I Guess This Is The Big Goodbye

I have learned that the video above looks disturbing. I don’t quite know why. Something about the guy making himself look like Data and dancing around his living room? Apologies if it’s distracting. But I really couldn’t help but use it. What could be better than a video with clips of Data and Picard?

A week and a half or so ago, Sir Patrick Stewart died. I know he had done a whole lot of things, but for the longest time, I only knew him as Captain Jean-Luc Picard from “Star Trek: the Next Generation”. I loved that show. I didn’t watch it all the time when I was 8 and it was brand new, but I got attached to it pretty quickly.

Captain Picard was an awesome character, but it is interesting to watch the evolution of how he was played. He looks so very stiff at the beginning, and then eventually he becomes what we’re used to. I think every time I have some Earl Grey Tea, I will think of him.

Our whole family would watch the show, and Mom would comment that she thought his bald head suited him. She used to say she thought he looked kind of cute. I watched every episode of the show, but I don’t think I really understood some of them until much much later. Something I didn’t know at the time was in “The Inner Light”, the episode where Picard lives a whole lifetime in 25 minutes, his son is being played by Stewart’s own son.

I thought about trying to name a few episodes that were some of my favourites, and it was hard to settle for a few. I decided on three, but there are many many more. Of course “Inner Light” is up there, and it’s also one that I didn’t truly understand until I was older. It’s funny. When I was a kid, the quiet scenes with the family felt so boring because I felt like he was being kept from commanding the ship, but those are the ones that make me cry now. Darmok is another deep one. His determination to learn an entirely different kind of language is touching. I know that “Tapestry” is basically “Star trek” does “It’s a Wonderful Life” but it’s an episode that makes me think about life choices and the impact that they have on the future. He was just so good at them all.

I heard his voice so much that I would totally recognize it in other contexts. In a way, I guess that could be a curse because once it became associated with Captain Picard, it was hard to be other things. I was so happy when he showed up in “the Simpsons”.

I didn’t know this until after his passing, but Sir Patrick Stewart was a strong advocate for survivors of domestic violence and The LGBTQ community. No wonder he could play such a good Picard. He was a good guy at heart.

I was sad to hear that at the end, he was dealing with both Alzheimer’s and Lewy Body Dementia. I was also amazed that he managed to film Star Trek Picard all the way into March of 2022 as well as shoot his scenes for “Avengers: Doomsday” into 2025 while all of this was on the horizon.

I should really stop. I mean, it’s not like I knew the guy. But I had to put something down because I watched him for so many years. Here’s one last video that he apparently made as a birthday surprise for Gene Roddenberry in 1991.

I laughed when he got to Q.

I guess Q was right after all. All good things must come to an end. Rest in Peace.

You With Your Guide Dog And Me With My Prompt

I know this is AI. Some people might find it a little corny. But it gets stuck in my head and chases me around…and…there is a sappy part of me that can’t help but smile because I know why it was written. Jonathan Mosen wrote this song for his wife. He wanted a song about two blind people in love and this is what he built.

Pedestrian Smash!

I have questions about this accident. Well ok, only one, really. When did they start making pedestrians out of concrete?

Yes, the driver was 60 and getting around on a scooter so perhaps he was a little more fragile than your average bear, but still. He, on a motorized vehicle, hit someone hard enough that he caused himself to fall from said motorized vehicle, acquiring severe enough injuries in the process that he ultimately expired. His victim, meanwhile, who according to the definition of the word pedestrian would have been toddling around on nothing more than two feet and a heartbeat, is said not to be injured whatsoever. Not shaken up. Not suffering from bumps, bruises or scrapes. “Not physically injured” is what they’re saying. HOW!? I don’t know. But I’ll tell you what I do know. Next time I’m in a fight, that dude had better be on my side.

Police said the rider, a 60-year-old Kitchener man, was transported to an out-of-region hospital with serious injuries. 
Investigators determined that the rider made contact with a pedestrian while operating his e-scooter and subsequently fell, sustaining serious injuries.
The pedestrian was not physically injured.
Two days later, on Oct. 18, the man died as a result of his injuries.

Instadash

So remember a couple weeks ago when I predicted that Instacart was going to buy Skip the Dishes because it was the only way their partnership made any sense? Well, Unless Skip is going to become part of DoorDash it looks like I’m losing that bet, because DoorDash is about to buy Instacart.

DoorDash announced Thursday that it has agreed to buy Instacart in a deal worth approximately $17 billion.
Under the agreement, DoorDash will acquire Instacart for $65 per share in a combination of cash and stock. The deal is expected to close in late 2027 or the first half of 2028, pending shareholder and regulatory approvals. 
That timeline would likely allow the companies to complete the merger before the end of President Donald Trump’s second term in January 2029, potentially avoiding scrutiny from a new administration that could take a tougher stance on large mergers.
In a press release, DoorDash said the acquisition would combine its delivery network with Instacart’s grocery shopping and fulfillment technology. The company is pitching the deal as a way to help smaller grocery chains and retailers better compete with retail giants like Amazon and Walmart, which have been expanding their online shopping and delivery services.

Translated into reality, that last sentence should read more like “Good news, grocery stores! If you’ve ever wanted multiple big business dicks to drill you simultaneously, now’s your chance. And if you’ve never wanted that, too bad. Bite the pillow if you have to. Stop crying.”

The above also applies to workers and consumers of course, because that’s how mergers almost always work. Lost jobs, lower wages, higher prices, worse service and nowhere else to take your business.

Congratulations, Premier Eb…Uh-Oh

B.C. Conservatives projected to win 1st majority in nearly a century after Eby’s election gamble backfires
It’s hard to explain how giddy this news made me. I was out at a restaurant when I heard it and it was all I could do not to stand up and cheer. I settled for a nice, hearty laugh and a big slug of beer instead, for the record.

To be clear, it’s not that British Columbia has a Conservative government for the first time in damn near 100 years that excites me. That part’s probably gonna suck real bad real fast and I expect there’ll be a lot of buyer’s remorse going around before too long. What I love is that the voters saw through David Eby’s cheap, costly power grab and responded by feeding him steam shovels worth of shit. This is exactly what should have happened to Doug Ford when he pulled the same stunt last year, but you can’t always get what you want even when you really, really need it.

If you want my opinion and let’s face it, you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t, snap elections should be illegal. The only reason we should ever be having an election before a four year term is over is because a minority government has fallen. Anything else is a waste of valuable resources that could be going to fund services that people need. You don’t need a stronger mandate, mr. politician. Mandates don’t get any stronger than a majority government. That’s how the system is designed, and it generally works pretty well that way.

No one involved in this debacle should ever work in politics again.

The B.C. Conservatives have toppled the incumbent B.C. NDP to win a majority government, CBC News projects, the party’s first since 1928.
“B.C. is definitely blue,” Premier-designate Lorne Doerkson said in a jubilant victory speech.
David Eby, who called an election two years early in hopes his party would win a stronger, fourth term, resigned as premier and NDP leader in his concession speech.

Does This Make Him The Undisputed Champion Of Football?

Depending on how closely you follow football, the name O.J. Brigance may or may not be familiar to you. I’ll confess that it didn’t ring much of a bell for me, even though he’s done something that no one else has. I’d say and likely never will again, but at the rate we’re going here…

Anywho, O.J. Brigance is the only person ever to have won a Grey Cup and a Super Bowl for the same city.

“Wait,” said someone who pays attention to football but is probably a little young. “How can that be?”

Because the CFL didn’t just start doing stupid things last year, that’s how.

In 1993, the league admitted its first United States-based franchise, the Sacramento Gold Miners. After modest success, the league then expanded further in the U.S. in 1994 with the Las Vegas Posse, Baltimore Stallions, and Shreveport Pirates. For the 1995 campaign, the American teams were split off into their own South Division, and two more teams, the Birmingham Barracudas and Memphis Mad Dogs, were added; at the same time, the Posse folded and the Gold Miners moved, becoming the San Antonio Texans. In 1995, the Stallions became the only non-Canadian team to win the Grey Cup.
Despite all American teams having the advantage of not being bound to the CFL’s minimum Canadian player quotas, only the Stallions proved to be an on-field and off-field success. The establishment of the National Football League’s (NFL) Baltimore Ravens, worsening financial problems among the league’s core Canadian teams, and the inconsistent performance of the other American teams prompted the CFL to abandon its American experiment and retrench its Canadian operations. The Stallions organization was used as the basis for a revival of the Montreal Alouettes.

You can read a bunch more about all of that here if you’d like, including Baltimore’s variety of names.

It was all over by 1996, but we were half way to history.

O.J. Brigance was on that Baltimore Grey Cup team. When it folded, he went on to play seven seasons in the NFL. He played for a number of teams, among them the aforementioned Baltimore Ravens with whom he won the Super Bowl in 2001, thus becoming the answer to a very odd trivia question.

Sadly, he died of ALS in August of this year. He was 56.

The native of Houston, Texas spent five seasons with the B.C. Lions and Baltimore Stallions, winning a Grey Cup in his final CFL season in 1995.
He played 90 career regular-season games, recording 322 defensive tackles, 53 special teams tackles, 35 sacks, nine fumble recoveries, and two interceptions.

The six-foot, 236-pound defender spent the next seven years in the NFL as a member of the Miami Dolphins, Baltimore Ravens, St. Louis Rams, and New England Patriots.
He made 42 total tackles, three forced fumbles, and two fumble recoveries over 98 career regular-season games.
Brigance retired following the 2002 season and was hired as Baltimore’s director of player development in 2004, a role he held until his death. He won the Best Overall Player Development Program award in 2005 and 2006.
He was diagnosed with ALS in 2007, which led he and his wife, Chanda, to found the Brigance Brigade Foundation, a nonprofit designed to raise money and awareness about the disease.

Maybe Try Changing Your Brain Instead


I don’t know what this dork thought he was doing, but if it was anything other than being painfully unfunny, showing off his rotten judgment and probably losing an election, I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news. Also, if one person booing you is enough to make you storm off in a huff like that, politics might not be for you.

And what’s up with the woman who walked out with him? Why would she do that? Unless of course the two of them planned this as some sort of stupid conservative culture war thing.

“The students are hurting our feelings! College is bad! Woke ideology! Listen to our podcast!”

Two candidates running to be mayor of North Bay, Ont. — Dan Seguin and Melanie Demers — walked off the debate stage Monday evening in protest after an audience member booed Seguin’s opening remarks.
With the Oct. 26 election just days away, the debate took place at the Nipissing University Student Union centre and was to be focused on student issues.

However, things escalated quickly. In his opening remarks, Seguin said he believes a woman is going to win the race for mayor.

He then pulled out a light pink bra from his suit jacket and placed it on his shoulders.
He said he’s going to “change my sex” to convince more women to vote for him.
“I want to feel that the women who told me they weren’t going to vote for a man that now they can vote for a woman,” Seguin told the crowd.
“Now, I’m going to have a few (more) votes.”
When a spectator booed, Seguin and Demers both demanded the spectator be removed or they would leave instead.
“That’s not right,” Demers said while packing her things up. “I’ll walk out with him. Bye.”

Moderator George Legler, co-president of the Nipissing University Political Science Society, tried to get the situation under control, asking Seguin and Demers to stop talking.
Ignoring Legler, they both walked off the stage. Campus security was called and escorted the pair out while audience members clapped.
“I’m getting out of here. This is disgusting,” Seguin yelled out to the crowd.
They did not return.

Who Are These People? Local Candidates Try To Answer

Another helpful who should I vote for in the municipal election guide, this time thanks to CBC Kitchener-Waterloo.

They asked all of the candidates in all of the races to name their top three priorities, talk a little about how they would work to address each one, and then tell us anything else they think we should know. In addition to the region it also covers Guelph, so it’s even more useful. Not everyone has answered, but they’re adding responses as they come in, so you may want to check back more than once if you haven’t made up your mind based on what’s already out there.

Speaking of out there, I found this wile looking through the answers from Kitchener’s Regional Council candidates.

Mike Wisniewski
Top 3 issues:

  • Did not list three specific issues

Statement:
I’m running for Regional Council because of an issue I’m having with a local business that also happens to have a contract with the Region of Waterloo. That business has asked me to take my patronage of their service elsewhere while refusing to provide an explanation as to why. 
[Editor’s note: CBC is not naming the business until we are able to include a statement from them.]

I simultaneously want to know everything and nothing about whatever is happening here, but it’s nice to see the old crank spirit is still alive and well in this era of constantly being told that no one cares enough about anything important to do anything about it.

Voting Info For The Municipal Election, The Stuff That’s Still Useful

I need to come up with more creative ways to say the usual “Hi. It’s me. Remember me?” because that’s getting old. Either that, or I need to show up more often. Either way, it’s municipal election time, and I’m going to try and put some useful info up here.

Unfortunately, because life lifes and municipal election websites are confusing, I have already missed putting up the advance polling stuff. They ended yesterday, and that makes me sad. It makes me especially sad because they had an advance polling location suuuuuper close to us. Plus, all the advance polling spots were supposed to have the talking machine that lets us vote independently. If only I had felt prepared to vote by yesterday, we could have just walked over and done it. But sadly, I did not.

So here’s the part that prevented me from posting this sooner. When I went to the where to vote page, after some hickups, I was able to look up my ward and figure out where all the polling places were. But then I wondered how I was supposed to know which places would have the machines. There’s a sort of helpful accessible voting page, which has become more helpful since I looked at it on October 3 when I originally wanted to post this. Back then, it just said there would be machines at all advance voting locations, and one station per ward on election day, but neglected to indicate which one. I even had someone look at the screen and review both the where to vote page and the accessibility page, and they never saw the list of places. Now, there is a list of places, and it matches the ones I squeezed out of the poor employee who answered the phone when I called them and asked how I’m supposed to find these magical machines if they don’t tell me where they are. Am I supposed to play roulette? Well, squeezed is an exaggeration. They were very nice and gave me all the locations for all the wards. They did say all that information is on the website, and I said I looked and didn’t see it. Could it have really been there all along? I’m going to hope not.

But thankfully, either because they updated the website, myself and the other person are confused, or maybe my call had some effect, no roulette is required, and I don’t have to do fancy HTML to make lists or tables with the wards and polling spots with machines because they’re right there on the page. Woo! If they weren’t there, it would have been nice to have a message there that told me that that information was going to be populated later, and maybe tell me when so I don’t keep checking back.

Also, in case you’re like me and never received your voter information card, here’s the list of acceptable types of ID. Phew, I have a few of them.

I’m happy that a couple of weird things that happened to me when I last looked at the site aren’t happening any more, but one little oddity still is. Every time I hit the control key on its own, it opens the admin panel for the election website. This is a thing I see often with government websites. I know it’s supposed to be a shortcut for admins, but here’s something people don’t realize. Screen-reader users sometimes hit the control key to get the screen-reader to stop talking. So every time that happens, the admin panel opens up and I have to click back and try to consciously prevent myself from hitting control. This is especially annoying if a webpage has steps to complete in a process, such as looking up which ward you live in. Sometimes having to click back to the page makes the whole interface mad.

I hope this helps someone, and I hope our voting experience is better than the last one. Usually they are. Here we come…just as soon as I figure out all my choices.