Things I Miss About Living In Saskatchewan

My company is sending me back to Saskatoon on Friday - that's tomorrow, woo! I will be out on our project site, helping to start up all the new equipment that we've programmed here in Montreal.

After living in Montreal for seven months I have come to realize that I'm one of those people who just really loves Saskatchewan. Not that Montreal is bad - it's an awesome city and overall, I'm enjoying my time here. But I miss:

• Pilsner, and pilseners in general. Vitamin P, Pil - or as my friend Chet calls it, 'Sner - don't seem to exist in Quebec. Pilseners aren't stocked in grocery stores or available on tap, at least where I'm looking.

• Prairie farmer drawls. The laid-back "Ohhh yaaas" of agreement - with that tiny hint of the mid-western Fargo accent - that come out at a family reunion are music to my ears.

• Fields and wide open spaces. Flatness. Prairie. I grew up in a house that had this view of the University fields when you looked down the street: 

• Good roads, bridges, and overpasses. I guess the bridge in Prince Albert and the Victoria Bridge are exceptions, but I will never, EVER complain about Saskatoon potholes after living in Montreal. Here's an interactive map of structures in critical condition. 

• Crown Corporations. We are so, so lucky to have SaskTel competing for business in Saskatchewan. In my opinion, land lines are always a ripoff, but SaskTel's cellular, internet, and TV offerings are spectacular given the size of the company and number of customers. Fact: I'm still using SaskTel cellular service here because my plan is so good. But my ISP, a Bell subsidiary, isn't great. 

The one reason I'd be tempted to stay here - I live in a building with a grocery store in the lower level. Seriously, I have never experienced anything so amazingly convenient. It is very easy to live here without a vehicle.

Saskatoon is where I want to be, though. I'm over halfway through my Montreal assignment, so I'll be home in no time!

Great Week

The last week has been pretty awesome! Unfortunately I never remember to take pictures of anything awesome. Here's the skinny:

• Two of my pals flew out to Montreal for the Rush concert last Wednesday! Incredible show but unfortunately Geddy's bass was only audible when Neil wasn't drumming, which was hardly ever. 
• We ate tons of great food, including an awesome breakfast, poutine, and smoked meat! 
• Flew back to Saskatoon for the long weekend, had some of my mom's delicious Easter buns (paska).

Here are some things I DID take pictures of:

Two of Robyn's cousins visited Saskatoon for the first time and were inundated with all of the city's offerings, including the river, the beautiful campus, and the Berry Barn's Saskatoon Berry Pie:

SERIOUS YUMS.

My sister got me this awesome cookbook for my birthday:

I got a bunch of other awesome books, including How to Cook Everything, The Book of Awesome, We, Robot, and Room.

Robyn and I went to Poached for breakfast and it was AMAZING. I ordered crab cakes with a poached egg on top and marinara sauce, a breakfast salad and a bagel. We got a side order of bacon-wrapped maple pecans - ALSO AMAZING. It was Easter Sunday and the staff hid a few Cadbury eggs in the salad, which I thought was cute!

Robyn and I cooked our own supper on Sunday night (which was much needed - with the concert and the Saskatoon visit I haven't cooked at all for myself!). It turned out to be super-healthy but also super-delicious! Shown here is spaghetti squash with a tiny bit of parmesan, a spinach salad with cranberry-cinnamon goat cheese, pecans, leftover chicken and a simple oil-balsamic-garlic dressing, and kale chips.

I was skeptical (perhaps uncertain is a better word) of both the kale and the spaghetti squash, but both were excellent and I will purchase both in the future! 

Snow Lions in Saskatoon

On Friday I took off for Saskatoon for the weekend. Air Canada managed to delay my flight out of Montreal, which caused my connecting flight in Toronto to leave without me - hooray!

Everything flying to Saskatoon was full, but luckily I managed to hop on a plane to Regina mere minutes before it took off - after sprinting to the gate an amazing agent got me on the flight. Robyn, being awesome, drove to Regina and picked me up.

On Saturday Robyn and I visited the Forestry Farm Park & Zoo, which is awesome in winter! It's open to the public - 100% free of charge - in the winter months. It's only slightly creepy walking around in an empty zoo (we were the only people at noon on a Saturday) but the awesomeness of the animals makes up for it. Since it's winter, they're moving around to stay warm, and because the zoo is otherwise empty, animals are curious about anyone who is there.

The most amazing was how interested the lions were in us:

As long as we were standing there, the male paced back and forth in front of the viewing glass, growling (purring?). The female joined him for a while, but we were too boring to keep her interested.

And yes, we were slightly surprised to see lions hanging out in -25*C weather!

After a weekend packed with family and friends and familiar routines, it's a bit strange to return to Montreal. But this should be a fun week, tomorrow I'm hosting my cousin and her family for a bunch of delicious pizzas, and on Thursday I have an "interview" to determine my competency in French which will determine my placement in a beginner's class. Fun!

How to get Froyo on your SaskTel Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant

EDIT, APRIL 2011: Hey guys, I noticed for some reason this blog post is getting lots of traffic. Just a heads-up, the info might be out of date and inaccurate by now, especially considering that Android 2.3 is starting to roll out to the Vibrant phones!

Irritating news yesterday, as Samsung Canada announced Froyo (Android 2.2) was available for the Galaxy S Vibrant on SaskTel - and SaskTel said that was false.

Well, good news, a bunch of enterprising hackers have figured out how to get Froyo on their SaskTel Vibrants anyway. Basically, we're going to flash our SaskTel Vibrants with Bell firmware. I'm collecting these links as a helpful internet denizen, but I can't take any credit for any of the process (I do want to thank Bman_1 for pointing me in the right direction).

Standard Disclaimer: While this worked for me, there's a chance it may not work for you. If messing with your phone's firmware makes you queasy, wait for the official SaskTel update. You and you alone are responsible if you brick your phone. These instructions are largely based on this forum post with a few more details added.

UPDATE DECEMBER 19/2010: I can't say whether it's because of this procedure or not, but my Vibrant bricked itself a few days after this update. I heard it turn itself off (it played that off animation) and I was unable to revive it. It died randomly while I wasn't touching it. BEWARE!!!

--== How to get Froyo on your SaskTel Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant ==--

1. Download Kies Registry Patcher from this forum post on XDA-Developers. You will need to register for the forums. Yes, a small pain, but you want the latest version of this software.

2. Download and install Samsung Kies. This is Samsung's massive, bloated updating program. If you already have it installed, make sure you have version 1.5.3.10103.102 installed.

3. If you have Kies open after installing it, close it. Launch Kies Registry Patcher.

• Set "Enable Spoof" to true. 
• Set "Spoof Product Code as" to BMC (this is Bell Mobility Canada's code). 
• After you select BMC, "Spoof Software Revision as" should say "I9000UGJG9/I9000BMCJG9/I9000UGJG9/I9000UGJG9". Kies version should be the same as above.
• Click "Write Registry" and click "yes" to apply the update. 
• You're done with the Kies Registry Patcher for now, but leave it running in the background. You'll need it in a minute. 

4. Open Samsung Kies. Now, refer to Samsung's great step-by-step instructions to updating your phone to Android 2.2. 

5. When you get to Step 13 on Samsung's upgrade instructions, you'll be waiting 2-5 minutes while the firmware is downloading to your Vibrant. This is a great time to snag a copy of the ROM, so go back to Kies Registry Patcher and select Rom (top menu bar) then "Save ROM". Don't worry, the update takes a few minutes, you'll have plenty of time to make this step. 

6. After Step 14, your Vibrant will reboot itself. The first bootup to 2.2 will be the longest bootup you will ever experience, DON'T PANIC and DON'T PULL THE BATTERY. It will start up after a few minutes. 

Once your phone has booted up, you will be running in the slowest and ugliest Android environment you will ever experience. BE PATIENT. All programs and services need to re-initialize themselves in the 2.2 environment. Give your phone about 20 minutes to sort itself out, then reboot it again (shut it down by holding the power button, don't do a battery pull). 

After upgrading, my Email app (not Samsung Email) was crashing and preventing me from pulling down the top status bar. I had to remove my work Exchange account from Settings -> Accounts and Sync. After that, things were working perfectly. 

I didn't see that much of a speed increase with the upgrade (I don't have a rooted phone or OneClickLagFix) BUT the new features are really awesome. Voice Search works great, you can install Skype, and Chrome to Phone works perfectly! 

I hope this guide is useful to a few people! If you're looking for support, your best bet is visiting that XDA-Developers thread. My upgrade went perfectly so I won't be much help troubleshooting. 

Good luck! 

--== BONUS: Fix GPS Issues if you haven't already ==--

When I got my Vibrant, the GPS was lackluster. If you're running Android 2.1, visit this XDA-Developers post and follow those instructions. 

If you're running Android 2.2, the number code stops in the above link stops working. You can get to the LbsTestMode menu by downloading an app called Any Cut from the Market, long-pressing your home screen, select Shortcuts, select Any Cut, select Activity, then scroll way down and select LbsTestMode. Click the shortcut, then go back to the above-linked post and change your SUPL/CP settings.

Google Transit, Where Are You?

In March of this year, the Star Phoenix reported that Google Transit was going to roll out in Saskatoon. At the end of June, to be exact.

It's now the end of July, and there's no Google Transit in sight! A careful googling for clues reveals nothing - there's literally no mention of Google Transit and Saskatoon on the internet except for that one article (and on Wikipedia, citing the same Star Phoenix article). Is it really coming?

I'd love to see Google Transit in Saskatoon. Anything would be better than Saskatoon's incredibly slow, complex Click'n'Go. I recall during the extremely cold week of January 2010 the entire City of Saskatoon's website was completely unavailable for several days due to the volume of people trying to access it. Assuming the buses weren't running, I skipped class (it turned out the buses were running).

The best feature that Google Transit would bring is Google Maps integration. Plug in where you are and where you're going, and Google Transit finds the best route(s). Google Transit also works with Google Maps on smartphones - iPhones, BlackBerrys, and Android phones. This alone has the potential to massively boost transit ridership! Making routes easy to access - and more importantly, easy to search for while on the go - has the potential to significantly increase the number of riders.

Google has a knack for organizing information and making it easy to use and access. Hopefully, Google Transit for Saskatoon rolls out soon, and provides us with a better solution than Click'n'Go, dialing 975-7500, or carrying around a massive stash of brochures.

Mandatory Disclosures of Privacy Breaches in Saskatchewan

This headline popped up in my Star Phoenix news feed the other day:

"Province Ponders Revealing Privacy Breaches"

I quote, from the article:

"The issue here is this is people's private information," said NDP house leader Kevin Yates. "When your private information has been given to a third party, people have a right to know that, not only the individual but the public also has a right to know that if their information guarded by SGI . . . or held by any agency is allowed to be made public. That is of concern to everybody."

Kudos, Kevin Yates and everyone who agrees with this idea! Citizens should absolutely have a right to know about when their private data has been accidentally distributed to third parties.

To those of you who are on the fence: other organizations know a lot about you. Saskatchewan Health Region knows your health, the U of S knows your academic record, the Government knows your name, address, and SIN number. The fact that organizations are not legally obliged to disclose privacy breaches is crazy!

Here's an even better idea. What if the law required organizations to notify citizens of ANY time their personal information is disclosed (en masse) by any organization. This would mean that any time your information is lost, leaked, sold, accessed or otherwise distributed, you know about it. Let's assume there's a fair use exception, like if a contractor needs to let a subcontractor know your address for work you've hired the contractor to do.

There would be two immediate benefits to this system: For one, citizens have the benefit of knowing who is holding their private information. Secondly, if violators faced significant fines, organizations would have to tighten their control of private data - especially in Regina, where medical records have been found blowing around on the street.

On the scale of confidential, need-to-know, and right-to-know, I'd argue that when your personal information is involved, notification of privacy breaches should be a right.