Look now, the Future

Here comes a glimpse of the future;

All this work we've done to build some place for all of us to go, it's a waste. We go to school so we can learn, and become successful later in life. Read that as: become wealthy. Success is wealth, nothing more. So once we have money, what then? We spend a lifetime accumulating wealth, as per the North American Culture, but once we attain that coveted monetary value, what do we do? Our lives are finite, and what good does money do after death? Thousand dollar bills do not pave the way to some golden heaven, where a tycoon can spend money for eternity.

What other legacy do we have to leave behind? What happens when we grow bored of money? Simple, we look for a more exotic currency. Enter, the human life.

There are no words in English to describe the transactions of human lives. We think lives are worth something, but it's so easy for us to spend human lives, especially when we don't have to see the business in action. It's like a debit on human beings. We spend them, but never see the faces of the people we're condemning to death. The legacy we leave is one of money and blood. To the people we're spending, all of our money doesn't mean anything, and thus, our culture doesn't either. Ironic how the very people we destroy don't even acknowledge us as equal to them. It works vice verse, we're more willing to spend that which is different or expendable to us.

So what do those of us do who don't want to accumulate wealth? Try to find a cause to work towards that doesn't involve monetary exchange. Read that as: nothing in North America. We work and live to pass the time until we die. I said it, we don't work towards some bright future, we're just passing the time until our number comes up. Some of us will raise families. Some of us will try to raise families, and fail. Some of us won't bother, because having a faithful relationship is just too much work. Some of us just won't bother because just starting a relationship is too much work.

And the process of spending humans, using war to increase wealth, and exploiting others, will continue regardless of our efforts. In the path of trying to make a future without exploitation and the heedless pursuit of wealth, the numbers of those making a difference, to those struggling to try and keep things the same, is roughly the ratio of white tigers to insects.

Should we keep trying? Absolutely. At the very least, it'll be something to pass the time.

My Favorite Four Letter Word

My schedule was changed. Somewhere, somehow, I don't know or care why. Its just changed. Which means that I'm going to be working tommorrow, instead of out taking pictures.

The "little" abrasion on my wrist has inflammated, in spite of the many antiseptics I used on it. I think its just an ugly little wound that refuses to heal properly. There's no sign of infection, but it's still incredibly sore. It's very likely that it will form a scar, which wouldn't be a bad thing, seeing as how the wound is oddly shaped like a wave.

It's raining again, and it's dark and cold. I'm tired, I was looking forward to a short break, but like some ignorant hero in a fantasy novel, what appears to be the last hurdle turns out to be only one of the first.

Fuck, I hate weekdays.

Edit: Turns out I didn't have to work at all. Just my schedule for this week and next week were so similar that I ended up mixing the two up. So I ended up trekking out into the pouring rain and cold for nothing, save a few groceries. Oh, and Battlefield 2.

Another Edit:



Think of it as a papercut about the size of a loonie (roughly 2.5 cm for those who don't know what a loonie is).

Ouch

All the preparation and training in the world can't help weak arms deal with a shifty load. I was lifting a boxed basketball net when the load shifted from one side of the other, and the box went with it. That's all fine and good, it didn't fall on anyone, but in the process, it grated a goodly layer of skin off my right wrist. Abrasions and discomfort follow.

Getting home, I noticed the wound turning an off colour, usually a sign of pending infection. So I opened up a bottle of hydrogen peroxide and cleaned the wound. It looks normal now, minus the screaming pain in my wrist. I'm just waiting for the polysporin to kick in, to calm the pain.

Honestly, one rough little abrasion, and then I have to go through all this work just to get it semi-treated. Can't leave it though, injuries tend to raise concerns at work, so I'm showing that I'm not brushing it off.

I'll have some more pictures either tommorrow or Tuesday. Probably Tuesday, as I'll be out and about. Weather's been pretty spectacular lately, so maybe I'll be lucky enough to flaunt a few of those pictures by Tuesday.

There were times

I don't have a lot to say today. I'm pretty tired, and I have another long shift of work tommorrow. I was reading through some people's MSN spaces, and thought better of ever doing that again. It's not a happy place in that neck of the interweb. The combination of angry, sad people, and Microsoft's active censorship makes for a very dark, if subdued, read. Two things that negate each other.

I don't have any new pictures to share yet, but I'll probably be going out Tuesday or Wednesday to survey the flood damage near to my house. Should be some interesting shots out of that. There's been a total change in mindset with many people here. We had a little thundershower roll through this area today, and the moment the rain started to fall, people got all stone-faced and bitter. Some were downright rude... but I guess that happens no matter what. People just can't stand each other...

Or maybe they just can't stand me. We'll see when I go back to work tommorrow.

Blitz

Today was a bit of a blitz. I slept for 10 hours last night, a long sleep that felt too short accounting for the amount of stuff that needed to be done today.

My first stop on the to-do list was the chiropractor. My third and final followup after a lengthy period without any form of spinal adjustment. Sleeping on the horse-trailer floor took a bigger toll on me than I thought. Everything from my waist to my neck had knotted, and required and extra snap to correct. Despite popular horror stories that play chiropractic treatments and painfull and unnecessary, I find it to be rather painless (this coming from someone who enjoys cracking their fingers), and more necessary than antibiotics for living in comfort.

Next on my list was a short hop to the convenience store for some snacks to pad my breaks at work. I get hungry working 8 hours, and I'm experimenting with ways to get food in to eat that doesn't come in packages of 20.

The hours have just flown by, and it's hard to believe that I'm sitting here, writing this, when it felt like the day should have more left to it. Reading the news, I feel like there was definitely more that should have been done today, but not necessarily by me. Oh well. Trying to claim too much responsibility for something is just disaster waiting to happen... but if nobody else is willing to step up to the plate, then things just stall.

Nectarines. We got some today. A sign that summer's here, and I'm missing it because I'm working. Not that there's much to miss right now. The water is finally going down, so I'll have to go venture the mud soon to get some more new pictures.

Big Skies

Another motorcycle shot, this one on extreme wide angle. Looking at the sky, you'd find it hard to believe that less than an hour after I was done my pictures, we got hit by a massive thunderstorm. Well, that's foothills weather I guess...

In other news, I went to a house party on Wednesday night. Not cool, not an enjoyable event. I had to drive in the morning, so I was the only sober one amongst a mob of drunken, drooling fools. I don't mind social drinking, but when you're best friend is a bottle of Vodka, and you find yourself hitting on the host's dog, you know it's gone from social drinking to social dementia.

To top it all off, they bedded me on the floor of a horse trailer. On the human side of it, but still, sleeping on a hard, slanted floor is not only difficult, it's damnably uncomfortable. It felt good to drive home after that, and sleep in a real bed, with my own blankets and a soft mattress.

One Revolution Ago

A year ago on this date, I was bored one night and decided to start something that had just started getting popular. I started a Blog, which started off as the humble and generic Thought Storm, based off a basic template with a navy blue background and white and yellow text.

Since that time, my blog has grown and changed, as I have grown and changed. The first changes were simple. Tweaks to the background colours, and some modest links along the sidebar. From there, the stories, ranging equally from my experiences, and my take on media and politics, grew to be more general and more entertaining. The use of pictures came shortly after. The T-storm we know now is a culminative product of the last few months of alterations.

Currently, T-storm is my repository for whimsical commentary, pictures worth sharing, and just general impressions. It is, in a sense, a close and personal look at me, without being overly personal. You can read everything I've written here, as many times as you want, and still only know me by the sketch I create here.

I never expected T-storm to last more than a few months, but now with time and energy, I will continue to keep posting, for at least another year. Pictures have become a regular part, so you may all expect to see at least one up for every five entries. Or so I hope. My original plan for this blog had been one of political commentary and criticism of the media, but currently, bringing both of those topics up would be tanamount to clobbering an otherwise dead and buried horse. We are all aware of Left-Right political shenanigans. We are all aware that the media almost never sticks to its job. You don't need me to beat the topic up any more, unless there's something really drastic that I feel needs to be brought up.

So, in advance; here's to another enjoyable, terrible, entertaining, and otherwise obscure year for T-storm.

Thanks to everyone that posts comments. I'll continue posting, even without comments, but seeing people's reaction to my stuff gives me a small sense of validity (I am, after all, supposed to be a writer.)

Cruise Control

This actually came before the flood. I was planning on putting some of my contract pictures up earlier, but some things can't wait. So you get them now, enjoy.

I had about 60 shots, and lots of them turned out really good. Expect to see lots more of them. Unless... you all don't want to see lots of motorcycle pictures out with the green grass and blue skies.

The Waters are Rising

Even more flooding. This slow moving lake was once a flat stretch of dog park. It's now part of the fringe flow of the river. The flooding was so powerful that the river itself has changed its course. Parts of Calgary's highway system are now new riverbeds, while the old riverbeds are now still pools of water. This is likely to become a new part of the river, or perhaps a new lake, after the water goes down. Mosquitoes were already forecast to be bad this year. I've got my can of Muskol right here, and I'm ready. I'm hoping the evacuees will get to go home tommorrow, to see the damage this flood has done. It might be heartbreaking, but it's better than the anxiety of not knowing.

In other news, the Higgins bridge by my house (the picture below with the bridge and the river), has washed out, so I won't be able to venture to the other side on foot.

Never Laugh

The LaFarge concrete plant, shortly after the floodgates were opened on the Resevoir. Those bits of colour you see off in the distance are actually the roofs of cement trucks, poking up out of the water. LaFarge managed to save most of their functional cement trucks, but the ones that got left behind accentuate just how bad the flooding is, and just how high the river has become. Case in point, this cement factory used to draw water right from the river using a suction system. They had problems with it, because the water had to be pulled up a six foot pipe, suspended from the river's edge down to the water, before it reached the pump.

As expected, people were aghast. So much water over so little time. It's been more than 200 years since we've had flooding this bad, and nobody thought that it would happen again. The earth doesn't forget, and floodplains are there for a reason. Yes, damage was done, and I hope everyone's okay after this is over, but we have to ask ourselves what we were doing in the path of the destruction in the first place. Floodplains are like cold lava flows. Just because a volcano only erupts every 200 years, we still know not to build on the volcano. The river is the same. Just because it does not burn, it does not mean it shouldn't be respected.

Hubris, and the Water

We didn't see it coming today.

We've watched on the TV for years, watching other people swamped in the brown currents of an angry river that broke free of it's confining banks. We watched, and we laughed. There was something humerous about watching other people sitting on their roofs, hugging their knees and watching the water swirl by like an oft-beaten child watches an angry parent pace. After all, it couldn't happen to us.

Today, we stopped laughing. Furious winds brought thick black clouds, laden with moisture. Our already high rivers seemed to recoil away from the clouds for a moment, before the sky opened.
And poured.

And will continue to pour through tonight into tommorrow. For the first time in over 5 years, Southern Alberta has been issued a general flood warning for all major rivers and tributaries. Both the Bow and the Elbow are expected to exceed their banks by early tonight. Homes have already been evacuated. Roads have become lakes. Citizens, in their unfamiliarity with the element of water, have been taken aback by the sheer force and effect. Suddenly, they are the ones, sitting with their arms around their knees, watching the water rise. It's not so funny when you're the butt of the joke.

I'm safe, on the top of a hill in a poorer neighborhood. I'm safe, while those in some of the most expensive neighborhoods, built on the floodplane, are now forced to leave their homes. I somehow feel that the contractors never told them that there was a normal floodplane, and the 100 year floodplane, washed by the waters that not even the Resevoir can hold back. Somehow, I bet they thought that it wouldn't happen to them.

Never say never, and never laugh when the waters rise.

Roll the Dice on the Weather

I was out taking pictures again today. Mostly of motorcycles, but I managed to get a good look around as well. There's nothing like being out in the park with green grass, bright blue sky, little wisps of clouds, and ominous black thunderheads on the horizon. We weren't even done for an hour, before the clear sky broke in a crack of thunder, and rain poured for about a good hour. Then the sun came out again for a while... unpredicatable. I shouldn't say that, as the weather can be predicted. When there's dark clouds on the horizon, you almost know for sure that it's going to rain. If not here, then somewhere else.

With people, it's not so sure. When there's everything in place for a riot and revolution, the proverbial dark clouds on the horizon, nothing happens. Everything stays decidedly mediocre and stable. Nobody wants change, but nobody wants to stay the same. People kill each other over card games and money, but they give change to a drunk man on the street, because they mistake him for a homeless man. Not only is our malice indiscriminant, but so is our generocity. Maybe it's just to make us feel better, and not to influence the world around us.

Bow River

Not exactly the most powerful shot of the cresting Bow River, but how exactly does one take a picture of something this powerful without being swept away in it?

We've had three consecutive days in a row of clear mornings and thunderstorms in the afternoon and evenings. I'm going to have some new and interesting pictures to share tommorrow, as my stack from the last month has run pretty dry. I love photojournalism contracts. It pays in money, experience, and pictures. Three mediums that make my life easier.

Bulbous Little Green Thing

Just another green plant in macro. I'll have some new stuff available during the weekend. I've been given a freelance assignment contract for $200, and I need to focus on that before I do too much frivolous photography. There should be lots of good stuff coming up, what with the depths of summer finally coming to bear on southern Alberta.

We got struck by lightning at work, on one of the Lightning Rods. Anyone who's been in a similar position knows that you don't hear anything, you just feel the sonic boom. Eerie.

Big Green Plant

One of the plants in my back yard under extreme macro. Your eyes aren't fooling you, that is a baby ladybug on the bottom-right leaf. It's probably no larger than a sesame seed. I have a few more pictures to post after this one, but I have to go to work now. If I feel like anything when I get home, maybe I'll post a few more pics.

Until then, au revoir.

My poor car

This is my car. It's an '85 Honda Accord, brown, with brown interior. The poor thing has come to grief, with it's aging transmission finally giving out. I'm now faced with a choice. The car is currently the property of my dad, and if I finance the repairs, the car will become my property. I need a car, and I learned how to drive in this little beast. Not only that, I grew up in this car, and I would rather it had a second chance, rather than being relegated to the scrap heap.

It's neither the fastest, nor the coolest, nor the sleekest. It does have a sunroof however, and pending the repairs, it will be able to go from point A to point B. Something many faster cars have trouble with, what with their nasty habit of running into each other on the highways.

End repairs will probably cost between $1200 and $2000. I can't get a new transmission, so my choices are a used one, or a rebuilt one. Neither one sounds very reliable. Maybe I'll just strip the engine out, and have pedals and a scrape rudder on the back.

The Way of Water

The trail by my house, after the water level dropped. Standing water, and vivid green grass are two things I haven't seen in this much abundance since I was a little child, and we got a week's dump of rain, similar to what we just went through.

I sat and watched this little stretch of pathway for about half and hour, and watched many people attempt to evade the puddles. There's mud on either side, so they ended up getting bogged down, instead of wet. Many of them were wearing white runners. Why someone would wear white runners while crossing an area near a flood zone is beyond me, but it was funny nonetheless.

Flood Warning

It's like the biblical plagues over here. First tornadoes, and now flooding. We've had six straight days of rain, and I'm not talking about the little dribbly kind, it's been pouring nonstop. The Bow and Elbow rivers (the two major rivers of Calgary) are have both already burst their banks, and are continuing to rise at an astonishing rate. They've cordoned off my section of Fish Creek (beside the Bow River), so I can't even get down there to take pictures. This is highly unusual for Calgary, a virtually desert city, but I guess it's not that unusual, provided that half the city is built on 100 year flood planes, and we've been 80 years overdue for a monumental flood.

I guess I'll be inflating the dinghy to get to work on Thursday.

As a side note, I've never seen such green grass in Calgary. There's already been predictions that when the sun comes out, the grass is going to overgrow like a weed, and will need mowing every three days to keep it managable. Now, I'm not one to believe that plant growth is directly proportional to rainfall, but it will be interesting to see what becomes of the former "Brown City."

Captain's Log

We washed up today on a sandy isle, just south of the Hawaiian island chains. The disaster wasn't expected. I feel that when I return home, I will be court-martialed, hung, and drawn. That is, unless my men mutiny first and do the quartering first, and send my parts home to be hung later.

Due to my error, at least fifteen of the King's men are dead, claimed by the ocean, as honourable death as any. I was... drawn into a trance while issuing orders. Some claim that it was the siren's call that made me lose my focus, and drag the ship off-course. To tell the truth, there was no loss of focus. I believed that I was on the right course the whole time. I was genuinely surprised when the planks started falling away from under my feet. I hit my head on the way down, and only now do I even know where we are.

The stars are clear, at least. I always wished that if I was to die, I would do so under the heavens unveiled. That way I could at least see where it would be that the good souls go. Mine is just envious, down it will go, not up. Lucifer himself will likely torture me, crack my old bones over his favorite rack. I am not afraid though. Whatever happens to me, now and in the future, is justice. No matter how cruel things seem, I have faith that there will be balance, and everything will get its due in the end.

Fifteen dead men are to my name. I hope God takes them close to him, and shows mercy and forgiveness to the rest of my crew. I can hear them coming for me...

Please, may it be quick.

Tornado Watch

A Tornado Watch was issued for Calgary and the surrounding areas today. Quite the buzz in the media. They always were ones to hype the buzz about just about anything though, as the supposed "supercells" ended up being dry clouds with not even so much as a spit of rain or a crackle of lightning. (Famous last words.)

Work was a zoo, sale on, cameras selling good, as usual. Family from Texas returned on Friday, and demanded that there be family pictures taken. My dog Sarge had some trouble with the point'n shoots. Anyone who knows anything about photography knows that dogs have different retinas than humans, so instead of giving off the mildly annoying "red eye" that plagues people, my poor pooch ended up ruining six of the better shots because the reflections out of his eyes produced bright and dynamic green lense flares. I kid you not, these are the variety with the parallax rings and everything.

So I ended up busting out "my" camera for some retakes. I have an external flash that can pivot, so I did some bounce flashes, problem solved.

I've noticed that the number and... variety of the comments across my blog have taken a nosedive in the last couple weeks. Understandable, as everyone is working/schooling/both. I find it ironic that as this blog nears it's one-year birthday, it returns to the state that it started in, a comment-less rambling of eclectic things by a social inept who likes to complain a lot... poetically.

Pictures. I always have pictures. More to come.

There must be something in the air

Sam Roberts. Hard Road.

Knock yourself out folks, and you'll find out why I think 'ole Sam is the best thing to happen to Canadian music since Hello Time Bomb first hit the airwaves, back in the days of MGB. If you like Sam Robert's music, please, buy his CD "We were born in a Flame."

Definitely worth the $15 dollars.

Stuck in the Rain

The sky opened up on me today, dark clouds, darker clouds, and lots and lots of rain. Didn't get a chance to take any pictures, I was back to work after a short, two-day break. My heels feel flat, but I guess that's the feeling of a hard day's work. Cameras were on sale today, so my little plastic table was a madhouse of questions and claim-slips. I think one or two of my little cameras sprouted legs and walked away. I'm hoping loss-prevention picked them up before they found their way to a door with a would-be illicit owner.

Got home, shucked my work duds, and came to peek at my online world. Not much stirs, and the bandwidth is quiet. So I sat and listened to the rain. It got really dark outside; black, like a corporate heart. No thunder, no lightning... just ominous. I almost wish something would happen around these parts, but it almost seems that people want things to remain conveniently in lingo, so things go ne'er one way, nor the other. Able to swing either way at a whim or panic.

Nobody really cares, things hang over the balance on the shoulders of people who hang over the balance on other people's shoulders. Everyone goes through the motions, they all say the words, they all smile and nod. Sure, it's sunny, when the very abyss itself is pouring rain on you from above. Everything's fine and peachy in this little one-person world, surrounded by a bunch of insolent other one-person worlds. Don't look at the clouds, and somehow you won't get wet.

People, they make the circle. They start at Ignorance, work their way to Understanding, and then roll over to Apathy. It's a long journey where the beginning and the end mean the same. I'm stuck in the rain.

I'm stuck understanding.