Month: December 2012

Ser Jorah in a fedora! It’s perfect, and it rhymes!

Nice Guys of Westeros is a hilarious mash-up of “Nice Guys” of OKCupid and Game of Thrones.

Found via Cameo Wood.

So what’s the new rain-check date for the Apocalypse?

“There exists in this country, sadly, a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry that sells and sows violence against its own people,” said Wayne LaPierre, executive VP of the NRA at their press conference in response to the Sandy Hook school shooting, who then failed to identify “Big Gun” and their puppet lobbyist organizations, NRA and ALEC.

He then went on to blame the Sandy Hook gun massacre on ten things, none of which were real guns. He did cite pretend guns in movies and videogames and the declaration of schools as gun-free zones as culprits, and also suggested that every school have an armed guard or cop (as if the Blackwater-ization of the school system is a good idea). Between their blaming of games and movies and their not taking any questions from the press, it seems that they’re quite fine with their oddball interpretation of the Second Amendment and ready to throw the First under the bus.

I think that it’s possible for responsible civilians to own guns in modern society — we somehow manage to do it in many industrialized nations, including here in Canada — but I think that the NRA has lost any concept of responsible gun ownership (they were a lot saner decades ago). Not with a line like “The only guy that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” anyway (which is the sort of sentiment that you’d expect from movies, and aren’t they the real problem?).

In case you wanted to know the truth about Grumpy Cat, watch this video. It’s adorable:

The folks at Ford Canada invited Yours Truly and Tamara McPherson, creator of WonderMoms.ca, to take their C-MAX series of hybrid cars out for a spin on a little excursion they called the C-MAX Holiday Challenge. We’d first take the cars out for a little city and highway driving and try to get the best energy efficiency our of them.

Energy efficiency achieved!

The C-MAXes have a feature on their dashboards that make it easy to tell how energy-efficiently you’re driving: the Efficiency Leaves. It’s an animated display located just to the right of the speedometer that gives you at-a-glance feedback. The more energy-efficient your driving is, the more leaves appear on the vine. Smooth starts and smooth braking is the key to making the display lush and green, and it also means you’re making the best use of the car’s energy and saving money to boot.

My “10 and 2” safe hand position on the wheel is unstoppable!

I’ll admit that I’ve become a bit of a skeptic about North American cars, having rented more than my fair share in business travel and being less than impressed by their fit and finish as well as they way they handle. They’ve improved recently, and the C-MAX is indicative of that trend: it handles very nicely. I’d have sworn it was a Japanese car and not the Ford that I’d come to know. The folks at AutoGuide.com seem to agree.

Me behind the wheel of the Ford C-MAX Energia.

Along for the ride to help us out were Rannie Turingan and Sara Mercier, both wearing elf costumes and playing the parts of “Jingle” and “Belle” respectively, the helper elves. They were charming company, and I was glad to have them along for the ride.

Here’s Tamara behind the wheel of her Ford C-MAX.

Tamara drove the C-MAX while I drove the C-MAX Energi, which was the plug-in version of the C-MAX, which can be filled at the gas station or charged up at an electric station for about 35km (21 miles) of pure-electric driving. The engine was zippy and responsive, whether in electric or gas mode, and on a flat run on the Don Valley Parkway, I got the car up to 90 km/h (just over 55 mph) before it had to switch from electric to gas. The car certainly didn’t feel like a golf cart!

After taking the C-MAXes out for a spin, we drove them to The Danforth to go to Treasure Island Toys (a great little indie toy store; you really should check it out) to go on a shopping spree for charity. Tamara and I were each given a $1000 gift card and a 15% discount with which to buy toys for children who otherwise wouldn’t get any for Christmas. If you’d like to help add to the toys we bought, there are 22 Toronto-Area Ford Dealerships that are accepting donations.

At the end of the shopping spree, a song.

My thanks to the folks at Ford Canada and Treasure Island Toys for the fun with the C-MAX and the toy shopping for a good cause!

You might think that advertising a mortuary requires a delicate touch, but so do most morticians. Hence their ads all look the same: the understated design, the euphemism-laden ad copy, and a paucity of scantily clad models.

Every industry has its mavericks, and in the mortuary business, Funeraria Lopez is one. Their television ad eschews the traditional classical music piece with the word “Requiem” in its title; instead, it gets into the holiday spirit with a jaunty easy-listening instrumental version of Silent Night. Having the proprietor in a Santa suit and his sexy assistant in Santa-themed bikinis was a clever touch, but the piece de resistance is the bit where the camera pans over a sexy Santa-ette in a coffin, starting from her feet and working upward. Just when you’re about to ask God how he could take away such a fine-lookin’ lady, she opens her eyes and gives the camera a thumbs-up, subverting your expectations in a twist the way M. Night Shyamalan used to. Genius!

Eros, Thanatos and Quesos. What more could you ask for?

While the new office is quite nice, we’re taking on a few more people and the place is getting a bit cramped. So we’re looking around for some new space. Here are our criteria:

• We’re a tech company specializing in mobile device consulting and mobile app development. We’ll be 6 to 8 people, half of us tech consultants, half of us developers.
• We have the occasional client come to visit us, so access to a meeting room would be nice.
• Some of us don’t have cars, so access to public transit is important.

If you know of any available office space in Toronto, whether solo or shared, let me know in the comments or please drop me a line!

This article also appears in Global Nerdy.