The Uniter Fiver
Local university mag The Uniter is holding a competition called The Uniter Fiver where you can go n vote for your favourite artist ad they win stuff (I think?) and get some much-deserved local cred.
I'm lucky enough to know not just one but two of the super-talented guys who submitted videos and even though you can only vote for one I'm gonna plug 'em both anyway, because they're both brilliant and they both deserve it:
"Crows" is a collaboration between Co-pilot, Mumbles and my friend Abstract Artform aka Shea M.
I met Shea through my friend Colin a few years back on a patio at Beachcomber's. In between charming all the waitresses and probably the waiters too he totally won us over as well.
After we'd had our fill of slushy drinks & beers he insisted that we go to karaoke at Saffron's on Corydon where we had one of the best, most random and entertaining nights ever.
In addition to being a sweet and unbelievably genuine person, Shae is also super-talented, and you should definitely vote for him.
Aband*nthecar is a one-man synthpop band aka my very dear friend John L. I don't know much about his music so here's his description of his setup for this video: I use a Boss RC-300 looping pedal with a single drum sample, the Little Phatty mainly for the arpeggiator, and the MicroKorg for the vocoder and leads.
I first met John several years ago when he was dating Kat, who is my best ladybro.
We were all at Wine Fest and ran into each other about 2/3's of the way through the night and even though everyone else decided to go off in search of more, differenter wines, John and our friend Teri and I decided to stand around the port table for close to an hour and drink there.
This move has basically become a staple of every Wine Fest since, and with good reason (port is great).
In addition to being one of my best friends and one of the cleverest and most outrageous people you could hope to meet, John writes some of the most charming and catchy tunes I know and you should definitely vote for him.
I don't actually know anyone from Bear Clones but they get a special spot in this post because of this cover of Faust from the epic 80's rock opera that almost nobody knows about Phantom of the Paradise.
I can't in good conscience tell you to vote for them since I'm plugging my friends, but I highly recommend you check out their stuff and definitely recommend that you watch Phantom of the Paradise.
Happy voting, and good luck boys!
xox yr Shaner
Fred Penner played a show at the WECC this past weekend
One of the best things about being born in the late 80's is that it was a really good time for children's programming. I grew up with wicked shows like Under the Umbrella Tree, Lamb Chop's Play-Along, and Fred Penner's Place which was a show that ran for a decade or so on the CBC.
I always wanted to crawl through that goddamn log like he did at the beginning of each episode. What a boss.
What was really cool about growing up with Fred Penner's Place is that he's actually from my city, so pretty much everyone I know has either seen or talked to him at some point, or knows someone who dated one of his kids or something like that.
There's even a small local tumblr that features people taking pictures with him in the background
because people from Winnipeg are sneaky like that and we really, really love Fred Penner.
Anyway in addition to other shows he does throughout the year he always comes back to Winnipeg to do two sing-along shows each year right before Christmas
-one for kids during the day and one for us nerds at night.
Tthe kids show is probably just the same songs, but the evening show must be way more fun because we're all drunk and belting out the words to the songs that we thought we'd forgotten years ago.
Plus it's super cool to have omg Fred Penner play the song you requested
(even if we all know we're all secretly there to hear him play his version of The Cat Came Back, but never mind that)
because there's something about sitting with yr friends drinking beer singing along to songs you learned when you were 5 that just melts yr heart
even when it's -35 outside and everything else is frozen solid.
The web pages I frequent summed up by the general types of posts I see:
Facebook: “All the people on my friends list are going to pile on to 1. Defend your point or 2. Go on at length about how wrong you are.”
Twitter: “You made a valid point! Let’s discuss like adults and have a productive conversation.”
Online newspaper publications: “I like commenting anonymously because I can say all the ignorant things I want about issues I know nothing about.”
Reddit: “Your statement makes me feel bad about myself. Time to take it personally and out of context and fight with you about it for a day and a half!”
4chan: “DICKS. EVERYWHERE.”
Watching Flight
with the cats and blankets and tea and advil because I can't sleep, haven't slept, since the night before last because even though decongestants help me breathe they don't stop the sting behind my eyes
and nothing is worse than trying to sleep with sore eyes.
I don't recommend it.
Anyway since I can't sleep and I'm not going to watch any of Dr. Who without Tyrone I figured I'd write a little message to you lovely people
who still come around n read this nonsense all the time even though I don't update as often as I should
to say that, so far, Flight has been a terrific movie.
I figured it'd be good since there was a bunch of full-frontal lady nudity in the very first scene and also Denzel is in it and I love him
but it's been really intense so far and I only got to the part where the airplane just crashed.
Which was terrifying and awful and stressful to watch even though I know that flying is actually the safest way to travel and shit like that rarely goes down
but it's terrifying nonetheless and makes me realize that pilots actually have balls of steel and are a million more times hardcore than I could ever be.
Not astronaut hardcore, but pretty effing close.
Another weekend in the bag
dinner's almost ready and we're having a bunch of healthy stuff to try and balance all the shite we ate/drank earlier and the gym we skipped on Saturday
(whoops)
which happened because at the time we usually go to the gyme we were actually waking up in 'MERICUH.
Which if you had asked me more than 24hrs earlier I would have no expected, at all. But that's one of the great things about life is we don't always know what we're in for and sometimes it's bad but mostly it's awesome. At least for me, anyway.
Who would have known that upon completing my interview with fabulous local band Les Jupes and heading out to Garbonzo's for a beer tasting with some of my finest male friends that we would be planning a trip to Grand Forks to drink beer.
Yes, that's really the entire reason that we went.
We weren't even in the good 'ol US of A for 24hrs but managed to have a ridiculously good time nevertheless -we closed down JL Beers and were right back at 'er the next morning before departing back to my lovely country of origin.
I was impressed at the waitress who made fun of Adrian's accent with us, the selection of beer at Happy Harry's, the cheapness of the burgers at JL Beers, and the amount of fun that we managed to collectively jam into less than a day.
Thanks boys, I'm glad we're friends.
cc: the amazing @cenquist, @kenquist, @adriantrimble and of course the always-charming @tyronedeise. Love you all.
Sometimes I feel like I can't express myself
but then I see stuff like this and think
"yeah, I'm still doing pretty okay."
This is the best poster for an event in Winnipeg right now
This poster was made by local hilarious badass Tim Co-Op and I jacked it from his Facebook Instagram feed because it's fucking badass and hilarious and I needed to share it with the world.
I remember standing in Nathan Phillips Square
I’d like to say that it happened just before things fell apart but if I’m being honest they were well over at this point and we were just clinging to some stupid hope that we could pull through even though it was obvious that we couldn’t.
I used to think looking back that we were in Toronto because we were looking at apartments but that isn’t right. This happened after I’d dragged him from Hamilton to Toronto to look at a place because I was lonely and miserable in Hamilton and desperately looking for some sort of familiarity which is how Toronto felt to me –something I knew and understood. He’d played along and we’d already put our names down for an apartment in a month or so by this point.
We were in town for WinterFest which maybe they still do in Toronto or maybe they don’t, I’m not sure since I haven’t been before or since that occasion.
The Weakerthans were playing and I wanted to see them. They weren’t one of my bands the way that they are now but I was sort of grasping for anything that felt like home at the time even though I didn’t realize it then.
I remember that we had a fight because he didn’t want to go so I hopped a Go Train and met him in Toronto as a compromise which didn’t really help because it was cold outside and he didn’t want to stand outside in the cold and see a concert even though that was the point.
He wanted to go and I didn’t because their set wasn’t finished and it was snowing and seeing this concert was the whole reason I’d dragged him to Toronto, dammit.
So he stayed on the edge of the crowd and I weaved my way to the front and felt better surrounded by all the people and a group of guys and two girls started talking in between one of the songs and mentioned that they were from Winnipeg and I said
hey me too
and we all talked about how they were on layover between London and Winnipeg for a few days and were in town to see the show and I said I’m moving to Toronto soon and they said
you’re so brave
and I felt brave for the first time in a long time.
One of them gave me a swig of the rye they were drinking as the next song started playing and I remember closing my eyes and feeling the snow on my face and listening to that song and feeling
so hopeful and excited for the future.
Well.
It didn’t last very long. A few weeks later I found myself on a flight back to Winnipeg to pick up the pieces of my heart and the life I had tried to leave behind.
I couldn’t listen to The Weakerthans for a really long time and especially not that song which I associated with that last perfect moment which of course wasn’t perfect at all.
It’s been a long time since that moment and last week I found myself wandering around The Exchange in the dark humming that same song as I looked up at the big rows of windows
and I realized that it still made me feel hopeful and happy. Just in a different way.
It’s funny how things change.
Drunk girl in the Exchange
I first saw you on Albert and McDermot
while Tyrone was taking photos of the storefronts of Rhymes with Orange and Tiny Feast
and I was standing by holding his papers and humming a song by The Weakerthans.
You were walking up the street in a tiny dress and a blazer
holding your phone in one hand
and a glass full of some sort of drink in the other
my hunch is a long island tea, but it's anyone's guess.
You walked by and kept stumbling on the cobblestone streets
and I felt compelled to say something to you
but I didn't because mostly we're taught to keep to ourselves
lest we bring trouble or interfere.
However
as I watched you stumble away down the block
and then across McDermot
almost falling twice
I thought "fuck convention" and started to run after you.
By the time I reached you, you were already a block away
by King and Notre Dame
and I sprinted around the corner and shouted EXCUSE ME at you.
I think I scared you but you stopped.
I asked if you were okay and you drunkenly said you were
even though your dress was half-tucked up and you'd lost that glass somewhere and I could smell the booze on you
and I thought to myself
that you would have looked really professional if your dress wasn't so short & your little boots were so high.
But that's besides the point.
I asked if you wanted me to call you a cab and you said no
so you said you would call your boyfriend and I said I'd wait with you and you said I didn't have to
but I did
and when he didn't pick up you got up and straightened out your skirt and said
I AM TOTALLY OKAY
and sprinted across the intersection and through an empty parking lot before I knew what was happening.
I yelled after you
where are you going?
and you said
HOME.
I hope you made it back okay
to wherever your home is
because I'm still worried about you
dashing around by yourself in your high heels in the cold.
So if you read this, please let me know you're all right.
To Tyrone, on our anniversary
We've been together for four years, now, which a friend pointed out recently is longer than most of the couples she knows -married or unmarried. Which is true for me as well since I don't think I know many people who've stuck it out as long as we have.
I watch people we know come together and fall apart and yet I look at you every day and feel this growing sense of love and excitement as our lives change and continue to intertwine until, really, it's not "my life" anymore, but "our life." I feel so incredibly lucky to be able to do that, to see you and feel that way and have it only increase over time.
I realize that what you and I have together is rare and unique, and something that a lot of people will never get to experience. I feel so fortunate to be able to have that, with you.
Over the past few years I've leaned so heavily on you, as a student with basically no money and no free time, and you've never been anything but encouraging, kind, considerate, and giving beyond the scope of anything I would have ever dared ask of you. You supported me when I made the incredibly difficult decision of leaving my safe job with the province to pursue my university education, and all throughout the three years I was a student.
I like to think that I would have had the tenacity to continue to pursue my goals on my own, but I know for certain that having you in my life made it significantly easier to do so.
I wasn't just working to make my life better, but to help build a better future for both of us.
I still am.
Back in the very early days of our relationship I was struggling to make a decision: go to school out of province, or stay in Winnipeg to go to school and invest in our relationship. I remember being scared that our relationship wouldn't work out and was talking to my mum about it, and she said "you can go to school anywhere, but you won't find a man like Tyrone anywhere else" and she was right.
Honestly, there are times when you'll be working on some new project, or describing something you read that day to me, and I'll look at you and think "I get to be with him. He loves me. How the fuck did I manage that?"
I'm still figuring that one out.
(My current guess is that I have a wicked rack, but who knows.)
Honestly, it doesn't matter as long as we love each other.
I can't picture my life without you. I would never want to. It would be missing something so vital, so central to my happiness, my motivation, and, really, what makes me who I am.
I have been, and continue to be, shaped by my love for you. You have made me a better person, a happier person, a more grounded and reflective person that I ever would have been able to become on my own.
If I've had even half the positive impact on you that you've had on me, then I'm doing okay.
I could continue. I could go on at length about how much fun I have with you every day, how entertaining and hilarious our conversations are, how adorable you are when you walk around the house in bright underwear and socks pulled up high, how you manage to be so intelligent one minute and so weird and off-the-wall the next, how excited I am to be building a life with you, how being around you makes me a better person, how falling asleep and waking up next to you are the best parts of my day.
Thank you for all of that. For bringing these things into my life and making it so much better.
I love you more than words could ever express, no matter how many long-winded blog posts I write trying to articulate it.
Happy anniversary.
