I’d love to say last year was exceedingly exciting, but in reality, the best I can come up with is average. And, since I haven’t been keeping up with statistics and the like for about half the year, there’s not much sense in pulling a year-long popular posts type thing–those will return starting end of this month, life permitting. The year was so average that, well, I can listify it. So, I will. Because lazy wins on this day after booze.

• Of course, the team I call my own (hint: over here) choked again. In spectacular fashion. They call this the rebuilding year–well, those of us who haven’t seen the playoffs since 2004 are still waiting. Oh well. We’re also used to it.
• I got a lot closer to spending the rest of my life with someone–I even had a quote in hand for a wedding, which was something a lot of people–myself included–didn’t see me doing.
• I moved back to Ottawa, where I actually started to put my life back together–or, rather, where I actually started to have a life again. This whole getting out and doing things idea? Yeah, let’s keep hold of that, yeah?
• That wedding quote I mentioned? Turned out it wasn’t going to be needed after all–I ended up single this year. It was hard getting there, a lot of things went down that kind of kicked me in the face, but I can’t say I didn’t see it coming.
• Met some extremely awesome people this year–and actually started talking to a couple of them more regularly. Get these people in the same room with a nifty amount of something alcoholic and there may not be a room left, but hey, we’d have fun doing it.
• Did a ton of job searching. No job finding, but plenty of searching. That’s halfway, right? That’s what they tell me, anyway.
• And, most importantly, survived to see 2012. Some days I don’t know how, but you’ll have that. Provided life doesn’t continue to kick me in the face, this year will rock in comparison.

So how was your year?

This is what happens when life takes off at full speed. The blog tends to sit over here and do several different kinds of collecting dust. Newyears resolution: correct this malfunction, immediately. Thinga have been happening in wicked fast pace here, which naturally means I haven’t actually been even keeping up on the whole hockey thing–thanks, Shane, for at least filling me in on *most* of what I missed. Now things can calm down just in time for my team to inevitably fall apart.

The holidays are insane on a good day, which accounts for most of my time spent doing things not related to blogging. What accounts for the rest? A mutual friend of both Shane and myself came down with some pretty nifty little medical issues–some of which, some of you are already familiar with. That’s required we be a lot more not near electronics than usual around here while those get fixed and otherwise taken care of. Thankfully, she’s kind of on her way towards recovery now, which means–you guessed it–back to business as usual around here.

It’s been pretty low key on the familial front. Mother’s still working too much, dad’s still working too much, brother’s still–well, okay, nothing he does is low key but there’s not enough room in this entry for that. Oh, and–surprise of surprises–I’m single again. The reasons behind it aren’t worth going into detail publicly–again, some of you already know and the rest, well, probably have theories. But suffice it to say I kind of saw it coming. For those of you who read Jessica’s blog when she posts to it, it’ll be up again just as soon as she figures out what she’s doing with it–and if it’s actually going to get any kind of continued use. Outside of that, it’s been a pretty routine month and a bit–where routine equals anything but. but now, there’s time. And where there’s time, there’s all kinds of random. New year, which means new posting habbits, new mockery, and a new year end show to be kicked off at 9:00 tonight on Mojo Radio. Drop in, say hello, and have a listen (links are over here), while we do 2011 right–and get trashed. Look for more blog content from this corner–including my 2011 review, starting… well… later tonight or early tomorrow. Maybe. But it’s coming. In the meantime, we now return you to whatever you were doing before I distracted you.

On this side of the border, it’s thanks giving weekend. In this house, that roughly translates to way too much food all at once, being way too full to do much more than fall over where you sit and optionally stay conscious, and having way too much fun doing it. So, basicly, the same thing as Christmas except with different music. Things have been cooking since about an hour after most of us were up, and the evidence can’t very well be missed. I don’t much like coming back to Pembroke, but this is a definite plus–the probably half a ton of leftovers that will be returning to Ottawa with me. This has officially become the house of food, no question. And we’re accepting guests.

So. I’ve once again gone and not done this kinda thing in at least a month. You’d think I’d learn to stop that, after 2009, but well–yeah, you know. Where to start and not come off like I haven’t a clue. Well, okay, like I haven’t any less of a clue than usual. Things have been more than a little up and down the last month and a bit. More up than down lately, but you’ll have that. I’ve been going through some things not altogether fit for blogging–they weren’t fit for discussing in general, but you do things like that when you’re, well, the best way to put it is not quite yourself. Things are looking a little better now, at least. Sometimes I still think I’m on shakey ground, but again, you’ll have that. Still, things are being worked out, other things are just being accepted, and I’m getting back to where i was–much to the dismay of a few people, I’m sure. Moving on to bigger and better, as it were. Which, yeah, means I’ll find plenty of things to mock, have plenty of personal things to throw out here just because, and probably do much more bitching about the job market. Because that’s what you do when you’re me. The month of August and first half of September were… well… fun, except not, but now, it’s high time to either get things together or get gone. And, because I’m doing exactly that, have the rest of this entry in list format.

• Employment prospects were looking good, right up until they weren’t. Typical patern for anyone who’s been looking for work the last 3 years–hell, Zoom found herself a job after 2.5 years’ looking herself (congrats for that, by the way). I can’t even be surprised it took 2 and a half years–but only because I’m working on 3 and a half. But, again, you’ll have that.
• Certain plans have been brought to a screaming hault while things related to what I’ve been dealing with away from the blog get themselves worked out. They may come up again. Or they may not. See certain things, acceptance of.
• Hockey starts this week. Yet another reason for me to get back into blogging. Go Leafs go! Preferably farther than last this year.
• Related: I am such a bad horrible not so good fan. Thursday is hockey night. Thursday is also departure night. Which means I miss hockey. Not getting off to a positive start this year, me.
• Thanks giving shows up again this coming weekend–meaning, well, 8 (7, since it’s after midnight?) days from now. I take off Thursday to spend the weekend at the parents’. It’s gonna feel more than a little strange not having Jessica here this year, but as they say, it happens. Maybe next year.
• It used to be awesome warm outside. In 24 hours, it hit OMG WTF where’s my brain cold. They’re forecasting awesome warm again this coming week. Fall, make up my goddamn mind–these windows don’t like to be opened/closed on a daily basis.
• And lastly, finding interesting ways to save money–and yet more interesting ways to purchase apps for the purpose of accessibility testing? Priceless. For everything else, there’s a maxed out creditcard.

Do what you do, kids. Mockery commences at some point. Just, well, right now? I got nothin’.

PS: Go postseason baseball go! I don’t really care who wins–the Redsox are toast. Just, for the love of cheese, whoever does, do something about Philadelphia will ya? That’d be wicked nifty.

I still exist. And surprise surprise, nothing’s busted this time. I’ve been most of the time playing catch-up with the stuff everyone else has written, not to mention helping Shane out when he decided to up and nuke himself. Yeah, classy. In and around that, I’ve actually managed to find a tiny little handful of jobs to apply to–including one from a company I’d escentially given up on. After the departure of the fiance, that’s been pretty much it–yeah, exciting stuff, no? I’m getting back into the usual routine, though, which means–yes, you guessed it–mockery, snark, general harassment, and oh yeah, the popular posts for June and July that never actually got done. Plus, my official, final review, of a former web host. Until then, I leave you with these few short, barely twitter-worthy (so they wind up over here, instead) thoughts.

• I live in Ottawa. Why for am I reminded of Toronto, then, what with emergency vehicles passing by here every half hour?
• Listening to an online scanner, one should not be able to pick up pieces of live music in the background while the person using the radio’s attempting to talk–or rather, yell–over it.
• Related: Said background music and the fact I can actually pick it out should not amuse me.
• One of us gets stressed, somebody sends us Mcdonalds money. Drama doesn’t have to suck completely.
• And lastly, is it wrong of me to sit here and listen to the afore mentioned online scanner, wondering if someone’s going to get a call to this address or one near it? Anyone?

I am about to break my own rule. But before I do that, it has to be said that this week, with no exceptions, was a box of awesome, packed in epic, with a win topping. Jessica came by for the week, as she’s known to do. We had several things planned, and I’m fairly sure we crossed most of them off the list.

A lot of reconnecting was done, and plenty of amusing fun was the result. She came in on Friday, and we went to Pembroke right from the station for my aunt and uncle’s 25th anniversary. We were able to introduce her to more of my extended family who, as I suspected, strongly approved. A ton of fun was had, alcohol–the bar variety–was consumed and dancing was done. Afterwards, it was back to Ottawa and the awesome waiting there.

Monday was getting Jessica used to the place, since she hadm’t been here before. Tuesday was our first official show on Mojo Radio, in preparation for something we’ve been working on for a few months. We test our usual setup for such things in a week or two if all goes well. Wednesday was more relaxing, and getting ready for Thursday.

One of the things Jessica wanted to get done was to meet up with a local friend of ours–you may know him as Blind Bandit. So we did the least recommended thing and mixed that with booze. The result? Posted on Shane’s blog and not fit for public consumption. Friday was more relaxing, and today, we sadly have to return her.

The week wasn’t all party and insanity, though. Sjhe cane up to belatedly wish me a happy birthday. And, in so doing, might have just removed my biggest–or, at least, second biggest–knock against the iPhone. I’ve been saying the thing needed a dedicated, physical keyboard since before I got one, and nearly screaming it after. Because she has that whole listening thing down to an art, she went and picked one up for my birthday. Hence, this post is being finished while on the road. I’ll write a review of this thing when I get home. As for now, I should probably go say goodbye to my girlfriend.

This has been in the planning stages for more months than I’ve been keeping track, and now, it’s officially almost official. This weekend would be 25 years since my oldest aunt and uncle married. And, because it pretty much took them going through some of their own personal hells to get here, Trish has taken it upon herself to put together a small party, of sorts, complete with a cerimony for the couple to renew their vows. It’s at this cerimony that I’ve been asked to perform one of their favourite songs. So for a change, I’m heading to Pembroke for the weekend later tonight, and not specifically for my own reasons. And this time, for the first time in a while, I get to drag Jessica with me–her bus pulls into the station in a little less than 3 hours, give or take. Not too unlike her first trip across the border, we go straight from here to the bus station, scoop her up–suitcase and all, and shoot out of Ottawa like a bat out of hell. That wasn’t our original plan, but hey, it gets her here and us there, so whatever works. So, this weekend. Family event. Pembroke. And for a change, Jessica gets to come along. Oh, and hey, she gets to hear something that isn’t me dinking around with the piano, also for a change. Will wonders never cease? Now, about this whole packing thing.

I swear, I didn’t do all that much outdoors today, simply because within 5 minutes of me being out there, I start to feel like I spent the last hour at the gym–except without the good feeling of having worked out. I had to make a real quick run to the store, and by the time I got back, I could have rung out my shirt. Needless to say, tonight/tomorrow, I’m staying very close to my air conditioner. There’s a heat warning/advisory/thinggy out for tomorrow, it looks like. I have only one thing to say. What was your first clue?

For that, I’m going to blame the fact there hasn’t been much on a personal front to actually post about. things are still awesome, except for that whole job market not really existing thing, but they keep saying it’ll fix itself and I keep throwing applications in random directions. But, really, it’s been pretty low key on the home front after the episode with my former web host, DreamHost–I’m still developing that entry, I swear. With things settling down, though, I have time for random search mockery. And random other mockery to be done later. But, rather than waste an entry just for that, have this.

Jul 16 2am: greyhound pissed me off

Oh, yes, yes they did. And occasionally, still do. It really and truely deserves its own category.

Now. Where’d I put that popular posts thinggy from, oh, 2 weeks ago?

Signs you should update more often include, when you’re going back through things you meant to blog about that now all of a sudden aren’t so relevant because you waited over a month to review them, you find something you’ve been meaning to blog about and just never had the time–or, for 3 days during that time, didn’t have the blog (that entry’s coming). That, er, rather includes this.

Jun 14 11:03pm: calling in sick for hockey game

I will openly admit to having unknowingly done exactly that. And hey look, we even won. Yeah, I’ll admit to having called in sick for a game. And I won’t lose any sleep over doing so. Don’t ask me to try hat after a loss, hough.

If I had a dollar for every fun thing that happened this past month, I could probably get off disability altogether. The month came to an end with probably the most exciting fun I’ve had in, let’s say, ever. And by exciting, I mea not really. I’ll save the details for an entry to be named later, but suffice it to say we were offline for the better part of 3 days while information was pried from various friendly turned hostile hands and a rebuild was completed. But, the blog’s back, as is all my various other methods of fun torment. Which means back to business as usual. Just as soon as I get back to my usual level of caffeine. I’ve been running on quite a bit of it lately. I blame the entry to be named later. Happy reading, folks. I’m back.

I always said Pembroke was the kind of place I loved to visit, but wouldn’t want to live there. Having lived here several times and visited several more, every time I switch I become more and more convinced of that. Which is another of the reasons I’m in love with living in Ottawa. I like Pembroke, as far as small towns go. But it’s the kind of place you go for a day or two, maybe a week if you need to. Then, it’s back home to online grocery delivery, places to walk to, potential places to work, and actual transportation. It’s weird, odd, and slightly strange, but a thing I missed about Ottawa was visiting Pembroke. I should do this more often. Or, you know, maybe not.

In yet another example of things that didn’t happen when I lived in Ottawa last time, the company what takes my rent money every month–the same company I was with before I left the city 3 years ago–now gives you a lazy type option for doing, in my opinion anyway, the most tedius of the household chores. And, knowing my tendency towards the lazy as I do, first chance I got I was all over it. So as of this morning, mixed in amongst all the other usual stuff that goes into getting the apartment set up and getting me refamiliarized with this area of the city, I got my hands on my first apartment-sized dish washer. Yeah, okay, so it’s not exactly world’s most major. But, well, it’s kind of somewhat vaguely amusing to me–I’ve lived in 3 apartments so far, two of them in Ottawa and two of them owned by the same company, all in the span of the last 5 years–and until today, it’s been by hand with the actual cleaning of things. I still haven’t gotten my apartment-cleaning, laundry-doing, food-preparing robot, but I’ll settle for a dish washer until such a creature is perfected. Hey, these things make me happy. Proof I need something more to do? Maybe. Potential of that happening tonight? Not unless you count sleep. Eventually.

Every time I come to Ottawa, whether it’s to live or visit, I always have this wicked huge list of things to do. And almost always, within the first week or two, I end up making a sizeable dent in that list. Which is exactly why it is they should absolutely never let me anywhere near Ottawa. Reasons this is bad for me include, but are not limited to:

1. Random, most-of-the-day walks that take up more distance than most people could see themselves walking and still being healthy
2. Stops along said walks to occasionally collect random bits of random, in photo form



3. Popping into random specialty stores just to see what they’ve got on for cheap that’s semi-original (hint: there’s a crap ton)
4. Yet more walks, with yet more photoworks, with yet more scenery



5. Yard sales–every second weekend, on every second block
6. Random crap picked up at said yard sales, for cheap–like my new coffee table (it’s on wheels)
• Or the old coffee table, which doubles as a temporary TV stand (it cost me a dollar, 5 years ago)
7. Grocery shopping, sans the actual shopping–hey, I’m lazy, and I hate shopping
8. Milano Pizzeria–no, seriously, if you must have pizza, you must have Milano
9. And oh yeah, yet more photoworks



10. And I guess that whole employment thing doesn’t hurt, once I figure out what that is

If that’s a week in Ottawa, no freaking wonder the previous 2.5 years just kinda sailed by at warp speed. I know this much about Ottawa on my second time around, at least–I’ll definitely get back in shape. Now, then. Where’d I put the rest of my to-do list?

Yeah, I know. I fail this hard at updating and that’s my best title? I blame recovering from the last week, which kind of went like this in no particular order. Get moved out of the old place, into the new place, fight with our ISP to actually get online, blow my 3G data quota before getting online, spend most of the week fighting with our ISP to get online in a way that doesn’t suck, learn that’s not going to happen with this modem and as long as the routes we’re assigned keep sucking horrible, throw groceries at my fridge in ways that haven’t been done since 2008, and oh yeah, discover just having moved into this apartment means clearing out the last of the previous tenant’s, er, crap. And on top of that, the world was scheduled to end yesterday. Oopsies. Basicly, it’s been fun. And now that it’s all relatively calmed down–at least as much as it can be expected to be when back in Ottawa, actual content. But first, a moving WTF/rant/mockery thing. Next entry, assuming I don’t get sidetracked.

Things that happen when you go 3 weeks without updating, episode number I’m not sure how many. House hunting, of a sort, didn’t turn out to be a complete and total flop–hence the, well, nearly a month without updating this thing. Which, yes, means I’m once again nearly a month late with April’s highlights–that’s on the list. In between all the other insanity. Sandwitched between trips to see family, an entire life shift kicked me in the face. Not only has the job market actually at least done a relatively average job of not sucking, but as of 3 days ago officially, I have a location that will for the foreseeable future pretend to be a new place to live. And, surprise, it’s back in Ottawa–roughly across the street more or less from where I used to be. The apartment’s laid out pretty well like the old one was. And, to boot, it’s in the same building as–and, in fact, is directly below–the rental office that used to manage the building I moved out of.

Shane and I have had a running joke amongst ourselves since before he moved in here that I’d eventually be evicting him from my living room. So, when we first got wind we’d be landing this apartment, I wrote him an informal eviction notice–which, naturally, got blogged. It generally wasn’t received all that well by many, in spite of references to it for the majority of the 5 or 6 months he’s been living here. Still, it was mildly entertaining to those who actually had some involvement with it. And, officially official now, on the 15th of this month–yes, that’s in 2 days–I sign the papers for the new apartment, and officially evict him from my living room. Larger apartment, more space, major city, and in a decent area for getting to potential places of employment–not much could be better. Well, except for having something to do at one of those potential places of employment–but we’re working on that.

Speaking of potential places of employment, I’m encountering indications things might actually be trying very hard to return to some kind of pre-2010 level as far as job market activity goes in Ottawa. What lead me to that theory? For the first time in just about ever, Rogers, who I’ve gone rounds with before for other reasons on the customer side, has once again at least temporarily started posting openings–and I’ve applied for just about all of them. And if that wasn’t a vague attempt to possibly lull me into a false sense of getting somewhere, another potential employer I hadn’t heard from in nearly a year threw out a few positions of its own. Alcatel-Lucent, who I’ve had an interview with in the past–and who’s building is actually laid out very similar to the one Dell used to own–is, also at least temporarily, back in the hiring business–and likewise got poked with an application or two. I’m not sure what all will come from any of that, or the few job postings I responded to by more conventional means from companies I haven’t seen much of in the 3 years I’ve been looking, but hey, I can’t exactly do much worse off on the job front.

what all of this means is I’ll potentially have plenty more in-person things to comment on and/or mock rather than the occasional dumping of links that also hasn’t actually been happening in quite a while–I need to fix that–or the seemingly lacking actual coherent thought that happens to have more to it than 140 characters. Such thoughts may or may not involve version 3.0 of the pot-smelling basement. Or, they may be extremely disjointed list-type stream of consciousness “I’m sick, so have an entry” type posts–not entirely unlike this one. Or they may be little more than 140 character thoughts in blog format–at least, if Twitter keeps doing what it was doing for most of today, anyway. Still, things are trying real hard to calm down now–and will do a whole lot more of that after this weekend. Which, you guessed it, means the mockworthy comes right back to where it started. Hey, on second thought, I should go 3 weeks without updating more often. No, wait–next time something important might actually happen.

For the better part of the last two years, I’ve been dealing with the second career program up here in the name of trying to find a non-retail job in a town of primarily retail jobs. After going a round or two with the local college–note to self: round 3 should probably happen soon, we’ve sort of refocused our attention on the one call center in the area, Online Support. Ignoring the fact I’ve had more than one interview with these folks and haven’t exactly gotten anywhere with them, it’s not even what I’d call conducive to getting me back where I want to be–not directly, at least. Still, it’s a step up from where I’m at, and the folks over at second career seem convinced that this time I’ll get in, so on Friday, I took another run at an interview with the company. I’d been given the impression it was going to be a second interview, since I’d already gone through the initial process and they had my stuff on file, but apparently they’d switched HR folks since last time and my info ended up tucked away in storage somewhere. So, it was back to square 1. I went through their 20 questions, and pretty much recited all of their information back to them before the interviewer did–you’d think I’d done this before. It was pretty well the same old song and dance from interviews past, with one potentially noteable exception–I had brought the laptop I recently purchased with me, which prompted the interviewer to go see if she could track down their IT personnel to play their own version of 20 questions. We talked tech for a few minutes, then after some creative use of the said laptop and an iPhone for the purposes of network connectivity–note to Online Support: tell your HR people your wireless password already–I was able to simultaneously show off and complete their required assessments at the same time. we played another round of 20 questions, then I got the standard “we’ll call you” response on the way out the door–again, you’d think I’d heard that before.

It’s no secret this isn’t exactly where I planned on being, but then, it’s even less of a secret that I didn’t plan on being nearly 3 years without work either–thanks, Dell. Love ya. Really. And right around the start of a recession too. Strike 3–you’re fired. But, hey, if this slight change in interview tactics works, I’ll be pleasantly surprised. And somewhat gainfully employed–at least until such time as something more promising shows up, or these jobs go overseas. which, yeah, would be a hell of an improvement. So, I’ll just go on about my day, occasionally poke the second career folks so they don’t think I’ve fled to Mexico to join the drug trade or something, and busy myself with not holding my breath. Hey, I haven’t taken out a loan just to buy groceries–I’m good. Now, let’s see if I can perhaps possibly get a little better. Anyone want a techy? I charge reasonably.

I wrote last Friday that the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) has taken to threatening law enforcement action were I to show up at the meeting that was supposed to have taken place on Monday morning. Yeah, that one that was scheduled for a teleconference later on that same afternoon–more on that in another entry. They’re threatening law enforcement action over a single sentence in a previous post that made clear in no uncertain terms the professional damage that may or may not have resulted from this meeting were the level of incompitence displayed so far by my caseworker to actually go unaddressed. I was, rightly so, more than a little pissed with what’s been happening the last few months on that file, and more than a little irritated someone decided to focus more attention on a single sentence in a blog post than on the actual issues that provoked the afore mentioned blog post. Irritated, but not surprised.

Related:

• The internet is not private. Live with it.

It’s been a common trend in the last few years, though more so in the last year or so, to see how far government agencies and potential employers can shove even the pretension of online privacy out of the way under the guise of performing a more thorough background check. From the Maryland department of corrections asking for social networking passwords as a part of their certification/recertification process, to a New Jersey police chief who seems to have no problem telling parents to hack their kids’ online passwords–and even shows them how complete with spyware, that’s becoming the cool thing to do. And I’m not even touching the most recent instance of online content overreaction in Canada involving two teenagers, a Facebook photo and a conservative political ralley. yeah, those two teenagers.

Part of me expected this exact response, pretty much as soon as I started to push back against what ODSP was up to. And, indeed, it was even while expecting that response that I still wrote the exact post I did, in the exact context I did, and later ran into the exact result I did. So why wouldn’t I change my writing accordingly, people have asked? Put in the simplest of terms, because I’m not that dishonest. No, this isn’t Facebook and people don’t need my password to see 90% of what I write here. Yes, this blog is perfectly and completely public, and yes, I’m very well aware of this–I made it that way for a reason. But, much like the Facebook photo incident of this past week, the only reason anything on this site became an issue at all rather than the, in my opinion, more important priority of getting to the bottom of the mess at least one person made of the last 3 months’ mountain of paperwork is because someone actually had time, and may have been getting paid for said time, to have a sit down and throw something into Google that landed them on the blog.

I’d be a freaking liar if I said I didn’t enjoy taking a look at who’s been checking this place out and from where. I’d be lying if I said I do this solely for my own benefit–Microsoft has an incredible word processor for that if I really really need something like that. But yes, primarily, this is my thing. Sometimes, my thing includes something others will find semi-useful and/or interesting–that’s what search engines are for, after all. but I have a significant problem when people actually devote time and resources to scanning this blog, or any other that I help to maintain, looking for dirt–be it on me, on friends of mine, on family, on my friend’s sister’s boyfriend’s mother’s cat. I’m not in the business of slinging mud. for that reason, you’ll find no mud on this blog to sling–be it at me, or at anyone I happen to know. I’ve called people and/or government and/or corporate entities out on this blog. I will continue to call people and/or government and/or corporate entities out on this blog, if the said people and/or government and/or corporate entities continue to screw people over on the same, consistent basis. And if the only thing certain entities can find in their obviously too much spare time to make an issue of is one line in an otherwise mild–for me, anyway–expression of general overall fed-up-ness, I must be doing something pretty damn right.

No, I’m not surprised in any way, shape or form that at least 3 ODSP locations–Kingston, Ottawa and Cornwall–have been scouting out my blog. In fact, I’m really kind of flattered that a small-time blog like this one manages to make it onto ODSP’s radar, even if it’s over what amounts to trivialities that in 6 months won’t make a whole hell of a lot of difference. But not being surprised by it doesn’t mean I agree with the fact that a government entity who has until this past week had no interest whatsoever in actually giving me a response has decided, on the public dime, to devote time and energy to looking for the smallest hint of an almost problem and trying desperately to turn it into a major issue. That’s crossing at least one line, and with very little in the way of justification for it–last week’s teleconference didn’t exactly reveal much in the way of straight answers about it. I’m still waiting. Perhaps the next time one of ODSP’s people drops in, they’ll leave a comment behind or otherwise drop me a line. And maybe, just maybe, it’ll include their justification for doing so. But if it doesn’t, on that, I also won’t be surprised.

The parental units have found themselves with dogs for as long as I can remember. They’ve got two of them now–yeah, okay, so one’s mine, oh well. They’ve taken off for the weekend to do whatever they do when they take off for the weekend, and left me to keep the creatures from tearing the house apart in their absense. Which comes with its very own, double-edged benefit. The pups are awesome judges of the day’s weather–it could be just barely above freezing, but if it’s forecast to be into the 20′s (I’m using Celsius, for the curious reading from the US side of the border–hey, it makes more sense) at any point during the day, it’s guaranteed any outside time they get today–and they usually get a lot–won’t go quickly. Yesterday, they were in and out an average of 10 minutes. but yesterday, the weather threatened to suck out loud. So far this morning, none of the trips outside with them have been anything less than half an hour–and all of them have ended with me escentially guiding them back into the house. Hey, I gots stuffs to do, here. I’m convinced if I let them, they’ll very happily spend the day outside doing whatever they do when they’re spending the day outside. Only problem is, if they’re outside, so am I–another dog day entry for another dog day, I think. So I’m out there every hour or two, for between half an hour and an hour, until such time as the weather starts sucking again. It’s great–gives me something to do that doesn’t involve housework or draining the laptop’s battery for the millionth time. I’ll just be going ahead and changing my mailing address to be my parents’ front yard, that’s all. Hey, at least the view’s decent.

Seems them what run the disability support system around here haven’t gotten done having fun with me yet. At the eleventh hour, escentially, with an hour left in the actual business day and therefore not a whole lot of time to actually work around their latest curve, ODSP decides they’d like to go another fun-filled round. We got on the phone with a manager this morning, due to the fact one of us can’t trust our caseworker half as far as we can throw her. Explained the situation, got told she’d look into it and get back to us by the end of business today. So I’m helping Jessica get set up for a project we’re contemplating starting work on, and the call comes in from the manager. I figure okay, she’s got answers for us. We can get part of these issues resolved hopefully before Monday, if not try and prevent the need to go in there in the first place. Not so much. Seems in their spare time, Ontario Disability Support Program employees run random Google searches on folks in the hopes of hitting on something potentially scandalous. One such employee–wouldn’t surprise me if it was the very manager we spoke to, honestly–comes across my blog. There are several pops for people showing up here using keywords related to ODSP and/or Pembroke, so that wouldn’t surprise me. She, or someone working for her, decides to take offense at one or two sentences in a post published here earlier this week. Specificly, this post published here earlier this week. They’ve decided, based on the fact they have plenty of free time and can very easily spend it on Google, that they’re not going to permit me to show up for Monday’s meeting. Taking it a step further, they have apparently decided that my showing up on Monday will constitute a perfectly good reason for them to have the police involved.

So now, not only do we have Wingnut deciding to play the privacy game only if and when it suits her, but higher level management is apparently deciding that I’m a threat to the security and safety of employees of the ministry of community and social services. Instead of me showing up there, they have proposed instead that they call at 9:00 AM on Monday morning–the smart money’s on that phone not ringing at 9:00 AM on Monday morning, just sayin’. We’ll supposedly be holding this meeting via teleconference on that day at that time with all parties involved.

So if I have this straight, and in all likelyhood I may not actually have this straight, potential privacy issues and general incompitence takes a back seat in this ministry to looking for and possibly attempting to make use of some incredibly trivial part of a blog post expressing more than a little tiny bit of frustration with the offending ministry. Really. And the tax dollars of people who actually don’t have a problem finding work are paying for this? That must go over insanely well.

I have not received any notice, written or otherwise, legal or otherwise, requesting and/or requiring me to take down or modify the offending post. Anyone who knows me probably knows just how far such a request would actually get them. The request to not show up on Monday also didn’t come in writing, legal or otherwise. The only reason I’m not seriously considering just showing up there anyway? I’m not *looking* for problems–they’re handing me enough without me helping them along with the process. This meeting will happen. This meeting will happen on Monday. And if this meeting doesn’t happen on Monday, at least one of us, probably both, will be on the next vehicle moving in an officeward direction. Oops–probably shouldn’t of said that. I’ll expect the Ottawa Valley detachment at my door Tuesday morning. Well, if you folks from the offices of the ODSP are going to spend this much time tracking what gets tossed up here when I’m not over my head in job searches, least you could do is drop a comment once in a while–say hi to that guy you’re trying to dig up some dirt on. Wait, no, nevermind–it’s much more fun to yoink lines from a random post completely out of context. My mistake. I’ll know better next time.

So as any of you who’ve been reading this thing since December are aware, it’s been somewhat of an uphill fight between the Ontario disability Support Program (ODSP), Shane, and myself. We’d go a round or two, find a clue, offer it up and have it escentially kicked across the room by someone in government who thinks they know better. We’d find more information, offer it up, complete with the math that lead us to the result you’d expect to see if you actually follow their own rules, and get summarily told we were using the wrong math. Lovely. Except in every which way that it’s not. And oh, let me count the ways. So the four of us–Shane and I, and our respective caseworkers–go several rounds about that over the course of the last month or so. And in the process of doing so, come up with the fact that not only were we using a completely different math system from what our caseworkers were, but apparently our caseworkers were using completely different systems from each other–thus resulting in completely different results being pried out of completely identical documentation. Yeah, I don’t get it either. That’s government for ya.

So we spend the better part of the last month trying to work around that, and hit one very problematic road block. Both caseworkers are clinging to privacy laws like they’re on life support. In spite of the fact half the time when we call, Shane and I are 3 feet away from each other and can get a good enough idea what the conversation’s going to end up revealing just based on one side of it. And picking up the phone and saying “by the way, you have my permission to access my case file and compare with his case”? Yeah, not good enough, apparently.

In her defense, Shane’s caseworker is at least in possession of a low-level clue. Enough of one that I don’t think her information’s the source of half our problems. Mine, on the other hand, could probably benefit from some retraining in a few key areas. In theory, I could probably have told Shane’s caseworker to go ahead and look up my file and she might have. Mine? Nope. Can’t. Privacy laws. Permission doesn’t matter. So, fast forward to Monday. Shane has to be in to see his caseworker anyway for an unrelated matter, so I bounce it off him and the wheels on the way back that we find a brand new way to tackle this small little tiny minor issue. Both caseworkers, both of us, one room, A S A fuckin’ P. So we make the call Monday afternoon. Shane’s worker, we’ll call her Clue, has absolutely no problem with it. Oh, you want a meeting? Awesome. James is coming too? Okay. He’s dragging his caseworker in as well? Hey, that works. 9:00 AM? Why not? My worker, on the other hand, we’ll call her Wingnut, takes a little more twisting, turning and kicking to get her into the same meeting. Oh, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to make it. We can’t have a joint conference–the other party has to be perfectly fine with it. Oh, er, he is. Well. Um. I’ll have to check with his caseworker. Oh. You did. Well, er, let me see if I’m available. Oh, crap–entire morning’s free. 9:00 AM, you say. Can I ppossibly get away with calling in sick? (Note: she didn’t actually say that last part, but you know she thought it.) Fine, fine. But I probably won’t change anything anyway.

After she ran out of excuses, we finally dragged Wingnut into the meeting schedule with the three of us. This coming Monday, sharp at 9 barring natural disasters, I have a sneaking suspicion somebody’s going to get an education in just what the hell their job involves–a little hint for those of you keeping score, it doesn’t actually involve trying your hardest to pull a fast one. So bright and early Monday, me, Shane, Clue, Wingnut, a pair of eyes of our choosing, and a small mountain of already submitted documentation will all pile into a conference room down at the place what employs ODSP peoples. A well-timed phone call could, if the need should present itself, also see she whom Wingnut and Clue report to showing up for that very same meeting.

It’s one thing for us to end up getting different results from the government. That’s kind of expected–if they can find some way to sneak it in that you don’t actually get your hands on everything you should, they’ll do so. If you don’t expect it, well, sorry. But when two government employees, handling two different case files, get slapped with the exact same supporting documentation for both case files and come up with completely different results, even from one another, Houston, we has a problem. When we can take a look at the inner math supposedly behind both cases, even after having said inner math explained to us, and still end up being sent for a loop thanks largely to the fact the results don’t even look like they *should* be close, yeah, say hello to the red flag, ladies and thinggies. Somebody’s not giving us the goods, and I have a sneaking suspicion it’s not Clue. I have an equally deep suspicion the problem will be solved, or unemployed, before this issue’s fully delt with. I hate being screwed with.

Oh, and miss permission doesn’t bypass privacy laws? Turns out that only applies if you’re not Wingnut, apparently. According to her, she and Clue had a conference re: this issue in which both our cases were discussed. Neither Shane nor I were informed of such a conference, as we would have needed to be in order to be fully in compliance with privacy laws. Clue, naturally, didn’t exactly confirm they held a conference re: our respective cases, so once again, somebody’s either lying or violating those same privacy laws she has no problem slapping us in the face with. That gets added to the list of, shall we say, topics on the agenda for Monday’s meeting. This, combined with the few months of back and forth that haven’t really gotten us anywhere, combined with the fact 90% of this issue could have probably been cleaned up if they’d either 1: actually compared notes or 2: applied just a little bit of consistency to their own procedures, is going to make for a quite interesting morning. I have a sneaking suspicion one of us is going to come away bloody. And I’ll be quite damned if it’s gonna be me.

No? Okay fine. This would be, for the first time in a little bit over a month, my attempted reemergence into the realm of this whole blogging thing. This may or may not include yet more mockery, and that thinggy I’m supposed to do about what you guys were reading last month–conveniently, 4 or 5 days before I should be doing that thing about what you were reading while I was being all unavailable and things. There’s an abso-freaking-lute metric ton of crap I probably could, and should, be writing about. Sadly, most of it kind of stopped applying about 2 weeks ago–sorry, life does that to ya. Things that do get a mention here and may or may not be elaborated on when I have slightly more brain power. In list format, because hey, first post in a month, here. Lazy.

• Moving: Jessica got herself all moved in, relatively in one piece and with most of what sanity she has left after dating and being engaged to me intact. Her stuff, thankfully, also made it to the other end in one pice. Find her take on that and several million other things over on her blog. Go now. I’ll wait.
• Technology: I’d started the process before I left, and finished it while down there–in and around the above mentioned move. Shortly before my return to Canada–where I’m currently flaed out now, the new laptop I’d been aiming for met me here. It’s nifty cool, in the wicked sense. Still getting used to using Windows 7 on a more than occasional basis, but hey, so far I’m not complaining much.
• The stupid: there’s acrap ton of it. It starts with local cab companies, and it’ll all warrant separate entries. Again, see the need for more brain power.
• Hockey: the playoffs are closing rappidly in on us. There will be playoff mockery involved. There will not be Leafs recaps involved–again. Ah well. You saw it coming.
• Leafs: I quit. At least for this season. I haven’t done a recap since mid-February. To recap this many games would be both exceedingly spammy and a very good reason to develop a migraine. Naturally it would also double as an excellent exercise in frustration–like all mid to late season attempts at playing the comeback kid do. You’re just not that team, Toronto. Sorry.
• Mockery: Oh, dear lord, the mockery. Not in this post, but the mockery. I’m buried in it. It’ll get posted over the next couple days. Trust me–it’ll be more than worth the wayt.

So that’s kind of where I’ve been. Now, where’d I put my caffeine?

Part of my reasoning behind showing up in Rochester for a month, particularly this month, is the opportunity to do exactly what’s currently being done today. Sure, we don’t need a particular day to do it, but well, it’s here and we’re doing it, so draw thine own conclusions. I aranged to have a little surprise show up for Jessica at work today during a couple hours when she needed to be away from the apartment. She hasn’t had much of that done for her I don’t think, and well, it’s muchly deserved. I don’t think she disagreed, considering she showed it off apparently to a couple folks she worked with. Something else was supposed to show up for her today, but I’m going to just assume USPS decided today didn’t agree with their schedule so hopefully it’ll show up later this week. The third, now second, part of today’s activities takes place in just about an hour.

I’d seen some info on this little Italian restaurant not far from here floating around in various places, and was looking for an excuse to check it out. We’ve always had half a dozen things going on on any given day and well, the checking out of new places ends up usually getting squished off our list of things to do. So tonight, that’s being remedied. I made a place for us at Pane Vino Ristorante, which advertises itself as romantic, authentic Italian. Romantic or not, authentic or not, I’m calling it an excuse to just unwind, reset, and generally not have to actually do any work for our food. Not unlike the insanity of Saturday, except with about 10 less people. It’s a thing we try to do, usually somewhere a little more familiar than this, at least once while we’re together. This time just so happens to fall on a day when you’re theoretically supposed to do stuff like that, but oh well, whatcha gonna do? It’ll be nice, though, to actually just take an evening and be easy about it. The fact that I know it’ll help her to relax more than she already is? Added bonus. Now, back to this whole getting ready to leave thing.

Happy Valentines day to those of you who actually observe it, for whatever reason. Happy monday to everyone else. Either way, do me a favour and crack open a cold one. I’ll try and think of you while I’m drowning in pasta. Maybe.

So yesterday was the epic get-together of win. A dozen of us crammed into one of the local restaurants and pretty much had a table or two entirely to ourselves, and an epic server of awesome to boot. Why? Simply because we could. There was me, Jessica, Heather and a whole crap ton of others, most of whom I’d never even seen before then, sitting around a huge table, eating and generally doing all manner of cutting up. The layers of awesome just kept coming–and so did the very nearly doubling over laughing at quite probably the absolute most random crap going. The food was awesome, the friends were epic, and when I came back to the apartment last night, I honestly questioned for about 10 seconds how the hell it was I’d be fitting through the door. It’s been a small age since I saw that many people get together and no punches were thrown. And the flirtation, oh the flirtation. I’m convinced that was half the hillarity in and of itself.

Everyone was all in general agreement last night we should do that more often. Which probably means I need to start inventing money to get myself back down here for another one of these parties. And, well, hell, because I can–why not? I have all kinds of reasons to keep coming back here, and surprisingly–or perhaps not, if you’re keeping score–not all of them are Jessica-related. Just most of them. This stuff keeps happening, I’m gonna start to wonder just which of my two apartments I should be staying in. Now to get through the week so we can do something just like this all over again, except potentially with a different group of people and for possibly different reasons. This should get real interesting real fast.

Related: Heather, we’re getting you a blog. Yesterday. Because we can. Yeah, I said it. Wait for it.

I’ve been on ODSP’s case for, like, ever about not escentially drumming us out of the running financially, for what little my being on them’s managed to accomplish. For those just tuning in, ODSP is the Ontario Disability Support Program, also known as those folks what pay me because no one likes to hire the blind guy and I still have bills to pay. I’ve done everything from harass folks locally to write the folks who actually make the decisions, most of which eventually ended up documented on this thing calling itself a blog. Adding to my reasons for harassing folks at both ends of the food chain, my recent attempt to save money has prompted ODSP to attempt to save a little on its end. Thus, not doing a whole lot on mine to make actually saving money worth my while.

Let me bring you up to speed. I live in a fairly cheap apartment, rent-wise. It’s $550 a month, plus your electricity. For most places, that’s cheap. For Pembroke, I’m surprised it was even vacant. I’ve lived there since 2009. At the end of 2010, I decided it would be in my best financial interest to do the roommate thing. Yeah, that would eventually require a bigger apartment, but two bank accounts are almost always better than one, so the math should have worked out. Then I got a phone call. I’d forgotten there was actually two different types of math at play, here. There was actual math, as in that stuff you were forced to sit through before they’d let you get out of highschool, then there’s ODSP math. That, apparently, follows an entirely different, much more nonsensicle, set of rules.

We ran the math out, figuring we could probably manage to free up an average of roughly $250 between the two of us, which could easily be realocated into bills we otherwise would have had a difficult time paying had we decided to be stubborn about it and forego the whole idea of a roommate. Those numbers in hand, we actually planned our month of January figuring if things changed, they wouldn’t change by a whole heaping lot, so we could optionally minus 50 from here or there if we needed to in order to cover off something else. We played with it until it didn’t hurt our heads, then left it there. The month rolled over, and shortly after, the phone rang. It was ODSP. They’d decided they’d be cutting a nifty little slice off each of our monthly allowances, to the tune of very nearly what we were figuring we could just end up reusing. On top of that, a letter showed up in my name 3 days after that wonderfully heartwarming conversation, escentially telling me they believe I was overpaid for the month of December and they’d be collecting that back, kind of now like. And they did it in the form of slicing off what they were going to, plus what they thought would be an awesome magical number to just sort of start at for repayment. Yeah, just how I wanted to start my 2011. While dealing with that, we were also looking at the possibility of said larger apartment, and trying very hard not to laugh at the prospect of them arguing with us about our attempt to save money just long enough that they wind up being forced just by way of our expenses to reverse themselves anyway, and we’d still wind up not having actually managed to come out any further off the financial ropes.

Since I hadn’t yet figured out exactly how much they’d be snagging from me each month to compensate for having paid me more than they’ve decided I’m worth, I went with their usual practice and left things as they were for the time being. Then the roommate fled to see his girl, and I came down here. I wouldn’t find out until a few days later, when I both had time and wasn’t at too much a risk of losing a lung to actually do the month’s finances on my end–belatedly, but hey, they got done. Their definition of a repayment plan leaves me with less money at the end of it than I had pre-roommate. All told, I actually ended up losing most if not all of what I was kind of aiming to put towards the actual paying of bills.

Look, guys, I get you’re cheap. Really, I do. I get you measure your $10 annual increases in the context of millions of dollars combined. Again, I really do. But not even you can comprehensibly wrap your heads around this attempt at math, as evidenced by the fact no one I’ve spoken to on this file’s come anywhere near close to an explanation that doesn’t try very hard not to trip over itself and fall flat on its face. Just what actual sense does this make? Seriously? Not only does ODSP want to not actually give you more money, but if you actually try and save yourself some of the money they do give you, that only serves to invite them to claw it back whether they actually should or not. And of course, the system is designed in such a way that they decide you can live on this amount, and you get to provide them 80 metric tons of documentation on why you can’t, then wait for them to maybe or maybe not–usually not–change their minds.

ODSP is here to foster independence and help recipients to actually function on their own without needing to spunge off family/friends. Just don’t actually try and avoid spunging. Turns out ODSP math doesn’t allow for it.