My first day here I sat in a class next to a gentleman name Francois. We got to talking a bit, and as it turns out he's an avid cyclist. I produced my bike path map of Montreal and asked him if there were any good routes I should try out since I brought my bike. He was so nice that he actually took out a piece of paper and drew me a map to a nearby park that he said was quite nice for riding.
The weather has been pretty lousy all week. It has been very cold, and wet. The thought of riding in this weather doesn't exactly have me jumping up and down. Rather than get covered in mud trying to ride in the rain, I decided to walk to the park. It's huge. For some reason it looked pretty small on the map. From various points in the park, most of greater Montreal is visible.
In case you would like to see what Montreal looks like, you can check it out here: http://www.digitalintuition.com/shared/montreal.wmv Please be warned that my web server is slow, and the file is about 10MB...so you probably want to download it in the background. Also, I cannot vouch for the quality of the photographer. Frankly, the guy should probably not quit his day job any time soon!
Showing posts with label Devteach 2007. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Devteach 2007. Show all posts
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
If it weren't for hunger
If it weren't for hunger, I'd never really see new cities. Hunger is great because it forces you to go out and look for food. This afternoon I had a plan, and the plan was simple. Take a hot bath, go get food, come back and go to bed at a reasonable time. While I soaked in the tub I absentmindedly thumbed one of the magazines given to people at the DevTeach conference. I landed on an article describing a hypothetical developer who developed some bad health habits and had a heart bypass.
That reminded me. Someone made me eat a salad yesterday. It was up to me to put things right today. I could think of only one food capable of combating a salad with any real efficacy: pizza. I leaped out of the tub, dressed, and left the hotel with a precision usually reserved for covert military operations. I'd show that salad who's boss.
As is my habit, I tried looking for a place out of the way. When you're smack in the middle of 1.8 million people, out of the way takes some work. Complicating matters, I refuse to drive aimlessly about a foreign city. Better to walk. Besides, if you're in a car, you're safe. Whilst wandering about, I found the strangest thing: Quebecois Little China. (Chinoise petit? That's just a guess).
Now, people in Montreal are proud of speaking French. Most of them speak English, but as a matter of pride they don't unless you are clearly a mono-linguiled idiot such as myself. Now, add one more language to the language barrier: Chinese.
It was really bizarre to see people switching back and forth between three languages with aplomb, all inside the same conversation. It was like being in a movie where the bad guys are hiding in "Little China". The stores were clearly for the consumption of the local Asian population. Even the layout of the inventory was clearly non-western.
Anyway, I pushed on...since I've never heard of a Chinese pizza. Eventually I found myself in front of an establishment that appeared to have pretty much every greasy food under the sun.
Perfect. I checked the menu, and sure enough, they had pizza. I was sold.
As I prepared to place my order for a mushroom pizza, I remembered that one of my coworkers had suggested I try putine while in Canada. It would be incredibly rude to requisition advice without using it, even if the food sounded a bit odd, so I screwed up my nerve, clenched my stomach, and requested an order of putine with my pizza.
What's that? You've never had putine? You wonder what it might be? Well it is perhaps the one food more capable than a pizza for combating a salad. Putine is comprised of french fries, covered in melted cheese curds, then slathered in gravy. Believe it or not, once you finally silence the voice of reason in the back of your mind, it is really good stuff.
So I sat in this diner, eating fried foods adorned with more saturated fats, watching the world go by. I caught myself watching the cyclists again. This time, I noticed more detail. Some of them weren't suicidal. Some were desperate. They had the distinct appearance of reluctant cyclists. These people were afraid, but someone had double dog dared them to commute via bicycle for a week and they couldn't say "No". They would grimace before launching themselves haphazardly into traffic, and somehow when they opened their eyes the world would still be there. Secretly, I think they wanted to wake up in a hospital so the dare would officially be dissolved.
As I reflected smugly upon my keen observation, something almost slipped past my ever present radar for the unusual. Another bike. Sort of. It was a barking bicycle with a square nose. Actually, it was a bicycle with a shopping cart for a front, and the cart contained a medium size dog that was barking happily as its owner trundled it down the sidewalk. I couldn't have seen that in the hotel bar.
That reminded me. Someone made me eat a salad yesterday. It was up to me to put things right today. I could think of only one food capable of combating a salad with any real efficacy: pizza. I leaped out of the tub, dressed, and left the hotel with a precision usually reserved for covert military operations. I'd show that salad who's boss.
As is my habit, I tried looking for a place out of the way. When you're smack in the middle of 1.8 million people, out of the way takes some work. Complicating matters, I refuse to drive aimlessly about a foreign city. Better to walk. Besides, if you're in a car, you're safe. Whilst wandering about, I found the strangest thing: Quebecois Little China. (Chinoise petit? That's just a guess).
Now, people in Montreal are proud of speaking French. Most of them speak English, but as a matter of pride they don't unless you are clearly a mono-linguiled idiot such as myself. Now, add one more language to the language barrier: Chinese.
It was really bizarre to see people switching back and forth between three languages with aplomb, all inside the same conversation. It was like being in a movie where the bad guys are hiding in "Little China". The stores were clearly for the consumption of the local Asian population. Even the layout of the inventory was clearly non-western.
Anyway, I pushed on...since I've never heard of a Chinese pizza. Eventually I found myself in front of an establishment that appeared to have pretty much every greasy food under the sun.
Perfect. I checked the menu, and sure enough, they had pizza. I was sold.
As I prepared to place my order for a mushroom pizza, I remembered that one of my coworkers had suggested I try putine while in Canada. It would be incredibly rude to requisition advice without using it, even if the food sounded a bit odd, so I screwed up my nerve, clenched my stomach, and requested an order of putine with my pizza.
What's that? You've never had putine? You wonder what it might be? Well it is perhaps the one food more capable than a pizza for combating a salad. Putine is comprised of french fries, covered in melted cheese curds, then slathered in gravy. Believe it or not, once you finally silence the voice of reason in the back of your mind, it is really good stuff.
So I sat in this diner, eating fried foods adorned with more saturated fats, watching the world go by. I caught myself watching the cyclists again. This time, I noticed more detail. Some of them weren't suicidal. Some were desperate. They had the distinct appearance of reluctant cyclists. These people were afraid, but someone had double dog dared them to commute via bicycle for a week and they couldn't say "No". They would grimace before launching themselves haphazardly into traffic, and somehow when they opened their eyes the world would still be there. Secretly, I think they wanted to wake up in a hospital so the dare would officially be dissolved.
As I reflected smugly upon my keen observation, something almost slipped past my ever present radar for the unusual. Another bike. Sort of. It was a barking bicycle with a square nose. Actually, it was a bicycle with a shopping cart for a front, and the cart contained a medium size dog that was barking happily as its owner trundled it down the sidewalk. I couldn't have seen that in the hotel bar.
She Makes Coffee Nervous
It is always a great pleasure to associate with, and listen to intelligent people speak about topics that they are experts on. That is the beauty of being here at DevTeach. I work in an office without anybody to really bounce ideas off, at least, not C# or .Net ideas. The unfortunate side of being here is that the pace is fast. Try compressing a topic that could easily take an entire day into a one hour and fifteen minute session. It gets ugly fast.
This morning I participated in a session on data binding, hosted by Beth Massi. By the time I got there, it was standing room only. This room was occupied with about 50 people, and only four of them were women. One of them was the presenter. She started with a very quick overview about what we would do if we were using Orcas (which, of course, we aren't) and in the next 10 minutes took us on a tour, with examples, of no fewer than 5 different data binding methods. My head was spinning. Then she made the most absurd declaration I've heard in a while: "Now we're really going to start moving!". Oh boy.
When I crawled back to my room for a lunch break and some writing I hungrily gulped down two Tylenol. Throughout the session my mind kept flicking back to the movie "You've Got Mail". I don't know what Beth is like when she isn't on a short schedule, but I can tell you one thing that was certainly true this morning: She makes coffee nervous.
This morning I participated in a session on data binding, hosted by Beth Massi. By the time I got there, it was standing room only. This room was occupied with about 50 people, and only four of them were women. One of them was the presenter. She started with a very quick overview about what we would do if we were using Orcas (which, of course, we aren't) and in the next 10 minutes took us on a tour, with examples, of no fewer than 5 different data binding methods. My head was spinning. Then she made the most absurd declaration I've heard in a while: "Now we're really going to start moving!". Oh boy.
When I crawled back to my room for a lunch break and some writing I hungrily gulped down two Tylenol. Throughout the session my mind kept flicking back to the movie "You've Got Mail". I don't know what Beth is like when she isn't on a short schedule, but I can tell you one thing that was certainly true this morning: She makes coffee nervous.
Monday, May 14, 2007
This City is Crazy
This afternoon found me sitting idly, chewing over what I had just seen when WHAMO, a bowl of salad dropped out of the sky and plopped down in front of me, nearly taking my nose off in the process. Anybody who knows me will attest to the strangeness of this situation, since the chance of me ordering a salad is, well, nil. Shaken from my thoughts I sufficed to reassure myself that this city is crazy.
Please understand, I'm no complete stranger to the madness that is the modern large city. I've seen many of them: Chicago, Sydney (thanks to my brother and sister in law), Paris and Frankfurt (thanks Mum), and Los Angeles. Never have I ever had a salad administered to me. No sooner did I sit in a restaurant than this salad appeared, or dropped courtesy of my overly efficient waitress, right in front of me. In the U.S. we expect water when we sit. Perhaps Montreal is recovering from a scurvy scare, and the city had to implement mandatory saladings.
When I left my room this afternoon, my mission was simple: find lunch at a respectable price. When I say respectable, I mean less than twenty dollars. Since I am downtown in a large city, that is of course a challenge. My mission was simple because I have a lot of homework to finish this evening, and I'm already completely exhausted. Perhaps you can guess what my next foolish maneuver was. No camera. My first look at Montreal during the day, and no camera.
Before I walked a full block I had nearly seen five bicyclists meet untimely ends. Usually I blame motorists for the kinds of infractions that kill people on bicycles. Not this time. These people were weaving in and out of traffic with a complete disregard for the cars trying to run them over at 40 MPH. They weren't all couriers either.
After walking about 10 blocks I finally got to a neighborhood that was low brow enough to serve a reasonably priced lunch. And what did I get for my efforts? I got a salad.
Please understand, I'm no complete stranger to the madness that is the modern large city. I've seen many of them: Chicago, Sydney (thanks to my brother and sister in law), Paris and Frankfurt (thanks Mum), and Los Angeles. Never have I ever had a salad administered to me. No sooner did I sit in a restaurant than this salad appeared, or dropped courtesy of my overly efficient waitress, right in front of me. In the U.S. we expect water when we sit. Perhaps Montreal is recovering from a scurvy scare, and the city had to implement mandatory saladings.
When I left my room this afternoon, my mission was simple: find lunch at a respectable price. When I say respectable, I mean less than twenty dollars. Since I am downtown in a large city, that is of course a challenge. My mission was simple because I have a lot of homework to finish this evening, and I'm already completely exhausted. Perhaps you can guess what my next foolish maneuver was. No camera. My first look at Montreal during the day, and no camera.
Before I walked a full block I had nearly seen five bicyclists meet untimely ends. Usually I blame motorists for the kinds of infractions that kill people on bicycles. Not this time. These people were weaving in and out of traffic with a complete disregard for the cars trying to run them over at 40 MPH. They weren't all couriers either.
After walking about 10 blocks I finally got to a neighborhood that was low brow enough to serve a reasonably priced lunch. And what did I get for my efforts? I got a salad.
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