Someone is WRONG on the internet!

I've been enjoying the xkcd web comic for a while, it appeals to my inner nerd. This particular recent entry explains me to myself at last, and earns xkcd a spot on my "Series of tubes..." sidebar.

In iPhone news, I have recovered from "bricking" my iPhone by unwisely installing an update. A hack emerged a week ago that let me return to iPhone bliss and my broken Motorola Razr, the one that can't navigate or even dial "9", has been retired again... Lesson learned.

Here's an iPhone photo from the lake shore last weekend when Chris and I visited my parents. We could hear the howling wind and pounding waves and just had to investigate!

What's happening in my tiny world of endurance sports? I'm training for the 30K "Around the Bay" race in Hamilton at the end of March and riding my tri bike on a CompuTrainer once a week at a new facility called Absolute Endurance. They're in the building that since my childhood has housed a thrift shop. Funny to walk into it again after all these years!

Listening to: Stacy's Mom by Fountains of Wayne from Welcome Interstate Managers.

Up the Yangtze

I saw the new documentary Up the Yangtze this evening. When my friend Adrian suggested we go see it my first thought was of the Monty Python record album sketch of a made-up football supporter's song praising the river - "Szechuan is the province, Shanghai's the port. Yangtze is the river that we all support!" In the end Adrian couldn't come so Sheryl and I went without him on the opening night.

What a great film! The director Yung Chang found the perfect family to focus on, peasants scraping out a living in the shadow of the Three Gorges dam, with the water rising inexorably around their shack and their daughter being sent to work on the cruise ships that run up and down the river. Following them showed the human reality of this massive civil engineering project. To me it was the story of China's headlong rush "into the future", with tradition and humanity discarded without a backward glance... Yung managed to capture some very vulnerable moments as his subject family was forced to make desperate choices. The film's web site is uptheyangtze.com. Yung was in the audience for our screening and gave us an update on his subject's lives since filming was completed.

Update: The director's parents used to be my parent's neighbours! My parents came back from a Yangtze cruise about 12 years ago and urged them to take their Canadian born and raised sons to see China. The rest is history...

I suppose I have to be honest and report a personal tragedy. I managed to upgrade my iPhone too enthusiastically and it's now non-functional because of conflicts with the hacks that enabled me to use it in Canada. I'm kicking myself, and have fallen back to my Motorola Razr that doesn't dial 9. There'll be a way forward again in a few weeks...

Open the Floodgates!

Boy it's been hard to get back into blogging... I enjoy it, but it takes so much time. I've spent the last week battle a stomach bug that has kept me very close to the toilet, so I suppose I've actually closed the floodgates. Now I need diarrhea of a different kind!

So yes, I did spent three weeks in Australia last month. Way too much to put in one post, so I'll leave that on the agenda, perhaps even with a "table of contents" entry to organise it. Instead I'll start with Christmas and fill in the gaps later.

Christmas this year was at my sister's place. Chris was with me Christmas Eve and Morning, and my parents came in to town and stayed at a hotel for several days, which let them visit their town friends and eased all our travel plans. Very civilized, I thought. My brother had no respite though, they came up from New York state with their twins and they pretty much all got sick as soon as they started traveling. His girls are growing up fast and were fun to have around when they happened to be healthy.

We ended up dining together the day before Christmas Eve, Christmas Eve, and again for Christmas Lunch. Not only was it a lot of food, it was a lot of family! Note to self: spread all that stuff out next year, like over a month perhaps...

So what did Christmas bring for everyone? Lots of technology, lots of movies, lots of books. Chris got a new iPod nano, some spending money in his iTunes account, and the new Simpsons and Futurama movies. Sheryl got an iPod nano too, while her daughter got an iPod Touch. I got a nice sweater that I've been wearing almost on-stop, and an iPhone! Too bad I can't hack my iPhone to work as a cell phone in Canada (yet), but it's a groovy iPod, camera, and web browser. Santa brought Chris and I a new 32" Sony Bravia flat panel TV too, which Chris in particular loves...

New Year's Eve was an interesting variation on a theme. I spent all New Year's Day, starting right at midnight, demonstrating Bowflex fitness equipment on The Shopping Channel. Seven hour's worth of muscle building! Personally I've usually chosen to spend New Year's Eve quietly at home.

Since then I've been pretty busy with my triathlon club getting plans together for the coming season, leading another Running Room 5K Clinic, and other Shopping Channel gigs (January always has a big fitness focus apparently).

I did manage to find time to finally replace my superannuated 1994 Cavalier. Two weeks ago I picked up a 2006 Mazda 3 Sport, which is a much nicer ride... I managed to keep the news to myself for about a week and surprised Sheryl by showing up at her office behind it's wheel. My first road trip was this past weekend, heading up to the Washago International Film Festival (a weekend of spy-themed DVDs at a friend's cottage; Diamonds are Forever - a camp hoot with appalling acting, The Conversation - I loved it, but it's better seen alone, On Her Majesty's Secret Service - more camp, The Departed - excellent but grueling), where this photo was taken.

Last week I went with Chris to see Juno, a film he's already seen with his Mum. A fun film with entertaining dialog and a fantastic lead from Ellen Page, but I think the teen pregnancy thing was handled a little too lightly... Still, worth seeing.

Listening to: Oxygène Part IV by Jean Michel Jarre from Oxygène.