Output Stream of Consciousness

Just a small rant this time.

Construction speed zone signs. Definitely saw, this weekend, an utter lack of respect for them.

Was it, however, a deserved lack of respect?

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I've wanted to spill my personal philosophy for some time now. It's made a little harder in that, not having taken Philosophy of any sort, I lack some of the spot-on philosophy - I wouldn't know Logical Positivism from a hole in the ground.

That said, I think in many ways, Empiricism is as good a label as any, but even Empiricism casts a pretty wide net, so I'm going to have to chip at the sides of the stone to get the shape I wish to convey.

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Gustafson's zoo, a.k.a. the "GuZoo", just north of Three Hills, Alberta, has had more than its share of controversy. It has been accused of neglect, inadequate shelter, and the like. It's still on the dirty side in a number of spots, but in general feels more like a farm. It didn't seem all that bad in person, though certain not comparable to the Calgary Zoo, and it's much more hands-on than any other zoo is likely to be, so I'll just report on my experience there.

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Link: http://www.dnagardens.com/

We set out early on Saturday, dropped the doggles off with Dena's parents, and headed north on Highway 21 to Elnora. Our destination: D'n'A Gardens, purveyors of prairie-hardy fruit trees.

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Just a little something that always creeps me out in movie theaters...

They often have slides of trivia, ads and the like before the movie starts...

...but watch. Look at the cups of pop. Now wait. Look at the next cups of pop you see. See the splash? It's the same splash. They've been using the same splash on their cups of cola for years. Oooooo, scary!

How hard could it be to make cola do a cool splash? Why is it the same one (they even edit the darned cup, but not the splash!) after all these years?

I've been noticing some low-carb products disappearing, some becoming harder to find, although there's still a trickle of new products.

Now, low-carb eating is still a mighty effective way to lose or maintain weight. So why aren't we seeing low-carb products win out the same way low-fat products did?

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Link: http://www.freakonomics.com/

I really like the cover on this book. Apples to oranges - cute, I get it :) (NOTE: The paperbacks I saw overseas don't have this mutated-fruit cover)

This marks the first time that I've bought a book because I saw the author on The Daily Show. Sosumi; it sounded pretty interesting.

This isn't a book about capital-E dollar-sign-instead-of-an-S ol' boring Economic$, this is a book about the human side of economics, the economies of cheating, incentive, fear and information.

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Link: http://vanishingrabbit.com/

My fiancé was giving me a ride down Centre Street N, which has a hodgepodge of old stores, small businesses and restaurants along its length, when I spotted what appeared to be a magic store. "A magic store," I effused as we passed it, after already noting a number of cool spots along Centre during our driver, "we will have to remember to come back along here."

Dena paused, then made the next right, and smiled, and we went around the block. Indeed, would we otherwise remember to come back?

It was, indeed, a magic store. Entirely dedicated to magic.

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I love languages. I love learning languages. So it will come as no surprise that I own quite a few language-learning books.

It's a very uneven field of quality and helpfulness out there. Sometimes you can weed them out by thumbing through them in the stores, sometimes it's a book-and-tape-only combination that you have to take a chance on, and sometimes, you only find out about the problems when you've gone a few chapters into the books.

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I picked this up on sale; a quick flip through the book gave me an inkling is was a good book. Indeed, it is.

Bob Flowerdew, with his all-too-appropriate-sounding name (though a web search turns out other people with the same last name) is a popular organic gardener in the UK. The title, as you might figure, is a misnomer; the only 'no-work' garden is one you completely ignore. That said, he certainly focuses on ways out of the back-breaking labour gardens sometimes entail.

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This... is an intriguing movie. Violent, gory, mostly black-and-white with spots of colour, stylized, film noir. It's a living, gangster comic book with a sassy edge. Ang Lee's The Hulk got the comic book feel down with camera shots. This doesn't have the camera shots, but it has everything else.

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Was reading through an entry on Tom's blog re: music theory, and was inspired to dredge up one of my own pet hypotheses.

The hypothesis, and I'd be surprised if it hasn't been investigated, is that harmonics in music reflect the more subtle harmonics that reflect emotions in speech.

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As far as Calgary garden centers go, I really like this quirky, small garden center out in Bowness.

It's shocking how much the employees like plants. No, love plants. I swear they'd take them all home if they could. They can identify most plants at ten paces, it seems. For all their lack of room, they make up for it by bringing in interesting plants.

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I am glad that Terri can finally rest in peace. I hope that Michael can heal, and that the parents can finally start coming to terms with her passing.

Not two days afterwards, Pope John Paul II, an extremely engaging emissary of the Catholic faith, also passed away.

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Okay, okay, everyone and their dog has weighed in on this case already, but it has been much on my mind.

What should have remained a relatively local, personal tragedy has turned into the a bigger battle cry for 'human rights' than Rwanda ever did.

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