Down the Bog

Well, there you go. If you think Big Brother is watching you and especially your activity on the internet then check out this link to see if along with your IP address it correctly indentifies the town you live in. It does have quite a lot of information on it like the last item on your clipboard and operating system but for me it was a quite long way out with it’s geography.

http://www.spyber.com/

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The new Formula One season started this past weekend and I was giggly with excitement. With Michael Schumacher safely tucked away into retirement it seemed like it was going to be a new dawn for F1. I certainly wasn’t clear in my mind as to who would be at the front because it seemed like there could be four or five teams that might have a shout at winning some races. But in the end I suppose it was normal service resumed because Ferrari fairly dominated proceedings with their new driver Kimi Raikkonen.

The other thing that has concerned me in recent times is how my wife Nicola has lost her passion for F1. When we first met it was a shared interest and throughout our early years together we always got excited each Grand Prix weekend. But alas during pregnancy and certainly after our young son was born Nicola just completely lost the desire and I’ve felt like I was suddenly a lost soul not recognising my wife anymore. Okay, that last sentence is completely over the top but I’m making a point here and I want you to understand.

However this past weekend Nicola assured me that the love was coming back. She could feel it in her bones returning and this season would be like old times. But no it could never be like old times. Why? Because she’s now become a Ferrari fan rooting for Kimi Bloody Raikkonen. Can you believe it? She has always detested Ferrari and bemoaned the fact that red was their colour because red has always been her colour. But now she’s turned to the dark side and I’m not sure that I can ever forgive her!

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I’ve spent the last couple of days deleting spam comments from this blog and it’s really ticking me off. I know that I can fix the problem to an extent by identifying key words that are typical spam words and not allowing them but I don’t really have the patience to start doing that and I hate the thought of making some words effectively taboo.

So for the time being while it’s not completely hopeless I’ll carry on manually removing the dodgy spam comments but I just don’t get it. Does anyone ever click on a spam link and think that it’s a worthwhile practise. I suppose people do otherwise spam would stop wouldn’t it? It’s like my hotmail inbox and all the garbage that ends up in the bulk folder - honestly who ever bothers to look at it?!!

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Last wednesday myself and Ruth took a late evening trip to our local Walmart. We had a few household items to pick up but I also made the fatal mistake of browsing the electrical section. Always my favourite part of Walmart because of the computer games, electrical gadgets, DVD’s and so on. You know, all the boys stuff. Looking at the computer game section I noted that they had a Lord of the Rings DVD game called “The Battle for Middle Earth”. It’s a real time strategy game which is my favourite kind and it was just a snip at $7.88. I remembered the game coming out a year or two back (maybe longer than that) but that it got very good reviews so I snapped it up then and there.

Back home I popped it on a shelf and there it stayed until this morning when I thought that I’d install it on my PC and take a look. I opened up the security seal on the box, took out the case and opened it to find to my shock and horror NO DVD. Aaaargh!

So as soon as I could I got myself out to the car, cleared off the latest dump of snow because, yes we are still getting lots and lots of snow and drove down to Walmart. There at the customer service counter the lady was very obliging, if not appearing to be completely convinced of my story and told me to go and get another copy from the shelf. But it wasn’t to be my day because there weren’t any copies left. I went back to tell her and she said I must be mistaken because her records showed that there were sixty-eight in store. But we found out that that wasn’t accurate because the sixty-eight applied to a job lot of cheap computer games all at the same $7.88 price tag but mixed titles. I was offered a refund but in the end swapped it for a different game however I was disappointed that my original choice was no longer available.

I said to the lady at the customer service counter that it was an awkward situation because how does one prove that the CD/DVD was missing from a sealed box? She said but who would make up such a story? I didn’t know if she was being sarcastic or what but I’d have thought it was a very likely story to be made up by a sneaky villainy type of person. Ah well, in the future I’ll just make sure I check these sealed packages as soon as I can after purchase even maybe before I leave the store. Or try and practise not feeling so guilty the next time I have to try a similar exchange. It seemed such an unlikely story.

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The Cricket World Cup has started people and I know that this is going to interest everybody here in Canada. Especially as this is the flavour of the game where they wear pyjama’s instead of all whites. It’s amazing how often I see people here wearing pyjama bottoms outside even in the snow. Pyjama bottoms and snow boots. Go figure!

Still, I digress, I’d like to draw your attention to the following link that will give you all the information that you’ll require to follow world cup proceedings and note the flag with the maple leaf.

http://cricketworldcup.indya.com/event/groups.htm

Yes, indeedy, Canada is competing in the same group as England and although I’ll be following my old country I’ll also be rooting for Canada and I’ll be tickled pink if they manage to beat England. They shouldn’t of course but don’t rule it out because they gave a great account of themselves against the West Indies in the last world cup and England can be such an up and down team.

As far as the tournament itself is concerned I think that the winning country will be either India or South Africa, not Australia and certainly not England. Watching it is going to be difficult though. Canada is probably not even aware that it has a team taking part so sports coverage will be minimal (hockey is sooooooo boring!) but I’ll keep tabs on it online. Nicola has just mentioned that I can subscribe to a package from our sattelite TV company that will allow me to watch all of the games for $180 and I’m mightly tempted but I reckon that I’ll miss to many of them while I’m at work. Still, something to think about.

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Look, I know I’m a guy but I’m a romantic fool and there’s no doubt about it. I do like a love song and isn’t that what music is all about? Love lost, love won. So here are my current top ten favourite love songs. It’s very much a current list because ask me again another day and it’ll change. But here’s my list for being in love. What’s yours?

1.Lionel Ritchie              You Are
2.Belinda Carlisle           Circle in the Sand
3.Chaka Khan & Rufus   Ain’t Nobody
4.Bee Gees                   The Wedding Song
5.Santana/Rob Thomas  Smooth
6.Darius Danesh            Colour Blind
7.Dire Straits                 Romeo and Juliet
8.Olivia Newton John      Hopelessly Devoted to you
9. Mama Cass Elliot        It’s Getting Better               (Sorry Nicola!)
10.The La’s                   There She Goes

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My third winter here is beginning to really tick me off! Previously I’ve been used to getting into March and feeling a real improvement in the weather but not this year. Just before the weekend we had a real winter storm that despite fairly mild temps insisted in dumping something like 20 to 30 cms of snow coupled with high winds. Now I hear on the weather news this morning that we are due a cold three or four days of wind chill approaching -40 degrees. I feel like we’re being punished for a mild and slow start to the winter especially as I noted that Calgary was expecting a plus temp of 12 degrees today. How can that be? Edmonton still minus though. (Sorry Sarah)

I know more seasoned people will say that March is still a wintery month but not for this newbie. I want a mild March and I want it now. Global warming? I don’t think so!

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