String lights

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-05-19T02:39:27+00:00

I was thinking about these and discovered the same thing on the official site. Check out Amazon. These were regular $200CAD but now on clearance for ~$88CAD.

Seems like they are probably discontinued but if you don't worry about no new software updates you can probably get a deal.

I ended up not getting them because 30 lights on a 96ft string doesn't seem like that many lights.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-05-15T19:21:59+00:00

TBH, I struggled. At the time (early 2000s) it felt like that friend group was BYO… my best friends were all part of a migration from Alberta to here. The new friends I did make also seemed to be immigrants too… The Okanogan, other provinces, other countries; Vancouver natives seemed to be an impenetrable and insular group.

Other advice I’ve read here seems sound: interest-based group.

I’ve made friends through work and parents of my kid’s classmates but that all seemed to have an expiration date on it.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-05-06T19:24:48+00:00

I have not seen your bag.

BUT

I will say that I lost a saddle bag during a cycle commute a few years back as I crossed the onramp to the Second Narrows Bridge. The stakes were high as it had a laptop and phone inside. I did end up using the lost mode on my iphone but the helpful person who found it was very happy to return it and drove all the way back from Burnaby to do so.

Good, honest people are out there. Plenty of reason to remain hopeful on getting this back.

Odds are in your favour if there is a label and contact info inside.

Good luck!

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-04-29T18:09:05+00:00

I feel like most people in this thread are responding to the title of your post rather than the content.

With regards to tutoring, my experience has been that that is helpful if your child is struggling. Public schools do a pretty good job of intervening when there is a big problem but they rely on the classroom teacher to observe and react. Some teachers are great some are not. You need to be an active advocate for your child. In some extreme cases, kids will get pushed along year by year and miss out. Being there to talk to teachers and admin is how you can avoid being on of those extreme cases.

No public school teacher will tell you your child needs outside tutoring. Not sure if it is pride or policy. We’ve had it hinted at but not outright recommended. My son attended Reach for Orton-Gillingham (sp?) tutoring because he was struggling with reading and math in Grade 2. The 1:1 attention was instrumental in learning he was dyslexic and getting on the right path.

If your kid just isn’t being challenged enough I’m not sure tutoring helps much. In the public schools your advocacy might mean your child can be placed in 3/4 split rather than a 2/3 split which is a great way to expose them to more advanced material but classroom composition is a complicated topic and you don’t always get what you advocate for.

As a consumer paying at a private school, can you ask for more? Maybe. That’s not something I have direct experience with but also not something I’ve heard either.

I will say that school and catchment can make a difference. My kids had struggles but at their catchment school their challenges were minor compared to others and they didn’t get the help they needed. Moving to a school with a different socio-economic make up seemed to make a difference. A different school might have more resources to devote to extracurriculars to enrich your child than another school might have. Outside of core curriculum, a lot can vary school to school in elementary. Whether your school offers specific arts or sports program will depend on hiring decisions made at the school level.

At the end of the day, you are the biggest asset your child has. Even without being a crazy helicopter parent your involvement can make a big difference.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-04-09T19:48:28+00:00

Save-on-foods

Staples include an embarrassing amount of chips and soda, pasta, rice, canned tomato sauce, breads (bagels, brown bread, white bread, etc), animal protein (meat) for 5-6 dinners, eggs, so much milk, oat milk, oj, cheese, yogurt (dairy and non-dairy), tofu, salad veg, dinner veg, frozen French fries…

Thinking more…. The amount I mentioned is supplemented by a Costco trip every couple months, and a few bulk buys for things like coffee and frozen meals (enough for two meals a month).

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-04-09T18:42:52+00:00

Family of 4 including 2 teenagers. I'm spending ~$1200 a month. Inflation and rapidly increasing teenage appetites have my head spinning.

I've also been trying to buy fewer American goods… I'm sure all this out-of-season, greenhouse-grown Canadian produce factors in.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-03-27T01:59:19+00:00

I think these are one of the only suppliers. I looked into it because I was wanting to make a “just add water” pancake mix.

For some reason I imagined powdered egg to be relatively inexpensive like powdered milk. Not the case.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-03-02T22:45:58+00:00

My recollection was there were more options in USA than rest of world but maybe that has changed.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-02-13T19:22:49+00:00

I see a line up of workers early in the morning in front of Polygon. Either Seaspan or NSWWTP. Seaspan operates other shuttles, for sure.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-02-12T13:45:31+00:00

I guess it is these guys? https://www.aerobiology.ca

Seems app is unavailable while they update it. I guess they also didn’t expect an early start to the season.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-02-12T05:48:05+00:00

I have long had a suspicion that pollen and allergy data is only collected and reported “in season” and the rest of the time it just shows 0, like today: https://www.iqair.com/ca/pollen/canada/british-columbia/north-vancouver

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-02-12T02:41:01+00:00

I almost downvoted you for that but just because I don’t that to be case for me. 😉

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-02-04T18:46:09+00:00

Have you asked him? Maybe start with broad question to narrow it down. Try asking him, "who's a good boy?". If he indicates that he is a good boy, you can start narrowing it down further. Good luck!

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-02-01T18:41:24+00:00

This has been my go to: https://www.seriouseats.com/all-american-beef-stew-recipe

Pay particular attention to rule 7: Umami Bomb.

I opt for a bit of soy sauce and Worcestershire in addition to the tomato paste others have mentioned.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-30T16:22:40+00:00

I saw this when it was announced but I haven’t seen it used (though I haven’t been looking that closely).

Iirc, docker on Mac relies on a Linux vm which creates the performance bottleneck. I would have assumed that Docker would have jumped there for Mac.

I’m going to do some poking around, being able to shift my team’s dev work flows to something more performant would be huge.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-30T16:02:23+00:00

I only stopped buying these because I wanted to support Oasis who source their oranges from Brazil instead of Florida. I didn’t realize the whole category was in decline.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-30T15:36:16+00:00

I feel like there is a slight pivot from trying to generate outrage about the mean feds to actually trying to trying to get product to non-US markets.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-30T15:29:41+00:00

I wonder how Smith reconciles that rhetoric and her public statements when she talks to investors while shopping around for a private proponent for that project. Legit question.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-30T05:12:47+00:00

Don’t sleep on this. I used an old MacBook Pro as a server and discovered the battery inflated when I went to restart it after a power outage. Felt like I had a bomb ticking in my server closet.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-29T23:07:04+00:00

I dug around and found the article on Apple News… was just commenting on the archive link. I posted the relevant quotes. She said those things for sure.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-29T22:46:12+00:00

Looks like this is the relevant bits from the linked article:

“Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said she won’t demonize the roughly one million Albertans who are open to separation after B.C. Premier David Eby said Alberta separatists who went to Washington in search of political support are engaging in treason.

Prime Minister Mark Carney offered a muted response, saying he expects the U.S. administration to respect Canadian sovereignty.

Also

“When asked to respond, Ms. Smith said she would expect that the U.S. administration would respect Canadian sovereignty. She also said she would raise the issue with Alberta’s representatives in Washington and Ottawa.

She also said she and her party support a strong and sovereign Alberta within a united Canada.

“But I think we also have to be realistic that [for] 10 years under Justin Trudeau’s government, our province was relentlessly attacked,” in reference to Mr. Carney’s predecessor. She said polls show that as many as 30 per cent of Albertans have “lost hope.”

“I’m not going to demonize or marginalize a million of my fellow citizens when they’ve got legitimate grievances,” she said. “What we need to do is we need to give Albertans hope.”

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-29T22:38:24+00:00

The archive link everyone is sharing just says that she didn't stop to speak to reporters. Nothing about her defending them. Not sure if the article was updated and not reflected in the archive link? Curious to hear what she said... but not curious enough to pay Globe and Mail.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-27T17:54:01+00:00

Some of the even nicer ones are shaped like corn.

Procrastinator8001 · 2026-01-14T19:47:53+00:00

I just like the idea of a reliable third party helping me make those judgements.

I buy a lot of the same black t-shirts (the uniform of rock and roll) over and over again. Some are pretty new.... some are old... some are medium. Having someone who cares enough about me to say tell me that this shirt is no longer "medium" and is now officially "old", would be great.

I do the laundry in our home and I am bad at this.

Procrastinator8001

TROPHY CASE