Pioneer on the Internet – Sean Gursky

When my torrents started to act up a few days ago I thought nothing of it. I chalked it up to the tracker being problematic, Shaw being stubborn, a weird seed to peer ratio or something else I would investigate later. I never thought it meant that my RAID 5 system had failed. When I went into Disk Management and saw my RAID drive not recognized my face turned a ghastly expression and Jenna said she “never wanted to see that look on me again”.

Wingman was crying for me and for over a day I neglected the signs. In fact it had been crying for so long that two drives were marked as failed. In a RAID 5 system it can survive if a single drive fails, but two or more is when things get serious and I had a critical issue on hand.

My 1and1 data loss in March is still an open wound and the thought of losing everything was too much to handle. When I say everything I mean it. I could survive if my Videos folder disappeared. I could slowly rebuild it over time, cut back on what I wanted to watch. However losing the photos would be an injury I could never recover from. I may not look at our Jasper photos from 2004, or reminesce about the giant pizza Dad and I made one day, but I always could, and to have that taken away would have been huge.

The thought of losing everything started to takes its toll as the RAID was being examined at work. How would I recover? What would I do differently? It was like being faced with a life changing conversation at the doctors office after being told what the dark spot on your x-ray meant.

This was a road I did not want to go down but I prepared for the worst and contemplated what would be my poison as I intended on drowning my sorrows in the evening if the results weren’t good.

Our company IT man, Nigel, had been investigating the RAID and seeing what (if anything) he could recover. After a few hours had passed I heard an exclamation of victory and I was told Wingman would be okay. One hard drive was lost in the process and I would be wise to add a fifth drive to the array to allow for proper redundancy. Fortunately the next task of locating an old model hard drive was easy and for $140 (plus the lunch I owe Nigel) Wingman will be okay and with no data loss.

The Sunday before all of this started Jenna and I were relaxing at home and she was watching an episode of “Sex and the City”. It happened to be My Motherboard, My Self in which Carrie Bradshaw has her Macintosh laptop die and loses all of her files. Everyone she spoke with asks her what she uses to backup and equates backing up to something everyone does that no one talks about.

Even with a backup solution you can still come face to face with losing everything and having nothing.

From Me To U2
It’s old news now, but U2 is coming to Edmonton in June 2010!

The Monday after we returned from Las Vegas I saw rumors about an upcoming announcement and was thrilled to see a planned stop at Commonwealth Stadium. The U2.com pre-sale started less than 36 hours after the concert was announced and I was back in the same uncomfortable and stressed situation of vying for tickets. Would I play the odds and expect a second show to be added? Or should I play it safe and get seats?

The second tour date never happened, but from my understanding Live Nation stopped the roll out of a second show due to slow ticket sales. Hours after the public sale tickets were still available, and even the following day seats were available in the upper balconies. AC/DC sold out Commonwealth in the summer within minutes, and since this show did not get that same treatment Edmonton will only be enjoying one show. It’s easy to get hung up on the show that got away, but the important item here is that U2 is coming and I can stay within my area code to see them perform.

I ended up buying two seated tickets (closer to the center of the stadium to fully appreciate the stage from the front) and two general admission tickets. I often say that the April 10, 2001 performance I saw of U2 in Calgary was a life changing experience, and I think being on the floor for that was a strong reason why the night was so memorable. To get an optimum spot on the floor you have to wait in line. In 2001 I was in line for eight hours, and that is the norm for most lineups, especially if you would like a chance at the ‘inner circle’. I am still not sure which way I am leaning, we have already seen the show from the seats and a floor performance would give us more appreciation for the frenzy; but at the cost of sitting and waiting all day.

I came across this time lapse video of the “Claw” as it was constructed, performed on and torn down the other day and it immediately brought my excitement level back up for the show. Now to just get through the next eight months.

Nose Bleed Count
The count is now up to nine. There have been a few close calls but were just drips compared to the river of blood that is needed to count for this. The humidifier has been brought out of hibernation as I try and battle the dry climate.

It has been over four months since my surgery, and yesterday I had my final appointment of 2009. I have not noticed any improvements or discomfort over the last few months, it has felt natural; almost like I never had glasses at all. I was seeing 20/20 in July, but I had to guess on some letters. Yesterday I was still rated at 20/20 and some of the letters did not seem as fuzzy before, or maybe I exaggerated how fuzzy they were originally; either way my score remained the same. I do wish my eye sight was a little stronger, but 20/20 is the optimum eye sight so I shouldn’t be too upset over being normal.

The doctor has recommended I stop taking Flarex as part of my daily regime as there was no scaring or haze on the eye. He did note that my pressure was high and told me that about 10% of patients who use Flarex have increased pressure in the eye because of it. When I go for my next appointment in six months my pressure will be re-evaluated then and we can see if not using Flarex helped, or if it was related to something else all together.

With a clean bill of sight I feel good about my decision. The weeks following the surgery were difficult, but not having to travel with glasses, contacts and appropriate solution is amazing and worth the frustration I had in June. If I play hockey I can just get my gear and go. I don’t have to plan my day around when I put contacts in or if they need to go through another round of solution to make sure they are sufficiently lubricated.

I am not sure what to do with my glasses. I have some frames I like a lot, but I will never wear them again. When I need to wear glasses again it would cost more to get the new prescription put into the frames than to order a new pair online, but throwing them out is like Kerry Weaver walking for the first time without her cane. I will think on this further and hold onto the frames…for now.

In the mean time, can Sean see yet? Yes!

I had a hot dog on the weekend. Usually this is not cause for a whole post, but this was more than a hot dog, it was a Fat Frank hot dog! My plight with Fat Frank’s has been long and arduous. It started in June when Cindy and I walked to Fat Frank’s on Whyte Ave and found them closed.

Fat Franks is closed!

Other trips down Whyte Ave were greeted with a closed Frank shack. In a cruel sense of mockery, the times I had already eaten or it was not hot dog o’clock Fat Franks would be open. I have seen the small Frank stations around Edmonton but was never in a situation to try one…until Saturday!

Jenna and I were running errands on Saturday and after a morning that had trips to AMA and Mountain Equipment Co-op we needed some supplies at Canadian Tire. It was early afternoon, several hours since we had breakfast and in the shadows of the entrance stood a magician commanding a portable Fat Frank’s stand. Like an oasis in the Sahara, I had a Fat Frank.

It may not have been a gourmet style one that you would find on Whyte Ave, but it was still delicious. Perhaps after having my first Fat Frank my luck will change and the next time I take a walk down Whyte Ave they will be open.

I had a problem with my music library, but the thing was I did not realize it was a problem until I read about the following on last.fm:

Sometimes the endless rows of music in my media player leave me at a loss. I have a music collection that I?ve spent years lovingly crafting. All my favourite bands. Yet as I spin my mouse wheel its full length, nothing springs out. I scroll up, scouring the rows for something fresh. I scroll down, searching for some long forgotten treasure. After a few minutes I select ?shuffle? and go make a cup of tea.

I agreed with everything! I have found myself cycling through my music with no goal or objective in mind. Now that does not have to happen because earlier this week Last.fm introduced Boffin which allows me to create a radio station with my selection of music.

First off, it scans everything in my collection and keeps track of all labels and tags. From here, and with the help of magic from last.fm HQ it checks what others have classified that music as and voila I have Sean Radio.

Now, whatever mood I am in for I can find it. If I want to get a splash of alt-country, punk cabaret and rock I can do that. It is like Party Shuffle and Genius from iTunes combined with last.fm to make a great product. I have spent hours going through my library and was never bored or uninterested in what I was hearing. Now when I want casual acoustic I won’t be surprised when Stone Temple Pilots or AC-DC come on.

A good company is one that makes a product you use every day. A great company is one that makes a product for something you never realized you needed and does it seamlessly.

Over the last few months I have been holding out for that one perfect week where every show I watch aired. Battlestar Galactica and Lost returned in the same week in January and Dollhouse was premiering in February, and with shows that started in Fall 2008 still ongoing I figured there would be plenty of opportunities for the worlds to align and I would be treated with Monday through Friday of television.

It never played out that way. I was always robbed of this magical week because of many reasons. Several weren’t aired due to Presidential press conferences, networks went dark on others because they were avoiding the DTV switch that went into play in some markets and then the usual scheduling issues that networks have prevented other ones from airing.

In the next three months I will say goodbye for good when three of my TV wrap for good and while their absence from the weekly program grid would increase the odds of this television storm aligning I wanted every show I watched in the 2008-2009 season to be on at once.

This week is as close to the storm as I would get except ABC robbed me of that with Scrubs and Lost not being aired. Even Jenna’s programs almost had a 100% turn out rate. It seems I was chasing an elusive dream that was never meant to be.

There are very few things that make me happier than good TV. TV that gets an emotional rise out of me is better. TV that can stir emotions and make me tug at my hair as a wonderful story unfolds is best. Last week’s episode of Battlestar Galactica titled Someone To Watch Over Me did just that. It made me feel like I was watching the season three finale Crossroads Pt. II again.

Bear McCreary wrote a very long, in-depth and informative three post blog recap on his experience with that episode and the passion he had for that episode was evident in the final product. There were too many things to list that this episode did right and it makes the series finale on March 20th a little bittersweet. This episode was amazing because there is an end game in sight, and if it weren’t for the show coming to a close it may not have happened otherwise.

Two weeks from now it will be coming to a close. I will be experiencing the first of three shows I watch come to a final curtain call, something I am not sure how I will deal with just yet but that is Future-Sean’s problem and I still have several hours of Battlestar Galactica to enjoy.

My Tube Challenge

Today marks the release of U2″s new album No Line On The Horizon. However, thanks to someone Universal the album was put on sale early and subsequently making its way around the file sharing community I have listened to the album thoroughly. However, this post is not an album review, but a discussion on what will be following very soon: a world tour.

I have seen U2 in 2001 and 2005 and both shows were an experience onto themselves. U2 may have been slipping with their effort in the studio but they are the best live act I have seen and have vowed to travel whatever distance to see them live. Therein lies the problem.

In the last few months there has been talk about Ticketmaster and Live Nation merging, which could raise ticket prices. U2″s tour company is Live Nation and hasn’t been without their ticket sale issues in the past but this merger has me concerned as a fan, especially one trying to buy tickets for one of the biggest bands in the world.

Recently there have been issues with Leonard Cohen and Bruce Springsteen tickets going through an auction site, well before the public on-sale date, and charging an unfair amount to fans. I am afraid, and almost expecting, this to happen for U2.

If I could pay to guarantee my priority ticket purchase, could I justify it? That is what has been going back and forth over in my head. U2.com offers a subscription to their website, in addition to exclusive-this and behind the scenes-that when there is a tour involved members of the site get an exclusive on-sale for them. This is something other bands have done, the first that comes to my mind is the Pearl Jam Ten Club.

I bought a membership in 2005 and used it to secure seats to their Vancouver performance. Would I have still gotten tickets without the membership? Sure, I think so, but I may have been fighting for 300-level seats instead of the 100-level ones but the first show sold out very fast a second was added and I could have been directly in the middle of that mess trying to get it sorted out. However, I also know someone who went to 13+ Vertigo shows, and the U2.com membership was not used for all of them, so is there much of a benefit?

What does it all mean? Is $50 worth it to be the first in line to spend $300+ on tickets? It kind of feels like a “Sucker Tax”. Although when U2 performs that one song that speaks to you on a different level, puts on a visually stunning display during Where The Streets Have No Name or takes you on an amazing musical journey for two hours you aren’t thinking about the extra $50 you spent to get there.

It was that feeling, the one that I have only seen U2 been able to pull off, that I decided the extra cost was worth it for peace of mind. Now I have to spend the next few weeks (or months) reading rumors on potential tours and scouring fan sites looking for any bit of information I can glean, like I have done for the last two tours.

Last week I got the notion in my head that I would like to see Battlestar Galactica music composer Bear McCreary perform his pieces live. I am a huge fan of his work with the series and the two shows he performed last April were well received by everyone in attendance.

Logistically speaking this would be a mess and anything but cheap. Last year the tickets were $20 but when you include airfare to fly into Los Angeles, transportation, food and a hotel room it would definitely inflate the cost; but what a trip it would be.

There is no guarantee that a live performance will happen, it’s all speculation. However it is something McCreary wanted to do again and with the series wrapping up next month I think it would be a nice send off. Although all of this could just be one giant Cylon pipe dream.

I will stay on the look out for any performance rumors. If you would be interested in an Alberta to California trip to hear the live musical performances from a science fiction show (as I try my best to sell the nerd factor) get in touch with me.

Thinking about making such a trip for Bear McCreary got me wondering about the artists in my top ten list, according to my last.fm. How many of them had I seen live? If I was such a fan of their studio music then at the very least I should see them perform live.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that there were only three I had not seen live. Besides the aforementioned Bear McCreary The Beatles is one that I will have to live vicariously through historic footage on, but Radiohead is still very around and touring and a possibility.

I may not go out of my way to see Thom Yorke and company live, like I have with U2 or The White Stripes, but if the opportunity presents itself I would do my part to complete this last.fm Top Artists challenge. Or maybe I am going about this all the wrong way and should listen to artists that are more prone to touring Canada?

So say we all.

In the fall of 1993 I had just turned eleven and saw something I would not appreciate until over 15 years later. I saw a lot of movies when I was growing up, but one in particular stands out. In November Mother dragged Dad and I to see Baraka in theaters. I hated it. For an eleven year old I found no redeeming value in the movie, there were no words, it had strange music and peculiar visuals.

Dad and I bugged Mom for months, even years, following that movie. It was the movie that we compared all movies to after the fact but I just did not understand it. Even now when I told Dad about the movie he groaned and asked if I knew what I was doing, after all these years that wound never healed.

The powers of technology have allowed Baraka to return to my life, this time in the form of a beautiful transition to Blu-ray. When visual aficionados list must-have movies on Blu-ray this one is high on their list and on the weekend I realized why.

What I could not understand 15 years ago I appreciated now. I understood what the movie was saying and even after all of this time the message could still be interpreted.

I can’t say exactly what did it for me in this movie but I felt an emotional connection to several scenes and thought the images were very powerful. Every shot felt like a beautiful photograph and I would be lucky enough to witness just one of those moments for myself.

I’m glad to have given this movie another chance even if it was the punch line to so many jokes all those years ago.