The insanity of Poker-thons has to end, never mind the eerie resemblance of the name to another certain insane fad that we came to know in the late 90’s, which mainly concerned monsters cruelly imprisoned in red-and-white egg balls.

Texas-Hold-em, I choose you!

It’s only the introductory paragraph, but already, I digress.  Allow me to elaborant.

What could only be part of the Republican plot to control the minds of the proletariat through the dark art of card playing (and secondarily, fox news), the game of poker, and specifically, the texas hold-em permutation, has been gaining in incomprehensible popularity in the last little while.  To paraphrase a firend of mine (who, incidentally, also happens to belong to this), a few years ago, nobody played poker.  Now, everybody does.  Or it just seems that way…  and it also might have something to do with the "age of adulthood" that seems to be creeping up on me and my friends.  Is there really nothing left to do on Friday nights that we are forced to sit around a table in some guy’s apartment, rectangular pieces of cardboard in our hands, coloured plastic circles stacked in front, saying nothing but "check", "call" and "raise"?  There has to be a better way, people!  Repent! Repent!

As you can imagine, my method of protesting this global phenomenon (oh, you just know they must played this in Bin Laden’s caves - although there it was known under the moniker of Kabul Shoot-em) is to simply not participate in the furthering of the stereotype that this game is fun to play.  Consequently, I’m sitting next to the TV playing my old-school MegaMan X (post on this coming soon…), and everyone else is sitting almost entirely silent around a table, thinking about their money, looking over at my TV screen because it’s a lot more entertaining to watch MegaMan do his blast-the-baddies thing than to play the same game of cards one more round.

There were at least some interesting moments of the night.  Due to the unfortunate fact that the chips that were to be played with were a no-show, as was the guy accompanying them, a shortage was reached.  Only by pooling our mighty brains (and to a lesser extent Lindsay’s chest-of-loose-change), were we able to come up with a solution: pennies!

The bounty of pennies (over 200) wasn’t the only treasure unearthed that night.  A long-lost key to our apartment, a variety of other keys of unknown origin, and an sky-blue elastic all made an appearance that magical night.

We kept the extra house key; the others went back into the mound of change, and we gave the elastic to the cat to chase after.

Later, what started out as a discussion of the future of card technology (know that in the future, all cards will be digital handheld rectangle screens, dealt automagically to players) led right into the affirmation that not only that, but the impersonal nature of internet poker rooms will eventually backlash, and people will clamor for something more tactile and real.  Taking a page out of Demolition Man, we decided to set up a primitive teleconferencing poker system.  It was a huge success:

Of course, we stopped taking cues from movies at that point. There’s only so far a good idea in a Sylvester Stallone movie can take you before a can of whoop’ass is unleashed.

Sometimes you have to learn how to read the signs.

I wake up about three minutes before my alarm is set to go off.  Right away, you know that if I’m depriving myself of my much-loved sleep all on my own, there’s something definitely wrong here.  In any case, I get up a half hour later anyways, which is about normal.

As usual, I take too much time reading the news online, and after I pull the inevitable "oh, shit!" when I glance at the time, I’m off to my routinely frantic dance of teeth-brushing, shaving, getting dressed, and lunch making.  Surprisingly, I’m out the door a bit earlier than usual, which simply puts me on time.  No need for the five-block sprint in the rain to the metro today!

Actually, there was, because metros being what they are (i.e. unpredictable bastards), I end up having to run to work from the metro station to be there on time for the 9 am meeting.  I make it for 9 (again, surprise!), but there are no more chairs, and I end up having to stand, all hot from the run, and uncomfortably close to the other standing late comers.  Consequently, I’m sweating.  And did I mention I hit my head on the door when I tried to enter the darkened room?  It was opening so easily, then wham! Someone was standing there and I was already into the follow-through.  Beautiful, sweaty, hot lab meeting…  but at least the presenter was interesting! (Ça, c’est pour toi, Cat, si tu lis!).

Anyways, seeing how for one of my courses I need to attend the astronomical 30 seminars having to do with various subjects of my domain, and there are two happening at McGill today, I take off at about 11:20, assured by Tous Azimuts that the trip to McGill would take at most 20 minutes.

Let’s go on a tangent here: Are we going to trust the STM again?  Should I ever have done so?  Is this the last time I get screwed by them?

In case you’re wondering, the answers to the above challenging questions are in the negative.

I should have seen the omen for what it was - the old man with no neck dressed in an expensive business suit, in a sleep coma drooling on his expensive tie.  I was disgusted, but yet I could not turn away.  It obviously was a sign that no matter what, I would be either screwed or end up riding the metro forever, like this dude seemed to be doing.

As prophesized by Mr.Drool (oh, he SO saw that coming!), a connecting metro leaves about 10 seconds early, royally screwing me and causing me to be late by 10 minutes, where I would otherwise have been about 5 minutes early.  But wait, I’m forgetting something.

Oh yes.  WHO NEEDS AN EXIT TUNNEL THAT LEADS SPECIFICALLY TO A BANK?!

I was following the signs (literally, this time) to get to Sherbrooke.  So far, so sweaty (metros aren’t known for their excellent ventilation, especially with a jacket on).  I know where one exit leads, but another sign points to a tunnel I never took before, and the promised land of Sherbrooke street is proudly displayed above.  I enter.

What I end up in (where I become more and more apprehensive) is a strange self-enclosed steel and glass food court, with no apparent way out.  I see some escalators, but dismiss them after seeing from where I stand that they lead to a marbled lobby with metallic lettering.  Five minutes to the seminar.

I dash around the food court, trying, for the love of all that’s holy, to find a way out.  Then I meet this little gem of a woman:

Me: "Pardon, où est-ce que je peux trouver la sortie?"
Her: {Shrug}
Me: "…"
Her: "Sorry, I can’t help you."
Me: "You have no idea where the exit is!?"
Her: "No…"

LEAVING THE MOLE-WOMAN TO WHAT IS EVIDENTLY HER HOME, FROM WHICH SHE NEVER EMERGES INTO THE OUTSIDE WORLD, I attempt the escalator.  I see light, glorious light!

…

A BANK?!  W.T.F!

Yes.  People evidently need a special tunnel to get to the bank from the metro station.  I suppose the Mole-Woman needs to do her banking somewhere…

Five minutes late.  I exit, two blocks east (that’s bad) of where I would have been if I had just gotten out the metro normally, and semi-dash to Drummond street.  If you’re at all familiar with Montreal, and at all familiar with the unexplainable obsession of universities putting their buildings on the top of freaking mountains, then you also know that you can’t climb Drummond at a run - more of a exhausting, toungue hanging out, plod.

Of course, the seminar is on the 10th floor - don’t you know that low oxygen stimulates students?  I’m sweating, I’m annoyed, and I have no fucking idea where the damned room is.  10 minutes late.  I find a door with the right number - I can hear someone talking inside - and I try it.  *RATTLE*.  Ugh.  Must be a two-door class deal.  I’m now resigned to the ugly stares I will inevitably get for not only disturbing the lecture by coming in 10 minutes late, but resonating a loud, annoying sound throughout the lecture hall.  Luckily (and no, this doesn’t make up for everything else!), a poor chump is also making his way in right before me, and becomes my human shield. 

I settle in to one remaining seat, and try to take notes without soaking the looseleaf with my drenched forearms.

Finally, on the way back home (after two incomprehensible lectures), I climb on the 24 bus, only to find that it absolutely and positively, smells like someone has taken a shit on the floor, then spread it around.  I kid you not - I was gagging.

Sigh.  Whattaday.

Just a quick post about a new plugin I just installed - it makes creating popup images from thumbnails a breeze.  Very cool, but somewhat non-user friendly - I had to hack the code a little to fix the annoying default behavior of having the images floating over previous posts!  Definitely not very aesthetic ;).

It’s called LazyImageLayout, and it rocks my locks.  You don’t have to specify any window size or nuthin’.  Observe:

Yesterday marked the unveiling of the official emblem of the 2010 Olympic winter games which will be taking place in Vancouver, British Columbia.  I was all ready to post a picture of our new friend and all, but then I read that publishing anything that lies under the "Olympic Brand" is actually against the law and I could actually get prosecuted for promoting the freaking games on my site.  So, after thinking about it for a while (there’s a lot to consider!), I decided that the best course of action would be to simply point you on your way to having a look-see at the new logo. 

After reading the reasons (actually written in a proletariat-friendly manner, hoo-ray) why they decided to absolutely control the logo, I suppose I get it - they’ll need to make up all the money they’re spending on the Olympics, and if a sponsor knows that they’re paying for something that is otherwise available for free, they’ll think twice about actually going through with the transaction.  Anyways, anything in the black has been promised to be re-inserted into the present dismal athletic support program we have here in Canada (although the situation has recently gotten much better).  With all the embarrassment (well, that’s at least one way to call it) going on in the government these days, I think the kids at the top want to avoid the nationally-depressing feat of not winning a single gold medal for the third time in a row, after Montreal ‘76 and Calgary ‘88.

Anyways, back to old ‘Naaqy.  If we forget for a moment that his name brings to mind the shocking and common religious Quebecois swear word (I’ll give you a hint - it starts with a "T", ends with a "C", and has "aberna" in the middle…), it’s actually quite a nice choice they’ve gone with here.  If you’ve seen the clothes the Canadians have been wearing to the past few Olympics, you know that when it comes to design, Canada is no slouch - and we see again here that its once again the case.  True, it looks like it’s been drawn by a child (heck, it even looks like a child - one who’s eaten one too many potato chips), but it still manages to convey Canadiana, friendliness, strength, simplicity, and four out of five (yeah, I don’t what’s up with that) Olympic colours.

I didn’t actually watch it all, but by far my favorite moment of the ceremony was when they introduced Paul Martin for his pre-taped message of the games, half the audience started booing.  But in typical Canadian fashion, if only to be polite, the boos soon stopped and were replaced by resigned light applause.  PM the PM started talking - but not alone: a lone rapscallion, far back in the giant auditorium, vented out his frustration with a poignant "You Suck!", clearly audible on the national broadcast.  Well done, sir.  But just you wait, they’ll all get their come-uppins’ soon enough…

Look, I know you don’t care.  I don’t care that you don’t care.  What I do care for is when I do something so utterly sweet, that I just have to let the whole world (well, ok, maybe 5 or 6 people by the looks of my hit counter) know about it.  And hey, what the hell are blogs for if not for posting utterly unimportant happenings in the grand scheme of things of the person that created them?  My point exactly.  So sit down and bask in my geekyness.

(Warning: Geekyness may cause slight skin irritation.)

Bungie, makers of Halo, have just released a patch that they hope will put an end to the rampant cheating that was present on xbox live and what turned me off of playing Halo 2 many months ago.  Consequently, me and the other flatmate have been going at it with gusto once again.  What I wanted to share was a particular oh-so-sweet (that yes, nobody cares about, I know!…) sequence that I pulled off that still gives me a subtle rush just thinking about it.

And now, thanks to crazy game-recording technology, you too can feel the sweetness.  Observe!

Ok, so it’s not clear right away what the hell this is.  Allow me to explain.

The above is a screenshot of one of the maps in Halo 2, which you can access after you’ve played it by going to Bungie’s website and looking under your profile.  What this allows über-geeks to do is take a look-see at why they’re sucking so much.  At least in principle.

What we have here with the blue lines is the path that the flag I was defending took from its original location inside my base (starting point upper left) to it’s eventual end point, the base of the opposing team (can’t see that, though).  I draw your attention to the following details:

• The flag gets taken out of my base by the opposing team, who then proceed to hop into a jeep they have waiting there to drive them quickly back to their base to score.  If something isn’t done quick, my team is screwed!
• As you can see above, the jeep quickly takes off towards the rocks, where safety, jubilation and  dishing of the trash-talking await them on a successful capture.  But they didn’t count on…
• ME!  As they begin to accelerate towards their freedom, their horrible horrible freedom, I sprawl myself onto the driver’s side, latch on, and begin to inflict a severe beatdown on the driver’s poor noggin.
• Success!  With the driver’s skull bashed in (*snicker*), I hop into the driver’s seat, with the flag carrier of the opposing team as my passenger.  I nod hello, he looks back at me in shock, and utters his plea to his team: "Hey! Get that fucker outta the car!"
• Grinning like a maniac, I pull off a three-point turn and cheerily drive Mr. Enemy back to my base, flag and all.  You can see where this happened if you look at where the blue line (indicating the flag path) goes forward, stops, goes backwards along the same line, then heads back towards the base.  *grin* :D
• Intelligence dawns on Mr. Flag Carrier, and he hops out of the car as I’m about to enter the driveway.  And he didn’t even leave me a tip!
• Frantic, with me humming a jolly tune, he runs away with the flag.  That’s the point above where the blue path does a 180 and starts to act erratic.
• Calmly, I exit the driver seat of my new car, and walk around to the back, where the giant turret sits…
• Notice with me, folks,  the elongated black arrow running from my position (the white hand icon on the left) to his, indicating an instant kill.

I’m giggling again.  Hehehehe!