The Coffeehouse

As part of an assignment, my professor required us to read this article. You should all read it. Infact, if you alread know why you are not an environmentalist, you should still read it because oddly enough, it will probably change your mind. The guy is a wacko...

Here are some of my favourite parts of his article:

Saturday, October 28th is the national Troops Out of Afghanistan protest day.

If you're in Toronto:

March and Rally
Troops out of Afghanistan
Saturday October 28th
1 pm
US Consulate (360 University ave)

For other cities in Canada: http://www.acp-cpa.ca/en/Oct28Events.htm

My parents are going away for the weekend, and my brother is going on a business trip.

Parents: You're staying at home all weekend, and you're especially not going to the rally because we fear for your safety.

Me: I went to Palestine and faced IDF soldiers with rifles the size of my leg every single day....safety?

As I mentioned earlier, I can't get "real" stats out of this thing unless I'm a paid member, and I can't put one of those free counters on my blog cause it doesn't allow HTML, BUT, they show you this really simple graph...

This is as of 12:45 am today and my # of visitors is growing!

Not like it's that big of a deal...

Ok, this is SO COOL.

The other day blog.com was down for maintainance, and that usually means they're adding some different feature or changing the layout of the dashboard, etc.

BUT, they've added TAGS. AND a TAG CLOUD (look at the sidebar!)

I LOVE TAGGING THINGS.

As part of completing my certificate in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), I'm taking a course called Internet Distributed GIS for Public Engagement. It's basically a course on how to apply GIS technology and web-based geospatial social systems to communities for citizen participation. Yeah, that's a mouthful, and I didn't quite grasp the whole idea until a couple of weeks into class. I'm really enjoying it though, we have this really tech-savvy/nerdy instructor who shows us cool GIS-based websites and applications. Our first assignment, due Monday, is about examining a particular element of a current social software or web GIS application. One of the options was to look at the new geotagging feature in Flickr, and since I have very willingly surrendered to the awesomeness that is Flickr, I chose this option. Yes, I have dared to combine business and pleasure. This was my proposal:

I will explore how activist users and groups in the Flickr community use the geotagging tool and citizen-generated spatial data to communicate, organize, and advocate for their respective causes. I will study the geotagged maps of several groups and compare and contrast the ways in which the geotagging tool is used, either to document an event, share a news report, or organize and plan. It would be interesting to compare how geotagging is utilized and if it is more beneficial to city-specific groups (for example, an advocacy group based in Toronto) or global communities and organizations, and whether geotagging can be considered as an effective global communication tool in the activist circle. I hope to discuss ways in which geotagging, along with other features on Flickr, could be helpful in influencing citizen-engagement and furthering the role of activists on the web.

Since geotagging is a fairly new option, there aren't THAT many photos geotagged (compared to the amount of photos on Flickr), and frankly, many of them have been geotagged incorrectly, and its frustrating. Many people tend to geotagg from afar, whereas I zoom in to the max before I geotagg my photos.

So, I haven't really started my project yet, and if anyone has pointers/suggestions, it would be immensely appreciated :D

This is probably the umpteenth time I have had the urge to switch over to Blogger, but I still don't have the guts to do it. Everything's basically set up over at The "New" Coffeehouse, yet I still have to move all my posts, which is a very big hassle, plus I lose all my beloved comments. So please guide me oh humble readers of The Coffeehouse. To move, or not to move, that is the question...

Okay, so I've decided there's too many pictures to post (and yet, not enough), so I've uploaded them onto my flickr account. But I will share one with you here....

What gives someone the right to enter and exit another person's life as they wish, whenever they wish to do so?

I'm not angry, and that wasn't meant to be a rhetorical question. I am honestly confused and curious as to what type of thought-processes are involved in such actions.

I have a best friend from highschool who I used to keep in touch with after I moved away, we were extremely close. Then she got herself caught up in some guilt-cycle where she would procrastinate to write back, feel guilty about that, prolong it longer, feel even guiltier that she didn't have the courage to face me, procrastinate..etc. Me, knowing that she means no malice, and always hearing her news through another friend, continued to write her on special occasions and stuff. It's been about a two years since I last heard from her and now, out of the blue she sends me a note, and not even a direct one, but one through those stupid social network testimonial thingies (!!). I'm tempted to write back, but I know it'll be another two years before I hear anything again.

I've pretty much closed this chapter of my life, and I usually never reopen it once its been closed, and never look back. There's no use dwelling on the past. What to do?

I am a prospective juror!

This is exciting! I know that I may not be summoned for another couple of years, but I WILL be summoned to serve eventually, woho! I know so many people who tell a bunch of lies and make excuses when they're summoned so that they don't have to serve, but I don't understand this. Some people have good excuses, but other than that, why wouldn't you want to take part in delivering justice to people in your community?

Onto other things...

Okay, here's the deal: I have 741 photos and 21 videos (I realized that the video of the boys wasn't working, but it's fixed now :D) from my four weeks in Jordan & Palestine (minus the pictures/videos I deleted), and I have 626 photos and 5 videos from N, my friend who traveled with me (minus the ones SHE deleted and others), giving us a total that is very close to 1,400 pics.

So last week I decided to finally develop some, 'cause they were all on my computer and I wanted to have some copies on-hand to show people on campus and to show family & friends.

Guess how many I developed?

Just GUESS...

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Five-hundred-and-eighty-one.

And I found a 600-pics photo album to put them in :D