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 between 4:00 p.m. and 6 p.m. tomorrow, tune in to catch some accordion action.
[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
only to be handed their asses in a variety of imaginative ways.”
Which in turn inspired this little bit of Photoshoppery:
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s talk about Accordion City, Ruby on Rails and our lively tech scene. Ryan McMinn from Unspace posted to the Rails mailing list (which I really should join) about having a Toronto Ruby on Rails pub night on Monday March 13th at 7:00 p.m. at the popular local brew pub C’est What (located at 67 Front St. East). Here’s what the posting says:
Spread the word! The inaugural Toronto Rails pub nite will be an opportunity to meet the folks
working on Rails in your community. There will be plenty of opportunity to discuss projects you’re
involved with, recruit talent, and even find out what all of the fuss is about!
Unspace wants to support the growing Rails community here, but we felt that a user group was too
formal, stuffy, and intimidating to those that are new to Ruby and Rails. Instead, the best opportunity
for advocacy is something where people can make friends and have fun in an informal setting.
We also welcome people who are working with other, similar technologies. If you are open minded and like
to discuss how we can all create better sites, come share a pint.
In
case you can’t make this one, it looks as though it’s going to be
monthly happening — the next one’s already been scheduled for Monday,
April 17th.
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 read or perform their work, which is then rated by the audience.
A design slam is something along the same lines, except it’s about technology rather than poetry. Attendees will be randomly grouped into “agencies”, who will then be presented with a problem by a fictitious company. They’ll be given a set block of time to design and pitch their idea to the company, who will then choose the winning proposal.
As with DemoCamp, there a few rules and they are simple:
Here are the details:
consumables – flipchart paper, markers, etc as well as prizes for the
top teams. Email mmilan at gmail.com if you think you can help out with any of these.
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 Outfitters has given me heat for seeing what I look like in a hat with a self-portrait and someone at a Home Depot once thought I was dictating prices into a portable tape recorder (I was actually talking to Cory using the then-new walkie-talkie feature of my cellphone).
The last such incident of this sort took place last summer at the Runnymede and Bloor branch of the retail book chain Chapters, where I saw my friend Diane Duane’s Young Wizards series of books on prominent display. I often carry my camera with me and decided to take a photo to send to her.
“Excuse me, sir,” said a young woman in a golf shirt with a Chapters logo, “but you’re not allowed to…hey, don’t I know you? You’re the guy from the party with the accordion!”
After some brief re-introductions, I told her that I knew Diane Duane and have actually met gone out drinking with both her and her husband, Peter Morwood, she decided that it would be all right — “just this once” — to take the photo. The photo’s since been sitting in my “to be blogged” folder for some time, so here it is at long last.
This is yet another preamble for yet another story that Boing Boing caught first. I thought it was still worthy of blogging since Diane is a friend and I thought it would be nice to promote her work.
The first two volumes of the Feline Wizards trilogy drew a sizable
audience, but not enough to convince Diane’s publisher to pay her to write book three. Over the years, an anxious audience has demanded a conclusion to the series, so back in December, Diane posted an open question to her blog: would her readers support her if she finished the trilogy without a publisher?
The answer’s been a resounding yes — one reader’s even gone so far as to offer a $1,000 matching grant to Diane toward the completion of the book.
For more details, see Diane’s entry about the subject in her blog, Out of Ambit.
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 from the don’t-know-fandom-when-they-see-it Underground’s lawyers).
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 aware is that he has a subarachnoid hemmorhage, which to this layperson sounds like pretty bad news. Today’s CAT scan should provide more information.
Wendy and I visited last night, and as soon as I finished whatever work I can’t take with me, I’m headed back to the hospital. I don’t know how many times I’ve asked for your best wishes, prayers or moving the coffee table for better feng shui, but if you can spare some, they’d be appreciated.
As one might expect, non-work-related blogging may be a bit light for the next couple of days. Be well, everyone.
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 creating — you should go take a look at this article in Tucows Developer.
Click the photo to go to the Tucows Developer article on DemoCamp.
