September 4th Labour Day Entry

GuuzakaTube                                                                                                   2017-09-04

September 5th Post-Labour Day Entry

*It was Labour Day at the time of this writing, but I didn't finish this in time for it to justify that title, so I've changed it to reflect reality.
Today, is Labour Day in Canada and I believe the U.S.A? There may be other countries that are celebrating it too, but I'm not 100% sure about that. What are my plans for Labour Day? Well, nothing special. I went places on Saturday and Sunday, but don't have anything extraordinary planned for Monday. Let's discuss the latest videos on the channel. Wait, before we do that, I think I ought to address that slide that pops up right after the silly intros....

So yeah. First it was the issue of accidentally filming in 4K at All Saints Catholic Secondary School, running out of space after filming Colonel J.E. Farewell Public School, didn't have a paperclip to remove my Lumia's microSD card tray, and now the lack of OIS in a bunch of the latest videos? 😱 Not good! Really need to look into getting a good 128GB microSD card. I'm thinking of going with the SanDisk 128GB Extreme PLUS, Samsung Pro+ 128GB, Samsung EVO Select 128GB or maybe even the Lexar Professional 1000x 128GB. We'll see. 

iLLumiShield – Nokia Lumia 1520 Screen Protector Unboxing

So you've seen the video, but how is the screen holding up for me? Very well. The screen truly is an ultra clear, premium plastic as both the company and reviewers who've used this product claim. I'm really glad to see that it's holding up to it's high standards. Ok, so it's only been 12 days since I've had it at the time of this writing, but if you've had any doubts about it, I can tell you that it's very good. And since this was used on a Nokia Lumia 1520, I should also talk about potential screens issues associated with using screen protectors on this device - none! That's right; none for me. Some people have claimed that putting a screen protector over the Lumia 1520 will cause it to act weird, or worsen the phantom touch problem if the phone has it. Thankfully, my phone does not have that problem nor did it act weird. So the takeaway is that it is not normal for the Lumia 1520 to behave crazy when you put a screen protector on it! It should function like a normal phone! If it does have the phantom touch issue, or otherwise misbehaves from digitizer related issues, then it means the you need to get the screen digitizer replaced. Period. I've said this before, and I'll say it again: It is extremely risky and unwise to use a smartphone without a screen protector, so buy one from a reputable brand if you haven't at this point! ☠

All Saints Catholic Secondary School

So even though it was alarming to see the 4K video of this school eat up my Lumia's internal storage, I loved the sharpness, but hated the shakiness and frame skipping at some parts. 😖 Complaints aside, this place was fairly interesting to explore, with the building itself being a large place to walk around. Then there was the track, Donald A. Wilson across the street and a lot of other things to see. Oh yes, and now would be a good time to clear up something that wasn't brought up: at the end of this video, Donald A. Wilson Secondary School (sort of), and Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses, why did I use the footage of me walking to these places as the ending slide, rather than have them in the beginning like usual, with a skipper slide for those not interested in seeing the walk? Because I felt that it was already bad enough to have a wordy excuses slide, and then show those that may have taken the time actually read it a skipper slide. "Oh my gosh! How much crud and excuses am I going to have to through on ine video?!" You might say. Therefore, I omitted it until when the time came to edit Colonel J.E. Farewell Public School, I realized that I could have easily solved this dilemma by simply putting the time to skip to on the intro image I used at the beginning of the videos. 🤦🏾 I know. Should have been an extremely obvious solution. Anyways, enough of that and let's go ahead and discuss the high school that neighbours it from across the street.

Donald A. Wilson Secondary School

Ok, so to get this out of the way, that giant white thing was indeed a dome. It's called the Whitby Dome and it's a part of the Whitby Iroquois Soccer Club. Should have been obvious, but oh well! Anyways, so like it's Roman Catholic counterpart across the street, Donald also had a fair bit of things surrounding it that made it interesting to walk around and photograph. It had the dome, and an interesting sports field that I explored in the ending segment, and some other nice areas. So! This brings it down to the ultimate question: which of these two high schools was the more interesting one to explore?  I..... apparently don't know. Sorry. 😐 Alright, I gotta give the edge to All Saints Catholic Secondary School. 😅

Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses (Rossland Whitby Congregation)

You know? I think this might just be my first time filming a Jehovah's Witness Kindgdom Hall. I've done Roman Catholic Churches, Adventist Churches, Community Churches, Reformed Churches, Methodist, and Latter Day Saint Churches, but don't recall ever covering a Jehovah Hall. Have I done Presbyterian, Anglican, or Orthodox churches yet? Don't think so. There are tons of other denominations out there, and plenty in Canada that I haven't filmed yet. For now, let's just discuss this particular location in Whitby. It was a small, but nice place to film and photograph. The area was surrounded by a lot of greenery, and is very close to Otter Creek and a trail that I assume shares the same name. Don't quote me on that though! 😐 Though the gentleman that happened to be there didn't know where it was when I asked him, I was able to find it very shortly after coming towards Rossland Road away from the property. 

Colonel J.E. Farewell Public School

So who exactly was this J.E. Farewell man, and what did he do so significant to earn himself that title? I have no idea, and like me, you probably don't care? As we can all see from the beginning of the video, the front looked as though it were recently paved, but thankfully, it was hard enough to walk on. Still, that was a risky move. 🤐 Anyways! This place was an average place to explore. If you read the All Saints entry from above or watched the video, you'll know that this is where the storage on my Lumia became so low, that I had to film the ending segment on my shakes-like-an-earthquake BlackBerry Q10 camera! 😰 Seriously, that thing shakes so ridiculously bad when you walk with it! Like holy smokes! If you can recommend me a smartphone that has extremely good optical image stabilization for people that like to film while they're walking, please! Tell me the name of it! I suspect that it's probably the Google Pixel or iPhone 7, but let me know what else. Can't believe I had the guts to bother making videos with that garbage for so long! Well, truthfully, I could have just stuck to games and commentaries, but no! I really wanted to incorporate outdoor videos, so I just made the best with what I had. 👌🏾 Anyways, on a final note, Guthrie Park has proven to be a good choice for using it as the ending segment, rather than doing my traditional on-the-spot rotation. There's nothing "spectacular" about it. Just found it to be a pleasant place to walk through.

The Salvation Army Whitby Community Church

Looks like a familiar title right? Well, that's because there's an Oshawa location called The Salvation Army Oshawa Church. So now this leads to the following question: how many Salvation Army churches are there? Who knows... Based on my time spent filming and photographing the locations of both churches, I can tell you that the Oshawa location is the larger of the two. With them both being Salvation Army churches, they also have the same emblem, as you'll see down below the photos. How did I like it? Well, it didn't have the space and hills that the Oshawa area had, so there wasn't a ton to film, but plenty to photograph. The Mcquay Boulevard & Bonacord Avenue location it sits at was quieter than the Thornton & Rossland area.

Mercedes-Benz Durham (Immaturity)

When I was first looking into this place, I was like "Wow, this looks like a small dealership" When I got there, it really did appear to be fairly small. That is, until when I did the Honda video and discovered that they had a new extended lot where they keep additional vehicles. Makes sense. For this to be the only Mercedes-Benz and SMART dealership in the entire Durham Region, there had to be more to it in order to explain the number of Mercedes and SMARTs I see on the road sometimes. And of course, they're obviously not as common as pickup trucks, but for a luxury brand, I do see them a fair bit in some areas. Oh yes, and did you personally know that SMART was German?! I didn't figure that out until I believe two days ago! 😱 For all these years, I've never looked into it, nor have I even been curious about it, because I dislike that brand. But after filming this place, it made my curiosity rise a little more, which lead me to the interesting discovery of learning that it's German. Wow. So for German cars, you have Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Porsche, BMW and apparently SMART. Who would have thought? Maybe you knew that, but I didn't. This is what I like about doing these videos: it allows me to have a better understanding of the cars I see everyday, by seeing them up-close and in-person, with plenty of them next to each other for accurate size comparisons and trim details. While we're on the topic of cars, when will the Mercedes-Benz EQ come to Canada? You know, that all-electric crossover of theirs that they've been talking about? I'm hearing rumours of 2018 or 2019, but could that really be true? Should be interesting to see! 

Whitby Oshawa Honda (Immaturity)

Honda! One of the most famous Japanese automakers around, so it was only a matter of time before I covered a Honda dealership. This one was conveniently located right next to the Mercedez-Benz dealership, making it easy to head over to it and get business done. As you can expect, there were a lot of Honda Civics, minivans and Honda Ridgelines. Other models were plentiful, but I don't recall seeing any Acuras at all. Maybe I missed them? Maybe there was none to begin with? Who knows. I'm aware that while some Honda dealerships do have Acuras in their inventory, Acura happens to also sell by itself in dedicated dealerships, like how Lexus doesn't sell with Toyota, and how Infiniti doesn't sell with Nissan. Anyways, it was a large lot with plenty of vehicles to choose from, and in many colours. For some reason, I felt that it was going to have mostly grey and white vehicles, which it did, but offered more blues, reds, and even dark purple and hidden greens, than what I thought. Unlike the Mercedez-Benz dealership where I was the only one checking it out, the Honda dealership had a few others checking out some of the cars. I wonder if they knew that the video I made of the place was about to turn into a comedically-edited tour? 😜🤣 Probably not, because they hardly even batted an eye or did not care as they were likely too busy looking for golden Acuras! Kidding! They just wanted to take a look at them in-person and then drive away in their Acura NSX 2017. No, they don't actually have that. Or do they? Ok, that's enough Acura shenanigans for one post. Wait, one more! When will we see a full-sized all-electric Acura pickup truck??? 🤔 2025 or never?

Other Ramblings & What's Next?

Alright, so let's be honest and just come out with the fact that I'm annoyed at how I did not finish this on the same day that I typed this! GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! Ok, finished raging. 😁 So! I normally do not explicitly tell you what exactly is to come for the videos, but because I already made a strong reference to it in one or most of the videos above, I might as well spill it: an unboxing video, Captain Michael Vandenbos Public School, Saint Luke the Evangelist Catholic School, Williamsburg Public School and Cochrane-Whitburn Trail. "Oh my gosh! Why did you just spill everything so openly?!" Some of you might say. Well, I already mentioned that I was supposed to film the schools north of Country Lane and Rossland, so it was already leaked anyways. You could argue that not everyone would have known that, or that not everyone watched or paid attention to the moment when I said that, but hey: some of you will pleased to know exactly what's to come this week, especially if you're actually familiar with those places, or enjoy unboxing videos. If you're curious about what I will be doing outside of YouTube related business, you'll be bored to know that I plan to carry on with day-to-day things. Why is it raining now? Anyways, I'm out! Yay the sunshine came back now! 😎🌞

January 22, 2017 Uploads

GuuzakaTube 01.23.17

January 22, 2017 Uploads

Second batch of uploads for the year. Yay? For this entry I'll be discussing Mercedes-Benz

EQ [Reading & Commentary], Say No To Sugar Daddies! [Reading & Commentary], Pastry Push: Feeding The Floor Dwelling Gengar Knockoff LOL!, Subway Surfers: Runs And Disses!, and West Hill Collegiate Institute: Foggy Day and Exterior Tour. Yes, I got around to playing two games, so let's get into it!

Mercedes-Benz EQ [Reading & Commentary]

With the buzz of all these electric cars and hatchbacks, I decided that it was time to do a commentary video on one of my favourites out of these electric SUVs: the Mercedes-Benz EQ! The Audi e-tron Quattro is another well loved choice of mine, but the EQ looks more futuristic and cool from the front end. Then there's Jaguar's I-Pace. Another interesting looking one, but still haven't looked into it much. So, the video! While I was reading about this car, it definitely gave more insights into what it was about, a better look at the interior and importantly, the EQ brand. What I really learned from that, is that this car will be the 1^st of the EQ product portfolio that could potentially span many all-electric Mercedes vehicles. This is pretty interesting and exciting, but as you will know from the commentary, there are two things I don't quite like: autonomous driving and the 4-seater configuration. If there's one thing Porsche is certainly doing right with their Mission-E, that everyone else seems to be chasing, is this whole crazy autonomous driving technology. Some people, including the automakers themselves of course, keep insisting that it'll make the roads much safer, because there will supposedly be no human error once autonomous technology becomes perfected, but that has yet to be seen. The technology in our vehicles has already become increasingly automatic, and they want driving to be like that too? So far, autonomous driving has caused some people to be very lazy and careless, which has resulted in several interesting/sad/hilarious news reports. The 2^nd issue is that too much electronics and tech causes poor reliability, because it leaves vehicles with more components to go faulty, and become expensive when repair time comes. And most importantly, it takes the fun out of actually driving. Since a lot of people, including myself, actually want to drive, I really hope that these automobile manufacturers do not come to the point where they make every car in their lineup 100% autonomous. Thankfully, there are companies like Porsche and certain others that understand this, so that won't happen. And even if they try to, we can always vote with our wallet and boycott cars that are 100% autonomous, should they ever try to pull such a move. I know vehicles have changed considerably over the years, mostly for the better, so it was necessary to embrace those changes. Is it necessary to embrace a change just so some people will be able to sleep, do their makeup, scratch their butts, eat and do a million other things while their car is going at 100 km/h on Highway 401? No. Please say no! Now for seat configuration! While I was recording the video, I had now idea whether this thing was a 5-seater or 4-seater, but thought that it may have been 5-seater for some reason, only to learn later that this is a 4-seater... Deal breaker? No, but a little disappointing. But one can hope that they'll offer a 5-seater variant. And oh, a little more ground clearance would be nice. The Audi e-tron Quattro has good clearance for a crossover, so they could take a cue from that competitor. Finally, if there's something that I really need to do better next time is READ like I know how to FLIPPING READ! GOSSSSSHHHHHH! Editing was so painful because of frequent errors and seemingly endless slip-ups.... Good grief! Have I not been speaking English for 20+ years?! Jeepers peepers man! I really think that reading over the text once or twice probably would've have helped significantly, but the problem is just laziness sometimes oftentimes. Still, one should be able to read their native language out loud with relative ease and rare mistakes, or was I just being too hasty and hard on myself? Who knows! All I hope for is to have less editing to do the next time I shoot another reading & commentary video, which is going be soon! Can't wait to see the Mercedes-Benz EQ on Canadian shores!

Edit: In regards to the ground clearance remarks, I actually took another look at the car and it doesn’t actually seem to be any lower or higher than the Audi rival.

Say No To Sugar Daddies! [Reading & Commentary]

Seriously, just say no to them. Do not entertain the idea. They can say all they want that it's not prostitution, but it is! Listen, by definition a prostitute is someone who engages in sexual activity for money. When you set yourself up to a sugar daddy, they're giving you money in exchange for use of your vagina, mouth, butt or in some cases, all of the above! They often like to say that it's different, simply because there's a temporary “relationship” and “companionship” involved, but you know what? It's just the industry trying to toss sugar over a dirty blanket. That's all. Even the article that I read in the video, later warns that if you're going to do this, that you should treat it like a job and not expect it to turn into an on-going relationship! See? I'm not the only one that sees the sugared up lies about the industry. At the end of the day, whether you want to make good or bad decisions such as this, there will be results for your actions. Choose: good results or bad results? People that often use sugar daddies for tuition have to try hard to had their identity in order to avoid risks with employment, because they know deep down that it's a degrading, desperate move. As mentioned in the article and some of my commentary, use other alternatives. Times are hard, money can be scarce, but you'll be surprised at the number of wonderful, better options available when you actually make an effort to seek them out! Seek them! Ask, seek, knock. (Sure some of you might get that reference). Oh yeah, and in before someone potentially comes here to yell at me for yelling at only the girls doing this, I do mention guys in the video doing it too, so I'll mention it here too: University & College boys, do not turn to a sugar mommy just to fund your schooling! It's not funny and sounds like a horribly degrading idea. Be a man and seek out the alternative options that will leave you feeling proud and confident!

Pastry Push: Feeding The Floor Dwelling Gengar Knockoff LOL!

Lame Fun Fact: I originally titled this “Pastry Push: Feeding The Floor Gengar Knockoff LOL!” but later tossed “dwelling” into the title since the sweet toothed creature spends the game time in the floor. Pastry Push is a puzzle game with many different levels and three dessert worlds. You must push the dessert across the floor into Moko, the Gengar knockoff's mouth, by swiping north, east, south or west across your screen in as little swipes as possible. You must also avoid obstacles like torches, trap doors and such. While it is a decent game, with great graphics, frame rates, music and gameplay, I unfortunately played the game like such a frustrating idiot in some levels. Granted that I'm not really that into puzzle games, as I prefer adventurous platformers, or racing games like Asphalt 8, that's still no excuse to play poorly. Then again, there's been a lot of gameplay videos of mine that are full of facepalm worthy moments, so it's nothing surprising. I just use the excuse that I'm just “demoing” or “showing the game” to get away with it. Has it worked? Nobody notices or cares, so I'll say yes. Besides, you're probably not ever going to read this, so I could even say that I'm dating an Aboriginal Antartican Glacial woman, and you'd never know! Ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke ke!

Subway Surfers: Runs And Disses!

I've contemplated on recording this game for quite some time, and now I've finally done it. Just as the title and video description will tell you, I run while making lots of silly, cheesy, rude remarks about the characters and such. I'm not going to bother explaining Subway Surfers here, because it's widely recognized as one of the most popular endless runners. In the video I'm running in a dated version, from I believe 2016, Tokyo. Uh, I don't really know what else to say, admittedly – actually I do! This endless runner is very popular because it's one of the best runners around, that's why! I know I enjoyed it a lot, more so than Temple Run! Why? I just love the colourful graphics, gameplay, characters and international tracks. Well, I guess the tracks part might be considered bad for some, because you only get to play in different worlds when they issue the change through an update. Fresh? A drawback? Hindrance? Cool? Who knows, but all I know is that is doesn't bother me that much, though I guess it would be better if you could play on various tracks whenever you want, while they could still create new tracks that could be issued through updates. Still a very fun game either way. Will probably play again in the future on a different track. Will I bother to unlock new characters this time, or will I continue to insult them about how they're ugly, stink, sore, loserish, __________? We'll just have to find out the next time! LOL!

West Hill Collegiate Institute: Foggy Day and Exterior Tour

It was a “mild” winter day when I decided to drop by this place to film it, but man oh man, was it foggy! Wow! I was a little concerned about the fog making the video blurry, but it turns out the bigger problem was the damn shakiness! Sheesh! I really should have done a better job at keeping the camera steady! Part of the problem was that because visibility was poor, I didn't hold the camera in front of my face as I should, to not only pay better attention to what was being captured, but to also help the stability issue. The next time, man..... So! The school itself is a pretty large building that has a lot of corners and paths that made the walk around very interesting. The atmospheric fog also gave it very eerie, yet interesting vibe to it, especially when I stood at the track and a gate near some ravine. While the walk around was fun and all, there was something that made things extremely frustrating: a shut off! Yep, that's right! The little black devil decided to shut off after recording for 14 minutes, and even though it showed the “shutting off device” it did not save the video like how it normally should when that message shows! What treachery! I wanted to just bash and snap the thing when it did that, but I just resorted to swapping the battery and walking around again to recapture the video. Success! I was able to do a complete walk around and safely complete the video. Whew! A bit of a crazy, desperate move, but I REALLY did not feel like dealing with BlackBerry bulldoo, especially since the incident at Sinclair, so I just grudgingly made the move. Oddly enough, I did try the same thing initially at Sinclair, but it failed, likely because I haven't figured out the secret with temperatures, contacts and other bits. Needless to say, I'm glad I was able to capture West Hill again, but it would have been so much better if I didn't have to redo it in the first place! I was able to pull the old, original, 14 minute video off of the phone, but it of course cannot read because it claims that the file is “corrupted or missing codecs”. Some day, I mean it that I'm going to get that issue solved once and for all, and restore all “dead” videos I captured since 2017. In fact, I hope to actively look into this week. Last time, I did mention something about how I searched and found that the solution to the problem was mostly cost prohibitive software. This time, I'm going to look beyond money grabbing software and see if I can discover a solution to this excruciating problem! I know, some might say “Just stop using that piece of _____ already, and buy a darn new proper camera!” First thing's first, a proper camcorder is even more expensive then a legitimate MP4 fixer, and remember: the same can happen with camcorders too, so it's important to learn how to deal with a problem, and not just run away from it and hope it never occurs again.