tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7644868018612640632024-09-10T14:10:59.955-04:00Musings on various topics that may be slightly more interesting than this blog's title.Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.comBlogger175125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-7384195123014857222016-12-15T14:03:00.003-05:002016-12-15T14:03:54.167-05:00

I am by no means a comic aficionado; I leave that stuff up to people like Patrick & Dad.  However, I do enjoy comics, every now and then.  I'm not sure yet whether I prefer the physical article or reading on a tablet - more and more lately, tablet is becoming much friendlier - but I've always liked web comics, for sure.  I've gotten out of reading them lately, which

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-28092819152660868492016-12-12T14:13:00.004-05:002016-12-12T14:13:59.090-05:00

I need to get some of the writings I've got in my notebooks out there - not all of them, but I've got a few things that I'm hanging on to that I think people would like to read.  This one is ratings and reviews of podcasts I've listened to over the last week.  I'm keeping tabs on what I'm listening to on a daily basis and writing things down (giving them a rating out of 5) so this kind

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-30970783721149172232016-10-25T14:31:00.000-04:002016-10-25T14:31:46.661-04:00

I've been using MyFitnessPal since - I'm honestly not sure.  I remember using it when I had a BlackBerry.  Conservative estimates say at least 5-6 years.  I'm currently sitting at a log-in streak of 275 days, which consists of a mix of full food diaries and some not-so-full diaries.  For the last month they've been full diaries for a semi-accurate weekly calorie count. I was

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-9168555791059169522016-09-08T16:00:00.000-04:002016-09-08T16:00:04.105-04:00

My last post on this blog was back in May, but that wasn't a substantive post; it was a link to somewhere else.  My last "real" post here was actually April 1st.  Thought I'd provide some sort of update on how things are going. The last thing I wrote about was a 'life reset' check-in; technically speaking, I should have provided another update back in June.  Well...I've kind of

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-62547498934329614922016-05-02T14:15:00.001-04:002016-05-02T14:28:02.341-04:00

I had this idea for a post about the Blue Jays, and my first instinct was to write it here - but this isn't the right spot for it.  Instead I remembered that my brother and I sort of run a Blue Jays blog.  By 'sort of' I mean we hardly ever write anything.  But it exists, so here we are. You can read it here: http://bluejaysluddite.blogspot.ca/2016/05/the-bat-flipped.html

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-59771389270732061172016-04-01T12:03:00.000-04:002016-04-01T12:03:01.341-04:00

Full disclosure: I'm writing this a full 2 weeks early.  I'm starting it in one of my Moleskine notebooks, and transferring to Blogger via a neat new tablet Bluetooth keyboard.  That detail is unimportant, but super neat to me. Since the curling season is coming to an end, I thought it would be a good idea to score myself a number out of 4 in each applicable category. Get Healthy -

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-70532649174435391532016-03-13T19:55:00.000-04:002016-03-13T19:55:16.552-04:00

I honestly don't know where to start with this review.  I guess it'd be best to open with that I enjoyed the 6 episode mini series.  Were I forced to give it an arbitrary rating, I'd probably go with a 3.25 out of 5. I wasn't the biggest X Files fan while it was on the air, picking up only in the last season (which featured the infamous John Doggett).  I got hooked on the show in

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-17683566311391578892016-02-19T12:11:00.001-05:002016-02-19T12:11:11.029-05:00

I got started playing Clash of Clans over the summer, mostly as a way to prevent boredom.  I was terrible at the beginning - and I'd say I'm probably just Pretty OK at it now.  But I log in to play (even if it's just to check in on my base) at least once a day; I'd say without a doubt that this is the most I've ever played a video game - and I'm including countless hours trying to

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-85395540292707900282016-02-10T16:00:00.000-05:002016-02-10T16:00:04.199-05:00

Last weekend I had a second viewing of X-Men: Days of Future Past.  I first saw it in theatres, and enjoyed it.  Apparently not everyone did? Anyway, my only problem with the film was the opening exposition from Patrick Stewart / Professor X.  It felt very clunky and put in solely for the movie watching audience - doesn't it seem funny that none of the other mutants were already

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-46943439222949465592016-02-05T10:00:00.000-05:002016-02-05T10:00:21.465-05:00

This is going to be part of a series of three posts about what I'm doing as of February 1st to get back on track with various things.  I wrote about it last week if you'd like to read more.  Get Creative.  This is the last part of my so-called life reboot.  It's not as important as the first two (Get Healthy/Get Organized), but I think it fits in with the others.  

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-295849013013211982016-02-03T10:00:00.000-05:002016-02-03T10:00:16.271-05:00

This is going to be part of a series of three posts about what I'm doing as of February 1st to get back on track with various things.  I wrote about it last week if you'd like to read more.  Read my first entry, Get Healthy, to catch up. Get Organized. This is something I always struggle with, and something I want to improve upon.  Before the new year, I started keeping a

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-18179949736150737112016-02-01T10:00:00.000-05:002016-02-01T10:00:25.669-05:00

This is going to be part of a series of three posts about what I'm doing as of February 1st to get back on track with various things.  I wrote about it last week if you'd like to read more.   https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_16_lift-off.jpg I've done some thinking and brainstorming about my life reboot, initially thinking I'd focus on 7 things I want to fix or adjust.

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-76466399579834067612016-01-26T18:00:00.000-05:002016-01-26T18:00:06.320-05:00

Original photo by flickr user Lucky Larry, 2010 One thing a lot of people do around the start of a new year is set resolutions.  Occasionally, I will opt to pick something arbitrarily that I want to change (such as last year's goal of texting less and calling more; this did not stick).  Other years - like this one - I don't really stress about it so much.  However, I'm at a

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-21756377805069862382016-01-14T14:03:00.000-05:002016-01-14T14:03:50.435-05:00

"Mount Doom Status Update" sounds both ominous and awesome at the same time!  I'll keep it quick so I don't bore everyone - basically I have the project working as expected on a daily basis and runs like a charm.  I'll make a full post sometime on the weekend (when I get some time) and share the full project files and everything; I'm kind of thinking of tweaking it to tell me only when

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-21359095349520650832016-01-10T10:59:00.001-05:002016-01-10T10:59:52.668-05:00

I know I just posted about this yesterday, but I've put some more work into this (while procrastinating other things, naturally).  To recap from yesterday, this is what I wanted to accomplish in "Day 2": Figure out where IFTTT adds the next row of data (i.e. above or below the first row?) Confirm the distance in miles from Hobbiton to Mount Doom in Miles, convert to Kilometres Take the

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-88898135030888465552016-01-09T12:21:00.001-05:002016-01-09T12:21:57.256-05:00

Vanessa gave me a FitBit for Christmas - specifically, the Charge HR.  I've done some nerdy things with it - like figure out how to send more than just phone call notifications to it.  So far I can send text messages, and when activated, sports scores.  Fantastic! I thought that was the end of my fiddling with it for now; I figured I would probably play with it a little more here

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-86338298092684631172015-12-08T19:11:00.002-05:002015-12-08T19:11:56.259-05:00

This is not a review of the Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 3 episode; you can find a podcast about it over at the Mission Log podcast if you're so inclined.  But this is decidedly not a blog post about Star Trek.  Also, I'm going to try cross-posting this on Medium so please get in touch with me if you have any editing notes I should consider. November 8, 2013: 275.2

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-50865953075048091092015-11-16T10:30:00.000-05:002015-11-16T10:30:00.289-05:00

Another episode of External Monologues!  There's not much of note in this episode, except that I created a pretty  cool (I think) audio production of a short story I wrote back in 2010.  You can read along with the story here, because I also decided to record it using an older tape recorder.  Because I can. The music used underneath the story production was Small Hours by

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-56368719518758178972015-09-14T19:00:00.000-04:002015-09-15T06:28:08.144-04:00

In today's episode, I ramble on a little bit about a few different topics, ranging from my upcoming podcast project, to Alternative Airwaves, to Spotify.  Some links below. Direct download | iTunes Beirut Album - "No No No" Spotify Edit: Helps if I include the link to the podcast!

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-51292850218733928212015-09-02T16:28:00.001-04:002015-09-02T16:28:09.323-04:00

How do you like that for a witty blog post title?  OK, so I mentioned in my last podcast (link here) that I want to do a show about radio dramas that have been shared on archive.org, specifically starting with X Minus One.  Each different show would constitute a season on the podcast. Originally the plan started out just being to cover X Minus One by itself - and call it the X Minus

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-7508745523962225482015-08-31T10:15:00.000-04:002015-09-01T13:47:46.696-04:00

In today's episode, I finally implement a theme (Kyle Cox's Life Is Good)!  I talk about nosy grocery store cashiers, Clash of Clans, Reddit Gold, and X-Minus One.  Links are below!   The podcast is for sure on iTunes now! Full download link - Clash of Clans - Reddit - X Minus One - Backwards Compatible Podcast - Anthology Podcast Want to support my

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-86583318434241634032015-08-20T14:28:00.000-04:002015-08-20T14:28:24.559-04:00

Titansgrave: The Ashes of Valkana on YouTube Season One of Titansgrave wrapped up (and hey, I learned after watching Episode 10 that there's at least another season planned) this week.  The final episode was pretty great, I think, and addressed some of the issues I had early on.  I definitely think you should watch this series - most of the episodes are under an hour in length and the

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-56824376594643667102015-08-17T23:11:00.001-04:002015-08-18T06:47:24.493-04:00

In this week's episode, I keep it short and to the point and drop the music from the show, resulting in an ultimate savings of 3 minutes. Not as short as I thought it would be in the end! Other things talked about: stuff I learned since episode 1; some new notebooks I picked up from Dollarama; my weight loss struggles; the Ottawa Champions; Pokemon Sapphire; and the nerdiest of all, Tasker for

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-51819399486906300622015-08-13T10:00:00.000-04:002015-08-13T10:00:02.223-04:00

Alright!  So when I mentioned on Monday that I put out a new podcast, I listed the RSS feed...but apparently I have to hit "publish" on Zencast.fm for anybody to make any use of it.  Well, it's there now.  And it has a name. I thought of a few names and came up with External Monologues.  Not that it really needs a name, but I thought it would be good in case anyone

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-764486801861264063.post-78773315851779127872015-08-10T21:10:00.002-04:002015-08-10T21:10:43.034-04:00

So I got excited about a Thing and I decided to Make It Happen.  Recently I released a podcast entirely done on my cell phone using Spreaker - that got me really excited for possibilities with podcasts from my phone in general, and I started looking into things. Well, it turns out that to do it for free, the mobile solutions are not very practical.  However I wanted to do an audio

Stephen Gowerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04880311368518953778noreply@blogger.com0