E-Filler Archives

Looks like I'll be in good company when I reach the perly gates; Andrew D. is also apparently slated for disposal in the near future. The following was on his whiteboard today:


For those of you just tuning in, you can review Part I of the Lab Mystery here.

If you're thinking about moving to Toronto, you might want to take a look at this handy map before you take up residence. The Toronto Star was so kind as to use Google maps to plot all the homicides this year.

The Legendary Nights Tennis Classic recently took place in Ottawa.
The tennis action was mediocre at best, but the view didn't disapoint.
Anna Kournikova was there, sporting a hot pink outfit in her "triumphant return" to Canada, and at one point even a Ottawa Senator's jersey. The question remains, is this tennis or entertainment? Do we care who won or what they wore?




I know I was more concerned with the outfit.

Recently I brought up the idea of kiting to the CS crew as a means of getting physical activity we can all do, which didn't go over very well, so I'm making a second pitch here. Traction kites are much larger than your typical pansy-assed single-line kites or stunt kites and are designed to generate a lot of force (they're not unlike wakeboarding kites). Some positives from traction kiting:

• you get to be outside, which is, like, not in the computer lab;
  
• you can do it all year round (though kiting on skates isn't recommended for beginners due to the very large possibility that you'll cut something open);
  
• it doesn't need to be particularly windy;
  
• it builds upper-body muscle (since you have to keep your arms tensed continuously);
  
• you only need about half a football field to do it, which is easy to find in London;
  
• it has just a one-time cost (namely, the kite);
  
• it is very dangerous (perhaps surprisingly, I understand the risk of injury comes primarily crashing into goal posts, trees, buildings, or power lines, not the ground);
  
• it causes you to scream like a little girl.

The basic traction kiting activities include scudding (trying to avoid being dragged along the ground) and kite jumping (obvious). You can also buy all kinds of crazy things like buggies and all-terrain skateboard type things.

If you thought Western was a crazy school, check out this picture from Queen's University (appearing in today's Toronto Star):

The caption reads:

Meanwhile, in Kingston, a Queen's University student celebrates homecoming on top of an overturned car Saturday night.

I can't seem to find any more details about the 'festivites' at Queen's. Does it always result in a riot?

As most of you are aware, I'm getting married. As such, I'm in the market for a photographer to take some pictures on this particular day; the problem is finding a photographer who will provide me with the raw digital photos afterwards. It makes sense that a photographer wouldn't want to turn these over, since after all part of where they make their money on the prints. But after the initial sale is done, why not? I'm not going to go back to this guy in 10 years for more prints.

One photographer I looked at provided a CD of the images in PDF format at screen resolution (72 dpi)...what good is that in 30 years? (You can't print a 72 dpi image and have it come out looking nice...) Am I the only one who finds this unacceptable? In this day and age doesn't it make sense to get the full quality digital images? Perhaps I simply care too much and should just take what I can get.

...because the university wants to stick it to you one more time. According to an article in today's Gazette, tickets to this year's homecoming football game will be $20 (up from a reasonable $7 last year...that's a whopping 185% increase).

If you want to complain, fire of an e-mail to one (or more) of the following:
mustangs@uwo.ca
or
Jeff Renaud

As an addendum of sorts to my shorn scrotum story, I came across some more oddity today at the grocery story.

How can these Stix & Bitz simultaneously have a "great new taste" and be of the "original" flavour? Once you change the flavour, you'd think it would cease to be the original flavour.

We were out last night celebrating my thesis proposal presentation, and I was shocked and appalled that no one else reads Savage Love, or had even heard of it, for that matter. It's a sex/relationship advice column (mostly sex), written by Dan Savage. He's the only advice columnist I've found who gives actual reasonable advice. Just off the top of my head, some of the more universal wisdom he's given out: that a guy who only cheats on his girlfriend/wife once should be considered faithful; that giving oral sex is a requirement these days (and, consequently, dumping a partner who won't give oral sex is defensible and recommended); that you should embrace and play out your fetishes. And, of course, most famously of all, he introduced to us the word santorum.

Anyway, what got me talking about it last night was this week's column. It's not the typical Savage Love. It's only one letter, and Dan doesn't (and can't) really give any advice. But hopefully it'll freak you out at least a little. If you want an example of more typical Savage Love fair, here's one pulled from the archives mostly at random.

If you listen carefully, you can hear the price of gasoline going up again. Hurricane Rita (possibly named for Rita MacNeil, we don't know for sure) has recently been upgraded to Category 5. I think Katrina was only Category 4. Rita is headed straight for the Texas coast where 25% of the US' refining capacity is located. So, with an increased public awareness of hurricanes and oil, plus the recent problems in Louisiana, I think it's safe to say we can expect the worst in terms of investor panic. Will gas break $1.50 a liter? Anyone want to wager?

Since there seems to be a news drought around here, I guess I'll write a random thought:

A few weeks/days/whatever ago I was surprised to learn that I'm not the only one who uses Google's search function as a spell checker. No doubt most of you've noticed that when you enter in a mis-spelled query into Google it suggests a corrected spelling. (For an amusing take on this, enter in "French Military Victories" and click "I'm feeling lucky".) This got me wondering just how many people do this, and how much of Google's resources are wasted on performing an over-complicated spell check. Does anyone know how much a single search query costs Google to execute?

Jay: The Intel C Compiler - $399 USD. The license agreement says nothing about a tiered pricing scheme, so it looks like you can compile once, give away as much as you want. It's also compatible with GCC (I assume they mean the object code is), so really, is there any good reason why we're not running icc compiled Linux on our Intel based PCs??

The Ass Cancer Association is touring Canada with a 31 metre-long colon. I think we should take a field trip to Toronto. It's all for ass cancer awareness. The news story says "members of the public can go through" it. I don't know what that means.

So myself, Mike, Andrew, Oli and Jason go to the lab, and to our surprise there are some notes left on a few of the white boards:


No big deal right? Well, I get the following on my whiteboard:

Since 4 of the 5 primary suspects were there (and Micah swears he didn't do it), who did?!?! Maybe it was Christine...she's always been a little quiet...

Look who's on the new UWO Computer Science homepage:

E-Filler's very own Jason (who ocassionally makes a post on the comments section) and his ex-girlfriend. Congratulations, your backsides are now famous.

A few weeks ago I was browsing Wikipedia when I noticed the following "change" to the main page:

A few minutes later the defacement was gone...but I'm left with a few questions: Who is Willy? Why is he on wheels? Was this a hack? Has anyone else seen anything like this?

Does not go to Calgary. Give me my pitcher, Dan.

I present to you: The iPod Nano. The cheapness of the shuffle with the screen of the mini/regular...looks like colour too! We could have a winner here folks.

If you go to Google maps and select the satellite view, then scroll over to New Orleans, you'll see that a "Katrina" button appears. When you click it, it shows only recent satellite pictures from the storm affected regions. I'd post a link to this new feature but I lack the skillz.

Wow, when humanity sits down to work on something collectivly, we can churn out some pretty impressive works. What am I talking about? How about this extensive CATEGORY (not just an article) on Transformers in the Wikipedia (complete with 4 subcategories). Everything you could have wanted to know is in there...

And Mike, the Transformer with the tape player in his chest is Soundwave.

This interview with the mayor of New Orleans is worth a listen (WMA). I can't believe it...

Slightly out of context:

President Bush, who flew over flood-stricken areas on Wednesday, compared the devastation to the 11 September 2001 attacks.

BBC News

Maybe now the US will declare war on Mother Nature.

Looking around for lower gas prices? Check out www.gasbuddy.com. In London gas is still 'okay', as low as $0.96/L...