Archive for June, 2008

Conclusion to my stay at UNB

Published by Sean Et Cetera on June 26, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

My time at the University of New Brunswick for ResNet is finally over, and aside from the two hour layovers in Montreal and Toronto the trip home was uneventful.

Before that, however, was the closing even in downtown Fredericton, and the theme of the dinner was ‘maritime kitchen party’, which is listed in Wikipedia as a traditional Atlantic Canadian social gathering.  I believe it was my first time eating lobster, but from what I heard, having it served cold would have been a new experience anyway.  There was a band playing at the end of the event, Bottoms Up, and the music was quite enjoyable.

After wards, Chris, Jim, and I went over to Lunar Rogue again, where we met up with some of the same people from the night before, as well as other ResNetters.  I tried Rickard’s White Ale, followed by Pumphouse Fire Chief Red, which was decent.  Truthfully, I had more beer while at the conference than I have had otherwise, mainly because it seemed like they had a good selection, and I could, if need be, get commentary from Jim, much like I did on my final selection: Innis and Gunn Oak Aged Beer.  As with a couple of the selections made by some connoisseurs who were in attendance, there was a chance to give it a try, and it sounded intriguing and so I did.  Eventually, I ordered one for myself, even though I didn’t expect to drink it all, as it was definitely not something you drink quickly, but more something you enjoy.  After drinking that, I could definitely enjoy beer more than I do now, as I haven’t had a taste for it until recently, and the beer typically available did not appeal to me.  In fact, I’m going to be on the look out for similar beers.

I’ve uploaded some photos and created a flickr set for them in case you are interested, including a picture of the glass that the oak aged beer came in.

Late night, late start to the day

Published by Sean Et Cetera on June 24, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

Last night I ended up goign once again downtown for dinner, this time with Jim.  We met up with another ResNetter and went with him to BrewBakers, where a number of other ResNetters were.  All in all, there were two different groups, each with 10 to 12 people.  For those of you who saw my tweet from last night, it said I was “having a glass of reisling at Brewbakers”, and that was because we were having a conversation about Facebook, which is bound to happen in a group like that, and one individual, Bud was his name, mentioned that “Sean is drinking a glass of reisling” would appear on my Facebook because everything appears to be posted abotu what students are doing.  Really, it was done to prove a point.

The food at BrewBakers was delicious.  I ended up getting the Maple Ginger & Lime Salmon, and is was as great as it sounds; not nearly as sweet as I was fearing, and it still had some salty taste to it from the seared edges.  The reisling was for pre-dinner, and I had a glass of PumpHouse Blueberry Ale, complete with floating blueberries, which was also tasty.

Following that, we ended up going to Lunar Rogue again, and we were there for at least 2 hours, possibly more, as I’m not sure when we left BrewBakers, and I know we left right before they closed at 1:00 AM.  Surprisingly, I enjoyed the Picaroons Irish Red Ale I got while there, so much that I ordered a second.

However, I woke up late as a result, as well as due to the crazy schedule my body is on anyway, so I missed breakfast and the first session.  It’s time to head over to the snack break and then go to the final session.

More of what’s happened at UNB

Published by Sean Et Cetera on June 23, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

After my alone time on Saturday, which included the events of my previous post and then some LotRO, we had the opening dinner/get-together at the UNB Student Union.  For entertainment at the gathering, there was a local group of young Irish dancers who performed for us.  This was the one point where I broke a rule of ResNet: always have your camera.  As a result, I have no pictures of the event. Following the get-together, there was yet another trip downtown, this time with a larger group of ResNetters.  I came back to campus early with Chris, and it appears I missed the run in some of the ResNetters had with a bacholrette party.  There’s always some crazy story that comes from ResNet though.

With the coming of Sunday, it meant that I would actually have to go to a session or two, which is fine, since that’s why I’m here.  Prior to the sessions was the keynote, given by Stephen Downes, which was good at the beginning, but got a bit “meh” towards the end, as I’ve heard about Web 2.0 enough, and I don’t think we needed some of the explanations he was giving.  The interesting thing about his presentation was that he had a a form on his site where you could post a comment, and another page that would then refresh to the next comment every 10 seconds.  I’ll proudly say that I was the first to type in the URL and get the first comment in.  There were a number of amusing items posted, including someone typing out a Rickroll.

Today was the presentation that Jim and I had worked on called “Pros and Cons of Computer Requirements (or lack thereof)”, which was really more of a panel discussion that involved the audience, as we didn’t quite have enough content for a full presentation, which is fine.  We said our piece in about 20 minutes, and then had a discussion for the next 30 minutes or so.  Needless to say, I was glad to have it done.

This afternoon, Jim, Chris, and I went walking on some trails downtown, including a walking bridge that used to be a railroad.  I took some pictures of the trip, and I swear I’ll put them up on flickr sometime, just not now.  After walking the 6-point-something-almost-7 miles, I’m glad to have my shoes off an have had a shower.  Now to lay down and either play something on the DS Lite or take a nap for a bit until it’s time to decide on something for dinner, which will once again be something local downtown, as we’re on our own for food tonight.

UNB so far

Published by Sean Et Cetera on June 21, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

The trip coming to Fredericton was long, but for the most part uneventful.  From Detroit we went to Toronto, then Halifax, and then Fredericton.  We took a different type of plane for each trip, and I found out that I’m less apprehensive about flying in a propeller based plane than a jet plane, and the smaller, the better.

Last night we waited for Jim to get in and then he, Chris, and I headed downtown to get some food.  We eventually decided on Lunar Rogue, and we all got the same thing: fish and chips, which was very delicious.

Today I slept in, not having anything to do until 5:00 PM.  Once I got ready, I decided to head downtown to see what I could find during the daytime on a weekend.  I changed the route from the one we took last night, which went through less of the residential area, which worked out in my favor.  As I passed some buildings, I noticed a farmers’ market (W. W. Boyce Farmers’ Market) and decided to check it out.  There were a lot of vendor, both outside and inside the barn, selling all manner of goods.  One of the vendors was selling local wine, and I picked up a bottle of maple dessert wine to take home.

I noticed that there was a place to sit down and order food in the center, so I figured that I might as well.  Really, I enjoy being somewhere where there’s a sense of community, and local dinning places almost always have that aura about them.  I ordered my food and sat back and enjoyed my surroundings.  My order was the smoked salmon omelet, which normally comes with mushrooms and onions, but as I’m not yet a fan of mushrooms, I asked for it without, however the onions and mushrooms are already mixed, so I went and ordered it without either.  The dish itself came with choice of toast, in this case whole wheat, hash browns, and a bite-sized, deepfried cinnamon roll.  A little bit later, the waitress came back and said that the chef would add some cheese to the omelet in place of the onions and mushrooms, which sounded great to me.  Once the food got to my table, it was as good as I expected it to be. The toast was thick and from a decent sized loaf of bread, and between it and the omelet, I barely touched the hash browns, and wrapped up the cinnamon roll for later.

I walked around downtown a bit more, being thankful that the supposed “early afternoon” rain had decided not to show up.  I stopped in at a local sports memorabilia store to see if there was any Don Cherry related items I could pick up for my wife.  Sadly, there were not, but I picked something else up for her that she should enjoy.

As expected the walk back was a bit rough, having to come all the way up the hill, but at least I didn’t have to stop and was able to make it.  Now that I’m done with typing this up, I think I’ll log into LotRO for a bit and do that until I have to get going.

Not that I want to end on a downer, but it’s been one year to the day that my father passed away.  Between that and that this was the first Father’s Day without him, it’s been a bit rough, but that’s the way it goes I guess.

links for 2008-06-07

Published by Sean Et Cetera on June 7, 2008 in del.icio.us. 0 Comments

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