Here’s a blast from the past: me with purple hair, rockin’ out at Queen’s Park on Saturday May 1st, 1999:
I had no idea what was coming up next.
Yesterday marked the 9th anniversary of my playing the accordion on the street for the first time. I’ve got a longer entry about that fateful Saturday, when my [...]
Category Archives: Life/It Happened to Me
Nine Years as “The Accordion Guy”
May 2, 2008 – 11:03 am
Cory Doctorow’s Reading of “Little Brother”
May 2, 2008 – 10:56 am
Last night, the Ginger Ninja and I attended Cory Doctorow’s reading of his new novel, Little Brother at the Merrill Collection (the collection of sci-fi books located in the upper floor of the library on College Street just east of Spadina). Little Brother is Cory’s first foray into writing a “young adult” book (memo to [...]
Colossal Cake
May 2, 2008 – 9:59 am
We have team lunches (on the company dime, whoo-hoo!) reasonably often at b5media. Sometimes it’s dim sum, sometimes it’s shwarma, sometimes it’s pub food. Last week, we ended up at Wayne Gretzky’s, where we saw this colossal cake in the desserts display:
Damn, that’s one seriously stacked cake!
Naturally, we had to order a slice of [...]
Scenes from the Good Food Festival
April 30, 2008 – 11:21 pm
Last weekend, Wendy and I attended the Good Food Festival, an annual showcase of food vendors and cooking instructors sponsored by Food Network Canada. It features samples galore, either for free or a very low price, which means that you can get a complete lunch simply by “grazing”. Here are some photos I took at [...]
Grand Theft Auto IV: Midnight Lineup and First Impressions
April 29, 2008 – 9:06 am
Here’s a photo of the line outside my local EB Games (the Runnymede/St. Clair location in Toronto) for Grand Theft Auto IV, taken last night at midnight:
The 30-car parking lot behind the store was full of cars that I could’ve sworn were lifted right from the previous game in the series, Grand Theft Auto: San [...]
Sign of the Times
April 28, 2008 – 2:15 pm
I took the photo below in High Park station this morning:
This photo is a sign of two things:
The Toronto Transit Commission is back in action (and running smoothly from most accounts).
Grand Theft Auto IV gets released at midnight! All branches of Future Shop (except in Quebec and Sudbury) and EB Games as well as the [...]
Thanks, Rochelle!
April 22, 2008 – 11:57 am
I’d like to thank Rochelle for inviting me and Wendy to her family’s Passover Seder this past weekend (and her dad for kindly sharing his brisket recipe). Both the food and the company were excellent!
As a special “thank you” to Rochelle and her family, I present the Saturday Night Live skit from 1992 featuring Jerry [...]
Even for “Engrish”, This is Incomprehensible
April 20, 2008 – 9:37 am
I work just south of Chinatown, where I saw this t-shirt on sale on Friday:
Odd as Engrish can be, it usually makes at least some sense. Whoever made this shirt wasn’t even trying.
Why I’m a Good Movie Date
April 20, 2008 – 9:11 am
I provide at least as much entertainment as the movie itself:
(By the bye, we saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall last night and it was pretty entertaining. Perhaps not as memorable as other Judd Apatow-produced films as The 40 year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up or Superbad, but still fun.)
Why I Took the Job Title “Nerd Wrangler”
April 17, 2008 – 9:16 am
Nerrrrrrrrrrrrrds!
When I accepted the position of b5media’s technical project manager, Jeremy Wright said “come up with a less-formal sounding title”. I did a little Googling and figured that I could “own” the term “Nerd Wrangler”. It’s happened — I pretty much own the first page of results for the search term “nerd wrangler”, with and [...]
My Commute
April 16, 2008 – 11:57 am
Most days, I commute to work via the Scorpion King, my trusty 2003-model Trek Calypso, a cruiser-style bicycle that provides a comfortable and “business casual” clothing-friendly ride thanks to its fat tires, comfortable seat, fenders and chainguard. The most efficient route I use is 6.3 kilometres (3.9 miles) in length and has only two hills, [...]
CPAP Cost Breakdown
April 11, 2008 – 3:38 pm
I’ve received a lot of email resulting from my CPAP article. Many emails asked me about the costs of a CPAP machine. I’m only too happy to provide a breakdown for the curious.
When reading the table below, please keep in mind that it covers only the cost of the machine and a service plan; you [...]
CPAP (or: Snorkeling While I Sleep)
April 9, 2008 – 3:20 pm
At the Doctor’s Office
Regular readers of this blog will remember the article last year in which I wrote about my overnight stay at the sleep lab at St. Joseph’s Health Centre. I got the results a while back, but it was only a couple of weeks ago that I saw my doctor about the results. [...]
A Forgotten Story from Austin: Pokin’ a Dead Goat with a Stick
April 3, 2008 – 3:57 pm
I’ve mentioned in earlier entries that my first week with b5media wasn’t spent at the office; rather, it was spent at the South by Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin, Texas. Since around a dozen of us were staying, it was decided that it would be cheaper to rent a ranch (which we found via Craigslist) [...]
Now Available at a Cheesy T-Shirt Kiosk at a Mall Near You
April 3, 2008 – 2:00 pm
I saw this at Vaughan Mills last weekend. I may have to get one for the next nerd conference I attend…
