Tag Archives: Calgary

anal drivers…

Posted by bookermorgan on

I consider myself a bit of a crazy asshole driver. Only a little. I rarely let my driving put myself or anyone else in danger. That being said, there are some things that happen on the road that irritate the hell out of me.

The first thing that drives me nuts is the apparent lack of signal lights in this city. How lazy are you that you don’t signal? Do you expect me to just know where you are planning to go? This beyond.ca forum post shows that failure to signal lane change is 2 demerits points and a $115 ticket, and that page is from 2004! I would love to see a CPS Officer pull your lazy ass over for that one.

Another irritation would be tailgating. That is just dangerous. I brake for tailgaters. That is after I slow down to 5km under the limit. Following to close is $172.00 and 4 demerits! On that thought, this morning I was coming off 19th street on to John Laurie EB, which is also the exit lane to 14th street. I was getting up to the 70km/h speed in that lane. I had a blue Mitsubishi car sitting beside me with his signal light on. So this guy finally slows down enough to whip in behind me about a foot off my bumper. I slow down to get him to back off. No such luck. I tap the brakes. He flashes his lights at me. It was at that point I switch lanes to continue on John Laurie, and flash him the Hawaiian good luck symbol. End of story right?
Nope! Mr. Awesome decides to show me who Big Dick on the road is. He switches into my lane, comes up behind me, switches into the left lane, gets beside me, and his passenger returns the bird. Then he decides to remain there for a bit, before pulling out in front of me and pulling away. I switch into the left lane, and end up passing him on the corner at John Laurie and McKnight. Oops, that pissed him off. I get back into the right lane, he pulls back up on my bumper, then beside me. We hit the lights at 4th street, and once the light goes green, he pushes his way over to turn right and head south. Was that really worth it?

Geocaching? umm…what?

Posted by bookermorgan on

That smartphone in your pocket right now could be your ticket to an essentially free new hobby. At least it was for me.

Armed with my smartphone only a year ago, I found my first geocache. What is a geocache? Well Geocaching is essentially a treasure hunt. Caches are placed all over the world. The sizes vary, I personally have found as large as an ammo box and as small as a keychain.

So how do I find one? Simply sign up at geocaching.com, go to the play menu and Hide and Seek a Cache. You can put in your postal code and get a map of all the caches in the area. The location will be listed as a coordinate that you can set into your GPS as a waypoint. If you have a iPhone, there is an official geocaching.com app you can use. If you have an Android phone like me, I recommend c:geo.

So whats the challenge? My GPS on my phone is lucky to get me to within 10m of the cache. I also have a handheld GPS that can get within 2m in clear skies. So you aren’t going to be directly on top of the cache, and you will have to do some hunting! I have found caches in bushes, under trees, under rocks, under light post covers, and in metal fence posts!

Inside the cache there will be a logbook, sign it! There also could be trade items. These items are usually toys, but be cautious as they may also be trackable items. Always trade even or up. Nobody wants your pocket lint :)

And trackables…what are those? They could be anything! I have had coins, tags, and tags attached to items. Items like a toy car, a small stuffed animal and a toy airplane. There is a problem with these not being logged properly or being stolencompletely. It is very important to pay attention when you are trading, and if you take a trackable, log it on that trackable’s page!

Blogging for the Wedding

Posted by bookermorgan on

Six months until my wedding day, 179 days. Luckly the list of to-do’s is actually getting smaller, thanks largely to my wonderful fiancee, who in between work and school is finding time to hack away at the details.
My task list is quite a bit smaller, I attribute that to having a mans eye for things. She knows what I’m talking about, the differences in colour and texture that only a woman notices, and appreciates.
Continue reading →

The Real Canadian Superstore

Posted by bookermorgan on

My grocery store of choice would be the superstore. Not that I love that is it always busy, or that I have to have a dollar for a cart. It’s just that I am cheap! I have a Safeway a block from my place, but am trying to avoid going there because their prices are higher. This is proven month after month by our local CTV here.

There is also that reward for shopping at a specific grocery store. If you shop at Co-op, you will be rewarded once a year when they send you a cheque. I believe it is more of an apology, “sorry that our prices are insane, heres a couple bucks.” Safeway has those Air Miles, that you can collect and get some free trips. Or like me, free gift cards to Starbucks, and the movie theaters.  I honestly don’t know what Sobeys has because, I maybe set foot in there once a year due to them having the highest prices. And Superstore…well if you are feeding a family, or you have emptied all the cupboards and fridge and spend that magic $250, you get something free.

We once got a slow cooker, a Presidents Choice brand slow cooker. We didn’t even clue in to the fact we would get something free, they just brought it to us. But then there are the people that have that free item in mind the second they step in the door. They are shopping with a goal. They have a cart and a basket. The items they actually need go into the cart, and the filler items are in the basket. These people will watch the register total climb higher and higher. You will see them add or take items off the belt, because they want that item but only want to pay $250 for their total order. And they are always in front of me.

I pick my line thinking that this will move quickly. Yeah right, because that ever happens. I usually wonder, “who is the jerk that left a full basket in this stack of baskets?” Thats usually when they push me out of the way to get another item out of that basket, a $2 item, or maybe $5.

I must say out of everyone in the store that I feel bad for when these people shop, the poor person that has to re-stock the items left in the basket probably has it the worst. How long does that basket sit there? Is there any meat or maybe ice cream in there? Hope not!