I have volunteered to be Chief Returning Officer of our professional employees union. I’m supposed to make impartial rulings on “corner” cases on elections, nominations, etc. not directly covered by the constitution and bylaws. And, of course, I oversee elections to ensure they are free and fair. I could be in for some interesting and busy times in the next few weeks as the principal officer positions of the union are up for election in a month or two.
I noticed this spider on its web in the bathroom the other day. It must have been busy during the day while I was at work. Or it could have been busy at night but I didn’t notice it that morning. It’s a good thing this spider was in the main bathroom. My wife would have had a fit if it was in the ensuite. Naturally I got rid of it once this picture was taken.
One of my youngest cousins got married on the weekend. I did try and take some pictures after the ceremony but the selector button pointed at P instead of AUTO. I fixed this and took some pictures at the reception:
I put plastic lattice around the deck to keep the dog and other critters out and to give the deck a “finishing” touch. I also affixed a sheet of lattice to the inside of the fence between our yard and the park: to keep the dog from hurting himself on the chain link fence. I also lengthened his dog run by transplanting some “wild” daylillies from the yard side to the park side in order to “soften” the effect of the lattice and removing the little fence that protected the daylillies and some hostas. Eventually I intend for the wisteria to grow along that fence as well.
I spent almost a day trying to find out why my dialog in Borland C++ was closing with the press of an <Enter> or <Esc> key. When I set a break point I found those keys weren’t even being seen by the dialog. Finally after considerably searching I found that controls such as buttons have a Default property. If this is true then <Enter> or <Esc> will automatically press that button. Thanks for making this clear!
My Dad passed away this Tuesday in Vancouver of pancreatic cancer. I had the fortune to have been invited as special surprise guest to my brother’s 50th birthday party by my sister-in-law Rosemarie. So we had the party and then my brother Tom and I visited my Dad during what turned out to be his last few days. I’m glad we chatted and I gave him a hug. Now I’m the only Jim Service in the immediate family — kind of sad that there won’t need to be a Jr. appended anymore.
He is survived by five children: myself, Tom, Jane, Bob and Chris, their spouses: Julie, Rosemarie, Dan, Chrissy and Sharon; one wife and 3 ex’s: Helen, Helen, Jean and DJ; and thirteen grandchildren: Ian, Stuart, Alexis, Nicolia, Rhea, Kyle, Ryan, Nicole, Crawford, Holly, Alex, Sarah, Emma. There are also some step-children and step-grandchildren; however, I either don’t know or can’t remember all their names.
We were working in the same company, Ontario Hydro, for fourteeen years though he didn’t actually do anything to have me initially hired there. The closest we ever got was when I was on rotation as a Trainee Engineer in the same division. Otherwise, we worked at two different locations. So, we were both, nominally, electrical engineers. I tended to use and program computers and he managed to avoid ever having a computer prior to his retirement in 1991.