in related news, i bought a 2 GB usb flash drive to easily transfer data between my work computer and my laptop. i had just finished procrastinating by deliberating what to name the drive when i realized that this was blog-worthy, if only for the fact that it afforded me further procrastination. without further adieu, the drive is named mnemosyne—i thought it was clever-ish.

i'm presently reading the amber spyglass by philip pullman and enjoying it very much (thanks alyssa for getting my started on the series!). the first book is called the golden compass, you may have heard about it: the movie. if you like fantasy or sci-fi, check these out.

what other media have i been consuming lately you ask? well, i got the new pay-what-you-think-it's-worth album from radiohead: in rainbows. as usual, i think it's brilliant. i love their work and hope they do well with this experiment.

that's it for now. peace out.

today i logged onto my web host and it informed me that i had 3 months remaining before my ownership of the domain name antimattr.com passed quietly away. consequently, i felt rather disappointed in my own lack of creative expression over the past long while.

"i've been busy."

i may as well print this pittance on a card to hold up at all the appropriate junctures.

so, i'm making time right now. of course, i can't really make time, but i can better spend it.

perhaps i should bring everyone up to speed. yes, let's.

i've moved home; effective since october 1^st, i am again a resident of bond head, ontario—my childhood home. i come home to sunsets over a corn field and i nightly walk the same streets that my feet have countless fallen on. this not-quite-déjà-vu, it makes me reminisce; it makes me question the self that i was and how i derived from him; it makes me want to reclaim certain parts of my former self and glad for the surrender of others.

in any event, despite where my thoughts may wander, it seems that leaving the city has already begun to make them better heard, which is promising.

moving, as always, was a lot of hastle, hustle, and bustle. thank you to everyone who loaned me their time, energy, and patience.

...well, in the midst of composing this here (re)entry, i got a little sidetracked, albeit in a very welcome way: i talked with vicki on the telephone and ended up reading her a neil gaiman story.

so, as it happens, i'm now quite tuckered out and i'll have to take my leave of this update...although you did get the biggest bit of news there anyway.

peace and love my friends,

-matt

• i was ill again for a brief while, but it appears to be passing, which is quite a relief;
• i became a vegetarian. it is going very well, except for the derision of my workmates. i feel good about the food i'm eating and how it is treating my body;
• i got a laptop. i quite enjoy it. work-james bought the two 512s off me and i bought two 1024s; performs well. graphics card is no good for games, but then, that's not why i bought it—sigh, lappy is primarily for work. i think i'm going to turn my desktop into a media server. blah blah blah...
• i read "miss wyoming", i liked it. i'm reading "american gods", i'm liking it.
• i've developed a penchant for taking apart toaster ovens. beware: if i come to your home, i may start disassembling things;
• i gave notice at my apartment building, i have until the end of september to make some decisions about life, the universe, and everything; and,
• i'm sleepy...bedtime!

to love, luck, and laughter, be well my friends.

well hello there. sorry i couldn't get here sooner; it would seem that the undertow of the everyday had taken me away from the interweb...at least as a generator of content.

in recent news, i have been licenced as a professional engineer in the provice of ontario, huzzah!

to celebrate, i have included a random image that i drew a few months back and taped to my cupboard.

and now what to do with my one day of weekend...perhaps i'll take a stroll.

peace be with you.

bruce peninsula getaway

the captions tell our story, so be sure to read those if you're going to go through the pics.

that's all for the time being.

the system really does get your off your ass too; i get rather tired after a tennis training spree or a best of five match.

also, easter came and went, and victoria and i had a weekend of travel and family visiting that was full of food, fun, and fatigue. actually, i'm writing this blog post over a lunch that is composed mainly of leftovers from said holiday.

thursday was chad's cd release party, and everyone was great (ory no'man and matt york played too...matt york played a wonderful love song...souls, check it out on his myspace). i however, was way too tired to be socialable and steamed out of there afterward in a blatant manoeuvre to avoid conversation. sorry team.

other than that, i've just been a very busy boy with the ol' work-work-work thing. in fact, this blog entry is actually me avoiding a report that i plan to finish up today before going out with my friend james. huzzah for homework!?

speaking of work, the case that i mentioned i would be going to court on, it settled, so that is no longer hovering over my head.

and one final and exciting note; i figured out my life goals: (1) giant dragon-fighting-robot tattoo on back and (2) own a ping pong table (also, play ping pong on said table). i might be joking.

peace and love.

matt's blog forwarding service: Lorenne posts cool flute videos.

i really need a nap, so i'm going to blog with purpose...here is the list i promised you moogan! everyone else, by way of introduction, these are my firefox extension recommendations:

• adblock: um, stops ads.
  • Adblock Filterset.G Updater: set of filters for adblock...basically, you won't see ads on the net anymore.
• All-in-One Gestures: use mouse gestures to perform various actions.
• ColorZilla: "Advanced Eyedropper, ColorPicker, Page Zoomer and other colorful goodies..." i use this for web development stuff, picking colours, etc.
• Copy Plain Text: as the name implies...for when you don't want the formatting to come with your copy-paste, just the content.
• Download Statusbar: "View and manage downloads from a tidy statusbar - without the download window getting in the way of your web browsing."
• Image Zoom: "Easily zoom in, zoom out, fit image to screen or set custom zoom on individual images within a web page. All this can be done by using the context menu or a combination of mouse buttons and scroll wheel. Handy to see the finer details of smaller pics or to make very large pics fit within your screen."
• NoScript: "It allows JavaScript, Java and other executable content to run only from trusted domains of your choice, e.g. your home-banking web site. ¶Such a preemptive approach prevents exploitation of security vulnerabilities (known and even unknown!) with no loss of functionality..."
• OpenBook: "This extension allows for customization of the Add Bookmark dialog. The bookmarks tree can be automatically opened and elements can be hidden." i like to add keywords when i bookmark sites, or maybe edit the url...this extension allows for that.
• Web Developer: "Adds a menu and a toolbar with various web developer tools." i use this for all sorts of stuff, even if you don't make websites, there are still some things you might find interesting and maybe even helpful.

peace.

when i woke up there was an im from my dad asking if adrian, my brother, had told me about the earthquake. heading over to adrian's blog, i found that he had indeed experienced an earthquake (related blog post)—craziness.

the thought of nature and human peril put me in mind of the time we were in fiji as kids and there was a cyclone and my dad had my brother and i run outside so that he could take our picture in the storm.

someone on my facebook posted these animations. they're great, huzzah for self-reference!

• animator vs animation
• animator vs animation 2

right now, my sleeping schedule is completely messed up though. i've been waking up for pills every fours hours and essentially just taking naps night and day for the past couple of weeks. the habit is proving hard to break. for example, last night i worked on job-related stuff until about 2 a.m. this morning, then slept until about 4 a.m., piddled around on the computer for an hour, went back to bed for another couple of hours, and then started up this blog post...truth be told i'll probably hit another nap after this before getting back to this report i'm working on.

on a related note, when i stopped by the office on the way to toronto from my parents' house, in addition to picking up files that i'm working on now, i also received a fax; it would appear that i'm finally breaking the ice and am going to be going to court as an expert witness for my job! how incredibly nerve-racking...and exciting. this will go down in late april, at which time i'm sure you'll hear more.

among my distractions while working from home, google gave me $10 (USD) for free, but i can't use it because none of the goddamned vendors ship to canada...frustrating. if you're american, enjoy signing up for their new checkout service though.

finally, inspired by my current winamp selection—i hadn't mentioned this before, but xavier rudd is incredible, check him out. his music is paul simon meets ben harper. thank you moogan for putting him on my radar.

peace out.

moving right along then...

my brother recommended that i check out the show dexter. i don't usually watch tv, but i'm really enjoying this series. my best stab at a description: it's like the silence of the lambs meets csi. if you check it out, let me know your thoughts.

presently, victoria is reading a guy gavriel kay novel, which makes me jealous. firstly, i can't focus on reading right now—presumably because of the controlled narcotics that i'm regularly ingesting—and secondly, i already have a book on the go with a dozen lined up behind it. (not from work-) james just told me that guy has a new book out, and i haven't even looked into it yet until just now...ysabel, i'm intrigued. well, it's on the list.

it's interesting, setting up shop on someone else's computer. for one thing, since i don't have server-side blogging software, i need to install an ftp program (i use filezilla). and then, of course, i am very partial to my text editor (jedit), so no settling for notepad for me. then come little things, like updating winamp so you can get more shoutcast radio stations, and installing my favourite firefox extensions, et cetera. it just makes me realize how damned obsessively particular i am.

hmmm...and those are my assorted pre-midnight-drugging-session thoughts for you. g'night folks.

since i'm doing everything manually, when i archived last months' posts, i changed the links in this rss file to point to the correct archived locations for those posts, and that probably made them show up as being "unread" in your reader application. i'm still trying to figure out a good way to deal with this situation. for the time being, i'm making a mirror of the main page in the eventual archiving location and simply pointing to that file.

oh, growing pains.

the following are "notes" from my facebook account, which i've used to update people over the last little while, solely because it has been easier than working on antimattr.com...making me lend even more thought to the advantages of converting to wordpress...anyway, here are said notes:

my birthday party

6:43pm Sunday, Mar 11

I just wanted to thank everyone that came out for my birthday.

I hope everyone had a wonderful time.

I am told that I had a tonne of fun ;)

Cheers, to love, luck and laughter.

tonsillectomy

8:12pm Monday, Mar 12

i am at home with my parents and victoria, and i'm recovering from my tonsillectomy.

thank you everyone for emailing me, i'm just watching a movie right now with everyone and may not get around to individual replies just yet, but i wanted to let the world know that i'm alive.

everything went well, although i'm in a lot of pain. huzzah for T3s, and i don't mean the terminator movie (although T2 was good in my books, think of it what you may).

peace and love,

-matt

tonsillectomy recovery

12:50am Thursday, Mar 15

it has been approximately 2 days and 13 hours since my operation.

i am a mess of pain and confusion.

i cannot swallow without tremendous pain, and sleep is fitful and fleeting. i have an incredibly sore neck and a headache like none i've ever known.

i have a 10 minute window every 4 hours, after taking my T3s, where i am able to sip chicken broth and eat some jello.

i think that i would be insane by now if victoria where not here and nursing me. she is the most compassionate and patient person i have ever known, and i wanted to thank her publicly (i love you baby).

my mom and dad have also been great to me, thank you both!

adrian, thanks for the use of your room ;)

i hope everyone is doing well, and that i can return to your world of solid food and non-delirium sooner than later.

thanks to everyone that has been sending me emails and such. i welcome further updates to keep me occupied.

peace and love,

-matt

tonsillectomy recovery - the legend continues (i.e., part 2)

10:47pm Friday, Mar 16

so the pain has been increasing over the last couple of days.

this morning, the T3 was insufficient; i was, without great pain, unable even to drink broth.

we (victoria and i) had previously spoken with my surgeon and he had offered up percocet as an alternative to the T3, but we had declined, thinking i'd be alright.

so, now that i was not alright, my dad called back in (victoria was off duty, hehe) only to find that my surgeon was off until tuesday. gah.

so, my dad (being an absolute gem) drove me to aurora to a walk-in clinic. oh, by the bye, talking has also now fallen outside of the range of things i can really do anymore--victoria has an uncanny ability to understand my mumblings though, it's really quite nifty. anyway, through handwritten notes and chewbacca-like noises i made the doctor aware of the fact that i wanted better drugs. and so, percocet was prescribed. this doc also gave me antibiotics, which i'm taking, but am unsure if i actually need or not.

so percocet is supposed to be ten times stronger than T3...

so far, it's only a little tiny bit more effective at dealing with this new level of pain (i.e., eating jello hurts, life sucks), but also knocks me out cold for a couple of hours afterward (which is fine by me, bye victoria, have fun with my parents). the only side effect is this odd sensation that my eyes are uncomfortable and must be closed and have pressure on them; so, i rub them.

and that's my world of pain right now. fun stuff eh?

for entertainment i've been listening to "the dawn and drew show" while falling asleep, but really am not that interested anymore.

also, i've been attempting reading wired magazine, but that is slow going b/c i can't focus.

victoria came back to bond head today, which made me very happy.

so cool! vicki brought me a birthday gift from alyssa (her housemate). for some reason (i'm an idiot), i still had not obtained gloves for this winter. alyssa, knowing this and being super-awesome, got me the neatest gloves ever! they're from 180s.com and use the exhale heating system (there is a magnetic flap sealed valve that you blow into to heat the gloves with your warm breath!).

i think that's so cool.

um, now i'm going to go glove my cold hands and lie down in wait of my next dosage.

...

don't worry, matt will be back soon, in the meantime, stay classy ontario et al.

through this haze i've been having a few worthwhile thoughts, and i'll try to get those up here tomorrow. one thing, before i go, there is a new version of wordweb (freeware) available that has a "hear a pronunciation" feature and incorporates tabbed online definition sources, snag it windows users! g'night.

surely i've missed many good stories that have already passed out of my exceptionally brief memory buffer. sigh.

last night was my birthday party and i wanted to thank everyone for coming out to celebrate. the music was phenomenal. ory and jason just killed it, they were great. cindy doire and pat robitaille were exceptional. i bought both of their cds and cindy's is on right now actually. i love music...

tomorrow i go for my tonsillectomy and am off work for the week. i'm really hopeful that this will cure what ails me. wish me luck.

see you laters alligators.

tonight i was joined by nathan and emma and good times were had. good times included but were not limited to:

• the consumption of an oven-baked peanut butter and banana (pita) pizza, followed by spaghetti with tomato sauce (not very exciting, sorry);
• the thorough trouncing of matt by nathan and emma (respectively) at the newly acquired game of rummikub;
• my first adventure to the pool in ages; and,
• ice cream (sans screaming).

james (from work) loaned jpod to me, i'm liking it (i think i'm putting down the neal stephenson book yet again, haha).

and now for some half-life² adventuring before sleep, g'night.

thanks to everyone who attended!

my head hurts, but here are some assorted thoughts and memories:

• not having serving bowls and using pots and tupperware for chips.
• wow, the apartment is full.
• rapid cake slice distribution, exact right number of forks, neato.
• what are they doing with the rent money? obviously not salting this deathtrap set of steps.
• guinness...mmm...
• lots of dancing.
• grabbing the unattended microphone and announcing victoria's birthday to the bar (my favourite, did it twice...i think).
• trying to dissuade people from violence in the washroom, then deciding it best to just go tell management about the situation.
• shaking hands and giving high-fives to strangers on the walk home.
• waking up this morning.

and now i'm going to go play some more of my recently-purchased distraction: hλlf-life²: episode one. so far, so good—i actually got a little creeped out by the zombies last night...

rock on.

a few antimattr.com notes:

• i have added an rss (rss on wikipedia) feed for the blog...it was incredibly simple and i should have done it a long time ago. if you're using firefox, you'll see the feed in the address bar, and you can subscribe from there. also, i'll put up a link in the body of the page sometime soon.
• i got really bored of the header image for antimattr.com and have replaced it. also, i removed the mazetones image that i've been using for a background for a while now. merp.

on friday night i hung out with jayley, al, oliver, and rocco. we watched the borat flick and i was amused not but not overly impressed.

on saturday victoria and i went to visit my nanny and grandpa. we had a good visit, which included playing the kick-ass board game rummikub. i would highly recommend that you seek out and obtain this board game for cottage adventures, etc. also, you might find it sold with a different name, like rummy-o.

after concluding the nanny/grandpa visit, we were off to peterborough to celebrate megan's birthday, and celebrate we did!

after enjoying a very yummy dinner at a bubble tea joint (the newdle box, 213 Hunter St. W.), victoria, megan and i headed across the street to the only cafe where we met up with several friends (all new to me. adam is an artist, check him out) and proceeded to imbibe obscene quantities of alcohol. we three collectively agreed that we reached the state of drunkenness known as "sloshedness". i did some card magic that was well liked (i think), and that was fun.

i don't remember the cab ride. haha. when we got home (to megan's apt.), i remember victoria and megan talking about kraft dinner...then i remember waking up in the morning. huzzah for passing out!

after hours of water-drinking and headache induced moaning we mobilized and went out for some early afternoon breakfast.

oh, i did a bunch of the driving in victoria's standard vehicle this weekend, and that was fun...i like driving a standard vehicle, and thinking about what's going on mechanically while driving...not that you can't do the same thing with an automatic...

after driving back to toronto, victoria headed off to guelph and i went down to chad's for some grammy-watching fun. also, chad and i played some guitar after the other attendees went home. fun times, haven't seen the chad in a dog's age.

oh!!! i saw the specialist again and i am (finally) going to get my tonsils out, in march! now there seems to be a light at the end of this tunnel of chronic illness that has beleaguered me for several months. i'll no doubt keep you posted on this whole saga as it continues to unfold, especially since it will see me off work and in pain; pain that i intend to disseminate via this here interweb.

that brings us up to speed. rock on, matt out.

orynoman.ca, the official site of the ory no'man too, went live a couple of days ago, and i'd love for everyone to please check it out and give me some feedback (if you're not keeping tabs on me, i've been designing the site for my friend ory over the past week or so).

first and foremost, i'd like to ensure that it is displaying properly across the range of operating systems, browsers, and monitors that you (my loyal readers) view this interweb thing on. also, i'd like to rest assured that you can all stream the audio from the "music" section of the site and hear the too's wonderful music.

let me know!

-matt out

the photo section should be up within a week, i'm crazy busy with other things right now, so that's not getting done :(

...

last night jayley and al, moogan, alyssa, victoria and i went to see po' girl. they were great, as was their opening band. i'm listening to a po' girl album i downloaded from emusic presently. definitely worth checking out.

...

victoria bought me some valerian root tea. wow, this stuff is powerful. i don't remember my dreams usually...perhaps i don't usually dream. after drinking this stuff i woke with a full complement of "whacked-out" dreams. according to napoleon's book of fate, one part of my dream (hearing musket fire) indicates that i'm going to fall in love with a soldier. hmm...

nonetheless, i'm going to keep at it and see if it is beneficial to my health, since i've been hypothesizing that lack of proper sleep has contributed to my ill-health.

that's all for now, rock on and keep the peace.

i have a new photo up for your viewing pleasure, and i'm quite pleased with it, i must say: yellow-backed rose.

yesterday i got called out to a fire. this was particularly emergent, since potentially important evidence was going to be discarded to secure the loss site, and so i went there and worked until midnight. today, i worked ten-to-six, primarily shovelling out an elevator shaft with two storey's worth of stored materials dropped down into it. now, i'm exhausted.

i think i'm going to put in a little more time on ory's site tonight, then get some sleep. i'm excited for the site to go live, and will link to it at that time. also on that note, ory reportedly gave me a shout-out on the radio tonight! huzzah!

okie dokie, rock on folks.