Catching up

This one will take a while 'cause I've not written for a while there's a lot to write about.

Coldplay. Went to see Coldplay at GM Place in Vancouver a week ago. I'm not a mega-fan of Coldplay, but I have to say that the show was the most entertaining I've seen in years. I go to a lot of gigs and I always enjoy them but this one was better than usual. First off, there were two warm-up acts.

The first one was Howling Bells, from Australia. They're kind of a cross between less dreary Cure and Sarah MacLachlan. Needless to say I bought their only album (check iTunes).

The second warm-up was Snow Patrol from Ireland. Another great band. One thing that struck me about them was that the singer had a huge grin on his face all the way through the set. I was wondering if he just couldn't believe that he was up there opening for Coldplay.

Then Coldplay themselves were excellent. The band were all over the stage, the lighting was excellent, they played in three different places in the venue. At the end of a stage in the audience and then at the other end in a spot where 6 seats had been reserved. Brilliant show.

Then last week I went to see The Tragically Hip at the Orpheum in Vancouver. The Orpheum is a lovely place to see anyone. It's an old building and is really designed for plays and stuff like that, which leads me to my only complaint about the Hip show. It was too loud! My ears rang for two days after. The Orpheum is not really designed for amplified music. But the Hip were terrific. I saw them at the Pemberton festival last summer but it was really nice to see them in a more intimate setting. The antics of Gord Downey (the singer) are worth the ticket price on their own.

That's about it for live music this year I think. U2 is coming later on and I might go to that, AC/DC are coming too but no thanks.

Still looking for full-time work. Had a few nibbles but nothing really. One company was looking for someone with my exact qualifications, they brought me in for an interview, and - nothing. Didn't even call me back. Rude. Had a phone interview last week that sounded hopeful but nothing yet.

My own 'business' is not really doing anything either.

Been doing some stuff around the house. Built the bench we've wanted for a while. It's in the mud room and is really somewhere to take off your shoes and for the kids to put their stuff, backpacks, jackets and shoes. My wife has been wanting me to do it for ages and now it's done.

Been out walking a lot, riding my bike a lot too.

Anyway, that's enough for now.

I'm on Twitter as vanmacguy if you want to look me up.

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Some Mac stuff I like

I've been playing around with a bunch of Mac tools lately, so wanted to post them here.

Geek Tool. Geek Tool is not for the feint of heart. It basically displays the results of any Unix script on the desktop. Sounds easy, but you have to have the script first. I have it displaying the current date and time, and it works really well. Here's a link to more information at MacRumors.

Bowtie. Bowtie is a little utility that displays the current iTunes track on the desktop. It's also got a bunch of 'skins' with it so that you can change it's appearance. It's tres cool. Get it here. Oh, and it's free.

Evernote. This is a great application. It's a replacement for the note part of Apple's mail and the nice thing is that there's a matching iPhone application. Works super well and it's become a standard for me. Get it here, it's free too.

iStat Menus. Again, a great, free application. This one sits in the Menu bar of your Mac and displays all kinds of system information. I have mine set up to show me, CPU, active processes, hard drive space, temperatures and network activity along with the current date. I've been using this one for a while and it runs on all my Macs. Get it here.

Tweetdeck. Tweetdeck is my choice du jour for Twitter client on the Mac. It's got a nice interface and you can do every kind of Twitter action from it. Unlike some other Twitter clients where you have to go to the Twitter site to say, unfollow someone. It's free (notice a common thread here? I'm cheap) and you can get it from here. There's also a matching iPhone app, get that from iTunes. It's free too.

One that's for the iPhone is called RunKeeper. I have the free version (surprise!) and got it from the iTunes store. It tracks your run, walk, bike ride and will tell you the distance travelled and your speed. It also displays a map based on Google maps when you're finished. You can have it automatically send your workout details straight to Twitter if you want to share them.

The last one for now is Tinkertool. It's free and you can get it here. Tinkertool lets you change all kinds of settings in Mac OSX. And it doesn't change anything permanently so you can experiment as much as you like without breaking anything. There's a single button to click if you want to restore everything.

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My own business

Hah! Is all I have to say. I don't know if it's me or the economy but the business has not taken off at all. It's as slow as molasses in the winter. So I'm back to trying to find a real job. I'm still trying to do my own thing but I have lots of time to find real employment.

Anyway, the location of this blog has changed. I've resurrected my original website at www.bailie.org. That URL used to redirect to this blog, but I've now put the site back up. It's basically a resume site and this blog is a link off it. I had some good luck with the resume site when I had it up before, and right now I could use all the luck I can get.

What else. Well since I posted last we got a puppy. She's part poodle and part cocker spaniel and is all cockapoo. Her name is Molly. She's very cute and is a lot of fun. We're just trying to get past the house and leash training.

I had a birthday a little while ago too. Ho hum. Started using Twitter, get me here if you like. House projects this summer are to reinforce the floor underneath the main level. It's become a little springy over the years.

I'm learning Objective-C and Cocoa programming on the Mac. I've always loved coding, it's something I've never tired of in all these years. So I might as well add another language to the list.

That's all for now.

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My attempt at starting my own business

Well, today was a big day in some ways.

For the last few weeks, apart from finishing the office (see earlier posts), I've been building a couple of simple websites and getting all my ducks in a row to launch my own consulting business.

The fist couple of things I had to do were to get some kind of logo, build some web site(s) and do a mail out of a brochure-type document.

Well, check, check and check.

Two web sites, one for Mac Support and one for PC Support www.vanmacguy.com and www.davidbailie.com respectively.

If you are in my address book, you already got the mail out and brochure. If you got it, please consider helping out and distributing it to just one person - you can do more if you like though. Starting a business is hard. Especially with no income.

If you're not in my address book, or you are but didn't receive it, and you want the brochure, please comment on this post and I'll send it to you straight away.

Some would say that these economic times would make it even harder to start your own consulting business, but I think that this tough economic climate is actually going to help. The more businesses and small business that lay off their IT staff, the better it is for a consultant. Only time will tell I guess?

End of line.... For now.

End of office saga

So, it's finally done.

After almost three years elapsed time, thousands of dollars, hours and hours of work and even more hours of planning, it's finished.

It looks great. I'm all moved in, working from there right now, it's warm, but not too warm (thanks to the three Mac's) and is nice and quiet (apart from the aforementioned Mac's).

The creak in the floor is actually going away as the hardwood settles in. The chairs run nice and smoothly, the desks look and feel great and everything works.

Problem is, I've spent so much time planning and working on it, that I don't actually want to be in it now. Hmm. I'll get over that though.

Now, on with the next job. Actually, I'm going to wait until the summer to do that one, I have to reinforce the floors in the house, and it's cold down there right now.

Back to tech stuff.

End of line.

Ongoing office build saga

Firstly, apologies. I'm sure no one is interested in this, but this is a blog after all, so I just write crap in here that I'm working on.

The dilemma right now is what to do with the floor. We were going to put tile in, then we decided to put slate tile in. But we decided that as slate is uneven, whenever we rolled a chair over it, the little parts that were uneven would crack and splinter so we'd be left with slate dust all over the floor. Not good.

So we decided back on tile. I did some research on installing a tile floor and while it didn't sound that difficult, it made me realise just how final putting tile down is. If you mess up one tile or one cracks, you just can't get it up again. So we decided to go with hardwood instead.

Great, another job I've never done before. Found the design we liked and went out and bought it. That part was easy. Installing it was actually not too bad either. A tip for all those thinking of doing the same thing. Walls are not straight and most floors are not flat. You can save yourself hours of frustration by making your walls as straight as possible and by ensuring that your floor is flat.

That said though, my walls are not straight and my floor is not flat and it went in fine. I have a creak in the doorway, but that's actually kind of old-world, so I don't mind that.

Almost done.

End of line.

So...

My Father-in-law went home the other day. 

The office is looking good. Many thanks to him for helping.

We have the drywall up and one coat of 'mud' on. I've had a drywaller come in and finish it off, so as of today, the subfloor is done, the wiring is all done, the window is in, the door is in and it's ready for paint, slate floor and desks. Then we can move in! Woo-hoo! Can't wait.

The snow is mostly gone compared to how it was and freelance work looks like it's going to pick up. I've had a couple of calls this week already.

I've decided to go at this freelancing thing a lot harder than I have in the past. I've bought a domain name and put up a first cut at a website. Find it here if you like.

Bought the wood for my desks yesterday. I'm going to custom build them into the office with one desk all the way down one wall and all the way across the back. I got Black Walnut for the desk, it was really expensive and is really heavy, but hey, it's not like I'm planning on moving offices any time soon, so I may as well do it right.

I'd like a logo for my freelance thing. Thinking of a caricature. I'd have to have one made though as I have no idea where to begin with arts stuff. I can spell Photoshop but that's about as much as I know.

Anyway.

End of line.

Building and constructing

Decided to spend the first couple of weeks of the year finishing my office. For those that don't know (and why would you?), I started the office project almost three years ago by tearing out the sauna that was in my house.

Well the room has stayed in a state of partial deconstruction for a while and since I'm not working it's the ideal time to get busy.

My father-in-law is here now helping me construct. We're doing wiring, external window, floor, insulation, internal pocket door and drywall. Should all be finished in a week or so. Dirty work and my poor hands are all busted up and scabby. Not used to manual labour I guess?

The family got a Wii for Christmas and I just bought Wii Fit. Going to Mexico in February for a couple of weeks so I want to try and get in some kind of less disgusting shape for then. This seems like as good a way as any other to try that out.

End of line (for now).

Happy holidays!

Went to Big White at Christmas as previously forecast (you do read this is chronological order don't you? Keep up!).

As promised, it was coooold! Still went out snowboarding most days but not for long. I don't know what it is, the abundance of food and drink or the altitude but I'm constantly exhausted up there. Out of breath just getting my snowboard gear on. Oh well, it was fun and peaceful for once. That will only mean anything if you know the history of my trips up there, so don't worry if you don't get it.

Came home on the 27th and left the family in Kelowna for a few more days. Came home to a burst water pipe too and a ton of snow! Apparently Vancouver has been subject to a deluge of snow and freezing conditions this year so it's no surprise that there is a lot of snow and plumbing problems. My burst water pipe was in the garage on an outside wall so no damage was done thankfully. You'd be surprised (as I was) at how many buckets of snow it takes to flush a toilet though. Ask me, I know. Also, plumbing is the trade to be in right now. I waited three days for one and then paid 205 for him to be here for less than 15 minutes!

Happy Holidays? Humbug!

Work shmirk...

Well, joining the ranks of the unemployed was not that bad. I'd rather not be 'between positions' but oh well. Shit happens right?

I've been doing some freelance work for a new client. It's been fun but being a freelance Mac consultant will never make one fat and happy. Happy maybe but there's not enough work with the few clients I have to keep my fat. Ok, certainly as fat as I am but no more than that.

Christmas is coming and we're off to Big White as usual. We're only going for a week this time and we're going up earlier than usual and coming home earlier. Should be fun but it's looking like it'll be colder than normal.

What else is new? Not much really so I'll see you later.

What's new? Not much thanks. What's new with you?

Not too too much.

Was told yesterday that my last day is actually Wednesday and not Thursday as originally promised. I'm kindof sad about that. As you all know (if you read this crap at all), I really love my job and the company I work for, so taking a day away from me is like shortening my vacation. I'd rather keep the days thanks. That said, I could go in the extra day but won't but whatever.

So Wednesday is going to be a sad and boozy day. Thursday I'll go back to the office and collect my things as well as the things I'm buying from the company. I'm buying my Aeron chair. Look it up, ahh, here, I'm too good to you. We have a bunch of them at work, and they're allowing us to buy them and for the price they're asking, I'll never, ever be able to buy a better chair, so yeah, I'm buying mine. And I'll pick it up on Thursday.

Today is Saturday, so again, if you read this crap at all, you'll understand when I say that I bought Wall-E. Watched it tonight with the kids (not that I bought it for the kids, I love it for myself) and it was excellent. I think its the best of Pixar's movies so far.

I also bought an Airport Extreme Wireless base station today too. Had an old gift card for Future Shop and was going to get it when the office was built, but given that we've been having wireless problems, I thought I'd get it now. I already had/have an Airport Express, and it extends the range of an Airport Extreme base station so it was a logical choice. Funny but I've had wireless for many years and have struggled with the range of the networks. Our house is older and is quite large and is all on one floor. So some of the other wireless routers I've had over the years have had range extenders, the problem with them is that when you use them, the extender becomes a different network. So if the family room has a signal, it might be on a network called steve but when you install an extender, it needs to be it's own network, , so you might call it steve1. Well when you move from room to room, you need to disconnect from steve and connect to steve1. Not acceptable.

Apple's Airport is the only one that allows you to have range extenders (called Airport Express) that just extend the range of your network without them becoming a different network altogether. Email me if you want to full picture. As usual, Apple have really thought this thing through and although it certainly wasn't as easy to set up as promised it sure works well. Airport Express'es have a whole other bunch of really cool features too, look it up if you like. No, do it yourself. Dammit, here! I really do care too much.

Having a few glasses of wine tonight, that's something of an exception for me too. I don't usually drink at home.

My project for when I'm out of work (apart from my office construction project and finding a new job) is to digitize all of our video. We started shooting video before our first son was born, and he's now 7. I've never done anything with all the video, but now it's time. I have a project in mind called my son, from 0 to 5 in 5. A 5 minute video of his first five years. I want to do this for my second son too and he's 5 in February,  so I'd better get my thumb out and get busy.

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Post op redux

Doing pretty well after surgery last week.

Back at work now, not walking too well or too far, as it's uncomfortable, not painful at all, just uncomfortable.

Catching up on all my blog entries, one good thing about not moving too far or too fast.

One of my good friends leaves this week. If you read this at all, you know that my last day is coming up soon too. It's not really sunk in I suppose, but it is now, with my friend leaving. Soon for me, about a week.

My wife has been fantastic about my surgery. It's not like I've been unable to move, but she is aware of how uncomfortable it is for me to do much and has just taken over my normal duties. She's great and I love her.

Had some problems with our wireless at home this week so I'll take a look at it this weekend.

Wall-E is released on DVD this week! Going to buy that on the weekend for sure!

Signed up for a Twitter account this week too. Can't decide if I like it or not. Actually, I guess I can. It's almost worse than FaceBook (and I hat (no, not hat, hate), FaceBook, although I use it most days) and I've already got more than a dozen people following me and me following them. Don't see it lasting long though.

Hmm, what else? Been busy at the office. Trying to wrap stuff up. Also trying to build a website for a new Freelance Mac Consulting venture - VanMacGuy.com - not having much creative success though (you checked it out right? Told you). I got the domain and all the tech stuff is done and working, but I really am not inspired -  creatively speaking. Never had much of a creative eye, but I did used to have more than I have now. Wonder what that's all about?

End of line (for now)...

Looking for a job

We all know that my last day at my company is coming up soon. So I'm looking for another job, right.

Well I finally landed an interview, and had it yesterday. It went well, I was interviewed by one person and then by two. The interview with the first person went well I thought, we connected well and got along fine.

The second interview was with an engineer and a consultant and I wasn't so happy with it.

But we'll see what happens. The company is a real tech company, and I would be the only IT guy, which would be really great, I'd be able to run the whole IT show and I'd really like that.

No idea what's going to happen (obviously) and I hope I get it, but we'll see.

End of line...

Post-op

Well, I had some guy-surgery the other day.

90 minutes of surgery, 3 hours of post-op recovery, a lifetime of getting used to the difference.

Not comfortable telling the whole world what I had done, but the recovery is painful and uncomfortable. Fine if I'm hanging around home in a robe, but when I have to wear clothes, umm, not so much.

Anyway, as the Urologist said, hurts for a while, but not forever, right?

I honestly believe that daytime TV is mostly responsible for Post-Partum Depression. It's horrible! New Mothers that are at a loss for what to do and switch on the TV are *going* to get depressed. It has to happen. So when a new Mother starts a conversation with "today, on Oprah", help her, reach out stand guard.

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Linky linky

It's a link-type day today.

Firstly, I must have one of these! Talk about improving my weekends! Pity I can't afford it and probably never will.

I always enjoy a good dig at Microsoft. "There are just some sites that no-one should ever visit", love it.

Some 'demo reels' from the guys I've been working with. First one here and the other one here. More of these to come later. Such talent...

Poor Facebook dude. Idiot.

And finally... The Earth on the Jesus phone. Sweet.

End of line.

General stuff for today

My bad back is back - with a vengeance. It got worse again on Friday, this time only my right side, and continued on until on Sunday afternoon I was walking with a limp (limp what you might ask...?) and my right leg was going numb.

Got no sleep Sunday night, lots of drugs and came to work late. I'm trying to get in to see someone, massage, chiropractor, anyone to no avail. I'm seeing my Doctor this afternoon though. So we'll see what happens.

Now then, glasses. I finally found and ordered some new ones. Got them from Lens Crafters of all places. The LC in Metrotown has a huge selection. I went for top-of-the-line everything lenses-wise. Should have them in 2 weeks or sooner.

They also have a 30 day money-back guarantee in case I don't like them. They were 650 all told, but that's just what they cost.

We have house-guests this week. Rhylin's Mum and her friend are here for the birth of Mum's friend's grandchild. So home is busy.

Going out on Friday night. A friend of mine from work is leaving both the company and the city and is heading back to Trawna. So there is a huge group going out for drinks. Should be a fun and drunken night. Look out for hangover on Sat AM.

End of line.

Glasses update

So, I went to order said glasses today.

As I was being measured for the new top-of-the-line-you-really-must-have-these lenses, the woman behind the counter was tallying up my bill.

That's 1158 in total, she said. Umm, I said, I was told 849 yesterday. Oh, that's without the frames at 309 was the reply.

I asked the woman doing the measuring to stop as there's no way that either my wife would approve 1150 for glasses, or that I would pay 1150 for glasses.

When I got the price, I asked for all-inclusive. WTF do I care about the cost of the lenses on their own?

Boy!

RAW

So, people 'in the know' have told me that once I started taking digital pictures in the RAW format, that I would love it.

Last weekend I decided to give it a try and yes, they were right, I loved the results.

Here's a link to my Mac.com gallery containing the RAW images.

Enjoy.

Glasses

Went for an eye test today. I did this for a number of reasons.

Firstly, my currently glasses are getting scratched, or are already scratched to be more precise.

Secondly, I've noticed that my vision is getting worse, particularly without glasses.

And finally, due to my leaving this company, I want to make the most of my benefits before I leave.

So, I had them tested and found that they have indeed deteriorated since my last exam and that my glasses are no longer as useful as they were.

After the test, I took a look for new glasses, and found some. I have a wide head (must be to contain all the brains?) and so a lot of frames don't fit. The glasses stores in Vancouver must cater to smaller people than me. 

Now for a little history lesson.

When I was growing up in England, our Health Care Service was called the National Health Service or NHS for short. The NHS would give you glasses so you didn't need to buy them, but they only had one style. When I was younger and not nearly as nice as I am now, I and others could always tell when a kid came from a poor home because he/she would wear 'NHS frames'.

So, forward on to today. NHS frames actually turned out to be exactly the same frames as Rayban Wayfarers. And dammit all if those shape frames weren't the ones I picked out today?

So, I'm going to be wearing glasses that I wouldn't have been seen dead in when I was a kid. 

Glasses who's wearers were mocked when I was a kid. 

And I'll be paying 850 for them, when people I mocked got them for free.

Dumb, huh?

Oh well, best get back to work so I can afford to pay for them...

Post-interview

Well it turns out that it wasn't an interview after all but was a meet n' greet.

It was good though, I got to meet the owner and we discussed his need for a full-time Macintosh Admin and the requirements that he has in the coming months and years. It sounds like I will have to do more than just consider a freelance-type role if I want to stay in the Macintosh field.

That said, I applied for a Windows Systems Administrator position this afternoon. Eeew. I had to reach for the wet wipes as soon as I sent the message as I felt so dirty. But I spent years in Windows and can do all that stuff standing on my head and the position was for a mixed Windows/Mac Administrator, so it might be great! We'll see if I even get a call back.

Later people.

Interview today

Today I have an interview. It's my first one since officially looking for work this time. 

I'm calling it an interview anyway, although the person I'm meeting with is calling it a meeting to determine whether a 'fit' exists or now.

The company is a Vancouver-based Video Post-Production facility that handles some TV movies and documentaries. They are quite well-known and have been around for a number of years.

The fit is going to come because they are a 100% Macintosh company and are in the process of deploying an Apple XSAN. I really hope they're deploying XSAN 2 and not XSAN 1.4, XSAN 1.4 is horrible. It's probably (in my opinion) one of the worst pieces of software to come out of Apple and I'm sure they purchased it and just dumped it out - it doesn't display any of Apple's normal usability features and stability at all.

Anyway, lets hope today goes well and that there is indeed a fit for me. Then I can stop thinking about trying to find another job and go and work somewhere that I can set up from scratch instead of inheriting others design characteristics. It's always better to do the whole thing yourself, although it's not always possible.

Good luck to me.

Restore a Mac from a .dmg (Disk Image)

I'm a Mac guy. I'm a Mac guy at home and professionally I'm a Macintosh Systems Administrator.

I learned something today that I wanted to share with my loyal readers.

I needed to take the hardware back from a team and replace it with a different machine but with the same software. The machines in question are both iMac's. And here's how to do it without having to rebuild it.

Use Super-Duper to take a full disk image of the old machine and save it to an external FireWire drive.

Connect the FireWire drive to the new machine, insert the OSX Install DVD and reboot the machine with the Option key held down, once it's up, select the DVD and continue as if you were doing an install. 

Once you get past the first couple of screens, select Utilities and Disk Utility.

In Disk Utility, both the volumes Macintosh HD (or whatever the local Boot volume is called) and the FireWire drive will be listed.

In Disk Utility, click on the current boot volume and click Restore.

Next to the Source input field, there is a button called Image. Click it and navigate to the FireWire drive and find the Disk Image you put there. Click the Image and click OK.

In the Destination input field, just drag the current boot volume from the left pane of Disk Utility.

Make sure you select the Erase destination check box, and then click Restore.

You'll get a progress bar that will tell you how long it will take. Once it's finished, there will be no message, but you'll see that the progress bar has gone away. Quit Disk Utility and quit the installer. When the installer is exiting, it will give you a few options. The one you need is to select the Startup Disk. Select the Macintosh HD volume that you just restored to and continue the restart process.

Once it comes back up, you'll have the same hardware, but a new install which will be the same as the image.

Simple, huh?

A little girl!

I know I said I would post more last week but everything happened so fast and I didn't have access to my Mac so...

We had a baby girl. At 5:44PM on September 5, little Lenaya Margaret Bailie was brought into the world. She weighed 9 lbs 2 oz at birth and has all 10 fingers and all 10 toes.

Here she is.

Both Mother and Baby are doing well. We all came home from the hospital on Saturday afternoon and Lenaya had her first public appearance on Saturday evening at our neighborhood block party.

Cheers.

Contractions every five minutes...

My wife just called with contractions every 5 minutes.

She's calling the hospital right now to see what she should do.

More news later when I get some.

False labour?

My wife reported this morning that she was in 'false labour'. It began at about 3AM, and the reason it's called false labour is that while the contractions were pretty much equally spaced, they were of different durations.

In real labour, the contractions are evenly spaced but get consistently longer, this wasn't the case.

Still, this false labour may be a precursor to real labour? Let's hope so.

More news as I get it...

Hmm... Redux

No more activity I'm afraid.

We thought that might have been it yesterday but nope.

So we're still holding for launch!

Interesting evening last night. I went for drinks with the other Systems people from my company. As mentioned earlier a lot of people have been laid off, so last night when I was out with them I realized that of the 13 people that were there, I was the only one that didn't have a job with the company after November. Felt a little odd I have to say.

More soon.

Hmm...

My wife just emailed and reported pelvic pressure...

Is today the day...?

Let's see how good medical science is shall we?

Regular readers (right) will know that my lovely wife is pregnant.

We've been expecting a new addition any time now, but the Doctors all said that the due date was September 2. The other two children we have had together have been a few days early and that's what we expected this time too but no, this one is reluctant to debut.

So let's see when it actually happens shall we?

Later.

As reported earlier... Oasis

I saw Oasis at GM Place last night. They were awesome as usual.

Oasis are not a band that I would tell everyone to go and see just for the show. But if you're a fan of their music, even in a small way, then you should go and see them. It's rare that you see *everyone* in the audience singing along to every word. It happens with Billy Joel, but Oasis fans nail it every time.

They played all the favourites and 4 new songs. The new songs sounded good too.

Well worth the ticket price and GM Place is a great venue too.

Very kewl.

Soon.

New job required...

Yes, the company I work for has laid me off. Actually, me and a bunch of other people.

They're reorganizing and a lot of us had to go. I am not mad, or upset with them at all. I completely understand.

All I am in fact is sad. I have really enjoyed my relatively short stay here (been here since December '07) and really enjoy my job and the people I work with.

They've been pretty much the only company that treats it's employees as adults, and I shall miss that most I think.

We've all been given three months working notice and the company has said that we can use as much time as we need to find other jobs. Our HR department has started 'reverse recruiting' so they're all working to try and get us hired by other companies. They're sending around postings and contact information for all kinds of other companies.

They're treating us all very well (why does that sound like a message from a hostage?).

But I still have to find another job. Sigh.

Later.

Pemberton Festival

This weekend I'm going to the first Pemberton Festival. Ever.

It's being held at Pemberton in British Columbia, which is apparently 40 minutes north of Whistler.

There are dozens of bands playing there, a few of which are The Tragically Hip, Jay-Z, Nine Inch Nails and Coldplay. I have nothing against Coldplay but think it's strange that they are headlining. The festival starts on Friday afternoon and ends on Sunday night.

I totally understand that the organizers want to have a safe event and want to curb any violence and things like that, but the rules they've put in place seem a little strict. Bands will play from around 4PM to around 10:30PM each day. And alcohol sales stop at 10PM. Quiet time at the campsite is from 3AM to 7AM. What I don't understand is what do the organizers expect people to do after the bands have finished until 3AM?

Anyway, I'm going with three friends and we're all camping, Thursday through Sunday is a long camping trip for me. Four nights of being bloody uncomfortable, damp and possibly cold. Four nights of little or no sleep. Four nights of no creature comforts. Four nights of no computer. And last but not least, four nights of being away from my lovely wife and kids.

Pictures (and more) to follow.

Rush

Went to see Rush at GM Place on Thursday night.

What a show that was! Absolutely spectacular. Rush always put on such a great show.

Sure, they're a little predictable, there's always a drum solo, always a few instrumentals and always a few medleys of various songs. But I think it's the predictability that people have come to love about Rush shows.

My only mistake was getting floor seats. I thought it would be the cool thing to do, but nope. Stood up all through the show (it was more than 3 hours long with the intermission) and was constantly straining to see everything and not just watch the huge monitors behind them.

But the sound was great (take note The Cure) and the show was perfect. A great mix of old and new. The boys looked great, and like they were really enjoying themselves (take note The Cure). Geddy seemed genuinely interested in talking to the crowd (again... The Cure).

Everyone should go to a Rush show, even if you're not a huge fan. As long as you don't dislike them, you'll have a great time.

Later dudes.

The Cure

Went to see The Cure at GM Place in Vancouver last night.

This was the fifth time I'd seen them and was by far the worst of the five.

I've listened to The Cure for almost 30 years. My first album was The Head on the Door and I bought it in the 70's.

For me the Cure have always been a 5 piece band, and for this tour they are a 4 piece, maybe it's just me, but you can't remove an instrument from a band and expect no-one to notice, or expect to replace the sound with a guitar. They removed the keyboards (I'm not a huge fan of keyboards) and they tried to back fill some of the keyboard sound with a guitar, which just sounded trashy.

The guitarist Porl came out with a shaved and tattooed head (I don't believe the tattoos were real personally) and dressed in tight PVC with huge platform boots on that were purple and lit up. Didn't fit with The Cure's overall look at all.

The sound was lousy at time I couldn't hear the lyrics or Smith's guitar at all.

It was a lousy show in my opinion. Will I go and see them again? Sure, but I won't look forward to it nearly as much next time. They have a new album due out at the end of the year, but without keyboards, it might be good, but it won't be The Cure.

Sorry Cure fans everywhere, but you should have seen then ten years ago.

More soon.

Well Birthday week is gone for another year

A big thanks to all my friends who took me out and paid for everything as a part of my Birthday celebration.

I had a great time. We went to the Yaletown Brewpub and it was a good night.

Now on with the rest of Birthday month!

More to come.

Birthday week is finally here!

If you know me, then you also know that my birthday is right around the corner.

So I mark today as the official start of birthday week. May 1 was the official start of birthday month. People often ask why I remind my friends so much that my birthday is approaching. I tell them that I do it for them. It's a completely selfless act. If they forgot I'd be mad at them and they would not get the benefit of my wit and humour, so by reminding them, they don't forget and I don't get mad or disappointed. So it's a win for them really. Simple.

In other news. I now have a ticket for the Oasis show at GM Place in late August. We also have a baby due in very early September. So I hope that the two don't conflict, because you just know which event I'll be at, right?

More news, I'm going to Pemberton Festival in late July. It's a three day outdoor festival in, you guessed it, Pemberton British Columbia. Which is just a bit north of Whistler. Check out the site for all the details but three days, dozens of bands including The Tragically Hip, Nine Inch Nails, Coldplay and lots more. We'll be camping for the whole thing and it should be a riot. Jay Z is headlining too, and apparently he puts on a really good show, so although I'm not a fan at all, I'm looking forward to seeing him/them, whatever.

With the layoffs at work, particularly on the floor I'm on, it's like a ghost town. Someone said that on the east side of the floor they saw a tumbleweed! While I can't confirm or deny that sighting, I wouldn't be surprised. No idea what, if anything is happening with the team that I'm on, but time will tell I supposed.

More later.

New Mac for the MUG

The MUG that I'm President of, finally decided to buy a new computer and more importantly what type to buy.

We decided to get a MacBook Pro and I picked it up last weekend. 

Got to unpack it and build it out on Sunday and did the now standard 'unboxing' ceremony complete with pictures. 

The pictures are here:  http://gallery.mac.com/applesbc#100008 .

 It sure is a nice machine though. I really like the new touch gestures on the larger trackpad. True that I haven't used them much yet, but we'll get used to them eventually.

This all means that we can now keep all the club documents in one place and have a decent machine for people to give presentations on, rather than limiting our presenters to those that have their own laptop, which is what has happened in the past.

More later.

It moved!

People that know me also know that we're pregnant. Expecting on September 2.

Anyway, last night I experienced the baby move! One of those monumental moments in any parents life.

Amazing.

More soon.

Ahh, Friday

Well today was supposed to be another 'layoff day', but it seems that the communication lines got crossed somehow. It didn't happen anyway.

It turns out that the heads of my company are meeting in one of our overseas offices and are determining what the company is going to look like going forward. We already know that whatever it looks like, it doesn't include the video editors and other post-production people that have already been let go (what do you mean, you haven't been following along?). But it waits to be seen as to what the rest of it looks like.

Am I worried? Yeah, a bit. Someone told me the other day that you shouldn't worry about the things you cannot change. And that you shouldn't worry about the other things either. So I'm trying to live by that right now.

Anyway, it's Friday. Went for a one beer lunch with my boss and a couple of his peers which turned into a three beer lunch. And beer time in the office is due to start in about an hour. And I'm leaving at 4 today to meet some friends for drinks. So it's kindof like a beer Friday for me.

More later.

Score one for our team!

I'm a Macintosh Administrator by trade. And I love it when I convince someone to switch.

This morning I was talking to one of our Project Managers, who was telling me the problems he was having with his StinkPad. I told him that he should switch to a Mac. He said that he would love to, but that the budget for his group wouldn't allow it. Well with the layoffs we've had lately, I just happen to have 5 Mac laptops sitting in my desk, depreciating and gathering dust, so I told him he could have one. I like how I'm so free with the company's money?

He checked with his Manager, and she said 'go for it'.

So I'm building it for him right now. Sweet.

Another good thing about this is that his Manager is having problems with her StinkPad too (umm, isn't everyone?), so he's put himself in the position of 'pilot' for Macs in the PM office. So when they all see how trouble-free it is, we'll be rolling more out, you can take that to the bank.

Check one more off the list Redmond.

More later.

Shutdown Day 2008

The second annual Shutdown Day is happening May 3 of this year. I honestly didn't know that there was a first annual, but whatever.

Anyway, I've signed up, and will shutdown my computer for the day. 

Problem is, it's Saturday so it's going to be tough. I've always got lots to do around the house anyway so I'll get over it. It's a strange feeling though, having no computer for the day. Just goes to show how much we've come to depend on them.

More soon.

What the hell is going on?

Yes, this all looks a bit odd doesn't i?

It's been a long time since I posted to blogger, since then I've been working with Wordpress at my own site (but not very much) and have realised that I really don't like how the wordpress editor doesn't work with Safari. So, given that I'm not changing from what I think is the best brower, period, my blog location had to change instead.

So here we are. I've included some of my more recent posts, but not everything.

More soon.

A good day? Maybe...

Some of my friends got let go from work today. We (actually, I, now) work (or worked) for a media company in downtown Vancouver. The company is ‘restructuring’ and ‘getting back to core values’ and this meant that the video editors that have been there for a long time, were no longer required.

I understand that it’s just business and as such I fully support the company. I agree that we should re-align ourselves with the core values and that in that case, these unfortunate people were surplus to requirements. But I feel so bad for them.

I guess I wouldn’t feel as bad if I too had been let go (yeah, no kidding, I’d just be worried sick about making mortgage payments) but I do feel really bad. But here I am anyway, still ‘with job’ and with job that I love too I might add.

Well, when I say here I am, I’m not actually working right now, I’m at my MUG. For those that don’t read this trash normally, I’m the President of the Vancouver Macintosh User Group (MUG). And tonight (actually, as I type this), we’re being treated to a great presentation from a member of the MAC BU which is the Macintosh Business Unit at Microsoft.

I like how Microsoft and Apple are able to still work together given there vast differences and the (in my opinion) very funny and pointed Mac vs PC ads currently running on TV. They try really hard to make Office look good and work really well on the Mac. And they’ve almost got it. They went through a lot of changes to Office for this new version and for the most part it’s great. Word takes a long time to load for me, but apparently this is a known issue and is being addressed by MS. So stay current with your patches.

Saw Sarah Silverman a few weeks ago, it was great to see her. I’m a huge fan of her comedy. The only disappointment I had with the show was that I had heard or seen more than half of the material that she did that night.

I’m going to see Rush and The Cure in May too. And now Oasis had added Vancouver dates in August. Tickets are expensive! But that’s not stopping me.

I’m buying a new computer from the MUG on the weekend. We’ve decided on a nice, shiny new 15″ MacBook Pro. So I’m going to have an ‘unboxing’ ceremony, complete with pictures which I’ll put up on the MUG web. I’ve unboxed a few Mac’s now and have never taken pictures, everyone should have at least one unboxing. Sounds rude, but it’s not. Well, it is if you want it to be anyway.

Tonight is also the big draw at the MUG. We’re raffling off $1500 in Apple hardware the winners choice). I have $200 in tickets and am going to buy a BlackBook if I win it. The BlackBook is for my Daughter in Calgary. She runs a PC right now and nobody deserves that!

More soon.

President again

At the last meeting of ApplesBC (the Vancouver Macintosh User Group), we had our AGM. At the AGM the existing Executive resigns and is either voted back in or new members are voted in in their place(s).

As President for the 2007 / 2008 season, I decided to resign as such and to volunteer for the position of Webmaster instead. But we already had a webmaster.

So today we had our first Executive meeting for this season. As past President, and since nobody else had volunteered for President, I had to attend. I had given a lot of thought to what I’d like to do for the club. I learned that I enjoy running the meetings and although I wanted input into the website I didn’t really want to be the guy that did all the work. So I had decided that as long as our current webmaster was willing to work with me and take direction from me, that I would return as President for the next year.

This morning at the meeting, I presented this thought and it was unanimously accepted amongst the Executive.

So I’m President again. Some would say I am a sucker for punishment and sometimes I would agree. But I really want to keep this club going and I felt that while nobody else volunteered for the Presidential position and given that I actually enjoy some of the duties of President and given that there are new Executive members that are going to take some of the load off me, I am happy with my decision and the decision of the Executive.

More later.

Upcoming 'cultural' events

Well, some would call it culture.

I'm going to see Sarah Silverman at the end of March. Then The Cure in late May then Rush in later May.

Never had so many events going on at the same time.

Of course my Credit Card is feeling the strain, tickets are not cheap. Neither is going away for a long weekend though I guess.

Been a huge Cure fan for a long, long time. I'll almost be the oldest person there, but I so don't care. I've seen them 4 times now I think? And each one has been better than the last.

I've seen Rush a couple of times too. The last time was in Vancouver when they put on a 3 hour show! It was fantastic. And I've not seen Sarah Silverman before, but I'm such a fan of hers. I think her type of humour is what we need right now. We need people to stop taking themselves so seriously and being easily offended. I'm not advocating racism, but I am advocating a sense of humour which involves the ability to laugh at ourselves.

More later.

Big White Ski Resort

I took a few friends to Big White Ski Resort last weekend.

We had a great time skiing and snowboarding and sampling the many different food and beverage offerings. We sampled many more beverage offerings than food of course.

One of the highlights of the weekend though was seeing my friend Paul perform with his band The Hip Replacements. As you might gather, they are a Tragically Hip cover band and played all our favourites. They were playing at Rakkels on the Ridge, a popular ski bar at Big White on both Friday and Saturday nights.

We went and watched them on both nights as we had so much fun.

Anyway, here are some pictures from my Flickr page.

More later.

Macbook woes

Well well well.

On Tuesday night I was happily mac-cing away on my 3 week old Macbook.
Imagine my surprise when I flipped the lid open on Wednesday morning to find rainbow coloured lines running from top to bottom of the display!
I restarted the machine and the screen was blank. A grey colour, lit up, but blank.

Video Ram failure.

Took it back to Future Shop where I was initially told that the 14-day period for returns of exchanges had passed. They turned out to be excellent though as they allowed me to exchange my broken Macbook for some extra cash for a brand new Macbook Pro!

Yummy!

So all is well, thanks Future Shop for great service.

So, now I'm running a Macbook Pro instead. Haven't had much time to use it yet as I spent last night loading it up again, but the display is fantastic. I also like how they have split the USB ports up so there's one on the left and one on the right. They also included a DVI to VGA connector. Ahh the little things make such a difference!

I was a little concerned about the relative small size of the display on the first Mac I got, and the display on the Pro has chased all those concerns away. At just over 15 inches it's all I could possibly want.

Apple keynote

Just watching the Apple keynote from WWDC this week.

Lots of cool stuff coming in Leopard methinks?

Gotta love the Mac...