Gordon Ramsey has nothing on me

Strawberry cheesecake... Done!

Someone actually bought one if these

I knew someone did!

We're not saying we're gonna fix it...

But we at least are warning you!

Beef stew

Look at me go cooking a very lovely beef stew... From scratch

Pumpkins

It's a bit late but here are some photos of our pumpkins this year. Can you guess which ones were done y whom?




I need to remember to use manual focus at night time. The next one is a bit, (a lot) blurry.

Check out this Scouting site

I was asked to design and manage a web sie for Nicholas' Scouting group, Ridgewood 195. They were one of the last groups in this district to have a web site. Shauna naturally volunteered me and after making up a very rough test site they agreed to let me design it for them. The design of the site itself was not that complicated. The application I use, Rapidweaver, is very user friendly and can generate very unique designs based on various templates. The tricky part comes when it goes from me volunteering my limited, self-taught knowledge to the demands of a professional web master.

I decided that it would be best if I could set up each section to be updated remotely and not through me. I use various web based applications to update this site so setting up a blog page was easy. I looked no further than Blogger. I created a free blogger account for each section then used a Rapidweaver page to pull that information and embed it with our site, in our template.
Next they all wanted calendars, (or maybe I suggested it). Again I turned to Google. Google calendars are free and once you have one account set up with google, you get access to so much else. Once the online calendar is updated it again gets embedded in our site to our own template. Every section can now post entries to their blog and update events all from their own homes, which leaves me with the general smooth running to deal with. Aside from a few areas that only I can update and to be honest it's only a few pages at most, it's all taken care of remotely.

Check it out and leave a comment if you like what you see.

http://195ridgewood.com

A smart blonde chick

Ok, so I know that the dumb blonde chick jokes are very patronizing and generally wrong but still. This girl makes some very good points, depending on your own views of course.

Microsoft party time

Ok just so everyone doesn't think that I hate Microsoft, here's their latest ad for hosting a Windows 7 party... or at least I think that's what it is.

Another new computer

I am hoping for a day where technology can no longer make things smaller, faster and better. Because on that day I will not have that burning feeling every time something newer comes out. I am writing this outside on my deck on my new and improved 17" Macbook Pro. At least this time, I did need to upgrade. My old 13" Macbook was getting a bit long in the tooth. Yes it was an Intel based Mac but it came to a point where I was just using it as a media centre. I installed Plex (plexapp.com) and had it hooked up to my bedroom TV just for watching movies. Which is all fine and well but it did seem like I wasn't using it for much else... like sitting on the deck for the few remaining weeks of nice weather we have here in Edmonton. I wasn't actually planning on upgrading the Macbook first. I intended to replace my old 20" iMac. Now this is 4 maybe 5 years old and is running the older power PC chips. So I can't even upgrade the OS to Snow Leopard. This will become my media centre on my living room TV eventually and it will do a very good job at it, but the Macbook is just more versatile for my needs right now.

So give it a few months until March or April when my tax cheque comes in and I will be writing again about my latest purchase. Unless technology reaches the end of it's capabilities... but i'm not holding my breathe.

My new niece

My sister Rachel has finally had a baby. I say finally because her and and her husband Jason have had a tough time of it trying for a baby. Well I'm sure it wasn't too tough for Jason trying! But to cut a long story short, little Jessica Mary was born on 27th August at 7:27am. And when I say little I mean big, she weighed in at 8lb 6oz. Way to go guys.

Blogging from anywhere

I have iblogger for my iPhone which allows me to post blogs anywhere via the iPhone to my blogger account, which in turn is linked to my web site so that everything is up to date and synced. I have just signed up for posterous (http://posterous.com) which runs along the same lines but instead of using my iPhone I can use my email account. With web mail access I can log in anywhere and post, even if I don't have my iPhone with me.

Posted via email from deejaydoubleyou's posterous

Andy Ihnatko's recommendation

I am trying Posterous because Andy Ihnatko says it's awesome and that's good enough for me!

Posted via email from deejaydoubleyou's posterous

The camp fire

Is nothing better on a nice spring evening camping?

Downtown Vancouver

The reflection of downtown Vancouver from Stanley park marina

Shauna reading

Shauna takes a break after making burgers for everyone by reading a magazine under the orange tarp

Nicholas riding

At least Nicholas is having fun riding his bike in the misty rain

Day 5

We had planned to go to Victoria today which is on Vancouver island, but we got up later than planned, (7:30) so decided to do that tomorrow. Instead we opted for activities around the camp ground. After a breakfast of bacon, sausages, eggs, mushrooms and onions, pancakes and coffee we took a bike ride through the trails to the lake where we had earlier seen signs for canoe rentals.
Later, Nicholas and I went back there and rented a canoe for an hour and let me just say this, a 7 year old is not much help when it comes paddling a canoe against the wind. Give him his dues he did paddle as much as he could. The day finished off with a movie , thanks to the MacBook and external hard drive and taking some good photos of Nicholas in the woods. Plus a few beers.

Day 4

Day 4 took us to Stanley park in Vancouver. After stopping at a visitors center and picking up a brochure we decided that we could spend all day there. The aquarium was the first stop and if I had to give one piece of advice for anyone visiting there it would be, "wear shorts and a t-shirt in the tropical center!". It was do frigging hot and humid on there that my lenses for my camera fogged up and I couldn't take any photos. There were some nice colorful birds and butterflies in there, but they all came out with that wedding fuzzy look to them. The rest of the aquarium was pretty good with sea otters, dolphins and buluga whale enclosures. They also had a frog exhibit.
After the aquarium we headed up to the minature railway for Nicholas. This was better than some small railways I have been on. They tried to keep you entertained while you pooter around at 3mph.
By this time our feet were beginning to hurt so we sat in the park while Nicholas with his abundance of energy played in the playground for 20 minutes.
A good way to see and get around the park is in the vintage shuttle buses. They look very old fashioned from the outside, all colored in reds and green with gold lettering. And they are actually very old fashioned on the inside as well with wooden seats covered in a thin cushion. I swear the windows were going to shake themselves out at one point. The upside is they take you around the park stopping at various points of interest. We took one from the aquarium to the marina and another from the totem poles back around to the aquarium again. By this time it was getting Kate and we all were getting hungry so we headed home.
One thing I should mention that I have noticed throughout this trip is that Rogers cell coverage is crap! U haven't travelled this trail before with another carrier so i can't compare it to anyone but from around mount robson on til kamloops we had no service and then it was only edge speed, which we soon lost again until we hit chiliwack. You may have noticed this blogs being a day later than the info I am giving (it's actually Wednesday today not Thursday). This is due to not having service just outside of maple ridge, a area outside of Vancouver. I admit, we are half way up a mountain surrounded by trees but still, we're not that far from civilisation. We gave to wait till we go half way down to Hera our iPhones chime over and over again not only signalling ghat we have text messages but we have service once again.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Day 3

Late last night, after reviewing the campsite and the hassle we had getting here, we decided that we were going to stay here fir the remainder of the trip. It really is a nice camp ground. The trees are covered in moss giving them an eerie old world feel to them.
Nicholas and I rode our bikes on a short trail that led down to the beach. I'm planning on going back again but with my DSLR camera. There was an ominous mist hanging over the lake with just the tops if the surrounding mountains poking through.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Day 1 and 2

Well the morning if day one started off early. We got up at around 7:00am and tried to finish off the last few things we had to do before our trip. Well as it turned out we had a lot more to finish off than we thought and didn't end up leaving until 10:30am.

The driving went quite well and went surprisingly fast. Nicholas was kept entertained and the traffic was moving well. We made a stop in Hinton for gas and the mandatory bathroom break. We, (and by we I mean me) were able to drive as far as a provincial campsite just before Kamloops. That's where we ended day one. I recorded an audioboo here of the lovely bird chorus.

Day 2 started off good and went downhill from there. We set off from our campground and headed in to the mountain pass. We took some amazing photos of misty rainclouds covering the tops of the mountains. We made it as far as Hope, BC before we needed gas. I mentioned to Shauna to remember the way we entered Hope as this was the way back to the highway, which is the way we duly drove out. The thing is it turned out to be the way back to the highway going back towards Kamloops! Luckily we were able to only spend a five minute detour turning around and we were back on our way towards Vancouver.
Next came the passing of Chiliwack. Passing it was fine, but just after we had a phone call from my friend Dan. He gave us a tip from his brother about some good campsites in Mission. Somewhere during the conversation, information got muddle and wires hit crossed and we ended up parked at the side of the road fumbling with our free AMA roadmaps. It was after fifteen minutes of fumbling that I embarrassingly remembered that Shauna and I both have iPhones. iPhones that both contain google map applications. We entered our current location and where we wanted to go and were off again. What followed, I won't go in to in great deal but all I will say is that I don't ever want to see highway 1 east or west, highway 7 east or west or the stupid gold bridge leading in to Coquitlam ever again. It really was like the scene from national lampoons European vacation where Chevy Chase is driving around London and keeps pointing out big ben and houses of parliment as he "just can't get over!".
Day 2 ended we us finding another provincial park, Golden Ears, only to be told there was a fire ban in effect so we couldn't have hotdogs for tea. Sandwiches it was for us. See you on day 3.

Mobile Blogging from here.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

A proper breakfast

Now that's what I call a proper full English.

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Spotted @ a retirement home

You go grandad!!!

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Still snowing in April

has nobody informed the weather that it's almost May, we don't need anymore snow!

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Myth busted

I thought these went the way of the dodo but someone still has furry dice hanging from their mirror

Posted via Pixelpipe.

My critique on scottcritiques.com

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Scott Bourne

I follow Scott Bourne through various types of media. Twitter, TWIP (This Week In Photography) and Mac Break Weekly. He is always giving away free things which adds to his likeability. Visit this link so you too can be inspired by all things SB. http://www.mydl.me

Chase - Siberian huskey/Collie mix

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Totally Connected

Now I finally am web 2.0'd. After a long time of not joining in with all the social networking tools that are available us, I resisted the urge until I crumbled under the pressure and signed up for facebook. SInce that day I have cancelled my facebook account twice. The latest craze to sweep the pages on the internet is something that I have known about for over a year but never really saw the reason behind it. Twitter, basically for those of you who do not know what Twitter is, it's a tool that lets you update your friends on what your are doing right now... in 140 characters or less. I think a lot of the draw behind it is quite a few celebrities have embraced it and quite often post updates on their whereabouts or activities. Stephen Fry, Jonathon Ross and Philip Schofield are probably the best known for those of you living in the U.K. U.S. president Barrack Obama is on there as well, but I'm sure he doesn't actually update it himself. So as you can probably tell where this post is heading. Yes, I am now on Twitter and you can follow me by searching for deejaydoubleyoo, (notice the 2 o's).

Well I am following a mac guru by the name of Leo LaPorte. While viewing his recent updates I noticed that he used a service called PixelPipe. It turns out that this application updates several services at once. As you can see the previous post is of a bunch of flowers I took with my new camera. Via a plug-in in Aperture I am able to upload that photo to my blog, my twitter account, my flickr account, my youtube account and many many more if I chose to add them such as facebook, Vimeo, Friend Finder, Photobucket and myspace to name just a few. I have also downloaded the iPhone application from PixelPipe as well which gives me even more connectivity.

Sometimes I think I might love technology too much.

IMG_0126 - Version 2

Posted via Pixelpipe.

I just gold starred Rock Band2

I am no drummer. Although I can tap out a beat, it generally wanders off rhythm and I'm sure it doesn't belong to any official drum beat pattern. However, since we got Rock Band and subsequently Rock Band 2 for Nicholas' Wii, I have been getting better at the drums. Mainly for two reasons. (I'm sure I've wrote this before somewhere just not sure where). 1: Because I have a lot of respect for people who can play the drums properly and 2: because no-one else wanted to play them. Since the early days of 'Eye of the Tiger' I have progressed. And finally last night I gold starred my first song. To achieve this feat you need to complete a song on the expert level. I always thought you needed 100% on expert but last night I completed it with 99% accuracy but I'm guessing I only made one or two mistakes giving me the 5 Gold Stars! What song did you play I hear you ask? Psycho Killer by Talking Heads. Not the hardest song I admit but I how many songs have you gold starred... Huh? Thought so :p

Man Utd off to glory

Manchester United have just won the Carling League cup after a very tough battle against a surprisingly equal Tottenham Hotspur. Nothing was settled after ninety minutes of regular time, and the score remained goalless after a further thirty minutes of extra time, so the match headed to a penalty shoot out. Giggs scored a precision penalty to put the reds up 1-0, then Jamie O'Hara had his shot stopped by Man Utd goalkeeper Ben Foster. Tevez scored for Man Utd and someone netted one for Spurs making it 2-1 after 2 kicks each. Christiano Ronaldo slotted home United's third and Bentley missed his giving Manchester a 3-1 lead. Anderson had the responsibility of winning the cup by scoring his penalty leaving Tottenham no way of coming back which he duly did. Manchester United are still in for a chance of winning fours trophies this season as they are still in the FA Cup, European Champions League and currently sit seven points clear of Chelsea and Liverpool who have 55 points, plus Man Utd have a game in hand.

Weird people

I meet a lot of interesting people during my time at work. I've met everything from lesbian plumbers to native American indians dressed up as cowboys, which I thought was really weird. Given that my knowledge on native American indians extends as far as watching old John Wayne films, I took it to be that the cowboys killed the indians or vice versa. Surely an indian dressing in a cowboy hat, big silver buckle and cowboy boots would be the same as a Winston Churchill dressing up as Hitler. Still, I have met a lot of nice, fascinating people as well. I've had an in depth conversation with a Cambodian refugee who described what it was like to flee his village being guided by nothing but placing his hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. He spoke of how he traded all his money in for gold so that it would still retain it's value later, and how when the rebels started capturing them in the jungles and stealing it all, they went from carrying in their pockets, to sewing it in to their clothes. But then that didn't work because the gangs started forcing them to strip and just took all their clothes. In the end they just swallowed the gold but even that didn't prevent the gangs from trying to take it all. They would force them at gun point to deficate in the jungle. As always in life, Newtons third law is continually proven... "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction", except I tend to find that for every interesting person, there is at least five on the run escaped mental patients.

Today I had the good fortune to meet one of those people. Admittedly she was getting on in years but I have found that stupid knows no age limit. She seemed 'normal' at first until... the cat showed up. I'm not sure what it is about cats, but they seem to attract, or be attracted to, stupid people. People who own cats always seem to believe that the cats are real people and can understand English. Now hold on a minute, before you all start to shout at the monitor I don't mean basic single words. This is of course true to the belief of the stupid that the cat or other domesticated animal for that matter understands the language being spoken. What the animal is doing of course is relating to the noise you are making and linking it to what you do next. Search google for Pavlov's dog for more on this subject. As a side not, Joe Rogan described it best when he recalls times when he was 'high' and people were talking to him on the set of "Fear Factor". He said, "Isn't it crazy that talking is basically a form of telepathy. I mean I am thinking things in my head and making weird noises with my mouth and you know what I am going on about!". The same applies to cats. Getting back to the weird old lady, she took this Doolittle syndrome to the next level. Not only did she think that cat understood what she was saying but she went as far as to ask the cat questions! Seriously? Not only did she think that the cat could interpret her voice but was expecting the cat to answer her!!! I believe the question was, "Why haven't you eaten your breakfast?". Like the cat was going to stop, look up at her and meow, "I'm not really hungry, in fact I'm fed up of Whiskas, I feel like chips. And while you're at it, could you stop calling me Trixie, my name is Sharon".

Now I'm lucky enough not to just meet these weirdos at work and while we're talking about cats I have to share a recent situation I experienced, but I'm sure you all have seen this one. People treating cats, or pets in general, as people. This past New Years eve I met such a person. Someone who if you just met them you would have no negative opinion of them... until you mentioned cats. Then she would bore you to tears about how 'Simon', (and thats another freaky thing, giving a pet a person name! Pets are called Blacky, Shep, Rover, and Polly), how Simon did this really cute thing where he holds a carrot between his paws. And how he likes his milk served in a metal bowl not a plastic one, and how he will only eat the expensive cat food because it has more real meat in it, and how he likes to wake you up in the morning by placing his paws on your face... but get this, you can't move them because he is comfortable! Oh my freaking god! Get a life. It's a cat. It's a lower class species that has no purpose at all. And you are talking about it in the same regard as a small child? I'll tell you what, you put the crappy food out in a cheap plastic bowl and leave it there for a day or two and we'll see if he eats it then! Don't get me wrong on all of this, I love animals. I have two dogs and a whole bunch of fish, as well Nicholas has a pet hamster. But nothing would cause me to treat these animals like they were equivalent to Nicholas, no matter how clever at rolling over he was... the pet not Nicholas.

Global warming

Well I think this is a good example of how screwed up the worlds weather is becoming. Today in Edmonton we are expecting a high of +8*c and according to Dominic Burns from the Chris Moyles show on BBC radio 1 in England, they are expecting a cold snap that will make it feel like -7*c. A total reversal in what is normally expected.

I shouldn't really complain about the weather here as so far the winter has not been that bad. We have had 2 freezes where the temperature dropped to a frigid -40* but only for a few days at a time. Let's just say the brass monkeys around here won't be having any new monkeys.

Cheers.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Podcast

In my continuing effort to keep the rest of the world connected and informed to what's going on in my life, I have created a podcast. Amazingly enough, despite the lack of content and quality, it was accepted in to the iTunes store. The first episode was more of a practice run than informative. Nevertheless, as always I endeavor to provide ways to keep everyone in the loop and yet keep it easy enough that even my sister Rachel can do it.

1: First make sure you have iTunes installed on your computer. If you don't have it get it here. Download it, use it, enjoy it, imagine how you survived with out it.
2: Click on the iTunes Store link on the left hand side menu bar.
3: Look in the top right hand corner and locate the "Search Itunes Store" search box and type deejaydoubleyou.
4: Next you see the podcast with a "Subscribe" button beside it. Click on "Subscribe".
5: All available podcasts will be downloaded into the podcast library. From there you can listen to them right on your computer, or sync them to an MP3 player and listen on the go.

It couldn't be any easier, well o.k. it could be just click the link below.

People with money

Why is it that people who have money have to, at every available opportunity, tell you about it. Maybe it's not actually people with money. Maybe it's people who pretend that they have lots of money and they want to appear that they are well off. A lady I hooked up with Internet this morning was like this. Apologizing for how messy her apartment was because she had just come back from sailing on her boat in the Bahamas. And how she came back earlier than she originally planned and how disappointed her daughter was because she had been borrowing her jeep while she was away. Even though she shouldn't be because her daughter now gets to drive her 2009 Hyundai Tiburon that was in storage. A car that she gave her daughter the money to buy and that was in storage with her corvette. Like I give a flying crap about anything she could afford. Does she feel the need to justify her finances to everyone she meets to sleep at night. "oh my, that guy might have thought that I don't have lots of money! He'll think I'm one of those common people". Whatever she needs to do to be happy I guess. I think people who actually have lots of money just act normally to blend in with us commoners. ;) Takes all sorts I guess. And she had really massive fake boobs! LOL.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Snow (a rant)

I think I've had enough of the snow. It was a novelty when I first came to Canada but now it's just a pain in the arse. Maybe because I don't snow board or ski that I hate it. Maybe it's because stupid people pile all their snow from their drive ways and cover my cable boxes even though there us a sticker on the box in plain view indicating that it is against local bylaw to cover it with dirt, snow or shrubs! And don't get me started on shrubs.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

iPhone blog

So through the wonders of the app store, I can now write blog entries on my iPhone so there will be no excuse for me not to keep this updated.

Mobile Blogging from here.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

More Final Cut Pro effects

I have been really getting in to editing with Final Cut Pro and making silly little videos just to experiment with different effects and techniques. I have been using training videos from Lynda.com. The videos on there are really clear and easy to understand. Anyway here's another test video. Also I should add that all my videos have been uploaded to youtube as well. Just search for deejaydoubleyoo. Or just click here.


Click below to download.
Distort PIP test