roger's cable: a true story

When I moved into my new place in April, I had free cable. I guess they forgot to disconnect it, so I was getting it for free.

Several months later, I received the dreaded little red card from Roger's explaining they had cut off my cable service because I was a "new" owner of the unit. This was on October 16, 2003.

On the same day in the evening, I called Rogers to have it reconnected. They told me they would reconnect on Tuesday, October 21, 2003.

On Tuesday, I came home from work to find the cable had not been reconnected yet. I called to complain. Rogers told me their network was down and they could not contact any of their service guys to see where they were. It was 6pm, and they told me that the service people work until 8pm, so they might still be coming. I did not receive a cable connection on Tuesday at all.

On Wednesday, October 22, 2003 (6 days after I ordered cable) evening my cable was reconnected.

On Friday October 24, 2003 cable was out again. I noticed there was a message on my machine. It was fuzzy but I could make out the words "Roger's Cable". I called Roger's to complain. These people were surprised and shocked that I had been disconnected. To them, it made absolutely no sense that someone would come in and disconnect me. They were sorry and told me that they would reconnect me immediately the next morning (Saturday October 25, 2003). They told me I had to be there to get the cable, so I had to cancel my plans for the morning.

Saturday morning came and went. I called Roger's again. They told me that according to my file, someone was supposed to come on Saturday and they didn't know why no one came. They apologized for keeping me in the whole time and asked if I wanted to reschedule. The best they could give me was Thursday October 30, 2003 (14 days after I ordered cable). So I agreed.

Every day leading up to Thursday I started researching on alternatives to getting Roger's cable. Bell Expressvu, StarChoice, Look. None of these are an option for me for two reasons.

1) I'm not allowed to attach a satellite externally to my condo.
2) Even if I was, you need a balcony facing south (CN Tower).

On Wednesday while browsing through Roger's site, I came to realize a cool deal they had for digital cable. Rent a box for $8.95/month, and you still get whatever you ordered before, but then you can get extra stuff. Plus all the channels are free for 2 months as a trial period, and there's no commitment required.

I called Roger's to see if I could add this deal onto what I already had. The lady was nice, she said I could tack on the order for the digital box with (tomorrow) my current order. The difference is before I could just have the cable installed, whereas now I had to stay in so that I could answer the door and let the guy deliver the digital box.

Thursday night, the big day! 14 days after I ordered cable, it was time to get my order, plus digital too! 5-8pm, so I rushed home after work and waited. And waited. And waited some more.

Well, turns out cable was connected while I was home, but no one showed up to give me my digital box, so I had no idea cable had been hooked up. I called to complain once again. The guy checked my file, and found NO RECORD OF ME ORDERING DIGITAL CABLE! Unbelievable!

This is my account of dealing with Roger's cable. This is by no means a warning or anti-Roger's rant. After all, these bastards have a monopoly on cable, so even if you wanted to find an alternative, you can't! The friggin bastards have 100% share on cable, so they can screw around with you knowing full well you'll come back begging for more!

Even better is their lovely phone service. They put you on hold, reminding you to stay on the line because you are in a queue. 30 minutes later you hear a "click" and you've been disconnected. How wonderful! Another time I was on hold for 20 minutes, talked to a guy and give him all my information (home number, address and postal code, full name, the problem i'm having) and he tells me he's going to transfer me to someone who can help me with my problem. At this point 3 things can happen. I could be on hold another 15 minutes and then get the wonderful "click" again. OR, I get transferred to the other guy and this dude asks for my info AGAIN, and then asks me, why that other guy transferred me to him! OR, I get transferred again!

searches

funny searches yesterday that lead to this blog site..

"Internet+fragrance+mall+Honestly+yours"
"werewolf+woke+up+naked+buffy+gay"
"hands+on+a+hooker+joe+schmoe+show+pics"
"wtc+papparazi"
"joe+schmoe+finale"

To the person searching for:
"so+come+home+running+Chris+Tomlin+chords", the song's chords can be found here.

yay!

Yankees lose!

smallville

it seems like the show has changed to Wednesday at 10pm on City, instead of Tuesday's a 8pm. Weird.

Anyway, I missed an episode, last weeks, because Roger's didn't bring back my cable as promised (they brought it back a day later), then two days later, they stupidly cut it off again. What a dumb bunch of idiots.

Anyway, back to the show. Kristin Kreuk is really pretty, still.

One beef with the show I have is this. What happened to Pete? This kid gets virtually no air time, even though he knows Clark's secret and is Clark's best friend. Is this cuz he's black? That's so wrong. Meanwhile, I don't care as much as long as Lana gets more airtime.

Still, you gotta feel somewhat bad for Sam Jones III. He must've thought he was getting that "Big Break" when he signed on and read the part about being Clark's best friend and getting to be in the know of the secret powers. But he gets nothing. He more like just a recurring character on the show.

Give Pete more love guys. C'mon!

Riesen

We are having so much fun with this candy. I bought a package of it and we've been eating it. One guy won't have any, insisting it smells like shit. But it doesn't.. it's smooth chocolate, not too sweet, not too sticky like some other caramel candies.

He was saying how even if I gave some to a homeless man, he would not eat it.

Then we played with the words of course. One guy would say 'hey ebrian, give me one riesen', then i'd say 'i have no reason to give you a riesen!'. Then the guy who doesn't like them says 'even a homeless guy would have no riesen to live'. hahaa

mcdonald's

noticed someone searching my page for McDeal information. Here in Canada, here is monday to friday:

Monday - Big Extra Meal
Tuesday - Big Mac Meal
Wednesday - McChicken Meal
Thursday - Two Cheeseburgers Meal
Friday - Fillet O' Fish Meal

If you have a McDeal meal, it is $4.27. You can also just get the burger(s) for $1.39 that day. It's a good deal, in my opinion. Anytime you can fill your belly with a drink, fries and a burger all for under $5, that's a good deal.

My schedule looks like this:

Monday - Big Extra Meal
Tuesday - Big Mac Meal
Wednesday - McChicken Meal OR Manchu Wok ($5.97). I usually get the 2 items deal. Noodles, shanghai pork and either green bean beef or pepper chicken.
Thursday - Manchu Wok (5.97) or a Calzone ($4.27) from Mrs. Vanelli's
Friday - Often times Friday we go out together to eat. It could be Pho or Mamma's Pizza. Or just a random restaurant in the area. I could also have the lamb dinner or roast chicken dinner from the Friendly Greek, or a submarine from Subway. Submarines are a bit more expensive because I find that a half sub isn't enough to fill my stomach, whereas the full is too big. I can finish it, but end up feeling sleepy for the rest of the afternoon. Plus it's around $7. The Greek food is eiher $5-7, depending on which meal, or whether you get a salad or not. Or I could have another Calzone.

In a week I am spending around $25 on lunch food. I guess if made my own lunches, it would cost around $10/week. But then again, time is money and spending that extra hour on Sundays (or for some people who prepare lunch the night before) just isn't worth that $15/week, to me.

Right now I am limiting myself to spending approx. $100/week, as in that's all I take out per week. Some weeks I'll have $40 left, other weeks I'll have nothing left. So I figure as long as I limit myself to that amount, in the end I can only spend that much on average, per week. I'm spending on average about $150/month on various bills.

The other day I was calculating my expenses and realized that I'm not making much money at all. I think many people at work would be surprised I was making so little.. but then again it's only my first year of working. Then you factor in the fact that I'm living on my own but my parents paid for it, and how I really only paid 1/3 for my car. Plus most guys my age have a girlfriend, and since I don't one that saves me quite a bit too. All in all I am living a pretty good life.

Speaking of that my parents are constantly in my ear urging and guilting me into finding a girl and getting them some grandkids. Dad makes a good point that the older I get, the pool of good women gets smaller. This is a really good point. Less than a year ago my opinion on getting married was that the only point of getting married was to have children. I love children.. thus I always felt that the alternative to marriage would be adoption.

However, ever since my family moved away I have really started to cherish the times whenever I am with friends. I now value that companionship, so I think more about finding that special someone than I did before. Guy friends are one thing, but eventually that guy is going to look for a girl, and then he will have less time for me, eventually having NO time for me. Thus it brings me to my final point.

Living. Money. A job. God. I'm so close to "having it all"...

quick update

yea-yea, i've been busy ok.

i've travelled about 600 km in the last 3-4 days in my car. the agape retreat was far. but it was good. moving onto agape would be kinda scary seeing as my mom was going there just 5 months ago. but they are good people.

fantasy football has been rough.. i've gone 1-5 in the last two weeks.

after a whole week to do devotions, i'm only on day 3 of purpose driven life. i swear i'll be better! doh!

saw 'kill bill' yesterday. overly-hyped movie. is it just me or was this movie really *yawn* boring? okay, so people's limbs and heads were chopped off. so what? what about the other 1.5 hours of nothingness? qt - i'm disappointed. the toes part was funny tho.

getting fed up with my computer.. overheats all the time, especially now with heat turned on

my dad is coming back tomorrow! i'm so excited.. i miss him so much!

yesterday i read day 1 of the purpose driven life. i can't decide whether to do it in the mornings or at night. for now, i'll do it at night, but in the future (if i can ever catch up on my sleep that missed 3 weeks ago) i would like to switch it to a morning devotion.

it took me approx. 40 minutes to read, reflect, write and pray on Day 1's reading.

commitment

after a really challenging sermon this sunday, i've decided to make a commitment to making devotions part of my daily routine. i've been through this a thousand times, 'going back to daily devotions', but each time the urge has passed and dwindled.

this time, i'd like to post this up so that those of you reading can keep me accountable. i'm going to keep a written diary rather than computer, because i know from experience that i cannot keep myself from being distracted whenever i am on the computer. for now, i will read a chapter every day until i find a good devotional book. in my diary i will keep track of the chapters i read, date and time i read it, my thoughts on the scripture and also record what i feel is my level of spirituality at that time.

i think this is a step in the right direction. throughout my bad and good times, my faith in God has remained very strong. it's time i made a commitment towards not only having a strong faith, but also a great personal relationship with Him.

raptors

tonight we had a draft for raptors tickets. 9 teams drafted for season tickets (a pair). monchichi and i are sharing, and we got the lakers, 76ers, celtics, heat, and chicago (preseason). we were forced to take a preseason ticket because we got one of the top 4 picks. we got 2nd.

i'm excited.. i really like the Lakers this year, even if Kobe ends up in jail (more on this later), they still have Malone, Payton and Shaq. It's a stacked team and should be able to compete with teams like the Spurs or Kings, who are stacked as well. 76ers, another player I've always wanted to see is Alan Iversion. He plays with so much heart and desire. Sure he jacks up 30 shots per game, but it's the valiant effort that I admire. We got Celts too, Paul Pierce -- all heart and soul.

The Heat's rookie Dwyane Wade is my pick this year for rookie of the year. I think he'll get tons of playing time, and he's the only scorer on the team. All you need is a high scoring average to get an ROY. And yeah, it IS spelled 'Dwyane', not D'wayne like D'wayne Bates of the Minnesota Vikings..!

Finally I'm happy about the Chicago preseason game too, although I would have preferred the game against the Greek team, Chicago is Toronto's final preseason game, so I suspect we'll see maybe 1 quarter of Vince, and then a good 36 minutes of Chris Bosh.

Kobe. This is just speculation, but in my honest opinion, I think a woman gets a certain amount of unfair power in rape cases. If it's down to his word against hers, the woman almost always gets the benefit of the doubt. What if Kobe had sex with this girl, and afterwards she asked if he'd call her, and he said no way! Easily she could have been upset enough to claim rape, knowing that a guy with a high profile like Kobe (or Mike Tyson) would at the very least pay her off. Either way, she gets her revenge.

Hypothetically, any woman would have an easy time winning such a case.

The thing that has always bothered me about Mike Tyson has been that the woman called him in the middle of the night and asked him to come over to her hotel room. If anyone has seen or read about Mike Tyson, you know he's not exactly the type of guy you call over for some emotional or family crisis. This girl called him over for sex, plain and simple. Okay, so maybe he was a little rough on her? It still doesn't take away from the fact that she intended to have sex with him. That bugs me that he still gets, what, 5 years in prison?

Now if the same thing happened to Kobe, that would be a different story, because he's a nice guy who someone WOULD be call over if there was a family or emotional crisis. Also I read that this woman accusing him has mental instabilities and recently tried to commit suicide, twice. And she isn't going to be put on the stand. What's up with that? How do we know she isn't just doing this for the fame and money? A woman who is suicidal, could just be out for some attention and a big settlement.

Bah.. what bothers me most about all of this is that Kobe Bryant is my favorite basketball player. He's never said anything foolish or stupid that I've seen in his one-on-ones or post game interviews. He married his highschool sweetheart, he's brimming with talent. I know it's naive to think that this guy might be perfect and that he's probably not.. but i'm a believer.

the red team wins!

how many times did you guys get this question yesterday:

"are you voting tonight?" (I respond)
"why not?"

Why not? The simple response would be -- because Mike Harris isn't running. But that would only lead to even more questions. How about "because to me it's just red against blue."?

Regardless of which government runs the province, people are going to be unhappy. For me, every which way I will be affected both negatively and positively. I believe it's pure folly to worry about politics unless they are telling me I have to start paying to breathe, or that I can't pray in public anymore or read the Bible without paying a tax. Because outside of those things, I really could not care less. I'll take issue if my normal daily life is drastically changed, but otherwise I care as much about the Blues and the Reds (and the Oranges, Greens etc) as I do about whether or not "J Lo" is getting married again.

friendster

friendster.com was originally a place my friend told me about and I thought it was just stupid. but recently having added people to my direct friends' list, i have started to find it more interesting.

what's the point of this site? i believe the purpose is to meet people. this is a marvel of an idea -- meeting total strangers who just happen to know someone that you also know. cutting down the 4, 5, 6 degrees of separation down to 1-2. it's kinda neat. the coolest thing about it is clicking on one of your own friends, and then on one of their friends, and then seeing one of your own friends on a friends' friends' friends list. now THAT is cool.

blaster

damn kids..

i got hit with the blaster a few days ago. yea i know, why didn't i patch it? because i couldn't. microsoft thinks i have an invalid cdkey to my xp disc. okay, so it's true, but still, doesn't everyone? i was looking at the ms site the other day. xp pro is $600! are they our of their minds? their operating system is worth more than my computer, stereo, tv -- combined. that's ridiculous. and which of these is the least reliable? of course, the OS.

fellership

my fellowship at church is going through some drastic changes. we started out as a 19-28 age span, but this fall we are making a big change to it. the reason for the change is that many highschool graduates have had trouble transitioning into from the highschool fellowship to ours. the reason being there is a gap between the ages in the fellowship, mainly that it's a slew of people who are 23+ and then a bunch of 19-20s.

the age gap is inconvenient and not our fault; it's just that many church people that age have gone to schools outside toronto. as a result, our fellowship continues to get older, and the younger people find it less and less appealing to attend.

so, time for big changes. the fellowship "genesis" will no longer allow anyone 25+.

conveniently, we've had small groups throughout the year, and only the older groups have been attending. so we could just continue on with the groups, and just stop going to those large group activities that including the younger people.

however, we need new small group leaders.

i've been approached (albeit jokingly) to be a leader. i don't see myself as a leader. i've done leadership roles in my highschool fellowship and it just didn't really work out back then. i don't see that changing now.

i've been going to this church for just over a year now. i finally feel like a part of the "family". it's a big church, afterall. i am volunteering to be part of the welcoming committee. i couldn't do that before because i had no way of getting to church on time.

limbaugh vs. mcnabb

three points i'd like to make about this recent thing between these two people.

1) a bad team makes a bad qb look worse, and a good team can make a bad qb look better. in all cases, the team around him makes him look good or bad. take qb's like trent dilfer, troy aikmen, tom brady. these are all below average qbs who are a product of a good system, which make them look good when they really aren't that good. dilfer helped baltimore (a team known for its defense) win a superbowl. now some would say dilfer guided the team and a good solid qb. but a person in the know would realize that dilfer simply didn't make the mistakes he usually makes, and it's the defense that won them the SB. same goes for tom brady when the pats won it a couple years ago, and now clearly sucks. troy aikmen won quite a few SBs, but it a product of a good offense coupled with the one of the greatest runningbacks in the history of the sport. this "great" never threw more than 20 touchdowns in a single season.

that said, i don't consider mcnabb in this category of quarterbacks.

2) limbaugh was wrong, the media doesn't particularly want to see black quarterbacks succeed in the nfl. if that were the case, they would have made a bigger deal out of daunte culpepper last season, when he struggled mightily. aaron brooks is struggling right now, no one has said anything about him either.

3) the philadelphia eagles should have seen this coming. andy reid, and the rest of coaching staff, the gm, even the fans should have seen this coming. philly's offense is struggling and they're blaming mcnabb. hello?! mcnabb is all they have on their offense. you got last years' receivers, james thrash and todd pinkston -- neither of these two would be a wr3 in most teams. you got duce staley, who has had a decent career due to a good offensive line. chad lewis, one of the oldest tight ends in the league. realizing that you have an overachieving offense last season all in part due to your quarterback, and not signing anyone of any significance in the offseason -- THIS is why donovan mcnabb has struggled this year.

happy birthday!
today my lil bro turns 16. wow! happy birthday!

i suggest going for that driver's license and not holding off like i did. driving, to me, is a necessity but i still think it's overrated (just ask danny heatley and his pal dan snyder). but getting that insurance going early on will do wonders for you later on in life.

when i turned 16, dad took the day off to be with me. we were gonna see "virtuosity" the movie with denzel washington and russell crowe. when the time came i asked dad when we were gonna see it, and he told me, right after i mowed the lawn. what a great birthday that was! mom bought me the forrest gump soundtrack that year for my birthday.

useless information

Where does the egg come from on a chicken? Where does it 'come out' ? Ever thought about that?

I looked this question up on the internet and found answers like:

"it comes from its mouth"
"from its rear end"
"from its love hole" <-- love hole? LOL

The hen -- in fact -- has only ONE hole. It poos and lays eggs, from the SAME HOLE!

See here for a cool cross-section!

asbntr

gone. gone? gone. where'd it go? i wish i knew. :(

so long, alt.sports.basketball.nba.tor-raptors, it was nice knowing you.

:(

it's that time of year again. you can see it in peoples' faces on the subway, the gloomy eyes, the frowns. the bags building up under peoples' eyes. the weather is getting cold, people start remembering what their new years' resolutions were and how far away they are from completing them. it's Q3 for many them, big deadlines coming up. most people have used up their vacations already. some people realizing their lives aren't at the stage they expected to be.

there i was last night, lying on my couch, tired as hell but wired from coffee. i gave up on coffee months ago, but my boss bought be a cup today and so i drank it. coffee takes about 8 hours to kick in for me. dunno why. watched "fear factor". totally grossed out by the 'cave dwelling spiders', they looked more like.. i dunno what, but not like spiders!

watched "everybody loves raymond", and for the umpteenth time, wondered when they were planning to start writing *new* jokes? sipping away on my cup the precious nectar of berry fanta goodness. charlie sheen's new show "two and a half men" is a good one. that kid reminds me of my brother.

at 10:45pm, i realized that there was no chance the Bears would make a game of it. this team should never play on MNF. they are a terrible team and do not deserve to be playing in a nationally televised game. bring me the Chiefs or the Seahawks.. but the Bears? c'mon!

my clock said 11:15 am when i went to bed. startled by the stupid alarm an hour later. the clock said 7:30 am.

...another day...

goodness gracious! this stuff is awesome! it truly is the precious nectar of berry goodness!

i'm not joking people... the fanta berry flavor is amazing... i think i'm finally gonna use up that first tank of gas for my car, driving back and forth from the fanta store!

just a quick update on the fanta -- i tried the berry kind.

OMG!!!! It's unbelievably good!!

fanta

this is a marvelous drink. my romanian coworker repeatedly raved about this soft drink, to which i simply laughed and mocked him. but then after reading countless positive reviews (it was almost as if "fanta" was some kind of drink for gods) i decided to try it out.

i drove out to sheppard and pharmacy, to a store called "ABC Delicatessen", a romanian owned convenience/meats store. they had shelves and shelves of meat, and fanta. it was crazy, a huge lineup of people, all european, and i was the lone chinese fellow, standing in line amongst about 30 people, each with a slab of some sort of meat in one hand, and a bottle of fanta in the other.

it was then when i realized that fanta had some kind of weirdo cult following!

mind you, if you have tried fanta you probably had the north american kind. for some reason north american companies think that orange soda should taste like orange colored sugar water. if you've ever tried drinking crush or c'plus, you will know what i mean. it even stains your teeth like cheesies. this drink reminds me of Orangina only not bitter or tangy. also, Orangina needs to be served chilled or it tastes nasty.

european orange Fanta is by far the best orange soda i have ever tried. when i open the bottle a crack to let the gas out, it smelt like mandarin oranges. the aroma was so real!

i also bought a bought of the berry flavored fanta. i haven't tried it yet, but check to read a comment about the stuff, search for "fanta" on this page. I just love the part when they called it the "precious necktar of berry goodness".

berry goodness?

LOL

Yesterday my classmates came to Milestones downstairs for dinner, then came up to see the place. They were very impressed, and were making fun and teasing me about how huge the place is. Actually they made me feel pretty uncomfortable.. they made me feel ashamed of what I have been blessed with. I don't know if they meant to or not, but many words were hurtful to me.

I don't think of myself as "rich", just very blessed and thankful for the years of hard work my parents put into their careers just so that my brother and I could have a comfortable life.

I think it's a different kind of culture for them. These are the people who want to move out badly, not thinking really about the closeness of family and being more concerned about their own wealth and privacy. They all thought I was the luckiest man alive, whereas for me, I would trade it all for a 400 sq ft apartment if I could have you guys right down the street.

I guess they don't think about things like that because they take that for granted. Maybe they are less mature in that sense, still feeling like their parents are a burden to them, rather than realizing they are in fact the burden of their parents. It's interesting comparing these people with church people.

Church people, the instant I tell them that my family is moving to the States, they ask if my brother is going, or why I am not going with them. Whereas my classmates, instantly they ask me if I will have my own place, will I get a car, etc. I don't know if that reflects their priorities in life or what.

I think this directly correlates with what I learned about many christians and how they cut off their relationships with non-christians. This past evening has made me think about my classmates in a different light altogether. Are they my true friends, or just people I happen to know?

so tired today

i've been really tired all week. i think it coincides with me play wc3 all night, but i'm not sure.. but for some reason everyone at work has been tired all week too, and they're all too old to play wc3.

maybe it's the air, or the change in weather that leads to a sadness which leads to tiresome feelings.

i was a little stressed yesterday after i found i was being sued. but now i'm calmer, i didn't do anything wrong, i mean i didn't do anything wrong on purpose, so hopefully my wrongs can be overlooked for that. for some reason my body and mind freezes at the thought of my reputation going down the tubes. the thought of losing the respect of my peers, or losing my dignity, or losing face..

i've always thought that stuff like that doesn't bother me, but now i find it really does. i hate the feeling of being under attack, it's worrisome and because i shy away from confrontation it bothers me even more that someone would try to attack me. especially someone i considered a decent person.

well, i'm not going to go to court, i'll have my father represent me. hopefully everything goes well.. i guess we can only leave it in God's hands now.

btw, 41 days to go!

i'm lost, in translation

on tuesday i saw Lost in Translation with monchichi and marion. i remember marion possibly from many years ago like maybe 10-15 years ago. but anyway, on with the commentary.

the movie was funny. especially for us watching as asian canadians, there were parts that were so hilarious! the acting was pretty good too. the story also was good.

i keep thinking about how great a movie it was, but i can't pinpoint what was so great about it. most of my 'fans' are asian, so i encourage you all to go see it! support in the indie films!

there is minimal swearing and no real adult situations although there is one adultery situation. it's funny, has some meaning. there are some parts i feel might be way funnier if i knew some japanese.

i give this movie 10/10.

to the people who are spamming 15 times a day


Can you please stop? You're filling up my mailbox with 15 of these per day. It is too much.

Besides, this is a web-based email, they have virus checkers built in, so no one is going to fall for these stupid attempts anyway. Give it up already.

And go outside.. there's a beautiful world out there for you to enjoy! Do something useful with your life!

joe schmoe

i don't claim to be a huge reality tv fan, but i do happen to watch Amazing Race, and Survivor. i was also watching paradise hotel until i realized the whole thing was fixed.

joe schmoe is the reality show that is all fake. they took a poor average joe american and put him on a show called "the lap of luxury". they have him think he's on a reality show, where the grand prize is $100,000. but everyone on the show are fake. he's the only person who's REAL on this reality show.

and it's hilarious because they picked the perfect guy. the guy talks about boobs and how he wants to hook up with some of the contestants on the show... each of the actors/actresses play the stereotypical roles of a reality show. the "ass", the "bitch", the "schemer", the "best friend", the "virgin", the "homo", the "veteran", etc.

it's a great show.. kinda cruel at times, i mean you really start to feel sorry for "matt", last episode he absolutely broke down because someone got booted off. he cried so hard the producers started to doubt if they could continue.

first episode, the immunity challenge was how long you could stay in contact with a hoooker. the "hooker" was played by a porn star, and the funny thing is as soon as she went topless, "matt" recognized who she was. LOL. anyway it was all fixed, they would have him go down the wire with "the ass", but he let go right in the beginning (he was assigned to put his left hand on her right breast) and it surprised everyone, including the director, he was so shocked! and the actors too, they were like "omg!!"

so anyway.. it's a really funny show, you should check it out if you get a chance to!

i was just reading that the emmy's have been getting bad ratings lately, year after year less and less people are watching it. i have some theories on this matter:

a) people who grew up watching the current shows are getting older; more mature, and just couldn't care less anymore about it.

b) award shows in general are overrated. do you really need awards to feel good about yourselves? aren't the $1M per episode salaries good enough? i mean really, what should other industries start giving out awards for best manager, or best telemarketer? best phone answerer?

c) the two times i tried watching it, there was a black woman doing the hosting. she was terrible. apparently she has her own show! goodness, what were the networks thinking??

something that disturbed me deeply a week ago was when the metro (free newspaper in toronto available in the subway stations) had news of "J Lo" and ben affleck's relationship on the front cover, as the headline story. what the hell? who cares?!

john mayer

i bought the new john mayer cd last weekend. forgot to mention it. i bought it because i had his song bigger than my body stuck in my head for about 3 days straight.

this album has a different flavor from the first. room for squares was a more fun album, more acoustic stuff. while this new album is more.. almost jazzy. like he brought together a band and they just started jamming at a bar. what i mean is, the mind behind the music it is gone, like he didn't spend as much time delving into the music as he did the first album. just 'threw' it together. well, that's what it sounds like.

most of these songs will not make it on the radio other than the song i was hooked to, which means although it is a good cd, he won't make as much money on it as the first.

i'll admit that this cd took some time to grow on me. at this point, i'm really starting to like it alot (i listen to it all day at work), whereas at first all i did was listen to (track 2). it doesn't have the same feel as songs like 83 or 3x5 or No Such Thing, on the first album.

well, anyway i suggest only true john mayer fans buy this one, otherwise you might feel you were robbed of the $15-20.

isabel, among other things

The case I could have been jury on is all over the news these days. I never realized what a big following it would have, but lots of people are talking about it. I guess many people have thought that police brutality was an important a real issue. Possibly many people have felt they've been treated unfair by police because sometimes they unfairly use their power. Whatever the case may be, it seems this case will make a statement one way or another.

Canadian Idol ended yesterday with some dude named Ryan Malcolm winning it all. Will anyone remember this name 1 year from now? I mean no offense, I heard him sing and he's pretty good, much better than the other guy Gary Beals, but seriously will anyone remember this guy?

The way I figure it is this. It's not just about having a good voice, but also the marketability, good looks, and what I call a "hook". With a hook I mean some kind of theme that gets to you and makes you want to buy his cd, or see him on TV, or would make me want to meet him. Ryan Malcolm, has no hook. I guess it also depends on the music they feed this guy to sing. Let's see, what kind of music does Canada listen to these days, and what kind of music is Ryan Malcolm suitable for singing?

Hmm..


Meanwhile, the hurricane Isabel is coming along. Some of us at work are hoping that it will die down as it passes through States, and then miraculously pick back up again to Category 5 status again while it comes through Toronto. That would be so sweet..

close call
Today at court, we all waited impatiently to tell us they had picked their jury and so we could go home. They dragged it out til about 10:30am. I dunno why they had to drag it out so long.

We piled into the courtroom and sat and waited. The 12 jury members filed in. We waited some more. "All rise!", we rose. I'm not sure why they were wasting our time, I mean does it have to be so formal?

Then, the judge explained that one of the jury members had written a letter to him explaining how her mother was near the brink of life and that she simply could not serve the 2+ months of trial. The judge excused her and told us that one of us would have to replace her! DOH!!

So they started calling out at random the next panel. Judge said he'd call 10 people who would be brought to the back, and then one by one would be interviewed to see if they'd qualify to be the next juror. I was picked (argh..) 5th!

So we were all sitting in the back room, I was totally petrified. The bailiff came in and asked the first lady to come out for her interview. I was really scared at this point, because I knew the #3 guy was self-employed and would be able to cite financial hardship has a valid excuse not to serve. And the #4 guy was a student, so obviously he couldn't serve a 2+ month case!

So we all waited there. 5 minutes later, the bailiff came back in to get the next person, only instead she told us we were free to go home! Praise GOD!! They picked the first lady.. haha..

I was so relieved, I blurted out "HOLY CRAP THAT WAS A CLOSE ONE!" and everyone laughed.

That's my experience with jury duty.. and the best thing is, I'll be exempt for the next 3 years!

Here's the case if anyone is interested. It's kind of scary, thinking about it. This morning I was in the washroom and all 4 guys came in. I was thinking 'good Lord get me out of here!'. I was pretty scared!

no pauley shore for me
Today I had Jury Duty. It was basically just the selection process. I got really lucky. Basically there are about 200 people brought in the courtroom, and first they do screening for like people who are physically unable, or might know the people involved in the case, or might know the witnesses, etc. This process took all morning, from 10am til about 12:30pm.

People were coming up with the stupidest excuses. After they read out all the possible witnesses (there were about 50 of them), one guy claimed that "one of them might be my fiancee's second cousin". Uh-huh... yeah right.

One old guy said he couldn't hear higher pitched voices of women. The judge said "I think most of us suffer from the same thing!" and told the man to sit back down. Haha...

One lady claimed to know two of the doctors listed on the witness list. But when she was asked how old each of them were... she got them both wrong. Haha.

One guy claimed he'd be a bad juror because he has a bad short term memory. He went ahead and explained how he forgot the room number of the courtroom, minutes after someone told him.

After the screening, they separated the group into different panels.

First panel goes through interviews to see if lawyers from both parties agree on them. That group was to go through the process this afternoon. I sat there anxious that they might call me.

They estimated the case would take at least 2 months, which would have been bad for me since my contract ends in two months. It would be highly unlikely for me to get a contract extension, if I had spent the last two months in court!

Anyway, there were 5 panels in total of about 20-40 people each, the last one being ordered back for Friday afternoon. I was one of the lucky few at the end!

The judge ordered us to return on Monday at 9:15am in case they had not found the 12 jurors they were looking for out of the first 150 people.

Hopefully they will have selected the 12 by then..

first day
today is my first day at jury duty selection. i'll keep you guys posted what happens.

yesterday i picked up my car. i was so excited! the car drives really nice! when i accelerate, i don't feel it much, the car is really smooth. i drove it at night and the lights looked pretty nice inside. all orange.

the stereo deck is probably the only disappointing feature. i guess being used to drive the van, i didn't have to reach as far to change stations and skip cd tracks. but the sound system is also pretty good. i don't think i'll get new speakers.

some people mentioned i should get tinting. i might. hard to tell if i need it since i drove at night.

of course its got the new car smell which is nice. i am hoping i get sent home earlier today, instead of 6pm, because that way i can drive around and have some fun, maybe go and buy some clothes or something.

i'm bringing my owner's manual and my bible for reading at the waiting room at the courthouse. i gotta go now.. ttyl!

my brother told me about this song. i hadn't gotten a real chance to meditate on the words until last week. it's a good song!

come home running - chris tomlin

Oh heart of mine, why must you stray?
From one so fair you run away
And one more time you have to pay
The heaviness of needless shame

Oh heart of mine, come back home
You've been too long out on your own
And He's been there all along
Watching for you down the road

So come home running
His arms are open wide
His name is Jesus
He understands
He is the answer
You are looking for
So come home running
Just as you are

Oh child of God so dearly loved
And ransomed by the Savior's blood
And called by name, "daughter" and "son"
Wrapped in the robe of righteousness

guess who's back?

Okay.. I gotta keep this more up to date. It's just a matter of me opening this up every day.

This Saturday I went to see a film from the film festival. It was called "Zatoichi", which is a legendary character, a blind guy who kicks ass. The movie was funny, and tons of action. It was a samurai thing, done in japanese, with sub-titles. It reminded me of many of the anime movies i've seen. It started out really cool, Zato kicks ass, like 5 guys at once, blood squirts out and gushes everywhere. Lots of blood, that's what I remember most about it. There was so much blood that at some points people were just howling in laughter because it was so unrealistic.

And just like many of the anime's, the ending made absolutely no sense at all.

I went with my old highschool buddy Max. I hadn't seen him in about 6 months. I've found that even though we're still friends, due to the 5-6 years between of "growing" up, we have absolutely nothing in common anymore. No similar interests, other than ice cream.

Listening to him talk about things made my mind wander and think about how I've changed since highschool. The experiences I've gone through, how much closer to I've grown to my Lord. The different people I've met that have changed my life forever.

free bible for pda's

My friend at work told me about this.. which is odd coz i don't think he's a believer. anyway, here it is, it's free. They don't have the NIV, but they do have a couple that are free, and those should be fine. I got the American Standard Version. I'm also planning on getting another. Cool.. I can read the bible on the way to work now (yea yea i know).

i bought a guitar stand yesterday at steve's music store. it was a long time coming, i have been storing my guitar in my laundry basket.

anyway.. i'll update about my labor day weekend later.. so sorry.. late for work!

almost famous
almost famous is my all-time favorite movie. for awhile, i thought it was my #2 behind forrest gump, but each time i watch almost famous, the more i realize how much i like the movie. i have seen it about 3 times in the last couple of days.. i just watch it, over and over.. and i don't seem to get bored of it.

i still haven't heard from the nissan dealership concerning my car. i wonder if they having trouble finding it.. it's almost been a full week now.. it's kinda frustrating..

on saturday my grandparents are going to maryland to visit my uncle.. i can't wait!

today my boss pete left. he's leaving to get his master's in public administration. i don't know why but i was really sad today to see him go. is it weird to be sad when your boss goes away? i felt that pete played a big part in my development in the last 9 months. he was always encouraging me, giving me career advice, and acting like an older brother. i think i'm gonna miss him a lot. i feel that God put him in my life and i'm so grateful for it.

i found out that i'm still gonna get paid for the jury duty, which makes it a week vacation instead.. pretty sweet..

caught red-handed!
the funniest thing just happened. i just finished mopping the kitchen, took me awhile to clean up the grannies' mess, but i finally got it out. then I told them not to go into the kitchen because it was still wet.

anyway, then i went back to watch tv, and to my surprise my grandmother comes out to see me through the kitchen, so i reminded her i'd just cleaned up. so she went back to my room. out of curiosity, i went back to look at the kitchen floor. a clear set of prints, almost like someone had come out of sandbox!

so i went over to their room, and just then my grampa asked me, why is our kitchen floor always so dirty? they couldn't figure it out.. grandma blamed it on the fact that the kitchen floor is black so everything shows up on it, whereas in their room, it looks clean (hardwood). i told her it was probably her slippers that were dirty. she insisted it was just the color of the floor that was at fault.

so i pulled grampa aside and showed him the prints my grandma had made. i pointed out that she was the only person to walk in the kitchen since i had mopped. therefore, it had to be her slippers. so grampa waddles back to their bedroom and tells her. but she won't believe it. so i walk over and say, come and see the marks you made, you were the only one in the kitchen since i mopped. at that point she realized it must be her slippers, but because of her proud ways, she refused to get up, citing she was 'too tired'. LOL

i got her! hahahaha..

wedding(s)
kevin and melodie's wedding was a lot different from lon and yvonne. i think the biggest difference was that k&m have money. it was more your typical chinese wedding. they did it at tmccc (birchmount/sheppard) and it was pretty nice. i grew up in that church and it was still the same, but just seemed a lot smaller. pastor wesley did the wedding, his first. he's such a wacky pastor. he was cracking jokes and stuff in the middle of his sermon and all that.. it was pretty hilarious.. even at the banquet he ran all the games. the great thing about wes is he doesn't need a mic, because his voice is so loud!

the banquet was at new world palace, they really did up the place real nice, it was "pretty". as all traditional chinese banquets, the invitation says 6pm but the food doesn't come til 8pm. we had a pool to guess when the food would come out. i guess 7:45, kevh voted 7:50, eric guessed 7:41. frances got it the closest at 8pm. the food actually came at 7:56pm. when you're that hungry, everything tastes good, so i can't tell you how good the food was because if you asked me, i would tell you it was the best food i've eaten EVER.

in between the banquet and ceremony, i went with rudy to the nearest Nissan dealership and negotiated for a car. i got it. whee!

september 10, 2003
mark this one down, boys and girls. on sept 10, 2003, mr. loquacious is going to court! that's right folks, after ducking behind my student status three times, i have finally been summoned to jury duty.

$40/day baby..

today at the loblaws they were selling a whole rabbit. thought that was a little gross. i lifted it and look at it, then found they were also selling half rabbits too. mmmm... rabbit....

busy busy busy
another weekend, another wedding..

i had wendy's today. waited until the grannies were asleep and then ran downstairs for food. i had the bacon mushroom melt combo. that burger is something else.. delicious!

i just had bbt with adam. it's so convenient, literally i step outside my buildnig and there it is. for some reason whenever i go for bubble tea i always feel like i need to try a new flavor. i tried kiwi green tea, which tasted nothing like kiwi. actually it was a little bitter.. but man, the waitress we got was really cute. when she came over to take our orders, i looked up right at her, not realizing how (wowee) she was and pretty much froze, unable to remember my order. so i just pulled out the menu and pointed and said "uhh.. kiwi.. green tea.. yes bubbles". wow.

anyway.. time for bed.

crash different

http://www.waveworks.net/mac.html

funny stuff..

blah
it still bothers me that i have to use html tags to make the title because the blogger title thing doesn't work. why is it even there? that bugs me.

somehow i was invited to kev and mel's wedding banquet without knowing. the invitation didn't mention the banquet at all, so i just assumed i wasn't invited, but today kev called me to give me directions to the place. there's gonna be dancing afterwards.. dancing at weddings sucks, because i don't dance. so i just sit there and do nothing while people try to drag me over to the dance floor to prove to me that it's actually fun. okay. now i'm standing among people jumping up and down and side to side. am i having fun? no! i hope they have an open bar...

i've lost 8 pounds since my parents moved away.

i booked the flight for my grandparents to visit my uncle in the states. for a whole month, i'll be able to:
- cook for myself, thus eat food that i KNOW is not rotten
- eat food in dishes i KNOW was washed with soap
- live in a clean place

don't get me wrong, i love my grandparents, but it's like living with a couple of teenagers!

length

do people read long posts? I find that I get much more responses when i post something short compared to when I post something short. in truth, i don't care if anyone reads this. for me it's the hosting of a log that i can go and look back on when i need to. i think it's pretty sweet that they've got stuff for me from years ago.

hello

what a depressing song.

playground school bell rings again
rain clouds come to play again
has no one told you she's not breathing?
hello I’m your mind giving you someone to talk to
hello

if I smile and don't believe
soon I know I’ll wake from this dream
don't try to fix me I’m not broken
hello I’m the lie living for you so you can hide
don't cry

suddenly I know I’m not sleeping
hello I’m still here
all that's left of yesterday

i guess this is just more notes on the group evanescence. yeah, i know sometimes you can analyze something to death. but listening to their songs, it's odd to think they claim to no longer believe in Him when you look at their lyrics, the whole album is like one giant spiritual war.

Take a look at Going Under's first verse:

"Now I will tell you what I've done for you
Fifty thousand tears I've cried
Screaming, Deceiving, and bleeding for you
And you still won't hear me...
Going under

Don't want your hand this time
I'll save myself
Maybe I'll wake up the walls
Now tormented daily, defeated by you
Just when I thought I'd reached the bottom"

Then there's Tourniquet:

"I'm dying,
Praying,
Bleeding,
Screaming.
Am I too lost to be saved ?
Am I too lost ?
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.

Do you remember me ?
Lost for so long.
Will you be on the other side ?
Will you forgive me ?"

And then there's Everybody's Fool:

"perfect by nature
icons of self-indulgence
just what we all need
more lies about a world that

never was and never will be
have you no shame don't you see me
you know you've got everybody fooled

look here she comes now
bow down and stare in wonder
oh how we love you
no flaws when you're pretending
but now I know she "

Other than the "she" part, this could be the group struggling with the feeling of betrayal by God. Maybe they went through a sufferous time in their lives. I dunno.

It just goes to show you, sometimes a band can truly come out of nowhere, just cuz they actually had something to sing about. Look at Alanis Morrissette, that first album was great, but afterwards, that passion was gone, and now she stinks.

Field of Innocence, confusing:

I still remember the world
From the eyes of a child
Slowly those feelings
Were clouded by what I know now

Where has my heart gone
An uneven trade for the real world
I want to go back to
Believing in everything and knowing nothing at all

I still remember the sun
Always warm on my back
Somehow it seems colder now

Where has my heart gone
Trapped in the eyes of a stranger
I want to go back to
Believing in everything

happy birthday to me
thursday was my birthday. i can honestly say that this was my best birthday ever. definitely most memorable.

hanki was gonna take me out for a sushi dinner. work was hectic, just the way i like it. i had manchu wok for lunch. telus sent me a birthday greeting through text messaging to my cell. my computer and the computer next to me was infected with the slammer virus, but we cleaned it out easily and we were fine.

things were going great. we were getting really close to home time. i was definitely looking forward to the sushi!

then, it happened.

my computer turned off. luckily i had saved recently, so no biggie. the lights were out too though, that was a bit annoying, but we have great sunlight from the windows. so we all sat there. then my co-worker's cell phone rang. it was his wife. hummingbird centre lost power too. then another cell rang.. it was my friends girlfriend in New York. power was down there too.. wow! so we all grabbed our things and headed down the stairs. we're on the 27th, so it was quite a trek. i noted that the washroom water wasn't running either.. interesting.

when we got downstairs, there were lots of people down there, all whispering about what had happened. no one knew about NY, so i told them about it. no one really believed me.

it was a HOT day. i don't usually have to go outside, because the subway is connected to both my office building and my condo. it was REALLY hot. i took off my shirt and changed to a T. still hot though.

we noticed that all the streetcars had stopped, and that all the buses were packed. some of them said "extra fare required". i got separated from my co-workers and started walking east towards Yonge street. when i got there, i found that tons of people were just walking up north, so i decided to join them. i didn't have a plan or anything. i tried calling some downtown friends just to make sure it wasn't the Rapture. then my signal died. i guess everyone was using their cells, so signals were getting mixed badly. sometimes it wouldn't dial, even with full reception. other times, the line would ring, but then it would stop ringing and no one picked up.

there were a bunch of black teens trying to sell calls from their cell phones (which apparently were working fine). "$2 per call!" they yelled. i just shook my head. dumb kids..

i was hot, but i have a pretty good thresh hold of heat. i actually enjoy hot intense humidity, believe it or not. but i passed many people who were clearly suffering from it. at first stores on yonge street were selling water, but the further uptown i got, the more i found stores just giving it away. i saw a few buses drive past me completely filled right to the front steps. it became more and more apparent to me that i would be walking home.

the distance from my work to home is about 15 km. where i live is considered 'uptown' compared to where i work which is 'downtown'. i'm not sure why it's up and down, but thursday i found it might have something to do with the incline. my walk home on thursday was all uphill.

i'm not sure which coffee shop i went to because i was just dried up and wasn't paying attention. anyway, i got an iced cappachino (no, it wasn't timmy's). that thing sure was refreshing, even though their ice machines were down, it was still pretty slushy. once i had the drink, was quite happy. i found myself singing out loud. first, it was I Could Sing Of Your Love Forever, then it was Jesus, Lover of my Soul. I sang pretty loudly, although no one actually looked at me so maybe it wasn't THAT loud.

around rosedale or so (i go by the subway system, cuz i don't really know the streets), i ran into adeline, the girl who emcee'd lon's wedding banquet. she was with her bf andy. (i think it was andy). she didn't recognize me at first (what else is new). we walked together all the way til sheppard. that girl is a trooper.. she was walking fast and full of energy. didn't seem tired one bit, whereas i was lagging behind. i think at around eglinton we ran into andy's old roommate from university.

i think it's pretty interesting how we ran into people we knew. my feet were burning.. like hot burning. i thought the skin under my feet had grinded down to flesh.. that's how it felt. my legs were aching. yet, this girl adeline was just going, not one bit tired. she had running shoes on though.. i think that is an unfair advantage!

the whole time i kept trying to call home to make sure the grandparents were okay. they didn't pick up the phone though. i was worried they might have gone to china town. i prayed hard they were safe.

when i first ran into adeline, we saw a pickup truck with a bunch of people in the back. we ended up passing them on foot, but they caught up to us at around york mills. i think cars on the street must have lost so much gas from idling and waiting. there were some kind people who tried to help direct traffic only to be honked by the drivers. if only they thought for a moment what a huge difference these people were making.

anyway.. eventually we got to sheppard. adeline and andy parted from me at that point since they lived there. i walked a few more steps, crossed sheppard, and collapsed at the sheppard centre, right around the stairs.

when i came to, it was morning and i was naked. just kidding. i just took a break and when i looked up i saw my old childhood friend mike. he had me beat, he'd walked from front street. i discovered he lives in the same building as danny. what a small world! i called home again and finally they answered.. God really answers prayers.. they had gone out before the outtage, to go shopping then came back -- and the kicker -- our building had emergency power reserved for elevators, so they got home safely.

instead of sushi, i had peaches and lady fingers for dinner. i took a shower with a flashlight..

and that, in a nutshell, is the story of my 25th birthday.


oh.. another interesting thing i found out that adeline is actually hanki's cousin.. what a small world indeed!

mikey
first off.. a congratulations to mikey bustos for doing so well in the canadian idol competition. mikey was eliminated from competition last night, but not before touching the hearts of many with his beautiful voice and emotion-filled performances. i'm sure it was an unbelievable experience for him and i hope that he is more thankful than upset. it is a huge accomplishment to make it just to the top 10, in canada -- a country that is just barely scratching the surface of embracing the hip-hop culture.. that's pretty fantastic.. keep your chin up, bro! (not to mention he got to meet mariah.. i'm so jealous!)

insurance
the insurance rates between the altima and the accord are almost identical. i guess the test drive will have to be the ultimate decision maker for me. bri: i think altima's are pretty reliable now, from what i've read. most people my age of suggested getting the accord, and the older people have said to go for the altima.

rent
if you know anyone who is looking for a place to live, i know of a condo for rent about 5 mins walking distance from north york subway station. it's a pretty upscale place. it comes with a parking space. laundry machines, oven, fridge etc all there. the rent is around 1400/month. send me off an email (brian_yao@yahoo.com) if you know anyone who'd be interested.

wedding
lon & yvonne's wedding was very nice. everything went as planned except for a tiny hitch just in the beginning, when the music for yvonne to come down started, she didn't. but eventually she came down and everything when smoothly. being a groomsman definitely has its advantages and disadvantages.

advantages are you get to be part of an amazing moment of your friends' lives. you get to wear a cool suit (and might i add, i looked pretty sharp in it) and have everyone stare at you. i was really happy that everyone seemed to liked my new haircut.

disadvantages are that everyone stares at you. and it's a lot of work.. very tiring standing around helping out lon or yvonne.

but it was a lot of fun and a total honor to be a part of.

highlights:
- seeing moments of pure joy in Lon's face at the wedding
- lon getting it all right -- he seemed pretty confused at rehearsal
- yvonne almost breaking down during her vows
- the bridesmaids -- very nice.. and i don't just mean kind and friendly!
- lon and yvonne's kiss at the end.. easily the best kiss i've seen at any christian wedding --- interesting tidbit, they hadn't kissed in over a year, and you could tell they missed it!
- walking up and down main street Unionville for wedding photo's -- i grew up in Unionville
- jon's (best man) toast
- the TSMA bit..
- jon almost breaking down during the end of his toast
- embarrassing games at the banquet
- the sound system failing in the middle of lon and yvonne's first dance
- yvonne's thank you to her dad (almost broke down again)

what can i say.. i love that emotional stuff.

the sound system was weird.. it kept cutting in and out. only about 15-20 songs were played in total out of the 100 i had picked. which is fine since i planned it that way. mikey's song didn't get played though (i had it on random, so it was just luck of the draw).

my final words are words of thanks to the bride and groom for letting me be a part of it all.

finished
the music list is done. finally. it doesn't fill a whole disc, but it's good enough. there's 7 hrs worth, and i even included mikey's song (i hope he doesn't mind..). i'm hoping someone will come up to me and ask 'hey, what song is that?' and i'll say 'why, you don't recognize the voice? it's none other than the infamous bustos and lam!'.. heheh

tomorrow i'm going to the mall to pick up the tux. that lady is gonna be so surprised, because when i first did the measurements, i sucked in my stomach, and since then i've gotten much fatter.. she's gonna be like.. "are you sure you're the right person??"

anyway i've been thinking more about the car. isn't an accord the second most stolen vehicle in north america, after the civic? now is that because of the sheer number of accords out there, or is it just a target? one of the major concerns for getting a car is also the "less headaches" the better..

vee-heh-cull

maybe someone here can help me with my latest quandry. i like the altima 2.5 sl. it's a nice car. however, the accord ex-l is equally impressive. i need a 4-door sedan so that my grandparents can get in and out without too much fuss. resale value doesn't apply either, i will drive this car til it dies.

i think the final decision will probably be decided by which one costs more for insurance..

hair-razing affair

i just got my very first ever "more than $10" haircut. downstairs there's a salon place, and i figured for sure they could not possibly screw up my hair. usually i go for the $10 cut, because well, who cares about hair right? but usually those things take about 2 weeks before you start looking normal again, because they don't know what the heck they're doing. so anyway, today i went to the salon place. it was $26+tax, so that was pretty expensive.

i can certainly see the difference though. at this place, he asked me what i wanted and i said 'what do you think?', and he said, (and i quote) "your look isn't really doing anything for you". Haha. so i told him to just do what he thinks would look good for me. i think it looks alright.. plus he took a lot more time making sure no extra strands of hair missed getting cut. i liked that close attention to detail. too many times i walk out of a $10 cut, come home, wash my hair, and when it's all dry, i find out they missed a whole patch. that really sucks.

also, when i go in there for the $10, they have no clue what i want or should have. i remember the last time i went to "first cuts", the lady asked me what number (for the buzz cut machine adapter size). duh.. who remembers that?

civic

yesterday was completely uneventful. i spent the whole day narrowing down my mp3s, from over 180 hours worth down to 12 hours. i need to bring this list down to 2 hours worth of nice, soothing wedding music.

i only saw mikey's performance, then i turned it off and continued making my song list. mikey sang quite well. zack werner claimed mikey is too too syrupy. you know what, mikey IS syrupy, but that's how he should be -- that's how r&b singers are supposed to be. look at usher, brian mcknight, maxwell, joe, eric benet, r.kelly. by definition, a male r&b singer has to 'syrupy', or a better word would be silky.

poor zack is looking for a rock star canadian idol. uhh.. newsflash.. check out today's top 30 songs and tell me how many of them are rock songs!

american toilet bowl

tonight i saw the movie american wedding. at first i didn't really want to see it, but seeing it at fairview justified enough for me to go see it. (fairview charges 675 cents, even on a regular day). kev, char, anita, larry, mattmark, 'maxima' were there too.

i hafta say it wasn't your typical 'fellowship' type movie, like one of those movies you don't bring your kids to see, or your parents.

but it was a riot! there were parts in it that people were almost falling out of their chairs from laughing so hard! it's also not often people laugh so hard they are clapping, or almost standing.. it was really funny -- gross at times -- but funny.

in the beginning of the movie i kept thinking how immature it was and didn't find too many things funny, but after awhile the humour grows on you and you can't help but laugh at it. actually this movie was way better than american pie 2, and slightly funnier (but also dirtier) than the first one.

beefs..?
something that makes me wonder is what happened to that other guy, the football guy 'Oz'. Wasn't he a friend of jim's -- wouldn't he be invited to the wedding? and what about tara reid, is her acting career going so well that she didn't need to make an appearance? and this guy kevin.. his character serves absolutely no purpose. if you take him out of the movie, it's still the same exact movie. and... who names their kid 'january' ??

score!

yesterday the guy finally came to pick up the fish tank. he brought with him 6 other guys, some of them were from his baseball team. (did i mention this guy's name was carlos delgado?). anyway, all the guys were pretty cool, they were pretty polite, even though i could smell they'd all come in from a bar.

they did a good job moving it, without scratching any of the walls. also, the guy gave me 150 bucks for the lawnmower. that was sweet. my dad said i could keep the money, so.. score! the guys invited me to go drinking with them, but i decided it's better that i didn't. even though they seemed like nice guys, they were big and figured when i had my 1 beer and couldn't take anymore, they'd probably make fun of me or something. plus i had to work today anyway.

i guess i'll use the money to buy mario kart: double dash, when it comes out in a couple months. and buy the evanescence cd once and for all.

going under

I was just reading an article about how the group Evanescence essentially decided to make their group completely secular, breaking all ties to their Christian roots. I really have a problem with this. Many groups switch between 'genres' in order to change their image (and ultimately try to make more money).

I remember once hearing Tarzan Dan saying he felt sorry for DC Talk for being labelled a christian group, back when they released that song to the secular world (i can't remember the name). U2 claims to be christian and in fact I've read Bono is a very strong christian, but they don't play christian music. Sixpence is another group that switches back and forth. Deliriou5 has released secular songs in the past.

For those reasons it doesn't bother me. I'm more concerned about whether they've truly denounced God, or if they're just doing it for their image/money. Whether they've decided to stop singing for the Christian genre or not doesn't affect whether I listen to them or not. It's really between them and God.

It brings us back to that 'you can't be saved twice, type of deal'. If they've been saved, and are now denouncing it, it's over for them. So for their sake, I hope it's just for ratings.

Regardless, Going Under is a pretty good song, though I had to listen to it 2-3 times before I started to like it.

Seabiscuit

I ended up at the movie after all. Kev called me from the base of my building at about 9:15, and I decided to just forget about waiting for this fish tank guy to call. The way I figure, he already paid for it, so he's gonna call me again to get his purchase.... eventually.

The movie was really good. I had seen "the making of.." of the movie on ESPN, and it looked pretty impressive. They said it was first time they ever had footage so up close and personal to a horse race. I think it would've been better at a better theatre, but the story itself was very inspiring. Set in times of the great depression, a bunch of hard-luck guys get together by chance and put together one of the improbable horse racing success stories ever.

But.. I dunno if it was the theatre, or the direction, but I didn't quite feel the attachment that I think the director was hoping for. It felt great (umm.. no spoilers) when great things happened in the movie, but.. it wasn't.. I don't think the director did a good enough job to draw me into the characters.

Well, let me put it this way.. the great parts of the story didn't bring a tear to my eye.

Maybe I expected too much out of this one, since people were already saying this movie would get nominated, but I still give it an 8/10 but I don't think they should get best direction or best film. Maybe.. Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor?

movies :(

Today, a guy called me to come pick up our 180-gallon fish tank. He came last week but with 4 guys, they didn't have enough strength to carry it out (we used 6 guys to move it in). Anyway, I was supposed to go see Seabiscuit to day with Char and Kev. This guy called me and said he'd call me around 8pm and pick it up shortly after.

Well, it's 9pm now and nothing. That really sucks. I accomodated my time for him and he didn't even call me. Now I'm going to miss the movie which starts in 50 minutes. It's going to take an hour to move the thing. That is just wrong..

life lesson

Even though my dad 'lectures' me everytime i see him, and most of it goes in one ear and out the other, one of the things he said to me last time i saw him rings pretty true and i've been giving it a lot of though.

He was saying how we spend 1/3 of our lives sleeping, and 1/3 of our lives working/studying. Those two are intangibles of everyday life, Christian or not. But it's the other 1/3rd that God is going to ask us about. What did we do during the 'other' 1/3 of our lives. So far for me, that 1/3 has been spent majorly on playing video games.

It makes me realize think about all the time I have wasted, and how much time I have left in my life that I need to make better use of.

today

Anyway, onto today's events. Olivia drove me to church. Today was my first time at T3C without family. It was a weird feeling, singing and praying without them there. Yesterday night, they didn't call me, so I was a bit worried since I had asked them to call me every night. I kept praying that they were safe and there was a good explanation behind why they hadn't called. Actually it turned out there just wasn't any reception for my dad's cell phone. Apparently they spent the night somewhere in Nebraska (or in layman terms -- in the middle of nowhere). Today they were already in Utah, which means they should arrive in Nevada sometime tonight, even though they had planned to arrive their tomorrow night. I guess my dad drove REALLY fast..

After service I went with Kev and Char to go grocery shopping at the big No Frills up near PacMall. That place was packed! Kev and I talked about his Altima and how nice it was. It was really spacious, especially in the back. I was pretty impressed with it. We saw a 2003 2.5s too, and that looked even better.. Well, it's bulkier anyway.

I bought a couple of steaks, salad dressing, lettuce, breakfast bars, and a block of cheddar.

introducing: my grandmother

Later on the in the afternoon after I got home, I told my gramma that I would be cooking for myself for dinner. I think she understood (my chinese is pretty poor). But for some reason at 6 she told me it was time to eat, and she had taken out the food and had put rice into my bowl. Again, I stated my case, that I was going to eat later and that I was cooking for myself. She said she already cooked before, and that she had already taken the rice, and that I should eat with them. (For those of you wondering, she's a very stubborn woman).

Again, I told her, I am cooking for myself tonight.. and continued watching TV. At 6:30, again she told me to come eat (they hadn't eaten yet, for some reason they were waiting for me, even though they normally eat at 5:30. So again, I told her I was cooking on my own and that I would start cooking soon, and to just start eating. Finally, they started eating. It's weird that the whole time my grandfather seemed to understand what was going on, but didn't say anything!

At 7, I went to cook my steak and again she told me to come eat. At 7:10 after I'd finished cooking, she again told me to come eat. My bowl was still full of rice. I took my plate and brought it over to the table and started to eat my steak and salad. She motioned to me to eat the other food as well. Again I explained that I was cooking on my own, and that I had told her this 3-4 times and also before she had prepared the food. She was not a happy camper..

They finished eating and did their dishes, and left the food on the table for me to eat, even though I was clearly eating my own food (btw the steak was awesome).

After I finished, I did the dishes, and then did their dishes again (my gramma doesn't believe in soap). Then I went back to watch TV. Then, gramma comes back over to talk to me, as if to lecture me or something, I don't know what. She seemed flustered and asked me if I didn't like her cooking. Well of course I like her cooking I said. I explained to her that I need to cook on my own once in awhile (and I plan to do so in the future as well). I told her it had nothing to do with her cooking, but that I felt I needed the experience of cooking on my own. I'm 25, after all. She wouldn't listen. She insisted that I just didn't like her cooking.

At this point, I started getting angry. I explained to her again, that I had told her that I would be cooking, and then I had to tell her 4 more times, and why didn't she listen to me. Man, I was pretty frustrated, partly because of her, and partly because my chinese was too poor to get my point across. She winded up sulking, putting the food away and mumbling to herself.

I wish that either that she could speak english or that I could speak chinese more fluently. Even though she is a stubborn person, I still think this could have been avoided if we could see eye-to-eye.

I think I'm gonna be blogging a lot more, now that I don't have my brother around to hang out with on the weekends.. either that or I'll have to find some friends..

Even now I still feel sick from yesterdays eggscapade. My throat still feels shrunken.

Anyway for lunch I didn't eat until 2pm, and I had some instant noodles. For dinner I ate with my grandparents. They like to eat cooked salmon straight out of the fridge! I think that's a little weird.. it's really cold. I heated it up. We had cherries for dessert afterwards.

After dinner I was feeling a little bloated so I *finally* tried some winsor pilates. I did the ab workout, but I got about halfway and my abs were aching so I just followed along lazily after that. I definitely do feel better though. I think if I do this every day, I should be fit in a couple months. I'm also going to try jogging every morning.. err.. did I mention this already? Maybe I should start.. err.. next week.. heh.

I insisted that my family calls me at each stopover, so last night they called me to let me know they were safe! Praise God for that!

Yesterday's fellowship was pretty good. We had to describe with words, starting from A..Z to describe God. We got quite a large list! After fellowship, we went to have desserts. I had a think called a Flaming Alaska. It was ice cream inside a cake, with whipped cream around it. Then they poured alcohol on top of it and lit it on fire.

It was an interesting dish, and tasted so good. But after I was finished, I had an inkling that there was some serious amounts of egg in it, because my stomach started to ache. Turns out there was a lot of egg in it, because last night was one night I would like to forget. My chest started to hurt really badly, I couldn't swallow and tons and tons of phlegm was building up. I must have spat out about 500 ml of it.. I couldn't sleep because of the build up. Finally I just induced vomitting, which wasn't very good either because the egg had to come back up through my throat, and so my throat swelled up. (I guess because the egg was in its purest form by then).

Anyway, I am fine now, my throat is still a little bit tightened up because I still can't swallow much, but at least there's no more phlegm build up!

This morning it was hugs all around before I had to leave for work. Saying goodbye to my mom and dad was nice, they've left me in good hands I think. Despite all the responsibility, it should be alright.

But when it came to saying goodbye to my brother, the tears started to flow. I wept. And as he saw me crying, he wept too. My mom, upon seeing we were both crying, also started to cry and we all hugged eachother. I tried my best to give some life advice to my bro in between the sobbing, but it was too difficult..

Then, I said goodbye again and headed off to work. In the elevator I almost broke down again, but in fear of people seeing me, I cleaned myself up. In the subway it almost happened again but I was okay by then.. I guess the moment had passed.

But, I'm fine now, thanks for asking.. [sniff]

Oooh.. I had a short chat with a friend of Mikey Bustos, of Canadian Idol yesterday. To check out updates, take a look at http://www.mikeybustos.ca. All of us here at ebrian.blogspot.com are definitely cheering and praying for Mikey. I also got a chance to listen to a song that Mikey and his friend Lawrence Lam made. It's a great song, just the two of them, one singing one playing instruments. It's a pretty good job, considering the home-maded-ness of it.

Okay, aside from the fact that the US went into Iraq and took over the regime all based on lies (wrong data), I saw the released pics of Uday and Qusay just now. All I can say is... EWW!

Well, miraculously my parents are still here. There was a bit more to move and clean up than they expected, and so the Wednesday date was moved back to Thursday, and now to Friday. For sure they are going tomorrow though. They've already packed the car, so there is no turning back. For the few that are reading, please pray that they have a safe trip.

I've already said my goodbyes to that blasted dog that caused me many headaches and sleepless mornings. I will definitely miss him. He is too cute not to miss... :)

My fears of subsided a little bit. I have to just keep remembering God is there and that I have friends out there willing to help and support me if I need it.

Hey you know what's funny, my boss posted his own position up the other day. He suggested that I apply for his position! Wouldn't it be weird to be my own boss, but not really? That would be so cool. Praise God for giving me this opportunity, even if it leads nowhere. I still can't believe my own boss would push me to apply for his position while he goes and gets his MPA. That's certainly encouraging...

Good night all!

This past weekend was busy times for my family as they prepared to move. It makes me worried as that day gets nearer. I will have so many responsibilities once they are gone, and I don't trust myself to be able to remember all the things that need taken care of.

o The house still hasn't been sold yet
o My grandparents are staying with me, so I will have to take care of them, despite our huge difference in culture and language barrier. I can understand what they are saying to me only 50% of the time.
o The tenants in my condo are leaving, so I will have to find new ones. This involves posting it on a rental magazine, interviewing the candidates, drafting a new contract agreement, etc.. tons of legal mumbo-jumbo
o I will have no form of transportation other than TTC when they are gone, as they are taking the car with them.
o I will have to pay property taxes, hydro bills, insurance
o I still don't have a full-time job

Gawd, I know there's a lot more and already I can't even remember everything. It's a frustrating feeling.

Praise God!

With much disbelief and disappointment, I'm here to announce that one of my favorite shows from last season, John Doe, has been cancelled.

John Doe talked about a man who woke up naked on an island. He found his way back to the city and discovered that despite not knowing anything about himself, he knew the answer to any other question you could think of.

He befriended a few people, including a police investigator (he would help the police to crack the tough cases), a bartender at the bar where he worked as a pianist, and an ex-waitress who became his personal assistant and later died because of him. There were these crazy sign-language-using fanatics who were trying to keep him from discovering his true identity (that's how the girl died, they killed her).

Anyway, last season's finale ended in the cliffhanger when Doe discovered that the leader of the fanatics was none other than his good friend, the bartender! My brother and I, and another friend were all looking forward to the conclusion of that episode. But alas, the show is over.

It's hard to believe that some of the absolute garbage they show on television could get through but not John Doe. This is totally disappointing..

The people voting for Canadian Idol are on crack. One of the issues for me for this show is finding someone who is marketable enough that they can break through and actually make it big enough to be recognized outside Canada. Because really, who cares if you're the Canadian Idol? What I'd like to see is an American Idol -- born in Canada.

Anyway yesterday I watched Finding Nemo with my bro and mom. It was really good. I thought it was fun and entertaining. We watched with a lot of children in the audience, and that made it more fun because they would giggle at certain parts. The little girl behind me had no idea what was going on though. Something I thought was really interesting was in the very beginning when all the eggs and Marlin's wife was killed (eaten). It was a really sad moment, and the kid behind me goes: "mommy, why is he sad?". The kid had absolutely no concept of death. Imagine, Disney teaching your kids about death before you get a chance to explain it better to them. Again, near the end of the movie when Marlin thought Nemo was dead, the kid asked again "mommy, why is he sad?". Also, I felt that Dory spoke way too fast for young kids to understand. The movie was good overall, but probably not suitable for really young kids.

It's not often that I laugh out loud at the movies..

Canadian Idol was exceptionally bad last night. This group of 10 were people who shouldn't have made it this far into the competition. They were awful. Any one of the last 10 would easily have beaten out this whole group. It's a shame that Canadians will be forced to vote for 3 of them. Best case scenario -- no one calls, all 10 get eliminated.

There were no bright spots. It was like watching Pop Stars all over again. I actually switched to baseball (yes! BASEBALL!) at times because the singing was so bad.

What made the bbq the most fun was the people there. It was at the BA's (business analyst) place. Everyone on the team was there, plus my boss and his boss (and his wife). And the BA's husband. Their backyard is sweet. They have a pool, and a huge deck that surrounds the pool. Then further back they have their own little 15-tree forest, and -- a fire pit.

My boss' boss' wife is an unbelievable baker. She made chocolate chip cookies that I COULD NOT stop eating. They were unbelievable. I'm truly convinced that you cannot get cookies that good anywhere on this planet. On top of that, she made a 3-tiered chocolate cake which she didn't bring, because she unfortunately dropped it on her living room floor as they were getting ready to leave. That sucks. I probably would have still eaten it, lint and all.

These people -- my boss' boss and his wife, are as Canadian as Canadians get. The baker lady said it best: "Canadians are immigrants with seniority". That is so true. Anyway, they were telling us about how they encountered a bear while camping, on their honeymoon. How good does it get, to go camping on your honeymoon. That would be a dream come true -- basically free, totally romantic -- did I mention basically free?

It was funny the way they've encounter various bears and other wildlife. What was funnier was when one guy John, a China (mainlander) brought lichees and mangoes, and no one knew what they were. The baker thought the mango's tasted like pine trees, and my boss picked up the mango, peeled off the skin like you would do with a pear, and ate it like a banana. He literally had the mango clenched in his fist. I've never seen someone eat a mango so messily..!

On Friday night my brother and I went to see T3. I liked it a lot, it was pretty good -- the action scenes were great and the comedy was good. The people we were sitting with were awesome, they made the movie better (enthusiastic bunch). This one lady beside me couldn't stop laughing at times with the jokes Arnold made.

I liked the ending, even though if it was a little bit anti-climatic. Considering that the Terminator was programmed to keep casualties at a mininum, it was kind of cool that it was able to calculate the odds and in the end, outweigh the lives of those two over the possibilities of saving the whole world. And being able to hide the fact from them. That's pretty cool.

The idea that a machine could process incoming information and calculate the final result -- the result being a preservation of life for the two of them. You wouldn't expect a machine to be able to make that type of calculation. It's a nice ending to a really great movie trilogy -- a fresh idea that the heroes don't need to "save the world" in order to have a happy ending.

On Saturday, I spent the whole morning hacking a D2 character and trying it out on Act4 Hell, to see if I could anything. It was still nearly impossible, even with the best runewords equipped. In the afternoon I went with family to buy me a new mattress.

At 4pm, I went to a work-BBQ, at the BA's house. It was a good BBQ. I'll talk more about it later.

Saturday night.. err.. Sunday morning at 1:30am, the fire alarm went off in the building, and I took the stairs down. 32 flights down.. my legs still hurt even now! It was a false alarm though.. I lost about 3 hours of sleep from that.

I'm finding even after 2 weeks, I'm still a little bit sick. The cough still comes back occasionally.

My 5-week-long animatrix download finally finished last night. I watched the whole thing. What a waste of time. I should've been watching CSI instead. Sure, it was interesting, but after all the anime I've been watching, there was nothing impressive about it at all, and of the animators' takes on the matrix were a little weird, like the one of them trying to convert a machine to team up with them, that was so stupid. The only one I liked was the very first CGI one, the fight simulation between the oriental girl and the black dude. The girl was pretty decent looking .

Yesterday one of the guys at work took us out drinking because he'd gotten his contract renewed for another 6 months. I had a pint of Honey Brown. It was good.. Beer is definitely an acquired taste, and I think I've finally acquired a taste for it. However, due of my lack of regulated alcohol intake, after only half the pint I had hit phase 1 of drunkeness and felt like throwing up. So I had a lot of wings and nacho's, to get past Phase 1, finished off the glass and hit phase 2.

I am a calm person while buzzed, so that's good, and I got some dirt from other people as they tend to talk more while drinking. I got some great career advice from a lot of people :) I wonder what is better though, getting all red or not, while drunk. I don't get red, but everyone else seemed to. Is that good or not? Maybe it's a good gauge as to whether to stop drinking or not, on the other hand you look pretty stupid when you get all red, because people KNOW you are drunk.

I think it works out better for me. I know when to stop, and not looking drunk bodes well when you're sitting on the subway with a crowd of people.


Lakers got Payton earlier this week, and now Malone. I wonder if we can go unbeaten this season. Can we win 98 games straight? I think it's do-able...

Oohh.. on yahoo launch they played a song that i've been wondering about for a year now. "Tiny Dancer" by Elton John -- the song from my favorite movie, Almost Famous, from the scene when they're all on the bus after Russell had just gotten back from his crazy acid-almost-jumped-from-the-roof-into-the-swimming-pool performance. I love that scene, they're all sitting there reflecting what had just happened, and one guy just starts belting out this song that was either playing on the radio, or just not at all. But the point is they all start singing together, including Penny Lane, and the kid William Miller. Good times..

Something funny happened last week. My brother and I went to McDonald's for lunch on Canada Day. The McDeal is $3.99, which comes out to $4.27, but the guy charged us $4.82. We asked why, and he said there was a price change.

Anyway, on Thursday I happened to mention this at work, and one of my co-workers Ken, he was upset by this. After all, it is still advertised at $3.99, so how could they charge us more? By charging us $4.19, they were able to add the PST, making us pay way more because of that tax. Well, he was outraged by this!

So when we got back to the office, he called up McDonald's HQ, and complained, posing as me. I thought it was so funny, going through all that for just over 55 cents! Anyway he complained and we left my work number with them so that the manager could call us back for compensation. Then on Friday they called, so I had Ken pick up (this was all his idea, not mine!) and he demanded a free meal. The lady actually wrote down my name and said I could come in any time and claim my meal!

Anyway.. I never did go.. I was just thinking, as soon as I said I was "Brian Yao", they'd probably do something to the food.

Well now, it's been a while hasn't it.

It's Saturday. Today I treated my family for lunch because no one wanted to move. I was starving, and to get everyone to start moving I volunteered to pay and all of a sudden everyone was running for the car! We had pho. Yesterday my dad, bro and me watched American Werewolf in Paris, a pretty cheese movie, on television. It was fun though, first time we'd done that in about half a year.

I just tried about 45 minutes of the Diablo2 1.10 patch (beta). It was really boring, but it was single player. I really can't see myself getting hooked on the game again.

I feel like I'm just blogging for the sake of blogging right now, with nothing much to say, so I'm just gonna stop now.

The dinner went well. I was fairly sick that night but I was able to 'entertain' with my usual antics and great personality.. :O It was the first time anyone had been over to my place and I think it went relatively well. They didn't run into too many issues with the parking, so that is at least encouraging. Mom made awesome food.. I'm going to miss that! Then we watched CI, then For Love or Money. It was the first FLoM I'd seen -- I didn't really enjoy it that much. CI was pretty good.. it was nice to see the Mikey Bustos made it to the final 30.

Me, my brother, Raec and Hanki are definitely rooting for Mikey. And we're trying to find some relation to him.. I mean, I should be able to find connections with basically any chinese person in Toronto within 4-5 degrees of separation, so for now we're going to go along with "yes, I know Mikey through a friend", and leave it at that.

Yesterday I spent "canada day" in bed and on the computer playing Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne (expansion pack). Yea yea, i'll buy it later. Right now it's impossible to buy it because it's sold out everywhere you look. Since I promised myself I would eventually buy it, it shouldn't matter to the makers whether I pay for it now or later right?

Anyway, it was really good. It took me a total of around 20 hours to finish all of the single player campaigns. The bonus campaign was REALLY good. I enjoyed all of the quests and optional hidden quests. The xpac brought a lot more to the game than I had expected. I won't spoil anyone's fun though so enough of that.

Last night was most depressing as I went to bed coughing, wheezing and sneezing. In the background I could hear booms coming from all over the city from the fireworks. Just below me there was a huge crowd at Mel Lastman Sq. I spent my my last 3 Canada day's in Ottawa, and now I'm lying in bed trying to block out the sound of the booms so i can sleep. What a contrast!