Author: admin

So…let’s talk about Christmas parties.

My office Christmas party usually is during the day, involves a lunch, some games here and there, and some door prizes.

I read an article (here)the other day talking about how parties have swayed from drunken debauchery where you kiss at least three colleagues and then look ashamed the next day at work to the politically correct office parties.

I must admit that the old Christmas parties seem like a lot more fun. I went to a wedding back in the summer and met quite a few people from work whom I don’t see outside of this environment…and it was fun! I saw the husbands they talk about, saw them pound back a few drinks and get on the dance floor. That’s what it’s all about people…party down.

In a jumpback to the old days, a few of us at work have decided to have our own party at Baton Rouge on Thursday night.

Wow. That graphic didn’t really come out big at all.

Anyhow, I’m tired of the Internet being 99% non-Canadian so I’d like to share a great Canadian site with you.

Redflagdeals.com tallies all the great deals that are going on across Canada…gift certificates, special in-store offers, you name it, they have it! Heck, even in the forums they go ape over when the new Canadian Tire flyer comes out (as we all do!)

Anyhow, if you are ever thinking of purchasing anything ANYWHERE, check out this site first.

I am finally done mailing my Christmas cards. I’m sure there will be a few stragglers I forgot (like Kevin last year who I insulted by actually asking for his mailing address but never sending him a card! Woops!) but that’s why I have extra cards.

This year, I went on a more personal angle than usual which I personally think is hilarious and falls in line with the Palmer you all know and love.

I just had a brainwave when James and Ferda said they woudln’t make it to the Christmas party. With everything else on my mind, I didn’t realize they were going to Cuba the same time of my party. Dang, oh well. Something tells me they’ll have quite the time there and don’t need eggnog.

HEY! Speaking of my party, I would like to put on record that Vero and I may have picked up the best cheesy holiday sweaters there ever were at Value Village yesterday. I thought I had a winner until I stumbled upon goodness in the wool form. I cannot wait to post a picture.

iplaying: Where Is Everybody? Nine Inch Nails – The Fragile

Yesterday, I went out to buy some Christmas party items along with hauling Vero and Eric out to pick up a Christmas tree up the road.

Let me tell you something…in the city, you don’t get the Charlie Brown Christmas trees that you find in the woods. These are full fledged genetically produced perfecto Christmas trees. I was thinking “I don’t deserve this as my first tree!”. Anyhow, after some clever engineering, the tree was up with some great lights. I am in the total Christmas zone now.

Dad mentioned that I should water the hell out of this thing and he wasn’t kidding. I put some water in last night, and when I woke up, there was not a drop left in it. The good thing is that the tree is starting to smell like one. Maybe it needs water to have the pine smell.

For the rest of the week – mail out more Christmas cards, pick up Christmas party necessities, and pick up Maureen at 7:30 on Saturday morning. I better remember that little ditty.

I don’t know about you guys, but I am the king of procrastination when it comes to studying for an exam. I feel guilty when I tell people that I can’t go out and do anything since I’m studying because I feel that I don’t really get much done. However, it’s worked for me in the past…oh…15 years of my life so I guess I am doing the right thing.

Let me tell you of my productive day due to studying for an exam at 7 that night. Let’s start on Friday night.

• Have some dinner. Start reading some course notes.
• Watch an episode of Smallville. By the way, Smallville rules. I was watching the Superman movies just to start me off in the Supescape, but now I’m a full fledged member. I’ll be honest, I’m a sucker for those high school drama type shows. Hello Dawson’s Creek!
• Checked out some more notes. Realized I’m a little sleepy. Will only take a 15 minute nap on my oh-so comfortable couch.
• Wake up to Joe and Lucas calling. Realize I should study some more. That works for another 20 minutes. Watch another episode of Smallville.
• Decide to go to bed since a good early morning start should prepare me.
• Read Dune: The Battle of Corrin for an hour.
• Go.To.Sleep.(Again)
• Get up, eat an apple. Go on the computer.
• Decide to sit down and study some more.
• Pop in some Zeppelin in the new stereo and play around with the different sound settings.
• Call Eric to ask him about some of the different settings and how Pro Logic disseminates the sound from a CD into the rear channels.
• Go to Amanda’s to drop off paint supplies. Go to Eric’s to drop off a vaccuum.
• Get home, eat some lasagna, watch a bit of Smallville.
• Study for another half hour. Periodically go to check if I should upload some more pictures to Flickr.
• Study some more. Studying involves me looking at key messages and checking out the practice tests online.
• Realize that the Christmas party is coming up soon so think about some good tunes that we may play.
• Haul out the guitar and play some good tunes that flow together.
• Realize it’s time to make a freakin’ setlist after all these years that will work well in a crowd
• 1 1/2 hours later, I’m done choosing the songs for the setlist, but maybe I should think about the order.
• Realize I should really get back to studying. Sit back down to the stereo and study for a 1/2 hour.
• Eat some supper.
• Go to Vero’s and then go to my exam. I love this girl. She’s great.
• I am pretty sure I passed the exam. Don’t know if I got over 80% but I think I did pretty good. One more exam to go on the 19th. It’s an essay writing class so no real studying to prepare.
• Came home, bought some frames at Wal-Mart (may I point out that during the Holiday rush, the hours to go to Wal-Mart are after 9:00 since they are open until 11:00. There was no one there).
• Hung up some more concert reviews.
• Watched another episode of Smallville.
• Am killing time until Flickr is done another upload.

There you have it. A day in the life of Palmer when he is studying for an exam. Pretty productive if you ask me. If it were just a normal day, it would have consisted of the following:

• Wake up.
• Watch Smallville.
• Go to bed.

iplaying: Mina Loy (M.O.H.) – Billy Corgan – The Future Embrace

Lucy introduced me to the writings (ramblings) of Herbert Kornfeld a few years ago and I thought we had lost him…not a new posting since 2004, but lo and behold, he is back, along with free access once again! (The Onion was pay per view for awhile…)

Click here for Herbert’s Ramblings.

A biography of Herbert:
Herbert Kornfeld writes about workplace issues for The Onion. He works as the Accounts Receivable Supervisor at Midstate Office Supply, the state’s oldest wholesaler and retailer of office supplies and business machines.

Note: I would highly recommend reading the entries from Day 1 onward. His entries follow a storyline of sorts. So just navigate backwards in time and start there.

Can I just say that the ramblings of Herbert closely mimic the ramblings of our very own James in his accounting department? I remembered Herbert as soon as I read a few of James’ entries. His blog is here.

update: Oh, this is mint. They made a website for Midstate Office Supplies.

Query:

I have a cell phone. I’m now going to get a landline. I’m thinking of getting a smaller cell phone package.

Should I:
– stick with Bell Mobility since I already have a phone and have fulfilled my contract.
– get a new phone which means I would have to sign a 2-3 year deal depending on where I go and get good perks.

For example, if I sign up for three years with a new phone number at Bell – I get a new phone, and a portable DVD player. However, my number would change.

Also, if I go to Future Shop, I get a new phone, and a $100 gift card but my number changes.

So…in my eyes, I’m thinking signing up for a contract isn’t that big of a deal to me. I think for the rest of my days I will have a cell phone. And from what I know, the contract doesn’t lock you into that plan, it just means you can’t go to another supplier. So if I stuck it out with Bell for the rest of my life, what’s the big deal of signing up for a contract?

I need some advice on this. Has anyone been royally screwed when it comes to contracts? I have not. I never had the desire to switch phone companies. Well, except for the fact that it’s freakin’ expensive, but I’m sure I could just change to another plan

iplaying: Yo Mama by BC-5

Continuing on from Benoit’s entry on how he was introduced to video games, let me tell you my story:

I recall playing a Colecovision in Gaspe and didn’t really understand what was going on. Then I moved up towards Atari over at the Suddard’s where I am going to be honest here…I thought it sucked. What was with that lousy joystick?

Alright…here’s where we step it up a notch for the best 10 years of my life. I don’t know how I afforded it, but I remember that I ordered a Nintendo Enterntainment System from Nanny down in Florida. Supposedly the games were cheaper down there but I have to wonder now…anyhow I got home one day from school and Mom said Dad needed help downstairs with something and I thought that was strange since he was usually at work by this time. Then she said he needed help playing Police Quest (which will be explained later in my post of how I loved computer games). I went downstairs and lo and behold, there was Dad hooking up the Nintendo. Whoa. What a feeling. You know how you can’t remember half the stuff you’ve done in your life, but there are certain moments where you can recall them like they happened yesterday? This is one of those moments. Dad went to work and I played Super Mario Bros. and Duck Hunt all night and woke up early the next morning to play it again.

Nintendo became my life. That’s right…I was a video game geek. Lucky for me, I meet Marc who lived a few doors down who shared my passion. I can still remember the countless hours we spent playing Dragon Warrior just to build up enough experience to progress into dangerous territory with harder enemies. Man, RPGs were not made well back then. Now they are built so you don’t have to really build up experience…you just keep playing the game. Actually, this brings up a good rant as to how experience points are not really needed anymore in video games.

Then came the time where the Super NES came out and I needed it. However, my parents didn’t see the sense of having two video game systems (Heaven forbid!) and to get a Super NES, I had to sell my NES and all its games. It was a sad moment in my life, but on the horizon I could see the new Zelda game inserted into the Super NES console (BTW, probably my favourite video game. Perhaps I should sit down and make a top 10 list).

Over the years, I became lest enthused with Super NES and moved towards computer games – mostly the Sierra Quest series – King’s, Police, Space, Leisure Suit Larry…you name it, I played it. I loved those games. I’ll go more into computer games in another post.

When I moved to college, I played video games here and there but never really felt the itch to sit down for hours anymore in front of the television set. I am disappointed with how I turned from the uber-geek of video games to someone who isn’t even interested in them anymore.

Last year I thought that I was becoming bored with the monotony of going to work and coming home, that I may want to try a new video game console since Carrie and I used to play quite a few video games all the time. Carrie and Philipp bought a Gamecube which we played religiously for awhile and I ended up getting an XBox last Christmas.

However, I’ll be honest with you, I probably played it 10 times.

Gone are the days where I was interested in video games. I don’t know why I am this way. It saddens me actually that I am this way. How could something that was such a part of my life, just wither and die?

So there you have it..my video game history! I suggest you go see Benoit’s entry since he has a very keen interest in the video game industry and it was an entertaining read. I also encourage you to write about your first forray into it!

iplaying: Release – Live in Kingston 2005-07-15 – The Tea Party

What can I say today on the anniversary of John Lennon’s death? Not a whole lot. I will admit that I’ve just started to engross myself in the ways of the Beatles in the past year so am only now seeing the tremendous impact that it must have had on people when he was killed.

What can I say about about John Lennon? I can say that he writes some pretty kickass tunes. I can say that what I know about him, he pushed the envelope of peace. What could he have accomplished in the past 25 years? Probably a LOT. More than you and I could do. Celebrities seem to have more power than us…

I hope that I continue my journey in listening to the Beatles and the works of John Lennon to truly appreciate what he has given us. Happiness is not a warm gun…

iplaying: You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away – The Beatles

Alllright! Going to see Live and Nickelback on February 18, 2006. Thank you presale!

Who am I more anxious for? Man…Live puts on a wicked show…but so does Nickelback.

Plus, if the theory of Live pans out, the next album will be amazing. I have this theory where each alternating album sucks. So they in line for a comeback.