Edwards Design Solutions

Most people know that I love football. That comes mostly from my father’s influence while growing up. Once I learned about what hockey was, being about 18 or 19 years old, I was pretty much hooked. That was a time, around 1990, when I was one of America’s troubled youth. I was messed up into smoking dope, I was in a bad relationship with a girl, I was in a punk-rock band and I was trying desperately to make something of myself by attending the local trade school.

Well, during this period of my life, I had spent some time living with one of the band members (Ron). He was a huge hockey fan who had even played in high school and a city league. He was also a huge Rush fan (I swear he must be part Canadian), hence my love for both of these things today! I have always been a Steelers fan and thought about watching some Penguins hockey. What a sweet time in the franchise to start watching the Penguins, I mean it was the year of their first Stanley Cup!

Unfortunately, I did enough bad crap in that time of my life to pretty much lose everything. So I decided to join the US Navy, there was nothing left to lose. I even returned to my roots, by going back to church, for the few weeks before leaving for boot camp. I met my wife at that church. Continue reading »

Rated: PG-13 for Martial Arts Action/Violence and brief Sexuality. 1hr. 25min.

I had the pleasure of watching Iron Monkey for the first time last night. I have once again been reminded why I love everything the amazing Yeun Woo-ping touches (i.e. Matrix, Crouching Tiger, Forbidden Kingdom, etc). The thing I respect most of the genre, is the un-abated display of the many actors’ and actresses’ Kung-fu. A great Kung-fu movie reminds me that I want to learn at least one style before I die. That style may most probably be Krav-Maga, for its readily accessible training facility where I live and for its relevance to today’s society and usefulness.

Of the Chinese culture, besides the highly respected discipline of Martial Arts and the complexity of its heritage, one of the most amazing things is its history. One of the greatest cultures and societies in the world, China also has some of the greatest folk-lore in both imaginary legends and real heroes of the times. Iron Monkey is a Hong Kong cinematic adaption of Wong Fei-Hung, one of the most recent and greatly loved folk heroes. There have been quite a few movies on the different aspects (and ages) of Fei-Hung’s life. Some of the most notable are the Once Upon a Time in China series, the Drunken Master series, the Eight Bandits (earliest) and many others; including Iron Monkey as the early years of his life. The total count of films that include Fei-Hung number into the hundreds!

Iron Monkey is included in the particular sub-genre of Kung-fu films being designated as “wire-fu” or “CG-fu”, but the momentum of the film and storyline kept me enthralled so that it was not as noticeable to me as some movies can be. I feel that the story is very well written, the acting is perfect and the fight scenes are impeccable. The following is a brief mash-up of the movie’s story and the history of Wong Fei-Hung: Continue reading »

Ever heard of the United Socialist State(s) of America? Well now you have. If you live on the North American continent, then you are in the melting pot. If you live in another part of the world, you are probably chuckling at this article as something you and your nation has known for some time and can’t believe that the stupid and blindly ignorant Americans can’t see it let alone believe it is really happening. There has even been a song and a book (both parodies really) about such a thing being possible, but I feel we are now living the reality.

I remember 5th grade history, being about the birth of this country and its symbols of patriotism and power. It was also about this country’s founding fore-fathers and the documents they created to make us the greatest nation in history. I am talking about the U.S. Constitution (which includes the Bill of Rights) and the Declaration of Independence. They were all based on degrees of freedom; freedom of tyranny (be it a monarch or other federal governing body), freedom to have an opinion, freedom to protect one’s self, freedom to worship without government interference or favoritism, freedom for the people to have the last word over the state or federal government, freedom from oppressive taxation, freedom to retain private property and such.

Unfortunately these symbols of patriotism (the Flag for example) and our birth-right documents have been legally trampled and disgraced over the years. There have been ridiculous demonstrations of the burning of the Flag, wearing the Flag inappropriately, walking on it and even flying it incorrectly! There has been a recent and bold mocking of the Constitution, by electing a president that is proven to not be a citizen of the United States. What is worse, is that Congress and the Democratic Party don’t even care that he is an illegal alien, by definition of federal immigration laws. This slow and purposeful degradation of our country and the way of life for its occupants has become a stark contrast to what was originally intended in the 1700′s, let alone from what was in the 1920′s! Oh don’t stop reading yet, the points are coming hard and fast in the next few paragraphs and they are from other sources to fuel this long-awaited post of conspiracy, hidden agendas and contemptuous treason of the worst kind. Continue reading »

Well, it appears that hockey fans are getting a rematch of last year’s Stanley Cup Finals. There are a few differences from last year to this year however. One difference is that the Penguins are one year more mature, but so are the Red Wings. Another is that there are quite a few more injuries on Detroit’s starting lineup and there are quite a few more injury makers on Pittsburgh’s starting lineup!

I have watched the Western Conference finals very closely and the one thing that kept Chicago in it at all, was the injuries that kept the bigger names from playing for the defending champions. I could easily tell that my Penguins have sustained offensive attacks at speed and stronger defense from even the offense lines. There are four lines of quality players that have been stepping up during every game of the Stanley Cup playoffs. There are just two too many two-headed monsters!

I feel like bragging and saying that the Gino-Sid combo is a solid one-two punch. The Crosby-Guerin combo is another solid pair. The Fedotenko-Gonchar combo is another lethal pair. When considering the other stand out solo acts (besides Crosby, Malkin, Fedotenko or Talbot), you have to recognize and appreciate the game play of Staal and Adams as well as Marc-Andre.

The penalty killing prowess has gone way up in the post season as well, but lets not forget that the team’s success would not possible without the accurate and influential managing of Coach Bylsma’s recipe for his black and gold powerhouse that is the Pittsburgh Penguins. Oh lord, it’s going to be a great Final run….justice will be served!

Upgrades people, upgrades. No more of this broken-down, used up, out-mode junk! The WordPress 2.6 I was using has been traded up to a newer release. The change went smoothly and the early reviews of the site show there are no harmful side-effects.

My one word of caution to anyone running an old version, never fear the change and always read the documentation. The WordPress upgrade page was accurate and made my change go as smooth as a newborn’s rear. The backend (or rear!) of the application is also very nice. It has a sort of iGoogle feel to it, but not too tough to get around in. The only real reason I didn’t make any upgrades to the site before now, was there was nothing going wrong with the site…until this morning that is.

EDS-Online was hacked by a phisher, masquerading as a bank from the UK. It seems that one of my portfolio designs was no longer secure and my WordPress index page was deleted. They had access to, and had placed a phishing site within, my directory. Not too malicious, just annoying. All seems to be repaired and the crack in the old armor has been patched up. Rather quickly I might add. I had securities in place within an hour (stopping all access to the phishing site) and the site was upgraded and back live in about 4 hours total. I of course had to work around my work schedule to get it done. But my boss was none the wiser, as I completed all tasks anyway! Yes, I am usually a multitasking nightmare, but not today!

Now I can go back to my blissful existence of ignorance and tube watching! By the way, my Penguins just killed the Capitals last night… 6-2! Way to go boys.

Rated: PG-13, sci-fi action and violence, and brief sexual content. 2hr. 6min.

I am a Trekkie from way back. The different tv series’ have always been a favorite for me. I love TOS, enjoyed much of TNG, liked the deeper stories of Voyager, appreciated elements of what Enterprise was supposed to bring (at least in the first two seasons) but the movies have always been plagued. There were things in the “Motion Picture” that I enjoyed, TWOK has always been my personal favorite and I liked parts of First Contact. Nemesis was good to bring a different feel to the extended Next-Gen series. But the offering by J.J. Abrams has caught everyone’s eye. I can honestly say that I have been skeptical up to yesterday.

Early teasers and the quite limited release of trailers made me a bit wary of what more could be done to destroy my favorite franchise of all time. I have not had the chance to catch J.J.’s Lost, but I thoroughly enjoy Fringe. Anyway, when I got to the theater, I half-expected to see no real acceptance of the film. You can usually get the impression of how a film is doing (or going to do) based on the decor. Well my wife and I were greeted with a pair of 8 foot long tables with theater help selling Trek gear and giving away swag. It was like going to a mini-con! The walls were adorned with Star Trek emblems, Saturns and various types of space craft. The movie was obviously good and being that we saw it one day after the continental release, there was time for early reactions to generate this kind of acceptance.

I became quite excited about seeing the work that J.J. had slaved over and I was glad that we were 15 minutes late to get our seats. We sat 6 rows from the screen, dead center, and had thankfully missed the commercials and only saw the upcoming film previews. The opening sequence doesn’t offer any familiar theme music, or anything else for that matter, with the exception of Star Fleet uniforms. Continue reading »