Tag: Canadian arts

A cooking show I like

I like to cook, and I’ve been known to watch a little television, so people are sometimes puzzled that I don’t particularly like watching cooking shows. Some other people who like to cook, I’ve learned, love cooking cooking. In fact, they find themselves becoming somewhat “addicted” (their words) to the Food Network.

Me, not so much. For whatever reason, I don’t particular enjoy sitting there watching celebrity chefs prepare food (that I’m not going to get to eat). So since Food Detectives stopped making new episodes (far as I can tell), there is no Food Network program that I watch regularly.

But over on the W Network, I have recently discovered Anna and Kristina’s Grocery Bags. It’s basically a cooking show. And that one, I may be just a little addicted to.

Photo of Anna and KristinaI had seen their previous show (possibly still on), called Shopping Bags, in which they test various consumer products. It was definitely an entertaining approach to product testing, but the information always seems to whiz by so quickly it wasn’t that useful. Three types of five different products in one half-hour; how are you supposed to remember which to buy afterward?

Whereas each episode of Grocery Bag focuses on one (1) cookbook. That’s what they test: cookbooks. They do this by making a sampling of recipes from the book, within a time limit, to be judged by a chef. Interspersed in there, they do a little pre-taped product testing of both kitchen gadgets and ingredients, to be used on “cook day”.

I like it in part because I can relate to it. Anna and Kristina are competent cooks, but not trained chefs. As the stress mounts of trying to prepare five or more new recipes for a guest who is coming to judge your efforts, they make mistakes. They get annoyed with each other. They swear. They redo. They run off to the grocery store to buy more ingredients. They curse the poor instructions or weird ingredients of the book. They get grossed out trying to deal with octopus tentacles or squid ink.

Then when the food is done and the chef arrives with a bottle of wine, everything seems a little better. And the tasting begins… Will the dishes make the taste buds sing, or stimulate the gag reflex?

It’s drama, man. It’s highly entertaining every time.

Plus, it’s useful. As it’s a test, they try to be real sticklers for following the recipes—like manually chopping all the onions if the book says to, instead of what I would do, which is stick those suckers in the food processor. In the end, they come out with a recommendation to buy or not, but as you’ve seen how and why they came to that conclusion, you can decide if you agree. It’s made me consider cookbooks I otherwise never would have, like Gwyneth Paltrow”s (!)—turns out it’s not just the vegan, raw-food weirdness you might expect—and Gordon Ramsey’s.

Now what I want to know is whether those “addicted to the Food Network” people would (or do) like this show. Or is it just too real?

We paid $48 to watch someone do Pattycake

Last night, May 7, Lowest of the Low played Massey Hall the first time, the capper on their tour celebrating the 20th anniversary of “quite possibly the best Canadian debut album ever”, Shakespeare My Butt. I was not there. But I did see their sold-out show at the Starlight Club in Waterloo, on April 21.

The show itself, I have no complaints about. The opening act were Mick Thomas and Squeezebox Wally, an Australian duo so taken with Shakespeare My Butt  that they would play the entire album at their shows. They even made one of the songs—“Rosy and Grey”—a hit there. So there was much more collaboration between opening act and headliner than you normally get, with Lowest members joining in on Mick’s set, and Mick contributing to the Lowest set.

Lowest of the Low played the entirety of Shakespeare My Butt, in order, then came back to do various songs from their other two albums, including “Black Monday” and “The Last Recidivist”. It was fun being in a room full of people who also knew all the words to all the songs. And it was nice to hear, from singer and main songwriter Ron Hawkins, that both “Subversives” and the afore-mentioned “Black Monday” were as honest and beautiful as they were because each was inspired by women he really loved. (He explained it in a less mushy way, but that’s what it came down to.) Performances of both those songs, I found particularly powerful.

But the room? With the low ceiling and all, the music was painfully loud. I had to do the extremely cool “Kleenex in the ears thing” to survive. And with the full house, it was hot and crowded. Plus, way too many tall dudes. I had to keep moving around, trying to get a spot where I actually see the band, and not just the back of someone’s head. The crowd was very well-behaved—no smoke of any kind, and surprisingly little beer spilled. But still. I’d say I’m too old for this kind of show, but I didn’t really like them when I was younger, either.

So kind of glad I didn’t drag any friends with me to this, as I feel I would have just had to apologize. Instead, I suggest, just check out Lowest of the Low on record. That way you’ll thank me later. Maybe start with these ones:

  • “4 O’Clock Stop”, Shakespeare My Butt, the insanely catchy opening number. Lyrics may not cohere as a whole, but they sure feel right as they hurtle along.
  • “Black Monday”, Hallucigenia, as the singer regrets the effects of his depressive nature on the “sad and beautiful” Kate. “The way I am has never been too good for us.”
  • “Rosy & Grey”, Shakespeare My Butt, the most Canadian love song ever, where even “the smell of snow warms me today”.
  • “Gamble”, Hallucigenia, which sounds like it’s exactly about Buffy and Spike, Season 6, even though it was written before then.
  • “Henry Needs a New Pair of Shoes”, Shakespeare My Butt, a deceptively upbeat little ditty that, on closer listening, reveals the social conscience of the band, along with their sense of humour.

And now for something completely different….

A couple years ago I wrote about attending the Open Ears festival, and the organizers noticed. So the notified me about this year’s festival, “celebrating the art of listening”. It took place at a busy time for us, but we did manage to attend one concert: Toca Loca, on April 30.

Where Lowest gave me some unpleasant flashbacks to concerts of my youth, this was like nothing I’d ever seen or heard before. The opening number was “Temazcal”, a piece for maracas and tape. So recorded sounds were played, then a live percussionist joined in on maracas. That was followed by “AK-47”, a piano solo based on the assault rifle. It was both virtuosic, and pretty noisy.

Then there was “Pattycake”. Two performers sat facing each other clapping out the familiar childhood rhythm, but at increasingly dizzying speeds, and with some variation in the original words. It was riveting, as mistakes would be—if not disastrous—at least potentially quite painful. “Repetition is good. It builds trust. Soon you come to know what’s expected.”

In the next two pieces, all three members played along to pieces composed for them, one a fusion of New Wave, Synth-Punk, and No Wave (I don’t know what that means, either), the other a love song as expressed by an industrial machine.

And finally, the “Halo Ballet”. In this one, five gamers manipulated the Halo participants into a kind of dance pattern, instead of the usual trying to kill each other. They would shoot patterns into the sky, or be stacked on one other and twirl, or leap around in synchronicity. We watched all that projected on video. Meanwhile, of course, the band was supplying the soundtrack.

Afterward, Jean commented on how we had paid $48 to watch people do Pattycake. “Did you dislike the music?” “No, can’t say I disliked it.” “Were you bored?” “Absolutely wasn’t bored.”

Me either. $48 well spent. And looking forward to the next Open Ears, where I can hopefully experience more of the aurally novel.

Movie review: Canadian film fest

In the wake of the Genies, we saw the two main contenders on the weekend.

*** Barney’s Version (January 2011) – Theatre
Paul Giamatti, Rosamund Pike. A movie built around Barney Panofsky’s relationships—with his father, his friends (especially Boogie), and the three Mrs. Panofsky’s.

She says: Very well-acted, engaging, funny in parts, but a lot of tragedy as well. A realistic love story at its heart. Just barely passes the Bechdel Test, though.
He says: I enjoyed it. Paul Giamatti is a really good actor.

? Incendies (April 2011) – Theatre
Lubna Azabal, Rémy Girard. After their mother’s death, her children (twins) are told to locate the father and the brother they knew nothing about. It leads to a tragic voyage of discovery about their mother’s past.

She says: Very well-crafted, completely compelling, but a dark story with a really disturbing twist.
He says: God, that was so depressing. I’m really disturbed now. Why would anyone want to see that?
She says: I think the fact that it’s affecting you so much shows that it’s a good movie.
He says: No. It was terrible.
She says: The story is terrible. (And I’m grateful that the worst of it wasn’t actually shown.) But I still think the movie was good. It was haunting.

A ballet at the Moulin Rouge and a symphony in space

The recent calendar has been a little busy, starting with a surprise party for Jean last Friday (at Verses), and a Valentine’s Dance on Saturday (at which we received some nice comments on our dancing, actually), and ending with another Verses dinner this Saturday, with a dance class and practice night fit in there as well.

And we also attended…

Moulin Rouge: The Ballet

The first ballet we’ve been to since, I think, the Ballet Béjart tribute to Freddie Mercury, quite a few years ago, in Montreal.

This one featured the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, and took place in our home town concert hall. It was inspired by the Bahz Luhrmann movie, but didn’t imitate it so closely as to get into copyright trouble. So though it is still a love triangle between a woman who works at the Moulin Rouge, an impoverished artist, and a more powerful man, they aren’t the same characters as in the movie. We still get a tango scene, and green fairy scene, but not at the same points, nor for the same reasons, as in the movie.

No matter. The plot isn’t the point in a ballet; it’s just window dressing for the dancing. And that setting and themes made for some really lively dancing. It particularly came to life, of course, with the extended can-can scene inside the Moulin Rouge. That part begun with an unfortunate flub, in which one dancer was nearly dropped, but otherwise the dancing was nothing but impressive. (Not that I’m any expert.) I wasn’t sure what Jean thought of the whole thing, but he assured me he found it enjoyable—even though he knows this may mean has had to attend another ballet in another 10 years or so.

And Friday, we had tickets to Symphony in Space.

Space image

This was a KW Symphony Pops concert intended to feature music with a astrological theme. So there was some Star Wars music, some Star Trek music, and some things you wouldn’t expect, like Bach’s Bradenburg Concerto, which apparently is out there on a space capsule somewhere, searching for intelligent life.

I’ve never seen conductor John Morris Russell before, but man, what an enthusiastic, lively personality he is. Along with being interested in science as well as music, he’s quite passionate about education, so the show also featured some young performers. The most adorable thing was seeing all these tiny violin players trot out to join the symphony in Suzuki’s “Variations on Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. Brought back memories of my own violin-playing days. But these kids were much better.

The second half was hosted by an astronaut, Bjarni Tryggvason, who guided us through the planets of our solar system as the symphony played excerpts from Holst: The Planets and a bit of Mozart (Jupiter). This part was also accompanied by these gorgeous NASA photos of the various planets. It was really hard to get bored during this concert.

The conclusion featured the Eastwood Collegiate Concert Choir accompanying soloist AJ Bridel on “Defying Gravity” from Wicked. Man, does that girl have chops. Remember that name: She might be someone someday.

All in all it was one of the most enjoyable symphony performances of the season. Well worth making time for!

Congratulations, Arcade Fire

… On winning Album of the Year at the Grammy’s. Which I actually didn’t realize would be such a shock to everyone who isn’t me. (Cause it was certainly the best 2010 album I heard all year…)

And congratulations, Grammy’s, on giving Neil Young an award for an actual song (not just nice music repackaging), thus eliminating one from your embarrassing top 10 list of people who’ve never won a Grammy.

And to all the people in Twitter-ville so very, very upset that the Grammy’s dared award Album of the Year to a band they’ve never heard of… I gave you my very mature response:

Nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah. My band rules.

If I programmed the SYTYD Canada finale show

Through the So You Think You Can Dance Canada season, I’ve been taping my favorites to DVD. In advance of tonight’s final show, I just rewatched them all. Be interesting to compare my picks with the judge’s.

Week 1

Bree and Edgar – Sexy hip-hop

Of course, with Bree having been eliminated so early, no way this will be in the final show. I love how sexy it is, but that’s apparently the very reason these two ended up in the bottom three that week: People were offended by it! (In the video, the actual dancing starts around 1:37.)

Hani and Tara-Jean – Nico’s jazz routine

Yep, also won’t be there, given than Hani was the first to go! Seemed completely unfair, though, both that he ended up in the bottom 3, and that the judges dismissed him along with his injured partner.

Week 2

Nathalie and Mackenzie – Hip hop

Seems I either love the hip hop or am completely indifferent to it, and this one, I loved. I think it’s partly the song, which I liked so much, I bought! (Also a very rare thing for me, with hip hop.) And these two white, contemporary just did a great job with it.

Charlene and Jeff – Contemporary

Having rewatched, I have to say, I don’t think I’d include this one. It was fine, they danced it fine, but there was just so much contemporary this year! Nothing especially stood out about this one. I can’t even remember the choreographer, but it was probably Stacey Tookey.

Danielle and Sebastian – Theatre

This one, on the other hand, was very memorable. I think Sean Cheeseman may be my favorite choreographer. This seemed to suit Danielle and Sebastian perfectly.

Week 3

Amanda and Denys – Quickstep

Someday, someone needs to explain to me why in the ballroom dance classes I take, quickstep is considered one of the easiest. It’s typically the first one you learn. Yet on this show, it’s taken as gospel that it’s the hardest. Either way, Amanda and Denys nailed it.

Charlene and Jeff – Hustle

Oh my God, just as impressive on the second viewing (well, it’s more than my second). Still think this is the best disco I’ve ever seen on one of these shows. They were amazing.

Week 4

Nathalie and Mackenzie – Blake’s contemporary

I think I’d like this better if I didn’t now know that the tatoos represent Blake and Mia Michaels (are we ever going to find out what that was about?), but it was a fairly striking contemporary piece. And at least neither was supposed to have a disease.

Amanda and Denys – House

The number that, insanely, landed these two in the bottom three. Aren’t they great? (By the way, this is the closest Denys got to hip hop in the entire competition.)

Week 5

Charlene and Mackenzie – Latin

Some sexy Latin thing they did. Another one that, on retrospective viewing, I’m not sure deserves a place here.

Amanda and Sebastian – Contemporary

Amanda is afflicted with something here—Alzheimer’s? An eating disorder? I don’t remember. (When I tape, unlike YouTube, I don’t include the intro.) Sebastian tries to uphold her. Clearly, I liked it at the time, but they did way too many of these “issue” dances this year. (Ever since that cancer number made a big splash on the American show…) Caused each to lose something in the repetition.

Claudia and Denys – Samba

Clearly I wasn’t being overly picky this week, but Denys was great as usual, and Claudia kept up reasonably well.

Danielle and Edgar – Contemporary

Mostly notable for how well Edgar handles this dance, given that it’s not his genre. Danielle looks remarkably strong (physically, not as a dancer) with him. And, I love this song!

Week 6

Janick and Denys – Tango [Edit: Paso Doble]

Possibly at some point I just started taping everything Denys did? Although this was a good tango paso doble (and Janick’s first appearance on the DVD). But I can’t say I particularly remembered it before rewatching it just now.

Amanda and Mackenzie – Afro-jazz

Another one I didn’t remember all that well, but it is nicely done.

Claudia and Jonathan – Hip hop

This one, I actually remembered! Because I was so surprised how good they both were. On rewatch, I remained particularly impressed with Jonathan (and Claudia still wasn’t bad). But don’t expect to see it again, as they’re not top 10, and there’s a tour to promote… [On edit: Or, not so much, apparently…]

Group number by Mia Michaels (results show )

Even though I taped some, I’ve been mostly ignoring group numbers and solos in this list (as it’s already insanely long), but had to include this, as I think it’s possibly the single best thing done all season. Wow. Just, wow.

Week 7

Danielle and Denys – Contempory (military loss)

On rewatch, this really is my favorite contemporary number of the season. I can tell the story without any preamble, it’s incredibly touching, Danielle is just amazing, and Denys is Denys.

Week 8

Edgar and Amanda – Hip-hop mannequins (Luther Brown)

I think Amanda actually held her mannequin positions better than the hip-hop boy, but whatever, it was a very fun number. (Amanda is actually quite amazing, especially given her young age.)

Janick and Jeff – Blake’s jazz fusion

Nice sexy number, with whips and cages! I was impressed how well Jeff, who looks so Pillsbury dough boy, pulled this off. Amazing what eyeliner can do. Great dancing doesn’t hurt, either. (And apparently not offensive often for either to be eliminated, which is good.)

I’ve left off the “Top 4” show, as it’s not taped yet, but my favorite there was definitely the Sean Cheeseman “royalty” number that Janick and Jeff did. After that, Nico’s contemporary with Denys and Janick.

My picks (not necessarily predictions) for top dancer are 4. Janick 3. Jeff 2. Amanda 1. Denys.

Boyden on Riel and Dumont

Thursday I went to see Joseph Boyden talk about his new book, his first non-fiction effort, Louis Riel & Gabriel Dumont. I was flying solo, but not because Jean wasn’t interested. Boyden is perhaps Jean’s favorite novelist, and being Métis himself, he’s also interested in the Riel story. But weirdly, Jean was busy listening to another author that night—Kevin Callan, who writes humorous non-fiction about canoeing and other outdoor activities.

I have to admit that one of the main things I was wondering about Boyden is whether he looks as good in person as he does in his author. From my second-row seat, it quickly became apparent that, yes he does. The shock of black hair, the great smile with the gleaming white teeth, the compact body, the cool leaf tatoos on his forearms… It all adds up to someone perfectly fun to spend an hour looking at.

Fortunately, though, he was also quite interesting to listen to. He explained how he’d found it very difficult to get this book completed. Having to stick to facts (instead of the “lies of fiction”), trying to cover the lives of two men in a mere 45,000 words, were huge challenges. It took him about 3 years to complete the book.

Of course, he did learn a lot about the two men. He pointed out that Riel was not fighting just for the rights of the Métis, but of all the settlers on the land the railroad was to come through, whether Native, white, or Métis. And when McDonald sent in the troops, he says it was Riel’s refusal to follow Dumont’s advice and engage in guerilla warfare that doomed them. He was very moved by reading the transcript of Riel’s trial, where Riel was fighting not only the charges against, but also his defense team, who were arguing that he was insane.

During the Q&A, we learned a bit more about Boyden himself. He says his interest in Canadian history likely comes from having an elderly father, born in 1898. (His father died when Boyden was 8.) This set many of us off trying to do that math in our heads… And he thinks that his ability to write from a woman’s perspective (as in Through Black Spruce) was helped by having seven older sisters, who frequently dressed him up as a doll. And he’s currently working on two novels, one a continuation of the Three Mile Road / Through Black Spruce series, and another centered around the Jesuits arrival in Canada.

In general, he came across as quite charming and pretty funny, particularly for one whose books are a little dark.

Afterward, I stood in the line to get my books signed: Through Black Spruce, which I had before, and the Riel and Dumont one that I bought on the day. Fortunately I had something to say other than what seemed to be overly obvious, that being that I’m a fan of his writing. “I think you know my mother,” I said. Because, you see, they’d previously worked together at Northern College in Timmins. It can be a small world.

Magnetic North magnificence

Another thing I like is having Good Seats when I go to any kind of live performance. It’s to the point where I will avoid going completely if I Good Seats aren’t available—or are outrageously priced. Because I’ve tried, and I just know that being too far from the stage really does diminish my enjoyment.

Hence it was that we ended up at a performance of Norman last night.

Norman was playing locally as part of the Magnetic North theatre festival. I had never heard of this festival before, but apparently it’s been running for a number of years now. Every other year it goes to a new Canadian city; otherwise, it’s put on in Ottawa. This year is Kitchener-Waterloo’s turn.

When I heard about it, it sounded like something interesting and that I wanted to support. I was especially excited that Rick Mercer was doing a show as part of the festival. But when I finally remembered to try to get tickets for Rick’s show, the seats just weren’t that Good. Row M, kind of off to the side. It was dimming my enthusiasm.

So I looked through the program for what else might work, and Norman sounded interesting:

Most of us grew up with the work of Norman McLaren. Between slick Saturday morning cartoons or on clunky classroom projectors, McLaren’s mesmerizing work slid unexpectedly into the lives of generations of Canadians.

In the internationally acclaimed Norman, ground-breaking projection technology allows a performer to physically interact with the cinematic universe of award-winning Canadian film pioneer Norman McLaren. Join us as they delve into the vaults of Canada’s National Film Board to combine technology, animation and theatre in an unforgettable visual experience.

Seats were not actually being assigned for this, which made me think they weren’t expecting a big crowd. Smaller crowds always greatly enhance your chance of Good Seats. So I got tickets for that.

The performance was at 7:00. We arrived around 6:35 to find the Centre in the Square looking eerily empty, with maybe 10 other people there at that point? So yeah, no problem getting Good Seats!

As the performance approached, fortunately, more people showed up. The crowd was still one of the smallest I’ve seen at the Centre, but at least had swelled to filled all the best seats in the house (though all the bad ones were empty).

I wasn’t terribly clear on what we were about to see, Jean even less so—he had no idea who Norman McLaren was, and had been telling people he was going to something called Daniel that night. After a short announcement, which concluded with the reminder to turn off your cell phones, the lights dimmed, all went quiet, and…

Someone’s cell phone started ringing. Couldn’t believe it!

That is, until I realized that this was part of the show. The single performer, dancer Peter Trosztmer, talked on the phone on his way to the stage, then addressed us about his obsession with Norman McLaren.

The 90 minutes that followed are really hard to describe, but were completely riveting. Peter would talk about McLaren, show parts of his films, but also interact with them in dance movements. He would dance between the intersecting lines. He would bat away the assembling and dissembling balls. He pulled away Norman’s chair in the well-known Chairy Tale, then interacted with his own. He became one of the dancers in the beautiful Pas de Deux.

I don’t know how they did it all, but it was absolutely brilliant.

Intersected with these film/dance pieces were documentary bits, in which holographic images of various people who worked with McLaren spoke about him. Also shown were some interviews with McLaren himself. It all gave me a much deeper appreciation of McLaren’s genius, particularly his skill at making music visual. It makes me want to go watch a bunch of his movies—which, fortunately, the NFB makes easy to do. (And isn’t it fabulous that staid old Canada funds a film board where an eccentric genius can spend a lifetime producing abstract short films?)

Much as I was taken with the whole thing, I wasn’t sure how Jean would react, but I needn’t have worried. Though he opined that it could perhaps have been a tad shorter, overall, he was in awe. He loved it.

So thanks to all you people who quickly snapped up the Good Mercer Seats, thus leading me to one of most intriguing live performances I’ve ever seen.

The Music of Fleetwood Mac

This was the theme of our latest Jeans’n’Classics concert: The Music of Fleetwood Mac. Our original guests had to bow out, so we attended with Camie and Frasier instead. As with the previous concert, and despite some lobbying for the new Mexican place (Margaritas), we went to Uptown21 first.

Once again, they did a great job. We all went for the day’s three-course prix fixe menu, three of us with matching wine (Camie had Shiraz). The first course of duck confit and wild mushroom was fabulous. The other option, grilled shrimp, also looked very nice. Next up was either a root-vegetable soup, which got some raves, or a salad with apple, sugared pecans, and cheddar in a balsamic vinaigrette. Very good. And the main course choices included lamb with vegetables (Jean), trout with vegetables, a vegetarian option, and something I can’t remember. But my trout was well prepared.

We also enjoyed the company. We discussed Austen (the author, not me misspelling the city), university funding, travel plans, the joys of home renovation, the Olympics, and the last time we’d listened to Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors. Though not necessarily in that order. They managed to get us out just before 7:00, and we commented that it would be nice to go again sometime and not have to rush through dinner. And maybe also try the Mexican place.

There was the usual insane number of people looking for parking when we arrived, but this time we did manage to get a spot at the Kitchener Library, which is pretty nearby. And as a bonus, their parking meter machine was broken! It was a near full house again.

The concert featured Rique Franks, Katherine Rose, and Neil Donnel on vocals. They explained that it was a new show, and it was a little rougher than usual, with some lyrics and vocal lines and song dates mixed up. But overall it was very enjoyable. Kind of a reminder of the many hits they’d had in the 80s there, all of which I knew at least by chorus, and a good selection from Rumors, which I pretty much know inside and out. I especially liked that some non-single but excellent songs from that classic album, such as “The Chain” and “Oh Daddy” were included. 

The music in general was well-suited to the orchestral approach. Jean developed an insta-crush on Katherine Rose based on her husky speaking voice. And Camie noted that it was nice to have the speaking and singing duties distributed among three people.

Next up: Elvis!

Weekend update

We’ve had varying success with recent weekend activities.

Failures:

  • Ben Heppner, who failed to show for the Grand Philharmonic’s performance of Edgar’s The Dream of Gerontius. If you’ve never heard of this work, don’t worry; neither had we. I don’t know if having the big star there would have made a difference, but we had to conclude that we aren’t necessarily fans of all great choral works. Cause we seemed to enjoy this way less than the rest of the audience, though the quality of performance was clear.
  • Avatar, because it sold out before we got there. Seven weeks later and it’s still that popular, eh? Guess for next time, we’ll order our tickets online in advance.

Successes:

  • Up in the Air, well-attended but not difficult to get into, and quite a good movie, to boot. No 3-D extravaganza, but a clever script and compelling characters.
  • The Waterloo anti-prorogation rally! Yes, we went. Pleased to see a good turnout. Hadn’t been to a political protest in decades. Wasn’t sure what would happen. Mostly, we politely listened to speeches of varying quality. Found the whole thing kind of heartening.
  • Participated in an unofficial canoe club gathering around the Banff Mountain Film Festival. Only we skipped the Film Festival part (one grows weary of watching short films about people doing risky stuff outdoors) and just joined in on the preliminaries of a hike and dinner. Made for a good day in this surprisingly mild January we’ve just had.

Upcoming:

Sigh. Though I’m kind of grumpy about it, I feel somehow compelled to watch next Sunday’s Superbowl halftime show, to see how The Who does. I’ve actually never watched any part of the Superbowl before. Obviously I saw the Janet Jackson thing afterward on YouTube, and I’m a bit sorry now that I didn’t take the time to watch Prince’s half-time performance, but there you are. This will be a first.

So now I have to figure out things like, when is half-time, anyway? (My husband is absolutely no help in these matters.) OK, I do realize it’s a live sporting event, so the exact time halftime begins will vary, but around when will it be? Online TV guide has some pre-Superbowl thing happening from 2-6, with the game from 6-10. (And here I thought the game was actually played in the afternoon, not at night.) So am I naive to think halftime will be somewhere around 8:00, then? And they aren’t going to interview Townsend and Daltrey during the pre-Superbowl thing, are they? I really don’t want to PVR that whole thing, nor do I want to lurk in front of the TV all day.

Ah well. I suppose if I somehow miss it, I can still catch it on YouTube later…