I finished reading jPod by Douglas Copeland last night and can highly recommend it as a laugh out loud read. I just couldn't put it down. I'm pretty sure this is the first novel I've read by him (having missed Microserfs many years ago) and I'm pretty sure it won't be the last. jPod is Seinfeld (set in todays technology machine) crossed with Clerks (for angsty, dissatisfied with their lives 20 somethings) crossed with Dilbert's cube farm hijinks and with some other really weird stuff thrown in to glue the storyline together. It's told in a style of fast cuts and stream-of-consciousness interstitials which moves the story along quickly. I rather like the characters and, working in this industry, have probably seen at least a few of their types (possibly sometimes in the mirror ;) ). Well worth the read - but be warned, you'll want to finish it in one sitting.

(Spoiler Warning - Read at your own risk)
We went to see X-Men III on Friday night and I came out of the movie with mixed feelings. Not quite sure if I liked it as much as I or II. On one hand to the good, my least favorite character got offed. I always felt Cyclops was far too whiny to be an effective X-Man. On the other, not so good, so did Professor X and Jean Grey/Phoenix. Mystique and Magneto pretty much neutered and normalized - not good. And the legion of mutants led by a motley crue of wanna-be's *sigh*. The mutant sniffer chick reminded me too much of the Anna-Lucia character from Lost (very irritating) while the sonic clapper chick was just plain weird. The trailers played up Arcangel yet he had very little screen time, and damnit - no Nightcrawler this time, however, introducing The Beast was good. Yet finally, the storyline was kind of weak - what if we could make everyone "normal". Now define "normal". Which theme, of course, lends itself well to a polarizing of camps (good mutants, X-Men vs bad mutants, Magneto's crew). Maybe I'm missing a greater theme, that of humanity seeking to control biology/nature/evolution... (ok I'm reaching here) and the Pandora's box that can unleash.
Hmmm, looks like the cons are outweiging the pros right now. I think the movies are getting a little tired - maybe it's time to put them to rest. On a positive note, I'll be eagerly awaiting Wolverine which is scheduled to be released in 2007.
For X-Men III: 3 out of 5 stars.

Wow, what a week! Why is it that the short weeks (Canada had Monday off for Victoria Day) always seem the most jam-packed? It's getting to the point where I approach a long weekend with trepidation because I just know what's waiting on the other end of the holiday. Thankfully is mostly all good this week, just really really busy. A colleague asked me once when did I find the time to write articles for my blog? I laughed and replied I don't - which is why the posting is so sporadic. Well now that tv's done the season enders, time suddenly freed up in the evenings so I expect I'll be able to devote more time to producing some articles instead of vegging on the couch. But two evening are set aside for training at the club. We'll see how it goes. I also want to overhaul this site and get it up to standards. I had originally created this site as an experiment and to get to know the Movable Type templates better. I'm pretty comfortable hacking the templates now and should really create a better version. Again - we'll see. I might be able to get creative again one of these days. Options, options - I might even shut this site down and start a different one from scratch. I don't know - I'll have to sit down and make a plan. Ah - enough for now. I'm off for home and the only plan I have is to see X-Men 3 tonight. The weekend awaits.

Well finally - President Logan got his comeuppance, and Jack's been shangheid at the close of 24, Season 5. Does the nail-biting ever stop? I can't really say this season did it for me as much. I think overall I prefer Season 3 for grit and sheer ballsy storylines. Season 5 did have it's moments but to me most of them felt forced, too directed, too scripted. The characters felt a little too manipulated. But still, I enjoy the show and will eagerly await Season 6. Best acting kudos to:

• the kid during the Ontario airport terrorist crisis


• Jean Smart (Martha Logan) for a tremendous job as one messed-up First Lady

What an amazing time I had at the Canadian Fencing Nationals in Montreal this weekend. I haven't competed at the Nat's since 2002 so I'd forgotten how big it was and how much fun. (and how much money I end up spending at the vendor tables *sigh* ) It's also some pretty tough competition. I figure, the general pools at the Nat's are like our Super Pools here in the Maritime League (yikes!). And I was lucky enough to get into a pool that contained both a National Team member and a former Olympian. My only regret was that one more point I failed to get to qualify for the Direct Elimination rounds. That would've been sweet - but, maybe next year. I will be satisfied with the high points of scoring 3 points on the olympian, winning a pool match, and selling the other ones not too cheaply. I only lost two matches 5-0 (which is not so good) but one of those was to the girl who would eventually win the gold medal in Women's Foil. So the results of my 6 pool comrades, one took gold, one took bronze, one was in the top 16 (and I got three points on her too), one came in 20th (she beat me 5-0), one came in 36th (I beat her) and one came in 38th (she beat me 5-4), and I came in 37th.

Now I'm really looking forward to the summer so I can work on some stuff for the next season.

Roger Johanssen (of 456 Berea Street) pointed out an excellent article by Derek Powazek called The Art of No. Read it.

The article centres around asking "Why?" instead of saying "No" when approached to implement what seems to be a ridiculous idea (to us as designers, developers etc.). I'm sure all of us have been in the same situation, the client comes to you with what seems to be a stupid request and the knee-jerk reaction is to just say no. But the better response to these requests is to ask why? As in "Oh yes? That's interesting, why do you want us to do this?" which should open the conversation to an elaboration of the problem/s they're trying to solve.

In my team (we're called Solutions), we are always trying to get clients to come to us with the problem that needs solving (not with their solution which they want us to implement) simply because we're well positioned to develop a solution that will address their needs while fitting in with all the other solutions we've developed or maintain. And this is critical when you have as large a solutions architecture as we do. To me it is equally important to get to the meat of the problem whether it's to implemet a large scale application, or as simple as an addition to a webpage. Why, indeed.

Such a simple question - such powerful results.

I guess I spoke too soon yesterday. Apparently flickr was busy making improvements to their service and now I'm feeling the flickr love all over again. They've redesigned the navigation a bit, everything's working snappy, uploading's back to the easy-peasy way it always was, and they've doubled the upload limit to 2GB. Great work folks!!

Is it just me or has flickr been really misbehaving as of late? It seems impossible to upload photos, the response time from the servers is very slow, many images that don't load properly, etc. What's going on? It's verry annoying.

I meant to post this last week but was in Fredericton most of the week in many, many meetings.

Adobe has released a preview version of their AJAX framework (titled SPRY) which will allow designers with basic knowledge of HTML, CSS and JavaScript to create/implement AJAX apps in their websites. Plans to incorporate with Dreamweaver are in the future. Hmmm. Interesting. But I wonder how many instances of AJAX for AJAX's sake will start to populate the web once this is released wide. I hope people will think to use it when it makes sense to use it (ie: when it makes user interaction with the website easier).

Back from the provincials and it was a pretty fun weekend. This is a slightly better time of year for driving up to Bathurst as it's around a 4 hour drive or so and the days are fairly long now. It's also warmer up there so we're not going from springlike temps into snow on the ground (that's not fun at all). We had a really good turnout and the fencing was pretty intense. The whole event turned out to be enjoyable overall. It was just a little disappointing, though, to come in 2nd in the Open Women's Foil event. Technology unfortunately did me in as the scoring box wasn't reset so did not record my valid hit in the overtime tie breaker - grrrr. Really, it's only disappointing because so may people have a certain expectation of your performance and when you don't deliver, well, it's kind of a letdown. I didn't manage to get into the Open mixed Super 8 pool (which I've gotten used to making) either but I was pleased with a 9/33 placing in the overall mixed event. Anyway, no big deal. I know my abilities and am quite satisfied with how I've been fencing over this season. There's always room for improvement though so I'll have to put a plan together for next year. Right now, I'm focussing on Nationals which will be taking place in a couple of weeks and hopefully it'll be just as good a time.

Well, I'll be off soon to drive back up to Bathurst for our Provincial Championships this weekend. Should be a fairly well attended event and I'm just hoping I'll do well. It's always the same before every road trip - a mad rush to get everything organised and packed (yes, I still have to pack). But once I'm on the road it all seems to settle down. This'll be the final prep event for most of us before the Nationals in Montreal in 2 weeks - now that's something to get a little nerved up about.

So, wish me luck folks! I'll update you as soon as I'm back.

The music labels want the feds to draft a law urging U.S.-style copyright laws in Canada to halt music piracy. Canadian artists have formed a coalition protesting this. Isn't it about time to listen to those who make the music rather than the profiteers?
ref: Canadian Artists Protest Labels' Piracy Plan
and Canadian Music Creators Coalition Gets Busy

And in other news, Apple manages to secure their 99¢/song pricing model after months of wrangling with labels.

All these issues do nothing enforce the picture painted of the labels/industry as controlling, greedy, grasping ticks growing fat on the back of the artist and the consumer. Well, that's just business I guess. I heard somewhere that the artist's cut of CD sales is paltry. I think personally I'd rather download the music off an artist's site and pay them the $10 directly.