The Penalty Box

If you are one of many gum chewers who chew with your mouth open, SHUT YOUR DAMN PIE HOLE. I do not need to hear you smacking your gum. I don’t care if it’s fruity or if you need it because you inhaled that garlic infused Limburger cheese onion cake for lunch, I don’t want to hear or see it.  Close your mouth and breathe through your nose instead of acting like a 14 year old ADD Halo player on X-Box Live.

Thank you.  You may now return to your regularly scheduled programming.

Why? Because they pull crap like this.  It means if you get spammed with text messages because your number ends up on some calling list, you’re footing the bill.  It’s like if Canada Post suddenly said, “Hey you know, this spam mail you’re getting, it’s costing us money to send to you.  Doesn’t matter that you can’t control it, we’re going to charge you for it anyways.”  When my Bell contract is up, I am GONE.  Of course, this assumes Rogers/Fido won’t be just as douchey.  It’s 160 bytes of data, if this causes problems you’re doing it wrong.  Ask Southeast Asia how they do it.  You can get a plan there that costs $40 a month for $5 a month, regular stuff like call display, voice mail included.  In Hong Kong, everyone has a cell phone, even the janitor making minimum wage because it’s really that cheap.  People are complaining to the CRTC, but considering the system access fee campaign has amounted to basically nothing, I have no hope that this new fee will get reversed.

On another note, I came across this new fangled hockey table.  This would be so much cooler than an air hockey table.

I spent Canada’s 141st birthday at Granville Island, taking in the sights and sounds of the Vancouver International Jazz Festival.  My tastes in music have morphed over time; I find I enjoy the small 3-6 piece ensembles a lot more than the booming big band music that first attracted me to jazz music.  Don’t get me wrong, I still love the off-beat bass pulses of Dave Brubeck and the eclectic piano riffs of Count Basie, but there’s something more intimate about a jazz trio or quartet that lets you connect more with the music.  Besides, if you can do that while consuming some awesome beer in the Granville Island Brewery Taproom, all the better!

As I was walking around today between sets at the Taproom, I stumbled upon an actual honest-to-God dixieland band, complete with tux shirts and bow ties.  Once I process the pictures off of my camera, I’ll post them.  The harmonies, brisk bass line and some wicked cool clarinet riffs made for quite an interesting set.  This kind of thing makes me annoyed that I forgot about the Jazz Festival until mid-week last week.  All these different styles of music, whether it be new kinds of fusion or revived styles, come together at the Jazz Festival, and it really is pretty neat to see and hear them all.  Next year I’ll have to write myself a reminder so I can catch stuff like the Gastown Jazz that happened two weekends ago.  There’s also usually really good groups performing at the Roundhouse.

On a funnier note, I saw Gordon Campbell walking with who I assumed was his daughter when I was heading out of Granville Island to the bus stop.  In a way, I was kind of surprised he didn’t have some kind of security contingent with him.  For one, he’s the premier, so it’s probably in the budget.  Today was also the day that the gas tax kicked in, adding another 2.4 cents per litre to the price of gasoline.  Then again, the worst thing ever done to a Canadian politician was a pie to the face, so I guess he really didn’t have a whole lot to worry about.