It’s hard to believe that this year will mark a decade for me of attending the annual South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas. I started in 2001 by attending just the Interactive festival, and that’s still the core of what interests me, but over the years, I’ve extended my stay and now take in film screenings and panels and as much free music (along with beer and food) as I can squeeze in. One of my traditions has been to make a mix CD each year of songs that have meant something to me in the previous 12 months. I used to make about 20-30 copies on CD and then give them out in person each year. It was a nice way of reinforcing the connections I’d made and giving a small token of friendship to some of my new pals. But each year, it got more onerous to create something that most people would end up ripping to their hard drives anyway. The only place most people play CDs these days is in their cars, and I expect that’s changing, too.

So, this year, behold the mighty .m4a compilation! It has album artwork and everything. All that’s missing are the liner notes, which I’m going to provide for you right here. You don’t need to be attending SXSW to download and enjoy this 10th annual SXSW edition of Compilation Champs. But if you are, make sure you say hello if you see me. In any case, please let me know what you think about the songs. I love putting this together each year and writing a little bit about music, which I don’t do often enough.

You can stream the whole thing by hitting the play button, but it works best as a download, so go ahead and click that link (or the image).

Duration: 48:00
Download .m4a file (67.8 MB)

1. Intro – The XX (2009, from the album XX): I named this my Album of the Year for 2009 and this song does indeed make for a perfect “intro” to the rest. The XX sound to me a bit like what would have happened if Young Marble Giants had listened to more James Brown growing up. Minimalistic dance music that’s both cool and hot at the same time.
2. Shadow – Delta 5 (c. 1979-1981, from the album Delta 5: Singles and Sessions 1979-1981): I only recently discovered the amazing Delta 5 after watching a documentary about the history of Rough Trade Records in the UK. This unique band had two bass players and were at the forefront of the feminist and anti-racist movements. Plus they’re from Leeds, home of one of my all-time favourite bands, The Wedding Present.
3. Blessed Brambles – Múm (2007, from the album Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy): My fascination with Icelandic music continues, and with Múm’s in particular. There’s a mechanical sound to their music that reminds me of sewing machines: industrial and yet homey at the same time.
4. My Love Life – Morrissey (1991, from the EP Morrissey at KROQ): An old favourite from the tail end of my college days. A plaintive plea for sympathy, and who couldn’t use “a little something” for our love lives?
5. Overground – Siouxsie and the Banshees (1978, from the album The Scream): Stark and cool, this song is from the band’s very first record. Despite being criticized at the time for their lack of musicianship, I find the stripped down sound enervating and kind of epic, actually.
6. I’m Confused – Handsome Furs (2009, from the album Face Control): In a lucky accident, I stumbled into a show by this husband-and-wife duo at last year’s SXSW. I couldn’t believe how energetic they could be with just a guitar and a keyboard. It pleased me that they’re Canadian, from Montreal, but it’s strange that I haven’t really listened all that much to Dan Boeckner’s other band, Wolf Parade.
7. Time for Heroes – The Libertines (2002, from the album Up the Bracket): Another discovery from the Rough Trade Records documentary. I’d only ever heard of Pete Doherty as the drug-addled boyfriend of Kate Moss. His most recent band, Babyshambles, never crossed my radar at all, but listening to The Libertines makes his subsequent troubles all the more sad.
8. Hell Yeah (Pimp the System) – Dead Prez (2004, from the album RBG: Revolutionary But Gangsta): Dead Prez impressed the hell out of me in the film Dave Chappelle’s Block Party, and so I went looking for more from them. This song is powerful enough to both frighten me and make me see things from the other side. Muggings and fraud are survival tactics, but there’s also a thrill, that of “pimping the system” that tries to keep you down.
9. The Major Lift – Years (2009, from the album Years): Years is a side project from the impossibly-named Ohad Benchetrit, multi-instrumentalist for Do Make Say Think. It was the horn section in this particular song that grabbed me, especially the tuba, which is a bird seldom-heard in most of my music.
10. A Prophecy – Close Lobsters (1987, from the album Foxheads Stalk This Land): Scottish band Close Lobsters were part of the C-86 “movement” spawned by a compilation put out by the NME. Though they weren’t prolific, this entire album is a treasure chest of jangly goodness. I have no idea why the song speeds up at the end, but I sort of like that it does.
11. Footsteps – Bricolage (2009, from the album Bricolage): This Glasgow band seem to be mining the same territory as Postcard Records acts like Orange Juice and Josef K, which is just fine by me. If I had actually heard this album last year, it might have been my album of the year. Also, what is it about Scottish bands that compels them to make electric guitars sound like something else? First it was Big Country making guitars sound like bagpipes, and now on this song, Bricolage give the guitars a steel drum feeling. Or am I crazy?
12. Broken Rifle – Evening Hymns (2009, from the album Spirit Guides): Closer to home this time. Evening Hymns is essentially Jonas Bonetta, from tiny Orono, Ontario. Over the years I’ve introduced a few people to some great Canadian music, and I hope this year it might be this lovely song that reaches you.
13. Peach, Plum, Pear – Joanna Newsom (2004, from the album The Milk-Eyed Mender): I had heard OF Joanna Newsom for quite a while but had never heard her music until the closing credits of a short film called City Paradise, which featured “Peach, Plum, Pear.” It worked so well there that I’m stealing the idea here for my own “closing credits.”

I have no way of determining how many people download the compilation this year, so if you’ve read this far, would you mind just dropping a comment to say Hi after clicking the download link? Of course, it would be great if you came back to tell me what you thought of the music, too.

from Consolation Champs

SXSW 2010: Compilation Champs

cross-posted from Toronto Screen Shots

On Wednesday, my wife Brooke and I will be flying to Iceland for the fifth edition of the Reykjavik International Film Festival. We’re staying for the entire duration of the festival, which runs from September 25th through October 5th, and in addition to seeing films, we’ll be doing some sightseeing. We’ve rented a car for the entire time, and are hoping to see as much as we can, including the Golden Circle (the geyser at Geysir, the waterfall at Gullfoss and the site of the world’s oldest parliament at Þhingvellir National Park), the Blue Lagoon geothermal spa, and possibly an overnight stay on Vestmannaeyjar, the Westman Islands. Other planned activities include whale-watching and horseback riding, depending on the weather.

All that to say that I haven’t quite decided how I’m going to cover the film festival yet. Ideally, I’ll be able to blog as usual, posting reviews shortly after seeing the films, but because it’s a vacation, I might just be having too much fun to post right away.

Though the entire schedule hasn’t yet been posted, the main program (Open Seas) features the following 18 films:

• 33 sceny z zycia (33 Scenes From Life) – Malgorzata Szumowska
• Pandoranin kutusu (Pandora’s Box) – Yesim Ustuoglu
• Adoration – Atom Egoyan
• Avant que j’oublie (Before I Forget) – Jacques Nolot
• Piao lang qing chun (Drifting Flowers) – Zero Chou
• Il y a longtemps que je t’aime (I’ve Loved You So Long) – Philipe Claudel
• Good Cats – Ying Liang
• Revanche – Götz Spielmann*
• Frygtelig lykkelig (Terribly Happy) – Henrik Ruben Genz*
• Barcelona (A Map) – Ventura Pons
• Venkovský ucitel (The Country Teacher) – Bogdan Slama*
• Zui yao yuan de ju li (The Most Distant Course) – Jing-Jie Lin*
• A Feast of Villains – Pan Jian-Lin
• My Winnipeg – Guy Maddin*
• O’Horten – Bent Hamer*
• A Nyomozó (The Investigator) – Attila Galambos
• Dos Miradas (Two Looks) – Sergio Candel
• Til døden os skiller (With Your Permission) – Paprika Steen*

Some of these played at TIFF this year and some others were released earlier, but I haven’t seen any of them. So far, I’m planning on seeing the ones marked with asterisks based on either recommendations from friends or just my own interest. If you have any recommendations I haven’t marked, please comment and let me know why I should see them.

from Consolation Champs

Off to Reykjavik

With our trip to Iceland just a few weeks away, I was delighted to discover Iceland Socks, a promotional site for the Iceland Express airline. They’re already a pretty hip company, with a great blog featuring lots of information on music and other stuff, but Iceland Socks is pretty amazing. The site lets you quickly create your own travelogue movie, starring a pair of sock puppets you can name. You can add subtitled dialogue in up to three scenes. Lots of fun and a great way to get people to think about Iceland’s “other airline”.

You can see my masterpiece here.

from Consolation Champs

Iceland Socks Rocks

The Toronto Star reports today that Air Canada is laying off another 632 flight attendants, trying to cut costs associated with the soaring cost of fuel. Most interesting was a compilation of measures other airlines are taking in a desperate effort to keep flying:

• American Airlines has removed pillows from most domestic flights to save $375,000 a year.
• American and others are charging $15 for the first checked bag.
• Southwest Airlines is among those slowing down to reduce fuel.
• Delta has swapped heavier seats for models weighing about 5 pounds less.
• American’s new drink carts are 17 pounds lighter, a move that saves 1.9 million gallons of fuel a year.
• Lufthansa is among those washing its planes more often to reduce wind resistance.
• Japan Airlines is redesigning cutlery to save 2 grams per piece. It is also saving 50 pounds per flight by cutting the number of newspapers and magazines it carries.
• Cathay Pacific has removed paint from its 747 freighters, removing as much as 440 pounds per plane.
• Delta is studying whether it is feasible to divide pilot manuals required on each flight between the captain and first officer, so they are not toting duplicate sets of five or six books that each weigh about a pound and a half.
• Northwest is carrying 25 percent less water for bathroom taps and toilets on international flights. Each 25 pounds removed, saves $440,000 a year.

It is definitely only a matter of time before passengers will be paying fares based on their own weight. With rising obesity rates in the developed world, some passengers may find themselves, er, grounded unless they can pay their way. It only seems fair, since there are already extra charges for overweight baggage. But I wonder what kind of a “human rights” kerfuffle will result?

With some peak oil commentators like James Howard Kunstler arguing that the whole airline industry will be dead and gone within 24 months, the point may be moot.

from Consolation Champs

Air Travel in Crisis

Brooke and I got home last night from four days in New York City. While Brooke attended the Origami USA annual convention, I was free to wander the city and get into mischief. The weather was incredibly hot and humid and there were unpredictable and wild storms on both Saturday and Sunday. Since I had my Edirol R-09 digital recorder with me, I decided to record my thoughts instead of trying to keep a written blog. Forgive the rambling nature of these, but I thought it might be an interesting way to document my time there.

Saturday June 28, 2008

Episode 1: McCarren Park, Brooklyn

Duration: 7:58

Episode 2: McCarren Park, Brooklyn (after my tour of the Brooklyn Brewery)

Duration: 2:52

Episode 3: Hotel Kitano, Manhattan

Duration: 1:57

Sunday June 29, 2008

Episode 4: Hotel Kitano, Manhattan (morning, before almost drowning at the Pride Parade)

Duration: 2:55

I meant to record a few more episodes, especially since my experience on Sunday was so crazy. I walked out to Fifth Avenue to catch the Pride Parade and ended up following it all the way down to Christopher Street, about 40 blocks. Just as I got there, the heavens opened and without an umbrella, I was drenched. The rain didn’t let up for more than an hour so it kind of put a damper on some of the specators, though to their credit, the parade marchers kept up appearances. Well, except when the storm first broke and the parade stopped. I’ll never forget the sight of four drag queens huddled under a tiny umbrella trying to keep their wigs dry. Later, as I made my way back uptown, I tried to huddle under various awnings with hundreds of others. It was interesting sharing a bit of shelter with a group of soggy drag queens! By the time I got back to my hotel, my shoes, pants and shirt were waterlogged and I even had to spread all my paper money out to dry. Luckily the Euro 2008 final between Germany and Spain was on TV so I wrapped myself up in a robe and watched that.

Later, instead of going out to see a comedian (Eddie Izzard’s show was sold out, and Brooke doesn’t know Patton Oswalt at all), we just decided to see Pixar’s new film, Wall-E. First we ate at Empanada Mama, somewhere we discovered on our last visit in January. Delicious, reasonable and a short walk from the cinema which was on 42nd St.

On Monday, I met up with filmmaker Aaron Katz for breakfast (I’d met him the previous weekend in Toronto when he was here for Generation DIY) at Junior’s in Brooklyn and then went to the IFC Center to see Daisuke Tengan’s film The Most Beautiful Night in the World, screening as part of the New York Asian Film Festival. After that, a quick stop at Italian Wine Merchants to pick up few bottles from my favourite Slovenian wine producer (Movia) and then back to the hotel to meet Brooke and catch our shuttle bus to the airport.

Another great trip, and I’m still only just discovering what this amazing city has to offer.

Oh yeah, pictures are up on Flickr. Fair warning: lots of origami models.

from Consolation Champs

New York Audioblogs

I’m barely 40 pages into Chuck Klosterman’s Killing Yourself to Live and I’m already feeling jealous. Not of his talent for comic writing, though he has plenty of that. I’m feeling strangely jealous that I’ve never been able to go on a solo road trip with 600 CDs like he’s doing. You see, I’ve never had a driver’s licence. 99% of the time, it’s no big deal at all. Well, more like 80% of the time. When my wife and I do occasionally need to drive, we either rent a car or borrow my Dad’s or her Mum’s, and Brooke does the driving. I know she resents it a bit (okay, maybe a lot), but at this stage I really think it might be too late for me to learn.

I did know how, once. Just like every other kid, I signed up for the driver education classes at my high school and did perfectly well. Except for one thing. It was probably at my very last lesson when my driving instructor advised me not to book my test appointment until I practiced my parallel parking. A lot. At this point in the story, my memory gets a bit foggy (this is, after all, now more than 25 years ago). I did NOT practice my parallel parking. In fact, I got a bit annoyed with his advice. And when it came down to it, I guess I just didn’t care enough. All of my friends were getting licences, and some of them were even buying cars. I was happy, like Iggy, to be the Passenger. Until now.

It’s not that Klosterman has made me crave the experience of actually driving thousands of miles. The physical and mental effort of keeping the car safely between the lines and away from the cars in front and behind strikes me as exhausting. But there’s just something about the particular kind of solitude with musical accompaniment a “road trip” offers that a bus journey with an iPod just can’t match.

Even if I were to practice my parallel parking, after all this time, and successfully obtain my driving licence, I doubt very much whether I’d be able to take off on my own with a trunk full of music. I suspect that there would be some marital payback which would involve me doing every single bit of driving for the next ten years, and beyond. And as a much older new driver, I could never build up the self-confidence that would let me roll down the window and rest one arm on the doorframe. Instead of the freedom that I have in mind, more likely I’d be squinting at highway exit signs, nervously changing lanes and trying not to fall asleep behind the wheel.

If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll get back to my vicarious road trip now. At least when I start to get sleepy, I can just put the book down and go to bed.

from Consolation Champs

Vicarious Road Trip

I’m here in Austin for my eighth consecutive South by Southwest Interactive conference. I’ve come to look at this week as an essential creative reboot each year. The weather in Toronto combined with the months of near darkness always leave me drained in inspiration. And then I come to Texas and spend a week with a few thousand of my closest friends.

I didn’t plan well this year. And work got crazy. And I foolishly solicited SXSW filmmakers to send me screeners. So the leadup to this year’s conference was a flurry of late nights and trying to compile a super-calendar of Interactive, Film and Music events. Now that I’m here, it’s clear that I just can’t do it all.

In fact, my normal “shy extravert” personality has taken a hit and I am finding myself cocooning in my hotel room, which is unusual for me. I think part of it might be that I’m a bit nervous about trying to meet new people (ie. Film people). On the one hand, I’m a lazy man and don’t mind hanging around with my old Interactive tribe. But I feel like I might be missing an opportunity to learn something new and talk about another of my favourite things with like-minded people. But I’m also afraid of being embraced by the Film people and then missing out on all the stuff I’ve come to love about the Interactive conference. This conflict over different social choices as well as scheduling options has left me even more paralyzed than usual. And I don’t like feeling like this.

I’m hoping that staying a few days extra to see free Music day shows and hang around with my Austin pals will sort me out. I’ll post an update in a few days.

from Consolation Champs

SXSW 2008: Social Networking Indeed

For someone who considers himself a seasoned traveler and informed citizen of the world, I’ve always been a bit embarrassed that New York City wasn’t really on my list of places visited. My parents had taken me a few times when I was a young sprog, but I have no memories of the city, only the stuff I’ve seen in movies or read in books. It seemed crazy to me that I hadn’t visited, until you figure out how expensive it is to fly anywhere in the U.S. from Canada. Though New York is only about an hour’s flight from Toronto, it’s at least a $500 ticket. Since New York is also incredibly expensive in general, I’ve usually saved my dollars for visits to some of my other favourite American cities (Austin, Chicago, San Francisco) instead. But a few months ago, my lovely wife Brooke surprised me with tickets, and we just spent a fantastic three-day weekend in mythical Gotham.

After hearing about New York my entire life, I was happy and relieved to say that within an hour of arriving, I felt like I “got” the city. I felt at home and comfortable, which was unusual. American cities usually feel different to me, and it normally takes me about a day to settle in. I was also surprised that New York actually felt small to me. Not literally, because we only really got to see a small patch of midtown on our trip, but I guess I mean it felt manageable. We found that we could walk almost anywhere we wanted to go in just a few minutes, and if we needed to jump on the subway, we normally only had a ride of a few stops. I’m also a bit proud that I grasped the subway almost right away. Our subway in Toronto is much more basic, but I’m a transit user, so it was fun to figure out a more ambitious system.

Most delightful of all was the feeling that I actually knew people in this vast and hitherto-unexplored metropolis. When Brooke mentioned she’d like to tour the New York Times, I emailed Khoi Vinh, the design director of their web site, to see if any were offered. He graciously offered to show us around, himself, on Friday afternoon. On Saturday, we arranged to meet newly-engaged Dan Budiac and Kathryn Yu for brunch. And then while browsing in the 14th Street Apple Store, we serendipitously bumped into Anil Dash and his wife Alaina Browne. On this weekend, the big, intimidating city felt more like a village to us.

It helped a lot that we stayed at the wonderful Chelsea Lodge, a quiet, comfy and affordable haven on a quiet residential street. We ate two delicious breakfasts at the nearby Empire Diner on Tenth Avenue, where we overheard a number of great conversations, including the subject of a Men’s Vogue cover story reading the story to his group of friends. Our other breakfast was at the wonderful Pastis, in the revitalized Meatpacking District. It’s said to be a celebrity hangout, and we did spot Sam Shepard and Jessica Lange and their daughter having breakfast just before we left. While we’re on the theme of food, we also enjoyed great and unfussy food at Empanada Mama and the “Burger Joint” hidden in the luxe Parker-Meridien Hotel.

Other highlights of our whirlwind trip include:

• Visiting all three of NYC’s Apple Stores
• New York City Ballet‘s production of Balanchine’s Prodigal Son
• the huge Japanese bookstore Kinokuniya
• MoMa
• Nintendo World
• Strand Books
• Touring the United Nations Headquarters
• New York Public Library’s exhibit of Kerouac’s On the Road

By Sunday we were pretty wiped, and the only vaguely stressful things that we encountered were:

• looking for a Starbucks near Times Square that had somewhere to sit down, just after all the theatre matinees let out.
• trying to bring a special bottle of wine back through security in my carry-on bag and being forced to leave it there—no liquids allowed, even in sealed bottles.

For anyone interested, I’ll post a link to our photos when I get them posted to Flickr.

New York, I will be back soon!

from Consolation Champs

I Love New York, Seriously

Cuban flag
Originally uploaded by Patrick Dinnen

Brooke and I are off early tomorrow morning for eight days in Havana. We’ve never been to Cuba before and thought we should go now before it all changes. We’re not beach people, so we didn’t care about staying at a resort where we wouldn’t be able to meet Cuban people or see what their lives are like. Instead, we’re staying at a casa particular, a kind of Cuban version of a bed and breakfast. After reading raves about them on TripAdvisor.com, we’ve decided to stay with Ana and Pepe in the Vedado neighbourhood of the city. Though they do have internet access, don’t expect me to tie it up posting to Flickr. But when we get back, I’ll likely be posting like a fiend. Wish us safe travels, everyone, and we’ll raise a mojito for you!

By the way, Viva Cuba is actually a very charming recent film from filmmaker Juan Carlos Cremata Malberti. I reviewed it over on Toronto Screen Shots.

from Consolation Champs

Viva Cuba

I know this post is long overdue, but it’s actually taken me this long to recover physically and mentally and catch up a bit at work. This year’s SXSW was even bigger than last year, and despite the fears of my friends and I, it was actually somehow a bit more manageable. This was probably due to a few factors. First, I had a panel to prepare for and that allowed me to focus on that to the exclusion of almost everything else on the Saturday. Another sadder reality was that Brooke’s father passed away just a week before I was to fly to Austin. We spent almost the entire next week with her mum in Collingwood, about an hour and a half north of Toronto. That made it pretty impossible to think about or plan my week too carefully. For a few days, it wasn’t even clear I’d be able to make the trip at all. But in a strange way, it made me less anxious about the panel and about figuring out what I wanted to do every hour of every day. I was just happy to be there. And just so you know, Brooke was able to spend some quality time alone with her mum that week and sent me on my way with her blessing. She’s amazing like that.

I didn’t attend a lot of panels, or take a lot of photos or notes, so I thought I’d just give you a list of highlights and lowlights:

Highlights

• My panel was great. It was a pleasure and a privilege to meet some very sharp people who also happen to be warm and genuine about their faith. I’m really hopeful that I can be involved in something like it again next year.
• Sticking around a few days was a great idea. Although I didn’t buy a Music badge, there were heaps of free day shows. I got to see The Buzzocks(!), The Polyphonic Spree, Apples in Stereo, Peter Bjorn and John, Robyn Hitchcock with Peter Buck and Okkervil River. There was even free food and beer.
• During one of the parties during Interactive, I was chatting with my friends Kevin and Baratunde when we were joined by a personable young guy talking about films. He introduced himself as Joe and said he was acting in a film that was at the Film festival. During our 40 minute conversation, it dawned on me that we were hanging out with Joseph Gordon-Levitt, star of The Lookout. He turned out to be a great guy, smart and interesting but completely unpretentious.
• As a panelist, I got a complimentary Gold badge which allowed me to attend both Interactive and Film events. I took the opportunity to see a few films (Reign Over Me, Exiled, and Eagle Versus Shark) and this was a great break from the intensity of hanging around with smart geeks or rocking out at concerts.
• The panels and keynotes I did attend were almost all interesting and valuable.
• I focussed more on my writing about film and made a number of useful contacts. My decision to launch Toronto Screen Shots was based on attending a great panel called “Blogging About Film.”

Lowlights

• The weather in Austin this year was kind of crappy. It rained for several days, which made getting around fairly miserable.
• Hotels were expensive and filled up really early. Despite sharing with my friends Neil and Kevin, which involved spending five of my eight nights on either an air mattress or a rollaway bed, it still cost me more than US$1,000. I’m going to book my room by July or August next time.
• Almost everyone I know had some travel snafus on the way home. I wasn’t immune. I flew back Saturday from Austin to Detroit without incident, but my flight from Detroit to Toronto was cancelled for “unscheduled maintenance.” Despite the fact that it’s a one hour flight, there were no flights available until Monday or Tuesday, and the airline would only pay for one night’s accomodation. I banded together with a few other Torontonians and we took a taxi across the border to Windsor and jumped on the train. I got home about seven hours late, and it cost me more money, but there was no way I was staying two days in Detroit, especially at my own expense. Boo airlines!
• As always, the week went by far too quickly and I didn’t get to spend nearly enough time with people. There were a few people whom I’d wanted to meet for the first time, and didn’t get the chance. Ah well, I’ll be back next year!

from Consolation Champs

SXSW 2007 Wrapup

Every year I’ve attended SXSW, I’ve put together a compilation CD to give away to people I know, and this year is no different. The playlist is finalized, the liner notes are almost complete, and I’ve started burning the discs, but I’d like to know how many to burn. I usually give away about 30 each year, but if you’re coming to Austin, and haven’t received one before, and would like one, please comment.

I won’t be leaking the playlist, but if you like Chinese reggae, Uruguayan punk, or Bollywood novelty songs, you should be happy with this year’s disc.

March 8, 2007: I’ve now posted the playlist for all those who are curious.

from Consolation Champs

Compilation Champs 2007

Yes, it’s hard to believe, but I’ll be attending my seventh South by Southwest in a few weeks. Things will be a little different this year for a number of reasons.

1. This year, for the first time ever, I’m speaking on a panel. Not seeing anything on the schedule about the subject, I proposed a panel on faith, and it was accepted. It’s entitled Ghost in the Machine: Spirituality Online and it’s scheduled for Saturday March 10 from 5:00-6:00. I’ve assembled a panel of rock stars who will say most of the intelligent things, but I’m still nervous and excited.
2. As a panelist, I received a free Gold pass this year, which means for the first time I can attend both Interactive and Film events. I’m still unclear how ticketing to film screenings works, but I’m hoping to actually see a few films this time. A few of the scheduled films recently screened at Sundance, so it might be a good chance to see some stuff that won’t make it to Toronto until at least the fall, if at all.
3. The Interactive section of the conference ends on Tuesday, but I’m not leaving Austin until Saturday morning, so I’m hoping to catch a few bands during the Music portion, and just generally hang out in one of my favourite American cities with some of my favourite Americans.

If you’re going to be there, make sure you say hello! And it’s also acceptable to buy me a Shiner. After all, I’m a crusty conference veteran now!

P.S. Make sure to check out SXSWBaby for the latest news and updates.

from Consolation Champs

7th Annual Pre-SXSW Post

I finally finished uploading the last of the pictures from our trip to Slovenia last month. 663 pictures! You have to see the ones of Bled, at least.

Here’s the entire set

from Consolation Champs

Slovenia Pictures Up

Beautiful Slovenia (images copyright Boštjan Burger)

Brooke and I are off on a well-deserved break. We’ll be spending ten days in Slovenia. I’ll try to post some photos and maybe even some travelogue type stuff but no promises. In the meantime, enjoy the gorgeous photos of Boštjan Burger, who maintains an amazing repository of photos and VR panoramas that cover the entire country. If you hit refresh, you should see a different picture above each time.

We’re going to be staying in a wide variety of accomodations, including a former jail, a castle, an ultra-modern “boutique” hotel, a gourmet restaurant, and a working winery. Slovenia is a tiny country which encompasses both the Alps and the Mediterranean, so it will be like seeing all of Europe in ten days.

from Consolation Champs

Taking It SLO

Lake Bled (image by Igor Modic, courtesy of Government of Slovenia Public Relations and Media Office)

Back in November, Brooke and I enjoyed our first trip south of the equator, spending a fantastic week in friendly Uruguay. In the spirit of that trip, we wanted to choose another destination for our vacation in 2006. The conditions were:

• Nobody we know has been there. Yet.
• It should be easily confused with another country (ie. Uruguay/Paraguay)
• It should be small enough that we could see a few different places in a week.

And we’ve found the perfect place. Slovenia. You see? It’s not yet on the tourist radar, at least for North Americans. George Bush made a famous gaffe (another one) where he mixed up the two countries of Slovenia and Slovakia. To give credit to poor W, it’s a common mistake. In 2004, Slovakia sent 602 kilograms (1,327 pounds) of misaddressed mail to Slovenia. And the entire country just surpassed the 2,000,000 population mark, making it smaller than the city I live in. In addition, the country spans many different types of terrain, from the Julian Alps in the north to the Adriatic in the southwest. The first of the former Yugoslav republics to declare independence, it has a robust economy, and joined the European Union in 2004. In fact, in contrast to researching our trip to Uruguay, this has been a breeze. The Slovenian government has numerous web sites for tourism and other information, and they are well-organized, attractive, impeccably-translated and full of useful information.

Though our trip isn’t until late September or early October, we’re already getting excited.

from Consolation Champs

You’re Going Where?

Small Footballers

We got back today about noon, and have been unpacking, showering, sleeping and doing laundry all day. Hoping to get the rest of my pictures up on Flickr by the end of the weekend (all 400 or so!) and will try to edit my travel journal into something vaguely interesting for public consumption.

Did I mention that we came back to more than 10cm of snow? After a full week of plus 30°C weather? Yuk.

P.S. The photo is one of my favourites, and I’m hoping to write something about Uruguay’s football culture for the excellent site The Global Game soon. Watch for it!

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North of the Equator Again

Having a wonderful time. I’m beginning to post some of our Uruguay photos over on Flickr. Have a look.

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Wish You Were Here

Just for fun!

Plan your trip   Local Radar   Detailed Forecast

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Montevideo Weather Updates

Though we’ve been planning for quite a while, I haven’t mentioned yet that we’ll be spending a week in Uruguay beginning this Friday. We chose Uruguay for several reasons. Back in 2002, I read a fascinating article about this virtually-unknown place in National Geographic Traveler magazine, and that stuck in my head. And last year, my company began representing a winery from Uruguay (which is known for a full-bodied wine called Tannat). Finally, since both Brooke and I have only ten days of vacation per year, we wanted to pick somewhere small enough to explore in a week. As an added bonus, we were able to use airline points accumulated over the past two Christmasses (my company gives us points as gifts!) to purchase what would have been very expensive tickets.

We leave on Thursday and fly to Miami, where we have an eight-hour layover. Then we take a night flight to Buenos Aires, and then the short hop to Montevideo. I’m hoping to be able to blog while we’re away, but I must say, once again, God Bless the Internets. There is very little tourist information available in English about Uruguay, but through a great site called Virtual Tourist, we were able to make contact with several Uruguayans who were gracious enough to offer to show us around. We’re even planning to take in a football match, hopefully in the historic Estadio Centenario, where the first World Cup matches were played in 1930, and where, just this past weekend, Uruguay defeated Australia 1-0 in the first leg of their playoff for a spot in the World Cup finals in Germany next year. (16/11/05 UPDATE: This morning, Australia beat Uruguay in the return leg 4-2 in penalty kicks after the match ended 1-0 for the Australians. So, I hope the country isn’t too gloomy during our visit.)

The internet was also instrumental in helping us plan a short escape from the Miami Airport on Thursday afternoon. We arrive around 3:00pm and leave again at 11:00pm, so our options were limited, but we’ve decided to take a cab to Ocean Drive, stopping at the News Cafe for some food before joining a walking tour of the Art Deco district put on by the Miami Design Preservation League. The tour should end by 8:00pm, giving us plenty of time to get back to the airport.

I’m very excited to be travelling to some places I haven’t been before, and Brooke and I have even been taking Spanish classes in preparation. One interesting hiccup, though, is that in Uruguay, the common “ll”, which is pronounced “y” everywhere else in Latin America, becomes “zh”. This should make our language adventures even more interesting.

Wikipedia entry on Uruguay

Virtual Tourist pages on Uruguay

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South American Vacation!

Valpolicella Region, Veneto, Italy.

Just a sample. I got back from Italy last night and am still a little bit jetlagged. I have lots of photos and notes and will try to post a short recap of the trip sometime this weekend. In a word, though, Italy is enchanting.

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Valpolicella

Lake Garda, Veneto, Italy

I’ll be here for the next week. Hope to post some updates.

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Lucky Me!

It’s January and I haven’t booked my ticket to Austin yet. Back in 2000, I was talking about SxSW 2001 in September, for crying out loud! Recent world events have made me less than enthusiastic about many things in my life, and my annual pilgrimage to blogger Mecca is one of them.

The past four years have been a blast, but it was impossible not to notice that the “first wave” of blogfolk have begun staying home. As the community has become larger, it’s become harder to spend significant time with anybody, and although I love meeting new people, sometimes I miss the early sense of camaraderie.

There are a few other factors. The trip gets harder to fund every year. Though I’m in love with my job, it doesn’t pay nearly as much as my old sales job. Last year, Nick Finck was gracious enough to sponsor my freebie press pass as I was still affiliated with Digital Web magazine, but that’s no more. Last year, I shared a room with two friends, but that left me without a bed of my own, and I promised myself I wouldn’t do that again.

I’m sure I could stay with my pals, the wonderful Browns, but that leaves me far from the action and although I’d relish the chance to spend more time with them, I’d be dependent on them (or taxis) to get to and from events.

Not to mention that Brooke’s contract just ended and she’s got nothing solid lined up. Plus, we’re hoping to spend a week in Iceland (yes, Iceland!) in August, and that will be expensive (even though it looks like the flights will be covered by some nifty airline miles my boss gave me for Christmas!).

Still, March for me has always meant Austin, and it’s the one time of year I can usually connect with many online friends I never see otherwise.

Ah, malaise! Maybe some of youse guys can shake me out of it. What are your plans for SxSW this year?

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Austin Blues

Ok, as promised, here are some snapshots of our visit to Ottawa. As you can tell, we had perfect weather.

The Centre Block of the Parliament Buildings, Parliament Hill

The view west from Parliament Hill, showing the Supreme Court of Canada and the Ottawa River

The Canadian Museum of Civilization, located across the Ottawa River in Hull, Quebec

The Peace Tower

The National Gallery of Canada and the Notre Dame Cathedral Basilica

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Capital Snaps

This weekend, Brooke and I are embarking on a little getaway trip to our nation’s capital, Ottawa. We’re taking the bus, which means a five-hour trip each way (lots of time to read!). Our main reason for going is the National Capital Marathon. No, we’re not running it (yet!), but we’re going to do the 5K race on Saturday, and then watch the marathon on Sunday morning.

We’re also taking the opportunity to dine at one of Ottawa’s newest and most-acclaimed restaurants, Beckta. The nicest thing is that it’s being paid for by my employers, as a sort of thank-you for all the work I did on our big tasting event a few weeks ago. We’re also meeting up tonight with one of my colleagues (our Ottawa sales rep) and his girlfriend for a more casual meal.

Hopefully, we’ll also find a bit of time to explore the National Gallery of Canada, check out Parliament Hill and maybe do a couple of other touristy things. We’ll be back Sunday and I’ll try to post a picture or two.

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A Capital Idea

Disclaimer: Personal and amateur wine travel report. Not required reading by any means! Nor does it represent the views of my employer.

I thought I’d write a little bit about the trip Brooke and I took last weekend to the Niagara wine region. This is only my second trip there to visit wineries, and on the first we were on our way to a play at the Shaw Festival so we just hurriedly stopped at a couple in Niagara-on-the-Lake.

This time, we planned to stay in the village of Jordan, which is a great base for exploring all of the Beamsville Bench wineries. Each winery is literally two minutes from the next, and though we visited about ten places, we left a lot for our next trip. Here are the impressions I can recall:

Peninsula Ridge: A very swanky tasting room. The big surprise here was how good their 2002 Inox Chardonnay is ($24.95, +594226, Vintages). I’m not a big Chardonnay fan, but this had all kinds of flavours, quite bold without needing to see the inside of a barrel.

Thirty Bench: One of our own. Not much to look at here, really. As we were approaching the tasting “shack,” we passed by a large group of workers apparently going off to harvest something somewhere. As a rule, I was tasting all kinds of Riesling, and I’d heard good things about Thirty Bench’s efforts. I think I bought a bottle of their Semi-Dry ($10.95, winery only).

Vineland Estates: A beautiful winery, and a bustling tasting room. All kinds of good stuff here. My wife is a big Icewine fan, and we tried them all (Vidal, Riesling) as well as their Select Late Harvest Vidal 1999, which is a bargain I couldn’t resist ($15.00, 375ml, winery only). We came back here for dinner, at Mark Picone at Vineland Estates, and with dinner I drank a glass each of the St. Urban Riesling 2002 ($15.00, winery only), which was bone dry and delicious, and then the Cabernet Merlot 2001 ($24.95, winery only), which was much better than expected. With dessert, we split a glass of the aforementioned Late Harvest Vidal 1999. Overall, Vineland was the most impressive of the wineries we visited. I’m surprised more of their wines aren’t available at the LCBO.

Hernder Estates: A picturesque covered bridge leads to this winery. On the day we were there for tasting, they were hosting a craft fair, so the tasting room was packed with crafty old ladies having a gargle. We actually returned here on Sunday morning to taste again. I’d sampled their Reserve Merlot 1997 ($19.95, winery only, though it has a CSPC number +554402), and it tasted unlike anything I’ve ever had before. I kept telling Brooke it was “interesting” without being sure if I liked it. I sampled it again on Sunday before buying a bottle to bring home.

Thomas & Vaughan: Very unassuming little cottage tasting room, not in itself a bad thing. But I was singularly unimpressed with the wines I tasted. I tried the Chardonnay Sur Lie 2000 ($7.95, winery only), the Sauvignon Blanc 2002 ($14.95, winery only), the Merlot Estate 2000 ($19.95, winery only), and the Meritage Estate 2000 ($24.95, +992503, Vintages).

Malivoire: Similarly, I was not too happy with the offerings from Malivoire, though that may have had more to do with the swarm of flies in the tasting room than anything else. But the wines I tried seemed overpriced and unimpressive: the Chardonnay Estate 2002 ($22.00, winery only), and the Moira Vineyard Gewurztraminer 2002 ($28.00, winery only). We also noted the irony of an Ontario winery with a ladybug in its logo when so much wine was spoiled recently by an infestation of aphids and ladybugs.

Henry of Pelham: We arrived at their tasting room just as they were closing on Saturday and were turned away. When we returned the next morning, they not only remembered us, but let us have a few extra tastings free of charge. Friendly and knowledgeable staff made this a fun stop, and actually sold me on some wine, too. Most of the wines we tried were good, but I bought the Unfiltered Cabernet Merlot 1999 ($24.95, +395855, Vintages). The woman doing the tasting for us had us compare two bottles, one just opened, and the other open overnight. Wow. This is a wine that really needs time to open up, but the results are delicious.

Cave Spring Cellars: Located in a storefront on the main street of tiny Jordan village, the tasting room here also had a knowledgeable and friendly staff. I sampled several Rieslings here, including the Dry Riesling 2002 ($11.95, +233635, LCBO), the Off Dry Riesling 2002 ($11.95, +234583, LCBO), and the especially delicious Riesling Indian Summer 2001 ($21.95, 375ml, +415901, Vintages). I also tried the very interesting Chardonnay Musqué 2002 ($14.95, +246579, Vintages Essentials), made from a rather aromatic clone of the Chardonnay grape.

Chateau des Charmes: What an impressive sight as we approached the winery: the chateau, bathed in sunlight, overlooking impressive vineyards dotted with modern looking windmills. The experience was spoiled somewhat by tasting room staff who seemed uninterested and not that knowledgeable to boot. We might have confined ourselves to tasting icewines here, though to be honest, I don’t really remember. This was our last stop on our way to Buffalo, where we spent the rest of Sunday exploring the Albright-Knox Art Gallery and, less loftily, the Apple Store at the Walden Galleria.

We stayed at the wonderful Walnut Tree Cottage Bed and Breakfast right on Jordan’s Main Street. It’s a little self-contained cottage with its own gas fireplace, which we used well.

So, that was our little weekend getaway. We’re already planning to go down again in January for the Icewine Festival.

from Consolation Champs

Weekend In Jordan

Hello again from Katowice! In the past week, we’ve seen some beautiful and some terrible things, and met some of the nicest students in the world. Our English class is in full swing and we’re enjoying ourselves immensely. Our students are between 14 and 24 years of age, and most look much younger than their ages. They are so open and honest, and they appreciate absolutely everything we say or do. It’s almost embarrassing. We’ve taken so many pictures, and I know that when our class ends on Thursday night, there will be some tears (and some will be mine – I’m such a sap!).

Friday morning we’re heading to Warsaw, where we’ll get to do some more sightseeing before flying back to Toronto on Sunday night. Hope to see some of you soon. And the rest, stay tuned for the Poland Gallery!

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Poland Report II

I’m writing from the home of one of our hosts, so I can’t say much, but Brooke and I are having a wonderful time. After a certain amount of culture shock, we’re settling in. We’ve done some sightseeing already, to Krakow and to a salt mine near there (the city’s name escapes me at the moment). Tomorrow we’re going to see Auschwitz, which is not “sightseeing” but which will be a valuable experience.

The Polish people we have met so far have been incredibly hospitable and friendly. This is a place we may want to visit again!

I’ll have more to share soon…

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Wish You Were Here

Forgive the terrible pun. SARS is a serious problem. But not really here in Toronto. Just to prove it, the city has unveiled some terrific deals to re-encourage tourists to visit. If you’re travelling from New York, Ottawa, or Montreal, you can fly to Toronto for FREE the next three weekends. And if you like theatre, you can get an amazing deal on tickets to see The Lion King or Mamma Mia! It includes theatre tickets, a three-course meal, tickets to a Blue Jays game, and even a night at a nice hotel, for $125 (Canadian dollars, too!) per person. Normally, this would cost at least $300.

You could even forego the hotel room and crash with me or one of the GTABloggers! Come and visit us! We don’t bite!

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Thank Your Lucky SARS

Well, here I am, settled in to my hotel room and blogging already. I just wanted to note how much nicer my hotel is than last year, and apparently it’s about the same price! The Hampton Inn and Suites just opened recently and it’s only about two blocks from the Convention Center, where all the SxSW stuff is going on.

The weather is gorgeous, sunny, maybe about 70°F. I forgot sunscreen and just had to go out and get some. Tonight is Break Bread With Brad, one of my favourite events. It’s a perfect icebreaker and a chance to catch up with old friends and make new ones.

I spent last night with the amazing Browns. They manage to juggle two energetic boys, a crazy dog, and a cat, and still make room for little old me.

Gotta go now. I’m being IM’ed!

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Greetings From The Hampton Inn

Well, I’ll be away for the next week in (hopefully) sunny Austin, for South By Southwest. I’m hoping to be able to blog a little bit from there, but I can’t make any promises. When I come back, I’ll be sure to post a nice wrapup with some photos.

Over the past 24 hours or so, we got about ten more inches of snow. So this trip couldn’t come at a better time.

Tonight, Brooke and I went to the Raptors game. They lost to Houston 97-95, and a few thousand of Toronto’s large Chinese community were in attendance to cheer on rookie sensation Yao Ming. Also spotted: Canada’s (probable) next Prime Minister, Paul Martin, sitting courtside.

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Off To Texas!

Well, a week from right now, Brooke and I will be enjoying our honeymoon. After almost a two-year engagement, and months of stressful planning, we’ll finally be escaping to San Francisco. Thanks to the internet, our planning has been easy and fun.

We found our two hotels (Rick’s Bed and Breakfast in SF, Sonoma Creek Inn in Sonoma) online, and through a very cool online reservation service called Open Table, were able to book reservations at Boulevard (in SF) and The Girl and The Fig (in Sonoma). We also reserved our tickets for Alcatraz and a hot-air balloon ride in Sonoma using the web. Finally, we’re organizing a little get-together with some online friends and acquaintances for Friday October 11, for which we used Evite.

It seems amazing that ten years ago, the same kind of planning would have taken months, and involved travel agents, long-distance phone calls, and the postal service.

(By the way, if you’re in the Bay Area and want to join us on the 11th, drop me a comment. And any other sightseeing tips for San Francisco and Sonoma County are also welcome.)

UPDATE: Thanks to another great site, Zagat Surveys, we decided to cancel our reservation at The Girl and The Fig and change it to Cafe LaHaye, whose food is much more highly rated. I guess we’ll find out…

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Honeymoon Planning

Well, we’re finally nailing down our honeymoon plans. We’re spending a week in San Francisco, from October 6-13. We’re going to be staying at Rick’s Bed and Breakfast on Haight Street near Buena Vista Park for the first two nights, then the Sonoma Creek Inn for two nights, and then back to the B and B for the final three nights. It’s hard to believe our wedding is less than six months away!

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The Honeymooners

Some of my rambling and incoherent SxSW reflections here.

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SxSW Reflections

Celebrity sighting: Winding down our SxSW experience yesterday at Guero’s, we saw Lyle Lovett.

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Celebrity Sighting #2

SxSW SURREALITY: I’m blogging this from a panel where I’m also reading the live posting of a guy sitting in the row in front of me.

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SxSW SURREALITY

Well, if you’ve been wondering where I’ve been for the past few days, wonder no more. I’m in (fairly) sunny Austin, for the South by Southwest Interactive conference. Rest assured that I’ll have a full report with pictures posted in, oh, about three months, but in summary, I’m having a blast hanging around with some incredibly smart and talented people. In fact, just as I was writing this post, I introduced myself to Clive Thompson, one of the editors of Shift magazine and a really great writer on web subjects.

One of my ongoing projects is to write a profile of Canadian web whirlwind Cory Doctorow, whom I’ve also met here. Well, Cory has set up his Airport base station here in the Convention Center, and in fact this is how I’m posting right now. He just walked by to tell me about it and Clive grabbed him and set up a breakfast meeting. So, it’s quite possible that I’m going to be scooped by Clive Thompson.

In other Canadian news, last night I met Nicci Scheid, who is the New Media Manager for Now magazine. And, GTABlogger Katherine Parrish is here, too, putting together a report for CBC Radio’s Definitely Not The Opera. Suddenly, I feel lazy and untalented…

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SxSW 2002

Back from the Windy City with some keen observations:

• We saw flags and “God Bless America” and “United We Stand” posters all over the place.
• The Chicago El has got to be the most un-user friendly transportation system in the world. The signage is confusing. There are not just two stations named “Harlem” but three, with two on the same line!
• I like Frank Lloyd Wright’s “Prairie Style” architecture better than the Victorian style.
• America still surprises me with its stark distinction between black neighbourhoods and white ones.
• The American Girl doll phenomenon is really freaky. We spent some time at “American Girl Place” and found girls buying clothes so they could dress like their dolls, and sitting in the restaurant sipping tea along with their dolls. Oh, and spending ungodly amounts of their parents’ money on outfits and accessories.

Yes, we had a wonderful time. But I must complain that with all the media coverage of how airline security is getting tougher, we noticed no differences at all.

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Chicago Notes

Brooke and I are (nervously) heading to Chicago this weekend for a four day trip. Any ideas for neat stuff to do or people to meet?

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Nervous in Chicago

From an email I sent to my gracious hosts, Dinah, Kristin, and Jish:

“Just wanted to let you all know I’m back safely, even though I had an aisle seat in the second to last row on my SF-Pittsburgh flight and we had awful turbulence and the freakish looking permatanned “flight attendant” almost spilled things on me and some old guy almost “air raged” at me when I tried to get past him on the way off the plane since he couldn’t get his bags out of the overhead container and somehow I lost my key and couldn’t wake Brooke since she had the phone unplugged and so I had to wait almost half an hour in the lobby of my building at 1am on a Monday night when no one comes in or out until Brooke finally woke and plugged the phone in and got my pathetic message saying I’m stuck in the lobby and please come down and let me in…”

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Welcome Home James!

Well, it’s my last full day in San Francisco and I’ve really enjoyed my time here. Today I spent a few hours in Golden Gate Park looking for a well-hidden treasure. Then I braved the crowds to score some Ghirardelli chocolate, returned to North Beach for some great pizza, and am back in the Castro for coffee. This morning, I met with Heather and Derek who treated me to breakfast at the Pork Store (a lot better than it sounds!), and I received an autographed copy of Derek’s new book. Stay tuned for a review, and if I get a second copy in the mail, watch for another contest, a la Zeldman. I’ll be home tomorrow, but don’t look for me until Tuesday. Jet lag, you know…

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Last Day in San Francisco

Well, the first few days here have been eventful. Ocean Beach, the Tonga Lounge, Fisherman’s Wharf, Haight-Ashbury, Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower, and the Castro. I’ve moved on from Dinah and Edmond‘s hospitable home to the Jish-o-plex. His apartment is so close to the ocean, you can hear the waves breaking at night. One day the whole building might just fall right in. Having a wonderful time, wish you were all here.

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SF Impressions

Well, I’m off. Updates might be sparse, but they should be rich. I’ll be staying for a few days with the lovely and brilliant Metagrrrl, and then, maybe, the Streets of San Francisco…

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Off to California

I’ve been rare of late, I know. I spent most of the past two weeks moving, and I’m finally (mostly) unpacked and back online. I have just over a week to prepare for my California excursion, and am really getting excited. Today I bought Let’s Go: San Francisco. I’ve never gone wrong with Let’s Go over the years, starting back in the 80s when I went to Europe. Keep those SF travel tips coming, folks!

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Let’s Go: San Francisco

Well, it’s official. The Consolation Champs California Couch Crash™ will take place from Saturday August 11 until Monday August 20. I’m taking suggestions for cool things to do in SF. That is, in addition to visiting with interesting blogfolk. I know all the major things I have to do (Golden Gate Bridge, Golden Gate Park, Alcatraz, Ghirardelli, Chinatown, cable cars), and now I’m looking for less obvious delights, along the lines of the quirky Musee Mechanique (thanks for the suggestion, Cory.) Any ideas?

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California Couch Crash

Attention CC readers from San Francisco/Northern California: After an apparent invitation and some discussion, plans are underway for the Consolation Champs California Couch Crash™. For 7-10 days, sometime after August 10, I might be sojourning in the area, and would be desirous of a flat, hopefully soft surface to sleep on, as well as some good company. Feasability studies are underway, but if you could help, please let me know. Dates are flexible, so let me know if anything interesting is going on (apart from the regular earthquakes and rolling blackouts, that is).

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Can CC Crash Your Couch?

Well, it’s finally ready. You can check out my SxSW pictures and commentary. It’s also mostly XHTML compliant, although I didn’t use CSS for positioning. Maybe I’ll fix that later. My narrative isn’t as reflective as I wanted it to be, but that’s mostly because it was edited down from my breathless “diary” that I usually updated when I got in at 3:00 am each morning. Since I’m not working, I didn’t have the luxury of testing on different platforms and browsers. It looks fine to me in IE5 on a Mac, but please let me know if you’re having trouble on your machine. Same thing with broken links, etc. Enjoy!

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Geek Week in Austin

Our trip to Newfoundland this past weekend was amazing in so many ways. I’ve been to the Maritimes before (most recently, a trip to Halifax in 1995), but I’d never been out to “The Rock” before. Funny how this is also the nickname for Alcatraz, with just about as many people wanting to escape. The difference in Newfoundland is that, even though lots of people are forced to leave to look for work, they almost all come back. From young to old, everyone loves their heritage and given a choice, most would live here their whole lives.

The problem, for those who don’t know, is that much of Newfoundland’s economy is based on fishing or logging. The cod fisheries are pretty much exhausted and so many people are losing jobs. The rest of Canada, especially Westerners, like to grumble about how a lot of fishermen collected unemployment benefits for half the year because they could only fish half the year. Now even those seasonal jobs are gone. I joked to my friends that it seems ironic that Albertans would be criticizing Newfoundland, since Alberta’s wealth has come from oil, another non-renewable resource. It could just as easily been the Albertans out of work. But that’s Canada. A group of squabbling regions.

I’m off topic, now, of course. I wanted to tell you how great the people are in Newfoundland. Even though their standard of living is probably near the bottom of the scale, they are the most generous and hospitable people in the country. The thing I noticed most is the complete lack of pretension and self-consciousness. In the pub we inhabited for the two nights of our visit, the band were a bunch of 30 and 40 something guys, playing mostly traditional music. The dancefloor was always packed, with a rare mix of old and young people. Stepdancing seems to be taught to everyone at an early age, and no one seemed to care if you were a good dancer or not. It was just enthusiasm and having a good time that counted. Very refreshing when you come from a city as cold and arrogant as Toronto.

I haven’t even mentioned yet the spectacular scenery. We visited Signal Hill, where Marconi received (or transmitted, I wasn’t paying enough attention) the first transatlantic wireless signal. And Quidi Vidi Village, a picturesque fishing village right in St. John’s. And best of all, Cape Spear, the most easterly point in North America. When we drove there, it was raining hard and the winds made it even worse. We were reduced to running out of the car for five minutes at a time, taking a few pictures, then running back to the car to try to warm up and dry off. In the summertime, you can see icebergs floating a few hundred metres off shore, and spotting whales is not too difficult either. I’ve always loved the ocean, and in St. John’s, you’re right out in it.

We were only there for a weekend, but I know how much I want to go back. Next time, in summer. It was so nice to have conversations with every shopkeeper and waitress we met, and the Newfoundland sense of humour is in evidence everywhere (one of Canada’s best TV shows is a political satire called This Hour Has 22 Minutes, which is performed by four Newfoundlanders). In Canada, we tell Newfie jokes. I’m sure they were all started by Newfies themselves. To conclude, I’ll leave you a list of placenames in Newfoundland, which I found very amusing:

• Come By Chance
• Conception Bay
• Cow Head
• Cupids
• Dildo (and South Dildo)
• Farewell
• Garnish
• Goobies
• Halfway Point
• Heart’s Content
• Heart’s Delight
• Heart’s Desire
• Joe Batt’s Arm
• Leading Tickles
• Mosquito
• Paradise
• Renews
• Rooms
• Seldom (and Little Seldom)

If you’ve read this far, you might want to see the rest of my pictures. Feel free to add your comments, too.

from Consolation Champs

Back From The Rock

Just a taste, for now. Beautiful Quidi Vidi Village, St. John’s, Newfoundland.

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Just A Taste, For Now…

Brooke and I are getting ready to go. We’re flying to St. John’s, Newfoundland for the weekend, with our friends Philip and Ian. Philip works for Air Miles and got us some really cheap tickets. I’ve wanted to go to Newfoundland for years. I love the coast, just being near the ocean. It could be my Irish heritage, or something, too. Lots of pubs and traditional music (Brooke will hate that part!). So, I’ll take a lot of pictures and hopefully put something together for you all to look at next week. Of course, it being October, the forecast for St. John’s is rain, rain, and more rain. Still, we’re hoping to go for a boat cruise on a restored schooner and stuff like that. I’m excited.

Since I’ll be away until late Sunday, I’ll leave you with something to laugh at. If you know me, you’ll know that I love to laugh at my own jokes. I don’t think enough people saw this when I first posted it, so I’m going to repeat it. We were at a dinner party with our friends Jen and David, and we’re talking about psychiatrists:

DAVID: Yeah, my uncle’s a psychiatrist…….He’s f***ing nuts.

ME: I didn’t think they were allowed to do that.

Everyone laughed, except David.

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To St. John’s…

I’m doing hotel research for SxSW. Since I don’t drive, I need somewhere close to the action. I’m considering The Wellesley Inn. Did anyone stay there last year and have any info. on it? I’m not coming on corporate money, so I need somewhere reasonable. I’ll probably be sharing for the conference (but there’s room for at least one more!) but I’m staying until the 17th, so if anyone has any advice, please help!

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Hotel Research for SxSW