Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Dave's LiveJournal:

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Sunday, June 28th, 2009
3:21 pm	This Week in Dave I guess I should update this thing once in a while. This was taken at Elk Island National Park back on May 22, where Jenn took me for my birthday and we hiked and picnicked and took photos and learn some very interesting things about the history of the place (namely how successful it has been at repopulating species that were hunted nearly to extinction). On to more current events. Jenn and I just got back from a Kung Fu camping trip at Mink Lake, where we stayed since Friday evening. Not a terrible campground, I guess, but too close to a highway and busy railway, sites are too close together without enough tree coverage separating them, and not enough tree cover to separate the sites from the lake. And too many noisy seagulls. Aside from complaints about the site, it was cold and windy when we got there, and then cool and breezy the next day, and then hurricane force winds this morning, cold, and a bit rainy during breakfast this morning. But overall it was still pretty fun. Tomorrow morning we head out on our drive to Vancouver, a bit of Seattle, and perhaps other points beyond, where we'll be for the next couple of weeks. Whee! Vacation! (Comment on this)
Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009
11:25 pm	Make a Wish (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, May 13th, 2009
10:32 pm	Rawr (Comment on this)
Tuesday, May 12th, 2009
12:12 pm	Leisurely More misc. photos here and here. Note Jenn's new glasses! (Comment on this)
Sunday, May 3rd, 2009
12:00 am	Exhausted Today: Went shopping, had lunch in the car, grabbed camera and went to Hawrelak Park for about 20 mins and snapped a bunch of photos, went to friends' house for their son's second birthday party, ate two cheeseburgers and three cupcakes, went home, bikes through the river valley on the way to Kung Fu (the long way), got a bit lost in Riverdale, climbed a steep hill (on foot, no way I could ride it), biked the rest of the way to Kung Fu, started practice pretty much within minutes of arriving, worked out hard, became the brunt of Sifu's jokes due to said cheeseburgers, got repeatedly kicked in the head with pads on (but including four kicks to the head where one of the pads was missed), sat for a while, and then biked home. Good god am I exhausted. But it felt sooo good being back on my bike! (Comment on this)
Monday, April 27th, 2009
9:44 pm	Awesome Weekend Waiting... ...for the first train carrying passengers to arrive at the new McKernan/Belgravia LRT station. More on that in a bit. Thursday evening: Went to Metro with a good part of the Development department, had food, had drinks, and played pool and chatted with my co-workers. Friday evening, Jenn and I went for food and drinks with her old crew from her previous job at the Atlantic Trap & Gill. Food was pretty good, and I get along pretty well with lots of those guys. Saturday morning, we woke up at about 8:30 and remembered that the SLRT grand opening that happening that morning, and that I was going to go down and take photos. Jenn was going out shopping anyway, so she dropped me off at the new McKernan/Belgravia station, and I snapped a bunch of photos of the first train rolling in and the Mayor unveiling the station plaque. I boarded the train and apparently got on the car that was supposed to be for media and dignitaries, but I think they let it slide because of the camera. We rode the train down the new track (the smoothest track they've built yet) to the new South Campus station, where we were met by a pipe band, activity tents, and where several speeches were made, and where I took a bunch more photos. ( We need photos. Lots of photos. ) Full set is here. Jenn met up with me at the station, having come back from her shopping trip...with a Nintendo DS. We went for lunch at Mucho Burrito downtown and it was pretty good. The service was excellent. Apparently they're opening another one closer to my work, too. There's lots of great food choices opening up nearby. We went to Future Shop after and I bought Final Fantasy Tactics A2 for DS (but have yet to play it). We then went to London Drugs to look for something else, and there I was tempted by a 75-300mm lens for $300 which I bought on the spot. More toys! That evening, we went to The Old Spaghetti Factory for dinner, and I had the vegetarian lasagna, and it was really good. Then we went out to the Leonard Cohen concert. And oh boy, it was AMAZING. Probably one of the best shows I've ever seen. The man is just amazing, and the band just as much so. They were spectacular, all of them. I won't forget that concert any time soon. I was so thankful I emailed our CEO this morning to thank him for the tickets, and told him what a great perk they are. The whole day was just fantastic, and everything worked out so well timing-wise, from getting up in the morning, arriving in time for the ceremonies and to take pictures, to catching the LRT to and from the concert and the bus back home. It was just overall an amazing day. Sunday was less exciting, but I cleaned up the kitchen pretty good. I wanted to do that since we found a sowbug and a carpet beetle the other day (which is odd since we lack carpet), and was worried that the source of them would be behind the fridge or the stove. But all clear, they must've been just stray bugs, and not even the kind we're that worried about. On that note, it's been six months since we moved into the new place, and so far no bedbugs to be had. I think it's safe to say at this point that we're all clear. It's also been two years since Jenn moved in with me, and almost three years that we've been together. And it's still going so great. I love her so much, and I love how much time we spend together. She helped make this weekend so wonderful. <3 (8 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 15th, 2009
11:09 pm	Oooohhh, it's a snake!!! Meet Spurlock. We're babysitting him while our friend is away in B.C. looking for a new place to live. He's a really nice snake and was really good about us taking him out to play. As morbid as it may sound, I'm really looking forward to feeding him next weekend. He's a Duméril's boa, in case anyone was wondering. I do like snakes, and have wanted to own a smaller one like a kingsnake for some time, but this guy is making me think I might want a bigger fella like him. We're also looking after what I think is a Kenyan sand boa, but I'm not sure. The thing is always hiding, and is apparently really moody. ( More photos! ) (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, April 13th, 2009
12:31 pm	Woo! Guess who snagged free tix to Leonard Cohen? (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, April 10th, 2009
10:01 pm	Rain! Woo-hoo! Not just the first rain of the season, but the first thunderstorm, too. And it's funny, just earlier today I was saying how much we could use a good rain. I got my wish. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, April 9th, 2009
10:25 pm	Terrible I've been a terrible blogger lately. I barely even update my Facebook status anymore. I've also been a terrible photographer lately. I've hardly taken any photos in the last while, and I still have a bunch to process from even longer ago. I'm also terribly jealous of Jenn's brand new computer and 24" widescreen LCD. It's a pretty slick Dell Studio desktop with a 24" widescreen LCD, nothing too spectacular but plays the games we play more than just well. Did I mention it has a 24" widescreen LCD? Well, it has a 24" widescreen LCD which is freakin' huge for computer monitor. HUGE. Work has been terribly busy, but should hopefully calm down over the next couple of weeks. I got a raise recently, but nothing terribly huge. I've been getting a twitch in my left eye lately, which has been terribly annoying. The eye doctor I saw said i wasn't anything to worry about, probably just a combination of stress, caffeine, and eyestrain since my prescription has changed. So I've cut back on the caffeine a bit, which seems to have helped, and will be going shopping for some new glasses soon. I'm feeling a terrible bit of pain tonight. I've been learning a new kick at Kung Fu, which is hard on the hips, and in addition to that I got kicked in the head repeatedly tonight (with pads on of course but still), which was hard on the face and neck. That's about all, not terribly much to talk about, I guess. Lost and Heroes both have had some excellent episodes lately. Yay! (Comment on this)
Wednesday, February 18th, 2009
9:11 pm	(X-posted from edmonton, but with more cussing) While standing in line at Sobeys downtown this afternoon, a guy wandered through the place wearing a swastika armband on his sleeve. I had to do a double-take to make sure it didn't have a stripe across it or something; nope, it was a fuckin' nazi armband, red white and black, no doubt about it. It makes me so angry and disheartened to think this kind of shit still goes on around here. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, February 7th, 2009
8:59 pm	This is me, at the construction site of the new EPCOR Tower in downtown Edmonton. Ken Cantor, the Commercial Manager at Qualico offered a bunch of us from C2E a tour of the site, and I took him up on it as both a photographer and an urban nerd. It's a bit odd because I'm not sure when I started thinking of myself as "a photographer," but it's definitely a good thing that I've been getting in that mindset, and it's great to find myself taking up these opportunities which may never come to pass again. Unfortunately I can't display any photos that show identifiable faces (except my own), since I was on private property and that was their one stipulation about photographing the site. But I still came away with a ton of great shots. ( Photo Tour ) (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, February 6th, 2009
10:53 pm	25 Things (Cross-Pollinated from Facebook) ( Yeah, I know. ) (Comment on this)
Thursday, February 5th, 2009
9:03 pm	Yikes, I haven't updated yet in the new year? I was on a roll for a while there... This afternoon I had the opportunity to take a tour of the construction site for EPCOR's new office tower and the new LRT tunnel being built underneath it. I took a ton of photos, but it will probably take me a while to go through them all. It was a pretty neat experience, actually, and it's weird to think that the next time I find myself in the middle of that tunnel, it will likely be on a train, and covered entirely by an underground parkade. (Comment on this)
Monday, December 29th, 2008
9:27 am	Exposing Myself a Little Not like that, you sickos. My Flickr account is really my "everything photo dump," a mix of travel, fun, family, and artsy photos; this is fine and good and Flickr is well suited for that broad purpose, but I'm thinking I should find someplace to put my specifically artsy photos to showcase them on their own, as a portfolio of sorts. I was thinking about resurrecting my deviantART account, but when I looked at it today (I can't believe it still exists), my last journal post there reminded me of why I abandoned it to begin with: Journal Entry: Wed Sep 6, 2006, 5:18 AM I haven't bothered to post anything new to DA in a long time, because frankly, it's not worth it. When I post photos to Flickr and share them with the communities there, I can get dozens to hundreds of views in a matter of a week or two. I've only had Flickr a few months longer than my DA account (which I've had since July last year), and I've got 11,697 total photo views there. I've just 397 views of my deviations here on DA. Total. Ever. DA is too made of too many closed circles of friends. If you're not in one of those circles, you're nobody. If you are, you still have no guarantees that anyone will ever look at your submissions. The search still sucks so it's impossible to get any external exposure, and there's nothing here that really fosters a community feeling. So in short, don't expect anything new from me here. I wonder if this has changed much since I left and if I should give it another shot, or if I should keep looking elsewhere and - in that case - would like to solicit some opinions about what might be good or where I should look. Part of the problem I think is that maybe I'm not sure what I want out of such a showcase-site. I like the community-orientedness of Flickr, but I think most sites that would enable me to show off my photos would likely have even less of a community around it than DA. I could set up a website or photoblog on my home server easily enough (it should work well for this now that I've upgraded the RAM from the factory-installed 512 MB to a relatively whopping 2 GB), but I still wouldn't know how to get it "out there" in terms of exposure. Suggestions? Advice? Recommendations? Solutions? Bueller? (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, December 25th, 2008
11:24 pm	This has been the best Christmas I've had in a very, very long time. Merry Christmas everyone. I love you all. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008
9:32 pm	Letsee... - Still living out of boxes and bags - Still waiting to hear from Epcor about that $105 - Government in chaos - Snowing and windy outside vs. We got a Wii Fit you guys holy shit It's pretty fun and cool, actually. Supposedly it will help my flexibility. I hope so because - as I've discovered while trying to learn kick at Kung Fu - I really have no useful flexibility at all. It's funny, though, I've been actively looking for a Wii Fit for months. Several months. And I keep just missing them. Jenn goes to Shopper's Drug Mart practically on a whim today and stumbles on one. Go figure. (6 Comments |Comment on this)
12:35 pm	Maybe Escalators Aren't For Me I hate standing on an escalator. I want to climb it like stairs. I go just a little tiny bit crazy inside when I am forced to stand behind people. But that's not what I want to talk about with this post. Am I the only one having trouble digesting all this crap currently going on with our government? I can't keep on top of it, to say nothing of how I can't keep on top of all the views and opinions surrounding it. This is to say nothing of how it has exposed how so many people really don't understand how our government works, such as how we elect MPs, we do not elect a PM, or how it works when the minority government has lost the confidence of the house. As much as I'd like to see Harper not be the PM anymore, I'm having trouble believing that a coalition will produce an effective or productive government considering that the coalition parties have little in common with each other, and on top of that considering the divides that both pre-existed and are now widening as I type this. I honestly can't see the GG approving of it, because I can't see it forming a stable government. On the flipside, Harper has brought this on us all by failing to provide a distinct economic plan and by instead playing partisan politics. It's clear that his government is more interested in attempting to edge out the other parties rather than to cooperate for a working Commons during what may be one of the worst economic crises our country has seen in a long time. So, thank you Mr. Harper for not only failing to make the current government work, but also for poisoning the well to ensure that the alternatives won't do much better, whether that was your intention or not. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, December 1st, 2008
8:57 pm	To-DONE! To-do: - Final inspection - Hand over keys & provide forwarding address for deposit - Sever all ties with dumbass management company (just waiting for the deposit back). It's finally done, and we even got $250 back from the ordeal. I don't think they intended to return anything - the original estimate we received was for $0, but they seem to have changed their tune when I reminded them of the Landlord Tenant Act and asked for receipts of all the work done. They still took their time, but meh, we got money back and we're done with Mayfield Management now. That's right, I can say their name now. Mayfield Management. Bunch'o'pricks. Don't recommend them at all. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
12:18 pm	Chinchila in a Fishbowl Chinch in his dust bath (the fishbowl works well for this). He's currently at Jenn's Parents' house, and I miss him. Why is he there? Well, I never posted about this yet, but the week before last, we got a notice that they were going to - wait for it - spray our suite for bedbugs, preventatively. Why? Because the dumbass girl on the 3rd floor that bought a used mattress of Kjiji for $10 with free bedbugs? Her boyfriend lives right above us. Combine that with the general paranoia of us coming from a building that had bedbugs, and they decided not to take any chances with us. I was pretty choked up about it, I mean we had just finished unpacking everything, setting everything up just the way we liked it, and started to enjoy the new place, and BAM! Pack everything back up, back to living out of boxes and bags. They're supposed to do a follow-up treatment, so we're still living out of boxes and bags until they do. I'm still frustrated by it, but I'm far less upset than I was when I was packing up again. Still, I'm really sick of this crap, and we can't get ourselves into a house fast enough at this point. If only we could afford it. On top of that, Epcor still wants to charge me $105 for not having power for 4 days. I'm fighting them over it, but I think it's pretty much set up for me to lose. At least with that attitude I can only be surprised, and can't be any more disappointed. On the bright side? Christmas shopping is DONE. (Comment on this)