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

There can be a blush of excitement after scanning an old photo. One realizes that the actual paper artifact has been granted an entirely new digital life. It cannot fade further. Multiple copies can exist. It can even be easily passed around via email or a web page. I most recently added a blog entry along these lines a month ago.

Similarly, after languishing on 8mm video tape in a drawer for sixteen years, I helped this video capture from Thailand make its escape. That country was a common vacation destination for colleagues in the Gulf. In fact, we went up to visit another teacher, Mr. Don Richardson. This particular clip was made in old Chaing Mai. We were on break when living in Bahrain. Later that summer, I finished my work there and took up teaching duties in Dubai.

This grainy, 2 1/2-minute clip does not accurately show the environment. It does, however, show personal events that until recently were difficult to access and impossible to share.

Labels: Bahrain, Don, Thailand, world, YouTube

I'm happy today's Friday as I haven't got class. Although it seems we'll have an instructors' meeting a week from today, I've got no obligations at the moment. That, of course, doesn't mean I'll accomplish anything useful today. If the weather stays good, I could wash the truck and then wax it. I enjoy rubbing wax on aging painted metal and I like buffing it off by hand too. I've yakked about this before, so I needn't rehash old ideas. Yet, I found myself in a new situation yesterday. I can mention it here.

In the afternoon, my students wrote an exam for 2.5 hours. During the intial hours, I completed all my possible class-related busy work. I had a few spare minutes. As we were in the computer lab, I checked my email. That was okay as I had messages to answer from my supervisor. I added a discussion question to the BCIT homepage for my class. Doing so was certainly within bounds of work protocol.

Then, I meandered over the the www.futureshop.ca site. I decided I could use some additional duel-layer blank DVDs. I ordered a 25-pack that was specially priced. Is it acceptable to buy something online while on the clock at work?

I quickly worked to ease my moral conscience. I thoroughly convinced myself that my actions were just part of Bill's theory frictionless commerce. Furthermore, I reasoned, people have been making personal phone calls from work for decades and decades. As it turns out, I'm as good at thinking up excuses as my students.

Labels: BCIT

At the beginning of the month, I publicly admitted my fear of mashing up with YouTube. Yet after a few short days, I have added a link to my YouTube channel. It's now on every page of my eJournal and images!

Call me fickle.

Labels: YouTube

I find it interesting that traffic, on a macro level, shows many of the same properties and characteristics as fluids.

During the past few years, I've taught afternoons and have avoided the morning rush hour. My classes do finish at 5:00 pm so I drive about eight miles home during heavy traffic. Initially, I used to travel between the Burnaby campus and New Westminster on Canada Way. Unfortunately, there is a huge volume of cars which exit off Route 1 at Kensington. So, for a time, I sped up Royal Oak and used Kingsway. Then, the development of a shopping center near Griffiths slowed things to a crawl in that area.

So, just like water finding its easiest route, I travel up Royal Oak to Oakland and then wind around through neighbourhoods to Imperial Street. This route is between the two larger ones mentioned in the previous paragraph. There are fewer waits at lights and in stop-and-go traffic.

Labels: cars, New Westminster

I watch quite a lot of TV and I write about it here a bit too. Nowadays, most of my programming is designed for the 16x9 screen. It's not so much that I'm still impressed with high-definition, it's more like watching programs in standard format sucks.

If I were to choose a single program that makes the best use of the improved HD medium, it'd have to be CSI: Miami. The quality of the camera location, video capture, and editing is light-years ahead of many other shows. Nearly every scene this season is eye candy. It is shot a bit on the yellow side of the spectrum but assume that's a technique to emphasize it's taking place in a semi-tropical location. Interestingly, the CSI: NY tends to have bluer hues by comparison.

I would have to say that as far as the use of editing to advance a storyline, the crew of CSI: Miami consistantly beats out many high-value Hollywood productions.

Labels: camera, HDTV, television

Today is the beginning of the third week of classes. Because of the short length of these intensive courses, this means we're in the middle. In fact, I'll be giving the midterm examination on Thursday.

Today might be a bit too soon to think too much of the upcoming vacation in Los Angeles. We'll fly off on Saturday, May 5th and return a week later. Anyway, I check out the guide books from the library but Jay reads and writes down everything. I don't have too much to prepare 'cause we travel light, much lighter than most middle-aged tourists.

If in fact it's too early to get excited over LA, then it's definitely too early to seriously think about the annual autumn trip. We've sort of settled into a routine of going somewhere for a month or so in September or October. The weather's still good at most destinations but the summer tourist rush is over. I think we'll pick cities from this chunk of Europe to explore. Any suggestions?

Labels: travel planning

I was feeling very lucky today to live here. Perhaps it was today's mixed-bag of weather. The more I thought about life, the more I'm glad we chose to live near Vancouver.



I fear that there really aren't many people who end up choosing where they will live. For a great number, one's place of residence has more to do with being an accident of birth. In this day and age, one might not think of a hometown as a factor limiting choice, but I wish I had statistics on how many adults have ultimately ended up fairly close to where they grew up. There's certainly nothing wrong with that. Yet those who maintain it's perfect without having tried other locations have not actually made a choice, have they?

Others may live where they do because work led them there. I consider that, in fact, as noble. Life changes and those who demand to maintain historical ties as a birthright are sadly ignorant of the greater history of civilization.

So, the fact that Vancouver was once just a place on a map and now my home makes me as proud of myself as my adopted area.

Labels: feelings