the flying squirrel

After the jump is the speech I gave to Waterloo City Council on Monday. The meeting itself was written up in the Chronicle, but I don’t think the quote from me totally sums up what I was trying to say (you know, newspaper quotes…).

I’ve mostly been complaining about the media and the residents’ associaton here and on WWBA. It took me a bit to figure out what to say to council.

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Do you read Seth Godin’s blog? You should read today’s post, particularly if you’ve been following the HUG thing.

Which statement do you think is more likely to generate the desired response?

I’ve been living here for 50 years! I pay my taxes! This neighbourhood is a disaster and the city needs to do something!

or

I love this neighbourhood and I really like living here. I think it would be really great if more of the people like me who want to live here were able to.

Even if nothing else comes out of this, I hope some people at least learn something from it.

I’ve been moved to write a post about HUG Waterloo on WWBA. It’s a follow-up to a post I did a year ago on the supposed “student ghetto” in the Northdale neighbourhood where Ellen lives.

Ellen and I talked to Jan D’Ailly last night, offering some of the pieces of the puzzle that I’d been missing. We’re a little dubious about coming forward because this could get messy. But Ellen thinks it’s important. I do too, for that matter.

Waterloo council is planning to table a motion related to HUG Waterloo’s proposal, and we’re planning on speaking there, if Ellen’s up for it. Wish me luck.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

I’m in Belleville for the holidays, as usual. I’m enjoying a little bit of relaxation and celebration back home with my family.

My mom threw her now-traditional Christmas Eve Open House last night. I got to catch up with cousins and aunts and uncles. Today we did the normal Christmas gift exchange and dinner stuffs. All in all, it’s been a lovely Christmas.

I managed to watch the Doctor Who special tonight, and it was… something else. I look forward to the resolution next week.

I’m putting together a game of Spirit of the Season–a special Christmas edition of Spirit of the Century–for next week. I’m looking forward to pitting Nick Saint, aka Secret Santa! and his band of Reindeer Men against their dastardly enemies. And it’s been over a year (really?) since I last ran a game. I’m looking forward to getting back into that. And I’ll need to put some work into it tomorrow.

I don’t have any particular reason to go Boxing Day shopping. I’ll have a look around online, but I’m not especially looking to buy anything.

I’ll be back in Waterloo on Monday, I think. Then I’ll have to get ready for my New Year’s party.

I’ve been trying to get more into Ubuntu lately. Not just running it, but getting involved.

I like Ubuntu. I like the software; I like the ethos; I like the community; I like how it’s catching on with people. There’s lots of things to like. I haven’t been this excited and enthusiastic about a computing platform since my old Amiga days. Rather than just basking in my enthusiasm, I want to do something about it. I want to contribute.

So I’ve been poking around the various ways to get involved. I was sitting in on some of the Ubuntu Open Week sessions last month, looking in occasionally when they were talking about things that looked interesting. In one of the community sessions, I asked what you could do when your LoCo (Ubuntu Canada, in this case) doesn’t have much of a presence in your area. I didn’t get much of an answer, but I did start up a bit of a conversation with some other Ubuntu people in Southern Ontario.

So coincidentally, the next week was Ontario Gnu/Linux Fest. Ralph, one of the KWLUG people, was asking around for people to help out with the Ubuntu table. And since I wanted to promote my release party, I volunteered.

I got to hang out with other KWLUG Ubuntu people, and they showed up for my party the next week. We talked a little about starting up a more local LoCo. Ralph went off to UDS in Dallas and talked to the Ubuntu Canada people there. The result of that discussion is the Kitchener/Waterloo Chapter of the Ubuntu Canada LoCo.

So far, we have 12 people signed up. As of right now, we know we’ll be participating in the Ubuntu Global Jam early in 2010. What we do beyond that, we’re still working on figuring out as a group. I’m just happy that we’re building this local group I can explore this whole Ubuntu thing with. I’m looking forward to seeing where it goes.

I went to the first Ignite Waterloo event last night. Ignite events have been around for a while, but this was the first time we had one in Waterloo. And it was amazing. The premise is you get smart, talented speakers and give them 5 minutes each. They have to prepare 20 slides and they automatically change after 15 seconds.

For the speaker, it’s both a great challenge and a lot of fun (or possibly terrifying, but they seemed to be having fun). For the audience, it’s illuminating and never dull. Speakers covered a whole range of diverse topics, from solving Rubic’s Cubes to dealing with economic development in Africa.

Oh, and there was a cupcake decorating contest, too.

What I found amazing is how many people I recognized there from all sorts of different things. Kwartzlab, of course, Communitech P2Ps, Devhouse Waterloo, BarCamp, DemoCamp, etc., the Royal Medieval Faire, work, online… Normally those lines don’t cross very much. It’s really gratifying to see some of these groups come together.

A whole bunch of other bloggers have already posted their rave reviews of the event. Here’s just a few:

• Fellow Kwartzlabber, DW (You might recognize one of the photos).
• The Ignite Waterloo blog
• rQ (with a follow-up about cupcakes)
• b.p.’s awesome sketchy notes
• wendyhoo
• cutegecko
• a bunch of photos
• And, of course, the twitter stream.

I hear a rumour there will be another one in the spring. In the meantime, the amazingness of Ignite gives me great hope for TEDxWaterloo in February.

So me and some folks at kwartzlab (as well as the KW Linux Users Group) are getting together on Thursday to celebrate the release of Ubuntu 9.10, the Karmic Koala.

Details at the Kwartzlab site if you’re interested in attending.

I run Ubuntu at home on all my computers now. Well… nearly all. It’s come along way in the last few years, to the point where it’s making me feel at home and content in an operating system again. I’m also feeling like I want to contribute to the community. So the party seems like a nice way to do that a bit. Plus, I kinda want to see who’s around here, maybe build a local community where we can participate.

I’m a member of Kwartzlab, and I think they’re an awesome group of people. This is one of the things I’m hoping to do to get more involved in the lab. Another is showing up on Tuesday Open Nights and just working on projects. That’s what Tuesday Open Nights are for, after all.

And maybe I can bring it all together and hack on some Ubuntu-related projects in the ‘Lab…

Kwartzlab is a club, a collective, a shared idea, and a place. The idea sprang up when Mike Hiemstra put out the call on his blog back in March. Since then, folks got together, had lots and lots of meetings, incorporated, leased some space and have been spending the last few weeks turning a little bit of the old Boehmer Box Factory into a place where people can go, commune with like-minded folks and make stuff.

Tonight’s the Grand Opening.

I’ve been sort-of involved since the beginning. I’m a member, ‘cuz I really want this thing to take off. Just being around these folks is really inspiring, and I’m hoping I can contribute something to the group.

Come check out the space tonight. They’ve put a lot of work into it and it’s night and day from the way they found it. See some cool projects, and chat with some great people. It’ll be a lot of fun.

Let’s clear out some links and ideas and things with a bullet post.

• Things have been a little hectic lately. Hence no posts. Sorry about that. Have to get back into the habit of posting regularly.
• Also, recent job searches have reinforced my inner critic. I’m settling in at Open Text, and people are really cool here, so I think I can relax a bit and get back to posting.
• Got back from Liz and Chris’ wedding last night. It was lovely, and I’m glad Ellen and I could be there. And it was awesome to get the gang back together.
• For reasons to complicated to go into here, Ellen and I stayed stayed over night in Montreal.
• All in all, I drove about 1800km this weekend. I think that’s a record. I’m still recovering.
• One nice thing is I’m now all caught up on Big Finish Doctor Who audios.
• Went to TIFF the previous weekend (and briefly the one before that). Saw three movies: The Trotsky, Bad Lietenant and Ong Bak 2. All three were good in their own way. The Trotsky was wonderful.
• Helped out with the Royal Medieval Faire again, just doing little volunteer jobs. May or may not do it again next year. I’ve got a lot of stuff going on right now. Speaking of…
• Kwartzlab! I’m a member, and haven’t been quite as involved in the initial build-out as I wanted to be. The grand opening is Thursday! And I can’t go. insert frowny face. But! I’ve got some cool project ideas I need to find time to work on.
• I’m working on throwing together a release party for Ubuntu 9.10 in the ‘Lab.
• Tonight I’m debating whether I should help out at the ‘lab, go to DevHouse or get groceries. I think I have to get groceries. :/
• A bunch of other stuff happened since Worldcon (the subject of my last post), but you should probably just be following me on Twitter for bullet-equivalents. Just check the sidebar!
• Anything you’d like me to write about?

Ellen and I had been planning the trip to Worldcon in Montreal for two years, and I wasn’t going to let a little thing like a short bout of unemployment stop us. Fortunately, I got the offer for a job at Open Text the Thursday before we left for Montreal. Which was a huge relief, but led to some scrambling to deal with all that paperwork while I was trying to relax at a little bed and breakfast in the McGill ghetto. We managed to sort all that out fairly well, though. Thanks to Dawn and Dan and David who put up with my desperate requests to track down someone to witness contracts for me. Especially David, who was gracious enough to sign even though he’d just driven in from the Maritimes. I owe him lunch sometime.

Ellen went to Worldcon in Toronto in 2003 and loved every minute. She was really the driving force behind us going when it came to Montreal. A bunch of our friends initially made plans to go but ended up selling their tickets for one reason or another. I might have done the same, if it were just me. But I wanted to go to this thing with her, hang out, go to panels and readings and so forth and just share the experience.

Plus, I really needed a vacation. I hadn’t had an actual vacation since 2007, and I hadn’t taken two solid weeks off in… I can’t remember how long.

Two weeks in Montreal: time enough to settle in before the con and to give us time to recover afterwards. We stayed at Castel Durocher, a lovely little place Ellen had stayed at before, when she was in Montreal for an EWB conference. They were very accommodating and brought me croissants and chocolate.

Worldcon itself was an experience. Unfortunately, we ended up missing out on a lot, since the building it was in didn’t agree with Ellen’s allergies. But we did get a pretty good taste of Worldcon, I think. Ellen bought lots of books, I got to go to a couple parties and see the Hugo awards. We went to readings and panels and got to sit at a table and chat with Mike Resnick and Paul Cornell. I greatly enjoyed it, and would happily do it again, particularly with Ellen along. I don’t think we can make it to Australia next year, tho.

Upon reflection, Worldcon strikes me as being more or less like Ad Astra, except about ten times bigger and with more authors you’ve maybe heard of.

Anyway, the second week in Montreal was mostly spent looking for food, exploring the city and generally relaxing. I got to meet up with Dan, chat about what he’s been up to and check his place out. And then we had to go. I wish we had more time, and I’m now wondering why it took me so long to visit Montreal.