Tagged: audio
Hurried hard yesterday
- by admin
Which is curling speak for "frantically sweeping the ice in front of the 40lb granite stone sliding down the ice so it gets to where you want it to go while your friend, the skip, yells at you".It's ridiculous and a ton of fun, as I discovered when Tyrone, John, Bree and myself went to the Granite Curling Club to practice for the Manitoba Music Rocks Charity Bonspiel next weekend.
Because we decided to sign up to curl in a bonspiel without ever having curled before.
Naturally.
Luckily everyone involved with the sport is kind and amazing and the manager of the club let us use the ice and equipment for free, and the three older guys who had been curling for 40+ years and were there to practice for their badass team took time out of their day to teach us how to properly play the sport and not just mess around stupidly like we had been doing previously.
Even though curling is a Scottish sport it feels so Canadian.
Before you play you shake hands with the opposing team and say yr name, so now everyone's friends.
You don't yell or jeer at the other team to break their concentration.
Or otherwise be a sportsing asshole.
You drink before the game
during the game
and then after the game the winning team pays for drinks for both teams.
It's basically polite people being polite playing a nice game of sliding heavy rocks down some ice and one person on each team yelling stuff like
HURRY HARD!
DIE!
EASY!
OFF!
RIGHT OFF!
and others that I don't remember while getting outrageously drunk
It might be the best sport ever.
Big thanks to the Granite Curling Club and the fabulous gentlemen who made my introduction to the game such a fantastic one!
On Winnipeg, and negativity
- by admin
One of my most popular posts is a post I wrote praising Winnipeg a few years ago. I still stand by it.
But I didn't always.
I used to be one of those winter-hating, downtown-bashing, sad excuses for citizens who felt that the only positive aspect about living in Winnipeg was that I was able to bitch about it.
I used to think that moving to Toronto would solve all my problems. That it would make me happy.
Who the fuck knows why.
A bigger city doesn't make you a better person.
A different climate doesn't change your personality.
A subway system or some skyscrapers or more clubs to visit on the weekends doesn't improve who you are.
Only you are in charge of that.
This seems to be something that people from Winnipeg forget about. People I see on Facebook and on forums and in newspaper comments.
They become so obsessed with associating their identity (read: personal misery) with where they live that they blame their city for causing them to be bored, broke, stuck in a rut or otherwise unhappy with their lives.
As though a city is to blame for their own personal choices and mistakes.
When someone posts something negative about Winnipeg, I wonder if they realize that it's a reflection of themselves? When they say "eugh what a shit-hole! This city sucks!" do they realize that they live here. They're a part of whatever problems they feel the city has because they're a citizen here.
Any by rejecting their own personal responsibility they put down those of us who are trying to stay and make things better.
By saying "I'm better than Winnipeg!" what they're saying is "I'm better than everyone who chooses to live here. I'm better than you."
Because instead of trying to figure out why they're unhappy here they blame Winnipeg. And they run away.
(Or say they're going to, anyway)
Most people who claim to "hate" Winnipeg never seem to actually go anywhere. They stay here and gripe because it's far easier to bitch about it than to actually take all the steps necessary to move away.
This is because people's perceptions of their problems are so deeply-tied to Winnipeg that most people don't ever actually leave. It provides people with a reason to be upset, with an easy scapegoat.
"My life would be so much better if I left this place"
"My career would be farther along if I lived somewhere else"
"I'd be a happier person if I didn't live here"
I hear people make these statements and it makes me sad for them. That their happiness is contingent on a population size, on street names, on landscape.
What a horrible way to go through life.
Don't get me wrong -I'm not saying nobody should ever leave. There are a multitude of good reasons for anyone to move anywhere.
But a shitty attitude shouldn't be one of them.
"Enjoy the fuck out of it"
- by admin
is something that my friend Adam (on the right) says a lot.He's one of the most ridiculous people I know. Incredibly sweet and hilarious and rocks harder than anyone else, guaranteed.
Recently I was thinking "wtf am I going to do with 2014?"
'Cause even though it's a giant cliche a new year is always a decent reason to stop & reflect on yr life and where you want to go and etc
and I always try to take some time to think about wtf I want to do with myself.
To be honest, I'm working on being more positive.
But not in that fake way. I hate that shit.
That "like omg you guys it's SO. GREAT. HAHAHAHAHAHA OMG"
bullshitty way.
Fuck those chicks.
(and it's always chicks who act like that, isn't it?)
I'm talking about being like
"s'cool. I've got this, life.
I can handle this shit."
I'm going to do my best to not stress the f out when life gets tough
to channel my inner rock like Adam would do
and enjoy the fuck out of it.
Got an odd email just now
- by admin
From someone I haven't talked to in a long time.Someone who used to be a big part of my life and influenced me in many ways.
Looking back I can safely say these experiences (in the long run) taught me the kind of person I'd rather not be
fixated on money
close-minded
shallow
the list goes on
and we had a huge falling out a few years ago due to a sketchy and poorly handled situation.
I blew up.
I told them how I felt and left it at that. In the years since I haven't thought much about them
and when I do, it's through the grapevine and usually a story so ridiculous that I sigh, roll my eyes and think
thank god I don't talk to them anymore!
But I've been sitting here for the past hour or so staring at my screen
typing,
trying to figure out how to say what I want to say without sounding
callous
cold
and downright mean
because in the end, as it turns out
letting go is harder than I thought.
Which is better: Drive the movie or Drive the soundtrack?
- by admin
We're watching the movie right now so I'll get back to you on the soundtrack part but so far it's pretty kickass.
I can tell I've been playing a lot of GTA 5 recently because at the beginning of the movie when Ryan Gosling was driving around listening to the police radio all I kept thinking was
it's a shame he couldn't see their radars right now.
I've been playing so much of it because we've been on Christmas vacation which basically has resulted with a lot of drinking with my friends, sleeping in, going to the gym, reading a few books I've been meaning to get around to, and playing a lot of video games because it's fucking cold outside.
Tomorrow is NYE as you all know and I should probably be reflecting on the past year and I probably will at some point
all the cool shit I did
the university I graduated from
the jobs I got, lost, and have now
the people in my life
but not right now because Ryan Gosling is being too dreamy.
Fred Penner played a show at the WECC this past weekend
- by admin
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.
Watching Flight
- by admin
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 eyesand 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.
This is the best poster for an event in Winnipeg right now
- by admin
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.
To Tyrone, on our anniversary
- by admin
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.
I bet you want to know why I'm watching 'Chocolat'
- by admin
The answer is that it's partially because it's on Netflix.
But mostly the answer is because back when I was fresh out of high school I knew a girl named Rae-Annon and it was her favourite movie if I recall correctly. If it wasn't, and I'm wrong, it was damn near her favourite because she talked about it a lot.
Even though she and I went to elementary school together, or maybe it was middle school I'm not sure anymore I knew who she was because she was the weird goth chick that my yuppie friends and I would look at from down the hall with big saucer-like eyes and wonder what could possess someone to dress that way.
(We, however, were dressed in as little as the school would let us get away with wearing without having to wear a garbage bag for a shirt and we were barely on our periods so who were the fucked-up ones, really?)
Anyway after high school we reconnected by chance because we both worked at the same McDonalds in Winnipeg Square where I wiled away a year of the year and a half between when I graduated and when I moved to Ontario.
She was way more self-assured and I didn't realize it at the time but I really looked up to her even though she had slightly hippie-er tendencies than me like not always shaving her armpits and talking about shakras and stuff.
She went to the East Coast for a month and brought me back a small bag of sea glass which I still have and treasure even though we haven't talked in years.
We used to hang out in her parent's basement which was basically her little pad and watch movies like East of Eden and Breakfast at Tiffany's and drink wine from a box and talk about the boys in our lives. She showed me how to paint watercolours and bought me a martini glass set for my 18th birthday and we had stupid made-up words like 'citag' that we used with each other because young girls are dumb that way.
She knew me back when I was still a pretty fucked-up mess and sometimes I feel bad about that.
We've completely lost touch over the years after a nasty falling out that was, largely and unsurprisingly, my fault. But when I think about those years I try not to think about the end, but rather the rest of it which was sweet and amazing and good.
So when I saw Chocolat on Netflix the other day I put in my queue and even though it's not a very good movie (which I didn't expect it to be) it's nice to remember her and my friendship that feels like a lifetime ago.
So hi Rae-Annon, if you're reading this.
