Hello my foreign friends. Yes, I'm back with another interesting blog update that makes no sense to the average human being, if you are a human.
For starters, I would like to talk about my cellular phone. Recently, I received an "irresistible" offer invitation from Rogers, my current wireless service provider. After reading that awesome offer, I decided that I would upgrade to a smart-phone after all, instead of pondering it. So, I decided to go with the HTC Magic +, which would cost me $29.99 with a new three-year agreement and the upgrade fee of $35 would be waived. At this point, I would have to decide when to formally make the upgrade. So, I started to think about it. And, I decided that I may want to buy the phone before I make my trip to Ottawa, so that I could use the phone's GPS feature, considering the fact that I would get two free months of data, and that my uncle's Sony nav-u GPS navigation device sucks. Well, after thinking about it, I decided that I would get the new after I return from to Saskatoon from my trip to Ottawa. Why? Well, I currently have the LG Shine TU720, which is the best phone I've had, period, despite the lack of being able to set my own MP3 files as my ringtones. But, it has treated me well, even in areas where the coverage from Rogers can be considered "crappy." How? Well, let's just say that Andrew Pang calls me while I'm at school, and I answer, and I feel like being a jerk. So, if I wanted to stop talking to him, I could walk downstairs in almost any campus building, and the call would eventually drop. I could also enter any elevator, and in most cases, the call would eventually drop, especially in the Murray Library. But, to me, however, the phone has some almost-human qualities, and I thought, "My phone hasn't really been anywhere special with me." If you think about it, when I first got a cell phone in 2005, I had an Audiovox 8615 through Virgin Mobile. With that phone, I have been to Calgary and Yorkton, Saskatchewan. After that, I had an Audiovox 8910, which I took with me to Calgary a few times. After getting sick of Audiovox, I decided that I wanted the Motorola RAZR V3c, which I enjoyed using. But, I just got sick of Virgin Mobile and officially made the switch to Rogers, which took a bit of getting used to, but I eventually got the hang of Rogers and refuse to switch to another wireless provider. But as for my LG Shine TU720 phone, it has been to some pretty cool places, besides Calgary. Aside from Calgary and Saskatoon, I have used my phone in Regina and Prince Albert, and have decided that Ottawa should be the last "different" city that my phone will "see." And yes, I treat my phone like a human being, and it's totally creepy and weird at the same time, but this should tell you how much I love my current phone, but am also wanting a new one. But, once I get back from my trip, my phone would have been in more than those cities listed. Once I get back, the final list would include Calgary, Saskatoon, Prince Albert, Regina, Ottawa and Montréal. Now that's an impressive list of cities, isn't it?!
Now, speaking of Ottawa, the day I leave would be Jeff Meville's 22nd birthday, if he were still alive. And in this situation, if he knew that I were leaving town for any reason, he would do his trademark wave (I wish I could do it the way he did) and say to me, "Goodbye my friend from a foreign land!" Of course, that could be considered discriminatory and it did bug me sometimes, but I never said a thing because I knew that Jeff genuinely enjoyed saying "racist" things to me and that I genuinely enjoyed it. Man, I miss Mr. Meville, and I wish he were still alive today, because he was a pretty creative guy and I always enjoyed his hilarious antics, although I never understood his obsession with swords.
Now, it's time to talk about my boring life.
Since my last blog update, it was the night before a wonderful day: Monday, April 12, 2010. That night, I was watching new episodes of my favourite FOX shows. But, the next day was wonderful for one important reason: those evil kids who didn't go to school the week before would be returning to school. During the week of April 5 to April 9, 2010, high school and elementary school students in Saskatoon did not have to attend school, while University of Saskatchewan students did. So, that was wonderful to see kids return to school instead of staying out in the day causing trouble. And something I forgot to mention was that I had prevented four cars from passing me on the Idylwyld Freeway the day before.
Monday, April 12, 2010 was a good day, as I made arrangements for a tour of the Ottawa Marriott, which resulted in a complimentary stay for up to three days. Now that is great, and is a savings of up to $211.10. Later that week, I updated the maps on my uncle's Sony nav-u GPS navigation system for free, thanks to a torrent. During a webcam conversation with Dustin Fiddler that week, I learned that he occasionally did impressions of me. However, they weren't as kick-ass as Rory's impersonations of the reverend.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010 was the day of my first final exam. On that day, I wrote my political studies exam, which was held in the dreaded Physical Activity Complex. Now, remember when I said that I had learned an important lesson after writing an eight-to-ten-paged essay the night before it was due? Well, after I wrote my final exam, I received my essay, and the professor gave it 75%. And after I wrote my final exam, I went outside, and saw something big. In fact, it was so big that I couldn't believe my eyes. In 2007, my uncle adopted a dog named Bear but gave him up for adoption in 2009 because the condo complex he was living in at the time didn't allow dogs outside and keeping him inside the house was becoming a problem. Well, on April 14, 2010, I saw that very same dog, and was so excited!
April 15, 2010 was a Thursday, and I was hungry, and bored. After some studying, I decided to take a "study break." So, I decided to head to the Burger King on Confederation Drive, where they had the slowest service, ever. First of all, there was only one person taking orders, and that same person was also filling orders. Now, if you were the only person who was helping customers, wouldn't you want to hurry your ass up? Well, not the person that was working there. First, she took a bunch of orders from people, and then she went and filled their orders, slowly. Then, she took more orders, and then filled them, slowly. This was not the first time I've had this type of slow service at that location. My uncle Harley has complained about the slow service at that location numerous times in the past. For the restaurant locations that I have been to in Saskatoon, I would say that the location at The Centre Mall has the fastest service while the restaurant at Preston Crossing has the most-friendly staff. However, despite my crazy rant, Aaron Arnault said that he controlled the line at the Confederation restaurant, and that he would have made it move faster if I bought him a burger. Of course, he doesn't seem to understand that "I am racist" and that I cannot buy him burgers, despite my many explanations in the past. Besides, an evil man like him does not deserve free burgers. And after that fancy lunch, I decided to fill up the gas tank in my car, effectively making the study break cost me a total of $62.33. Later that day, I decided that I enjoyed watching Friends, after seeing the episode titled "The One with All the Haste," and it's not because Ross proposed to Emily. It's because Chandler and Joey lost their apartment (despite winning a bet to keep their apartment) and accepted that fact after Monica and Rachel kissed for one minute, even though we didn't get to see them kiss. That night was also the night of the very first leaders' debates in Britain for the country's first-ever televised debates, and I have one word to describe the debates: lame! Why? Well, David Cameron didn't stare at Gordon Brown until he got uncomfortable, Gordon Brown didn't get angry, and Nick Clegg, who is against the first-past-the-post electoral system (even though that's what will get him elected, if he does get elected), turned out to be the winner of the debate.
The weekend of April 16 to 18 was kick-ass, as I didn't have to work. However, I did have a final exam to write on the Saturday. For starters, on Saturday, I went to school, but got hungry and used a coupon I had from SPC to get two P'Zone pizzas from Pizza Hut for the price of one (and I later went to Ky and Tho's house). But on the receipt, it said "Unknown Discount." But before going there, I made a stop at the Real Canadian Superstore located at 2901 8th Street East and bought myself a Marriott gift card for $50.00 Canadian, which I will use for my hotel stay in Montréal at the Residence Inn Montréal Downtown. But while I was there, I was shocked to see that the automatic sliding doors in the basement that I love so much were removed. This had happened before... but this time, it was different. When the store was expanded in 2003, there were two sets of automatic sliding doors in the basement. One was completely removed to make way for the elevator, while another set was temporarily removed, but later re-installed. But this time, seven years later, things are different. Not only are the doors gone, but so are the mechanisms that made the doors move in the first place. This gives me less hope for the automatic sliding doors on the main floor, and I will cry (maybe) if they are replaced. However, I am already worried, as the entrance doors by the elevator seemed to have stopped working for some reason. But oddly enough, the sensors on those automatic sliding doors seem to work just fine. The reason that I am worried about the doors at the 8th Street location is because of the replacement of the doors at the Confederation store, which were only there for seven years at the most. However, at that store, I am happy, because the new doors are from Gyro Tech. Later that day, I also picked up my new video card that I bought on April 11, 2010 online from the post office, as I had the card shipped to my PO box. I also did some testing with my uncle's GPS, after updating it with new maps. And by Saturday evening, after writing a final, I had my new video card installed, and was playing The Sims 3 without the video card failing. And by the end of the weekend, I was watching another new episode of The Simpsons, which I enjoyed very much. I also discovered that Dunkin' Donuts has Canadian locations, but it appears to be limited to the Montréal area.
This past week has been interesting, as I wrote more exams. On Monday, it was sociology. After that final, I went to visit a couple of teachers at Aden Bowman Collegiate. Later in the day, after checking my PO box for mail at the Shoppers Drug Mart on 22nd Street West, I received a new CIBC Dividend Visa, which had one of those annoying chips on them. And later that day, I also vacuumed and cleaned the inside of my car, which hadn't been cleaned since last summer. And during that same day, I was watching an episode of The Simpsons, when Homer decided to become a boxer and was getting better car washes after every match, and eventually got a "mega tycoon" wash.
On Tuesday, I got my new passport from Passport Canada, and I must agree with anyone who says I look like a terrorist. When I got my pictures taken, I didn't look so bad. But when the actual passport arrived, with a discoloured digital image, I really started to look like a terrorist. Later that night, I slept an entire eight hours, but still felt like crap on Wednesday morning.
Wednesday was the night I wrote another final exam. However, after the final, I also made a few stops, including Westgate Books to bug the Reverend Nathan Dutnall, who ended up not being there. Then, I also ate at Montana's Cookhouse, which didn't taste very good. Then, I went to the Real Canadian Superstore located at 2901 8th Street East for some groceries, before going downtown to return a library book at the Frances Morrison Branch of the Saskatoon Public Library. Eventually, I just went home and watched television, before falling asleep, while dreading the idea of working the very next day. Now, the interesting part of the night was when I discovered that the Real Canadian Superstore on 8th Street East was finally being repainted.
Thursday was an important day, even if I had to work for four hours. Why? Well, as you know, I have been counting down the number of days until my trip to Ottawa. And as of Thursday, the number of days finally became a single digit: 9. Also on Thursday, Noelle shared a YouTube video on Facebook that had medical employees at the Province St. Vincent Medical Center in Portland, Oregon doing a "pink glove dance." It was a pretty cool video, and I also loved the song in the video. On Thursday, while working from home, I was involved in part of a 90-minute team meeting online, which really hurt my ears, but was funny, nonetheless! And by the time I finished work, I started watching coverage of the second round of British election debates on CPAC, and sadly, Nick Clegg really did outshine David Cameron and Gordon Brown, again. But out of the three, I do not like Nick Clegg, as he would ruin my favourite type of electoral system, while Gordon Brown leads Labour, which in my opinion, has always stunk up the joint. So, that leaves us with David Cameron, who must become the next British prime minister, or the British economy may start to stink up the joint even more than it does right now. I also learned later that day that Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff would be "speaking" (or participating in highly-partisan activities) at Holy Cross High School on Friday. As it turns out, he did, by sporting a Holy Cross High School sweater. That bastard... first, he stops off at a high school. What the hell was he trying to do? Was he trying to encourage a bunch of grade 12 students to vote for the Liberal Party of Canada in the next federal election that he will probably try and trigger once again because we have a minority Conservative government? Earlier in the week, Gail, a friend I used to work with, informed me that Mr. Ignatieff would be signing books at the McNally Robinson bookstore location in Saskatoon on Friday evening as well. Sadly, I had to work at that time. Speaking of his "tour" that stopped in Saskatchewan, the Liberal Party of Canada made an interestingly-partisan news release lately. To read it, click here.
On Friday, it started to get cold, and it rained a little bit, to my delight, as I don't really like the warm weather. Out of all four seasons, I only have one favourite season: the fall or autumn as it seems to be called. Anyway, I stepped out of the house for a bit and decided to take Saskatoon Transit to go across town to get a haircut at some place called Changes on 8th Street East in the Wildwood area, because I know someone that works there named Lucy. After paying a high price for a haircut, I took the bus to school for a while, before going home. Now, the Friday was a bad day, because of a number of things. On the way across town, the transit operator of the bus I boarded arrived two minutes late at the bus stop, and that was fine. In fact, she arrived at the downtown terminal three minutes before the scheduled departure time. However, what ticked me off was that she left the bus and returned ten minutes later and left the terminal seven minutes after the scheduled departure time. Thankfully, I arrived at my 10:30 am appointment on time though. However, I will be writing an angry letter to Saskatoon Transit at some point. In addition to the bus stop situation, I was "screwed" at the library. Recently, I've been searching for the movie Polytechnique, as I did not want to download it. So, being the loyal guy that I am, I called up every BLOCKBUSTER store in Saskatoon to no avail, because I presumed that it would be a FAVOURITES rental, which I had a coupon for. My next step would be to search the Saskatoon Public Library's catalogue, or the Saskatchewan Information and Library Services Consortium. Eventually, I found the movie, and made a request to hold the movie. After two days, the jerks at the Saskatoon Public Library did not hold it, and it was eventually checked out by another patron. Then, on Friday, I saw that it was available at the Frances Morrison Branch of the Saskatoon Public Library. By the time I arrived, however, it was checked out and is due on April 30, 2010. Tough luck, isn't it? Yeah, I was angry. Eventually, I checked out another DVD and headed home, using Saskatoon Transit, again. After arriving home, time seemed to fly by, and I had to work... from home, and ended my Friday at 11:30 pm. By that time, I was too tired to do anything else.
Yesterday was a busier day for me than usual. In the morning, I presented a new website I'm working on to my mom's boss, which will go live at some point after the domain name registrar receives their cheque payment from her. In the meantime, we wait. Well, before that, I did pay a visit to the Real Canadian Superstore located at 411 Confederation Drive as well as the Walmart Supercentre located in the Blairmore area. Then, after the website presentation, I came out to the car, and there was a protest/march with students from the First Nations University of Canada, who, I guess, were demanding that funding from the Government of Canada to the university be restored. Eventually, I drove past them and to my cousin's house. From there, we went to Burger King, then to the Real Canadian Superstore located at 2901 8th Street East, where I saw Shelly, who refused to let me see the current week's special offer coupon, as it was a coupon that gave you a free watermelon if you made a $150 purchase or more. Of course, I was tempted to buy a watermelon... but at $6.88, I decided not to, considering the fact that I would be in Ottawa in just one week, and that every penny seems to count now. Besides, the last time I dropped a watermelon from a building, I felt guilty about it, because it looked like a really good watermelon. The last thing I dropped from a building were four pumpkins, and I remember that night like it was two years ago... because it was two years ago. That night, I had signed up for same-day downtime at work and decided to hang out with the Reverend Nathan Dutnall, instead of going home to study for a midterm that was coming up that week. Then, one of us suggested that we go buy pumpkins to drop from the roof of a building. So, even though we were on the west side of town, I decided to skip the store on Confederation Drive because I like the store on 8th Street East better. So, we drove across town, just to buy four pumpkins, and then we went somewhere... and dropped them from a roof. And while I was at the store, as I pushed my cart of pumpkins into the store to pay for them, Shelly saw me and said, "I'm not even going to ask," and then went into that little office behind the customer service counter. Anyway, after stopping at the store to simply buy a 12-pack of Coca-Cola, I left, after apparently being "hurt" by Shelly because she hid that ultra-important coupon from me. Oh yeah, at the other store, they were giving away free slices of cake for the store's grand reopening. Well, that store did install new Gyro Tech doors, so that's worth having a grand reopening for. I then checked my PO box, and found that on Friday, I received a response to a letter I wrote to the Honourable Rob Nicholson, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada about children being abused. Now, out of all of the cabinet ministers in Prime Minister Stephen Harper's caucus, I actually like Mr. Nicholson the most. He has a cool name, and so far, he is the only minister to personally respond to letters that I have written. To see the letter, click here. So, yesterday was the first time my cousins Ky and Tho came over in over two weeks, and boy were they ever lazy. I then asked Tho if he wanted to go outside for a walk, and he told me that he was "allergic to the outdoors" and continued to play Flyff on his dinky laptop. Eventually, it was time to drive the boys home. After having dinner, I watched an interesting episode of Global National, as well as interesting episodes of COPS and America's Most Wanted. America's Most Wanted, however, really caught my attention, as they showcased a cold case from 1991 that involved the shooting deaths of four teenage girls at a yogurt shop, as well as the weird twists and turns the case has taken over the years. For more information on last night's episode, click here. Eventually, I fell asleep at 11:00 pm, only to wake up at 5:00 am this morning to work at 6:00 am until noon.
Today, I woke up at 5:00 am, and found snow outside. However, for the most part, it has melted as of tonight. Then, I spent six hours working from home, then had lunch, then studied, watched television and eventually started typing up this blog update until now. Well, I did watch Global National and new episodes of The Simpsons and American Dad at some point tonight, and now I'm done talking about my boring life. And as we speak, Peter Poorman is starting to hate everyone, and is thinking of removing himself from Facebook, again. I hope he doesn't. If he does, I will be forced to hire Godzilla to stomp on his house.
Now, before I end my blog update, I must mention that I did receive two other letters as well. More than a month ago, I wrote a letter to Toyota Canada about the recall, and received a response at some point during the week of April 12 to April 16. To read their letter, click here. I also wrote a letter to Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall about photo radar enforcement in Saskatoon, and Saskatchewan in general and eventually received a response from the Minister Responsible for SGI, June Draude. To see her letter, click here.
Well, that's it for my boring life updates. Now, it is Sunday evening, and there's not much to do, besides watch television, again. So, I will now talk about things that I look forward to, soon. For starters, tomorrow is my mom's birthday. On Tuesday, my street will finally be swept. On Wednesday, I will write my last final exam of the 2009 to 2010 school year. Now, speaking of that day, nominations for the Internet's Huy Dang Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Nonsense are still being accepted up until 10:00pm Saskatchewan time on Wednesday evening. If you would like to nominate yourself or someone else that you know that is not Peter Poorman, please click here to get started. Thursday, although a busy day, will still be payday, and I couldn't be happier about that. Then, on Friday, it will be April 30, 2010, which will also be Prime Minister Stephen Harper's 51st birthday, as well as the earliest date I can check into my flight and select a seat on the planes that I will be boarding for my big trip to Ottawa. And on Saturday, it will be the start of a whole new month, as well as the beginning of my trip to Ottawa, and I'm really excited about that! In fact, if you would like to see a more updated version of my current trip plan, you can click here (and yes, I am very detailed to a really creepy extent... please do not call me a loser for this... and for including a visit to a Real Canadian Superstore as part of my trip).
Well, this must be it for now. Anyway, as of tomorrow, Kojo Anaman will be leaving Saskatoon for his trip to Halifax... and Amsterdam at some point, and I hope he has a hell of a lot of fun on his trip! In fact, I would not mind visiting Amsterdam at some point, but that city is not anywhere near the top of my list. After Ottawa, the next city I would like to visit is Toronto. Actually, I don't really know which city I want to visit next. I've thought about London on several occasions, and I could visit Ben Mayes, but I think it would be better if that guy came to Canada instead. I've also thought about Halifax as well in the past, but that's not really interesting. However, Jennifer did promise her friend that she would visit her there, if she had money. On my next trip after Ottawa, I would prefer to visit a Canadian city... I just don't know which one as of yet. But, at some point, I would like to visit Ottawa in the winter and skate on the Rideau Canal Skateway.
Well, that's all for now my foreign friends!
Hopefully, I will update my blog again before I leave to Ottawa!
Anyway, have a good night... and remember, DON'T GET RIPPED BY THE RIPTIDE!
