Spring is in the air . . .

First, my apologies for not being a better blogger as of late. Though, I have to admit, since no one actually reads this blog, my apologies go to my blog itself and, I suppose, to me.

At any rate, I have a few things I want to talk about today. My last in class semester of school is finally finished. On this blog much of the grueling work that made up this said semester can be found.

Now on to the real matter at hand. Very little time can pass these days without hearing something about how fucked up our climate is. From the West Coast being pummeled with storm, after storm, after storm to the Colorado area seeing three back-to-back blizzards. And all a Torontonian has to do is merely step outside into the balmy 10-degree January weather to see that something is amiss.

All of this strikes me as being very odd, probably bad news and possibly cataclysmic, but the other day I saw something that made me feel that the situation is probably a lot worse than I realized.



Not the best photo, I admit, but let me just explain to you what is going on in this picture. That pale green and out of focus thing you see there springing from that tree branch is a baby leaf. And surrounding that baby leaf are hundreds of little buds all primed to join their early bird brother and spring to life months ahead of schedule.

Make no mistake this photo was not taken in April of last year, but just yesterday, January 5, 2007. Not only that but it was taken on Ward's Island in Toronto, an area that is always two to five degrees colder than the city.

I don't know what kind of implications this has for the coming spring, though I can guess that if we do get another cold snap (if you remember we did have about four days of minus 15-degree weather in early December, accompanied by about a centimeter of snow), these young buds/leaves will surely die, leaving fewer leaves to cleanse our already putrid summer air.

Congrats Cheri!

Man, I've been meaning to blog about this for some time and I could sit here and come up with a thousand excuses why I haven't but instead I'm just going to shut up and blog. Well, looks like The Radical Reverend Ms. Cheri DiNovo has won the provincial by-election in Parkdale High Park! Let me offer a 'tip of my hat' to Ms. DiNovo and a 'wag of my finger' to the Liberals (with a credit to the illustrious Mr. Stephen Colbert, of course). But before I get too much into what went wrong with the Liberal campaign, let's have a look at the numbers, shall we?

De Jong, Frank - Green Party of Ontario - 1452 votes (6.2%)

Di Novo, Cheri - New Democratic Party of Ontario - 9487 votes (40.5%)

Grzywna, Stan - Family Coalition Party of Ontario - 292 votes (1.2%)

Hutcheon, David - Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario - 4093 votes (17.7%)

McIntosh, Jim - Ontario Libertarian Party - 138 votes (0.6%)
Turmel, John C. - Independent - 66 votes (0.3%)

Ursomarzo, Silvio - Freedom Party of Ontario - 90 votes (0.3%)

Watson, Sylvia - Ontario Liberal Party - 7919 votes (33.3%)


Keep in mind these are not the final numbers (click link for final numbers), but just what the polls (199/220) are reporting at the time of this writing.

Now, the Liberal smear campaign was well documented by the main stream media, but I suspect that what the Liberals tried to do was something along the lines of what NDP supporters succeeded in doing during the last federal election. During that election a number of bloggers, namely Chandrasutra and The Accordion Guy, started blogging heavily about their disaproval of Liberal incumbent Sarmite Bulte. In the end NDP candidate Peggy Nash easily took the riding.

Similarly the Liberal campain started on bloggers row, but some how went awry. I belive that the the critizims made of Di Novo unfounded and poorly contextualized. And also that they were done in such a mean spirited manner that the media and, in turn, the voters choose to ignore the message and shoot the messenger.

ROFLMAO!

I recently discovered this gem of a site, which is on a mission to rid the world of internet slang and teach kids about proper English, or failing that (which they certainly will), to educate parents about what their kids are blathering on about in chatrooms. Some particularity enjoyable quotes from the FAQ page:

What does this site do?
No Slang.com is a translator similar to those offered by Google or AltaVista with one major difference: We don't translate language, we translate slang and acronyms.

You know, those weird acronyms your kids use; things like lol, idk, rotflmfao, bbiab, and those stupid alternate spellings like kewl, dood, ur, and thanx. We hate those, and have made it our life's goal to educate people about proper grammar.

Who started this site?
No Slang.com was started in 2005 by Ryan Jones (a PHP coder / SEO from Michigan) after talking to his Boss's kids on AOL Instant Messenger and not being able to understand a damn thing they were typing. After much research (and free child labor) he compiled a database of over 1000 slang terms, and continues to add new ones every day.

There is also an area where you can add your own Internet slang to the site, I took it upon myself to add POC (people/person of colour) and GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgenderd). While these are not terms exclusive to the Internet, they do come up quite often in chatrooms and message boards, so I thought they might be helpful.

However, as amusing and helpful as I found noslang.com, this site took the cake. That's right now you too can speak just like a 12 AOLer! Just for the fun of it I translated the lyrics of Talking Heads, Once in a lifetime.

AND U MAY FIND U LIVNG IN A SHOTGUN SHAK
AND U MAY FIND U IN ANOTHAR PART OF DA WORLD
AND U MAY FIND U BHIND DA WHEL OF A LARGE AU2MOBIEL
AND U MAY FIND U IN A BAUTIFUL HOUES WIT A BAUTIFUL
WIEF
AND U MAY ASK U!!11!!1!!11!!!!1111 OMG WTF DID I GAT HERE
L3TNG?!?!?? OMG WTF DA DAYS GO BY/LET DA W8R HOLD ME DOWN
L3TNG DA DAYS GO BY/W8R FLOWNG UND3RGROUND
IN2 TEH BLU3 AGANE/AFTER TEH MONEYS GONE
ONCE IN A LIEFTIEM/W8R FLOWNG UNDARGROUND
AND!1!1111!1 LOL U MAY ASK U DO I WORK THIS
AND?!!!!! OMG LOL U MAY ASK U SI TAHT LARG3 AU2MOBIEL
AND?!??!!?! WTF U MAY TEL U SI NOT MAH BAUTIFUL HOUES
AND!11!! OMG WTF U MAY TEL U SI NOT MAH BAUTIFUL WIEF
LETNG!!11!11 OMG WTF TEH DAYS GO BY/LET TEH W8R HOLD ME DOWN
L3TNG DA DAYS GO BY/W8R FLOWNG UNDARGROUND
IN2 DA BLUE AGANE/AFTER DA MONEYS GON3
ONCE IN A LIEFTIEM/W8R FLOWNG UND3RGROUND
SM3!111!!!!1 AS IT EV3R WAS.SM3!1!!!111!1!!!!!1!11!!!! OMG WTF LOL AS IT 3VER WAS.SME!!1!!1!!11!!!!1!!11 OMG WTF LOL AS IT AV3R WAS.
SM3!1!1!!!!1!1111!!1!1!1!1 OMG WTF AS IT EVAR WAS.SME!!!11!111!!111!1!!!! WTF AS IT EV3R WAS.SME!!1111!!1!!11!111111!1!! LOL AS IT EVER WAS.
SME!!!1!!111111!!!!11 LOL AS IT EVAR WAS.SME!1!!1111!11!11111111! OMG WTF AS IT AVER WAS.
W8R!!11!111111!!11 OMG LOL DISOLVNG.AND!111!1!!!!!1!!!1! OMG WTF W8R REMOVNG
THER3 SI W8R AT TEH BOTOM OF TEH OC3AN
CARY TEH W8R AT DA BOTOM OF TEH OCAAN
RAMOV3 DA W8R AT TEH BOTOM OF TEH OCAAN
LETNG!1!!! DA DAYS GO BY/L3T TEH W8R HOLD ME DOWN
L3TNG DA DAYS GO BY/W8R FLOWNG UNDARGROUND
IN2 TEH BLU3 AGANE/IN TEH SIELNT W8R
UND3R TEH ROX AND S2NES/THERA SI W8R UND3RGROUND
LETNG!!1!!11 OMG TEH DAYS GO BY/LAT TEH W8R HOLD M3 DOWN
LETNG DA DAYS GO BY/W8R FLOWNG UNDERGROUND
IN2 TEH BLUE AGANE/AFTER TEH MON3YS GONE
ONCE IN A LIEFTIEM/W8R FLOWNG UNDERGROUND
AND!11!! WTF LOL U MAY ASK U SI TAHT BAUTIFUL HOUES
AND??!!!?! WTF U MAY ASK U DO3S TAHT HIGHWAY GO
AND??!!!! OMG WTF U MAY ASK U I RIGHT.M?!!?!?11!1!!11!!!!1!11 OMG WTF I WRONG
AND???!??!?? WTF LOL U MAY TEL U WUT!!!11!1111!1111!1111!1!!1! LOL HAEV I DONE
L3TNG????? DA DAYS GO BY/LET TEH W8R HOLD ME DOWN
LETNG DA DAYS GO BY/W8R FLOWNG UNDERGROUND
IN2 DA BLUE AGANE/IN TEH SIELNT W8R
UNDER DA ROX AND S2NES/THAR3 SI W8R UNDERGROUND
LETNG!!!!1!!! OMG TEH DAYS GO BY/LET TEH W8R HOLD MA DOWN
LATNG TEH DAYS GO BY/W8R FLOWNG UNDERGROUND
IN2 TEH BLUE AGANE/AFTAR TEH MONAYS GON3
ONC3 IN A LIEFTIEM/W8R FLOWNG UND3RGROUND
SME!11!11 OMG LOL AS IT 3VER WAS.SM3!!!1111!111!!!1! WTF AS IT EVAR WAS.SME!1!!!!!11!111!1! OMG WTF AS IT AVER WAS.
SME!1!!1!!1!1!1111!111 WTF AS IT EVAR WAS.SME!1111!!11111!1!1!!! AS IT 3VER WAS.SMA!!!!1!11!!1!1!!11!!11 AS IT 3V3R WAS.
SMA!!11!1!11!!!!!111!!!!11! AS IT EVAR WAS.SMA!!!!111111111!!!111 LOL AS IT 3VER WAS.!!1!!111111!!11!1 WTF LOL

Note how the translator inserts LOL, WTF or OMG after nearly every sentence, priceless.

I promise to be a better blogger in the fall

So I’ve never thought of myself as being one to flake out in the heat of the summer. The dumbed down CBC programming pisses me off to no end and I wouldn’t pick up a Dan Brown novel no matter how hot it gets.

However, I now realize that blogging and I do not go hand in hand during the summer months. Maybe it’s the debauchery (or hope thereof) or maybe it’s just a left over habit from being out of school during the summer. Whatever the reason I will be a better blogger when the leaves start to change and patios are put away for the long winter. For now though I have to go meet some friends for a drink ; )

Ban together! The time is now

I've been hearing about this for some time now, the death of the Internet, as we know it. It figures that some one would try to pull this; the Internet is a massive threat to big business and politicians. Not only do they have to deal with millions of viewpoints, many of which differ from their own, but those viewpoints are not moderated by corporations, like so much of today's MSM.

I first heard this on demonbaby's website which has a great and comprehensive look (scroll down, April 20th) at the horror of what may be. However now there is a whole website dedicated to the phenomenon. To galvanize the troops I've quoted the direct effect to the average Internet users below.

• Google users—Another search engine could pay dominant Internet providers like AT&T to guarantee the competing search engine opens faster than Google on your computer.
• Innovators with the "next big idea"—Startups and entrepreneurs will be muscled out of the marketplace by big corporations that pay Internet providers for dominant placing on the Web. The little guy will be left in the "slow lane" with inferior Internet service, unable to compete.
• Ipod listeners—A company like Comcast could slow access to iTunes, steering you to a higher-priced music service that it owned.
• Political groups—Political organizing could be slowed by a handful of dominant Internet providers who ask advocacy groups to pay "protection money" for their websites and online features to work correctly.
• Nonprofits—A charity's website could open at snail-speed, and online contributions could grind to a halt, if nonprofits can't pay dominant Internet providers for access to "the fast lane" of Internet service.
• Online purchasers—Companies could pay Internet providers to guarantee their online sales process faster than competitors with lower prices—distorting your choice as a consumer.
• Small businesses and tele-commuters—When Internet companies like AT&T favor their own services, you won't be able to choose more affordable providers for online video, teleconferencing, Internet phone calls, and software that connects your home computer to your office.
• Parents and retirees—Your choices as a consumer could be controlled by your Internet provider, steering you to their preferred services for online banking, health care information, sending photos, planning vacations, etc.
• Bloggers—Costs will skyrocket to post and share video and audio clips—silencing citizen journalists and putting more power in the hands of a few corporate-owned media outlets.