Category: news of the wierd

  • Bonus blog – serving the social media masters – but why

    Between my blog (right here), my coffee website and my radio-tech-geek site, I have upwards of 100K readers per month.

    100 thousand. Unique readers.
    And the stats to back it up.

    But I consistently ignore the bigger audience (you folks out there in blog land)
    in favor of spending my free time quipping on Twitter and posting the periodic axiom on Facebook.

    But why? Why? WHY?

    Well. I have been thinking about it.

    Social media challenges in 2012Part of having 1800 twitter followers – which is a small number in the big scheme of things, is that I can attach a face to so many of these good people. It is, in fact, a conversation – a back and forth if you would. A kind of interaction that does not really happen as effectively on the Blogosphere. Unless of course the occasional blog reader chooses to comment on something – which is great. I LOVE comments.

    Twitter is great. No question. But it can be frustrating at the same time. Every one of the 1800 followers is a sentient personality, with fabric, substance and real edges. Twitter is blog-3D. And a twitter writer needs to put substantially more energy into the 140 character snippets because you are trying to convey a focused thought and be aware that potentially several thousand sets of eyes might take a peek at your thought… and react to it… good or bad… in near real time.

    So. I love twitter and my following readers.

    And if twitter is fun (and not effortless) then Facebook is even more challenging and more frustrating… because you are preaching to a largely converted choir, who are going to be less tolerant to the spectrum of your (my) muse.

    Meaning, as over the top as I can be on Twitter – as funny or unfunny as I can be – or as cynical or jaded, my thoughts are quickly lost in the conversation as other funnier quips move up the feed chain.

    Not so much on Facebook. Things are moving a little slower – and I find it way easier to become impatient with my FB friends and likely they are experiencing the same thing about me. I am challenging at the best of times – and not always in a good way.

    So. My big audience gets nixed more than occasionally. I guess it is about balance and managing all the social media tasks. I will most certainly talk more about this – because the discussion has merit and it’s an opportunity for me to dial it down a bit… and who in my social media circle would not want that!

  • Testing odd looking antennas in the Victoria area

    What has 50 surplus Russian made ferrite rods (ferrite rods are crushed iron and resin – and little more? They look like licorice cigars and are used in AM radios… no really!)

    Sections of PVC pipe?
    A dozen turns of exotic insulated wire? (known in geek world as “Litz” wire…)
    and a variable capacitor? (Not a flux capacitor by any stretch of the imagination.)

    If you have ever taken apart a transistor radio you have likely seen some of these innards — on a much smaller scale.

    But what does it do?

    Surplus Russian Ferrite Rod Antenna - made in America!Well. Most of you folks know that long distance radio reception is possible on your little AM radio at night? You did not know that? Well it is.
    For instance, a station in San Francisco on 810khz on the radio dial is audible from Mexico to Alaska. It is called “KGO” and it is part of the ABC radio network. You can hear it on your car radio or anything that tunes AM – no, really you can.

    And unless you do not already have an AM-FM battery powered radio in your emergency kit, you should have one handy. Oh yea, internet radio is all sexy and everything but after an earthquake, the only thing you will be hearing (apart from the screams for help) is going to be low power AM and FM stations locally – running on back-up power. Forget your cell phones, cable TV and internet. None of that stuff is going to work. Be prepared.

    I digress.

    Surplus Russian Ferrite Rod Antenna - made in America!I am testing this gizmo (seen in the photo) It is one of about 10 ever made – and there are 9 other ones in use in North America.
    What does it do? It pulls weak radio signals out of the air and boosts them for virtually any AM radio.

    Believe it or not, when you are driving to work in the morning (on or about sunrise) in Victoria (or anywhere on Vancouver Island or on the West Coast) you are picking up signals that have traveled the entire distance across the Pacific ocean… from Japan, China, Korea, Australia, Hawaii, etc. Yup, they are there – but they are pretty weak most of the time. Sometimes (right around sunrise) they will be enhanced and you may hear Japanese or Korean… it happens. No cause for alarm.

    The gizmo above gives them a huge boost so they become readily audible on virtually any small radio. I will produce a you-tube video in the next few days (conditions permitting) to better demonstrate what this thing can do.
    But why build one? Well, it takes basic antenna principles to a bit of an extreme – for the purpose of receiving radio signals over vast distances, but also enhancing signals within a 100 mile circle… so when you absolutely positively must be able to receive a radio signal under stressful conditions. Yup, that is pretty much it.

    I will be testing this gadget around the Victoria area for the next while. You may see it on top of my blue 2012 import along Dallas Rd. or in the Gonzales – King George Terrace look-out. Do not be alarmed. It is a passive receiving antenna. I am not transmitting any signals. And yes, the device looks odd and potentially scary. But not to worry. Stop. Come by. Ask for a demo.

    It is all about making radio and retro electronics fun and staying safe during an Earthquake or civil defense emergency!

  • The IT factor and losing sight

    Coffee Cupping at HABIT CAFE & CULTUREHaving spent 4 days in Portland, Oregon recently – at the annual SCAA event, I had the opportunity of wandering in and out of the coffee envelope… checking out street life, retail and everyday happenings for the average resident…
    With some thoughts to comparing what I saw in Portland to what I see in Victoria and Vancouver…

    Within Victoria’s (and Vancouver’s) cafe scene are examples of a magical factor that every cafe covets – the IT factor. That ability to draw line-ups day after day, hour after hour, week after week for all time.

    Victoria has a few cafes like this; Discovery, Cafe Fantastico, 2% Jazz, Fernwood coffee to name a few. The Stick in Sooke is a caffeine oasis in Sooke some 24 miles to the West. Drumroaster coffee at Cobble Hill north of Victoria totally has the IT factor nailed to the wall with an endless source of IT energy. It. The it factor. The ones that do not have it covet it. The ones that do treasure it and nurture it… protecting it.

    OK. Now let’s leap from the “it factor” in coffee… to retail.

    When Andrea and I were in Portland Oregon (and in San Francisco late in 2011) we did a lot of retail and people watching. And the one thing that struck us was the popularity, and near hysterical adoration towards the APPLE store. Sure, they have some super neat products; I know, I now have an iPhone – having just replaced a phone from 2005 or so.

    The Portland APPLE store is in the middle of the downtown mall amidst stores that were utterly deserted and dead quiet apart from a few staff that were wandering around. Walk into the APPLE store and you are surrounded by people and staff — and energy… it factor energy.

    Again, I get it. Lots of neat cool desirable stuff.

    But why has everything else become so unexciting (apart from coffee, food and great beer — still in Portland right at the moment!)?

    Have we as a species stopped being excited about a lot of stuff or is this just a bad case of my distorted perspective.

    Something like this happened in the early seventies (if I recall correctly) – People actually lost interest in the Apollo moon missions. Most of my readers are likely too young for this… but it was true. After a moon mission or two, people stopped watching the launches and the journey. Can you imagine? And we never go there anymore – largely in part to the cost.

    The World is a place of wonder – and I think many of us are not paying enough attention to those things that are truly great, interesting and exciting.

    Lucky for me, I have a passion for food and coffee – and although I often find it challenging to find new ways to get excited about coffee — and consequently excite new people about cafe and coffee culture… I still manage to do it.
    Because, dang it, a great cup of coffee is GREAT. It is fun and exciting and makes me feel excited about lots of stuff that many of us, it seems, find mundane.

    So. Look around you. Re-engage. Find the it factor outside of the most common realms… like computers, gadgets and phones.
    Starting with a great cup of coffee or a neat coffee shop.

  • Toshiba Netbook NB555D quick look

    The Toshiba Netbook model NB555DHaving acquiesced to pressure from my chief significant other (she) having grown tired of watching me hover over my Asus Eee PC 4G (and its 7” screen) like a microbiologist examining a specimen…

    I finally departed mid-2007 and came into the modern times with a Toshiba Netbook model NB555D. In good time too – we have been hauling the little Asus around the World (well, back and forth to Hawaii to be exact) for many years now – running its native Fischer-Price style of Linux (Xandros if I am not mistaken…) and a handful of Live USB sticks with iterations of Ubuntu just to be safe.

    I had just become fully comfortable manipulating the OS on this little sub-notebook sized unit (just installed “Leeenux” – a light duty version of Ubuntu even less bloated than Easy Peasy… The Asus Eee runs great, still does – and it will travel more – just not on the next Hawaii trip – coming up in a few weeks.

    The search for a slightly better netbook was not a long one – managed to zero in on the Toshiba Netbook model NB555D fairly quickly. Simplified by the fact that I did not want another Asus (at least right away), did not want a Sony, and did not want anything running Android on a device that would be locked to that OS.

    What I found kind of interesting and slightly annoying was the complete lack of any credible peer reviews of the Toshiba Netbook model NB555D – nothing. One 1 paragraph review and a you tube link. The rest were ads and zero content lazy shills with links to vendors – more of the net seems to be like that sadly.

    Anyway – what of the Toshiba Netbook model NB555D? With a 10.1” LED back-lit screen and a decent size keyboard (for my large hands…) and an energy scrimping Ghz AMD processor – (superior video processing to its Intel brethren in another similar model number) – and an attractive blue shell (and an interesting finish…) I guess I was prepared to be happy from the moment of purchase.

    That would not come immediately.

    The Toshiba Netbook model NB555D ships with Windows 7 “starter” – but let’s call it what it is – Windows “stripped down” is more like it – but that is OK all things considered. And here is one reason why:
    Windows 7 is a memory guzzler. The Toshiba Netbook model NB555D ships with 1Gb of DDR3 1066Mhz RAM – which is what the Toshiba Netbook model NB555D needs to be happy – leaving little left over for apps.

    Out of the box, the Toshiba Netbook model NB555D is a slug until it gets through a series of software updates and software self optimization (A windows 7 feature – it actually “learns” some of your preferences and practices as you use it more…)
    One of the first things I did was axe the “Norton Starter” that comes with it – I use AVG Free for virus protection but Microsoft Essentials (Free anti-virus) would have been a good choice too.

    Next I loaded “CRAP Cleaner” – a great tool from Piriform.com (also free) and got into the start-up manager and pulled a bunch of useless utilities and “launch speeders” that accelerated the appearance of the “Login screen” from a miserable minute and a half to a respectable 50 seconds.

    In a head to head with the 2007 Asus Eee 4G PC, the faster machine (the Toshiba Netbook model NB555D) actually lagged the Asus oldie in every instance.
    Using Crap Cleaner really got things zipping – still slower than the much older Asus however. More on its performance after I upgrade to 2G of RAM (in a few days)… with more user comments and software tweak suggestions!

  • The decline of the American small business empire part one

    Guitar necks are us...My buddy Chris, and I, sit over coffee most mornings at the University of Victoria’s Finnerty Express – it is my morning hang out. We are often in the company of retired or working Math professors, economists, technicians and even gardeners. There is always a lively discussion on topics as widely varied as politics, religion and events of the day.

    Chris had a story recently that was too hard not to share. And it is all about the decline of customer service and small business in America (much of this could apply to Canada as well…) So here we go.

    Chris and I are both aspiring musicians, both of us being active guitar players and singers. We actually performed recently in front of a lively crowd of around 100 people in one of the Grad student lounges on campus.

    Chris likes to build and modify guitars – for most of us guitar types, the endless tweaking of our instrument is in our blood. In this particular instance, Chris was ordering a neck for one of his prized instruments, an old Fender Telecaster. He was ordering this new component from Seattle – and as it turned out, one weekend recently, he found himself in Seattle, not far from the factory that makes the parts that he was looking for.

    So. Brilliant. He was in town and decided to head to the factory store and get his purchase directly. Over he goes. When he gets to the store, somewhere near Redmond Washington, he drives into the parking lot and walks up to the door. Looking in he can see a wall of instrument parts and the desired neck he seeks. There is a sign on the door. “Appointment only – showroom not open!”
    Chris sees someone working in the store and beckons him to the locked door. A fellow comes over and open the door an inch. The guy points to the sign. Chris says, “I have come all the way from Victoria and would like to buy one of those necks… I have the cash in my pocket…” Store clerk: “We do not accept drop ins… you will need to call for an appointment…” Clerk hands him a card with the 1-800 number.
    Chris backs away and phones the number.
    You guessed it. The clerk in the store picks up the phone at the counter. I kid you not.
    The clerk takes his information and comes back to the door.
    Chris comes into the store and points to the neck he is interested in.
    Clerk says: “We do not do direct store sales generally…” “You will have to place an order on the internet…”
    Chris repeats, “I have cash in my pocket, I want that neck on the wall… and you have a shipping area in the back… can I pick it up there?”
    “the shipping area is for couriers only… fedex, purolator, etc…” the clerk tosses out.

    At the end of the exchange, Chris was several feet away from a guitar component that he was ready and willing to pay for on the spot – and was unable to because of a poorly operated business with completely and unflinchingly inept staff.

    This is one reason while America is failing. They have lost touch with reality and the ability to do business.

    Example two from the beleaguered Chris:
    Chris recently bought an audio mixing board from a company in the U.S.
    Over the internet.
    Audio mixing boards: All of us musicians have one. We often use it to hook up multiple instruments and microphones in a studio or stage situation.
    Chris needed a small mixer for performance scenarios. He found the one he was looking for at a decent price. Brand new. When he purchased it online, he took the option for “extended warranty and insurance coverage” — for virtually any situation; drop it off a cliff, it is covered. No worries.

    Within a week, his mixer arrives. But it does not work properly.
    He calls the help line for the equipment company that sold him the equipment.
    Chris tells his story, “The gear arrived but it does not work… it is broken… there are several channels that are dead…”
    “Not sure what we can do for you…” says the voice on the telephone…
    Chris reminds them, “I bought warranty coverage for this piece of…”
    “Ah, says the fellow on the help line…” “you are describing a pre-existing condition sir… it did not fail while it was in your possession! Your warranty coverage does not cover this!”

    Say what?

    I looked at the mixer for him – it was a simple take apart and I am a qualified technician. By the looks of it, it could not have worked even from the factory – it was defective in that there were cold solder joints and solder bridges from the factory. It never worked. It could never have worked. Shocking.

    Anyway – 2 months on and Chris is still fighting via the phone and the internet to get his money back, a refund or something functional.

    Another reason why America is in trouble…
    Because small business and manufacturing have utterly lost their way.

    This is the 1st chapter in what might become a small series in why we are falling down in the area of manufacturing and customer service in North America.

  • Victoria Summer 2001 Under the Sea with Brennan Storr

    Brennan Store - Largely the Truth - Under the seaI have a pet theory, one that I dreamed up during moments of great reflection –usually while sitting on the toilet or waiting for traffic lights to change. My theory is that this world is the spiritual equivalent of a rock tumbler. The rough, jagged gemstones are new souls: immature, wild and unaware of the damage they do to others.

    Through the love and hardship of a thousand lifetimes the rough edges are worn smooth and we emerge from the other end as wiser, kinder old souls – polished gems – and we make our exit. I haven’t gotten as far as figuring out where the stones come from or go to but if you’re looking for hints I always recommend the “Three B’s” – Bible/Bhagavad Gita/Battlefield Earth.

    The reason I mention this is because I recently moved apartments and with the hassle involved in moving this middle-class circus from one fairground to another I have decided that in my next life I want to be a Hermit Crab.

    Imagine the simplicity – shells are abundant so you can house hunt wherever you like, rent is low because the water makes paper currency impractical and everywhere you go is oceanfront property. You’re mobile, too, so if those shiftless European Crabs move into the neighbourhood and let their yards go to seed because they’re busy playing dice or pitching woo at your women then you can just pick up and go without having to file a forest worth of paperwork.

    Contrast that with moving from one apartment to another. First, you have to decide you want a different/bigger/smaller apartment. Then you need to start shopping for a place and hope that once you’ve found one you like, the owner/manager hasn’t established a set of prerequisites which weed you out right away: “We only rent to couples/single people/people with no children/an odd number of teeth/who dress in spandex and fight crime in the evenings.”

    Once you’ve established that you are eligible for the privilege of paying them too much money in exchange for a place to live you fill out a number of forms which give the property management company permission to prod their finger up your background.

    Remember, too, that you must do all of this at least one month in advance of when you intend to move. Two months is preferable. The machine-like precision of six months notice will curry you favour when robots wrest control of the world from man. Giving exact notice before you’ve even left the womb will assure that you’ll be the first one chosen to go back in time and kill John Connor.

    When Nicky & I found an affordable two-bedroom apartment it was four days past the 30-day deadline set out in the rental agreement for our current apartment. I took our “Notice to Vacate” form to the property manager for our building, a perpetually frowning chubby woman prone to wearing cat sweaters and who looks, more or less, like a forlorn Care Bear. I saw then the appeal of rules to the mediocre.

    “You’re four days late!” she said, puffing herself to appear more threatening, like a squirrel. I apologized and explained that our new apartment had more or less fallen into our lap and asked if she could simply backdate the forms. After all it was only four days, two of which were Saturday & Sunday. That appeal for clemency brought about a startling metamorphosis and this wan, rotund woman suddenly came alive with the possibility of delivering unto someone else a portion of the misery that was her life: “Late is late! Unless we can fill the apartment you will have to pay next month’s rent AND right now we’ve already got one apartment vacant, so finding someone for yours is VERY unlikely.”

    Brennan Store - Largely the Truth - Food writer, comedian and humoristMy first attempt a failure I then tried to take the same tact at the office of the property management company. I understand the point of rules – despite what the anarchists say, most of us could not function without some kind of external control and without it would barely have time to smash Piggy’s glasses before the entire planet was reduced to a cinder. That said, rules need wiggle room because life as a human gets messy and rarely unfolds according to plan.

    This argument was of zero interest to the woman behind the counter at the property management company:

    “Sorry, but you’re four days past the 30-day window.”
    “I know, but I thought maybe because we’re moving from one building managed by this company to another…”
    “You’re four days past the 30-day window.”
    “…and both buildings are owned by the same man…”
    “You’re four days past the 30-day window”
    “…and I’ve been a good tenant for the last four years…”
    “Four days…”
    “ …that you might backdate the forms for me.”
    “…past the 30-day window.”

    I would have had better luck arguing with a calculator.

    Then I was given a “Late Notice to Vacate Form” which except for the word “Late” was identical to the “Notice to Vacate” form I had brought with me.

    So now we were on the hook for $830, one month’s rent, unless Texas Instruments and the Human Ottoman managed to fill not one but TWO apartments.Nicky & I decided that this was unacceptable and so embarked on an ad campaign that could have sold American flags to Ho Chi Minh.

    This resulted in the building manager, to whom Nicky had given the Troll-esque nickname “Grumpy grogs”, spending so much time showing the two apartments that hundreds of Billy goats must have merrily trip-trapped across her unattended bridge.

    Brennan Store - Largely the Truth - Under the seaAfter a week of this she found tenants that she couldn’t turn away and stopped by our apartment to tell us before tromping home to watch “Toddlers & Tiaras” with the blinds drawn. The look on her face was that of a chubby-cheeked child who has been denied the opportunity to fry ants with a magnifying glass:

    “We found people to take your apartment so YOU can take the ad off Used Victoria.”

    “That’s great news! We’ll take it off Craigs list too. And Facebook. Twitter. Google Wave. The bulletin board at Thrifty’s. Safeway. Fairways. Quality Foods….”

    She walked away before I could start on the coffee shops. Or mention that this all could have been avoided had she just backdated the forms in the first place.

    Or how I intend to avoid this issue in future by being a Hermit Crab.

  • Victoria Summer 2011 Design ideas from Italy Chapter 2

    A P.R. firm in Italy has spent the last 13 months coming up with a re-branding for their product.

    13 months and this is what they came up with.

    Feel free to click on the photo for the slighter larger view…

    I have been polling this story pretty broadly and so far only one guy (a colleague that lives and works in Taiwan) thinks it’s OK to lampoon, minimize, diminish or profit from the misery of the past.

    Example: There is a good reason why we discourage commercial use of images of Nazism and Adolf Hitler in ad media around the World.

    And for similar reasons, the embracing of multiculturalism and leaving behind of old stuffy racist colonial thinking is known as progress.

    The image above was custom made, for me, by the P.R. firm in Italy with the designer begging me for a change of heart with a frequent; “What? WHAT? What is wrong with using this lovely plump African woman dressed in 19th Century clothing to help sell espresso beans?”

    My attempts at explaining my position on this matter have prompted more; “What? What? I don’t get it…”

    Help me out here folks: Using racial stereotypes to sell stuff in Europe is not, like, this common, is it?

    And for the record, the White guy that lives and works in Taiwan does embarrassing impersonations of Chinese Cab drivers that would have fallen flat on a 50 year old episode of the Ed Sullivan show – still, I appreciate all opinions…

    Especially yours!

  • Victoria Spring 2011 – Islandnet under attack

    Islandnet denial of service attackMy ISP (client since 1995) has been under a cyber-attack since yesterday – taking down the entire operation several times over the last 24 hours – disrupting thousands of customers and hundreds of webpages.

    For the time being all is calm.

    Islandnet.com was contacted by the attackers who ordered that the web site in question be taken down.

    Islandnet.com has capitulated. And in their words.

    “UPDATE 3:12pm: we have been contacted by a group claiming to be behind the attacks. They identify the target (a customer of ours) and demand that the site in question be shut down or the attacks will continue. As much as I hate to capitulate, we can’t afford to stand up for the rights of one customer at the expense of all the others, so the site has been shut down.”

    Not sure how I feel about this.

    So. It was not the website I thought it might be. For all intents and purposes, it could have been my blog – which regularly speaks out on some sensitive international issues – pleases me to no end that my opinion is not so valued somewhere that I would be attacked over it. That said, I am not sure how I would feel about my Canadian ISP giving me the boot over the whims of a foreign power.

  • Victoria Spring 2011 – Our Work Place Glee Music Therapy

    My work place Glee - music therapyFor most people, music in the work place comes out of a back ground music system or off of someones bleeding iPod. It’s not like anyone has a radio playing at their work station anymore – So it may come as something of a surprise to find a lab in a local University that has its own built in jam space for lunch time guitar and bass throw downs.

    Seems odd to me – even though I got the ball rolling – And I am sure this is more common than I think it is – or perhaps it is a well kept secret elsewhere.

    Because for some reason, my employer (a local University) seems to be a hot bed of musical talent… and trust me folks, I am not self identifying here or anything – any money I have ever made in the music biz has gone directly to charity. Not talented. At all. But I can pretend. Sometimes quite effectively.

    But I do plays the guitar a bit. A bit. A bit of guitar. A bit of bass. A bit of voice and a bit of piano. All in good fun. And for whatever reason, it all feels good.

    Yours truly has been playing on and off since a long time ago – first Piano since the age of 6 and guitar since I was 13. And although I am no prodigy (too old), I can read a chart or two and turn a page of lyrics into something that passes as entertainment and vaguely familiar.

    Imagine the delight to realize the amount of raw talent all around me.
    For my space it started as innocently as showing up at work with an acoustic guitar. Strapping it on over coffee break and busking around the lab. Before you know it, people are joining in or watching appreciatively. From there, another guitar was added… and a bass… and another vocalist or two… and more music.

    We are not the cast of Glee by any stretch. But we are having an amount of fun that was completely unanticipated. Additionally, there are several other similar groups on campus doing exactly the same thing – and ironically, we all may have an offer on the table to play our music at a Summer Festival… which, for me, makes no sense at all. I am not deaf, but I cannot hear Journey or Celine Dion in much of what we are doing… at least from the regular line up. We do have a student who sits in from time to time that sings like an angel… but she is leaving town.

    A bunch of geezer music players worthy of entertaining a crowd? Don’t know. Who am I to judge modern music? Stay tuned.

    In the meantime, in the corner of one of our labs is a 300 Watt P.A. system, microphones and a rack of musical instruments. If you listen real closely over lunch at the University, you might just hear our noise.

  • Victoria Spring 2011 – Good bye to the Salmon Kings

    Good bye Salmon Kings - thanks for the memoriesHere is how my post read six months ago…

    But through a strange twist of hockey club management, my favorite Captain… Wes Goldie, has been replaced with, by the looks of it, a guy who spends more time in the penalty box – than on the ice or on the bench…

    Say hello to the new captain of the Victoria Salmon Kings – Pete Vandermeer – third on the all-time American Hockey League penalty minutes list.

    “Our barn, Save-on-Foods Memorial will not be a place other teams will want to return to,” threatened Vandermeer…

    “Even if the other guys leave with a win, it’s important they leave missing some blood and teeth when limping out of here.”

    OK. The Salmon Kings management started to screw up at the beginning of the 2010-2011 Season with the hire of this Vandermeer thug – who only lasted about a half season before he vanished. We gave up Wes Goldie who turned out to be the high scorer for the entire season… for the Alaska Aces.

    And now the Kings may leave Victoria – or be dissolved.., and their place taken by a Junior team – of teenagers… the former Chilliwack Bruins… to become the Victoria Bruins… how imaginative.

    So get this. People are unhappy in Chilliwack, B.C. and we are unhappy in Victoria B.C. – The owners of the Kings have totally misread their audience and are marching blithely into yet another screw up with these changes.

    Yes, it is a business.

    But I am a customer. And I am not buying it.