This is a pretty interesting post that deals with how one weblogger reacted to fame. I guess after a while you may forget just how many people are reading your thoughts. I think because of that I often don't post things that I may otherwise, I wouldn't want to shatter reader's expectations or turn them off because I did something they don't agree with. In retrospect that is probably not the best way to write a blog, but is complete honesty any better?

There is a cool 13 minute quicktime interview with REM on Rolling Stone's web site. It's sort of retrospect of their new album Reveal. You can check it out here.

I was bored on Monday so I wrote a quick story called Grace. It's up now so feel free to read it.

Yet another article on blogging: Blogging as a Form of Journalism. An interesting enough read and it makes some good points like established media is losing ground and not every blogger is a journalist.

Finally some recognition for my design skills,

(actually I think that last one is the nicest blog I have ever seen (and this is after a few days of exclusive blog surfing for design ideas))

, the last one being midnight inferno (via matt). To think I am wasting my time in CS at UW, I should have gone right into graphics. Maybe I should submit my design as a template to blogger. Maybe not, before you know it everyone would be using it.



Today only, you can lease the use of my site designs (new or old (150kb)). Why waste your time when you can waste your money? Buy now! Contact me with an offer.

Just got back from seeing Memento. It was a good movie because it had a great style that made me think. I am not too happy with how it ended, it started off so good and then just trailed off. What did you think of the movie?

This afternoon had been a frustrating one. I decided that I should run some errands because I had been pushing them off for a while. The first was deposit some money in the bank. The easiest one I thought. Boy was I wrong the whole thing took me almost a half and hour and by the time I waited in line 4 times. got a new bank card and got the correct instructions on how to set the new password. It really infuriates me, there I am waiting in line for a single ATM behind 4 people while there are 4 capable clerks in the bank. Yes we can see you...

I have finally figured out why I am having such a tough time with the ladies in the past months. Lack of effort is one but let us ignore that for now. The real reason is that all of my hot twenty-something ladies are looking past me and latching on to SMILTs (via Julie) . This in turn has caused all of the hot twenty-something men (I haven't tried this one yet) to go try on a Cougar (i posted this weeks ago but now it all makes sense).



When will order be restored? Why can't I have the hot twenty-something ladies and the SMILTS and Cougars can hook up?

Tomorrow is my first interview of the term so I thought I would get a few pointers. Not that I need the help but if you have any good ideas let me know. Here are some of the sites that seem useful so far.

• Tips on interviews and Group Discussions


• Some employment services site
• 
  
• Wet Feet's Tips


• Answers to technical interview questions The scary thing is the first questions I read I am positive have been on my UW assignments in the past. (courtesy of Matt)

Still trying to get into the swing of things this morning I am watching Of Mice & Men while surfing the web and keeping myself occupied. There was a quote to good not to pass on ...

I'll take a whore house any day. You get drunk and get it out of your system.

I may have paraphrased that a bit, but it still is funny.

So tired. I spent Saturday night abusing things that I shouldn't, and it has me feeling spacy today. I wouldn't say that I am hung over I am just not quite myself.

Emergency Exit is looking like a good place to explore. After following the first of the adventures of the 2 ex dot commers who are travelling the world I am sufficiently "hooked". So far they have been to Thailand and Hong Kong.

I am so close to finishing my assignment, I have taken my sweet time and not sacrificed other classes to complete it , which is a good thing because skipping one class for another is not a good habit to get into. This assignment has had a terrible side effect on me - I keep dreaming about scheme. Last night I was having a recursive dream. Is that even possible?



I'll make sure I kill off the recursive brain cells at tonight's keg party with some extra beer.

The weather this week has been very dull. It's not really raining that much but it feels like it has been for days. I like the rain once in a while but not everyday, but I miss the sun. The rain does have some benefits:

• The way you feel when you give in and let the rain fall over you. You lift your face to the sky and are greeted with hundreds of responses. A layer is lifted off of you as you walk in the rain. Especially summer rain, you would rather be outside and wet than inside and dry.


• The way you laugh when you see a dog walking in the rain. Every few steps the dog sniffs every possible crevace and then shakes viguorously trying to remove all the water. You laugh harder as the dog attempts to dry itself every minute or so.


• The way your friends scream at you when you jump in the middle of the puddle sending streams of water in every direction but your own.

Do you like the rain?

Ugh... things aren't going well now. Anyone an expert in scheme? If so how do I fix this error?

13 error> (satcom d)



;Aborting!: maximum recursion depth exceeded

I surf and I surf and I still have nothing to give to you. Where did all the content go? Maybe I didn't look hard enough, maybe it is somewhere under a rock in Canada. I promise to do better this weekend when I actually have time on my hands. I am still plugging away at my AI (artificial intelligence) assignment. I would tell you what is was about but it would involve a lot of math terms and cs terms and then I would get confused and tell you something that was wrong and then you would get mad at me like that time when billy gave you an automic-wedgie. (i'm rambling.. (brad sleep 8hours))

Sigh, not a single picture of me anywhere on the site. I know you are all upset that you can't look at the goodness that is me so here they are. These pictures were taken at the REM concert last week. It'll give you an idea of how big the crowd really was. Endless.








It's obvious which one I am right? If not email me and I'll tell you.

Woo hoo, I just finished one question on my assignment. It only took me 3 days to do and now I have 2 questions left to do in less than 24 hours. I guess I am taking a late on this assignment.

What is ICQ doing to me? Here I am trying to do this assignment that I have no idea how to start and the prof basically said that it was too late to start, and I can't connect to the world of support. ICQ is giving me the error "Server rate limit exceeded. Please try again later". That does me no good. So when I lose 10% of my final mark I guess I can blame it all on ICQ.

I might as well give my 2 cents on this whole Kaycee thing. If you don't know what I am talking about it doesn't really matter. It's probably not even worth getting caught up in. Maybe you would rather go watch some movie trailers. For those of you that do know what I am talking about you are probably tired of the whole thing and you can go watch trailers too.



Anyone left?



Anyway, this whole thing just has me going, your mother was right. You can't trust anyone, especially on the Internet. I am glad that I wasn't emotionally invested and I feel sorry for those that were. It probably put many through needless pain that could have been avoided. But, then I was thinking. Isn't a blog really just a form of entertainment. It's like a book that is updated everyday. There are many facets to each blog to create it's personality. As a reader it is up to you if you keep coming back to hear the latest events. Some blogs just have better stories and that is what Kaycee's blog was, a really good story that had people crying in the end. Does is really matter if it was real?

My procrastination has finally caught up to me. Whoever thought there was a benefit from putting things off was so wrong. Here I am trying to enjoy what is left of the May 2-4 weekend and I have entered panic mode for the upcoming days. I have a quiz to study for and an assignment to do. The problem is I have to code the assignment in scheme, some language I don't remember a thing about from 2 years ago.



You see procrastination has it's price. It's like a night of drinking. If you drink a little you get a buzz and you recover quickly the next day. Finish of that 26er of tequila and you'll be paying for it the rest of your life.

That was the best sleep I have had in about year. I just woke up now. I think it was the combination of how tired I was this weekend and the lovely rain that is falling. Today is a lazy rainy day. Too bad I have to study for a quiz tomorrow.

I am not dead, it's just within my reach. I have spent another weekend working except this time I had no sleep and had a 25th wedding annivery to go to. Tired, very tired am I.

That was the most expensive free concert that I have ever been to. REM put on a great show with an estimated 20,000 people there. You can read about it here. It was so awesome, we were maybe 50 feet away from Stipe himself. High Points of the concert experience:

• Stipe saying "Je suis un Canadien" (I am Canadian)


• Some girl saying Stipe made her wet


• The Rain


• Stipe throwing fruit into the crowd and then throwing the fruit bowl out to protect from the acid rain


• All the wonderful Music


• A wicked finale of "it's the end of the world...(as we know it and i feel fine)" that was very extended and involved Stipe climbing on TV's and playing his stomach like a Bongo


• And the music was incredible

Too bad you couldn't make it. Here comes the expensive part. I got a parking ticket and my Van was towed. It cost $180.00 in all. Let's not focus on that, it was a great experience I wouldn't trade for anything.

Some more information on tomorrow free REM concert in Toronto can be found here. They are estimating 10,000 fans, it should be a good time.

I hope I didn't offend anyone with the too many brads rant. I think it's funny, all my life I was the only Brad in my classes and group of friends. Now it seems like they are popping up everywhere. It's an invasion, I don't really want the name to catch on. I want it to be like me and be unique and not overdone.



Not too much is going on these days. I have no cute stories to tell about my adventures. Hopefully on Thursday I will. Instead I will tell other people's stories. My friends have a little dennis the menace in their neighbourhood. Yesterday he poked his head in through their window and then climbed in to chat with them. He tried on all their sunglasses, tormented their cats and then guessed that the 22 year old was 37. Little kids can be amusing can't they.

I hope I didn't offend anyone with the too many brads rant. I think it's funny, all my live I was the only Brad in my classes and group of friends. Now it seems like they are popping up everywhere. It's an invasion, I don't really want the name to catch on. I want it to be like me and be unique and not overdone.



Not too much is going on these days. I have no cute stories to tell about my adventures. Hopefully on Thursday I will. Instead I will tell other people's stories. My friends have a little dennis the menace in their neighbourhood. Yesterday he poked his head in through their window and then climbed in to chat with them. He tried on all their sunglasses, tormented their cats and then guessed that the 22 year old was 37. Little kids can be amusing can't they.

There are too many Brads on the web. To combat this I am making the web a No Brads club. I will be the only Brad. No others will be allowed. The club will be modelled after the No Homers club from the Simpsons.

I knew my time would come. One day almost a year ago (i'll let you know which day soon) I heard a voice say "if you build it she will come". That day has come, she has finally noticed me.

brad, i must admit that i have had a secret crush on you. my name is sarah michelle gellar.....and i have this fantasy of eating cheese with you.....right now i am wearing leather.....
you are so sexy and your site rocks

My day has finally come. All that hard work has paid off. I have reached my goal..... Unless this is someone's idea of a sick cruel joke.

It's here! Did you run out to get your copy? Last night we went to pick up our copies at HMV. There was quite the line but most people were there for Weezer or Depeche Mode and not REM. Anyway to help people scam free music I am posting the lifting from the new album. Feel free to download and sing along. (It's with the rest of the music on the left side)

Grounded, 5 a.m., the nightlite is comforting

but gravity is holding you.

Once settled into sleep,

you have watched

on repeat the story of your life

across the ceiling

and in review.



You've said the air was singing.

It's calling you, you don't believe.

These things you've never seen.



Good morning, how are you?

The weather's fine,

the sky is blue.

It's perfect for our seminar.



Now close your eyes and start to breathe,

allow the noise to recede,

allow yourself to drift and fly away.

But you just stay.



You've said the air was singing,

it's calling you, you don't believe

these things you've never seen,

never heard.



Did you hear these voices?

Did you hear these voices calling?

Did you hear these voices calling you?



Locked into a conference room,

we're only what our minds assume

and rationale is leaving you.



This conceit these systems of belief

Your counselor agrees

You always mark these boundaries now you're free

and with relief.



You've said the air was singing,

it's calling you, you don't believe

these things you've never seen,

never heard, never dreamed.



You said the air was singing,

it's calling you, you don't believe

these things you've never seen,

never heard, never dreamed.



Never, never, never...



Once you had a dream

of oceans and sunken cities,

memories of things you've never known

and you have left alone.

I had a teacher named Mr. Gay in highschool. Don't you think that name would have really sucked to have. You can just do so much to make fun of it. If you think that is bad what about the name Gay Ho. Her parents had no idea what they were doing. Do you have any other funny names to share?

At the market on Saturday someone made a strange offer. It was about 10 o'clock and I was still waiting for someone to pick me up so I was just sitting among the flowers and this tow truck operator comes up to me and asks how much the flowers are and then out of the blue goes "wanna get hi". I felt like I was stuck in an afternoon school special that had gone horribly wrong.

The trailer for American Pie 2 is out. Even if the movie sucks the trailer still is funny. Could you image if that really happened. Good news too, Jim is going to Band Camp!

It has been a long weekend and it's not over. I ended up working until 11 last night. How fun is that? Then I woke up at 5:30 to do a delivery. This was a good one, every year I do it the Nursery Manager always slips me something extra for helping out. Her reasoning is that if I weren't there she would have to pay someone else anyway. This morning she handed me an envelope and said to buy a nice breakfast. When I looked inside I saw that nice red (yes red, Canadian money is pretty) fifty dollar bill. I used it right away to buy the best breakfast I could find. McDonalds.

Not only is this request disturbing to me "free pics of girls taking shits", it's even more disturbing that I rank second in the search. Why? My theory is that since we blog often google can manage to pick out any phrase that it wants even if it is "free pics of girls taking shits". Great, now I have started a cycle next time someone searches for that I'll be number 1.

Ugh, getting up at 3:30 in the morning to go stand in a really big parking lot a.k.a the toronto food terminal a.k.a the market is not my idea of a fun Saturday morning. I was there selling flowers for my parents. The market is very multicultural with every race trying to ripe each other off to get the best bargain. The most amusing are the (fat) European men who try to be funny with their comments but mostly scare people.



I did get to hold lots of money, when I said I wanted a 10% cut I was denied. Apparently I am not worth as much as I think.



I also sharpened my bargaining skills. No one gets one over on me...

I can tell that I am really going to like the Music class that I am in this term. On Wednesday he made us sing and clap and he told all sorts of interesting stories. The dead give away was when I went to class and he was playing the Chemical Brothers.



Last night the text book for the class also taught me something new. Did you know that Rock'n'roll was originally an African American euphemism for sex?

Check this out, a Micheal Stipe quote, "its a blast to play it live even if its for tv. and it's going to be wild in toronto". Taken from here. Are you jealous now?

R.E.M. TO PERFORM FREE CONCERT IN DOWNTOWN TORONTO. This is the coolest thing ever. I am so there even if I have to skip a lot of classes to do it. Afterall it is the only North American performance for the year and I can go to it. How often does that happen? I am so pysched about this! Are you jealous?

I have to take all these personality tests for one of my classes so I thought that I would share the results. You may find them amusing.

• hardcore Type A personality


• big 5 (each out of 15): Extravert 12, Aggreable 12, Conscientous 11, Emotional Stability 11 & Openness to experience 11


• Meyers Briggs test says ENTP which I think is extrovert, intuitive, thinker and perceiver


• self Esteem 86/100


• high flexibility


• tendency towards creativess

I think I tested pretty well. I was worried about seeing suicidal tendancies or something like that.

Tall men have more children... (via Julie) This article was too good for me not ro post, after all I am 6'6". The article states the usual things such as tall people get instant respect and so on. I think the article is pretty one sided. No where do I see them letting the world know the pain we tall people go through trying to find a pair of pants long enough. Sure short people can't find them short enough but they can hem them. Tall people can't extend pants. Where is my article on the angst of tallness?

I think every student in coop at UW must complain about the experience at some point so I might as well get it over with. We have to use this stupid telnet system called access to look at jobs. It is the slowest and most archaic program ever. Waterloo a "leader in techology and innovation" can't even get a stupid web system together. They tried launching one last term but it was too faulty so they took it down. I can't believe how much money I pay the department to use a crappy system and get the run around all the time. I am so glad this is going to be my last placement before I graduate.

Are you looking for something to do. Something to make the day go a litte quicker. Something that will make you go "what the hell was that". If so check Animation Express it contains many animations that just may waste time and keep you entertained.

I wish all roads were parallel and perpendicular. Tonight I went to pick up a friend in Guelph and got lost on the way back to Waterloo based on her mother's shoddy directions. We ended up in who know the hell where. It was awful too because we would be like "this looks familiar, let's go a bit further". By the time you do that 10 times you are hopelessly lost and have to back track.



This is why I wish all streets/highways were in a grid pattern. Miss an exit, oh well just turn at the next one it'll get you there just as fast.

I am so tired today. Last night I had a "midnight inferno" episode. I have no idea what I was thinking about to keep me up put it did it's job well. Perhaps it was guilt over skipping my management sciences class. Nah, who could feel quilty over that. Tonight should be more relaxing with 2 dollar beers and a new episode of Buffy. (You can watch the trailer here)

I was just reading Strategy to woo diehard Mac fans starting to pay off for Microsoft at the National Post. Interesting in itself but I have some rather different opinions since I am a "die-hard mac fan".



"Bill Gates, by the way, is a huge Mac fan and he has a warm spot in his heart for the Mac platform, and it hurt him to see our customers suffering" This is why the article thinks (i could be mistaken) why Microsoft pumped 150 million into Apple in 1997. I could go off on some tangent that Microsoft needs Apple to develop cool new features that it can steal. That would be a little narrow minded. Just because someone invented the wheel first doesn't mean someone else wouldn't have. The only reason I think Microsoft needs Apple is because otherwise they would be a monopoly and that wouldn't be a good thing for anyone. They pumped in the money to assure that there would be a compeititve market. Maybe not a healthy market but at least their is a choice. Also, could you imagine the monopoly charges that would have been made against Microsoft if Apple weren't around.

Myst III is shipping today. This is causing a real dilema. I want to buy it because I liked playing the first two games so much, but the game is a real time sucker and is that what I really should be doing when I am suppose to be studying for school and the like.



Maybe I'll make a deal, if and when our cable is disconnected (we aren't paying for it right now, it is magically still hooked up but Tracy says it is some thing that they do after disconnection to lure in people) then I can buy the game. That way I can only waste my time on the game and not the game and tv.

I have been doing some site maintenance. Nothing big, just making it so everything says that I am back in Waterloo. I also managed to recover a desktop picture that I made a while ago but lost when my hard drive crashed 2 months ago. Anyway, you can grab it off the sidebar, it's fireball squared.

I posted a new song for download (left hand navigation bar). The band is the Sugababes and the song is Overload. I just find the song very addictive. I have no clue why. Here are the lyrics as usual.

Strange fear I ain't felt for years

The boy's coming and I'm close to tears

I can't let go of you now



Imagination's playing round for free

In my world I take him out for tea

Oh my God, can't say no



Skipping school, go walk for air

I just had to get out of bed

I'm on overload in my head



Train comes I don't know its destination

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation

Train comes I don't know its destination

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation



Life is a dream, time does come true

And in my sleep I think of you

Feather bed by myself



Basically probability

Says that fate's come side with me

It's been so long on my shelf



Train comes I don't know its destination

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation

Train comes I don't know its destination

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation



The tension is incredible, boy I'm in charge

You know how I feel for you,

Will you stop, or will you just keep going

Please don't say no, no, no, no



Train comes I don't know its destination

(Yeah yeah yeah)

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation

(Situation)

Train comes I don't know its destination

(I know, I know)

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation

(Situation)



Train comes I don't know its destination

(Our secret's safe in bed)

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation

(Situation)

Train comes I don't know its destination

(I know, I know)

It's a one-way ticket to a madman's situation

(Got me feeling bad)

So we went to the Bomber last night. It's the campus pub for those of you too lazy to click. It was a great night. It's that night when you seem to be reunited with everyone. It was a great time. There was a lot of grinding. I always seemed to be in the middle of it too.



I love nights like that. You are in this little bubble of happiness. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks about you, you just keep on doing the things that make you happy. Even if that is smoking on the patio after they asked you to leave.

I was just checking my messages on my phone to see who the hell had woken me up at 2:30 in the morning last night. It was my brother. I guess he decided that since he is turning 26 that he should go out with a bang. He left 3 messages. All insanely early in the morning, I wish I had known it was him I could have called at 6 west coast time to wake him up. The messages themselves were pretty funny. A lot of "iluvu's" and drunken drivel as each of his friends left me a greeting that consisted of "Wazzups" and "How are you doing?(s)".


Now I have 3 years to plan the perfect revenge. What shall I do?

I finally broke down and bought a printer. I went with the epson 777 it was 20 dollars cheaper than the 777i. I wanted the cool plastics of the 777i but I am a poor student I should really save my money.

Is there anything Britney can't do? Would you like to learn more about semiconductor physics? Go here and Britney can show you the ropes.

Last night's class went a little better than music on Wednesday. We waited 15 miuntes and then realized that the 20 of us had been in the wrong room. Laurier had listed 2 rooms and we were in the wrong one.

Check out this review of R.E.M's new album Reveal. It's sure to get the new music juices flowing.

How advanced do you think robotics exactly is? Today in my A.I. class we watched a video on Minerva. She is/was a robotic tour guide at the Smithsonian. This article at Wired sums things up nicely.



It's too bad there hasn't been any major advancements for the field in the last three years. Mental note: when I finally do create an army of minions they should contain some major advancement.

Third day of school and I already feel like I am behind in everything. I guess it doesn't help when you are surfing the net when you really should be doing reading. Anyway, if you have high speed check out Nibblebox. It has flash stories, I have checked out a few and they seem pretty funny so far.

That was an easy night class. After waiting a half hour the prof still hadn't shown up so we left. A bit of a let down after a few weeks of hearing all good things about the class. Will I never know if the stories are true? Does the prof really smoke up before lecture?

Did anyone see Tracy naked yesterday? While she was unpacking I was fooling around on her computer and asked her if I could turn on her web cam. Half thinking she said yes and the cam left her mind again. A half hour later I heard a scream and a never-turn-my-cam-on-again yell (not quite that because I am paraphrasing but you get the point). Tracy was about to take a shower and had stripped down right in front of the cam not remembering that it was on. Needless to say seconds later she was checking to make sure there was no evidence left of her nakedness on the server.



So, the call goes out. If anyone caught a naked pic send it my way. It will make great blackmail material someday.

Some maintence and a new story for you. Nothing is something I put together when I was bored at work one afternoon last month. Not a stellar piece but it will occupy your time.

I guess I should be happy that my site is finally coming up in the search engines. Especially since I moved to this domain from the school servers not too long ago. But, if you came here looking for "boy sex slave" or "free big pitchers porn" you are in the wrong place. You did give me a laugh though, you didn't spell pictures correctly.

I have been using a computer for way too long. When I am taking notes by hand in class it feels very weird. It's a forced action to write rather than something that comes naturally like typing.

Woke up feeling pretty good this morning considering the activities of the night before. I was pretty toasted but I stopped at the ideal point for a quick recovery. It all started with 2 dollar beers at the bar next door. Then we came back to watch the new Buffy episode. Which was very good but I won't spoil for you. At this point I polished off half a 26er of Vodka. Good thing I can take my alcohol well, otherwise I would be hurting like Ryan.



First day of school was pretty good. I had database management and A.I. (artificial intelligence). It looks like this AI class won't be able to teach me how to build an army of minions to do my bidding. Maybe that's taught in the graduate level.

Why am I frisky when I am drunk?

Because I am such an apple fanatic I get really excited when a new product is announced. The iBook is no different. This especially appeals to me with my student budget. The new design doesn't remind me toliet seat like the last one. The only thing I would like to see is a 14" monintor but if you want that I guess you will have to suffer with the Titanium Powerbook.


(The following was not a paid advertisement)