Another arbirarily chosen marker of the end of a year is upon us. In that time, I’ve lived in 3 places (okay 2 and a half), held three jobs, and learned a great deal of things. Skills, knowledge, the world, and things about myself. I’ve met so many wonderful people, and lost contact with almost all of them. Despite that, I still feel pretty good about all of it. Perhaps I’ll post about that a little more specifically sometime.
I was thinking that when I reflected upon this year as it draws to a close, that I wouldn’t feel so good about it. In fact, just the other day, I was feeling like a huge loser. Though it was pointed out to me that this was not the case, and I took that to heart.
Posted by Ron as Miscellaneous at 12:01 PM EST
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In other news, a coffee shop in Windsor blew up on Christmas day. That’s “Blew Up” as in, “nothing left and took out the building next door.” I grabbed a pic from a local website. Plenty more photos there; check it out.
Total Destruction! Cool! (I say that with a clear conscience because nobody was hurt in the blast.)
What really surprises me is that none of the local media sites had much coverage of this. In Windsor, you’d think this would be pretty big news. I guess because there is no body count, nobody is all that interested. I found out about it on a message board hosted by one of my friends living in Windsor.
Posted by Ron as Miscellaneous at 12:02 AM EST
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It’s been a little while since I last posted. Holidays and all that. But today was back to work, and so resumes the normal routine.
My parents and grandma came down to visit us here in London this year, which turned out rather nicely so far. Everyone had an enjoyable Christmas, I think. Meghan went back to the Sault on Dec 25th to visit her family though, so we did the tree and presents thing on the 24th.
I got lots of cool stuff that I don’t need, but like having anyways; mostly games (Warcraft 3, Neverwinter Nights Diamond, Castlevania: Circle of the Moon) and books (Gunslinger Book 1, Call of Cthulhu RPG 6th Edition [Chaosium, non-D20!], Book 2 of a Viking saga, Book 11 of the Wheel of Time series). Tons of other stuff, too. Meghan got a bunch of stuff along the same lines as I did; games (Castlevania: Curse of Darkness, and Zelda: Minish Cap), books, and whatnot. Just when I thought we’d have room for everything here…
Dinner was amazing; 12 pound turkey from my sister’s workplace, 10 pound ham from mine, sweet potato, cranberries, broccoli, cauliflower, stuffing, and of course, more desserts than I could ever hope to even sample. There will doubtless be leftovers for weeks!
We spent much of the time just hanging out here, and playing with all our new toys. Jen got a poker set from work, so we all learned how to play and have had a surprising amount of fun with it; I didn’t think I would like it. I guess it helped that I totally cleaned up!
All in all, this was an enjoyable holiday, but far, far too short, as always. One thing I did miss, as I have for the past several years, was getting to see any of my old friends whose numbers I am less and less sure of all the time. Hopefully I will be able to take the time to do something about that in the near future…
Posted by Ron as Miscellaneous at 8:41 PM EST
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Last night, as part of a weekly ritual Meghan, my sister, and I have set up, we tour a new restaurant in London each week. We all take turns selecting the venue and picking up the tab. This week it was my turn again, and I selected The Marienbad. It’s a germanic place that I’d been wanting to try out really bad ever since we moved here.
I’ve been craving rouladen for about two years now, and it did not disappoint, to say the least. A lovely dining room atmosphere, the scents of “grandma’s kitchen,” authentic central European cuisine, courteous wait staff, and a charming old (late 19th century) building combine to make it one of the nicest dining experiences I’ve ever had. It doesn’t hurt that the menu boasts having 80 beers from 6 continents available. I supplemented my meal with this week’s featured beer, De Koninck, a Flemish brew I’d never had the priviledge of trying before. Very tasty.
Posted by Ron as Miscellaneous at 4:40 PM EST
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We have made a new addition to our family. We got another cat. Please excuse the horribly overdone reference, but I couldn’t resist. You see, his name is Ziggy, or Zig for short. Like if he gets in my way, I can say, “move, Zig!” Hence the overdone reference.
He came from ARF, the Animal Rescue Foundation. The members of the organisation take in animals and care for them until they can be adopted out. After filling out an application and going through an interview on the phone, we arranged a meeting. Everything went pretty well, and now we have a new furry companion for Loki. The whole process took less than 3 days, and cost only 75$ as an “adoption donation.”
Posted by Ron as Miscellaneous at 5:41 PM EST
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All this talk of politics in the news has moved me to finish the second of two entries that I’d promised in late October.
I’ve never truly understood where I stood politically. I knew that I was left of centre, just not how far or where, exactly. I like a lot of the NDP policies, for example, but at the same time found some of them overly restrictive on a personal level. I already know what I am, I know what I believe, but I didn’t know what to call it before. Now I do. I’m a Libertarian Socialist.
Posted by Ron as Politics at 10:45 AM EST
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Last night I had a great idea for a videogame. The concept would be based on a racing game where everything is wide open. Let me expalin what I mean by that.
The game could be enjoyed on your own, like racing against your personal best, or whatnot, or even against computer opponents if you want, but the main focus would be the online interactivity of it.
The game goals would be whatever you want them to be. My original concept was basing it around Brock Yates‘ Cannonball Run, which was an illegal coast-to-coast race that was run in the US during the 1970s. Then I had more ideas. That could be one possible plotline, but there could also be street racing, organised by other gamers, as well as drifting, like what you can find in NFS: Underground, and SCCA-style sanctioned track racing on real, modelled tracks, much like Gran Turismo, and One Lap of America.
The setting: basically anywhere. The game would read data from GPS roadmap software, so you could take your vehicle just about anywhere. The only thing that the game engine needs to do is generate backgrounds, which, by necessity would have to be fairly generic, but geographical considerations would obviously be taken into account, and things like landmarks and famous cities could all be mapped out more specifically. Imagine, if you will, taking your vehicle to the Bonneville salt flats for a wide-open throttle test of your new upgrades.
That brings me to the cars and parts. I like the idea of using ‘real’ cars like they did in GT, but since this game would be largely online, newer cars could be added as they come to market. And the game could query used car sites like Autotrader.com or whatever to come up with a list of cars available in any given area. Theoretically you could use any car you want, but again, part availability could be determined by online aftermarket retailers, though there would be nothing to stop you from having custom work done (at substantial cost).
Speaking of parts, I thought that maintenance would be a neat aspect of realism to get into. All parts would have a durability rating. Racing hard can (and eventually will) cause you to break parts. This happens in real racing all the time, so it seems logical to integrate it into the game concept. Buying a new car always gets you a car with parts that are fully intact, but buying used, you’re taking your chances. Cars that are ‘certified’ for example, would have at least average durability, but in the as-is section, many would have low durability parts or stuff that is completely broken from the get go. You would be able to spend lots of money on “bulletproofing” some parts, making them extremely resistant or even immune to breakage, another aspect of modification.
Other things to consider are mechanics. A good mechanic will be pricey, but will almost never botch a tricky job (i.e. installing an aftermarket turbo), whereas a cut rate guy might be able to get it done cheaper, but would be more prone to doing it wrong, leading to more problems down the road.
And of course, you would be responsible for getting your oil changed, filling up on fuel, buying new tires, paying speeding fines, and all that good stuff. Also factored in would be things like weather, construction, and traffic (information that is all accessible online, and therefore, also to the game).
Anyway, this will probably never happen due not to the complexity of the game engine, but rather the legality of arranging all this. Cannonball Run was controversial enough when it happened (and when the movies about it were made) which is why it is now banned. And in GT, the reason why there is no damage system is allegedly because of the manufacturers of the cars did not want to allow it for various reasons. Something to do with people making assumptions about the durability of their products or somesuch. So there are some “roadblocks” (pun intended), but I can seriously see it happening at some point. Just not soon. We have the technology, the interest is there (racing games are big sellers), so I hope something like this is only a matter of time…
Posted by Ron as Games at 11:29 AM EST
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I haven’t made too many political posts lately, and there’s a reason for it, but lately something has really been irking me and I feel that I need to rant about it.
There has been a lot of talk in the news recently about the Conservatives’ plan to get elected by lowering the GST. Out of one corner of their mouths, they accuse the Liberals of pandering to get votes with the spending spree, then, out of the other corner of their mouths, they do their own version. Lowering the hated tax is a vote grab, pure and simple. And the part that scares me is that it seems to be working. People think it will be sooooo great to have all this imaginary excess cash in their pockets.
Harper has played a numbers game, and played it poorly. He says the ‘average’ Canadian family of 4 with an income of $60k will save 400$ per year. That means they would have to spend $40k on taxable goods. Rent, groceries, and other necessities are not taxable. Besides that, I’m willing to bet that those things cost most families more than 1/3 of their income. Plus, people tend to think of gross income when he mentions these figures, but you can’t spend it if it’s already been taxed away on income tax. That makes his ‘average family’ seem a little less average. He’s talking about upper middle class here, precisely the voters he would like to woo away from the grits.
Then there’s the part of his plan he isn’t talking about, the ‘bait-and-switch’ part. I’m also willing to bet that the tax reduction will be financed largely by slashing or eliminating the GST rebate program. The rebate program was as close as the Liberals came to actually eliminating it, something the Neo-Cons say they didn’t deliver on. Let’s again look at the numbers.
I, personally, get in the ballpark of 300$ per year in GST rebate. That 300$ represents taxable spending on roughly a third of my (admittedly pathetic) income. Even assuming ol’ Steve’s wildly inaccurate amount of taxable spending as 2/3 of my income, the GST credit still represents a 50% reduction in the tax rate, or about 3.5% in real numbers. In order to gain that much back under Harper’s plan, I’d have to spend over $30k annually on taxable goods. I don’t even make that much.
No, as usual, the Neo-cons serve only the interests of the rich, who spend far more of their income on the non-evadeable GST, and businesses, who have to spend money to make money. Keep that in mind when you select your allegiance on the ballot this winter.
Posted by Ron as Politics at 10:59 AM EST
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