Christmas Eve (I'd Have a Blue Christmas Without You)

Ottawa 4:24 pm. Soon I will be going to the airport to meet Leslie and we will have Christmas Eve together.

"I knew him when he couldn't hammer a nail"

As a gift to the employees the Director's Board gave all the employees at the organization the day off today. I decided it was time to decorate the tree since Leslie will be arriving Christmas eve. While I was doing this I had the Discovery channel on. There is a program called Canada's Worst Handyman and should be one of the contestants? Keith Cole from York University days. In my second year Keith had the room next to mine in Vanier. I seem to remember Keith played a lot of Madonna back then.

I should ad that not only was Keith a contestant but he "won" the contest. he was declared Canada's Worst Handyman.

Snowfall Update

Leslie's flight has been rescheduled so that she will arrive Christmas eve which is the best Christmas gift I could ask for. We will make our way down to Owen Sound on Tuesday for our second Christmas!

Due to the significant winter storm, Denver International Airport will be closed through the evening of Thursday, December 21. As a result, United is canceling all flights into and out of Denver until that time. Please continue to follow the suggestions below regarding rebooking on another flight. We continue to work to accommodate our customers and get them to their destinations safely and as soon as possible.

Walk out to Winter

But It's Not You Who Gets Me Down

Oblivious

The Fella Who Couldn't Wait For Christmas

Leslie was scheduled to arrive in Ottawa tomorrow evening but her flight has been cancelled due to severe weather. There was a blizzard today. Not in Ottawa, but in Colorado. The weather in Ottawa is like spring going on to summer. I am all excited that she is coming period. I start my holiday tomorrow afternoon and I was so looking forward to having Leslie here tomorrow night. I feel that childhood anticipation for Christmas. It's great. I can't wait. I really can't.

Dusk

It's spring in December. For the past week the days have been balmy and the air moist with the phantom expectation of bursting bulbs and buds that aren't going to come. The diagonal line that cuts across the sky is the trail of a jet. With the light of the setting sun it looks like the feeler of some celestial creature stretching the length of the sky.

Ancient Computer

This is a device found about 100 years ago by sponge divers on an ancient shipwreck in the Mediterranian. It's acknowledged as an ancient wonder for it's complex gears that function as an accurate astronomical calculator. More at the Washington Post >>

Taken at the Miniwanca camp outside of Shelby, Michigan, May 2003 by Red Monkey

Old Friends and New Days

I haven't mentioned on the blog how much I love my new work place. My previous position was a trial for me in all the senses of that word. Sometimes it seems that life puts all the pieces of the puzzle out there and all you have to do is make the effort to recognize them. This has been the first time in years that I can say that I am truly happy. I didn't realize that until last week when I was walking down the street and had this strange feeling that seemed to take me back to a place I haven't been for years. it was kind of like seeing an old friend except in this case the old friend was me.

Argo

My sister Jeanne got a new puppy a few weeks ago. He is an 8 week old Golden Retriever named Argo (after the ship in the Golden Fleece).

I'm A God Damned Angel

Skidoo Trash Can song Harry Nilsson
No No

"This is a clip from Otto Preminger's "SKIDOO" this has more of the prison acid sequence, with Jackie Gleason, Burgess Meredith, Peter Lawford, Cesar Romero, Harry Nilsson, Richard Kiel, Austin Pendelton and others tripping on acid. Then there is a song by Harry Nilsson performed by dancing trashcans."

Dumber & Dumber

The older he get's the stupider he looks

Once a Dick

Trying to get attention ever so desperately >>

Revved Up Like a Deuce, Another Runner in the Night

Last night I bought my first mp3 player and went to see a James Bond movie. This makes me a very pathetic panda I suppose. However I love my mpio. It's no iPod but I could get one for everyone in my family for the price of one mpio. It's a flash memory (1gb) unit which gives me more music in a day than I can listen too. My first portable music unit was a Sanyo walkman type machine (1979) It was about the size of the Penguin Tale of two Cities paperback. I could play 5 or 6 songs then had to flip the tape. In otherwords I am amazed by this jukebox tube.

Now about the Bond film. I never was a fan. I grew up with Roger Moore as Bond. Moonraker. Bond was always this Playboy dink. What was nice about this take on Cassino Royale was that Bond was both more brutal and more sensitive. Also more incredible and more a person. they cranked this up to 11 and sat down to talk about 'feelings'.

Daniel Craig is an excellent Bond. This film which follows Ian Fleming's book a bit more honourably, explains how Bond become the man he is.






You may want to note that he has freaky ears.

What struck me most about this article from the New York Times on the Bush administrations public statements on taking a new tact, is how much Iraq is treated like a department within the US government. I suppose that is exactly how the bureaucracy sees it and perhaps why that detachment from reality has lead to disaster. Then again they aimed for disaster from the start.

Pokermon

last night I went out to play poker with some of "the boys". I don't play a lot of cards and especially not Poker. I am also notorious for not paying attention seeing cards as an excuse to drink beer. However because there was money involved my sense of cut-throat competitiveness jumped in. We had three experienced players me and an absolute babe in the woods. I had some good hands and played by the "know when to hold em, know when to fold em" book just like the song says. it was a lot of fun especially because I came away a big winner which was all the more satisfying because I took the shirt of the smuggest guy there.

Liberal Leadership Race

The Liberal Party leadership race took place tonight and Stephane Dion came from behind to snatch victory from Michael Ignatieff, or Iggy as he came to be known to the public. I'm fine with that. I never liked Ignatieff going back to my days as a student when I had to read his essays and texts on nationalism. he always struck me as a bit of a reactionary and I really was put off by his initial support for the American war against Iraq. he was a bit too much of an ideologue for my liking.

Rick Mercer has an nice take on the leadership race which he attended. He neatly sums things up

The Liberals went into this convention with a host of choices. They could have gone with a battle-tested politician, a former athlete, a world famous academic or a food bank founder from the West; at the end of the day they choose the nerd. That’s pretty Canadian.

Dion was a member of cabinet under both Chretien and Martin and on the one hand is an old school Liberal in some respects. On the other hand Canadians don't know that much about him. It will be interesting to see how he is received especially in Quebec where he is from but not necessarily loved. He is smart and seems very capable. I am hoping that he will be effective in getting Harper out of the Prime Minister's office.