Going insane.

Gone gone gone.


I don't know if it is because this is the 7th straight day of 8+ hours of working, or not.

or because my notebook is still borked in the monitor and is going to be sent away tomorrow for probably a week and a half.


And why do I have to keep reminding ____ that rape is not the answer.

Getting a DS Lite. Which Colour?

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/subclass.asp?logon=&langid=EN&catid=22018

Pink, Onyx, or White.

My purchase will be based entirely on the comments.

Working Overtime this weekend.

24 hours at 1.5x pay.


Money =(

I guess this is just as well because the box for my computer just came.

Less than one month.

I wish it was all over already.

 

Dell is being a complete bitch about repairing my notebook. I have opted to use my company's address for shipping. The rep made me jot down all this unnecessary-ish information, which was really unfriendly.

 

It'll be a while.

Sick and Sad.

I have the flu.

 

It brought a delirious fever at about 3:30am this morning.

 

My notebook's monitor is broken.

 

Need to send it to help.

Summer Slam, Grand Prairie, and Alberta. Two of these three sucked big time. (WALL OF TEXT)

Friday after work, Nicola Irwin and I began our journey towards Grande Prairie, where the Summer Slam music event is being held. Unbeknowst to me, this will be the worst trip of my life.

The drive there would normally take approximately 130 minutes. It took us right about 300 minutes to get there. The reason for this is that the Green Pellet (Nicky's V-hickle) doesn't like the heat very much. Just as we were 30 minutes down the road, the car starts having problems and periodically stalls (and thus we have to lift up the hood, let it cool, and then restart.) This problem got so bad that if the car stops accelerating (or revving) , the engine will stall. This means that obeying stop signs was absolutely impossible. Any kind of left turn was out of the question, and all right turns had to be done with a rolling stop. It also meant problems when we confronted slow-moving vehicles because it usually means that we have to slow down (which would stall the engine.)

In total, I think we had twenty stalling incidences. In my mind, the first few stops were scary and unusual. This shouldn't be happening. The next few were actually kind of fun, in a way, because it was difference. As the drive went on in the blazing heat, it quickly turned into boredom, and then frustration. I want to stress the fact that this was 33+ degrees with no air conditioning.

At approximately 9:30 pm BC-time, we got pulled over by the police for speeding (80 in a 50 zone). I was mortified. Nicky managed to explain the situation in such a way that we were left off the hook. At least that was sometime, right?

By 10:30pm, we had reached Grand Prarie at last. Phoning Ricky Tang for the location of the actual event, we made our way according to the directions. This was fine, except that the directions were totally bogus and wrong. We drove across the town, hitting the city limits at least twice. After making a U-turn, Nicky accidentally drove on an unknown paved road.. It was wide enough for just a car. It turned out that the road was supposed to be for pedestrians only when we found the 'real' road on the side. Thirty minutes later, we were informed by our good friend that the concert had ended. (GP operated on Albertan time, which meant it was midnight already. )At this point, we were tired, hungry, and angry.

The city of Grand Prarie had a terrible City Planner. Located on the vast Albertan wasteland, the city was completely flat and had plenty of room for expansion. Instead of having straight-forward roads which were completely straight, it had roads which bend in unnecessary and confusing directions. They should have just laid it out like a checkered-board. The lack of any identifying features of the city added to the confusion. There were no Oceans or Mountains or Rivers or any reasonably tall building .We couldn't really orientate ourselves and frequently had to back track when we went in the wrong direction. Exasperating this was the fact that almost all major roads has an island blocking the two different direction traffic. This made going into shops very annoyingly time consuming.

After meeting up with the other group, we went to a bar. We got hammered over a duration of about two hours. I still retain my memory of the whole event- Nicky does not.

In the morning, we were greeted by the sounds of a bulldozer and an asphalt roller at the cabin we're staying at. This meant we had less than 6 hours of sleep. I was a bit hungover.

We went to Denny's for breakfast, arriving at 11am local. We were served at noon, and finished at about 12:30. Afterwards, we went to the mall, where I bought Planet Puzzle League, Civ 3, and CNC Generals. I needed them. We got some awesome cowboy hats, then to Earl's for a late lunch//early dinner in preparation for the upcoming final night of Summer Slam. We had too much time, and ended up driving to their downtown east side. We walked by some questionable people who looked like professional ladies of the night outside of an unnamed bar. Interestingly enough, on the opposite corner of that was a toy model shop where kids go to play. Even more interesting was that the model shop was several shops down from an adults video store.

We finally made it to Summer Slam at 7pm local time. The actual thing wasn't bad. The first guy who played was desperately trying to sell his album. He even brought a sharpie so that, you know, he could maybe sign it if you wanted to buy it. Next was a guy who goes by the name of Tom and two other people. They weren't that bad, actually.

Payola was up next, and they were genuinely good. They got a little angry due to the lack of participation from the audience.

The Tragically Hip was up next. I only had one of their albums before this event, and I'm sure that I'll get more now. We went to the pit floor right near the stage. Neat, but painfully loud. There was cheering waving, clapping, and generally-good-time having. Due to the noise level, I retreated away from the pit into a more reasonable sounding zone. I think there were about a thousand people there in total. This time, it ended 11:30 local time.

Nicky and I decided that we wanted out of this town. We didn't want a repeat of the whole drive on Friday so we decided to blast out of the town. During the long drive, we discussed the whole flaw of Alberta, and how no one should want to live in the conservative hellhole which is filled with stupid people. On the road, we went over the remains of an unidentifiable dead animal. Its remain was split into three parts with blood all over. We could only really determine one of the legs on the creature. My theory was that a cow or an elk escaped the Albertan farms only to be hit by a car.

We got home at Tumbler Ridge at 1:37am BC time. I was just glad to be home. When I got to my apartment, I found out that my roommate had locked it using the little sliding-chain lock. You know, the one that doesn't have anything to do with the key. I tried to get the attention of my roommate, but after 5 minutes of fruitless yelling, I stopped. My neighbours didn't need this.

The time right now is 4:21AM, and I'm hiding in the laundry room of my apartment watching the sunrise and writing this whole thing down.

Summary: Went to Grand Prairie over the weekend to a music show. The ride there sucked. The stay there was very tiring and frustrating. The show wasn't bad. The ride home was insightful. Being locked out of my apartment sucked big time.

Summary of Summary: I didn't like my weekend.

Snow. Sick.

There were friends I haven't seen for years. We gathered for food and drinks. All that fun stuff. I had a chat with this barkeep. The conversation felt very natural and real.


And then, when I came outside, the whole town was covered with snow. It was peaceful and serene. I remember wanting to capture this moment on camera. I remember saying that I should get my camera from the exact spot I left it, but I didn't do it.


I woke up with my head burning hot with sweat. It felt like a hangover (caused by dehydration?)
Even now, I'm not feeling well.

Gah.

Mid-Summer Night's Dream.

I had a good nap from 6:30--> 9:30pm today. It was quite disorientating waking up.

Now, for the real part of my entry, which is about my dream. It once again appeared in a kind of movie-like story.

As far as I can gather, the story is about a man, a leader, who has throughout his life been getting a sense of deja-vu, like he has seen and lived fragments of his life before, only he hasn't. The time and place was one such that anybody with real talent can change the outcome of history. This man was such a person. Throughout

There was a scene where the man was walking in an indoor environment. Some alarm goes off, and he walks in the command centre/observation tower.
The man (somehow) was transported upwards. At this point, I was looking first-person down. A feint light beam was aimed directly below.
It was a standard sci-fi single beam type weapon being fired onto the building. The man wasn't killed, but many were. This was an "Oh shi-" moment for the man.

From what I understand, this was the event that the man had been dreaming for years. It didn't happen exactly, and his dreams didn't show what exactly happened, but throughout his life, components of the events were spliced into his  many different dreams. He realized it at the end though.

It is like taking The Starry Night by Van Gogh, cutting the painting into a couple dozen blocks, pasting the blocks onto new boards, and drawing a different painting around that block while retaining the same sort of style and theme. The result are drawings that look similar individually, with a common theme, but impossible to reconstruct the original. He finally realized what the dreams (or new paintings) were after seeing the event ( The Starry Night).


Analysis:
1) This immediately reminds me of Command and Conquer et Kane.
2) The twist ending is reminiscent of the end of the last book in Hitch Hiker's Guide.
3) This is probably some fantasy of wanting my dreams to have actual meaning.
4) It is weird to have a dream about a guy whose dreams were actually not dreams, but are visions of the future.

Dawn of the Dead (1978) is a genuinely good movie.

I bought Dawn of the Dead on Friday as an Impulse buy when I saw it on the bargain bucket at the price of 4.99. It is George Romero's second movie in the Dead series.
 This is a genuinely good movie with some subtle jabs at modern society. This isn't a hardcore violent zombie film, but more of a satirical examination at the lives of the living.

Fun fact: While watching this movie, the light bulb in my room burnt out. I have no light source in my room at the moment.

Other: Immediately after I came home on Friday, I realized I lost my Credit Card. I looked and looked and decided to just report it missing. I found it today in an obscure part of the Bathroom. I have no idea how it ended up there.

Something TERRIBLE happened today.

I just want to mark this.

Details might come later, but they might not.

I think I'm emotionally scarred for life.

The worst part is I have to live with it on my conscience every time I look at the little orphan children.

I'm not in any real trouble though.