It's time to relax on this fine long-weenend Thursday afternoon. I found some cheesy jokes on the PIR Intranet that I thought I'd share with you all. It's hard to find some clean humour these days; maybe I'm just dirty and don't encounter these often.

A man walks into a bar with a slab of asphalt under his arm and says, "A beer please, and one for the road."

A sandwich walks into a bar. The bartender says, "Sorry, we don't serve food in here."

Two hydrogen atoms walk into a bar.
One says, "I've lost my electron."
The other says, "Are you sure?"
The first replies, "Yes, I'm positive..."

Two antennas meet on a roof, fall in love and get married. The ceremony wasn't much, but the reception was excellent.

Why did the golfer wear two pair of pants? Just in case he got a hole in one!!!!

Have a great Canada Day weekend!

Due to the lack of new quality programming these days, I find myself watching (or taping) Canadian Idol.

Somehow I need to get my reality show fix-- that and the fact that Canadian Idol ads are plastered all over the TTC Subway System.

Who am I kidding, I must quit making excuses and admit that I still like watching Idol.

If you happen to be as a loser as I am, you might have noticed that Dave Moffatt made it into the Top 32 candidates.

Dave Moffatt-- you might remember him as the little boy from the "hit" Canadian kid-boy-group sensation "The Moffatts." He was definitely the cutest Moffatt (and no not that loser Clint) out of the four. Wow, it so weird to see him on the show. I have to admit that he's not a bad pop singer-- actually he's pretty good. I caught him during his audition with a duo rendition of Shania Twain's "From This Moment On" and it was impressed.

I guess singing tunes like "Girl of My Dreams" and "Miss You Like Crazy" really helped! Haha.

I was being an even bigger geek and checking out the unofficial Canadian Idol message boards. According to idolforums.com, Dave lives in Winnipeg, works at the Bay (in the fragrance department), and he is gay with a boyfriend. Of course, we never know how credible these sources are, but it's an interesting read. However when asked (in his official Idol profile) which musical act would you most like to see in concert, he answered "Cher."

This is when the famous "Kill Bill" siren would go off in my head. But this not any siren, it's an internal gay alert system. Haha.

I think I'm an outgrown tween girl-- checking out message boards where the predominate demographic are La-Senza-Girl-wearing tweens with awful grammar.

Anyways, I missed it this week's Tuesday and Wednesday shows, so I'm here scrambling to find a torrent for it. I'm totally cheering him on in Round #2-- let's hope he makes Top 10. He's not the best singer out of the bunch of other Idols, however, he's got that pop spunk. C'mon, he's a Moffat-- it's weird how it's like we grew up together-- almost like they were a part of you. Like how almost how I felt like I was friends with the cast of "Friends."

Yeah, I'm fucked. I blame it on nostalgia. Yep, that's it.

Just a small rant on the environmental front. This one really puts me to shame, especially being a York resident.

As you might have read in the news, York Regional Council "unanimously" approved a Big Pipe extention that cuts right through the sensitive lands of the Oak Ridges Moraine. [Read Article]

The project, which involves laying down sewer pipes along 19th Avenue between Yonge and Leslie in Richmond Hill, has significant environmental impacts because it will pump substantial water resources (up to 66 billion litres, according to environmentaldefence.ca) underground water from the Oak Ridges Moraine.

This is definitely another wake up call, as it seems as though York intends to spark further urban sprawl into areas in King Township and the northern stretches of Vaughan. I am disappointed that although York has been so adamant to bring upon a viable transportation alternative and more sustainable communities -- with the Viva BRT project and the creation of "Transit Communities" in 4 new high-density nodes (See Markham Centre)-- that we continue to see the subsidy for further urban sprawl. It seems as though there is a great will to provide for sustainable development, but once again, no one in the Region have and political guts to stand up against these sprawl development initiatives.

They see it as there's nothing to lose. More development yields more property taxes and more development charges. Sounds good economically no?-- of course, we've neglected the long-term effects on the environment.

Meanwhile, curbing sprawl is easy: stop providing water/wastewater infrastrucutre to new areas. No water infrastrucure yields no urban development-- it's as simple as that.

What is most disturbing is that Bill Fisch, the Region's Chair and CEO, stated that the sewer connection will not damange the natural area because it will run underground.

He makes a remarkable point. If we stash things underground, things will magically heal itself. Riiight. There is apparently no ecological connectivity once structures are placed beneath the soil. Yep. So burying radioactive wastes would be okay too because yes, it would run underground.

Yes, this is the man that we've put in charge to run our region. It is sad that he was caught in the media stating such irresponsible, absurd and ignorant comments.

I think he needs to hire me as a co-op sudent to write him some background briefing notes before he opens his mouth.

Politicians. What would they do without civil servants?

He was also stated in the article as saying "we're putting the environment way ahead of almost anyone else in the province," now I'm quite disillusioned on what exactly he believes is taking that "environmental" step.

Right now, it all comes down to whether Leona Dombrowsky, Minister of the Environment, will approve this project or not. She better have a good set of Reseach Analysts! But really, with the Liberal government's strive for more sustainable growth, and the recent Greenbelt and Places to Grow (which passed Royal Assent a few weeks ago) initiatives-- not to mention a possible violation with the Canada Fisheries Act-- lets hope they'll be able to stop the enviornmental madness.

It's finally up! And I don't mean my member. Yes, hope you enjoy my new layout. I decided that I've been staring at that ugly picture of me for too long. So here we are, a much more colourful, but simpler layout.

Less is more. Less is more. This is what my boss always says. Maybe he's having an impact on me through this layout. I've taken out some of the distracting stuff-- like the petty icons and smaller graphics. Though my intention was to make it simpler, it's weird, I still find myself going crazy and implementing more and more. And voila!

Less is more. Is it really more? I foresee an interesting bloggin opportunity. Too tired to blog right now, but I will write my thoughts on that. Yes, Matt will.

Oh yeah, if you haven't plugged into my shameless promotion via MSN, I've re-opened Hyperdot-Main with more functions, features, and an exciting new layout. Check it out.

I've finally managed to understand the concept on not using tables for web layouts. Let's just say it was quite the learning adventure. My stiff head (not my member) has not been receiving much information lately. It's not as spongy as it once was.

Great news everyone, Green Apple, my work pet plant is making a full recovery. She's like full of energy, and it makes me feel good that I managed to save it. Give her some new soil, some daily water, a little sun, and voila. Please call me Dr. Lee.

Last week however, my co-op predecessor a.k.a. 'plant killer' came to the office to do a long overdue work-related presentation. We chatted a bit, and the only that came into mind was that he was the plant killer. But before I even had a chance to kindly confront him about the plant, he made a remark that it was "wonderful that I managed to preserve the plant." Omg, so not only was he aware of the state of the plant before he left, but he had the guts to comment that I saved it.

That's just being really nasty. I swear, that's like manslaughter.

Anyways, I politely mentioned him next time to return the plant back to our plant-lover colleague if he doesn't want to take care of it. So that was that.

It's almost about that time again, the dreaded excitement of course selection and enrolment!

So I've been browsing through what to take and let's just say, it's giving me, as always, a pain in the arse.

After sifting through the courses, I've come down to a final seven:

Here's the 'given's'. I will have to take these:

PLAN 350: Research Methods for Planners
This course sounds dreadfully boring. You learn to plan, design and execute out planning related research.

PLAN 320: Economic Analyses for Regional Planning
I definitely enjoy regional planning courses. It is practical and relevant and hopefully it will help with grasping more concepts related to Economic Development.

Here’s the 'choosers'. I have no idea how to pick and choose. Argh:

PLAN 483: Land Development Planning
This class seems very interesting as you investigate the economics and financing of public and private development projects. Maybe this class would've actually been useful before my employment at PIR. Rather than having to be confused when the boss is talking and then looking it up on Google or Wikipedia. It's funny how Google has indeed become an extension of my brain.

But yes. I want to take this class. Better late than never. But this completely conflicts with PLAN 350, which is held at exactly the same time.

Planning administrators. Oh how they bug me so.

PLAN 453: Urban Stormwater Management
It's about time that I take more natural sciences classes. This seems quite interesting and Shima and Liz seemed to have a good time with the professor that resembles Richard Gere.

Oh baby.

The downside is that it is a 8:30 Tuesday and Thursday course. That is no good for Matthew.

PLAN 341: Conservation Resource Management in the Built Environment
This is another 'Richard Gere' course. Pretty much deals with the ecology of the urban environment. This course would be good for me.

PLAN 309: Site Planning & Design Studio
I want to take up studio classes again. They're totally fun and refreshing, despite the fact that it's long agonizing hours. But presentations are held 4:30-7:20 on Fridays. Fridays! You've got to be kidding me. Forget it!

PLAN 355: GIS Spatial Databases
I enjoy doing GIS. It's such a satisfying feeling when you present a map that not only is pretty and colourful, but it actually tells and me something valuable.

That's too neat.

PLAN 474: Local Government and Politics
I love politics classes, especially ones related to Planning. Might be useful if I really want to work for the public service. The bonus is that its only two hours a week!

Planners, what are you guys taking?