Tempus Fugit

Latin (tem-pu̇s-ˈfü-git): Time Flies

Posts

  • On the Road – Day 3

    So much for the intention of blogging something every day. What happened to Day 2?

    Not much to report from TO., except a warning about taxi drivers. Since we don’t have a car on this trip we’ve been cabbing it the short trip from the hotel to the Agfa office. The trip can be anywhere from $7.25 to $10.00. Why the discrepancy? It’s cell phones. The guy with the high price ride was so busy talking on the radio and the cell phone and oh yeah, and spending a few brain cycles on driving in heavy rush hour traffic, that he forgot where we were going and had to be reminded several timers, especially after he made a couple of wrong turns. Hey there are only 3 turns between the office and hotel.

  • On the road – Day 1

    It’s been a while since I’ve been in Toronto on business but this afternoon I flew in for four days of education with Agfa for a project I’m working on with two other team members.  The flight down on Westjet was uneventful except for the guy in the middle seat who thought he owned the armrest and couldn’t figure out why the TV control buttons were not doing anything for his screen, while mine was flipping channels like a bandit. He even tried it twice, but I didn’t have the heart to tell him what was wrong. Guys that technically challenged probably shouldn’t watch any more TV. I slept off and on and listened to a couple of podcasts to pass the time.

    After a long wait in a taxi line and a short ride we’re at the hotel. We’re staying at the Radisson Airport and the rooms are quite nice and we hit the local Kelsey’s for dinner. Over dinner I got to know my team mates a little better as they are both new on the project and work on different areas that I do. Now I’m back in the room watching a little TV, without any help from my seat mate! It’s warmer that Winnipeg at +4, but raining. No matter, we’re stuck at the hotel without a car, so It will most likely be work and sleep for most of the week.

    Radisson’s have sleep number beds, so I’ll get to check it out for a few days. Since we’re looking at a new bed for home and I know somebody who can get me a great deal on a bed!

  • NAU and the Amero – something you don’t hear much about

    Amero, Debut of the amero

    The euro followed the same blueprint of stealth and surprise. It was already issued as replacement currency before the masses could coalesce to fight it.

    Goodbye loonie, hello ‘amero?’

    A common North American currency would bring about lower long-term
    interest rates, greater price stability and improved trade, says a new
    report from the Fraser Institute.

    The study calls for a North American Monetary Union that includes Canada, the United States, and Mexico.

  • Leaving the Lake

    The weather was good today, sunny, warm for the time of year and light breezes. I slept until the sun poked through the clouds and into my room. It seemed like I’d slept in quite late, but it was only 9am. After a few cups of blender grind coffee and some scrambled eggs and toast I was off to take in the last kayak paddle of the ’07 season.

    Getting the 17′ Necky out of the cottage and down the stairs single handed was a littel challenging, but not too bad. Locating the paddles that were tucked away in the back corner of the shed behind the sailboat centerboard took longer. After a little boat prep, I’m off for a tour of the bay. What a difference this time of year, very quiet, very few people around, virtually no boats and virtually no wildlife. As I enter the shallow bay just north of our cottage I’m struck with the lack of wildlife. Normally, the bay/swamp is teaming with life but today it’s very quiet. No birds, no ducks, no eagles, no beavers, no otters; very quiet and very still, you feel quite alone.

    As I paddle around the bay, most folks have packed up for the season and have put away docks and boats. One cottage has some interesting activity at the dock. A barge, with a bobcat is working. Using some chains hooked to the bucket of the bobcat and around some dock segments, they are lifting the dock out of the water for the winter. Up at the top of our point a crew is busy putting in a new dock with a big deck, which looks very nice.

    I took a walk out to the point along the trail and sat in the chair for a few minutes, just enjoying the view and remembering the summer. After that it seemed to be time to pack up and go as the sun is starting to dip, seemingly prematurely at 4:30 in the afternoon and you can feel the chill building as the sun’s warm rays begin to fade away. Washing the dishes from the weekend and re-setting the fireplace seems to take a long time, or is it that I’m making it take a long time, drawing out the last few moments of enjoyment and soaking up that last little but if lake life before heading back to the city. The sun is setting over the lake as I arrive in Kenora. The lake has it’s hold on me as I stop in at HoJo’s for a chai latte and a little internet fix before the drive.

    It’s getting dark and the road home is calling. Time to go.

  • Cottage Crisis

    I arrived at the lake very early this morning about 2:30am. After lighting the fire and turning on the heat and watching Edmonton beat Calgary, I went to bed in a very very cold bed. Lying very still, I warmed up a small section and drifted of to sleep. In the morning it’s a cloudy day with light intermittent rain. No high speed Internet, but the old stand by, dial-up, and no that’s not the crisis.

    The crisis is much more serious, given that it’s a cool morning that just begs you to get together with a steaming cup of coffee and a book. Yesterday I bought some fresh Starbucks beans for just such a purpose to enjoy this morning  in the ritualistic early morning coffees at the lake. As I prepare to grind the beans for that perfect cup, I’m greeted with a low, quite “mmmm” from the coffee bean grinder. Not the enthusiastic wiring of the blades the chopping and grinding of the beans and the “awful” noise that it normally produces. The “awful” noise that our son’s hated so much when they were trying to sleep in that they bought us a different, more gentler, kinder, coffee bean grinder to replace the one we had at home, which now lives at the lake.

    That’s right, the crisis is that the coffee bean grinder is broken!

    What to do! Well, being resourceful and having a well equipped shop, I’m at the bench taking the thing apart to get it operational. After all this is a major issues! Stores are closed, there is no ground coffee in the cottage, it’s do or die!.  It turns out that coffee dust and moisture has penetrated the seal and rusted the armature shaft of the motor to the top bearing. In other words, it’s stuck. Well, some penetrating oil should help out. Every time I use penetrating oil I remember Ken Main. Ken was a friend who owned Furby Motors and gave me a summer job. He also was a sailing buddy on Lake Brerton. When ever things were “stuck” around Furby, Ken would say “Just put some squirrel piss on it”, referring to the very thin nature of penetrating oil. That was over 30 years ago, and I still think fondly of Ken every time I use penetrating oil.

    Well, that didn’t fix things fast enough. It’s still on the bench soaking and still stuck. I need my coffee. I briefly think of smashing the beans with a hammer, but settle for using the blender. The grind is a little course but it does the job.

    Ahhhh, the black elixir of coffee has been restored to the cottage experience. All is right again. Crisis averted.

  • And then there were five

    Just five riders turned out for the FOG ride yesterday, and after Lockport there were just four of us. It was warmer this week than last, but still fairly cool at about +3 and a light wind. One of the riders drove in from Brandon to join the ride, quite dedicated for a cool late season ride. He was quite a strong rider and on the final leg up Henderson highway into the wind he pace that I certainly had to work hard to keep up to and I think the other two guys were being pushed as well.

    That’s the great thing about group rides, lots of times you get pushed to go harder that you would on your own.

  • GTD and Inbox Zero

    I’ve been working at getting my “stuff” under control and as part of that I’ve read GTD and am working at getting is implemented and established as a habit in my life. So far, it’s going fairly well, but time will tell. Hey Google, runs GTD courses for it’s employees!

    An empty email in-box seems like a nirvana goal, and it has some appeal to me. My work email has over 200 things in the in-box that may have been read, but not processes. I’m reading the series in 43 Folders and just watched the video. It’s good stuff.

    43 Folders Series: Inbox Zero | 43 Folders

    New: Merlin’s Inbox Zero Presentation

    Merlin does a live presentation on Inbox Zero from time to time. The latest version of the presentation was delivered on July 23, 2007 at a Google Tech Talk in Mountain View, CA. You can download a PDF of the slides for the presentation and can watch the 58-minute video of the talk and Q&A right here:

  • Last Ride?

    Today, may have been the last ride with FOG (they really need to jazz up the website). It was -4 at the start and about 14 guys started the ride. By Lockport, a mere 45 minutes into the ride we lost a few and 10 carried on over the Lockport bridge to Birdshill park. This was a change in the typical route and despite an extra lap around the park we were back at the parking lot in under 3 hours and only 74km compared to the typical 95-100km.

    The cold has really taken it’s toll on the group size. Last week, the drop out rate was even higher and only 3 of us when the full distance. While there is no snow yet and the roads are fine, I think I’ll be at the lake next weekend, and riding two weeks from now many be questionable, so this might be it for the season.

    With the cooler morning temperatures combined with the dark at 7am I’ve really lost the drive to cycle to work so I’m going to need to either toughen up or find a replacement activity for the winter to replace the cycling. Perhaps some evening cross country skiing? A great reason to buy some new gear as the current stuff is ancient.

    Oh yeah, I need to blog more. It’s been quite a dry spell.

  • At the Lake


    Wave Crashes
    Originally uploaded by Big Dadoo

    I thought I’d post this picture just to show that I’m actually using the camera. Just as I was arriving at the lake last night, Eric called by cell to ask if I had the camera. Then this morning Scott calls the cottage to ask if I have the camera. Both guys had some plans for using the camera this weekend. Normally, it just sits around the house, but this weekend it was a high demand item, perhaps we need a booking system.

    As you can see, it’s a little windy, so I don’t think I’ll do any kayaking this morning. I slept in a bit because it was a little cloudy, cool and windy and then it was a little surfing and some reading on GTD. I think I’ll get the book and give it a try.

    So, here it is almost noon and I’m cooking breakfast. Afterwards I think I’ll do some clean-up work around the cottage and then do some geocaching later this afternoon. For sure I’ll take some more pictures.

  • waitless

    I’ve only watched a couple of these but they are amazing, especially the one on peeling an egg.

    Update: It gets better.