Exploration

Quiche

2009-11-09T17:25:00.000-08:00

I made my first quiche ever last night. It was a last minute thing so I used a store bought crust. There wasn't a huge selection of crusts so I didn't look that close at what I was buying, knowing they were all crap.

So now that is has been done I aim to develop a better crust for use with the quiche. I suspect this will be an iterative process as I learn and make new ones. Means there will be a lot of quiche in my future.

In the days to come I will share how my crust experiments are going as well as detail some of my ingredients

Last nights quiche

Bison Quiche

300g Bison
1tbsp coconut oil
1/2 onion chopped
1/2 pepper chopped
Handful spinach
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 cup grated cheddar or mix

Browned the ground bison with some 1/4 onion and the coconut oil.
add oregano and sage.
Once close to being browned I added a good handful of spinach.
Then I added the other 1/4 onion and about 1/2 yellow pepper.

While that cooked for a minute I combined 2 eggs and 1/2 cup of 2% milk in a bowl. To this I added about 1/2 of the cheese. I sprinkled another 1/3 on the bottom of the pie crust.
I then added about 1/2 of the bison mixture, and then poured the egg mixture on top. I finished adding the bison mix in and pressed it all together (I probably used to much stuff, it was VERY full of stuff).
Covered the pie with the remainder of the cheese and popped it in a 375f oven for aprox 40mins. A knife will come out of the center clean when it is done.

Let sit for 15minutes once I took it out.

TheDailyPlate.com puts this recipe at about 2100 calories, so 268 per 1/8th of a pie.

Pancakes

2009-11-01T08:47:00.000-08:00

Over the last several months Sunday has become pancake day. Although I am aware of the various protein pancake recipes out there I wanted something a little more pancake like, that was healthful and not hugely caloric.

Initially I was simply using a whole wheat pancake mix at the store. Then one day I was reading the ingredients. Pretty simple. Flours and some baking soda.

I set off to create a solid pancake recipe. I have read a lot of different recipes so this is no doubt a combination of knowledge gained reading blogs and experimentation.

When I first started these the initial cakes were edible, but very very dense.

Below is the current edition of the pancakes. These were this mornings idea, and I think the best I have made.

Pancakes (Makes aprox 9)
1 cup oats ground
1/2 cup oat bran ground
1/8 cup quinoa ground
1 tsp baking soda
1 scoop unflavored whey
100g "balkan" style yogurt (Plain, full fat)
2/3 cup applesauce
2 eggs

Nutrition profile for recipe from http://livestrong.com/thedailyplate
Cals: 882, Carbs: 128g (sugar 7g, fibre: 20g), Protein: 53g, Fat: 27g, Sodum: 256mg

Mix it all together and make as you would pancakes. I use whole oats, regular oat bran and quinoa and grind them in a coffee grinder.

Another change has been syrup. I typically have been taking a cup of frozen blueberries or mixed berries and boiling them with a little water, reducing them and having that over the pancakes

Basic fruit reduction
1/4 cup water
1 cup frozen mixed berries
1 tsp lemon juice

Boil water, and add frozen fruit, turn down to medium. Let simmer. Once cooked a little mash the fruit and let simmer and reduce while you make the pancakes. Check often and turn off at desired consistency.

No more excuses.

2009-10-31T20:05:00.000-07:00

Just an quick update.

I have been at the "new" job for about one and a half years. I think things are going pretty well there now. Schedule is a little more under control. Working 7-5 or there abouts now.

A Gold's Gym opened up this year very close to work so I signed up there. This has alleviated a lot of workout concerns as I can get in at lunch now. I am typically getting to the gym 2-3 times a week for resistance training.

I have also recently added swimming back into the mix. Tuesday's have me heading to the pool to swim for about an hour after work.

Thursdays are typically fight practice in the evenings. This has all come together to mean I am fairly active again, which is good.

Another step in the right direction is going back to food logging. I have started using www.livestrong.com to log my daily calorie intake, 1800 is my goal at the moment, as well as my current weight. This will allow me to better asses the calories I am burning in a week.

Since I have started this I have dropped from 220lbs back to about 210lbs as of today and am doing fine.

What does this all mean? Same thing as always. We may be busy, we may not think we have time, but they are all just excuses. If we want to be healthy and active we need to make it a priority in life and get it done.

Confusion.

2008-06-07T05:40:00.000-07:00

Life progresses onward. School is finished and I have started a new job. I still feel very new even after three weeks. I am however optimistic about it as a good job where I will be able to learn a lot.

Downside to job is I am still pretty busy time wise. Commute is about 1 hour and I start at 7:30am. Need to be out of the house by 6:30am. I work till 5:30 so am not home till about 6:30pm. End result of this is I find my self needing to pick up some sort of exercise routine that fits into my life, which now includes someone else to work around as well.

I used to work out in the morning, and it worked out well for me. I am considering a home gym in order to do this again. Option 2 is a gym membership downtown, which means working out after work, which seems like a good idea, but I am often exhausted after work and I am not 100% convinced I will actually go regularly.

Besides the exercise I also need to get my nutrition in shape. I am having SO much trouble with this. I want to be healthy and have a decent body that I feel good about, but I have such a sweet tooth and desire to eat crap some days. I have been able to suppress it before and ate well for several years. I know how to eat well, but I always seem to think tomorrow is early enough to start.

Really I need to suck it up and get it done.

End of it.

2008-04-24T18:09:00.000-07:00

Well tonight is my official last night on the help desk answering phones. I have approximately 50 minutes left. The job was good to me in some ways. Most people were good when they called, some however are just tools who need to learn to read. They ruin support for the rest of you.

Either way done and out in less than an hour.

Tomorrow is a new day, Tomorrow is my final exam of my program.

Currently I know one mark, it is an A+. I am anticipating 2 more in Linux and Reservoir Engineering and Developmental Geology. This leaves a few wild cards.

Foremost is Geology. I do not know how well I did on the lab exam. I did ok on the midterm, but only managed an 82 on the pretest. I do not feal great about the final. I knew what we were supposed to know, but purposely did not study some stuff as we were told it would not be there. Unfortunately 11 marks worth of it was there. I may be able to squeak out a 90 on the test, but I suspect mid 80s to high 80s is more realistic. So at the end, probably an A in the class, I do not know about the A+ though.

Next up Geop 395. Did well on the lab test I believe. No clue how well the labs were done, we never got them back. The Mid term and quiz were both strong at over 90 and I am pretty sure I crushed the final. Probable A+

The last is Geophysics 397. We had no midterm. The entire class was based on a project and a presentation. I believe I did both well, but do not know for sure as I have not seen the marks. The final for this class is tomorrow. I feel very prepared for it so I am optimistic I can achieve an A+ in this class.

My 4.0 probably hangs on Geology.

So tomorrow is it all done school 2 years later I have a substantially new life. No longer working in retail. My income has approximately doubled, plus better benefits and bonuses. I have a new girlfriend. I am optimistic about the relationship. Life is good.

The biggest change to my life? This institution will be gone. When I moved to Calgary I got my first job here, that was back in 2001. I worked here when the Towers came down and now just about 7 years later I am finally leaving it. It has been good to me for the most part. Good people, good friends, places to live, employment and flexibility for me when I went back to school.

Despite being happy to never have to answer the help desk phone again, the job ensured high marks and no student loan, and for that I am grateful.

That is all for now.

Abstract

2008-02-09T13:39:00.001-08:00

In modern times the ability to find and exploit economically viable hydrocarbon reservoirs is of increasing importance. Being able to determine if a bright spot is a reservoir or just an anomaly is an important part of this challenge. If we can determine this we can drill fewer dry holes, which translate to a more successful company. One of the ways we can determine the fluid content in a potential reservoir is through AVO analysis both traditional AVO and through AVO inversion. AVO inversion techniques where applied to bright spots located off the coast of Trinidad where they have been able to distinguish between hydrocarbon accumulations and non hydrocarbon accumulations in all cases but one. AVO inversion can be a powerful tool which can be used to eliminate false positive bright spots from seismic sections allowing us to drill better and more productive wells.

Thoughts on AVO.

2008-02-02T09:27:00.000-08:00

How do we find out about the subsurface? Seems like a simple problem. There is rocks down there. For some professions that might be good enough, but to find the precious hydrocarbons our planet has locked away it is not nearly enough.

Actually finding out what is 3km or more below the surface is a significant problem.

One method is to drill a hole. Simple, but fairly effective for a small area. We have developed many tools to find out what is down there. Measuring everything from background radiation in rocks to how resistive a rock is.

We can use several holes drilled over a large distance to infer what is down there, but in terms of finding new places to drill that will have hydrocarbons, maybe not the most effective.

Seismic can give us a good idea of what is down there. Essentially we introduce a wave pattern into the earth and then record how it comes back to the surface at various locations and then sum the results to enhance the signal and remove the noise. Once we process these "stacked" waves we can get a good idea of what the subsurface looks like. Figure 1 below shows 2 sources being reflected at a common point and being recorded. Since they have a common reflection point the received wave contains information about the same point.

fig 1

It is important to remeber that it is not a photo, but a mathematical model based on our understanding of rock and wave physics. This means it is not perfect.

The model may exhbit a "bright" spot where the signal returned from the sub surface changes significantly on the displayed section. These can often be caused by a gas reservoir. The gas in the rocks strongly effects how the waves travel and how they return to surface. In figure 2 below we see the amplituides at 1.4 and 1.6 get stronger as we move right to left and then die off again. This may indicate a reservoir. Each second on the diagram correspods to 5000'.

fig 2

Unfortunately often might not even be 50% of the time and drilling every bright spot means a lot of dry holes being drilled. Obviously this is not what we want, drilling a hole 3km into the surface is an expensive prospect.

In figure 1 we would see a difference in amplitude between the two rays despite the fact they are reflecting from the same point, this is caused by the different angle the rays strike the reflector at. As mentioned earlier, summing these or stacking them removes this information but produces a good signal of that point. The formulas for this relationship are complex and have been simplified over time. A simplifictaion by Shuey is the most common way to express this relationship.

Analyzing how the relationship of how the amplitudes change with incidence angle can answer some important questions. Do we see the amplitudes getting weaker as we move further from the source? Or do we see them getting stronger?

In general the responses can be classified in 4 ways and will tell us what type of rock and what type of fluid we have in the pores.

This is the basic idea behind AVO and a formation charged with gas will exhbit a different AVO response than one charged with water. And more importantly it can be used to differeniate a gas charged bright spot from another anomaly.

This gives us a basic understanding of AVO and a place to move forward from.

Another Semester

2007-12-19T12:24:00.000-08:00

Another semester has come and gone. This puts me 1 semester away from actually finishing some kind of post secondary education. Feels pretty good.

The marks this semseter break down as follows...
CMPP 230 Database Design & SQL Program A+
CMPS 320 Unix Systems for Geologist A+
COMM 288 Technical Communications II A+
GEOL 385 Case Studies in Petr. Geology A+
GEOL 390 Log Analysis for Geologists A+
GEOP 396 Advanced Geophysical Appl. A+

This maintains my GPA of 4.0 and continues my lowest mark being a A+, which is a grade higher than 90%.

Christmas is almost here and despite being alone for most of it, it should be relaxing and I am looking forward to it.

Lisa has gone to visit family in Texas, and I miss her already. I know she will not be gone long, but knowing she is not close, knowing I can't if I want to, just go and see her sucks. Depsite the short time together she has become very very dear to me. I love her very much.

Well despite not having written in here in forever I don't seem to have much to say, so to summarize....

Marks good.
I love Lisa.

Win or Die?

2007-09-29T12:51:00.000-07:00

If you don't get in the water you can't drown.
If you don't get in the water you can't win,you can't start and you can't even finish.

Not starting because of fear of failure and pain is a mistake.

Infinite Rage

2007-09-29T07:22:00.000-07:00

More like frustration and certainly not infinite, but discrete frustartion dosen't have quite the ring to it.

The last week has been interesting. I don't mean in one aspect of my life, across all aspects it has been this way.

Gym time has been pretty low over the last week. Once on the weights and once on the treadmill. Although judging from my weight last Monday I am not eating enough to support the amount of exercise I was doing. Typically on Monday I am the heaviest, which I attribute to retention of water from eating poorly over the weekend. Last Monday I was down 4lbs from the previous Friday. When I weighed on Tuesday I was at the same point.

School, well it was an interesting week. We wrote our first linux test this week, I totally forgot we had it till the night before. Such a scatter brain this year so far. Be a miracle if I maintain the A+s. Either way I set about reviewing and making flash cards. I specifically targeted my weak areas. Things like how to get the kernel version number from the system I ignored even though I figured it would be on the test.

# 7 What is the version of the kernel you are running and what command did you use to find it.

No problem. Fire up a command prompt.
Linux:# root:/ $_
Keith: ver
Linux: Unrecognized command.
Linux: # root:/ $_
Keith: Fuck.

Yeah so apparently in DOS you use ver to get version and in Linux, you don't. Guess I didn't know how to do it afterall. On the positive side it was only 2 marks and I found the kernel number stamped on some system files.

The answer is "uname -r" btw.

Well I still think I did decently on it.

Geology and Geophysics were pretty standard this week. We did more accumap in geology lab and more survey layouts from seg-y headers in geophysics.

Oracle. Got our test back from last week. 48 out of 50. I'll take it. One wrong which I legitimately answered wrong and one wrong that I guessed at.

Well logging. The interesting course this week. As in ANCIENT CHINESE CURSE kind of interesting. Class starts as well as usual. Andreas has a new plan which I am happy to try. He has an assignment on his website. No trouble. He is going to go over it one at a time. This will force people to pay attention and follow what he is doing.

We do not have printouts, but we have two monitors. I open the assignment up on one and the log we are looking at on the other. I copy and past the log into paint so I can make notes. I also have facebook up. Initially I am having trouble keeping up with him, or that is how it feels at any rate. I feel he is all over in terms of speed. I can't guage how long I will have to write things down I start becoming frustrated right away.

We got through question #1, then we get to question #2. Brock puts up his hand and asks how to do #3. At my current frustartion levels this pushes me into an even deeped frustration. Can he not see that Andreas is about to show us that and we don't need to slow things down by asking him retarded questions.

#3 is a volume shale calculation. Basically we are figuring out a ratio between how much is at one point in the log compared to the difference between the sand line and the shale line.

The formula in the book reads....
Vclay = Vshale = (SPclean - SPlog)/(SPclean-SPshale)
where
SPclean = Max SP deflection from a nearby clean section
SPlog = log reading from the point of interest
SPshale = SP reading from the shale baseline.

On this log the scale is as follows
SAND SHALE
-90 -80 -70 -60 -50 -40 -30 -20 -10 0 10

No trouble, I have been reading a lot on this stuff I understand how the SP log works. I can't really read the board from where I am, but I go to town. I calculate 56% or something. He calculates around 44%. Hmm I think. I ask Natalie next to me what numbers he is using??

She tells me. I ask what he is using in each variable. And this is where the train loses it.
He is using Vshale = (4-(-40))/(4-(-82).
I am using Vshale = ((-82)-(-40))/((-82)-(4))

Ie I have used
SPclean = -82
SPshale = 4
he has gone the other way.

So now I am frustrated and I don't get why. I stand up and walk to the front to read the board myself. admitedly I am now in a POOR mood. I point at the board and ask where he got the 4 from???? He tells me it's the shale measurement. I ask why? Why not the clean? I don't get it. He starts explaining the concept of the formula. I don't want to hear this I want to know why the hell we are using 4 where it says SPclean. I turn and walk back to my desk muttering, he replys that maybe if I put up my hand like everyone else etc etc. Sure I can now agree with that, but in my poor mood it did not help things. I sit down and put up my hand. I repeat my question. He starts explaining how the formula works. I interupt and start to ask again why we are use the shale line value in the clean spot. he interupts me and tells me not to worry about the formula in the book.

That is the last straw in my brain. I have gone from frustarated to argumentitve and I know I am done, I know nothing is gonna help now. I leave. I get up and leave the class in a VERY pissed off state.

So unlike me. I can not believe how frustrated I got over the whole thing. So now I get to go back and apologize for my outburst and I still have no idea why he would put the values in the way he did. I also have no contact information for him so I can't even ask in private.

Summary: I handled it very poorly. He is smart. He is a lousy instructor in my books.

And that wraps up school and moves on to the love life.

Lisa and I are getting along well still. We are still enjoying each others company and she is making a lot of effort to see me when she can, which makes me feel pretty damned special. We have had a small conversation about where things might be going. Half of her wants to try and make something from this and the other half is scared. I can't say I blame her.

I think we will both be ok though. She makes me smile and makes me happy and obviously cares for me as much as I care for her.

What an emotional web we weave.

Change of Perspective.

2007-09-22T09:35:00.000-07:00

Time invariably marches on. What we do with that time is the issue. Opportunities are always there, we just need to open our eyes and see them.

I have not stopped caring about Shannon, and like other relationships in my past I know that when someone touches me as deeply as that I always will. This does not mean I can not move on.

I spent a lot of time thinking about how to win her back, how to fix things, how to be better for her. In the end I needed to realize that it was truly done. I needed to realize that nothing I could do would fix things, or bring her back. All I was really doing was causing us both pain, which is not what I wanted to do.

What does this have to do with opportunity and opening your eyes. I moved on and decided to live life. I asked out a woman I had wanted to ask out for awhile, but was unable to because I was shy and to emotionally encumbered. This wouldn't make much of a blog entry if she had said no, so I will assure you she did not say no.

We have been out a couple of times and we are both looking forward to our next date. She is intelligent and attractive, a great combination. She is originally from England, still has an accent and uses what I consider to be insanely addorable British slang.

I currently do not know where things are headed right now with her. I know we enjoy each others company, and are wanting to take things slow.

The end point of all this is that life dosen't just dump things on your doorstep. You need to take an active role in how you want things to play out. Sure it might steer you, you can not for instance control the actions of other people who effect your course. But you can actively navigate along the corridor provided.

And now on to school and a breakdown of the classes.

Geophysics 396: Seismic survey design. We are learning how to determine optimal fold right now and by the end of it we should be able to design an effective 3d survey to image a subsurface event effectively. Lab wise we are learning to read SEG-Y header information and determine the subsurface survey size by locating the max/min inlines and CDPs. Using the corner points (in UTM) we are able to plot the survey. This is all for orthogonal layouts mind you.

Geology 385: Case studies. We are going through a case study or two every week. Basically an overview of a field and what they are doing there that makes it interesting. With weyburn we talked about secondary and tertiary recovery as well as horizontal drilling into marly formations. Lake Newell talked about deviated wells again, but with rigs starting at 45 degrees so they could get a much steeper angle much faster on the borehole. In the labs we are learning accumap and becoming much more framiliar with querying the large database to find information on wells and other things. We will also learn geo-scout later in the semester.

Comm 288: Technical communications. This course involves writing a large team project. We are doing it in conjuction with Geology 385. We basically pick a field, Ricinus, in our case and are writing a term project with the aim to sell "Cardium Unit #1" of the Ricinus field to the investors. The teams are broken down into a company President, VP Production, VP Land and VP Exploration. I have been given the exploration role for our company. The cardium formation should be ok and I have already found a lot of overview on the depositional environment it was formed in. With the addition of well logs and hopefully some seismic it should be interesting.

Geology 390: Well logging. This course is essentially self taught. We have a new instructor who is a PHd and I am sure SUPER smart and a nice guy, but he is not currently a great presenter. He is planning some more interactive stuff next week. We shall see how it goes. The concepts make sense now. Once you have a clue what each of the logs do you have a better chance at understanding the curves the log readings draw. The whole idea is pretty cool.

For instance clay based rocks(shales) have more of a particular potassium isotope than sandstone does. Shales are source rocks, where the Hc comes from and sandstones are resevoir rocks, the places that the Hc is stored.

By running a tool down the well bore we can measure the presence of this isotope along the well bore. Neutron logs bombard the formation with neutron. These neutrons are absorbed when then contact a hydrogen atom and release a gamma ray. The release of these rays can be measured. This indicates a presence of hydrogen, most noteably water. The presence of this water can give us another indication of porosity, or lack there of.

Formation density logs can be used to determing the porosity of the fomation (How much empty space is in the rock to store Hc).

We also run electrical logs which can be used to measure the resistivity of the fomation. Archie conducted expriments and figured out formulas that describe how formation resistivities change with the presence of water saturation, porosity, and water resistivity changes.

Putting these all together we come up with something like this....

We have three columns. The first has the SP log and the Gamma ray log. They measure essentially the same thing, changes in gross lithology. Gamma is preferred. The scale moves from a reading of 0 to 150 API units for the gamma ray log. So when the line is on the right we have a high reading and so it is a shale. as the line moves left our isotope count is dropping, the formation is becoming more sandy. The second column is showing the resistivity of the formation. You will note that the resistance spikes at one point registering over 20 ohm-ms. The last column is showing us the density log (FDC) and the Neutron log (CNL). As the log moves down the CNL line suddenly drops telling us that there is low hydrogen in the formation there. Looking at the Density log we see the two lines cross at this point as well. The density log is indicating an area of high porosity. Combining all these logs we see that at the top of the log we have a shale that is becoming sandy as we get deeper. At a certain point the resistivity shoots through the roof. At the same point we have an indication of low porosity from the Neutron log. and an indication of high porosity from the density log. Really the Neutron log is not showing us low porosity, it is showing us low hydrogen. So low hydrogen in a high porosity area?

Gas contact. This also fits with the other two logs. High resistivity and moving into a resevoir type system.

From the gamma ray log we can also infer that the grain sizes in the rocks are getting smaller as we move up, or fining upwards. This may indicate a river type depositional environment or it may indicate a transgressive sealevel along a shore line. Both of these should result in a fining upwards trend. Looking at the whole gamma log I would probably go with the shoreline or barrier island type system. Starting near the bottom we have a shaly sequence that moves into sandstone. It coarsens upwards. This indicates that sea was in a regressive state. Over time sandstones were deposited. Then we see that it moves back into shales as we get towards the top indicating that the sea has transgressed back onto the land.

A lot of information from a few wiggly lines.

The last two classes are Unix, where we are dealing with linux at the moment, mostly at the command line. It is currently fairly boring, but we are moving into commands like grep which are newer to me and so a little more interesting. The other is Oracle which is ok, currently we are building pretty simple databases and the commands are coming pretty slow. We can also practice on-line so I can work on it anywhere easily. It is a pretty good class.

All in all it is a pretty good semester, despite the well logging stuff being self taught.

Well that is all for now!

Choices

2007-08-16T07:57:00.001-07:00

Everyday we make choices. They guide us through our life like a giant choose your own adventure book. You have just got home from work, what do you do: Go for a run, turn to page 15 or Lay on the couch and watch a movie, turn to page 75. Some are simple, some are more complex. Sometimes we know a choice is right to make and we still make the wrong ones. Part of what makes us Human; we are not totally designed on logic.

I was originally writing this as a comment on exercise and nutrition. We can choose to eat properly or we can choose to work out. We can choose to be dedicated. These choices all fall directly to us. Now though this is more about life and relationships, making the hardest choices of all.

Emotion is such a huge part of us. It is an important part of us, but one that must not run rampant over all logic. I am guilty of this at times, and at times I am guilty of no emotion and just seeing through logical eyes.

I have made many choices over my life, as have we all, some are small and we make them everyday, some without thinking. Others are larger; I made a choice to not weigh 300lbs. Some of these choices workout for the best others do not.

My weakest area on choices is easily relationships. I can make the decision to be with someone, to give them my heart, to let my emotional barriers down. That is no problem. I can make the decision to be with them, to love them forever. This is not my issue. After awhile, maybe things aren’t perfect for whatever reason, emotions take over without logic, without the thought that I love this person and want to be with them. Emotions of fear and being with one woman forever emerge. I guess maybe it boils down to a fear of committing to what I want so very badly. I choose to withdraw. I move away and in the end either I break up or she breaks up with me. I am left wondering what the hell happened. Most of the time perhaps it was for the best, maybe my fears were because I couldn’t be who they needed me to be. Or I wasn’t willing to work on things enough.

Ironically when I look back at my history of relationships, the closest thing to a one night stand was a series of encounters with a friend that was still probably 3 or 4 months long. I am not one to look for tail every where, I am certainly not a playa. So then why after a time do I wonder if the girl I am with is the right one? Why do I wonder and pull away from the relationship. It makes very little logical or emotional sense to me to pull away from what I want.

In the end I make the choice and I have to live with it. If she makes the choice not to be with me, and truly believes in it, I need to stand by her choice and let her make it. I need to choose to be a better person, someone who is less selfish. I can’t just decide to turn off my feelings, but I can decide how I am going to act on them. Sometimes I choose to be selfish and in doing so I end up hurting people I love. I do not want to be this person anymore, I want to be better for me and for the people I love.

Choices, we can all make ones that will make our life better. Sometimes we do, sometimes we don’t. Choices are however what will guide us: how we choose to react to things, how we choose to interact with others, how we choose to live our lives.

For now I need to make some hard choices, and the last few days have been fairly insightful for me. I choose to let how things are be good thing for me. I choose to understand and accept why Shannon can’t be with me. I choose to not dwell on rekindling the past relationship with her. I choose to not live for the slim hope of a possible future with her at my side. I choose to be someone she can trust to be a friend, not someone she can trust has an ulterior motive.

Tournament and being fed up.

2007-06-30T06:31:00.000-07:00

Well I can not deny this year has been interesting. Unfortunately a lot of it has been the ancient Chinese curse kind of interesting. Some days I have a hard hard time staying focused and being positive.

It seems as soon as something good occurs something bad occurs to nullify it. The last good thing was the job, I am still looking forward to it. I am happy that this is the last day I will most likely be sitting here doing this job. For a couple of months anyhow. To counteract the new job I get word that my rent is going up $100 a month. Well now I can't say that it is now a lot, but it is more. The new amount is pretty on par with single room rents I guess. However I no longer feel it is necessarily mutually beneficial for me to live there. At the new rental price I can find a place much closer to school. In the end I would rather it stay where it is, but if it has to go up it will and I will live somewhere else.

Over the horizon looms a potential place, only a few blocks from SAIT for essentially the same money with someone I know. Perfect. I will take a look next week. Another good thing. Now though it must be time to duck.

Reading the SAIT notices for employees I come across an interesting tidbit. They have moved tuition deadline from the start of classes at the end of August to the end of July. They will notify new students in an orientation package that is going out in mid-July and they will post a general announcement on the Student homepage on July 9. Wow. Not only are they moving the date a full 30 days closer, they are dragging their feet in telling us Students. In the end instead of having this pay cheque and two additional pay cheques to save for tuition. Now I have THIS cheque.

Will I come up with the money? I guess I will have to, but all it will do is introduce stress into my life that I really don't need.

And on to Tournament.

I went to practice on Thursday it was the monthly Tavern, sort of like a mini-event. We held a small triple elimination tournament.

When I arrived on scene there was absolutely nobody I knew. We have a lot of new fighters that have started in the year or so since I practiced. That's great I think to myself. A bunch of unknowns. Not in the sense that they are nobodies, but in the sense that they are Xs in the fighting equation. I have no idea how much skill they posses, or how long they have been fighting for.

I start messing around with my stuff and Varrus shows up. Yay, someone I know. Now Varrus is also going to school and hasn't been to practice in about as long as me. Good to see a familiar face. I think when it was all said and done the lists had maybe 18 or so people, 4 or so I knew fairly well.

I fight a few warm-up fights and it's a good thing I work out and in somewhat decent shape, because once you put that helmet on and start moving and swinging your stick around you overheat almost instantly. Still despite how fast I got tired, the guys I was fighting got tired before me. Or at least quit before me :D

Eventually they call us in and we do a Grand Melee. In this warm-up we all start in a circle and when it starts we engage each other in single combat until someone is victorious over the field. I win my first fight of the Grand Melee, but I lose my legs and have to go to my knees. My hamstrings cramp up almost instantly. I apparently am unable to effectively fight from my knees and die in the next combat. I spend the next few minutes trying to work the cramp out and get on with things.

The first few rounds are challenge rounds, I am victorious a couple of times. I fight a guy I know, and am victorious again. Well at least I didn't get knocked out in three. I fight Varrus. He wins, but the fight was fun. The tourney progresses. I have to fight one of my early victories again. This time I lose.

In the middle of the tournament the sky clouded and the rain and thunder came. I looked up at the sky, and wondered if this was a bad sign for me? I play a Mongol persona and once of their chief deities is the everlasting sky, Mongke Tengri.

Then there are three of us left. Me, Varrus and Robert. I had just fought Robert so I am picked to fight Varrus again. Not an impossible fight my any means, but not an easy one either. We square off and Varrus comes at my like a Roman devil. Damn I was SO not expecting it. Either way I managed to fend off his mad demon rush and hold him off long enough to get my composure back. The sun begins to emerge from the clouds and it is obvious, to me at least, that Tengri, the eternal sky is smiling upon me as Varrus falls to my blade. We stand up as we had both lost our legs. Both of us non-practiced guys are experiencing leg cramps, so despite us having issues it put neither of us at a disadvantage.

Now in their infinite wisdom they have decided "by" fights are destructive. Robert has the by this round and loses. It was his third loss, so he is out. Final two. Me and Varrus. We are both dead tired and sore at this point, we are both even with two losses. Typically in tournament they fight something like that best two out of three. We are old and tired, we opt for sudden death, next one to die loses.

Now it is important to note here, because I find this little factoid far more entertaining than who won in the end. A field of 15-18 guys, most of which probably practice fairly regularly and those who do not, do not because they are lazy, not because school or work interfere. Of this field the two guys left? Varrus and myself. Two guys who haven't fought in ages.

In the last fight I couldn't tell you exactly how it went down, only that again as the thunder shower passed and the sky and sun opened to smile upon the field, it was a good day to be a Mongol.

Bodyweight....

2007-06-24T23:23:00.000-07:00

So I have always found bodyweight training interesting. Why don't I do it? Not sure, partly because it doesn't feel like I am going anywhere to do it, so I lose focus and maybe wander back to the computer or something.

I do not believe that we are unable to get a good resistance based workout with just our own bodyweight. I am well aware I can get a kick ass workout.

So with this in my brain a friend mentioned something in his training log which I hadn't heard of before. The TRX. I asked what that was. He gave me a link to the item in question, http://www.fitnessanywhere.com/index.php

So my first thought was $200 was pretty pricey. However the guys who have it say it is worth the money. Maybe, but I still have trouble seeing materials and work on the device adding up to that much.

Either way I thought it interesting and worth trying out. I found some rope and a set of old hollow plastic dumbbell handles. I made handles and then every so often I tied knots in the rope. My thought was I could loop the handles through and attach it at different points like you would attach a yo-yo to your finger. So far I have only played with it indoors on door frames where the knots work as stops.

Before I got started I thought it might be an interesting gadget. I got ready to try it to see just how useful it might be. I put the rope over the door and closed it so I could try some push-ups. I can do push-ups so I set the handles so they would be close to the floor. I got down. I put my hands in the handles and attempted to do a push-up. I stress attempted. The fact my hands were able to move in any direction made it essentially impossible. Ok I thought. I moved it so I was on more of an angle and presto I could do chest press exercises. Rows were fine, I could do those as well, which was handy as heck.

You can always do push-ups for chest exercises but sometimes there is just no where you could do any type of back movement. With this device you can. Very cool.

So then I started messing around on-line. I found reverse crunches, hamstring work etc. Roland suggested I try ab roll-outs with it. Roland is a pretty nice guy, at least I thought so, maybe he hates me, those were HARD on my abs. Crazy hard.

The last really cool thing I have discovered is the assisted pistol squat. Essentially the suspension system is used to balance and add assistance in doing a one legged squat. Even with the system I was only able to do 3 or 4 in a row.

In the end I am 100% sold on the idea as a system and will be using it as the basis of my resistance training for the next few months at least while I don't have easy cheap access to a gym. I am still not willing to spend $200 on it though. I will remain with the rope system for now, with the intention of building a "proper" one as well as a few other goodies in the next week or so.

In other news what turned out to be a scouting mission for webbing turned into a 44km bike ride this afternoon (with a short break for coffee). My legs are still tired. The way into town was awesome I felt fantastic and had a great ride. The way out was evil. Lots of hills and I was tired and trying to outrun a thunderstorm. Unfortunately as you can guess, being tired and riding uphill equals a pretty slow progression. The storm however was not moving that slow. About 5km out, ie 20mins or so if caught up to me. By the end of it I was DRENCHED. Was so happy to get into a warm shower!

Shannon and I are also getting along well and chat on-line most days. In a lot of ways this is great and in other ways painful. As I have stated before I care about her immensely and have decided I would rather have her in my life as a friend than not at all. So it is great I get to stay in touch with her and also painful because it is hard to honor her decision about our relationship and just be a friend, and not try to actively encourage her to change her mind about things.

Apparently I have a lot to say these days...

A few steps, things coming together

2007-06-20T20:50:00.000-07:00

Been a little while since I wrote especially considering all the current goings on in my life. However I wanted to tell some people about things in person before they read them here.

Well we will start with the diet and nutrition portion of my life. Still going well. I have stuck religiously to plan A of the TNT plan. This does not mean I couldn't do things better, but I could most certainly do things worse. Everything I have eaten is approved on this plan and I have not strayed into processed carbs and starchy vegetable land. This puts us 20 days into the plan.

My home scale has shown more dramatic changes than the gym scale, this may be to me weighing after working out, consuming water etc. It is the same time of the day so you would think it may weight heavier but still show the same sort of weight move. Either way I am not concerned about my overall weight, I am really desiring to me leaner, more than anything.

The gym scale put me at about 217 or so last week and my home scale put me at 205 or so yesterday, but more importantly it registered the lowest bodyfat # I have ever seen it even consider for me. This combined with pants feeling a little looser makes me pretty happy.

The next large thing is a car. In a previous post I put up a picture of a car I was considering buying. Well it is officially mine. I can drive anywhere I want now. Not that I do a lot, but it is great for getting groceries and other errands on the weekends when transit out of here is horrible.

Lastly I went for an interview with Western Geco. They showed me around and I enjoyed myself. It rekindled my interest in what we were doing in school, it had been two months since I had looked at anything related to exploration. In the end they did not offer me a job and in all honesty I was crushed. I talked about this awhile ago, after I had come to terms with it, my words didn't really do the magnitude of my disappointment justice.

However that behind me I had another interview with Total E&P. A company I had frankly never heard of before. It was for an IT position not an exploration position. I was less enamoured with this job. I went to the interview anyhow. I have always been told you should do as many as possible to get used to it, so they are less intimidating.

I went to it. Total E&P may not be big in Canada, but they are it turns out a HUGE player elsewhere. They were founded in the middle east in 1924, and have just recently moved into Canada in 1999 to set up oil sands operations. They have plans to build their own upgraderer and have already outgrown two downtown office floors. They told me they had gone from 15 to 225 employees in the last few years. The position was essentially what I was already doing with a few important differences. 1) More money 2) Downtown office(I have always wanted to work downtown) 3) AWESOME downtown location above the Devonian gardens. 4) Relevant industry. Contacts made through this job will be 100 times more valuable than contacts made at SAIT. The kicker is that if I can't work at Total in the fall due to conflicts I am more than welcome to come back to the help desk at SAIT. Yes this means I was offered the job and I accepted. I start July 3rd and have a 2 month contract till the end of August.

So in the end life is pretty good and I will leave you with the Dalia FPSO (Floating Production Storage and Offloading). Dalia FPSO is 300m long, 60m wide and 32m high. She is big.

Low carb, potatoes and Ubuntu

2007-06-09T21:43:00.001-07:00

So if anyone reads this and has been paying attention you will note I have been eating a low carb regime as recommened by Adam Campbell and Dr. Jeff Volek. They are publishing a new book out in November I believe called The TNT Diet (Timed Nutrition Tactics)

So I have done well and have managed not to stray, of course I can eat full fat sour cream and regular pepperoni so it's not THAT hard.

However to be creative I went back to a recipe I see pop-up every once in awhile. Low Carb Mashed Potatoes. I didn't use any recipes because frankly I was not impressed the last time I tried it. This time I boiled up about 1/2 head of cauliflower until tender and then drained it. I put that in the food processor with a couple tbsp of butter and maybe 5tbsp of ranch dressing (1 carb per tbsp). I wizzed this all up until it was kinda creamy like mashed potatoes.

Two thumbs up this time. It was very tasty. I probably made enough for two or three people, but it was so good I ate it all. I figure in total I am looking at about 11g of sugar from the cauliflower, 10 or so of fibre and 7 grams of protein. I am officially stuffed as well, so I probably ate to much of it.

In other news I finally backed up my computer to DVD and wiped XP. It was in serious need for a re-install. However this time I don't do much, 90% of what I do is on-line and the rest is chat based and the occasional document. So I chose to install Ubuntu 7.0 instead of Windows XP. Well it still looks like linux as it is a gnome environment on it for the GUI.

In terms of use, it is easy. If I need to find a package I can search for it in the Synaptic Package manager. If it is not brand new it will probably be there all compiled up and ready to go for me. Ubuntu handles the install and away I go.

So after a day I am impressed. I have music and my iPod is connected, probably the one thing I was most worried about.

Vroom Vroom

2007-06-08T15:54:00.001-07:00

Beginning earlier this year I began a quest of sorts to purchase an automobile. A CHEAP automobile. I plan on upgrading in about a year, once I have a real job.

So I began looking through classifieds. Then my boss mentioned one of the client support guys was looking to sell a car for about $2000. A little high, but they have 3 cars and just want to get rid of this one.

In the end it turns out to be a 1991 Honda Accord with a little surface rust. It is an automatic and runs well. It sports 291,000km. A lot perhaps, but in line for the age of the car.

So after much humming and hawing and convincing and unconvincing. I have decided to go for it. I would rather buy it from someone I trust than a dealer. So the inspection will cost about $70. The car will go for $1500. Insurance should run me about $80 a month. We won't talk about gas. My current usage model is envisioned as not using it to get to work, but using it for shopping, and getting places with the bike etc.

It will be the first vehicle I have owned in quite sometime and I am looking forward to it. Hopefully we can get all the details worked out by next week. It would be handy to have to get to the 5km race I am planning on entering on the 17th.

Life goes on

2007-06-08T14:16:00.000-07:00

So I didn't get the job. So what? nothing has changed. I still have my current job, I still get paid enough to live. I still have a roof over my head. I didn't get flooded out.

In other news TNT Plan A is going well. I am surviving just fine without processed carbs, no surprise. I am surviving just fine without sugar from fruit or from oatmeal, perhaps a little more surprising. Intervals are just as evil as I remember, but I will do them as well as my other goals, I will give this plan a very fair shake and maybe come out a little leaner and maybe even with a little more muscle.

Not much else going on right now.

Jamie Oliver

2007-06-04T11:11:00.001-07:00

Been a little while since I have watched Jamie do any cooking on the ole TV.

I don't have a TV. I have however over the last month managed to catch 4 or 5 episodes of his new show. The guy is a star, and has easily double or trippled my desire to cook and expriment again.

You can get some of his recipes on www.foodtv.ca

His new show is done very rustic, older looking kitchen, almost cabinish, a lot of outdoor cooking in a wood over, over charcoal etc. As always he is picking his own herbs. However now he is big time and is not picking them from his window box, he is pulling them from his massive garden and making his gardener try things. (What a crappy job that guy has, not) Because of his garden he is now pulling produce out of it as well, fresh tomatoes, beans, berries, you name it. he is very encouraging when it comes to people growing there own stuff.

His website describes the new show as follows, Check it out. He makes it look as easy as it is.

This series is my chance to get back to doing what I love: cooking at home with simple, accessible ingredients. Over the last few years I’ve been growing my own fruit and veg with the help of my gardener Brian.

It’s a really laid back show and each episode focuses on a particular theme – it could be a look at all the different varieties of tomatoes, what you can do with lovely home-grown potatoes, or how to cook different cuts of lamb – but I’ll also be looking at how easy it is to grow your own produce; sometimes in weird and wonderful ways.

Even if you live at the top of a block of flats you will be able to have a go at growing something! It’s a celebration of no-nonsense beautiful seasonal food – a proper cooking show for modern-day people.

PAIN and diet.

2007-06-02T14:21:00.000-07:00

61 small steps to be preformed. 1 step taken. 60 to go.

I hit the gym on Friday and I did the New Rules of Lifting break in program A. Now it's the day afterwards. I can tell you that walking, sitting, moving in general sucks. DOMS has set in with a vengenace. At least it's a "good pain", one that makes you feel like you did something.

On the other side of the challenge I started TNT plan A yesterday as well. So far so good. No huge shocks to my system. No cravings over and above wanting to shove crap in my face when I am bored.

KABOOM!

2007-05-31T21:39:00.000-07:00

Well today it was illustrated to me why I am not a betting man. The one thing in the past uncountable years. The one certainty I would have bet on, the Calgary Transit work stoppage has been avoided by a tentative deal that goes for ratification tomorrow. Crazy. No such thing as a sure thing.

So there are a few places in Calgary where the bike paths suck ass. Some of the paths are wide sidewalks, and then they suddenly turn off. Not at an intersection mind you, but in the middle of the road. The signs say bike path left and forward. If you look on a map though it shows that the forward path is a designated on road route. So now you are actually riding on a sidewalk. Something I sorta hate and still do sometimes. Yesterday I had elected not to turn off on to the park path, but instead to go further north before turning into the neighborhood and snaking my way home. I have taken the route in previous years no big deal.

So there I am on the sidewalk, approaching an intersection, tree is obscuring the vision a little so I slow down as I approach. I see a car approaching the intersection. He slows, i ease off the breaks, and get ready to coast across. He stops slowing. Fuck. At this time I suspect I should have jammed on the pedals and tried to slip by him, but no. I hit the breaks and stop dead infront of him. I actually thought for a second, a brief fleeting second that his bumber would stop in time. Long story short he bumps into me a little. I get a couple of scrapes, I don't even get knocked over. The front tire is however BENT badly, unrideable.

The guy was nice enough about it, left me his number as he had offered to pay for repairs and drove me the rest of the way home. Probably a bit older than me. Saucony shoes in the front driver seat as well as a health club tag on his key chain. At least I got hit by someone who can appreciate cycling and not a total redneck douch like the prick that ran over Fish and then sped off.

Rock and a hard place. I wasn't on the proper side of the street. I was against traffic and on the sidewalk. I was not in the right place. He certainly did not look right as he pulled into the intersection, he slowed initially because he was looking left at oncoming traffic. Could have just as easily been a small child chasing a ball instead of me. Part of me really dosen't think he should pay, part of me would take half. None of me thinks he should pay for all of it.

I looked over the bike tonight a little closer, since I need to take it in for repairs. (What kinda shop opens at 10am?) Front wheel is pretty obviously screwed. Back wheel looks pretty decent, it maybe has a little whobble, but it might have been there already. It isn't enough that it touches the brakes. The rear shifter seems to work fine. the front shifter works, but on the smallest gear the cage is now touching the cage. I do not believe the forks or frame is bent. So hopefully it's a new wheel and a minor adjustment on the cage and I am good to go again.

interestingly enough the title of this entry has nothing to do with a collision. Instead it refers to TNT, Timed Nutrition Tactics. A new work by Adam Campbell and Jeff Volek. I have been fortunate enough to have a sneak peek of what it will be like and am basing my new nutrion plan around it. The next 4 weeks are low carb. Not atkins VERY low, but low. No grains, breads, sugars etc. Plenty of meats, fats and vegetables.

I am stating this new plan in time with the JPfitness 61 Day Summer Challenge. My tracking spreadsheet, personal goal section and grocery bill are all available at
http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pcYKF234Hk5WTYj2BGLy7JA
My training log for at least the next 61 days is at
http://forums.jpfitness.com/showthread.php?p=391537#post391537

It should prove to be interesting. The 52 day challenges at Mens Health have been a great help to me in losing the weight.

Strike!

2007-05-02T21:30:00.000-07:00

Although it is not official Calgary Transit is on the verge of going on Strike. I am both looking forward to it and dreading it.

It will force me to ride my bike to work, which is about 12km one way. It could potentially be very good for me. On the other side until it is, it will suck. :)

School went well. After losing round 1 to stats, scoring 76% on the first of two midterms after a very bad day, I managed to come back and score 100% on the second midterm and quiz right before it. In the end I managed to squeak out an A+ in the class. It was a relief to not have my row of +s interuppted.

30019 CMPN 269 Computer Networking A+
30109 CMPP 334 Java Programming Level I A+
30025 DRLG 220 Drilling Fund. for Exploration A+
30050 GEOL 380 Exploration Geology A+
30026 GEOP 296 Geophysical Data Processes II A+
30024 STAT 240 Statistics A+ 4.000

Straight across the board. That's what I am talking about. So we exit the first year with a 4.0 GPA. Can't complain about that.

In other news I recieved a $500 scholarship from Landmark Graphics. That was nice. I will be applying for it again. They hand them out to students in second and third semesters.

Work is still pretty up in the air though, not 100% sure what I am doing over the summer. Waiting to hear about a geophysics job, and if that falls through I am stuck at SAIT for the summer. I never get to leave. I feel like the place is the mob. hahahha.

On the relationship front, I am doing mostly ok. There are still nights where I miss Shannon intensley. I don't suspect it will go away anytime soon. I care about her and hope she knows that even if I do my best to not contact her. I figure it is easier for her if I don't. When I miss her she is the only one I want to talk to about it.

The strangest thing for me has been that the scarf she made me is the one thing that really triggers me emotionally, for good or bad. Sometimes I don't put enough appreciation into homemade gifts, but it is pretty clear to me that I should. This item she made for me with her love and two hands is probably one of the most important things to me right now.

Continuation

2007-04-18T21:24:00.000-07:00

Well as we can see I was not in the best mood when I wrote the last entry.

I am officially single, and as of last weekend after seeing her again to collect some stuff, it suddenly seemed so VERY final. Hit home pretty hard, I am sure for both of us.

The next few days were pretty bad, I was sad and feeling very sorry for myself. I talked to her on-line a couple of nights ago and it was very very hard and again or still I was sad. A couple days later now that some of the emotions have passed I am happy I chatted with her and told her how much she meant to me, even if we were not destined to be together.

I don't know if I totally agree with her reasons for breaking up, but in the end I guess I don't need to. They are her reasons and it takes two to make it work. I won't say we had a perfect relationship. I am not always or ever, perhaps, the best communicator. Maybe even part of me never thought it would work. I personally think that is a part of me that I don't like and a part of me from my past. Not perfect? yes. Workable? I thought so.

No matter.

At this time in a much less emotional state I have decided instead of dwelling on the break-up and how much I miss her, that I would focus on the past. That I would focus on when she was happy with us, when we were BOTH very happy with us.

Thanks for everything Shannon, know I love you.

Life sucks

2007-04-15T13:34:00.000-07:00

Despite working as hard as you can at life, it can still kick you in the gut.

life sucks.

Interesting links....well I think so anyhow

2007-02-17T06:21:00.000-08:00

Surfing about last night I came across a fairly indepth website.

Sure I had seen the USGS website which has some cool stuff on it, although all about the US. However last night I came across what amounts to our equivalent agency, Natural Resources Canada: Earth Sciences Sector. Maybe not as catchy as USGS, but still has a lot of stuff. The link is http://ess.nrcan.gc.ca/index_e.php.

So a quick overview finds Maps, images, data, a geoscience data repository, links to other sources of information on geology.

The geoscience section has a tonne of information on geophysical surveys in Canada. Most of it seems to be just basic logging information, however some of the stuff, ie the Seismic and magnetotelluric data (Lithoprobe) section,http://gdr.nrcan.gc.ca/seismtlitho/index_e.php, has a fair bit of interesting stuff. They have a website dedicated to the project as well, http://www.lithoprobe.ca/.

Also I found something called the Frontier Geoscience Project, which is described as "From 1984 to 1990, over 6800 kilometres of deep (> 15 s) multichannel reflection seismic data were collected offshore Eastern Canada". You can download a lot of the segy data as well as read the processing reports for them, ie line 84-1 is located here, http://gdr.nrcan.gc.ca/fgp/grand_e.php#841. Most of the sections aren't hugely exciting, but the processing sequence is of interest to see how they got from acquisition to section.

The USGS has a similar site for segy and images of the sections located here, http://geopubs.wr.usgs.gov/open-file/of02-368/data98.html. Some good ones there. Much larger and much higher resolution.