It's Colin's 21st Birthday today, and I really, really hope he has a good one. Although, if his hangover is at all proportional to the amount he drank last night, he's gonna need a bottle of tylenol and a few more drinks just to get to the level of "I can tolerate sunlight today".
Who knows where life will take will take my best friend now that's reached the legal age of consent for virtually every activity in every country on earth. With his talents, ambition and charm, he's sure to go far; but I can't help but hope he doesn't go too far away from me.
I love ya, buddy. Best wishes always.
By Ian on February 15, 2002 at 9:49 AM
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I signed up for this dealy called Blogger Insider, which pairs people on the net who run "web logs". (Sites like this one, diary type sites, etc.) The pair poses questions to one another and each posts his/her responses for the world to see.
I got hooked up with Alison this round, and she seems really cool. She asked me some good questions, and I've prepared my answers and posted them here. When you're done reading these, check out her website, which is also linked over on the side.
1. Do you have any fears that others would call irrational?
As a matter of fact yes... some of my friends know this, but many people do not. I am deathly afraid of Ninjas. Ninjaphobia, if you will. I'm not making this up for comedic effect. I'm actually afraid that in every dark alley or ill-lit room there could be lurking Ninjas ready to kill. Intellectually, I know that Ninjas are scarce, and probably not interested in me; but Ninjas are ruthless, silent killers and if one ever wants me dead, I'll never realize it until it's way too late.
2. What's better: peanut butter & jelly or grilled cheese?
Good lord... I don't know if I can choose. Pb&J is sticky and yummy and makes you talk funny and smack your lips around. It's quite the experience. But grilled cheese is warm and soft and greasy and fulfilling. Jessica used to make me grilled cheese sandwiches, and she worked in the medium the way Michelangelo worked in clay. I guess I love grilled cheese more, because even though I've always got the ingredients around for both, I really only ever eat grilled cheese. I feel like I'm betraying the PB&J, though.
3. Another food question: do you use any condiments that other people find strange (like jam on scrambled eggs or hot sauce on french fries)?
I'm a condiment purist, I'm afraid. I use ketchup on all the appropriate things, but I rarely exceed the bounds of normality. Ketchup on KD is a Canadian phenomenon, as I understand it - but I'm sure Alison knows this, being a fan of the Barenaked Ladies.
4. What's the best thing about January?
My mom's birthday is in January. But that's not terribly significant in the grand scheme, and I usually almost forget it. On reflection, I would have to say the best thing about January is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. He was a good man.
5. If you could remain at any age forever, what would it be, and why?
Every year of my life, I get unhappier. I think I'd like to be 13 again for a long time. I made more money than I could spend on my paper route, my parent's paid for everything anyway, school was easy, romance was still a vaguely repugnant concept. Only caveat: I'd miss Colin, since I didn't know him yet. So I'd want to be 13, but live here in Calgary and be friends with him.
6. Think of one thing that you're talented at (art, math, the ability to automatically alphabetize things, whatever). Now, you have to trade this talent for one talent that you don't have. What talent would you give up, and what talent would you acquire?
I'm sure I take my own talents for granted, but I think I'd like to keep most of them. But I've always wanted to be able to play an instrument, maybe the guitar, so that I could strum it and sing love songs to girls I like, or be a busker at a mall. So I guess I would trade my customer-service abilities for that. They come in handy at Safeway, but they mostly go unappreciated.
7. Where is the farthest that you've travelled? What did you do there?
The furthest I have travelled would have to be England. I was very young, but I remember my Aunt Madeline providing me with popsicles. Lots of little miniature blue popsicles. For years I dreamt of moving to England and making a killing by introducing the full-sized type. Someone beat me to it, I think.
8. From "The Book of Horrible Questions" - - (it's a great party book, by the way): For $250,000, would you, during a family wedding, get up to make a toast and tell the family that you have mixed feelings about the wedding because you are secretly in love with the person getting married (a close family member). When everyone laughs, you must dead seriously explain, as you begin to cry, how painful it is for you; then you must run away and hide for three days. $250,000 is yours. You wouldn't have to work for a long long time if you didn't want to, you could buy a house, etc. Then again, you could never tell anyone that you were set up to do it. Would you do it?
All the females in my family belong to really distant parts of the family, so yes. I'd never see most of the people at the wedding again, and I doubt they'd believe me anyway.
9. How long have you been on the internet? Is this your first homepage/blog?
Going on about six years now. ianwallace.com is the first page on which I used a web log, but it was actually my 7th or 8th homepage. Most of the earlier ones have been lost to the electronic ether, which is probably for the best. For the record, I honed my HTML skills making a tribute site to Pamela Anderson, an activity I am now completely unable to rationalize: I never really liked her very much.
10. Is there any one person in your life who you wish you had been nicer/more understanding with (a classmate/relative/random stranger encountered in the supermarket)?
I can be harsh with strangers, especially ones I encounter in supermarkets. (see Stocker Mentality) But I think of all the people I've ever mistreated, I wish I'd been nicer to my parents. I guess everyone maybe feels that way at the end of their rebellious adolescence. They're good people, and I could have recognized that more often.
11. On the other hand, is there anyone who you went out of your way to be nice to, and wish you hadn't (someone who took advantage of you/a generally mean person)?
Glen "Fucker" Watts. A client, who was treated kindly and fairly, as are all our clients, who stole Colin and I's work. Ass. I wish I'd knocked him down and run over him with his ugly car the first time I met him.
12. Would you rather be too hot or too cold?
Too cold. That's an easy one.
13. Describe the last REALLY good day that you had.
Just after Christmas, I spent most of the afternoon/evening at Chinook Mall with Melissa. We saw A Beautiful Mind, ate dinner at East Side Mario's and just had a really good conversation that lasted for hours. I've rarely been so enthralled by anyone, and just being with her was humbling. I bought one of those geometric sphere thingies that folds in and out of itself and gets bigger and smaller - you know what I'm talking about. That was a terrific day.
By Ian on February 8, 2002 at 12:16 AM
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Until recently, I was a subscriber to the high-speed cable internet service of @Home, provided by local franchisee Shaw Cable. I'd always been happy with the service; it was fast, reliable and easy. It came with an optional piece of software that allowed users to monitor their incoming e-mails, view TV listings for their area, get up-to-date weather, stock and horroscope reports, and also served as a news ticker and internet radio tuner. All in one program that was unobtrusive, skinable and had a tiny system footprint. Naturally, it stopped functioning when the @Home network collapsed, and it's only one of the things I've had to learn to do without.
Throughout the course of @Home's corporate dissolution, Shaw has maintained the internet service, and made sure all their customer's switched over their e-mail and webspace accounts to a new datacenter. I commend their efforts in keeping everything running smooth, but I can't help but notice that under the new Shaw plan, I have far fewer benefits available to me as a customer, but I'm paying the same amount. I'll run down the problems I've been having since the switch-over:
1) With @Home, I could access my POP mail through hotmail when I was away from the house. Shaw doesn't offer that option, and you have to visit Shaw's specific webmail site to remotely access your mail. But their site is buggy and very lacking in features.
2) Shaw's newsgroup servers are unresponsive and sluggish.
3) The Shaw user control-panel is hard to find and harder to use.
4) Not helper programs
5) No one at Shaw's customer support has any idea when any of these issues might be fixed.
There was a time when I would have said "Give me net access, give me an e-mail account, and everything else is fluff", but I think it's bad strategy to offer a range of services to your clients for 3 years, then yank them and have no plan in place to offer equivalents, especially when the reduction is actual services provided is not matched by a decrease in price paid. So today, the ladies and germs at Shaw High Speed internet become the second winners of the ianwallace.com Stupid God-damned Fucker Award. Congrats!
By Ian on February 6, 2002 at 2:37 PM
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I'm not a Christian, and I don't think I'll even be able to endorse their little social club until the lot of them smarten up and start playing a little nicer with their neighbors.
But this phrase popped into my head last night, and I realized that it would be the perfect slogan for a religious tract. The Bible being the most obvious such tract, I went with it. No disrespect to the Talmud, the Koran and all other such works. Except for the Book of Mormon - it really is pretty stupid.
Props to Ditto.com, where I found the image, and to Matchbox Twenty, who wrote and performed the songs I listened to as I photoshopped up into it's present glory. I love using "photoshop" as a verb.
You likey? Let me know... ian@ianwallace.com.
By Ian on February 4, 2002 at 5:41 PM
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Today is 02/02/02. You only get that kind of thing going on 12 times a century, and it looks like I'll be around for the whole series this time around. Woo hoo!
By Ian on February 2, 2002 at 4:48 PM
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