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

You might not be able to make out this picture. Maybe I'll get a digital camera with a decent zoom in the fall.

There are two seagulls to the right. One's a parent and the other hesitantly following is the 'baby'.

We get a free nature-show each year. It is available right from the window. Down on the roof of the Met Hotel, gulls nest in the summer. We get to watch the entire process from initial peeping beaks to the runt's last flight away. It's now August 20th and there are three young'uns this year. They're at a point where they'd terribly much like to fly. They start at one side of the building and run, flap, and screech to the opposite side. I expect that at least one will take a maiden, winged voyage by the end of this weekend.

The picture, though, was taken at the New Westminster Quay yesterday. In this case the mother was teaching the, still brown, offspring to swim and hunt for food. It was continuously peeping and although I don't speak gull, I'm sure it was shouting to be fed. Becoming independent can be damned hard work.

Labels: camera, New Westminster, Quay

I've not blogged about an old movie in a long time. I did mention how West Side Story (1961) wasn't the best way to prepare for a trip to New York City in May. Similarly, I am sure that watching An American in Paris (1951) won't really be too useful in getting ready for next month's trip to Europe. After all it is a musical and 54 years old to boot!

Still, there are those moments in old films that are simply wonderful and rare. They come from the well-written scripts, I think. I like dialog that sounds contrived; after all, it's supposed to be entertaining. I can hear 'real life' on the way to work on public transit, if I choose.



Gene Kelly: That's quite a dress .. you almost have on.

Nina Foch: Thanks.

Gene Kelly: What holds it up?

Nina Foch: Modesty.

Labels: movies, Paris, stars

Update: These are some events since this morning's entry. As the computer's heavy, I ...

drove to the computer shop at 10:05 am.

read the sign which said, "Summer hours: 11:00 am to 7:00 pm".

returned home.

drove again to the computer shop at 11:10.

found that no one was there.

went to the shopping centre and looked in London Drugs for 20 minutes.

drove back by the store and there was still no one there.

drove away, but first copied down the phone number on the storefront.

returned home.

called the phone number and left a message.

received a call at 12:15 when eating lunch.

drove again to the computer store.

parked, brought the bare PC inside, plugged into their outlet and it worked!

felt like a fool.

loaded the computer back into the truck and returned home.

parked in front of the building rather than in the parking garage.

brought the PC into the lobby, got the original power cord, and plugged it in.

saw nothing happening.

surmised, finally, the brand-new cord that had come with the power supply was not functioning.

returned to the computer store with the cord and it didn't work.

plugged it in using one of their spare cords and it booted right up.

took his cord and returned home again.

am typing the entry on that computer. PHEW!

Labels: computers, errands, Hardware

Posted by: Dennis S Hurd / 2:04 PM 0 comments

I'm happy to be able to blog today. I'm doing it on my Gateway notebook as my home computer is sitting beside the doorway.

Yesterday, I mentioned that the power would be off in our building for maintenance. I turned off my computer just as I should. I cannot remember the last time I shut it completely off. Occasionally, I reboot but it's been months since the hard disks have spun down.

After six hours all the home gadgets came back to life. We had to run around and reset the alarm clock, microwave, and other appliances. I pressed the switch on the computer ... and nothing happened. Since I had once had a power supply give up the ghost, I assumed I knew the problem.

It was only 4 o'clock in the afternoon, so I walked down to a computer store that's a few blocks away. The owner tested the power supply and said it was dead. So, I pulled out the bank card, withdrew $55 and walked home with a new one. I screwed the screws and plugged in plugs. Then, I reached for the switch. Still ... nothing happened.

Although that shop stayed open till 7:00 pm, I decided to just leave it until today. I'll carry the whole computer back to the guy and see what he says. I do like having a two CPU house.

Labels: complaints, computers, Hardware

I'm rushing to add my entry soon. There's a power cut looming this morning as our building has scheduled transformer-vault maintenance.

So, I'll find a picture to post. Last night, I cut and pasted a bunch of digital photo files from my notebook to the big machine in the living room. It's much better to keep everything in one place so I can burn a DVD of all personal data every so often.



Here's a photo taken a month ago. It was taken with Tim's camera. It shows the introduction of the rubber ducky that I once uploaded to flickr.

Labels: Flickr, Tim

I should've been correcting final examinations yesterday. Instead, we drove to Lougheed Mall, visited the Flight Centre, and purchased air tickets to Europe. We're leaving during the first week of September and returning the last. We'll fly into Amsterdam and back from London. It will be fun deciding on an itinerary with Jay.



Twenty-three years ago I returned for a summer in the US after teaching in Kuwait. I flew via Amsterdam. I found this fuzzy photo. The fact I can post a .jpg on this blog shows the miracle of a good scanner and graphics-editing software.

Labels: Amsterdam, travel planning

---

Your Weekends Belong to You (Again)
Sent on August 14, 2005 by Dennis Hurd

This is just a quick note to say that teaching your class seemed very
special. I think generally several students drop out of classes during
a term but not this one! Yours was also the first class in which
there was nearly perfect attendance. (It's okay King ... we're not
angry.) This goes to show that, as a whole, you were a hard-working
group of individuals. Although you come from a variety of backgrounds,
it was a pleasure to see your dedication. There's not a single student
that I'm not proud to have met.

---

I find myself relying more and more on the web interface of myBCIT to communicate with my students. It's especially useful for weekend courses as there's a long period between classes. With nearly 100% Internet access in homes and libraries, I can be assured of 'being in the face' of each student during the week. I've gone into a variety of details in this blog over the last few years.

Message boards free us from paper and allow classmates to read each other's responses. A grade book feature allows each student access to their data online whereas that information used to exist only on a worksheet in my briefcase. I can upload files and photos for sharing. The security factor is very important as the information is available to no outsiders.

An announcement feature shows information right on their screens after login. This is a perfect way to add a homework reminder, restate a key point, or just provide a group message without resorting to email. I can't help but take each course very seriously, and luckily, most other BCIT instructors do too. The first words of this entry 'were announced' after arriving home from yesterday's final class.

Labels: myBCIT, software

As has been the case recently, I fish for something to scan for Sundays' entries. I assure you this is only because I'm too tired to say much of import after a 7-hour teaching day.

One thing I've discovered about myself is that I save far too much junk. I save things I'll never need. For example, I located my expenditures from August of 1989. I am not sure that this is a positive. It totally flies in the face of my view I'm so come as one may. Rather, it makes me seem a little, you know, .... retentive.

Before blogging, I never really managed to keep a journal. Yet, I used to keep a spreadsheet of monthly expenses well before I bought my first copy of 'MS Money'. If you click on the thumbnail, you'll load a .pdf file of expenses during August 1989. I was in Bahrain at the time. The columns of figures are Bahraini Dinars, US Dollars, and Sri Lankan Rupees, respectively. I spent less than $350 a month? No wonder why I am rich today.

I wonder if the categories and my percentages have changed after 16 years. Well, surely there's one difference: I quit smoking five or six years ago.

Labels: Bahrain, blogging, file archives, money