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Notes from a bemused canuck

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Month: May 2005

Weekend in review

Posted on May 31, 2005 By admin 3 Comments on Weekend in review

Today, I am happy.

That, in itself, means little, to be honest, but it's the culmination of a lot of worries. I love my job, I love my Katy, I love my apartment. Touch wood, things will continue on this merry way *touches wood*.


I had a nice weekend. Lots of yummy spicy food, waaaay too much pig, lots of money spent.

I bought a VCR (which raised my blood pressure – SCART leads are evil, so are NTL boxes) and a little HI-FI for the bedroom. Yesterday, Katy and I went to The Pier and other swanky shops on Fitzroy street for stuff to add a bit of colour to the apartment. Got some nice cushions for the couch and the rocking chair. I seriously need to go back to the open-air market in the city center because I'm drooling over the batik fabric throws. I'm seriously going to spend some money there next pay. It has beautiful stuff, but as Katy says, we need to unpack and place all the schwag we have in boxes before we get more.

I'll be posting pictures of the apartment as soon as things get settled.

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Vocabularians and lingweenies

Posted on May 31, 2005 By admin

What a lovely bunch of vocabularians (persons who make up new words) you are! Lasterday (refers to any day before today) we squinched (action required to fit something into a space that is slightly too small) a schmiglet (a small unit of measurement) of your awesomtastic (so wonderful the words just meld in your mouth) one-of-a-kind entries into this space in preparation for our Top Ten reveal. With so many chizzy (awesome, super, happening) creations to choose from, we admit to becoming a bit flusterpated (a state of being flustered that's so intense, one's actions and words become bound up) and fahoodled (confused, esp. when trying to think of too many things at once). We craughed (to cry and laugh simultaneously), we troddled (to wander around without knowing of doing so), and finally decided to use the schwack (a large amount) of multiple entries received as the basis for the Top Tenthis is, let's not forget, all about favoritism.

From the thousands of submissions we received, here, then, are the ten words (not in the dictionary) entered the most often:

Top Ten Favorite Words (Not in the Dictionary)

1. ginormous (adj): bigger than gigantic and bigger than enormous

2. confuzzled (adj): confused and puzzled at the same time

3. woot (interj): an exclamation of joy or excitement

4. chillax (v): chill out/relax, hang out with friends

5. cognitive displaysia (n): the feeling you have before you even leave the house that you are going to forget something and not remember it until you're on the highway

6. gription (n): the purchase gained by friction: “My car needs new tires because the old ones have lost their gription.”

7. phonecrastinate (v): to put off answering the phone until caller ID displays the incoming name and number

8. slickery (adj): having a surface that is wet and icy

9. snirt (n): snow that is dirty, often seen by the side of roads and parking lots that have been plowed

10. lingweenie (n): a person incapable of producing neologisms

Original link: http://m-w.com/info/favorite.htm

POPULAR CULTURE

ESPN-onage (n): secretly viewing an all-sports network when your wife leaves the room

polkadodge (n): the pseudo dance when two people attempt to pass each other, each moving in the same direction

scrax (n): the waxy coating that must be scratched off an instant lottery ticket

LANGUAGE

dunandunate (v): to overuse a word or phrase that has been recently added to one's vocabulary

lexpionage (n): the sleuthing of new words and phrases

whinese (n) a language spoken by children or spouses on long road trips

WEATHER

slush turtle (n): the snow that collects on your mud flap

spinter (n): the season between winter and spring where everything is drowning in a slush/mud mixture

sprummer (n) when spring and summer can't decide which is going to come firsthot one day, cold the next

PEOPLE

headset jockey (n): a telephone call center worker at the other end of a toll-free number

knitpicker (n): a person who selects your knitted sweaters. Beware the Christmas knitpicker or the put-the-family-in-the-same-sweater-for-the-photo knitpicker.

stealth-geek (n): one that hides nerdy interests while maintaining a normal outward appearance

ANATOMY

fumb (n): the large toe

jimberjaw (n): a protrusive chin

wibble (n): a trembling of the lower lip just shy of actually crying

MENTAL & PHYSICAL CONDITIONS

asphinxiation (n): when you are sick to death of unanswerable riddles

museum head (n): being mentally exhausted, and unable to take in anything more; usu. follows after a full day at the museum

precuperate (v): prepare for the possibility of being ill

TECHNOLOGY & THE INTERNET

shanghaIM (v): Instant Messaging somebody who's in the process of IM-ing somebody else, causing them to inadvertently type (and possibly send) their message to you

vidiot (n): one inept at programming a VCR

wurfing (v): the act of surfing the Internet at work and rationalizing that it is for work purposes

TRANSPORTATION

detroitus (n): car parts found alongside the highway

junkstaposition (n): when two or more immobile vehicles are parked next to each other

pregreening (v): the tendency to creep forward while waiting for a red light to change

FOOD

onionate (v): to overwhelm with post-dining breath

smushables (n): the groceries that must be packed at the top of the bag or separately to avoid being mangled by the time you get home

spatulate (v): remove cake batter or other substances from the side of a mixing bowl with a spatula

MISCELLANEOUS

dringle (n): the ring-shaped stain on wood caused by condensation from a glass of liquid

espacular (adj): especially spectacular

furgle (v): to feel in a pocket or purse for a small object such as a coin or key

hoyle (n): the point at which a genius transcends our reality and becomes a madman

nudenda (n): a nudist's unhidden agenda

optotoxical (adj): of or pertaining to poisonous looks that could kill, esp. from a spouse

parrotise (n): a haven for exotic birds, esp. green ones

quackmire (n): muddy edges of a duck pond

sinspire (v): to compel one to be creatively wicked

sprog (v): to go faster than a jog but slower than a sprint

Source: http://m-w.com/info/favorite_not_prev.htm

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Hmmmm, pig.

Posted on May 29, 2005 By admin

Katy and I have been eating a lot of pig in the past little while. This makes us happy. Hmmmm, pig. We had Katy's mom's curry last night. Hmmmmmm, curry. And she made this dish with cabbage and carrots and chilies. Hmmmmm, chilies.

We came to Leicester this weekend to drop off some things and pick up a staggering amount of stuff to bring home. Katy's parents are driving us back to Cambs today, so we're going to have a day out and about in town. They also wanted to have a peek at the apartment with all my furniture in it. We're off soon, so more later.

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Pillow talk

Posted on May 28, 2005 By admin 1 Comment on Pillow talk

Her: I'm craving cheese & mustard sandwiches.
Me: You are so peeing on a stick when we get home. You have all the signs of a pregnant woman. Your back hurts, your ankles are swollen and you have violent mood swings.
Her: you'll find that that's just me, dear.

To which I had to giggle.

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it's hot, it's damn hot!

Posted on May 26, 2005 By admin 5 Comments on it's hot, it's damn hot!

I've been productive today.

I've registered at the surgery nearest to my house (as I'd been meaning to do for a while now) and I have a checkup next tuesday. Nothing's wrong, I just need a referral for an ophthalmologist.

I've been told by Barclays that since I'm foreign scum, I can't open a bank account with them. I wanted to get one so I could have a savings account separate from my natwest checking account. Screw 'em, I'll get a natwest savings account. I have now called NW and they're sending me the paperwork to sign.

I've vacuumed my apartment to get rid of most of the schmutz on the floor resulting from the bubblewrap bomb that went off on tuesday.

I've spent a morning bidding on stuff at Cheffin's military antique and attic sale. I bought some cool russian decorative plates to use as wall hangings, a victorian silver whiskey decanter, two little prints and the birthday present I wanted to get for my dad.

As a side note, auctions ROCK! I was good, and didn't spend too much money. I'd set aside 100 pounds and ended up spending 110. There are a few lots that I'm really not happy about letting go, but the last thing I wanted to do was get auction fever and end up spending 175 pounds for RAF commemorative plates of the end of the battle of britain (I stopped at 50 pounds for that lot). There was a lot of WW2 stuff that my dad would have loved, as well as some decommissioned guns – though I have no idea how I'd manage to ship him an AK-47 or an Bren MK1 machine gun. I would have loved to get the german officer leather trench coat, but that thing went for an insane amount, as well as a genuine RAF fleece-lined leather aviator jacket.

The attic sale was a fun jumble. The difference between lot prices is amazing. A damn big mahogany side-board with a huge mirror went for 40 pounds. If it would have been possible to fit the thing in my already cramped apartment, I'd have gotten it. Bargains to be made, I tells ya.

Plus, maybe it's because I'm a newbie, but I really got a rush of bidding, especially when you get in a little war with someone else (who, most of time, has deeper pockets than you do). I'm going to have to do that again :)

As a side note, I had the strongest feeling of deja-vue while I was there. Meh, I'm used to that. Side-note #2, I was the youngest person there by a longshot. However, I didn't stand out when compared to the 40 year old dude with the jackboots, ugly-ass handmade tats and razorhead tshirt… Side-note #3, it's so hot today that I've already changed my tshirt twice.

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Songs that remind you of people

Posted on May 25, 2005 By admin 7 Comments on Songs that remind you of people

You know, there are songs that you just associate with people, for a variety of reasons.

For example, the song that's playing right now will always remind me of my friend PO (and goes all the way back to CEGEP, all those years ago).

So my question to you, general public, is what song reminds you of me?

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The dice man

Posted on May 25, 2005 By admin 1 Comment on The dice man

I started a new book today, The Dice Man, from Luke Rhineheart.

After having lived in moderate happiness with moderate success with an average wife and family for seven years, I found suddenly, around my thirty-second birthday, that I wanted to kill myself. And to kill several other people too. […] Now the desire to kill oneself and to assassinate, poison, obliterate or rape others is generally considered by the psychiatric profession as 'unhealthy'. Bad. Evil. More accurately, sin. When you have the desire to kill yourself, you are supposed to see it and 'accept it', but not, for Christ's sake, to kill yourself. If you desire to have carnal knowledge of a helpless teenybopper, you are to accept your lust, and not lay a finger on even her big toe. If you hate your father, fine – but don't slug the bastard with a baseball bat. Understand yourself, accept yourself, but do not be yourself. It is a conservative doctrine, guaranteed to help the patient avoid violent, passionate and unusual acts and to permit a prolonged, respectable life of moderate misery.

It shows promise :)

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A weird night's sleep

Posted on May 25, 2005 By admin 3 Comments on A weird night's sleep

I slept in my own bed for the first time in over a month last night. It's weird, cause I need to get used to my mattress again. I've also discovered that the back garden is FULL of songbirds that think that 4am is a perfectly wonderful time to start tweeting. I must consider investing in a shotgun.

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This is me being geeky

Posted on May 25, 2005 By admin 2 Comments on This is me being geeky

People have been asking me if I like my new job and what exactly it is I'm doing here. Short answers for both: I love my job and I'm designing and implementing web services for ontology and controlled vocabulary lookups.

It's amazing the surge of productivity I've seen in myself since I moved here. The job I was doing at McGill was, to put it mildly, not up my alley. I could do it, but I hated every minute of it. To those people who know me well, this will say it all: I'm looking forward to go to work in the morning now and I haven't been late once! (though the fear of missing my only means of getting to the office might have a bit to do with that last one)

As to what I'm doing, we need a centralized source to query ontologies like GO and MeSH (to name a few). Things like that's the ID associated with this term, or what are all the child terms that are linked to this ID. Since this is going to be reused by a few people, we decided to go for broke and make a nice series of webservices, cause we're nice like that. You'll find the database schema and the class diagram below:

 

This has been my moment of geekiness, please ignore all of the above if you're not computationally enclined.

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My furniture saga unfolds

Posted on May 24, 2005 By admin 3 Comments on My furniture saga unfolds

They were in and gone by 9:30am this morning. It's now 4pm and there's bubblewrap everywhere in my apartment. Every step I take makes noise. The big pieces are all unwrapped and rebuilt. I have a set of sheets in the wash right now so they can have that fresh-laundered smell. I only have about a half-dozen boxes that need unpacking. I'm halfway done on all the dishes I need to wash before I can pack them away. My apartment suddenly shrank by half :)

I have my stuff.

yay :)

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Quote of the day

"Taxation, gentlemen, is very much like dairy farming. The task is to extract the maximum amount of milk with the minimum of moo. And I am afraid to say that these days all I get is moo."
--(Terry Pratchett, Jingo)

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