Saturday, August 30, 2014

How to shrink the Internet

If WWW pages that start with numbers, i.e., "10 Weird Facts About," "10 Most Scenic Roadtrips," "12 Terrible Mistakes," etc., were banned, the total number of WWW pages on the Internet would probably drop considerably.

Sunday, August 10, 2014

Fishy business at the Aquarium

What bugs me about the people bitching about the captivity of whales and dolphins at the Vancouver Aquarium is that they are complaining because the aquarium keeps these animals, which are mammals (just like us) that are cute, or, more likely, "smart."

What do these people think about other fish and animals in the aquarium which are not "smart," i.e., they are "dumb," relatively speaking?

I don't get the sense these people's attitude is "let's start with the smart whales and dolphins, and if we are successful at discouraging their presence in aquariums and/or liberating them, we will then move on to the other fish and animals."

It's no great secret that all animals and fish in zoos and suffer STRESS. Remember the pacing polar bears in Stanley Park?

I wonder why we need zoos and aquariums at all, when you can easily see animals and fish in books and on the Internet.

Saturday, July 26, 2014

The vinyl "renaissance"

It totally makes me laugh the way people say "vinyl records are having a renaissance," and "vinyl sounds better than CDs." Fuck off, they do NOT sound better than CDs.

I suffered for over 30 years from the 50's to the 80's listening to records with all their scratches and other defects. The number of CDs which sound "bad" to me, including reissues of LPs which I already own, I could count on one hand.

The problem is, when people talk about this "renaissance," they are not talking about classical music which is QUIET. You can actually hear the scratches and so forth, unlike with pop music where it usually drowns out the scratches, except in the gaps between the tracks.

Stupid stuff on Facebook du jour

Aren't you sick of these stupid questions on Facebook which only exist to create lists of people like "Can you name a city which has an X in it? I bet you can't!"
 
How about this one:

"Can you name a Polish city which has the letter Q in it? I bet you can't!"

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Out of the mouths of babes...

The friend of mine with the 3 year old daughter was at the supermarket today. While shopping, she picked up some pasta and turned to the kid, saying that she had a recipe using this pasta, and showed her daughter the recipe on her phone (not as if the kid could read it, it was just a symbolic gesture). Without hesitation, the kid said to her in a loud voice "it's a RECIPE FOR DISASTER." Some guy walking by overhead this whole conversation and burst into hysterical laughter.

Friday, July 11, 2014

Another mindless Facebook poll: "Which Surrey community are you?"

There is yet another mindless Facebook poll making the rounds. You know, like the ones which ask "Which sexual position are you?", "Which racially-discriminated-against ethnic group are you?" and "Which bad remake of a TV show are you?"

This one is "Which Surrey community are you?"

It doesn't help that Surrey itself is so ambiguous about its communities, which officially are:

Cloverdale
Fleetwood
Guildford
Newton
North Surrey
South Surrey


Note that some of them like Whalley are not even mentioned!

Typical results from the poll, based on questions that you are asked, would be:

Crescent Beach - you live a secret life; you tell your friends you live "close to White Rock," not mentioning the "S-word."

Cloverdale - you are a nasty person, you don't see treating your pets badly as a bad thing.

Newton - you are a risk-taker, living in a place where there is a high propensity to getting murdered.

Surrey Central - you have aspersions to being a trendy, modern kind of person, living in some cool new condominium, but down at heart you are the SOS (Same Old Surreyite or Same Old Shit).

Whalley - you have serious substance problems, so much so that you cannot even walk or ride a bicycle without falling down.

Thursday, June 26, 2014

New Transformers movie

I know nothing about this film. When I half-heard something about it on the radio, I thought the name of the film was "Transformers: Asian Extinction."