Pimp My (Alberta) Campus

Just to be clear, I think Thomas puts the Progressive in the Alberta PC Party, and I don't really give a dog-damn about what goes on in post-secondary institutions so long as they're not concocting legions of microscopic death machines in the nano research facility of Campus Alberta.

Though I don't have any fancy letter designations after my name like our Provincial Deputy Czar, I did sort-of complete nearly one-third of a program at S.A.I.T. once upon a time. I dropped-out. Not only because the programming seemed awkwardly archaic, as though spit-out by some freakish abomination of a 1950's robotic engineering firm, my unenthusiastic instructors (I'm sure it was just my exceedingly bad luck in timing) mostly sucked, and at the time I was so highly confused by my self-imposed impoverished lifestyle that I just couldn't bear to suffer the stupidity of fighting the whole system on a diet of oatmeal and cabbage. Still, I think it's safe to say I know a thing or two about how higher education relates to getting higher and higher, and I don't need a diploma to rock the piano well enough to convince a certain typecast of art-chick that I'm not altogether unworthy of a good snogging, so.... uhh... drop me a line sometime?

Hopefully this latest institutional excision by the PCs will be enough to coerce the cadre of registered geek sympathizers into descending the staircases of their ivory towers long enough to tighten their belts a bit. His excellency, Czar Thomas, shouldn't hesitate in using his new found super powers stemming from his freshly minted status as a magic fulcrum in extorting some useful intellectual property from the entitled clutches of the pampered, directionless egg heads. These absent-minded professors with their dope pipes and their gaggles of art-fag groupies for audiences. Let's get serious here and break-out the filmstrip projectors; unlock the old listening lab for a dose of reality when it comes to reporting cutting-edge technology as an appreciating asset.

It's high time post secondary education dollars started garnering greater plus-money returns in their legacy role of twisting innovative thinkers into well-respected industry serving cogs with important shiny pins on their lapels. Czar Lukaszuk should use his elevated title like a trump card in as many backroom deals as possible and pimp the brain trust behind closed doors to key industry players - to the benefit of all Albertans, of course. If there were Alberta Legislative Member trading cards, I'd have only Thomas Lukaszuc and Raj Sherman cards in my collection because even during the Ed Stelmach daze, I thought them to be pretty cool operators with fine speaking voices.

Whatever. Get rich and have some fun at taxpayer expense. Who cares what the peanut gallery thinks. Most of them couldn't see the trees for the forest if they had on a pair of extra strength tree/forest-vision goggles. The unigeeks will always take care of developing innovative ideas because most of them need to resort to distinguishing themselves intellectually in order to get some action on a Friday night. You don't need a degree with distinction to figure out that the cart needs to go BEFORE the horse if you expect to lug those textbooks from the printing press. Now that the toothpaste is out of the tube, we need to get on with trying to put it back in by awarding some sweet contracts to some loosely organized firms who are willing to make every piece of empirical knowledge on record accessible through Kindle. Let's move forward already and turn over some serious one-sided coins.


The way I see it, the people who enroll in University can be divided into one of three camps: the methodical careerist who views higher education as nothing more than a necessary step in their pursuit of a normal, professional lifestyle; the gifted academic who wants to play a part in the advancement of universal knowledge for all of humanity; and the clueless hot chicks and hammerheads who see no option other than going to Campus Alberta so they can party and be with their friends. All three camps form a perfectly equilateral trinity of equilibrium in balancing the natural course of human progress against the intentions of God almighty.

Time is money, money is power, and power is maintaining an iron grip on the regulatory agencies that broker our lifestyles through their patents and their procurement of intellectual property. Let's pimp that campus post haste!

Get a Hobby, Mr. Expert

I could not more strongly disagree with anyone who proposes to unreasonably tax lifestyle choices. Of course, I do happen to be someone who happens to enjoy drinking, and I also smoke far more tobacco than anyone should, but this land wasn't built into the marvel we see before us today by a bunch of non-smoking teetotalers. Despite our sometimes drinking a bit more than we should - our society as a whole - from time to time, we continue to be functioning members of communities and folks who are loved by significant others. We sometimes contribute generously to the advancement of noble causes or help our friends through challenging times. We should not be treated as some endless source of revenue for a bunch of nitpickers! 

Everybody groans when prices go up, and we know that getting clobbered on spirits isn't always the wisest thing we choose to do, but seeing your wallet always being clobbered can be far more detrimental to one's well being than one's liver. Canadians continue to make whatever concessions in order to purchase all kinds of tasty alcoholic beverages and packs of smokes. It’s a tradition for many good people to go out and party with friends or meet new people with a little help from liquor. They go out on the weekends to fraternize with co-workers, and somehow manage to drink responsibly enough to have a grand old, uninhibited time under warm influence of good old-fashioned booze: a glass of wine with dinner and one following... before going to an outdoor patio for as many beer as one can handle while listening to good tunes. What. A. Great. Time. Something to look forward to after the monotony of a dreary week of working, and an enjoyable way to discuss current affairs, gossip, and sports or other interests and personal tastes.

One should simply drink as much as one sees fit. That’s my motto. So long as you’re relatively safe and don’t step on anyone’s toes. I see no good reason to penalize everyone who just wants to have a good time, and for some people coffee with cigarettes is a fun and relaxing thing to do. S 

"Would you care to have a cigarette to go with your crossword, M'am?"

"Why yes please! How kind of you to offer, young man! Let me buy YOU a drink!"

Of course I would never recommend that someone take up drinking or smoking necessarily, but let's face it - certain personalities seem to have a stronger inclination to become addicted to nicotine or booze for whatever reason. Cigarettes are very portable, and can be incredibly comforting for someone who smokes. A liter of Vodka can provide about six people with a great time, and in Alberta, a well-stocked boozemart is never too far away.

For me, nothing compares as a means to melt away life's nagging stresses than a smoke break, and basically, you're not hurting anybody other than yourself by inhaling a few puffs of smoldering tobacco. Nobody wants to see a loved perish from unhealthy lifestyle choices, but tell me, oh scholar, what would be worse: someone who suffers a complete emotional breakdown and uncontrollably lashes out at the world because tobacco and alcohol is so ridiculously taxed it becomes out of reach without cutting into their staple necessities, or a strong personality in demanding circumstances who manages to keep from going off the rails thanks to something as simple and mostly unobtrusive as having a smoke once in a while? I say, let us smokers smoke! I don't admonish others for their choices even if whatever they do doesn't suit me and I hate to see nice people be made out as pariahs. 

As overwhelmingly harmful as excessive tobacco and alcohol can be to one’s health, many smokers do indeed live to be a ripe old age. Drinkers too. Granted that it is highly unlikely that you won't develop a litany of health problems from decades of nicotine or booze addiction, one can always quit smoking or drinking. A terribly high percentage of the cost of packages of cigarettes and cigars, or bottles of liquor and beer, is already quite prohibitive anyhow, and yet people pay it. Why? They like it. Partying with booze is most often a joyous occasion. It’s tradition and it’s fun. It gets people dancing and singing; celebrating a wonderful life.

Not everybody is cut-out to drink and / or smoke, and booze especially can lead to peril and precarious situations. It is well known that alcohol often precedes violence and can spurn incredibly destructive behaviours to be exhibited by certain individuals. It has always been a negative societal reality, and it will always be a symptom of any free and just society. Fortunately everyone is typically well aware of booze-abuse realities, which is why in our benevolent western society we fund so many outreach services and therapeutic initiatives. I have no quarrel with any organization that relies upon attraction through good example. Interventions are sometime warranted to prevent hard cases from going over a cliff.

I like that people care about each other and some want to help people avoid a crash course. What I don’t like, are so-called experts who think they know what is best for everyone else – so much so that they see fit to coerce the government to penalize everyone with ever heightening sin taxes. It goes against the spirit of the free market, and it cheeses me off to no end!

With inflation what it is, and the stagnancy of wages, low-income earners can scarcely afford the simple pleasure of having reflective smoke-breaks throughout the day in the True North Strong and Free. They have to resort to inferior products if they drink routinely, and I think that’s almost criminal. One fringe benefit of being a smoker, from my own perspective, is that it provides a rock-solid excuse to remove oneself from any situation for a spell and to change the scenery momentarily. Most decent people can empathize with the gravity of a powerful craving. For this writer, smoking is like granting oneself little stimulating rewards throughout the day for a job well done. After work, there’s no better way I can think of to unwind than to have a few beer. I’m no expert, but I think that someone who routinely drinks beer might be far less concerned about health issues than someone who relies on, shall we say, strange concoctions of OTC drugs to get them through the night? Since we're being frank and honest here, let's admit that many people are habitually or occupationally exposed toxins far worse than those of a burning a dried, shredded-up plant leaf.

I like to write and to play guitar. I love having conversations with friends over a few drinks in a pub or a backyard. Getting blotto on a camping trip. Wine, beer and spirits taste good to me, and it’s an amazingly relaxing, beautiful thing to feel the glow of an alcohol buzz settling in. I like smoking a few cigarettes or cigars with my drinks. I like to get moderate amounts of exercise from walking the dog. I like my job. I seriously do not like these so-called experts who always seem to be sniveling to higher authorities in hopes of convincing them that I deserve to keep even less of the money I earn because they deem fit to see my little pleasures in life get mad-soaked in unnecessary, and unfair fees. Campaigning against fun. I have a good mind to give any pickpocket a good cuff upside the head! Stay away from my lifestyle choices, Mr. Dr. Expert Punk M.D.! Go and snort a crushed Advil you sack of unfun, cantankerous worms! Enough of the madness and the bleating. Get a hobby. 

Mentor To Madness (Two Videos) Unbridled Authority

Empowerment for Profit

One of the last entries I made on my Twitter channel before going to bed last night was: “Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.” – Henry Kissinger.

It got me to thinking, an aphrodisiac for whom; the wielder, the target, or both? In my own mostly uninspiring travels in this life, I have experienced and observed interpersonal power in flux to various degrees. From the big power brokers making headlines, to Mom & Dad’s squabbles at the kitchen table, personal power is an intangible reality governing everything from how electric current arrives in hundreds of millions of homes every day to designating who does the grocery shopping in a family.

We’ve all heard the idiom that knowledge is power, and in this age of information, nothing could be further from the truth – at least when one looks at the bigger picture...

~>> ~ <<~

Imagine discovering a small community of people on a remote island going about their day-to-day affairs with nothing more than an equivalency of 19th century technology: a means to generate electromotive power, a few mills, basic sanitation, refrigeration, and medicine.  

One fateful day, under the guise of benevolence, a missionary group decides these people would benefit extraordinarily from having access to modern microcomputers with the Internet at their disposal, so at great expense, they put everything in place to empower the community through information technology by installing some satellite transmission equipment, a few internet servers, and some desktop computers.

Having set everything up and having trained the populace to adequately use their new information systems, the missionaries return to whence they came after ensuring the community leaders are convinced the technology is stable and infallible. Before long, every man, woman, and child in this isolated region are on the internet, exploring the outside world from behind a keyboard and monitor.

Within a couple of years our pretended populace have mastered social media and their curious little community has attracted so much attention from the online world that they are considered an anthropological sensation by researchers. Then, just as the stubborn and skeptical elders of our fictional oasis are beginning to finally embrace the newfangled technology themselves, the main server to their island gives-up the ghost unexpectedly. No more internet!

In the meantime, while everyone on our remote island was busy being enthralled by their own narcissism and empowerment, the missionaries were fastidiously collecting advertising revenue generated from their exclusive rights to all internet traffic between the island and their own network of servers. Unbeknownst to the highly distracted island dwellers, the money was being used to finance the construction of a diamond mine right under their noses. Now, in their current state of perceived dis-empowerment from the sudden failing of their now beloved online computing ability, the community is in an uproar! Fix it! Fix it!

[…to be continued]

     

(Technical) Fun With Spreadsheet Design

Here I go again... spelunking into the depths of Microsoft's Excel Caverns, only to emerge for an occasional cup of tea, and to write a few notes about what it is I hope to accomplish with a bunch of numbers and a variety of software applications.

The image at the top of this article (click to enlarge) is a simple screen capture of my current project, which currently serves no definitive purpose other than to grind-up an integer, and look somewhat curious; my hope is for it to act as a foundation for greater imaginings.

It is in fact a working slide rule of sorts. I built the whole thing off the cuff in about a half an hour. The pink cell is the only input... the rest of the numbers are derivatives. It's at the middle of the leftmost column after [MAGIC NUMBER], the one that reads "222" and can be any integer.

Any good spreadsheet intended for the general reading public should include a concise and comprehensive graph or two. Or as many graphs as the designer sees fit, I guess. This designer sandwiched the cell that reads [MAGIC NUMBER] between two interpretive graphs: a ring chart, and a small bar graph. Behind the bar graph, I inserted a background of a scanned image of John Lennon 7" single, "Mother" still in its original Apple Records' sleeve. The charts are populated with data sourced from some of the derivations throughout the chart.

Well that's it for tonight. 

Canada's Poverty / Hunger Crisis... Ended!

A U.N. Rapporteur, eh? A U.N. Rapporteur describing hunger AND poverty to whichever delegates happened to be gathered in the sit-down chamber on the day said Rapporteur was scheduled to deliver his or her rapport? I can admit that I know scant little about the structure or machinations of the U.N. All I do know, is that they seem to exist for no other reason than to advance a cryptic agenda by interfering in international politics.

When I hear Libby Davies of the cart-before-the-horse New Democratic Party start to publicly talk about a "food strategy" in conjunction with a "crisis", my inner "Bloggeur" cannot help but think that someone's gotta be pushing to create a crisis where none existed in the first place. Artificial scarcity, redefining poverty... whatever it takes.

It didn't take long for some poverty advocate to worm their way into the exchange after typing in that response to Libby's #Right2FoodCan tagged tweet.

While the 50/50 estimate I responded with was quickly pulled out of thin air, it's probably not too far from the truth in some instances at least. When you see someone emerge from a food bank only to get into the driver's seat of a Lexus, you know something just ain't right. If indeed there is a real hunger crisis in this nation, there's no good excuse for it. I realize food prices are climbing at an alarming rate, and I know rent is astronomical, but is there really a hunger crisis at foot? 

What, exactly, is considered to be a state of poverty these days anyway, and is a national strategy really necessary? Whenever an NDP leader says strategy, you can bet your last petrobuck that what they really mean is that they'd like to impose some kind of newfangled wealth redistribution policies: taxes; penalties; beleaguering businesses with duplicitous redundancies and enshrining ridiculous money wasting requisites. Whatever it takes. 

You can go to my Twitter channel @moremoreenough and see the exchange in its entirety if you like. Keith Lanthier basically goes on to call me an insensitive ignoramus in so many words. While that may not be untrue in certain instances, I'm not beyond reproach and I'm a staunch believer in self-improvement. I like thinking for myself and working out solutions of my own design.  

Here you have a succinctly outlined budget complete with a grocery detail... I cooked it up with a single person earning close to the minimum wage in mind. The numbers seem realistic enough to me. This is essentially how I used to shop when I worked as a service station clerk. Somehow I get the impression that Libby Davies is the sort of shopper you might expect to see dipping into the inside aisles for the rich stuff, and allowing impulse to determine her grocery bill before worrying about the staples! Like I said, she hails from Canada's cart-before-the-horse party politic.  

You might have noticed how I cheekily included a $60 bag of weed in with the groceries. Like a kid trying to sneak some flashy high-octane sugar-based cereal into Mom's cart. Obviously it was intended to amuse, but it also effectively illustrates how one little sandwich baggie worth of stuff can account for more than a quarter of an entire monthly personal food budget. It's a discretionary item. You wanna get high this month Mr. Record Store Clerk? Better put that take-out pizza order on hold! 

Sure it's a bit of a bleak existence when you're earning such a dismal pittance. You'll likely spend much of your non-working time cooking and cleaning-up. If you're inexperienced when it comes to cooking on a budget, you can turn your new found poverty into a learning opportunity out of necessity. Imagine that!

Unfortunately, with only $51 left over in the kitty, there's not much wiggle room if some unanticipated expense materializes. Still, for $950 / month, you should expect a reasonably decent accommodation in any of Canada's major cities, and you've got a land line telephone to keep your impoverished self amused with on all the long, lonesome nights ahead of you. Have you considered living with a roommate? 

Pink Shirt Day

As an amateur blogger, computerizer, and social media enthusiast, I have become fairly adept at working with simple 2D graphic images and layouts. It’s something I enjoy doing, and have discovered that using images conveys concisely whatever your take happens to be, on whatever theme, scheme, or dream in your midst - a fine way of challenging the norm from within the confines of an X by X pixel frame.

My latest quip was to put a couple of lines of text above and beneath an image of a textiles sweatshop pic I found using Google. I did this as a response to the anti-bully movement perpetuating itself (I'd provide examples, but you can imagine some of the fluff) through the trending of #pinkshirtday on Twitter:

I understand the gravity of singling-out some hapless kid at school, and understand fully how severely upsetting and even dangerous bullying can be. Needless to say, relentlessly picking on someone innocent is quite inexcusable behaviour. I've just always had a general skepticism about any sort of mass movement in general, and while solidarity can be a positive force for change (it takes a paradigm shift brought about through power in numbers), more often than not it seems that with some attitudinal shifts come unanticipated and sometimes unintended consequences. 

Blah, blah, blah. All it is to me - this wear-a-pink-shirt-or-else day is just causation for me to consider a scenario where little... let's call him Alphonse, hasn't the means to get a pink shirt in time for the big day. Sure... someone would probably lend him one given the importance of such a momentous day, but oh, the shame of only being included thanks to someone else's pity! Not to mention his folks weren't even clever enough to think to use some of the diluted red food colouring at the back of their barren cupboard as a pink-wash to dye a white shirt (beet juice works too)... all the stores are out of pink shirts now anyway. 

Naturally, I then imagine all the pink-shirted kids ganging-up on poor Alphonse, stuffing him into a locker in an impulsive fit of reverse-bullyism; believing him to be a bully-sympathizer because he could only manage to scrounge a silk bowling shirt with fuchsia stripes inside the arms from out of his abusive step-dad's laundry pile. 

... and that is my idea of bullying Indian Chief Theresa Spence who is known in some Canadian circles (I've seen it online) as "Thief Theresa Spends", the pride of Attawapiskat, champion of the people's rights, and alleged embezzler who requests one-on-one meetings with both the Queen of England and the Prime Minister of Canada, PLUS the Governor General all at once, and all while undergoing a supposed hunger strike in a tee-pee on an island in the middle of the Ottawa river, etc., etc., etc... actually, it sounds pretty romantic when you think about it... 

Sometimes I make little screens like the one above, thinking I'm so clever, while the thing I "made" had pretty much already been done, and I'm unwittingly taking credit for someone who actually beat me to the punch. The pet store guffaw above is an example of just such a gaffe, I think.

The only politics I find more scintillatingly disappointing than American Politics are the politics of my home Province - the province in which I was born, the home of the Edmonton Oilers, foothills to the Rocky Mountains, and gateway to the north country, with it's official provincial motto being Wild Rose Country, and unofficially known as God's Country, Alberta, CANADA.

I could go into how I felt about how our former premiere, Ed Stelmach, how he courted all manner of shit I staunchly disagreed with at the time, like ushering in T.I.L.M.A., or funding a wildly expensive CO2 capturing facility, but what good is it? I should digress, however, that I may have to promptly stick my foot in my mouth as I see our current Premier using that very same CO2 sequestration facility as a bargaining chip to trump the unreasonable demands of the enviromoney opponents. Those sly, soft-spoken agents of stagnation who comfortably sit at their international CO2 craps table with their big money and their New York liberal clout?

Still, the numbers don't lie, and being $22 billion in debt - only eleven years after King Ralph got us back in the black - is just exhausting! I mean, I could understand our budget barely breaking even after a run of bad luck, the ever more demanding unions of the public servants, but our current provincial debt seems drastically excessive for a region as incredibly resource rich as Alberta is, no? It's hard to imagine these Albertan politicians wanting anything less than the best for their fellow Albertans, so I hope they are working with Alberta's best long-term interests at heart.    

I dunno. I think it's pretty funny. A little jab at the whole horse meat debacle.

I also don't know what to think about the image above. I didn't take the photo myself, so I've no idea if it was staged or what. Hopefully it's just some ruse for impact, but I thought I'd add the wording and make one of those cool amotivational posters out of it. I could never drink a snake's blood to fulfill some weird ritualistic requirements I don't understand. As you know from my #pinkshirtday ranting, I'm not too big on mob mentality or peer pressure. Sometimes I'll enjoy acting the fool for a good laugh, but I gotta draw the line at playing with serpents for macho points.

Here's a picture I shamelessly scanned in from the front page of The Edmonton Journal. It's a titanic module on it's way to Fort McMurray. Even though it will only be moving at a top speed of 25 km/h, I imagine it will nonetheless endure some shock and vibration along the way. I suppose if it cannot stand up to a few bumps in the road, it shan't be ready to contain steam pressure or whatever it's purpose is without a few post-transit touch-ups. In any respect, it's pretty gosh darn amazing!

That's all I've got for now, so I'm going to just go ahead and publish this article as is. It'll be an early night for this poor amateur freelance political hacktivist blogger, and I feel so bloated right now, I don't think I'll bother with hyperlinks and all that jazz.