Electrifying. Power On.

Actually, the power in my building was... flickering last evening.

It was kind of neat to see the whole building without power. Kinda like how you'd want a huge flood//snowstorm to hit your city. Something about similar people facing similar hardships, and therefore have similar/relate-able experiences. I reckon that I'd be pissed off if it becomes a common occurrence.

Pokemon Pearl.

I'm finished with this game. Beat the Elite Four today, and completed my regional Pokedex.



It provides me no additional pleasure.

I'm gonna stop playing.

17 KM trek today.

I went on a 17km Trek today with my room-mate Matt, his supervisor Travis, and co-worker Reena(sp).

It was at the Wasiti (sp) Onion lakes. I didn't get any pictures (due to the camera problem), but Matt did, so I might throw them up later.

It was an average distance, according to more experienced hikers. The main problem was that the trail was intruded by snow, and makeshift rivers of melt-water.

The trail was nice, and I think that's enough of an exercise for the entire week.


Other:
I finished reading the book "Contact" by Carl Sagan. I see that the book is based on realistic sciences, and that the plot is carefully weaved (the Pi thing was especially interesting), but it didn't seem to be that interesting to me. I don't know.

3 Things I intend to buy in the near future.

With my job coming along pretty well, and with my first paycheck of roughly 1000 dollars, I have decided that I want to buy these things in the future.

 

1) A 30-ish GB iPod. The 4GB 4th Gen Mini is officially broken. For about four months now, the mini has been on the fritz. The battery of the unit was faulty. Within 1-3 hours of use, the unit will undergo many bouts of "Low Power", which will inevitably stop the song and shut down. I know that this isn't true because I can sometimes restart it and continue using it for another 1-2hours. Most of the time, though, it just continues the "No Power" fascade.

 

2) A (digital) camera of my own. It doesn't need to be fancy. Something with 5+ Mega Pixies will be fine with me. The one I am using right now is basically broken. That's all. I'm not sure of any branding so far.

 

3) A DS Lite. My current DS is frankly getting old. I could use the brighter screen and what not. My only concern is that Nintendo might do some stealth announcements about the next system, though the timing doesn't exactly make sense (as the DS is really selling in volumes of the Library of Congress). However, it has been two-ish years since its release, so maybe it is the perfect time.

 

 

Note: The Wii isn't really that appealing to me right now. I'm not too sure that I can get my hands on one anyway.

 

 

Bonus) In the far future (but not too far), I intend to buy either a) a mediocre current-gen desktop computer, or b) a more game-able notebook and 'sell' my current one to my sister for half-ish price.

Send me stuff.

I need (want) somebody to send me media files. I just can't get my torrents to work here.

Help.

Shows:
Smallville (Last two episodes of the season)

Doctor Who Series 3 (Finishing Soon)
The 4400 Season 4 ( Beginning in July)

That's all I can think of right now.

Leave me a message if you wish to help and I can provide further details.

Starcraft 2?

Meh.

I'd much prefer a MMO game.

But then again, it won't matter until it comes out. I won't be spending my precious time speculating on a game that will be delayed (and you know that Blizzard will delay it!) over and over again.

Everything about Surveying.

A Surveyor (at least at the Wolverine Mine at Tumbler Ridge) is all about interacting between the Engineering department and the Field departments. They're the physical representation of the Engineers because they're the ones who are interacting with the crew. They're responsible for labeling points in the real world with relevant information. This information includes the intersection of different ore bodies, location of intended drill holes, and the edges of proposed roads.

The main tool of a surveyor is the GPS staff. It is a two metre stick with an attachment in the middle. This is where the portable hand-held GPS unit sits.

To get around the mine, we use pick-up trucks. It is driven directly to the location on most areas of the mine. There are no helicopters. On the occasional road staking (That is, putting wooden stakes with instructions of whether or not the elevation is correct at the level), the truck would be parked nearby and then the rest would be taken on foot (since the road isn't complete).

Other tools of a surveyor are:
- Spray Paint Canister
- Wooden Stakes
- Black thick felt(ish) pen

On the stakes would be written its designation (A1, A2, A3... etc) and its elevation difference (cut or fill). The Spray Paint is used to mark the exact spot that the drillers need to drill.  Without these marked, the drillers can't properly drill. The Blast Crew can't blast non-existent holes. The Shovels can't shovel hard rock. The Haul Trucks have nothing to Haul. There would be nothing.

Three Realizations.

It is nigh impossible to get any kind of Highspeed internet here, not because of the remoteness of the location, nor because of the exorbadant cost, but rather because it is impossible to get the rights to set up the equipment without the ownership of the property. High speed internet here is provided by the PRIS (Peace River Internet Service?) and is only available as wireless radio-satellite. My fellow co-worker, who is also a UBC Engineer student, has been here for seven months and he has not been able to travel through all of the hoops to get to the person in charge. (We live in an Apartment owned by the Strata company, which rents out to a house rental company, and then to our respective company.) The real problem is that those people in charge (of our company) don't know and don't care to find out about the person from which we need authorization.

Not that I need it. Ever since I got this job, I have come to several realizations.

1. I don't have a lot of time left after factoring in Work, Cooking, Laundry, etc. Oh, and Sleeping.

2. If one doesn't care about watching Videos or Gaming on the Internet, a fast and steady connection is not required.

3. This job is dirty.

I've included more images, mostly from my trip to Tumbler Ridge Point. Nice place, but I don't know if it is worth the time it takes to get there.

PS. My connection is really flaky. I was able to download an episode of Lost (~100MB, torrents) over ~20 hours. There are times when I see that it reaches 70KBps. Right now, it isn't even moving at any speed.

Crash course at Surveying.

I never appreciated the work that a Surveyer does at a Mine. I spent the day with Dan, the EIT surveyor from Queens. We went up the mountain on the trucks and probably labeled approximately 150 drill holes. It was a really time-consuming work. Basically, there is a GPS device which measures location and elevation. We were responsible for labeling locations with wooden stakes (with a sharpee from "A1" to however many rows and columns there are) of where the holes would be drilled. These holes will later be filled with an explosive and blasted together at once.

The information from the GPS device is then taken back to the office and uploaded onto the computer. Once modified, the work plans are updated and the information is given to the people working on the drills.

This isn't just about marking locations for people to dig. The distances between the markers have a huge significance as that will determine how fragmented the rocks are at the end.

More Unrelated Photographs.

Orientation.

Today was the first day of my job at Tumbler Ridge. It started rough because I didn't know exactly how I was going to get there. It turns out that there is a van that ferries people to the office. I just have to stand outside of my apartment at 7:15. Neat.

The rest of the day sucked. I spent around 6 hours in orientation. This involved watching idiots get cut by meat-grinders and how we're not supposed to do that. It also included a "Pit Driving Exam", which was meh. I took two trips into the pits and I have to say that the whole thing is really bumpy.

Well, at least I get paid.

I will be following an EIT (Engineer-In-Training) tomorrow doing Blast Patterns and GPS data collection. I will be probably doing that all Summer. Aye.

The same people leave the mine at 4:30 and reaches town right at 5 pm. Travel time isn't that bad.

PS. I got myself a mailing address now.

More unrelated photos

Smalltown mentality.

I don't know if this has to do with me being Asian, or just new, but every time I pass someone by, they smile and nod at me as if they approve of what I'm doing.

But what am I actually doing? Walk around? Is it that amazing?

Another thing I've noticed aside from the obscene percentage of trucks is the number of fat kids on the street. It is unhealthy and sickening. By my count, four out of nine kids I saw were proportionally obese. And by obese, I mean fatter than I am. I don't know why this could happen.

The Cost of Living.

This way of life is starting to get to me. My apartment-mate Matt seems to be an uber outdoor type of guy. He brought two bikes, a canoe, fishing gear, and various other things. He also happens to be a pretty hardcore cook (read: hardcore compared to me).

The really neat thing about this town is that the local grocery store is so close. I'm practically living at the city centre where there are ~20-30 different stores Food here costs more, as expected. A loaf of bread at 1.59 . 4L Milk at 4.99.

Aside from food, I don't see myself spending much money on anything.

The community centre is pretty awesome. There is a library, an ice rink, basketball courts and tennis courts. There is even a full scale swimming pool.

Unrelated images here.

Spiderman 3.

I didn't like it.

Far too many plots crammed into one. Not a whole lot of new Gadgets. Norman/Harry's storyline = bleh.

Day 120

At the Airport

Airport Security is kind of ridiculous. Or, at least, my parents. They told me that I needed to be there at the airport two hours earlier just to be safe. Two hours/ Alright. Air Canada recommends that I get there 1.5 hours earlier Minimum.

I arrived at the airport ~12:05pm. I finished checking in and was waiting at 12:30pm.

So, in general, this was good.

Security was kind of lax, which is a good sign. The wait time was short, which is also good. I spent the rest of the wait time watching my "recorded" version of the latest Smallville.

On The Airplane

I wasn't able to use my notebook at all on the airplane. Those people wouldn't even let me use my iPod.

Does the music from my puny headphones impact their sensitive instruments? Because that's all the machine is emiting. The flight took 1h9m.

The Ride to my Home

It took two hours. The guy who drove us was an old-ish man with a messy beard. Due to the fact that I couldn't hear him over the hum of the huge truck, and the fact that I'm insanely introverted, there was barely any conversation. The student I was travelling with (Karl) also seems to be really introverted too.

Yep.

My New Home.

I swear, the room is built exactly like what Lysandra's back in Richmond Centre. Seriously, guys. It is like exactly the same. I haven't been able to find a hotspot yet. There are a lot of wireless signals flying across, but I haven't been able to get to them. Weird.

You've done your part. Now it is my turn.

Leaving in about 4 hours,I've come to realize that this isn't going to be a fundamental change. I mean, it is just going to be pretty much the same thing there as it is here. I've been putting this job up on a pedestal when I shouldn't have been.

There has been a lot of weird things happening. I thought that I had finished packing my junk, but it looks like I'll have to do some last minute rearranging (due to the over-weighted-ness of said junk).

It is still somewhat blowing my mind that I'll be sleeping in a foreign bed tonight. Has it really been that long?

Stop it. I don't want to hold your hand.

This is a conversation involving me and someone else.

Intrepid readers of my blog will realize who this is.

Hint: Check back to my Animal Crossing stuff in Jan/Feb/Mars of last year.

Fun game: Try and figure out which is me and which isn't!

A: hey
B:!!!
A:the pokemon game u have diamond or pearl
B:Pearl
A:ok i was just assigned to go to lake valor to see what the exposion was and now i don;t know what to do
B:Go to the other lakes
B:You need to go to all three lakes
A:okie but i haven't been to the one near the snow whatever
A:where u able to catch a chansey
B:Didn't you get a Poke-egg?
B:It hatches into a Happiny, which evolves into Chansey.
A:yea i have a happiny
A:but it's moves sucks
B:=(
A:do u know when it evolves
B:It needs an item to evolve
B:oval stone, or whatever, from the ghost tower
A:oh
A:i was there
A:i have an oval stone
B:give it to happiny to hold
B:and when it levels, it should evolve
A:ok
B:It might take several levels
A:he is level 25 right now
B:k...
A:so how do i get to these other lakes
B:www.gamefaqs.com
A:i am not cheating
B:Aren't you?
A:no
B:k

Bored out of my mind.

Ugh.

I just realize that without school and without work, my life is intrinsically boring. I mean, most of my friends are working mondays to friday, so I don't really have anything to do.

I went to Walmart today to track down some of the remaining supplies. I finally got my steel-toed boots for ~50 dollars. I have to say that though Walmart is pure evil, they're really good with their prices.

I saw Christine Joseph and I didn't say hi.