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I wrote that I didn't have any problems since the surgery but since that post I've had to go to the hospital twice: First for a blockage somewhere in my gastrointestinal system on September 11th, and then on October 21st for a couple gastric ulcers. The blockage was fairly painful, and the solution was uncomfortable as well -- an NG (nasogastric) tube forced down my nostril to suck air and liquid out of my stomach. At least they sent me home with some more painkillers. The ulcers bled so much that I got really dizzy and lightheaded with a real danger of falling and passing out (going down a flight of stairs was iffy business), but it was not particularly painful. For this I finally got admitted into Mount Sinai Hospital, the services of which I find increasingly amenable on each visit. I had a couple liters of blood pumped into me, and have been on iron supplements and acid reducers ( pantoprazole ) since. So physically, I am slightly weak but mostly recovered. I should be ...

My internet, that blessed fount of procrastination, has been restored, restored after no less than five Bell technicians and uncounted phone conversations. What a kerfuffle! But now that it is here, surrounding me, binding me to the outer world, I have drunk deeply from its waters and have been fairly actively playing video games. Peace, when have I done otherwise? For the computer, I have thus far played: - The Book of Unwritten Tales: Downloaded this one way, way back and finally got around to finishing it. Really a lot of fun, with intricate hand-drawn graphics and lots of self-referential humour. Worthy point-and-click adventure. - Convoy: I Kickstarted this one, intrigued by the notion of a FTL-like in a Mad Max-esque world. The combat employs a novel engine that plays like an RTS on rails. Fun, but graphics leave much to be desired. - The Curious Expedition: Lovely, tiny pixel figures crawl around the world, annoying (and sometimes befriending) the locals while pillaging t...

It's been a month and how have I been? Not miserable, but not boomingly good either. Winter has cast its shocking gaze, and I find myself little prepared for it. Drained, I find myself. I just got back from visiting my parents, who are well enough. My father had a mild heart attack a couple months ago, and seems to be relatively good now, though he still suffers from high blood pressure. We're all getting old, very old. I feel new aches and pains all the time and find the value in stretching throughout the day. I went to the AGO with the aim of seeing the David Bowie exhibit but the thing had sold out, such is its popularity. I took in a couple of other things, eager to avoid the crowds. A quiet gallery is a blessed thing. Some coffee, some sweets, some escape. Saturday MJ and I picked up groceries from the St. Lawrence Market, some of which made its way into a simple meal. We started in on the third season of The Walking Dead -- such violence, such gore! They really took...

I had a dream Sunday morning wherein I.. no, now I'm mixing it up entirely with Wall-E . No! Ok, I was supposed to take a test or exam (yes, in my dreams I'm often back in school, make what you will of that) and I wasn't prepared. It's funny, I haven't really had many stressful situations like that since school or university. When it comes to work you just need to surround yourself with resources -- people, internet, files and numbers. Rarely do you have to memorize a bunch of stuff and be prepared to demonstrate your skills. Except maybe in interviews. Anyway, the wall-e bit was.. hmm.. there was this kind of shuffling shelf unit, like where wall-e stores things he finds interesting. Eh, I did remember more at the time but it's all gone now, to a better place outside my head. In a not so guilty way, I played several hours of Call of Duty 4 Sunday and yesterday. I was lightly upset that I had to tone down the graphics quite a bit for it to run on my machine, b...

I started and finished Portal tonight. Wow. That was just.. wonderful! Fun, fun.. addictive. I'm willing to bet that most people that tried it ended up spending hours (as I did) saying "Just one more level..." until finding that they'd finished the game. I loved the atmosphere. Most reviews you read talk about the dark humor, which certainly was entertaining, but what got me was the gloom of being a test subject in a capricious, arbitrary experiment. It reminded me a lot of Cube , which, again, I'll emphasize I liked for its setting, for which I was willing to endure a contrived plot and logic holes. Anyway, yeah, that feeling of being taken out of one's life and thinking of nothing but survival, escape and, eventually, revenge. Of course, the Valve/Half-Life 2 engine makes the game SUPER pretty and pretty damn realistic (it helps that there is almost none biological life in this world). While short at about 2-4 hours of play time, it's an intense couple ...