It’s been about a year now that I’ve signed onto Goodreads. It’s pretty good. I’ve got about 8 friends reading the same book or types of books I’m reading. I Haven’t figured out how to work the “follow” feature.

Looks like its trying to clear up out there. The Sun seems to be poking out through the cloud cover. It’s going to be a cooler weekend.

But at least I got some hockey to watch even though CBC has the game on at 1pm today. I’ll be able to catch some of it from 1-2pm and miss a good chunk of it on the way home but at least the Chicago/SJ game #4 is on Sunday. I’d love to see Chicago sweep SJ. First time Chicago in the finale since 1991.

According to my stat counter I’m getting about 20 hits/day this month. Since this isn’t content for the masses, that’s not to bad. I might be moving that Google ad somewhere else on the page and removing that Spot ad altogether since it’s not making me any money.

The contingency buses were running this morning. Oh, I had forgotten that the LRT would be shut down from Clairview to Corona. For the last few weeks ETS was adding new track from the tunnel entrance at 91st street. ETS was providing shuttle service from Clairview to downtown but at the Library the driver in broken English mentioned Churchill station. I ws on the street at this time. Something inside of me said I should have taken the day off. I walked over to Jasper Ave by about 99th street and decided I’d walk the rest of the way down to 106th and hang a left. I strolled in shortly before 10am and even got a preferred dialer 6 feet in front of the TV to watch the game at 1pm. Or what I could watch of the game. We did MF again (uggh) but I was getting sales. No credit cards. The second half as a bit easier. JT was there and we were tossing paper balls around having a bit of fun. I was contemplating working the afternoon extra hours but they canceled it. Just as well.
I walked with Will as far as Corona and I was going to wait for a #2 bus but a contingency bus arrived. I boarded that since the busses are more or less express. I listened to my Itouch along the way home. All the Lilac bushes our out in full bloom now. The driver wouldn’t let me out along the stop by my place so I had to go to Clairview. I got a regular bus and at the corner here I saw Anne across the street as I was waiting for the light to change. She didn’t see me.

I got inside taking the stairs as she was just coming off the elevator. I got the last period of the Flyers\Habs game. 2-0 Philadelphia. Yikes, the Habs are in trouble. They could be out by Monday night. Yet this playoff season they’ve been the comeback kids, coming back from Washington and then Pittsburgh. So never say never. At least I’ll be able to watch the Chicago/Sharks game at 1pm tomorrow. Crazy time of day for a hockey playoff game. I remember seeing the NY Islanders this day 30 years ago today take out the Flyers and it was over by 4pm.

Speaking of which it was 30 years ago today Richard, Ellen and I saw Star Wars “The Empire strikes back.” That was a special weekend. I’m glad I recorded that time in my original diary. I wish I was into photography and had a Polaroid back in the day. I would have asked a passerby; “Scuze me sir, would mind snapping a photo of us three?“ I’d have loved a photo of us 3 in the movie line up. Where have all the years gone?

That’s another reason why I’d like the Iphone because it can take video and photos. I’ve been hearing on places like YouTube and Cnet that an Itouch with a camera is coming this summer. I don’t believe it. I’m surprised Apple didn’t include a camera in the 3G version of the Itouch in the first place. Maybe they want to see what the success of the Ipad will be like. Anyway, that’s about all for now.

We’ve got a scorcher of a day going on today at +27 at this hour. We’re going for a +29 even though a +30 is being called for. That’s 86 F for my American readers. That’s hot. In the interior of BC like Hope etc, they usually get +40 in July and August.

I’m off tomorrow because Anne has relatives coming from Sydney NS and they want to take us out to dinner. Anne has the whole week off except for Saturday. In which case I’m watching game 4 of the NHL Conference finales and trying to get over this cold.

Tonight I’m in for 4 hours and we’re doing FFAB. Uggh. It’s not that bad though. Last night I got $200 and a $20 card. Nothing much to speak of but we don’t have taps until we do Cops sometime in June.

Today in SF Signal they announce a new SFF podcast: The Skiffy and Fanty show. All things SFF. I checked out there Home page to see if the show is available in Itunes. I’m also downloading the last issue of LibrVox. Also from SF Signal they announced a cool anthology: “Before they were giants.” It comes with 15 stories and Interviews from the authors and anecdotes of the stories they tried to publish and about writing in general. This actually is a cool idea. The anthology is edited by James L. Sutter. I’m going to ask for it next time I’m in Audrey’s.

I’m finishing off my first coffee here for the day and this entry is going to be published before I tackle my email. Anyway that’s all for now.

trip heading into work this afternoon. I bought a 6/49 ticket and had left over Pizza from last night for my lunch and a large diet Cola. Good stuff. The guys were doing FASB and the women were doing Rainbow. We had the game on and I watched a little of it following the scores. Jerry and I had a $2 bet. I took the Flyers. I won 4-3. Boston was up 3-0 and then the Flyers came back. They even had a game that was dissalowed. It took the officials a long time to decide if the Flyers go ahead goal was allowed but it wasn't. Philadelphia got the go ahead goal and the 8th place in the East (Flyers) make it in.

I headed up to my bank barely catching the bus. I did my banking and got all my vacation pay on my paycheck. Excellent. I headed home on the train without incident.

Anne was on the balcony planting flowers getting ready for summer and the cats out and about.

As for me, I'm going to do a bit of reading and have some supper and then try and go to bed. Anyway, that's about all for now.

Anne and I left out of here about 2:20pm for Ricky’s Sunday afternoon. It was actually quite nice out there even a bit breezy. I brought my book along to read waiting for the bus to downtown. It just began to rain. We got to City Center Mall and Anne needed to go to the Dollarama for a few things they didn’t have at the location across the street here. So I ended up waiting for awhile, so I thought I’d test my ITouch to see if could find a wifi connection but nothing became available. I read for a bit until Anne arrived. I didn’t bring any funds with me because I didn’t think we had enough time to get to Audrey’s books. I like Ricky’s. I had a Molson Dry (5.5) alcohol and the best bacon cheeseburger/fries I had in a long time. Anne bought breakfast we relaxed having good time. On Sundays, Ricky’s closes at 5pm. It was about 4pm when we left but Anne needed some more things at the Dollar store. I read and we headed back to Churchill LRT and there was the train pulling out as we were halfway down the stairs to the platform. Fifteen minutes later we were on our way home. It was a nice Mothers day with Sun and rain mixed throughout the day. We enjoyed going out.

At Clairview I decided to be patient and wait for the bus but Anne said she was walking. Then I realized that this being Sunday, we could expect half hour 40 minute delays. About by the Dollarama I realized, wait. I lost my hat in the wind while listening to my music with my headphones on. It was only the dollar ball cap.

At 6pm the Vancouver/Chicago game was on. It was a good game as well. Vancouver won 4-1. Game 6 is Tuesday. It’s still do or die.

This month marks the 30th anniversary of Star Wars “The Empire Strikes back.” (ESB) It was Saturday May 24th that I recall how Richard, myself and Ellen were heading towards the Hobbit Shop when we saw the lineup. Richard recognized one of his Scientology buddies in the line up and he let us in ahead of him and his wife as long as I paid for everyone. At that time the tickets were $4.50 each and since I had my income tax return fresh from the other night, I paid for all of us. There was no tax of course. That movie still is my favorite. I liked the first one of course and the 2nd but the 3rd didn’t work with me what with the Ewok’s crap. I really enjoyed the prequel trilogy, When the 3 of us saw ESB the movie had been out already for 3 days still getting large line ups. I think we were at the 4pm show because I recall how I wanted to watch another historic event in the making unfolding on a TV screen at the Toys and Wheels store at the City Center Mall (which we were in today.) A crowd was watching the NY Islanders taking on the Philadelphia flyers. The underdog Islanders against the Flyers. I was still processing that in my head as Richard found some black candles, which held some kind of novelty for him. Obviously when the movie was let out the Hobbit shop was closed so I took Ellen as far as JP terminal. I walked the rest of the way home. Hard to believe that was 30 years ago.

Once in awhile I check out my Google Adsense account. Firstly this is not content for the masses. That’s my disclaimer but since I opened up an Adsense account a few years back and put an add on my web site I received over 15,000+ page impressions. Out of those I got 9 clicks for a big whopping $3.90! Wuwho, That might be able to buy me a Wendy’s junior cheeseburger, hehehe

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I went to bed about 3am utterly exhausted. I had my player with “Aural delights” 134. They were interviewing SF Anthologist Jonathan Strahan. I’ll be listening to that on my commute. I woke up about 1:15pm an hour and a half more then I wanted to.

I’m about halfway through “Night Shift.” I’m enjoying this. There’s about 5 in the series so far as of this year. After this I think I want to go back to reading book 3 in the Wes’ har Karen Traviss series. When I’m working with long series, I like to mix them up instead of reading one long series back to back. When I’m ready to read Kate Elliot’s “Crown of Stars” and in between that I’ll read S.L Veigh’s “Star Doc” series. Both are about the same as far as volumes in the series go. I own both of those series.

Tonight it’s Pittsburg/Montreal for game #6. Pens lead Habs 3-2 in the series and could put the Habs away tonight. All I got to say is, Go Habs go! It starts at 5pm and we’ll have that game on tonight at work so I can at least get a glimpse of it. Odds are high that the NHL powers to be (we know who) wont let Montreal win over the Stanley Cup (US) champions. Last night the officiating wasn’t bad between Chicago and Vancouver but Vancouver (winning like 3-0 over the Hawks) was getting penalized left right and center. Chicago got away with a few things last night. I would love to see a Habs/Canucks match up in the finales but that isn’t going to happen. This isn’t whining either and what I’d like to see happen and what will in all probability, happen is SJ-Sharks/Pittsburgh Penguins in the finale. That wouldn’t be half bad. Come on Sharks in that case. But if the Habs win tonight and somehow stave off elimination, there will be a game #7 folks. Most likely Wednesday. I’m just glad that SJ took out Detroit Saturday night. Anyway, that's about all for now.

I got up early having the usual 2 hours sleep overnight for a Friday night. Although I was feeling good heading into the office. I was actually feeling happy, knowing I had just the 4 hour shift ahead of me. It was partially overcast out there under somewhat sunny skies. I bought some Tim's on my way into the office.

Work went well. We had a light shift. Maybe 12 tap shooters and about 8 in the back. We covered 3 campaigns and I got 5 cards for $145 on card. Jerry brought in a couple of bags of empties for me. I was glad to get out of there with about the lowest total I had for the week.

I went to my bank got my $20 for my book for latter and the train home. It was mild going home. Not warm but mild. I got home as Anne was getting ready trying to clean up before she left for her job.

The only casualty for the day was not being able to go see RJS as Anne needed the bus pass to get to work. Anyway, that's about all for now.

couple of days here. Yesterday afternoon I finished reading "Crossing the line." I enjoyed it and I'll return back to the Wes'har series later this year. I'll have a bit of a "review" of this book later tonight when I get home from work.

Right now I'm reading something a little out from my usual comofrt zone of SFF. "Night Shift" by Lilith Saintcrow is my first stab at reading urban fantasy and as I'm 20 pages into this thing, its not too bad. I like the writing and its in first person.

Over night we had a whack of snow on the ground. We're getting what Calgary had over the last weekend. I'll try and get a photo up. This early May snow storm is not uncommon this time of year around here, anything can happen.

Podcasts are great. I've got about half a dozen on my ITouch right now. I'm subscribing to "Starship Sofa," "Mysterious Universe," "Aware," "Logans run," "Slice of Sci-Fi," and of course "Puck daddy." I like Starship Sofa the best and ITunes lets me subscribe to these podcasts. I hook my ITouch to my PC and after a brief sync ITunes opens up and searches for new episodes and downloads them right to my ITouch, for free. I haven't figured out how to delete podcasts I no longer need to free up space on my ITouch. I've got about 6.5 Gb/7.1Gb of space left. I think when I get a second part time job I'm going to get the 64Gb ITouch.

This weekend Robert J. Sawyer is coming to Audrey's books for a reading and a signing. I'd like to get Robs's "Watch," but I'm so short of descretionary funds this year and I'm lucky if I can get 1 book/month. Anne wants me to put in the extra 2 hours for Saturday but even though I can't buy "Watch" at least I can to go to the reading after work. I'll try and do the Friday afternoon shift to make up for Saturday afternoon. It's the Lodge night thing that is getting in the way of things this month. .

Speaking of podcasting and the playoffs, Montreal won game #2 with the Pens, their series is tied at 1 as they go into the Bell center tonight. Go habs go! Last night Chicago split a home at home and they tie their series at 1. The Flyers and Boston are I think tied at 1. Red Wings/Sharks, Sharks are leading that series 2-0. If the Habs can take out the Pens -yeah, right- and SJ can take out Detroit, then we got new Stanley Cup champs this year. I'd love to see a Habs/Vancouver match up in the finale.

Tonight, I'm at the 5-9 for a snowy Spring evening but luckily for me we got monitors all over the place so I can get an occasional glimpse of the playoffs in between calls. I had a great site line to the monitor above Jerry's desk at the end of our tap dialers but for some reason as soon as Patrick left that dialer and I settled in the last 2 systems went and crashed on us. Something to do with the power grid. Why those two systems, I don't rightly know. Maybe its because we're using very old computers. Anyway, that's about all for now.

Ok on my agenda for today, I’m watching Doctor Who at 5pm with my brunch. At 6pm until about 8:30pm is Game 2 of Detroit/Sharks game. Then I’m reading for the rest of the night.

Last night I was listening to “Mysterious Universe.” It’s a great podcast. The topic was about how physicist Stephen Hawking said we should avoid contact with aliens. He basically said that any encounter with ET might be like the Spanish colonization of the New World. Makes sense to me.

My book wish list includes the Okal Rel Saga by Lynda Williams. Part 5 of this book will be released this month from Edge publications. So many books so little time.

Today I discovered Podcast.com. Podcast audio books in serial format for free. These podcasts even sync up with ITunes via RSS. I’m beginning to like Itunes and when I get some cash I’m going to get an ITunes gift card for $10 and begin to download some tracks onto my ITouch. One of the guys at work yesterday said he has something like 2,500 ITunes tracks in his ITunes library. That’s $2,500 worth of music!

When I was over there at Rogers getting my bag of chips yesterday I was checking out their Xbox 360 titles. I’m waiting for Fable 3 to come out. I still want to get into playing Oblivion but I need Xbox Live because my game disk is scratched. With the Xbox Live update even if my game disk is scratched all I need to do is to leave it in the CD chamber scratched or not and I can always play the game. I’d love to see Oblivion the sequel with co-op play. Now that would be something. The game wouldn’t give Warcraft any run for it’s money but I’m sure the Elder Scrolls gaming Universe would like the concept.

This week, I’m in the office for 2 full days. Most likely Monday/Wednesday. Then Thursday night I’m giving the FC exam prove up for a brother in my Lodge. Then Saturday Robert J Sawyer is in town and even though I’m working until 4:30pm I hope I can meet with him if he hasn’t left by then. So this week I have a full week and I might even be able to watch the odd NHL playoff game. Anyway, that’s all for now.

Since my laptop Wifi stopped working the other day I haven’t been composing my diary/blog that much.

Our local weather has been cold and windy lately but its supposed to warm up over the next few days. Not like +20 or anything. This Spring has been colder then usual.

I’m about 85% of the way through “Crossing the line” and I should have a bit of a review before the end of the month. I’m really enjoying this one.

Last night we were watching Montreal/Washington. Game 7. The Habs scored first and the score remained 1-0 for most of the game. With about 10 minutes left, the Caps scored to tie. Then the Habs scored to pull ahead. With about 2 minutes left the Habs got a penalty and the Caps pulled their goal tender for the extra man but with seconds left at the end of the day it was Habs 2/Caps 1. That was an awesome upset. An 8th place team took out the Presidents trophy winners. Love it. That made my 7.5 hour day yesterday. So now in the West it’s: Vancouver/Chicago, Detroit/Sharks. In the East it’s: Montreal/Pittsburgh, Philadelphia/Boston. I don’t think Montreal can take out the Penguins. But I’m hoping at the end of it all in the East its: Montreal and in the West its Vancouver.

I haven’t been taking my ITouch to work at all because I’ve still got no music on it. I’m learning how to work out MP4 files upload them to Itunes so I can download then (in sync) with my player but there’s only so many hours left in the day. Anyway, that’s about all for now.

Most of my free time over the last few days has been eaten up by trying to get the wifi on my Itouch to get fixed up. I opened up an ITunes account. I’m checking YouTube and the Forums and learning a lot of information on routers. My router did not come with a password when I got it last November. It’s a Belkin N150. For the most part it’s a decent router but has the tendency to suspend my Internet Explorer occasionally. I’m using my laptop to type this with my router on Wifi. I’ve tried all kinds of things and all kinds of password schemes. I tried admin, 1234, take my system off line for 30 seconds and reboot. Since my router didn’t come with a password, it allowed me to make one up. Nothing. I even went into the routers admin page and got the Wep key and typed that into the Itouch. I tried a dozen different things but still I can’t get onto Safari I even toyed around with changing the DSN settings. All I get is incorrect password for my network. The thing is the ITouch at least recognizes my network name but no matter what I do, I access the Internet from my Itouch. I got the 3rd gen version. I know this works because other people I’ve met and know, tell me it does and I‘ve seen the browser work on YouTube.

Other then that not much else is going on. Weather wise here it’s been very dry here in Northern Alberta and on the rest of the prairies. We really need rain. Back in the 1980’s we used to get a lot of rain. Sometimes it would last for 2 solid days or more, now we’re lucky we get a weeks worth of rain in a year.

Anyway, I’m going back to play around with this thing. Vinny from work says there’s a free says there’s a free program he wants me to download. He’s going to gain access to my laptop (the one I’m using now that he fixed for me last month) from home. I guess I’ll be plugging in my ITouch USB cable to call up ITunes and he’ll help me set things up from his location. We’ll probably do this on Sunday or Saturday night. I hope. Anyway, that’s about all for now.

with a spitting headache.

Anne gave me an Adville and a few minutes later I felt a lot better.

Seems Boots had jumped off again over the balcony about dusk this morning. He loves doing stuff like that and most likely he will be doing a lot of this during the summer.

Anne and I were about how the Mp3 player I want to buy but the Pay Pal way/EBay might take a month or more to get here. So shes going to give me the $200 to go over to Future Shop when she comes back from the bank tomorrow and I'm getting the 8 Gb version. I mostly want this for the pod casts I subscribe to and listen to a bit of music and play a few games from the apps store. I discovered that the Itunes gift cards don't work here in Canada but are sold here. Go figure. I can access the app store and download content using one of those disposable credit cards anyway. Well I'm pretty sure I can. I'm almost certain that I'll be getting my Itouch tomorrow. I'm looking for ward to it, although I wont have much time to play with it.

An update on the UFO story from yesterday. Ian Punnet had Nick Pope on the show last night and the guest said that the video seemed to be a hoax. He sited the almost perfect condition of the trucks in the photo, the absence of people nearby etc.

The Penguins/Sens game wasn't bad. I was hoping for a Sens win so now the Pens lead the series 2-1. I'm happy that Phoenix is leading 2-1 in their series with Detroit.

Despite having too much hockey I had a good day. Anne made a nice breakfast brunch. I'm going to post this and get some of my music converted over to the Itouch for later. Anyway, that's all for now.