The 4th of July marks the Independence Day for the United States of America. Although, technically, America is the full continent, I have found that US citizens call themselves Americans (which, they are) and America becomes by default only the US. For the longest time, this was a pet peeve of mine, and I would say “a friend of mine who is a USA citizen”. However, rarely would anybody understand what I meant. But if I said “my friend is American” and I was referring to a USA citizen, then EVERYBODY would understand it. So I’ve stopped nit-picking…

I have had the privilege of meeting many Americans in my life, and some of them actually are close friends of mine. I have many dual-citizen friends, including Canada/US and Mexico/US. Many of my research colleagues are based in the USA, and I’ve visited quite often and have had wonderful times there (my favorite cities: Washington DC, New York, Boston).

To my American friends who are now residents of Canada, hope you enjoy the celebrations, wherever you are! I am not going to get into anything political, but I will definitely say, thank you United States of America, for producing some very fine young men and women who are near and dear to my heart, and Happy Fourth of July!

You know when you have these seemingly brilliant ideas and someone has already blogged about them? Yeah, that’s the feeling I have when writing about Tumblr. One of the most recent Web 2.0 (highly praised by my blogofriend Heather Watson), I heard about it for the first time at VIDFEST 2008, precisely from Heather (aka Hez). I then discovered that Jarrett also has a Tumblr. Then Dan mentioned he had a Tumblr too.

Last week I had the pleasure of meeting Ryan Nadel, who works in the journalism/film/media industry, at a lovely party hosted by Candice Faktor, of OurFaves.com. This small gathering of good friends proved a great laboratory to have actually good conversations, and Ryan and I engaged on a discussion of Tumblr. Ryan does have a Tumblr account, and (to my surprise I might admit) I have found at least two other friends of mine who do.

Remember - I am not in media, nor journalism, nor public relations, nor tech per-se. I am a specialist in environmental studies who loves blogging. So, for me to hear about Tumblr, it was a bit like “this is the new Twitter or the new Plurk“. It would seem to me as though Tumblr.com would be the place where I could synthesize all my online stuff (portfolio) and go from there. My friend Andy calls his Tumblr “his brain dump“.

My question is - is that the direction in which Web 2.0 is going? I am having a hard enough time with FriendFeed, BrightKite, and all that jazz. Not sure about how to feel about Tumblr. Any thoughts? Do I really want to get yet another Web 2.0 application? Particularly, can I hear some thoughts from those of you who actually have Tumblr.com accounts? Thanks.

So, remember when I said that I was going to only attend 6 events all month? Scratch that. It’s going to be 5. Green Drinks is colliding with WordCamp Fraser Valley, which means, I can’t do Green Drinks YET AGAIN. Ooops. But on the good news front, I will be going to Net Tuesday, and I want to promote my friend and mentor Dave O’s upcoming event, with the topic “Podcasting For Social Change”. You know you want to go, because he’s got a very fine line-up of speakers, including John Bollwitt, Roland Tanglao, Rob Cottingham, and Dave Olson as a moderator (you’ll NEVER get another chance to spend this much time with these many awesome people at the same time, unless you do Northern Voice 2009… and even then!).

So, mark your calendars - Wednesday July 8th, 5:30pm, WorkSpace. More details? Check Dave O’s blog.

I took the liberty of using DaveO’s YouTube promotional…

While having early dinner with Isabella a couple of weeks ago, we were discussing Vancouver Blogger Meetup business and we switched to the topic of metaphors. I have before discussed the distinction I make of bloggers and civilians, because in my mind I see that we as bloggers (and geeks) have a certain power that we ought to harness for the good of humanity (civilians).

While it remains true that I blog primarily for myself and for my own entertainment. I blog sometimes to provide entertainment to others (my friends, on and off the blogosphere, and in general, my readers). But mostly (and I am now more and more convinced after having immersed myself in the blogging for social change and sustainability sub-community), I think that my blog can be a tool for social change. I also believe that I can be an agent of change. That’s one of the things I aspire to do. I told this to Tom at SteakCamp, being able to unleash the power of Web 2.0 and help enhance the reputation of a tiny little East Side restaurant was one of the primary reasons why I answered Buzz’s challenge.

Isabella and I had a really nice and long discussion on our roles as superhero bloggers, and our mission to help the society in which we are immersed. Along the same lines, we all have our superhero weakness, our kryptonite. In my case, the same thing that makes me powerful (my inner drive, my enthusiasm and energy, the speed at which I read, type, learn and understand) is what makes me weak (when I over-extend and push myself beyond my limits). It’s all about the balance, I think. I work hard and play hard.

This is partially a serious reflection and a funny tidbit that should tide me over to the next reflective post about myself. I also would like to follow up on the geek t-shirts and show you the one I found reflects exactly how I see myself as a blogger.

Photo credit: All rights reserved by Think Geek

.

Now, if YOU were to think of yourself as a superhero, who would you be or what would you say is your superpower? Bear in mind that not only bloggers could be superheroes, civilians can also have their secret identity

Every summer, my Mom (who is a professor of Political Science) makes an extra-especial effort and takes some time off (normally a month) to come and visit me (and my brother, of course). Recently, she told me the good news that she was now a Dean of Social Sciences at her university/faculty/school. The bad news is that this new job implies added responsibilities, and thus she is unable to come to Vancouver to visit me. Which totally has me bummed.

Even though my apartment is really small, and sometimes I’m up to my eye-balls with work, I make a point of making time and spend a couple of weeks just spoiling her rotten. Mom and I are really best friends, and I always enjoy her company. She’s taught me a lot of new recipes and there are few things I don’t tell my Mom.

I am particularly bummed because many of my blogosphere friends were looking forward to meeting her, and I was really looking forward to showing her off. My mother is a really amazing woman who has fought adversity in a myriad of ways and has never given up. Even when I didn’t believe in myself, she believed in me.

I have tried to keep a minimal blogosphere/Twitter presence, but I just couldn’t resist writing about this topic. My friend Duane has a day job which is NOT being a photographer, although he does some fantastic photography work. Thus, when Duane has to police the internet to find whether someone is lifting his photos AND violating his Creative Commons license he expends time, money and it is in general, an overall headache.

Given that I can’t ask these questions to my Dad (who would be my go-to guy, normally), and armed with my own understanding of intellectual property law (having taken these courses during my Masters degree), I went to examine the recent case where one of Duane’s photos was lifted, apparently violating the Creative Commons License.

The first thing I did was read the Creative Commons that Duane has on this particular photo. I couldn’t find it off the website of the realtor, because there is no link back to Duane’s Flickr photo stream (the first red flag - no clear attribution).

The second thing I did was to read the realtor’s website upside down. As it turns out, the footer of one of his images says “All images (c) — the realtor’s name —”. Well, sorry to disappoint, but the photo above that exact footer is the property of whomever took it. From what I read on the site, the site owner did not take the photo, so, how can he claim copyright over an image that isn’t his?

The third issue is that for the Vancouver photo of the month promotional, this realtor’s site is using one of Duane’s images WITHOUT ATTRIBUTION. And the fourth issue is that of Duane being the copyright holder. Since the earlier footer implies that ALL images are (c) — the realtor’s name —, by association, this would imply that the photo of Vancouver at night (which you can find here on Duane’s Flickr stream) is also copyrighted by the site owner. Which it can’t because, well, Duane is the owner of that photo!

So what are the implications? First of all, I checked Duane’s CC license on that particular photo. The license is “Attribution-Non-Commercial-Non Derivative“. This means that (a) it should be attributed to Duane Storey (attribution that I can’t find for the life of me on the site that lifted this photo). That also means that no derivative can be done. Therefore, the site is violating the CC license because the composite photo IS a derivative of Duane’s original work.

Why is this a big deal? Well, for starters, because it’s one of those gray areas where people seem to just be entitled to use Creative-Commons licensed photos in whatever shape or form they want. Secondly, it makes (at least me) worried about whether I should even license my photos on Flickr. One of the reasons why I opened some of my own personal photos to licensing is precisely that I expect attribution!

I look forward to hearing from Duane how this issue was resolved. I can understand why Duane is upset, and I hope that this can be resolved quickly. Particularly since this seems to be a worrisome trend as of late!

I was showering the other day and meditating about the things that I have accomplished with my blogging. Amongst the reasons why my blog is moderately popular (I’m not going to be conceited and say that it’s very popular, but there are some people out there who read it with some frequency), is that I have built some sort of reputation as a decently-trained palate, and a good restaurant reviewer. My friends (both bloggers and civilians) seem to trust my instincts in regards to places to eat.

Nevertheless, my blog isn’t exactly a food blog. It is a repository for my thoughts, the things I do, the concepts I am analyzing, etc. A journal and a memoir. It’s Raul’s life seen through his own eyes. As Barbara Doduk put it, it’s a blog with a Raul theme… [Urgh, that sounded self-absorbed]

Nevertheless, I am kind of proud of my current place at the top of the Vancouver UrbanSpoon Leaderboard. With over 70 blog posts and about 4700 views, I feel really happy when people tell me (either on the street, or through email/comments) that a restaurant review has helped them make a decision on whether or not to eat at a certain restaurant.

The interesting thing is that, while I think it was me who suggested some type of ranking for restaurants, etc., I feel somewhat uncomfortable with the whole idea. Not that I want to hold on to the top spot forever, I am pretty sure I’ll relinquish it at some point. Particularly because, well, let’s be honest - I’m just one guy and there’s only so much money I’m willing to pay for dining out on my own dime! It’s just that I don’t want to be in some sort of competition.

I did some math recently (yes I am a geek, tell me something I don’t know), and came up with the View Density Factor (calculated as follows)

VDF = (Total number of views)/(Number of posts)

My current VDF is about 60 views per post, and I was talking recently to Karen Hamilton about her VDF (which is about 90 views per post), so I mentioned that she should be proud.

Quite frankly, I couldn’t care less about my ranking, even though it’s kind of nice. It’s a neat element to discuss whenever people ask me “so what is that you blog about” but I’ll be fine if/when I relinquish my # 1 spot. Throughout my life, I’ve grown used to relinquishing the # 1 spot. And you know what… it’s not all that bad. In the mean time, I’ve SpoonBack’d a number of reviews that I didn’t have linked back to UrbanSpoon, so we’ll see how those do.

My WordPress-ification process has been quite intense, and it’s hard to juggle searching for a job, doing academic work, socializing AND trying to master WordPress. But right now I feel pretty good about it, and wouldn’t go back to the Blogger platform. The last time I posted something on Blogger I was actually kind of weirded out. “WHOA. It’s like I’ve never used this“.

This week (probably Thursday or Friday, as I want to stay away from the computer for a while), I am buying the CSS customization option for WordPress as I want to be able to tinker with the layout and the theme color scheme. Since I’ve been previously known to avoid the WordPress Codex, I figured this time I would follow the rules and go and read the Codex before I ask my friends “how do I go about this…”

Both Rebecca and Andy wrote recently about themes, and Rebecca unveiled her awesome new theme just this week. But to be quite honest, I still had one question in my mind - what IS a theme?

A WordPress Theme is a collection of files that work together to produce a graphical interface with an underlying unifying design for a weblog.[WP Codex-Themes]

Yeah. RIIIIIGHT. The preceding paragraph proceeded to explain what a theme is in WPGeekSpeak. That’s the point where I realized one of the things that I hadn’t done (shame on me) ever - CHECK THE GLOSSARY. So I went to the Codex WordPress lesson semantics. Are themes the same as CSS? I have discovered that no, they’re not. I roamed around the glossary and semantics site for a while, and now I understand that by customizing the CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), I will be able to define colors, layouts, etc. The theme is more overarching, then…

I may request help to customize my CSS, but I also want to learn how to change it myself, because I don’t want to be a fake geek. I like being a true geek, and I like to do my own stunts. I am well aware that asking for help is one of my challenges, but thankfully, being a computer geek is complicated enough that I am always willing to ask someone to give me a hand. So, I hope that soon enough, you’ll see a different color scheme, although it may be a while for a change in theme!

Spending time with good friends over brunch is always fantastic. I had never done brunch with Monica nor with Tanya and thus I jumped at the possibility of hanging out with two of my favorite gals for brunch. We met at Provence Marinaside, at the foot of Davie Street, in Yaletown. I have had dinner at Provence before, but (as you may have noticed by the fact that I do not have a restaurant review of it), dinner there was anything but memorable. And this time, Provence Marinaside didn’t make an impression on me either. The saving grace was, of course, the company. I love both Tanya and Monica and we had such a great time that the food and service at Provence was somewhat irrelevant.

The added bonus was seeing Michael Weatherly (of NCIS and Dark Angel fame). Weatherly is an actor I’ve always liked a lot, and from what I could see, he didn’t seem conceited at all. I was *this* close to say “hey Michael” but refrained myself. Geez, after all these years living in Canada AND living in Vancouver, I can still get a bit star-struck.

The food was really nothing to write home about, it was decently good breakfast, but honestly, screwing up breakfast is rather hard. I ordered scrambled eggs with fruit, toast and veal sausage. Perhaps not the best choice. The veal sausage was WAY too strong and it looked really pretty ridiculous. For about half the price, I could have gotten better scrambled eggs and sausage at an equally sophisticated restaurant (Crave on Main). I would rate the level of service and pricing at Provence Marinaside with the same of Figmint on 12th and Cambie (whom, if you recall, I didn’t like either).

Again, this wasn’t a BAD breakfast in terms of food, but it wasn’t something I would write home about or a rave review. The company was really what made it all worth it, because the service was pretty appaling. We didn’t get refills for our water, nor for our coffee, and I had to ask THREE times for jam. I am NOT impressed. If you’re charging high-end-ish prices, you should give me high-end-ish service.

Hanging out with Monica and Tanya, was just unbelievably awesome, and I got a lot of really important and useful advice in regards to my life in social media and also, in regards to the job search. It was very calming to hear them both reassuring me that I’ll be getting a good job. We also laughed a lot Good times, indeed. Although next time, I’ll probably suggest we change venues for brunch. I am not coming back to Provence Marinaside. Not until they have fixed their level of service

I moved to Canada nearly a decade ago, not knowing what was going to happen and uncertain about my future, funding for my degrees, and the life over here. All I knew is that I was leaving behind an incredibly annoying boss, a job that while I liked, was just extracting the life out of me, and a really strong social networks of friends, as well as my family.

I now have family all over North America, have lived in Europe and moved back to Canada, and every morning I wake up feeling free, happy and fulfilled. I have a LOT of Canadian friends, both born-Canadian and immigrants. At one of the gatherings I organized recently, I discovered that out of the six people in our table, NONE had been born in Canada.

I have fell in love with a Canadian, I have had my heart broken by a Canadian, and despite this, I love Canada. I love its multiculturalism. I love its freedom. I love its uniqueness. I love the fact that I have many Canadian friends, and many non-Canadian friends, all of whom I love dearly.

I am enthralled by what Canada has offered me, and while I am keenly aware of my roots and my origins, I am also very happy to be living in Canada. On your anniversary, thank you Canada for giving me so many opportunities for growth, for love, and for happiness. Happy Canada Day, everyone!

I know this isn’t the kind of post that people would like to read up on a Monday morning, but I have been getting many reminders (the most recent, this past weekend) about how important it is not to push myself. I have had this conversation with many of you recently, about how much I’ve been pushing myself and over-working and thus I plan to take all of July easy (except, of course, for the job search part - which will have to be rather intense).

Therefore, I have decided that I am only committing to 7 (SCRATCH THAT - 6) events throughout the whole month of July, and even those, I will just stay for a short while. Therefore, you’ll see me (briefly) at:
- Green Drinks
- Third Tuesday
- Net Tuesday

I’ll be organizing
- Vancouver Bloggers Meetup

I’ll be presenting at
- WordCamp Fraser Valley

And I’ll be doing the whole 24 hours relay of
- Blogathon 2008

Anything else, I will most likely pass. I am really, really, really sorry. If you have a house party that you’ve invited me to, I’ll probably make a REALLY BRIEF appearance and not stay for long. Bear in mind that this is not in any way a reflection of any desire to be anti-social. Much to the contrary… unless I start taking care of myself, I will be running myself out of steam over, and over, and over again.

This decision also will influence my online communication. I will attempt not be on Twitter much, so if you want to get a hold of me, email, GTalk or MSN will be pretty much the best way. I may not be at any big events for Canada Day either, so in advance - Happy Canada Day!

[ EDIT - I noticed that Green Drinks collides, so it's only 5 events all month ]

Often times, I get so carried away with the whole social media and tech discussions (try Googling iPhone Rogers and you’ll know what I am talking about) that I tend to forget to talk about the field where my expertise lies: environment. I did not go to graduate school in this field just to let it slip through the cracks. So I was quite pleased to see a few opportunities opening for me this week to have enviro-geek discussions on my blog, and meld my two worlds: tech-geeky and enviro-geeky.

Darren Barefoot is helping IKEA Canada spread the word about IKEA’s most recent initiative: The IKEA Way. What is this? In a nutshell,

The IKEA Way is our promise. We promise that we’re working towards having an overall positive impact on people and the environment. In other words, we’re going to be nice to people and nice to the planet. Sounds ambitious for a global company? It shouldn’t. We believe it’s just part of smart business, but more than that — it’s the right thing to do. [The IKEA Way - What We Do]

In the academic literature I have frequently come across the concept of “GreenWashing”. In non-enviro-geek terms, greenwashing refers to the deployment of a series of strategies and tactics that will make your company “look” green but it does not mean that you will indeed be undertaking measures to reduce your company’s environmental impact.

While doing a little research for this post, I came across a really neat article on TreeHugger titled “Greenhushing doesn’t help anyone“. So what is greenhushing? Pretty much the opposite of greenwashing: when a company doesn’t want to promote its environmentally-conscious efforts for fear that they will be taken as greenwashing.

As Stiffelman points out, greenhushing may just be as bad as greenwashing. Why not promote your efforts if you are actually a company that is trying to better its environment? That’s one of my own personal pet peeves. If you have it, flaunt it! The whole concept of eco-labelling is predicated on this idea - my products are more environmentally-friendly, thus merit eco-labels (be it SeaChoice, Forest Stewardship Council, Environmental Choice or any of the other ecolabels floating around).

The IKEA Way seems to me like a good initiative (I have been perusing the website and offered some feedback on how the website and the overall initiative can be strengthened). Of course, there is work to be done, but at least, these are some steps towards better environmental performance. And besides, who doesn’t like IKEA furniture? I do…

Moreover, this looks like a perfect mesh of Web 2.0 and environment. This is the direction where my own work is going to go, I can see that. I like to harness the power of Web 2.0 to effect social change and sustainability. Hat tips to Darren for pointing me out to the IKEA Way.

Which technically means, I’m an Ultra Nerd. Hat tips to Dr. Beth Snow (I was browsing her “geek” category archives and came across this test).

Now, you know you want to tell me - how nerdy are you?

While having one of perhaps the most relaxed afternoons of my recent life with my friend Arjana, we were talking about my recent fainting spell and the recurring migraines. This morning, I woke up at a reasonable good time, after sleeping a solid 8 hours. I begun my work day with a cup of coffee as I would normally do, and less than 20 minutes later, I had a headache.

A blinding, head-shattering, “I need a nap right now and some analgesics” kind of headache. I just woke up from said nap, a few hours behind in my work. Knowing me, I took this as a controlled experiment. I re-read notes of the latest instances of caffeine intake and how my head felt. Strongly associated. Lots of coffee = headache/migraine. *sigh* That’s too bad as I *love* good coffee. But if I want to be able to work well, I’ll have to switch to non-caffeinated drinks. Good bye, iced mocha

I started reading Derek K. Miller’s blog over a year ago, and I would always come back here and there for updates, particularly as he writes about topics that are rather near and dear to my heart.

In addition to all the stuff Derek has written about, he often provides advice to newbies on podcasting, blogging, photography, even Mac geekiness. Besides, in case you didn’t know, Derek is the co-host of Inside Home Recording, along with Paul Garay. And he has a great sense of humor. Besides, Derek’s even been Scobleized!

Derek’s viewpoints are visionary and I was blown away by his recent interview with the CBC’s Spark on the concept of a digital legacy. I consider both Derek and Airdrie my friends, and had a chance to hang out with them a couple of months ago. Good times indeed.

Today I read on Twitter and on his blog that he is turning 39, and I figured I’d send a big shout out. But hey, don’t drop the happy birthday wishes here - go to his blog and say “Happy Birthday”. Enjoy the bachelor week, Derek, and celebrate as much as you can!

While having dinner with my very good friend LF at Burgoo on Main, we had an interesting conversation, worth recalling here now. In the past few months, blogging has become a passion for me. So much that I think I’ve become a blogaholic.

I started reading blogs because my friends used them to keep me up to date on what was going on in my life. I started blogging first because my brother did it. I blog because I love writing. I still do like my academic work, and I am passionate about environmental issues, about research, and about teaching. However, I also love social media and the new word that has opened to me. From new friends to attending events to getting swag to simply being recognized (someone recognized me at the Car Free Festival on Main Street - “OH, so YOU are Hummingbird604! I do read your blog“). Quite endearing, really.

But the truth of the matter is that, beyond that, I may seem like a blogaholic but I have never done things any other way. If I am going to take something on, I do it to the fullest. When I learned to play volleyball, I became passionate about it and tried to get as good and competitive as possible. When I learned to dance, I immersed myself in the salsa culture and danced until my feet hurt. When my father said that I needed to find out what exactly made me happy I embarked in a test-drive of many different careers. That has been both my philosophy and my way of going about things. DO THINGS TO THE MAX.

I thought to myself…”well, if I am going to be in the social media , I am going to learn how to do my own HTML tags. I want to be able to modify my own CSS. I want to learn how to increase my Google Page Rank, understand SEO, and more than anything, be able to use social media and the technology to bridge the chasm between audience and data source… As a researcher, I want to be able to understand the why. As a blogger interested in social media, I want to understand the the how.

I have found that when a topic touches an issue that I am interested in, I research and read about it obsessively. The Sarah Lacy/Mark Zuckerberg interview fiasco. The Emily Gould - Gawker blogging debacle. The whole issue with AP and charging for quotations. Bill C-61 and the lack of transparency of governmental policy decisions. The list goes on, and on, and on. It’s almost 2 AM on a Saturday night (when normal people are either asleep or getting home from the bar) and I am at my office working, and blogging.

So the questions that are currently on my mind are … what is it that drives people to be workaholics (or blogaholics - or in my case, both)? What drives your inner competitive spirit? And what kind of trade-offs do we need to take into account before we dive in head on? I’d like to hear your thoughts.

[UPDATE - Having published the post, I almost forgot to mention that my friends Ianiv and Arieanna own the Blogaholics.ca domain - go check it out!]

I took a good chunk of the Friday afternoon off to give myself some time away from the blogosphere. Funny how it goes, Karen Parker and I bumped into Richard Eriksson at the Apple Store where he posed the question of the day - “Will YOU buy an iPhone?“. I have been reading reviews of Rogers iPhone plans all over the place, and a lot of my friends have something to say, in one way or another. Buzz Bishop asked around on Twitter the same question - will we buy an iPhone?

With all the buzz in the blogosphere, I can’t really say that the topic has been exhausted, but it has been covered by my friends John Biehler, Andy, Liam, Tanya, Jordan and a number of other friends mine have been examining the issue in such a thorough way that I really don’t think I have much to add to the discussion. EXCEPT - that I am an enviro-geek learning how to be more of a tech-geek. So if Rogers hadn’t royally made such a big mistake, I would have most likely bought an iPhone.

Since I have tons of geek friends in the blogosphere with iPhones (Rebecca, John Biehler, Duane, Tod, Andy, Tanya - although she got rid of hers recently, Jenn, Nadia, just to name a few) I have had a chance to test-drive the artifact itself. I like it, the functionality is awesome, and there’s a gazilliion things that you can do with it.

Here is where Rogers made a mistake, in micro-economics terms - Rogers had the perception that the geek’s price elasticity of demand of an iPhone would be low. Ok, yes that was economics-geekspeak. In plain English - Rogers gambled on the addictive nature of gadgets for geeks. If you REALLY want a gadget, you’ll pay whatever price is necessary. Thus the price elasticity is low. If there are numerous substitutes, you’ll switch to whatever gadget is cheaper and can get you the same thing for the same price.

My price sensitivity, however, is quite high. I am highly sensitive to pricing changes AND surprising as this may sound, Rogers, SO ARE GEEKS! Living in an expensive city like Vancouver, and having tonnes of other options to switch to, trust me, an iPhone is NOT an item all geeks need. There are dozens of other options they have and they can switch to. Substitutes are available all over the place. Price elasticity is high.

Since I’m sensitive to price changes, and truth be told, I am also quite fine with my cell phone as is, and I don’t need yet another gadget, I will not be buying an iPhone. It would have been nice, for sure. It would have been fun, absolutely. It would make me look even geekier, heck yeah. But I am quite alright, thank you very much. Rogers hasn’t given me much reason to be thrilled with them, and now even less.

For more information, Google “Rogers fail iPhone” and you’ll find dozens of my friends’ reviews of the issue. Have everyone a good weekend.

I’ve been playing tennis since I was a little kid, as both my Mom and Dad were big tennis fans. I remember that my Dad wanted to teach me how to hit a single-handed backhand, but I adopted a two-handed backhand (which to this day is still my strongest stroke). I have managed, with time, to hit a single-handed top-spin backhand, but I still slice it two-handed.

Growing up watching the tapes of epic Wimbledon finals of Chris Evert vs. Martina Navratilova, and Bjorn Borg vs. Jimmy Connors, I always wanted to be there. The word “Wimbledon” evoked an exhilarating sensation of triumph and success. So when I decided to undertake some of my graduate work in Great Britain, I said to myself - “Raul, you HAVE to go to Wimbledon. Even if just to see it from the outside. Even if you can’t really attend a game. Just do it.”

So I did. One weekend, I took the train to London and managed to traverse the somewhat complicated tube train system. It was a sunny summer day, actually I think the Championships were on. I walked towards the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, enjoying the sun. It felt like bliss. I managed to score a visit to the Museum. Finally, I was in Wimbledon! While definitely not playing, I still had fulfilled my dream of being on site, where these epic battles had taken place.

Just this week, one of my nieces won her very first tennis tournament. She is a phenomenal tennis player and I am sure she’ll do great. I don’t know if she’ll ever play in Wimbledon, it would be awesome if she did, but the most important thing I want her to know and remember is that I will love her regardless of whether she wins or loses. Tennis is just one facet of her life, as it was only one of the facets of mine.

I am still in love with Wimbledon, and I always will. That’s probably why I was so happy when the 2004 movie “Wimbledon” came out. For your viewing pleasure, the trailer.

I got home last night at around 9pm, exhausted after having spent time running around like a headless hummingbird, and even though I sat in front of my computer, I was simply unable to produce anything. I wanted to write up everything I had for the weekend, and not a single word came out. My brain was completely shutdown.

Even hummingbirds need to rest, and I am not the exception. These past few weeks, I’ve been talking to my friends, both on and off the blogosphere, about the fact that I have been pushing myself to extremes and sleeping very little. That’s not a sustainable position (not in the environmental sustainability sense, for the record, but in the sense of ’sustaining’ - long term).

I need to take care of myself, and I plan to do so in the next little while. Please take no offense if I don’t respond quickly to emails, messages, phone calls, etc. I just want some time off. As I mentioned before, there will be some time-stamped posts in case anyone really cares to read, but for the most part, it is my absolute hope that I won’t be online this weekend. Enjoy yours!

On July 16th, 2008, a number of local, Metro Vancouver bloggers who use WordPress as their main platform will be descending on Langley’s The Cascade Casino (no, we are NOT gambling, just in case you were wondering) to present at WordCamp Fraser Valley, and according to the most recent update from BlueFur, they’re already at 33% capacity (and it’s not even July) so be sure to register, PRONTO!

At any rate, I found out that Gary Jones is looking for coffee and snacks sponsorships. Given that I work in the environmental field, ideally I’d like to see a reduced environmental footprint. One idea would be to contact local, environmentally-conscious producers to see if we can get some type of sponsorship (e.g. organic vegetable platters, or organic, ethically-traded coffee). I’ll see what we can do - I am sure amongst my readers there must be people who work in environmental issues and the food industry, so if you do (or know of someone), drop me a comment or send me an email.