the flying squirrel

You know, I kinda feel bad for not posting as much personal stuff. Most of what I end up posting is Ubuntu or Kwartzlab-related. I know there are at least one or two of you who might like to hear a little bit about *me*.

How do you feel about bullets? Maybe in reverse-chronological order.

* I dressed up as The Blue Screen of Death for Hallowe’en. [Blurry MySpace shot](https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/LyXn7pEaAJqS6vt6HQFlcVcronFdHSbP-DFsMLhVdgU?feat=directlink).
* I spent a chunk of the weekend at [FSOSS](http://fsoss.ca). Yeah, that’s Ubuntu-related. See the previous post. But it was cool and I got to hang out with some really interesting people, like one of the engineers working on the [Raspberry Pi](http://www.raspberrypi.org/?p=106). I also made some contacts and got some ideas for future Ubuntu things, if I ever have the time.
* [Hacky Hallowe’en was awesome](http://makebright.com/2011/10/kwartzlab-rocks-hacky-halloween/) apparently. I’m sad I wasn’t there. Wait, that’s about Kwartzlab, not me…
* I got a cold a couple of weeks ago and have been mostly quarantined from seeing Ellen. This makes me sad.
* I’ve become mildly obsessed with Dragon Age. I got the game because a bunch of co-workers liked it and figured it would be a modest distraction, but I ended up getting sucked in. I’ve played Origins and all the DLC. I haven’t played Dragon Age II yet. I’ve been too busy to afford resurrecting the time vampire. I have, however, bought the first volume of the tabletop role-playing game (which was a little disappointing) and I’ve just finished reading the first novel. I started the second last night.
* Speaking of obsessions, have you seen [the Doctor Who toys they’ve announced recently](http://merchandise.thedoctorwhosite.co.uk/enemies-of-the-third-doctor-collectors-set/)?! My most recent order (including Idris, River and Scaroth, last of the Jaggaroth) should be arriving soon.
* I should write about what I’m doing at work sometime. I’ve become a language designer as well as an IDE developer. It’s all pretty cool. My employer encourages us to blog about what we’re working on, but I still feel weird about it (hence not referring to said employer by name; not that it’s a secret or anything).
* I didn’t get to do nearly as much gardening as I wanted to do this year. Nearly every weekend was booked up with *something*: Ubuntu release parties, Stratford plays with Ellen, SoOnCon, Toronto International Film Festival, Ubuntu Global Jam, our trip to Montreal, Car Free Sundays, Kwartzlab cottage weekend… If not one of those, I was most likely spending time with Ellen or playing Dragon Age. I did a little bit to enact my gardening plans, but I’d hoped I’d be further ahead.
* Still, it was a pretty awesome summer. I can’t say I really regret all the stuff I’ve been doing.

It’s a provincial election time. I hate it when people say “Oh, there’s an election, but I just can’t bring myself to care.” But this time, I can kinda relate.

Thing is, I *do* care. There’s a lot of provincial stuff I care about. It’s just that from what I can tell, my local race is a foregone conclusion, I don’t think any of the candidates are awesome enough for me to feel like I should be personally sticking my neck out for any of them, and I’m a little bit annoyed with every one of them for one reason or another.

I actually mostly like the Liberal government’s record. I think the HST is a fantastic idea. I like green energy and I think they’ve been doing a reasonably good job of investing infrastructure. They’re taking credit for uploading services off of municipalities, which I think is a very good thing, but it’s taken them an awfully long time to do it, and they’re only just getting started at the end of their second term.

I also don’t like aspects of the campaign they’re running, but it’s not like any of the rest are much better. I’m really annoyed about the G20, but it’s not been an election issue, other than some noises from the NDP, and as there’s been no inquiry, I have no idea how much of that to lay at the feet of the province.

I would like to see people talking about building a new deal for cities, creating a sustainable funding model to get them less dependent on property taxes, which create perverse incentives and disproportionately hurt the elderly, of whom there will be many more in the near future. Other than talk of uploading and downloading, we aren’t getting any of that. And that’s thinking way too small.

I’d like to hear more about public transit infrastructure than just the Liberals patting themselves on the back for things like the LRT and the NDP promising to freeze fares (with no discernible plan to fund ridership growth).

I’d like to hear actual *innovative* ideas about how to solve Ontario’s problems. That’s probably too much to hope for.

So I don’t know. I’ll probably vote Liberal. I’m not a huge fan of the candidate, but I’m not a huge fan of any of the candidates. Not even the Greens. That just leaves me with my [algorithm](http://www.flyingsquirrel.ca/index.php/2008/09/08/ugh-election/).