Analyze this

So I've been busy with a new project this week (it gives me an excuse to forget about all the other half finished projects I should be working on).

We have had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad website for the church ever since the first computer-savy priest we had decided that it would be a good idea to have an online presence.  It was functional, but... less than attractive.  We've been talking about rebuilding it for 2 years.  But talk is cheap and doesn't get you very far.

So I decided to get things rolling, and created a site with Google Sites.  You should be able to find it here (as long as our DNS is mapped properly, or some computer geek gibberish like that):  www.stmarysandthemissions.ca  Careful about the rickroll though...

At the same time, I decided that maybe it's time to put Google Analytics to work on my blog - it'll give me a much more accurate count of who exactly is watching me, instead of that silly hit counter over there to the right that says there have been over 10,000 visits to this site (8,000 of which have been me!).  I've had Analytics running for two days now, so it hasn't given me much information yet.  But in time, I should be able to collect enough data to decide if its worthwhile to install Google Ads so I can start earning advertising revenue.  (haha.. .just kidding)

Anyhue, apparently, over the past two days, I've had 12 unique visitors to my blog and yesterday I received a visit from someone living in Kealakekua, Hawaii.  HAWAII!!

...it's kinda humbling being 'world famous'.

:P

FiveFingers

Now, here's the part of the blog where even my boyfriend is going to think I've jumped off the crazy cliff and landed in a pile of hand-smack-forehead 'what were you thinking??' ridiculousness.

About a year ago, somebody was trying to explain to me this cool new footwear that mimics callouses on your feet so that you can essentially walk around barefoot.  I got this silly mental image of some sort of silicon sock, which might be really comfortable, but would probably also get really slimy with sweat.  Left to my own devices, my imagination is usually way out in left field somewhere.  But the idea of the callouses didn't go away, and in fact reappeared last week when this person actually went and purchased a pair.  This stirred up a bit of excitement in me, so I did a little more research.

I distinctly remember as a child thinking about how I had really long and straight toes, and most adults had really short and gnarled up twisted toes, and how I hoped my toes never got to be like that.  I mean, I used to practise holding pencils and drawing pictures with my toes! That's just how awesome my toes were!  But now, as I get older, I'm starting to see that twisted, bent-out-of-shape, toe mutilation happening on my own feet.  It's sad, because it's pretty obvious what's doing it: shoes.

I also remember as a child spending practically entire summers with no shoes on and having absolutely no trouble taking short sprints across gravel driveways in my bare feet.  One particular summer, wanting to 'build up my callouses' on my tender feet,  I made myself a pair of sandals out of thin cardboard and yarn (and probably a little bit of duct tape) - all in the hopes of having a little something to protect my feet, but still feeling that bare-foot freedom.

And then I grew up, and started confining my poor tired feet to shoes all day long.  Pure silliness.  All last summer, I wore sandals.  Last fall when the weather started to get cold, I started wearing shoes again - and my shoes felt tight, and too small, and restrictive, and sort of like a jail for my feet.  And now, those same shoes fit just fine, but my feet look like my shoes!  FEET AREN'T SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE SHOES!!!

I found these black & white pictures the other day from a study done in the 1930's about barefoot vs shod feet. In a person who always walks barefoot (so we're talking mostly 3rd world and/or tribal people), you can draw a straight line from the heel, through the large knuckle of the big toe, to the pad of the big toe.  Their feet are wide, and their toes are spread apart.  On a shod person, you can't draw that line; their toes are cramped together, their feet are narrow.  Also, their balance is poorer, their posture is poorer, their running abilities are poorer, they experience more fatigue and more chronic pain.

People were not born with shoes.  Our natural state is shoe-less.  Now, I do realize the need for shoes.  We live in a climate where shoes are a necessity lest we end up with hypothermia, and in a culture where it's just not safe to walk down the street with nothing protecting the bottoms of our feet.

Enter: Vibram FiveFinger.  The shoe that fits like a glove, for your foot!  Toe-socks have been around for decades - THIS is the toe-SHOE!  The next best thing to barefootedness.  No, it is not some sort of crazy silicone dream sock for your foot, it's more like a sandal with a separate little sole for each of your toes and allows your feet full range of motion.

After a significant amount of research, and finding nothing more than praise for the product, and knowing that I needed a new pair of sandals for the summer anyway, I went out on a limb and decided to try something a little different.

My FiveFingers arrived in the mail from MEC today.  And I am wearing them right now.  And they are extremely comfortable.  My feet look mildly gorilla-like; however, I also own no less than 3 pairs of Crocs, and nothing looks more ridiculous than those hideous things!

I'm hoping that they'll help me build up some foot and ankle muscle, and maybe straighten out a couple toes in the process.  At the very least, they should get me lots of attention!  Plus... it's the next best thing to being barefoot all the time!

Geekery

I dropped a wad of cash on my car today.  Had that nasty gas pedal recall done (I actually think it was a placebo fix, but now if anything does go wrong, at least my insurance company can't go saying that I should have had something fixed and I didn't so they won't cover me), and 'got the computer recalibrated' whatever that means - I wonder if they could recalibrate my laptop too; maybe it would quit shutting off on me for no good reason.  Anyway, the computer thing was because my engine light came on yesterday.  99% of the time its just a sensor or a computer error, but it's not something you want to mess with.  They're also going to order me a new door panel because apparently I have a heavy elbow and have broken the plastic under the fabric of the arm rest.  The break recall (yes, there are 2 recalls on the Corolla), will have to wait for another day because the parts are back ordered; but like the guy at Toyota said, that won't be a problem unless I plan on driving to the Arctic in January.  Now, all of that stuff, ALL OF IT, didn't cost me a thing - I love warranties!  But where they get ya is the dog-gone regular maintenance and servicing!  You know, the oil change and 10,000 point inspection, and fluid refills, and valve stem replacement therapy, and gizmo re-alignment, and do-hickey boondoggling or something etc, etc.  Friggin cost me about $1000 bucks.  (Ok, not really, but still!)

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And on a completely different subject:

Once upon a time, a 6'7" man named Fr Steve built a website for St Mary's.  It... well, it was lacking some character, BUT, at least it was a website presence for the church.  Fr Steve, unfortunately, was the only one who had the computer knowhow to do anything with it.  And then he moved.  Enter a long lineup of people who said they could probably figure it out, but never bothered to, and two years later, we once again have no website presence.  Now, maybe it's not entirely necessary - I mean, the Roman Catholic church is a bit of a dinosaur anyway... I mean... um... gee, I hope I don't get fired for that...

But seriously, a website, a GOOD website, has its uses.  But I don't know how to code HTML.  Enter: Google Sites.  So much fun!  Google practically has a 50% stake in my life now anyway what with Calendar, Reader, Blogger, Documents, Picasa, Youtube - all of which I use on a regular basis.  So I figured, hey! Why not let them host a website for me too!   (Google does have an ambitious goal of collecting and cataloging ALL of the WORLD's data, so I might as well help them out.  They figure it'll take them roughly 300 years.  Note to self: buy Google stock.)

If all goes well, maybe I'll have a new website to share with you soon.

Manditory Laundromat Blog

It seems that I always have something to blog about after a trip to the laundromat.  That's JUST how exciting my life is.

I was the only one in the laundromat tonight as it was about to close, so I was making small talk with the owner.  Things were fine, just folding up the last of my laundry and talking about the weather and such.  And then I made a critical error - I had noticed a Hydro One smart meter flyer taped to the change machine, so I asked the owner if Smart Meters were going to affect his business.

*sigh* Small business owners are typically very opinionated people, and I sure did get an earful!  Not that his opinions were off-base or anything, just that I felt a little trapped and all I wanted to do was go home.

"Smart Meters" of course are those delightful little things that Hydro One is going to start turning on over the next few months to 'help us all conserve more energy'.  You know, that energy that we've got a larger surplus of now than we have ever had before because 75% of our energy-sucking factories have closed down or moved to Mexico.  Yeah, apparently we need to conserve that energy, so Hydro is helping us do this by implementing a timed system of peak and off-demand periods so that the price you pay for your power will be based on what time of day you consume energy.  For example, doing laundry at 2pm on a Wednesday afternoon will cost you 8.8 cents/kilowatt hour but doing your laundry at 4am will only cost you 4.4 cents/kilowatt hour.

See what the laundromat dude did to me?? He got me all annoyed about Smart Meters.  And, oooh!  Don't even get me started about wind turbines or debt retirement charges!  And all I really wanted to know was if the cost of drying my clothes was going to increase.

I'm all for environmental stewardship and energy conservation and reducing greenhouse emissions and all that jazz, but the fact is, the power is being produced whether we're using it or not.  And way more of it is being produced than we're using.  In the world of economics, when supply outnumbers demand, the price falls, not the other way around!

Smart meters are not going to change the average joe's power consuming habits because the average joe simply is not going to go out of his way to do laundry at 4am!  Smart meters are however going to make somebody a buttload of money even though the demand does not justify the cost.  Talk about a case of wolves dressed in sheeps' clothing - there are a bunch of sly, shifty muckity-mucks out there disgusing their money making schemes as 'energy conservation' and 'going green', and it is wrong.  Way, way, way wrong.

Jeez.  I think I'll just go pitch a tent in the woods.