SwiftSessions Blog

Well, I received an offer for a permanent full-time position at work yesterday, which I was very eager to sign. Starting November 18th, I’ll be a National Supply Chain Analyst for Loblaw Companies Ltd; a fancy title for someone who buys food (there’s more to it than that, but I don’t want to bore you with the details of supply and demand). As I prepare to begin this next chapter of my life, I’m filled with a mixture of emotions. I’m excited to be working for such a great company and with some amazingly intelligent and friendly people. I’m relieved that I’ll be making more money, have benefits and receive a discount on groceries. I’m nervous that I’ll be doing this for the foreseeable future and that I only have 15 days of vacation for the entire year. 15 days which I’d gladly spend to go and visit my friends in Australia and not regret it when I can’t take a day off in the summer.

I guess my initial plan to take over the world will have to be placed on hold. I’ve fallen into the gears of the daily grind and soon enough, I’ll simply be the oil that keeps them turning. But fear not my friends, this is all part of my master plan. As anyone who’s ever studied economics can tell you: In order to start your own business, you need Capital. Where I’d like to be and where I currently am are quite long distance apart, but not entirely unachievable. And so I have to ask myself “How badly do I want it?”. Am I going to work a job like everyone else in this country until I’m 65? Or, am I going to work hard for a few years, save some money, and eventually invest it towards my own business; A business which doesn’t require me to physically be anywhere or do anything for that matter. Ahh, now that would be ideal.

But for now, I know what I must do. I’ll do what I have to do to get to where I want to be. “The same thing we do every night, Pinky—try to take over the world!”

Seeing how it’s halloween today, I’ve decided to leave you with a haunting little song from the 80’s. Happy Halloween!

Here’s a little update on a design project I just completed. Recently, my friend Cory asked me to create a design for a website he was developing. It’s for a Auction Centre in Saskatchewan called Country Boy and they auction off everything from classic cars to typewriters. Now, Cory is an excellent developer and one of the best programmers I know, so I was really excited when he asked me to design the website. He gave me a little doodle of what he wanted and a couple days later I sent him my mock up. I just hope the client likes it as much as he did. He made a few changes, so the final product won’t look exactly as it does below. However, once the website is completed, you can view the final, functioning version at http://www.countryboyautosales.ca

Last night I had spent about and hour picking out a new song of the week; and since it was a song from an album that hasn’t been released yet, I took the extra care to write out the lyrics (as I heard them) for a great new song off the new Dinosaur Jr. album. Yea, I downloaded some pirated/unreleased music, who gives a shit… right? I’ve had music on my blog for months now without an issue, but all that stuff had been already released. I was aware that I should be careful about how I provide access to these files when I was adding them to my server. I never allowed direct downloads to the files. I always used the flash music player widget to allow visitors to listen to the music I post.

You can imagine my surprise when I woke up this morning and tried to access my website, only to be redirected to some default secureserver page. So I check my e-mail, and sure enough there it is, at the very top of my inbox, an e-mail from my host entitled Copyright Dispute. I knew right away that it was for the song I had posted last night. I wasn’t really upset about it, I was just shocked at how quickly they found it. My website receives the traffic equivalent of a lonely country road. The only consistent visitors I get are my friends. So it was quite eye-opening that they were able to find the song within 8 hours of me uploading it to my server. Fuck the DMCA!

I had to fill out a simple request with my host to reactivate my account and promise to remove the file. I wouldn’t even consider that a slap on the wrist, but a hassle nonetheless. In order to avoid this problem in the future, I’ll no longer be uploading any music to my server, and all the music that’s currently on there will be removed. I intend to replace the music with youtube videos; it seems like the best way to get around copyright infractions. I’ll make it Youtube’s problem and not mine hehe.

So for the time being, I apologize for the music being down. I’ll do my best to get it all online as quickly as possible. Including the track that caused me all this grief. And I gotta say, it’s a great fucking tune, it was worth the trouble. Stay tuned for more Illegal hotness.

Hey all, I’m sorry I haven’t been posting as regularly as I would have liked to and I’ve always defended myself on the basis that I’ve been working hard on design projects. Well I’m glad to say that I’ve managed to complete one of those projects. It’s a website for a dessert cafe out in Calgary, Alberta. It’s called Red Mile Creamery & Desserts. They have over 60 flavours of ice cream, tons of tasty desserts and even Turkish coffee. It was hard not to get hungry staring at all the tasty treats while I worked on this site. But it feels good to be see it go live tonight and I’m pretty happy with the way everything came out. I still need to setup the mailing list, but I’m not too worried about that. Any feedback on the site would be greatly appreciated. Thank You.

I haven’t exactly done much since last week regarding design projects. Part of it was due to some nasty viruses and malware that were starting to consume my computer and my life. I’m pretty sure I got most of them trying to stream some live sports over the weekend. It took me a few days and a ridiculous amount of spyware/adware removal tools to finally get rid of them. I don’t have time to backup all my programs and music just yet, but I know that formatting would be the best way to make sure all that crap is gone. Either way, I was able to sit down and get some work done today. Here is another completed template for Veck Web Services.

My portfolio website went live last night. You can visit it by following the “Home” link at the top of the page. I’m pretty happy with the way everything looks and functions. I just wish I had some more work to put in the actual portfolio section haha. Well, I’m not too worried about that; I know it’s just a matter of time before that happens. I already have a couple projects on the horizon and I’m currently working on design project for a friend of mine over at Veck.ca … If that goes well, it could mean a steady flow of work coming from just his website, which would be great for both us. I should have some screenshots to post later this week.

Also, I’ve been thinking about the blog and ways to keep it fresh. I’ll probably do a few things as weekly updates. For instance: Song or Wallpaper of the week. I just think it would be a good way for me to establish a routine. Well, that’s it for now, stay tuned for more hotness.