| Festival: Prequel |
[Sep. 4th, 2007|11:01 pm] |
What better way to start a new job than by taking a week off work to attend the Toronto International Film Festival?
Yes, that IS a rhetorical question.
For the past six years I've been dying to do the fest properly. But a combination of work and school have always made it impossible to see much more than ten films. So this year I took a week off, bought a day pass, a ten pack of tickets and I'll probably end up seeing over thirty films.
Interested in what that looks like?
Well, there it is.
<img src="http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k288/elasticlad/IMG_3005-1.jpg" />
Sigh. No. It's not. Because I'm so friggin incompetent that I can't manage to insert an image directly right into my post. I go through this every time I try to post an image...but I've never bothered to memorize how I do it because I post images so infrequently.
Soooo. No image. YET.
But I'll master it and edit the post to show the biggest bestest picture of 30+ tickets on a table you've ever seen.
In the interim you should know that I'll be lugging a camera around the fest taking pictures of all the cult celebrities and no name writers.
There will be no pictures of Brad Pitt unfortunately, because The Assassination of Jesse James was the ONE film that I wanted to see that was sold out.
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| Jobby |
[Sep. 4th, 2007|10:45 pm] |
So.
I have a jobby. Specifcially, a new one.
I'm now the Public Relations Officer for ACTRA Toronto. If you know me, and you should, you're probably asking...
"Elasticlad, you're so attractive and sexy I didn't know you had mad Public Relations skills to boot"
Well, I DO!
There will be no training\transition period. Annnnnd that's kinda tuff. It means I'll be jumping into the deep end of the pool with only a theoretical understanding of what swimming even is. So I'm going to have to step up my game. This is my first PR experience and it's a one person dept. It's a big step for me and for the first time, in a long time, I'm really going to be tested. |
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| Fan Expo 2007 |
[Aug. 28th, 2007|03:19 pm] |
I attended Fan Expo 2007 over the weekend. Essentially the Expo is a combination Horror/Sci Fi/Anime/Comic Book nerdfest. If you have a nerdly peccadillo and live in the GTA then the Metro Toronto Convention Center was the place to be. Some highlights. - Jonathan Frakes
- 2$ Comic Books
- Frank Quitely
- John Romita Jr.
- Autograph Mania
- Green Lantern
Some lowlights. - Fighting your way past a storm trooper in full armour with a helmet that has destroyed his peripheral vision.
- Creepy middle age Anime fans. Not middle aged anime fans. Just the creepy ones. You know who you are.
- Lineups.
- Line Capping.
I had a great time and I wish Scott had badgered me into doing this a couple years earlier. I walked out with a ton of comics and I got to see artists and authors I really admired. Oh, and we capped the night off by going to see Superbad. Now that is how you party down my friends. |
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| Reboot. |
[Aug. 2nd, 2007|11:13 am] |
Re boot. If I had to pick a word to describe my brain right now I’d probably choose “empty”. I was feeling particularly unhappy with the paper I’d turned in for school last night. S was teasing me a little. It’s been a weekly occurrence with me since I started up school again. Every week I moan and gripe about my work and every week I’ve come through with flying colours. “What makes this week any different?” Well. On the surface, nothing. Except that even though I’ve been getting good grades, not once have I felt like I’ve written anything well. I pretty much honed in on what the prof wanted from the class and, just like uni, gave her exactly what she wanted. And it works. But none of it has been written well. It’s passable, but not high quality. And that’s what I wanted from my work. High quality. As a matter of course I sat down a couple days ago and worked out some of the things I’m currently involved with. - There’s work, the 9-5 time suck.
- My time on the negotiation committee.
- Frisbee twice weekly.
- School twice weekly, but more like thrice weekly when you take readings into it.
- Genealogy research.
- Book biz.
- And various other odds and sods that take up the day.
That hardly leaves me any serious time with S, much less any serious time for myself. It’s a problem that’s growing worse. I’m not overwhelmed, in fact I think I’ve done a fairly decent job in managing my time. But my life has turned into a buffet, intellectually I’m eating a little bit here, a little bit there and never really feeling like I’m filling up. I feel empty. I’ve got a vacation coming up in a week and that’ll go a long way to helping me recharge my batteries. But I need a little more out of life than just filling up the hours in the day. So I’m hoping to reboot, recharge and reconnect a little. I’ve been promising myself some of these things for awhile and reality still manages to get in the way but at least by writing it down I’m taking steps, no matter how small, to make it happen. Who’s In? Who’s Out? |
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| Autograph: Part Deux |
[Jul. 31st, 2007|10:12 am] |
THEY CAME!
Cos was able to get the books signed.
But don't take my word for it. I'll let him tell you in his own words.
Okay, so after I finished playing a wild tennis match in the driving rain and electrical storm I was ready to head over to the book signing. But wait, my tennis opponent/friend's car wouldn't start... so we had to hurry to fix the car in time using random combinations of things that looked like tools from my truck.
Then I rushed out with the book in hand, the street lights out from the storm, the rain pouring. I arrived at the comic store where there was also a protest going on against "comic book author/right wing extremist Warren Ellis" They had signs and weapons, but I proceeded into the store anyway, where I was robbed. They took the comic books I came with, but luckily due to the size of the store I was able to purchase the same comic books she sent me for twice the price of whatever she paid.
So I continued to the line where I had to wait a grueling 17 hours with no food or water, but just beer. Right when I was about to approach Mr. Ellis at his desk with his cowboy hat, Jack Daniels bottle, and half empty red bull can, the protesters were back with their signs, raging. That wouldn't stop me. I walked up to Mr. Ellis, I told him "Your work has inspired me in many ways." Haha, little did he know I hadn't read a comic book in my life. Or maybe he did know, he thanked me and then stabbed me with his knife in the leg, not believing a word of what I said and ending my glorious tennis career.
I hobbled out of the store under heavy gun fire, diving for The Beast, my 1999 Ford Ranger. I slammed the accelerator and spun out in the driving rain with the signed comic book in hand. Maybe after all that work and danger I'd read it, my first comic book, but naw, I didn't want to bend a signed copy of it. Was it worth the 20 ice creams I held out for to do, only time will tell.
In summary, about 65% of this story is true, and I got that book singed and SOMEHOW returned unharmed (;
So now I apparently owe several brownie earthquakes to a person I've never met. Oh well, I've heard worse fates.
Faulk Out.
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| Autograph |
[Jul. 30th, 2007|01:48 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | warren ellis | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | The steady thud of a headache. | ] |
So.
Warren Ellis is apparently signing autographs today in Phoenix. Nearly two weeks ago I sent a couple comics to S's cousin in this hopes that he might be able to score me a signature (or two) from the man himself.
However, as of Friday, the comics have yet to arrive down south. Which means, if they don't show up in the mail today I'm absolutely pooched for getting an autograph.
I have no one to blame but myself for leaving it so last minute, but I honestly thought that 7 business days would be enough time for it to arrive.
So it's finger crossing time.
Edit. Email from the cos. Nothing yet. Mail hasn't arrived. The possibility, however dim, still exists that it could come today. Here's me. Not betting the farm. |
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| So. Sorry. |
[Jul. 20th, 2007|08:33 pm] |
I'm watching Outlaw In-Laws, packing away my self respect and watching my I.Q. puddle onto the floor.
Me no am think good now. |
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| Die Hard. 4.0. |
[Jul. 10th, 2007|02:18 pm] |
So.
I’ll keep this Spoiler Free.
Tried to see Transformers last night, unfortunately the show was sold out. So we saw DH as a back up.
Die Harder is officially no longer the worst of the franchise. Actually I’d say 4.0 isn’t even a DH movie. It’s like someone saw the original three and thought it’d be a good idea to take the premise of cop in trouble and push it to ridiculous extremes. They cribbed the same names, some of the same motifs, and created a half decent flick. But it wasn’t Die Hard. Hell it wasn’t even John McClane. It was bald ass Bruce Willis walking around, being tough and preaching the necessity of American values.
Why does every aging action hero have to do some sort of film centered around computers these days? As if watching poor old Harrison in Firewall wasn’t enough, now we have to watch John McClane get preached at by a number of web nerds about how computers are the future and he is naught but a relic of the past. Until he blows all the computers up that is.
And PG – 13 violence? Blow it out your ass. Don’t show me a gun firing and then cut away to a falling body. That’s not Die Hard. That’s family viewing gone hideously awry.
Yippe Ki-Yay Mother F---. Don’t even talk to me right now. I thought I knew you. I thought we had something special. Now you’re just another catch phrase who’s whored himself out to the man.
The great thing about the original series is that the violence, while always straining credibility, left its mark on our hero. J McC was always beat up and worn down by the end of the film. It worked and it worked well. Now the setups are unrealistic. The explosions and violence are over the top. And the worst damage possible happens to our hero and by the end of the movie he’s still up and moving like he’s ready for a dance at the Community Social that evening. That’s James Bond. It’s still not Die Hard.
Bring back John McTeirnan. Bust his rickety ass out of jail or whatever crack den he’s holed up in and put him back behind a camera.
Underworld was good. Underworld:Revolutions was not. Do NOT give the guy who made Revolutions the Die Hard franchise. Just…No. Don’t do it. Stop right now and back away from the director. Pull your head out of your ass and do not make a movie with him.
The best part about Die Hard is that one of parkour villians was the Hero Cop from District 13. Now that was a good movie.
All this may give you the impression I did not enjoy the film. That is untrue. I enjoyed it quite a bit. I just didn’t like it. |
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| TGIF |
[Jun. 22nd, 2007|01:07 pm] |
The subject says it all doesn't it?
I'm bone tired today and feel like just keeping things mellow. Two months in the novelty of riding into work has just about worn off and some days (Read. Today.) I just don't feel like half hour uphill slog that I know is in my future.
I'm pretty wiped on an emotional level as well. Since getting the news about Mom...three?...weeks ago it has had the unintended affect of prioritizing what's important in my life and what's just bullshit that has collected in the corners.
Busy doesn't really seem to cover it right now. The Nine to Five, Ultimate twice weekly, Schoolwork twice weekly (alternate nights), cottage renos, auction attendance, bookstore work, BBQ's, Guy's Night Out, Date Night, Negotiations Committee @ Work...etc etc.
I've supposedly got an entire weekend to myself coming up, but honestly, it's somehow gotten to the stage where the day I'd zone out on the couch watching tv is better spent doing a myriad of other things. I know that there's a bathroom clean, a beer run, schoolwork, groceries, poker night, and watching D and L play frisbee all in my future. I feel guilty doing nothing. It's not enough to relax, I have to relax by doing something. Even my down time has to be spent doing something constructive. It's like when people take a vacation and need another week off afterwards to recoup. That's me right now. Finally an adult. In need of a mental recharge.
I'm not complaining (much). I'd rather be busy than the alternative. It just feels like today it all kind of caught up with me at once. Right now I just want to sleep, watch TV, and redefine just how laid back a person can really be. |
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| Laundry Hamper |
[Jun. 18th, 2007|05:16 pm] |
Apparently, if your cat is mad enough at you, he will crap in the laundry hamper.
If you thought your dry-fit was smelly before... |
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| Facebook |
[Jun. 14th, 2007|09:58 am] |
If I have 81 friends on Facebook they'd all better show up at my funeral when I die.
Not that I plan on dying or anything.
Just sayin', that's all. |
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| Addiction |
[Jun. 5th, 2007|09:52 am] |
Time to lay off the ebay comic book hunting for awhile. I've found a lot of good stuff that I've always wanted to own (Near Mint complete run of Watchmen I'm looking at you) but I'm not getting the chance to enjoy them, and frankly it just eats up too much time.
Thankfully I'm cheap so I haven't blown my budget on the whole thing.
Besides, no one ever got rich from collecting comic books. Well. There was that one guy, but you know, he was doing it in the 40's before anyone knew that they'd be so big. Now days everyone is trying to make a buck off it, and no one is suceeding. |
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| Pt. 2 |
[Jun. 1st, 2007|02:24 pm] |
Parity.
The dollar is supposed to reach parity.
Son of a bitch. |
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| When I was young... |
[May. 30th, 2007|10:20 am] |
When I was a kid I remember years of stress worrying if Dad was going to be able to keep his job. Bell was always going through staffing cutbacks and he jumped postions and departments a lot in order to stay ahead of it all.
It was tough.
It feels like my entire working career has been pretty much the same. I graduated in lockstep with SARS and watched the film industry vanish in its wake. I've been kicking around the biz ever since but it's never really recovered.
Now I have to watch the GD dollar make the likelihood of a real recovery even less likely.
93 @#!$@ cents! Frig! It hasn't been that way in 30 years! 30. Years.
It used to be 85 cents was the cut off in order to have a meaningful film industry and we blew by that awhile ago.
I'm so glad that I'm back in school on the side. Let's face it. I haven't written anything meaningful in years so there's no point in my staying in film to get my writing career off the ground.
I just want something where I'm not constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. |
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| Batten the Hatches... |
[May. 15th, 2007|09:37 am] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Relief Maps - Pattersickle | ] |
Ever get a hunch? A feeling? A premonition?
Me too.
Hence today I will be keeping a looooooow profile.
I'm not much of a believer in fate or karma. What I do believe in is Grade 12 Finite Math class which tells me that no matter how improbable a thing may be...it is STILL possible.
I sense long odds for today. |
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| Fat Bottomed Me |
[May. 10th, 2007|01:22 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Veruca Salt - Volcano Girls | ] |
Well,
I can pretty much kiss lunch hours goodbye from here until August. School is in and I'm already running into a time crunch. Ok, so it's only the first week...and I AM playing Ultimate four times this week...but there's always gonna be an excuse like that...know what I mean Verne?
So. Time management is in. The latest funny video of some guy getting kicked in the crotch on YouTube? Still in. I'll just feel even worse when I watch it. With just the one course I'll be able to focus to focus on class in a way I was never able to when I was actually going to Uni.
6 Classes a year just made it to hard to focus on any one thing properly. It was always about getting the project that was due soonest done and moving on to the next item on the list...learning (real learning) had very little to do with it.
So I'm hoping to focus in a way that just wasn't available to me before.
* * *
On biking to work. Strangely I'm really enjoying it. I'm getting that nice post-workout endorphin rush in the morning which helps to actually make the morning workload bearable.
I've become a convert to wearing a helmet when biking. I admit, I was never one before. But after watching that guy two bikes ahead of me get shmucked by a car yesterday (and flying OVER the hood of said car) I'm a believer. |
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| Movie Monster Mythbusters #1: Vampires |
[May. 1st, 2007|06:24 pm] |
Why do people almost always become evil when bitten and turned into a vampire?
I can understand how they might seem to be evil from a historical standpoint.
"Hey it's the Dark Ages and I need blood to survive. Soooooo I'm going to take a couple pints outta you if that's ok?"
The act might be evil. But the need that drives the act is not.
So why, in modern vampire movies, do good people turn bad? Bedsides the dramatic tension it adds to the story line I can't figure out a logical explanation behind it. You need blood to survive. Solution. Blood bank. It's less glamourous but just as effective.
The need to drink blood wouldn't fundamentally change your personality. Maybe over time your mind would become a little unhinged at the radical change in your culinary habits. But that's crazy. Not evil.
So the question stands. |
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| Weekendy Nougat Goodness... |
[Apr. 30th, 2007|04:30 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Harvey Danger - Sad Sweetheart of the Rodeo | ] |
Fun with auctions this weekend.
Big book auction on Saturday. Big enough that the auctioneers actually bothered to call me at home to tell me it was going down. Needless to say that this warning brought out all the potential book buyers in the area. Ones with considerably deeper pockets than mine.
So while the big dogs were scrabbling with each other, and bumping prices up to 30+ bucks a box, I hovered around the edges of the crowd and threw my money at the considerably lesser gems. Even these lesser items went for more than they usually do because of the aura of heightened interest.
So I missed out on all the sure fire winners. But I still managed to walk away with six boxes of books. And a cursory glance through my winnings on Saturday afternoon brought out some surprising finds. So in the end it was a win-win for everybody.
A purchase for my personal consumption? 50 bucks for a lot of sixty odd comic books in VG\NM condition. I stashed the lot and found out they were worth upwards of six hundred dollars. So that made me very happy. Even better, there were about a dozen duplicates in the box so I think I’m going to put them up on Ebay and see if I can’t make my money back.
Other news. Fixed up the bike on Sun and managed to get in about 25 klicks. Wrapped up my weekend by bumming around the apartment and cleaning a bit. Tomorrow is supposed to be the day I start biking to work for the summer. I realized last night as I thought about that that my initial enthusiasm for the idea had waned somewhat. Unfortunately, my diminished excitement had also spilled over into my schooling plans. So right now I’m fairly blasé about an idea that only a week ago was going to be the highlight of the summer.
Hopefully once I actually start biking and schooling I’ll feel differently. But right now…I’m finding it difficult to muster up the energy. |
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| Back in the saddle again... |
[Apr. 18th, 2007|11:07 am] |
So yesterday I went out and signed myself up for a course in Public Relations at Ryerson. After dropping something in the realm of 500 bucks for the course fee and the application to join the Certificate program I’m still left with the nagging feeling of….Why did I do it?
Well. I recently applied to an internal job in public relations at the National Branch. Didn’t get it. Met all the requirements in theory but I was completely devoid of any legitimate experience in PR. So whilst I was bummed at being turned down it wasn’t completely unexpected.
(I kicked the shite out of the first interview, but had all my short comings painfully addressed in the second interview)
It was an interesting job and something that I really could have sunk my teeth into. So that may be responsible for starting this whole ball rolling. But it still doesn’t really answer the question.
After some more thought I draw upon the conclusion that I miss being a part of the conversation. Which is certainly true. I don’t miss the university lifestyle of multiple deadlines, poor food, worse hygiene and erratic sleeping schedules. I always felt that those things got in the way of really learning and enjoying the material. I never had enough time to really delve into the subject matter before I was off and running to work on something else. What I’m doing now may provide me with opportunity to do that. I want to learn and discuss and to do it in such a manner that I actually get something from experience. I want to be a part of the dialogue again.
And let’s face it. My work environment could stand to use a bit of shaking up. I’ve grown complacent with the lack of a challenge my current job presents me and since I don’t hate it enough to find a new one. Here I’ll stay unless I do something about it.
So. I am.
I’m waaaay out of my comfort zone here. I’m very OCD in that once I have a pattern I like/need to stick to it (see my comic purchases and tv schedule). And now I’ve gone a dropped a big messy timebomb right into the middle of it all. Deadlines (but easily managed ones), Financial pinches (do you REMEMBER how much school costs) and having to work on understanding and analyzing material instead of just passively processing it.
I’m instituting change in my life and I’m not a fan of it.
And I’m trying to go beyond changes to just my working environment. I’m trying to introduce change to my daily habits. Up earlier, eating healthier, working out daily. All of those little things that seem fairly simple but require significant alterations to the way things are done. It’s all pretty boring to anyone but me. But I can’t help feeling like the walls of my cubicle have gotten a little and it was time for me to push back. |
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| (no subject) |
[Apr. 16th, 2007|01:31 pm] |
Busy Weekend.
Or at least, it was a busy Saturday. Started with a Speedpoint tournament in the afternoon. We did all right. As a team we’ve grown by leaps and bounds in the last year and we came close a couple times to winning games that we would have lost outright not so long ago. My overall fitness level still sucks. I’ve been trying to do an hour at the gym nightly but by the last couple games I was sucking wind like a leaky bagpipe. There’ll be pictures to post later on.
(An aside about my digital camera: It’s a Digital Rebel. It’s big, it’s beautiful and I love it. But in the era of digi cams the size of a credit card it can be damned inconvenient sometimes)
Saturday night the guys and girls parted ways. The girls did dinner and drinks and the guys watched hockey and played poker. I took the first two hands and lost out on the next three. Which means after the cab ride home and comping a buddy on the last hand I ended up a whopping 20 bucks in the black.
But the true victory of any poker night is not how much money you make but whether or not you win a hand at all. The first time we played Poker I was the big loser and I’ve never been able to live that down. Since then other people have fallen under the wheels of similar thankless losing streaks but I’ll always be remembered as the first.
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