So long, summer,

maybe I'll see you next year.

Work has decided that I should not have a summer. Yeah I'm pissed off about it, since basically I look forward to it for several months of the year. But despite my protests, it seems the schedule will not change. So, no dragonboat for me. I think that's my main problem with it. And there are other things as well, like seeing friends, temple festivals, hiking, etc. Well, I said I was at the breaking point, then something like this comes along. Time to more actively pursue other opportunities. Though it's probably too late for this travesty.

Preparing to be robbed

I even know who the thief will be.

Insurance called to say the car is a "total loss" as the damage estimate is around $5500. To me, that implies they think the value is around that or perhaps lower.

If I search on sites like auto trader, models identical to mine tend to go around $7000 or more, and have 50000, 75000, or even 100000 more kms of wear. Even very conservatively, that means mine should be worth over $8000, realistically more than that.

Besides which there are many hours of shopping and research, as well as inspections and such when trying to purchase a vehicle, and even transport around to see those vehicles you're shopping for. Think there'll be any reimbursement for that?

I'll be sortof ok to accept them buying-out the car, as long as they pay something resembling what it would actually cost to replace with an equivalent, but I'm definitely expecting to have an argument on my hands when they tell me what some book says it should cost in fantasy-la-la-land. I also expect they won't give a damn, and I'll simply be screwed out of a few thousand bucks.

Crazy cantonese

Why would you make two words homonyms, AND antonyms??
設 and 撤, approximately meaning "set up" and "take down", with the same pronunciation including accent "chit3".

Dragonboat

First paddling of the season today, yay!

Car crunch

Got rear-ended by a pickup truck on saturday, on 16 ave. Which pushed me into the car in front. It sucked to be the meat in a GMC-Chrysler bun.

Overall i was quite calmly accepting of the situation, wasn't really angry or that upset or anything, guess i just felt that it happened and that's that. No big emotions. Other people were quite good about it too. There was a firetruck at the scene already, so they checked that we were all okay, and called dispatch to send a police car, etc.

The fire truck was at the left side of the road, partially in the left lane (maybe block 1/3 of that lane). We were all in center lane. Light turned amber, car in front stopped quickly, I had to stop quite quickly too. Truck behind me wasn't paying attention to us, because he was paying attention to van in left lane which apparently wanted to pass the fire truck without properly changing lanes, just swerve partially into our centre lane a bit, where the truck behind me was. I can't verify that, but sounds right, especially since I had seen that van there a moment earlier, but it managed to disappear from the scene. (even worse considering the light was surely red by that time.)

I get $115 ticket for "fail to ascertain sufficient space for movement." When you stop at an intersection, you must leave enough space between you and the car in front to allow for being smoked from behind without sliding into them. When the policewoman was saying so, I pointed to the line ups of cars at the intersection and said "not a single one is leaving that much space!" and she said "yeah, well, I could give them all a ticket." Yeah, could, but wouldn't. I also oppose the ticket because actually there's no damage to the front of my car or rear of the car in front, which to me indicates I left sufficient space that despite getting my ass kicked, I managed not to damage the car in front.

Got my car estimate from the body shop. Estimate is about $5300 on the rear of the car. Because the trunk won't securely close, the car's deemed undrivable so I'm in a rental till they decide what to do. The insurance might call it a write-off. Hope not, as I imagine their book values are well under reality values. From "Auto Trader", same model car with many more kms than mine go for $8000-$9000. Write off also probably ignores the many hours of research and shopping you have to do, and costs of inspections on potential replacement vehicles.

Relativity

For half of my run today, I did intervals of sprinting and walking, equal time of each. I started noticing pretty quickly that the sprint intervals sure felt a lot longer than the walking intervals. I attribute it to relativistic effects. I think Einstein determined that the faster you go, the slower time passes. So I think that's what happened during my sprints. Yeah, that's it.