2024.03.19 06.39
100928
three songs
100920
small towns
100919
best dollar stores
100918
KW day two
100917
Waterloo via Galt
100914
Facebook Humbug
100908a
Portraits at Forest Hill
100908
new family member
100907
bears raccoons
100906
frightened, bikes gone
100812
tug of war
100803
monday at centrepoint mall
100802
sunday with my folks
100300
march 2010
091200
december 2009
090800
august 2009
090600
june 2009
090400
april 2009
090300
march 2009
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unmodified old essays and pix
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100803 monday at centrepoint mall
1200 | Getting up at noon isn't so bad, really. Not for me. Except when
I go back to bed for some reason, such as to warm up after getting up. Oh well.
If you don't already know, at this point in my life I seem to be getting up
from bed every 2-4h, to pee, usually. It's not good. I've spoken to my doctor
about this, and he's checked my prostrate gland for me. It's not swollen at all,
so he believes the problem is something else. I have to go get tests. I would have
done this today, but everything important was closed. Oddly, the Centrepoint Mall
formerly Town and Country Square was open, as was Food Basics nearby. So much for
legal holiday.
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1400 | I got up again. I think I stayed awake. I do remember preparing
food. What was I craving today? Lightly fried eggs on multigrain bagels? I should prepare
my blog entries closer to the time the events happened. My short term memory sucks so much
right now.
Jeff wrote back to cancel his plans for Niagara Falls and Marineland. Gawd! $40 per person
is insane. Who can afford that? But later he SMSed me saying he was tired of sleeping. He's
been in much pain, as his new teeth hurt him so very much.
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1500 | Jeff's here! I've not seen him for a long time. His new teeth look
amazing. I didn't take any pictures. He hurts a lot, and he's worried the smile won't look right.
We went to Centrepoint Mall. It's been part of my North York for a long time, perhaps from
the very beginning. It hasn't changed much structurally. It has four large stores on each of
four spikes. There is a Canadian Tire, a No Frills, The Bay and a Zellers (which is owned by
The Bay). On the inside of the mall are the smaller stores, such as EB Games, Mac Sushi,
and maybe 100 other small places.
Jeff was surprised by how many cellular companies were there. Bell, Rogers, Virgin,
Koodo, Mobilicity, Fido; not Telus, Public, Wind, Solo. There were some companies which
represent more than one provider, or sell primarily cases. Centrepoint is a good mall
for purchasing a cell phone.
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1630 | We spent some time evaluating the Mobilicity deal. It's 65.00
a month for "everything". That means data, local voice, local text, Canadian voice, Canadian
text, American voice, American text, Global text. Now that I'm getting data, I want a cell
phone that will let me tether to the netbook. We'll see if it works okay. If it does,
then it will have earned it's 65/mo fee.
We went to the Bell booth to try the Blackberry hands on. Jeff seems to dislike them,
but I didn't mind the scroll button. It's smooth and responsive enough.
He didn't remember Blackberry ever using a mouselike interface; it's
an improvement over what he remembers. The phone I'm looking at is 500.00
this company doesn't do special plans to reduce the cost of their phones.
In fact, they don't do accounts either. You just need to have the money they
require in your account before the moment they need it. No credit, and no
credit check required. See? I really like this company.
If someone were to find my current phone, they could use it to call
long distance until I noticed it missing, and I could be liable for thousands
of dollars of long distance charges. Mobilicity is only prepaid. Whatever you
have in your "wallet" is all any thief can take from you and your phone. Oh,
and they can take the phone itself, which is paid full up front; that would
really suck.
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1800 | Poor Jeff. We had McD drinks, and it caused him serious
pain. So he took me back home, and went back to feel better. He SMSed me later to
say that he adjusted his teeth, and they improved at home.
I normally don't go to bed until 4am, so I made some food at home, and got
ready to go out again. This time I would take my bike somewhere downtown, and
just check out windows.
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1900 | I brought two cameras with me. I love taking pictures of
Toronto at sunset. So why has it been so very long that I've done just that? On this
trip I saw exactly one kind of red brick I like to record, and took the picture,
but only one. The curious emotion I would like to share with you is I have to
resist buying yet more digital cameras as they go on sale.
I took the subway south to Davisville. There are lots of interesting stores
along this stretch of Yonge street, between Davisville and Eglinton Station. I
don't require anything, so I didn't buy anything. I saw lots of green grocers
and I could have picked up some nice berries, or anything, but I wanted to
bicycle, rather than to shop.
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2030 | As I pass the TD Bank and the Rogers store, I get a phone
call from my Stx. As always, the act of pulling the phone out of my pocket touches the
screen so that the call is ignored. Jeff was surprised when we talked about this at the
mall. I explained that it used to answer the call, and whoever called would listen to
me walking, hoping I'd hear them calling out from my pocket. Now it has to get my
password right, and it just doesn't do that often.
I called the store back. It was Julia. She had been trying to switch shifts with
people so she could do something with another barista. I told her it would be hard
for me, but I would do it. My new shift would be from 730am to 400pm. I'd be waking
up around 5ish and so I had to catch a bus and return home right away.
I caught that bus, and the driver was cool. While I'm on the bus, Julia called
back to advise me she made other arrangements, so I wouldn't have to come early; I
could just come at my normal time. The weather today was amazing and perfect so I
got off the bus, just so I could return to riding.
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2100 | It stayed light out for a long time. So I found my way to
a smell. There was a Mexican restaurant. I locked my bike and went inside. Everything
looked right, but the prices. I wasn't ready to spend 15.00 for some of the good smells
coming from there. I might do that when Abie returns, and we could go together. But
two doors south of there was a new place that sold Gelato. It was costly too, but
for some reason 6.00 didn't feel like 15.00, so I tried the lemon, tiramisu, vanilla
and yogurt with berries. All of them perfect. They make the gelato there in the
morning, and sell it all afternoon and night. The owner himself was taking orders
and serving the ice cream. And the neighbours from all around were coming in and
expressing how happy the store was finally open today.
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2130 | I needed the bathroom, so I rushed home; I prefer my own toilet.
And I've been avoiding doing laundry. We don't have ensuite equipment for that here, so I
have to usually get a ride to carry all of it. The laundromat I go to is near the store I
work at, but I'd have to do it four hours prior to work, as a minimum. I love the laundry
place because I can start perhaps ten loads of laundry, and dry them all too, nearly
at the same time. I like their high efficiency washers, and don't use as much soap, but
this requires my vigilance as how much is that? It's not just enough to follow the instructions
on the bottle. I add soap and water until it makes a light suds on top, and keeps the suds.
Eeep, I've digressed. I have a favourite pair of pants for work. They've needed washing
for a while, so I hand washed them in the shower along with me. I'm writing this at 423am
and they're drying well.
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2300 | I normally would stay up late, but I'm fading. And this is odd;
there are people coming in upstairs! It is 11pm, and something is happening here. I don't
worry about anything, so I just lie down for a while. It turned out to be a long while. I
woke up at 4am, so here I am finishing this, so I can post it for you.
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