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The Random Thoughts Thread


buswizard

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16 hours ago, captaintrolley said:

I thought you could only take photos or videos with the camera. That's all mine does, and I don't know how to take video with it.

Smartphone camera have evolved that some can do augmented reality on the newer models. 

Back on topic, a lot of places are adapting the QR code model to manage things like lineups like TD does for in-person services as an example. Even when they push a lot of services online such as changes on an existing product or opening new products. To prevent human contact or touching certain items. 

Last time I went to a restaurant, they would have a menu that is laminated that they could disinfect once the customer is done viewing. Noting this was last summer and they only did dining outdoors and not inside. 

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3 hours ago, GTAmissions1 said:

a menu that is laminated that they could disinfect once the customer is done viewing.

I like that idea.  I've been to a few places that have a paper (regular 8 1/2" X 11" 16 lb bond) menu and they just throw it out after a customer has handled it. I found that approach to be very wasteful. Plus so many places using disposable cutlery and tableware. Again very wasteful. as if they weren't aware that soap and hot water kills the virus. Plus having to purchase all those disposables cutting into their revenue at a time when most places are operating reduced hours and do not have all of their former patrons back.

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9 minutes ago, captaintrolley said:

I like that idea.  I've been to a few places that have a paper (regular 8 1/2" X 11" 16 lb bond) menu and they just throw it out after a customer has handled it. I found that approach to be very wasteful. Plus so many places using disposable cutlery and tableware. Again very wasteful. as if they weren't aware that soap and hot water kills the virus. Plus having to purchase all those disposables cutting into their revenue at a time when most places are operating reduced hours and do not have all of their former patrons back.

Yeah that I don’t understand..... they complain about losses (valid) but then do wasteful things like that?  Probably don’t want to be bothered to clean the menu everytime.... (the cutlery doesn’t even make sense, like did they  suddenly forget there’s dishwashers?)

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4 hours ago, pccstreetcar4549 said:

Probably don’t want to be bothered to clean the menu every time.... (the cutlery doesn’t even make sense, like did they  suddenly forget there’s dishwashers?)

And when you ask why... you get this "due to covid we want to keep our staff and customers safe... " As if that clearly answers the question.  It may be an answer, but it makes no sense whatsoever. Unless of course you can't be bothered to wash the dishes / cutlery 'due to covid'.

Masks, physical distancing, hand washing, disinfecting high touch surfaces I can understand, but some of these other 'due to covid' nonsense protocols are not at all logical. And don't even get me started on seating that is all roped off.  I get that they don't want people seated next to each other, but have it so at least one person at a time can sit down.

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  • 2 weeks later...

This link is so much fun..

Covid got you stuck at home?  Go for a 'drive' in any one of several cities...

Check out local transit and familiar landmarks while you 'drive' around. .  Click on the city of your choice. You can also turn the 'car radio' on for local listening pleasure. 

I really enjoyed Amsterdam, Zurich, San Francisco and Seattle so far. 

https://driveandlisten.herokuapp.com/

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It has been years when Viola Desmond appeared on a Canadian $10CDN bill.

Now, I'm suggesting some of the ideas on who will sport on a next Canadian Dollar bill. These are the suggestions I can think of: Frederick Banting on a $5CDN bill, Roberta Bondar on a $20CDN bill, Chris Hadfield on a $50CDN bill

What would it take to have these people appear on the respective bills?

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#FoodForThought:

The YHM airport (in Hamilton, ON, Canada) back in its heydays used to have a variety of flights to choose from.

There was time that Norwegian Air Shuttle used to offer service from YHM to DUB (Dublin, Ireland) for a brief time. That stint unfortunately was short-lived.

Most recently, Swoop Airlines recently curtailed its service there (IIRC, the only flight remains is the YHM-YEG route).

What would it take - to "Make YHM Great Again" in terms of its service offerings?

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Apparently after five years of smoking out the neighbours, one of them went out and bought a pellet grill smoker and tons the situation’s reversed:  they’re breaking it in with a pork loin right now and the smell of Smokey goodness cooking is wafting over the fence in the direction of my house and it smells so good.   And it’s a beautifully day to be breaking in a new barbecue too with the unseasonal warmth we’ve been having.   I’m going to have to do rubs this weekend or something.  Interesting random thought:  the Halloween witch probably doesn’t know they have it yet which means she probably smells it and probably blames me thinking I’m doing low and slow barbecue right now.

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It has been days since Alex Trebek passed away as a host of "Jeopardy!".

The only problem remains: who will replace Alex Trebek?

Would it be nice if "George Strombo" is an ideal candidate for Trebek's successor? I mean, really - Strombo did a brief stint on HNIC, but sadly it only lasted a year and a half.

FYI, HNIC = Hockey Night in Canada

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It's been one of those days you just don't want to go outside.  I was expecting more rain based on the forecast and there's been some off and on all day but it wasn't as wet as it sounded like it would be, but the wind that's been blowing for most of the day has made up for it.  There's a lot to be said to hunkering down indoors and staying cozy while the wind whips and lashes the outside of the house.  It's been severe all day with only a couple of brief pauses and it's caused a number of large power failures in the area.  Luckily, the location I'm in hasn't been affected except for some intermittent fluctuations with flickering lights during the heaviest gusts but so far that's all, knock on wood.

I've been puttering around knocking off a few small things here and there.  I did some remote data logging testing with some new equipment and sorted out some gotchas with an infrared camera.  That's a seriously fun thing to play around with:

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Nothing hits the spot on a crappy day like a hot cup of coffee and I'm thinking about having another since that last one was four hours ago now.  I'm also thinking about whether to go downstairs and tackle assembling a cabinet that someone in my family bought 25 years ago or going outside for a drive to see what there is to see with the storm or stay here in the living room doing not much of anything until it's time to go to sleep.

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On 11/15/2020 at 8:54 PM, captaintrolley said:

Microsoft did an 'update' yesterday.  The notification said it would take 'a bit longer than usual'.  They weren't kidding.  A TWO HOUR update.  Wonder what they updated that took so long? My task bar is now a different color.. I guess I can live with that LOL.

Reminds me of those that were downloading macOS Big Sur when it became available. I mean I downloaded it when it first became available and it was slow as molasses. Noting that there were a ton of people downloading the new update causing strain on the servers and the amount of bandwidth capacity.

I downloaded it a few hours later and the update was 12.1 gigabytes (yes, it was that large) plus having to reinstall the OS. Overall, I always find that some people are willing to update when it first becomes available. Others wait a little bit until the issues are ironed out. I mean nothing is perfect today no matter how much quality control is involved. 

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Windows 3.1 was a current product when someone in my family bought two of these cabinets but never assembled them so this is new old stock.  I ended up with them and put the first one together six years ago and it was an ordeal so I left this one.  Until now.  I need the storage but I’m getting a refresher on why I hated building the first one.  Companies should stick to what they know best and for Rubbermaid, it isn’t flat pack furniture.

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However, it’s a new old stock throwback to the early 1990s and I know a lot of you are younger so it’s interesting to see how things used to be done.

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Look at the box and the manual.  There are no internet addresses of any kind.  There are no social media tags at all. You get a 1-800 number that’s staffed Monday-Friday, 9-5 eastern time.  And that’s it.

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  • 2 weeks later...

According to The Globe and Mail, Rogers is planning to relocate the Rogers Centre to a different location in partnership with Brookfield Asset Management. Unfortunately you need to be a subscriber to access the article.

Reading the history of Skydome and the cost overruns and how it was sold to Rogers at a low price. Skydome has existed for over 30 years and a lot of special moments (I remember attending concerts that can't fit in today's Scotiabank Arena). Hopefully if they do build a new baseball stadium, Rogers actually shoulders the costs versus trying to rely solely taxpayers to build the infrastructure. Especially the cost overruns. 

https://www.680news.com/2020/11/27/rogers-plans-to-demolish-the-rogers-centre-build-new-ballpark-in-its-place/

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39 minutes ago, GTAmissions1 said:

According to The Globe and Mail, Rogers is planning to relocate the Rogers Centre to a different location in partnership with Brookfield Asset Management. Unfortunately you need to be a subscriber to access the article.

Reading the history of Skydome and the cost overruns and how it was sold to Rogers at a low price. Skydome has existed for over 30 years and a lot of special moments (I remember attending concerts that can't fit in today's Scotiabank Arena). Hopefully if they do build a new baseball stadium, Rogers actually shoulders the costs versus trying to rely solely taxpayers to build the infrastructure. Especially the cost overruns. 

https://www.680news.com/2020/11/27/rogers-plans-to-demolish-the-rogers-centre-build-new-ballpark-in-its-place/

Interesting.  If they're considering other off-site locations near the waterfront for a replacement ballpark, one location comes to mind:  Exhibition Place.  Ouch!  I just had to go there, didn't I!

There's been a lot of dissatisfaction in recent years with Rogers Centre the Skydome since it doesn't do baseball or football well and it's seen a lot less concert use since the the post office building was turned into the Scotiabank Arena Air Canada Centre and they began using it as a concert venue.  By the way, is it just me or does that place sound awful?  Massey Hall's always sounded good and it's famous for that.  The O'Keefe Centre / Hummingbird Centre / Sony Centre / Meridian Hall  is another one that's always sounded good.  But the Air Canada Centre, the Skydome, and the Molson Amphitheatre have all been ear-bleeding experiences.  The Amphitheatre's not even an enclosed space so that one's got to be due to a really horrible sound reinforcement system or a string of sound engineers at every concert I've been to there who couldn't mix for the venue if their life depended on it.

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On 11/15/2020 at 8:54 PM, captaintrolley said:

Microsoft did an 'update' yesterday.  The notification said it would take 'a bit longer than usual'.  They weren't kidding.  A TWO HOUR update.  Wonder what they updated that took so long? My task bar is now a different color.. I guess I can live with that LOL.

I have automatic updates turned off; Win 8.1 does not care, it just reminds during the boot that updates are available. I do not feel like fixing something that is not broken.

 

 

On 11/17/2020 at 2:07 AM, GTAmissions1 said:

...snip... Overall, I always find that some people are willing to update when it first becomes available. Others wait a little bit until the issues are ironed out. I mean nothing is perfect today no matter how much quality control is involved. 

I use Firefox and am on the beta test program, my current version is 84.0b5 which just came in; so far all has worked as it should.

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The instrumentation platform at the Aricebo radio telescope just collapsed and fell 450 feet into the reflector below.  That pretty much cements the decision not to repair it but close it down instead that was announced a bit over a week ago.

2020 keeps getting better and better even with only one month left to go.  Nobody’s going to be sorry to see this extra long 366 day leap year of shit leave at the end of the month.

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2 hours ago, Wayside Observer said:

The instrumentation platform at the Aricebo radio telescope just collapsed and fell 450 feet into the reflector below.  That pretty much cements the decision not to repair it but close it down instead that was announced a bit over a week ago.

2020 keeps getting better and better even with only one month left to go.  Nobody’s going to be sorry to see this extra long 366 day leap year of shit leave at the end of the month.

That monolith disappeared too...I'm pretty sure the aliens will show up around Christmas to celebrate the grand finale of the world as we know it.

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3 hours ago, Doppelkupplung said:

That monolith disappeared too...I'm pretty sure the aliens will show up around Christmas to celebrate the grand finale of the world as we know it.

Who knows, with the way things are going, anything's possible.

I was thinking about that monolith disappearing too.  That part intrigues me more than its arrival.  When you think about it, sneaking something like that into a remote location that nobody's thinking about is the easy part.  Making it disappear again after it's been discovered and people are paying attention to it without getting caught, that's a lot more difficult.

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6 hours ago, Wayside Observer said:

That part intrigues me more than its arrival.  When you think about it, sneaking something like that into a remote location that nobody's thinking about is the easy part.  Making it disappear again after it's been discovered and people are paying attention to it without getting caught, that's a lot more difficult.

agreed bigtime.

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I really wished that TD should offered Google Pay (and Samsung Pay) in Canada. 

Although I don't deal with that bank, it really sucks that TD in Canada only offered Apple Pay. All other users with Android devices - have to suffer from using a substandard app that TD offered called the "TD Wallet".

There is a petition online demanding that TD should offer an alternative for non-Apple users. If I was a politician, I would introduce a private member's bill "mandating" that all banks and credit unions in Canada to offer mobile payments based on the standards (not limited to Apple, Android, etc.). 

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  • 3 weeks later...
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1 hour ago, GTAmissions1 said:

I was able to get myself a gaming laptop a few days ago. That will kept me entertained during the lockdown. It's not just electronics that are in demand - even powerline networking adapters, network cables and routers are in demand too!

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5 hours ago, FutureHeartsJunkie said:

I was able to get myself a gaming laptop a few days ago. That will kept me entertained during the lockdown. It's not just electronics that are in demand - even powerline networking adapters, network cables and routers are in demand too!

Especially with WiFi 6 being adopted to more devices along with bandwidth consumption and connected devices to support them. Pretty much squeezing a lot more out of the data pipe. Some providers like Rogers pushing people to watch television via an internet connection (IPTV) being bundled with the internet plan of course. Digital cable without internet has been mostly phased out. 

The nice thing with a gaming laptop is that you can also do regular work along with gaming. I know a few friends that have shelled out over $1,000 for one. At the same time, they are pretty powerful machines that can play games but also do the basic tasks such as web browsing and the other basics. It is a pretty big cost, but also worthwhile if you get a lot of usage from the item. 

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