I'm An Artist Too (126)

The cellmate asks the computer "What are you in for?"

The computer replies "I performed an illegal function call."

I find it humerous when people see that on their computer and think the computer did something in the statutory legal sense and they think the cops are on their way.  For those who don't know, when your computer says that, it generally means that something got messed up and a program tried to write to a memory or disc location that it didn't have permissions for, or execution of bad code, or something.  It could mean a lot of different things; none of which you need to call your lawyer about.

I'm An Artist Too (125)

I can't think of anything to write about today's Coffee Cup Art. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Move It On Over - Part 2

Last year I blogged about my previous moving experiences. It seemed whenever I had to move, I hardly had to look around. There was always an obvious no-brainer choice; a God event. When I went looking last year, there was no obvious no-brainer. There didn't seem to be a God event. Then Jack told me that if I didn't mind uncertainty I could stay with them. It sounded good to me.

Throughout the year, one of the places I looked at kept coming to mind. I would pass it on my drive home from work. I'd be stopped at a light, look up at the building and think "If I had taken that apartment, I'd be home by now."  As it was, I had another thirty minutes to drive.

Last Sunday afternoon it has became clear that I would likely have to move out of the McQueen's house. I began to contemplate my options. Apartment vacancy rates are really low. There are still bidding wars over houses. And there was always a chance I could stay in Embrun. I asked God for His guidance. Like Gideon, I put out a fleece. I asked God for a 1 bedroom apartment in the aforementioned building facing East on either the top or bottom floor coming available in July.

On Monday morning I called to ask about available apartments. I told them I was looking for a 1 bedroom apartment for sometime between June and September. They told me "Yes, we have a one bedroom apartment on the top floor coming available in July."

"Oh really. Here's an odd question for you. What direction does that apartment face?"

"East."

"Sweet. I'd like to take a look at it." On Tuesday I was shown the apartment. I filled out an application. On Wednesday I was told my application had been accepted. Then yesterday I signed the lease.

There were three things that really attracted me to this apartment. The first was that it was mostly seniors. I really don't want to live in a building with a lot of students. I like to go to sleep at night. The second thing was that the rent was in the right neighbourhood. If the rent is too low, you're asking for trouble. If the rent is too high, I'd be better off owning. The third thing was the location. It's close to almost everything in my life! Here's a partial list of things it's close to:

1. Tim Hotons
2. Country Style Coffee
3. Blackbelt Baptist Church
4. At least 2 grocery stores
5. 2 malls - a major one and a minor one.
6. My favourite multi-screen theatre complex.
7. Some of my favourite restaurants including an all-you-do-eat sushi restaurant.
8. A Farmboy
9. Zellers
10. Canadian Tire
11. My dentist
12. Giant Tiger
13. Staples Business Depot
14. FutureShop
15. The Highway
16. The Transitway
17. Chapters
18. A low-traffic route to and from work.
19. My bank
20. A Public Library

Now, there are a few things in my life it's not close to:

1. My friends.
2. A Blockbuster Video.
3. My doctor's office.
4. My barber
5. Other things that I'll figure out as I find I need them!

So, now I get to organize a move. I have to reserve the service elevator. Any volunteers? I don't have a lot of stuff.

Church Hopping - Part 4

It's been a while since Church Hopping - Part 3. Since then, we've mostly been going to Blackbelt Baptist. We did go back to Golgotha Baptist once because they were having a retirement service for the pastor there.  Since my last post on the subject, I have visited the following churches:

Fate Anglican Church

This was one of those small churches in a school gym. The pastor didn't like the liberal direction the Anglican church of Canada was going, so he broke off and joined a more conservative network of Anglican churches. You gotta really respect that. So, given what it was - a small church, it wasn't bad. I liked how the pastor had a Q&A period at the end of his sermon. It was different being in back in a liturgical church. I can see how some of those prayers and creeds could get old. They become just words you say every week, but once in a while, they're really good. The authors obviously put a lot of time and effort into them.

Redemption Alliance

The oddest thing about this church was that all the music was played before the sermon. There was no closing song. The music was very good. I enjoyed it much. The people were somewhat friendly. One distracting thing was this one guy on the worship team was wearing a short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt. This was in February. It was out of place! Other than that, it seemed to be a run of the mill church. Nothing special either way.

Oak Orchard Church

Every so often Blackbelt Baptist and Oak Orchard Church have combined services. They also combine for their youth oriented groups. I've been to Oak Orchard twice; once in a combined service, and once in a regular service. The music was always very good. The people were really friendly. I haven't been assaulted with that many "Hello and who are you?"s since Beaver Creek Baptist Church. They do communion every week, which is odd to me. For communion, they just have one loaf of bread that everyone breaks a piece off of. The germophobe in me doesn't like this. Thankfully I brought my hand sanitizer with me that morning. Then the speaker, who wasn't the pastor, started speaking. He was to give a "quick summation" of the life of Joseph. This "quick summation" took a long time. I think it would have been just as fast to read that portion out of Genesis. All in all, it wasn't bad. I'd go back a few times.

Village Baptist

The music was odd. They had a lot of talented musicians, but the layout was different. They had two stages. On the main stage stood the guitarist, two vocalists, and an old-school choir. On the second stage sat the bass guitarist, an electric guitarist, a keyboardist, and the drummer. I find it really odd to have a choir singing contemporary worship music. But, they made it work. The preaching wasn't bad, but it wasn't good either. And no one, not even the ushers, said "Hi" to me. I won't be going back.

Riverview

I enjoyed this service. There was a huge young adults group. I think they took up about 4 or 5 pews. I haven't seen that since my church in Sault Ste. Marie. One guy came over to talk to me and invite me to sit with the young adults. The preaching was decent. The music was good, although they lacked a drummer. (Ohhhhh, if only I lived closer to that church!) I'd go back.

Glebe Baptist

One morning when I was staying in the Glebe I didn't feel like driving very far so I decided to check out Glebe Baptist. It reminded me of my church in Sault Ste. Marie.  The old wooden pews, with red carpet was like my Sault church. The percentage of the pews filled up was about the same was the Sault church when I left. And, they had an old-school choir, just like my Sault church when I moved there. Besides the piano and organ, this choir was accompanied by a bass guitarist. I thought this to be odd. That's usually one of the last instruments to be added to a worship team. There's not a lot of bass guitarists out there. They even did a contemporary worship song. The preaching wasn't too bad, except the preacher kept saying how Christ died for us out of his love for, and devotion to us. I thought Christ died for us because of his love for, and devotion to his father. Perhaps that point is debatable? Anyway, A few people came up to me and introduced themselves to me, so I felt welcomed.

Chedarview Alliance

I'm writing this the day I went to Chedarview. Let me say, it was not a good morning. It all started on Saturday when I had a late lunch.  I skipped supper that night.  I intended on a breakfast at Tim Hortons on Sunday morning on the way to church.   I had picked the Tim Hortons closest to the church so I could stay and enjoy my breakfast sandwich. When I got to Tim Hortons, it was closed for renovations!  I was hungry, grumpy and not happy!   I drove around Farhaven looking for another Tim Hortons, and all I could find were gas station Tim Hortons.  I wanted to sit down and read a book.  I didn't want drive-thru! I decided to go to church hungry and get a big lunch afterwords. When I got to church, no one said "hi" or shook my hand - not even the guy handing out the bulletins. That was disappointing. The music was tight. But the preacher went on and on and on.  And on.  He was the freakin' Energizer Bunny. He just didn't stop. Even the best preachers start getting stale at 40 minutes.  This guy was far from the best. I expected he's preach for about 30 minutes.  After 45 minutes of preaching. I noticed people getting up and leaving. I would have left too except I wanted to know how long he intended to bore us. Was he planning on keeping us there until Jesus came back? It felt like it. After 50 minutes he finally closed in prayer. (My prayer was one of thankfulness.) The worship team cut their last set down to one verse of one song.  I won't be going back.

Stick a Fork in 2009; it's done!

2009 has been a pretty bad year for those of us living in the McQueen household. I am writing this on New Years Day, 2010. Now that the year is over, I'll write about why it was so bad.

The bad stuff started happening in December of 2008, so I'm going to lump that in with 2009.

Some things are worse than others.  As the year started showing a trend of being "one thing after another", I started keeping track with a list.  The first part of the list was the order I remembered things happening.  After that, I added to the list as things happened.

The following order is the order of the list I recorded.

The OC Transpo Bus Strike

This started in December and lasted two months. By the time they put the rural buses back one, it was four months. I take a rural bus. I had to drive in to work every day for four months. I live far away from work. I put 8000 kilometres on my car in that time.

My health

Normally I don't get sick. I might get two colds a year, and that's it. This year I got four colds - twice as many as usual. But the worst of it was I got the stomach flu twice. I got it in December a few days before I went to Halifax for Christmas. I threw up for the first time in 18 years. Not cool. Then I had a relapse when I was home in Halifax.

The Economy

We're in the worst recession in a long time. Some were comparing it to the 30s. I don't think it was quite that bad - at least in Canada, but it was still pretty bad.

Pandemic

While the Swine Flu pandemic turned out to be pretty tame, it still was, by definition, a pandemic. It was a new virus that few people had immunity to that was hitting young people harder than old.  It was the first pandemic in 41 years.

Pastor Jack Left Yahoo! Baptist

The very day I returned from Halifax from my Christmas vacation I found out Pastor Jack would be leaving Yahoo! Baptist. For the McQueens it would mean changes were likely on the horizon. They would probably move before too long. They would be facing unemployment in the worse economic situation in years. This would not be a year of plenty for them. It also had implications for me. If the McQueens moved, so would I . If I moved, I would surely face a huge rent increase. If my rent increased substantially, the possibility of finishing off my pilot's license in the near future would be pretty small. There goes that life goal.

Being on-call at work

Due to the recession, the Government of Canada put forth an Economic Action Plan which included an EI workload increase. So a bunch of us had to do some on-call time. I hate being on-call.  I've done it three times before.  I hated it.

Euphoria drinks rose in price

Euphoria is a store near by that sells smoothies and fruit drinks. They're really good, but a bit expensive. They just got more expensive. It's not a big deal. Just an annoyance.

July was the wettest on record

This summer stunk because it was really wet.  The days were cool and the nights were warm. I want the opposite. I don't care if it goes above 30 in the day, I want to get cool at night. Instead, in the summer of 2009, it would get up to about 22 in the day, and go down to 19 at night. It was very humid. It was very hard to sleep. If I had continued to work on my pilot's license, I wouldn't have gotten very far due to the weather. So, at least the weather wasn't taunting me. :)

Pastor Jack fell off the roof, and broke his ankle

Being out of work is bad enough - this was just terrible.

The McQueen's car made several trips to the garage

They're out of work. The last thing they need is a failing car!

Corner Gas ended

This is a minor one. I really enjoyed that show. Now it's over.

Record Federal Deficit

The last time there was a record federal deficit in Canada was in the 90s. In order to balance the books, the government slashed a lot of programs. In the process they cut about 45 000 - 50 000 federal public servant positions. If they do that again, I don't have enough seniority to survive.  So, this causes me to worry about my job security.

Saturn Dealerships closed

Saturn had such potential. But now it's over. GM says that any GM dealership should be able to fix my Saturn, but Saturn has a few parts that are different from other GM cars. I want to sell my Saturn and replace it with a car from a company that's still in business, but I'd never get for my Saturn what it's worth to me.

That's 13 items.  I can count at least eight more that didn't make it onto this blog because....well somethings just don't belong on the Internet for all to see.

But, it wasn't all bad. Let's look a the bright side of 2009:

I got to fly First Class to Halifax at Christmas time.

'Nuff said

The McQueens didn't have to sell their house.

God really provided for them and allowed them to stay. Since they got to stay, so did I. While, I didn't get to resume working on my pilot's license, I was able to put some money away. If they (and I) can manage to stay there for another year my question won't be "What apartment building should I move to?" But "What condo building should I buy a condo in?"

The McQueen kids got to go all over the world for school.

Bruce returned to Vancouver. Jane went to LA. Robin got to go to England.

So far, 2010 is shaping up to be a better year for me. The federal budget came down in March, and it seems as though my job is safe....for another year anyway. It has been a beautiful winter. As I write this, I'm living in the Glebe for a few weeks. Sweet!

Concentrated Bad Luck

I have some theories on luck. My first theory is something called the "Universal Luck Constant" meaning there's only so much good luck to go around in the universe. If you use up a lot of luck in one area, there's less to go around in another.  For example: one time my friend and I parked out car in the city to play pool for an hour or two. We didn't put any money in the parking meter - thus risking a parking ticket. We both played one of the worst games of pool in our lives. We couldn't sink a ball to save our lives. When we returned to the car, there was no ticket. We used up all our luck by not getting a ticket. We had no luck left over to play pool.

Another theory about luck is that you can have a lot of bad luck in a short amount of time, but then things turn around afterwords. In February of 2008 I had a really bad month. This is what happened (in chronological order):

It snowed a lot

That was the February of an almost record breaking winter. Pastor Jack went to Jamaica on a missions trip. Robin went to Italy on a class trip. The other two kids were away at school. This left Wendy and I at home. So I did as much of the shovelling as I could. It snowed 4 our of every 5 days.  Shovelling was a daily chore.  I was really getting tired of it. Ottawa almost broke a record that winter for amount of snow.

My uncle died

This was, by far, the worst part of that February. He should have lived to 120 years. It was the uncle with whom I lived when I lived in Toronto. He is greatly missed.

I ordered a used CD online, and when I got it, it was damaged.

I blogged about this before. The day I received the CD was the day my uncle died. I decided to deal with the CD when I returned from Toronto. When I returned, I found out the deadline for returns had passed.

My camera stopped working

It was hard to describe what was wrong with the CD, so I decided to take a picture. When I did that, I saw that my camera wasn't working.

My first cavities in years

Since my last trip to the dentist I had taken better care of my teeth than ever before, yet I got a cavity. Two of them, in fact.  For the first time in my life, I was confident that this trip to the dentist would end well. It didn't. I had two cavities! I began to suspect a dental conspiracy. When I got the cavities filled my dentist took liberties and did some other work that I hadn't asked her to do. That extra work wasn't covered by my insurance. This eventually broke down my trust in her, so I had to find another dentist. You have to trust your health care providers.

A button fell off my jacket

I found this nice corduroy jacket at The Bay. I wear it at work. Then a button fell off. Upon examination, I saw a second button was getting close to falling off. No big deal - I'd just sew them back on.

I lost my sewing kit

This is not a big deal. My sewing kit is one of the $2 kits you find in the dollar store. It has some thread, a few needles, scissors, etc. It wasn't a huge deal, just an annoyance. I wasn't able to sew a button that had fallen off my jacket (see above).

My desktop computer stopped working

The day I realized I lost my sewing kit, I decided I wanted to watch a DVD on my desktop computer. When I turned the computer on, it didn't work. The video card was broken. Oh well, I still had my laptop. My laptop only has a 12" monitor, but it's better than nothing. And, it's an Apple so it "just works."

The DVD software in my laptop stopped working.

When I inserted the DVD, and the DVD software started, my computer froze. I rebooted and tried again. It froze again. I tried starting the DVD software without inserting a DVD into the computer. The computer froze. I looked around the Interwebs and found out that on my specific laptop model (12" PowerBook G4) the DVD software with that specific version of Mac OS X didn't work. I had to wait for Apple to fix the problem and release a patch.

As the last thing happened I was really starting to loose it. Everything was going wrong that month. The last four items happened on the same day. The only good thing that happened that month was that I signed my indeterminate contract at work. That means there is no determined end to my employment with the federal government. Other than that, everything was going wrong. When I couldn't watch a DVD that day on either of my computers, I just grabbed my iPod and listened to some soothing music whislt lying in the fetal position on my bed.

See how all that luck was concentrated into that one month?

Then March began. This is what happened in March:

I re-ordered that CD

It was in perfect condition when I received it. In the end I spent as much on the two used CDs as I would have spent on one new CD.

My camera got fixed

On a whim, I took my camera into Blacks to ask if they had seen my problem before. The guy at Blacks looked at it and told me "Yes I have seen this. In fact, that's a known problem with these cameras. Cannon is aware of the problem, and they're fixing this problem for free, regardless of warranty status." He told me how to go about getting it fixed. Yay!! I didn't have buy a new camera!

I learned a lot about oral health

My suspicion of the dental profession led me to do a lot of research. I found out some things like how cavities can heal themselves given the right conditions. I discovered something called xylitol, an all-natural sugar substitute that kills the bacteria that causes things like cavities, gum disease, inner-ear infections, and some throat infections. There's also evidence that it helps the bones absorb calcium. It has 40% of the calaries of sugar. It's digested independently of insulin, so it's safe for diabetics. The only downsides are that it's a wee bit expensive, and hard to find. I did find it in January of 2009, and I've had great dental reports since then.

I found my sewing kit

This happened within the first couple of days of March. I found it in the jacket that had the missing button. When I found it, I knew the month was starting to turn around.  I promptly fixed the buttons on that jacket.

Apple patched their DVD player software

Apple released the patch, which I installed allowing me to watch DVDs on my laptop again!

I thought it was so funny how everything was concentrated into February of that month. By the end of the month I was really feeling defeated by life. Once March arrived, things started turning around immediately. Then life returned to normal.

I also noticed something about bad luck.  Only one of those things was really bad; my uncle passing away.  The rest of them were small.  The thing that made them seem worse was that it felt like every single day something else went wrong.  Even if it was just coming home and having to shovel a foot of snow off the driveway. By February the snowbank at the corner of the driveway was about 8 feet tall, and it was quite the feat of strength throwing snow over that hill. The bad luck incidences were accumulative.  Eventually you just need something to go right.

So that is an example of Concentrated Bad Luck. 2009 was like that too, and I'll get to that later.

Here's a Dilbert comic illustrating the Universal Luck Constant:

The Dental Conspiracy

When I was growing up, I found my oral health didn't seem to be connected to my oral care. The more I brushed and flossed, the more cavities I got. When I brushed and flossed less, I got fewer, or no cavities.  When I was in college I never went to the dentist, and I was pretty slack about brushing and flossing. When I was in university, I went to the dentist. I expected to have 17 cavities, 5 extractions, and 2 root canals. Instead, the dentist said "Well, you have no cavities, but you need to brush and floss more." So I did.  Diligently.

Two years later, once I had my job with dental benefits, I went to the dentist again. For the first time in my life I was confident I would have a good check-up. I had brushed twice every day. I flossed more than I ever had before. When I would drink sugary drinks, I would immediately chase them down with water. Take a sip of Pepsi, then a sip of water.

The dentist took a look, and some X-Rays and said "You have two cavities."

WHAT?! That doesn't make sense! I neglect my teeth, I'm fine. I take care of them and I get two cavities?!  I suspected a dental conspiracy. I looked around the Internet for evidence to support my theory and couldn't find much. But, I did find an awful lot of information, which I will share with you now in the form of myths and facts.

Sugar causes cavities

It doesn't. Acid causes cavities. Acid slowly dissolves the minerals in your enamel. Eventually, your enamel becomes weak and worn away, and a hole appears. That's a cavity. A certain strain of bacteria uses sugar to replicate and create acid. Acid can also come in the form of acidic food (like oranges and lemons), acidic drinks, or your saliva could be acidic.

The only way to fix cavities is to have them filled

This is mostly true.  The truth is that your saliva has minerals in it that strengthens tooth enamel. But, the more acidic your mouth is, the longer that process will take. In fact, if your mouth is acidic enough, or for much of the time, the cavity will grow faster than the minerals will be replenished. If you put your mouth into a non-acidic condition, you can remineralize your teeth with your saliva.  However, with a full-on cavity (a hole, as opposed to weak teeth), I doubt there's any substitute for a filling.

Fluoride in our water prevents cavities

If this were the case then cavities would only be found in areas without water fluoridation.  (Sault Ste. Marie, during my time there, did not fluoridate their water, yet even without much brushing or flossing, I had no cavities.) It's true that fluoride, in very small doses, can help teeth remineralize. In order for fluoride to work on your teeth, it needs to be in contact with your teeth. Fluoride in a mouth wash, or in toothpaste will help, but in drinking water, it won't do much once you've swallowed the water. Fluoride is an industrial byproduct. In the bloodstream it can be extremely harmful to people and animals. It's true that cities keep fluoride levels low enough not to harm most people. But if you drink more water than most, you may consume more fluoride than is harmless to you. The bottom line is this: A dilute fluoride rinse (0.05% Sodium Fluoride) in a mouth wash is good for your teeth. Due to the nature of fluoride, a stronger concentration is not necessarily better than a weaker one. Stick with a 0.05% sodium fluoride mouth wash - so I've read.

Sugar-Free gum is good for your teeth

That depends. It's true only if your sugar-free gum has the right sweetener in it. It probably doesn't. It probably has sorbitol, manitol, aspertame, and/or maltitol in it. None of those are good for you. Most sugar-free gums use sorbitol as the main sweetener. The bad bacteria in your mouth quickly learn how to use sorbitol instead of sugar. These sweeteners can cause gastro-intestinal problems. The sweetener you want to look for is xylitol. Xylitol is an all-natural sweetener that the bad bacteria in your mouth never learn to use, even after years of exposure. Xylitol also makes your mouth alkaline, so your saliva can remineralize your teeth. Look for Xylitol gum at your local health food stores.

Xylitol will give you diarrhea

It's true that in large quantities xylitol will give approximately one third of the population loose stools until their system becomes used to it. But, for dental purposes, you only need about 6.5 grams to 10 grams a day. You don't even need to swallow it. You can chew xylitol gum.

If Xylitol were so great, why don't we hear more about it?

Good question. I've found that some dentists are somewhat aware of the existence of xylitol as a molecule, but are unaware of it's dental benefits. Either that, or they don't want you to know too much. It could really cut down a dentist's business.  :) The only downside to xylitol I can find is that it's expensive compared to other sweeteners. It's also not appropriate for all types of baking.

Sealants will help protect my molars from cavities

They will as long as they were applied correctly, and they stay on perfectly. Once they start wearing down, cavities can form beneath them that can't be seen with the naked eye. Besides, sealants don't fix the problem. They're a band-aid solution, except it's like putting on a band-aid before even getting a cut. Wouldn't it be better to fix the problem (ie: bacteria and acidic saliva)?

It's a good idea to take dental advice from a computer programmer.

It's not. Don't do it. (BTW: I'm a computer programmer, darn it, not a dentist!) It's better to take dental advice from a dentist. This dentist maintains a blog where she answers people's questions. It's really quite informative. She wrote a book called Kiss Your Dentist Goodbye where she explains things more fully. She has come up with an easy system you can use to keep your teeth healthy and shiny. You can buy the products from her site, but you can buy them elsewhere with no profit to her.