This is my site at 640×480 resolution.

http://www.deanwelsh.com/coppermine/albums/userpics/640×480.jpg

It works nicely… but it’s completely a fluke, I was shooting for 800×600 min.

-dean

I’m entirely sick of the old design now. So, I’m workin on a new look here. Like it? (comments box is gonna be weird for the moment I think, cause I haven’t touched that yet…but hey, I can only do so much so fast.) gotta paint a new upside down dean to plunk in again.

-dean

My uncle Dennis noticed that sometimes you can’t quite fit an entire frying pan into your sink. It almost fits, but there’s that damnable handle that’s about ten centimeters too long. So, one afternoon, Den decides to take all the pots out to the garage and he saws off the offending handle excess. Den’s my kinda guy. Who needs more than a nub to grab onto, right? Anyway, Auntie Pat isn’t too happy with her burnt hands and Dad’s been calling Den “short-handle Anderson”. I hear Dennis is none too impressed with the new uh… handle.

-dean

To this day, I still haven’t memorized the multiplication tables. Whenever i need to multiply something, and I’m not sitting at a computer. (Your math teacher was wrong about not having a calculator handy… but calculatorlessness does happen once every 3 or 4 years. ) I’ve always thought it out like this. it’s not very efficient or logical, but it’s what seems natural.

4×6=
4,8,16
17,18,19,20
21,22,23,24

or
6,12,24

I mention this because the pattern is kinda interesting to me now that I’m thinking about it.
Binary=1,2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512

While I’m boring you with numbers, here’s another thing that’s interesting to me alone.
Multiples of 9 have always fascinated me.
09
18
27
36
45
54
63
72
81
90
99
108
117
126
135
Left number goes up by one(1 to 2), right number comes down by one. (8 to 7) so it’s 18,27

Then when you hit 12 it becomes a game of add the first digit (1) to the second digit (0) and leave the third digit alone and you repeat the pattern. So 135 becomes (1+3)5 or (4)5 and since We know 9x5=45 we know that 9 was multiplied by 15

WHEEE! I know. crazy.
NOW! check this out. The digits add up to 9!
WATCH!
8×9=72
7+2=9
AMAZING!
let’s try it again.
36×9=324
3+2+4=9
NINE!

but it gets weird when you get into double numbers times 9.
44×9=396
3+9+6=18
but… Phew… we can just do it again.
1+8=9
YAAAAAY

It’s also weird like that from the double down. so 45×9 works out alright. but 43,42,41 you have to do the re-add thing. so 41×9=369
3+6+9=18
1+8=9

But throw any number at 9 and you’ll always be able to get 9 by adding the digits.

125694×9=1131246
1+1+3+1+2+4+6=18
1+8=9

33333×9=299997
2+9+9+9+9+7=45
4+5=9

When you have crazy repeating numbers there’s another neat thing.
5555×9=49995
now… 4+5 does equal nine. but that’s not the neat thing.

66666x9=599994

Oh man. Mathemagical!

alright, that’s enough I should do some work or something.

-dean

So, in a move reminiscent of highschool winters on country roads, I slid my car into the ditch yesterday. I’m fine, steph’s fine and it’s fine and all. Snow is soft. I was, however, stuck at a 45 degree angle in a snowdrift in -30 degrees Celcius weather at 4:00AM. Tried pushing. Cars that are made of real metal are heavy. Manual cars suck for getting your non-driving girlfriend to help with rocking your way out of the drift.

So I figured. “meh… this is the main road between Tofield and Vegreville, someone’s bound to come along. An hour later, my temperature gauge says my car is about to overheat (engine’s don’t cool all that well when all the coolant is sloshed over on one side of a 45 degree banked engine, regardless of the subzero external temperatures.) So I shut off the car, and we sit there listening to the pot full of boiling water sound of my engine and watch a few satellites swing across the sky. That was fun for about 15 minutes. No sign of country travelers.

I decide to walk up the road towards the yardlight I see about 100 meters up the road, steph stays behind in case someone comes down the road while i’m gone. I hate to pester people at this hour, but I realized my pants were making cracking sounds as I walked. (water from wet snow freezes in your Jeans and makes them kinda brittle if it’s cold enough.) It’s a house, there’s a nightlight on inside. So I ring the two doorbells. I’m not sure either made a sound. I try again. no answer. I knock on the door. no response. but I didn’t knock on the door very hard as I really don’t want to wake these people up. Rats. Guess i’ll go back to the car.

Pants:Crack. snap. crack. snap.
Shoes:squeak squack squeak squack. (snow on the ground squeaks underfoot http://www.catalystmagazine.net/issues/story.cfm?story=387 )

Car’s cooled down a bit, guess I’ll start it up again before it cools down too much to start. (delicate balance you see.) I take off my pants and steal steph’s leggings (she’s wearing a snowsuit), and I lay them out over the dash defogger and try to dry them out a bit in case I decide to walk the 10K back to Tofield. The fans are blowing cold air now because the temperature of the air the heater fans blow out seems tied to the heat of the engine. Brr… cold knees… must remember to throw some snowpants in the trunk for future emergencies. Car engine’s heating up faster but it’s still blowing cold air. If I don’t warm up i’ll try that house again. Gauge says engine is getting pretty hot. rats. House it is. pants back on. colder pants… But ever so slightly drier pants. Steph comes with this time.

Up the road to the house again. Hand in my pocket, check for my wallet, it’s there… and cold metal… what is that?
Hey! That’s a handy LED flashlight in my pocket not the roll of bottlecaps candy i thought it was. (bottlecaps come in rolls instead of bags now if you didn’t know.) right on. Pants aren’t cracking quite as much now, that’s nice. Flashlight remaining in my pocket. Enjoying the moonlit night. (winter nights stay fairly bright. The snow reflects a lot of moonlight gives you a soothing black and white view of your surroundings.) hmm… there’s a dirt spot here on the driveway where a vehicle parks and stops the snow from hitting the ground. even though there’s 30-40cm of snow everywhere there’s still a dirt spot here. They must park their vehicle right here. I don’t think anyone’s home at all. Maybe they’ll be back soon? Maybe they’re just at the bar… no, it’s after 4 that would have closed awhile ago… I think? Steph says it would have.

Looks like we’re going for a hike to Tofield with my cold pants. great. I’ll try knocking again. [Harder, louder, knocks.] No answer. No one’s home. Meh… try the door anyway, it’s Canada afterall…

SUCESS! aaaah… warmth, so nice.
“Hello? Anyone home?”
No answer.

sudden movement. GAH! what was that?
click clack click clack scritch… Thump.
oh… A kitten, running on linoleum, hitting a wall. cute.

Bookbags all around the entrance. kids. A family lives here. Guess they’re not at the bar? Grandma’s for the weekend? Looks like i’ve got the place to myself. shoes off. Up the stairs, Rotary wall mount phone! cool. Phone works but it’s making a weird dialtone pulsing sound… what the hell? look around. Flashing light on the cordless phone across the room. ah… voicemail. Steph calls our friend in Tofield. The phone’s busy. Oh great… she has dialup internet… right. peachy. Guess it’s a towtruck for me. Where’s the phonebook? I don’t want to dig through their drawers. damn. Guess I’ll leave a buck and call 411. I’ll use the rotary though. I miss these things. What’s that weird bit on the side of the phone? oh! penholder! right on! old phones are the best. Then a robot answers the 411 call, spoiling my phone nostalgia.

Phone:”what city and province please?”
Me:”Tofield, Alberta… but it’s not really a city… it’d be a town, there are only about 2000 people living there.”
Phone:”Residential, business…
Me thinking: (wow… it parsed all that. that’s pretty Impressive.)
Phone: or government?
Me:Business please. (thinking… Government gets its own menu item? Governmental sprawl?)
Phone:”the name of the business you’re trying to reach”
Me: uh… Towing?
Phone:”one moment please.”

Then it connected me to an operator who gave me tofield towing’s number.

Towing guy “so where are you…”
me: “uh… good question. I can talk you here. You know that road that goes towards vegreville that’s gravel for awhile and eventually it hits a long paved stretch? uh… 662?
Towing guy:662? (pensively…) 662?
Me: “oh wait… 626… 662′s the tofield area code.”

Eventually he figures out where I’m at and Then says… “It’s going to be about 3 hours before we can get someone to you though. It’s a busy night. you could try someone from Vegreville they may help you out faster.”

I tell him I can wait. 3 hours… wow. good thing we’re inside. Guess I’ll find the T.V. or something. rats. country television. Peasantvision we call it. Over the air television at 5 on a sunday morning. Hope I enjoy religious and Fishing television.
Wait… under the T.V. DVDs! ooh Sinbad and a Robin Williams live set. that’ll do me. Where’s the DVD player? crap. they took it with them.

OW MY FOOT!!! What the? oh… hi kitten.

Screw this. Maybe that dude just didn’t want to scour the countryside looking for me. I’ll go back up to the corner of the road and get the range road numbers. It’s nice that they have those country road markers now. You can actually find out where you’re at as opposed to the old days when you had to count intersections from a landmark. I head up the road to grab the numbers steph stays behind in case the tow guys call. While I’m there I load up my arms with some boxes of chocolates I had in the car. I figure I’ll leave them as a thank you gift, I don’t have any cash on me. Crap… except now my arms are full of chocolate and I can’t turn on the rubber click in/out switch on my flashlight with my gloves on and I need it to make out the numbers on the roadsigns. I’ll try biting it on. there. that worked… except this flashlight is cold metal… aaaand it’s kinda sticking to my tongue. I’ll just wait till it warms up from my mouth warmth, it’s not like a flagpole or a swingset. There we go.

I give the guy the numbers. still 3 hours. Damn.

Maybe there’s another DVD player here. I go snooping. the kids like comics. cool. I’ll read their nick fury graphic novel if I don’t find a DVD player. Picture of two kids and a lady, guess that’s who lives here. Ash tray, I only smell cat and Stephs allergies don’t kick in, they must have been away for a long while. Kitten has food… but no water… hmm then where…? Oh! note to self: leave the toilet seat up. Bingo, another DVD player.

So we watched some movies and the cat attacked the furry winter hat I was wearing until I grabbed him and held him still till he fell asleep purring in my arms. I like kittens, they’re fun, but steph’s allergic to fullgrown cats.

3 hours later the guy tows me out. Steph leaves a note saying “Thanks for the use of your phone and warmth. Please enjoy the chocolates. Your kitten is adorable.” The sun’s coming up and the sky is a deep blood red to pink to orange (or orange to pink? i forget) gradient. and we head back to Vegreville.

It was a nice night of breaking and entering.

-Dean

“Dean? Will you be in there long? I just spilled orange juice on my head.”

-Dean

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/01/07/mesley050107.html

Boo.

-dean

I’m full of Cancer, AIDS, Tuberculosis, Mononucleosis, Halitosis, Septicemia, and a side order of SARS.

back when I’m feeling better.

-dean