the pod bay door

:: My brother’s brief report on Elvis Costello’s appearance at the Calgary Folk Music Festival two hours ago is available for viewing.

:: I was at work today, felt like going in for one day this week. Tomorrow is another lazy day. I attended my Pilates class tonight and it felt like gentle torture. Tonight in my computer room at home I found some misplaced photographs and a lost business card with an important phone number on it. Two discoveries in 30 minutes! Now if only I could find the book that’s gone awol…

:: The temperature has been hovering in the 30C (86F) range here for a couple days. Very hot, I have fans on throughout the house. I will return to work tomorrow for one day, then take Friday off. (Don’t ask, it’s something I feel I have to do).

:: If I was retired and flush with cash, or independently wealthy, I’d consider attending the 10-day World 3-D Film Expo, 12-21 September 2003, in Hollywood.

:: I bought skater shoes and sandals today. No pictures available at this time.

:: Back in Edmonton, after a 12-hour drive from Brandon yesterday, where I’d spent the night at a friend’s house. (Thanks, Cathy!). The last three days in Winnipeg were much fun, very memorable. I am exhausted on many fronts: emotionally, physically, mentally. I am “peopled” out. Here are the details from the open house on July 18th:
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:: The homepage on my folks’ computer defaults to the Shaw high speed internet site. I’ve always detested the fact that Canadians cannot subscribe to US cable networks such as HBO, Cinemax, Nickleodeon, Showtime, etc. Imagine my shock and awe when I noticed the words, “Interested in HBO? Take the Poll” on the above page. I clicked and came to a page that reads:

INTERESTED IN HBO? HBO, ESPN, Fox News, Nickelodeon Kids, Showtime and more!

You may have recently read that Shaw has applied through the CCTA (Canadian Cable Television Association) to allow Canadian cable distributors the ability to offer American Networks such as HBO, Showtime, Cinemax, VH1 and others. This application was in response to numerous requests we have had from our customers through our call centers and retail locations.

Currently, the only way to access these popular networks is through Black Market illegal satellite systems. The majority of the 400,000 Canadians with illegal satellite are using it to access these popular networks.

We are interested in your opinion on this issue. Do you think that Canadians should have access to these American Networks? Click here to cast your vote.

Thank you for taking the time to share your opinion with Shaw. We look forward to serving you better!

After picking myself and my jaw up off the floor, I quickly voted, and noted the results to date: 96.5% – YES, 3.5% – NO.

I checked the CCTA web site, and found this 19 June 2003 news release, providing more details about the application. The 24-page application is available here, in PDF format.

If you support this application, PLEASE go to this page and cast your vote in favour of Shaw’s efforts. Note that you can only cast your vote once. But please, do it!

:: Each visit to Winnipeg is not complete w/o an evening with a group of important local friends, including Tony, Steve, Mike, and others, and usually in the form of a bbq, which we did this evening at Steve and Val’s house. Mike and Susan are on vacation, so I missed them this time around.

As always, we had much fun, the burgers and smokies were downed, the beer flowed, the conversation continued for hours. Claire, Tony’s daughter, will be entering UW this fall, and recently began an online journal. I love her concise and to-the-point movie reviews!

:: Tomorrow is Part 1 of the high school reunion. And I get to sleep in again.

:: I’m running searches on Google trying to find a specific satire blog (which really pokes fun at blogging in its simplest form), and I found a reference to satire blogs by Dubya and Saddam. Oh, I found it.

:: Today I took my mother and her neighbour Lynn’s two children to see Finding Nemo. This is a marvelous movie, another triumph for Pixar (Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, Monsters, Inc.), and one of the best films of 2003. The writing is crisp, the characters funny and engaging; I laughed out loud many times during the movie. Voice actors include Albert Brooks, Ellen de Generes, Geoffrey Rush, Allison Janney, Willem Dafoe, Eric Bana (The Hulk), Barry Humphries, Elizabeth Perkins, and many others. BTW, check the “outtakes” from TS2.

:: This evening, Brenda made dinner for me. The main course was beer butt chicken. I’m not kidding. It was delicious. You shove an open can of beer up the chicken’s butt, place it on a bbq… More details to come.