Ooooo, blogger just added this new easier way to throw pics on here, that's cool. Here's a good shot of the view from Riverside Park in Kamloops. Thanks for the tips on where to post pics Jess & Tara, I will get around to that soon.
Thursday, June 30, 2005
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
In defence of the city
Our new editor started today bringing a new sense of hope. The old Ed. is around for another month to help him adjust to his first editor job, but things will start to shift pretty quickly. The outgoing editor is eager to do as little as possible as soon as possible. After 44 years at the paper people are hoping to make a big deal of his parting, though it just occurred to me, on the off off off chance that he catches wind of this blog, I shouldn’t say more.
So after posting nearly daily for the first week, the break for the last four days feels like a long time…I’m addicted. Partly it was a busy weekend of work including chasing the first real news story in town in a long while, only to have the lead of the story (kid died in fire) buried half way down the story by the editor – even though everyone in town already knew. I also didn’t post because I’m running out of ways to whine about boredom.
With the fire this weekend the phrase “word on the street” has been bouncing around. That’s one of those odd sayings…which word? which street? Like someone walking along sees the word “fire” laying on the street, picks it up and gives it to the next person they see. “The word on the street is ‘fire’.” Plus wouldn’t many of those rumours be spread indoors? Plus in this town “street” is pushing it at times, more like lane, or gravel road, or dirt parking lot.
Speaking of streets, and making fun of town sizes, Jen mentioned on her blog she’s going to Vancouver and would like to live there some day but is afraid. Since I still can’t figure her blog out and I’m never on line to chat (I have to write these in Word), I’ll respond here: the cliche of the big scary city is exaggerated. Sure there are more strangers and more noise and crime etc but proportionally the crime rates aren’t any worse, in fact they’re often less than in smaller towns on a per capita basis.
Vancouver’s homicide rate of 2.12 per 100,000 is equivalent to a single homicide per year in the entire Central Kootney region (Castlegar-Nelson-Creston). Also only 13% of solved homicides are committed by strangers, most are by family or friends, so it doesn’t matter much how many strangers are around.
Don’t know why I went off on that tangent, my point was the amazing abundance of choices and transportation etc in the city can make it a lot easier to live the way you want and the anonymity can help you be yourself and live more free. The positives more than amply compensate for the negatives. Vancouver has Kits beach, movies, Stanley Park, wilderness so close, skiing, book stores, coffee shops, bars, sushi, the Mongolian Grill, night life, Symphony of Fire, planetarium, Anthropology Museum, Art Gallery, famous library building, Queen E. Park, festivals, sea wall, Granville Mall, Steveston, Commercial Dr., Grouse Grind, aquarium, Chinatown, Gasstown, PNE, constant concerts, famous authors reading, Granville Island, Lighthouse Park, Endowment Lands, Kerrisdale, Jericho & Wreck beach, Pacific Centre, A&B Sound, the Skytrain, fascinating characters… I miss the city! (and that’s just off the top of my head)
Anyway, while I’m on the topic of friend’s blogs Manny finally got one, though knowing him it’ll just be about sports, and as Scott points out, Rap, Everybody Loves Raymond and marathon bear wrestling sessions (he once fought off a Grizzly with his bare hands for 17 hours!).
Manny will be happy to know I finally saw Meet the Fockers and as I suspected I’m glad I didn’t spend $10 on it. It would almost be worth the admission to watch THAT cast reading from the phone book for two hours – which makes the film’s luke warm impression all the more disappointing. With two of the best actors in film (Hoffman/DeNiro) and one of the funniest guys of the last 15 years (Stiller) it should have been fantastic – instead it’s mediocre at best.
Speaking of mediocre, weird weather we’re having eh? Nice segue eh? Speaking of segues, there are flood warnings again in the region for the third time in a month and I think I mentioned the hail the other day. In eastern Canada they’re in a deadly heat wave and in the Okanagan, where it’s supposed to be hot it’s cold and rainy.
My brother Zach was working near a road in Kelowna in the rain the other day when there was a car accident. He was first on the scene and luckily has his First Aid and was able to help the one injured guy who had a broken leg. He gave a pleasant description of holding the guy’s leg still while a jagged shard of bone sticking out dripped clear fluid on his hands.
Speaking of segues I’m going to cut it off here, guess I did have a few things to say after all. Ciao.
ps. I still don’t have many good pictures from here so here’s another old one I like. I’m still trying to figure out how to host a bunch of pictures online, aside from just posting them here but since I only get 10-20 min online before things start to go weird, it’s taking a while.
pps. There are new Post Secrets every Sunday - they always disturb & enlighten, see link at left.
Simpson’s quote of the day: “Ow, my eye! I'm not supposed to get pudding in it!” - Lenny
Our new editor started today bringing a new sense of hope. The old Ed. is around for another month to help him adjust to his first editor job, but things will start to shift pretty quickly. The outgoing editor is eager to do as little as possible as soon as possible. After 44 years at the paper people are hoping to make a big deal of his parting, though it just occurred to me, on the off off off chance that he catches wind of this blog, I shouldn’t say more.
So after posting nearly daily for the first week, the break for the last four days feels like a long time…I’m addicted. Partly it was a busy weekend of work including chasing the first real news story in town in a long while, only to have the lead of the story (kid died in fire) buried half way down the story by the editor – even though everyone in town already knew. I also didn’t post because I’m running out of ways to whine about boredom.
With the fire this weekend the phrase “word on the street” has been bouncing around. That’s one of those odd sayings…which word? which street? Like someone walking along sees the word “fire” laying on the street, picks it up and gives it to the next person they see. “The word on the street is ‘fire’.” Plus wouldn’t many of those rumours be spread indoors? Plus in this town “street” is pushing it at times, more like lane, or gravel road, or dirt parking lot.
Speaking of streets, and making fun of town sizes, Jen mentioned on her blog she’s going to Vancouver and would like to live there some day but is afraid. Since I still can’t figure her blog out and I’m never on line to chat (I have to write these in Word), I’ll respond here: the cliche of the big scary city is exaggerated. Sure there are more strangers and more noise and crime etc but proportionally the crime rates aren’t any worse, in fact they’re often less than in smaller towns on a per capita basis.
Vancouver’s homicide rate of 2.12 per 100,000 is equivalent to a single homicide per year in the entire Central Kootney region (Castlegar-Nelson-Creston). Also only 13% of solved homicides are committed by strangers, most are by family or friends, so it doesn’t matter much how many strangers are around.
Don’t know why I went off on that tangent, my point was the amazing abundance of choices and transportation etc in the city can make it a lot easier to live the way you want and the anonymity can help you be yourself and live more free. The positives more than amply compensate for the negatives. Vancouver has Kits beach, movies, Stanley Park, wilderness so close, skiing, book stores, coffee shops, bars, sushi, the Mongolian Grill, night life, Symphony of Fire, planetarium, Anthropology Museum, Art Gallery, famous library building, Queen E. Park, festivals, sea wall, Granville Mall, Steveston, Commercial Dr., Grouse Grind, aquarium, Chinatown, Gasstown, PNE, constant concerts, famous authors reading, Granville Island, Lighthouse Park, Endowment Lands, Kerrisdale, Jericho & Wreck beach, Pacific Centre, A&B Sound, the Skytrain, fascinating characters… I miss the city! (and that’s just off the top of my head)
Anyway, while I’m on the topic of friend’s blogs Manny finally got one, though knowing him it’ll just be about sports, and as Scott points out, Rap, Everybody Loves Raymond and marathon bear wrestling sessions (he once fought off a Grizzly with his bare hands for 17 hours!).
Manny will be happy to know I finally saw Meet the Fockers and as I suspected I’m glad I didn’t spend $10 on it. It would almost be worth the admission to watch THAT cast reading from the phone book for two hours – which makes the film’s luke warm impression all the more disappointing. With two of the best actors in film (Hoffman/DeNiro) and one of the funniest guys of the last 15 years (Stiller) it should have been fantastic – instead it’s mediocre at best.
Speaking of mediocre, weird weather we’re having eh? Nice segue eh? Speaking of segues, there are flood warnings again in the region for the third time in a month and I think I mentioned the hail the other day. In eastern Canada they’re in a deadly heat wave and in the Okanagan, where it’s supposed to be hot it’s cold and rainy.
My brother Zach was working near a road in Kelowna in the rain the other day when there was a car accident. He was first on the scene and luckily has his First Aid and was able to help the one injured guy who had a broken leg. He gave a pleasant description of holding the guy’s leg still while a jagged shard of bone sticking out dripped clear fluid on his hands.
Speaking of segues I’m going to cut it off here, guess I did have a few things to say after all. Ciao.
ps. I still don’t have many good pictures from here so here’s another old one I like. I’m still trying to figure out how to host a bunch of pictures online, aside from just posting them here but since I only get 10-20 min online before things start to go weird, it’s taking a while.
pps. There are new Post Secrets every Sunday - they always disturb & enlighten, see link at left.
Simpson’s quote of the day: “Ow, my eye! I'm not supposed to get pudding in it!” - Lenny
Friday, June 24, 2005
Disturbing event
I haven’t been sleeping well. I blamed the new environment - I’m a creature of habit. But there have been distinctive noises in my place late at night that I can’t explain. To paraphrase John Irving they are sounds like something (or someone) trying not to make a sound. Those sounds just outside your conscience range, you heard something, you just can’t tell if it was a fridge or a car driving three blocks away or someone outside your bedroom door.
You lay still for an eternity hoping for a repeat or follow-up sound that will explain, the furnace kicking in, your neighbour getting into their car, but the repeat doesn’t happen until you start to fade again. You lose your concentration and again barely hear the sound. Eventually you have to get up and check, turn on the lights, check the locks and look in the dark corners before you can go to sleep, but the whole process delays your sleep a good half hour to hour.
This place has always had a bit of a strange energy to it, a weird sort of depressive mood, to go with the mild stink I can’t get rid of. I’d been blaming the smell on the filthy former tenant, who was also the former occupant of my job – so we joke about stinky at work, until someone casually mentioned “I wonder if it might be the guy who died in the bathtub…”
Turns out an old guy killed himself in his bathtub a few years ago and wasn’t found until the smell overwhelmed the neighbours. We’re not sure which of the quad-units it was, but it was in one of these connecting apartments.
I’m a practical/rational guy. I’ve never believed in ghosts and new agey energy crap, but I've seen things in my life that can’t be explained and it makes sense that there would be some connection between a place and someone who killed themselves. An unnerving question would be – did the strange energy come from the suicide or play a part in it?
So for the last few days I’ve been working on getting past this in my head, which can be a chore at 1am for a natural insomniac with the wind shifting the house all night.
Last night as I was drifting off I was startled awake by yelling and commotion. I sprung awake disoriented and was initially relieved to realise it was a fight or a party and not something…closer.
In 3 weeks I’ve never heard a noise in this neighbourhood past 10pm so I went to the window to check. Of course the noise stopped and I stood there like a dolt for several minutes. Every time I made a move to head to bed I’d think I was hearing something again. Sometimes they sounded like they might be angry out of control sounds, other times I’d think it was laughing and regular partying, so despite the unnerving feeling that it didn’t seem right at 2am on a weeknight I climbed into bed. Remember I haven’t been sleeping and I had to get up in 5 hours. I wondered about calling the cops as I fell asleep, but there had to be a bunch of closer houses if they needed to be called.
This morning in the light of day I forgot all about it until we got word at work that there'd been a fire half a block behind my house at 4:30am and I suddenly remembered waking again around that time but falling quickly back to sleep. The part time reporter ran over and took a picture of a slightly burnt apartment building and we thought that was that until a guy stopped by the office to ask if we knew anything. Crack newsroom that we are he knew 10x’s what we knew.
Apparently an 18 year old (whose name I’ll hold) lived there alone and was having a bit of a party when his mother’s 20-something boyfriend, who he regularly fought with, showed up. There was some kind of altercation but people believed things ended there. Today the entire street is blocked off and guarded by police and the head of the hospital and RCMP media contact, whom I have good relationships with, refuse to say anything about anything, and the young man (according to our interested party) is not around.
I’m trying not to jump to conclusions but if it had been a simple kitchen fire it seems the police would have been quick to mention that.
Anyway I’m feelin a bit spooked, regretting not calling the cops and fearing having to delve into this as a news story.
I haven’t been sleeping well. I blamed the new environment - I’m a creature of habit. But there have been distinctive noises in my place late at night that I can’t explain. To paraphrase John Irving they are sounds like something (or someone) trying not to make a sound. Those sounds just outside your conscience range, you heard something, you just can’t tell if it was a fridge or a car driving three blocks away or someone outside your bedroom door.
You lay still for an eternity hoping for a repeat or follow-up sound that will explain, the furnace kicking in, your neighbour getting into their car, but the repeat doesn’t happen until you start to fade again. You lose your concentration and again barely hear the sound. Eventually you have to get up and check, turn on the lights, check the locks and look in the dark corners before you can go to sleep, but the whole process delays your sleep a good half hour to hour.
This place has always had a bit of a strange energy to it, a weird sort of depressive mood, to go with the mild stink I can’t get rid of. I’d been blaming the smell on the filthy former tenant, who was also the former occupant of my job – so we joke about stinky at work, until someone casually mentioned “I wonder if it might be the guy who died in the bathtub…”
Turns out an old guy killed himself in his bathtub a few years ago and wasn’t found until the smell overwhelmed the neighbours. We’re not sure which of the quad-units it was, but it was in one of these connecting apartments.
I’m a practical/rational guy. I’ve never believed in ghosts and new agey energy crap, but I've seen things in my life that can’t be explained and it makes sense that there would be some connection between a place and someone who killed themselves. An unnerving question would be – did the strange energy come from the suicide or play a part in it?
So for the last few days I’ve been working on getting past this in my head, which can be a chore at 1am for a natural insomniac with the wind shifting the house all night.
Last night as I was drifting off I was startled awake by yelling and commotion. I sprung awake disoriented and was initially relieved to realise it was a fight or a party and not something…closer.
In 3 weeks I’ve never heard a noise in this neighbourhood past 10pm so I went to the window to check. Of course the noise stopped and I stood there like a dolt for several minutes. Every time I made a move to head to bed I’d think I was hearing something again. Sometimes they sounded like they might be angry out of control sounds, other times I’d think it was laughing and regular partying, so despite the unnerving feeling that it didn’t seem right at 2am on a weeknight I climbed into bed. Remember I haven’t been sleeping and I had to get up in 5 hours. I wondered about calling the cops as I fell asleep, but there had to be a bunch of closer houses if they needed to be called.
This morning in the light of day I forgot all about it until we got word at work that there'd been a fire half a block behind my house at 4:30am and I suddenly remembered waking again around that time but falling quickly back to sleep. The part time reporter ran over and took a picture of a slightly burnt apartment building and we thought that was that until a guy stopped by the office to ask if we knew anything. Crack newsroom that we are he knew 10x’s what we knew.
Apparently an 18 year old (whose name I’ll hold) lived there alone and was having a bit of a party when his mother’s 20-something boyfriend, who he regularly fought with, showed up. There was some kind of altercation but people believed things ended there. Today the entire street is blocked off and guarded by police and the head of the hospital and RCMP media contact, whom I have good relationships with, refuse to say anything about anything, and the young man (according to our interested party) is not around.
I’m trying not to jump to conclusions but if it had been a simple kitchen fire it seems the police would have been quick to mention that.
Anyway I’m feelin a bit spooked, regretting not calling the cops and fearing having to delve into this as a news story.
Thursday, June 23, 2005
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Weather is fun
It’s nice to know that no matter what, I will always be loved…by mosquitoes!!! At least I’m making lots of friends, hundreds a day, I tend to kill a lot of them, but it’s nice to be popular. I’m starting to appreciate the old line about the provincial bird, I think that was Ontario – but I’ve never seen anything like this. Four weeks of record rain followed by several days of record highs have led to a crop of the little fuckers that even the farmers say they’ve rarely seen – and remember they can tell you the mosquito count from 1912.
I’m just back from taking pictures of a golf tournament where I was dancing around and slapping at myself like I was having a seizure, it’s nice to be inside. It seemed like I had 4-6 biting me at every moment. Despite the bugs, and the now constant itching, it’s awesome to have the heat and the sun back, even if it means I have to stay in doors more than when it was raining.
Luckily I didn’t get around to writing here a few hours ago, I was fuming when I left work and it could have been ugly. Suffice it to say I’m tired of being told I’m "an embarrassingly bad" or "crappy" photographer because I’m forced to use the paper’s embarrassingly crappy amateur camera. It’s hard to walk into an event and try to act like a professional photographer who knows what I’m doing when I have the cheapest camera in the room.
So as the floods end now we get tornadoes?! It’s nice here but now in southern Alberta there are tornadoes. Is that normal? I knew there was a reason I didn’t trust the openness of the prairies – there’s nothing to protect you and keep you safe on dry ground like in the mountains.
Another nice thing about the sunny weather is the sunsets. For weeks people have been telling me the best feature of the prairies is the sky, which is like saying the nicest thing about a building is the empty next door, but when the sky lights up insane swirls and layers of deep oranges and reds and purples, even I have to admit it’s impressive. I’ll post pics when I get them on this computer.
Another nice look is when you get spots of cloud shadow drifting across rolling fields of swaying grass – of course it says a lot that I think it looks like a yellow ocean.
Speaking of endless prairie I met a young couple the other day who are cycling from Victoria to St. John’s. It took them a month to get here, taking their time, and they figure they’ll hit Newfoundland in September. In B.C. they did about 70K a day, out here it’s more like 110-120.
I’m out of steam for now, Marcel e-mailed some great thoughts on the future of news etc that I wanted to get into but it deserves more time and energy than I have now. For now I’m adding a picture and reorganising my links, again.
It’s nice to know that no matter what, I will always be loved…by mosquitoes!!! At least I’m making lots of friends, hundreds a day, I tend to kill a lot of them, but it’s nice to be popular. I’m starting to appreciate the old line about the provincial bird, I think that was Ontario – but I’ve never seen anything like this. Four weeks of record rain followed by several days of record highs have led to a crop of the little fuckers that even the farmers say they’ve rarely seen – and remember they can tell you the mosquito count from 1912.
I’m just back from taking pictures of a golf tournament where I was dancing around and slapping at myself like I was having a seizure, it’s nice to be inside. It seemed like I had 4-6 biting me at every moment. Despite the bugs, and the now constant itching, it’s awesome to have the heat and the sun back, even if it means I have to stay in doors more than when it was raining.
Luckily I didn’t get around to writing here a few hours ago, I was fuming when I left work and it could have been ugly. Suffice it to say I’m tired of being told I’m "an embarrassingly bad" or "crappy" photographer because I’m forced to use the paper’s embarrassingly crappy amateur camera. It’s hard to walk into an event and try to act like a professional photographer who knows what I’m doing when I have the cheapest camera in the room.
So as the floods end now we get tornadoes?! It’s nice here but now in southern Alberta there are tornadoes. Is that normal? I knew there was a reason I didn’t trust the openness of the prairies – there’s nothing to protect you and keep you safe on dry ground like in the mountains.
Another nice thing about the sunny weather is the sunsets. For weeks people have been telling me the best feature of the prairies is the sky, which is like saying the nicest thing about a building is the empty next door, but when the sky lights up insane swirls and layers of deep oranges and reds and purples, even I have to admit it’s impressive. I’ll post pics when I get them on this computer.
Another nice look is when you get spots of cloud shadow drifting across rolling fields of swaying grass – of course it says a lot that I think it looks like a yellow ocean.
Speaking of endless prairie I met a young couple the other day who are cycling from Victoria to St. John’s. It took them a month to get here, taking their time, and they figure they’ll hit Newfoundland in September. In B.C. they did about 70K a day, out here it’s more like 110-120.
I’m out of steam for now, Marcel e-mailed some great thoughts on the future of news etc that I wanted to get into but it deserves more time and energy than I have now. For now I’m adding a picture and reorganising my links, again.
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Provincial Chicken Pawk
After probably hundreds of hours of messing with my computer in the last many months I hope I fixed a key problem. An error message turned out to be related to my RealOne player, so I got rid of the player and things seem 10 times better. I don’t want to get my hopes up until I use it for a day or two, but it looks good – I can open and close windows with the click of the mouse rather than going for coffee while they open.
I love how Windows & Telus have help menus for internet trouble but you have to be online to see them – "trouble with your internet? just check telus.com!" It’s like when I called to get my phone hooked up and I couldn’t get past the part where it asked what number I was calling about.
I was reading Alain’s musings on work stress and objectivity in news and realised I don’t have to worry about either here. The only work stress I have is how to look busy on Tuesday after the week’s paper has been put out or how to live with selling any journalist integrity I may have had for $10 an hour. Reading Alain’s thoughts I also thought about how desperately he needs a writing job so his posts stay to the length of a shorter novel and that my posts being short is not necessarily a bad thing – thanks for the accidental advice.
According to someone, who shall remain nameless (for abandoning us to go to school in England…lets call her Kinga D.), I’m supposed to have more pictures – so there’s one at the bottom.
I just overheard a little kid with a heavy Brooklyn accent on a commercial say "Chicken Pawk (ie. Pox singular) is a pawk where chickens go to have fun."
I’m going to go play with my computer and do things I haven’t been able to in a long time.
Parting thought, courtesy my buddy Homer: "A gun is not a weapon, it's a tool. Like a butcher knife, or a harpoon, or... or an alligator."
After probably hundreds of hours of messing with my computer in the last many months I hope I fixed a key problem. An error message turned out to be related to my RealOne player, so I got rid of the player and things seem 10 times better. I don’t want to get my hopes up until I use it for a day or two, but it looks good – I can open and close windows with the click of the mouse rather than going for coffee while they open.
I love how Windows & Telus have help menus for internet trouble but you have to be online to see them – "trouble with your internet? just check telus.com!" It’s like when I called to get my phone hooked up and I couldn’t get past the part where it asked what number I was calling about.
I was reading Alain’s musings on work stress and objectivity in news and realised I don’t have to worry about either here. The only work stress I have is how to look busy on Tuesday after the week’s paper has been put out or how to live with selling any journalist integrity I may have had for $10 an hour. Reading Alain’s thoughts I also thought about how desperately he needs a writing job so his posts stay to the length of a shorter novel and that my posts being short is not necessarily a bad thing – thanks for the accidental advice.
According to someone, who shall remain nameless (for abandoning us to go to school in England…lets call her Kinga D.), I’m supposed to have more pictures – so there’s one at the bottom.
I just overheard a little kid with a heavy Brooklyn accent on a commercial say "Chicken Pawk (ie. Pox singular) is a pawk where chickens go to have fun."
I’m going to go play with my computer and do things I haven’t been able to in a long time.
Parting thought, courtesy my buddy Homer: "A gun is not a weapon, it's a tool. Like a butcher knife, or a harpoon, or... or an alligator."
Monday, June 20, 2005
Woo hoo Disaster!
Woo hoo, the terrible flooding finally started to touch my area so I had something to write at work! Of course I’m kidding (because pain & suffering is funny), but there is a bit of that in media. News jobs are more exciting when terrible things happen. Luckily, as dramatic as things are getting in Calgary and Drumheller, it still looks like things should peak and start to get better in the next day or so with only moderate damage (in terms of huge catastrophes).
The only way it’s impacting us here is that the town is preparing to take in evacuees. There are some pretty dramatic pictures at cbc.ca and among the Calgary Herald’s reader submitted photos.
Anyway this is another short post since my computer is still freezing up and crashing whenever I’m online. It’s taken me 4.5 hours to get it going properly today. I seem to spend about 75% of my free time working on it. I’m taking a step back to find and solve the underlying problems so I may not be online much for a day or two. Not to mention I need a break from the daily aneurysms.
I hear through the grapevine that MB is leaving, or has left, Kamloops. Since I'm already gone I could care less, I miss everyone there, but I hope it was a happy parting and I know she's off on an exciting African adventure.
The grapevine also told me Fred was in da'Loops. We'd hoped to meet in Edmonton sometime around now but I don't think that'll happen. Also in the great Alberta/j-school migration Al is due out this way sometime in the next week - bring a boat! Speakin' of boats Tara is getting her drivers license, with her and Meghan on the road, stay off the sidewalks in K-town.
Also in boat news, Wade might be one of the only people happy to see floods in Calgary, the 2 boats he built are in his garage, he can paddle to the store.
I've added 3 more fun links to the bottom of my links list. Have a fun evening.
Sunday, June 19, 2005
Rain & old farmers
They’re building arcs in the rest of southern Alberta, but it’s sunny again here for only the second or third day I remember in my 3 weeks. They’re calling it the worst floods in Alberta history, more than 3,000 evacuated, Calgary declared it’s first state of emergency ever. Apparently the worst of the rain has stopped but some rivers have yet to peak. Of course the farmers here are complaining we didn’t get enough of that rain.
The old farmers are characters. Generally great, friendly guys who’ve been working hard their entire lives and are still at it, but they bring the Canadian obsession with weather to all new heights. It’s always either too dry or too wet or too hot or too cold – rumour has it there was a good day in 1957. And they all remember exactly what the weather was like years ago and how this is the most rain we’ve had since 1994 or the earliest spring since 1976 etc.
Drivers are so strange here too. The highway speed limit is usually 100 km/h, which is plenty for my 22 year old car, but when I drive that fast on the highway—where speed can be a matter of life and death—every car (or pickup rather) I see races past me at 140 looking at me like I’m an asshole for going so slow. But then in town when I let my speed drift up toward the speed limit of 50, everyone gawks at me like I’m some kind of speed demon with a death wish.
It’s a daily occurrence to see old guys in pickups stopped in the middle of the main drag facing opposite directions carrying on a conversation. There’s room to go around so it’s not a big deal, but the other day I drove past guys doing that, went 5 blocks down grabbed something at the store and came back to find them still there.
Speaking of old guys, that seems to be about all there is in this town, kids and middle age to older people. I’m not sure where all the 17-40 year olds hide but I never see them. The few younger adults you meet are settled homeowners with families, aspiring to being 49 years old.
Anyway I’m headed out to catch some of that sun again.
They’re building arcs in the rest of southern Alberta, but it’s sunny again here for only the second or third day I remember in my 3 weeks. They’re calling it the worst floods in Alberta history, more than 3,000 evacuated, Calgary declared it’s first state of emergency ever. Apparently the worst of the rain has stopped but some rivers have yet to peak. Of course the farmers here are complaining we didn’t get enough of that rain.
The old farmers are characters. Generally great, friendly guys who’ve been working hard their entire lives and are still at it, but they bring the Canadian obsession with weather to all new heights. It’s always either too dry or too wet or too hot or too cold – rumour has it there was a good day in 1957. And they all remember exactly what the weather was like years ago and how this is the most rain we’ve had since 1994 or the earliest spring since 1976 etc.
Drivers are so strange here too. The highway speed limit is usually 100 km/h, which is plenty for my 22 year old car, but when I drive that fast on the highway—where speed can be a matter of life and death—every car (or pickup rather) I see races past me at 140 looking at me like I’m an asshole for going so slow. But then in town when I let my speed drift up toward the speed limit of 50, everyone gawks at me like I’m some kind of speed demon with a death wish.
It’s a daily occurrence to see old guys in pickups stopped in the middle of the main drag facing opposite directions carrying on a conversation. There’s room to go around so it’s not a big deal, but the other day I drove past guys doing that, went 5 blocks down grabbed something at the store and came back to find them still there.
Speaking of old guys, that seems to be about all there is in this town, kids and middle age to older people. I’m not sure where all the 17-40 year olds hide but I never see them. The few younger adults you meet are settled homeowners with families, aspiring to being 49 years old.
Anyway I’m headed out to catch some of that sun again.
Saturday, June 18, 2005
Figured out the links so I threw some faves up, I'll organize them better at some point, but there are some good ones for now.
While southern Alberta (as close as Drumheller 50 minutes away) is being evacuated under 10 and 15 year record amounts of rain, the sun has finaly come out here for what feels like the first time in 3 weeks.
While southern Alberta (as close as Drumheller 50 minutes away) is being evacuated under 10 and 15 year record amounts of rain, the sun has finaly come out here for what feels like the first time in 3 weeks.
Computer and weather fun
I was looking at photo options here and didn’t get far when my computer crashed for the 3rd time in as many days, so I’m getting weary about online stuff and all I got to were the couple fun pics below.
Speaking of crashing, I’m on ADSL here, which should be fine, but it means a whole new bundle of security software etc and I’m nervous that’s the main reason for my computer troubles so at the first hint of a problem the first thing I do is unplug the modem, so if we’re chatting or anything and I suddenly disappear – that’s probably what happened. Sorry Meghan.
So it’s the end of another long thrilling week and for the first time in a long time I have nothing special to do this weekend (work, moving etc). I was really excited about it yesterday, but after a slow start this morning and my 2 hr computer ordeal, the morning’s nice weather seems to be turning and I was hoping to clean up before I went out but now it’s already 2pm. The moral of that story is, this will be a short post.
After my post the other day Audrey warned me to be careful because this is a published form and people have been sued for what they blog. It’s a good reminder that I think people probably often forget, most blogs are only meant for friends, but I looked over what I wrote and I stand behind it, and whatever I say in the future.
This is a casual form for friends and family and I can’t imagine anyone in this town ever finding it, especially my boss who’s afraid of computers, but even if they did I imagine they’d pretty much agree with me. My boss is a good guy, who I’m sure means well at heart, but he’s been at this job 44 years and is about to leave and he admits openly he doesn’t like it anymore.
I’m going to try to post at least one cool link per entry to a site that people may not know, soon as I figure out how to have a separate link list. For now here’s an incredible one http://postsecret.blogspot.com/ I think a lot of people have probably seen but I just rediscovered. It’s worth another look, truly fascinating, whether you believe they’re true or not.
I was looking at photo options here and didn’t get far when my computer crashed for the 3rd time in as many days, so I’m getting weary about online stuff and all I got to were the couple fun pics below.
Speaking of crashing, I’m on ADSL here, which should be fine, but it means a whole new bundle of security software etc and I’m nervous that’s the main reason for my computer troubles so at the first hint of a problem the first thing I do is unplug the modem, so if we’re chatting or anything and I suddenly disappear – that’s probably what happened. Sorry Meghan.
So it’s the end of another long thrilling week and for the first time in a long time I have nothing special to do this weekend (work, moving etc). I was really excited about it yesterday, but after a slow start this morning and my 2 hr computer ordeal, the morning’s nice weather seems to be turning and I was hoping to clean up before I went out but now it’s already 2pm. The moral of that story is, this will be a short post.
After my post the other day Audrey warned me to be careful because this is a published form and people have been sued for what they blog. It’s a good reminder that I think people probably often forget, most blogs are only meant for friends, but I looked over what I wrote and I stand behind it, and whatever I say in the future.
This is a casual form for friends and family and I can’t imagine anyone in this town ever finding it, especially my boss who’s afraid of computers, but even if they did I imagine they’d pretty much agree with me. My boss is a good guy, who I’m sure means well at heart, but he’s been at this job 44 years and is about to leave and he admits openly he doesn’t like it anymore.
I’m going to try to post at least one cool link per entry to a site that people may not know, soon as I figure out how to have a separate link list. For now here’s an incredible one http://postsecret.blogspot.com/ I think a lot of people have probably seen but I just rediscovered. It’s worth another look, truly fascinating, whether you believe they’re true or not.
Thursday, June 16, 2005
Wah! Woe is me.
When this job (reporting) is good, it’s hard to imagine a better job. Last summer in Chilliwack there were times I had to pinch myself and realise I was being paid to hang out on the beach looking for cute girls to photograph or attend a concert or being curious about something and it being my job to investigate it and phone the people who could best explain it to me.
Today I spent the afternoon racing around a little lake in the sun on airboats – swamp boats with big fans on the back. It was a nice change from my windowless office. I start with this story to point out I’m in a pretty good mood at the moment and the complaining I’m about to do is not about a bad mood.
My main problem is my old boss, isn’t it always? He aspires to running a shopper or the Town of Hanna’s PR newsletter or anything other than an actual newspaper where he might risk offending someone…or making them think.
Every story that could approach controversy has to be vetted by those involved, i.e. the Mayor gets to read stories about him before we publish. The boss prefers photos over stories and if we have to do a story he prefers the short single source story.
For photos he prefers old people, preferably not doing anything…literally! The other day he said we were short on sports pics and I should run to the golf course where the senior’s league was playing. He actually said, I don’t want a shot of someone swinging or anything, just get a shot of a bunch of them standing around. This was his idea of a 'sports shot,' old people standing around!
The only other reporter in town is based in Drumheller, 50 min away. I tried to complain to her the other day about not having much to do – I did 1 almost real story last week, 3 or 4 embarrassingly short & simple stories and a dozen or so pics & small odds & ends. She said she did about 20 full stories and was working furiously till 2am one night – so I guess I shouldn’t complain.
Prairie
Yesterday the rain broke for a few hours so I headed for a walk. I figured I should immerse myself in the prairie and maybe I’d start appreciating it. I drove to the longest, flattest, straightest, quietest stretch of dirt road I knew of, parked the car and started walking. I figured I had 2 or 3 hours so I’d just walk for an hour or so and see how I felt, then turn around.
At one hour I felt pretty good so I kept going. Throughout my entire walk 3 cars passed, all 3 stopped to ask what was wrong. After an hour and 45 min. I stopped and turned around, and no shittin you – there was my fuckin car! It was small and distant, but my entire walk was simply there between us.
I checked afterward and I’d gone just under 12 km, then I had to walk back…looking at my car, my destination, the whole time…it was hell. It was the most frustrating thing in the world, to have to see my destination for the hour and 20-min it took me to almost jog back, cursing my stupid idea and vowing never to do anything like that again. By the time I got to my car it was pouring rain and I really felt like shit.
Anyway I’m mostly just bored and lonely but things could be much worse. Drop me a line and I’ll try to keep this up and next time I’ll have some positive things to say.
When this job (reporting) is good, it’s hard to imagine a better job. Last summer in Chilliwack there were times I had to pinch myself and realise I was being paid to hang out on the beach looking for cute girls to photograph or attend a concert or being curious about something and it being my job to investigate it and phone the people who could best explain it to me.
Today I spent the afternoon racing around a little lake in the sun on airboats – swamp boats with big fans on the back. It was a nice change from my windowless office. I start with this story to point out I’m in a pretty good mood at the moment and the complaining I’m about to do is not about a bad mood.
My main problem is my old boss, isn’t it always? He aspires to running a shopper or the Town of Hanna’s PR newsletter or anything other than an actual newspaper where he might risk offending someone…or making them think.
Every story that could approach controversy has to be vetted by those involved, i.e. the Mayor gets to read stories about him before we publish. The boss prefers photos over stories and if we have to do a story he prefers the short single source story.
For photos he prefers old people, preferably not doing anything…literally! The other day he said we were short on sports pics and I should run to the golf course where the senior’s league was playing. He actually said, I don’t want a shot of someone swinging or anything, just get a shot of a bunch of them standing around. This was his idea of a 'sports shot,' old people standing around!
The only other reporter in town is based in Drumheller, 50 min away. I tried to complain to her the other day about not having much to do – I did 1 almost real story last week, 3 or 4 embarrassingly short & simple stories and a dozen or so pics & small odds & ends. She said she did about 20 full stories and was working furiously till 2am one night – so I guess I shouldn’t complain.
Prairie
Yesterday the rain broke for a few hours so I headed for a walk. I figured I should immerse myself in the prairie and maybe I’d start appreciating it. I drove to the longest, flattest, straightest, quietest stretch of dirt road I knew of, parked the car and started walking. I figured I had 2 or 3 hours so I’d just walk for an hour or so and see how I felt, then turn around.
At one hour I felt pretty good so I kept going. Throughout my entire walk 3 cars passed, all 3 stopped to ask what was wrong. After an hour and 45 min. I stopped and turned around, and no shittin you – there was my fuckin car! It was small and distant, but my entire walk was simply there between us.
I checked afterward and I’d gone just under 12 km, then I had to walk back…looking at my car, my destination, the whole time…it was hell. It was the most frustrating thing in the world, to have to see my destination for the hour and 20-min it took me to almost jog back, cursing my stupid idea and vowing never to do anything like that again. By the time I got to my car it was pouring rain and I really felt like shit.
Anyway I’m mostly just bored and lonely but things could be much worse. Drop me a line and I’ll try to keep this up and next time I’ll have some positive things to say.
Joining the bloggosphere
I finally decided to join the blog world rather than pestering my various list-serves with unwanted crap, so friends who actually want to can check out what I'm doing. It'll take me a while to make the blog look any good and to find my style, but I WILL keep this one up - I've tried before and never gotten to a second entry.
This will be an informal and honest account for friends & family, so if you are a current or potential employer please don't read, I'm probably bitching about you. So that's all for my first (test) entry but I'll do a good one right now before I even tell anyone I have this up. Ciao.
This will be an informal and honest account for friends & family, so if you are a current or potential employer please don't read, I'm probably bitching about you. So that's all for my first (test) entry but I'll do a good one right now before I even tell anyone I have this up. Ciao.
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