The Squamidian Report – Mar. 27 / 04
For the ‘ON LINE’ version of this newsletter, go to:
http://www.members.shaw.ca/doug_b2/report.htm
Also in this issue:
The Ontarion
Hi All,
We took a bunch of pictures when Ryan and Emily were out here a couple of weeks ago. I’ve posted 4 of them to one of my web site. Bottom link on the pictures page.
http://members.shaw.ca/doug_b2/Pictures/pictures.htm
When they headed back to Ontario they took the cool wet weather that they had brought out with them, back with them.
That meant we had our warm sunny weather back for a while. Clear days mean clear nights and there was some great star gazing again. Mercury is now visible just after the sun goes down, at about the same location that the sun was before it set. The other 4 planets are very much visible along their common arc across the sky. Get out there and enjoy it.
By the middle of this past week we were into cool wet weather again. That kind of thing can sort of be expected since this is rain forest country after all. Wet weather here is seldom dull and dreary. As I’ve mentioned before, everything here is three-dimensional. Because the terrain and the atmosphere must share the same space the cloud layers stand out against the backdrop of mountains. They slide through the valleys, down the sides of steep slopes, always changing. You can often look down and see rain, up and see sunshine lighting a high snowfield. Air movement can be seen by watching the clouds traveling in multiple directions at the same time. Low clouds near the surface will often be moving south, riding in the air that is sliding down out of the mountains. Higher clouds will be moving north or east, riding air that is coming in off the ocean.
Ever do one of those really dumb things? I sent in my tax return but forgot to include the check to cover the amount owed. I then had to go through the whole gantlet of Rev Canada’s voice mail menus and busy signals to find how to send them my check. Why can’t any of this ever be easy??
Sue had raked up the thatch and dead grass in the lawn last weekend but we had run out of time and just left the stuff lay there. By mid week it had all disappeared, even the stuff she hadn’t raked up. Turns out the crows have been taking it to use in their nest building efforts. We would have composted it, they had a better idea.
By necessity, we do compost everything that we can. There is a very real shortage of topsoil around here so we have to make our own. I took down some small trees on our neighbour’s side of the fence that were overhanging the deck area (with their permission of course). We ran everything through the shredder and turned it into a pile of mulch that can now rot down into soil. A large pile of branches and sticks becomes a small pile of chewed up material. That’s also how I disposed of all the ivy I had to remove to fix the fence on the other side of the back yard.
Looks like this is a lawn-mowing weekend. I had thought that just the front was now long enough but it looks like everything needs it. Of course that means trying to get the old lawn mower started. I hadn’t put it away properly, you know, empty the gas, put some oil in the cylinder, that kind of thing. I had just abandoned it under the deck in a dry storage area. So getting it started will not be easy. And of course once it will start, I have to double check that I’ve cleaned up all the Yogi land mines in the grass. The poor mower wouldn’t stand a chance if it hit one of those.
It’s kind of interesting watching all the people from the city as they head up to Whistler for a day of skiing. Some of them are wearing shorts, some are bundled up in snowsuits. They all do a mad dash up the highway as they try to get there one car length ahead of everyone else. Whistler has the advantage of being able to extend its ski season well beyond what is happening in the village. They ‘upload’ onto the mountain. The lift station that is about half way up becomes the bottom of the ski area. The skiers ride all the way to the top, ski down to the mid section and then ride back up to the top again. At the end of the day they ‘down load’ back to the village. When the season is over, they will switch from skiers to mountain bikers. Those guys cover themselves with motocross style body armor and hurtle down the mountain on bicycles. That would have been fun when I was a few years younger. Now I’d splat instead of bounce.
P4P update…. This new computer I’ve build is running along just fine, smooth and quiet. A funny thing regarding the Hyper Threading feature of the CPU, the system sees the 2.8 gz CPU as two P4 chips running at the 2.8gz, just like a dual processor system would show. Pretty well all of my software is way too old to take advantage of this system but its fun to have anyway. I’ve still got a lot to learn about the nooks and crannies of XP but I do like the improved stability over 98SE. I don’t like how it tries to hide a lot of things from the user. I am used to ‘down and dirty hands on’ computing. But I guess even old farts like me can learn new OS’s. One word of advice, don’t let yourself use a 19-in LCD monitor unless it’s yours because you can never go back to a CRT no matter what size screen it has. That poor old system that used to be my main seems so dull and shabby now that it hardly gets any use at all. Mind you, it does have one very valuable use and that is as the destination for my data file replications, which is a fancy way of saying that is where I backup to over my network.
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Hopefully Nova Scotia Sus will have some Cuba adventures to write about when she gets back.
****
THE ONTARION REPORT
March 25, 2004
Ya don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction!
Barry McGuire made that line famous way back in 1965. I hadn’t thought about that song for many many years until Doug sent me a note telling me he saw Barry McGuire on TV singing “Eve Of Destruction”. He told me that he didn’t remember McGuire’s first name but he was surprised how much he looked like me. Well, being the curious cat that I am, I went online and checked this guy out. I found him in of all places www.barrymcguire.com/photos/ and dad gum it all if he don’t look a tad like yours truly! Of course he hasn’t aged as well as I have even if I do say so myself. He’s 5 years or so my senior and has what I call a “Turkey” neck. He’s probably heavier, has a history of drug abuse, drinks like a fish, has brown eyes instead of baby blues, has a voice like gravel instead of velvet, chubbier cheeks and a much fatter bank account but other than that bares a slight resemblance to me. I take the resemblance as a compliment. I guess it’s better than being told I look like Elmer Fudd. Actually I had another person tell me I look a lot like Mel Gibson without hair. Now that comparison I can live with! I’m just kidding about that one but when you’re on the computer, you can stretch the truth a tad and nobody can see you to dispute your claim. LOL! I guess you all know what I look like so I’m not pulling the wool over any of your eyes. Although they say they can do wonders with plastic surgery these days. I’m sure if my neck ever gets as “Turkey” looking as Barry McGuire’s, I’ll book a visit to my local plastic surgeon in short order. Either that or I’ll grow a beard. They tell me that a beard can hide a multitude of imperfections. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now, I think I’ll change the subject!
Spring has sprung! We’re in
the middle of a warming trend here in KW. It was actually a pleasant
temperature outside today. I was in the house for the whole day and didn’t
stick my head out until around 10:30pm. It’s still nice out and sitting around
+13c. We’re supposed to be heading for a sunny weekend, I hope the weatherman
is right! Doug tells me BC is about 1 ½ months ahead of Ontario with it’s
weather. By the sounds of things Doug is being slightly affected by the pollen
in the air out west. I doubt it’s as bad as it gets around here but when you
suffer from allergies any pollen is destructive to the breathing. I don’t have
any allergies so I know I’m going to enjoy the good weather when it’s finally
here to stay. I have a few things I have to attend to with the arrival of
spring. The first item on my list will likely be one for this weekend. I want
to take the flagpole down and refit it with a pulley system for raising and
lowering the flag. The Canadian flag has become faded and tattered and will
have to be replaced, this time with a better quality one for sure. The British
flag that I had flying below the Canadian one was a better quality one and
didn’t tatter but has torn one of the grommets out of the leading edge and is
held on only by one corner now. If I can’t repair it I’ll have to buy a new
Brit flag as well. I first figured that if I didn’t have a halyard on the
flagpole the local pranksters wouldn’t be able to steal the flag. Now that I’ve
had it up for a few months I find I’m not looking forward to taking the pole
down every time some work on the flags or pole is needed. I’ve devised a
cleaver way of concealing the halyard inside the pole. I’m going to see if my
idea will work once I get the pole down on Saturday. The other project that I
intend to tackle is designing a new filter bed system for the back yard pond
before we reintroduce the fish this year.
Carole and Adam have been feeding and looking after the goldfish in the aquarium over the winter. We’ve learned a lot about what keeps the water and other items in the aquarium clean and algae free. I’m going to apply this system to the outdoor pond and see if it’ll work. Instead of having a charcoal filter hanging on the side of the tank, we have a plastic perforated floor in the tank. There are two plastic 1”x12” plastic tubes mounted in the corners of the floor. There is an air pump that pumps air into the bottom of these tubes. The floor of the tank has a 1” air space under it and is covered with fine gravel. When the bubbles rise in the tubes, they create an upward movement of the water in the tubes which in turn draws water up from under the floor. This causes a circulation of the tank water down through the gravel and back up the plastic tubes, trapping the fish poop etc in the gravel like a filter. The gravel is cleaned with a simple siphon type suction device. The impurities are light enough to be siphoned up the device but the gravel only stirs around and then settles back on the floor of the aquarium. I’m sure I’ll be able to make up a similar filter system for the pond outside. Should be interesting to see if and how well it works. We also found out that by not over feeding the fish and keeping the aquarium exposed to only a few hours of light each day we can control the amount of algae and other matter in the tank. Nobody at any of the nurseries we dealt with last year told us the reason for having floating plants in the pond. They would only say that you should have about 60% of the surface covered in plants. NOW we know that this limits the amount of light, thus limiting the algae growth! Hmmmmm……live and learn I always say! Anyway, it’ll be worth a try.
It can’t be any worse than having to empty the pond and pressure wash it every 3-4 weeks. I’ll keep you posted on the progress of this idea for sure. I don’t see why it wouldn’t work! The fish have certainly gained loads of weight over the winter. They are about 3-5 times the size they were when we first got them. In fact, one of them is almost big enough to have for supper! I’m sure Carole would miss him though. I think she counts them every time she feeds them to make sure. Hahaha…!
Well, I guess I should be heading off to bed. I always seem to be doing this at such a late hour. Thanks again for tuning in and don’t be shy, jot something down and send it to Doug. I know you’ve all got something to say so let’s get typing!
Talk to you again next week.
GREG.
PS: Something To Think About>
A word of encouragement during a failure is worth more than a dictionary full of praise, after success.
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I’m sticking this way down here at the bottom to see if anyone notices it! In a month from now, on Saturday May 1st we will be sending out the 100th issue of the Squamidian. I’d like to encourage any of you who have a few minutes to spare to send in an article to include in that issue. It can be as short or long as you like. The whole purpose of this newsletter is to share the adventures and experiences of life. While you can choose any topic you like, writing about normal things from your prospective is easy to do and informative to read. Give it a try.
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Have a good one..
the
doug
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