Today I came to the city in the car. Both of y motorized vehicles are having issues. Thursday I went to start the car at lunch time and click, nothing. The instrument panel was blank. Finally after work it started, it appears the remote car starter, which hasn't worked in 5 years is screwing up. A safety bolt under hood is malfunctioning, and acting like a Kill Switch. I am going to put some teflon oil on it, to make sure it stays down, when the hood is down.
The rain looked like it eased up on Friday, so I rode the bike to work. Went out at lunch time to start it and clunk. Screwed around with it for awhile. it didn't start. After work tried to bump start it, start running with the bike and let clutch go. Nothing.
I pushed the bike out to the street, I was going to have it towed home so I could plug in the charger. The tow truck didn't come. I had to go back later and push the bike back into the work parking lot. It still wouldn't start. I didn't want to leave it on the street as the street would have no vehicles parked on it, and the bike would be kind of a shock to a person texting and driving. I was also nervous about someone coming along and taking it....as a 'found' bike.
This morning I called the auto service again, this time they had a truck. I decided to have it towed to the repair shop. The guy at the shop thought it could be started from a boost, we tried, nothing. They are going to check the starter. I priced out one before I left, $541 + labour. Oh joy.
I am headed to Toronto next Friday for 10 days. Robert (Thelma) used to work for Air Canada, so I got cheap tickets. Toronto Pride occurs while we are there. We are staying for the parade on the 30th. Normally I am not a fan of parades, but this one is huge.
Edmonton Pride was kind of quiet for me, I asked some people what was up and no one was doing anything. There was a road hockey tournament in Vegreville, so I volunteered at it. A relatively quiet weekend. This one too, I watch some movies at home last night. The ride to the city plans were kind of nixed.
Oh, I forgot, did the ride for Dad last weekend. It is a charity bike ride for cancer, prostate cancer to be specific. There were over 1000 bikes registered, I think there were about 500 bandits. We completely took over small towns we stopped in, Andrew and Mundare. At Mundare I met the ex-mayor, he was talking up the town. I belong to a bike group that does tours and they were heading to Andrew in August. He said to call them. I don't think our 20 bikes will do much for the economy. But I guess it is better than no bikes.
The people I was riding with knew the Mayor of Mundare, he actively asked for the route to go through his town next year. The town's main street was lined with bikes on both sides, for the whole length of the town. Free food at Stawnichy's helped. This is the town with the phallic looking sausage in it.
After the ride I sped back to Vegreville, from Edmonton, to attend a social event for the ball hockey tournament.
My opinion on Snowden kind of echoes John Cusak's. Snowden is the guy that revealed a whole pile of NSA secrets, even though he worked for a company with Booz in the title. This is one of those security companies that got big after the US involvement in Iraq. I guess they walked into the Cheney Money Tunnel and got a pile of startup cash.
Some people think Snowden is a traitor. I guess you could look at it that way if he didn't break a law (The Partriot Act- PA) which violated the 4th Amendment, the right to go about your business without government spying on you. But no one has taken the PA to the Supremies yet to get a decision on it, so with out that decision, the PA is the Law of the land and therefore Snowden is a traitor. He is a smarter 'traitor' than Bradley Manning though, he got out of town after leaking all the data. Bradley went to Guantanamo, where Snowden probably would have gone.
I wondered why he piked Hong Kong to come out in, a smarter move would have been Ecuador or Iceland. It's not like he didn't have the cash. And he wasn't on any no-fly list or he wouldn't have made it to Hong Kong. Now he is kind of stuck there, well I guess he could go to mainland China.
He has gone underground after leaving the hotel he stayed at.
The bigger issue is what he revealed. Secret Courts, secret charges, investigating anyone, US or not. The PA is meant to be to track aliens. Jon Stewart sarcastically reported that 51% of the people whose data was mined were alien's - thats a 49% error rate; meaning that 49% of the mined data belonged to US citizens or Green Card holders. I think even weathermen have a better error rate.
So we are smugly sitting here in Canada thinking it can't happen here. Well it can and probably is. I remember George Carlin talking about wire tapping in the 70's. He knew he was being monitored so he'd answer the phone with "Fuck Hoover."
I watched a show on Canadian comedian David Steinberg, he was active in the 60's, hung out with the Smothers Brothers and some other people. It appears he was a real rebel. In fact Jon Stewart can thank David Steinberg for breaking the way for his type of humour. We probably don't hear much about him as governments know the best way to bury something is not talk about it. He wasn't silenced though 'Curb Your Enthusiasm was one of his latest projects.
TV really sucks at this time of year (as does this app - it doesn't paginate, so I am typing blind). I had to add Bravo to get one show. I am waiting for the CRTC's menu system to kick in, the one where you can pay for the channels you want, not all the other ones.
I watched Angels of Sex, a Spanish movie with subtitles. Spanish people talk a lot faster than French people, the words just fly by on the screen. The spanish name of the movie is El Sexto de Los Angeles. This was a great movie, it managed to cover a pile of social issues effectively. First off, the youth in Spain have a very high unemployment rate, something like 50%. So they showed them squatting in houses where the owners had gone away - to where ever - for long periods of time.
Bruno and Rai are the two main male characters, Bruno has a girlfriend he lives with (in her parents house) named Carla. Her parents do not like him. Something happens to him and he meets Rai who winds up looking after him on a night when Carla's parents are in town. Rai is a pretty good looking guy, and it is obvious that he is interested in Bruno. There I set it up, watch it. It was damned good.
We are losing our Director at work, she is headed someplace away. That's ok with me, she and I have not seen eye to eye. I think the new guy will be better, I have met him before.
Well, I'm off, maybe try to write some fiction. Or maybe I will head to the Mall. My son works at Target in it, but not today. Target just opened up in Canada. 
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