HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2000-01-26, Page 5Arthur Black
Computers and
poetry? Why not?
There’s a guy in my town named Here. He
is shortish but extremely muscular - think
human fire hydrant.
The word on Here is: don’t mess with him.
Oh, he's friendly and gregarious enough, most
times — but he’s also as tough as a platoon of
Ninjas, and if you incur his wrath, your
allotted span on this planet can be measured in
nanoseconds.
Which is why it was unusual to see Here
lined up at the local Libation Emporium one
day, grinning like a man who’d won the Lotto
649.
“You're looking mighty chipper today
Here,” said the checkout clerk. “What’s up?”
Here smiled a smile as wide as the federal
deficit and said: “Just walked down to the end
of the bleepin’ dock (Here swears a mite) with
my bleepin’ computer - an’ I hove that bleeper
as far as I could inta the harbour”.
“And it felt so bleepin’good that I went back
home, got my printer and I hove that
motherbleeper in after it!”
I know exactly how Here feels. I love my
computer when it’s doing what I want it to do.
Which would be about 1.3 per cent of the time.
The rest of the time I hate my computer. I
International Scene
By Raymond Canon
7
of the best
Whenever I am out of the country, I
frequently get asked about specific Canadian
companies. In so doing, it gives you a fairly
good idea of which companies are being
noticed and in a positive way.
You might like to hear of two of the most
commonly mentioned, two that are held in
both envy and respect.
The first is Bombardier, a name that has
been associated in Canada with snowmobiles.
It was this company that invented the machine
and, imitation being the sincerest form of
flattery, at the height of the snowmobile craze,
there were more than 50 companies engaged
in manufacturing and marketing this product.
When the demand for such vehicles dropped to
more normal levels, so did the number of
suppliers and many of them simply
disappeared.
Not Bombardier! The company decided that
its future was not in snowmobiles alone and
looked about for other areas into which to
branch. The results of that decision have been
nothing less than spectacular for Canada.
At the present time not only is the Montreal
based company involved in snowmobiles and
other terrain vehicles, it is heavily engaged in
transportation equipment such as subway cars
and above all in aerospace products.
Most of this product is exported and thus
adds to our trade surplus.
The company has almost singlehandedly
taken Canada into third place in the export of
commercial aircraft, exceeded only by the
huge Boeing company in the United States and
the equally large Airbus consortium in the
European Union. Its famous short take-off and
landing aircraft (STOL) are still made in
Toronto (Bombardier bought out the former
hate it more than Eatons hated Simpsons.
More than Alberta hated Trudeau. More than
Tyson hated Holyfield.
If I could find an ear on my computer I
would gnaw it off.
But I can’t. I can’t find much of anything on
my computer - that’s the point.
I could probably live with my handicap if
only my computer wasn’t so bleeping smug.
I'll be working away on it when suddenly my
monitor screen will go into a kind of graphic
stomach cramp and a message will flare across
the screen.
THIS PROGRAM HAS PERFORMED AN
ILLEGAL FUNCTION AND WILL BE
SHUT DOWN.
What???? What illegal function? I paid for
this computer! I'm over 21!
Another favourite computer moment occurs
when I painstakingly type in some incredibly
stupid internet address —
(htttp://LiZard~xanadu/medusa/@#&phrymzi
k.com) - the computer clicks and whirrs - and
this message pops up on my screen:
COULD NOT CONNECT TO
“[1.135.245.49]”.
CAUSE: CONNECTION TIMED OUT
(10060)
Gee, thanks, Bill Gates - I can sure work
with clear and concise info like that.
No point in appealing to your friendly
neighbourhood computer geek - they
producer DeHavilland of Canada) and its jet
airliners and business jets are produced in
Montreal.
In addition, the company owns the Lear
Aircraft Co. in the U.S. and Short Brothers in
Britain, two well-known airplane
manufacturers.
Needless to say, all this has caught the
attention of foreign businessmen and it is
probably safe to say, (along with other
products and people) that Bombardier is better
known abroad than it is in Canada.
The second company is to be found at the
other end of the country, in North Vancouver,
British Columbia, to be exact. The company,
Ballard Power Systems, was founded about 15
years ago and for much of its early existence,
was dependent on financial handouts from the
Dept, of National Defense in Ottawa.
What kept these grants coming was the fact
that their single product, a fuel-cell battery,
held great promise, especially in a world
where environmental concerns are of steadily
increasing importance. Another was the fact
that it caught the attention of Simon Reisman,
who had been responsible for negotiating the
free trade agreement with the United States
and Reisman’s word carried a lot of clout in
Ottawa.
I have found that, like Bombardier and a lot
of other Canadian firms, Ballard was much
better known abroad than in Canada. While
there was much research going on in this field,
the results at the small Canadian firm were at
I ---------------
A Final Thought
"What happens is not as important as how
you react to what happens.”
- Thaddeus Goias
understand this gobbledygook! It makes sense
to them!
Nope, folks - we’re on our own.
Well ... maybe not quite.
I hear that the honchos at Sony Vaio
Programming in Tokyo have replaced the
stupid and meaningless Microsoft error
messages with...haiku poetry.
Which my dictionary defines as: a very short
Japanese style of poetry, consisting of three
lines. And how does that apply to computer
error messages? Try these:
A file that big?
It might be very useful
But now it is gone.
First snow, then silence.
This thousand dollar screen
Dies so beautifully.
A crash reduces
Your expensive computer
To a simple stone.
And my personal favourite:
Windows NT crashed.
I am the blue screen of death.
No one hears your screams.
Computer programming with a sense of
literature AND a sense of humour?
What next?
Mackintosh?
least four times more productive than any of
the rivals and it was not long before the large
car manufacturers were literally sitting up and
taking notice.
I kept hearing about it in Europe, partly
because Daimler was one of the companies
attracted to its potential.
After Ballard went public in 1993 with a
stock issue, the results started to show. Today
the company has joint ventures with both Ford
and Daimler-Chrysler which will hopefully
result in mass production of fuel cell that can
be used in vehicles.
To show how important this is for the
environment, this devices takes hydrogen and
air and converts them into electricity. The only
emission is water that is so clean you can drink
it. That should, I am sure, make everybody sit
up and take notice.
At the same time I am writing this Ballard
expects to have its engine in mass production
by 2003 so it may not be too many years
before you will be driving a car whose engine
was designed in Canada.
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THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 26, 2000. PAGE 5.
The
Short
of it
By Bonnie Gropp
The joy of music
They call it skank. Sound interesting?
Skank is the name given to a form of dance,
a somewhat frantic, puppet-like skip and
shoulder-shrug popular in the mosh pit. (You
read right)
What is most surprising is the fact that it is
the gentlemen who appear to enjoy it most.
They leap together bouncing into, away from
and around each other while the gals stand to
the side with a face clearly expressing,
“What???”
Let me say that next to some of the other
forms of moshing, which seem considerably
more aggressive, skank is kind of cute to
watch, a lively display of teenage vitality.
And great exercise. In fine spirits at a
wedding reception recently, I was invited by
my son to skank. It was fun, but I must admit
the slow number the DJ played next was most
welcome to this 40+ body with the 16-year-
old mind.
For more reasons than one, too. Dancing
later with my husband, it struck me that
perhaps today's teens are missing something.
The romantic, albeit sometimes insipid
ballads of old provided an opportunity for
some innocent cuddling. There was a purity,
yet an intensity that exemplified not just the
sweetness of young love but the need.
Even in the jitterbug, jiving days of the
1940s and 1950s there were songs that
brought couples together. Elvis, despite his
hip-swaying, pelvic-swivelling gyrations
could wrench out a ballad better than any. But
each year brought change, music to inspire
other things besides the passions of young
love.
Reaching my teens in the mid-1960s, I was
well into the evolution. By the end of the
decade, heartfelt yearnings set to tune were a
little uncool, dancing almost forgotten. Songs
were political. The era’s composers used their
music as a platform for their views. People
wrote about such unromantic topics as drugs,
and evoked unsentimental ideas on loosening
morals.
There were obviously more messages to be
delivered through music than tender missives
of amore.
But, much as I enjoyed what I was hearing
in those days, I still had plenty of listening
fodder for my more dreamy moments.
Fortunately, with music being significant in
family life, I had grown up hearing a nice
variety of talent, including Nat King Cole,
Johnny Mathis and Bobby Vee. They were
always only a spin away on the old hi-fi.
Their’s were typically sweet melodies,
passionate yearnings delivered by people who
could actually sing. Young as I was they
obviously struck a chord, because hearing
them today still inspires that dopey, lovestruck
feeling.
Clearly, the element of romance through
music seems to be missing for today’s young
music lovers. And yet, as 1 listen to other tunes
from my past, other genres, I am reminded
that music is expression.
The lyrics and melodies may not carry
thoughts of hearts and flowers. The moves
they inspire may not inspire thoughts of
Astaire.
But music should make you feel and actions
that depict such uninhibited joy as skank, have
a charm all their own.