The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century

Here in Accordion City, the rest of Canada and other countries in the Commonwealth, it’s Remembrance Day, during which we remember the members of our armed forces who died in the line of duty. In the United States, it’s Veterans Day, and there are similar observances in other countries.

In honour of this day, I’m sharing Rick Mercer’s latest rant from his show, The Rick Mercer Report, in which he tells us to “remember to remember”. As with many of his rants, it’s poignant, funny and right on the money.

I’ll be marking today with the traditional moment of silence at 11:00 a.m., a reference to the signing of the Armistice at “the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month”.

After the window-smashing incident at the bingo hall (I’ll explain later) on Sunday, I dropped my trusty Honda CR-V (13 years old, only 130,000 km/81,000 miles on it) at the shop. A day and some hundreds of dollars later – window replacement was $330, but I also needed a fall/winter tune-up and an emissions test, the latter of which led to the discovery of an exhaust leak – I have my wheels back in perfect working order.

I’m still out a GPS, and I’m thinking of using my iPhone 4. Any suggestions for dashboard mounts and GPS software? Let me know in the comments!

Many people have covered Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance, but none have done it as wonderfully and weirdly as this choir made up of Chinese seniors.

This Friday, November 11, 2011, can also be written down as 11/11/11, which is why a number of people have declared it “Nerd New Year”. Seeing as that’s the designation for the day, and seeing as we’re slightly overdue for another Toronto Techie Dim Sum, I’m calling one for this Friday at noon, Nerd New Year, at our regular place: Sky Dragon at Dragon City Mall (southwest corner of Dundas and Spadina).

In case you missed the one in September, I took some photos and wrote up a quick summary here.

As with the Toronto Techie Dim Sums, this is just a lunch gathering of folks who like tech. There’s no agenda, no set topics, no presentations – just good people, good conversation and good (and inexpensive) food. You don’t have to be a developer to attend! If you take part in the activity ofwriting software, building web sites or cobbling together technologies, or if you just like hanging out with the very nice people who comprise Toronto’s active and vibrant tech scene, please join us for a Nerd New Year lunch!

As always, we all pitch in on the final bill. For the past several dim sum lunches, it’s never gone over $12 a person including tip, and it’s sometimes been less. You’re not going to find a better deal or a better crowd!

It’s an open event – invite people, friends and colleagues! If you and your friends are interested in joining us for lunch at Toronto Techie Dim Sum, please RSVP on the Facebook event page. It’ll give me an idea of the number of people who’ll be attending and will let me make the proper arrangements with the restaurant.

This article also appears in Global Nerdy.

That’s my car, as seen through what remains of my front passenger window. It happened yesterday afternoon in the parking lot of Delta Bingo, on St. Clair just east of Keele.

The thief was after my GPS – a basic Garmin Nuvi 255, nothing fancy – which I normally put away when parking out at night but don’t bother hiding in broad daylight, especially in neighbourhoods that aren’t particularly “ghetto”. S/he completely ignored the satellite radio. My next GPS will simply be my iPhone, which I’ve always got with me and will take whenever I’m away from the car.

Looks like I’ll be paying a visit to Centre Honda today.

My 44th, to be precise. Party tonight, blog post tomorrow.