I love MSN's articles sometimes...

So I logged out of Hotmail and figured I'd check and see who won the Grey Cup today. Saw a picture of a go-kartand the heading "The Passion for Driving - See the numerous ways in which you can indulge your ‘need for speed’." I clicked on it and read it. Really good article. It was mostly about the different ways the average person can get into racing. One of the first segments was about racing schools. Again, very good. Got me to thinking again. The N.A.S.C.C. recently published their (hopeful) ice racing schedule. I say hopeful 'cause, well it's nearly December and until yesterday we were still getting temperatures well above freezing. Kinda hard to get 18 inches of ice when the ambient temperatures are above zero. Anyway, I just thought this would be a great time to let people know about the ice racing school they put on every winter. You can check out the Ice Racing schedule here. I intend to take it this year. Apparently, in the one day on the lake, you learn more about your car's abilities, driving on the edge and in adverse conditions than you would in a week on a dry track like Race City or Mosport. If that's even remotely close to the truth, I figure everyone that drives on winter roads should take it every time they get a new vehicle.

Making an escape!

Well, I'm finally making my escape from Pacific Truck. Never have I worked in such a bad place. Talk about a poisonous work evironment. Wow. Almost everyone I work with treats everyone else like dirt. The other day I counted the number of times somebody called someone else an idiot, moron, loser, dumbass or numbnuts and didn't mean it as a joke in an hour - 17. And I was off working, so I didn't hear all of them I'm sure. Ususally it's not directed at anyone in particular, but just in general. Add to that the constant meddling by the higher ups that have no idea what's going on, and it's no fun.

Anyway, It's all over next Friday!

The new company is Called AGS Group. Website here. I heard about it from a friend from Princess. I was in shopping and mentioned that I was looking to get into machining. Well, she only works at Princess on weekends. She runs an automated laser cutter there during the week and told me that there was an opening for another laser cutter operator. I applied and went for an interview. At the interveiw, the HR person opened by saying that I wasn't suitable for that, but there was this other position she'd been talking to the engineers about. Was I interested in building and repairing their custom automated machines? That way I could get some use out of my electronics, and get to know the machines better than most ever get a chance to. OF COURSE I was interested! Especially since I had been thinking a good career path would be to get my Journeyman's and then go to work repairing and building the automated machines. I can skip the whole apprenticeship time. GREAT!

The company is pretty good too. I was talking to Marrianne after the interview and she was saying the company is a great one to work for. Good benefits. She figures I'll get along great with Leeview. That's the guy I'll be working with - the engineer that designs all the equipment. She says he's a bit off too. Like I couldn't tell from the name...

Anyway, I start on the 5th. I can't wait.

What IS real Magick?

I was reading in PACE today, and a new member there was asking about how you know your workings are actually working? Read the thread here. She's thinking she's doing it wrong bcause she's not feeling anything.

I know that almost always, I feel a kind of shiver up my spine when I realease the energy for any workings I do. Sometimes, while healing or doing energy meditations, I feel something similar to an electrical charge running through my body.

Anyway - more to the point. To me, the main power of my rituals is over ME rather than the world around me. Magick is real beacuse I beleive it to be. The only place it's absolutely powerful is inside me. Call it a form of self-hypnosis if you want. It can affect my outlook, my attitudes etc. By that, it affects my reactions to outside influences and therefore how people react to me...

Discussion on the C.U.P. Website, but feel free to leave comments here too...

Rememberance Day

Many thanks to Rowan13 on PACE who dug up this little story in honour of our vets. Read the whole topic here.

"Please wear a poppy," the lady said, and held one forth, but I shook my head.
Then I stopped and watched as she offered them there, and her face was old
And lined with care; but beneath the scars the years had made
There remained a smile that refused to fade.

A boy came whistling down the street, bouncing along on carefree feet.
His smile was full of joy and fun, "Lady," said he, "may I have one?"
When she'd pinned it on he turned to say, "Why do we wear a poppy today?"

The lady smiled in her wistful way, and answered, "This is Remembrance Day,
And the poppy there is the symbol for the gallant men who died in war.
And because they did, you and I are free - that's why we wear a poppy, you see.

"I had a boy about your size, with golden hair and big blue eyes.
He loved to play and jump and shout, free as a bird he would race about.
As the years went by he learned and grew, and became a man - as you will, too.

"He was fine and strong, with a boyish smile, but he'd seemed with us such a little while
When war broke out and he went away. I still remember his face that day
When he smiled at me and said, “Goodbye, I'll be back soon, Mom, so please don't cry.”

"But the war went on and he had to stay, and all I could do was wait and pray.
His letters told of the awful fight, (I can see it still in my dreams at night),
With the tanks and guns and cruel barbed wire, and the mines and bullets, the bombs and fire.

"Till at last, at last, the war was won - and that's why we wear a poppy son."
The boy turned as if to go, then said, "Thanks, Lady, I'm glad to know.
That sure did sound like an awful fight, but your son - did he come back all right?"

A tear rolled down each faded cheek; she shook her head, but didn't speak.
I slunk away in a sort of shame, and if you were me, you'd have done the same;
For our thanks, in giving, if oft delayed, though our freedom was bought - and thousands paid!

And so when we see a poppy worn, let us reflect on the burden borne,
By those who gave their very all when asked to answer their country's call
That we at home in peace might live. Then wear a poppy! Remember - and give!

~~By Don Crawford.~~



LEST WE FORGET

What is it with attractive women and smoking?

I don't know what it is, but lately I've been noticing that every woman I seem to be interested in smokes. I really don't understand it. It's not that the smoking is attractive. Quite the opposite. I usually lose at least some interest in them when I see them light up.

Does it have anything to do with their personality? Is there something I'm attracted to that makes them more suceptible to smoking? Is it something else?

Oh well, maybe I can find someone that USED to smoke, but doesn't any more.

This is why hotmail has their headlines

So I finish logging out of hotmail and I see this headline at MSN Sympatico - Dating the underdogs; Are they worth a second look? Now, me having always been an underdog, I figured this could be good for the self-esteem. It was. It's about how the stereotypical ladykillers are falling by the wayside in favour of the erstwhile social pariahs. Being somewhere between nerd, geek and good friend, I found this to be quite encouraging.

After some reflection, however, I realized that I've known this all along. I've always known that I'd be a really great boyfriend/husband/father/uncle/whatever. If I don't say so myself, I'm one of those proverbial nice guys who finish last. Maybe I'm just too nice. I guess I don't fight hard enough for what I want sometimes. Guess I need to work on that.

Of course, when it comes to women, there's a whole different factor at play. Some people will be surprised by this, but if you truly know me, then you know that I'm shy. Well, I guess shy isn't quite the right word. Normally I have pretty good self-esteem. I know I'm likeable, funny, caring, smart, etc. When it comes to women though, there's always something in the back of my mind saying "She wouldn't be interested." or "Why would she want to be with me?" or "I don't look good enough to get her attention." Let's be honest here. I'm no model. I never will be. I'll never have the chiseled face, rippling abs, etc. of a model. Not to mention that my skin tone is all wrong and by BS tolerence would have me going nuts by the end of my first show. I do know however, that I'm not exactly repulsive either. I'm in decent shape even if I do get a little extra excercise moving around (if you catch my drift). I'm still funny enough to get a smile out of pretty much anyone and I still have an IQ over 130.

What gives me a chance with women if I'm not much physically?? That mind. All I can do is keep telling myself that my mind and personality will be enough to have someone fall in love with me eventually.

Stoned & Drunk -- It's not what you might think!

A monkey is sitting in a tree smoking a joint when a lizard walks past and looks up and says to the monkey "Hey! What are you doing?"

The monkey says "Smoking a joint, come up and have some."

So the lizard climbs up and sits next to the monkey and they share a joint. After a while the lizard says his mouth is "dry" and is going to get a drink from the river. The lizard climbs down the tree, walks thru the jungle to the river and leans over the river to get his drink. The lizard is so stoned that he leans too far over and falls into the river.

A crocodile sees this and swims over to the lizard and helps him to river bank, then asks the lizard, "What's the matter with you?"

The lizard explains to the crocodile that he was sitting smoking a joint with a monkey in a tree, got too stoned and then fell into the river while taking a drink.

The crocodile says he has to check this out, and walks into the jungle, finds the tree where the monkey is sitting, finishing a joint. He looks up and says "Hey you!"

The monkey looks down and says, "Duuuuuuuuuude.......how much water did you drink?!"

Twin test

I was just poking around here on blogspot and stumbled across this really cool test. It seems to be a fairly comprehensive personality test in its own right but what really makes it cool is that it lets you compare your personality with mine. Follow this link to take it and compare yourself to me. My username is Verbami. I think case matters, so don't forget the capital V. One condition though. If you take the test and compare yourself to me, you have to leave a comment here telling me what your user name is so I can compare too. Just kidding. If you don't want to, you don't have to but I'd really appreciate it.

What a weekend!

Well, the weekend is over. Finally. Well, I'm not sure if it's a good thing or not. I can finally relax a little, but the best weekend I've had in a long time is over. It all started Saturday with the Witches' Ball. Who would've thought that when you get 200 pagans together for the "Witches' Ball", only two would actually dress up as witches? Anyway, It was another AMAZING time. Some great costumes, one woman dressed up as Lady Luck. As soon as she walked in everyone knew she had a lock on best costume. See why? Apparently took 22 decks of cards... I didn't even come up on the radar for the costume contest, even though I thought I made a pretty good fallen angel. Other than that it was just a great time had by all. Check out all the pics from the night once I get them all posted (probably tomorrow night).

After a couple hours for sleep, It was time to get to the old airstrip at CFB Namao for an RX-7 Club Autocross. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so no pics. Well, that's not entirely true. I'll probably be editing this post later when some of the other guys post theirs. I did get a good pic of the funny tire wear from driving like that for any extended time - thanks for letting me use your camera Fernando. For more detail, click on the picture. Notice the roughness. I have a little problem with oversteer and that's what happens when your tires go sideways a lot at high speed. I did find that my times were a little embarassing, but I suppose I didn't do too bad considering I was totally outclassed. There were only two cars that I thought I might be able to compete with. One wasn't too far off from what I have, just a couple of little mods I don't have but the driver was REALLY good. Lots of experience. I really thought I would be able to beat the Festiva ice racer with the 16 year old driver though. Guess not. I found out later the driver there has been racing since he was 8, and the Festiva was FAR from stock. He managed to beat some of the turbo RX-7s.

After a quick nap at Mom & Ric's I headed off to the Samhain (pronounced sow-in), or fall harvest open ritual at the new Unitarian Church. Great facility by the way. As usual, it was one of the best ones of the year. Terry channelled the goddess Isis, Willow almost impaled the scarecrow while invoking Spirit, the pumpkin mini-cupcakes were especially great.

Man monday morning was rough. I had a decent night's sleep last night, but I'm still not that great. It's time for bed...