Barkerburgh

A few months back, my friend Greg, a guitarist with a flair for the above mentioned Rock’n Roll with a heavy metal bent, went to Toronto’s Necropolis cemetery for some moody album cover shots.

I was the art director and photographer. Greg brought his guitar.

I thought the cemetery closed at 8:30pm but they had just changed the closing time to 6:00pm for the winter, so when it began to rain and we decided to leave, we discovered we were locked in and had to climb over the high wrought iron gate in the rain.

Good times. Good times.

From Michael Moore’s Wednesday, November 5, 2008 newsletter:

“But today we celebrate this triumph of decency over personal attack, of peace over war, of intelligence over a belief that Adam and Eve rode around on dinosaurs just 6,000 years ago. What will it be like to have a smart president? Science, banished for eight years, will return. Imagine supporting our country’s greatest minds as they seek to cure illness, discover new forms of energy, and work to save the planet. I know, pinch me.”

Pinch him, not me.

Oh hell, pinch me too!

(Read the whole thing here.)

I freakin’ love this Discovery Canada commercial. It’s based on an American version but ours is better.

I find myself humming the tune at odd moments, and even ones too.

I sing along with it and laugh and clap, then prowl the airwaves searching for it just to hear it again. Now though, I’ve downloaded it to hear as often as I like until I am sick to freakin’ death of it.

Boom-di-yada!

(Added Thursday, September 25, 2008, 17:55:
wikipedia entry
xkcd: XKCD Loves The Discovery Channel)

Two things.

a> I’m very happy that Showcase (Rogers 39 in my neighbourhood) is now running the third season of the excellent hard science procedural drama ‘Regenesis’ ^{[wikipedia], [imdb]}.

2> I just finished a short story that I really like.

Seven words you won’t be able to say on TV anymore.

I will always laugh about Cardinal Glick.
(more…)

I’m just sayin’.

…while I was housesitting for Peter and Leslie. Go on. Guess! (more…)

I guess the title just says it. Except that there’s this - no, never mind.

I have recently reacquired copies of two of my favourite albums; Joni Mitchell’s 1985 album ‘Dog Eat Dog’ and Jennifer Warnes’ 1986 Leonard Cohen tribute album ‘Famous Blue Raincoat”.

Wow. Listening to these tracks after not hearing them for a few years is still visceral, still exciting and suddenly startling.

Why startling? Well, my situation is considerably different now from what it was in, say, late 2001. The music while still beautiful, means so much more. Email me and I’ll send you a breakdown. I dare you.

I’m listening to ‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ as I type this. ‘Bird on a Wire’ right now, as it happens.

Ah. Cohen’s poetry and Warnes’ voice.

Kill me now.

Well, not now. But you know, let me finish listening to the albums again. And I have a week of house-sitting to do involving feeding cats, and I have a doctor’s appointment on May the 8th, and some genetic counselling and testing in July, so kill me later. We should talk.

Laura invited me to join her on Thursday evening at the Princess of Wales Theatre to see “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, Part I”.

It was based on/cut down from the Royal Shakespeare Company’s stage version of Charles Dicken’s 1838-1839 serialized novel of the same name, minus the ‘Part I’. In 1980, the RSC produced a version that “lasted more than ten hours (counting intermissions and a dinner break - the actual playing time was approximately eight-and-a-half hours)”. This play, and Part II, which I will again be joining Laura to see, were condensed out of that first grand production. Both parts together are six hours, so we didn’t lose much.

In 1982, a miniseries of the production was produced and was later broadcast on America’s PBS. I remember it being on and being interested, but I didn’t watch it, and I don’t remember why. Maybe the length…

Laura, being a big fan, had lots of background on the original production and the original novel, and I enjoyed her sharing immensely.

Being unfamiliar with the story but for the very basics, I did some research on Wednesday about the novel and the stage presentation, which I had heard of, and was intrigued and impressed.

And just so I could catch up a little, I downloaded the Gutenberg text of the novel. I hope I can be prepared for Part II.

(Sometimes when I am really impressed or moved by a show like this, including a TV show or a cinematic movie, I tend to try and replay it in my mind, to think about the language or the imagery or the story, and maybe I have cool dreams. Well, I had cool dreams last night; I just can’t remember what they were - and I really wish I could.)