Sick Kids Doesn’t Want My Money

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Last weekend, an earnest young lady named Taylor Lewis knocked on my door.  She was wearing a Sick Kids Hospital vest, and had a special tag hanging on a lanyard around her neck, identifying her as a certified agent of the hospital, empowered to represent the institution for the purposes of collecting donations.  I listened to her enthusiastic descriptions of the good works the hospital was engaged in, and how the benefits of their highly successful research extended far beyond their walls, to other hospitals, and other countries.

She answered my questions forthrightly, and I was prepared to donate twenty bucks.  Why not?  As she showed me the form, it was evident they were looking for monthly donations, rather than a one time hit.  Sure.  That made sense.  Fund raising is an expensive proposition.  If you take a one time donation, you have to start all over again the next day.  But if you find people prepared to donate monthly, it’s an ongoing revenue stream. Continue reading →

I Want to Get This Good at Photoshop

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I’ve been using Paint Shop Pro for years.  I got pretty good at making greeting cards, but there was a limit to what I could do in terms of photo-realistic compositions.

My friend, Kristan Uccello, posted a link on Facebook to a set of tilt-shift miniatures, which I think I can pull off.  I’m also interested in learning how to do High Definition Range photos.  I’ll keep you posted.

What really got my juices flowing, though, was a link to one of the artists in that list: Glenn Karlsen from Norway has some terrific and amazing images.

I’m not sure you can do this stuff with The GIMP, which is the open source, cross-platform image manipulation program I’m currently using, but I’m going to give it a shot.  Watch this space for developments.

Checking Up on Your MP

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Ever wonder about what your Member of Parliament is up to?  How he or she voted on legislation that interests you?  Well, wonder no more.  Just clock in at https://parl.howdtheyvote.ca/ and check up on your MP or on that bill you were wondering about.

It’s not perfect:

  • some bills gak the Ruby app
  • they only have data for 3 sessions of parliament
  • there’s no information about who put this together, or how you can help out
  • they tend not to have the names of bills, never mind the text

But for now, it’s better than nothing.  And, unless I’m prepared to do something better, I can just keep my trap shut.

What I’ll Tell Ken Dryden

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Over a month ago I contacted Ken Dryden’s riding office to arrange a meeting with my Member of Parliament.  I expected to see him within a week or two; I’d tell him of my concerns related to various issues of the day, and he’d take that into consideration when he returned to Ottawa.

But no.  It’s been over a month, and I don’t even have an appointment yet.  I was told his office had been flooded, and was currently being renovated.

If my office were flooded and needed to be renovated you can be sure I wouldn’t wait for the renovations to be completed before seeing my clients and assuring them I’m still on the job; that they can count on me to continue getting things done for them.  That it was business as usual.  I wouldn’t let a small matter like a bit of water get in the way of the important work I’m doing for them.

But hey, I’m not a politician. Continue reading →

OLPC Redux

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The new OLPC, the XO-2There is a tremendously well-researched, well-reasoned history of the OLPC, and it’s subsequent effects on the computer industry, at “Why Microsoft and Intel tried to kill the XO $100 laptop”.  A minor quibble about the article: the author didn’t mention the ASUS Eee PC, which clearly owes it’s existence to the OLPC, and then went on to spark other ultraportables such as the HP 2133 Mini-Note.

From Windows to Mac: Another Convert

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Mac OS X FinderI’ve been using, playing and struggling with Windows since version 3.0.  Before that, I used pretty much every version of MS-DOS.  I’ve poured a lot of my money into Microsoft.  I’ve watched them go from enthusiastic techno geeks, to arrogant robber barons.

When Vista was announced, I vowed not to donate another dime to the mighty Microsoft marketing machine.  I was planning on going to Linux.  But when push came to shove, I didn’t want to spend days struggling with obscure arcana.  So I decided to go with an OS hailed as a paragon of ease of use: OS X. Continue reading →

Why Peer-to-Peer Filesharing is Good For Big Media

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Mom invited me over for dafina yesterday, and as my car was in the shop most of the day, I spent the afternoon with M&D.  I had Bender with me and, to pass the time, I uploaded a few episodes of Weeds I had on my hard drive, to a jump drive.  Then I played them on Mom’s Ubuntu computer.

I always enjoy watching TV and movies with my mom: she’s very emotional and expressive.  Without fail, she’s more entertaining than the show itself.  In fact, even though she was tired and had said she was going to have a nap, she watched six episodes back to back!  She was hooked! Continue reading →

Lexmark X9575 Loses Out

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HP Officejet Pro L7650A few weeks ago I picked up a Lexmark X9575 Wireless 4-in-1 printer, scanner, dicer, chopper, at Costco.  It’s sat in the box, unopened, since then; not because I’m a lazy sloth (I am, but that’s another post, probably written by my wife), but rather because I looked up whether it was supported in Ubuntu.  The forums say, it isn’t.  So we wouldn’t be able to print from our Ubuntu-based Toshiba laptop in the living room. Continue reading →