We're going to Hungary next month, and we have to jump through hoops to get Nikki's passport. They didn't accept her birth certificate, it was "void", so we have to wait until one arrives that cost us $65 because we added an extra $30 to the price to make sure it gets here in 5 business days. Anyway, back to the passport thing... Here's a beautiful document justifying why a Canadian passport costs $87CAD: http://www.ppt.gc.ca/support/faq.aspx?lang=eng&id=540

The fee for an adult passport is CAN$87. Of this amount, CAN$25 is used to recover the costs incurred by the Department of Foreign Affairs in providing consular services to Canadians abroad.

As for the remaining CAN$62, the breakdown is as follows:

- 47% towards security fees (e.g.: examination, guarantor checks)
- 43% towards production fees (e.g.: material, printing)
- 6% towards administration fees (e.g.: business sustaining)

Couple of questions arise:

1) Isn't the abbreviation for Canadian Dollars "CAD"

2) "For the remaining $62, the breakdown is as follows" ... 47%+43%+6% = 96% ... What? Where's the extra 4% going?

3) Let's forget the mistakes on the site, do our taxes not already pay for government employees to sit on their ass and do their job? Or is their job strictly to sit on their ass and collect good money? Any "actual" work gets added on and broken down into 47%=THEIR already paid manual labour, 43% WE pay for their ink and paper and 6% administration fee a.k.a. just to round it off to 100% .. or wait...

What a bunch of bull.

Coolest signup form: http://huffduffer.com/signup/

Dave and I had an idea years and years ago about a website that would show projects in the Niagara region. This new government site is close to it, but not quite as detailed as what we had in mind.
http://jui.cc/C9

http://golang.org/

I would've never thought that a place like this exists.
Map: http://jui.cc/ub, Homepage: http://pimaair.org/

In case you weren't following, Canada just won gold against USA. Our friend Mr. Varga was on the edge of his seat.

This static site probably took a long time to build. But beyond that, note this guy's résumé.
http://www.galenfrysinger.com/the_traveler.htm

Looks like most of the area is covered now. Drag the little guy above the zoom slider onto Welland.
http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=welland

Awesome site design too.
http://www.learnsomethingeveryday.co.uk/

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2009/12/holden-caulfield-is-unactable.html

Bin Laden is starting to be like Jesus... appearing conveniently when people need him to appear:
http://jui.cc/AQ
(Shit... jui.cc picks the URL codes randomly and it came up with AQ for the above news article... I take back what I said... maybe Bin Laden is real and is controlling everything!)

via peopleofwalmart.com

An amusing article Jessyel posted on his blog accompanied by some nice black and white shots:
http://dailysnap.com/log/2009/10/timessquare.html

http://lottery1.sympatico.ca/Home

http://toki-woki.net/p/scroll-clock/

http://code.google.com/closure/

Back when Obama was 100 days in office, I made a site called howlonghasobamabeenpresident.com as sort of a gag... Not many people visit it, and I don't really expect them to - it's a gag site! Anyway it's interesting to note that in the recent weeks, people have been searching "how long has obama been president" more frequently. On October 9th, for example, 32 people found the site because they searched those keywords. Why are people searching this all of a sudden? Is it around that time when people start wondering? I guess when the answer "less than a year" isn't enough...

... for not being George W. Bush: http://jui.cc/lK

The biggest dust ring around the planet Saturn - which has never before been seen - has been spotted by the Spitzer Space Telescope. The ring is so diffuse that it does not reflect much visible light - but the infrared telescope was able to detect it.

Source: Sky News

http://www.youtube.com/v/QY9g30CthKE

http://www.thestar.com/article/697560

http://dailysnap.com/log/2009/09/photoblogsdead.html

Poor kid...
http://www.cbc.ca/sports/amateur/story/2009/09/10/sp-iaaf-athletics-semenya.html

A man who was walking on the bridge alerted U.S. Customs shortly before 10 p.m., after a woman, who was walking toward the American side, handed him her purse and then jumped off the bridge.

via: Welland Tribune

See, I think he just stole her purse and didn't want it anymore... I imagine she'll report it stolen soon and they'll say to her "this guy said you jumped off the bridge" to which she'll respond "whaaat? nooo" in a Mark Wahlberg kind of way...

http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/

http://www.jhnmcknght.org/

This is messed up. http://jui.cc/ZH

http://legault.club.fr/

A Flickr set by Vincent Bousserez
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bousserez/sets/72157594266762278/

You gotta wait a few moments for the stupid Java to load but it's interesting enough in the end: http://jui.cc/as