Winter = Time for Brain Volleyball

First snow! It got very wintry very fast this afternoon as a moderate rain turned into huge psychedelic snowflakes that freaked everyone out by covering first their heads and then the roads. Visibility was near zero and traction somewhere in the negatives around the time people got off work. Buses were stopped in lines along the side of the road. The food court in the mall couldn't contain all the folks who'd thought they'd just grab a quick bite while they waited out the worst of it. Of course, then it started to rain and the streets REALLY turned into a slushy mess. Alison documented the high key splendour out the back window, while Buster settled in for an evening in the scarf and mitten bench.





I played a show with the legendary Al Tuck at Gus' Pub on Friday night, and it went very well thank you, despite the fact that I'd never learned about half the songs he chose to play. Maybe that should be "because of," come to think of it. There's something pretty satisfying about learning a song onstage and getting through it all right while maintaining a certain sensitivity to what the other guitar and percussion are doing. I'm sure my own excitement about that and intense concentration came across in the overall performance. Too bad some lady was talking loudly on her cell phone through most of the show.

Gus' was completely non-smoking that night, as it will be I guess from now on. They've just passed a law here, effective December 1, that there's no smoking in ANY public place, which includes out on a sidewalk if you're within like 40m of a commercial doorway. As I think I said before, that's some pretty tough love, aka paternalism. If you know Gus' at all, or if you've ever been in any old man hardcore beer hall that has only recently become a place where indie rock kids can enjoy the irony of seeing their favourite bands there, then you know how strange it was to look into the VLT room/smoquarium and actually see the people sitting around in there, empty-handed, watching the show through the glass, not to mention breathe comfortably. Of course, people were going outside and back in so much that the front door was left open the entire first night in Gus' history that it would have been preferable to keep it closed. It was right comical.

And speaking of people trying to control the addictive behaviour of other people, my dad and I have been debating long and windily about that very subject while ostensibly playing an email chess match. It started with what I thought to be only a mildly provocative remark about the evils of advertising (my chosen pact with the devil), and has escalated, via the related subject of people sometimes not knowing what they want or wanting what they don't want to want, into a full-scale polemic on free will, responsibility, and the nature of the individual. Doesn't everything. The major sticking point seems to be about how much of a person's behaviour we should count as choice, which is why I selected the particular piece of music I did for this post, although honestly besides the "choose to choose" stuff I really have no idea what the hell Lou Reed's talking about in it. But it sure is cool. Goes nicely with the snow, too.

Anyway, this debate definitely has an air of My Dinner with Andre about it, with yours truly taking the titular role (i.e. Andre Gregory) as the interesting but probably a little too kooky idealist, and my dad as a less lisping but just as bemused and possibly not entirely comprehending "me" (i.e. Wallace Shawn). My Email with Andrew, as I'm therefore referring to the whole belligerent mess, is making for a very slow chess game. At least from my end.

Finally, we saw Borat on the weekend. It was worth the wait. Unbelievably funny and gutsy and really probably too over the top. I'd say almost definitely, actually. But hilarious. My favourite part was when he sings the phony Kazakhi national anthem to the tune of the American one at a rodeo in the south. Check it out if you hate political correctness and believe poop and naked men wrestling will always be appropriate comic fodder. And really, who doesn't?

- Andrew