Music, Literature

So, I guess the most exciting thing that's happened recently is that we got a harpsichord. Wha-aat? Harpsichord? Did he say... I think I heard something about... (harpsichord, harpsichord, harpsichord) What're they all muttering about? I don't know -- something about a harp seal.


























Well, y'see, my friend Tim's grandmother recently passed away, and one of the things that was left to him was this you-know-what that his grandfather built(!) back in 1965. Unfortunately, Tim is living in Toronto now and the YKW was here, and had to be cleared out of his grandmother's apartment by the end of this month. So I am temporarily, indefinitely looking after it for him. It's a beaut, too, although it needs a lot of work as it hasn't been played in years. In fact neither Tim's grandfather nor his grandmother was a musician! His grandfather just really liked building things.

Luckily, he hung onto all the stuff you could ever possibly need to fix whatever could go wrong with it, so now I have a new hobby. It's actually a pretty simple mechanism and it sounds really cool, so it's gonna be a lot of fun. We just got it last night, thanks to Tim's friendly uncle David who drove it and me over to our place, and I've already put quite a bit of work into it -- restringing, re-plectruming, pluck-action adjusting, and tuning. Once it's up and running I'll definitely record something and put it on the old blog.

Of course, it's not as if I needed something else to keep myself occupied, but I seem to like having a lot of projects on the go at once, so I'm not gonna beat myself up over it. It's fun to be able to pick and choose what current fixation you're going to indulge, as long as you don't get overwhelmed by the sense of busy-ness or the fact that nothing's getting finished. For instance, here's a partial list of books I'm in the middle of:

David Bowman - This Must Be the Place: The Adventures of Talking Heads in the 20th Century, 3/4 finished. This one has the most hope of getting completed. I already told you how enjoyable it is.

Marcel Proust - Swann's Way, 1/3 finished. Really really good, but you have to be in the right mood. I'm getting there again.

Deepak Chopra - The Path to Love: Renewing the Power of Spirit in Your Life, 1/6 finished. I always get something out of Deepak, even though his new-agey vagueness generally bugs me now. I've already gotten some pretty great rethinking out of this book, so maybe I won't be compelled to finish it before it's due back at the library.

Anthony Lane - Nobody's Perfect: Writings from The New Yorker, maybe 1/20 finished. It's short pieces so I just pick it up and read one now and again. Charles loaned me this one.

Michael Chabon - The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, only through 2 chapters so far. Got this one at the same time as the Talking Heads bio, and it's fantastic. There's some kind of perverse saving thing going on here. I think I feel like I don't deserve to read more until I've finished something else.

LeRoy (Satchel) Paige, as told to David Lipman - Maybe I'll Pitch Forever, 2/3 finished. Satchel Paige was possibly the greatest baseball pitcher ever, but no one will ever know because most of his career was spent in the negro leagues where proper records were not kept. He's a wildly entertaining guy with some pretty interesting views on life which often inexplicably revolve around diet. I started this bio during softball season and was quite enjoying it, but after awhile started feeling like I wasn't going to get a whole lot more out of hearing about another shutout. Still plan on finishing it, though.

Michael Crichton - State of Fear, 2 chapters finished. This is that piece of garbage my boss loaned me. I really don't see how I'll ever finish it, but feel that I can't return it without trying. Interesting that I've made it as far through this book as Kavalier & Clay, which is probably the book I most want to read on this list. The authors also have very similar names. Weird.

David Hume - An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, 1/2 finished. I read this back in the old philosophy days, but wanted to read it again after my big argument with Johanna's dad over laws of nature and human knowledge. I must say it really does stand up as a highly readable piece of philosophy, which of course means it's still dry as a buzzard-picked bone by general literary standards.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. - Breakfast of Champions, 2/3 finished. A very easy read and lots of fun, I've been reading it out loud to Ali at bedtime a chapter at a time. But because we seem to keep going to bed late there's often not time for a reading. Plus there are crossword puzzles that aren't going to just do themselves.

F. David Peat - Synchronicity: The Bridge Between Mind and Matter, 1/3 finished. I think I told you about this one before. Another kooky new age book written by a science-minded guy, this one trying to unify ideas in quantum physics and Jungian psychology. Koo. Ky. Pretty interesting, though. Unfortunately, it's one of my lunchtime books, and I'm usually too embarassed to take it out in public, opting for the Talking Heads book instead.

Herman Melville - Moby Dick, 3/4 finished. Another bedtime story for Ali that we pick up for awhile and love, then stop loving so much and start something else, returning when we finish that. It's been going on for years now. I swear we will finish it. It really is fantastic, but, like the Proust, fantastic in a long-winded, nothing ever really happens kind of way.

And now, because this evening's yoga class was extra strenuous and not very well taught, forcing me to take a hot bath on which I hadn't counted, it's time for bed, which means no Vonnegut again tonight. Maybe tomorrow night, if the band practice doesn't go on too long and I can force myself to tape Martha without watching it.

Bonne nuit.
- Andrew

When I press the special key it plays a little melody.

Sorry, not much to say again. Or rather, you're welcome. Two hours of Trump tonight. If I stay up to watch it I deserve whatever punishment tomorrow sees fit to dole out.

-- Removed to free up memory for more pressing things. --
Here's a little tune I've been working on for the past few days. There's some poorly frankensteined together bits and it's going to have a rhythm track of some kind in places, but so far I think it's pretty neat.

- Andrew

Birthday Fun

Had a great time last night, thanks to everyone who came out. We played some pool, had a few beers, caught a little Al Tuck action... 'Twas a fine birthday celebration. Like a dolt, I didn't take any pictures, but luckily my friend Meg did. Here's the Chester + Company pool sharks at Dooley's.

- Andrew

It's the most crotchety time of the year.

We were supposed to go over to our friends Charles and Kelly's place tonight to hang out, play with their kids, and eat some cheese. I've been looking forward to it all week as I never seem to see them or really anyone else anymore these days unless it's for some specific purpose, like someone needs a Mr. Bean lookalike for a practical joke or something. Plus I really like cheese. Yum.

But this incredibly stupid Christmas parade happened this evening that I only half remembered about and it prevented our bus and hence us from travelling to the north end. Over an hour we waited in the freezing cold, which is actually less time than a lot of the parade-goers, who started showing up along the route at 4:30 for a 6:00 parade with their blankets and folding chairs and understandably crying kids. The whole thing was just a bunch of local stores and businesses renting trucks to cheaply and crappily advertise their existence. I really don't get the appeal.

And because the whole downtown was completely messed up traffic-wise, we couldn't get a cab either, unless we were willing to wait at least another hour. So no Charles, no cheese. Don't people realize there are plenty of commercials they can watch on TV? The best scene of the night was a woman yelling at her little boy, who was complaining that his uncovered hands were cold, "All right, fine, you can have my mittens!"

Anyway, sorry this blog is becoming such a crankfest lately. I'll write something cheery next time, I swear.

- Old Man Grumpus

Sympathy for the Hand Grenade

People in cars are trying to kill me. When I ride my bicycle to and from work, they keep pulling out right in front of me or veering suddenly into my lane. Sometimes two or more will team up, one parked guy opening his door suddenly while his partners whip by real close on the other side of the bike lane. I make them really mad on my clownish toy vehicle. I look like a child playing in traffic, and should therefore be taught a lesson. I might as well be on a pair of stilts. At least they could see me from farther away.

Meanwhile, pedestrians are trying to make me kill them. The other morning a man grabbed his four-year-old daughter's hand and pulled her, without looking, directly into my path. He continued not to notice me even as I struggled desperately to avoid hitting the very large target that the two of them formed and not fly over the curb and consequently my handlebars. He couldn't hear me. So I didn't exist. Except in the wide eyes of his daughter.

Some people do hear me, and even see me barreling straight for the spot into which they're considering stepping, and they go for it anyway. Even if I shake my head frantically and give them the wide-eyed crazy guy look. Even if I repeat the word "no" over and over, starting under my breath and quickly building to a berserk shriek. I don't fool them, because they know that to serve them the punishment they deserve would be to punish myself at least as severely. I have no power in this relationship.

Hence, I am caught between the sadistic and the masochistic deathwish. Those whose hatred will not be relieved solely by my destruction would utilize me in their own, destroying me in the process.

- Andrew

The guilt, the guilt.

Anyone to whom I owe email(s): Thanks so much for your nice words. Yes, I am a terrible person. No, I haven't written you off. Please be patient with me. You deserve better than what I seem capable of at any given time. Matt, Jeff, Tim, I'm looking at you guys.

Anyone wishing I would post on this blog more often: Screw ya, whaddya think I am, your own private entertainment machine or something? Just kidding. You're absolutely right.

Unfortunately there hasn't been too much to write about. It's getting colder so we're staying in and watching movies more, or rather TV shows collected on DVDs. Just finished the second season of "Arrested Development", which was as always way too funny for it's own good. Also, last week, the first and I think only season of "Undeclared", because we knew Matt was going to be watching it too. It was made by the same people as "Freaks and Geeks" and was just about as good. I had seen one or two episodes when it was on TV, but I'd forgotten that the main character's dad was played by Loudon Wainwright (Rufus's funnier and more talented father). That was a nice bonus.

I'm a little sick of Donald and Martha, but will of course continue to watch them anyway. I think I'll start taping them, though, so I don't have to stay up late. Oh yeah, and we added another drinking game phrase: "presentation" (but only when they pronounce it PREE-zen-TAY-shun).

- Andrew

The News

This just in... local aging bohemians Andrew and Alison have reportedly joined a gym. The full reason is not yet known, though there is speculation that regular yoga classes at a similar cost to those being considered elsewhere are a probable partial influence. Rumours that the two will also be taking advantage of cardiovascular- and muscle-enhancing equipment can be neither confirmed nor denied. Opinions are varied as to just what this surprising turn of affairs means. While some pundits express skepticism that this is anything more than a short-lived bid for attention, others see it as the couple's first irreversible step into the realm of yuppiedom.

Yeah, so we went last night for an orientation session, and then early this morning for an elliptical workout. Seems pretty fun so far. There are TV's on different channels and if you bring headphones you can hear the sound and watch while you're working out. I got to see some music videos, which I don't get to at home because we don't have cable. Alison thinks we should check out when things are on that we want to watch but don't get and exercise then. I'm worried someone will show a good movie or a hockey game and I'll end up accidentally killing myself on the treadmill.

We also went to a yoga class on Saturday, which is how we got sucked into signing up. The class was really good, taught by a super nice Japanese lady named Michi who looks exactly like Dora the Explorer. She says "please" before every instruction and gives you a nice little parable-type thing to meditate on at the end of the class. We were psyched afterwards, and then they took us in this little tiny room and gave us the hard sell exactly as if we were at a car dealership. Pretty weird. But it does seem like a good deal, and we can keep signing up a month at a time so there's no long term soul-selling going on. Installment afterlife.

The other thing I wanted to tell you about was a movie we watched a couple of weeks ago now. It's called Palindromes, and it's directed by Todd Solondz, the same guy who did Happiness and Welcome to the Dollhouse. Like those films, it's about as black as comedy can get, while also telling the uncomfortably realistic stories of some uncomfortably sympathetic characters. I.e., it is awesome.

The story is about a 13-year old girl who wants to have a baby, so she gets pregnant and is coerced into an abortion by her parents. Not realizing that the doctor was forced to give her a hysterectomy, she runs away from home so that she may continue trying to have a baby. Of course she meets some sketchier than sketchy characters on the road and it's all very creepy and full of hilariously over the top pathos. Typical Solondz plot.

But the really out-there thing in this one is that the main character is played by a series of different actors who are different ages, races, and even genders. I'm still not exactly sure what the reason is behind that, except that one of the key thematic questions in the film is whether people can ever really change. There's also, I think, a point being made about the way others' perceptions of us affect our own self-image.

Finally, it's a loose sequel to Welcome to the Dollhouse, as this girl is related to the Weiners. Poor Dawn.

All in all, I give it two hyperextended thumbs up. Check it out.

- Andrew

Later you'll hear all the news!

We are busy 'round here, more than usual it seems. Blogging's taken a hit. Here's a cute pic to add something new to look at and later, we'll talk about shid.

-Ali

Which one will he finish first?

-- Imagine listening to "The Book I Read" by the Talking Heads as you read this. It was here, but I removed it to free up some of my limited space for sound files. --

Probably the last thing in the world I need to do is start another book, but I picked up the Talking Heads biography This Must Be the Place at this fantastic book store in Wolfville on the weekend and now I can't put it down. The guy's writing took some getting used to; actually, at first I thought he might be mildly retarded or something. His sentences are very short and he often says things that seem to be leading somewhere, but then moves immediately on to something else. But now I'm appreciating that I never have to spend a lot of time on stories I've already heard. And the unpredictability is quite exhilerating.

Actually, I just started another book, too. I think I'm in the middle of about twenty-five books right now. This one was loaned to me by my boss so that I might have my mind expanded. It's a grocery store piece of trash by Michael Crichton, of Jurassic Park fame, in which bio-terrorists use people's ("unfounded") fears about the unsustainable nature of our culture to wreak some sort of havoc or other. Even though it's a novel, it's all full of footnotes and lecturing about the "facts" on global warming, or rather the lack thereof. Mr. Chrichton believes we're all fools for worrying about what we are doing to the earth, as people have been worrying about that for centuries and nothing has happened yet. What is with this new use of the novel to espouse crackpot conspiracy theories? It's pretty annoying.

If he either a) didn't have such a history of embarassing misunderstandings when it comes to science, or b) could write, I might be able to get into the book on some level. Instead, I have to slog through many many pages of truly awful prose so I can talk informedly about the global warming conspiracy with my boss. At least it's really easy to read. You can skip every second sentence and not miss anything.

- Andrew

Weekend Snaps

I'm sitting here with Buster on my lap and he's making it very hard to type by pinning my arm to the chair, but I don't even mind 'cause he's being so sweet and I've just been going through all the photos we took in Wolfville on the weekend and remembering what a nice time it was. Still, if Buster had thumbs I bet he'd be some kind of master thumb-wrestler of Guinesian proportions. I fixed a bunch of those photos up for you to eyeball, so here they are.

This one I actually took a couple of weekends ago in Halifax, but I've been meaning to adjust the colour on it so's it'd be suitable for viewing.


This is the super-quaint but really nice room we stayed in at Victoria's Historic Inn. It was very olde and fancye.


We took a walk along the tracks that run between the town and the natural dykes that protect it from tidal flooding. Here's some of the nice scenery we seen.







I was going to write some more, but Martha's about to start. Remind me to tell you about this really great movie we saw the other night. Cheers!

- Andrew

Boo! :c (Supposed to be a vampire.)

Happy Hallowe'en, everybody. Ali and I had a really nice time in Wolfville and we'll probably post some pictures on here when we have more time. But first, here's a not very spooky little tune we created from scratch in the practice space tonight and recorded on my scrappy little dictaphone.

[It's gone now. It was pretty scrappy, and not very spooky. Seriously.]

Could become something decent, I think.

We're rereading Breakfast of Champions now 'cause we were in the mood for something light, and I'm happy to say it's held up pretty well. Very amusing and eerily relevant thirty-something years later. Hmmph.

OK, here's one photo from Wolfville that Ali worked on today. It kind of goes with the kind of spooky song.

Later.

- Andrew

Plans, Pipe Dreams, and Just Plain Irresponsible Brain Cell Use

As you may or may not know, Hallowe'en is the anniversary of Alison's and my first meeting, which was at a costume party in Montreal 11 years ago. I was Gilligan, and I lucked into a perfect cross between Mary-Anne and Ginger, with absolutely no Mrs. Howell. So to celebrate that blessed event we're going to Wolfville this weekend and staying in the same inn we stayed in last year at this time. I've been working like crazy with next to no free time so I'm really looking forward to it. Ali's actually going to be helping to shoot a wedding in Wolfville most of Saturday, which is how the whole thing got planned, but that's fine with me. It'll give me plenty of time to catch up on my Sudokus and maybe pass the halfway point in Swann's Way. And as Alison points out, there'll be no computers or telephones around.

OK, so did anyone else watch The Apprentice last night? What th' aitch? How could he just go and fire four people at once? Doesn't that mean the show will be three episodes short now? And what's with "step up"? When did everyone start saying that? We've added it to the drinking game for a more rollicking time. "At the end of the day, Jennifer M. just really needs to step up to the plate." Sheesh!

By the way, we finally made it into the practice space on Monday, and it was pretty fun. The Microkorg is our unimaginative if temporary drummer for now. I'm working on some jammable basslines to teach Ali for next time, but eventually I really want to try putting together some kind of long, slowly evolving, repetitious and modal keyboard piece in the style of Philip Glass's "Music in Twelve Parts". I'd like to out-serialize Stereolab. Might be kind of hard to do effectively with only two people playing at once, though. We'll see.

I've added another magazine website to our links: Make Magazine. I heard about it on CKDU because they were giving away a subscription to it as a prize during their funding drive. It's pretty cool, in a very extended sense of the word. Scrappy projects for bohemian techno-geeks. Definitely worth checking out.

And that's how I've been wasting my time lately. How about you?

- Andrew

The Nature of Things.

Today, downtown, there was a young owl in a tree nearby my office. People came in to tell me and Shirley about it. Of course we had to go check it out and take pictures! I only had my little digital so you can't see it too well. As we were watching him some crows started ganging up on the poor little guy...they were making a racket and flying at him and trying to either boot him out of the tree or hit him or something. It was horrible to watch...so we left. Shirley had to go on a job anyway and I couldn't stand to witness anything more brutal. I hope he's okay. Maybe his mom swooped in and saved the day. That's how it'll end in my mind anyway.

Puppy!

Okay, so I'm a sucker for the all the little fuzzy creatures in the world. Everyone knows this. As soon as I sat down at the hair salon the other day, the owner came over and plopped this into my lap! I went snap happy after that. Her name is Lola, btw. -Ali




Stay still Lola! Lola...Lola! Lola?

We have no phone again!

This is getting pretty annoying. I really wanted to call birthday people tonight, and especially to wish Mom & Dad a bon voyage, since they're leaving tomorrow. We'll have to finish our chess game later I guess, Dad. I can't see any quick way to end it, besides losing which could easily be accomplished in one move.

I'm hooked on Sudoku puzzles these days. Has anyone tried them? It's a 9x9 grid divided into 9 3x3 grids, with a few numbers from 1 to 9 filled in in spaces here and there. You have to figure out where all the other numbers go so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains each number once and only once. Eri, I think you especially would like them, because they're pretty similar to those logic problems I remember you used to be really into.

Have to go design a Xmas card now. It's a competition at work to see who comes up with the best one, and they're due tomorrow. I haven't started yet and I have to be in bed in an hour to go in early in the morning. Feels like high school, except without that nice free period I would always schedule for first thing in the morning. Wish me luck!

- Andrew

Just so everyone knows

We are still alive and in reasonable mental health and no one is holding a gun to our head making us type this with our temporarily unhandcuffed hands. And he doesn't have a moustache and a Felix the Cat earring in his left ear either. We just haven't had any any time, I don't really know why. And then our phone was out all day Sunday from the poor weather, so we couldn't even call people. So happy birthday, Dad, Eri, and Jason. I hope you guys had a real swell time. Ali tells me there's pix on the St. Louis blog, which I'm going to check out right after this though I really should be in bed.

We went into the practice space, by the way, tonight. Pretty fun scrappy jamming. I think the other people in the space assumed we had ceased to exist, because our stuff was pretty much buried and there was no space left in which we might play. Kinda smelled bad, too. Here's a picture of Ali rocking out and a movie of me getting down. I don't know why these movies always turn out so dark; they look alright on the camera's screen. Whatever, man.

- Andrew

Trees!

There are so many trees in this city and I love them all. I walked around a little yesterday on my way to and from the dentist and took a few snaps. These two are my favourites. (ali)

Hmm... no real theme I can discern here. Suggestions?

Boy, do I ever need a haircut. It's getting to be windy-rainy-Turneresque-sky season and my mane does not look so good in that kind of weather when it gets moppy. I'm a little vain, yes. But luckily I thought to take a picture of how I like it to look so I can show it to Krista and make her job that much easier:


I'm looking for a cheap mp3 player right now so that I can take rhythm parts from songs I've recorded, copy them from the computer onto it, and use it as a robot drummer for Our Igloo. The band that we went to see on Saturday, Hexes and Ohs, did a similar thing with a laptop and I was worried that they would make my idea redundant, but they actually had quite a lot pre-recorded and played a style of music that was quite a bit more "fascistic," for want of a better term, than what I've been imagining. More electronic-based, I guess. I want to keep it pretty scrappy and folky, and not at all become a slave to the recording. So any old player will do, as long as it's not the kind that can only play in "shuffle" mode, as that would be a little bit more anarchic than what I'm planning.

Here's a picture I took of Ali tonight when we went out for a walk. The moon was full and really pretty in the thick clouds, but by the time I could get the camera to work it had gone behind the clouds completely. I didn't want to use the flash and didn't have a tripod or anything, so that's why it's so blurry. I still like it though. The bright lights in the background are the oil refinery. The not as bright lights are the mental hospital. The really dim bulb in the sky is the moon. (The one behind the camera is me.)

- Andrew

Peechers

Documentary-style post. Weather here is crap but life is good. There are a whole lot of pictures that we've been wanting to put on here, so I'm gonna mostly clam up and let the pixels do the talking. Let me just say Ali and I went out for lunch, we visited our friend Krista whose cat is named Ralph, Flat Bunny had a nap, we went to see a two-person-and-a-laptop band called Hexes and Ohs who were thankfully nothing like Our Igloo despite identical instrumentation, I played chess with my friend Steve (and won!), we caught a bus home in the rain with our groceries, and we had our usual laundry and brunch this very very windy morning. Been a busy weekend.

- Andrew

OK, one more...

I almost forgot -- then some anonymous person's pets went apeshit in their hallway.

- Andrew