A Collection of Daily Wisdom by Dennis Sylvester Hurd since September 2003.

Until the recent trip, I hadn't been to Sri Lanka for a long time. I visited a number of times when working in the Gulf. In the thirteen years since my last time there, changes have occurred. Here are a few which I noticed. Now, everybody seems to be running around with cell phones, food packaging has become very convenienct and modern, and there were many more TV channels to choose from. Computers are more prevelant, and of course, there were no Sri Lankan Internet cafes in 1991. I picked up a CDROM of mp3 music files from street vendors near the Petta bus station. Here's one I liked from the disc which had over 100 songs.

Labels: Mediaplayer, music, Sri Lanka

We just went through the photos from the recent trip. Digital cameras are so flexible. Although there were over seven hundred files, the only ones we'll print are those which are to be mailed off to people. For example, whenever we rented a 3-wheel to see a historical or cultural site, we generally took a picture and copied down the driver's address. We promised to send a copy. Non-emailing relatives also need to view hardcopy prints.

Those pictures were among those which will appear on paper today. I just uploaded them in bulk to London Drugs Photo Station. Rather than having them mailed to the apartment, I chose to have them completed at my neighbourhood branch. They'll most likely be done in a few hours and the system will send me an email confirmation that they're ready to pick up.

If one still shoots on film, then we'll have to shout, "Dinosaur!" Laurie, are you listening?

Labels: digital camera, Laurie, Sri Lanka

... today, this monitor's surface seems like a blank canvas just taunting me for an entry.

Well, it is Thursday, so it'll be the last day of classes for me this week. My teaching schedule runs from Monday to Thursday. This means I'll have some time to do some things not completed since my trip. Chief amongst them is the chore of getting a new prescription and glasses. This time around I will have to go for my first pair of 'progressives', a babyboomers' euphemism for good old-fashioned bifocals.

Speaking of euphemisms, I was reading about the death of the previous leader of the Emirates. As I worked there for five years it was of interest to me; however, one term that kept cropping up was 'laid to rest'. Isn't that a bit of an understatement?

Labels: blogging

The DVD's have started rolling in again. DVDFlix sent three yesterday morning. Goodbye Lenin is a 2003 movie from Germany. I really didn't know what to expect as German movies are sometimes strange and depressing. Here's the plot line as found on the International Movie Database:

"East Germany, the year 1989: A young man protests against the regime. His mother watches the police arresting him and suffers a heart attack and falls into a coma. Some months later, the GDR does not exist anymore and the mother awakes. Since she has to avoid every excitement, the son tries to set up the GDR again for her in their flat. But the world has changed a lot..."

Consequences of 9/11 make the reunification of Germany seem so long ago! This movie certainly was not a stuffy historical documentary. We found it quite fun and worthy of viewing. Of course, you'll have to be willing to watch movies with subtitles ...

Labels: movies

Okay, my real plan is to type the notebook as entries for September and October. That was during our vacation time to Sri Lanka and stopover in Singapore. When I finally get these entries online, I will find a photo that showcases that day's events. To make the site load quickly, I'll make the picture very small but clickable. If a reader wants to display a larger (800X600 pixel) version, then a simple click on the small photo will do the trick. Let's try it here. If you click on the picture to the right, a larger one should become available for viewing. I took this picture on a short walk in Jay's neighbourhood.

Hello! It's time to dust off the monitor and try to remember which fingers press which keys.

We got back in the country last Saturday afternoon. Two months on the opposite side of the earth took a toll on my internal clock. I was useless because of jetlag yesterday. Yet, today things seemed better and I even started teaching a a new BCIT class this afternoon!

I've got oodles of photos. I will choose some from the 700 when I fill in the days missed when gone. Although I was not blogging, I was keeping a journal. It may be a while before it's all online though.

Labels: BCIT (Page 1)

. . . and resting!