I hope everyone had a great holiday, and that tonight brings much mirth and merriment to all. I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, and just need to write stuff off. Don’t mind me.

On my mind is my move to Edmonton with Heidi, my family and my father’s deteriorating health. I wonder whether or not I’m going to be happy as an engineer and where I wish to travel. I am starting to think American authorities are absolutely ridiculous in its handling of this recent “terrorist” attack. I think terrorists have essentially won…by facilitating the crippling of our economies and civil rights.

I saw Avatar, and enjoyed the theme of the story, but I’ll let PZ Myers speak of what annoyed me, the predictability and dullness of the plot:

There are good guys and bad guys, and the good guys are really, really good, and the bad guys are really, really bad. Like straight from the associate of arts degree program at the local Cartoon Villain College. When there’s nothing else to do, they blow things up that gain them nothing but universal loathing. They also have standard cartoon villain military tactics, which usually involves sending in swarms of moronic foot soldiers to accompany their high-tech airborne missile platforms and act as targets for the defenders.

That, and making scientists look like social incompetents.

Today was one of my last days of hanging out with my little brother. I’m incredibly glad I signed up for Big Brothers, Big Sisters. There’s no tax deduction, but I think it’s the furthest you can take a donation…one of your personal time.

I get frustrated at the Olympics, I think it’s a waste of money. So do people who believe that climate change is some hoax, and that pharmaceutical companies are injecting nanochips in my blood via the H1N1 vaccine. The latter two I would love to slap across the head very hard.

Now I’m questionning my job as an engineer…building refineries in Northern Alberta…all for the glory that is ca$h.

Be safe tonight, kids. Happy new year!

This man has had an incredible impact on how we view the potential of the human brain. He would read up to 8 books a day, committing every bit of information to memory. He’d read the left page with the left eye, and the right page with the right eye. Not to mention an opening up to the incredibly complex world of autism.

First, we need some context, which is funny:

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For for this to be hilarious, just add Usher.

I can’t stop laughing!

Keep in my mind that unlike Australians, we won’t be sipping white wine in the sun. However it’s easy to overlook this, given the meaning of the song.

Happy and safe holidays, everyone.

I received a phone call earlier this evening pertaining to my job application with Kiewit in Calgary. I received an offer, and I start whenever I want. I get to choose between Calgary and Edmonton with moving expenses paid. For the first time of my life, I’m considering purchasing a vehicle. I’m thinking about finally being able to pay off my debt. How much I’ll miss my family, not to mention pets.

I was told by the recruiter to take a vacation between before I start work. Therefore, I think Heidi and I are going to spend a week somewhere near the equator, and then maybe making a detour to NYC, before I move away in February. She’ll join me about a month or two later. This company has a reputation for being demanding of its employees, and it’ll be a good idea to relax a bit.

Speaking of relaxing…I can’t sleep for the life of me.

My family has pretty much always been in support of Western military. My father’s father served in the end of WWII, my mother’s father was in the army. My father was absolutely fascinated with fighter jets, and regularly took me to airshows. I was dead-set on becoming a fighter pilot until age 14, when I discovered I needed glasses. My dream was, in essense, shot down (pun intended).

I was always told by my father and CNN that Israel always has to defend itself against people who just hated them for no reason. When 9/11 happened, I was pretty sure I was still going to join the Air Force. I got my glider pilot’s license the next summer, and my private pilot’s license the summer before 12th grade. I was not uncommon for my father to have a military themed wallpaper on his office desktop background.

This is a tomahawk cruise missile warhead delivery system being launched from a naval vessel. It can deliver over 1,000 lbs of explosive over 2,500 kilometers. I’d see things like this on Extreme Machines and love it. I can just picture the narrator saying something along the lines of “With technology like this, the bad guy doesn’t even have a chance to fire a single bullet.”.

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Nowaways, my perspective is a little different. I see Israel as a bully, I question our involvement in Afghanistan, supporting a false government, when only about 100 taliban are actually in the country (they’re all in Pakistan now). I can understand if we’re making money off of their drugs, which is what it seems. Funny they don’t tell you that Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, is the brother of a major drug lord. It’s also funny that the Allies only burn southern opium crops, not northern ones.

I see this senseless violence, and greed that is to a level no different than telecommunications companies screwing over the public, or ticketmaster charging you $25 in “convenience fees” per event ticket, and wonder where we’ve gone wrong. We’re all just greedy motherfuckers, it seems.

Now when I look at a photo of a tomahawk cruise missile, I see the real result:

This child was at a distance from the target. I think its safe to guess that whoever was in the blast radius could now only be poured into a vial. This shit happens nearly daily in Iraq. How about if one cruise missile were to hit a rural community in Pennsylvania?  It would be a massive tragedy. Hit a few brown people in the desert? Meh.

Let’s pretend that is a photo of a child in Canada who died at the hands of, say, the Chinese. Would they be winning our hearts & minds, or would we sign up to kill those invaders at any cost?

My point? I do not believe that our tactics are helping us at all in reducing the threat of terrorism.

Science just asks for your eyes.

Watch my girlfriend kill this poor soul with one of her typical volleyball spikes.

…Fear her.

I was with Heidi and some friends last night. Some guys were playing Need for Speed: Undercover on the PS3, and a song came on that Heidi and I flipped for. A little bit of googling later, we found out it was a song called Genesis by Justice. Checked them out some more, and these guys are frickin’ awesome. They’re just like Daft Punk.

Here’s my fave song I’ve found so far:

This is the song that played in the game:

Tip of the hat to Matt for this: