More reasons to hate Bell Canada.

Bell sucks. Here's another reason why;

After noticing something was amiss with my phone bill, and calling Bell them up, I was told I was paying an extra 3.90$/month and 6.95$/month for "simplitel" which I never ordered. + Tax of course.

Apparently I've been paying this since October 2004, (total of over 560$) we don't use long distance, none of our friends or relatives are far and those that are, are just on the south shore at like .02$/minute...

That means that to make up for the 10.85$/month for the long distance plan, we'd have to be on the phone with them for approximately 542 minutes, or about 30 hours and 42 minutes.

Like we have that kind of time to waste... ;-) (my in-laws...)

So I went to PC Cyber and got a Magic Jack, if you're on Videotron or any cable service, it's great, technically it's great on DSL too, the only problem is when you try to have your phone service discontinued while keeping your DSL.

Yesterday I called my ISP (Mustang Technologies), I pay 32$/month for 200Gb on a 5mbit circuit, they can install a dry loop at my house for 15$/month. I give them the go ahead, but there's a problem, they called me back this morning and tell me that Bell will only certify the dry loop in my area @ 640kbits (!)

They're told by Bell that they're out of circuits where I live (Ile Perrot area) and they can't guarantee 5mbits.

OK, I tell the guy, let me give Bell a call.

I call Bell and ask for a dry loop installed at my house with BELL's own 5mbits Sympatico DSL on it. The guy checks, NO PROBLEM!

I then tell the guy, wait, you misunderstood, I want a third party DSL service installed on THAT SAME DRY LOOP; all of a sudden it's no longer guaranteed to give 5mbits.

I ask him: "And why the fuck not?"

He tells me that they have a certain amount of dry loops they are forced to sub-lease to other ISPs and that the limit in my area has been reached.

I tell the guy; "I live in a residential area of Ile Perrot, surrounded by moms and pops that have no idea what the fuck a dry loop is, in fact most of you guys at Bell technical support, probably don't even know that it is, how the hell am I supposed to believe that in my area of Ile Perrot, they are out of dry loops?"

It's true, I could walk around door to door in my neighborhood and ask everyone what a dry loop is, I can guarantee most of the people will answer that it's some kind of fruity cereal!

I've been with Mustang Techno for about 10 years and the service and pricing has always been impeccable, we've been "down" for a total of maybe one or two days in 10 years. I really don't want to change to a cable provider, mostly because in my area, the only cable provider is...

You've guessed it; Bell's retarded cousin, Videotron.

How the NHL will lose some fans.

How? Let's see:

The recent Zdeno Chara hit on Pacioretty, followed by the lack of any discernible sanction to at the very least, discourage such hits throughout the league. The re-signing of all-star commissioner and overall douchebag, Gary Bettman as commissioner of the NHL, a major hockey league, a sport he clearly knows nothing about, the fact that the NHL governor, Mr. Jeremy Jacobs, also happens to be the owner of the Boston Bruins, that the league disciplinary prefect Colin Campbell, also happens to be the dad of another Campbell NHL player who also happens to play for the Bruins...

Are those a lot of "also" being used in one long sentence to describe a lot of coincidences? Or is it indicative of a possible cover-up, over cover-up, lies and misinformations?

In a sport that supposedly makes the bulk of its revenue in the USA, a country that is struggling financially through a huge crisis, the appearance of impartiality is something important, and the thought does occur: What if it was the NFL?

Would it make things any better?

Henrik Sedin, one of the top NHL star players commented the non suspension of Chara "because Chara had no priors", by stating that if Chara is never suspended for anything he does, then he would never have any priors now would he. And that the NHL should start somewhere.

The fact that Chara has one of the best slapshots in the league, that he is a regular at all star games, does not put him above the regulations, if it did then Lindsay Lohan and Charlie Sheen would have gotten away with their respective (and illegal) escapades.

Zdeno Chara should have been suspended, if only for a couple games, as a show of goodwill but, with the Bruins locked in a race for first place in their division, the loss of Chara would have penalized them, dramatically favoring the Habs in this race.

Much in the same way that the loss of Pacioretty, a player that was in his breakout season, is going to penalize the Habs.

Where is the impartiality?

Someone should tell the commissioner that nobody's going to follow a sport once it has been established as being arranged. The WWF comes to mind...

Simon LeBon is sporting a beard!

It was with suspicion - and a little surprise - that I learned of a new Duran Duran full lenght album that had secretly been released in late 2010. On the verge of my own 40th birthday, and living with the lack of energy that goes along with everyday life, I seriously doubted that Simon and friends could still provide entertainment, while pushing 50.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7Er5TsQrGg

I was seriously wrong, the kind of wrong that is normally reserved for politicians, mostly governors.

Cinematically wrong then because All You Need Is Now is easily their best record in the last two decades. In the previous 5-6 albums they had tried to paint a slow, colorful canvas of indie rock, intermixed with several failed attempts at being mainstream and defining new fashion as they had done in the 1980s. This new effort brings forth their best abilities, all at once.

John Taylor's rhythmic bass is everywhere even in the surprisingly melodic - and rare - ballads.

Nick Rhodes is making us rediscover why he is legend; his arpeggios and soundscapes even in the most discoish of songs. Some of the more dramatic chord changes are pleasantly unexpected as in The Man Who Stole A Leopard, an ironic opus to the absurdity of American (and British) news.

Simon's voice is also pleasantly unlayered - although clearly autotuned - and his lyrics actually make (some) sense. The titlesong All You Need is Now (see video link above) defines exactly how a whole generation of 80s kids that are just about, or have just turned 40, feels. (like me)

Jesus, even the drums are good! In fact the only way to have made this album any better would have been to involve their ex-legendary guitarist Warren Cuccurullo.

I'm scoring it as an 8/10 accounting for Simon's beard.

In Memoriam; a nice Fuck You to Frank.

Today is an important anniversary for me, it's been five years since an old employer (B-Line Technical Services) has laid me off...

...for the second time...

...on the same calendar date.

They laid me off on Dec-15th 2002, then, after asking me to pass up a job opportunity with Minolta, and rehiring me the following April, they laid me off, again, on Dec-15th 2005.

The first time, I didn't see it coming at all. I was completely blind-sided when my local manager called me into his office to basically send me home. I thought it was a bad joke.

The second time, I didn't see it coming at all, I had just gotten a raise about a month earlier, as well as an extra week of vacations, both of which were supposed to become effective, in the new year.

So it's with great joy that today, after five years from the second Christmas surprise, I want to bestow a big, fat, juicy, Fuck You, to Frank, the owner of B-Line, as well as all of his family. Also, thanks for screwing me, and my family, out of the severance package you guys owed me when you laid me off.

I sincerely hope you had Lehman stocks.

Also, I'll allow myself to give a slight bit of advise to two people I deem to be good friends, you know who you are; You're still working there.

RUN!

It's almost hilarious how their website (linked above) has the following statement in bold characters on it's welcome page: "It is mission critical today…survival essential tomorrow."

They also need to hire someone that knows how to perform "effective business writing" because frankly - pardon the pun - their main page sucks monkey balls, I got tired of reading it after getting past the first paragraph.

Dan, Den,

There are things you do for yourselves, and things you do for your friends. The most important things though, are the ones you do for your family.

Think about it.

What happened to Donald Duck?

Donald Duck was always my favorite Disney character, along with Goofy and Mickey Mouse. I grew up reading their adventures in the Italian magazine "Topolino" as well as "I Grandi Classici".

Those comic books are available in Italian from Mondadori (only in Italy) and in French (in Belgium from what I gather).

The French ones are available to be purchased here in Quebec, but they are hard to find and usually a month or two late.

However, Disney hasn't been making original Donald Duck cartoons for a little while. Occasionally he can be glimpsed quickly passing through the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on the Disney Channel but no feature films, no pre-movie-cartoons, and no DVDs have been released with Donald in there for a while.

Why Disney? Why?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IfeuQ6Ayos

With classics like the above, it's a serious oversight. I particularly dislike the fact that some of the older classic cartoons have been banned because they were deemed "politically incorrect" or violent, but they've been replaced with Hannah Montana, the Jonas Brothers and other "Tween magnets".

Should nurse classes be added to high schools?

In light (blatantly bright light, supernova level brightness, biblical...really.) of the giant (blatantly huge giant, supernova level giant, biblical...really.) fail of the Quebec healthcare system, should we begin giving all high-school students at least one year of nursing class?

Consider a future, not too far, let's say 7-8 years, where all graduating high-school students would have a minimum of one year/course training as a nurse, everyone, male and female.

Imagine being at home when a family member gets burned/cut/bumped/sick/etc. and you have this nurse training, a training that would allow you to determine if they need stitches or not, if they need special care or antibiotics or not.

A course that would allow you to determine if your vomiting is caused by food poisoning, indigestion, gastro or Malaria. Perhaps with a little help from your friend Google.

A class that would teach you to make a bandage properly, perhaps set a dislocated shoulder, perform the Heimlich maneuver, determine if your old pop is having a heart attack, a blood cloth or a simple indigestion or a classic migraine.

Training to help you determine if your toddler is pushing a fever because she has the Measles or if she is simply teething.

Consider the savings in the healthcare system in nurse time, bandages (which we would have to pay ourselves at the drug store, perhaps 8$/bandage versus the usual 16$ charged by the bandage company to our hospitals), time and money.

Time and money.

In retrospect why aren't we doing this already?

WTF? Shouldn't we be demonstrating for relevant stuff?

Oct 2nd 2010, Quebec city. Over 60.000 people are reportedly manifesting to regain a professional hockey team.

http://www.demotix.com/news/463046/quebec-citizens-want-back-nordiques

Oct 3rd 2010, 30.000 people walked to collect money against cancer.

Some weeks ago, another manifestation gathered 1000 people to protest against natural gas mining.

Yesterday 5000 people manifested against a law that would allow English speaking families to send their children to PRIVATE English schools.

Seriously, WTF? Where are our priorities?

When I was a kid in Italy we had feminists protest against the rampant sexual harrassment that was usual in the 1970s in the offices, the minimal salaries women had, the rights to abortion, etc.

In France there are regular protests against the rape of pension funds by government.

Why in the hell is it that here in North America, when we hold a protest, a walk, a demonstration, it's never for, or against something relevant?

If I called a walk, on an arbitrary date, to DEMAND better healthcare for which we actually pay for on our taxes (and heavily at that), better roads, better government management, better police protection for victims, better education, a better choice of immigration...

How many people would show up?

Sadly, the walk for the Quebec Nordiques collected a total of 12.5M$.

The walk against cancer the next day? 2M$.

Nice.

Real nice.