Jason's

Misguided

Blog: Nov 2003

Blog:

• Happy Birthday, Sandra L.S.

• Nov 28: My cousin and I saw the Deftones last night at the cavernous Arrow Hall. Though the mediocre support acts lessened the overall experience, the show was very energetic as Chino's screeching vocals pierced the crowd. To gripe about the obscene prices for merchandise and food, or being stuffed in a room with stupid teenagers, would be too easy.

• Nov 21: A group of us went to see a taping of Royal Canadian Air Farce at their downtown studio. Aside from really annoying interns, and a few sketches that weren't funny, we had fun seeing how the show was made.

• Nov 13: I was invited to a screening of my friend's documentary, "Portrait of a Street: The Soul and Spirit of College." Her documentary features eight people that recall growing up in Toronto's Jewish, Italian and Black communities. I'd seen it before on PBS, but wanted to see the 27th Annual Jewish Book Fair, which also hosted lectures and plays.

  I stumbled onto this glowing review of the Toronto International Film Festival that is another reason to see ourselves as the centre of the universe.

• Nov 11: Remembrance Day and Holocaust Education Week. Lest We Forget.
  • CBC News Indepth
  • Democracy at War
  • The Memory Project
  • Juno Beach Centre
  • History Television.ca
  • Yad Vashem

   

• Nov 10: Reviews for the Hulk DVD and Matrix Revolutions.

  I agree with Rotten Tomatoes' consensus of the Hulk that it had too much talking and not enough smashing. But damn, was the smashing fun to watch. Unlike others that disliked the animation used to create the green monster and the comic book-type editing, I think both effects were used well. The DVD has an entire disc of extras, too numerous to cite here, that are worth seeing, including an interview with Stan Lee.

  Matrix was a different story. Despite the onslaught of bad press, my expectations were lowered to the point that I wasn't disappointed by the trilogy's ending. In a perfect world, the Brothers wouldn't have succumbed to Hollywood greed and stopped after making the first groundbreaking movie. Maybe competition from the Lord of the Rings and influences from the Terminator movies affected their decision making. Ideally, one sequel should have been enough to advance the story and bring it to a satisfactory end. However, we don't live in a perfect world, not even in the Matrix, but a world of poorly conceived sequels and the suckers who pay to see them. Every time.

Web Design:

• Nov 25: I link to many sites from the directory and blog, but not listed is toronto.com. Here's why:

  • Html file size is 115.766 kB and has 164 images, of which 85 are spacer gifs (placeholders).
  • There are 226 links and 260 font tags dispersed among 56 nested tables.
  • The "Around Town" section has entire sentences marked-up as links, instead of one or two keywords, making it an accessibility nightmare.
  • None of the sub-sections are organized into proper unordered lists.

  Remedies: move the javascript and CSS into external files that browsers will cache and reuse for faster loading. Moving all font tags and other presentation code into a CSS file will reduce the homepage's size. Cull the avalanche of information by putting the sub-sections and guides to better use. Realize that web portals are more about organization and delivery of services than being online encyclopedias.

Politics:

• Nov 15: Former premier of Ontario Mike Harris is a coward. For years he ducked responsibility for the debacle at Ipperwash Provincial Park that caused the death of native protester Dudley George. However, the truth will soon be revealed at a public inquiry called to learn how it all went wrong. Until then, I'll be reading Peter Edwards' "One Dead Indian" to gain some perspective.
• Nov 11: With the Toronto municipal election over, some quick observations. Barbara Hall's collapse from over fifty percent in opinion polls at the start to only nine percent after the votes were counted was tragic. Almost thirty thousand people wasted their votes on forty mayoral candidates that hadn't a snowball's chance in hell of winning. Finally, voter turnout was a pathetic forty percent in Toronto, and even lower across the GTA. It's your community, don't complain when things fall apart.
• Nov 9: For the great pool of undecided voters, endorsements can help guide you. Leading the charge for David Miller are the Toronto Star, NOW Magazine, and eye weekly. Not surprisingly, the conservative papers favour another mayoral candidate. However, for our city to heal from the former provincial government's years of cutbacks and broken promises, we need someone with good ideas and integrity.
• Nov 7: Two thousand and three appears to be the year for elections across Canada. Toronto's civic election is next week and has been a fiery race among five very different contenders. David Miller is my choice for Mayor. I know nothing about school trustees, but my ward's incumbent councillor is too conservative and his voting record differs from my vision of the city. Worse, his campaigners were allowed to put a sign on our lawn, which thankfully, is only there for a few more days. For a thorough, yet biased, analysis of candidates and issues, visit these sites:
  • Toronto Votes 2003
  • NOW: 10 worst councillors
  • The Armchair Garbageman
  • last chance city
  • crazed monkey

Of Interest:

• The fortieth anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination has brought all kinds of conspiracy theorists back into the spotlight. It can be hard to separate fact from fiction, but a lengthy article at YellowTimes.org cuts through some of the noise and literary fluff.

Projects:

• I made a convincing proposal to voluntarily redesign the Hillel of Greater Toronto site. Now we'll play the waiting game for approval and feedback.

 

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