Zub Tales

Thanksgiving dinner and the weather has turned a touch colder here. Halifax is more rainy then Calgary ever was. I don’t mind the rain at all; with only a short walk to work, it’s just a nice distraction instead of an annoyance.

We cooked up a pretty impressive meal considering it was just the two of us: Turkey (just turkey breasts, not a whole turkey), Carrots, Asparagus, Stuffing and Potatoes. We’ve got just enough leftovers to make a second meal out of it, which is damn good. I didn’t want to overdose on turkey meals for the rest of the week. The local liquor store just started carrying the mighty Strongbow cider here, so it was a great meal indeed 🙂

Gal’s been in school for over a month and her schedule has definitely changed the way we do just about everything. She’s working, she’s studying, she’s stressing about assignments and everything else. She is enjoying her time at University, but it has been quite overwhelming for her. Having not been in school for quite a while, it’s a crazy readjustment for her. It’s the kind of schedule where our apartment gets more and more disorganized until one of us gets sick of it and we go on a cleaning rampage doing laundry, dishes and everything else. Then, it slowly degenerates again…

Work-wise, I’m quite a busy guy too. We’ve finally got overlapping episodes (and I hope it keeps up). It means that the work is very steady, but it does make it more hectic too. Still, the bigger pay from it is more than enough incentive. I’ve gotten more confident with my work. I’m getting far less revisions on my backgrounds and have gotten into an even better groove on them.

I can sort of see how monotonous this kind of corporate drawing could be down the road, but at this point it’s still a challenge. Having a wild set of goofballs to work with also helps keep the entertainment value intact. The key animators drawing extra frames of characters doing stupid or sick things that will never, ever air is also a big hoot. It’s juvenile, but hey, this is cartoons.

I’ve been thoroughly distracted at home with new video games. It’s just another thing for me to putter with and play. It’s been a good time waster, especially when the weather is crappy. Currently getting the most play are Unreal Tournament 2003, Grand Theft Auto 3, Links 2003 and Mame (the arcade emulator). If you haven’t tried Mame in particular, you really should; It’s a free download. You can find perfect ports of arcade games, digitized right from the original arcade motherboards. Everything from old games like Pac Man through to new fighting games and shooters are playable on Mame. If you get a good controller for your PC, it’s like an arcade in your room.

I went to a friend’s housewarming party on Friday and was surprised at the conversation that developed there. I ended up chatting with my boss Mark, Cornflake and a few other people about everything from politics, war, the internet, corporations, technology, greed and everything inbetween. A lot of it was negatives and positives of the way society seems to be developing.

I think almost every generation looks at the future as some sort of looming evil. From flappers of the 20’s, the war of the 30’s and 40’s, teens of the 50’s, hippies of the 60’s and 70’s, punks of the 80’s, grunge of the 90’s…it’s easy to look at each successive thing and say that the world is degenerating into something worse. Each time you can point at the “signs” and say that this is the worst it’s ever been. I think it’s more just fear of us getting older and not being the youth anymore. Call it optimism if you want to, but I want to enjoy things instead of obsess over how long until “the end”. I do still see the awful things out there, I do think about them, I just don’t let that wreck everything else.

Trying new Jimbo recipes has been entertaining. Most of the things I’ve cooked have turned out great, but I’ve flubbed now and then. I wrecked a frying pan when I tried to make a honey-garlic sauce with too much real honey. It caramelized and burnt to the pan to the point where taking it off meant taking the coating with it. I tend to cook with high heat, which doesn’t help. I guess I’ve been weened on those cooking shows where everything is sizzling like crazy and the chef is shaking pans and sprinkling stuff in all dramatically. Oh well, it makes dinner time pretty amusing. I never did this when I was eating alone.

Gala and I are both doing our best to save up money for the Christmas holidays. We’ve got flight plans booked and it looks like we’ll be in Toronto from December 19th to the 29th. That should be a decent break and give Gal a better chance to meet my family.

Let me know how you’re all doing.