Old timey sticks in the mud

I don't understand the logic of rules sometimes. For example, the 'no strollers' rule on the train at Heritage Park.

When you want to board the train, you have to leave your stroller behind. It doesn't matter that it collapses and you can carry it like a suitcase, they absolutely will not allow it on the train. That means that if you were thinking of taking the train halfway around the park and then getting off and resuming your visit with your stroller, it just isn't going to happen. Which means you're destined to ride the circuit twice to end up right back where you started, with your stroller.

Also, when you tell the ticket vendor that you just want three train tickets at $3 each and they tell you that will be $28. Then you explain you don't want boat or amusement ride tickets and they get all snappy. Then you offer them some change so you can get exactly one dollar back and they won't accept that.....

I can only deduce one thing from this. Some old timey people were grumpy farts. And didn't have access to caffeine. And can't do math. OK, three things.

Truism

Daft pianists

Speaking of things Daft, I actually like the cdza cover better than the Daft Punk version.

Sad cat diary

By the zany Ze Frank.

"Dear diary: It has come to my attention that the authorities have two hands, but seem to have made it the sadistic policy only to pet me with one of them at a time. Half of love is just.... low. Which is how I feel. My spirit is breaking."

Jack of diamonds

Things I learned lately 27 July

• Birds don't fart.
• When Q-Tips (cotton swabs) were originally introduced, they were called Baby Gays.
• Alan Emtage, arguably the father of web search (he made Archie at McGill in 1989) hasn't made a dime off his invention.
• The chairman of the company that built Dubai's Burj Khalifa — the tallest building in the world — wants to build an even bigger tower. That's because Saudi Arabia’s Prince Alwaleed bin Talal is developing the Kingdom Tower in Jeddah that could become the new tallest building in the world (1000m). Mohamed Alabbar said he would like his next project to be "a little taller" than that.
• A 46-year-old employed father in Florida, with no criminal record, was caught selling four bottles of prescription pain pills to an undercover cop. He was sentenced to 25 years.
• A federal fraud investigator in Canada was suspended without pay, because she leaked information that investigators had to cut people off their EI benefits in order to meet quotas. Investigators were given a target to recover nearly $500,000 in EI benefits every year.
• Breaking Bad actor Bryan Cranston walked around San Diego Comic-Con (2013) wearing a mask of the character from his show and nobody knew it was him.
• Virginia GOP gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli is intent on reinstating Virginia's Crimes Against Nature law. He thinks oral sex (between any two people) is the same as gay sex.
• While a woman was away for 2 weeks on vacation in Ohio, First National Bank re-possessed her belongings and foreclosed her house. Only one problem - it's not her bank - they went to the wrong house. Now she wants her stuff back, all $18,000 of it, and the bank is waffling.
• While adding backing vocals to the song 'Hey Jude', the Beatles asked the orchestra members if they would clap their hands and sing along to the refrain in the song's coda. Most complied (for a double fee), but one declined, reportedly saying, "I'm not going to clap my hands and sing Paul McCartney's bloody song!"

What should you do with your life?

You weren’t “born” to do anything, so stop using that as a guide for your life.

Happy and meaningful are not always the same thing.

Don’t do something you hate.

Do what you’re good at. Not good at anything? 'Become' good at something.

Ask yourself: "What am I offering the world? How valuable am I? Am I really not that valuable? How can I get better?”

Dancing queen

This video is disruptive to my brain.

Queen of hearts

Handouts? We don't need no stinking handouts!

Someone on LinkedIn in a Training Group asked, "Handouts - do participants want or need paper handouts to reinforce course content. Or is that old fashioned? Is there a better way?"

This was my answer:

PowerPoint presentations are best used as attention 'grab and focus' devices. Minimal words, lots of relevant, brain-tweaking visuals. So hopefully, when we talk about handouts, we're not talking about the kind that PowerPoint automatically produces, because IMHO, they're useless.

I agree that a handout should be the go-to device when you need to be reminded of what was discussed in the presentation. I believe that the more concise the handout, the less useful it is. But beyond a certain point, it stops being a handout and starts being an aide-memoir and eventually becomes a reference manual, which may already exist.

What I'm noticing more and more is that the youngest working generation and even the one before it don't want to have to read. They prefer to watch a video demo. So my suggestion is to record the presentation using a screen and audio recording tool (like Camtasia Studio), edit out the pauses and coughs etc., then produce the video online for both those who attended and even make it available to those who couldn't attend.

The Sound that ended silence forever

You know this tune ("Gran Vals” - Francisco Tárrega) all too well. Nokia introduced the 13-note piano phrase 20 years ago, creating the first ringtone. It’s estimated the passage is now heard 1.8 billion times around the world each day, about 20,000 times per second. The ringtone comes from “Gran Vals,” a 1902 guitar solo written by classical guitarist Francisco Tárrega. In 1993 the tune was hijacked by Nokia exec Anssi Vanjoki, who thought it would be the perfect default ring for the sleek, new half-pound Nokia 2110.

Don't let me down

Watch this father and his 23 month-old son belt out this Beatles classic.

Family album

The 1% pay for some amazing perks

A recent Reddit thread asked about the craziest services and products for the 1% that most of us didn't even know existed. A sampling:

• Fine Art Insurance - "And I don't mean, 'Sorry you lost it in the hurricane, here's your paycheck' insurance. I mean, 'The area is flooded and riots are breaking out. We're going to send a SWAT-like team to helicopter in and fly your assets out of the area and into a safer place.'"
• Full-Service Travel Agents - "Books flights and hotels and arranges visas. Also handles money for you (when you travel to another country). Got a problem? Call the agent. They'll fix it or get fired."
• Christmas Tree Stylist - "A $20,000 handmade Christmas tree put in your home every year and trashed on Jan 1st."
• Next-Level Personal Shoppers - "She has my entire wardrobe organized and coded in a database, and keeps track of new designer trends...She has all my sizes and we re-measure twice a year, so I don't have to go hunting for sizing or tailoring."
• Doctor House Calls - "We can set up a whole hospital suite in the comfort of your personal mansion, with private nurses and staff. It gives you optimal care, prevents [healthcare-associated infections], and gives you much more dignity when dying."
• Hooker Liaison Manager - "A mate of mine works on a super yacht for some playboy billionaire and part of his job is to get rid of the passed out hookers every morning and take them back to shore, then line up the next flock."
• PRIMA Cinema Services ($35,000) - "Newly released movies at home, the same day they open in theaters."
• Private Suites At Events - "At Madison Square Garden, for instance, your suite is like a living room with a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the event floor. You are also given access to a lounge area where you can watch the players come out of the locker room."
• A Family Office - "An all-purpose financial hub just for you that includes the services of accountants, investment managers, tax lawyers, personal lawyers, insurance professionals, financial planners, and concierge staff that cater to all your financial needs."
• Flying Domestically With No Security Check - "Most people know that the wealthy fly private. Not everyone knows that this allows them to just walk (or drive) right up to the aircraft with no security screening or luggage inspection."
• Amex Platinum and Black Card Concierge - "You'd be amazed how many thousands of people don't buy tickets themselves, don't plan their own weddings/engagements, doctors appointments, arrangements to pick their kids up from ballet/school/random location. The Amex concierge does it all for them."

Stock evaluation

I find it unfortunate that many companies are graded based on how their stock is doing. There are companies that are dissed very badly just on the basis of their stock performance, even though their product or service is top notch. That's why if I owned my own business, I'd never go public. I'd rather be graded based on the quality of my product/service and never need to cater to the whims of stockholders.

The Lukewarm Chili Peppers

Things I learned lately 21 July

• McDonald's has 'anti-veto' menu items. These are menu items that might convince people who normally don't go to McDonald's, to agree to go with a group (and not veto the suggestion). One of those items is..... the Filet-O-Fish.
• Most of your Facebook friends have more Facebook friends than you do. In other words, if you have 104 friends on Facebook, more than half of your FB friends have more than 104 friends themselves. Check it out. Let me know if this isn't the case.
• Most investment managers like to make like they're knowledgable, but statistics have shown over and again that they are nothing more than gamblers. Sometimes they win, most times they lose. Oh, but they still get their fees. People who get their hands dirty and handle their own investments are no better. It's not any different than playing the lottery.
• You can't legally own more than 4 cats in Wellington, Kansas.
• There are currently negotiations to create the world's biggest high speed rail network.  It could run from China to the United Kingdom, and over 17 countries in between.  Parts are already operating (China, Europe), and the hope is to have a fully connected network by 2022.
• A store in Brisbane is now charging customers a $5 'browsing fee' which will be refunded at the till if you buy something. The fee is meant to discourage 'showrooming', where the customer views articles in person only to leave and buy them cheaper online. This store obviously wants to go out of business.
• Amazon owns 10% of North American e-commerce. That's as much as Office Depot, Staples, Apple, Dell, WalMart, Sears and Liberty's e-commerce sales COMBINED.
• Knevel - what we used to call that hair on the face before we borrowed the word moustache from the Spanish.
• Evil Knevel - the kind of moustache an evildoer would have. I totally made that up.
• Remember that plane that crashed in SF? KTVU was fooled into airing the names of the pilots on the plane: Sum Ting Wong, Wi Tu Lo. There were others as well, but those were all that was necessary. It made it to air. I can't write stuff this good if I tried.
• There are about 6 million unsold Microsoft Surface tablets about to hit retail shelves at very deep discounts.

Dear PM: Take off that military flight jacket

When I saw pictures of our Prime Minister visiting Calgary during the floods, I spotted one where he was seated in a military helicopter, wearing a military flight jacket, complete with 'pilot's wings'. This just wasn't kosher for me and reminded me of George W.'s dressing up that he did while President. The difference is that Stephen did not serve, is not a military pilot and therefore does not get to wear the uniform.

It turns out that I'm not the only person who was a little put off by this display.

Pig must choose - chicken or egg

This is a charming video on (what I believe is) the best video site in the world - Vimeo.

Pig loves eggs, but his love for Ms. Chicken puts his culinary love in jeopardy.

Dance like you have to

It's always about the sperm

Darlene offered me a theory on why men don't feel cold at a cooler room temperature like women do. She said that in the same way that a man's testicles are sensitive to heat and must be out of the body to maintain a temperature conducive to healthy sperm production, a man's body prefers a cooler ambient temperature for the same reason - healthy sperm production.

Discuss.......

Cannonball!

A useful epiphany

I've been really lucky to have gotten to learn from and watch some amazing improvisors at Loose Moose over the last 6 years or so. One of the senior artists that I've had the pleasure to watch and learn from is Rebecca Northan, who really caught my attention with her performance in the continuing world tour of the incredible Blind Date show. Lately I had a chance to attend one of her classes and she mentioned an epiphany that she had about one of the key things that makes improv (and pretty much everything else in life) work.

But I'll let her explain it. After all, it's her epiphany. Although hearing it from her gave me one too.

Office for your iPhone? Yes, but.....

MS Office (Lite) is now available as an app for the iPhone. But not the iPad. Also, you can only get it if you have an Office 365 subscription. Also, it won't have every feature you'd have in regular Office programs. Also, the iPhone app will count toward the 5 devices you're allowed to run Office 365 on.

Well played Microsoft. Once again you demonstrate that you don't care what we want.

Yah!

This is truly the most bizarre Windows 8 advertisement I've ever seen. I don't even think they're speaking a real language in this one.

Mechanic Jr

World bike share maps

The geographic footprint of a city’s bike-sharing system can reveal both the municipality’s level of commitment to transportation alternatives as well as the topography of the surrounding area.

The map shows the locations of all docking stations for 29 bike-sharing programs around the world. They are drawn at the same scale and arranged by the number of docks.

To see the bike sharing systems on a much better map, go here. You can even see which stations actually have bikes at any moment in time.

Now that's cool.

Your move Calgary......

Where you might find me at a party

[by Evil Me]

• Making friends with the resident pets.
• Going through your bedside table drawers. Hey! This takes AA batteries!
• Judging you based on your alcoholic beverage stock.
• Photo bombing.
• Starting a fire in the backyard fire pit. You don't have a fire pit? No matter.
• Making mystery nachos with whatever I can find.
• Canvassing neighbours to see if they've accepted Jesus into their hearts.
• Running a midnight garage sale from your garage.

[disclaimer: this is a joke. i will not be doing all of these things. some. not all.]

LOL 'Cheeseweed'

Things I learned lately 11 July

• In 2011, there were 24,206 reported cases of rape in India. The conviction rate was 26.4%.
• You can buy Doom and Wolfenstein for your iPhone.
• New York City has plans to install 10,000 charging stations for electric cars.
• In 30 seconds, over 1,157,000 searches are performed on Google.
• The sun's mass accounts for 99.86% of the solar system's mass. It weighs 330,000 times what the Earth weighs.
• In case you're not the yoga type and/or have never been inside a Lululemon, a pair of Astro yoga pants made of 'luon' (the material that was recently found to be unintentionally see-through) will set you back $98.
• Honey laundering: A term referring to the fact that much of the honey sold in the United States isn't actually honey, but a concoction of corn or rice syrup, malt sweeteners or "jiggery" (cheap, unrefined sugar), plus a small amount of genuine honey.
• Apple is working on a patent that would auto-right a phone as it's falling to the ground to minimize damage.
• Tablet sales are on pace to overtake PC sales in less than 3 years.
• Republicans are afraid Hillary Clinton will run for President in 2016. I hope she does. We need two firsts in a row.
• So, a woman, who was tired of the sexist jokes she kept hearing behind her, took two guys' pictures and tweeted them. One of the guys lost his job and the company the woman worked for couldn't handle the public pressure, so they fired her too. Two people lost their jobs over one (at the time) innocent tweet.
• IKEA got caught photoshopping women out of its Saudi Arabia catalogue. Are we surprised?
• Oregon may become the first state to implement a program that would let students attend state schools without taking out a loan or paying out of pocket for tuition. "Pay it Forward, Pay it Back" lets students enroll with no money, so long as they pay up to 3% of their future salaries back into a state fund for 24 years.