Make sure you save your Office 2013 setup file!

Office 2013 hides the product key quite well.  I couldn't extract it from the Office 2013 installation I had.  I needed to figure out which license I used for the two computers I had Office 2013 on.  One of the computers was corrupted with malware and I had to reinstall Windows 8.  When I was trying to reinstall Office 2013, I couldn't figure out which product key went with which computer.  Finally, I found that the install file stub you download when you first install Office 2013 is unique to each license.  Luckily, this download file was saved from the computer that was reformatted!  You don't need to type in the product code when you run that install stub.

So, make sure you save that install file stub that you first download when you install Office 2013.  You should also keep track of which install file goes with which computer!  This is why M$ is going with the subscription style of Office 365.  Adobe Create Cloud is a clear money grab with its monthly subscription fees.  Hmm... that's why I root for an underdog like Serif Suite!  Their free versions are found here.

Why I like building my own computer!

I had the displeasure of dealing with an HP Pavillion Core i3 Desktop this past week.  The computer was corrupted with malware that prevented anything from being installed.  This happened even though the user was logged in as a non-admin user.  I had burned the four recovery DVDs in case Windows 8 needed to be reinstalled.  This particular computer had already been upgraded to Windows 8.l via the Windows Store (a really STUPID and time consuming way of upgrading from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1).  The problems started when I couldn't reinstall Windows 8 with the restore disks - there was a problem with DVD 4.  The dumb thing about HP/Compaq computers is they only allow you to make ONE COPY of the restore disks!  Not so with Dell.  Dell also lets you download new versions of the restore disks from their support website once you are logged into your account!  Luckily, I could 'refresh' the HP Pavilion from the restore image on the hard drive.

More problems ensued.  It downloaded and installed 99 Windows 8 updates.  Then it tried to install another 46 after that.  However, it hung on update 35 of 46 and I had to shut down the computer.  I tried again and it still hung up.  I eventually got most of it to update, but I could never update to Windows 8.1 from the Windows Store.  I gave up on that.  To be safe, I cloned the drive onto another drive sector by sector with ToDo Backup Free Edition.  This took about 5 hours.  This cloned drive is my backup for this STUPID HP COMPUTER.

Now, having given up trying to update to Windows 8.1, I needed to reinstall Office 2013.  Office 2013 hides your product key though!  I tried some possible fixes (ProduKey 64 bit, Belarc Advisor, and the VBScript OSPP.vbs tool that comes with Office 2013 itself).  However, when I was poking around my son's Lenovo Core i7 ThinkPad, I noticed that the Office 2013 install file that I had downloaded for that computer had the serial number.

THIS IS WHY I LIKE OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE AND USE LIBREOFFICE!

Now, I had built a Core i5 Windows 8.1 Desktop last fall and the problems with the HP computer noted above would not happen since that was a generic build.  However, as noted above, Dell has a much better recovery disk policy than HP!  So, I would buy a Dell over an HP any day (if I were to buy a name brand Windows computer).

Géza Anda, pianists and Schumann

In my pantheon of favourite pianists, Géza Anda and Maurizio Pollini are two who I listen to regularly.  Something common to the pianists I admire the most seems to be that I like how they play Schumann.  I just had a student ask me "what's this" as he wandered into my classroom to get a kleenex.  I said it's Géza Anda playing Schumann's Symphonic Etudes (pointing to a picture of Anda on my bulletin board).   A little later, a colleague heard Schumann's Fantasie playing and said "that's too cultured for us here".  I told him - not at all, a student just asked me what was playing earlier.  Last year, another student had asked me "what's that" when I had Perahia's recording of the Brahms' Handel Variations playing.  He actually wrote down the name of the work!

Anda died on 1976 June 13.  It was Maurizio Pollini's recording of the Symphonic Etudes that started my adoration for Schumann's music.  I ordered that CD from Templar Records in London, England when I was in grade 10.  Indeed, Schumann's Fantasie, Opus 17 is my favorite solo piano work.  In think during spring final exams in my 3rd year undergrad, Paul Robinson and Bruce Surtees were discussing Opus 17 on a Sunday afternoon (the station was CJRT - then Toronto's community station).  Bruce Surtees said the ending was like an open question.  Very beautiful and passionate - Romantic music to the core!  Many years later, my sister happened to be listening to Pollini's Symphonic Etudes CD playing and said she liked it.  So, that CD passed onto her.  My older son has been humming along to this CD as well the past few days as I return to listening to old favourites that haven't been playing very much recently!

Garden blooms and ridding rodents

The Norland Apple tree is blooming and the Thunderchild crab is starting to bloom.  I also see some blossoms on the Ohio Buckeye.  The Smokey Saskatoons are in bloom, but the Thiessen looks in bad shape.  I wonder if it was gnawed at by the voles.  I dispatched two today - one with the lawnmower and a second with a water hose.  They've been digging around all over the place.  No more neighborhood cats to control the buggers.

Kovacevich's Philips Beethoven Recordings

I have wanted this for a long time and this set arrived on May 22.  It's now a bargain box from Decca - 6 CDs of Stephen Kovacevich's Beethoven recordings for Philips.  I already had the Emperor Concerto, the Diabelli Variations and the Bagatelles.  Many years ago, I heard this recording of the Beethoven First Piano Concerto from a Philips Sequenza LP I borrowed from the Calgary Public Library. That was from way back in high school.  I marvelled at how big Beethoven sounded compared to Mozart.  And, when the first movement ends, Kovacevich plays the longer and more technically demanding cadenza.  Last night, I listened to the First Piano Concerto and the Fourth (I have never heard this recording of it).  I've always loved Leon Fleisher's recording of the Fourth the most.  A magical recording from 1959 with George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra.  Kovacevich plays the same cadenzas for the Fourth as Fleisher does in his recording.  The BBC Symphony under the late Sir Colin Davis accompanies with distinction.  The sonics are something else too. When I got the set on Thursday, I quickly listened to Opus 109-110.  The last three Beethoven piano sonatas get played regularly at our home.  I shall set these interpretations alongside Maurizio Pollini's (my favorite).

I prefaced my Beethoven 'concert' last night with Naida Cole's recording of Fauré's Ballade and Chabrier's Bourrée fantasque followed by Murray Perahia playing Brahms Intermezzo Opus 118, Nr 2.  Naida Cole is a Canadian pianist who is the youngest student to ever earn an ARCT from the Royal Conservatory.  She is now a doctor.  Murray Perahia hasn't made a new CD since the Brahms CD was released in 2011.  I should have gone to listen to him in Toronto when I was an undergrad!

Nothing gold can stay 2014 Edition

Other than summer, this is my favorite time of year.  I don't particularly like aspens or poplars, but it is at this time of year that Robert Frost's poem so aptly describes the fresh foliage of the aspens in the parkland of western Canada.  I don't have any sunflower seedlings sprouting this Victoria Day weekend.  Not much has grown for me and the trees in my yard are still budding.  Often, the apple blossoms are already out and my Ohio buckeye is starting to leaf.  Not this year though.

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

Last Thursday, my Earth Science 30 class went on a field trip to observe building stone in downtown Saskatoon.  Tyndall Stone is from the Ordovician (about 450 My). There is a lot of Tyndall Stone in Saskatoon and here is a crinoid fossil near the main entrance of the Delta Bessborough:

There are several great references about the fossils found in Tyndall Stone:

• Manitoba's Tyndall Stone
• Tyndall Stone:  Manitoba Rocks!
• GAC PDF reference
• Fossils of City Hall (Edmonton)

Elk Island National Park

Today's Route Map.  We went to get some music stuff at Long & McQuade Whyte Avenue (formerly Gordon Price Music) and the downtown store.  We then headed to West Edmonton Mall to buy food at T&T.  Next stop was Elk Island where we saw a couple of elk, a lot of beaver lodges, a baby bison and finally, a herd of bison at the Bison Loop as we were preparing to leave the park.  There were lots of signs of heavy oil production around Lloydminster.  Interestingly, there are very few pumping wells now and it looks like the storage tanks have been upgraded. A final stop at Lloydminster for gas and we finally arrived home at about 9:10 PM.

Suncor Edmonton Refinery

Lone bison calf grazing

Elk crossing the road

Lloydminster

Marshall

Jasper Skytram Opened for the Season Today

We were up at the Jasper Skytram early today, but they're credit card payment system wasn't working, so we didn't get up to the top of Whistler Mountain until the third flight up.  It was the first time for our little guy and second time for our older son.  A great view and the weather held up quite well.  We went to Maligne Canyon for a walk before heading out of the park.  On the way out, we saw a small herd of bighorn sheep which galloped along at 20 km/h with our car for a few hundred metres!  Route map for today.

Mount Robson Park

We have not been to Mount Robson Park the past two years and decided to head out there today after a visit to Pyramid Mountain.  A little cloudy, but the weather was fair.  A snowstorm is on the way tonight.  The skytram also opens on April 25th, so hopefully, the weather won't affect its opening tomorrow.  We walked through thick snow and fallen trees to finally arrive at Overlander Falls.  I last saw these falls in 1998 on the way back to Saskatoon from Vancouver.

Pyramid Mountain

Can you see the rainbow in the cloud?

Mt Terry Fox

Overlander Falls

Route Map

Avoiding the 6 hour detour

We found out that the Icefields Parkway was closed today until 8 PM.  We were on our way to Saskatchewan Crossing planning on taking the 6 hour detour we took 2 years ago (when the same closure was in effect for avalanche control), but I thought we could wait it out by going to the Roger's Pass and then coming back to Alberta in time for the opening of the Icefields Parkway in the evening.  As it turned out, when we arrived back at Lake Louise from Revelstoke at 5 PM, it appeared that the Icefields Parkway was already reopened.  It was and we arrived at Jasper at about 8:15 PM.  We saw a 'rainbow' cloud about 25 km south of Jasper and some elk just south of the town.

Can you see the rainbow cloud?

Revelstoke

Revelstoke Dam

Columbia Ice Field

Just south of Jasper town

Route map (click for link)

Radium Hot Springs

I am very glad I discovered Radium Hot Springs 3 years ago.  The path down to Sinclair Falls was closed today, but it was still a great trip.  We've never seen a bighorn sheep so close!  We also saw white tailed deer and mule deer in Kootenay National Park today (route map).

We also saw this interesting display (just one of 14 stations) which were so appropriate for our Easter Break!  The Stations of the Cross depict the Passion of Christ.  This is just behind the Kootenay National Park visitor centre.  We didn't notice it the previous two years when we visited Radium Hot Springs.

We didn't drive down to Invermere this year, but we viewed the Columbia River Wetlands from the top of the campsite beside the visitor centre.

On the way back to Banff we stopped by a footbridge over the Simpson River.

The regular hot pool was closed for maintenance (started today until May 3rd).  We got to use the other pool with the water set at 38°C.

Lunar Eclipse

This is the only picture that turned out for me (shortly before 1 AM Saskatchewan Time).

I was watching the live feed from Slooh as well.  The weather actually cooperated!

After the moon fully entered the Earth's shadow, I either lost it, or it clouded over again.  It was overcast all evening, so I'm glad I was able to observe and capture the beginning of the eclipse.

Here is my video:

My water colour paintings from April 10

This past Thursday, I had the opportunity to paint with water colours.  It was something completely different for me.  A nice change of pace indeed.

4-4-14 Orchestra Tour Day

Today, the two kid's orchestras of the Saskatoon Suzuki Strings played at St Peter School and Dundonald School.  The program for the concert can be heard here.  Each orchestra played their program four times (twice at each school).  This is our fourth year in the program.  You get what you put into it, and violin is a challenging instrument.  However, it is a more social instrument than piano (which I like the most).  These opportunities to perform are great for kids.

St Peter School Large Gym

Here's a science question for you.  This is a photo of a street that runs east-west.  Which is the north side and which is the south side?

Linsanity

We watched this DVD tonight.  The most significant thing for me was a question my son asked me after watching it "Is Michael Jordan Christian?".  My brother sent this to us for his birthday.  Jeremy Lin is not the big star of two years ago, but it looks like he'll make a contribution to the Rockets because of an injured team mate!  More important for us, he speaks about his Christian faith.