What's my age again?

Another birthday come and gone. This one was my 23rd, and I can't say I feel any older. Arbitrary numbers and math if you ask me.

This year my London boys and I broke the tradition of doing a big birthday combo weekend (Mike's is the 10th and Kozzy's is the 14th) and I spent Friday and Saturday night up north with the St. Catharines crew. The London posse is too spread out this year, plus we'd have nowhere to crash down here since the majority of people have moved back home or off to distant lands.


Erin's cottage is up on Black Lake near Minden, and we could only access the place by boat. I think roughly 20 of us headed up for the weekend, the notable exception being Cersdawg who has to prepare for yet another accounting exam.

I finally got my optometrist appointment done on the Friday morning, and my new glasses should be ready next week. Now I just have to go back for one more visit to have the doc ram contacts into my eyes and watch me fish them out, and I'm all set. Thankfully I'll be able to see the puck this year in hockey. I've never had contacts before, so I'm kinda curious to see what it'll be like to have my childhood vision back.

As soon as the appointment was done my bro and I packed up the cars and headed up to Orillia with the girls to finish off our shopping and grab some lunch. After a short delay (which my crybaby brother bitched about all weekend) we got up to the lake and Birdy shipped us over to the cottage in Erin's little aluminum boat. It turns out we were the first ones to arrive that day, and only a few of the guys who had spent the previous night up there were around to greet us.

Throughout the day more people showed up, and we hung around the deck, jumped off some cliffs into the lake, worked on our sunburns, and did a little fishing. My bro and I each pulled in a nice bass, one smallmouth and one largemouth, and we kept em to cook but never got around to it. They're currently sitting in our freezers. When I clocked the little mofo's over the head that night one of em had a crazy convulsion that made his body whip back and forth like crazy. I whacked him again quickly to put him out of his misery.

That night we got nice and loaded and I rang in my bday in style - passed out in a bed.

The next day was more of the same, but a few of the boys came up with the idea to stage a canoe race across the lake and back. Due to the number of guys and the lack of canoes, we did a time trial. Each team of two had to start from shore, curve around a dock at the other side of the lake, and come back to slap the deck with a paddle to stop the timer. I think 6 or 7 teams took part, one of them being my bro and I - the legendary MacCrae Lake Muckers. We drew the last position, and after some hilarious capsizings, and tight times, we took off and returned with the record of 2:14. I think 3 other teams were within 4 seconds of us.
Unfortunately my bro lost his brand new sunglasses as our canoe flipped over in the final stretch for the finish, but they were free anyway so I guess he can't complain.
Burt and Matty (who finished 2nd) then had a proper race with us after giving us about a 10 minute break, which was entirely too short considering my arms were jello ofter the first race. They spanked us handily and walked around like they owned the joint. Damn hosers.


My bro and Angela took off that day, and in the evening all of the boys had a hockey draft for the upcoming season of hockey pools. It was tough to do it all by memory, but I think I did alright. It's only a $5 pool anyhow. Unfortunately that draft took the time we had for a poker match, but nobody seemed to care anyway.

Another drunken night, another hungover morning, and we were headed for home. And after a stop off in Barrie for dinner with the parents and riff-raff (Ryan and Angela) we began the long drive back to Sarnia. We got lost in Woodstock after filling up with gas because all of the on-ramps to the highway were closed. So after a long struggle with the map and terrible detour signs, we made it back to a highway that later joined up with the 401.

I usually have an impeccable sense of direction, but I think I got all fucked up by the lights of a town nearby bouncing off the clouds. Made me think that the sun was setting there, but in reality it wasn't. And Jenn's useless with directions so we wasted a good 45 mins on that venture.

Once we arrived in Sarnia I was too exhausted to drive all the way back to London, so I crashed for the night and I took off in the wee hours of the morning for work. It was a surprisingly good day at work, which was a bonus.

I think NVP says it best in this pic... nobody likes you when yer twenty-three.

Premeditated mass murder/suicide

The following is a clip I came across of Dick Cheney's thoughts about Iraq from the long long ago: 1994



If that isn't enough reason to impeach the prick, send him to war crimes trials, strap him into the electric chair and send his ass to hell beyond... I have no fucking clue what is.

I other news, the biggest rat of em all has jumped ship on Dubya.
Karl "The Architect" Rove has decided to step down. The brain behind the worst and most destructive presidency the US has ever seen. Not exactly a flattering legacy...


Then again, we all know what 451 F means, and it seems that 50 years down the road that might not be just a fairy tale anymore.
Here's hoping that ain't the case.

Balint

Whenever I take a trip to my hometown, at the end of the stay I always find myself on the highway singing Podunk by the Foo Fighters. Terrible fucking song, and I bet 99.99% of the world has never heard it. Even fans of the band. And that's because it's only found on a few rare albums, one of which is the most prized CD in my whole collection, The Demo Tape.


Pretty much the main reason I wanna get a bulldog someday.
I'm gonna name him Clint.
And I'm gonna get a cat and name him Flicker.

Great names for animals.
And only the wittiest of people and most observant veterinarians will get the joke.

Anyway, I made an impromptu trip back to Barrie this weekend, and I had such a great time I didn't bother sticking around for more than one night. Hence, I'm back in London already on the long weekend.
I got together with a few friends and did a couple of things, but besides those positives I had absolutely no motivation to stick around. Some fat plug got all pissed last night at a bar because one of our chairs at the table was in his way, and we were only saved from a brawl by our new friend who was dubbed "Vesty". That's the kind of jerkoff you find in Barrie all the time - a fat guy who can't squeeze his gut into the ample space he had, so he resorts to violence instantly. Classy people up there, let me tell ya.

Next weekend a bunch of the St Catharines crew is heading up to the cottage for some good times and boozing. I'm really looking forward to it.

Plus I get my eye exam on Friday, so I can finally get new glasses. Not that my eyes have changed all that much, I just can't stand the ones I have now.

Never get transitions. Terrible fuckin things...

Stuck between stations

This past weekend was another busy one.

My bro and I each took the Friday off from work and had our girls down to Chatham for my cousin Eric's wedding. I had to race out the day-of to buy a new shirt because the dry cleaner's made my only white shirt even dirtier during the week, and it wasn't going to be ready for the Friday. But on the plus side, we dropped my uncles name at a store in downtown Chatham and got a 20% discount on the new shirt. Still, I hope they can clean the old one, otherwise I might have to burn the store down.

The wedding itself was at the bride's house out in the country, and it was a pretty nice spot. They kept the ceremony short, which we were all happy about considering the heat, and fortunately the rain held off for the day. The were calling for a ton of rain, but luckily it never came. After the ceremony my bro and I did our best to remember everyone's name in our family, and we introduced the girls to most of them. Then for a few hours we all socialized and had a few beers around the property before heading back into town for the reception.


Our table was right beside the bar, which was especially sweet considering it was an open bar. So we all got pretty drunk, but nothing compared to a few of my cousins, one of whom was hitting on our girls pretty hard. It was pretty funny, but eventually I had to step in and save them from his ramblings. And I actually got up and danced for a few songs that night too; a rarity for me.

The next day I caught an early lift with my dad and step-mom up to Guelph for the annual Hillside weekend. They spent the day at the show, but I spent the rest of the weekend there with my cousin Sean, and his buddies Trevor, John, Grant, and Mike. The same crew as every year...

The line-up was less than spectacular this year, but I did hear a few bands that were pretty good. Some young kid named Justin Nozuka was good, The Dears were solid but a little too noisy, Two Hours Traffic caught my attention so I grabbed a CD of theirs, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings had a full band for their set, The Immaculate Machine was pretty decent, but Emily Haines of Metric was a little disappointing and dark.

I was also introduced to a wicked band called The Hold Steady by Sean, who are pretty fuckin mint. And I also met a little girl from U-Vic named Lisa who was pretty cool to hang out with for the weekend. Maybe we'll meet up next year, who knows.

I stuck around til about 5 on Sunday, which is later than I've stayed any other year, but had to get home to London in order to drive Jenn back home, only to turn around again and drive another hour back home to London. Fortunately my dad lent me his car for all of this, otherwise I'd have been screwed. But that meant that I had to drive the car to Toronto right after work and catch a bus back home after he had the car back.

A lot of traveling, let me tell you.
And I'm still spending money like a trophy wife. Gotta stop doing that...

Vanz Kant Danz... but he'll steal your money

Last weekend was by far the busiest, but also the best, of the summer so far.

Friday night the whole 1 York posse (minus 3 guys) assembled up in Guelph for a party to celebrate Thompo and Devo's birthdays, but also the results of a big accounting exam a few of the boys had just written. A couple of the guys passed, but a couple failed, so I guess we drank the blues away and also drank to celebrate.

It was a memorable night. At least the parts I remember were memorable anyway. A few highlights were: Matty waking up of the train tracks with only one sandal on; Dale falling on me and Cersdawg, which resulted in a painful morning for me; a topless chick in the hottub back at Thompo's place after the bar; and me getting booted from a bar for being "too drunk". (I said too drunk is a relative term, but the bouncers didn't want to listen.)
Dale's note in the morning was pretty hilarious too. He left the following with a $20 bill on the kitchen table:


My old man came to town around noon to pick me up and head back to London for the rest of the weekend. I was ridiculously hung over all day, but I met up with Mike and we managed to get some stuff done for finding a place for the fall. I also did some running around with Arden, trying to find that damn Harry Potter book for less than $45.
My dad spent most of the day in the park where they had a music/craft festival thing going on. We saw Blackie and the Rodeo Kings, had some dinner, and then headed down to the JLC for the night's big event - John Fuckin Fogerty.

The opening band was pretty good, I think they were called The Payolas. It was a weird combo of a band, two old dudes and three younger guys. I think the old guys must be the originals, and the others were temporary fillers or new members (seeing as Matt Good's drummer Pat Steward was in the band.) They had one song that I knew, called Eyes of a Stranger, but the rest were pretty solid despite the fact that I'd never heard them before.

Then I heard one of the most bizarre things I've ever heard at a concert - the music being played between the sets. It was actually pretty good stuff for the most part, but 2 of the last 3 songs before Fogerty took the stage were fucking Fogerty songs! I couldn't believe it. The whole crowd was rockin' out to the recorded songs before the show even started. Very weird.


The man of the hour busted onto the stage with Travellin' Band wearing his patented blue plaid shirt, and he played the thing really fast. He did that with one or two other songs as well, and though my dad didn't like it much, I thought it was good cuz those songs were a little higher in energy. My dad also didn't like the kick drum that rocked our bodies for the whole two hour set, but that's probably just because he's getting old.
Speaking of old, the only time I've seen a more geriatric crowd was a few years back when he and I went to see Garnet Rogers and another dude in Toronto at some little dive of a venue.
But there was a good share of younger kids too. Fogerty songs aren't the kind that just fade away after a decade or two. I'm actually amazed that he wrote that many mint tunes in that short time when CCR was around. Legendary shit.

I'd say about three quarters of the songs were CCR material, which was pretty much what I was hoping for. But his solo stuff is pretty solid as well, don't get me wrong. For the classic song Centerfield he busted out the most ridiculous guitar in the shape of a an actual baseball bat. I have no idea how the stings are attached or manipulated, but it was pretty damn cool. This pic isn't from the London show, but at least you can see the thing:

I was amazed at how talented this guy was with the guitar. I've always thought of CCR songs as fairly simplistic, but you shoulda seen his fingers move as he did a solo intro into one songs - I swear they looked like they were made of some kinda goo or liquid rather than skin and bones. Amazing talent. Respect factor: 10 out of 10
I was also surprised at the length and energy of the set, considering this guy was in his prime in the 60s and 70s.

He's actually got a new record coming out soon, titled Revival. Not very creative really, but I'm sure it'll be pretty mint regardless of the title.

And after the encore, whadda ya know... they played another one of his tunes as the crowd filed out. Again, pretty damn weird!

After the show we met up with some friends at a couple of bars, and it took me about 3 beers just to get over my hangover. We were both pretty tired so we left and crashed by about 1 I guess.

The next day I dealt with more house stuff, found my cousin's wedding present at the festival, and hit the Beer Fest downtown with a couple of friends and my old man. And after another set of music in the park we went out for dinner and I fell asleep pretty early out of exhaustion.

I think I'm still recovering.
And this coming weekend is going to be even busier.

Words in print

I'd like to start off with a little opinion letter I read in the London Free Press the other day:

Pope’s fantasy world

Your front page article "Pope insists other churches not true" (July 11) blew my mind. Anyone who believes this kind of statement in 2007 is living in a fantasy world.
The only true church is the one that was practised by believers in the first century. Read about it in the Bible in The Acts of the Apostles. There were small groups of Christians who lived out this true faith through the centuries and a few who still do today. Many became martyrs then as well as today.
No church can claim the true path to salvation. Jesus Christ holds that distinction exclusively.

POSTED BY: Noel Paterson, London
POSTED ON: July 16, 2007

EDITORS NOTE: As published in The London Free Press on July 16, 2007.

"No church can claim the true path to salvation. Jesus Christ holds that distinction exclusively." And what of other religions? I guess they're all wrong because this guy says so?
Yet he's the one who thinks that everyone else is living in a fantasy world.
Ironic, sad, or disgustingly ignorant?
I say all of the above.


In other news, my boy Sid the Kid signed for another 5 years with my beloved Pittsburgh Penguins last week. Though he could've easily taken a deal for the league's maximum salary, he chose to take a few million less in order to help the organization build a stronger team. Good Canadian boy, you gotta love it.

Oh ya, and in more "news" the CBC has reported that "Canadians approaching retirement are now the fastest-growing demographic in the country"

I put the word news in quotations because unless you have been in a coma for the past 50 or 60 years, you'd likely say be inclined to say NO FUCKING SHIT!
This isn't news! This is the most predictable shift in our demographic EVER!

I also finished reading another book today - East, West by Salman Rushdie.
And upon concluding these tales, I'd like to punch Salman in the face and tell him "It's SALMON you jerkoff, there's no second "a" in there. It's a tasty fish, try some."
Then I'd like to kick the idiot publisher who thought this book worthy of printing.
Just brutal.
Vonnegut told us to learn how to write without using semicolons; Rushdie must've taken that to heart. The only problem is, he doesn't know what a fuckin period is either.
Learn to write!

(I realise I just used a semicolon, I did it to be ironic)

Oh... oh naggers. Of course... naggers. Right

MySpace flat out confuses the fuck out of me. I've only started to look into the workings of it, but goddamn is it difficult to manipulate so far. I'm mainly going to use it as a connection to bands via friend additions, but beyond that I think I'll stick with the better photo quality on Flickr, and the better reading frame of this blog for anything I write. And considering I have yet to learn how to play the old guitar very well, it'll be a few years before I offer up any master workings of musical art.

I'm not exactly a techno wiz, though I have managed to get about a 10% grasp on how to use this blog. And I think it's pretty decent, but I'm constantly annoyed by the layout, colours, etc. and whenever I try to fix it up properly I always get too damn frustrated to finish. (Incidentally, I just removed the backround picture to make the thing about a thousand times easier to read.) I've been debating whether or not to add a counter to the bottom of the page, but two problems arise. One, I have no fucking idea how to add a counter to this blog. Two, it's probably less depressing if I don't know how few people actually read my tripe. Not to say I'm writing any of this to draw the masses in, but you know what I mean.

I've been watching alot of South Park lately, so I decided to check out some stuff online. I came across that avatar creator here (I'm sure thousands of people would call this yesteryear's news, but shut up. It's new to me.) There are some damn funny combos you can come up with. Here's my self portrait, so to speak:


I've finally made some progress in the house hunt, but it seems like the pickin's are getting kinda slim. I've got a couple of places to look at tomorrow, and I hope they look good enough to live in for 8 months. If not I may have to become a squatter in my friend's laundry room.

Let's see, what else is new. I'm feeling kinda sick lately. Summer colds piss me off. My sleep has been erratic at best over the last few days, and I hope I can get it back to normal before the weekend is over.
I was actually supposed to go up to Welland for a party tonight, but the house thing has kept me in town. It's actually kinda nice to have a quiet weekend to get my shit together for once, and save some cash in the process. Though it is a pain in the ass I couldn't get up to the party.

I finished a Kurt Vonnegut book the other day during my lunch hour and breaks. Finished the whole damn thing in less than a day - miraculous. It was a great read, titled "A Man Without a Country", and it was basically a Carlin-esque look at the current state of affairs in the world through the eyes of a man who can joke about anything from the end of the world to Nazi death camps. Very entertaining.

Well I'm tired and I gotta get my sleep in order.

Night.

"If George Bush said we need men right now, I'd go"

It's amazing how neocons preach about how great and necessary the war in Iraq is, how honourable it is, how well it's going, how righteous America is, yadda yadda yadda...



but they never want to get their own hands dirty.

"Oh I love George Bush!"

Pathetic.

False Pretenses

This is a new video that's been released by the IAFF about Giuliani's responsibilities and failures when it came to 9/11.
Sure was an eye-opener for me.

Be the cat

I've been reading alot lately.
Novels and short stories and shit, and it's amazing how my online reading has dropped off.

I think there are two reasons for it -
#1 I have tons of spare time at work, and I need something to entertain my mind.
#2 my disappearance from the online world for a few weeks at the start of the summer. It really does wonders to ruin your sense of connectedness with the world outside, especially when you're used to keeping daily tabs on a site like Crooks and Liars.

I've also been watching a ton of movies and listening to tons of new albums as well as old LP's. The reason for this is simple enough too - I've got a house to myself, which means my personal taste and opinion runs the joint. Nobody complains, not even the girls who live below me when I've got the bass thumping at its loudest.

The summer is flying by, mainly because my weekends are always busy. I've only had one weekend in London without anything "going on" per say, and I hit the town with friends on both friday and saturday night. The weekend stuff is getting expensive though, and it's not about to stop anytime soon. With tuition due mid-August, it's about time to start shitting my pants.

The other day I was actually checking the BBC to see if anything positive was developing in the world - but as usual it's all going to hell in a handbasket. But one headline caught my eye and I laughed instantly: Terror fight "may take 15 years"

Is that not the most ridiculous fuckin thing? The arrogant bastard thinks that terrorism can be defeated! Bomb bomb bomb until all the terrorists are dead! And it won't even take two decades! I bet he also thinks that Saudi's fly planes into office towers without any logical precipitating cause.
Until the World Police realize that most of the world doesn't want them to be meddling in their affairs and bombing their babies, I think terrorism will remain pretty healthy. After all, children don't develop amnesia 15 years after a bomb has ruined their house and family.
Wake the fuck up.

In other news, I've got my schooling all sorted out for the coming year. Another full course load, even though I only really need a fraction of them.
It looks like 3 of us from the old place will be back, one will be gone to Ottawa for teacher's college, and the other two are Alberta-bound to work for a few months at least.
Now we just have to find a place to live and we're golden.

I also had a chat today with a friend of mine out east. We've laid down the groundowrk for a post-university move to Ausi-land to live and work for a time. Who knows how long it'll last, or when the idea is gonna get legs and walk, but I really do want to travel, and I love those sexy accents.

My friend Darrelle has committed herself to her music of late, and is doing a bunch of shows around the golden horseshoe. Ever since the first time I heard her play I thought she sounded amazing, and I'm glad to see that she's playing regularly.

Party boy is back from a year in Korea, and Sonya's off in South Africa for six months.
Bender and the boys are back from their multi-country European vacation, and my good friend Shannon is doing her Argentina/Bolivia thing right now, before a trip to the States and then a flight across to Europe to work in the fall.

See? Everyone's globe trotting, except poor old me. Haha.

Oh ya, Matt Good's new album is being streamed through his website, even though it's not due out until the end of the month. I gotta say, it's pretty solid. Despite the irritating intro to the first track, and the covers he recorded (in my eyes they're some of the weakest songs he's ever put on an album) it's pretty damn good. At first I though a few of the tracks sounded too similar, but once you hear them a few times they really differentiate themselves. Lyrically it's mighty impressive, and he's got a passion in this album that I kinda expected given the circumstances that led to his writings.

I guess it's gettin on bedtime. Lots of reading to do, movies to watch, and records to take in tomorrow, so I gotta get some sleep.