div to truly surround the divs within it, the contents must both be floated and the div must be somehow cleared at the end. The Firefox and CSS2 retards somehow IE's auto-enclosing a bug and demand that you do it manually according to CSS strict rules. Well, if you can't beat them, join them. Here are a few ways to do this:

1. <br style="clear:both;"> - after the content but BEFORE the closing tag on the container div!

Example:

<div ID="container" style="border: 1px solid black">
<div ID="nest1" style="float:left;border: 1px solid blue">content</div><!--end nest1-->
<div ID="nest2" style="float:left;border: 1px solid blue">content</div><!--end nest2-->
<br style="clear:both;" />
</div> <!--end container-->

 

2. Float the container div along with the content divs. No good if you want the container to be centered.

Example:

<div ID="container" style="border: 1px solid black;float:left;">
<div ID="nest1" style="float:left;border: 1px solid blue">content</div><!--end nest1-->
<div ID="nest2" style="float:left;border: 1px solid blue">content</div><!--end nest2-->
</div> <!--end container-->

 

3. #container:after{ content: "."; display: block; height: 0; clear: both; visibility: hidden; }

Add option #3 above to your stylesheet. It instructs your CSS to add it period right after your container div and then clear both sides of it. Then, to make sure it's not seen and doesn't ruin positioning elsewhere, it hides the period from view.

I'm glad I have this finally figured out now.

Resources:
http://www.positioniseverything.net/easyclearing.html
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum83/7739.htm

Spam Opera

Like the sands of time, so comes the unwanted, unstoppable and inexorable flow of spam through my inbox. Spam actually has its root in ancient Greece, when in frustration Herodotus exclaimed, "how can I stop the delivery of all this @#*$! parchment!?!?" And now, more than 20 years later we still have to deal with unwanted spam for such things as enlargement products which simply do not work, despite the fact that I followed the instructions exactly.

After putting it off for quite some time, earlier this year I finally bit-the-bullet and changed all of my email addresses to try to put an end to the literally hundreds of spam emails I was receiving every day. (Note that I didn't actually receive all of the hundreds of emails - my spam filters were doing their job admirably - but even good filters need to be checked every once in a while to make sure nothing of value gets through...) and I was tired of spam getting through to my regular accounts, and I was tired of having to sift through the junk mail folders to make sure nothing of value was going there. Actually, rather than completely new addresses, I just added a "7" to the end of the old ones like so:

shane.feldman@sympatico.ca

became

shane.feldman7@sympatico.ca

The effect was immediate. The spam simply and completely evaporated leaving behind only a slightly unpleasant smell...oh wait a minute. I realize now that the smell might not have been the spam...whatever, the spam was gone. That was roughly 6 months ago. Now, it's starting to creep back into my inbox again. 1 to 2 per day. Why? Why?! WHY?! (picture me dropping to my knees, arm raised, pleading to the sky, like Star Trek's Captain Kirk would after losing some young unnamed female crew member to an alien virus on some rocky planet where the rocks look an awful lot like papier mache...)

I think the reason why might have been the email field in the comments just below each post on this page. Though I've taken great pains to obfuscate the email addresses elsewhere on the pages of this site, in the comments area they were still there in all of their unadulterated glory. And because I tend to respond to many comments and faithfully fill-in the email and web page fields when doing said responding - my mail address has been picked up by the bots and now the spam deluge will start again.

Now, I first figured this out about 2 months ago. What I have been doing thus far is to manually go in and remove the addresses from the comments if anyone actually supplies their (optional) email address. I don't want the commenters to pay for my programming omission. But it's been getting tedious to manually go in once a month for 1 minute to make a quick, manual change when I can instead spend several HOURS working on a script to do things automatically. So, thats what I did. And it turned out pretty good!

Now, if you supply your email when making a comment, my script:

1. First checks to make sure it's a well-formed (but not necessarily valid) email address. (i.e. shane.feldman@sympatico.ca)
2. Then changes the @ to AT and the . to DOT (i.e. shaneDOTfeldmanATsympaticoDOTca)
3. Then it converts each character of the email address to its corresponding ASCII code. (i.e. &#115;&#104;&#97;&#110;&#101;&#68;&#79;&#84;&#102;
   &#101;&#108;&#100;&#109;&#97;&#110;&#65;&#84;&#115;
   &#121;&#109;&#112;&#97;&#116;&#105;&#99;&#111;&#68;
   &#79;&#84;&#99;&#97;)

Now, if you are at all inclined to check one of the existing comments, and why wouldn't you be? I would...then simply mousing over won't allow you to see the codes, If you really want to see the ascii codes then view the source of this page. But the important point is that now your emails are safe here. Feel free to comment away - and I defy any spam bot to be able to harvest email addresses from my web site now!

A Not-So-Easy-Rider

Well, I finally went and did it. I've named her Emelcee*; she has a pretty two-toned paint job and...that's all I know about motorcycles. The seller was kind enough to drive her to my home for me. I paid him, and then I raced out (in my car) to buy a helmet from Freak~N~Leather (who seem to have a new website - look at their URL - HAHAHA.) You can see by my new helmet that I'm tending more towards the outlaw look rather than the ultra-sissy European rider look - and now I'm in the market for a skull & crossbones decal for said helmet.

So as I said, I bought my helmet then raced home to learn myself how to drive a motorcycle since I am now a motorcyclist (that's what we call ourselves I'm sure - motorcyclists) The gears are something like "1-down, 4-up" whatever that means - I know where the clutch is and there is a little green light that tells me when I'm in neutral, and it's only a 750cc engine, so how powerful can it be? And what else do I need to know? Us motorcyclists aren't exactly known for doing rocket surgery. I get on the bike and barely manage to start it because I've never owned anything with a choke before and immediately realize that 750cc is a lot more powerful than I thought and now I know why girls like horses so much!

Since I don't have a license I drive down my driveway and all over my neighbour's front and backyard since they are away on holidays until the end of the month - I hope their grass grows back before they get home. I only dropped it twice which isn't bad since my crazy neighbour two-doors down almost killed himself in first gear. And now I'm waiting for JJ to come over so I can get some @#$#! pictures of me on the bike before I hurt myself...

I haven't been this excited in a long time.

*Emelcee = MLC = Mid-Life Crisis

Read more about my baby: the KZ 750 LTD

...but a goody.

A young man was on holiday in Kenya after graduating from college. While he was walking through the bush, he came across a young bull elephant standing with one leg raised in the air. The elephant seemed distressed so the man approached it very carefully. The young man got down on one knee and inspected the elephants foot. There was a large thorn deeply embedded in the bottom of the foot. As carefully and as gently as he could the man worked the thorn out with his hunting knife, after which the elephant gingerly put down its foot. The elephant turned to face the man and with a rather stern look on its face, stared at him. For a good ten minutes the man stood frozen -- thinking of nothing else but being trampled. Eventually the elephant trumpeted loudly, turned and walked away.

The man never forgot that elephant or the events of that day.

Twenty years later the man was walking through the zoo with his teenaged son. As they approached the elephant enclosure, one of the creatures turned and walked over to where they were standing at the rail. The large bull elephant stared at the man and lifted it’s front foot off the ground, then put it down. The elephant did that several times, all the while staring at the man. The man couldn’t help wondering if this was the same elephant. After a while it trumpeted loudly; then it continued to stare at him. The man summoned up his courage, climbed over the railing and made his way into the enclosure. He walked right up to the elephant and stared back in wonder. Suddenly the elephant trumpeted again, wrapped its trunk around one of the man’s legs and swun him wildly back and forth along the railing, killing him.

Probably wasn't the same elephant.

(I got this joke from The Rider's Mag. I didn't feel much like retyping it so I did a quick investigation on the subject of OCR. It was here that I found a good, cheap, and quick way to scan the occasional image to text.)

Is this even remotely interesting?

I work in retail point-of-sale. Recently I troubleshot an issue with a receipt printer, and it required "refamiliarizing" myself with some concepts I haven't really kept on top of the past few years, and writing the short doc below:

A receipt printer must have some way to prevent the computer from sending data faster than the printing device can handle it. The Epson TM-H6000III employs 2 methods to prevent this from happening:
1. Either DTR/DSR (hardware) or XON/XOFF (software) flow control which involves sending special control characters from the computer to the printer and back to manage what gets printed and when. (Epson default is DTR/DSR. WinXP default is none.)
2. A print buffer into which the printer stores incoming data yet to be processed. (Epson default is 4kb)
In addition to the above, both the computer and the printer also manage their own baud rates, the speed at which the computer sends it's data and the speed at which the printer receives it. Baud rate can be loosely defined as the number of characters per second that a device can send to or receive from. (Epson default is 19200, WinXP default is 9600)
Because of the Epson TM-H6000III's large 4kb buffer, there is rarely any need to invoke flow control, but this may actually confuse configuration and troubleshooting efforts. This is because flow-control may be set incorrectly, and (should it be and instead of but here?) because of the printer's large buffer, flow control only rarely gets invoked - only rarely enough to cause trouble.
A good example of incorrect flow-control settings would be the default values for the Epson TM-H6000III and Windows XP. At their defaults and with a large print job, the buffer might fill up before Windows is finished sending the entire job. The Epson TM-H6000III would send a control code to Windows to "stop sending information for a second", but because Windows' flow control is set to "off", it would blindly continue to send data to the printer, overflowing the printer's buffer and causing printer errors.
And with respect to baud rate, on the surface, setting the printer's "receive" baud rate to 19200 characters per second vs. the computer's "send" baud rate of only 9600 characters per second would seem like a good idea to prevent the printer from getting overwhelmed, but keep in mind that serial printer communications are bi-directional, and setting baud rate in this way actually means you may overwhelm the PC! Generally, both the printer and the PC should be set to the same baud rate, and the rule of thumb is to use the slowest acceptable baud rate, because "more slow" equals "more stable".
Note: Since at 9600 characters per second you could literally deliver more than 6 feet of store receipt to the printer in only one second...9600 baud is a more than adequate baud rate setting for both the PC and the printer.
So, as you now can see, stable and reliable receipt printing can easily be achieved if certain configuration choices are made beforehand:
1. Turn off the Epson TM-H6000III printer.
2. Open up the dip switch panel underneath the Epson TM-H6000III:
a. Set DSW 1-7 from ON to OFF and DSW 1-8 from OFF to ON (Baud Rate to be 9600)
3. Hold down the "Feed" button and turn the printer back on enter Self-Test mode and to verify your settings.
4. To exit Self-Test mode. Turn the printer off, and then back on.
5. In Windows Device Manager Settings for COM1:
a. Verify baud rate is set to 9600
b. Set flow control to be "Hardware"
Happy printing!

The long and short of it is, I found this pretty interesting. Is it just me?

More Panoramics

More panoramic photos

Above is the first panoramic photo I took with my camera. It even precedes the backyard photo you see in the previous post. I simply put this on my desk at my office and started spinning it around. Considering how well it turned out despite practically no effort on my part - no wonder I like taking these panoramic photos!

For the first time in years, I got to do a little sightseeing while on a business trip. I went to see the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial (the St., Louis Arch) in St. Louis, Missouri. This is a location that practically begs for a panoramic photo.

It's not my best panoramic photo, but it does the job of recording that location for that moment in time. I'll get better as soon as I read more of the manual. This was taken without a tripod - it's just me turning in a circle and trying to hold the camera steady.

This is a picture of the Arch Museum at the base of/underneath the St. Louis Arch:

Something weird happened here. First of all it was dark. There were lots of people in the shot and I felt nervous they were all wondering why I was taking their picture so I was moving fast. Again, I didn't have a tripod so I was actually making my way around a statue that was occupying the centre spot. I was trying to go around this statue without actually touching it because as you can see in the photo at around the 30% mark, there is a female security guard right next to me. She wouldn't move; I practically banged her cheek with my lens

Whatever. The shot looks cool.

Another One-Million-Dollar-Idea (if you share with me)

I certainly told enough people about it; and now all these years later, I'm surprised I've have never seen it in production.

What it is, is this: when I was a young man, long-haired, tall, and slim with perfectly flat abs and an upper body like Dakota Fanning - as was the style back then in the days of Miami Vice and Thompson Twins, I always had this problem when if I wore a belt with my pants, the buckle would ride up over the top of said pants. I was always reaching down to reposition the buckle back over the waistband of the pants. I should mention now that I most certainly do not have this problem anymore. Nowadays, my belt is way to busy struggling to keep from snapping, to worry about such impossibilities as creeping upwards into my belly. Right. So while this problem may not have been up there with say - whirled peas, it did get me thinking and I quickly came up with a solution - The Belt Rock (belt not included.)

Elegant in it's simplicity, the belt rock consists of only a fine hi-test line, like fishing line, and a rock. One end of the line ties around your belt buckle and the other is tied to the rock, which hangs freely at about knee level. I figure 10 lbs. would do the trick for the average male. There is an optional neoprene cover for the rock to save your knees when engaged in vigorous activity such as dancing or exercise. The Belt Rock could optionally be painted - a fashion statement. The Belt Rock could also be used for close-quarters self-defence. Associated games could be developed requiring the Belt Rock.

Note: Stephan Hoppe reserves all rights on One-Million-Dollar-Ideas. Stephan has about one One-Million-Dollar-Idea per week, but lacks the skill, energy, or inclination to do anything with his ideas. It is hoped that by merely expressing his One-Million-Dollar-Idea on the Internet, that should one of Stephan Hoppe's One-Million-Dollar-Ideas actually come to fruition, since the person executing the idea will not likely be able to prove that he or she did not first read about Stephan Hoppe's One-Million-Dollar-Idea on shoppe.ca; that the person will then become obligated to Stephan Hoppe in the amount of $500,000. This is another example of the fine line between futile hope and reasoned despair that Stephan Hoppe dances along each and every day of his life.

Puppy Love

I bought a Canon Powershot A630 from Best Buy earlier this week. I've been on the hunt for a new camera since last summer, when I decided to "get back into photography" after a 15 year hiatus This roughly corresponds with my interest in computers - that is, I became interested in computers and lost interest in photography. (Let's now see if the inverse becomes true.)

In October I bought a Kodak P880 for $100 more than this Canon costs. Being a super zoom, it was a little bigger which I initially thought was nice, and zoomed a little more than this Canon. It created photos with excellent colour, but you had to flip the flash up yourself and I couldn't stand the LCD viewfinder. In December, the Kodak developed some mechanical glitches and I guess that was the clincher for returning it. So since December, I've been on the lookout for the perfect camera (for me.)

It's only been a few days, I'll admit but I've gotten to know this camera really well since I sleep with it under my pillow every night. (and I know what you're thinking - bad grammar or big pillow HAHAHA) I love this Canon. I love it because it has 8 megapixels I takes four AA batteries - I can use alkalines if I wish or NiMH. It came with a hi-speed 2g SD card (which is nice). It has voice annotation, a large 2.5" LCD back screen that articulates, like a camcorder's does - If I flip the camera for vertical orientation, that LCD panel flips too! If I win the lottery I can purchase additional lenses for the camera, just like with an SLR. The macro is mind-blowing. I can get as close as 1 centimeter to my macro subjects!

But mostly, I love this Canon for the panoramic shots it takes. I don't know how it does it (I actually exactly know - it's just a figure of speech) but this little Powershot A630 takes the most impressive panoramic shots with almost no effort - certainly no more effort than taking regular pictures. So, I'm looking forward to redeveloping my photographic skills and creating some cool panoramics.

Ou est mon Sirop D'Erable?

A Rick-Mercer-style rant.

 

I read recently in Macleans about issues with the Maple Syrup industry. You see, Canada has 85% of the global maple syrup market, and the province of Quebec has 95% of that. The Quebec maple syrup producers are entirely mom-and-pop shops producing their own syrup and surprisingly the whole thing is regulated by a quota system; there are apparently "vast" reserves of maple syrup out there so that prices remain stable from one year to the next. Maple syrup is also graded by number and colour, with #1 Extra Light considered the best and being the most expensive.

I never gave it much thought before. I've never really understood the numbering and grading system - all I know is that pure Canadian Maple Syrup is awesome compared to any artificial sugar concoction from Aunt Jemima or Log Cabin. So whenever I end up in Quebec, I pick up a couple of cans of the first syrup I see - because it's about half the price it is in Ontario.

The problem (according to the article) is that with so many unregulated small operators making "mapple sirop" in their bathtubs, some are resorting to unsavoury practices to pad their margins. Of most interest to me in the article was the gadget they use to inject air into lower quality "amber" syrup to make it look like #1 Extra Light. Also of some concern was the contamination of some of the syrup with (sweet-sweet) pipe-lead and paraformaldehyde - an illegal chemical that makes the trees bleed longer. So, the tone of the article suggested that instead of a closely regulated company like Aunt Jemima making their barely tolerable excuse for syrup under the close watch of the US FDA, we have Jean-Paul and Germaine filling up empty bottles of Labatt 50 on the back porch, sucking on a couple of Craven-A's, and letting their cigarette ash fall into the vast syrup reserves while giving the finger to Health Canada.

What is proposed in the article is an expensive certification system where by maple syrup is "certified organic" Apparently the system is broken and ISO9002 is the only way to fix it.

Now, it's obvious to me that there is no problem. The system has worked for many years and the vast majority of the syrup producers out there are responsible people, but just as one guy tries to put a bomb in his shoe and now the world has to take off their shoes before going through X-ray at an airport, so it is that one (or so) unscrupulous maple syrup producer is going to have repercussions for an entire industry.

As I read the article, I realized that I can also see the future of maple syrup in Quebec (and Canada). One big conglomerate will purchase several smaller operations and produce non-descript yet "certified" maple syrup. Slowly, (but not really) they will either swallow up or squeeze out every single existing producer of maple syrup in Quebec until they are the only player left. Then this conglomerate will be purchased by a U.S. concern and that will be the end of another Canadian icon.

Our national beer brands, Molson and Labatts are no longer Canadian owned. Tim Horton's, the donut and coffee chain that Canadians most identify themselves with, is owned by Wendys out of Columbus, Ohio. And the image and likeness of the very symbol of Canada, the Royal Canadian Mounted Policeman on horseback - the Mountie - is owned by...wait for it...Disney!

And now we are going to lose Canadian Maple Syrup. All that will be left is back bacon, the beaver, and the maple leaf, but let's face it: we don't really want back bacon, Dubai will probably buy all rights to the maple leaf, and we lost the beaver a long time ago to Jerry Mathers.

No-charge One-Million-Dollar-Ideas (if you share with me)

I've been told that men are hard-wired to conceptualize maps and directions from a birds-eye view, as a traditional map is designed for, while women have more of a ground-level perspective, sort of like the directions that Google Maps gives out. This is why a woman will say: "West?! Is that left or right?"

I won't get into the superiority of the former system over the latter, but if someone could figure out a map with more of a grounds-eye view perspective, with perhaps compass points of "Up, Down, Left and Right" instead of North, South, East, and West...why, they'd likely make a million dollars!

Note: Stephan Hoppe reserves all rights on One-Million-Dollar-Ideas. Stephan has about one One-Million-Dollar-Idea per week, but lacks the skill, energy, or inclination to do anything with his ideas. It is hoped that by merely expressing his One-Million-Dollar-Idea on the Internet, that should one of Stephan Hoppe's One-Million-Dollar-Ideas actually come to fruition, since the person executing the idea will not likely be able to prove that he or she did not first read about Stephan Hoppe's One-Million-Dollar-Idea on shoppe.ca; that the person will then become obligated to Stephan Hoppe in the amount of $500,000. This is another example of the fine line between futile hope and reasoned despair that Stephan Hoppe dances along each and every day of his life.

Suppressed Memory - Flashback

When I was in Grade One, one day at recess Jimmy Martin pushed me down to the ground and then farted on my back. So I ran up to the recess teacher, Mrs. Farley and said: "Mrs. Farley, Jimmy Martin just farted on my back..." and Mrs. Farley said: "Farted? Did you just say farted?!" and she sent me to the office and I got the strap from Mrs. Fitzgerald for saying the word "farted."

If I ever see Jimmy Martin again, I am going to punch his face in.