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

I receive a weekly newsletter from NCIX.com. It always contains great deals on computer equipment. Even though I'm flush with extra, end-of-year cash, there was nothing much from the recent Boxing-Week sale that interested me. My quad-core processor PC and related equipment is new enough to not require upgrading. It seems odd not to drool over some new device or other.

The only item I could remotely consider as needing was some additional flash-memory for my new camera. My first digital camera had a 128 MB card although it was 4 mega-pixel. The average photo size was about 700 K. My new Kodak is 12 mega-pixel so each picture averages between 1.5 MB and 4 MB. Still, I was ahead with the 2 GB card I bought with the Z1275.

The sale at my computer store, however, included an 8 GB SDHC card for $49. I couldn't afford not to buy one. I think the computer I shipped from Dubai when arriving here in 1996 had a whopping 12 GB hard drive. Now, this little card holds 8. I doubt I'll ever have the need to carry around over 2200 photographic images. The little camera does create HD 720p video clips though.

Labels: camera, computers

Name something which people love to hate. It's fairly easy to complain about institutional food be it in a hospital or school cafeteria. It's also common to be dissatisfied with the speed, or lack thereof, demonstrated by many government bureaucracies. Yet, in today's rant, I'd like to bitch about my local telephone company.

I was, in fact, so worked up I filled in a complaint form at the Canadian Radio, Television, and Telecommunications Commission website. In addition, they forwarded another online form to the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services. By all means, if you're affected similarly, please give the CRTC and the CCTS your opinions too! Here's what I hurriedly typed into an online box:

I just received my Telus bill for standard phone service. I was shocked by the $2.95 LD Network Access Charge. I do not subscribe to any long-distance plan. I did not make any long distance charges during the month, so should not be subjected to the imposed, extra fee. If I did make use of Telus long distance, then I would happily pay. I should not, however, be charged this fee for months when no long distance calls are made. Telus appears to be charging for services not actually provided.

If there are general increases they should be added to standard residential rates and not tacked on as a mandatory payment of an 'extra' nature.

The lack of sufficient notification is also a very annoying factor. I received no written notice from Telus that this fee increase would occur.

Labels: complaints, telephone

This image was taken from my balcony late yesterday afternoon. It marks the 700th digital image of my city that I've uploaded to Flickr. The collection spans nearly five years and three different cameras. They are arranged from the most recent to the earliest. The main focus is probably on downtown as that's the part of town where I live.

If you click on the photograph above, you will start a slide show of these images. Should that fail to be enough to satisfy your curiosity about New Westminster, you many also check out a special group I created that contains contributions from other local Flickr users. Athough my photos represent a fair number of those, the total now stands at over 1400. They were uploaded by close to 80 unique contributors.

Labels: camera, Flickr, Fraser River, New Westminster

There's hardly a thing I truly desire that I don't already have. And certainly my time is more important to me than the few dollars saved at a Boxing Day sale. So I have no bargains to crow about in the blog today.

I did think it was interesting that on our trip to Seattle, for the first time, I noted WiFi signs at the rest stops on Interstate 5. I believe there are three in each direction between the border and the city.



Now, as well as a trip to the restroom, it's possible to check out the winter pass information for free. The whole web is not actually free but the following sites are provided gratis:

WS DOT Home

Traveler Information (cameras)

Travel Alerts and Slowdowns

Construction Updates

Weather

Mountain Passes

Accountability

Washington Tourism

Access is made available through a private company closely connected with www.coachconnect.net, so it is possible to buy time with a credit card. It is well designed for the RV crowd at $30/month and at the present a $2.95 tariff for 15-minute access would be useful for emergency email. Bear in mind, often these rest stops may be miles and miles from an exit.

Labels: Internet, road trip, Seattle

Dreaming not required. Batteries not included.

Labels: balcony, Christmas, Fraser River, YouTube

'Twas the night before Christmas
and all through the Eighth Ave Inn
not a creature was stirring not even ...

Okay, so I'm not much up to my rhyming old self.

So far the trip has been nice. We left before breakfast yesterday and got all the way to Bellingham before eating in a Country Buffet in the mall. We walked around in the mall before flying down the Interstate in the rain. We got right into the city easily and arrived too early to check in. For some reason they wouldn't let us have the room available until 3:00. So we walked to the commercial section of downtown and even to the Pike Street Market. Incidentally, they do continue to throw fish in the winter. After checking into the Inn, we got a call from the Thomas family. Joel, Lynne, Ben and Whit arrived and whisked us off to dinner in at a Bippy de Peepo or something like that. It was an Italian, family-type restaurant right down here close to Lake Union. It was fun and filling. It's the type of place where groups order large dishes and then everybody takes some. Everybody took a lot but our waitress still packed up the extra for us.

Speaking of eating, there is a nice breakfast offered where we're staying. It's just continental but there there plenty of fruits, yogurt, as well as cereals and muffins. This morning, we took our coupons from Expedia and walked right to the Music Experience Project. It was interesting especially the hand-on sections. I wish I'd had access to something like that as a child. Who knows, I might've been a rock star. The science fiction museum, obviously another of Paul Allan's hobbies, was interesting enough. I couldn't help but hold my Samsung cell phone on the opposite side of the glass from the Original Startrek series communicator. It was life imitating fiction. We ended up eating in the Westlake Center after trying out the new trolley car that runs about a mile to the shore of Lake Union. How sort of European! Finally this whole part of Seattle is getting a makeover. If I had a million dollars I could probably buy a studio apartment that'll be worth three million in a few years.

It's only 5:42 but it's, of course, dark. I won't bother unloading photos until after we go back home. There's no rush but everything will surely be closed tomorrow. Maybe I-5 won't be crowded as we travel back up to the Canadian border during the late morning or early afternoon.

Labels: sci-fi, Seattle

We avoided yesterday's rush on the roads. Rather than that, we're heading south to Seattle in a few minutes. Staying in a downtown hotel will make it easy to visit the Music Experience Project which has now been open for seven years. I didn't even really know about the addition of the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame, which opened in 2004. Of course we do know the outside of the freaky-looking building near Seattle Center. We already printed the vouchers from Expedia and will present them for use tomorrow.

We'll stay for two nights, returning on Christmas day. I think we last stayed in Seattle the Holiday Inn Express. As Jay was working at one in Richmond BC, he got a discount at all lodging within the company. That would've been the end of 1999 or during the subsequent year.

Things probably won't be very busy tomorrow because of the time of year. I do look forward to seeing the decorations in the downtown area. I'm guessing sellers do not throw fish around the Pike Place Market in the winter. I'm betting the original Starbucks, however, will be pouring a lot of coffee for last-minute Christmas shoppers trying to dry off and warm up.

Labels: road trip, Seattle