unrelated to the trip to

Friday morning I walked to Hema-Quebec for a plasma donation; the nurse in training that took my details was practically disbelievingly uncertain that my walk of 70 minutes is something she could/would do. Everything went smoothly up to and including when they put the needle into my arm and the machine that does the apheresis kicks in. Perhaps two minutes later one of the discs that spins which helps to push the blood that has come out of me into the spinning cannister ceased spinning. I alerted them to this and soon enough three of the nurses were there to try to see what could be done; they had to undo the Allen key screw, pull the disc out, put the plastic tube in place and try to put the disc back only it was being finicky, so then another nurse took over. Once that was settled the machine was beeping as there was a problem that given the amount of time that had passed and no plasma had been extracted that it perceived a problem. The instructor nurse figured it out - to first do a return cycle back into me, and then start anew as if it was at the very start, and this worked. I completed the donation as expected with no problems, and then walked back home.

On the walk there and back I counted exactly zero squirrels which seemed to me at the time to be very peculiar. I did, however, hear and see a large number of birds of quite a variety, including crows, sea gulls, robins, cardinals, blue jays, sparrows, mourning doves, Canada geese (high over head), red-winged black birds and I got reasonably close to a mostly black bird that had bits of blue and green only in the upper part of its wing. Of all of these the robins were the most audacious, often on the suburban lawns not far from the road and not scurrying away at my distantly perceived arrival.

Saturday I was hoping to watch the Miami Open Women's Singles Final between Elena Rybakina and Danielle Collins. I was about as disappointed as I ever get that TSN did not show it. The women's singles semi-finals, quarter-finals and earlier rounds were all shown, so why not the final? 

Saturday night was the Easter Vigil mass at my church, a long and complicated celebration. This morning was Easter Sunday mass and there were a lot of unfamiliar C&Es there. 

When I got home I found this guy hanging out on the upper part of the side of my kitchen sink:

I do not know what kind of bug this is; but it has been hanging out in my kitchen for the last few days, mostly in positions that didn't bother me.

Shortly I will be leaving to go to my mother-in-law's house to watch the Miami Open Men's Singles Final between Jannik Sinner and Grigor Dimitrov; the former Italian the latter, you guessed it, Bulgarian. I made certain with her over the phone that she was able to get it on her TV as I know that I can get it on mine as TSN is gladly showing much more men's tennis than women's.

putting aside the elbow macaroni

I went to my first plasma donation yesterday morning, for the first time this year; it went smoothly in all aspects.

I watched most of the first set of the second semi-final of the Indian Wells BNP Paribas tennis tournament, I fell asleep before the set ended and when I awoke I saw that the tennis was no longer showing. I checked my mobile device and found that Sakkari had beat Gauff 6-4 in that first set, but that it had been suspended. So I stayed awake until midnight and the match was still suspended at that time. Apparently it rains in a place that is called the desert. I awoke this morning to find that Sakkari had won; they played the remainder of their match after I went to sleep.

The two men's semifinals are being played this afternoon/evening, but there is an event at my church I am volunteering for; it is a games night where we open the table tennis table, put out card tables with chairs for other kinds of games and will have snacks and drinks. So I won't be able to watch the tennis.

box kite and flip switch

Perhaps it is the media at the moment that is having many ads from local charity organizations for food drives as we are in Christmas season, or all of the reports of homelessness that are pervading many Canadian and American cities.

I am getting the sense that there are many things considerably wrong with the structural way that our western society operates. 

• The number of homeless people has grown significantly in the last year as home and rent prices have skyrocketed. Should not being housed become a fundamental right?
• As mentioned in the opening, food has become more expensive putting more pressure on food banks. Why should food banks even exist? Ought sustenance not be fully provided as a basic right?
• Health care systems world wide are running short of nurses and doctors, rural areas are particularly hard hit. A new poorly reviewed Alberta health system change and a less clear Quebec health system change are imminent; will either of them make it better for the people in those provinces to get the health care they need?
• How the climate crisis is exacerbating all sorts of problems for the most marginal globally, and so many people across Canada with the wild fires that affected almost every part this past year
• More locally as evidenced by my recent blog posts; I have become frustrated by the Quebec government's antithesis towards finding new, imaginative and progressive methods of funding and expanding public transit province wide and most specifically in my city
• A colleague of mine at church works at Walmart as a greeter and I chatted with him today about his job and he mentioned that he has caught 3000$ worth of shop lifting in the last two weeks, mostly of really poor people trying to get something they need for their family, like baby formula
• There is a worldwide epidemic of loneliness that once used to be strictly an elderly problem, is now becoming a considerable problem with gen-z who through their childhood and teenage years had mobile devices and now as they graduate out of education find themselves friendless
• Of course there is war with Russia's illegal invasion into Ukraine and the Israel/Hamas war instigated by Hamas' Oct 7 attack; the former causing a worldwide impact given Ukraine's world breadbasket 
• COP28 and ADNOC's president being one and the same; so many fossil fuel interest lobbyists trying to continue the omittance of the term 'fossil fuel' to appear anywhere in a final COP document

One of the yTube channels I follow is called 'Second Thought' where the creator speaks often about socialism; not the kind that people in South America would protest heavily against, but about the more practical theoretical kind to replace Capitalism where instead of having capitalists with few owners focus production solely on profit, a socialist democracy would have the people be owners and decisions made democratically where profit may not be the primary goal, but rather, the health or job satisfaction of the employees.

There seems to be so little I can do to effect any change that is structural in nature. I can make donations to local associations that help with the homeless and destitute in terms of providing paths to housing and warm meals. I can write to my local, provincial and federal members of government to let them know my dissatisfaction with the the structure of the running of our society.

image

At my church's bazaar in October it was discovered that full cake or pie sold better in terms of demand and higher price. For that event I had baked some cupcakes. Our church is having another bake sale this weekend. Yesterday morning I went to buy the ingredients:

As I was walking to the grocery store (this was on Friday morning) it occurred to me only then that I have no cake carrier of any kind in order to transport the cake from my apartment to the church and for the person buying it to get it from the church to their home. The grocery store had nothing so I ordered some cake boxes from Amazon for next day delivery. Uncertain whether or not these boxes would arrive in time for the 16h mass today played a role in what happened next.

We had another event at our church this morning for which I was volunteering and left over in the kitchen were two of these from the bazaar:

Since it was flagged for future use I decided I would take one in case the cake boxes hadn't arrived yet; and when I got home, they still hadn't arrived. So I went ahead with my plan. First was to make the cake batter with water, vegetable oil, eggs and of course the cake mix and pour it into the two baking pans:

Then to bake them; after the baking, one had ended up being bigger than the other. I only eye-balled it to see about getting the two the same; ideally the difference wouldn't be so significant.

After I let them cool down a little I moved them to two cutting boards and chopped off at least some of the mound that results when baking in the oven, to make the two layers reasonably flat.

I watched a yTube video to give me some tips, one of which was to put four rectangular sheets of parchment paper beneath so that when iced, the tray holding the cake can be kept clean. Doing this, however, made it difficult to center the cake on the circular cake tray. Another tip was to put it upside down, so that the bottom side as it was in the oven which is smooth and flat, becomes the top side to do the icing.

Start with a dollop in the center and spread it out, when more is needed, put another dollop close to the center but on the side of the circle where it is needed.

It wasn't smoothed out particularly well and there are crumbs embedded, this will be buried, however, between the two layers.

Then, as before, flip over the second layer. In this one it can be seen that some of the 'bottom' of that part of the cake got stuck to the baking pan.

Now the top is iced.

Now the sides are iced.

I tried to smooth it out as best I could. The lady on the yTube video made this part look so easy.

And then I took the parchment paper away from the sides and it is clear that I didn't not center the cake particularly well.

I put the top of the cake carrier on and put it into the fridge to firm it up before heading over to the church to bring it for sale. If it does sell, and if I do get the boxes, I will considering doing this all over again either tonight or early tomorrow as I bought enough of all of the ingredients to make two. I did this in particular because once the icing I bought is opened it is only good for thirty days and so by doing the second cake I will use up more of it without waste.

UPDATE: the cake boxes I ordered arrived at 19h20 and so I baked and iced another one:

image

19h04

19h18

19h30

19h41

I wish that the car in this driveway at the rectory of my church hadn't arrived in advance of me going to shovel the snow there last night. By driving on top of the snow, it compresses two tracks of snow onto the pavement that are very difficult to pry off with the shovel, so they remain after the shoveling is done.

image

View from my bedroom:

View from my living room:

We received ~25cm of snow over the last 24 hours so everything everywhere looks snow covered like this.

Last night I went to my church and helped shovel snow from the rectory's driveway. In the summer it looks like this:

Perhaps the next time I go to shovel snow there I'll remember to take a photo of it in a winter scene.

impetus pitepus

If it wasn't for the third time that a secondary first was rescinded to the zero count, the first second would have thirded a fourth, fifth and sixth.

If all of the movies that I went to see in cinema during the year 2022, 2021 and 2020 were counted and then averaged out to get an average number of movies I've seen in cinema per year during that three year span it would come to a number that is likely in the subset of numbers that are defined as being real numbers.

A tea cup saucer, a non-rewound cassette tape and 450g of will power walked into a bar.

How is will power measured?

I read this article that indicated that past studies of will power show that we have a set amount that decreases during the day and so the will power to avoid that chocolate bar at night is much lower than in the morning. The article went on to say that some people have developed an infinite will power mindset (what they referred to as a non-limited view of will power) and that those people with that mindset have figured out that the more will power you develop and use, the more will power you end up with.

Moving sideways to pass through a crowded room is likely one method to avoid stamping on the feet of a septuagenarian who is meandering on her way to locating the nearest tea shop. Presuming I ever become a septuagenarian I hope to be able to be the one moving sideways and not the one meandering.

I saw 14 and 1/3 movies per year during the span of years mentioned above.

One third represents me as a person among my siblings, or my my son as one of my children. 14 doesn't mean anything to me at the moment of composing this blog post.

A poly lariat lasso, a straight flush and a stout rinse walked into a bar. You can well expect that the tea cup saucer got together with the stout rinse. How the other four coalesced I will leave to your imagination.

Over the holiday season that just passed, as an infinitesimal part of a brief conversation with my youngest child who is presently 13yo I mentioned that if she read my blog she'd know more about me. She said my blog posts are too long. Later on that same day I was reminded of Deb (RIP) who once frequented my blog and had indicated that the longer the better in terms of my posts.

As I have somewhere between zero and two regular readers of this blog (apart from myself), I figure I can write as short, as long or as inane as I'd like.

During my weekly conversations with another volunteer at my church it was suggested that I look into visiting my brother who lives in Valencia. I have a work blackout of vacation days effective presently and until May 2 and so the plan is to go on Victoria Day weekend.

I'd take TS260, a direct flight from YUL to BCN that arrives in BCN at 13h on Friday May 19. Take the R2N from the airport to Barcelona Sants train station. Exit the train station and wander around Barcelona staying within the vicinity of the train station, then take the Euromed #1161 that leaves Barcelona Sants at 16h10 and arrives in Valencia at 18h57 where I expect my brother and/or his wife would collect me and I'd stay with them Friday, Saturday and Sunday night, have both weekend days to do tourist/local things. On Monday I have a few choices of train to take, but probably I'd take AVE #5071 that leaves Valencia at 7h50 and arrives in Madrid at 9h54. Then I'd have to take either C1 or C10 metro from the train station I arrive in to get to the airport for TS385, a direct flight from MAD back to YUL that departs MAD at 14h25.

Nothing is booked yet.

Sensationally moderate

On Thursday this past week I went to my regular blood donation place to do a plasma donation. I go roughly every two weeks and am getting to know the nurses and staff there. It takes time because they have their own varied schedules and so I don't always see the same people on my Thursday evening visits with them. My next scheduled donation is on December 22 and I plan on buying some chocolates to bring as a Christmas gift to the nurses and other staff there.

On Friday evening I went to book group; I hadn't gone in a few months. The book we read was 'At the Water's Edge' by Sara Gruen. I quite enjoyed reading the book, but with respect to discussion it did not generate much. In past book groups I had prepared questions that I thought of while reading and I forgot to do this for this book. I will try harder on the next book. It was nice to see all of my book group friends again, though there were three or four missing. Also, the only other guy in the group wasn't there, so I was the lone male.

On Saturday morning I met with Luke whom I met in our Discord Kurzgesagt group, I had to awaken early to catch the 6h56 211 bus to get to the Peel base of Mount Royal for 8am. I had published this event in the group but only Luke replied. We had a nice walk/talk, though it was about -10c and windy. He works in IT support at the MUHC and has an a-hole of a manager so his intention in 2023 is to look for another job. As we were leaving the mountain on our way back to the metro he asked me to join him for breakfast, and then offered again and that he would pay. I was torn as I had over eaten the previous night and wasn't at all hungry, but could see that this would be helpful to him. I still ended up refusing and perhaps this wasn't the best decision.

A few weeks ago, perhaps last month, my manager sent out a poll to ask which night would work for us to get together and that ended up being Saturday night (last night). Unfortunately not all of my team (10 of us) were available, however, seven us did show up. To get there was a long commute:

I took an earlier than was absolutely necessary 211 bus because I was going to unfamiliar places. I knew at Bonaventure station where the South Shore bus terminal was as I had passed it many times, but I had never ventured into it. It turns out there is a south and north bus terminal and the 45 bus I was to take was in the north one. The 45 bus is a terminal to terminal, going from Bonaventure to Panama and had departures every 10 minutes. I skipped one because the 132 bus I was to take was only departing Panama terminal some 35 minutes later. Fortunately at the Panama terminal there was a heated indoor area to wait. Also fortunately, if ever we were to do this again the REM will be open with an REM stop more or less adjacent to that restaurant.

I am already usually socially awkward outside of one-on-one interactions, but this event had the bonus of a language/cultural barrier, with four of us Francophone Quebecois, two of us Francophone Algerians and then me, the lone Anglo. As much as I had a difficult time with this, I wouldn't skip a subsequent equally difficult work event because our manager was one of the attendees and so through conversation I got to learn some things about our department and the future of it.

I found out that most likely sometime next year, we will be closing down our incoming phone line; our customers are already being advised that email communication will get higher priority and eventually the phone line will be close altogether, to match my employer's global support policy. We as tech support can always call a customer if the problem/question they have is complex; but the reverse will no longer be true. I am pretty pleased about this.

About having met my coworkers in person for the first time, I have determined that it is both a blessing and a curse that this job is 100% WFH. It is a blessing that I do not need to be put in that awkward cultural difference situation every hour of every day of every week by having to go to work, but a curse that by not doing that I don't have the opportunity to learn and get better at these situations.

The last thing about meeting my coworkers in person that I'll mention is that our team is made up all of men except for one pretty, charming, young (~26yo) woman who was present at this event. I feel safe to say, as it is doubtful she or anyone from my work would ever come to this blog, or this post, that having her present provided eye candy which made what otherwise was a somewhat dreadful experience slightly more palatable.

On the walk from the restaurant to the 90 bus that took me and only one other passenger from the Chevrier parking station into the city I caught my first view of the Orion constellation. I was happy to see it but did not try to photograph it as it was cold and windy and I know that for this kind of photo I would need a tripod to hold the mobile device steady.

Today is Sunday and I went to church this morning, as I do every Sunday morning. The best part of this experience for me is that for the half hour before mass begins, I am a greeter at the entrance of the church with another volunteer, and the two of us have become friends getting this weekly reliable interaction. The rest of the day for me is to be a lazy oaf and watch NFL.

Tomorrow is off of work for me, I'm taking my last vacation day of 2022. I've got an appointment at 11AM with Maria at Montreal Nuru Massage. I've been meeting with her once a month, missing one or two months, for a year now, so even though this is a transactional relationship, it has been nice for us to get to know each other. Following that I'm going to see the movie 'Devotion'.

To terminate this post, I've been watching a show on Disney+ called Limitless with Chris Hemsworth. One of the recent episodes I watched was all about fasting and that reminded me that I have done this in the past with moderate success. Doing this is all in the hopes that processes such as autophagy and ketosis take place within me, with the idea that these processes help to provide me a healthier longer life. So, after the Pulled Pork Poutine I had at 3 Brasseurs last night, I've decided to fast for some indeterminate amount of time. Chris (and a longevity doctor with him) did four days on the episode I watched. I'm not certain I'll go for four days, but at least 24 hours and probably more.

when all else

Now that it has gotten much colder I have ceased outdoor running. I ought to be replacing this with going to my local municipal (indoor) pool to swim laps, but I haven't done that yet.

Canada's soccer team is participating for the first time since 1986 in the World Cup with their first game tomorrow against Belgium. I find it interesting that the Belgian team is quite highly ranked and yet as a country has only a bit less than a third of the population Canada does. I wonder if population density may have something to do about it.

At  my church we are doing a garage sale fund raising event this Saturday with many different parishioners donating stuff from their houses and all funds raised to go towards things like repaving the parking lot and other capital expenditures. I am the one directing this, so I will be going most of the next evenings and then will spend the day on Saturday from very early to make sure everything runs well. I hope this works out well as a fundraiser, especially given the amount of effort I and others are putting in.

Finally; my plan is to replace my 2019 purchased Moto Z2 Play mobile device with a Google Pixel 7 which is currently discounted. My current mobile device is no longer very battery reliable and though rarely, actually crashes some times and requires a full power down/up. As I have done in the past, I will buy it unlocked so that I can continue with the mobile plan I currently have which is an inexpensive one that is no longer publicly available.

when all else fails, flip a coin

At the Loyola Parents Dinner Dance Saturday night.

In chronological order

Three guys at the table, before the fourth arrived, all standing aside the table talking with each other, the shortest of the three of them is still five inches taller than I am; I wasn't comfortable to engage with them. I milled about a little, then sat down at the table. On my own for a while, then M, one of the wives of the standing men came and sat next to me and we had a nice conversation. She is from a latin country and is very expressive and has almost a continual conversational touch that I find warm and atyipcal. We shared our running and medal commonalities among other things.

We all took our places and conversation ensued; at one point an in depth conversation about how the school is very much sports-focused and how that almost dissuaded this one mom from sending her boy to the school. I spoke up of my own experience when I was a student, and of my son's experience, in his last year; neither of us being particularly sporty, and how there are numerous other opportunities for the boys to do extra curricular activities that line up with their interests.

MC of the event announces that each table ought to elect a 'captain' of the table. I was chosen and then all of the captains were summoned to the dance floor where we received playful glasses that lit up of various types and colours. This would identify all of us to everyone else as the captains. Then, as the captains we were encouraged to dance to show how committed we are to being the captain and engaging our tables. It was at this time I happened to notice 'J', one of the moms present who was a great dancer.

Soon after, everyone else was encouraged to go to the dance floor and people formed mostly in table groups, so I moved over to join my own table group. This went on for a short while then we sat down for the main course. Between this dancing and the main course I headed to the WC and on the way back encountered a person looking at the sports team photos from past years on the wall. He happened to be looking at the photos of students at the exact year that I graduated, so I recognized all of the boys in the photo. I engaged with him, talking about the boys whose photos are on the wall and our own boys. Moments later a faculty member joined us and knew something of the guy with whom I was speaking and so the two of them started off on an alternative topic that effectively disengaged me.

After our table had finished the main course, there was lighter music being played with no MC and the dance floor was empty. I meandered onto the dance floor and just start moving with the music, a few minutes later another male captain joined me, and the two of us danced for maybe five or eight minutes; just the two of us doing our own thing. The tables that bordered the dance floor had people who then started to take notice of us, they cheered, though no one joined us.

Then the MC came on and he invited everyone else; back on the dance floor, prizes were given, bottles of champagne, to people who show they are committed to having a good time and dancing up a storm; 'J' won the first one. We connected a little on the dance floor the way that sometimes people do; and after she had won and there were fewer people around her I went to congratulate her on being the first to win. She was gracious, friendly and about ten minutes later she put a cup of champagne in my hands. We would dance together on and off a little while longer. Later in the night when we had both gone to sit down, I located where she was sitting and chatted with her a little, as this was the first (and only) time I would engage in conversation with her. I mention that my son is in his last year, but this may not stop me from coming back to the Parent's dance next year, and that I would hope to see her there too. She reciprocated.

We left soon after; a little bit abruptly from my own perspective; but it was already midnight and three quarters of us were heading to church Sunday morning.

When the door knob knocks exactly zero times

Amazingly, I become the winner of two section V1 tickets to see the Als play tomorrow. This was due to being a volunteer at my church's annual bazaar. At a little after 7AM this morning I was there, with three or four others, principally preparing the chili, but later, helping with soup, hotdogs, chips and drinks to sell to the visitors to the bazaar. I also took on most of the dishwashing using the church's recently acquired commercial dishwasher. A parishioner has season's tickets and for whatever reason was unable to attend the game tomorrow, so volunteers at the event were asked if they wanted in, to pay 5$ per chance to win; so I put in 10$ for two chances, and I ended up winning.

I've asked around and there were no takers for someone to go with me; then I asked V-8 and she is now excited to go with me to the game tomorrow. It looks to be a great day as it will be clear and warming up to about 20C. Very unseasonably warm for this time of year. So, good weather to spend the afternoon at an outdoor stadium.

Yep, I participated in my parish's talent show this evening. I said the alphabet. A few different times in a few different ways. I got positive feedback, so that was good.

Some of the singers in the parish were really good and were fortunate to have such a warm audience to perform to.

Tomorrow is Sunday. It seems there are one of those days each week. Well, each week so far.

I wonder what kind of calendar would be used on TRAPPIST-1D where a year lasts 4.05 days. What is pretty nifty about this planet is that it is likely tidally-locked, which means that only at the terminator line it may be livable. Too far towards the sun side and it would be desolate and hot while too far on the dark side it would be desolate and cold. Imagine living within a 10km wide strip that spans the diameter of the planet that defines the day side from the night side. All the places for sleeping and night clubs would be on the dark side, while all of the sport arenas, schools and workplaces would be on the light side. With about 69% of Earth's gravity, it may not be too far from our native gravity to sustain human beings. Who knows?

Of course, it would take 39 years (14,245 days), travelling at the speed of light, to get there. Assuming we could get a space faring vehicle to travel at .25c it would take 156 years (56,979 days) to get there.

I'm keen on the idea of exo-planets, though for me it will only ever be an idea. Perhaps my children's children will get to visit one.

It is 23h11 at the moment I type these words, I ought to go to sleep soon. My eyelids are getting heavy.

Lloyd and the calamity

So we went to see the Super Hospital on Sunday. We booked a few months ago a free tour of the new hospital here that will close down four old ones. It was quite impressive with its state of the art equipment.

Following that we went to the Oeufrier for lunch where we had breakfast food. I had a Ménage à Trois breakfast poutine that was absolutely delicious.

Following that we went to the Centaur Theatre to watch the Geordie Production of Chloe's Choice. It was quite an excellent play, well acted and very well written.

Before all of that we went to church, and following all of that we went to my father-in-law's house to help him with connecting his mobile phone to his own wifi network. He had put lower case letters in the password where he should have been putting upper case ones.

You are free to not click on any of the links in the post. If, however, you do click on one, or more, of the links, can you please let me know that you did and let me know which one(s) you did?

being pious like an aardvark

I don't talk much about my religion or my involvement with my church on this blog.

I am Roman Catholic and go to church weekly, and occasionally more often. My two oldest sing in the kids choir and during the summer, G-bot also alter serves. I am part of the capital campaign committee at the church where over the last three years we raised over 235,000$ to replace the roof of the church.

I do not agree with all of the tenets as prescribed by the leading authority of my religion, but I do not feel that should stop me from getting involved in my parish. We do a lot of good work for our community and beyond the borders of our community and by being a member of the church we form a part of a large support group that will be in a position to help each other if ever civilization starts to tremble.

Why I bring this up is that our bishop and his team organized a Parish Vitality Conference that took place this past weekend and it really invigorated the dozen or so of us from my church that went. There were sessions on a variety of topics that are all intended to help revitalize our church. We (those of us who went to the conference) are meeting in the next week or so to review our notes and to develop an action plan for our church. It is what has been occupying my mind for the most part since Friday last week (the first day of sessions).

I have loads more to write about this, but I figure this is enough for now for my blog.