Some Randomness From The Road

– saw two moose (meese?) right beside the road but behind a fence on my early morning drive to Rocanville (one of our most distant communities at 2.5 hours) this morning.  A pretty rare sight (for me anyhow but then again, I don't hunt) so I actually briefly thought “Those are some weird looking cows!”   But I actually whipped the car around to go have a closer look.  But when I got close the second time, they bolted into the trees, still visible but not as clearly. 

– absolutely the most embarrassing day ever for my public session.  I don't pre-screen my search results, preferring to either come up with suggestions from the patrons or pick something on the spot myself.  So, when I demo my fake Facebook account (with no friends and only a membership in the Regina network), it's helpfully showing me the most popular posts in the Regina network on my news feed – including a humour video clip named “orgasm“.  Then I go to YouTube and one of the “most-viewed” feature clips on the home page is a girl in a thong.  Then, to top it off, I go to LeaderPost.com and the top news story is about prostitution which puts everybody over the top laughing.  “Is there anything on the Internet that isn't about sex?” one lady asks and I have to admit that, apparently, there isn't.

– there's a casino on an Indian reserve about halfway on the drive home so I stopped in for a restroom break.  I'm not a huge gambler and rarely go to casinos but I thought, “Why not? I don't get coffee breaks on the road so I'll take one now!” and threw $10 in one of the slot machines…which disappeared in about ten minutes.  This is my most expensive bathroom break ever (although I think I had to pay at the top of the Eiffel Tower and I have a memory that one wasn't cheap either – captive audience and all.)

– I figured out how to set a scan for my favourite artists on the satellite radio so now, anytime a song by the Beatles, Stones, Dylan, Wilco, Van Morrison, Radiohead, REM, U2 and a few others comes on, I can flip to it immediately.  Wish I'd figured that out about a month ago!

– did I mention that I've been up since 3am since Pace had one of his screaming fits and I couldn't sleep after he finally settled, knowing I had to be up in a few short hours anyhow?  I was good all day but it's finally caught up to me and I'm dead tired now. 

Did anybody else's kids do that when they were around 8 months?  Wake up randomly through the night and scream bloody murder with nothing able to console them?  It might be night terrors but that authoritative source, Wikipedia, says they often don't start until 2 years of age when they happen in children.

– speaking of Wikipedia, the first paragraph of the current version of the page for the community I visited today was something I had dictated to me by one of the public session participants to show how easy it is to edit the site.

– I love that my current work assignment combines so many things I love – meeting people, road trips, teaching about computers & the coolest web sites on the Internet.  Every day doesn't feel like work at all and the hours pass like minutes.  I was on the road today for over twelve hours today and it passed faster than many regular 9-5 days do!

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