The Squamidian Report – Mar. 6 / 04

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The Ontarion

Hi All,

Our street festival performance last weekend went well, I think. We haven’t been run out of town or anything yet. It was a bit cold playing on the stage in the middle of Winnipeg St. An unexpected squall blew in off the ocean and you could feel the temperature dropping. All of a sudden we could see our breaths and our fingers got real cold. We played in a couple of shops as well and it was warmer there. Once our scheduled part of the event was over we were free to do as we pleased. Warren went off to do his thing and I went over to the computer store. The woman in there (as in ‘MOM’ and pop computer store) is a musician and I knew there would be an on going jam session that I was welcome to join. That also gave me a chance to pick up the black fronted computer drives I was waiting for, which meant I could look forward to a quiet evening of just me and my parts.

Sue is back! You all know what that means. My vacation is over. Picked her up Tuesday at the airport so that meant Monday evening I had to madly scramble to get the kitchen counter cleared off enough so you could at least see portions of it. And I had to gather up discarded items of clothing that were scattered around the house. Then of course there is taking Yogi’s dog food dish off the table and putting it back onto the floor. Poor guy feels demoted.

The drive up Howe Sound on a sunny warm spring day is always a treat although I can’t very well have Sue do the driving if I’m on my way to pick her up. The view was clear right across the Strait, over to the mountain in the interior of Vancouver Island. Stopped at a computer store in North Van and picked up the monitor I was looking for. A nice big 19-inch LCD. The screen on it makes the 19-inch on my CRT look small and dull. They also had an ergonomic multimedia keyboard in gray and charcoal with a matching optical mouse so I picked those up too.

The grass is green and the flowers are out all over the Vancouver area. There are even some early plum trees blooming. Everything is in bloom over in Victoria, last week was flower-counting week there. Kind of nice. Got back to Squamish in the early afternoon so we had time to take Yogi for a walk down by the river. Handy to have Sue back home, the first thing she did was go out and get some groceries.

Sue spent the rest of this week doing an audit in Vancouver. Just a small, three-day one. I spent the rest of the week doing computer stuff and goofing off, we are a bit slow at work right now. That’s OK, it is still technically winter, at least on the calendar.

My mew computer system is up and running. In fact, this letter is being typed on it, can’t you tell? Assembling the hardware components was pretty straightforward; it’s the software end that takes all the time. I’m not up to speed yet with Windows XP so I have a bit of a learning curve to go through. Then there is loading and setting up all the software programs that we will want on the system and bringing over all the data files. I’ve partitioned the drive into a 15gig C: and a 100gig E:. I will put only system and program files on the C: and all the data will go on the E. That way they are kept separate to facilitate efficient backup routines. I will not bore you guys with the gory details of my new computer. In stead, I have posted a document on my web site that outlines all the neat stuff and how it all went together. Go to:

http://members.shaw.ca/doug_b2/GeekSpeak.htm

Of course a third computer simply won’t fit in my computer room / office. That means moving everything around. This new ‘main system’ inherits the spot where the old K7 sat. That PC has to sit in the little bedroom down the hall. Its monitor is too big to sit at the side desk in here. The little old 586 gets the side desk. All the network cabling is hooked back up and everything is working and communicating. I’ve got a spare network cable hanging at the end of the desk for Sue’s laptop. She can use our network connection to tunnel into the bank’s system. That lets here work and replicate from home. Placing a 19-in LCD where the 19-in CRT was sure frees up a lot of desk space. Squamidian Central has a whole new look.

And of course with the new look in here, Sue decided that the room needs to be cleaned up and tidied up a bit so now everything has been moved around and put where I’m not used to it being. And speaking of things being different, this new computer is quieter than the old one, even though it has twice as many cooling fans. Technology moves forward.

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THE ONTARION REPORT

March 5, 2004

Hello everyone! I was amazed at the response I received from last weeks Ontarion. I never dreamed that a story about urinals would solicit so much commentary. I’m glad that I was able to stimulate your curiosity if not interest in such a subject. I found the whole thing quite comical but I also learned a great deal as well. For instance, I’m sure you have all heard of a Rock Singer by the name of Adam Ant. He has turned his talents to an acting career in the past few years. Well, during my research, I found out that while on a visit to an island off the coast of Scotland a young up ‘n coming Rocker was in need of using the “Loo”. He proceeded to stand at a urinal in the public washroom at the Fairy Dock and while doing his business he noticed that the urinal was stamped with the manufacturer’s name. The make of the urinal was “Adamant” and at that moment he decided that would make a great show name. He revamped it a little and became “Adam Ant”. The rest as they say is history!

Thank you all for writing in with your comments on such an obscure topic. It was a fun week indeed!

There’s always something to talk about in the News but most times there’s little point in my rehashing what most of you have already read in the papers or heard on TV. There is one item that has stuck in my craw as they say and that is the cost of gasoline! I’m really ticked off with the “Price Fixing” that the oil companies have been guilty of for years. It seems they take any world crisis and turn it into an excuse for raising the cost of gas.

They invariably claim that because of conflict in the middle east the price per barrel has risen and thus the cost of producing a litre of gasoline has gone up! What else is new? I was passing a Petro Canada gas station at the corner of Fischer-Hallman and Highland Rds yesterday and noticed something quite funny. Someone had taken the trouble to make a sign out of cardboard about 2x3 ft in size and mounted it on a stake in the boulevard of the gas station. The sign had an arrow pointing to the station’s posted gas price, which was 81.9/litre and the sign read “FUCKIN’ RIDICULOUS”! Please forgive the language but I’m only quoting the author of the sign. However, I do think the wording pretty much sums up the opinion of most of us that have to pay these exorbitant prices to run our vehicles. One friend of mine suggested that the oil companies are preparing us for a Summer of $1.00/litre prices at the pumps. I don’t doubt that one bit! I find it hard to believe that these prices are justified. On Tuesday Carole and I were in Brampton and the Petro Canada stations had their prices set at 65.4/litre. When we got home to KW, the Petro Can stations were at 81.9/litre. Now someone tell me how that can be, would you please? I stopped in to the Petro Can near our place and when I mentioned the difference, the station manager said he believed that Brampton was closer to the main supplier and therefore their cost of gas was less than KW’s. Such HORSESHIT! Oil companies are like car salesmen, you can never get an honest answer out of them regarding the value of their goods. I guess there is very little we as consumers can do to change this situation. With that said, I guess all we can do is pay up or walk!

On another note…….nostalgia, history, progress, change for the sake of change or commerce or whatever you want to call it is taking place all around us. I was in downtown Kitchener today and began to think of all the changes that have taken place over the course of my lifetime in this city. For instance, how many of you remember the TNT Store at the corner of King & Water St? It was for lack of a better term, an Army Surplus store. You could buy everything from Army helmets to huge yellow rubber rafts from this store. It was kind of a forerunner to the KW Surplus we have today. When I was 11 years old, I started working for a tailor shop in the “Arcade” building on King St and used to spend my lunch hour nosing around the TNT store. The Canada Trust building is the structure that stands in place of the TNT now. Heck I guess it’s been there for close to 40 years now. Man, I really am getting old if I can remember back 40 years like it was yesterday! Oh well, there are many other structures etc that have changed as well. Of course we mentioned the City Hall a few weeks ago as one of the structures we miss. Does anyone remember such places as The Strand Bowling Lanes above the Imperial Cigar Store opposite Gaukel St on King. I used to set pins there on Saturdays as well. Another place I remember was The Jumbo Ice Cream Parlor just west of the TNT store on King St near Frances St. It was a favourite place to have lunch on a Saturday. They made great hamburgers for 25c and milkshakes for 15c. Next, there was a restaurant on Ontario St called The Chicken Nest, great chicken! My favourite place to see a movie was The Century Theatre just off King St on College St. It was at the back of the SS Kressge’s store on that corner.

My aunt worked at the lunch counter in Kressge’s and my mother and I used to go in to see her and have a chocolate sundae. All these food places, no wonder I had a weight problem! LOL! There were other landmarks besides the restaurants that I’m sure many of you will remember. There was the old wooden bridge just off Victoria St N on River Rd that crossed over the railroad tracks. I used to get all 4 wheels of my Mini off the ground going over that one. What a rush! Did any of you ever have your picture taken while sitting on one of the old cast iron cannons on the island in Victoria Park? Maybe standing at the foot of the statue of Queen Victoria across from the park canoe rental building was your place to pose? How many of you remember renting a canoe and taking a paddle around the “Lake”? The only danger wasn’t in drowning but in getting stuck in the Duck poo on the bottom of the shallow lake if you capsized the canoe. We used to go to the park on Sundays and listen to the band playing John Philip Sousa music in the Pavilion. When I think of it now, there were so many cool places to go and things to do back then. Nowadays everything seems to cost so much to see or do that we really do limit ourselves when it comes to our social outings. Even though we all make so much more money than we did back then it seems ridiculous to pay $12.50/person to go see a movie. Not to mention $6.00 for a bucket of popcorn and $4.00 each for a large Coke. An evening at the movies, strike that, MOVIE singular, can cost an easy $50.00. No wonder people are glued to their TV sets instead of going out!

Well, I guess I should wrap it up for this week. It’s been fun looking back on the changes. I hope you all enjoyed this trip down memory lane and can relate to at least a couple of the places I mentioned. If you can think of any more that we will remember, don’t be shy, join in the writing!

Until next week, thank you all for tuning in!

See you again with another edition of The Ontarion Report.

Bye for now…….GREG.

PS: Something to Think About>

A man has to live with himself so he should see to it that he has good company!

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the doug

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