Persistent Illumination

The thing I love about the Halifax airport is the free wireless. The thing I don't love about it is the fact that I can now add it to my "list of airports I've slept at."

After the plane last night was fully boarded, a Jetsgo rep came on and announced that the luggage had all been taken off the plane - except for a live dog, a stroller and something else. Weather and runway problems had resulted in our load being deemed as too heavy. All luggage was to be shipped on a flight to Toronto this morning at 6:30am - the same flight I'm waiting for, in fact. Anyone who wanted to stay with their luggage was welcome to get off the plane right then....

My housekeys were in my luggage. So it was either a night in the SLC sans luggage, or a night in the Halifax airport avec luggage.

I chose the more exotic route.

Sad that sleeping on a cold, wooden, flourescent-lit bench in the Halifax airport is my definition of exotic. Either that or I've been in Canada for far, far too long...

No comps from Jetsgo, by the way - no travel vouchers or hotel stays. The perils of flying with a shoestring airline, it seems.

---- Later update ----

Home now, home being Ontario, safe and sound Waterloo, good old 77 Seagram Drive. I'm tired after an airporter home, showering and making it to work on time, going to class, preparing for a debate tomorrow and then chilling at the (free) Cannes International Advertising Festival in Humanities tonight. One thing to be said about this year's Feds exec - they do sure know how to treat ya to a movie.

Hilarity was John Andersen (now Feds president-elect) burning through the Rick-Theis-prepared introductory speech, in the wake of some serious heckling from the audience (ahem, Meagan and Rick).

My favourtie commercials: the ninja "get a good companion," the BC SPCA "some things you should only do with a pet" series, Evian will rock you, pole dancing girl on the subway and of course the "chicken you can trust" bit. Being my dad's son, I noted that many came from Saatchi and Saatchi's international offices, and one company called DDB had a lot of good ones as well.

All this was part of UW's International Celebration week this week. Some good presentations from African dancers in the SLC today. Tomorrow is an early set up for an EWB display.

Oh, and in case you were wondering ... the list: Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Lima. Napping in Chicago, San Francisco and Cedar Rapids (Iowa) don't really count. But now, Halifax does.

The nice thing about the Halifax airport is the free wireless. Not much of a terminal to boast of - one long wing of this international (Cancun! Boston! Newark!) airport and only two Tim Horton's - but I've seen worse.

I have about 5 hours to kill before my flight at 7:30pm. Walden Two and the National Post. It's gonna be a long one.

Word through the grapevine is that Imprint's Board of Directors (of which I am no longer a member - website needs to be updated, apparently) decided at a board meeting on Monday to !disregard! the direction of the membership from the Annual General Meeting and not raise the Imprint fee. Furthermore, front-page advertising at Imprint may soon become a reality - perhaps the two decisions are related?

If any members of Imprint read this - and I know you do - I'd love to hear further details.

Every morning, I wake up and want to work like crazy. The idea of a real vacation is too foreign to me. I feel like a mental patient who just ... can't ... seem ... to ... relax. I'm going to check myself in for counselling if this doesn't go away when I get back to Waterloo.

Otherwise, an Ebert and Roeper-style rating of my vacation so far:

Cute girlfriend: two thumbs up!!

Nothing much to do in Wolfville, Nova Scotia: two boring thumbs down

The unearthly beauty of the Bay of Fundy and the Nova Scotian terrain: two very peaceful thumbs up

Discovering that Settlers of Catan is actually really cool: two very addicted thumbs up

Still not being able to completely cut the cord from Imprint: two distraught thumbs down

Not knowing anybody in Wolfville: one thumb up, one thumb down

Dilts hate-on on others' blogs: two Policy 33 violated thumbs down

Brie for breakfast: two thumbs up

In retrospect, I think that I have to do less worrying about Waterloo while I'm on vacation, and more enjoying of the Nova Scotian countryside.

Deep congratulations go out to anybody getting their iron rings later today. Sonya Konzak, Ryan O'Connor and anyone else I know who might be wearing a ring as of this afternoon (Geoff Rawle?) -- I know you kids have worked hard to get where you are today, so enjoy your engineering rituals. You've earned them.

The real winners: undergrad students. A dental plan and shorter registration lineups during O-week. wOOt! The 17-18% turnout was not too shabby, either.

As for the rest....

President: Andersen, in by a long shot. Runner up: Nada Basir. No real surprises there. Good luck next year, John.

VP Education: Howie Bender, by 20 votes. Runner up: Bobby Naini. Not as close as when Tracey lost to Capper by 14, but still ... I wonder if a recount is a possibility? Bender's going to have big shoes to fill.

VP Finance: Carmen Lam, by a lot. Runner up: Nick Cake. Cake and Jermyn split the vote - didn't see THAT one coming. Carmen's smart, but the election showed her to be quiet -- it will be interesting to see how that plays out in office, especially at council.

VP Internal: Lawrence Lam. Runner up: Lee Bowman. Poor Sabrina - being the strongest candidate doesn't always mean winning the election. Now, I was on council with Lawrence, and his committment to Feds is not to be questioned. He was always an intelligent speaker, with the best interests of students in mind. Still, I'm quite surprised at the result because Lawrence didn't campaign as well as other candidates. I have to wonder about the voter mentality in this race. Seriously.

Eng Senate: Kunal got himself disqualified. Sigh. Too many fines for being too ... innovative? Everybody learns the hard way, I guess. Good luck next year, Fish.

Arts Council: Hayle and Daley got in. That's good. Borelli too. Rida Rehmani survived despite joining the campaign at the last minute (and getting slaughtered by Imprint). That's all I have to say about that.

Post-election thoughts on the executive races: Screw the usual 'blue/yellow' split dissection. How about this:

• 100% of Feds executive incumbent candidates won their seats.
  
• 100% of oriental student candidates won their seats.
  
• 100% of Latin-born student candidates won their seats.
  
• 0% of 'brown' people won their seats.
  
• 0% of independent candidates won their seats.

Cost of flight, Toronto-Halifax, before fees: $20.04
Cost of flight, Toronto-Halifax, after fees: ~$60.00

---

Cost of transportation to TO airport: $40
Cost of taxi from Halifax airport - Halifax bus depot: $41
Cost of bus from Halifax to Wolfville: $12 ($24 rnd trip)

Egads. For somebody who used to live for travel, it becomes less and less appealing over time.

At least the weather's nice here.

Yesterday, I resigned as the president of Imprint Publications, Waterloo.

I offered my resignation just after the close of the 2004/05 Annual General Meeting, offering it to the membership still present immediately following adjournment. Nearly 30 persons were still present at that point. I asked to hear any substantial objections to my offer, giving a brief explanation of my reasons for resignation. Hearing none, I resigned.

The decision had been some time in the making. I knew that the major duties that were on my plate - chairing the Annual General Meeting, chairing the Editor-in-Chief hiring committee, watching over the ship until a few crucial things were attended to - would be done as of the close of yesterday's AGM.

I also knew - from looking in the mirror, among other ways - that I had been running myself beyond my personal comfort zone for too long. Earlier in the term I had resigned from or demoted myself in all of my other volunteer duties: executive on the Entrepreneurs' Association of UW, fundraising exec for the UW chapter of Engineers Without Borders, etc.

Also, my current job search was not going as well as could be hoped, and I had a serious student loan problem that I had been dealing with. In that light, volunteering had to come after taking care of my own personal life. And, as was painfully revisited at the AGM, being an officer at Imprint is still only a volunteer pposition.

I am torn between a great sense of relief and an even greater sense of apprehension. Yes, I will not be required to hold the weight of Imprint's world on my shoulders anymore, but I do anticipate that my responsibilities will remain as a sort of phantom limb for quite some time - not actually present, but still feeling realistically (and somewhat painfully) as if they still existed.

Adding to the apprehension is the unknown reaction to my resignation. There seem to be a mix of Dilts 'supporters' and Dilts 'antagonists' these days - depending on who you talk to, I am either one of the more popular people on campus or one of the most hated. Not that I seek either reaction - both disturb me more than a bit. I'm merely someone living by his own convictions and beliefs, greatly enjoying a wide range of interests and activities, hoping that his 'education' is comprised of a bit more than hours spent on papers and library trips.

Still, the criticisms bother me. A former ESS president is in this week's letters to the editor criticizing me on unfounded grounds about my recent OSAP column. A rejected applicant for Editor-in-Chief has posted on his blog that I am one of the most hated people on campus. Anybody care to tell me why I deserve this reputation? Seriously, I'm all ears.

Two years of almost full-time service, on a completely volunteer basis, whilst pursuing an undergraduate degree at the University of Waterloo. I would hope that this credential alone would help deter the critics. Still, I do have to wonder why it doesn't...

I must say that it was not unforeseen that yesterday's Annual General Meeting would become long and tedious. Still, I must admit my surprise for the reasons that it did become lengthy.

Imprint's membership present at the AGM - largely, its volunteer staff - voted to raise the Imprint fee (currently $3.30) by about $0.13 next year. During the debate, which took the better part of an hour, the reasoning seemed to be that since the full-time staff did not receive a CPI increase on their salaries this year (approximately two per cent), and budget lines for volunteer honoraria and staff benefits decreased by a few thousand dollars each, the student fee should be raised to accommodate the difference.

It should be noted that the honoraria and benefits were not the only areas that were cut in next year's budget - many budget lines saw decreases on the order of five per cent for the 2005/06 year. Moving from a budgeted $30,000 deficit (2003/04) to a **balanced budget** (2005/06) required cuts, period.

As chair of the AGM, I was not allowed to offer my position on the issue. I am glad for this, as I strive to fulfill my role to the best of my ability. Still, I am glad for those who voiced opposition to the increase, from Paul Lehmann to Neal Moogk-Soulis to Tim Mollison. First, it's a budget - it can be worked around. The $10,000 or so that the fee was raised to provide could have been sought from other venues, notably advertising. Worst case scenario, a deficit could have been run. I do not think the increase was a wise choice.

More interesting is the fact that many of the members eligible for honoraria essentially just voted to give themselves more money than they were scheduled to get. Many claimed that the primary reason for the fee increase was to accommodate for the f/t staff CPI increase, but that amount represents 25 per cent or less of the increase (~$1-2,000) while the honoraria and benefits represents 75 per cent of more (~$7,500 or more). I do not think these figures support the stated reasoning.

In respect to the members' decision not to award director/officer honoraria, I find the fee increase little more than a slap in the face. The specious logic at the fall general meeting was bad enough, for example:

• we (membership) want to use the money to purchase new computers (computers are paid from a capital budget, honoraria are paid from the operating budget, and besides new computers were about to be in the works anyways)
  
• the amount of the honoraria was too much (A - it was the amount that the membership chose at the Feb 2004 AGM, an amount they chose over an offered lower amount; B - the amount could have been easily amended)

But now the membership finds the time to extend out their collective hands to line their pockets with what will likely amount to less than a few hundred dollars each. Now, I am the first to admit that Imprint volunteers are overworked - they put in far too much time to receive the little money that they do - but for them to go to such efforts for a $0.13 fee increase for themselves but to completely ignore the board - well, that's a slap in the face.

I am glad to say that policy amendment ratification was much less contentious, going down the chute in less than 15 minutes. Congratulations also go out to next year's board of directors - Dan, Sarah, Jeff, Kelly and Dursh - who appear to be on track as a solid team. It is my hope that they are not given reason to become as disgruntled as I appear in this post.

The UW winter exam schedule has been posted nice and early. Me: April 14, 18 and 20. *groan* Let's hope for no more fire alarms this time, at least!

Dear Google,

Though I have come to believe that "it serves me right" to have made use of your public blog service, I still must protest the invasive adversiting techniques that are suddenly being used by Blogger. Skipping through my own personal blog, so kindly hosted by your site, I now see that my personal journal entries have been invaded in nothing but the most kitschy of manners by your company's web tools *without any notice whatsoever*.

You see, I notice that cetain phrases in my blog entries have now been highlighted as HTML links and marked with a double underline, only to direct my readers towards any one of a plethora of merchandising sites. It strikes me as an odd cross-section of "merchandise" that I have unwittingly listed on my site: references to a fire pit'; return true;" onmouseout="window.status=''; return true;">fire pit, duct tape'; return true;" onmouseout="window.status=''; return true;">duct tape, old skool'; return true;" onmouseout="window.status=''; return true;">old skool, t-shirts'; return true;" onmouseout="window.status=''; return true;">t-shirts all now try to sell things to my readers.

Making use of your generously free service, I may have gladly settled for some advertising here or there on my site. However, due to the intrusive and incredibly rude nature of the sudden change, I shall now spend time looking for a better way to host my blog.

Sincerely,
Andrew Dilts
one pissed off Google user

Imprint treasurer Neal Moogk-Soulis fell in the middle of an icefield today, breaking his leg. If you know him, please wish him well - it was quite a gruesome encounter, from the sounds of it. neal_ca ++at++ hotmail ++ dot ++ com

Here it is, in Neal's words (excuse the choppiness - it was relayed over MSN):

"... I was skipping along (well picking my way along) the path beside Columbia Lake and then 'whoop!' I did a fancy plie with nice 'crack.' I rolled around on the ground feeling sorry for myself then realized that no one was going to pass by for at least another hour or two, since I was going in early to leave early for the [Imprint] Board Meeting at 4:00[pm].

"... I figured that I had better haul myself somewhere with traffic (I was beside the fire pit and pumping station, where they have the slide on Canada Day). So I crawled/dragged myself towards Brubaker house, across the west, broken up field, and up the sliding hill before collapsing. Then, luckily one of the people living in Brubaker House was leaving for work so I called her over... the she and her husband hauled me to Brubaker House.

"... the ambulance couldn't find the place ... the UW cops never showed up (despite the on campus 911 call)... then the ambulance got stuck in the ice of the House parking lot because no one plows it (it's not technically a city street that was transferred over and UW doesn't bother salting it)."

About the injury:

"There is little pain and it is a clean break (luckily). Right now it just feels like someone gave me a kick in the shins. The crutches don't help of course."

Get well soon, Neal!

"...the values [Ned] embodies in exaggerated form now monopolize the political scene. In fact, one might say that Homer is Ned's next-door neighbor, not the other way around, so clearly does Ned bask in the mainstream..."

Part a popular story that has circulated on Reuters and other major news wires since last Sunday's Simpsons eposide, where Homer and Ned team up to present a religiously-themed Super Bowl halftime show. The complete story is here.

Before I went to university, I hitch-hiked across the United States and Canada because I wanted to learn what my two native countries were really like. I wonder ... what changes would I notice if I were to take a similar trip, now that "W" has been re-elected?

Google's Blogger has recently modified how comments can be posted on its members' blogs. Gone is the requirement that one 'sign in' before posting a comment to a blog post, which should increase the number of posters that provide traffic on sites such as mine.

So, for all those of you who don't - start posting!

"Hi, my name is Adam Mcguire and I have a confession to make: I didn't watch the Super Bowl."

Such begins what is perhaps the nicest piece ever printed in the pages of Imprint. We are lucky to have writers of Adam McGuire's caliber contribute on a regular basis. Writer of the only sports piece I regularly read, in any paper, Imprint will be sad to see him go.

It was so good, I just had to post it.

I just hope that you're a Lord of the Rings fan.

It is getting harder to wake up in the mornings. Both body and spirit appear to be slowing down. Great change is coming, apparently, as this is likely a sign that something wants my attention.

The week in a nutshell:

*I did not get the EWB job. Boo-urns. Still, I have not given up on the local chapter - I will be helping out with the "point seven pledge" tomorrow, for lack of anything better to do with my time.

*Only two midterms next week. One is open book. Zing!

*Adam McGuire wrote the nicest piece ever to appear in Imprint. Too bad it's about him missing the Super Bowl. More on that later.

*That thing which shall not be named is trucking right along nicely.

*My teaching of yoga is out of the bag. In come the demands for a teacher. So far, a friend/don at REV wants me to teach it for her floor; it's part of my auctioning incentive for a PsychSoc auction; Womyn's Centre for women's week; perhaps a Warrior Weekends?

*Feds elections are trucking along nicely. I like to think that I provided the inspiration behind it turning completely ugly, by recommending to the ASU that open questions not be allowed from the floor. The filter allowed for only suitable questions, calming the mood greatly - a move which has been reproduced successfully by all fora that I know of so far.

Since all my peers seem to be wrapped up in self-discovery, I thought I'd indulge them by playing along. The Dante's Inferno test allows one to see what level of hell they will end up in.

Really, I only found this appealing because I still believe that the Indiana translation of Dante's Inferno is one of the finest books I will ever read in my life. Without further ado, though, my results:

Purgatory
(paraphrase) you are a really nice person and will soon wind your way up the mountain of Heaven to live in ethereal beauty. Amen.

Interestingly, I won't be seeing Heidi anytime soon, because she wound up on the eighth level of hell. Not sure what a Maleborge is, but it doesn't sound appealing.

Anybody want to play Xbox? I have enough systems in my house to facilitate the a sixteen player tournament, should be fun....

This comes, of course, as a result of last night's Xbox Halo 2 tournament that we held as a fundraiser for the UW chapter of Engineers Without Borders. It was a cooperative effort with the student-run marketing team extraodrinaire The Crew and UW's own Computer Science Club. The Crew did nothing short of a fantastic job pimping out the event, complete with "DJ" booth, lighting systems and of course the golden old-skool joystick trophy for the event's winner.

Sponsorship - for prizes this time, maybe capital next time - came from such fun donors as EA Games, Microsoft, Coop rankings, etc. We did manage to raise a few hundred dollars for EWB - not fantastic, but it was a great awareness event. Potential networks were established - Canada Day volunteers, the FOC's Administrative Coordinator, many different people helped out in the end -- even Imprint's own president came to help out!

Having no classes will be one thing. But on tomorrow's "Friday" horizon, there are a few interesting gigs. I love it when my volunteer/work schedule rolls into a social schedule, although tomorrow promises to be a bit ridiculous.

The bulk of my day will be taken up with something confidential that I shall not mention here. But ah, the rest of it!

Feds media forum tomorrow at 1pm in the SLC, featuring Imprint, Imprint and Imprint. Apparently Ryan Chen-Wing is not allowed to do this anymore for uws? I will try to stop by and see the candidates if I get a break.

I have also been invited to lunch with the Arts Student Union at Mongolian Grill at 2:30pm. I will also try to stop by at that if I get a break!

Then comes the first ever meeting of the Over-Extenders Anonymous. 4:30pm at Bomber, baby!

The Xbox/Halo 2 fundraiser starts at 5:00pm, SLC Multi-Purpose room.

Shabbat dinner, to which I am invited despite the fact that I'm not Jewish, is at 7:00pm.

The FASS Friday night late "hack" show is at 10:00pm.

I've been chasing UW professor Geoff Malleck for some months now, as he promised me a coffee way back at the Impact conference. I was in his entrepreneurship class - it was one of my top marks - and I was rather impressed by a lot of it.

I finally caught up with him today, for a quick hour of his time. He's been quite a busy man since he's become the Associate Director of UW's Centre for Business, Entrepreneurship and Technology (CBET). Well, that's not really true - I'm sure he's been quite a busy man for much longer than that, as he's taught at various universities for some time now.

He has some interesting ideas - guiding student-related business clubs at UW into greater cooperation, for instance, a move which I wholeheartedly support. Interesting to hear more about the plans for better tech transfer at UW. I also got a good bit of the life story - he touches on that in his class - as he's taken a very interesting path to get where he is now.

And yes, mom and dad, I did hit him up for a job when I was there. I'm not holding my breath, but I would really enjoy something with CBET. He also mentioned that he'd pass my name onto somebody in UW's marketing department, which would be interesting considering my background.

In other notes, there seems to be a Feds election going on...

Today's Job Fair was an engaging occasion. Some thoughts:

I'd never been to RIM park before, the fair's locale, and I have to admit that I was less than impressed with what I saw. True, not the season for golf, but the facilities I toured did not seem to be quite spectacular. I love their motto, though: "It's For Now. It's Forever. It's For Everyone." Damn straight it's forever - at the cost of a few hundred million dollars overbudget, it had better last at least that long!

The fair itself was an interesting conglomeration of employers. The expected mix of tech jobs - amazon.com and the like - and business/financial services jobs - Manulife - was present. Still, there was the odd fish out of water - I spent a few minutes consoling the tree planting rep from Outland Reforestation, as the suits-and-CVs crowd certainly was not part of his target market. African Lion Safari as well, not sure they got so much attention.

Like many others, I was quick to note that all job positions advertised at the fair were listed in the "Employer's Manual" handed out at registration, thus negating much of the need to hobnob for employment. Go home, tailor those resumes and then apply from the comfort and convenience of your own home.

Knowing this, I instead tried for the odd/special/unusual conversations. Jasper National Park - were the positions going to be as laid back as expected? Would I have to pay for housing? No, really, amazon.com - how DO I get a non-tech job down there in California? Hey, Frito-Lay - if I work for you do I get free chips?

I think that Arda Ocal had the best question, for CBC - how do I get to be the next Peter Mansbridge?

I also noted a few employers that looked interesting - a medical research analysis company, maybe a resort or two. More than one "business services" firm or HR firm looked like it might be up my alley ... time will tell!