After a incredibly brutal season that dropped them to the basement of the NHL, the Edmonton Oilers secured the #1 draft pick in yesterday’s NHL Entry Draft. And with it, they picked two-time Memorial Cup MVP Taylor Hall. I can’t wait to see this guy in an Oilers uniform… let’s just hope they don’t absolutely crush this dude’s talent with management idiocy.
It’s early Friday morning at the Prince of Stanley’s year end school trip. Ok, it isn’t that early… it’s 7:49 and on a normal working Friday, I’d already have my nose hard to the grindstone.
Yesterday was filled with horseback riding, lean-to building and ziplining out in the woods. Today, it’s canoeing and archery before I let the Prince hit the souvenir shop and we jump on the bus back to civilization.
(It just hit me now but how cool would it have been to combine the horseback riding with the archery? There’s probably a policy somewhere about letting anyone shoot potentially lethal projectiles from the back of a large animal in mid-run. Pity.)
I’ve really had no connection out here, save for the times that I’ve been in the open field nearby. In fact, I’m writing this post in Evernote so that I can put it up later when we get back to E-ville. So, I’ve been in withdrawal a bit… I guess I can blame Rogers for that.
Right now, I’m going to go and wake up a half-full bunk of sleeping boys and get them up-and-at-’em before they ring the breakfast bell. I’m just praying for coffee at this point. Mmm… coffee.
From Popular Mechanics:
Sylvester Stallone is back, and he brought his guns—thank goodness. In addition to directing this comeback flick, Sly plays one member of a team of mercenaries who embark on a mission to overthrow a South American dictator. Also starring is practically every action hero ever to grace a movie screen: Jason Statham, Jet Li, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Steve Austin and Mickey Rourke, to name a few. Bring on the explosions.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6RU5y2fU6s&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xd0d0d0&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&fs=1]
Of course, they’re taking down a South American dictator… who, as a fellow dictator, can sympathize with. But when you have this many action heroes together in one flick you really can’t go wrong as far as I’m concerned.
iOS4... Looking good!
Ok, maybe I was a little hasty with the whole “making-someone-pay” thing with regards to the Apple iPhone iOS4 update yesterday. As it appears, patience really is a virtue… albeit one that isn’t very typical of benevolent dictators like myself.
The update was released around 11:00 am MDT so I updated my iPhone once I got home from toiling in the mines of industry. And no one had to die in the process, so all is well. So far.
Anyway, I got the update installed with no serious problems and have since spent some time putting all of the settings together and then I realized part way through today that this new iOS is absolutely sucking the life out of my battery! After fully charging the battery, I walked around the office for about 15-20 minutes I returned to my desk and saw that I’d used 6%!!
Basically, with the multi-tasking… this new operating system is taxing the hardware that comes with my 3GS. So that gives me a perfect excuse to get the iPhone 4 when it comes available. And I’m giving that a Hells Yeah.
Someone is going down for this.
It’s Father’s Day today, or as it’s come to be known in the New JeffLand Empire… Creator’s Day. It’s a joyous celebration of me and the hard work that I’ve put into creating this land and over 40% of the population that resides within its borders. Of course, no one in the rest of North America really cares about Father’s Day so why would it be any different in the NJLE?
Do something before she kills you.
For quite a while, the Queen has really been on my case about my snoring problem. And when I say my snoring problem, I am really saying that it’s her that has the problem with the fact that I snore like a buzz-saw.
For a moment, let’s set aside the fact that she’s a borderline insomniac anyway and focus on her observation that, besides my snoring, I’ve also exhibited signs of sleep apnea. The main sign is that I often would stop breathing completely for a short period while asleep. Other signs included some real nasty leg twitching and chronic exhaustion.
So, after much urging and persuasion (read: nagging) by the Queen, I talked to my doctor about it who hooked me up with an appointment with an otolaryngologist (ear, nose and throat doctor) who makes a ton of money shooting lasers into people’s throats at $1,500 a pop.
I originally thought that it would be pretty easy to diagnose the problem, he’d set me up with an appointment and bim-bam-boom… I’d be on the wrong end of a laser that would scar the back of my throat and suck my bank account dry at the same time.
No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to DIE!
Of course, I was foolish to think that it could be this easy. He examined my nose and throat before recommending that I take a sleep test as he thought that zapping me wouldn’t be the fix-all that I hoped it might be. I guess I should be grateful that he isn’t a trigger-happy doctor.
Eventually, I got a call from the respiratory health services folks who hooked me up with a sleep test machine. I took it home and, that night, I hooked it all up right before bed. Given that I had all kinds of tubes and wires running to me, I actually slept pretty well that night. The following Monday, I took the machine back to their office for analysis of the data.
I find your lack of faith disturbing.
About a month later, the results came back telling me that I have ‘Moderate Obstructive Sleep Apnea’. No shit, Sherlock. The report that came back from the test said that I had a Respiratory Distress Index (RDI) of 20; which meant that I had 20 events per hour where I would stop breathing. Over 40 events is considered severe.
What they recommended was that I take home a C-PAP machine (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) on a trial basis to see if it would make much of a difference in the quality of my sleep. The problem with this machine that it’s actually a total bitch to even be able to fall asleep with the mask and tube apparatus on. I’ve switched from the nasal mask to a different mask that covers my nose and mouth which I’m hoping will help with the problem. Of course, when I’m laying in bed trying to drop off… I can’t help but feel somewhat like the über-nerd version of Darth Vader with this ventilator pumping air to the mask that I have to wear.
Anyway, the machine costs in the range of $1,800 to $3,000 if I were to buy one. So I don’t want to go into this all whilly-nilly, if I have to fork over that kind of cash… I’d like to know it’s actually going to work.
iWeb from Apple's iLife suite
I’ve been a long-time fan of WordPress as a blogging platform, dating back to what seems like the dawn of time. While I wouldn’t say that I’m a heavy user that’s familiar with every facet of it, WordPress is very familiar to me.
The list of features is quite long and can be tweaked in an endless variety of different ways and being that I’m a big fan of customization, WordPress is a dream.
On the other hand, I’m also a big Apple/Mac fan(atic) and love to try to get everything I can out of my Mac. Having MobileMe built right into the Mac OSX install, there is a lot of great integration between different applications in the iLife suite and, for many of them, having a MobileMe subscription is what gels it all together.
So I’ve been really, really wanting to be able to make services like MobileMe and iWeb work. I really have. I really want to be able to use them.
I guess there’s probably a longer, more in-depth post that needs to appear about this topic but, for now, I’ll have to leave it at this: until Apple decides they really want to compete with Google… MobileMe is a gigantic waste of money and resources. Hence, I really doubt that I’ll end up ponying up some of my hard earned coin to utilize their services.
Hence, NJLE is staying exactly where it is. Here. In WordPress.
Jonathan Toews hoisting the Stanley Cup
Much like the United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation has their Most Wanted List of criminals, the New JeffLand Empire also has its own list of ‘Most Wanted; which is a list of people that desperately need to be brought to justice for their crimes.
Sadly, no criminals sought by the New JeffLand Empire have actually faced trial in what some would call our ‘kangaroo court’. (And trust me, there are no kangaroos in our courtroom. A naked midget with a fanny pack? Maybe. A Shih Tzu with a scratching problem? Definitely.) Despite this, we are confident that we can do our part for the global community to make this planet a better place to live in for everyone through the decisive use of swift-handed guilty verdicts and unnecessarily violent and painful sentences.
The NJLE’s Most Wanted List can be found as a page accessible from the menu of the site but for a direct link, click here. This list is only a start and will be periodically updated as circumstances require.