Cool findings on the Interweb

WWE referee Charles Robinson has his own Flickr photo collection.

Some neat pictures in his collection.

I hope that the next time I need to go to the hospital...

I get this kind of treatment.

Yeah, like that would ever happen.

Maybe if Daryl Katz buys the Oilers ...

... he'll fire the current management and bring in a real coach and general manager.

Seriously ... how bad do the Oilers have to be before MacT or Lowe (or both) lose their jobs?

NEWS FLASH: West Edmonton Mall's penguins return to Antarctica to escape frigid Edmonton winter

I feel obliged to mention that it is still freaking cold in Edmonton. Tonight's low is going to be -39 with a windchill of -50, and tomorrow morning when I go to work, it's going to be a brisk -38.

The cold snap should break by the weekend, when temperatures will reach a comparatively tropical -18. Hoo-freaking-ray.

Global warming, you say?

Edmonton's forecast for the next 24 hours:

Currently: -25, windchill -40
Monday morning: -29, windchill -44

TLC: Yup, we screwed up!

And while I'm in the mood ...

Miss America is on TLC this year.

TLC is home to Trading Spaces.

TLC has been running commercials saying that Paige Davis is coming back to Trading Spaces when the new season starts tonight.

The commercials, in so many words, say: "Remember Trading Spaces? Remember you used to watch it every week? Remember when Trading Spaces got rid of Paige Davis you and everyone else stopped watching it? Yeah, well, we're sorry we ever got rid of Paige. And she's back now! So please watch Trading Spaces again. Please? Pretty please?"

The mind boggles ...

OK, so I'm watching Miss America (it's a long story, don't ask ... ) and this year, they've "modernized" the pageant, including allowing members of the public ask questions of the finalists.

So this one person asks, "What does it say about this country when someone like Paris Hilton can become famous despite not accomplishing anything?"

Famous without accomplishing anything? Oh, you mean like MISS AMERICA!?

Retreat of the Peruvian Missionaries!

Sadly, our visit with the Invading Peruvian Missionaries came to an end a day early due to shifting weather conditions that required them to get on the road sooner rather than later.

Still, it was a fantastic week. Brad and Lori are great friends and wonderful servants of Jesus Christ.

It was an honour and a blessing to have them stay with us for the time they did. It was a treat to meet Francesca, the Peruvian girl they brought with them. And their kids got along fabulously with our kids.

Hopefully, we can go visit them in Peru some day.

Michael Jenkinson has gone missing

Navy cook’s disappearance is a mystery

Police and military officials are still searching for a Canadian Navy cook who went missing Jan. 3.

A colleague spotted Ordinary Seaman Michael Jenkinson during the daytime walking down a street in Esquimalt.

But Jenkinson did not show up for work. When navy officials grew concerned they called his family in Ontario who said they had not heard from him.

“(Jenkinson) is considered a missing person so we are cooperating and working with Victoria police,” said Navy Lieut. Paul Pendergast, a CFB Esquimalt spokesman.

There is no suspicion of foul play, Pendergast said.

Jenkinson is a member of the regular force and has been a cook at the base for two years. He normally wears blue jogging pants with “NAVY” written on one leg, and a blue and yellow Corona hoodie. Jenkinson is 5’11” tall, 140 lbs., has short sandy-brown hair, blue/green eyes and walks with a distinct limp.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service at 363-4457 or Victoria police department at 995-7654

Ultimate Fight Night ZZZzzzzz...

It's a good thing that the Invading Peruvian Missionaries were watching last night's UFC Ultimate Fight Night with me, or else I probably wouldn't have made it through to the end of the show. Not the best Fight Night ever - some pretty dull fights that featured a bunch of pretty dull fighters.

OK, maybe that's not fair. I didn't hate it as I watched it. Some of the show I really enjoyed. But writing this now, less than 24 hours after it was over, I remember almost nothing about it - except the one guy with the hole through his lip. And that's all I remember about it - not his name or anything; just the image of him showing the camera the giant hole where part of his lower lip had been a few minutes before.

Otherwise, it was completely forgettable - the fights, and the fighters.

Sure, the Fight Nights are supposed to spotlight lower-level guys and give them some exposure and experience. And, unlike wrestling where everything can be planned out, UFC President Dana White can't be telling fighters, "I want a knockout 1:32 into round one, and make it dramatic!"

It's live TV. If it's dull, that's the risk they take.

But even at the best of times, Fight Nights can be pretty frustrating.

The big problem with Fight Night shows is that they contain about 1 minute of fighting for every 9 minutes of promotional material, commercials, or extended previews of the show's sponsoring movie or video game (or, like last night, both).

Normally I just tape them and watch them using the FF button to skip past the extraneous stuff. No such luck last night watching it live.

Pileated woodpecker

P1010425
Originally uploaded by mjenkinson

I took this photo last March while my wife and I were out for a walk in our neigbourhood. It was the first (and only) time I had seen a pileated woodpecker in the city.

It was remarkably unconcerned with us standing right behind him taking pictures.

Pam Barrett remembered

I couldn't say it any better than this:

"We didn't have the same political philosophy, but she was firm in her beliefs," said former premier Ralph Klein. "I always had a lot of time for her."

Raw in HD in Canada = Raw in SD like last week

OK, I knew that because I don't have HD capabilities at home that I wasn't going to get Raw last night in glorious high definition. But I at least expected The Score to give us the 16:9 feed in standard definition.

Wrong.

Instead, we got a cropped 4:3 version of the show.

Oh well ...

Raw in HD for thee but not for me

The big news in the pro-wrestling world is, of course, the fact that the WWE's flagship show, Raw, moves to high definition tonight.

As someone who watches the majority of his television on either crappy 15-inch set in the bedroom or a crappier 27-inch set in the basement - both in very standard definition - I suspect the only difference for me will be the widescreen format and new Raw set.

Edmonton Journal review of Bret Hart's book

Full review is on the Journal's website.

While I enjoyed Bret's book tremendously as a gritty and detailed behind-the-scenes look at his wrestling career, I can't disagree with reviewer Ruth Myles's comment that "Hart slams others for their betrayals, real and perceived, but doesn't hold the mirror up to his own behaviour."

That's true. And it shows up most in the book when he's slamming his then-wife Julie for being cold to him at various points - whether she had jetted out from Calgary to New York or somewhere else to join him at a pay-per-view, only to go shopping during his match, or if she wasn't talking to him when he was home from a grueling road trip. Bret was very quick to point out Julie's perceived failings as a wife, but he was far less likely to admit his failings as a bad husband who was constantly cheating on his wife.

Not to mention, Julie raised their kids virtually alone as a single mother, and not once in the book do I recall Bret praising her for that - or even acknowledging that fact.

It's a shame that for all of Bret's openness in the otherwise brilliant book that he didn't open up a little more for some self-reflection on how his actions hurt his own family.

Stryper rules!

I've been on a bit of a classic Christian rock kick recently, and was thrilled to find this on YouTube. Ah, the memories of driving to the University of North Dakota from Winnipeg in the late 1980s to see Stryper in concert.

Invasion of the Peruvian Missionaries!

In a few hours, my family will be playing host to a couple of old friends - Brad and Lori Quiring, who are missionaries in Peru - and their kids, not to mention a Peruvian girl who they brought to Canada to show her the country.

This means there will be 10 of us staying in our house for the next 10 days.

Any TV producers who would like to shoot a reality show during the next week should contact me immediately.

Christmas 2007 videos

A repost from my old blog.

The Newsroom's new era

I've decided to embrace Web 2.0.

So, no more hand coding HTML. I got a Blogger blog on my domain, which will allow for RSS and Atom syndication. This means that the seven people who regularly read this site (hi, Scott!) can get their updates automatically.

And there will now be comments, which I always felt was one of the great failings of my former webpage.

I'll be slowly migrating over some of the content from the old site as I get the chance, and updating links, reposting my YouTube videos and such.

Test Post

Testing my first post. If this was a real post, it would be far more interesting.