On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

Trek Fan Mapping, Continued: Around the Cardassian Union

Tue, 01 Oct 2024 02:39:58 GMT

Crossed these off the to-do list today:

Gon'Cra
Deep Space 3
Starbase 514
24 Aquarii
Jod'Cor
Mivic
Huranzi
Latroci
Septimus

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Wed, 21 Dec 2022 14:12:51 GMT

1. Someone sees the work of the Guardian as a threat.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/dec/21/guardian-hit-by-serious-it-incident-believed-to-be-ransomware-attack

2. If you're trying to get in or out of metropolitan Vancouver, Canada, you'll need more patience than usual:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/winter-weather-flight-cancellations-1.6693294

3. Same for Ottawa-Gatineau.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/don-t-travel-this-weekend-if-you-don-t-need-to-opp-says-1.6692802

4. Mon-Fri 9-5 may be over for many, but what's taking its place in the federal civil service may be problematic in other ways for the staff as much as for the public. Especially in Ottawa-Gatineau where we don't have mask rules back in place yet.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/federal-departments-hybrid-directive-responses-1.6692401

5. The Convoy Siege of Ottawa continues to have consequences for a lot of people living here.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/zexi-li-freedom-convoy-year-in-review-1.6205324

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Post-Ottawa Siege: Enablers of a Repeat Attempt?

Thu, 23 Jun 2022 19:23:15 GMT

There was a meeting at Parliament Hill yesterday, and we have names of Conservatives happy to meet with Convoy Crowd people.

From CTV News:

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/which-conservative-mps-attended-anti-vaccine-presentation-from-convoy-figures-1.5959764

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Books: End of November 2021

Thu, 25 Nov 2021 00:40:09 GMT

Borrowed from the local public library:

What they didn't teach you in design school by Phil Cleaver
Lost Ottawa 3 edited by David McGee
Bitch Doctrine by Laurie Penny
After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency by Bob Bauer and Jack Goldsmith

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Catching Up - 23 Nov 2021

Wed, 24 Nov 2021 00:48:53 GMT

Things that I did over the last two days included:

Two more day-jobs applied to.
One application turned down.
Kept looking for other leads.
Started work on a medical/income support form yesterday. Not sure how/if that's going to work out.
Kept an eye on the Ottawa Police Services Board meeting the last two days.

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NPR's Top 50 SF&F Books For 2011-2020

Wed, 18 Aug 2021 18:14:16 GMT

Petra Meyer came up with this list the other day. You might have preferences of your own. Some of you, I see, have works included in this list, and I offer congratulations upon that inclusion!

Not sure how many of these I've been able to read yet, but that is a quest for another day.

https://www.npr.org/2021/08/18/1027159166/best-books-science-fiction-fantasy-past-decade

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Accomplishments of the Day

Wed, 18 Aug 2021 01:44:05 GMT

A partial list:

Waiting on the new e-mail re: my CPAP paperwork.
Turned away from an offer of a one-month contract to pursue another, longer contract.
More slow progress on the culling project, finally.
Got some sketchbook time in today while watching illustration tutorial videos.

I think I've gotten some progress on multiple fronts today. I want to do better tomorrow.

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Books: A Poll Result and a New List

Fri, 04 Jun 2021 02:27:47 GMT

You remember this poll?

Decided to go with an option unpicked to date by anyone: Stumptown Vol. 4: The Case of the Cup of Joe. Greg Rucka wrote it, he helped me out with some research on something I co-wrote a little over twenty years ago, and a lot of his stuff's entertained me over the decades since then. So he gets a little more of what I can spare, effective today. I pick the book up on Saturday.

Other titles I'm either reading, re-reading or trying to make time for right now, whether by my own finances or with the public library's help:

Glimpses of Cumberland Township - For the Honour of Our Ancestors - Cumberland Township Historical Society
The Red Atlas: How the Soviet Union Secretly Mapped the World by John Davies and Alexander J. Kent
Star Trek: Discovery - Wonderlands by altariel
Obscure Ottawa by Ray Corrin
Earth by David Brin
Chasing the Flame: One Man's Fight to Save the World by Samantha Power (Yes, she's a Biden appointee nowadays.)
Surviving Autocracy by Masha Gessen
Draplin Design Co. - Pretty Much Everything by Aaron James Draplin
This Day in Vancouver by Jesse Donaldson
How to Lie With Maps by Mark Monmonier
On Property by Rinaldo Walcott
The Library Book: An Overdue History of the Ottawa Public Library by Phil Jenkins
Trumpocalypse by David Frum
Tangled Up in Blue by Rosa Brooks
Cartographic Grounds - Projecting the Landscape Imaginary by Jill Desimini and Charles Waldheim

Another incomplete list, and I'm not going to be able to get to all of them, anymore than I managed with the March 2021 list.

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Books

Thu, 03 Jun 2021 02:50:07 GMT

I was going to work up a list of books I'm trying to make time to read tonight.

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Last Week of April 2021

Mon, 26 Apr 2021 13:38:50 GMT

So, I'm back to the job search, listening to The Current on Radio One, and still feeling like I'm neglecting one aspect of the job search (teaching myself to use assorted design software) in favour of another (searching job boards and applying for specific positions).

Also, looking at videos in the "How to ADHD" series as part research, part self-care.

Also, keeping an eye on my immediate family for assorted reasons.

Also, "meeting" with some of my Ottawa SF Society friends via Zoom tonight after supper.

Also, getting laundry done this morning.

Also, newspaper pickup/shopping errands, because Point 2 of Timothy Snyder's Advice on Resisting/Defending Against Tyranny: defend institutions. In this case, Section 2 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms by supporting a free press.

Also,...

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Mon, 08 Mar 2021 14:04:43 GMT

So.

International Womens' Day.

First anniversary of the declaration of Pandemic by the World Health Organization.

Job search continues.

Local weather is warming up again, with the official start of local spring being two weeks away.

This afternoon, I'll be watching the Ottawa Public Library's "Tech Cafe" session on how to turn your digital photo collections into hardcopy books. This might be useful given my fixation on local street names' histories and the imagery of the various styles of name signage across the city.

And other stuff going on too.

More later.

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Wed, 03 Mar 2021 03:52:13 GMT

1. Writing workshop today was okay.

2. So was the refresher from Ottawa City Hall on urban planning basics. They hold this class every few months for whoever is interested. The online version over Zoom was as packed as the one I attended in person back in the winter of 2019-2020. (At least I think it was back then.)

3. Still haven't seen WandaVision. Still resigned to spoilers because Disney+. Sounds like I'm missing out on fun stuff. Oh well.

4. More as it occurs to me.

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A List for the End of February 2021

Fri, 26 Feb 2021 14:11:32 GMT

1. The job search continues. As I type this, I'm looking at Indeed and Jobilico. I expect to check several federal commissions, departments and agencies, a couple of crown corporations, GC Jobs, the federal Job Bank, and at least ten temp placement companies (yet again) over the rest of today.

2. I hope to listen to Ontario Today at noon, because Perseverance on Mars is the topic of the day.

3. Downloading new updates for Affinity Designer, Photo, and Publisher.

4. The Affinity suite is still on sale from Serif.com at half-price as I type this. About C$35 for each of the three programs in the suite.

5. Inkscape and Krita and the like are also still useful freeware, so why not get those too?

6. Listening to The Current right now. The discussion in progress as I type this entry?

Letter-writing. Actual letters through the paper-mail system. Apparently, this is making a come-back among many who have the time and enough other resources.

7. More later today as I think of it.

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Progress

Sun, 15 Nov 2020 02:56:07 GMT

New printer is up and running.

New eyeglasses are on order. I should be seeing them - and seeing with them - in about a month.

Made more progress with cataloguing my personal library today.

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A Few Good Things Done Today

Sun, 27 Sep 2020 00:06:46 GMT

1. I actually got some sketching time - with actual ballpoint pen and paper! - taken care of today. It's been weeks since the last such session!

2. Took in several video presentations during Day Three of Typewknd!

3. Did some housekeeping on my new computer's hard drive, exporting files so that I could clear some space. Before, I had 45-50 GB free space. Now, it's 75-78 GB available.

4. I got an hour's walking exercise in today. Half of it via the shopping errand for newspapers and groceries, the other from walking around the block. Usually, that latter was only three circuits around the block. Today, it was four.

5. Celsys has announced that Clip Studio Paint's got a new update, v.1.10.0, to become available to users starting in four days. Apparently, the big thing is import/export ability re: SVG files. They specifically refer to working with Adobe Illustrator, but we'll soon see if any and all graphic designware that can create SVG files can play nice with this. Corel, Affinity, Inkscape, and whatever else is currently in play, hopefully.

6. Solved my Clip Studio Paint brush size menu problem: it was millimetres vs. pixels. I fiddled with that setting and confused myself as a result. Oops.

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FONTS: Personal Favourites

Mon, 21 Sep 2020 19:30:54 GMT

Last week, kestrell spoke about preferred fonts for accessibility re: websites. Also, she asked this question:

Do folks have favorite fonts?

She has her own goals in mind for the answers to that question, regarding accessibility, and she's been getting useful answers from her friendlist. For myself, selfishly, I do have a list of favourites. Many - most? - of these favourites have very little to do with such concerns. There's a lot of aesthetic considerations and a lot of personal nostalgia in play with my list. There is a certain amount of privilege - the privilege of being sighted all my life thus far - in my thinking here. This is selfish. Absolutely so.

That said, I am going to go into some detail about my own list of favoured fonts. In this entry, and probably others down the line.

I start with Space: 1999. That TV series in the mid-1970's created by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson was where I first started to care about typefaces, fonts, that sort of thing. Particularly the first season. Moonbase Alpha, the main backdrop of the series, doomed to wander the universe by an ill-placed nuclear waste dump turning a large chunk of our Moon into a giant fusion rocket...that place had a particular design aesthetic. Signage across the moonbase was in a font called "Countdown". Designed by Colin Brignall, I don't know how it reached the attention of Space: 1999's set designers and graphic designers.

He also designed Superstar, the font that Milton Glaser incorporated into the classic "Bullet" logo of DC Comics. So there's two.

Back to Space: 1999. The space suits were jumpsuits with the helmets, life support hardware, and so on worn over them. The life support hardware packs - front and back - were numbered. The numerals came from "Data 70". The packs labelled "1" were usually worn by Martin Landau in character as moonbase commander John Koenig when a scene would call for him to expect to do EVA work, and had that numeral inverted. Not sure why.

(There's apparently an argument over whether Data 70 is a knock-off of another font, Westminster. If you're interested, check this essay out.)

More to follow...

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Weekend Accomplishments

Mon, 15 Jun 2020 02:46:56 GMT

- Financial paperwork mailed off.
- Laundry completed.
- Shopping errands.
- Illustration/design practice with Clip Studio Paint and Adobe Illustrator.
- Contacted assorted friends online.
- Conversed with relatives by phone.
- Yard chores.

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Accomplishments

Mon, 08 Jun 2020 23:36:17 GMT

Applied for five jobs.
Attempted to conduct a video interview, and had to settle for a phone call.
Ushered a bumblebee out of the basement and out the front door of the house. And both I and the bee survived that.
Got caught up on news from reliable publishers.

(How are the bee and the two wasps previous getting into the basement?)

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Stuff That Got Done Today (So Far)

Sun, 07 Jun 2020 23:04:52 GMT

I fed myself, and allowed myself to be fed.
I touched base with friends in my Mac User Group for a couple of hours.
I kept an eye on news via sources I consider reliable.
I've downloaded resources for use with Clip Studio Paint.
Started looking for similar resources for SketchUp 7. (Yes, it's outdated. I can still use it until the (also outdated) computer it's loaded on goes to pieces, right?)
Got walking exercise.
Photography practice in low light.

More as it develops.

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ASTRONOMY: Orion

Mon, 30 Mar 2020 11:59:52 GMT

And there's much more than the features marked out on that image file as well!

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200329.html

This barely begins to scratch the surface of what we know in that corner of "our" sky:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stars_in_Orion

More on other topics as the day continues...

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Movies I Watched in 2019

Wed, 01 Jan 2020 22:59:47 GMT

Fewer than the year before.

Avengers: Endgame
Spider-Man: Far From Home
Ad Astra
The Good Liar

I'm thinking there were more...?

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Four Movies I Want to See

Sat, 14 Dec 2019 01:03:33 GMT

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
Dark Waters - because docudrama with Mark Ruffalo
The Good Liar - Mirren and McKellen
Knives Out

I doubt that I'll be able to get to more than one of them before the end of the year.

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Saturday Stuff

Sun, 13 Oct 2019 01:15:54 GMT

1. After watching the third episode of Stumptown, I finally watched the first episode of Diggstown tonight. Had the first season saved on the family PVR for months, and could not find the guts to watch it until tonight.

Yes, I know how that choice of phrasing looks.

Diggstown is worth the time, and I should have made that time sooner. My dumb.

2. I am sad at the death of Alexei Leonov. Yes, he was 85, and he'd lived a full life. He was one of the space explorers I first learned to know the names along with the likes of Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins. The first space mission I have clear memories of watching coverage of on TV was Apollo-Soyuz. We're talking multi-page spreads in the Regina Leader-Post back when they were locally owned - so I want to believe - and not a pawn of Postmedia to serve the international right-wing-big-money movement.

3. I got my hair cut today at the barber shop I've been dealing with since my dad introduced me to their dad. One of the brothers is in hospital and the other is not well yet still working. I fear for them. I couldn't do more than pay for the haircut and wish them well.

4. Enjoyed watching the first two Short Treks, "Q & A" and "The Trouble With Edward".

5. I am still trying to work out some thoughts on the changes to OC Transpo's network that took effect this week.

6. I am not indifferent. I am trying to pay attention.

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What am I curious about? - The May 2019 Edition

Thu, 23 May 2019 13:39:13 GMT

Seems like a good question to answer publicly while I'm in the middle of carrying out a job search. Don't you think?

So...a partial list:

Space
Cartography
Languages
Indigenous culture in North America
Politics in other nations
Mapping the Milky Way Galaxy
Urban geography
Architecture
Urban design
Ottawa-Gatineau history
Canadian history
Street names
Psychology
Comic books
Chess
Soccer(known as "football" outside of Canada and the States)

There's others to be added to the list, but here's a starting point.

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About those two lists?

Tue, 13 Mar 2018 09:47:16 GMT

One of world-healers and the other of world-wounders that I've been considering writing up?

I'm thinking that those lists had best be worked up soon.

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