The Squamidian Report – Sept. 17 / 05
Also in this issue:
The Ontarion
Hi All,
“Burns Bog in Delta, south of Vancouver, is the largest raised peat bog in North America, being more than 4,000 hectares in size -- 10 times the size of Vancouver's Stanley Park.
Occupying a quarter of Delta, it is the largest domed peat bog in North America and one of the largest in the world. It was named after a former owner, Pat Burns of Burns Meat packaging.
Biologists around the world know the bog, since only three percent of the planet is covered with peat lands. An ancient lake that filled with vegetation over the eons, the bog is choked with trees and bog plants such as sphagnum moss and Labrador tea. Rain is Burns Bog's only source of water, and its slow evaporation is a major regulator of the region's climate.
The bog covers the largest undeveloped urban area in Canada and the largest wetland in the Fraser River delta. It is home to 24 species of mammals, including beaver, muskrat and Columbian black-tailed deer, 150 species of birds.”
The pre-ceding is a quick description of Burns Bog snatched from an Internet site. I’ve never actually been there but I’ve flown over it several times when flying in to or out of Vancouver’s YVR. But when a bog burns, does it burn up, or does it burn down? Burn’s Bog has been burning most of this past week, the visible part of the fire is in the trees but it is burning just as much under ground in the dry peat. And that peat is saturated with methane so it really burns. The fire has been pumping out an incredible amount of smoke that has blanketed the lower mainland filling the Fraser River Valley, hiding Vancouver. It has blanketed the Straight of Georgia right across to Nanaimo, blanketed Howe Sound and the whole area right up to Whistler. There were several days were couldn’t see the mountains and we live right in them.
There have been fires in Burns Bog in the
past that took several years to put out, as they would smoulder under ground
all winter and then pop up the next summer. They have learned that to put out a
bog fire they have to bring the water table back up to the surface where it is
supposed to be. Needles to say, a good rainfall would be welcome right about
now.
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And now for you geography / geology buffs, Victoria BC on Vancouver Island has moved 3mm west during the last month. For that matter, so has the rest of the Island. About every 14 months there is a shake and slide event that takes place. It releases the same amount of energy as a 6.5 quake would but it is spread over a couple of weeks rather than a couple of seconds so it isn’t even felt by people. So as long as it keeps on happening nice and smoothly every 14 months or so, it won’t have to happen abruptly resulting in a quake.
*
Here is something that was kind of cute but very bizarre. We are just finishing up pulling sub-grade in the upper village at Britannia. (Translation… the old roads need to be cut down to the level below where the granular material will be applied to build them up to where their new surfaces will be. The excavator bucket ‘pulls’ the material toward the machine as it digs, hence, pull sub-grade.) Anyway, I’ve been working my way through the upper village pulling sub-grade and loading the material into dump trucks that back up to me on the as yet undisturbed road behind me.
One afternoon an old codger in his electric scooter type wheel chair and his wife using her walker came hobbling along up the section or road I had stripped down. This is pretty rough and bumpy at this point because we have not yet spread any granular. They came to a stop just short of where we were working and parked themselves, making themselves comfortable. Then, they removed some watermelon from a bag they had and sat there eating the melon as they watched us work. When the melon was done, they packed up and hobbled away.
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Mildly Geek Speak…
Ryan tuned me into this rather cool piece of free software called iTunes. It is the creation of the Apple Computer Co, as in Mac computers and there is a version for Windows PC’s. It can be found at http://www.apple.com/ca/itunes/ and it is a fairly large download of over 33 Mb. Unlike most people who use their computers as a music tool and player, I’m not even into music all that much. I see a computer as a work and communications and creativity tool. However, iTunes is a very useful and interesting utility for even an old fart like me.
First and foremost, it gives you an easy way to upload any or all your music CD’s onto your computer’s hard drive using very efficient compression to save space without sacrificing playback quality. From there you can burn a copy of a CD or pick and choose from tracks on various CD’s. You can play music from the track list or from a personalized list. The program sorts the music into genre’s, by artist, title, CD, etc. Therefore you can search using those criteria for a given song. (Which is handy if you have, lets say, 25000 songs to choose from, which I don’t.)
When burning a CD from your song list you use the program’s internal burn function, which un-compresses the files and creates a playable disc. If you used your usual burning software you would simply create a copy of the compressed files which would not play in a player but would be a good way to backup a lot of music onto a single CD. You could actually archive about 20 music CD’s onto a single CD-R for safekeeping. Or 140 plus or minus CD’s on a DVD-R. You would of course need iTunes again to play those files or convert them back to music file for burning onto a blank CD.
I imported about 40 CD’s totaling 430 tracks. It took up 1.38 gig of hard drive space. Without compression that would have been about 28 gig. It would take 24 hours to play them all.
You can also go directly to the iTunes Music Store on line and purchase for download CD’s or individual songs at a fraction of the cost of purchasing a CD off a store shelf. The artists’ still gets their royalties; you just don’t pay for packaging etc. The average cost for a full album through the on-line music store is $9.99 tax included. The cost for the same CD at a common music retailer (I won’t name any names… but it’s initials are H.M.V.) would be around $26.00 plus tax. Now I’m not saying you shouldn’t support local music stores. I believe you should. It’s just hard to justify paying 2/3’s more for the jewel-case and insert, which most people lose anyways.
doug
iTunes Super Geek Speak: Proceed with Caution!
My father mentioned that songs are stored in a compressed format. The default for importing audio into iTunes is Dolby AAC (Mpeg4). Songs purchased from the online store are also in AAC format. The compression is not 100% lossless compared to the original uncompressed source, however, AAC is extremely close. When you take an Mpeg3 file and reference it 180 degrees out phase against its uncompressed source, there is a remarkable amount of information still audible. (If you take the uncompressed source and reference it against itself 180 degrees out of phase there is total cancellation. [-1 + 1 = 0] So by referencing the compressed vs the uncompressed out of phase, any information that is left over is what is missing from the compressed file.) AAC is almost identical compared to mp3. Certainly through consumer audio systems and typical listening environments the majority of people would not be able to hear any difference at all. So it is a pretty fair trade off between file size and audio quality.
If anyone is actually interested I would be happy to post an MP3 and AAC phase test on the web to hear for yourselves…
d
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Greetings
everyone!
Well,
right off the bat, I have to pay tribute to Doug and Sue for being wonderful
host’s even in absentia! When they realized that Carole and I wouldn’t be able
to make the trip to Squamish and other parts of BC, they decided to do a BC
appreciation run and report their experiences to us so we could enjoy the trip
through them. In the mail yesterday we received a package from the west
containing a CD with 50 pictures of a round trip excursion by Doug and Sue to
Vancouver Island and back to Squamish. They took a couple of days and drove and
floated over to the island and drove north to Comox on the island. They then
took a Ferry back to the mainland and made their way back to home base. All the
while, documenting the event with their digital camera so they could send a
record of it to Carole and I. We were very pleasantly surprised by the gift and
REALLY appreciate this lovely surprise from Doug and Sue! Thanks guys, the
photos make us feel like we were actually there with you! We hope you enjoyed
the real thing as much or more.
*
Here In KW
Riding a
motorcycle is a different way to travel for sure. Its one positive aspect is
that in order to do it safely, one must pay attention every minute he’s
driving. If you lose concentration for a second it can be disastrous! Giving
yourself lots of room between your bike and the vehicle in front of you is
probably the most important thing you can do. Four wheel vehicles seem to stop
quicker than motorcycles. I’ve spent close to 30 years responding to motorcycle
accidents and trust me, the motorcyclist never wins! The one thing I’ve noticed
about riding a bike, is the sense of smell that seems to blossom while riding
in the wind. You suddenly become aware of all the odours in the air around you.
Everything from diesel exhaust fumes to someone frying bacon in their kitchen
with the window open. I’d say that since the advent of air conditioning systems
in vehicles, drivers have been denied the experience of smelling what’s going
on around them as they travel. I enjoy the smell of barbeques sizzling in
someone’s back yard and the smell of fresh bread baking as I pass by Weston’s
Bakery on Victoria St in Kitchener. There is one odour however that I’d just as
soon do without and that is the smell of second hand smoke from the vehicle
ahead of me. It doesn’t matter if we’re doing 100 km/h on the expressway or
idling in traffic at a stop light the stench of cigarette smoke seems to find
it’s way to my nasal passages. I have never been a fan of that odour and was
amazed the first time I noticed it while speeding along at highway speeds on
the bike. I will either slow down, move over a lane or two or pass the offending
driver to get away from the stench of cigarette smoke. Thank God we don’t have
to be subjected to second hand smoke in public places such as restaurants any
longer. I wonder if there’s some way of banning smoking while driving?
Hmmmmmmmmmmmm……..?
Now
there’s a new challenge for the anti smoking activists! I hope if they decide
to tackle this problem, they succeed.
That’s
about it for this week!
Thanks
everyone for tuning in and I look forward to talking to you all again next time
in The Ontarion Report.
Bye for now…… GREG.
PS:
Something To Think About>
Rumor
travels faster, but it doesn’t stay put as long as truth!
****
The Family and the Squamidian sites:
http://members.shaw.ca/doug_b/ and http://www.thedougsite.ca
Have a good one..
the
doug
The Fine Print!
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