Tiring day... I worked on the contuing job of cleaning and packing my apartment; after filling a box with recycling and throwing out a ton of plastic junk I still haven't made a dent in the clearing out of my computer room. sigh

I just posted a decent-sized article on the ABomanation blog on Fight City. I haven't been as frequent a poster here because Blogger has been giving me a lot of grief posting to Jazzlife.

I noticed from my tracker stats that folks are finding this Blog while looking for Alyson Court through search engines...

Sorry if I'm not providing you much on this delightful young lady in your searches... but I have to say: you have good taste.

I forgot about Daylight Savings Time starting today in Montreal. I could have gotten another hour's sleep!

Instead I had an extra hour to face the fact that as of this morning, there's snow on the ground. :[

NewsTrolls - News Under the Radar -. As with a lot of cool stuff on the Net, I found this thanks to jo the webmistress highlighting it.

It offers a great series of newsfeeds on all topics... but more importantly to many - including me - is that their comics section has great material! I wanted to link to a strip or two, but it didn't work... so you'll have to discover their great site for yourself.

It looks like the connection problem between Blogger and Freeservers is now resolved. My posting is a couple of days out of date, but at least you can read 'em!

Today was a day to hopefully get some extra money my way through work on a website. The offices for the Cystic Fibrosis society that I visited were near the McGill University, and the office area (actually the entire home!) were stuff that I dream of having. Well, except for the stairs part...

We'll see what comes of this in the next little while.

Blog-O-Baubles. Another blog by a fellow Canadian!

This one also talks of family life, which I love to read about... plus the story of buying Hallowe'en costumes at WalMart gives me chills; I have to go there to buy a costume for a friend's pre-Hallowe'en birthday party too.

(First time I'll dress up for the holiday since 1994)

Kinky cop handcuffs girlfriend - and has to ask bosses for key

This sounds weird... and not in a GOOD way!

If this works, you'll have 3 new posts to read. Actually, 2 from yesterday, plus this one. Blogger wouldn't allow me to upload by FTP yesterday.

Today was another day for small Flash victories: I succeded in making a music loop stop between scenes! A simple command did the trick, one I hadn't used before.

I ended up redoing my intro movie as a new scene on the main timeline. Because of it, I haven't been able to test out the preloader yet, but I'm hoping I can by the time this goes online.

Dr. Laura Shleisinger. If anyone makes me embarassed to be part of the same culture, it's her. Everytime she opens her mouth, it's her.

Homophobic and vocally nasty about it, insulting to everyone else... at least Howard Stern makes fun of himself as often as he does others, and doesn't expect anyone to accept his spew!

I'd heard her tripe TV show was cancelled. If so, why is it still on the air?

I'm also bothered by The 700 Club on TV. It seems it's always on when I wake up to watch taped shows in the morning.

It's the most extremist and narrow-minded show I've seen on the air for Christianity so far. Stuff like this does way more harm than good to a belief system.

Zero Tolerance for negative-minded people trying to think for us.

The Complete Bushisms - Updated daily. by Jacob Weisberg

People would actually want a man who says things like this as their President? Ack!

I haven't gone to my BBS home, The Savage Land since yesterday evening. Because of my tendency for short tempers, I've been reluctant to.

There's a guy I've known for years (because I don't want to talk of other folks the way I do myself, I'll call him Monahan here) with a learning disability; he has very weak short-term memory.

I tend to give him some slack for that - usually. On the BBS, he never even makes an attempt to post to anyone - unless it's to reply to something they said to him. Even then, if he answers in a full sentence, I'm amazed.

Because of my own disability - which I always try to work around - I can't be more forgiving about this. Every few months, we bring it up; every few months, he just says "OK!" about it - then goes back to his same stunts.

Us folks with disabilities try to work around them, because we want to still go on living, go on growing. He won't even try - and that annoys me.

I'm posting while at the office right now. Because of last night's WWF PPV (which I speak about a bit on the ABomanation blog at Fight City), I didn't get a huge amount of sleep before...

I also had sad news as I got in today: one of my co-workers (actually 2; the Director is with him) won't be in this week, because his mother died.

We'll all have to face that someday... I don't know how I'll handle it. My deepest sympathies go out to them.

While the actual medication was a wash, my 5 months of self-injection of Betaseron proved to have some use today...:

I finally got my flu shot for the year today. In the past, I wouldv'e been extremely agitated about having the shot.

However, this time, because a) I hardly felt it last year when I had it and b) I spent all those months steeling myself for injections meant that I took the shot this year wuthout even flinching! In fact, the lady who gave me the shot couldn't believe I was needlephobic because I didn't even take a breath before she gave me the shot. :)

I just visited JenniCam from a link in another weblog; I visited it a few times in the past, now I was vaguely curious how it changed.

I've always found it a bit smarky, to be honest... while Jenni always spoke of it as a way to follow a person's life online, how it wasn't meant to be voyeuristic - yet the gallery had tons of photos of her masturbating naked.

I currently don't own a webcam, but if that's the kind of photos you look for, I'll save you the effort for when I do get one: you won't see photos like that on Jazzlife!

It seems that Jenni has a boyfriend now... so you get to see photos of the couple having sex instead.

Not voyeuristic. Surrre...

PASSERBY V1.0 :::: ponderings in montreal.

Actually, the weblog itself moved from here in July 2000, but the top-most post includes a link to it.

This is my home city... how could I not link to a blog by it's name?

Hmm... I downloaded/printed up a Flash tutorial today to learn how to do something I've been trying to do for awhile: scrolling text with a draggable slide-bar.

So, I start to read what claims to be an 'easy' tutorial... and EASY is something it doesn't suit. I have experience at programming and it's still as clear as mud to me!

Yahoo! dropped in value a little yesterday again. Not a huge amount; it was something like 9/16 %. The funny thing is that I encouraged my stock club to now think of buying some while the price is lower; would've been ironic if right after my recommendation was when it gave a serious value rally.

I just looked at the price my Yahoo! stock was trading at by the end of the trading day. It had a 12.97% increase... $59 still isn't the high price, but I'll take whatever we get!

I've been thinking of stocks all evening. Tonight was the monthly meeting for my investment club. Overall, we had some serious discussions... but I was more concerned about our host, who wasn't feeling well.

That Russian philosopher streak that hits me from time to time hits here often too. I was usually the youngest member of the group, but in the beginning I was the only member still in his 20s. Now, the only one below 40 is more accurate.

My good friend (the one who helped me to get this PC) is 80 this year. Our host will soon be so as well. Most of the group are people in their early 50s or mid-60s.

This is strange... Blogger can't work the FTP settings for my ABomanation blog on Fight city.

I just posted a long entry to it too, earlier today.

Well, my stock value went up a little bit today, to around $52. Not a huge change, but anything of an increase is good to me.

I spent part of the day filling more hours for work. I'm seeing that Swish graphics for replacement of stuff I'd already created in Flash isn't really a good idea. The animations don't look terribly good. Mind you, I can use it to create the fonts I'd like to use within my main movie.

Crap. Crap, and more of the same!

Yahoo! stock prices are still plumetting. It's now trading around $46.

I've been constantly reading analysts suggesting that now would be the best time to buy more shares at a far lower price, before it soars up again; I don't have the spare cash to do so. Meanwhile, I have 12 shares that have dropped more than 200% from when I first got them. Bleh.

I also found out from my mom today that the twins organization site that I passed on to my brother-in-law was actually already taken over by another couple ages ago. Granted, I fell way behind on getting this done for them... but not bothering to let me know the designers have been switched is downright impolite.

Adapted Transport Sucks

There. It's nothing in a statement surprising to any of my regular readers, but I had to get it off my chest.

I've been trying to reach them since 10am. I have to reserve my transport for work Thursday... but all I've been getting are busy signals.

Now, in an efficiently run company, someone would say "We don't have enough lines free to cater to our client base... time to add more lines." Not so with these folks.

The service has earned the nickname "Mal-Adapted Transport", and this is why.

Financial frustrations mounted for me Monday, as I barely scrambled together the funds to buy a hamburger at lunch. I have to land a way to generate more revenue, and soon. I can't last this way. Time for that Taurus stubborn streak of mine to kick in!

My buddy Mike came by in the evening to give me Comicopia 61, and to take all the back issue stock off my hands. That's another corner of my living room cleared now!

Nothing like heading to bed in a bad mood.

I go to work tomorrow not even knowing if I can afford breakfast, let alone lunch. The paycheck I got on Friday left me $0 left as of paying rent and electricity expenses as of Friday. I guess JOB does mean "just over broke."

I passed a website onto my brother-in-law today. I originally took the site as a volunteer project after my sister recommended me - but that was near the beginning of this year. With commissions to take care of, and starting a job, I didn't have the free time to devote to it.

Now, my brother-in-law is learning HTML to try to get into it himself. My sister - his wife - is part of the club the site is for, so he's even one step closer to a member. This should work out fine.

Something is happening right now that really annoys me: even though I had 3 meals today, my body has decided to hit me with a hunger headache.

I spoke with my buddy Mike about Comicopia earlier today. He was supposed to bring me over my copy of the finished zine today (clocking in as another monster at 407 pages!), but headaches with the postal system today left him rushing around too much. So, I'll get it tomorrow instead.

Strange... I tried to post this earlier, but a new window kept opening up instead...

I printed up the copies for my zine for Comicopia 61 today. The man working at my usual copy place would have ripped me off if I hadn't stood up for myself.

I printed a total of 660 pages, which he figured it would be OK to charge me 6 cents a copy. That would amount to over $55. Outrageous!

I pointed out to him that I'd been a customer there for over 6 years, that the prices on their quantity chart were used for me always; the difference would mean I'd pay 3.5 cents a page.

At first, he wanted to argue that that was the price for a quantity of one page printed. I wouldn't accept that. I pointed out I'd been coming there for years because it was less expensive, that the price he'd just given me was more expensive than a copy centre in my neighborhood... he finally gave in.

The bill was $26.71. MUCH better.

In local Montreal news: the current mayor is really pushing his plan to abolish all the city's districts to make it one 'Supercity'. Nothing like a politician who wants to pass a massive change that the majority of people have said they don't want...

The latest announcement was of 6 city areas that he'd abolish immediately. Interesting how they're all areas that were most vocal about not wanting his plan...

Folks are now talking of holding a Refferrendum for each neighborhood to separate from Montreal. That word is already a constant headache in all Quebec minds...

Lousy day today, on several fronts.:

• My Yahoo! shares are going down the toilet; in the past two days, the value lost has been in the neighborhood of 40%. Current value is around $58.


• I got my paycheck for the week today... and once I pay a part of my rent tomorrow will have absolutely zip until next Thursday.


• One of my cats, Boots, is acting like a nut the past few days. He reacts to any change in his environment by acting surly... and I'm in the midst of major packing. sigh

I did something potentially noble this morning... in the end, I didn't have to, but it was noble nonetheless.

Every year for the past few I've been a recipient of the Gazette Christmas Fund (the Gazette is Montreal's english language newspaper). I wasn't sure if this year I'd really be deserving of it, since I'm employed part-time. If it was the case, I wanted to pass on it to allow someone more needy to get it.

Turns out I'm still elligible, because of my disabilty. The gesture was there, though.

I just changed my preferences on Weblogs. I kept getting error messages from attempts to visit my site. I can't understand why it's having errors, but I'd rather not know that about 10 people a day can't get to this Blog!

I'm trying to email a member of one of the APAs I contribute to. He never comments on the materials we contribute; that's very disheartening... it gives a sense of our contributions not being worthy of acknowledgment. I don't just write to hear my computer keys click, so understandably that bothers me.

As promised awhile ago, here's the logo I designed for Leth-Go:

I spent about 2 hours trying to get through to Adapted Transport today before I decided to wait for later. I have to get transport to work for Thursday, but I have a life around the phone, thank you very much.

MANiC! - what happens when you try to tag-team the world.... As a fellow Canadian alone, I'd recommend this Blog - but the fact that it's interesting (and talks about The Sims, a game I don't yet have but have heard great things about) makes it a more compelling visit.

My PC gives off a burning smell today... I'm hoping the CPU won't soon melt.

That's what happened a few years ago... for Montreal folks, I have to warn you: BusinessWay/CorBit are lousy on service or selling decent systems. It shouldn't melt, but it does.

The frustrating thing: since it's no longer under warranty - and my Yahoo! shares have really dropped in value - it'll be much harder to afford a replacement.

The day has started off chilly again - but I have to get things done! Although it's Thanksgiving Day here in Canada, I have several hours of work to do, as well as zines to write and print... PLUS, I have a ton of recycling/trashing to do to get this place ready for an eventual move...

The weather today really didn't make me productive... we have late fall chill outside, with some of it seeping into my apartment. Results: other than surfing the 'net most of the day, I didn't get any work done, on writing or my Flash project for work.

I recounted the page numbering on my zine before printing it up. I goofed a bit; I actually have 29 pages, not 31. That's still impressive.

Sometimes, I scare myself with my size of prolific writing output...

I just finished writing my zine for Comicopia 61 about half an hour ago. After setting all the page numbers, I've come to a final page-count of 31 - only 6 less pages than last issue.

I'm still dazed by this.

I've said before that every victory - no matter how small - is something to celebrate:

I went to WalMart today, to buy a new ink cartridge for my inkjet printer. There are two I know of near me: one in a nearby suburb of Montreal that only has a bus every half an hour, or another one in another suburb, theoretically closer to my home, but requiring a lot of walking to get to and from.

Faced with my movement limitations, I braved the former.

I ended up spending nearly 3 hours on the road to go there, not knowing much of the area I was going, but I just took the adventure and did it.

The Subsidized/Adapted housing services here in Montreal are incredibly lame at times.

More than 2 weeks ago, I asked if I could send my T4s with my application instead of a completed tax form, as I don't have one yet. I was told yes.

So: today I get my entire application returned to me, with the request to send a copy of my completed tax forms.

Idiots.

I didn't speak about some important news yesterday: Mark David Chapman, the man who murdered John Lennon more than a decade ago, was refused parole.

My reaction: GOOD.

A man does something unforgivable, takes a great soul out of the world before his time... and just because he's found religion and now says he's sorry, he should get realeased? I don't think so!

Rotting in jail is too good for him.

Tonight was the season premiere of Dawson's Creek on the WB.

I know, the show causes high projectile vomitting from quite a few real teenagers, the dialogue is like nothing a real teen would say... I guess the real demographic for the show is guys in their early 30s like me, wishing that they knew someone like Katie Holmes back in the day...

As sad as Pierre Elliot Trudeau's death was, I can't help but laugh at the ignorance shown by a Manhattan news anchor about it: apparently, he reported that "Former Canadian Prime Minister GARY Trudeau died."

GARY?!!

Why do I see that famous cartoonist drawing a cartoon to ridicule?

I was surprised: I just looked at the log stats for this site.

Apparently, Google sent a visitor my way in the past few days.

That in itself wasn't unusual. What was: even though the link was to the keywords Jazz Life, the content that it linked to was my article about the death of my family friend Loretta Rodman. It was a sad, significant event, but in no way jazz-related...

Message in a bottle travels halfway round the world.

This just goes to show: even in our age of high technology, some old stunts still work.

Residents face fines for flaunting knickers. After all the heavy sadness here for the past few days, I needed something lighter...

I saw the Trudeau funeral coverage on the news this evening. Very painful emotional stuff.

His son Justin delivered a eulogy. Even though his sons aren't being groomed for politics (Justin is a teacher in BC) he was extremely eloquent, and brought a sense of his father speaking.

It showed how important Trudeau was as well; Fidel Castro was there, talking with Jimmy Carter, former US President and long-time nemesis. It showed that respect for Pierre was stronger than personal grudges.

What upset me though was that people made a big deal about his daughter and her mother being there, because Trudeau wasn't married to her. Give me a break! The little girl just lost her father, her mother the father of her child. They don't have the right to grieve with the rest of the public there? I don't think so!

I wasn't able to attend the funeral of Pierre Trudeau today, but I heard it was very touching. I'll hear about it on the news in an hour.

An era in Canada is completely ended now. sigh

What I did get done today is to make a large dent in my computer room clean-out. A large chink of flooring is now cleared up... only drawback is that I'm now tired from this, and have to get to sleep.

powazek productions >>> a webcam for my brain. Why do I always seem to be following jo the webmistress on these things?

Oh well. Derek's post about personal websites here (sorry, he doesn't have permanent links to posts activated) just hits home. As a person who usually ends up as the only visitor to his Blog most days, I can relate - and it's very useful words to think about.

Our Quebec power company (Hydro Québec) are one step shy of mobsters, in my opinion.

I'm on their monthly budget payment plan. In my reevaluation for the year, it went up. They also decided I had an additional $150 to pay, and if I didn't pay it ASAP, it would be folded into my first 6 monthly bills. That brings me to a bill of almost $82 a month.

I pointed out to a service clerk today that this kind of payment was impossible for me, short of starving for the week of payment. I could hear his shrug over the phone as he just said, "We aren't a bank."

Screw 'em. It will take me several years to pay off that amount, but I'll only pay what I can - and keep hoping for someone to offer competition for them already. We deserve better service.

This morning, having breakfast in a restaurant before work, a lady a few tables over was smoking - right on the edge of the non-smoking section.

I pointed it out, and she just shrugged, telling me, "Smokers have to go somewhere."

If she'd asked me, I could tell her where to go...

Actually, I can see where the sofa being pitched - and the other stuff as well - may end up helping me to junk a lot of stuff. If anything, it will spur me on in some things.

For instance, there's a shelf in my living room that needs to be junked ASAP. I'm using my wheelchair for seating in the living room for now; testing it out, I realized there isn't even enough room to take it out of there right now.

After 8 years, I still have way too much stuff... but I may be able to see a change in it over the next little while.

My friends came over to help pitch out the old sofa that I mentioned yesterday. We also threw out the sofa chair, a matress I'm not using (haven't been for years, in fact), and an old broken dishwasher that just took up space...

The sad/scary thing though, is the fact that it barely made a dent in my packing.

What a day... writing for Comicopia 61, packing and sorting stuff for my eventual move and for the throwing out of my sofa and worn out sofa-chair Sunday... it's been bloody busy!

I won't miss the sofa... we've had it for more than 10 years, with 9 of them it being in my possession. We got it from my Uncle Peter years ago, and my sister and I got it when we shared an apartment.

A cat we were house-sitting for a friend used it as a litterbox, and I've never been able to clean the smell out (it's safe to say I'm not friends with that person anymore either...). In warmer weather, it stank. I've just kept it because I couldn't afford to replace it...

No more! It goes out for the trash folks to pick up Monday. There'll be no room for it when I have to move to a 3 1/2 Adapted Unit.