Link: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070921/japan_nova_070921/20070922?hub=World

Sad news this week for thousands of slackers avoiding life in Japan. NOVA is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy and many of its employees have been going unpaid for weeks. I don't know if I've ever met a NOVA teacher that was happy with their job, so perhaps this isn't altogether a bad thing for ex-pats in Japan.

Link: http://torrentfreak.com/rogers-fighting-bittorrent-by-throttling-all-encrypted-transfers/

Sucks.

When I left for Japan 3 years ago Rogers seemed to be the best choice for Internet access in Canada. It was cheap, fast and unlike Bell there were no caps on how much bandwidth you could use each month. Now sadly the tables have turned and Rogers is the service that sucks. Not only are there silly bandwidth caps, but since 2005 Rogers has been secretly throttling down all BitTorrent traffic. Starting a few weeks ago they even began slowing all encryped data as well after BitTorrent users began encrypting data to get around the blockade. Apparently this move my Rogers was not done to punish movie pirates, but because the bandwidth being gobbled up by BitTorrent was interfering with Rogers new VOIP home phone service.

Last month I foolishly signed up for Rogers home phone and "Hi-Speed" internet service. I guess I should have done a little more research before signing up, but I never expected Rogers' quality of service to drop off so much over my short absence from this country. Like most people I presumed the use of the word "Hi" instead of "High" was just Rogers trying to sound hip, and not a sneaky attempt to get around its obligation to provide fast connection speeds. Now I'm stuck with near dial-up internet connection speeds, and I can't change ISPs without also changing my home phone service as well. As the bandwidth needs of consumers continues to grow every year I don't see how Rogers will be able to keep up if they are already at their capacity today. Unless cable internet ISPs like Rogers find a way to increase the bandwidth on their wires then it almost seems like the cable internet business is doomed in the long run. Anyway, my advice to any of you out there reading this: Boycot Rogers, and find a new ISP.

Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/12/AR2007041202045.html

My old pals at Trailervision have a new movie in Hot Docs this year called "Let's All Hate Toronto". It's all about the animosity shared by Canadians toward their largest city. It's been getting quite a bit of press, much like their old documentary Stupidity once did.

I haven't seen the movie yet, but like most Canadians I've heard my fair share of Toronto bashing over the years. The strange thing about the hate aimed at Toronto is that it seems to be based on no one single thing. Nobody really seems to know why they hate Toronto; they only know that they really, really hate it. I thought as a service to my country bumpkin Canadian brothers I would try to help them find a way to justify their deep-seeded hatred for the T dot. Here are my suggestions:

1. Toronto is boring
When I lived in Japan there was never a shortage of interesting things to blog about on this site. Even in little po-dunk Noheji town there were lots of strange and interesting things to share with you, my loyal readers. Ever since coming back to Toronto I've struggled to find interesting topics to write about and as evidenced by the lack of updates over the past 6 months, it hasn't been easy. I thought joining the writing staff of Torontoist would help motivate me to find things to write about, but really all it has done is made me realize just how uninteresting Toronto can be.

2. It's too cold and too hot
We get 2, maybe 2.5 months of good weather tops.

3. No booze in corner stores
There are lots of cities in the world where you can buy beer and liquor from corner stores and they haven't fallen into alcohol induced anarchy.

4. Nowhere to go skiing
That crappy garbage hill in Etobicoke doesn't count.

5. Government Employee Strikes
Not a day goes by without some kind of strike by employees in the public sector. Teachers, nurses, and bus drivers seem to spend as much time on strike as they do at their jobs. I don't mean to say that I don't think they deserve a fair pay; it's just annoying how often fights over money get in the way of life in the city. In good old Japan, striking means coming to work early, protesting for an hour out front and then going to work as normal. How about we take a lesson from Japan and fire all those striking janitors and make the students clean the schools?

6. In New York people know they are rude, and are proud of it. In Toronto people are rude, but are under the delusion that they are actually quite polite.

7. Michael Kuss from City News.
He's lame, and his commercials are beyond stupid. Bring back Harold Hosein!

8. Kensington Market
It's dirty, full of stupid hippies and highly overrated. The rest of Toronto is also pretty dirty these days too. Enough with the lame billboard graffiti and subway scratchiti already.

9. No love hotels, snack bars, print club machines, computerized toilet seats, ginormous electronic stores, capsule hotels or any number of other cool things in Japan that I miss. Also our only Maid Cafe is inferior in quality to those in Akihabara.

10. The Toronto Maple Leafs
They don't know how to win a Stanley Cup or pluralize the word "leaf", and they never will.

*Update: I think the lingering cold winter really put me in nasty mood when I wrote this. The weather has gotten much nicer since then and I'm starting to like my hometown once again. Maybe I'll be saying mean things again in a couple months when scorching heat and smog hits the big smoke, but for I don't think I'll join in the Toronto bashing.

Link: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/france_transport_rail

An experimental TGV train reached 574.8 kph on a specially prepared stretch of track east of Paris. The train was pimped out with with two supercharged locomotives and extra-large wheels. The record smashed the 515.3 kph set by a TGV in 1990. It also just missed the overall world train speed record of 581 kph reached in 2003 by a Japanese maglev train. Since the train will never actually operate with passengers at anything near this speed, the new record doesn't really amount to much. I would be curious to see how a souped-up Fastech 360Z Shinkansen train would fair in a similar speed test.

Here's a dramatic video by TGV to promote their new speed record

Link: http://www.nowtoronto.com/issues/2007-03-22/news_story.php

Hey everybody! Sorry about not posting anything here for so long but I've been pretty busy and just haven't had time for poor old Avoidinglife.com these days. At first I thought I'd write about all the big changes in my life these last few months, but on second thought I think I'll cover a much more exciting topic, namely train news!

Pictured above is mock-up of what Toronto's new low-floor streetcars are probably going to look like. It's part of a proposed $6-billion, 120-kilometre light-rail network for the city. The future of the TTC's rail network has been a hot button issue in the news these past few weeks. While the city wants billions to build a series of dedicated streetcar routes throughout the city, the province seems only interested in funding a subway extension into the suburbs, mostly to gain favor among voters.

I'm sure you're all wondering by now "What does Jamie think about this?". Well, let me tell you!

Read more »

Link: http://www.beingfamous.com/blog/wordpress/?p=398

According to Amir of BeingFamous/CollegeHumor.com fame, Canada is "10% off" as in 10% different or 10% strange. At least that's what you might think if you are someone that calls the U S of A home. I have a few American acquaintances that are thinking of coming up here soon, so I thought that perhaps they could benefit from reading this before they arrive. I've spent a fair amount of time in the U.S. over the past 6 months and I too have found myself befuddled on a number of occasions by the 10% factor. One comment at the end of the article was particularly enlightening for me:

As a Canadian I’ve noticed in several States that when I say “thanks” or “thank you” the common response is “uh huh” or “yeah” instead of “you’re welcome”.

I was really confused by those "uh huh's" during my travels down south. I wasn't sure if it was a cultural difference or if everyone thought that my "thank you's" were somehow disingenuous. Also, the whole Delissio/DiGiorno thing had me worried that I was imagining things. Why does Kraft insist on giving so many of their products different names in Canada? Do they think we might have a problem pronouncing "DiGiorno" with all our strange "ehs" and "aboots" up here? I'm kind of relieved to learn that these were both just cultural misunderstandings. That's it for now. I think I'm gonna go have some french fries with vinegar, or maybe cook up some Kraft Dinner.

Footnote:
Unless folks in Vancouver name their dairy products differently, I think Amir is mistaken on one thing though. Most milk in Canada is called "2%" not "3%". There is such a thing as 3% milk, however it is normally called "Homo".

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK-2laSYpII

This is Paro. Paro is a "Seal type mental commit robot for psychological enrichment" or STMCRFPE for short. It's supposedly "the world's most therapeutic robot" and is intended to have a calming effect on patients of hospitals and nursing homes.

From Wikipedia:

The robot has tactile sensors and responds to petting by moving its tail and opening and closing its eyes. It also responds to sounds and can learn a name. It can show emotions such as surprise, happiness and anger. It produces sounds similar to a real baby seal and (unlike a real baby seal) is active during the day and goes to sleep at night.

Paro isn't mass produced like its robotic cousins Necord or Nearme, so if you want one it's gonna probably set you back a few grand. A cheaper alternative are Sega's dream pets. While in Japan, Kate and I picked up a couple of Yume Inus (Dream Dogs) for about 1000 yen each. They are really cool! They can't walk, but they can produce a cute mechanical bark, stick their tongues out, as well as turn their ears and heads. They also have sensors in their eyes, feet and on their backs so that they can react to you. They were once pretty expensive, but soon after the Chihuahua fad ended the bottom fell out of the market for robot dogs. I think they have now been discontinued, however Sega Toys seems to still selling the Yume Neko. Grab one now before it's too late! Take it from me. There's no better way to calm your nerves after a hard day than playing with a furry robotic friend!