Happy New Year!

Best Movies of 2009 (My Best)

1. Adventureland
2. An Education
3. Away We Go
4. Funny People
5. Brüno
6. District 9
7. (500) Days of Summer
8. Art and Copy
9. The Class
10. Fantastic Mr. Fox

Honourable mention and Can. con: One Week (crappy movie, great landscape porn: "You live in one of the most beautiful countries in the world." "I know. Too bad we're fucking it up.")

Confessions of a Reluctant Information Manager

The New Quarterly has posted their e-newsletter, which previews the upcoming issue (#113, due out in January, 2010). In it you can read my "e-exclusive," "Confessions of a Reluctant Information Manager: My First Semester of Library School." Want to know what I've been doing for the last 4 months? Read here!

And look for Issue 113, which features my story "You Wouldn't Recognize Me," on newsstands, in bookstores, and available online, this January!

Ladders

The kind in knitting, not for climbing. But these are big enough to climb on. Why? What am I doing wrong? I've knit and purled before. Is it the circular needles? Is k4, p4 a bad combination? Help!

Tropical Storm Danny

Compared to Hurricane Bill? Worse:



And yet, where was the news coverage? Where were the live reporters and hourly updates? Get your shit together, CBC et al.

And Bill? Danny? What is this, attack of the WASPs? I envy Mexico and their Jimena. But look out, Kevin is coming. Though he seems rather depressed.

What I'm Listening To

Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago. Buy it now.



Read the Pitchfork review here.

Hurricane Bill

The mines are no place for a hurricane, even one as brave as Bill.



Update at 11:37 a.m. Sunday:

Etching and Cross-Hatching

Recently I took a weekend-long etching/intaglio workshop at NSCAD. I made this print:





I love etching! I loved how meditative it was to scrape lines onto a plate. I loved learning about cross-hatching. I loved the process of sketch to plate to acid bath to cleaning to inking to wiping to printing to cleaning, etc. etc. I've been trying to get that old-fashioned, early 20th century feeling in my illustrations as I try to figure out how to illustrate my kids' books. So now I've tried a few more pen and ink cross-hatched drawings. They don't turn out as well as actually etching, but I'm slowly getting the hang of it. Below, some of my drawings.

"We will sample it judiciously!"

"When Olena was a girl, she had called them lie-berries--a fibbing fruit, a story store--and now she had a job in one. She had originally wanted to teach English literature, but when she failed to warm to the graduate study of it, its french-fried theories--a vocabulary of arson!--she'd transferred to library school, where everyone was taught to take care of books, tenderly, as if they were dishes or dolls."

--from Lorrie Moore's "Community Life," Birds of America (1998)

Unfortunately, Nicole

Unfortunately, Nicole never considered the fact that she could get pregnant while doing alcohol and drugs while having unprotected sex.
Unfortunately, Nicole has a reputation.
Unfortunately, Nicole has gone over the edge.
Unfortunately, Nicole suffered a set back last month.
Unfortunately, Nicole was having a wardrobe malfunction.
Unfortunately, Nicole lost to that fugly Serena.
Unfortunately, Nicole seems to have an incredible memory, or maybe because she's just hungry for gossip.
Unfortunately, Nicole didn't make headlines again until February 2001 where it was made public that she and her husband were separating.
Unfortunately, Nicole was only cancer free for two months, and then found out that the cancer had metastasized to her lungs.
Unfortunately, Nicole did NOT offer her placenta to Tom.
Unfortunately, Nicole came in 15th in the time-trial.
Unfortunately, Nicole has a girlfriend Melanie Mayron and, as they say, drama ensues.
Unfortunately, Nicole is the cutest baby ever and no-one can stop fussing.
Unfortunately, Nicole is not in these photos.
Unfortunately, Nicole was too young as the minimum age requirement was 13.
Unfortunately, Nicole had chosen all peonies for her wedding flowers.
Unfortunately, Nicole is not a serious student of music.

Wild Caraway Restaurant and Café

Best restaurant in Nova Scotia. Right next door to the blue house, right here in Advocate Harbour: wildcaraway.com

Venn Diagram

from benjoseph.tumblr.com

Thinking of Becoming a Teacher?

Don't. It sucks. Trust me. 10 years and I want o-u-t out. The human race is rapidly devolving and I can no longer stand being a frontline witness.

The Berth House

In response to Bookninja's 're-masculate' contest, the goal of which was to 'masculine-ize' a chick lit. title, behold, The Berth House, by Andi McKay.

Here's the synopsis: Donahue “Huey” Rare is the first boy in five generations of Scot’s Bay, Nova Scotia Rares to reject the family carpentry business and head to the high seas, despite the family sea curse. In his youth, Huey apprentices with Mr. Comeau (“Mr. C”), a salty Acadian sea captain infamous for his sea chanties and mean-spirited blind parrot, Chico. After a decade at sea fighting pirates, Germans and sea monsters, Huey returns to Scot’s Bay with his crew of misfit sailors to prove his worth, winning the love of the village hooker, Ruby. When a harrowing fire set by a new American carpenter threatens the berth house his father and brothers built, only Huey can save the village. But will he?

(note #1: I'm posting this here because, what happened to this contest? Seems they got a bit of press in The Guardian and that was that. Away into the ether)

(note #2: You can read the ridiculous synopsis to the extremely ridiculous original Birth House, which has one of the worst, most sexist covers ever, here)

Grow Up, Jenn Grant

I first heard Jenn Grant’s Orchestra for the Moon the night the Dalhousie graduate architecture students unveiled the first part of the outdoor theatre they had built in Spencer’s Island, five minutes down the road from Advocate. It was an extremely windy and cool night (though July can often be windy and cool in Advocate) and we milled about waiting for the decision to unfurl the sail-like screen (they finally decided against it). Living in a fishing village in the middle of rural Nova Scotia there certainly is a dearth of cool, so when I heard her beautiful voice, her charming melodies, her complex yet pretty orchestration, I marched over to the students and asked who was playing. “Jenn Grant,” they said. “She’s from Halifax.” So the next time I was in Halifax, I bought the CD and it’s basically been on repeat on my iPod, in the car, and on my stereo ever since. Multiple friends have copies. I don’t just love this CD, I LOVE this CD.

Flash forward two and a half years later and I’m living in Halifax where I’ve been trying to get my fill of all things culture before possibly heading back to the fishing village in the spring. I took in a week of movies at the Atlantic Film Festival, have enrolled in two continuing ed. courses at NSCAD, walk the dog in the park, go to concerts. So when I heard Grant was playing at the Rebecca Cohn, Dal’s beautiful theatre, I excitedly got tickets. Plus – bonus! She has a new CD out (Echoes) and this would be her official release.

Concerts, for me, can do one of two things. They introduce or reintroduce me to an artist, solidify my admiration, encourage me to look into their back catalogues or explore a band or musician I had never heard of. Examples include Jolie Holland, whose latest album (The Living and the Dead) hadn’t really impressed me until I saw her live. Four years ago, Broken Social Scene was ok, but the (to me) unknown band that opened up for them, Stars, blew me away. Other memorable concerts include The Sundays, Lhasa, José Gonzalez, Radiohead, and Beck, to name a few.

Then there are concerts that do the opposite. Whatever admiration I had evaporates after the second or third song. There are many reasons why. The crowd and therefore the realization their fans are drunken louts (Broken Social Scene), the sheer rudeness and ingratitude of the musicians (The Cranberries), the precious, phony, or cheesy stage show they put on (Santana), the low quality of the music and/or performance (Lush), or, and often most importantly, the in-between-song banter. When Tegan and Sara opened up for Rufus Wainwright, their banter about laundry and eating had me yelling at them to shut up (the crowd was full of louts—I had a full beer spilled on me—so my heckle went unnoticed).

Back to Jenn Grant. If she’d just sung her (absolutely underwhelming) songs, I wouldn’t have learned how much of a twit she is. Between songs she told stories about smashing up her mom’s car, about piercing her nose, about ballet class, about looking at fireflies in the country. And if any of these stories were brief or had anything to do with the music, then maybe I could have forgiven her. But instead they went something like this, “I was in the country…in, you know, like, Ottawa, in the country, right? And so one night I was walking with (insert name-dropped unknown Canadian musician here) and we, like, hee hee, saw, you know fireflies? And they were like, I don’t know they like flash and stuff, and so, I yeah, um, where’s my capo? So they were, oh my god, Rose Cousins! Everyone! Thank you Rose for singing with me tonight and um, yeah, so fireflies, they were, well, here’s a song about, um, er, stupid capo, here is some butterflies—no! I mean fireflies!”

Shut up! Shut up shut up shut up shut up! And worse than that was she didn’t sing one song from Orchestra for the Moon. Not. One. And her new album? Boring. Gone are the interesting time signature changes, gone is the fancy, floaty voice work, gone is the solidity of the first album. But you know, sophomore albums…a time to grow, right? Grant, clearly, is not a grown up. Here was a little girl on stage in a ridiculous purple satin dress with too-large red heels. Here was someone with no sense of audience. Here was yet another female artist who feels the need to act like a dumb girl when clearly her art is very intelligent and mature. And here is one less fan of Jenn Grant.