Haiku Movie Review: Iron Man 2

Loud, fast paced and fun.
Need to see the first one now.
I'd see this again.

This is why I want an iPad!

Well, one of the reasons, anyway.

Check out these screenshots from a new app called OnSong:





If this app is anywhere near what the screenshots and write-up make it look like, then I could see this being an absolutely fantastic tool, especially at camp when I'm flipping through chord charts for songs around the campfire. All my songs in one place -- no more loose sheets of paper that get lost, torn or trampled on. The ability to dynamically transpose chords, look up chord fingerings, the fact that it's a backlit LCD screen instead of a paper and a flashlight...

I was totally "meh" about the iPad until I realized that apps like this were possible. Now I'm very excited to see one for myself when they're released in Canada next month.

Fool me twice...

I stopped by Tim Horton's again this morning.

I ordered a donut.

Fool me once...

As fate would have it, I was in a rush, needed breakfast, and stopped at the local Tim Horton's again. This time I thought I'd order a Bagel B.E.L.T. sandwich.

With bacon, I stressed. I felt it may have been redundant, given that B.E.L.T. stands for bacon, egg, lettuce, and tomato. But if experience is any indicator...

Sure enough, when I got to the sandwich counter, I watched as the employee took some bacon out of the little drawer (convenient!) and put it into my...

Homestyle biscuit sandwich??

Granted, I suppose I should have been suspicious when the cashier failed to ask me to specify what kind of bagel I wanted.

Bacon? Sausage? Who cares...

Aww, screw it.

Last week I wrote a big long rant here before about, of all things, a Tim Horton's breakfast sandwich, and how the guy behind the counter managed to completely mess up my order. Basically I ordered it with bacon, saw him make one with sausage, reminded him that I wanted bacon, watched him confer with the cashier who took my order and look up the "order history" screen or some such, confirmed with me that I wanted bacon, then proceed to make me a new sandwich... with sausage.

See, when I write it like that, it's funny. You roll your eyes, you take it, and you move on (which is pretty much what I did, because I was late for work.)

In the original post I think my tone was a little more along the lines of "bemused, but slightly angry". I vented for several hundred words, before I closed with this quote:

"From the errors of others, a wise man corrects his own." -Syrus

I started off typing the rant thinking it there would be some humor in it, the type of thing you see at NotAlwaysRight.com or some such... but by the time I got to the end of the post, I realized... it was pretty stupid.

So what's left is this observation: Hey, nobody's perfect. We all make mistakes. I did, too, when I worked retail at Canadian Tire (a story for another day). And I met a bunch of rude weirdos, for sure, which just reinforces my assertion. Everyone needs to just chill a little, and the world will be a much happier place.

New Toy: A Wireless Digital Music System

I've said before in a previous post that my ideal "toys" work really well at solving real problems. Unfortunately it seems like a lot of companies don't get this concept, and those that do want to charge a premium price.

So here's my problem statement: I have a pile of music. I want to listen to any of it, anywhere in my house. And I want to listen to internet radio too. I want to be able to put on some generic soothing background music while I putter around the house doing chores, or while I have company over for a party. (C'mon, humour me.)

To that end, I bought the D-Link NAS, and I've been ripping my music collection from CDs to MP3s to store on the 1-terabyte network drive. So that puts all my music on the network, available from anywhere in the house (within wireless range). That's half the problem solved. Now, how will I play that music?

Options I've considered (or am currently using):

1. Play it off my computer (iTunes). The cheapest option, but not the most convenient: I don't want to have to lug my computer around.

2. Keep the music on an iPod. I'm sure it will be a shock and a surprise to everyone I know, but: I just don't get iPods. They're just not for me. Sure, I own one. But I don't use it. I can't even find mine right now. In the car, I'd rather have something simpler so I don't have to mess around with cables and docks and chargers.

3. PlayStation 3. The PS3 can play music and movies off the NAS. Mostly. Sort of. The interface is clunky and slow and needs the TV turned on to play music. Say what? This feels like a hacker's solution and I'm just not that impressed.

4. Wifi Internet Radio. I had one for a while. It works. The question is, if I want to listen to this stuff in different places, do I buy more of these units?

So this led me down the road toward...

5. Wireless music streamers. Expensive, but could this be the solution? What I liked about this concept is that it's not just a standalone device, it's a system -- a whole household of units that inter-operate, even synchronize themselves to play the same music at the same time, all over the house.

Perfect!

If all this sounds like an attempt to justify to myself another expensive gadget purchase... well, it is.

Mob Mentality

It's 6:20am on Saturday morning, and my alarm begins to blare obnoxiously. It blasts a monotone, beep-beep-BEEP-BEEP, getting louder and louder until finally I am awake enough to realize that I have a decision to make.

I could turn the alarm off, close my eyes, and go back to sleep. There's enough time for three more hours without feeling like I've wasted any part of the day.

Or, I could get up, get dressed, and drive into Westboro so I can have breakfast at 7:00am with other members of the Saturday Morning Caching Club, which we colloquially refer to as the "geomob". Then, after breakfast, participate in finding the geocaches listed on this morning's agenda.

On this particular morning, I hear the drip-drip-drip of fresh rainfall splashing onto my roof and deck. And the morning's agenda, emailed to our mailing list the day before, is a run through the suburbs of Gatineau looking for a series of tiny matchstick containers tied to spruce trees. Too small to actually trade any items - just a log scroll to sign. And you have to bring your own pen. Did I mention it was raining?

And yet, somehow, by 7:00am, I find myself walking through the doors of "Moe's" Newport Restaurant, home of the Elvis Sighting Society.

Sometimes I ask myself just what the allure of all this is. Today, it's not going to be about the "thrill of the hunt" or "taking you to cool and unknown places". Some days it is. Trips to Gatineau Park are usually worth the torture of getting up early -- the reward is an invigorating hike through beautiful scenery. Other days we do go places I wouldn't venture to by myself. Previous geomob outings have taken me as far away as Rochester, NY and the Eastern Townships of Quebec. I've explored abandoned underground subway tunnels, cached through 50km of trails by bike (in one day!) and spent mornings picking up garbage along the shoulders of the expressway while 18-wheelers roar by.

One common geocaching creed is, "It's not about the numbers". That's either a lie or hopeful self-deception. No, we don't always compare ourselves to each other. We all go at our own pace. But we do all go. I've had a busy summer, and haven't had very many chances to turn on the GPS. Meanwhile, friends are discovering caches I haven't seen yet (wasn't that one a neat hide, isn't this a clever camouflage). I do feel like I want to "catch up". If anything, today is about the numbers. A dozen easy park-and-grabs will bring me that much closer to my next "milestone". I don't watch the Ottawa leaderboard, but this will bump me up a notch.

Ultimately, for me, it's about the people. I walk into Moe's and the waitress brings out my coffee without even asking. She addresses me by name and asks if I'll have my usual ("Kiss Me Quick" -- the yogurt and fruit platter). Anyone is welcome at breakfast, so there's often someone new to meet, and there's a core group of people who I've come to expect to regularly be there. We share stories, trade hints, make jokes. There's usually a crack about my unkempt hair. We finish eating, get into cars, and venture off.

By noon, I am soaking wet from the rain, but I hardly notice. I have 15 more cache finds to log when I get home, but I haven't been keeping count. What I am thinking, as we part ways and I drive off, is that I really should get to bed earlier on Friday nights.

I've missed this.