I’ve taken a couple days off to rent a little house in Paris.  One thing that is noticeable when grabbing a place in this sleepy little town is that the conversations with the house owner really feels like you’ve been transported back in time.  “Oh, you’ll have to go out and see the deer with their fawn at 3 pm when the children all go out as well.  Then there’s Henry the Heron – you can see him from the patio.  You might get a glimpse of the beaver family as well.  They usually come out at around 5 pm.”  I have not said a word and it’s been a 23 min conversation.  Somehow, I feel more at ease and have just had a slice of homemade apple pie without knowing it.

Watched the first two episodes of Rostered On.  It’s a comedy about an electronic retail big box shop in the UK.  The jokes hit a little too close to home.  There was a scene about a man that had the settings on his toaster at the highest settings and complained that his burnt toast was from a faulty toaster.  The next thing that I remember is rocking in a corner with my Future Shop uniform clutched tight to my chest mumbling something about not being able to return a USB flash drive.

Is the World Cup over yet?  Generally, I don’t detest any single nation.  Every four years or so I find myself cheering only against one team – Portugal.  The reason is out of pure entertainment.  The fans are the most over-the-top whiners that I’ve witnessed.

Can’t imagine having the hoarding disorder.  There was a time that Sara and I did have a messy house, but this was caused by sheer laziness and not wanting to hold onto stuff.  There has never been a time that I thought “Oh, maybe this hairnet from the hotel will come in handy in a few years.  We should keep it around the house.  Especially since I’ve never used one in my life.”

The one thing that I don’t miss about living in a small town is knowing everything about everyone.  I don’t need to know what Mrs. Jackson’s two children’s marks were in Math in Grade 8.  I need space in my brain for old hockey trades and the name of the first album by the Beta Band.

How do you get into the street performer profession?  I’m not talking about the guitar players.  I’m referring to the break dancers, jugglers, etc…  Baking out in the sun and juggling fu**ing knives seems like the absolute last thing that I would ever want to do, let alone practice.  You have to spend countless hours becoming an expert in this craft.    The more re-tracing that I do on this profession the more ridiculous that it seems.  What’s the pinnacle – Vegas?  Nobody is looking up the stats on knife jugglers?  Well, one person – me, but nobody else.

An Ice Cream Truck recently came to my work.  As many co-workers ran out with glee to the ice cream truck they were turned away by the man – he was meant to go across the road to another tech company.  Many were sad, and a few confused on why he wouldn’t serve paying customers anyways.  The rest of the day just couldn’t live up to the moment of seeing that beautiful multi-coloured truck pull in and park for just that minute.  This life in tech moment has been brought to you by TWB Coop Brewery.  Where every day is like a Mumford and Sons concert.

Top 3 things that I knew as a child that other children didn’t seem to know/care about

3) Dandelions are not delicious.  There are thousands of these things everywhere.  They don’t even look tasty.  Had one of those yellow petals and it tasted bitter.  Little Georgie would just power through a minimum of 6 or 7 of these a day.  He’d have yellow stains on his pants.  Georgie didn’t have many friends – except the dandelions.

2) Being timed to get things by your parents is a trick.  “I will get this thing for you, but it will cost you a minimum of three chips old man.”

3) Getting dirty sucks.  “Alright man, you can roll around in that puddle if you want Joe.  Seems like a huge mistake to me.  You are going to look like sh** and your Mom is going to light you up when you get home.  Well, there you go.  Remember this conversation when you get home, yup lap it up like a dog as well – real smart Joe.”