Dad passed away peacefully at St. Joseph’s Health Centre on February
27, 2006. He was the devoted husband of Dr. Maria A. deVilla and the
loving father of me and my sister and Eileen and father-in-law to my
wife Wendy and Eileen’s husband Richard. He was also the beloved
[...]
Monthly Archives: February 2006
Feb
28
2006
Dad
Feb
24
2006
"Amish Teen Fined for Wiretapping"
It reads like a headline from The Onion, but apparently it’s a true story.
Feb
23
2006
Appearing Friday on YTV’s "The Zone"
I recorded 4 in-between-show segments for the YTV show The Zone‘s “Musical Week” with my accordion this afternoon, and they went quite well. The hosts, Sugar and
Carlos, are just as warm and friendly as they are on TV, as were the
staff and crew. If you’ve got access to a TV set [...]
Feb
23
2006
Toronto Ruby on Rails Pub Night: Monday March 13th
[via David Crow] First, a quote from Nat Torkington, an editor at O’Reilly and program chair for the O’Reilly Open Source Conference:
“Ruby on Rails is astounding. Using it is like watching a kung-fu movie,
where a dozen bad-ass frameworks prepare to beat up the little newcomer
[...]
Feb
23
2006
Design Slam This Saturday
The local BarCamp phenomenon doesn’t stop with DemoCamp (see this entry about the last one). The next event takes place this Saturday: Design Slam, or SlamCamp!
If you’ve got friends in the black turtleneck crowd or move among their number, you’re probably familiar with the concept of a poetry slam: a live event in which poets [...]
Feb
23
2006
"No Photos" Policies and Diane Duane’s "Wizards" Books
I never understand the twisted logic of many retail stores’ “no cameras” policies. They don’t make sense within the context of a place that is open to the public, even if it’s not publicly owned.
A couple of years back, I caught heat from IKEA for taking a snapshot of some of their toys, Urban [...]
Feb
23
2006
Robot Johnny’s TTC Anagram Map
It’s already been covered on BoingBoing, but I thought a Toronto-based blog like this one should mention John “Robot Johnny” Martz’s map of Toronto’s subway system with the station names replaced by anagrams of said names. It was inspired by a similar map made of the London Underground (whose creators have received a cease-and-desist notice [...]
Feb
21
2006
Bad News
While undergoing dialysis at the hospital yesterday, Dad slipped and fell backwards landing on his head, knocking him out and fracturing his skull. He’s currently in the intensive care unit at St. Joseph’s Health Centre and is conscious but confused due to some internal bleeding in his brain. The last diagnosis of which I was [...]
Feb
21
2006
Scenes from Last Night’s DemoCamp
If you want to see my photos and video from last night’s DemoCamp — that’s the monthly gathering in which developers
from the Toronto area demonstrate their current projects in action in
front of an audience of developers, product managers, venture
capitalists and other people interested in what our local techies are
[...]
Feb
20
2006
Burgertime
While I do like the increasing graphic realism of today’s videogames, the games of old (by which I mean the 1980s) had a clunky charm all their own that required you to use a little more imagination. Consider the arcade classic Burgertime (you can play a decent Flash version of the game here):
Those cheesy, low-resolution [...]
Feb
20
2006
When LiveJournallers Don Armour
Renaissance Faires, which I consdier to be one of the lower rungs of the geek hierarchy are just one of those aspects of geek culture that I just can’t get into (and remember, I can put up with a lot of crap: I sat through Spanglish and a Reform Party student meeting). Swordplay, jousting, mead, [...]
Feb
20
2006
Now Available at CafePress…
…the “I Went Hunting with Dick Cheney and All I Got was This Lousy Flesh Wound” t-shirt, for US$13.99. Also available in other styles.
Feb
19
2006
Lost Camera, Bad Samaritans
“Why do the wrong people travel, travel, travel, / When the right people stay back home?”– Noel Coward
[via Boing Boing] An American who lost her camera in Hawaii thought that she’d been dealt a lucky break: a park ranger phone her to let her know that a Canadian family had found her camera and gave [...]
Feb
19
2006
It’s That Cold Out There
This weekend in Accordion City, the temperatures have dropped to -10 degrees Celsius (that’s 14 degrees for my American friends who insist on using Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit’s quaintly outdated system). If you’re in the area and are planning on stepping out (like Boss Ross, who’s going ice drink…er, fishing), bundle up!
Failing that, find a buddy [...]
