Out of the Archives

Food Jamming, Getting baked, and "personalities" who can't cook

2007-04-10T11:53:00.000-04:00

I haven't really been watching Food TV lately. I have become disillusioned with the pap they have been serving up as of late. When Anthony Bourdain took aim at the network with a scathing and highly amusing diatribe, he pinpointed and articulated a lot of what I was feeling about the channel, in particular, "the ascent of the Ready-Made bobblehead personalities, and the not-so-subtle shunting aside of the Old School chefs". Bourdain states what he likes and what is redeemable about the shows and people populating FoodTV, but is unmerciful on those shows and 'personalities' he dislikes. I highly recommend you read his post on the Ruhlman.com (via LHB) - for just a taste here is the opening salvo from his commentary on Rachel Ray "Complain all you want. It’s like railing against the pounding surf. She only grows stronger and more powerful. Her ear-shattering tones louder and louder." I shudder at the thought of her getting any stronger/louder. And for more with the man, be sure to check out Raincoast Books for a three-part podcast with Bourdain.

Food Jammers photo by Kevin Quatman courtesy of the Torontoist.

There are a few shows I still do like, Surreal Gourmet and Barefoot Contessa among them (does anyone know how I can befriend these people and have them cook for me? I am always jealous of their guests), but if there is one show that redeems the network at the moment, it is Food Jammers, who have recently started their second season. They are funny, smart, and do really bizarre and interesting things with food. You can check out a few episodes of the show online. Who else would attempt dehydrating a turkey? Genius (even if it didn't work out).

What is really floating my boat at the moment is something I recently found on the interwubs:

Let's Get Baked with Mat and Dave. This weekly podcast/radio show which is produced in Halifax has bands come into the kitchen and bake vegan goodies with the two hosts. They put the recipes online, along with some photos, so you can bake along with them. They has some really great guests, fun food facts, tasty sounding recipes, and a really great theme song. My favourite episode that I have listened to so far has to be the one featuring Holy Fuck where they make a tofu scramble, but my favourite recipe is Christine Fellows' Coffee Kiss Cookies. Maybe if you're lucky I'll test out that recipe on you sometime.

Today I just discovered (thanks to The Most Serene Republic on Let's Get Baked) the vidcast show thingy Ctrl-Alt-Chicken which describes itself "a new form of cooking show... one in which the chefs don't know how to cook!"I have just watched their "minibite" on Artichoke dip and am currently watching their clip show. The show seems pretty good - informal and funny but with surprisingly high production values. They seem genuinely surprised with something turns out and, it seems, occasionally things do not - and we all know that spectacular failure is almost always more entertaining to watch than an easy success. I have some high hopes for it and am looking forward to watching more of their adventures in the kitchen. They like Monte Cristo sandwiches and i just heard the words "adverse chemical reaction". Awesome.

Do check out some of the stuff I've posted above and if you know of something else I might dig along those lines please leave me a comment. Happy eating.

rgsc

Video has not yet killed the radio star

2007-04-04T14:39:00.000-04:00

pic from Rob&Elliot.

Hey. I am really behind on my blogging, eh. But I've been busy, I swear. Ummm I'm not entirely sure what I've been up to for the last month or so but I am pretty sure it was wonderful and productive and life affirming and all that.

One thing that has happened is that I've signed on to be a volunteer at CFRC. I spent this past weekend in training learning the ins and outs of CRTC regulations (fun!) as well as learning how to be a radio superstar. I made a station id which was pretty rad and we nervously messed about in the control room. I am going to be shadowing a couple of programs in the coming weeks to see how the pros do it which should be cool.

I am going to be working in the music library getting things organized etc. and I am going to try to book some control room time to do some show demos. Depending how horrible they are, I might post them, so if you ever wondered what I might sound like on the radio you might very well be in luck. I can tell you are excited.

So that's it, that's all I've got to report. I've been thinking about posting something here for a while just to keep the "once in a blue moon" streak alive and that comic seemed like a pretty good jumping off point. Now, aren't you glad you stopped by....yeah...

rgsc.

A Glorious Day

2007-02-23T12:58:00.000-05:00

My oh my. What a beautiful day in the neighbourhood.

I got to have fish nuggets for lunch.

Gonna see not one but two concerts tonight.

Gonna get tickets to see Final Fantasy in Kingston.

ANNNNNND I got tickets to see the amazing, the wonderful, the incomparable

ARCADE FIRE.

Here is a little diagram I made to illustrate what the awesomeness will be like:

As you can see, the LazyLibrarian and I are going to be serenaded all night by Win and Regine who will never stray from stage left.

I am really, really stoked for this.

rgsc

The Diary of the Director of the Iraq National Library and Archives

2007-02-07T09:28:00.000-05:00

Burnt entrance of the INLA, 2003

I officially can no longer complain about work. While I like to bitch about the silly trials in my everyday working life, reading the entries from November 2006-January 2007 from the diary of Saad Eskander, the Director of the Iraq National Library and Archives, has illustrated what real tribulations are. The diary is posted on the British Library website and can be found here (with my thanks to the posting on Arcan-L for letting me know about it). It is an amazing, and continuing, story of how the staff of the NLA are struggling to keep their collections and themselves safe in the worst imaginable conditions. Here are a few extracts, I highly recommend reading the full diary.

Entrance after restoration (ca. 2005?)

From November 13, 2006

I received bad news, as soon as I arrived to my office. In my absent, INLA was bombed twice and snipers' bullets broke several windows. Fortunately, no body was hurt. My staff withheld these information from me, when I contacted them. They claimed that they did not want me to be worried and to spoil my visit.

I spent the rest of the week trying to advise a number of my employees what to do, as they got death threats. The Sunnis, who lived in Shi'i dominated districtwere given an ultimatum to abandon their homes and the Shi'is, who lived in a Sunni dominated district, had to leave their homes. So far, two of my employees were murdered, the first worked in the Computer Department, and the second was a guard. Three of our drivers, who worked with us by contract, were murdered and three others were injured.

Impact of Sectarian Violence on the INLA's Staff (December 2006)

Number Type of impact

4 Unlawful Death (assassinations)

66 Unlawful Death of Relatives (e.g. Sons, Daughters, Brothers, Sisters, Cousins, Uncles, Aunts, Nephews)

2 Kidnapping

6 Kidnapping of relatives (e.g. Sons, Daughters, Brothers, Sisters, Cousins, Uncles, Aunts, Nephews)

58 Death Threat

51 Displacement

3 Plundering

3 Damage to Houses

3 Other Material losses

Note: Total Number of the INLA's staff is 464 (including 39 Guards).

Number	Type of impact
4	Unlawful Death (assassinations)
66	Unlawful Death of Relatives (e.g. Sons, Daughters, Brothers, Sisters, Cousins, Uncles, Aunts, Nephews)
2	Kidnapping
6	Kidnapping of relatives (e.g. Sons, Daughters, Brothers, Sisters, Cousins, Uncles, Aunts, Nephews)
58	Death Threat
51	Displacement
3	Plundering
3	Damage to Houses
3	Other Material losses

From January 23rd, 2007:

At 11.30 a.m., intensive exchange of fire in the al-Fadhil area. Most of the roads were closed. Our guards were re-deployed. One window was smashed as a result of the explosions. I was informed on the same day that two of our technicians were kidnapped by unknown armed men in Al-Ghazaliya area. Fortunately, both were realised unharmed, thought they were verbally abused. Mr. C, the head of the Restoration Laboratory, received a death threat. He and his family left their house. I visited the Restoration Laboratory. It was hit by 5 bullets. Two windows were broken as a result. One of the restorers told me that her brother was murdered ten days a go for sectarian reasons. Another restorer told me that he cousin, who lived in Mosul, in northern Iraq, was also murdered for sectarian reasons. I did not know about these two incidents. I discovered that a number of my staff do not inform the administration about their ordeals for fear of reprisals.
I received more bad news about Miss D, an accountant. Her father and brother were both injured after the terrorists opened fire on them. The reason for it D 's father and brothers refused to leave their house, after they received a death threat

Stoop-erific

2007-01-19T10:20:00.000-05:00

Holy Smokes! Did you know that I once had a blog here? It certainly looks like I've forgotten. Well, I make no promises to post regularly or anything, but here's to good intentions.

I ask myself - what does one do with one of these newfangled blog thingys. The answer apparently is - STOOP!!!!! So here it is. The stoop, served up kingston style:

Since it looked all pretty with the snow etc. I took a few more pics (at the lazylibrarian's behest) which are slightly better looking than our front steps:

Well, I think I filled my blogging quota for the moment. See you again...hopefully in less than two months

Mii and my Wii

2006-11-19T18:21:00.000-05:00

One of the many, many, many fun things about the new Nintendo Wii (I posted about our morning's adventure with pics on The Lazy Librarian) is that you get to create an avatar called a Mii. Clever, eh. Here is me with my Mii. Striking resemblence, if I do say so myself. Laura is busy builidng Miis for everyone we know - I periodically hear her chuckle from the next room. Heh.

rgsc

Tasty fish

2006-11-03T12:52:00.000-05:00

As you might know, one of the perks of my job is that I get to eat in the dining room for next to nothing. By and large, all the food is good but the best day is always the Friday where they serve the Fish Nuggets (not to be confused with the inferior fishcakes). The Lazy Librarian has never been able to experience these bite-sized fishy wonders and thinks that I may be making them up. These photos show that they are real and they are gooooood.

Homecoming 2006 - repeat or restraint?

2006-09-07T12:53:00.000-04:00

The streets of Kingston are once again filled with those cheery faces of Queen's students. Frosh week is currently on and Homecoming is but a few short days (it was moved forward in order to cash in on The Score televising the Homecoming football game, or so I heard). Of course, you mention "Homecoming" in Kingston and everyone thinks back to the glorious time everyone had last year. The school, the city, the police and other interested parties have spent the last 12 months talking about how to avoid a repeat of last year's craziness.

Despite the launch of a Safe Homecoming Campaign, which includes what promises to be a high-profile advertising strategy, the sceptic in me is a bit worried that their efforts will be in vain - the students and hangers-on may very well do whatever the hell they want and that appealing to people to stay away from Aberdeen by reminding them of their "responsibilities as students and citizens" may just not have that great of an impact on the people who want to party. According to the Whig, students who live on Aberdeen seem to be rather unimpressed by the efforts, and I think it is safe to say that others feel the same (although I have to wonder what more could they possibly do? I suggested locking everyone in their rooms for the night but the logistics of that are pretty staggering).

Queen's and the City seem to have acknowledged that a party is going to happen and the AMS have made plans to ensure that those who do show up have access to first-aid, water and toilets, which I think is responsible on their part. Given the (unwanted) media-attention and the pressure from the administration, will people stay away? If people do stay away from Aberdeen will they congregate somewhere else? Will non-Queen's people descend on the Ghetto looking for a party? We shall have to wait and see.

I must admit that even though I am typically jaded and pessimistic, I remain cautiously optimistic that Queen's students will show restraint this year - both out of fear of the harsh punishments that are promised to be handed out to anyone who is found to have breached the Queen's Code of Conduct or caught doing illegal things and out of a sense of moral responsibility. I think the student population is probably tired of being associated with hooliganism and wants to avoid another debacle. Of course, last year it was only a small minority of Queen's students who participated (not that I am denying the responsibility of those affiliated with Queen's) and the out-of-towners, townies, highschool students, etc., who were there in full force last year will be harder to hold accountable. Hopefully they will stay away after hearing that the Po-Po might be breaking out the watercannons and rubber bullets and tanks or whatever their plan was/is.

I am going to be in Toronto next weekend so I, along with a lot of other people shall be watching from a distance. What do you think? Weigh in on the comments or with this handy-dandy little poll.

rgsc

Booker Books

2006-08-16T10:39:00.000-04:00

Eugène Atget, Secondhand Book Dealer, place de la Bastille, (1910-1911) from The Getty.

The Man Booker longlist has been announced highlighting, as always, how terribly un(der)read I am. As a lover of literary awards I will most likely follow this one as usual. Hey, I might even pick up on or two of the nineteen longlisted (this one and this one look particularly interesting). A few names are familiar including Peter Carey (I've even read a few of his books! Yay me!) and Nadine Gordiner (I think we have one of her's on our shelves somewhere). From what I can see there is one Canadian on the list- Mary Lawson, for The Other Side of the Bridge, who is from Sarnia but based in London (the good one, you know, in Britain, not London, Ont.) The last word in literary criticism, the bookies, have pegged David Mitchell's Black Swan Green as the favourite to win.

For more see The Guardian and the Times. Short list is annouced Sept. 14th.

Looking for ways to have fun in your archives? Play Guess that Goo!

2006-08-08T10:21:00.000-04:00

Howdy Archival types! Are you bored with arranging and describing? Genealogists driving you bonkers? Well then, gather 'round and let's play another exciting game of "Guess that Goo!" Look closely and see if you can determine what on earth the mysterious, sticky, possibly toxic (but hopefully not since I stuck my finger in it), black substance is.

Ick.

The Artel, or One More Reason the Town I Live in Is Cooler than the Town You Live In

2006-08-03T18:30:00.000-04:00

Kingston has, for a long time, had a strong arts community but really is lacking in exhibition space. Cue one of the best and coolest ideas I've heard in a good long time: The Artel. This is a combination artists' residence, studio, and gallery/performance space. The artists live, work, and show in the same building. And it isn't just the six residents who show. For a meager fee ($100-175) you can show your work for a three week stint. Currently they are winding down the last installment of the Canadian Poster Exhibition/Concert Series with The Art of Sérigraphie Populaire Screenprinting & Design Co.

This duo from Montreal make screenprinted posters that are LSD-bright and, for the most part, extremely complex. The show is predominantly made up of gig posters, what Seripop is best known for, along with a smattering of fine art and other prints. Seeing two rooms absolutely filled with them do to your retinas what I imagine hearing a live set of their band AIDS Wolf does to your eardrums - challenge and quite possibly punish (but, since the show which was scheduled to open the exhibit was sadly cancelled, this comparison is only conjecture) . After leaving the gallery, even on a very bright August afternoon, everything else seems a little less luminous in comparison. It is a fantastic show and one that you may still have time to see. The Artel website says the show is supposed to end today but the person I talked to there said it was running throughout the weekend [note: i was mixed up. It ended the 6th but the 3rd was the last day I could go to see it]. So, Kingston, get out to 205 Sydenham (that's NOP, just so you know) and take a look-see. If you miss this show, there are many more to follow. I highly recommend you keep an eye on this place.
rgsc
Update: Here is a photo of the Seripop installation taken from the Artel site so you can get a sense the sensory overload I was talking about:

The Wallet

2006-08-02T13:40:00.000-04:00

There has been a lot of slander aimed at my wallet on these pages and in person in the recent past. Frankly, I see nothing wrong at all with the size of my wallet. It is accused of being a "George Costanza" wallet. Well, I am not ashamed of this and, indeed, look upon it as a compliment. I will remind you of George's wise words : "A man carries a wallet." In dialogue with Jerry, George explains the importance of a real wallet:

JERRY: ... You know it is better without this big wallet. It's more comfortable.
GEORGE: It doesn't matter if it's more comfortable. It's wrong.
JERRY: Why?
(George pulling out his wallet.)
GEORGE: Because important things go in a case. You got a skull for your brain, a plastic sleeve for your comb, and a wallet for your money.

Truer words have never been spoken. No namby-pamby wallet for this kid.

The way I see it, when this archives gig starts really paying off (any day now, I'm sure) and I make Scrooge McDuck-sized piles of cash, I need an appropriate place to store my walking around money. With my wallet, I am prepared.

rgsc

Iconoclasm

2006-08-01T10:41:00.000-04:00

Today I participated in a little bit of iconoclasm. Don't worry, I have not been swept up in some Reformation-type fervour. I had to vacate a room in the archives and we are using this as an opportunity to deaccession a lot of stuff that we not longer need or should never have kept in the first place. This Sacred Heart statue was unremarkable, in less than ideal condition, and there really is no one who wants this sort of thing . So instead of hanging on to it, I was given permission to remove it from the archives. And what is the proper way of performing this task? Destruction. While smashing things can be fun, and I had no attachment to the statue, I still felt a twinge of guilt when I took the hammer to it. I suppose it is the art historian in me. Or the remnants of a Catholic school education.

I figured I might try something new (well, new for me) and I recorded the process. If everything works here is me destroying the statue, courtesy of youtube:

Just another day in the archives.

rgsc
PS - woo-hoo this is my 100th post. Took me long enough, eh.

Happy Birthday Mr. Fancy Pants

2006-07-27T21:11:00.000-04:00

Do you know whose birthday it was today? Do you know who likes short shorts? The answer is one and the same.

Since he likes to put up wonderful photos of people to celebrate their birthday (heh. like this recent one) I thought I would return the favour.

Happy Birthday Mark. Hope you like the pics.

Sailing in the Bay of Quinte

2006-07-24T13:28:00.000-04:00

The summer is flying by and it has been both eventful and enjoyable. I am planning on posting some pictures from our Newfoundland adventure but haven't quite got around to it. In the meantime I thought I would put up a few photos from this weekend's adventure - sailing with Ian in the Bay of Quinte. The weather wasn't as sunny and warm on Saturday as it has been for the last few weeks but a little drizzle didn't stop us from getting out on the water.

Ian gave me a quick lesson in the fundamentals of sailing and before long he had me hanging out over the edge of the boat on the trapeze - as seen above. It was a rather strange but cool feeling hanging over the water like that. However, you really have to be on your toes as you have to react to the changing conditions moving in, out, higher or lower as the conditions dictate. You just can't hang out there on a wire looking cool. Sailing, I have learned, is quite a complicated endeavour and you really have to be aware of what is going on in the water, in the boat and with the wind, 'cause if you aren't paying attention (or know what you are doing) you very well could get the boom upside your head (which happened several times) or boat might very well toss your ass into the water (which ours did, twice). All part of the fun.

"Mount and Thrust"???

2006-06-21T08:37:00.000-04:00

Photograph by : Canadian Press/John Cotter

Seriously, every time they talk about Operation Mountain Thrust on the radio, all I hear is "mount and thrust." I'm not fully opposed to a Canadian presence in Afganistan and hopefully our involvement as part of the 11,000 US, British, Canadian and Afghan troops taking part in the offensive will help stabilize the country and weaken the Taliban's grip and so forth.

However, c'mon guys a little subltly in the nameing please. Can I name the next mission? How about "Operation Kill all Taliban"? or, even better, "Operation Bend 'em Over a Barell." Perhaps all the good code names have been taken but you can do better than this.

The Ninja and Net Neutrality

2006-06-19T12:28:00.000-04:00

As an "information professional" (whatever that means) I figured I'd better figure out where I stand on Network Neutrality. I am here to tell you I'm a for it.

What is this thing I speak of, you ask? Well, it seems that the big baddies that control telecommunications figure that it is in their best interests to block or slow down access to certain sites or enhance access to their own. Naturally this in not in the average consumer's best interest. Surprise, surprise. By breaking down net neutrality they can charge certain content providers premiums to ensure that the telecom people provide premium access at top speed to one site while blocking or greatly slowing down access to another (ie. Yahoo could pay to have the ISP favour them over Google).

Want it broken down? Listen to the Ninja:

A slightly more serious but very informative explanation is provided by Public Knowledge.

Does this sound like conspiracy theory at work? Well, my friends, it has already happened in Canada. Two examples (from Save the Internet's FAQ, but quoted widely):

- In 2005, Canada's telephone giant Telus blocked customers from visiting a Web site sympathetic to the Telecommunications Workers Union during a labor dispute.
- Shaw, a big Canadian cable TV company, is charging an extra $10 a month to subscribers in order to "enhance" competing Internet telephone services.

And from the e-law guru, Michael Geist:

Most recently, customers of Rogers, Canada's largest cable ISP, have speculated that the company has begun to block access to peer-to-peer services such as BitTorrent as well as the downloading of podcasts from services such as iTunes.

The thing that makes the internet a grand place is that you have equal access to my crackpot ravings, to megacorporations, to activism sites, and to feelgood fuzzy stuff. This issue doesn't seem to have Canadians in an uproar (yet) and there has a recommendation made by the Telecom Review Panel that urges for the upholding of net neutrality (see Mark Evans and Mark Goldberg on the report) but this is far from binding and even a touch wishy-washy. However, in the US, things are heating up and there is a campaign to Save the Internet in the face Congress' planned revision of the Telecommunication Act that basically could fulfill all the hopes and wishes of AT&T et al and screw the people. To my American readers (do I have any American readers? Do I have any readers?) do what the ninja tells you - sign the petition, call your representatives, become a giant pain in their ass and let them know that you like your internet as it is. For the Canuks - hold tight and we'll see where things go.
rgsc
(with my thanks to the Mockers for really bringing this issue to my attention)

Last week I was given a Nobel Prize

2006-06-13T16:57:00.000-04:00

But it was Bertrand Russell's and I had to give it back. Now, it is not everyday that one sees, let alone is given, a Nobel Prize so you may ask yourself how such a thing came about. Well, Bertrand (he and I are on a first name basis) was given the prize for literature - not peace, for which he would have been equally suitable - in 1950 (you can hear and read his Nobel Lecture should you be so inclined). The Bertrand Russell Archives came to McMaster University in 1968 after they shelled out a big chunk o' change for it so he could fund his peace work and so they could look like a bunch of fancypants academics instead of being looked upon as colonial dullards (as was the custom at the time).

I was at "Mc" (the school is commonly referred to as "Mac" but there ain't no "a" so I am starting a one-man re-nick-naming campaign) for a conference, fittingly enough dealing with philosophy, and went on a tour of the archives. The archives houses treasures including the archives of numerous Canadian and international writers and publishers, musicians, businesses, labour groups, religious groups, and a slew of archives from long haired hippy pinko types, as well as a ton of rare books and other groovy stuff (hey look! Finding Aids!). Add to this the more-or-less complete archives and library of one Nobel-winning philosopher (they actually have stuff from three Nobel laureates) and I was suffering from an acute case of archival envy as my archives, while extremely interesting and important yadda-yadda-yadda just can't hold a candle to theirs.

The group was taken around by the head archivist - a very entertaining fellow - and we eventually ended up in the storage area of the Russell Archives. He brings out the Nobel Prize which consists of the medal (see above, actual size) and an illuminated manuscript, both in cases. He fumbled a bit with them for a while and I stuck out my hand offering to help him out, thinking he would hand me the manuscript case while he showed the group the medal. Instead, after looking at my name tag and a quick security check, he hands me the medal. Then, after showing the gathered throng the manuscript he take the case from me, pops the medal out and plunks it in my hand saying something like "Heavy, ain't it?" but much more eloquent, I'm sure. I don't remember...i was kinda dazzled...and nervous. As it is rather large and 22 karat gold, it was heavy. And rather cool. And I figure it will be the only time I will every be given an Nobel Prize, even if only for a few seconds. Although I won't say no if the Committee should like to consider me...just sayin'.

***

While I've been going on at length about my rather unimportant non-awarding of a major prize, my mom actually was given a major recognition and deserves a mention . She was awarded the Loyalist College Hugh P. O’Neil Outstanding Alumni Award. Here is an extract from the press release:

The Hugh P. O’Neil Outstanding Alumni Award recognizes a Loyalist graduate who has made an exceptional contribution to his or her community through professional and community leadership, or through volunteer service. This year’s recipient was Vicki Bateman, a 1972 graduate of the Information Systems program. From 2002 until 2005, Vicki served on the College Board of Governors and as a director on the Loyalist College Foundation Board. She has been an active member of the Alumni Association, serving on the executive since 1995, and as President for five years. She has had a successful career in the information technology sector as a Systems Analyst, Project Leader, Training Consultant and teacher. Vicki has served as a director of the East Central Ontario Training Board and of Quinte United Immigrant Services and is a long-time canvasser for both the Canadian Cancer Society and the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Ontario. She is the secretary and a fundraiser for the River Valley Community Centre in her home community and serves as secretary of a sub-committee for the Stirling-Rawdon 150th Anniversary.

You give a helluva lot to that school and I am glad to see you get recognized for it. Congratulations - we're proud of you.

My After-School Snack

2006-05-30T18:21:00.000-04:00

Ah, good ol' handi-snacks - can you even remember the last time you had one? Of course, this one isn't the classic version with the little red stick to spread the cheez-whizzy goodness, but it was still pretty tasty. It harkens back to a simpler times. Sure they are a bit juvenile, not to mention a bit ghetto, but they remain a classic, not to mention handy, snack.

It's Census Day

2006-05-16T08:39:00.000-04:00

It is census day where, theoretically every Canadian will fill out a form and let the government know who and where they are. The governments use these statistics for all kinds of reasons including making decisions about the allocation of resources.

Typically, after 92 years, the census records are released in their entirety and, as many of you saw with my post on the recently released 1911 census records, they are extremely fascinating and are highly useful for genealogists and other researchers. This year, however, for the first time, there is an "opt in" necessary for the release after 92 years. This means that if you check no for question 8 or leave it blank your information will be used only for primary, governmental purposes and not released to genealogists or others in 2098. You may ask - so what? why is this important? For anyone who has tried to find anything about their family history, or about demographics, or done any historical research they know the value of having census data available. If you opt out your decendents will not be able to find you and neither will anyone else. As far as they are concerned you will not have existed. So do genealogists (and archivists) of the future a favour and check yes.
rgsc

Random archival thought of the day

2006-05-09T13:47:00.000-04:00

I was flipping through the Carr McLean catalogue today and ran across this:

It is their new product, a Human Remain's Box, (only $39.95, get yours today!).

My first thought was:

"I could totally use one of these."

Have i ever told you the story about the bones I found here? I found some bones...

There is some weird stuff in my archives.

rgsc

On this day...

2006-05-08T16:24:00.000-04:00

May 8th has witnessed some illustrious events over history. Some notable events include:
1886 - Pharmacist Dr. John Styth Pemberton invents a carbonated beverage that would later be named "Coca-Cola".
1914 - Paramount Pictures is formed.
1933 - Mohandas Gandhi begins a 21-day fast in protest of British oppression in India.
1945 - World War II: VE Day. German forces agree to an unconditional surrender.
1974 - The Canadian Government of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau is defeated in the House of Commons.

And there are a number of notable births, including:
1828 - Jean Henri Dunant, Swiss founder of the Red Cross, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
1884 - Harry S. Truman, President of the United States
1911 - Robert Johnson, American singer and guitarist
1926 - Sir David Attenborough, British television presenter and producer
1926 - Don Rickles, American comedian
1937 - Thomas Pynchon, American novelist
1976 - Martha Wainwright, Canadian musician and songwriter

And now we shall add to the list the birth of Kieran Carter, my nephew. Born May 8, 2006 in Cleveland, Ohio.

I'm looking forward to meeting the little fellow (is 6 pounds 12oz little for a baby? big? i haven't a clue. He is, at this moment, smaller than me so I'll go with little) and am very glad to hear that mother & baby (and father, too, I assume) are doing well.

rgsc

Images of Vimy Ridge

2006-05-06T21:46:00.000-04:00

Peter MacCallum, Allegorical Figure Representing "Peace" Atop the West Pylon of the Allward Monument, 2005. silver print

The annual Contact Toronto Photography Festival runs throughout the month of May in more than 175 galleries all over the city featuring the work of over 500 photographers. As a part of this festival, the Peak Gallery is featuring a series of images produced by Peter MacCallum of the Vimy Ridge Monument. The monument, which commemorates the 11,285 Canadian soldiers who died in World War I whose remains were never found, was designed by Toronto sculptor Walter Allward and was completed in 1936. It is now what MacCallum calls "the object of a significant engagement in the perpetual war against time and forgetting," as it undergoes significant restoration and reinforcement in preparation of the 90th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge on April 9th, 2007. Based on what I have seen online, these photographs offer a unique vision of Vimy Ridge as it undergoes restoration as they successfully convey the power and majesty of the monument as well as the beauty of the site.

Peter MacCallum, Sheep at Pasture on the Preserved Battlefield, 2005. Image Size: 14" X 14" silver print

"The shell pocked battlefield is still off limits to visitors because of unexploded munitions lying below its surface. But as one of my photos shows, sheep are allowed to graze in the shell holes. (No sheep has ever been lost in an explosion). In addition to the practical function they perform as efficient grass mowers, the sheep have an obvious symbolic role. The Commonwealth infantry soldiers of the Great War, who wore standard issue sheepskin coats, were at times characterized collectively as trusting sheep, and their officers as protective or incompetent shepherds" - Peter MacCallum

For more stunning images of Vimy Ridge be sure to visit the exhibition David Milne Watercolours: Painting towards the Light at the AGO (until May 21)

David B. Milne, "The Twins" Crater, Vimy Ridge, 28 June 1919, watercolour over graphite on wove paper, 35.3 x 50.6 cm, National Gallery of Canada. Image from CyberMuse.

Clavicles & Cleveland

2006-05-01T13:59:00.000-04:00

Illustration by Nicolas Henri Jacob from Marc Jean Bourgery's Traité complet de l'anatomie de l'homme (1831-1854). From Anatomia 1522-1867: Anatomical Plates from the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library.

The strangest things will set a roadtrip in motion. Unless it is one of those aimless 'let's get in a car and go' sort of things, there is usually a reason to go somewhere. This weekend we went on a very spur of the moment trip down to Cleveland. The reason: my brother taking a rather poorly timed fall off his mountain bike, breaking his collar bone in what I can only assume were a number of pieces, since it involved some surgery, a metal plate and all the kings horses and all the kings men to put him back together again.

Since he was going to be incapacitated for a bit, what with the pain and the inability to lift stuff and all, and since his wife is about 8.75 months pregnant, we went with my mom to help out where we could.

All in all it was a pretty good trip. We were quite lucky with having great weather and little to no traffic so it was a pretty nice drive both ways. We worked in the yard (I got my first sunburn of the year: either i am building an early base or I am gonna be in trouble this year. This is why i spend most of my time inside, hiding from the sun), cooked about a months worth (give or take) of freezer-ready meals and did some shopping. Not a terrible way to spend a few days.

While it was not the weekend I had planned - well, perhaps "planned" is a bit of a stretch since I had sitting on my couch playing video games as a "planned" activity - it was nice to get down to Cleveland to see my brother even if we didn't venture too far from the house and despite the less-than-wonderful reason for the trip. Anyway, Rob, hope you take it easy for the next little while and get well soon.

In other news - Happy International Worker's Day.

rgsc

Two weeklong competitions that won't exactly determine the fate of the world

2006-04-18T19:34:00.000-04:00

But that doesn't mean they can't be entertaining, right?

This week there are two competitions that unfolding. One is rather highbrow and literary, the other is, er... not so much.

Let's start with the literary: for the fifth year in a row the Ceeb is airing Canada Reads. For anyone who is unfamiliar with the format, it is pretty simple: five Canadians each choose a book that they think the entire country should read. Over five days they debate the merits of their picks and each day the panellists vote off a book until they get a winner. Simple enough. There are always some very interesting arguments and even though I haven't read any of the books on this year's list I am still curious to see how it all unfolds. I watched it religiously last year and really got into it. This year is shaping up to be just as good. Today, Scott Thompson's pick was the first to get the boot after John K Samson broke a tie. Very dramatic indeed. My pick for the winner is Joseph Boyden's Three Day Road.

The other competition is more mindless entertainment than anything else, at least I hope it will be entertaining, but I am still intrigued. I can imagine a television exec thinking out loud: "Dancing with the Stars was pretty successful. We increased the chances of personal injury by having them doing pairs figure skating...what next?" I'll tell you what's next - Celebrity Cooking Showdown, that's what's next. What other show offers the possibilities of a b-list celeb getting scalded and potentially losing a finger or two? I missed the first episode yesterday but am gonna watch it right now... Alan Thicke is hosting and P-Diddy is a producer. It is undoubtedly going to be a trainwreck.
rgsc

Mystère Extraordinaire!

2006-04-10T13:20:00.001-04:00

This friday we gathered together to see who murdered our good friend Roland Stone. It was a group of shifty characters the likes of which have never been seen before. There were lies, there was money loaned and money stolen, there were questions of inheritance and questions of linneage, and there were wigs.

Thanks to Natasha & Matt for hosting, thanks to Mark (the coldblooded killer that his is) for organizing, and Happy Birthday to Danielle who is the reason we got together.

The Suspects!

The Killers!

The Wigs!

Intrepid : an adjective, a car

2006-04-03T17:21:00.000-04:00

in·trep·id: adj : invulnerable to fear or intimidation; a means of transportation that allows me to avoid taking the bus to work.

I realized today that I hadn't posted about the most significant thing to happen to me recently - I got a car! I am now the proud owner of a 1996 Chrysler Intrepid, which you can admire above. Stunning, isn't it? Thanks to the generosity of my mum, who got a car from my nan, who got a new car, I got this automobile and now I am no longer at the mercy of Kingston Transit. It's a bit of a beast and the A/C doesn't work, but it does have a tapedeck (Rawk!) and it is all mine. What more can i ask for?
rgsc

A belated blogger birthday

2006-04-01T11:02:00.000-05:00

Can you believe it? I has been a year, (hmm. now over a year. I thought my first post was on March 31st but was actually on the 9th...oh well) since I started this little repository of ramblings. It all started innocently enough - so I could post a comment on mark's blog - and since then has experience fits and starts of posting, letting you know what I've been up to, random things I've come across, and what has irritated me. You know, standard blog stuff. Even though my blogging attentions have been directed elsewhere as of late, it certainly has been an interesting experience and one that I plan to keep up for a while longer. It has been fun to look back on my past posts today and remember what i've been up to for the last 12 months. Hopefully you've enjoyed reading what i've been up to as well.
rgsc

Even creepier than Jeff from "Today's Special"

2006-03-24T14:11:00.000-05:00

I have this mannequin in my archives. It was donated for a planned nursing alumnae gallery and was greatly appreciated because these things apparently cost a great big chunk of change. I never saw it out of the box and I have the distinct feeling that no one else did either. I put it together today for the first time and this is what I got.

First, the legs were in a rather jaunty pose, but i figured that this was in a store so was to be expected. Then I get the torso on, no problem. Next come the arms. Wait a second, I say to myself, this is just not right. As you see the arms and hands are in a rather odd position. And this is the only position they will go in (ok, i can turn the hands around in the other direction but it is no better).

What on earth would a store use this mannequin for? The attention is on the hands - would it be to sell watches? Is it supposed to be leaning against something? It looks like she is about to get hit in the face and is shielding herself with her hands.

How the hell am I supposed to use this thing? I think, and perhaps you will agree, that it would look a touch out of place with a nurses uniform on or, worse yet, a nun's habit (that is my next step - figuring out how to get a habit on this thing. more pics may follow). The only thing i thought was maybe we could get another mannequin and have this one doing CPR on it - you know pushing down on the other one's chest with its hands but that would mean its feet would have to be hung from the ceiling or something. Plainly, this won't due.

Now it is staring at me from across my office. I think I may have to turn it around or disassemble it or something 'cause it is kinda creepy.

Do you remember Today's Special? I loved that show.

r

My sushi has a first name...

2006-03-10T18:04:00.000-05:00

[photo credit]

If I were a piece of sushi, I would be known as "Slim Tempuraluralura," pretty rockstar, methinks. Are you jealous? Do you wish you had a rockn'roll sushi name? You can get your very own at Yamroll.com, [no direct link so go to "stuff" then "name generator", via]. This is the site for what seems to be a new(? new to me?) CBC show called The Very Good Adventures of Yam Roll in Happy Kingdom - after you get your sushi name check out the "short" for a brief introduction to Yam Roll, "a chop-socky superhero sushi [note: one of his super powers is to type fast - awesome!] who braves monsters, speeding cars, and maurauding network executives, all in the name of unrequited love." Click here for a preview. Check it out, leave me a note with your sushi name.
さようなら
Slim (細い)

A post. not necessarily a good one...

2006-03-07T20:53:00.000-05:00

My first post in 18 days and this one isn't even an Out of the Archives original. Instead I am emulating (coughrippingoffcough), Goose of Veritas Lux Mea...again. But this time it is something funny rather than sobering. Very funny? And who don't like funny. Check out Married to the Sea for a daily dose of amended old-tyme illustrations. My personal favourite:
"Photographs Suck" Married to the Sea, Feb 21, 2006.
That's it. Maybe i will have a real post sometime soon. Then again maybe not.

Olympics? Meh.

2006-02-17T12:53:00.000-05:00

Although I am not much of a sports fan I typically watch at least a bit of the Olympics. This year, however, I have really had no inclination to watch it at all. I am rather tired of hearing about the Canadian Hockey Teams destorying everyone and I found the few bits of mens figure skating I watched really boring. Canada is currently ranked 5th in the overall standings which is cool, but I am just not digging it. I do dig skeleton-er Jeff Pain's helmet (seen above, as of this moment in second place after the first run behind fellow canuck Duff Gibson, final run to take place in 10 minutes or so), which is pretty damn awesome. I think the angry beaver should be part of the Canadian olympic wardrobe. As a sort of 'screw you' to Roots, if nothing else. Despite all this I still do like the idea of the Olympics and I would like to see Canada do well, even if it is out of some naive sense of national pride. I just don't care to watch the events myself. However, I have become interested in curling recently, for some reason...
rgsc

Steichen's 'Pond-Moonlight' sells for $2.9 Million

2006-02-16T10:07:00.000-05:00

[photo and facts from the BBC]

A new auction record was set for the sale of a photograph on Tuesday when Edward Steichen's The Pond - Moonlight was sold for a whopping $2.9 Million USD at Sothebys. The photograph was taken in Long Island, New York, in 1904 and was one of the first experiments in colour photography in American (the autochrome process used was developed in France in 1903). It is only one of three prints in existence.

That's it. I've been rather neglecting this blog so I thougth I would share a purdy picture.
rgsc

"And In This Corner..." : a small poll about two big cats

2006-02-08T16:07:00.000-05:00

Roger-Dodger

Tons o' Fun

Yeah, I've got nuthin' so here are some photos

2006-02-07T13:20:00.000-05:00

Fun with a straight razor

2006-02-01T00:29:00.000-05:00

I've been talking about liking the idea of shaving with a straight-razor (but being somewhat terrified) for a while. Mark and I had a conversation about this and so did Ian and I. Ian, being the generous (and possibly sadistic) soul that he is, bought be a straight-razor for Christmas. I got my courage together and tried it out for the first last night. While it wasn't as bad as this, this, or even this (couldn't find the right image for the last one, but if you've seen the film you know what I am going for, I would be lying if I told you i didn't make something of a bloody mess of it - literally. However, if you disregard all the nicks, the shave was amazing. I wasn't really prepared to shave with it. In order not to bleed to death the next time I try it out I need to get a) proper brush, b) proper shaving cream, c) aftershave, and perhaps most importantly I need to read how to do it. Gonna keep trying though. Any hints or tips would be appreciated.
rgsc

A weekend - stuff I saw, stuff I learned

2006-01-30T17:27:00.000-05:00

I saw:
Two bands, (thanks CFRC - hey it's their funding drive, go donate) both pretty spiffy - The Remains of Brian Borcherdt (very, very good) & Wax Mannequin (very odd, but good, too).

(Brian Borcherdt)

I learned:
Ritual lasts well into the evening, which can lessen the enjoyment of seeing bands at Clark. Something I will keep in mind the next time a band is playing Clark on friday.

(Wax Mannequin)

I saw:
LLAMA!!!!!

I learned:
Rabbits can be vicious.

I saw:
The Big Apple

photo by

I learned:
They are far from everywhere

I saw:
PUPPY!!!!!!!!!!!

I learned:
Poker+Champagne+Wine+Beer=An empty wallet

Thanks to James, Jen, & Arwen for an entertaining and informative weekend.
rgsc

Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,/ Great chieftain o the puddin'-race!

2006-01-25T10:20:00.000-05:00

For this and more Burns images checkout the National Gallery of Scotland.

Today is Rabbie Burns Day, celebrating Scotland's Bard, the lover of mice, whisky, winter, and, of course, haggis (hey! he even wrote about me and my victories! although it doesn't look like he was too fond of me). The traditional way to celebrate is to hold a Burns Supper. I had the great fortune of attending such an event when I lived in Glasgow and it was an fun experience even though I wasn't sure what was going on or being said most of the time (I will see if I can find and post photos from that later).

The Burns Supper, which dates back to 1796, has a particular format and the menu consists of the following: Cock-a-leekie soup, Haggis warm reeking, rich wi' Champit Tatties, Bashed Neeps, Tyspy Laird (sherry trifle), A Tassie o' Coffee. Toasts and speaches are made, poems are read (even if not understood), and the evening ends with Auld Lang Syne.

To celebrate you can prepare your very own haggis or, if you are running short of entrails, here is a veggie friendly recipe:

100g/4oz onion, peeled & finely chopped
15ml/1tbsp sunflower oil
50g/2oz carrots, very finely chopped
35g/11/2 oz mushrooms, finely chopped
50g/2oz red lentils
600ml/1pint vegetable stock
25g/1oz mashed, tinned red kidney beans
35g/11/2 oz ground peanuts
25g/1oz ground hazelnuts
30ml/2tbsp shoyu ( soy sauce)
15ml/1tbsp lemon juice
7.5ml/11/2tsp dried thyme
5ml/1tsp dried rosemary
generous pinch cayenne pepper
7.5ml/11/2 tsp mixed spice
200g/8oz fine oatmeal
Freshly ground black pepper

1. Pre-heat the oven to 190°C, 375°F or Gas Mark 5

2. Sauté the onion in the oil for 5 minutes, then add the carrot and mushrooms and cook for a further 5 minutes.

3. Now add the lentils and three quarters of the stock.

4. Blend the mashed red kidney beans in the remaining stock, add these to the pan with the nuts, shoyu, lemon juice and seasonings.
Cook everything, well mixed together, for a further 10 to 15 minutes.

5. Then add the oatmeal, reduce the heat and simmer gently for 15 to 20 minutes, adding a little extra liquid if necessary.

6. Turn the mixture into a lightly oiled 1lb loaf tin and bake for 30 minutes.

7. Serve with mashed neeps and tatties.

So have yourself a dram of single-malt and have a Happy Burns day.

rgsc

Debate and 'Death Country'

2006-01-15T08:51:00.000-05:00

photo from the Queen's Journal taken during Tuesday's debate

Friday night was a busy one here in Kingston - filled with political hopefuls debating the merits of terminator seeds and banjo-filled songs about cat-fighting raccoons. These two events were mutually exclusive but both were entertaining.

The evening started off by attending the standing-room only All-candidates meeting on Canadian sovereignty, the environment, and a sustainable Kingston co-hosted by the Society of Conservation Biology, the Council of Canadians, and Save Our Seeds. It was quite an interesting debate - much more exciting than the last English leaders debate which was boringboringboring - and it was nice to see our future leaders going toe-to-toe over these extremely important issues. While I won't give a blow by blow, I will say that Eric Walton of the Green Party came off extremely well: he was well spoken, knew his stuff, and seemed confident. Rob Hutchinson of the NDP also made a favourable impression with his strong statements based on both his party's platform and personal experience. However, he didn't seem to be as strong of a speaker and he went well over time on numerous occasion. It is admitted that these guys had the cards stacked in their favour given the topic of the debate - primarily dealing with the environment however there were opportunities for the other candidates to score points. Lou Grimshaw of the Conservatives has his moments, but by and large the applause was more polite than heartfelt (I really wished someone would have asked him about the posting of political signs on public property - which all the other parties agreed not to do, based on a suggestions by the Greens and which Tories were the only ones to ignore. Had I the chance I would have asked it "Mr Grimshaw, is it because you a) hate the environment, b) are an egomaniac who loves to see his name everywhere, or c) are you just a dick?" 'cause as far as I can see those are the only three possibilities. I hope they come knocking at my door). Liberal Peter Milliken, the honourable MP and Speaker of the House looked smug and schlumpy. He was the only one to get booed and heckled by the audience. He certainly didn't win too many points with this crowd by suggesting that terminator technology is fine and dandy since farmers have a choice whether or not to use it (yeah...just ask Percy Schmeiser about that one). Even the outta left field Don Rogers of the Canadian Action Party - who made some good arguments even if is overall platform is completely crackers - scored higher on the applause-o-meter than Milliken. If nothing else Rogers certainly added some spice to the debate. Overall it was a good debate. There was some evasion but little outright spin and the candidates were snarky enough to be amusing but not so much that they were off-putting. Feeling like we were good, politically engaged citizens, it was off to the Grad Club to rock-out a bit.

The first live musical experience of 2006 was a good one: seeing Windsor "Death Country" superstars Eliott Brood in an intimate environment before they get huge after playing SXSW in Austin. The only thing that could make this better? Getting in free due my being able to answer a question about Ferris Beuller's Day Off on a radio contest. So thanks for the ticket, Tuan fill in (Eric?, I forget who it was). The show started off with the superb Geoff Berner. Never before have I seen such a nervous looking guy grab a crowd's attention, with an accordion no less, singing songs about the failure of the Maginot Line ("Stupid! Stupid!”) and losing poker to Corb Lund. With an extremely strong voice, engaging storytelling, and audience participation, Berner had everyone's attention through his rather odd set. I would highly recommend checking him out live should you get the chance. Headliners Elliot Brood did not disappoint. They played a long set showcasing material off their latest album as well as playing covers of Neil Young, the White Stripes and others. Their songs give you a feeling there is nothing outside whisky, cigarettes and murder for these guys. The gravelly voice of lead singer Mark Sasso was perpetually straining as he belted out the gritty lyrics. The show was very up tempo and had the crowd dancing (well, if you could call it that - one particularly memorable "dancer" resembled a guineafowl on benzedrine more than anything else) and the band was in highspirits and were very accommodating (ie playing a request for a couple who had to leave to catch the last ferry to Amherst Island). Elliot Brood's brand of indie/punk-influenced country may not be for everyone (although their song "The Bridge" did very well on CBC's National Playlist) but they certainly had no trouble winning over the Grad club with their energy and sincerity. Elliot Brood photo from
rgsc

Happy Tim Hortons Day!

2006-01-12T09:10:00.000-05:00

Ok, it isn't really Tim Horton day, but maybe it should be. Today is the birthday of hockey guy and donut purveyor Miles Gilbert "Tim" Horton. To celebrate go get yourself a double-double.
photo from

photo from

Sure they're sparkly but...

2006-01-11T12:51:00.000-05:00

This came to my attention when perusing the resurrected Veritas Lux Mea. While this article it isn't new, I think makes quite an interesting read (I would, wouldn't I.) Photo from

Ten Reasons Why You Should Never Accept a Diamond Ring from Anyone, Under Any Circumstances, Even If They Really Want to Give You One

(I've just posted the highlights - see the article for explanations of each point and sources)

1. You've Been Psychologically Conditioned To Want a Diamond
2. Diamonds are Priced Well Above Their Value
3. Diamonds Have No Resale or Investment Value
4. Diamond Miners are Disproportionately Exposed to HIV/AIDS
5. Open-Pit Diamond Mines Pose Environmental Threats
6. Diamond Mine-Owners Violate Indigenous People's Rights
7. Slave Laborers Cut and Polish Diamonds
8. Conflict Diamonds Fund Civil Wars in Africa
9. Diamond Wars are Fought Using Child Warriors
10. Small Arms Trade is Intimately Related to Diamond Smuggling

" Many of the prisoner-laborers who work Sierra Leone's open-pit mines end up in shallow graves, executed for suspected theft, for lack of production, or simply for sport. (© Jean-Claude Coutausse/ CONTACT Press Images)" from Amnesty International
rgsc

Decemberists in Toronto (revisited)

2006-01-07T23:55:00.000-05:00

photo from kstashuk

A wannabe coolkid and a pseudo-hipster (a "yupster" no doubt) over at B(oot)log has posted mp3s of the Decemberists' Toronto show from October 2005. So...yay. Go get 'em.
rgsc

Out of the Archives and into The Archive

2006-01-06T09:38:00.000-05:00

Some of my fellow archivists and I occasionally talk about the (mis)use of the term "Archives". Often it is bandied about rather cavalierly, making us a bit irritated. However, in this case I'm not too worried about it. While not a correct use of the term, The Archive sounds like a pretty cool place - even without containing historical records. I particularly like the part of their mandate: to "provide a comfortable environment for people to meet and exchange ideas." This is certainly something archives in general should strive for. And who's to argue with gourmet coffee and baked goods (not in the reading room, please) and free screenings on Tuesdays. Next time I'm in New York I definitely will hop on the L train to Brooklyn to check this place out.
rgsc

Yarrr Hargh! We're Number One!

2006-01-05T19:10:00.000-05:00

According to a post on SoulShine, an OECD study from 2004 shows that Canadians are, per capita, the world's biggest downloaders of illegal files (here is the study, see p. 75). According to the article, for every one legal download there are 14 illegal ones. This information, naturally, makes the record companies very unhappy. They want to toughen up Canadian copyright law (see my post on Bill C-60, which died on the order paper when the election was called, here) and, in order to see that the law is changed to their liking, they (along with other vested parties, such as videogame manufacturers, book publishers, and film execs) are courting the possible future Minister of Heritage, Liberal MP Sarmite Bulte, by throwing her a $250/plate fundraiser at the Drake, which has been called worrying and inapropriate (and I am inclined to agree). While all sorts of groups throw money at political parties and candidates, Michael Geist makes the very interesting point that, as far as he can see, the Copyright lobby is only supporting this one candidate. As I said before, changes and reforms to Canadian copyright laws do need to be made. However, this doesn't mean that the companies should get all they want and that average Canadians get screwed. Somehow I don't think Canada will follow France's lead to allow free sharing of music and movies on the internet (the French probably will not see the amendment proposing this become law, either, unfortunately, as it can be reintroduced into Parliament and still has to pass through the Senate) but it would be nice to see the interests of the people and not just the executives being served. I have more to say on the issue of copyright - particularly on the levy charged on blank media - and on what some of these statistics about downloading might mean, but that will have to wait for another day as I spent ages figuring out how to PhotoShop my pirate picture...I think the maple leaf is a nice touch and those are some pretty badass headphones, eh?
rgsc

Holiday Roundup, or 'Where the hell have you been'

2006-01-03T17:17:00.000-05:00

Hello and Happy New Years dear reader(s). I know I have been pretty slack with updating lately. What can I say, the holidays have kept me busy. Well, to be honest, busy might be an overstatement; occupied is probably more accurate. To sum it up, the last couple of weeks have been taken up in pursuit of (at least) two of the seven deadly sins: Sloth and Gluttony (illustrated by the wonderful Gustave Doré courtesy of the University of Texas at Austin), as well as Yuletide cheer. Can’t forget the cheer…or the yule. It was actually a fairly unexciting holiday, but that suited me just fine. It started off on the Thursday before Christmas. I took a vacation day and spent it wrapping, cleaning so the pet sitters didn’t think we were a bunch of degenerate slobs, and sitting around (Sloth). It was then off to Caledon East for a good ol’ Pallister Christmas, complete with great drinks and wonderful eats aplenty (Gluttony). There I witnessed and experienced the wonders of a deep-fried turkey – honestly the best damn turkey I’ve ever had – and we managed to avoid burning down the house, the nearby cars, or setting ourselves aflame. Yay us. Among the wonderful presents that were unwrapped on Christmas morn’ was (I kid you not, this thing was tailor-made for me) a "Hot Rod Red" Nintendo DS courtesy of Laura (unfortunately I lost the decals so I can’t trick it out, but it is still cool, nonetheless). So, thanks to that I have spent much of my time since then burning up the track of MarioKartDS (Sloth). On the 25th we headed down Bellevegas way for more food and beverage with the family (Gluttony). It was back to Kingston and a very snuggly kitty on the 27th. I went into work on the 28th but my brain was still on vacation and I didn’t do too much (pretty Slothy). New Year’s Eve was pretty quiet but we did end up doing stuff. Everyone’s favourite engineer, Ian, came up and we headed to a pretty great townie hangout for pool and beer and then to The Toucan (my favourite place to go to in Kingston, I’ve decided) for more drinks, food, cards, more beverages, video golf, and to ring in the New Year (Gluttony). We planned to stay in, but when we went to the pub for breakfast on New Year’s Eve morning we say that they had half-price food and no cover (avarice?) so we decided to go. And it was pretty empty until about midnight, which suited me just fine, although I imagine the wait staff wasn’t too thrilled. Even though they tried to poison us with the world’s worst "champagne" (I am using that term generously in this case) I appreciated them giving us a little New Year’s tipple along with noisemakers and tiaras. It was a nice touch, even though it was horrendous. The last few days of the holidays were spent doing pretty much sfa beyond watching dvds and eating stocking candy (slothgluttonygluttonysloth). That’s about it. Not too thrilling but good. Hope everyone had a great holiday. I was going to do a year-end roundup but I decided against it as I was feeling a little like a

image from

rgsc

An Evening with Stars (and snow)

2005-12-19T12:46:00.000-05:00

On Thursday we braved what was being called the worst snow storm since 1976 (although we didn't get as much snow as they predicted there was still a crazy amount of it) to go see Stars. It took 5 hours on the 401 but we made it. In fact we timed it pretty much perfectly so that we got to Lee's Palace and had just enough time to get a drink and some swag before Stars took the stage. Others have reviewed the show much more quickly than me (and probably better, too boot) so I won't go into great detail but I will simply say that it was an extremely good show. The band sounded great playing a rather up-tempo set, Torq was in great form (very energetic, very happy to be playing in Toronto), Amy was sultry, the wintery/holiday-y set dressing very apropos, the addition of a saxamaphone lent an extra dimension to the sound, and the four song encore ending with Fairytale of New York was fan-damn-tastic. I thought I would have a recording of this show but I ran into some technical difficulties (ie I am technically a moron who can't properly operate simple electronic devices most of the time) so if you came here looking for that I am sorry. Trust me, no one is more dissapointed that me that all I got was one (rather crappy) photo from the show and a blank tape. At any rate, it was completely worth the trip to see them. Thanks again to Mr & Mrs Sparkly for the tickets and the hospitality. 'Twas another fun-filled TO weekend.
rgsc

Stars cover 'Fairytale of New York'

2005-12-12T15:01:00.000-05:00

Today I am trying something different. For a while now I have been avidly reading various MP3 blogs and I thought I would give posting some music a try (via an external host - so click on the links and scroll down. I am open to suggestions if anyone can recommend a better host than RapidShare). While this blog isn't going become a strictly music blog, from time to time I plan on posting some of the bootlegs of shows that I have made. We'll see how it goes.

Anyway, thanks to the ticket-acquiring skills of Mark, we shall be going to see the first of the six (!!!) shows that Stars is putting on at Lee's Palace (it looks like there still might be tickets for the sunday afternoon show for those that don't have them yet, the rest are soldout). To get everyone in the mood I have two songs to share. These ones, obviously, aren't my bootlegs, but I did rip them my very own self.

Since it is the season, here is one of my all-time favourite Christmas songs, covered wonderfully by one of my favourite bands.

Stars - BBC6- Fairytale_of_New_York.mp3

[UPDATE: Here is Your Ex-Lover is Dead(mp3) , the other song Stars performed on the Coe session. I uploaded it for someone on LiveJournal so I thought I might as well put it up here as well.
ANOTHER UPDATE, here is a video of Stars performing "Fairytale of New York" in Toronto on December 17th. With thanks, again, to the eagle eyes of For the 'Records']

The song is taken from the BBC6's Giddeon Coe Session (9 December 2005), with my thanks to OptimusCrime and For the 'Records' for pointing me in the right direction.

The second track is from FabChannel, which has streaming video of bands that play the Paradiso in Amsterdam. You will notice the date of the concert was August 29th of this year- one day before I arrived there this summer. Had I known about it earlier I would have arrived a couple of days before my conference. Much to my chagrin my tickets couldn't be changed. Anyway, you can watch the awesome video and listen to the this track - the first of their encore (I seriously considered traveling to Bologna to see them open for HotHotHeat but figured it would be a little ridiculous to spend $1000 to see them and then have to get back to Amsterdam for my return flight. Would've been supercool, though).

Stars -Paradiso - The_First_Five_Times.mp3.

So enjoy these two songs. I will post pics and possibly more from Thursday's show next week.
rgsc

The Rose City or "The Worst Place in Canada"

2005-12-06T19:20:00.000-05:00

I made my first trip to Windsor last week, which coincided with Stephen Colbert stating that Windsor is "the worst place in Canada. Just...just God-awful. I don't even have time to go into it, but if you've been there, you know." While I perhaps didn't get the full Windsor experience, from what I saw it didn't seem much crappier than Trenton or Brantford so, you know, maybe Colbert should take a tour of the other many crapholes in our lovely nation before making such a definitive statement. But I am getting sidetracked. Ok, so I went to Windsor to interview a 96 year-old nun and to check out the archival doings there. It was a quick trip but a good one. In addition to getting to see the archives there and do the oral history thing, I got to hang out a bit with everyone’s favourite Windsorite, Christine. She took me our and showed me a bit of what the city had to offer. If I were to judge Windsor on what I saw I would come to the conclusion that it was quite a happening place - this belief, however, is undercut by the fact that pretty much everyone I met told me that it wasn't a typical night. Nevertheless, Christine showed me a pretty great time out on the town. First up was bar called The Avalon Front to see an exhibit of local photographers called "Fotografika." There was quite a diverse array of images on display around the bar varying from portraits and landscapes and still-lifes, documentary, 'art' photos, colour and b&w, traditional and digital. A typical mix bag that you might expect from a group show. Most were good, some were excellent. Of particular note were a series of large b&w photos of people in front of their houses, a series of images by Christine's friend Chris which had intense colour and a unique mounting, and a time-lapse video that was projected on a screen of urban views. For the opening there was a dj and a pretty good little local band called Theory of Everything. If that wasn't cool enough, we then skipped over to the Phog Lounge for the opening night of their second annual T-Shirt Art Show. This, my friends, is an awesome idea. Essentially the bar had people submit one-of-a-kind or limited run t-shirts with designs that were silk-screened, embroidered, handpainted, etc. They stay up for the month and are auctioned off to the highest bidder (with some that you could buy 'off the rack' for a set price). There were some very cool, and some very odd, shirts and the bar itself was excellent with a good vibe, good beer, and board games galore (a very intense game of Connect Four was happening behind me at one point). A good time was had. Thanks to Christine for showing me her hometown and introducing me to all her ubercool, artsy friends. I look forward to getting back down there soon.
rgsc

Sarah Harmer at Sydenham St. United Church "So...Yay!"

2005-11-26T10:25:00.000-05:00

Last night the lovely Sarah Harmer graced the stage in the Sydenham Street United Church in Kingston (she jokingly said that she wanted to be quoted saying "So...yay!" about her return to Kingston...so that's what I did there). It was quite an amazing space and she performed a wonderful, and very long, blue-grass inflected set to a sold-out audience. This show was part of a little mini-tour in support of her latest CD I'm a Mountain which, like Songs for Clem, has more of a "traditional" feel than her two solo albums. However, where Songs for Clem was a disk of standards, I'm a Mountain features new songs, a few older Sarah Harmer songs that were recorded for the first time, a couple of Weeping Tile songs, two covers of her friend's songs (Luther Wright/Chris Brown and Kate Fenner), along with a Dolly Parton cover. Good stuff. The show pretty much played out like the disk: songs from the new album, covers, and selected songs from her solo albums. She was accompanied by her "Acoustic Band" who brought out guitars, upright bass, piano, organ, the mandolin, the banjo, and the violin to great effect. She was personable and humourous (especially when she misread the set list or after she realized that said she wrote songs that she didn't) and her voice was, as usual, fantastic - clear, powerful (so much so that she sang the final song "How Deep in the Valley" without the aid of the microphone), and suited to all types of music. Last night she showed that she could take a turn at pretty much any style and it would sound wonderful and authentic, whether she sang pop/rock, bluegrass, country, or jazz. Another great Kingston show.
rgsc.

Fencing with style if not skill

2005-11-25T12:53:00.000-05:00

Much to my joy, my fancy new fencing mask (seen below) arrived in Kingston on Wednesday. I ordered this stylin' FIE range mask from Leon Paul USA partly because I dug the free shipping. Hey! It's free! With the Canadian dollar being pretty strong, the mask, I figured, would be a fair bit cheaper than a similar quality mask purchased in Canada. As it turned out I saved only a bit, if anything at all, because I didn't figure in the duty charges and the $5 service charge levied by Customs (on top of taxes) but that is ok. What caused me much grief, however, was the fact that it took forever to get to me. When it was sent out from London I was told it would take two to four days. Excellent! I would have it in time for the RMC tournament. It didn't. It wasn't here for the Brock tournament the following week. It got to Toronto in two days but then it sat there. And sat there. And sat. All while I watched through the handy-dandy tracking service provided. If I couldn't actually see it just stalled in Toronto I probably wouldn't have been so irritated. I contacted the courier company and they said they would look into it. I contacted the Leon Paul guy, who was very nice and a quite apologetic (even though it wasn't his fault at all). I dunno if it got held up at customs or got lost in the shuffle or what the deal was but it took just shy of a month for me to get it in my hot little hands. But it is here and that is all that matters to me now. No longer will I have to use my first mask (seen on the top) which (a) has had a flaw in one section of the mesh which caused it to fail the safety test from day one, a point I was initially ignorant of until it was too late to do anything about it; (b) has started to rust in several places; and (c) has required duct tape from where the rubber bit around the front part of the mask is coming up and most recently from where a hit on the bib part took a chunk out of it. I doubt that the new mask will make me a better fencer, but it will protect me from getting a sword in my left eye and it will make me look better out there on the piste. And hey, fencing is, if nothing else, a style sport.
rgsc

...And now for something(s) completely different

2005-11-23T18:02:00.000-05:00

I have been sorta neglecting this thing. I would like to say that there have been a whole lot of exciting things going on but that would just not be true. Since nothing is going on here at the moment I thought I would just throw out a few random things.

-I am really digging CBC1's The National Playlist. For those of you who don't know about this, they have a list of 10 songs. Listeners vote throughout the week for their favourite of playlist, the bottom four get dropped. Each week there is a three person panel who, along with the host Jian Ghomeshi, each pitch two songs - one that has been released within the past year and a "desert island pick" which can be any song they think is great and relevant and stuff (with the one caveat that the song must have national distribution in Canada). On friday the panelists vote for which of the four new songs get added to the list. The songs have been a mix of contemporary and classic, popular and critically acclaimed. The pitches have been strongly and passionately made and have made me take a second look at some songs that I would not have thought about or haven't thought about in a while. I'm not a huge fan of all the songs that have been pitched or placed on the list but it has made for interesting listening nonetheless. So check it out 11:30am weekdays and the countdown on Saturday at 9pm and vote for your favs.

-It is getting to the end of the year and that means it is time for year-end best-of lists. The bloggers of the world have had their say and the best bands of 2005 both North and South of the border have been presented: Information Leafblower gives the world the Top 40 bands in the US and I (Heart) Music has the 33 Hottest Bands in Canada. Some surprises, some stuff I'd never heard of, plenty of great stuff. Many of the entries on the lists have links where you can download or stream songs.
Update: Here is the list of The UK's Hottest 47 Acts from Take Your Medicine.

-I am ashamed to say that I have never been able to make a paper airplane. Just never got the hang of it. Now, however, I may stand a chance as three engineering students from Leed's University have come up with the world's most perfect paper airplane. Go get some of that aerodynamic goodness.

-Gary Glitter, the former rockstar and constant perv (this is not libel - he was found guilty of possessing child pornography in Britain), has been arrested in Viet Nam and may face the firing squad for "obscene acts with a child". Now this would not normally be something I would post about except for this. On the excellent blog, Stereogum, there was a post on GG, which has a comment from a fellow in Scotland called (tiny)Judas. And this guy wrote the following:

"If you go to a little place called Kingston, Ontario and spend enough time hauling your ass to and from the train station which, because its canada (the home of pointless distances) is barely even in the city you can eventually get yourself a ca[b] being driven by Gary Glitter's cousin, who will tell all about his cousin and the 'difficulties' he's having in the far east. As far as i remember he didn't mention paying the price of sandwich to roger some vietnamese pre-teen... i guess i didn't tip well enough."

Weeee-eird. I don't take too many cabs so I don't think I have had the pleasure of being driven around by this guy but I guess it goes to show you that you never know who you are going to run around here.

-Ok, and lastly, Optimuscrime gets a cookie for the best illustration I have seen in a long time.

That's it. That's all I got. Hope you enjoyed this randomy-randomness.
rgsc

Rocktober (part two)

2005-11-15T08:03:00.000-05:00

Alright, here it the round up of my October rocking, and rock we did. On October 19 the megasuperstar Canuck collective Broken Social Scene opened their international tour where? That's right folks, Kingston. They chose to play Grant Hall as a sort of dress rehearsal but as far as I could tell there were very few kinks to work out. But before I get ahead of myself and start gushing uncontrollably at the awesomeness of it all let me talk about the opener New Buffalo. New Buffalo is Sally Seltmann out of Melbourne (we tried to figure out where she was from but couldn't pin it down - I figured she was European from her sound, shows you what I know). She played by herself and while her sound was good she suffered from the fact that she was alone - initially accompanied by a little pink gizmo she set to play the back-up rhythm which looked suspiciously like an iPod from where I was standing but which, I am sure, something fancier. She alternated between the not-quite-an-iPod (but might as well have been) along with playing the occasional bit of keyboard and accompanying herself on guitar. With her rather dreamy songs (no Whitey Houston that's for sure) she really didn't get the full respect/attention of the crowd despite having a really interesting set and a Feist-like vibe. And this crowd liked Feist, I'll tell you what. But again, I am getting ahead of myself. So check out New Buffalo (you can stream her album on her website) and hopefully with the exposure she gets with touring with BSS she will get more attention paid to her. Broken Social Scene, when they finally came on (come on guys, what was the freakin' hold up? You know from mentioning it during your set that Queen's students are partial to burning shit, don't give them an excuse. Oh, and it was awesome that you said that it wasn't cool to burn someone’s car. good on you), they did not disappoint me in the least. I have read some bloggers who were not so impressed by the show, much of it due to the sound, which makes me very glad to have stood 5 people away from the stage just off to the right of the speakers. They played a solid hour and a half set with tunes from their new album (which is superb) and their (even more superb) back catalogue. Jason Tait (Weakerthans) and Julie Penner (FemBots) were there along with six (seven? eight?) BSS guys and gal. And Feist came out to sing. And the crowd when bananas. And for the encore Sarah Harmer came out and I went bananas - she was made an honourary member of the group for the song "Backyards" and then was given the stage to sing her song about the Niagara Escarpment. They were really tight musically, had a good on-stage presence (except for the new singer, Lisa Lobsinger who really needed to loosen up and you know, maybe enjoy herself or something), talking and joking with the audience and Kevin Drew even hopped into the audience to hug them. The music was dense, anthemic, wonderful. Aside from some knobs in the audience (no, I don't need a running commentary or to hear you think that it "sucks" when they tell us that the version of Major Label Debut they played was the slow version, which, by the way, was far from sucky. Please, please, shut up. dicks) and rather low vocals (which is almost to be expected as it is their preferred sound even on their albums) it was an absolutely great show. It was very different from the first time I saw them - outdoor, huge festival during they day vs. an intimate gothic church-like space during the night - and I am so happy to have had the chance to get to see them up close. (The BSS pic was taken from the Queen's Journal).

The next show was back at the gradclub on October 27th for the Hidden Camera's, supported by the Lesbians on Ecstasy. I wasn't a huge fan of LOE - a bit too much crazy synth filled vocals for my liking - but they got the crowd going like you wouldn't believe and that is something to commend them for. Their music was quite heavy but still danceable and people seemed to dig it quite a bit. The Hidden Cameras, however, I did like quite a bit, and if there was one reason why I didn't enjoy them fully is because I am not all that familiar with them. I mostly went because Christine-y Weeney highly recommended their live show and I dug the few songs that I heard. While their were no male go-go dancers and the band didn't perform in blindfolds as they are wont to do from what i understand, they did cram seven people on the stage plus had a cellist and a viola player sitting off to the side (more volume on the strings next time, please), played a great big set of dancey pop tunes, and really got the crowd going. There was banjo, there was xylophone, there was co-ordinated dancing. And, from what I saw, the soldout crowd was digging it. (The Hidden Cameras pic was taken from Optimus Crime - you can see a tiny bit of me on the right by the wall).

So that was the last show that I saw in October, but since I am on the topic of shows I have seen I might as well give a rundown of the two concerts I have seen so far in November. First, on November 3rd, was controller.controller, which I was really looking forward to. There were two openers. The first was a band called Sylvie out of Regina (check out their very attractive flash site where you can preview their songs). They were quite good, alternating between shoe-gazer space rock and more driving bits, except that they got screwed by the sound guy (was he not in the room?) and you couldn't hear the vocals at all. Nevertheless, they sounded really good and looked like they were having a good time - especially the drummer dude who looked like there was no where else in the world he would rather have been. Magneta Lane were up next. The sound issues got sorted out and their was no missing the powerful vocals of lead singer Lexi Valentine. Considering how many people I have seen on the gradclub stage as of late this trio looked pretty sparse up their in comparison but the sound was big: big vocals, big guitar, big hair on the drummer who pounded out crazy-big beats. Seriously, she reminded me of Cousin It, except with two drumstick wielding arms sticking out of the hair and pounding furiously. It was pretty awesome. In rather stark contrast, however, was the bassist French (as far as I can see she only has one name) who looked rather bored. As a whole the band was exceptionally tight and played a really good set. Up next was controller.controller, who I saw back in July and which was a great show in every which-way. This, in comparison, can only be described a great show despite all odds (as will be described in a moment) capped off with one of the strangest moments in my live-music seeing history. As the band came onstage and turned on their signature red footlights, Nirmala took up the mic and positively croaked out that she had laryngitis but would do her best. To my surprise they played a pretty full, if slightly truncated, set. The band sounded fantastic, they played all their great songs off their EP and new full-length album and, all things considered, Nirmala sounded pretty good even if her voice broke on occasion. She has some help from the audience and Magneta Lane's Lexi came out and sang on one track but all in all she gave it pretty much everything she had and I for one have the highest respect for that. Once the set was done the drummer/keyboardist Jeff Scheven stayed onstage and played atmospheric electronic stuff. Strangely, i thought given the state of Nirmala's voice, the crowd wanted an encore. Nirmala came out, sat on the stage, thanked everyone. She asked if people wanted to dance, we said yes, and she thought she could work something out. As she was talking to Scheven, the guitarist Scott Kaija (I think he came out first, it was a while ago now and he may have come out second, doesn't matter) came out. He was followed quickly by bassist Ronnie Morris. They exchanged some rather unfriendly words that I couldn't quite make out, then Morris knocked over a mic stand and then one pushed the other and they were into the crowd and then went offstage into the gradclub kitchen where someone standing near the door said they were fighting. Nirmala looked rather shocked, as we all were, said something to the effect that there would be no encore and had the sound guy put on a cd. Apparently it was just some personal issues that have been worked out but still it was pretty dramatic. And weird. And Oasis-like. I can only assume that it is one of the by-products of a stressful tour.

Coming off two really packed, dance oriented shows, the second November show (gradclub again) was a whole different thing. On November 8th the always wonderful Jill Barber graced the stage. While I wanted to see the show, particularly to check out the opening act the Blue Raincoats, it was a pretty exhausting weekend, I was feeling a bit broke, and I had seen Jill with Josh Ritter on the same stage a few months before so I was going to pass on it...until my musical saviour Tuan of CFRC kindly provided my with two free passes. So we went. Things got under way right on time, which is never expected, so we missed the first few songs of the Blue Raincoats. They played a pretty good set, although I thought they sounded better on their album. I won't hold it against them as one of the band members was missing due to jaw surgery. They kicked it up at the end with a Nancy Sinatra cover and just as they seemed to come alive they were off. After a short break Jill took the stage. We had great seats at a table right up front of stage right which made for quite an intimate and mellow show. She sounded great, introduced us to her new guitar "Tennessee Rose", and previewed a number of new songs which were very good. As with the last time I saw her, Jill was quite chatty. She told anecdotes and shed some light on the stories behind her songs. She catered to the audience, which was quite good for a Tuesday night, playing a few more songs than she intended including a couple of requests. At the end she had the crowd join in on the chorus on a cover of the old country song "The Tennessee Waltz". As ever, she seemed right at home on the gradclub stage which, she informed us, is the first place she ever performed live, and she sounded wonderful. I am glad we ended up going.

So that's it. There are a few shows coming up in the next little while but October/early November will be hard to top in terms of the number of first-class shows that I was able to take in, in such a short span of time. 'Tis really one of the best reasons to be in Kingston - it may be small (which can be good thing in itself) but there is a lot going on.
rgsc

The Who's-Its take on the World

2005-11-07T10:22:00.000-05:00

On Saturday the Royal Military College held their 36th annual Team Fencing Tournament. I fenced with a mixed team (ie no club affiliation) that consisted of Ian, the always entertaining Ryan, and little ol' me. In order to confuse as many people as possible we called ourselves the Who's-Its. It was an excellent day with some good fencing and good fun. We finished a respectable 7th or 8th (I haven't seen the final results) out of 38 teams, the highest result I have seen in a while. I am looking forward to reconstituting the team in January for the Carleton Team Tournament where, hopefully, we will finally beat the Ottawa team (or avoid them altogether) and go for a medal.

Photo by (oh, and the "Photo by" photo is by, and that photo is by me, so I guess we now have our bases covered)
rgsc

Rocktober (part one)

2005-11-01T20:32:00.000-05:00

October has been an exceptionally good month for music in Kingston with one foray out to Toronto. So much so that October shall henceforth be known as Rocktober (TM OptimusCrime).
So here it is: 5 shows in 4 weeks...blogged all well after the fact.

It all started simply enough with Matthew Barber's CD release party on October 6th at the Grad Club. The opener, who's name I can't remember and which Barber himself didn't seem to know, was kinda uninspiring (see below regarding the Four for Fall show regarding how every opening band should be), just one rather nervous guy with a guitar. The rather large group of rather chatty and rather obnoxious people standing beside/behind us meant that we really didn't get to hear the guy. This is, in my opinion really really rude and it makes me mad. If you don't want to pay attention, fine. The Grad Club has 64 rooms, surely one of them would be much more suited to gabbing. This brings me to my eternal rock-show question: why on earth would you pay cover just so you could not pay attention? It is a concert. Watch, listen, dance if you feel like it. But please don't talk through the whole damn thing (even the main act? what are you people paying for?) while some kid is playing his guts out. Go to Stages. Just. Shut. Up. Ok, that's it for the rant. Matthew Barber came on and played a very good set of straight up rock and roll. The new songs sounded very good - especially "Love/Death" that his sister Jill previewed during her last visit to that very same stage (although, i must admit I liked her take on it better) and he played the best songs from his Story of My Life EP. Speaking of which - go out right now and buy that album. His new one is pretty good (with members of Stars and Metric as well as Jill Barber and his band the Union Dues backing him up, and while I was not in love with it at first it is growing on me. He sounded better on stage than on disc) this one is absolutely amazing. The crowd was a bit strange that night, rather sedate for such a rocking show, but it was definitely a good start to this musical month.

The next show, on the 13th, saw me heading to Toronto after work for the Decemberists show at the Phoenix. I have only started listening to this band recently but when I first heard they were coming to Toronto I raised the idea of going to the show with Mark (click here for his take on the concert). After discussing it for what seems like ages we finally decided it would be a good thing to do so we got tickets. By the time I got into town, up to Mark's, and down to the Phoenix we missed all of the opener's set. It was Cass McCombs and he/they sounded pretty good but I must admit we really weren't paying too close attention. The Decemberists were very good throughout but absolutely great at the end. I expected them to be a little more zany than they initially were but even through the first part of their set they interacted with the audience a bit, made fun of each other, and played extremely tight. The last few songs - the last of the main set "The Mariner's Revenge Song" and the last song of the encore "Chimbley Sweep" - were some of the best live music I have ever seen and were themselves worth the price of admission. Lots of fun audience participation - in the MRS they had us scream like we've been swallowed by a whale at the right part of the song and Chimbley Sweep was transformed from the short album version (just shy of 3 minutes) to a raucous, spiraling epic that included band members switching instruments, a random audience member getting on stage to "play" (I use that term very very loosely in this case) a guitar, and, to end it off the entire audience was made to sit down and become very quiet before they erupted into the chorus for the last time instantly making several hundred people jump to their feet. "Twas awesome. All in all the show was very good musically and was great fun.

On October 18th I was back in the Grad Club for one of the strangest line-ups I have ever seen. It was the Four for Fall show put on by Exclaim! magazine and featured, as you might expect four bands. While I found out later that there were some connections between the bands there was quite a stark divide in the styles. Essentially the middle two acts, the FemBots and Luke Ducet, are country or alt.country groups and the first and last acts, Whitey Houston and Shout Out Out Out Out are loud, manic, mental outfits that would have been quite a surprise to folks just looking to hear some slide guitar. But let's take them one by one. First up was Whitey Houston. This band is made up of two guys, one on drums and a singer/bassist. In this respect and somewhat for their sound the immediate comparison is to Death From Above 1979. These guys, who only referred themselves as the String Cheese and Ham duo (so I wasn't entirely which of the four they were as I was only familiar with the FemBots going into the show), played like every opening band should - they absolutely kicked ass. There was no ignoring them. You couldn't talk over them. You had to be blown away by them. I thought they were great, playing loud, driving, noisy, raw rock. The real unfortunate part about it was that it was just me, two other people, and three guys from the other bands watching. Up next were the FemBots who were exceptionally different but very good. They have been described as alt.country or "death country." The two permanent members of the band were accompanied by The Weakerthans’ Jason Tait on drums and Julie Penner on violin (both of whom popped up at the BSS show the next night) and by guys on bass and on the vibraphone. The vibraphone, to me a big xylophone, was awesome and the guy used a bow on the key-thingys as well as bashing them creating a really great sound. Up next was the headliner, Luke Doucet . Again in the county vein, and it might even be appropriate to drop the "alt" prefix. Also, a very solid set. I can't say too much more as I was wholly unfamiliar with him before going in but he played some excellent guitar (apparently he has played with Sarahs Harmer and McLaughlin) and it is safe to say he is worth checking out. The fourth band took quite a while to set up and the already small crowd thinned considerably by the time they were ready to take the stage. All in all I counted 6 band members....and 9 audience members. However, it was Kingston's loss that they missed Shout Out^4 as they were absolutely unbelievable. (photo by) I hadn't a clue what to expect. The lead singer/knob-fiddler Nik Kozub was part of Luke Doucet's former band Veal and he played a song with Doucet at the end of that set. The Whitey Houston guys were onstage as well as a number of others. There were two drum sets, four bass guitars, many keyboards, synths, and other devices that emitted awesome sounds. They bill themselves as a dance band (because I know essentially nothing of the genre my immediate point of comparison would be Daft Punk) but they rocked out seriously. Everyone on stage gave it their all and put on quite a show, despite most of the remaining audience was not terribly interested in dancing at first. By the end of it we all were up grooving. I really enjoyed their set and I really respect the fact that they played their guts out despite the fact that there was essentially no one there and after, so we were informed, their tour van broke down earlier in the day.

Since this post is already huge I will end it there but stay tuned for the recap of the rest of the month's rocking which will be done....sometime.
rgsc

Reconstituting Florentine Archives Online

2005-10-26T00:50:00.000-04:00

Italian archives have not had it easy over the last 600 or so years. Those that managed to survive into the 20th Century despite the frequent wars and other calamities that effected the peninsula were subject to the ravages of the Second World War (many library and archives were severely damaged or lost in Allied and German bombing; for a rather harrowing evaluation of lost libraries and archives of the 20th Century see the UNESCO report Lost Memory, part of the Memory of the World programme). The trials for the archives of Florence that survived to the mid-20th century, however, the were not over. On November 4, 1966, the Arno River flooded, unleashing upwards of six metres of muddy water into the streets of the city. The art galleries, libraries, churches and archives of the city were all affected, with many objects submerged in the sludge and heavily damaged. This includes the archives of the Cathedral (the Cathedral Square seen above, image from the exhibit Thirty Years After the Flood), which saw upwards of 6000 volumes dating back to the 13th century covered in mud and many were rendered illegible. However, an international effort was undertaken and a great deal was salvaged thanks to the efforts of the "Mud Angels" (see the exhibit image galleries for some remarkable photos). Apparently stuff is still in freezers waiting for conservation treatment almost 40 years on. Using new scanning technologies some of these once unreadable documents are now being made visible again. The Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore, the administrative body that is responsible for the Cathedral, with a Getty grant and the assistance of the Max-Planck-Institut in Berlin and the University of Cologne, has undertaken the mammoth Years of the Cupola Project which, since 1994, have been painstakingly scanning, transcribing and analyzing the 20000 documents that cover the years of the construction of the Cathedral’s dome, 1417-1436. So far about 6000 documents are indexed and available in both Italian and English and they have just begun putting up digital facsimiles of the originals. Essentially, they are reconstituting the archive digitally. This project is not only making the archival materials accessible to a geographically dispersed audience, which is not terribly new or revolutionary but still a great thing to do, but they are also making documents usable that have not been able to be read for 40 years. This archival material will be of immense interest to historians of art, architecture, science and material culture, as well as ecclesiastical historians and others. As for me, I think it is supercool and I hope to see the techniques and lessons applied to other archival collections that have suffered damage (thinking perhaps of some of the stuff in Mississippi and Louisiana after the recent flooding or affected by last year's tsunami or countless other documents that have been subject to extreme water damage).

Here is a natural light image of a page (a detail, see here for the full page)

And here it is under low-intensity lighting:

rgsc

Booker & Nobel Prizes for Literature

2005-10-13T07:51:00.000-04:00

Just a quick note to updated my earlier post on the Man Booker Prize. It was awarded on Monday and the winner is.....Irish writer John Banville for The Sea. Here is the Press release.
Update - Banville's book is apparently not an easy read. The choice has been praised for not giving into populist demands but rather it is being seen as returning the prize to a work of literature as art. Others, however, state that the book is forgettable. It, apparently, is filled with dense descriptions and some arcane language. It is interesting to note that Banville takes inspiration from Harold Pinter (see below) as Pinter is an author "who has traditionally stuck up two fingers to the critics and said sales are no measure of quality." The jury was sharply divided with John Sutherland, the chair, casting the deciding vote. Banville won because it was felt that The Sea is a "high point of fictional art".

I will update this post later with more details and will add the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, which is going to be announced tommorow morning (1pm CET which is...uh...6am Eastern Standard, I think). People are thinking it might be a North American (Phillip Roth, perhaps even Margaret Atwood or Alice Munroe) but in Swedish literary circles the Syrian poet Ali Ahmad Said, known as Adonis is favoured. We shall just have to wait to see. The Prize has actually been delayed for the first time in 10 years - it is usually announced the same week as the other four big awards - and the literary rumour mill wonders if it is because of a controversial Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk, who is facing charges in his home country for publically stating that Turkey is guilty of genocide against against Armenians and Kurds. The officials deny that the delay is due to arguements over Pamuk, and punits say it might be due to the committee considering a journalist, essayist or other non-fiction writer. See The Guardian for more.
Update : Announced this morning - the Nobel was awarded to Harold Pinter, something of a surprise as he wasn't really even consisdered as being in contention for the prize this year. The press release from the Swedish Academy doesn't say much except the prize was awarded as Pinter is an author "who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression's closed rooms"." While giving the award they stated that Pinter was someone "who restored the art form of theatre." See the New York Times and the The Guardian.

That's it for now for prestigious international prizes. As for literary awards in Canada, the Governor General's Awards shortlist should be announced by the end of the month and the winner in mid-November and the Giller Prize will be awarded on November 8.
rgsc
*******************************************************
Edit (Oct. 18) Governor General's Literary Awards were announced see the Press Release for the full list. Winners announced November 16th.

Amster-Hot-Damn: Days VI-VIII

2005-10-12T17:01:00.000-04:00

It has been over a month since we have been back and I have still to finish posting about the trip. Enough is enough. Here is the last few days. I am sure I have forgotten some things but here are the highlights. Sunday morning started a bit late but since we didn't have anywhere particular to go it didn't really matter. The first order of the day was to find some brunch. We ended up for the Broodje Bert - a rather tiny place that was named after Bert of Sesame Street fame and had breakfasts named for Bert and Ernie. We had some excellent open faced sandwiches with real fresh-squeezed orange juice which was fantastic.

We then headed to the area know as Spui (which is pronounced "Spow") for the art market which happens every Sunday (seen in a photo by Laura taken during the Friday Bookmarket). The street was lined with stalls of artists selling all types of art objects of varying quality. Not too much was too my liking but it was interesting nonetheless.

We had some excellent ice cream at the Australian Homemade Ice-cream shop and then went to the Bloemenmarkt. The flower market was very impressive. It consisted of stalls covering one side of a very large block (apparently the stalls are actually floating on the canal, although we didn't notice it at the time) and had on offer more varieties of tulip bulbs than I even knew existed. They also had a wide variety of other bulbs that I really had no idea about but it was amazing. We wandered through every shop looking for the best deal on export quality bulbs and looking at the cheesy touristy crap. There was an impressive rare prints and map shop along this road which had some fantastic early maps of Canada which, unfortunately, were way out of my price range.

We wandered to the Leidsplein to go to the VVV (the tourism office) to book a tour for Monday and then went to the half-price ticket place to see if there was anything of interest to do that evening. Nothing struck our fancy so we sat down for a drink in the square to watch the street entertainers - which included a group of guys doing Capoeira and a rather old, mostly naked guy who climbed a rope and did acrobatics and balancing trick - while we planned our next move. We found a listing for a blues club close by so we went by to see what was happening on that night. It turned out to be an open-mic night (with free cover before 11) which sounded good so with our evening entertainment settled upon we went looking for food. There are quite a number of places to eat and we had a difficult time deciding on a place. Actually, we wanted to go to a Javanese place but the patio packed so we kept walking looking for someplace else. After walking around the block we ended up at the Javanese place, Bojo, again and ended up eating in the dining room, where we had some excellent Indonesian food (I forget exactly what we had [chicken, rice, other stuff?] but it was quite unusual, very good, had huge portions, and was affordable).

After dinner we headed back to the hostel for a bit before going to the Bourbon Street Jazz and Blues Club. Here, we were entertained by the owner, who was quite cheeky making fun of the patrons and inventing songs about them, who played classic blues songs and other covers (such as some Jimi Hendrix) but in a very original way. He was joined by an excellent harmonica player and a few people from the audience got up on stage and were by and large very good (except for one kid who was kinda boring). We headed back to the hostel for what we thought would be a normal night with the only interruptions being the high kids coming back from the coffee shops. That turned out not to be the case. Laura had been feeling rather punky for a few days and at the blues club felt she couldn't get comfortable. A few hours after we went to bed she woke me up as she was in quite a bit of pain and thought it might be wise to see someone about it. After a very frustrating and ultimately fruitless series of attempts to get a hold of the insurance company back in Canada we decided to just get to a doctor. The staff at the Pig were excellent - outlining the options of the (very very expensive) doctor and the nearest hospital. Upon their advice we hopped in a taxi and got to experience the Dutch Health System firsthand. Things were very quiet at the OLVG (apparently voted the best hospital in the Netherlands) which was great as Laura was seen pretty much immediately. The doctor confirmed what Laura thought - a kidney infection - and after scolding her for not coming in sooner and threatening to admit her for treatment, did some tests and then let her go with a prescription and strict instructions to come back if things got worse. After taking some antibiotics we got back into the cab and headed back to the hospital to get some sleep. We tried to sleep as long as possible, something not made easy by all the racket made by the other tenants, but when we got up about noon Laura felt much better. I nipped out early to cancel our Grand Holland Tour (thankfully refundable with only a small surcharge) so we planned another day in the city...starting, of course, with a tasty meal.

A wonderful breakfast was had at the Pannenkoekenhuis Upstairs (photo credit) which was a really really tiny place up a really really steep set of stairs. Our timing was excellent (as it would be for our dinner) and we were able to get a seat – other groups were not so luck and we people were turned away when we were there. The pancake house was essentially just a small split level room. There was a table and the kitchen in the upper part, where the stairs came out, and a dining area on the lower level where there were three tables. There were all kinds of teapots handing from the ceiling which made the already low ceilings lower but were rather funky. The place was staffed by one guy (I assume the owner) who played waiter, cook, and all-round snarky commentator. The food was outstanding. I had the special which was a crepe (well, it was a little thicker than a French crepe, but not as fluffy as North American pancakes – and it was the size of a dinner-plate) strawberry, rhubarb and crème. Laura went with the less adventurous (I think the guy called her boring) but also excellent bacon, tomato and cheese. Upon seeing my choice Laura had some Pancake envy and we decided it would be a good idea to share. And it was a good idea with the savoury and the sweet and the pancakey goodness. Fortified we headed off to see some sights.

Being Monday, a lot of the museums were closed but I seemed to recall hearing about an anatomical museum in Amsterdam. I found a listing for the Museum Vrolik, attached to the AMC (Academic Medical Centre) but the street it was on wasn’t listed on our map. We went to the tourist office and the guy there found it and it was located in the suburbs so we had to take the metro out of the city. On the way to the train station we stopped at a number of bookstores (I found some great deals at an art book store) and other shops and just took our time wandering. We ended up at the second Dutch hospital of the day – although at this one no one got poked or prodded and we didn’t score any drugs – and easily found the museum. The small museum was being renovated but it was open while exhibits were being set up and shifted around. I was hoping to see more anatomical art/history of medicine stuff and we got a whole lot of body parts & misshapen foetuses in jars. It was rather creepy at times but worth the trip just to see it and to see a bit of the non-touristy parts of Netherlands.

After we got back from the museum we hit up the supermarket near Dam Square to get some waffles and some breakfast items for our trip home (which turned out to be a great idea). For dinner we thought we would use the money we saved from the tour and treat ourselves. Not sure if we would be able to get a table we headed to the Franco-Dutch restaurant De Belhamel. As with the pancake place our timing was excellent. We managed to get a table without a reservation (albeit inside not on the canal) just before closing. The décor was utter outstanding Art Nouveau and the food was fantastic. I had a salmon and veal saltimbocca (I wasn’t sure what it would be but it turned out to be a sort of pastry roll which was extremely good - it is Italian for "jumps in the mouth") with red snapper with asparagus for starters and Laura had red pepper tomato soup with crispy bacon and herb creme fraiche to begin and then duck with mushrooms and potatoes. After the fabulous meal we made our way back to the Pig, hung out in the Happy Room for a bit, and got ready for our insanely early flight the next day.

We got up early and were at the train station at 4am to get the train to the airport. Although we thought we left in a good amount of time a slight hold up at the ticket machine meant that we got to watch the train pull out of the station while we cursed. Thankfully we had plenty of time to get to the airport (more than we even realized at the time) so we waited the forty minutes at the station wishing we were still asleep. We got to the airport eventually, checked in, bought an outrageously-priced coffee and had some excellent salami and cheese sandwiches from the stuff we bought the day before. We proceeded to the gate to find out our flight was delayed due to fog in Amsterdam. The plane actually had to land in Frankfurt to refuel and wait for the fog to burn off. We read and dozed while waiting. It kinda sucked but we had our sandwiches and really nothing else to do except get home in time for work the following day. We had a rather uneventful flight once the plane made it to Amsterdam, got to watch a few movies (Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Fever Pitch, which was alright, Ocean’s Twelve, which I slept through).

So that’s it. A pretty long recap, I know, but it was a pretty busy trip. The conference was good, the weather great (perhaps even a little too warm – I didn’t pack enough t-shirts ‘cause everyone told me it would be 20degrees), the city was certainly interesting and I got to see a lot of cool stuff. I don’t think I would rush back to Amsterdam, although I would like to see other parts of the Netherlands, but I am very glad that I got to go.
rgsc.

...And knowing is half the battle

2005-10-07T08:47:00.000-04:00

Access to information is essential for democracy. Without being able to fully understand the actions of the government, citizens cannot participate in government in a meaningful way. September 28 was the third annual International Right to Know Day - a day for advocacy for Freedom of Information. In honour of this occassion, the Open Society Justice Initiative, part of the Open Society Institute, released their "Ten Principles on the Right to Know". I don't think many, if any, countries including Canada have FOI laws that actually would satisfy all ten principles but it certainly is something to strive for. In Canada, FOI is a matter of Provincial concern so it varies from province to province, here is Ontario's. Currently, the federal Access to Information Act is under review. In April of this year a discussion paper was issued by Irwin Cotler, the Minister of Justice/Attorny General of Canada focusing on reforms to the Act. He writes: "By its very nature, the Access to Information Act is all about openness, transparency, accessibility to Canadians, and accountability." With the modernizations and reforms to the Act, hopefully the Canadian government will meet by the Ten Principles set out by the Open Society. Here are the Priciples:

TEN PRINCIPLES ON THE RIGHT TO KNOW

To mark the third annual International Right to Know Day, the Open Society Justice Initiative today announces the following set of 10 principles on the right of access to information developed together with partner organizations:

1. Access to information is a right of everyone.
Anyone may request information, regardless of nationality or profession. There should be no citizenship requirements and no need to justify why the information is being sought.

2. Access is the rule – secrecy is the exception!
All information held by government bodies is public in principle. Information can be withheld only for a narrow set of legitimate reasons set forth in international law and also codified in national law.

3. The right applies to all public bodies
The public has a right to receive information in the possession of any institution funded by the public and private bodies performing public functions, such as water and electricity providers.

4. Making requests should be simple, speedy, and free.
Making a request should be simple. The only requirements should be to supply a name, address and description of the information sought. Requestors should be able to file requests in writing or orally. Information should be provided immediately or within a short timeframe. The cost should not be greater than the reproduction of documents.

5. Officials have a duty to assist requestors
Public officials should assist requestors in making their requests. If a request is submitted to the wrong public body, officials should transfer the request to the appropriate body.

6. Refusals must be justified.
Governments may only withhold information from public access if disclosure would cause demonstrable harm to legitimate interests, such as national security or privacy. These exceptions must be clearly and specifically defined by law. Any refusal must clearly state the reasons for withholding the information.

7. The public interest takes precedence over secrecy.
Information must be released when the public interest outweighs any harm in releasing it. There is a strong presumption that information about threats to the environment, health, or human rights, and information revealing corruption, should be released, given the high public interest in such information.

8. Everyone has the right to appeal an adverse decision.
All requestors have the right to a prompt and effective judicial review of a public body’s refusal or failure to disclose information.

9. Public bodies should proactively publish core information.
Every public body should make readily available information about its functions and responsibilities, without need for a request. This information should be current, clear, and in plain language.

10. The right should be guaranteed by an independent body.
An independent agency, such as an ombudsperson or commissioner, should be established to review refusals, promote awareness, and advance the right to access information.

Drawn from comparative law and practice in the over 60 countries world-wide that have freedom of information laws, these principles provide a clear set of standards to guide civil society groups and legislators in their efforts to increase public access to information.

As freedom of information activists celebrate International Right to Know Day, they can take stock of several significant achievements that advanced access to information as a fundamental human right in 2005:
• The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights explicitly recognized the right of citizens to have access to government-held information.
• The Council of Europe announced in May 2005 that it will commence development of a convention on access to official documents, the first international treaty that would recognize the right to information as a human right.
• As of September, a total of 63 countries around the world had access to information laws—more than a five-fold increase from 15 years ago when only 12 countries had such laws.

The Open Society Justice Initiative has helped these international efforts by promoting the right of access to information, assisting NGOs and government agencies with the drafting and implementation of laws, monitoring government transparency, and engaging in national and international litigation to defend and promote access to information rights.

(from material posted on the Arcan-L listserve - thanks to Laura Millar for posting the OSI Principles and to Loryl McDonald for the ATIA info)
rgsc

Out of the Archives and Onto the Trolley

2005-10-05T18:48:00.000-04:00

Bishop Barker Co., Aerial view of the Kingston penitentiary - taken from an aeroplane, 1919, Canada. Patent and Copyright Office / Library and Archives Canada / PA-030472.

This year the Queen's Archives did something rather different for their annual archives lecture. Instead of having one speaker who talked to a predominantly gray-haired audience, the Archives put on a series of five Social History Tours of Kingston. This past Saturday, they rented the Confederation Trolley, filled it with quite an impressive cross-section of the community, and took to the streets to discuss the Jewish Experience of Kingston, A Prisoner's Life in Kingston, The Gay and Lesbian History of Kingston, A Black History of Kingston, and The Chinese Community of Kingston. I went on the middle three and all were excellent. The first, the Prisoner's life, was led by the curator of the Penitentiary Museum. We went into Portsmouth and were shown the buildings and sites that make up or were once a part of the Kingston Pen - the first federal penitentiary in Canada (built in 1835). Filled with historical contexts of the prisons, tales of escapes (and eventual capture), and local history it also satisfied long held curiosities about a number of buildings in the area. The next, and best of the lot, was the Gay and Lesbian History of Kingston. This tour was given by Marney McDiarmid, based on her master's thesis. Marney was fun and engaging while sharing her research on the queer history of Kingston, based on oral histories she conducted over several years. This tour took us around campus, through the downtown, across the LeSalle Causeway to RMC, to the steps of City Hall, and to City Park - once known as Pervert Park. The final tour, A Black History of Kingston, highlighted key figures in Kingston's Queen's history, dating back to 1776 when the first black settlers came to Kingston as United Empire Loyalists and the slaves of Loyalists. All three tours were interesting and informative. It was rather fun riding around Kingston on the big trolley - a tourist in my own town - and was funny to see the looks of people as we went by and I learned quite a bit about the people and sites of Kingston that I had absolutely no idea about before. The lectures will be aired on CFRC on Fridays and, eventually, they will be made into virtual tours on the Queen's Archives' website.
rgsc

Queen's Homecoming - more thoughts and images

2005-09-27T12:47:00.000-04:00

I have thought a great deal about homecoming this year since I made my last post and thought I would add a couple more things. In my original post I may have been a shade too reactionary (calling for the busting of heads in particular). Many accounts of the night describe how the antagonistic attitude of the police exacerbated the situation and led to increased tensions. In past years the police have been quite diplomatic and handed out more warnings than tickets and things went smoother. What we saw was this year is partly the result of a build up of town&gown tensions. Last year a police officer got hit with a bottle in the face and this year they made it clear that they were going to enforce the law. As I said, the police did seem to restrain themselves remarkably (although there are accounts of the use of force I am not in a position to comment if it deserved or not). Next year, however, things will be different as the Mayor of our lovely town has said he will call on out of town riotsquards to come in with watercannons and police dogs and the Police told CTV that they will use teargas (despite some rumours, it wasn't used this year), pepperspray and tasers.

There have been some good comments in the blogosphere about exactly how the actions of the police contributed to the escalation. Note, however, that I do not say caused it, as I maintain that this line of argument doesn't hold too much water in my mind despite what the students on CTV last night and on some blogs contend. Blame should be dolled out in big, scorched, broken-glass filled, beer-soaked gobs on those who attended (even those who were not actively involved in the destruction, as students on LiveJournal have commented) and, to a lesser extent, on the police who's efforts turned out to be woefully inadequate and perhaps even inappropriate.

Because of the popularity/infamy of the Aberdeen homecoming parties over the last few years a cycle has begun where the party's size and madness increases from year to year as word gets out about what crazy-fun it is, leading to ever increasing numbers on the streets. The way I see it things will go two ways next year if Homecoming happens at all: a) Aberdeen will be extremely quiet in response to this year's madness. People will go elsewhere or stay away from things completely. Or, the more likely scenario b) the shit disturbers (Queen's students and others, like this year, who are looking to get drunk and join a mob) will come out in droves leading to a massive stand-off police and the scenario goes downhill from there, with the very real potential for fatalities. Unfortunately I think this has gone way beyond Queen's and there really is nothing they can do aside from cancellation of Homecoming. That is pessimistic but it really does seem that the Queen's community at large condemns such events as happened on Saturday so that means those involved in the mayhem were the mental few within the Queen's community and those who came because of Aberdeen's reputation with no ties to that community.

Perhaps my favourite quote of all that I have read of this comes from Optimus Crime:

"What the slow-witted frat boys who turned Aberdeen into Mogadishu failed to realize was that their party was likely a wake -- celebrating the death of Queen's homecoming."

(See Optimus Crime for a number of other very good posts, breaking Homecoming down in quotes and commentary.)

Only time will tell what will happen with homecoming. I really do hope the even can continue, just without the mayhem. What remains to be seen is if the Queen's administration thinks that this is realistic and worth the risk of finding out.

Images from KateLemon on the
Queen's LiveJournal page and also see this thread for some excellent discussion.
More on Dragondare's LJpage.
See the Queen's Journal here and here.
Two very good blog entries can me found on Living in a Society and also on the media; and on Adam's Rants.
For different takes, see David Zarnett, who while providing a very thoughtful analysis gives the hooligans too much credit. See also Life Of Dread (make some interesting points, although I don't really agree with most of what he says).
rgsc

Proud to be a "Harvard of the North" Alum

2005-09-26T12:20:00.000-04:00

Ahhh, Homecoming. Nothing like celebrating your alma mater by participating in a "drunken street brawl", including hurling racial slurs and bottles at police officers, fire fighters, and ambulance attendants. As in the past (but only the past 4 years, apparently), this year's saturday night Homecoming Celebrations included a two-block street party on Aberdeen St. This time, however, things degenerated into mayhem. Let's take a quick look at some numbers:

*Number of people attending the Aberdeen Street Party: 5000-7000
*Number of Police on hand: 100
*Cost of policing this event: $60,000 (not including police time that will be taken to prosecute all those charged)
*Liquor act violations: 200
*Criminal charges: 19
*Number of people who spent the night in jail: 35
*Age range of those jailed: 17 to 30
*Approximate number of non-Queen's Students present: about 1/3
*Depth of broken glass on the street: 2cm
*Number of cars flipped and set on fire: 1

According to some students interviewed on the night by the media, they blame the police presence for the increase in mayhem, that the students/partygoers were reacting to the police. I think this is a rather bull-shit filled argument. Due to the nature of the location, they did not break out the riot gear and fire hose as there is a very real risk of trampling as there is no where for the crowd to disperse to. As much as a few heads deserved to be busted (not all by any means, but surely a few) it would have caused wide-scale panic so the cops seemed to have kept their cool and should be congratulated for their restraint. The K-town police have a bad reputation (somewhat deserved, from all accounts) but on this occasion they did well. When they are getting physically and verbally abused - particularly when they were attempting to bring in paramedics to save passed-out drunks and bring in the fire department to put out the car on fire - and not pull out the billyclubs, they are doing alright. Imagine what could have happened if the police weren't there? Ugh. I don't want to sound like an old fogey but this is insane. Friday's issue of The Journal was filled with quote's about the the Man keeping students down and the unreasonable police presence last year and fears that they will be more unreasonable this year. One choice quote was "Police presence is bullshit..." and that the police don't have the student's interest at heart. Fucking right they don't - they have public safety at heart. I am very curious to see what tommorow's Journal has to say about all this. I would love to have the same people interviewed talked to again to see if they are singing the same tune.

It is very sad to see this occurring. One student quoted in the Journal said "Aberdeen is a tradition with a capital T," and continued "Homecoming is about school spirit and the University is trying to take away from that..." Does four years count as a tradition? If so, is this a tradition we want to continue? Really I don't see it as the University, the Police, or whomever else trying to take away from Homecoming spirit. They are trying to ensure that things go smoothly. The Aberdeen St. party has, really, nothing to do with homecoming or Queen's and really everything to do with idiocy.

Sure, many of the people were not Queen's students, yes. Many were underage, it seems, yes. But as the Queen's VP has been repeating it did occur one student's property around a student event and therefore it is upon the student's feet that blame should rest. And I agree. Criminal charges should be laid and academic sanctions for those who broke the law and the Queen's Code of Conduct. For the last few years the non-Queen's Kingston community have been extremely angry with the School for the actions of a minority of pissed-up students. This is only going to make things much, much worse.

I don't think homecoming should be cancelled because of this but I am very curious to see what other options there are. The University put on a free concert featuring some big-name bands. It was considered an utter failure as while it was sold out, only about 2000 of the 4000 ticket holders attended and it didn't prevent people from going to Aberdeen afterwards. What else can be done?

The CBC had picked up the story and is running it nationally. It also appears in the Star, on Yahoo News and who knows where else. This is really a disgusting and shameful moment. I am all for parties, drinking and other forms of self-destruction but there is absolutely no call for what went on at Aberdeen.

A proud, proud moment to be a Queen's grad.

Numbers and photographs taken from The Whig here, and see here for a chronology.
rgsc.

Amster-Hot-Damn: Day V

2005-09-25T22:21:00.000-04:00

After a bit of an interruption in service I am back and will, hopefully, fill in our last few days in Amsterdam (although it may take a while yet). When you last heard from me, the last session of I-CHORA2 had ended and we had seen "Hair" at the film museum. The fifth day was supposed to start with a field trip to the Municipal Archives of Amsterdam. That, however, did not occur as we kinda slept in and then got a smidge turned around. By the time we ended up in a position to actually get to the archives the tour was more than half over so we decided to cut our losses, head back downtown, and try to make the most of the rest of the day.

No beer lover's trip to Amsterdam would be complete without visiting the home of everyone's favourite Dutch brew, so it was off to the Heineken Experience we went. The tour was pretty interesting - detailing the history of the brewery and how beer is made etc. - if a bit cheesy. There were two rides along with the exhibits: one which you got to become a bottle and go through the bottling plant (you stand on a platform and get shaken around while a video-projection of the bottle's point-of-view gets played on the screen in front of you) and get to 'ride' on the horse-drawn Heineken delivery cart that goes around the city. At the midpoint and at the end of the tour there are bars where you can get a chance to sample the goods. I must say that it really does taste better at the source (well, close to the source as they no longer brew the beer onsite anymore). The entire Experience is quite interactive as they have places where you can answer trivia and play games as well as send emails and videomessages by email. The tour was good if kinda lame at parts but I am happy to have done it (and even happier that we got in free thanks to my boss' nephew who works for Heineken and hooked us up with free passes. Thanks!) and we got some good beer and a complementary Heineken glass for our efforts.

We headed to the Albert Cuypmarkt (photo by) to see the market and find something to eat. And eat we did. We started with one of the exceptional freshly made stroopwafels, a sandwich-type thing made with really thin waffles with caramel in the middle, and then, my curiosity getting the better of me, I tried the authentic Dutch treat - raw herring, apparently called Nieuwe Hollandse. I must say that I was pleasantly surprised. The little fish was cut up and served with onions and pickles. It did taste fishy but not overly so, and the texture was quite nice. I have no intention of running out and getting it again but I it was a worthwhile experience. Also on the menu were freshly roasted cashews and an excellent springroll. We wandered through the bustling market (unlike the photo, the street was packed) which covers three large blocks, enjoying the sights and people watching but not buying anything except some food.

We headed back uptown and I visited the Stedelijk Museum in its temporary home while the main site is renovated. The Stedelijk has one of the greatest modern & contemporary art collections in the world. The temporary site, however, focused on art dating from after 1965, which meant that what I am most interested in (ie pre-1965 modern art) was not on display. There were some interesting things on show but by and large I was disappointed. Too much space was given to an artist that I really didn't care for named Michel Majerus and the rest of the galleries showing the highlights had something of a scattered feeling. It really didn't seem worth the 9Euro admission fee - which was pretty damn steep for such a small (and in my opinion lackluster) exhibition. Ah well. I look forward to seeing the full collection in its refurbished gallery the next time I visit.

We headed back to the hostel for a bit of a rest before we went looking for dinner. Since I hadn't set foot in the Red Light District up to this point we headed there looking for something to eat. At the very edge, before seeing any of the infamous red lights was a street filled with restaurants and coffee shops. We ended up trying a Mexican restaurant called Café Pacifico which was quite good although the service was just like every other Dutch restaurant, from what I have heard and seen, as the wait staff essentially ignores you. With bellies full we headed out into the Red Light District proper. We didn't stay terribly long, just enough to walk down a few streets and get a feel of the place. I must admit is was a very very odd place. Just as you have heard there are beautiful women hanging out in windows wearing very little. They range from being bored to actively trying to get guys to step inside. Just walking through leaves you feeling rather strange and perhaps just a bit dirty. I do think the liberal attitude the Dutch have towards sex (and drugs for that matter) is refreshing and something to be applauded. All the power to them, I say. It is just not something that I as the by-product of a rather Victorian value system I was not entirely prepared for. Definitely unlike anywhere else I have ever been to.

It was an early night after emerging from the RLD into Dam Square we headed back to the hostel for a drink, a bit of television, and sleep.
******************************************
That is it for this evening. Two more days left are left to detail, but as I spent the better part of the afternoon making steak and stout pie and my typing time has seem to have vanished they will have to be done later.
rgsc.

CAG in Niag and other stuff

2005-09-23T11:53:00.000-04:00

Charles Bierstadt, S.J.Dixon, crossing Whirlpool Rapids on a 7/8 inch wire cable, Niagara Falls, Ont, 17 July 1891, Library and Archives Canada/PA-143309

I returned yesterday from the Catholic Archivists Group conference held in Niagara Falls. It was an interesting conference, the food was fantastic, the weather great. All in all a good time. I have a thing against the city of Niagara Falls - it is utterly tacky and touristy (a belief that was reinforced by a visit to the Clifton Hills area, which is chockablock with tacky crap) but I was really impressed by the Falls themselves. It has been about 15 years, I think, since I last saw them and I kinda forgot what all the fuss was about. Yes, it is just water, but it is still awe-inspiring. We went to Willowbank Home - and stunning house that was originally built in 1834 but is now in pretty rough shape. A charitable foundation has been established and a School of Restoration Arts is being designed where students will get to learn restoration skills while the house gets repaired, which is pretty damn cool. We also has a brief trip to Niagara-On-the-Lake. Got some fudge and a bit of vino. Oh and if you want my advice don't even bother going into the Niagara Bookshop. Yes they have some excellent books (but really no bargains and nothing you can't find elsewhere), but the proprietress is exceptionally rude and while I have bought things there in the past I don't think she will ever see my business again.

************************************************

Sooner or later I will finish the Amsterdam trip diary. Hopefully this weekend. So, for those of you (Mark) who are avid readers of this, one or two more days should do it.

************************************************

The National Archives...ok, the Library and Archives Canada, has an online databse/exhibit which was released last week called Framing Canada: A Photographic Memory. The thematic essays are not up yet, but the Weird and Wacky: Humour in Archival Photographs are there. (That is where I found the above photo of the guy crossing the Niagara Rapids, quite by coinidence). There is also a pretty awesome exhibit on Canadian Pulp Fiction (which made me sing "Get down, get down" in my head, as PF always does [heh. i love these bunnies. Really they deserve a post on their own, also check out the exorcist re-enactment]). Very nifty.

************************************************

Lastly, I hope all is well with the Pallisters and Levys in Texas. We are thinking about you and are closely watching the path of Hurricane Rita (I just heard on the news that they think Houston will not be in the direct path, so fingers crossed).

rgsc

Amster-Hot-Damn: Days III & IV

2005-09-17T00:52:00.000-04:00

I intended to continue the Amsterdam narrative on Wednesday (and Thursday) but I started fencing again and let's just say that I have been left with very little energy and have lost my ability to negotiate staircases. Ahhh. It's good to be back.

So, where were we? Ah yes, I-CHORA 2, which, in case you were curious (but not curious enough to follow the link), was the Second International Conference on the History of Records and Archives. The theme was "Archival Affinities: Adapting and Adopting Archival Cultures." Pretty exciting, eh?

Well, it was a mighty early start to the day but I got up and ready in the dark so as not to disturb the others in the room, had breakfast (too early for eggs, apparently, but at least I got my croissant), grabbed a cappuccino at the wonderful bakery that I visited the first day, and walked the very quiet Amsterdam Streets to the University. The first session, on the theme "Recordkeeping Legacies," was kicked off by an excellent keynote by Jeanette Bastian. She took a theoretical look at the issue of Colonial-era records/archives, setting up the case-studies presented in the papers that followed. Particularly interesting were papers on the Spanish-era records in the Philippines, on the Republic of Kiribati (a former British Colony in the Pacific), and on the Japanese policies regarding the records of the territories they conquered in the 1930s and '40s. After lunch was "Recordkeeping Crossing Frontiers," which started off with really good paper on the records created by Spanish citizens who wanted to go to the Americas. Unfortunately, as the paper drew near an end I was struggling to keep alert in the veryvery warm room so I missed bits. The rest of the session was ok, but not spectacular and more nodding off occurred. I think I got the important bits.

Following the first full day of the conference was the banquet. This was held in the The Orangery of the Hortus Botanicus (Botanical Garden). We arrived a shade early but the catering staff let us in to wander about the garden. The garden was opened in 1638 and holds approximately 2% of all the species of plant life on Earth (ca. 4000 species). They have a bunch of carnivorous plants (Venus flytraps etc.), prehistoric palm and the crazy-big Victoria Lilies (flower of which is shown at left). There were greenhouses and enclosures (including a butterfly house) as well but since the park was closed we didn't get to go in. There were lots of cool plant-type things which I really know very little about, but it was neat to walk around and look, especially considering I most likely wouldn't have come to the Gardens on my own. The drinks were free flowing and the Italian buffet-style meal was quite good. After they kicked us out a bunch of archival types went to a pub for a drink. We stayed for one and then headed back to the hostel.

Another early morning, another breakfast minus the egg, another cappuccino and another nice walk to the University as the city woke up started my fourth day in Amsterdam. This day's proceedings didn't disappoint. The Canadians were thick in the water on the programme and I knew it was going to be good. The first session, "Shaping and Reshaping Archives," started off with the wonderful Laura Millar who talked about the intersection of Native and Euro-Canadian recordkeeping in British Columbia. The two faculty members of UMan's Archival programme, Terry Cook and Tom Nesmith, also gave great papers, the former on the evolution of archival theory and practice in Canada and the latter examined an expanded notion of provenance. And a very interesting paper was given on German archivists following World War II. The final session of the conference, "Memory and Writing in Archival Cultures" started with UBC's Heather MacNeil's examination of the origins of written records as evidence of acts in England. Also in the session were two papers on the International Criminal Tribunals, one dealing with the records created in the trials dealing with Rwanda and the other in the former Yugoslavia. And with that the conference was done.

A few people went out for a quick drink afterwards but that was pretty much it. We went for dinner at a place that served really good, and cheap, Dutch food called De Keuken van 1870. Following dinner and a bit of a rest we headed to Vondelpark to the Film Museum, where they showed movies outdoors, projected onto an inflatable screen. We saw Hair, which was surprisingly good and it was really cool to see it outside, sitting on a balcony of an amazing building. And that ended another Amsterdam day.

Now 100% Certified

2005-09-15T10:52:00.000-04:00

I thought I would briefly interrupt the Amsterdam narrative to let you know that I found out this morning I passed the exam I took before I went to M&D's wedding and am now a 100%, Grade-A, Certified Archivist. Yes, I am now a member of the Academy of Certified Archivists. So, you ask, what does that mean? Well, it apparently means that I am a proficient and effective professional who demonstrates an understanding of all aspects of archival theory and practice (although, according to my test results, not so much in the professional, ethical and legal responsibilities category -- I blame it on differences in philosophy and the American-centric nature of the questions) who is committed and involved in the field. So there you are. Guess I fooled them, eh. So, you now ask, what benefit does this have. Uh...well as far as I can see there is no immediate benefit for me having the qualification. It won't allow me to advance in my current position but it can't hurt for the future, right? Plus I get to add a few more letters behind my name. Which is something...
And now back to our regular scheduled programing
rgsc
MIst, C.A.

Amster-Hot-Damn : Day II

2005-09-13T22:21:00.000-04:00

Although tired, we began our second day in Amsterdam right -- with a Piggy-provided breakfast. While we were able to gorge on bread with jam, peanut butter, and nutella, cornflakes, and an egg, we missed out on our croissants and felt mightily cheated.

Since our time in the city was limited, particularly since my conference took up two of the seven days we were there, we needed to make the most of it. That meant a hard-core schedule of two world class museums before conference registration in the afternoon.

Vincent Van Gogh, Almond Blossom, 1890 (for some reason the images from the museum don't want to come up so this one is from the Artchive)

Our first stop was the Van Gogh Museum. This huge collection, housed in a recently refurbished building, laid out the work of that tormented master from his early days as an artist through to his last. It also had quite an impressive collection of works by contemporaries/influences/followers, even if there wasn't too much of the non-Van Gogh on display. Several things struck me during my visit. First was how talented Vincent actually was. Ok, maybe it sounds a bit obvious to say "Van Gogh was a talented painter" but what struck me was his amazing skill, not only in paint-handling but also (as was brought out in the massive temporary exhibit Van Gogh Draughtsman: The Masterpieces) in his drawing ability - i never really considered him much of a draughtsman, not that I didn't think he could draw, but rather so much attention is given to the paint that I never gave it any thought. This was compounded by the fact that he was more-or-less entirely self-taught and just "decided" to become an artist after failing as a preacher. Another thing that stuck me was number of distinct styles that he adopted and used for a while before moving on to something quite different in his short artistic career (which went from 1880 to 1890). This was well brought out by the chronological arrangement of the galleries which were divided into the five stages of his development. Lastly, I was stuck by the efforts of Johanna Van Gogh, the wife of Vincent's brother Theo, to get the work of Vincent known. Theo, Vincent's stalwart supporter died six months after Vincent, and it was Johanna who went to great lengths to get their letters published.

Once we were done with Vincent (and after Laura had a little nap while waiting for me to get through the last gallery) we headed out to find some lunch before more art. We wandered a rather swanky street (Jan Luijkenstraat???) until we found an Italian deli (I didn't get the name) where we had a couple of the tastiest, most filling sandwiches to be found anywhere. Rejuvenated by our meal we headed to the Rijksmuesum.

Ok, I'll start with a disclaimer: I am not a fan of Dutch art in general. Yeah, some people dig it, but as my friend Maria and I concluded ages ago, Dutch art is all about boats, windmills, and rotting fruit. And I am not really into any of that. Ok, so maybe that is a bit of an overstatement (but not much) and I do appreciate Rembrandt and Vermeer and a handful of others, and that those still-lifes have a lot more going on than first appears with the memento mori and so forth, but by and large to me it is just meh. And that was pretty much my impression of the whole museum. Meh. Don't get me wrong. The Rijks is one of the greatest museums in the world and I am very glad to have had the opportunity to have visited it. I just don't really like the art they have on show. To be fair I know they do have stuff I like, but during their major renovations they are focusing on just the highlights. Of Dutch Art. The three Vermeers were extraordinary and the Nightwatch was duly impressive, the Deftware was interesting. As for the rest of it...well, glad to have seen it but really not gonna rush back. One artist that they showed three or four works that I do like was Pieter Jansz. Saenredam (the image to the left is his St. Bravo Church, Haarlem of 1636) so it was good to see them, (although there is a painting of the same church from 12 years later in the National Gallery of Scotland that I like much better.)

After our whirlwind tour through the Golden Age of Dutch Art it was time to head to the university to register for the Conference. That didn't take to long so we headed back to the hostel to freshen up before going to the City Councilor's Chamber at the Amsterdam City Hall for a reception to kick off the conference. We found the building no problem at all. Getting in, however, proved to be much more difficult. They marked two entrances on the tiny, crappy photocopied map they gave us and then didn't think it would be useful to put up a little sign anywhere showing us which door to go in. After wandering around for a while one of the people working on the local arrangements recognized us and showed us the way. Apparently there was a welcome and a bit of a talk, but we missed that. We did, however, make it in time for free drinks and hors d'oeuvres. We chatted with some archival types on the balcony for a little while before getting kicked out.

There were two keynote speakers scheduled following a dinner break so we didn't wander to far to find something to eat. We ended up at a restaurant called Szmulewicz. I haven't a clue how to pronounce that, but I do know the food was very good.

I don't know who thought scheduling two keynote speakers at 7:30pm after an open bar and a meal was a good idea, but if they asked my opinion I would have suggested that they do it before they gave us the booze. The speakers were alright, discussing the relationships between American and British/European archivists and historians, but I they didn't really have my full attention given that we had quite a long day, a number of bevies, and it was really warm in the lecture theatre. As you will see this became a running theme for the conference (well I didn't drink before the other sessions, but the tired/hot combination did play havoc with my attention span throughout the following days - I am quite glad that they plan to publish the conference papers in the future, but would have liked it if they would have given us the pre-prints like they did for the last one). Following a bit of discussion, I headed back to the Flying Pig where we hung out for a bit before heading to bed where I tried to get some rest for the big days of conferencing ahead.

Amster-Hot-Damn : Day I

2005-09-11T18:21:00.000-04:00

Alright Mark, here it is. A recap our our week in Amsterdam.

De Leydtze Poort [the gate to Amsterdam, Netherlands], c1690, by Isaac Commelin, Amsterdam

On August 29th, we set off for Europe - the first time since I left Glasgow four years ago. Flying AirTransat was better than I remembered (oooh, leather seats) and the flight was pretty uneventful. The worst part of the flight was that we were subjected to the absolutely terrible Monster-In-Law, but considering how aircraft seemingly were falling out of the sky at a rather alarming rate in August, I guess that is really nothing to complain about.

It was dark as we descended into Amsterdam and as we got closer to the city we could see large patches of light on the ground all over the place which was very cool. As we got closer we could see that they were greenhouses. We arrived at Schiphol Airport pretty much right on time (6am on the 30th) and after retrieving our luggage we took a train into Cenrtraal Station

From there it was a short walk to our home-away-from home, The Flying Pig Downtown. As far as hostels go, The Flying Pig was pretty good: It was pretty clean, the showers worked and had hot water and decent water pressure, breakfast was included (although you have to time it right to get your egg and croissant), there was free internet access, and it had a bar. It is, however, a hostel, so we had no privacy, were frequently woken up, and had to stumble around in the morning in the dark. But you get what you pay for and the Pig was kinda the cheapest option so it could have been much worse. We were too early to check in, so we stowed our bags in the luggage storage and went off to find something to eat. We wandered around a bit, getting a feel for the city in the wee hours before it woke up and was flooded by tourists. I passed on the McDonald's (where I saw a mouse run from the front counter to the kitchen) and opted instead for a fantastic ham and cheese filled croissant straight out of the oven of a little bakery down an alley a little way from out hostel. We hung out for a bit and soon it was time to check in.

Having essentially no sleep since 9am the previous day (it was about 3amEST) we attempted to get some shut-eye so we could make something of the day. The other people staying in our room and the hostel staff, however, had other ideas and it seemed everyone was exceptionally noisy. We got up about noon and headed out into the city. We went to the Anne Frank House. There isn't too much in the rooms - they are pretty bare and haven't been "recreated" in any way - but there were extracts from the Diary, photographs, archival documents and artifacts, and videos which talked about the Nazi invasion and the subsequent repression of the Jewish in Amsterdam and the experience of the two families who spent two years hiding in a few rooms before being betrayed. It is quite a powerful place and makes you reflect on the strength and courage of some people and the absolute inhumanity of others.

We had some fries with mayonnaise outside the Westerkerk and then headed back towards the hostel to figure out what to do that evening.

A ChattyLibrarian recommended that we check out Boom Chicago, an improv group and dinner theatre, and we figured that this might be something worth looking into. We hopped on a tram to the Leidseplein

(in the summer, obviously not when this photo was taken, there are a ton of tables outside the pubs/bars. Boom Chicago is on the far right)where we got tickets for the Best of Boom show, where they did skits from other shows mixed with improvised songs and skits based on audience suggestions a la Who's Line is it Anyway. Here's a lesson for you - one which we should have kept in mind throughout the rest of the trip: You can always find it cheaper! This goes for tacky souvenirs as well as theatre tickets. We learned this the hard way as, after paying full price for our tickets (we completely forgot to bring the 3Euro off coupon from the flyers in the hostel which also placed right at the entrance to the theatre) we had some time to kill. Just around the corner was the Half-Price ticket office where, you guessed it, we could have got the exact same tickets for half the price. At any rate the dinner was surprisingly good and the show was quite funny. While not everything worked, sometimes due to lame audience suggestions, by and large they were quite good. It was a bit edgy and at times shocking at times (a few "I can't believe they just said that" moments) and I was particularly impressed by the songs. Following the show we headed back to the Flying Pig, ending day one.

Stay tuned for Amsterdam Days 2-4, "I-CHORA and More-a." (yes, I acknowledge the lameness)

Has it really been a month?

2005-09-08T21:49:00.000-04:00

hmmm. It looks like the last time I wrote anything here was pretty near a month ago. No wonder I am feeling a shade rusty. September just sort of snuck up on me.

The wedding of Danielle and Mark in Winnipeg and was excellent - I can honestly say that it was the best wedding that I have ever been to - and I am sorry it has taken me so long to officially acknowledge it publically in blog form. Winnipeg and all its inhabitants treated me extremely well, which is turning into something of a pattern. It was great to meet the multitude of infamous Winnipegers and hang out again with assorted FISers, and play pool, baseball, bocce, frizknock and other assorted bloodsports. Oh, and have a drink or two.

And now to Amsterdam. I am going to write some proper posts along the lines of Mark's European Adventure Recap, but I didn't keep a journal of what we did or take many photos so...so I guess I will probably make stuff up and shamelessly use other peoples images, like This guy's:

Amsterdam was pretty good. The conference (the reason I decided that a late summer visit to The Netherlands would be a good thing) was pretty good -- not great, mind you, but pretty good -- and definitely worth while, and we certainly saw and did quite a bit, and had many-a great meal. I think we spent about the right amount of time in the city and I don't think that I would rush back but I am very glad I finally had the chance to get there.

More later.
rgsc

Learning to Whistle in Four Easy Steps

2005-08-12T13:30:00.000-04:00

The kind (and amusingly snarky) folks at Tiny Mixed Tapes have provided a step by step guide on how to whistle for all of you out there who haven't quite figured it out on your own (freaks). This, they assure me, will not only ensure that you won't miss the Iron&Wine/Calexico show, but will also prevent your best friend from screwing your significant other and ward off tennis ball-sized kidney stones. All in all, a handy skill to have. So, from TMT to you, via me, How to Whistle:

1. Tuck away your lips
First, your upper and lower lips must reach over to cover your teeth and be tucked into your mouth. Only the outer edges of your lips are visible, if at all.

2. Choose your finger combination
The role of fingers is to keep the lips in place over the teeth. Experiment with different thumb and index/middle-finger combinations to discover which works best for you, depending on the size of your fingers and mouth. Regardless of your choice of fingers, their placement is the same: each are placed roughly halfway between the corners and center of lips, inserted to the first knuckle. (Again, this will vary depending on the size of your fingers and mouth.)

Now that your fingers are in place, be very clear on these two matters of form:

a) Your fingernails should be angled inwards, towards the center of the tongue, and not pointed straight in and towards the back of your mouth; and b) your fingers should pull the lower lip fairly taut.

3. Draw back the tongue
Now comes the crucial part of the whistle. The tongue must be drawn back so that its front tip almost touches the bottom of the mouth a short distance behind the lower gums (about 1/2 inch/1 cm). This action also broadens and flattens the front edge of the tongue, allowing it to cover a wider portion of the lower back teeth.

The sound is produced by air flowing over a bevel, or a sharply angled edge. In this case, the sound is created by the upper teeth and tongue directing air onto the lower lip and teeth.

4. Blow
Inhale deeply, and exhale over the top side of the tongue and lower lip, and out of your mouth. Some extra downward and outward pressure by the fingers onto the lips and teeth may be helpful. Experiment with the position of the fingers, the draw of the tongue, the angle of the jaw, and the strength of your exhalation. Adjusting with these will bring success.

Start off with a fairly gentle blow. You'll produce a whistle of lower volume at first, but you'll also have more breath to practice with if you don't spend it all in the first three seconds. As you blow, adjust your fingers, tongue and jaws to find the bevel's sweet spot. This is the area of maximum efficiency, where the air is blown directly over the sharpest part of the bevel. Once you locate the sweet spot, your whistle will have a strong, clear tone, as opposed to a breathy, low-volume sound.

Listen for these sounds: as you practice, your mouth will learn to focus the air onto the bevel's sweet spot with increasing accuracy. You'll probably hear the following: a breathy, low-volume tone that suddenly, as you adjust your fingers, mouth, or jaw, will switch to a clear, full, high-volume tone. Success! You're on the right track--your task now is to reproduce the mouth and hand position that led to the better whistle.

rgsc

Booker Longlist Announced

2005-08-11T12:40:00.000-04:00

The Man Booker Prize for Fiction longlist was announced yesterday. The prize, set up in 1969, celebrates the best fiction, written in English, from the Commonwealth - ie pretty much anyone who writes in English but it not American. The list consists of 17 books, whittled down from 109, and will be further reduced to the shortlist of 6 on September 8th. The winner, who will receive 50,000 pounds, will be announced October 10th.

This year's list is quite strong featuring 4 previous winners (Ian, McEwan, Kazuo Ishiguro, JM Coetzee, and Salman Rushdie - Coetzee is the only person to have won twice and Rushdie won the "Booker of the Bookers" for the best of all novels that have won), some well known names, and a few more obscure authors. A conspicuous absence among the 17 are Canadians: there isn't a Canuck on the longlist, which I think is now two years in a row.

Currently the favourites are McEwan for "Saturday" and Ishiguro for "Never Let Me Go", but don't count out the others as the Booker often picks the wildcard or oddball of the group. Of all the books on the list, I am most interested in Zadie Smith's "On Beauty" (not released in Canada until September). I really enjoyed her first two novels - "White Teeth" and "The Autograph Man" - so I am looking forward to this one which, by its longlist endorsement, should meet the high standards of her previous work.

For brief descriptions of the 17 books and details about the prize and what the bookies are saying, see The Guardian.
rgsc

Dancing, Drugs and Deafness - 'It's All Gone Pete Tong'

2005-08-08T15:58:00.000-04:00

This weekend I was finally able to see the mock-rock-doc It's All Gone Pete Tong about the hottest DJ in Ibiza who tragically goes deaf.

We see DJ Frankie Wilde at his prime - as a god among the sun and intoxicant drenched denizens of the island, ruling the clubs, giving television interviews, gracing the cover of magazines, his albums going platinum, with all the women, scotch, and coke he could ever want. However, he starts to notice something is wrong. It begins with a buzzing. He then can barely hear anything at all. Following an absolutely awful set, he finally admits there is a problem. By this he is left with only 20% hearing in one ear, which he promptly loses. He then loses his wife, his record deal, and his marbles. After an aborted spectacular attempt to commit suicide (involving a whack of fireworks strapped to his head) following a long period of isolation, Frankie emerges where he battles his demons - the fantastic Coke Badger: a snarling, 6ft tall badger in a fairy costume complete with star-tipped wand who shovels cocaine into Frankie's face and kicks his ass when he dares suggest that their relationship should become more "casual" - the Badger is probably the best bit of the whole film.

(sorry about the pic - it was the best I could find)

He picks himself up, learns how to function in a silent world, falls in love, figures out how to mix without his hearing, and has one last spectacular set before disappearing into obscurity.

This is a highly enjoyable, even touching, film. You can't help but feel for Frankie, even though he in no way, shape or form fits the sympathetic hero role, as he struggles with the realization and implications of his deafness. With small shaky steps he overcomes whatever life throws at him, first by binging on whatever he can get his hands on, then through hard work and perseverance.

The acting is superb, the faux-documentary form (complete with talking heads) is well balanced with scenes shot in a more traditional movie-making way as you would find in a biopic, and it is visually stunning - showing the beauty of Ibiza, the energy of the clublife, and what can perhaps only be called the grotesqueness of the results of Frankie's addictions. Equally funny and dramatic this is a fantastic film

Metric - Live and Near You!

2005-08-04T23:29:00.000-04:00

Sweet Merciful Crap! Metric just announced that their new album, entitled "Live it Out" will be released Sept. 27 in Canada and that they will be touring extensively. Seriously, these guys don't screw around - they are hitting 43 cities in Canada and the US in three months. They are everywhere you want to be, including our beloved Kingston on Sept. 26 (at Stages, ack), as well as Toronto, Cleveland, Houston, Montreal, Vancouver, Winnipeg. If you live in a place that has running water and electric lighting chances are Metric will be there. Check out Pitchfork Media for the full list of dates (they have not been added to Metric's site yet) for a full list. They will be accompanied by some pretty stellar opening bands and you will be doubly blessed if your show includes The Organ or The Most Serene Republic, although I am sure all the opening acts will be great. Details about who's where will be coming soon, no doubt.

Finding Great-Grandpappy

2005-07-27T15:47:00.000-04:00

Last Thursday the Library and Archives Canada released the 1911 Census and genealogists couldn't be more pleased. In the Archives' newsletter, our great and glorious National Archivist, Ian Wilson, thanks his "colleagues at Statistics Canada for helping us provide this unique opportunity to view our past," and I can't help but think that he is saying this rather snarkily as the Chief Statistician, Ivan P. Fellegi has come out vocally against the release of the 1905 and 1911 censuses to the Archives citing privacy concerns and legal ambiguities, and refused to hand them over. Dick. The Archives had to go to the Supreme Court to get the 1905 documents that were supposed to come to them by law in 1997 and the 1911 should have been released in 2003. Anyway, with Bill S-18, becoming law on June 28, Censuses from 1911 to 2001 WILL be released after 92 years as they are supposed to.

The original paper records were microfilmed and the originals were destroyed. What a brilliant idea that was: the microfilms are often pretty crap. But from what I have seen so far are more or less legible and at least they can be accessed. The Archives has scanned the microfilm and you can bring up pdfs of the pages. They are arranged by districts (no nominal index available but give genealogists a few months and I am sure they will start popping up) so for now you will need to have a pretty clear idea where your family was at the time the census was taken and patiently search the name column. But, if you know or can figure out the Province-District-Subdistrict they were in you are golden.

For example, if your family happens to be from Ontario, in the District Hastings West, Sub-District Rawdon Township, Springbrook Village you can find them, although not until Page Seven:

It's as easy as that. So get out there and fill in the blanks in your family tree.
rgsc.

Eating, Drinking, and Smoking Across the Globe

2005-07-25T15:45:00.000-04:00

Our favourite celebrity chef is at it again. Premiering tonight on the Travel Channel is Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations. I am not entirely sure how this will differ from A Cook's Tour as it seems the premise is pretty much identical: Tony Bourdain, chef and writer, travels to interesting and exotic locations (like New Jersey!) to eat, get pissed, and crack-wise. Not that I am complaining as this is certainly a winning combination as far as I am concerned. Should be good viewing - hopefully they play it on Discovery or FoodTV or come out with a book tie-in as I don't get the Travel Channel. So if you happen to get a chance to see it let me know how it is.
rgsc.
PS. Bourdain will also be appearing on tv in fictional form in Fox's Kitchen Confidential beginning on September 18th. The show seems promising - Darren Star is the executive producer, Bourdain himself is a consultant and has said that the pilot is "pretty good" (not a ringing endorsement, I know, but at least he is still willing to be associated with the project) and it is following Arrested Development which is a pretty great timeslot to have. However, it is Fox, the people who bring us the horror that is Stacked and who have a tendency to cancel good shows.

Quote of the Day

2005-07-23T18:06:00.000-04:00

This installement of Quote of the Day comes to up from Leah McLaren of The Globe and Mail" who wrote:

"Chit-chatting with optimists makes me throw up in my mouth."

Snerk.
As irritating and self-important as many people find McLaren and her writing, I must say that I can't help but like it.

That's it for now. Went to Ottawa yesterday and I will post on my visit to the National Gallery sometime later in the weekend.
rgsc.

Kodak and the Digital - Two Bits of News

2005-07-21T15:20:00.000-04:00

One:
Yesterday it was announced that George Eastman House and the International Center of Photography have entered into a partnership to form PhotoMuse, a free, online resource for the History of Photography drawing on the collections of these two magnificent institutions. They plan to have 200,000 images, both American and international, online once officially opened in September 2006. Currently there are 250 images from each institutions (although there are apparently 806 images from the photographer Roman Vishniac...so who knows how many photos are currently online) which, once clicked on, bring up details about the image, links to bibliographies on the photographer, links to chronologies (including info on developments in photography, culture and politics), and a space for user comments (which could be a wonderful space for input and a model I would like to see repeated in the archival sphere). This has the potential to be a fantastic resource for the study of photography.

Alfred Eisenstaedt, Detail of ‘Children Watching the Story of "Saint George and the Dragon" at the Puppet Theater in the Tuileries, Paris,’ 1963, ICP Collection. Online at PhotoMuse

Two:
Today, Eastman Kodak announced that it was cutting 10,000 jobs, mostly in their manufacturing plants. This is in addition to the cuts made a year and a half ago which eradicated 15,000 positions. Last year’s profits in the range of $136 million have been replaced by losses of $146 million. The film business is very far from booming and sales of Kodak’s digital products have surpassed its traditional products for the first time. The outlook is not completely bleak, however, as the company has become the largest manufacturer of digital cameras in the US and is very much restructuring itself and focussing all its attention on digital imaging technologies. What this all means is not entirely clear yet as the use of digital photography is too new to have been comprehensively studied (although scholars have been dealing with the subject since the late 1980s and early 1990s). I wonder if this is the potential end of the democracy of imaging that was witnessed with traditional film based photography. Currently, while digital cameras are becoming ever popular not everyone is willing or able to purchase a new camera and all the accoutrements that go with it to allow for the printing of images. While disposable digital cameras have been around since 2003 (although I am not entirely sure how popular and widespread their use has been) and self-serve printing kiosks popping up all over the place, will the "average person" be able to have same ability to take and print their own photographs in a completely digital environment as they are used to? On the other side of the coin, could this lead to an expansion of imaging? As more parties become involved in the production of digital imaging technologies and cameras get cheaper, smaller, and more sophisticated, could there be a boom in the taking and production of photographs? Only time will tell.
rgsc.

c.c in kgstn - "You need to pay attention"

2005-07-15T17:40:00.000-04:00

Last night Kingston got its groove on as the wickedly funky controller.controller graced the stage of the Elixir. The show was hosted by Rockcrew Productions who are pretty much single-handedly responsible for bringing good music to Kingston. It was their third anniversary so to celebrate they gave away free cds from bands that they have brought to town. I got an ep from Everlea and a guy left his beside me on the bar so I also picked up a disk by The July 26th Movement who I never heard of before but seem pretty good (now apparently known as The Coast). These wouldn't have been my first choices but hey, who can argue with free?

The show started with Kingston's own The Roamers. While this name brings to mind a East Coast kitchen band in my mind it is actually a pretty good four-piece rock outfit. The guys are really young and sort of need to break away and find their own sound they are very good technically and know what they are doing. They sound like alot of indie/alt-rock bands but the most direct comparison I could make is with Dinosaur Jr. - and that is a pretty awesome band to be compared to. One of their songs had an alt-country feel to it and was one of their best. Certainly a band to watch out for.

Up next was Camouflage Nights - based out of Toronto but originally from Halifax. While my initial impression was "pretty good although not really my thing" by the end of their set I was hooked. It have a very Cake-like feel with rap-y style vocals. They are not big on complex lyrics but rather take the approach of looping and repeating phrases or verses while the music does the same, moving to a climax of funkiness. The band is comprised of six members, with a bunch of instrument swapping and each takes turns at the vocals although two of the guys do most of the singing. They have two organs/keyboards/synthesizers which are used to great effect. The band is really really tight and put on an excellent show. They don't have an album out yet but there is a 12" single and an mp3 for your listening pleasure on their site.

The headliners, controller.controller, were nothing short of awesome. There wasn't a single person in the place that was standing still - their disco-inflected post-punk ditties refused to let you rest - they screamed "YOU MUST DANCE!" so that is what we did. This band has gotten some crazy-good press: Time Magazine announced that their forthcoming album (due out Octoberish) is one of the most anticipated indie albums of the year; Pitchfork gave it an 8.3 (out of 10) - a pretty exceptional rating - and had nothing but really positive things to say about the whole thing. They played all the songs off of their super-funky EP History (do yourself a favour and get this cd immediately if not sooner) and played a bunch of stuff off their forthcoming album. It was an absolutely fantastic set, which led to the audience calling for an encore. Much to our delight the lead singer, Nirmala Basnayake, came out picked up the mic but instead of singing she proceeded to sit on the stage in the dark and explained that they would love to come back out and do another song but the police came and informed the club that they were violating noise laws and had to shut it down (it was before last call! What the hell?!?) She was extremely apologetic and we thought that was going to be it until guitarist Scott Kaija came out plugged in his guitar and started playing again very loudly. Basnayake just shrugged, said that it was a "fuck the law moment" and the rest of the band came out and they played a scorching encore. Which was? Awesome. They are on a mini-tour right now and are in Toronto on the 20th and I can't recommend going to see them highly enough.

After the show I hung out and had a beer with the other guitarist Colwyn Llewellyn-Thomas who I went to highschool with. We hadn't seen each other since 1997 and it was really great to catch up with him and hear what he has been up to.

It was all in all a great concert. The place wasn't really packed and the A/C was still effective so it was pretty cool in there and people weren't tramping on each other while getting their groove on on the dance floor. I was pretty wiped out today but it was totally worth it.

The next event in Kingston that will be chock-full of indierock goodness is the Wolfe Island Musicfest featuring Jill Barber, Luther Wright, Sarah Harmer, Apostle of Hustle, Cuff the Duke, Chris Brown Citizen's Band (f. Kate Fenner), Matthew Barber and the Union Dues, Tomate Potate and others so mark your calendars for August 5th and 6th. It is going to be great.
rgsc

Big Brother is Watching - and you can control his gaze

2005-07-11T22:19:00.000-04:00

Surveillance cameras are becoming an ever growing part of the urban landscape. They watch over public spaces and, working on the theory of the Panopticon (that if we believe we are always being watched by the authorities we will regulate our behavior) they are hopefully keeping our streets safer and giving the authorities the power to catch the badguys once they do wrong. Questions about whether or not this is actually the case is still up in the air. Questions regarding the impact on our civil liberties should not be passed over lightly. But, the fact remains that we are being watched and the watchers have all the power.

Want to watch? Then enter the Eyes of Laura: Surveillance webcam and street culture blog. There, you can take possession of a surveillance camera in Vancouver, controlling the perspective, angle, zoom, and focus. It is quite amazing to watch people go by down the street (or appear and then disappear on a slow internet connection) wondering if they know they are being observed. You can control the camera for 30 seconds using a default login or 3 minutes if you register.

The blog, which began its life on June 1st, is no ordinary blog - along with strange musings it has video and audio clips of the author, pictures, and a developing story line - in fact this isn't a blog at all. It is an art piece by one of my favorite contemporary artists - and one of the most applauded artists working today - Janet Cardiff, whose spectacular "Paradise Institute" and "Forty-Part Motet" are currently on view at the National Gallery. (For more webcam fun see the view for Louise Bourgeois's giant spider sculpture Maman)

While the website is not as immersive as her other works, it definitely operates along the same lines as it toys with understanding: mixing fact and fiction, sound and sight (and in this case text) as Cardiff leads us down a path to some mysterious destination. Unlike her other works which unfold over a relatively short period of time, this one has been going on for over a month now and shows no sign of slowing.

One thing that is particularly interesting about this site/work of art is that Cardiff has apparently gone to great lengths to hide her authorship and the link to the Vancouver Art Gallery, the sponsoring institution. On neither her nor the gallery's website is there mention or links to the work. Neither name appears on the site (that I have seen) and I only hear about it because on an article in the New York Times which spills the beans. The reason for this, I suppose, is to enforce the fiction but unless you were somehow "in the know" you most likely would never find the work. The author of the Times article never states how he found out about the piece and I am quite curious to find out how he found out given the supposed secrecy of the project.

A very interesting take on surveillance, blogging, modern communication and culture from one of Canada's art superstars.
rgsc.
ps. to run the site and camera you need java, quicktime, and macromedia flash plugins. If you don't have them you can download them via links on the site. A highspeed connection wouldn't hurt either, but isn't necessary.

Night Lights

2005-07-08T15:54:00.000-04:00

Since others have got it working I thought I would give the blogger photo thingy another shot. This time it worked - I haven't a clue why it wouldn't go the other day except to think that the blogger imps enjoy toying with me.

So to test it out I thought I would post this image of light use around the world which I think is pretty cool. They showed a similar image in the Massive Change exhibit at the AGO.

That is it. Trying to be productive at work and my lunch is over so back to it. Hope everyone has a great weekend.
rgsc

A slow week

2005-07-06T11:22:00.000-04:00

It has been something of a slow week - nothing really to report. Canada Day was spent pretty much in the car with no waving of flags or watching of fireworks but that is just fine by me. Went to see As You Like It in Stratford, which was pretty good. The music, provided by the Barenaked Ladies, was quite excellent and I really enjoyed the set design which used large metal ladders as trees, architectural elements and as, uh, well ladders. The play wasn't "knock your socks off" fantastic but all it all it was enjoyable.

This week, so far (and for the rest of it as far as I can tell) has been taken up by report writing which I have had enough of for the moment but since the boss is away on holidays it is nice to not be interrupted every ten minutes while doing it (I have been trying to get this thing done for ages but things keep popping up so I get a paragraph done then I am called away. Another sentence written then I am off to something else).

Really, the only reason I am posting anything at all right now is because I thought I would give Hello another shot (temperamental beast that it is) and lo and be hold. So here is a gratuitous picture of a cat (tm Selsine, all rights reserved) - Porkchop in my Return of the Jedi bag.

He may be a sorry excuse for a cat, but at least he is not THIS.
rgsc
PS now that I have Hello running again, I see there is an in-blogger image tool (just click on the little photo icon) which looks super easy to use. However, it doesn't want to put my photo up...bastardo!

"Don't put your faith in rock & roll - it will only let you down"

2005-06-27T13:05:00.000-04:00

So said the front man of uber-Canadian indie band Broken Social Scene, Justin Peroff, yesterday in the out and out rock-a-thon on Olympic Island, Toronto. While that may be an apt statement in general, yesterday there was not a let down to be seen. It was sunny and hot, but not in the really oppressive way that it has been lately, with a nice breeze off the lake, the beer was cold and plentiful and the indie-kid crowd was in a good mood.

We got there just as Milton's The Most Serene Republic took the stage and they seemed really really good, although we didn't give them our full and undivided attention. Following them was Do Make Say Think, who offered up a set of what they described as "Space Rock" - complex and layered post-rock that is perfectly suited to swaying. I picked up their latest album and have not at all been disappointed.

The concert really began with Metric. Their set was superb: a good mix of new stuff with their best from "Old World Underground..." Their songs translated really well onstage, the highlight in particular being one of my favorite songs at the moment, "Calculation (theme)," being transformed into an even more lush version than is found on the album and the stellar closer "Dead Disco." Emily Haines was great onstage. She approached the mike very seriously and what could really only be described as robotic before breaking out with a kick and a yell and completely rocking out. It was pretty clear that the whole band was having fun and giving it all.

Broken Social Scene was mind-blowing. Their albums are very good but their performance beat even that all to pieces. We spent the first part of the set eating so didn't have a perfect view, but the sound was excellent. The nature of the concert suited the band to the tee - collaborative by nature, with 11 people listed as members of the group, they had all kinds of freinds and lovers onstage with them - including Emily Haines, Leslie Feist, Amy Millan (of Stars), and guys from Apostle of Hustle and Raising the Fawn. There were upwards of twenty people onstage at times. I can't say enough about how cool they sounded.

Lastly, were the headliners Modest Mouse, by far the most rocking of all the bands on the line up. I was told that they put on a good show and was not disappointed. Their entire set was excellent, but of particular note was the fantastic banjo playing on "Satin in a Coffin" and "Bukowski" and the final song (before the encore) "The Good Times are Killing Me" for which members of all the bands that played the show came out for.

All in all a really good show from some of the best bands around. Thanks to Mark and Danielle for their usual good company and hospitality. I took the day off today so I think I am going to find some place dark to crawl into and try to get rested up for the three-day work week ahead.
rgsc

Birds and Rocks - Things seen on the road North

2005-06-22T20:42:00.000-04:00

Hi folks. I am currently transmitting from the lovely library of Laurentian University in sunny Sudbury. I am here for the second conference of my summer - the Archives Association of Ontario Conference. The theme is "Building Community Archives" or something like that. The program looks ok but, more importantly, the menu looks very good. I will have some free time so might be here frequently.

The drive went quite well. I made very good time, arriving here in about 5.5 hrs from Belle-vegas after stupid Expedia had the stupid wrong address for the stupid car rental place. Bah. The car, a two door Accent is pretty damn awesome, although it has a lame colour - I think it is called "glacier blue". It is tiny but very zippy. After renting two cars in a relatively short period of time I am becoming quite a fan. They are brand spanking new (smell and all), super clean, and, if you get the absolutely everything covered-type insurance you can drive the shit out of it.

The drive was really good, with clear skies all the way, and Sudbury and the campus seems nice (although I think I might have a very different opinion if I were here in February). It is very tree-filled and rocky. I am staying the University of Sudbury's residence (affiliated with Laurentian) and it is pretty weird to be in a spartan student room again - cinderblock construction and all.

Any way, I saw two pretty cool things on the way up. The first was Canada's glory in the skies - the Snowbirds. I saw them flying in formation, doing loop-de-loops and filling the sky with smoke while driving through Oshawa (apparently in town for the Canadian Aviation Expo). It was pretty cool to see them although I didn't get the best of looks as I figured I should pay attention to the road more that the sky.

The other cool thing that I saw was what seem to have been a whole army of Inukshuks. Starting just after Barrie on Highway 400 (later 69) I began to notice little piles of rocks on the larger outcrops. The first one I noticed was about five rocks stacked on top of each other. Later I saw more - some simple piles, some more complex humanoid piles. None of them seemed too big and sometimes they were alone and others were in small groups. They were placed all along the highway - for at least 200km - and I think they are pretty damn cool. Unfortunately I don't have my camera or I would have stopped to take a picture or two.

That's all for the moment. I am going to get ready for the opening reception.
rgsc

Download while you still have the chance!

2005-06-21T20:54:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, the Act to Amend the Copyright Act (Bill C-60) was tabled in the House of Commons for its first reading. This amendment has been in the works for about four years and it was hoped it would clear up a lot of ambiguities that are currently in our Copyright Acts. Ideally, copyright works to protects the moral and economic rights of authors of an intellectual work while, at the same time, protecting users and consumers. We, the users in Canada, have enjoyed a mostly satisfactory balance in the past but it seems that this balance will pretty much be done away with when and if the bill passes as it sits. Archivists, educators, and legal scholars have weighed in already and they are pretty much unanimous in their statement that it is the recording industry, first and foremost, that is pleased with the bill (with ISPs and photographers also feeling that their lobbying has not gone unnoticed) - note, that is the recording industry and not recording artists as Steven Page of the Barenaked Ladies, apparently, voiced his concerns about whether or not artists would see any benefits from the bill. The copyright law-talking guy Howard Knopf is quoted in the Globe and Mail as saying "It might as well have been called the Canadian Recording Industry of America Act." Among other things, the bill spells out that Internet Service Providers are not liable for the content traveling over their wires and would have them serve notice to potential infringers and keep their personal information on file for 6 months, gives photographers the copyright of the photographs they are commissioned to take (previously it was the commissioning body who had the copyright over the images unless spelled out otherwise in contractual law which overrides copyright), and makes it illegal to circumvent encryption even for non-illegal uses. It gives creators (read: Recording Industry) a great deal of power in controlling who gets their product and how much and how often they are going to pay for it.

What the bill does not do is clear up lingering ambiguities or address many, many concerns of the users. The best thing that has been said about it is that it could be a whole lot worse - such as the US Digital Millenium Copyright Act with is often called Draconian and Soviet. Canada has been placed on the US Watch list for possible intellectual property infringement. This is something of a mark of honour as far as I am concerned. It needs to be understood that copyright should not just be for the authors. Users have rights, too.

The jargon is pretty heavy going (I hate, I hate, I hate legalese) so, if you are interested, check out University of Ottawa prof Michael Geist's website for analysis of the bill and for the implications of what it all means.

So go out and get your fill of mp3s, as the fun isn't going to last for too much longer.
rgsc (with thanks to Loryl for her timely presentation at the ACA is Sask.)

Boo to Hello!, Hurrah for Flickr

2005-06-20T14:58:00.000-04:00

I am getting more than a tad tired of Hello. It just refuses to work for me. I haven't a bloody clue why it won't upload my photos but it just...uh...won't. I have tried it from different computers, I have followed the help file, I have been patient, I have torn my hair out. So I am trying Flickr. It has monthly limits on bandwidth use (so I may need to still use Hello or something else when my limit has been hit) but it seems much more friendly, is easy to upload, and doesn't require a separate program to use. Check it out. It may save some frustration for you bloggers. I have uploaded pictures to my last two posts so have a look if you want.
So, hello to Flickr. Please don't make me hate you.
rgsc

White Water Wickedness

2005-06-19T23:36:00.000-04:00

Rafting on the Ottawa (not us but this is where we were)
Originally uploaded by Rgscarter.

Earlier this week we got a call from Natasha who asked, "Did we want to go white-water rafting this weekend." Sure, I said, sounds awesome - and it was (Laura, unfortunately, had to work and missed out). Natasha, Matt, Mark, and Danielle picked me up in Kingston and we headed to Ottawa, where we stayed overnight at Matt's cousin's place. Early the next morning we piled again into Mark’s trusty Toyota and headed for Quebec. We joined up with Esprit Rafting at a skeezy small-town bar and were taken to the mighty Ottawa River. After learning all we would need to know about safety (first and foremost ‘Don’t Panic' or as they like to say BeCoolBeCoolBeCool) and then getting our gear on, we were all set.

With our intrepid guide Bob, and the guide-along-for-the-ride Slater, the five of us made our way out into the River which, thanks to the crazy amount of rain we got the day before, was running high and fast. We were eased into it, going down the smaller middle channel of the river first. We got to know how to move the boat and how to hold on for dear life when things got nutty and then we went down our first set of rapids. The first one wasn’t too tough but it gave me a bit of a rush. Over the day, when we approached the rapids I would get a bit anxious, but not nervous, and my heart would start pounding. We would go over and be told when to start paddling hard and it was really exhilarating. We were prepared for a bigger challenge which came in the form of a set of rapids called “Elevator Shaft” which featured, as you might imagine, quite a large drop. While I thought at the time that I just might fall in, we managed to keep it together and all stay in the boat. In fact, we didn’t dump the entire day – which is something I think we are all quite proud of.

"Dianne's Furious Daisies" + Bob (with thanks to Natasha for the image)

Bob told us about the natural history, geology, and some interesting tidbits about the area, including about the Shriner’s War, the reclaiming of old logs from the riverbeds, and the location of Neil Young’s cottage (for the record, born in Toronto on November 12, 1945, spent the first years of his life in Omimi, Ontario, and then moved to Winnipeg when his parents divorced.)

We ate a great lunch after finishing the run of the middle channel and then were bussed back to where we started up the river to do the faster, longer, main channel. This part featured a bunch of pretty crazy rapids, culminating in the raft-bashing monster called “The Coliseum,” which featured three very large, nasty waves. Our raft was the first to go through and we managed to get everything right and pull through. The same can’t be said for five of the other rafts in our group some of whom had rather spectacular flips. After we made it through we went around and tried to pick up the folks who fell out of their boats and then made our way down the river to the pick-up spot, swimming a bit of the way in the flat water.

Once we got to Esprit’s main camp, we sorted out our tenting arrangements, hung out on the beach by the river, had a few Blues, and played with the owner’s dogs. Dinner, served from the barbeque on the patio, was absolutely great and we then spent the better part of the rest of the evening by the bonfire on the beach just hanging out, discussing the nature of marsh mallows
Mallow of the Marshes

(as you can see from the links, they traditionally are made from the plant, although gelatin has replaced it for commercial production. I couldn’t find reference to the shortage but I am pretty sure I didn’t dream it up) and all kinds of things.

After a hard day rafting and sleeping in less than luxurious (but dry and convenient) circumstances we woke up tired and sore but were greeted to a Sunday brunch that couldn’t be beat and then headed back to Kingston. The trip was absolutely awesome. The views were gorgeous, the rafting wicked, and the company was excellent. I have to thank Natasha for extending the invite my way, to Mark for his expert driving, and to everyone for making it a superfun time. Hopefully we can make this an annual thing.
rgsc.

The Paris

2005-06-16T22:24:00.000-04:00

of the prairies

I can’t believe it has almost been two weeks since my last post. What can I say? It was been a busy two weeks. After a brief week back in nun-ville I was whisked off to Saskatoon for the Association of Canadian Archivists annual conference. It was an action packed, left me feeling like I had been hit by a train, super good time.

I left Kingston on Tuesday, flying in a rather small plane (over my old stomping ground - you can see my mom's house in the photo if you look close enough) to Toronto then onto The Wonder City. It didn't seem too wondrous as we landed as I left sunny Ontario (30 degrees and just plain gorgeous) to land in a rainy, Saskatchewan (a less than balmy 9 degrees). Nevertheless, I was quite happy to be there.

Airplane - view 3 Moms house

After checking in to my kick-ass room in the historic Bessborough (which was particularly astounding compared to my home of two weeks in Vermont, the Motel 6), which overlooked the Saskatoon River and the hotel's gardens, I went to register. At the desk I picked up my conference package I happened to met up with the ACA Board and they invited me out for dinner with them at the Conference Pub. We had wings and beer and it was all in all a pretty good start to things. Following that we went to the Vice Regal Suite, the president's digs, where I happily drank his beer, met up with friends and talked to a whole-lot of archivists.

The next day, was a pre-conference trip to Batoche. This was an extraordinary trip, regardless of the still rather miserable weather (at least it didn't rain, much) but I had a sweater and a coat so I was a lot better off than some. A history prof from University of Saskatoon (that's right, USask to those in the know - it is no UMan, but how many schools are?) gave a lecture on the background of the Metis struggle and the lead up to Batoche.

Batoche

When we arrived the story was picked up by a Parks Canada guide who showed us where the battle took place, including where the British army set up camp, through the house they occupied, then onto the cemetery where there was the graves of the Metis warriors who died and a monument to them. Then it was on to the church and rectory before going back to the interpretive centre for lunch (Bison soup) and a slightly kitschy but very interesting show on the battle complete with video re-enactments and animatronics (hurrah for edu-tainment!). Unfortunately there was a fair bit we didn't get to see - the site is huge - as some people needed to get back for a meeting, but it was a very worthwhile trip.

We got back in time for the official opening of the conference presided over by the Lieutenant-Governor of the Province, the mayor of the city, and some archival types. The highlight, though, was the entertainment - the Wanuskewin International Dance Troupe consisting of three Native dancers with two drummers. Their performance was nothing less than spectacular. It was an early night as I wanted to look bright-eyed and bushy tailed for the next day.

The conference program, on the theme of "Theory and Practice" was quite good. I made some mistakes in picking the concurrent sessions I attended, wishing that I had went to other ones when I heard from other people how good they were, but it was all in all pretty free of stinkers. Three of the four plenary sessions were great - with Laura Millar (theorist, practitioner and educator extraordinaire) kicking things off, Brewster Kahle, creator of the Internet Archive and many other super-cool free-access-to-information things knocked my socks off (even if all of what he was doing wasn't strictly "archival" but, unlike some of the UBC grads I talked to I am not about to quibble about the value of what he is doing based on that), and our Dean of FIS, Brian Cantwell Smith, gave an entertaining, forward looking, energetic talk on where he thought the Information Profession (library, archives, museum, and computer stuff) should go. He rather aptly asked something along the lines of "what the hell is Information Studies anyway?" something I wonder about as I am supposed to be a Master of it, and he went from there. The paper I presented seemed to go over quite well. While I was a smidge nervous to begin it was fine by the time I hit the third page. Very positive response from many people afterwards, which is nice ‘cause you just never know if people are gonna think it sucked.

The social event planning was unparalleled. On the first day was the East-West ballgame. Thankfully the sun decided to show itself and the rest of the week (which other than the baseball I spent in the hotel) and I played, rather surprising myself that I didn't completely suck at baseball and hadn't completely forgotten how to throw a ball. The east was glorious in defeat (9-6 or something like that) but at least we managed not to get trounced as we have in past years. Next year we will be ready for them. Then it was on to the Great Western Beer Night to lick our wounds or boast about our victory, depending which side of the country you were from, drink some decent and more importantly free-flowing beer, and support a scholarship fund. Because that is what it is all about, right, the charity.

The following night it was off to the Literary/Music evening for a bit o'culture. There were four speakers, including Guy Vanderhaeghe, who read from their works, and the highlight was the Amati Quartet, who played a Haydn string arrangement on 17th instruments. They usually play to huge crowds (their last performance was to 11,000 people including the Queen on her visit to the prairies) so to see them up close, with about 20 people was pretty cool. Following that I rushed off to a dinner party at one of my predecessor’s places, for cake, wine, and some relaxed conversation.

The last night was probably the highlight of the conference - the banquet and dance. Early in my archival career I have come to a few conclusions about the profession, one of which is that Archivists Love to Dance. I think it is the only reason most of us go to these things. The dinner was good, but pretty much every damn thing had saskatoon berries in it, and this being the third day of it I was getting a bit tired of them. Maybe it is a Saskatchewan thing, but they named their damn town after the berry! It isn't even really that good! It is kinda like a blueberry but...not. I guess you have to grow up with them. Anyway, the meal was good, the dance was great. I was in my usual fine form and looked like I even had a little rhythm, at least in comparison to the few wooden-legged male archivists who got anywhere near the dance floor. Following the dance we made our way to the president's room where I drank his beer, listened to the Newfoundland contingent sing some ditties, tp-ed the pres' four-poster bed with the archivist from the AGO because it seemed like a good idea at the time, and had some fun talking with all the drunkity-drunk archivists.

TPatACA - Heh. Juvenile, yes. Funny, very yes (with thanks to Linda for the pics) .

We were kicked out sometime after the sun had risen and only then because the Board needed to get some rest before a 9 o'clock meeting. Sissies.

Bessborough 6 - view from my hotel room on the last day (Broadway Bridge river)

The following day was spent more or less wiped out. I packed, checked out, had breakfast with the Toronto contingent and spent well over an hour staring into nothingness in the park behind the hotel, being entertained by magpies and inchworms, and kinda feeling miserable all around. We left a once again rainy Saskatoon in the late afternoon, flying out in a whole crap-load of turbulence.

It was a fantastic conference. I have been pretty much destroyed all week and only now and feeling more or less human again. Totally worth it, though. I am looking forward to ACA in St. John's already.
rgsc

VT-NY

2005-06-03T11:08:00.000-04:00

It was something of a fool-hardy plan: I would head out from Burlington Vermont at 7am, drive a rental car four or so hours to Beacon New York to visit Dia:Beacon, take a train to New York City to eat at Les Halles then go to the Met to see the Max Ernst retrospective, then back on the train to the car to get back to Burlington. Pretty much everyone I told my plan to thought it couldn’t be done, but I managed to do it all and do it right and make it back in one piece before dawn.

Mountains, Lakes, & Valleys

Vermont Country Side

Crossing Into New York

I got up at pretty much the crack of dawn to make it to the Burlington International Airport at 7 when the car rental place opened. I got into my trusty (and zippy) vehicle and hit the road. The drive was extraordinary. Through Vermont farmland with mountains in the distance, small-town America, following Lake Champlain, through the twists and turns of the Adirondacks, and into the Hudson Valley, the scenery was pretty spectacular. Following a quick bagel break on the road (and one stop on the Lake to check my map) I hit the I-87 and then the I-84 to Beacon.

Lake George: Quick map check

A museum I wouldn’t kick out of bed for making crackers

Alright, the Nabisco factory in Beacon, New York, built in 1929, didn’t actually make crackers, but rather the boxes for those crackers. What this means though, that quality of light – skylights cover the roof – as well as space were essential design elements. When the Dia Art Foundation was looking for a space to house their unparalleled collection of contemporary art they couldn’t have asked for a more ideal location. Dia, renowned for their sponsorship of exceptionally large-scale, often site-specific, and almost always highly conceptual art, has filled the refurbished 240,000 square feet of gallery space with the art of 24 artists in their collection. You can do the math. That is a crazy amount of space for each artist (although it is not divided evenly, naturally). To say the art is difficult is more than a mild understatement, but the experience of the museum of the art in such a setting is something to behold, even if you aren’t a fan of contemporary art.

On a downtown train
The plan was that I would head down by train into Manhattan. Because the drive took longer than I anticipated I was pushing it to make the train I originally intended. However, it became a moot point as I mixed up the train schedule a bit and I missed the train I wanted anyway. This was a fortunate accident as I really rushed through a bunch of galleries at the end and I was able to spend the better part of another hour taking time with the art. I just made the train and was following the Hudson into the City.

Manhattan in 3.5hrs
My New York plan was simple – hit the #6 Lexington train, conveniently located at Grand Central Terminal to 28th Street, eat at Les Halles, get back on the 6 to 82nd where I would walk the three blocks to the Met, spend a little quality time with Max Ernst then back to Grand Central to get back to Beacon. A great way to spend a day…if you live in New York. For the commuting tourist it was going to be a bit of a marathon.

Eating in the Halls of Bourdain

LesHalles

Ever since first seeing A Cook’s Tour I have been a fan of Anthony Bourdain. So a trip to New York would have been unthinkable for me without stopping in for some classic French Bistro cuisine at Les Halles. I was a bit worried that I didn’t have a reservation (I tried to make one online but never heard back from them – which was just as well as I would have missed it anyway), but there was plenty of room at 3:30 on Saturday. I had a seat looking out onto Park Avenue and wonderfully simple brunch starting with Gratinee des Halles (Onion Soup}, then the classic Steak, Frites, Salade with a glass of wine and a bodum filled with great coffee. Everything was excellent but next time I think I will go for something a little more daring. No time for dilly-dallying. I skipped dessert because while an hour and a half for lunch may be standard for the French, I had to get to the Met.

Lop-Lop, frottage, grattage and decolomania

Ernst – The Garden of France

What can I saw about Ernst at the Met? Fan-freaking-tastic ought to about do it. Max Ernst is said to be the most influential artist of the 20th Century, perhaps aside from Picasso. The show followed Ernst’s development from the rare WWI era Chagall-esque dreamy paintings through his collages, automatic experiments with rubbing and scraping, and late works made in exile in the US. I was able to spend a good amount of time at the exhibit, but I didn’t have too much time to spare. I didn’t want to miss the 7 o’clock train to Beacon so I took a pass on the Diane Arbus exhibit and saw essentially nothing of the permanent collection (criminal, I know). It goes without saying that I wish I could have spent a lot more time at the Met but I have absolutely no regrets about making the trip for the one exhibit.

1000 miles and counting
I made the train with a few minutes to spare. Read the Village Voice. Reached Beacon at 8:18. I missed the exit I needed to head north leading me about 35 miles too far west. A friendly gas station attendant set me right and I was making my way back to Vermont. While I spent most of the rest of the drive thinking that I was lost I somehow managed to find my way exactly to where I needed to be. The drive was much slower and with many stops for caffeine and/or map-checks but I made it home in one piece.

Much to my surprise the plan worked, remarkably, without a hitch. I accomplished everything to set out to do. After one return train trip, two world-class art galleries, 19 hours and over 1000 miles in the car it was a pretty intense American roadtrip.
rgsc.

That's right - Call me Master

2005-06-02T05:46:00.000-04:00

At long last, as I am typing, I have finally been awarded my degree from FIS. You may now call me Master. In fact I insist on it. No longer do I feel like a big fraud by having the "MIst" after my name on my business cards (not that anyone knows that the hell that means anyway). Of course, I am not there to get it in person - I didn't think I would be loving the boring ceremony, sitting with people I don't know, and taking the day off work in the middle of the week for it - but I have it on good authority that I jumped through all the hoops in more or less the right order to have earned it. Life changing...no, not really. Glad the thing is done with...pretty much.
rgsc

Better than “Well, at least it didn’t suck”

2005-06-01T14:07:00.000-04:00

or: How I stopped worrying and learned to love the Wookiee [now that would be some “strange love”]

Last night I saw Star Wars III after quite a bit of anticipation. Since hearing about the prequels ages ago, getting really excited and then experiencing the gut-wrenching horribleness (yes, apparently that is a word) of the first two piles of crap Lucas foisted on his adoring fans (Damn you Jar Jar!) I went in with more than a little loathing, some fear, and a big bushel of cynicism.

I must say that I was pleasantly surprised. Other than the fact that Hayden Christensen couldn’t act his way out from under a soggy Kleenex (he wasn’t that bad as long as he didn’t have to deliver any of the choice lines dreamt up by George, still pretty bad, though) it addressed some of the criticisms I had of the earlier prequels (like, other than the fact that we now have CG to do the special effects, why is the technology of the spacecrafts etc. so much more sleeker and sophisticated in Episode I than in Episode IV – here, by the end, everything gets chunkier), Jar Jar had no lines and only made two or three brief appearances, there was an army of Wookiees, it was pretty damn dark (one of the things that made my like Empire Strikes Back so much), and it really tied into A New Hope well.

So all and all I was pleased. Mostly I had heard that it was alright, not as terrible as the first two, etc. but I think it deserves a little more credit than that. I went in ready to hate it and was duly impressed. Could it stand on its own? Not likely. Lucas should be well pleased that he got a chance to make Episode IV before I-III, ‘cause it isn’t that likely that he would have made it to the rest.

I do have my criticisms, though, and not just with the acting/script. My biggest thing is with continuity and logic – like the sleekspaceships to clunky spaceships mentioned above. Two shall suffice.
-Why is R2D2 much more gadget-y now then later? Those rocket boosters and oil spurts and multi-directional shock thingies sure could have come in handy in the later episodes.
-And, this drove me bonkers: Why the hell isn’t the droid army absolutely kicking the ass of the clone army, a la the Terminator series. If I were building a freaking droid army I am pretty sure I would programme it to be able to kick the ass of humans. Seriously. Think about it for a second (or perhaps I have thought enough about it for the both of us), I can understand that humans have the advantage of rational thought (although the Brave New World-like training of the clones maybe would put a damper on that), and that the Jedi’s abilities would give them the upper-hand, but come-on, if you can build something as intelligent as R2D2, can’t you build a battle droid that could hit something as big as a Wookiee? If it were my droid army it sure as hell would not lose a single freakin’ battle. Especially since the things were programmed to communicate in English and have mildly amusing things to squeal when they get crushed or something. Less time on vocabulary more time on aiming. That would be my motto.

I guess 4 out of 6 in a series isn’t too bad. I just wish Lucas hadn’t screwed up the first ones so bad. Here’s another motto for you Lucas – Less time on eye-popping graphics and more time on story. Or as Laura said last night, couldn’t he just have hired someone with talent to write the script?
___________________________
In other news, I am back in Kingston after two weeks in Vermont. Work was fine. The countryside was beautiful. Had a great trip to New York. I have a post already but I want to add some photos I took and I keep forgetting the camera at home. So hold onto your hats (‘cause I know all three of my loyal readers are forever coming back to see if I have updated) I should have it up before the end of the week.
rgsc

Someone stole Bert's eyebrows

2005-06-01T03:23:00.000-04:00

And I know who it was.

Just a minute or two ago my boss popped her head into my office to get a document. Now, in the recent past my co-worker Rosa and I noted how my boss would pencil in her eyebrows in red on special occasions. Yesterday, I observed that they were darker than usual, but nothing too horrific. Today: all out Bert-ification going on up there. It was all I could do not to burst out laughing. I think I am going to have to turn off my office light and hide under my desk for the rest of the day to avoid any further confrontations. I don't think I can keep a straight face.
rgsc

It's a deal, it's a steal...

2005-05-14T22:58:00.000-04:00

Here in the land of concealed weapons, you never know what you might find across the street. Today was a spring Saturday in Oh-High-Oh and what does that mean? Well, yardsale, of course. Now, it was one of the most lackluster yardsales I have ever been to, but that doesn't mean there isn't great junk to be had. Like a cooler with a radio in it - and you could plug your walkman/discman into it!!! for two bucks!! how could you go wrong (I expressed interest, but my dad bought it, so we shall see who ends up with it, uh... in the end...)

Anyway, for the bargain price of $1(USD) I managed to pick myself up a vintage hand-held electronic gaming unit - the Sega Game Gear. Oh baby. It weighs about three pounds, is the length of my forearm, takes six AA batteries, but it rules. With the classic Sonic the Hedgehog 2, there was no way I could pass it up. It looked up from a pile of crap in its two button, three colour glory, and I just could not say no. I am very pleased with my find, to say the least. Gotta go. Tails needs me.
rgsc

Zelda-rific

2005-05-12T12:45:00.000-04:00

The kind folks at Nintendo sent out an email today about E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo) that will be held in Los Angeles next week. Among the 600+ new games to be released, Nintendo will be previewing the new Legend of Zelda game. At last year's E3, they released a 60 second preview that apparently knocked everyone's socks completely off. So maybe this year they will be able to give us a real title (the tentative "Legend of Zelda" just doesn't do much for me) and a release date - I need to know how long I have to finish Ocarina of Time, and start/finish Four Swords, and Wind Waker... oh, and Link's Awakening and the Oracle games...and The Minish Cap...damn, that is quite a bit of catching up to do. What have I been doing with my life? Certainly it seems that I have not been playing enough video games.

Anyway, we are back to having a grown-up, ass-kicking, horse-riding Link and I am quite excited.

In other 'Tendo news, they will also be releasing info on their "Next Generation" sytem the Nintendo Revolution (Revolution, XBox 360 - come on guys, a little originality, please). There are rumours (scroll down half way) but, again, the real news will come out next week. One way or the other, I imagine it will be pretty awsome and those devilish bastards will make me part with another $500, sometime around the middle of 2006.
rgsc

Starkey Rides Again (for the first time)

2005-04-30T12:04:00.000-04:00

While it was a bit strange reading things out of order, with character’s future events influencing your reading of what happened to them before instead of the other way around, Colin Bateman’s first outing with reporter Dan Starkey was another excellent and engaging read. While not a book that will change your outlook on life, it very well may make you laugh our loud and keep you turning the pages. Filled with witty bits, gritty bits, drunken bits, tragic bits, sexy bits, this book has just about all you could want. Here is our hero:

When I was thirteen I woke up in the middle of the night and found my brother pissing in my typewriter case. I decided there and then that there must be something wonderful about alcohol. As my artistic interest grew I discovered that many of my heroes had had impassioned affairs with what my old da referred to as the devil's vomit: Brendan Behan, Dylan Thomas, George Best, Pete Townshend. It had not adversely affected any of them, with the exception of the first two, whom it killed

It was the most natural thing in the world for me to hit the pub as soon as I finished lunch. My embarrassment with the chopsticks needed diluting.

In this book, Dan has a bit of an affair with Margaret, a geology student, which gets him kicked out of his house. Margaret gets murdered and his wife, Patricia, kidnapped and Starkey is left to run from the police, the IRA, the UVF, and everyone in between. With the help from a visiting American reporter, a stripper who dresses as a nun and drives a crappy red Mini but is really a student nurse, a Catholic priest with a Protestant heart (Father Flynn, who plays a key role in “Turbulent Priests”), and a politician who is pretty much a shoe-in to become the next Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, Starkey is able to sort out what is going on, save himself, his wife, and even his country.

The only two things I remembered from the movie were perhaps the two most important bits – what “Divorcing Jack,” the dying words of Margaret and what happens in the end. While the suspense was a bit diluted, there was enough going on that kept me reading to find out how Dan would solve the mystery and how things would work out in the end. So, I repeat my earlier sentiments. Looking for a good, but not too taxing read? Colin Bateman is your man.

Now I just have to get my hands on the second and fourth books in the series ("Of Wee Sweetie Mice and Men" and "Shooting Sean", as I have (read) the third and have the fifth, "A Horse with My Name") which no library in the city seems to have.
rgsc

The most hated of all objects

2005-04-24T19:35:00.000-04:00

I hate getting up. I really, really, 99.99% would rather stay in bed. Of course, I know I have to get up. That I can't spend my hole life in bed. But it is so nice and warm there...

My friend, Will, spent the first two weeks or so of his first year at university in bed. His rationale was that it was easier to stay in his room and sleep than deal with life. While seemingly correct, at least in the short run, it certainly is no way to deal with reality and I do not endorse this type of lifestyle.

I know I have to get up out of bed and face the world, but at that moment when the alarm goes off I really would rather just roll over. I tend to direct all my scorn at my alarm clock. "I hate you and your noise," I think and possibly mumble. I do all the things that one shouldn't do when attempting to wake up - especially hit the snooze button. Perhaps I could use a Clocky. Perhaps that would help the cause.

On Thursday I went to the Garden City for work. It seems almost inevitable that I forget something when I go away for any length of time. Hopefully it is something unimportant or that can be done without. Even though I reminded myself to pack my alarm clock, in my early morning rush to get my shit together and get out the door I forgot it. No big deal, there will be a clock in the room I am staying in, right? All too right. The clock there was the dreaded, windup type - you know, with the bells and no snooze. I despise these clocks.

They are exceptionally effective at what they do, granted. I stopped that ringing lickety-split. And while I felt I could have used a snooze button for a few more blissful minutes in bed I got out and got ready. My real issue was the ticking. All night:
tickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktick

How on earth do people live with these things? It is enough to drive a person mad. I don't think I would have made it though the night without my tape-player and headphones. When I woke up in the middle of the night I would have to flip the tape because I don't think I would have been able to get to sleep without the Smashing Pumpkins drowning out the sound of the clock. As much as I dislike my clock, I loathe this one. I could hear it down the hallway, as I approached the room I was sleeping in. I looked at it from the doorway and cursed its existence.

I survived the two nights with the clock. I guess there are different degrees of alarm clock evilness. Mine is run-of-the-mill evil. I tangled with the diabolical and managed to get away not too much the worse for wear. I am pretty sure that I will not forget my clock next time.
rgsc

Inciting insurrection amongst the rabbits

2005-04-24T06:04:00.000-04:00

I didn't even have the change to add it to my "Currently reading" list on the sidebar, but I have finished Turbulent Priests by Colin Bateman. This is the third book starring the intrepid, smart-mouthed, alcoholic, journalist and "international man of inaction" Dan Starkey. I picked the book up off my shelf quickly, not knowing that this is the third book (the first being "Divorcing Jack," which as you can see from the side I am currently reading, but I saw the movie ages ago - which I enjoyed) but the novel certainly stands on its own, although now that I know I imagine there are some references to the earlier novels that would have made some of the relationships a touch clearer.

This book follows Dan to the small Northern Irish island community of Wrathlin (aka Rathlin) where he is investigating reports that the Messiah has been born in the form of a girl named Christine. Naturally, hilarity ensues, but it is a dark humour of the fiercest kind. Bateman is exceptionally witty and frequently busts out some great wordplay; the comedy undercuts the harsh realities of the story without undermining it.

If you are looking for a funny, addictive, quick read - perfect for buses/planes/subways/those days when you don't feel like thinking too hard about anything - I would recommend this book or probably anything else by Bateman (I have also read "The Cycle of Violence", excellent as well, although NOT part of the Dan Starkey series as a number of sites have listed). Oh, and be sure to ignore the blurb on the back of "Turbulent Priests": it makes it sound pretty lame (at least the Harper Collins paperback that I have) and just trust that it is much, much better than the blurb (and this little review, I am sure) make it out to be.

"A Record Entry" and other fun with anagrams

2005-04-19T13:42:00.000-04:00

Today I am playing with anagrams (it is actually a work thing, not just a time waster, although it is that too - I am trying to figure out the cryptic meaning behind the name of an old park in Kingston where the hospital was built - rumour has it that the name is an anagram or acrostic or something). I put in my name (first and last) and here are some of the better entries - although there are a bazillion so I didn't read through each and every one of them:
"A record entry," "A rectory nerd," "A cry to render," "Ardency retro," "Traced ornery," and "Ace nerd or try."

For Laura (last name only, too many nonsensical with your full name) - "Tear Spill"
For Mark, no too many - "Ask Mrs. Rum"
For Danielle (first name only)- "Lead Line".

'spose I should get back to it.
rgsc

"Blind but seeing"

2005-04-18T20:54:00.000-04:00

After what seems to have been a very long time, I finally finished Jose Saramago's Blindess. This is the first in his cycle of allegorical works (as opposed to his historical novels), which have since been followed by All the Names, The Cave, and, most recently, The Double. In this extraordinary novel, the world's population, we are to believe, has been stricken with a "white blindness," the whole world with the exception of one woman, around whom the narrative more or less centres. She is the only witness to the depravations, indignities, and the utter chaos into which the world has plunged after only a short period of time. We follow the "doctor's wife" (none of the characters are given names; they are known only by some distinguishing feature or trait) as she leads a small group of those afflicted early in the pandemic, attempting to ensure that they not only survive the ordeal, but make it through with their humanity intact. Not an easy task.

While some have suggested that it the book can be looked at as a "magic realist" fantasy, along the lines of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, this book is an allegory. While there is a great deal of ambiguity about Saramago's intentions - details about the exact temporal and geographic setting are leftout, the best we can guess is that it takes place in an affluent, Western city, some time in the latter part of the 20th Century - but knowing a little about his personal politics (a card-carrying Communist), which informs his work certainly leads us to a slightly better understanding. In his own words:

Blindness is a metaphor for the blindness of human reason. This is a blindness that permits us, without any conflict, to send a craft to Mars to examine rock formations on that planet while at the same time allowing millions of human beings to starve on this planet. Either we are blind, or we are mad.(Interview in The Paris Review)

Like All the Names (and, as I understand it) other works, this book is not devoid of hope. Even when it seems that there is no hope for humanity, there are those who struggle to keep their dignity, their humanity, and to struggle to help those who are most dependent.

I highly recommend this book. Don't get put off by the stream-of-consciousness style of writing Saramago employs - with the dialogue of multiple parties in the same, large paragraphs and divided only with commas and capital letters. You will quickly get used to it and you will get caught up in the story and in the exceptional way it is told. Then go and read All the Names which, in my opinion, is even better.
rgsc

Seven thoughts in lieu of a full recap

2005-04-12T23:42:00.000-04:00

Well, since Mark pretty much gave the lowdown on our weekend of fun in the Big City, with pictures no less, I thought I would just hit the highlights with a few thoughts:

1 - Preparing for the Revolution
As usual, we were very well fed and adequately sauced throughout the weekend. The Boris (and other less revolutionary but equally tasty beverages) was free-flowing and we were treated to Mark's culinary skills with the likes of southwestern tofu sammidges, Toad-in-the-hole (that's right Mark- "Toad" but I will admit that a traditional toad-in-the-hole is made with sausages and yorkshire pudding, the egg/bread one is a bastardized version), and curried hashbrowns, and a wicked salad and "doubles" by Danielle. More good stuff was found at Mt. Everest and the Vegan place on Baldwin and, of course, the local watering hole (with or without toads)

2 - The really big shew
What prompted our latest sojourn to Toronto was the Constantines/"Better"thans show. While we missed the two openers, the two main acts were pretty damn good. The Constantines rocked real hard - very high energy - and I thought put on an excellent show (but they didn't play "Blind Luck" what's with that?). Although the bassist was pretty creepy. Weakerthans were also very good. Not great, perhaps (the show they played in Kingston last summer was, in my humble opinion, better. It did benefit from a guest performance by Sarah Harmer so that may have tipped the scale for me) but certainly nothing to complain about - we had dinner with Foucault and lost the cat in the impending class-war (good thing we had our Boris'!) - so it was a pretty full evening.

3 - Dancing on Bloor, Wu Li style
A memorable event of the night was Mark's exegesis on the nature of matter in the universe while walking back from the concert. He explained how the new physics with the particles and the waves and "the wrathfulness and the vengeance and the bloodrain and the 'hey hey hey it hurts me'" (and so forth), was really only a rehash of Buddhist philosophies. At the most essential level, everything is one and the same, things only exist as they are upon observation and we alter things by observing them (by the way, I remembered the name of the "tree in the courtyard" philosopher - it was Berkeley) etc. While he was not the first to say such things but it is nevertheless interesting. And more than a bit impressive given the hour and the amount of booze he consumed up to that point.

4 - There is some hope for the world (or, why is this stuff not on the market yet?
While not without a number of problems, the Massive Change exhibit had its fair share of interesting and enlightening aspects. All I have to say is that, judged on the products shown in the exhibit, Dean Kamen and his DEKA research outfit are doing stuff right. While the world may be going to hell in a handbasket, with people like him, there is still some hope alive. As far as exhibit design goes, it was uniquely set up, if not always successful. Of particular note was the blank white room that opened up to a room that was chock-full of images: everything but the ceiling, including the floors and benches had images on them. While startling at first, it was a gallery that paid off with attention to the individual bands as you could begin to pick out the meaning of some or all in that 'spectrum'. By and large it was devoid of text - which while it would have interfered with the overall effect, would certainly have helped answer the "what the hell is that" question (I see that the website goes into quite a bit of detail explaining the different imaging technologies, but I wish I had a little more on-site). It is an ambitious, problematic, tiring, but worthwhile exhibit.

5 - I'm OK, You're Karaoke
Alright, that was lame. But the singing wasn't. A cramped, hot room did not do any damage to vocal stylings of the ex-FISers and their significant others. Highlights: rousing renditions of more crap '80s tunes than you can shake a stick at. Lowlights: my version of I am the Walrus. Thankfully only Danielle heard it; although I am sure she will forever be scarred when she hears the words "Goo goo g' joob".

6 - Terrible, just terrible!
Why am I so bad at Metroid? Mark kicked my ass all over the spacestation. Ugh. Freaking awful.

7 - It was a beeee-utiful day in the neighborhood
A sunday walk in Christie Pits, what could be finer?

All in all a very fun (and full) weekend. Thanks yet again to our hosts. Can't wait 'till the next time.
rgsc

A kick ass weekend...

2005-04-11T11:33:00.000-04:00

...that kicked my ass.

We had a rocking good time in Toronto, as usual, thanks very much to the efforts of our hosts Danielle and Mark. So thanks guys, you rule.

Gotta go find a rock to crawl under and die for a day or two.

(Late night X 2) + booze^3 + very early monday morning = 1 tired kid.

More later.

rgsc

My So-Called South Park Life

2005-04-05T14:22:00.000-04:00

Me as a South Park character

Have you ever asked yourself "What would my friends and I look like if we were on South Park?" It seems my friends Ian has. You can see the result. Pretty damn sweet if you ask me.

You, too, can star in South Park if you follow the yellow-brick road to The South Park Studio.

Muchos gracias to Ian for passing his creations along.
rgsc

Who is the Fattest Cat in the Land?
	T.Dot Dodger aka "The Doodge"
	The Kingston Killer - Pork "Fatty McFatterson" Chop

Free polls from Pollhost.com