"His anger made him suddenly sober. His whole life had been a fight to attain the impossible. Son of a mother who deserted him when he was three. Father, an Irish prizefighter who dies from a lucky punch from a third-rate kid. A life growing up on his own in [1930's] South Philadelphia. Enlisting in the Air Force at seventeen because anything seemed better than the world he knew. Then the war... being in the midst of it... seeing guys you lived with and slept with catch a bullet at your side... wondering why they got it and not you. They had families who were waiting for them at home. Families and sweethearts who wrote long letters and sent food packages. And gradually the idea hits you that maybe they got your bullet because there was something back there, waiting to be done... by you. and it's your job to go back and do it. He fele he had been given luck - luck to accomplish the impossible. And he had to make good so that the the guy who got his bullet would undestand. he wasn't religious, but he believed in paying his dues. That had always been his philosophy, and it still was"
- "Once is Not Enough" by Jacqueline Sussann
... now don't get me wrong. I am against the continued presence of the military in the middle east. I would like to find a peaceful two-state solution in Israel... and I think George W Bush is a bumbling imbecile with the luckiest swing in American politics... but there may be something to armed service if men were taught to think liek this....
Yes, war is always a nightmare, reaching back to however far there has been a record of how man can brutalize his neighbour and probably further. But somewhere on a larger scale there was always a sense of boundary. created by technology, religion or morals, probably a mix of all three, it kept civility in the pursuit for power... somewhere in the 20th century that was obliviated... and now there is only fear, and dirty plays, and sucker punches...
not sure why this popped out at me today when i was reading, but it did... anyway... back to our regularily scheduled program of fluff,oddities, narcissim and good tunes... i promise
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Friday, November 13, 2009
... the jukebox conundrum...
last friday I was faced witha jukebox... and I froze... it isn't that I don't love music, know music... but in the moment... I couldn't remember a SINGLE song that I liked... not one... so I ended up picking "A Little Less Conversation" by Elvis Presley... the Oceans 11 remix.... Not that that isn't a fun song... I like it...
But if jukebox choices are to truly represent you... as Nick Hornby says... its what you like, not what you ARE like... than it isn't the song I would choose to communicate my self to the world....
And then I threw my back out... So I spent a lot of time on my back with a heating pad, staring at the ceiling with nothing to do but listen to Classic Rock on 181.fm The Eagle on my internet stereo thingamajig...
so I made a list of SONGS THAT ARE AWESOME... there was 1 rule. I had to hear the song played... If I heard it, and it was awesome... I wrote it down. For those who care to judge me by my musical taste but cannot decipher my upside down scrawl - Here's the list:
Don't Think Twice - Bob Dylan
Can I Get a Witness - Marvin Gaye
Do It Again - Steely Dan
Changes - David Bowie
Keep On Rocking Me Baby - Steve Miller Band
Tiny Dancer - Elton John
In The Air Tonight - Phil Collins
Hit Me With Your Best Shot - Pat Benatar
Sweet Melissa - Allman Bros
Everyday People - Sly and the family Stone
Thunder Road - Bruce Springsteen
Beast Of Burden - Rolling Stones
Any Way You Want it - Journey
Midnight Rambler - Rolling Stones
Comfortably Numb - Pink Floyd
Saturday Night's Alright - Elton John (nearly disqualified for its recent high frequency repetitious presence in my life currently... but it still kinda kicks)
Copperhead Road - Steve Earle
The Break Up Song (They Don't Write 'Em) - Greg Kihn Band
Teenage Wasteland - The Who (Nearly disqualified for its relationship to CSI Miami and my nemesis David Caruso... but it kinda kicks)
Mother - Pink Floyd
Born to Run - Bruce Springsteen
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
... Les Collines...
So there's this chick that writes this website... http://www.thecherryblossomgirl.com.. I found it once when I was google image searching for images of cherry blossoms.
But I have since become majorly addicted. Its like the Parisian version of the Hills, except without the annoying plots, annoying characters and, best of all, no Spencer Pratt...
... Just pretty girls in pretty clothes, living a seeming life of leisure, and looking wicked cute doing it...
Plus she's French, which automatically gives her wicked street cred on all things awesome... mais non?
Sunday, October 4, 2009
... Number9Dream...
Its funny... whenever i think about what i would do if i ever won the lottery - and chances are slim, i don't buy tickets - I don't think about the usual things first... oh no... no car, or dream vacation or triple a hockey team fill my head... i have always always always started with this fantasy...
From page 210 - Number9Dream by David Mitchell:
"I assume my tour is complete, but notice a slatted cupboard door at the end of the landing. Its knob twizzles uselessly, but it swings open anyway. Its shelves are not shelves, but steep stairs. A knotted rope hangs down to help you haul yourself up. On the third step my head hits the ceiling, which shifts. I push, and a crack of daylight opens as the plyboard trapdoor swings up. I was way wrong. This is better than a hiding place. I emerge into a library/study with the highest book population density i have ever come across. book walls, book towers, book avenues, book side streets. book spillages, book rubble. paperback books, hardback books, atlases, manuals, almanacs. nine lifetimes of books. enough books to build an igloo to hide in. the room is sentient with books. mirrors double and cube the books. A Great Wall of China quantity of books. Enough books to make me wonder if i am a book too. Light comes in through a triangular window. A sort of wickerwork light shade hangs down. Apart from the bookcases and sagging shelves the only item of furniture is an old-fashioned writing bureau with square holes to lose papers and bills in. My grandmother had the same sort. Still does I guess. On the writing bureau are two piles of paper - one white and blank as starched shirts, the other a manuscript laid in a special lacquer tray."
***********
On my FB profile I say that a book becomes one of my favourites when reading it feels like remembering rather than discovering... reading this was exactly what i meant by that... someone else found the words to describe something from my wildest imagination.
good book, worth a read...
You will like this book if you liked: Lost in Translation (sofia coppola); Ransom (jay mcinerney); anything by william gibson; pizzicato five
From page 210 - Number9Dream by David Mitchell:
"I assume my tour is complete, but notice a slatted cupboard door at the end of the landing. Its knob twizzles uselessly, but it swings open anyway. Its shelves are not shelves, but steep stairs. A knotted rope hangs down to help you haul yourself up. On the third step my head hits the ceiling, which shifts. I push, and a crack of daylight opens as the plyboard trapdoor swings up. I was way wrong. This is better than a hiding place. I emerge into a library/study with the highest book population density i have ever come across. book walls, book towers, book avenues, book side streets. book spillages, book rubble. paperback books, hardback books, atlases, manuals, almanacs. nine lifetimes of books. enough books to build an igloo to hide in. the room is sentient with books. mirrors double and cube the books. A Great Wall of China quantity of books. Enough books to make me wonder if i am a book too. Light comes in through a triangular window. A sort of wickerwork light shade hangs down. Apart from the bookcases and sagging shelves the only item of furniture is an old-fashioned writing bureau with square holes to lose papers and bills in. My grandmother had the same sort. Still does I guess. On the writing bureau are two piles of paper - one white and blank as starched shirts, the other a manuscript laid in a special lacquer tray."
***********
On my FB profile I say that a book becomes one of my favourites when reading it feels like remembering rather than discovering... reading this was exactly what i meant by that... someone else found the words to describe something from my wildest imagination.
good book, worth a read...
You will like this book if you liked: Lost in Translation (sofia coppola); Ransom (jay mcinerney); anything by william gibson; pizzicato five
Saturday, September 26, 2009
... summer gone....
an excerpt from David MacFarlane's Summer Gone (http://www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780676972801):
"The trailed over the red-brown path, around outcrops of granite and the sheltered clusters of wodden cabins, through the maze of juniper, and over the spine of the northern island to the little bay. Alone, well behind them, their counsellor followed.
"Most of them would not remember this. They would forget names and faces and voices. Things would go.
"But this was also true: every now and then, in one city or another, in high-rises, or townhouses, in unsatisfactory rented rooms, in expensive hotels, in deep suburban silences, alone, or with their unconsoling wives or lovers turning away from their empty arms, they would each dream about the path across the island
"They would know every rock and root and turn and deop. They would feel the weightless air, see the particular skein of a summer evening, smell the pine-needled turf of their racing footfall"
********
I have a path like that, that i can go to in my mind. I'm definitely a lucky girl
"The trailed over the red-brown path, around outcrops of granite and the sheltered clusters of wodden cabins, through the maze of juniper, and over the spine of the northern island to the little bay. Alone, well behind them, their counsellor followed.
"Most of them would not remember this. They would forget names and faces and voices. Things would go.
"But this was also true: every now and then, in one city or another, in high-rises, or townhouses, in unsatisfactory rented rooms, in expensive hotels, in deep suburban silences, alone, or with their unconsoling wives or lovers turning away from their empty arms, they would each dream about the path across the island
"They would know every rock and root and turn and deop. They would feel the weightless air, see the particular skein of a summer evening, smell the pine-needled turf of their racing footfall"
********
I have a path like that, that i can go to in my mind. I'm definitely a lucky girl
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
...hug and roll....
.... if you are of a certain age you have for shizz seen this clip....
It was a not-so-elegant to the age old question "but what about me?" when it comes to sleep and your special someone....
It was a not-so-elegant to the age old question "but what about me?" when it comes to sleep and your special someone....
now, I do not have this problem at the moment.... (oh that how to accomodate a guy was my problem... i have enough trouble meeting one I even want to bring home) .... but a twitter exchange with Flashpunk this morning brought the longstanding problem up... and if i am being honest... i have some thoughts on the matter....
Its not that I don't enjoy a good cuddle... I like it as much as the next girl (well, maybe not as much... but i like it just fine, thank you very much). But I reserve it for naps, rainy afternoons or the afterglow (that lasts about 30 minutes tops....)
As far as sleeping goes.... I do it alone... I am the Lone Dreamer.... you can be my Tonto... but you need your own saddle. Maybe its because I move around in my sleep.... Maybe its because on occasion I have been known to unconsciously fart in the night (and no one wants you pressed up against that).... maybe its because on vacations as a kid my sister and I had to share a bed, and that girl is a KICKER!
But whatever the reasons... I don't see why you should go to all that trouble to sleep uncomfortably... because it always is... no matter whether its spooning, the shoulder roll, the hug'n'roll or the superman... its never as comfortable as whatever position you end up in on your own... known as the pragmatic approach at the end of this video.
I have to say love one you're with... but there is no need to invest in the Love Mattress.... no matter how cool a design idea it may be....
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
... modern day barter system...
... I have a job, really... Its tough, in the modern day recesion, the age of salary freezes and position cuts, where cost of living increases have gone the way of the dinosaurs. I love my job, but the paycheque covers the essentials (read: rent and loan payments) but doesn't leave many dollars for much else.
But a resourceful girl as always I have found my way to circumvent. You know how they say a penny for your thoughts? Well, you can have mine for concert tickets, movie passes or free books.
The internet has created a multitude of sites that are open to content and willing to give you the experience if you are willing to share it with the masses. All you need is a basic grasp of grammar (very basic), a point of view and a little wit
Friday, April 17, 2009
.... Lennon LIVE(s)....
... Of course the legendary spirit of John Lennon, as well as his contribution to music, political and cultural history will never be forgotten.
And lately it has been hard for me to avoid... My new landlord is a Beatlemaniac.... The common area of my new house is covered with Beatles original tour posters in Italian and framed photos of John Lennon. When he told my postal code... it went like this.... McCartney 6 Harrison, 2 Yoko 8.... Its awesome... I can never remember my postal code... now I can't forget it.
And on April 23 there will be one more item to add to the collection. Shout Factory will be releasing a DVD of the concert John Lennon gave with the Plastic Ono Band in 1969.
For Those of you who don't know about the Plastic Ono band, you should start by reading the wikipedia entry. Basically, you know they say Yoko Ono broke up the Beatles... it was basically through the Plastic Ono Band that this was accomplished.
The "band" was formed PBB (Pre Beatles Break-up) to refer to the artists that would collaborate with John Lennon and Yoko Ono on their various musical endeavours. With names like Eric Clapton, Alan White, Klaus Voorman and so many more (including two of the beatles Geaorge and Ringo). And with the musical buffet set before him... the fate of the "rigid" structure imposed by the Beatles was sealed....
Anyway, in 1969, at the very last moment John, Yoko, Clapton, Voorman and White jumped a plane to Toronto to take part in the Toronto Rock'n'Roll Revival, a concert Rolling Stone has called only second in importance to woodstock....
And it all happened at Varsity Arena!!! Let me assure you, the coolest thing I have ever been to at Varsity Arena is a Club Monaco Sample Sale... and it wasn't that great.....
I am gonna have to start to do some digging around about this event... because it combines so many of my favourite things: pop culture, celebrity, music, the 60s and Toronto!
I am definitely gonna start by pre-ordering the Shout Factory DVD and giving it a watch next week.....
UPDATE: The 39 Jesses
URDB has recognized my efforts and i currently hold the record for most Jesses on a screen grab!
Thursday, April 16, 2009
...39 Jesses....
Ever heard of Universal Record Database? It is the site that records all human achievement....
Well someone created a record by showing 17 images of Uncle Jesse from Full House on a computer screen at once....
As a manic Full House fan... I felt it was my duty to beat it... and I did...
Presenting the 39 jesses....
Friday, April 10, 2009
...Jane Austen on the art of woo....
...i may be on my way to becoming one of those crazy Austen-ites.... I have never really read any before. I saw Jane Eyre as a play at Shaw Festival once... oh, and i heckled proudly at the TIFF Gala screening of the Jane Austen Book Club (neglecting, of course, to actually read the book for my own book club)...
But I just started Pride and Prejudice, because I have had, of late, one of those cosmic twisters which has put the Jane Austen on my doorstep, (kinda like the Wicked Witch of the East for Dorothy)... my roommate seems to own and love all things Austen, and I trust her literary tastes... It seems to be some sort of Jane Austen-a-thon month on TV, there have been four different Austen flicks on TV in the last week... And as constant as ever is my love for all things Brit....
Anyway, I think I love her for all the same reasons everyone else does... I love the headstrong free will of her protagonists, but the civility and gentility of the society in which they operate... Everyone wants to be an 'individual' but there is something so novel and fun about the thought of being an individual in a society that is not overrun with the MTV credo of being different, yet the same.
Its the same way everyone loves Anne of Green Gables...
Anyway, I knew it was solidified when I read the following:
"I have been used to consider poetry as the food of love," said Darcy
"Of a fine, stout Healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what is strong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely"
-Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice
It reminds me of a certain something I said about WATT in a recent post... Just with a lot more civility, and a lot fewer references to the actual act of coitus...
Now to get four cats, a really expensive teapot and a lot of new cardigans... this Austenite is BORN!
Monday, April 6, 2009
... Woodbridge and Tunnel...
.... my friend Alex made it up... It's my new FAVOURITE saying....
It refers to the Friday night infestation of he 905 into the 416... Alex and Santiago came up with it on Friday when they tried to go out on Ossington. They hit the Ossington, Baby Huey's, PaintedLady, Communist's Daughter... all to no avail...
Each and every bar was packed with boys in chains and girls in shockingly innapropriate footwear and "barely there" shirts. Puking in gutters and making out in the middle of the bar.... (c'mon people, if you have to do it, at least don't block the path to the bartender)
I love it... it so perfectly reimagines a tried and true saying for the EXACT SAME THING, just geographically distinct from the great home of Toronto to which it now refers.....
Woodbridge and Tunnel baby! Save Ossington!
It refers to the Friday night infestation of he 905 into the 416... Alex and Santiago came up with it on Friday when they tried to go out on Ossington. They hit the Ossington, Baby Huey's, PaintedLady, Communist's Daughter... all to no avail...
Each and every bar was packed with boys in chains and girls in shockingly innapropriate footwear and "barely there" shirts. Puking in gutters and making out in the middle of the bar.... (c'mon people, if you have to do it, at least don't block the path to the bartender)
I love it... it so perfectly reimagines a tried and true saying for the EXACT SAME THING, just geographically distinct from the great home of Toronto to which it now refers.....
Woodbridge and Tunnel baby! Save Ossington!
Sunday, April 5, 2009
... ahoy mateys! springward ho!!!....
...I used to sail... Or, to be more accurate, i used to be crew on my dads boat... We all were first mates to Captain Daddy... And each sprintime would have us back in the marina, aboard the seaworthy vessel Bananas (it had a yellow mainsail... Get it)... And every year, that first weekend that is sunny and crisp and breezy has me pining for the sea... Well, the lake.
You can live in Toronto for years and forget that its on the water... Unlike Vancouver, or Venice, Paris, London Dublin, or New York, toronto is a city that chooses to forget its roots as a trade route hub and harbour for weary travellers.
But i love Lake Ontario. Over the years i have had a friend who lived on Wards Island, and even had a great apartment whose roof deck looked over the ex to the lake (it was a nightmare during Caribana and Toronto FC, but whatevs...)
I came down to the lake today, just to sit by the waters edge and watch the sun dance on the water, and remember the wide open feeling of being out on the water. Luckily there are a lot of things that bring back that feeling: the sound of gulls, paper chains, the voice of baseball announcers on the radio, k-ways... But the best is a sunny day by the water.
Its like my own personal version of an ipod dock... Recharging the battery from the source, getting myself ready to go back into the world again.
Cheesy. Yes. Fantastic anyway... Hells yeah!
I would give anything to go back out on the water, rocking and moving so fast, sun in my face and wind in my hair. My dad at the wheel, my sister at the bow (she's'the original 'King of the World').
I should rent a boat. Who wants to be the captain?
You can live in Toronto for years and forget that its on the water... Unlike Vancouver, or Venice, Paris, London Dublin, or New York, toronto is a city that chooses to forget its roots as a trade route hub and harbour for weary travellers.
But i love Lake Ontario. Over the years i have had a friend who lived on Wards Island, and even had a great apartment whose roof deck looked over the ex to the lake (it was a nightmare during Caribana and Toronto FC, but whatevs...)
I came down to the lake today, just to sit by the waters edge and watch the sun dance on the water, and remember the wide open feeling of being out on the water. Luckily there are a lot of things that bring back that feeling: the sound of gulls, paper chains, the voice of baseball announcers on the radio, k-ways... But the best is a sunny day by the water.
Its like my own personal version of an ipod dock... Recharging the battery from the source, getting myself ready to go back into the world again.
Cheesy. Yes. Fantastic anyway... Hells yeah!
I would give anything to go back out on the water, rocking and moving so fast, sun in my face and wind in my hair. My dad at the wheel, my sister at the bow (she's'the original 'King of the World').
I should rent a boat. Who wants to be the captain?
Friday, April 3, 2009
....flashback....
... I went to a show last night.... and ended up in a time machine to my years in university.
You see. I went to see Birds of Wales. They were a band an ex-boyfriend turned me on to waaaaay way back in the day, that had fallen off my radar til I recently rediscovered them on twitter (which, by the way, has become somewhat of an obsession, but that's fodder for another post). I had seen some rocking shows of theirs in the past and was totally pumped to see them at Tattoo. Especially since the whole thing was in support of a great organization supporting and educating on Darfur.
So I was a little disappointed when I showed up an hour after the doors open to find 30 college kids sitting around the periphery of the bar. It was a full on college flashback, and my friend had not even showed up yet.... what was a girl to do... I needed a night out... i needed a drink, and I had already arrived... So I bought myself a corona and settled in to watch girls who had seen eachother just hours previously shriek and hug like soldiers returning home, and eavesdrop on the conversation at the next table about the "mondo paper that was actually due yesterday, but that I will hand in tomorrow because I told my prof I got crabs and was too traumatized to write it over the weekend"
Actually, after beers number 2,3,4 and 5... it was kind of a warm fuzzy feeling of being cocooned in the best and most carefree years in my life... Everything I did back then was SOOOOO important, and i was ready to take on the world.
This feeling was only extended when the opening act, We Are The Take, took the stage. In my years I have seen a LOT of shows. Huge stadiums, open amphitheatres, packed bars and, like this, empty rooms where the band can't help but acknowledge you... personally... since you are the only ne there. I remember in college, going to Le Swimming (oh how i miss you, and how future generations are going to suffer your absence) and seeing bands like Bedouin Soundclash and Plain White T's play in front of a crowd of no more than ten people. It is a totally different way to experience music. And it can be crappy if the band has ego complexes and are just disappointed that no one came to see them... But it can also be awesome. If you are one of those people that really loves the live music experience for the energy that flows back and forth between a band and their audience... its almost like a drug.
And We ARe The Take started with a double dose of it... Their high-octane guitar jams, heavy drumming and revved lyrics made me want to dance all over the floor.... I was the only one though. I made Chris dance with me... and it helped that we were the only people over 20 in the bar that wasn't related to the band... because we didn't give a shit... Slowly the girlies started to join us and sway in what I can only imagine were intended as seductive dances to allure the band (I can't really blame them... all four members of WATT are duh-REE-mee....)
The bands only flaw was the construction of the set list... starting and finishing with awesome rock dance tunes... and filling the middle with emo-to-the-max ballads. It lost the crowd (at least this crowd of one) and had everyone migrating to the bar and away from the energy of the dance floor. Not to say there wasn't talent there. They did an acoustic harmonized number with a trumpet (I loves me some good horn) that was awesome.... but it the set list should have remained at a higher energy level to the end, then they could have brought out the ballads for the panty-moistening moments for the ladies (which are vital... obviously, no denying it here, its my only excuse for loving Jimmy Eat World so much when I was 19)
There was something about WATT's slower jams that made me think of them as the really cheesy dudes that would look at you earnestly in the middle of sex and ask you if you are ok... those guys always make me want to laugh... (to be honest, if my answer is yes - in the middle of sex - you are doing it wrong)
But for a band where they are all under 25, and only been together two years I give them props.
Birds of Wales were as great as I can remember.... alt-folk rock with cute lyrics and a good energy... I have less to say because i was less critical... having more fun on the dance floor... and of course, already processing beers 6, 7, and 8.
All in all it was a fun night.... I was chatting with the friend I went with on the way home about our mutual time warp back to third year... and we decided we would both LOVE to be as committed to anything in our lives as we were to our extracurriculars in University....
... how can I get back there?....
You see. I went to see Birds of Wales. They were a band an ex-boyfriend turned me on to waaaaay way back in the day, that had fallen off my radar til I recently rediscovered them on twitter (which, by the way, has become somewhat of an obsession, but that's fodder for another post). I had seen some rocking shows of theirs in the past and was totally pumped to see them at Tattoo. Especially since the whole thing was in support of a great organization supporting and educating on Darfur.
So I was a little disappointed when I showed up an hour after the doors open to find 30 college kids sitting around the periphery of the bar. It was a full on college flashback, and my friend had not even showed up yet.... what was a girl to do... I needed a night out... i needed a drink, and I had already arrived... So I bought myself a corona and settled in to watch girls who had seen eachother just hours previously shriek and hug like soldiers returning home, and eavesdrop on the conversation at the next table about the "mondo paper that was actually due yesterday, but that I will hand in tomorrow because I told my prof I got crabs and was too traumatized to write it over the weekend"
Actually, after beers number 2,3,4 and 5... it was kind of a warm fuzzy feeling of being cocooned in the best and most carefree years in my life... Everything I did back then was SOOOOO important, and i was ready to take on the world.
This feeling was only extended when the opening act, We Are The Take, took the stage. In my years I have seen a LOT of shows. Huge stadiums, open amphitheatres, packed bars and, like this, empty rooms where the band can't help but acknowledge you... personally... since you are the only ne there. I remember in college, going to Le Swimming (oh how i miss you, and how future generations are going to suffer your absence) and seeing bands like Bedouin Soundclash and Plain White T's play in front of a crowd of no more than ten people. It is a totally different way to experience music. And it can be crappy if the band has ego complexes and are just disappointed that no one came to see them... But it can also be awesome. If you are one of those people that really loves the live music experience for the energy that flows back and forth between a band and their audience... its almost like a drug.
And We ARe The Take started with a double dose of it... Their high-octane guitar jams, heavy drumming and revved lyrics made me want to dance all over the floor.... I was the only one though. I made Chris dance with me... and it helped that we were the only people over 20 in the bar that wasn't related to the band... because we didn't give a shit... Slowly the girlies started to join us and sway in what I can only imagine were intended as seductive dances to allure the band (I can't really blame them... all four members of WATT are duh-REE-mee....)
The bands only flaw was the construction of the set list... starting and finishing with awesome rock dance tunes... and filling the middle with emo-to-the-max ballads. It lost the crowd (at least this crowd of one) and had everyone migrating to the bar and away from the energy of the dance floor. Not to say there wasn't talent there. They did an acoustic harmonized number with a trumpet (I loves me some good horn) that was awesome.... but it the set list should have remained at a higher energy level to the end, then they could have brought out the ballads for the panty-moistening moments for the ladies (which are vital... obviously, no denying it here, its my only excuse for loving Jimmy Eat World so much when I was 19)
There was something about WATT's slower jams that made me think of them as the really cheesy dudes that would look at you earnestly in the middle of sex and ask you if you are ok... those guys always make me want to laugh... (to be honest, if my answer is yes - in the middle of sex - you are doing it wrong)
But for a band where they are all under 25, and only been together two years I give them props.
Birds of Wales were as great as I can remember.... alt-folk rock with cute lyrics and a good energy... I have less to say because i was less critical... having more fun on the dance floor... and of course, already processing beers 6, 7, and 8.
All in all it was a fun night.... I was chatting with the friend I went with on the way home about our mutual time warp back to third year... and we decided we would both LOVE to be as committed to anything in our lives as we were to our extracurriculars in University....
... how can I get back there?....
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
...i am skeptical because this test seemed to peg me... got it right on the nose....
Look at my results
is it just self aggrandizing? or am i really this way? or is everyone really this way and it just managed to find great language to appeal to everyone?
help, what were your results? take the test, let me know
Look at my results
is it just self aggrandizing? or am i really this way? or is everyone really this way and it just managed to find great language to appeal to everyone?
help, what were your results? take the test, let me know
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
... Stone Fox on the interweb....
So, back in college, when I still entertained the thought that I would one day be a great filmmaker, I used to make stuff....
My friend Zayna and I ran the campus tv station, TVMcGill, which by the way, is awesome to this day (due to my legacy, i'm sure)
Anyway, we use to misappropriate the resources to create our own projects... and this one time, we made a music video for a friends band, by editing it for three straight days during the run up to finals in our last year of school. Holed up in the student union for 72 hours we thought we were creating genius. we were actually creating this:
Now, about five years later, I found it on an afternoon of youtube googling phrases from my personal histopry to see what comes up.... I have absolutely no idea how it got there... as the master miniDV and Beta tapes are somewhere in a box in my apartment collecting dust with my books by Kant and Derrida. But I am happy it did.
Maybe not so my viral internet fame can begin, but definitely because watching it brought back the memories of making it, and those were some of the best days in all the ones I have spent toiling away in the movie industry.
And so I thought I might provide a little how to guide on how to make a horrible music video and guarantee a locked in love for filmmaking and future internet embarassment
DO: Create a dummy production company and change your cell phone answering machine to reflect it, thus giving you a home base to secure corporate sponsorship, thus ensuring you do not run up your parents credit card to make your masterpiece
DO NOT: Answer your cell after you have started drinking at night, or before you aare fully awake the next morning, inspiring your sponsor contact to ask "are you really a professional producer? are you a student?" and causing you to have to do a lot of grovelling and finance most of the video with the credit card your parents don't know about (yet)
DO: Figure out your concept and storyboards early, stick to it and follow through.
DO NOT: come up with a narrative that no one is EVER going to understand like... say... I don't know... a guy who wakes up on the roof in a kiddy pool and can't remember where he was or what he was doing the previous evening, causing him to recall it in flashbacks as he walk the streets of Montreal, only to realize that he had stolen the band's mojo and all the flashbacks were actually the aforementioned band chasing him through the streets, and when he finally puts it altogether he just happens to have mentioned the bands practice space, where they are currently practicing in pajamas, causing yet another chase down the block..... Trust me, you will get it, it won't be clear to anyone else.
DO: Prepare as much of the wardrobe, makeup, props, locations, extras, etc in advance
DO NOT: back down from any last minute challenges or changes. Some that we dealt with here were:
-you aren't actually allowed to shoot in the montreal metro, which we did... so it was my job to distract any and all approaching subway cops while the band shot with the DP. I played stupid lost anglophone about 15 times, french subway cops are mean
-The purple footie pajamas for one of the band members were too bright through the camera, we threw them in a mud puddle, then into a drier at the local laundromat, and they were good to go
-we had NO shots of the dickies clothes or logo when they finally came through with the funds on our last day of shooting... we just went back and reshot some dickie's beauty shots... corporate selling out was ingrained in us early
-we couldn't actually get our hands on a smoke machine to create a "smoke rising from an open bag" to signify the bands mojo... instead we had friends take turns hauling down smokes and breathing out the plumes through a hose we inserted througha hole in the bottom of a knapsack.... we killed a lot of brain cells for our art
DO: Always keep food and snacks on hand to keep everyone happy during the day
DO NOT: Let your main talent get loaded and show up 15 minutes before his call time... The coffee and breakfast burritos you have on hand will sober him up and entice him enough to shoot, but you will end up having to make him look that haggard and hungover for the rest of the shoot
DO: do this... its a once in a lifetime opportunity to be this self-indulgent and have this much fun with almost no consequences....
DO NOT: take yourself to seriously.... in the end, the only thing that will happen is a few hundred people seeing it on youtube a half-decade later, just have fun with it.
My friend Zayna and I ran the campus tv station, TVMcGill, which by the way, is awesome to this day (due to my legacy, i'm sure)
Anyway, we use to misappropriate the resources to create our own projects... and this one time, we made a music video for a friends band, by editing it for three straight days during the run up to finals in our last year of school. Holed up in the student union for 72 hours we thought we were creating genius. we were actually creating this:
Now, about five years later, I found it on an afternoon of youtube googling phrases from my personal histopry to see what comes up.... I have absolutely no idea how it got there... as the master miniDV and Beta tapes are somewhere in a box in my apartment collecting dust with my books by Kant and Derrida. But I am happy it did.
Maybe not so my viral internet fame can begin, but definitely because watching it brought back the memories of making it, and those were some of the best days in all the ones I have spent toiling away in the movie industry.
And so I thought I might provide a little how to guide on how to make a horrible music video and guarantee a locked in love for filmmaking and future internet embarassment
DO: Create a dummy production company and change your cell phone answering machine to reflect it, thus giving you a home base to secure corporate sponsorship, thus ensuring you do not run up your parents credit card to make your masterpiece
DO NOT: Answer your cell after you have started drinking at night, or before you aare fully awake the next morning, inspiring your sponsor contact to ask "are you really a professional producer? are you a student?" and causing you to have to do a lot of grovelling and finance most of the video with the credit card your parents don't know about (yet)
DO: Figure out your concept and storyboards early, stick to it and follow through.
DO NOT: come up with a narrative that no one is EVER going to understand like... say... I don't know... a guy who wakes up on the roof in a kiddy pool and can't remember where he was or what he was doing the previous evening, causing him to recall it in flashbacks as he walk the streets of Montreal, only to realize that he had stolen the band's mojo and all the flashbacks were actually the aforementioned band chasing him through the streets, and when he finally puts it altogether he just happens to have mentioned the bands practice space, where they are currently practicing in pajamas, causing yet another chase down the block..... Trust me, you will get it, it won't be clear to anyone else.
DO: Prepare as much of the wardrobe, makeup, props, locations, extras, etc in advance
DO NOT: back down from any last minute challenges or changes. Some that we dealt with here were:
-you aren't actually allowed to shoot in the montreal metro, which we did... so it was my job to distract any and all approaching subway cops while the band shot with the DP. I played stupid lost anglophone about 15 times, french subway cops are mean
-The purple footie pajamas for one of the band members were too bright through the camera, we threw them in a mud puddle, then into a drier at the local laundromat, and they were good to go
-we had NO shots of the dickies clothes or logo when they finally came through with the funds on our last day of shooting... we just went back and reshot some dickie's beauty shots... corporate selling out was ingrained in us early
-we couldn't actually get our hands on a smoke machine to create a "smoke rising from an open bag" to signify the bands mojo... instead we had friends take turns hauling down smokes and breathing out the plumes through a hose we inserted througha hole in the bottom of a knapsack.... we killed a lot of brain cells for our art
DO: Always keep food and snacks on hand to keep everyone happy during the day
DO NOT: Let your main talent get loaded and show up 15 minutes before his call time... The coffee and breakfast burritos you have on hand will sober him up and entice him enough to shoot, but you will end up having to make him look that haggard and hungover for the rest of the shoot
DO: do this... its a once in a lifetime opportunity to be this self-indulgent and have this much fun with almost no consequences....
DO NOT: take yourself to seriously.... in the end, the only thing that will happen is a few hundred people seeing it on youtube a half-decade later, just have fun with it.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
.... best way i have found to support a charity today!...
If you buy this duvet cover, screen-printed to resemble cardboard boxes, the proceeds go to support a dutch homeless shelter....
Now thats thinking outside the box....
I realize most of the people who read this are located a little west of the atlantic and probably are worried about the homeless problem at home.... Well, for all you Noprth American Stylistas/Philanthropists.... go here to get the duvet, help out some dutch people, then go here to make a donation to the United Way...
oh, yeah, I am scouring the interweb for new duvet covers to go with my kickass new apartment... description coming soon, as are the horror stories from my search!
Thursday, January 15, 2009
... and i thought Dougal's work was complicated....
Commercials like this may take longer....
....but this one took 600m takes of one shot.... i would cry
... Doog's are pretty cool though. check this making of... only commercial i know that has one....
i guess that car one is a lot like this one....
i am going to end this post before it become's an ode to Dougal....
....but this one took 600m takes of one shot.... i would cry
... Doog's are pretty cool though. check this making of... only commercial i know that has one....
i guess that car one is a lot like this one....
i am going to end this post before it become's an ode to Dougal....
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
... how did i miss four-eyed monsters for three whole years?....
This is the best thing....
From now on it will be the only way I date on the internet... These people decided that, rather than send back and forth lame messages, or meet (she was too shy) they would communicate artistically.
Super fun, right?
I have never gone in for the whole online dating thing... Not that I don't think it works. I just don't think it works for me. I used to make fun of it outright... no go... I did an internship after my first year of university at a PR Firm that was working on the rebranding campaign of webpersonals to lavalife.com. Webpersonals was the Worldwide Interweb extension to the company that runs those party chat line dating things.... you know, the ones with the really lame commercials... yeah, they own lavalife... or they did then. So everyone in the office had to sign up... This was back in 2000. Y2K was still fresh in everyone's mind, People still knew what compuserve was, and dating/meeting people through the internet was just not done.
Suffice it to say, I met some real losers.... but it was for work, so it didn't really count.
Since then I have just said i don't like internet dating... and yes, I make fun of it... So much so that my sister called me on it, told me I couldn't really have a say unless I tried it... so I did.
And it wasn't that bad... It wasn't that great either. Look, its not that internet dating is inherently a bad thing. But you are definitely going to find people looking for relationships... thats the point. But here's the thing. I am not looking for a relationship. The relationship should be the by-product of the person I meet, not the other way around... and that's completely a personal preference. Online daters are looking for the person best suited to the relationship they want to be in....
So you end up dating people's profiles. They have slotted themselves into categories... nice, neat, clean, friendly categories... and there is no context. You know what they like, who they are, before you are ever attracted to them... and that seems backwards to me.
Arin & Susan managed to get themselves out of those boxes... have a little context before they met up... they managed to get a sense of eachother through the quirks and preferences without actually saying flat out "these are my quirks and preferences"
I like it....
From now on it will be the only way I date on the internet... These people decided that, rather than send back and forth lame messages, or meet (she was too shy) they would communicate artistically.
Super fun, right?
I have never gone in for the whole online dating thing... Not that I don't think it works. I just don't think it works for me. I used to make fun of it outright... no go... I did an internship after my first year of university at a PR Firm that was working on the rebranding campaign of webpersonals to lavalife.com. Webpersonals was the Worldwide Interweb extension to the company that runs those party chat line dating things.... you know, the ones with the really lame commercials... yeah, they own lavalife... or they did then. So everyone in the office had to sign up... This was back in 2000. Y2K was still fresh in everyone's mind, People still knew what compuserve was, and dating/meeting people through the internet was just not done.
Suffice it to say, I met some real losers.... but it was for work, so it didn't really count.
Since then I have just said i don't like internet dating... and yes, I make fun of it... So much so that my sister called me on it, told me I couldn't really have a say unless I tried it... so I did.
And it wasn't that bad... It wasn't that great either. Look, its not that internet dating is inherently a bad thing. But you are definitely going to find people looking for relationships... thats the point. But here's the thing. I am not looking for a relationship. The relationship should be the by-product of the person I meet, not the other way around... and that's completely a personal preference. Online daters are looking for the person best suited to the relationship they want to be in....
So you end up dating people's profiles. They have slotted themselves into categories... nice, neat, clean, friendly categories... and there is no context. You know what they like, who they are, before you are ever attracted to them... and that seems backwards to me.
Arin & Susan managed to get themselves out of those boxes... have a little context before they met up... they managed to get a sense of eachother through the quirks and preferences without actually saying flat out "these are my quirks and preferences"
I like it....
Monday, January 12, 2009
... so funny, I was just thinking about no name...
... when i was a kid, more often than not my after school snack consisted of no name chicken bologna... i would wrap pickles in it, or cheese soldiers (which, for those of you not awesome like me, is cheese cut into sticks, when lined all up in a row look like soldiers)...
... it was awesome! sounds gross i know, and to be completely honest, it was a little gross. chicken bologna is basically the ground up pieces of the chicken that no one would possibly purchase in their original condition, reconstituted and sliced and sold 15 to a package... And it was constantly in my fridge, i have this vivid memory of my dady, coming home from the office, still in his coat, smelling like winter, standing by the open fridge door and eating it straight from the package....
and it looks like it could be again. They discontinued the no name line of products in the early 90s. It was all the rage in the early 80s. introduced in 1978, after a big economic crisis it offered people simple food, cheap. It died and was replaced by President's Choice in the Reagan happy, label loving late 80's. We were supposed to be happy about it, because a great friend of the family (coincidentally one of my still all-time favourite people on earth) was integral in the development of the new line. But truth is, I missed that thickly sliced chicken bologna in the bright yellow packaging that was a constant in my childhood snacktime.
And now it looks like it may become a part of my cheap living, squatter diet, because THEY ARE BRINGIING BACK NO NAME!!!! I was just thinking they should, the other day... no odea how it came to mind, but i was thinking that with the economy being what it is, and the brand landscape littered with superfluous luxury, a good, reliable economy brand that is not associated with negative connotations, and as a strong tie to a powerbrand would do so well.
And tonight, on my TV, there is Galen Weston, hocking the no name brand.
The question is, whats the skinny on the chicken bologna?
...what am i, chopped liver?...
there are, at this point, and according to my blog counter, 1538 unique visitors to my blog... I can only conclude that they have all landed here by mistake and immediately left for greener inter-pastures, as I have had two comments in my entire blogging career.... two... only two...
and you know what they say about two?
it can be as bad as one, its the loneliest number since the number one.....
so if you are reading this, even by accident because you were really googling "big breasted cheerleaders bounce in the shower" and got here by accident, leave me a comment, I just need that kind of approval from strangers... a love poem would be even better
and you know what they say about two?
it can be as bad as one, its the loneliest number since the number one.....
so if you are reading this, even by accident because you were really googling "big breasted cheerleaders bounce in the shower" and got here by accident, leave me a comment, I just need that kind of approval from strangers... a love poem would be even better
Saturday, January 10, 2009
...Into the Mystic....
... So I have been missing in action the last week and a bit... I have been in Mexico with the fam, spending the week in Playa del Carmen at the beautiful casa passalacqua... Its been amazing, good times, great sun, fun with the fam, too much tequila...
but one thing has been bothering me... (well a few things actually, travelling with the Amazings is pretty tough on an average girl....) but the thing about Playa is that it is pretty Disneyfied... but today we took a little Mexican bus Adventure out to Paa Mul... a little RV Park and Dive Spot off the highway just south of Playa.... and its the kind of vacation spot i dream about... not built up, just a resto, a rv parking lot, a bunch of thatch cabins on the beach and a lot of coastline.... best day in a while, totally worth the crazy sunburn we all returned with....
but one thing has been bothering me... (well a few things actually, travelling with the Amazings is pretty tough on an average girl....) but the thing about Playa is that it is pretty Disneyfied... but today we took a little Mexican bus Adventure out to Paa Mul... a little RV Park and Dive Spot off the highway just south of Playa.... and its the kind of vacation spot i dream about... not built up, just a resto, a rv parking lot, a bunch of thatch cabins on the beach and a lot of coastline.... best day in a while, totally worth the crazy sunburn we all returned with....
I do not want to go home, not even a little bit... its a million degrees below zero in Toronto, and i just want to stay here... more blogging about mexico when i get back to the T-dot.... anything to relive the glory while huddled in the freezing white North....
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