New year = new workload

Posted by Johnny at 10:46 p.m.

Well, the holiday season is over, so I guess it’s time to get back to work. Bleh. Work Sucks.

My holiday was nice and relaxing, despite the lack of recording (and blogging). I’m hoping to get some more blogging done this year if I finally get a laptop. I’m waiting for Steve Jobs to possibly announce an Intel based iBook in his keynote speech tomorrow at MacExpo before I buy anything. If he releases a 13.3” widescreen iBook as reliable sources have predicted, that particular product will be going on my post-Christmas list.

Since I’ll be saving money on textbooks this year by not having to buy as many, and with the inclusion of the $400 present we’re getting from Uncle Ralph, I can justify paying $1400 for an overpriced but reliable piece of machinery that will save me from fighting with campus computer labs during my 5 hour-long breaks. I’m bitter about my schedule.

Another thing – I have no idea who to vote for in the upcoming election. I watched most of the debate tonight and I’m still not inspired in any direction.

Stephen Harper was well-spoken, but his plans are deeper than what he allowed to surface tonight. I want to find out what he really thinks and has in store for Canada. He still scares me a little bit…

Gilles Duceppe would be an attractive candidate if he wasn’t a separatist and intended to implement many of Quebec’s programs and policies in the rest of Canada.

Paul Martin was the most passionate of the leaders tonight and he took the abuse fairly well. I still don’t know if I am willing to support the Liberals, just because I’d be interested to see the results of a change in government.

Finally, Jack Layton was the best self-promoter of the evening and did a good job of separating the NDP from the other major federalist parties. Based on the debate alone, his party appeals to me the most, but I haven’t researched anything beyond the debate at this time.

The most important issues to me, at the moment, are lowering tuition and implementing proportional representation. I am definitely a political minority in Alberta, in that I don’t subscribe to the Conservative point of view – at least when it comes to the non-economic policies. So I would love it if my votes would actually count for something, instead of merely decreasing Jason Kenny’s blowout victory by a fraction of a fraction of a percentage.

This is where proportional representation comes in. With that in place, all of the Liberal, NDP, and even Green supporters in Alberta would have their voices heard in government for the first time. Instead of only sending the winning party in each riding to the House of Commons, all of the parties that ran in each riding would have as many votes as was proportional to the number of votes they received. This would be a major improvement over our current system, which discriminates against political minorities in regional areas of political concentration. I’m sure the Tories in the east would appreciate this as well.

The major downside to proportional representation is, of course, that a minority government is pretty much guaranteed. This could, however, be a blessing in disguise. My reasoning is that the public generally hates voting, as was demonstrated by the aftermath of the recent vote of non-confidence. Politicians know this, so to avoid non-confidence votes, they would be forced to work together for a change in implementing policies.

Yes, this notion of “working together” would generally slow down the already tedious decision making process, but overall I think it would be better for our country.

And now for the fun stuff kiddies:

• This men’s washroom idea would freak me the hell out. You can figure out why.


• "I've got to think it's UFOs. That's the only thing logical…." Wow. I guess the UFOs got bored with cows, so they moved on to mutilating horses. It’s a shame what constitutes logic nowadays.


• Speaking of logic, check out this “seminar” on Creation, and scroll down to the heading entitled “The Watchmaker.” If you don’t feel like reading, I’ll summarize it for you: Someone in Japan made my stopwatch; therefore, everything in the universe has a creator. Now, you don’t need to have taken Logic I in order to realize the logical fallacy here. “There exists an A such that A created B, therefore, for all D, there exists a C such that C created D” is NOT A VALID ARGUMENT. In logic, it is known as a Hasty Generalization.


• A perfect promise ring for your girlfriend – if he happens to like goatse, that is (don’t worry, it’s not a link to goatse, nor is it disgusting).

Love Johnny