Ok, so I'm done the Office (until those writer's get their act together and write me some more episodes or I find the British version somewheres around here) and now I can start posting on here again.
I've begun to hang out with a couple of the guys from work - which has been pretty sweet - except that it means that I have suffered great financial loss from an underground gambling ring that we started. You're probably wondering what shady sport we might be gambling on: pit fighting, cock fighting, crab racing... NOPE, none of those. We were betting on Wrestling.
Not Olympic Wrestling. Pre-planned scripted wrestling (don't tell Kerry). FROM 1991! That we'd all read the results from (but couldn't remember - or at least that's what we claimed - I $1 because I remembered that the Mountine beat Tito Santana). With all that said, I'm down $9. It's been a rough week, payday couldn't come soon enough.
Everyone needs to see Hercules The Movie / Goes Bananas / In New York. It's the one and only movie by the Thespian Arnold Strong (later Arnold Schrawhjhgahnegger). It's one of the funniest things that I have ever witnessed. Just ask Coffey. You'll learn a lot about the bible (like the lesser-known crossover adventures of Greek Mythology and Bible Personas).
The Great Wireless Hunt.
So today the wireless at work was acting a fool, so a few people were looking for it. That's right. No one at work knows where the wireless hub is. They spent hours searching for it. They even had one of the IT guys looking around with a laptop to see if he could find it, to no avail, he even found it to be on the move - it must have been swallowed by a rat or sewer gator. It kind of reminded me of some of the tense motion-detector scenes from ALIENS.
Later we received a company-wide email asking if we had any information about the location of the router. I feel like doing a ransom note up for it.
Was it really that great? No.
1.23.2008
1.11.2008
1.05.2008
"Christmas" report
Lord Kerrance here (that was for you, Annie). You may be wondering why no one has posted in a while. That's probably what you're doing if you're here. Or perhaps you're drunk and were looking for the Barstow blog, and you were really excited since the last time you were there they hadn't updated since 2001. Sorry friend, you've stumbled into the wrong place. But stay! We have party snacks and Twister.
Anyway, us Bairstoaways have been busy. As I sit here I can hear melodiuos strains from Caleb's room as he multitasks doing some freelance work AND installing a Mac OS on a non-Mac laptop (which is akin to stuffing prime steak with stale pretzels, but that's my opinion. The right opinion, if you're wondering). Luke is off in Tha Hamma, meaning we're sure to get 200 cm of snow. I have been feverishly learning two songs on guitar while memorizing a new verse for a hip-hop show I'm performing at tonight. But I need a break, so I thought I'd let you know the results of the 1st Annual Bairstow Celebration of Roughly The 1040th Anniversary of the Completely Arbitrary, Decidedly Fake Birthday Of Jesus Which Was Put In Place To Compete With A Pagan Festival Happening At The Same Time Thereabouts (ABCOTOAOTCADFBOJWWPIPTCWAPFHATSTT for short). Or as the less historically-savvy call it, Christmas Gift Exchange.
First up was a chocolate selection from our landlords, who are awesome. The chocolate almost lasted a week.
Then it was time for The Leb's gifts to me and Mook, both wrapped in suspicious manila packages. We opened it up to find that we had been granted a joint subscription to Modern Drummer magazine (stop laughing, it's a real magazine. For serious). Although I appreciate the gift, I can't help but wonder if this is a sinister plot on Caleb's part to slowly turn Luke and I against each other each months as we fight over who gets to read about random session drummers and drumkits made out of trash cans and old refrigerators first.
Then came my gifts to Caleb and Luke. I got Luke an Iron Maiden mug, which immediately became known as "The Chalice of Metal". Elaborate rituals shall abound on Metal Mondays. I got Caleb and anti-theft device in the form of a $20 iTunes card. I had hoped to derail his Interweb Piracy for a little while, but as of this writing he has already spent the whole thing, mostly on Gary Neuman.
Finally came Mook's gifts to me and the Leb. We both got DVDs: Caleb got a set about space, furthering his dreams to one day be an astronaut. I got the Simpsons Movie, furthering my desire to one day have jaundice.
Yes, the first ABCOTOAOTCADFBOJWWPIPTCWAPFHATSTT was a success. Many happy returns to you and yours.
Anyway, us Bairstoaways have been busy. As I sit here I can hear melodiuos strains from Caleb's room as he multitasks doing some freelance work AND installing a Mac OS on a non-Mac laptop (which is akin to stuffing prime steak with stale pretzels, but that's my opinion. The right opinion, if you're wondering). Luke is off in Tha Hamma, meaning we're sure to get 200 cm of snow. I have been feverishly learning two songs on guitar while memorizing a new verse for a hip-hop show I'm performing at tonight. But I need a break, so I thought I'd let you know the results of the 1st Annual Bairstow Celebration of Roughly The 1040th Anniversary of the Completely Arbitrary, Decidedly Fake Birthday Of Jesus Which Was Put In Place To Compete With A Pagan Festival Happening At The Same Time Thereabouts (ABCOTOAOTCADFBOJWWPIPTCWAPFHATSTT for short). Or as the less historically-savvy call it, Christmas Gift Exchange.
First up was a chocolate selection from our landlords, who are awesome. The chocolate almost lasted a week.
Then it was time for The Leb's gifts to me and Mook, both wrapped in suspicious manila packages. We opened it up to find that we had been granted a joint subscription to Modern Drummer magazine (stop laughing, it's a real magazine. For serious). Although I appreciate the gift, I can't help but wonder if this is a sinister plot on Caleb's part to slowly turn Luke and I against each other each months as we fight over who gets to read about random session drummers and drumkits made out of trash cans and old refrigerators first.
Then came my gifts to Caleb and Luke. I got Luke an Iron Maiden mug, which immediately became known as "The Chalice of Metal". Elaborate rituals shall abound on Metal Mondays. I got Caleb and anti-theft device in the form of a $20 iTunes card. I had hoped to derail his Interweb Piracy for a little while, but as of this writing he has already spent the whole thing, mostly on Gary Neuman.
Finally came Mook's gifts to me and the Leb. We both got DVDs: Caleb got a set about space, furthering his dreams to one day be an astronaut. I got the Simpsons Movie, furthering my desire to one day have jaundice.
Yes, the first ABCOTOAOTCADFBOJWWPIPTCWAPFHATSTT was a success. Many happy returns to you and yours.
12.30.2007
Hermit
So with Christmas comes loneliness. At least it does if you're like me and your stupid housemates decide they want to spend holidays with their families (italics in this case indicate a snivelly, nasal tone reserved for mocking someone for choosing something pansy-like [ballet, let's say] over something manly-like [Ultimate Fighting, per se]). They chose family instead of chillin' like a villain with me at Casa Bairstowaway with me. So, here is the complete list of things I have done in my utter solitude these last two weeks at home:
*Cleaned my room
*Cleaned bathroom
*Vacuumed living room
* four loads of laundry (including bedsheets)
* Watched the entire Star Wars trilogy (not end to end, but in my proudest moment I spent the tail-end of Christmas Eve watching Return Of The Jedi after church. Stupid Ewoks).
* Thus inspired, played through and beat Jedi Knight II: Jedi Academy for X-Box (on Jedi Knight difficulty. I've only ever beat it on Padawan before).
* Played the longest game of online Scrabble ever with Paddy (it's been like the full two weeks)
* Learned how to play "Brick" by Ben Folds Five, "Breakaway" by Kelly Clarkson, and "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley on guitar
* Watched the Conan O'Brien 10th anniversary DVD my brother got me for Christmas
* Watched The Commitments
* Watched Ocean's Thirteen
* Watched various episodes of Scrubs and The Office
* Made a survey about "An Acoustic/Indie Christmas" on createsurvey.com and had fun cross referencing the results
* Wrote rambling blog about car thieves and why I stole thumbtacks from Zellers
* Made nachos
* Made Kraft Dinner (2x)
* Ate a whole box of Mini-Wheats
* Made banana-orange smoothies
* Watched and re-watched videos of "An Acoustic/Indie Christmas" so as to over-analyze my harmonies and facial expressions
I think that covers it.
*Cleaned my room
*Cleaned bathroom
*Vacuumed living room
* four loads of laundry (including bedsheets)
* Watched the entire Star Wars trilogy (not end to end, but in my proudest moment I spent the tail-end of Christmas Eve watching Return Of The Jedi after church. Stupid Ewoks).
* Thus inspired, played through and beat Jedi Knight II: Jedi Academy for X-Box (on Jedi Knight difficulty. I've only ever beat it on Padawan before).
* Played the longest game of online Scrabble ever with Paddy (it's been like the full two weeks)
* Learned how to play "Brick" by Ben Folds Five, "Breakaway" by Kelly Clarkson, and "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley on guitar
* Watched the Conan O'Brien 10th anniversary DVD my brother got me for Christmas
* Watched The Commitments
* Watched Ocean's Thirteen
* Watched various episodes of Scrubs and The Office
* Made a survey about "An Acoustic/Indie Christmas" on createsurvey.com and had fun cross referencing the results
* Wrote rambling blog about car thieves and why I stole thumbtacks from Zellers
* Made nachos
* Made Kraft Dinner (2x)
* Ate a whole box of Mini-Wheats
* Made banana-orange smoothies
* Watched and re-watched videos of "An Acoustic/Indie Christmas" so as to over-analyze my harmonies and facial expressions
I think that covers it.
12.26.2007
12.25.2007
A little message
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!
Bets wishes to all of ye during Christmas. Hopefully you can all enjoy it with your family and friends.
Bets wishes to all of ye during Christmas. Hopefully you can all enjoy it with your family and friends.
12.23.2007
Why I Should Never Be On A Jury (or, Kerry Is No Better Than A Car Thief)
I have a new obsession. Over the last couple of days I've watched every video on http://www.baitcar.com/. Allow me to explain. British Columbia has the highest rate of auto theft in Canada. To combat theft, the police have started placing "bait cars" in high risk areas. When a bait car gets snatched, the police can remotely cut the engine at any time, making it easy to catch the offenders. Baitcar.com posts videos of these offenders as they steal the car, converse, and occasionally smoke crack until the engine is cut, when they invariably freak out (actually, it's not invariably; there's one where a guy starts reading a book, waiting for the police to call him out of the car. You have to be impressed by that kind of stoicism). A lot of the videos are played for laughs, including one where the theives joke about how funny it would be if they wound up on baitcar.com (while assuring themselves that the car they lifted is too "teenager-ed out" to be bait).
I'd like to say that the process has been educational, but it hasn't. Aside from a new verb ("gumping", the meaning of which I have yet to grasp) I haven't learned much. I had high hopes that maybe I would get a small glimpse into what drives (HIYO) these people to steal. Baitcar correctly identifies the link between drug use and car theft, but that wasn't quite what I was looking for. Drugs are the end that these people have chosen. I was wondering why they chose stealing cars as their means.
I'll be honest: I have stolen. When I was around 13 I had a summer of petty theft that was ridiculous. I stole stuff I wanted, like magazines, tapes (which were way easier to steal than CDs), video games and chocolate bars. I also stole stuff I didn't want just for the thrill of it: shoelaces, coin rolls, and at one high point, a box of thumbtacks (which I only just recently threw away). I understand the rush of stealing something, but for some reason there is a marked difference between stealing what I stole and stealing a car, and it's something besides the obvious fact that a car costs a lot more than a box of thumbtacks (unless, of course, you drive a Geo).
Honestly, and this is something I'm not particularly proud of, what makes what I did more acceptable in my mind is the difference between stealing from someone and stealing from something. If I steal a car, I'm stealing from a person (like me). If I steal from a store, I'm (more than likely) stealing from a corporation. And this is what I'll never understand about car thieves, or muggers, or home invaders: how they can so brazenly impose their will on another person and not feel bad about it (or at least, bad enough to stop what they're doing; I do plenty of things I feel bad about, just not bad enough). Do they not think about the inconvienience, the sense of impotence, the fear they put into people? What safety valve in their brain do they close off in order to allow themselves to take a car, a wallet, a television? That's what I was hoping to discover on Baitcar: the root of a car thief's self-entitlement.
I guess what I have learned is that I do not have a perfect compass of morality. I have personally committed the same act as the people on these videos and even though I understand why both my and their acts are wrong, I still do not understand why they do it as opposed to why I did it. There are a lot of reasons I did what I did, none of them any good. Sometimes it was becuase I was hungry (or, I should say, the North American suburban teenager version of hungry, where I casually wanted something to eat because I wanted it), because I was bored, or because I couldn't afford something I wanted. And I've seen some similar reason on Baitcar: some guys were going to strip it for parts to sell, some guys needed to get somewhere, and one guy even did it so he could give a buddy a lift home. Just because I can say with (relative) safety that I wouldn't or couldn't do what the people on the site do doesn't mean that I am free or clear, or better than they are. I have just as much self-entitlement as they do; I just express it differently (mostly by imposing music on people in the car, but in other ways too). If I wanted to be super philo-ma-sophical, I could ask if having a car means you have a sense of entitlement to that car, but considering that generally someone has paid for you to have that car, that entitlement is somewhat earned.
My point is, I think I was hoping to identify and discover what the difference is between me and the people of Baitcar, and since the only difference i could find isn't really a difference except in the way I react to it, there isn't much difference. I can either try to deny those feelings of self-entitlement, or I can start getting good with a screwdriver and find me a sweet Lexus.
I'd like to say that the process has been educational, but it hasn't. Aside from a new verb ("gumping", the meaning of which I have yet to grasp) I haven't learned much. I had high hopes that maybe I would get a small glimpse into what drives (HIYO) these people to steal. Baitcar correctly identifies the link between drug use and car theft, but that wasn't quite what I was looking for. Drugs are the end that these people have chosen. I was wondering why they chose stealing cars as their means.
I'll be honest: I have stolen. When I was around 13 I had a summer of petty theft that was ridiculous. I stole stuff I wanted, like magazines, tapes (which were way easier to steal than CDs), video games and chocolate bars. I also stole stuff I didn't want just for the thrill of it: shoelaces, coin rolls, and at one high point, a box of thumbtacks (which I only just recently threw away). I understand the rush of stealing something, but for some reason there is a marked difference between stealing what I stole and stealing a car, and it's something besides the obvious fact that a car costs a lot more than a box of thumbtacks (unless, of course, you drive a Geo).
Honestly, and this is something I'm not particularly proud of, what makes what I did more acceptable in my mind is the difference between stealing from someone and stealing from something. If I steal a car, I'm stealing from a person (like me). If I steal from a store, I'm (more than likely) stealing from a corporation. And this is what I'll never understand about car thieves, or muggers, or home invaders: how they can so brazenly impose their will on another person and not feel bad about it (or at least, bad enough to stop what they're doing; I do plenty of things I feel bad about, just not bad enough). Do they not think about the inconvienience, the sense of impotence, the fear they put into people? What safety valve in their brain do they close off in order to allow themselves to take a car, a wallet, a television? That's what I was hoping to discover on Baitcar: the root of a car thief's self-entitlement.
I guess what I have learned is that I do not have a perfect compass of morality. I have personally committed the same act as the people on these videos and even though I understand why both my and their acts are wrong, I still do not understand why they do it as opposed to why I did it. There are a lot of reasons I did what I did, none of them any good. Sometimes it was becuase I was hungry (or, I should say, the North American suburban teenager version of hungry, where I casually wanted something to eat because I wanted it), because I was bored, or because I couldn't afford something I wanted. And I've seen some similar reason on Baitcar: some guys were going to strip it for parts to sell, some guys needed to get somewhere, and one guy even did it so he could give a buddy a lift home. Just because I can say with (relative) safety that I wouldn't or couldn't do what the people on the site do doesn't mean that I am free or clear, or better than they are. I have just as much self-entitlement as they do; I just express it differently (mostly by imposing music on people in the car, but in other ways too). If I wanted to be super philo-ma-sophical, I could ask if having a car means you have a sense of entitlement to that car, but considering that generally someone has paid for you to have that car, that entitlement is somewhat earned.
My point is, I think I was hoping to identify and discover what the difference is between me and the people of Baitcar, and since the only difference i could find isn't really a difference except in the way I react to it, there isn't much difference. I can either try to deny those feelings of self-entitlement, or I can start getting good with a screwdriver and find me a sweet Lexus.
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