Author: admin

Sunday morning I had grand plans to wake up no matter what condition I was in and head out to see some long lost friends (aka people I haven’t had the chance to see since school was up and running). Mike calls into my room and says Matt is on the phone (wait…wasn’t he actually at my house last night?) and wants to know if I’m still going. After an affirmative, Mike tells me that they are meeting at the Lone Star in Barrhaven.

Hmm… that’s strange. All week long, the meeting spot was Broadways. Ah well…maybe they couldn’t get a reservation so they changed the place. No problem. I hop out of bed, have a shower and start surfing the net for Lone Star in Barrhaven.

Well, that’s where I hit my snag. I couldn’t find it anywhere! Perhaps it was new? Perhaps it was in another district instead of Barrhaven? I spent 30 minutes online trying to find this place. Finally, when frustration (and the clock) finally set in, I tried to track down someone’s phone number which was a pain on its own. I guess I don’t have my phone list up to date! I finally got in touch with Trish who could give me Matt’s cellphone number.

“Hello, Matt, where the heck is Lone Star in Barrhaven?” – Me.
“What? We’re at Broadways.” – Matt.

Groan. All that time wasted.

I get in the car, drop Vero off and pick up Philipp and Carrie to head out to Barrhaven. Everyone is meeting at 11:30 and I think by this point it is already 11:50. No worries, we’ll make it.

After meandering through Barrhaven (which I’ve never been to the downtown area before), we find the street where Broadways is supposedly located but realize that
A) There really aren’t any visible addresses as it’s just a bunch of mini-mall shopping block complexes
B) There are a lot of them.

We drive through the majority of them to see if we can find Broadways. We never saw a sign for it on the giant side on the side of the road (you know the signs I’m talking about) but we figured we may miss it so we drove through 10 blocks looking for it.

By 12:30 we gave up as we hit the last block and I noticed it was nothing but straight road from that point on heading west. We turned around and decided to go to Kelseys. But then Philipp sees Broadways! Argh. By this point we agree that we don’t want to show up an hour later when people are ready to leave and make them feel like they will have to stay. So that’s the story of Sunday Brunch for those wondering where I ended up.

The rest of the day was a beaut with a decent meal at Kelseys, a traipse around Westboro, and some supper over at Carrie’s. I also got to chat it up with Alex and Holly who just got back from Jamaica which they said was fab. Pictures and stories were told and it was cool to hear how great it was as I am heading down south in January for Vero’s sister’s wedding.

1987 – the year Star Trek: The Next Generation premiered.

Whoa, I was just reading an interview with Patrick Stewart since it’s the 20th anniversary of TNG. Has it really been that long? It’s like it was yesterday that I come home from working at Wal-Mart on a Saturday night and catch the new Next Generation episode.

Next Generation and Enterprise were the only Star Trek series I ever watched completely. I tried to get into Deep Space Nine but it was pretty boring after the first three seasons so I gave up (only to find out it got amazing within the last seasons) and Kapuskasing never got Voyager aired. I stuck through with Enterprise but I must admit the season where all they did was hunt down the Xindhi was pretty darn boring after awhile. But I stuck through with it. Actually, the last time I went to see Joe, I caught up on some of the episodes I had missed as I never got around to downloading the series finale. It was decent.

Anyhow, here’s a great interview with Patrick Stewart on how he became captain and how he enjoyed it.

Make it so.

Saturday Saturday Saturday! Man, we had a killer Saturday. First, let’s jump back to Friday when Eric, Annie, Mike and I were playing Asshole all night long. It was awesome. Although they play it differently than I do so I was not impressed with some of their rules (what do you mean I can only play one card a round? If it comes to me and I have the higher card, I should be able to play it!).

Saturday got us up and rearing to go. We cracked the windows open, we let the sun shine in – we’re talking sweet weather coming from the Gods saying “Eat, drink and be merry.” Mike soon got discouraged from all these thoughts of cleaning the entire location of Casa Losier/Palmer and when he hit a roadblock with the garage, I took him out of that element and said “Let’s take a breather. Let’s not get into the garage today. It will be glorious, but today, there are other things to be enjoyed.”

With that we headed to Value Village to scope out the jewelery section with Matt. We were headed out to Spring Bling – a yearly event put on by my friends Krista and Amy. Actually, it’s usually called Spring Fling but they renamed this year and you had to bring some jewelery.

What started out as a simple jewelery excursion turned into a full-out Value Village trip. In the end, two of us bought suits and we all had golf clubs and I managed to pick up an Etch-a-Sketch. We headed home where I started to spray paint the golf club and Etch-A-Sketch in a gold paint to accentuate our ‘bling’ness. The history of the word ‘bling’ is as follows:

“Bling-bling” (usually shortened to simply “bling”) is a hip hop slang term which refers to elaborate jewelry and other accoutrements, and also to a lifestyle built around excess spending and ostentation.

The word “bling” was coined by the rap family Cash Money Millionaires in the late 1990s.[1] It was used on a song title by Cash Money artist Baby Gangsta and used in 1998 by fellow Cash Money Records artist Lil Wayne on the track “Millionaire Dream”- “I got ten around my neck, and baguettes on my wrist, Bling!”- from the Big Tymers album ‘How Ya Luv That’. “Bling Bling,” released in 1999 on B.G.’s album ‘Chopper City in the Ghetto’ also led to the rise of the term. In interviews, B.G. has stated that the term refers to the imaginary sound that light makes when it hits a diamond.

At the same time, the afternoon turned into a rip roaring good time as Joe showed up with Matt as he was taking his motorbike out for the first time this year. We popped a few beers, sat down and had a good time. I then went to pick up Philipp and Carrie from the bus station and grabbed some beer on the way back and all was good in the world. Trish and Vero then showed up and the pre-party was in full bling…I meant swing, ha ha, and we had this awesome meal of pasta salad, salad, chicken, potatoes and carrots. It came out to be an excellent meal. Thanks to Mike for picking up those sweet chicken breasts, and to the rest of those who brought something to munch on!

The only thing that sucked was when we tried to make my Etch-a-Sketch into a necklace, the drill hit the actual inside portion which holds the sand. Actually, I don’t know what is inside it actually…some kind of silver substance. In the end, it turned out alright as we got some silicone and fixed it right up. But half the Etch-a-sketch didn’t work any longer.

After dinner we realized it was getting pretty late so we started blinging ourselves up which was hilarity. We wanted to try out this new card game Philipp had picked up called Werewolf but we didn’t have enough people so we just headed out to the party.

We were quite the motley crew showing up to this party. We got into the apartment lobby and I wondered if anyone would actually let us in as we were on camera and if anyone actually saw us, I’m sure they would say we looked like trouble. With our gold canes swinging, we crashed the party in full flair but to our dismay, the ratio of bling being worn at the party was a ratio of 5:1. As in, five people already at the party had the equivalent of one of our people. Doh! Maybe we overdid it! I was told Matt’s facial expression was worth the admission alone as he had spent a bit of money on his costume (hello gold pocket watch!).

We continued to party and all was good in the world. Krista’s famous nacho dip came out and there were some good drinks being concocted. We got to see MaryAnn one last time as she was moving back to Newfoundland (have fun there!). I had forgotten to bring my gift for her which really upset me (more so that I have to mail it now. As if!)

The rest of the night was a blur but the party was a good time and we headed home to take a breather.

Thanks to Krista and Amy for the great night, and to the others – no one can ever beat us in a bling contest. We were the greatest gang there ever was.

Flashback:

March sometime. It’s the storm of the century. I forget to go to the dentist. I have five minutes to get there – there’s no way. So I call and reschedule.

Fast forward last Thursday. The day of my final exam. Hmm…well I didn’t realize that I had a dentist appointment on that date also. No worries. What’s the worst that can happen when getting some tooth work done? A little freezing here and there, I’ll be fine for the final exam.

I get to the dentist office, let them know I am there (fast fact – they don’t know you by your face in the city within the first three years so I was sitting in the office for 20 minutes the last time before getting up to inform them and they thought I hadn’t shown up.), and wait a bit and then they tell me that I have no appointment that day, but it’s on May 7.

Well that’s strange. I have no idea how that happened in my calendar. Oh well, not a big deal. I’ll go and study for my exam.

Then I get a phone call the next day saying they have an opening and I can come in on Monday. Sweet!

Yesterday I head to the dentist, I’m waiting, waiting, WAITING. Finally 15 minutes pass and Diane the hygienist comes on out, talks the talk and I have a seat in her dental torture space (do they call it their office) and then she starts talking about cleaning for the day.

“Uh, I think I’m supposed to be here for some sort of work on my teeth.” – Me
“Really? Hmm…your chart does indicate that you are supposed to have some work, but it was for March and I don’t see another appointment booked.”

Sure enough, somehow there was never an appointment booked and all along, I was heading in for a cleaning! Argh…I was upset. But there’s nothing much I can do so I never take it out on people. Who knows how that happened? The Doctor came in and apologized and I said “No worries.” in fear that once he got me under the knife he could have done whatever he pleased and I may have a smile like Ross Geller who had the glow in the dark teeth at one point. Mental note – never piss off anyone who could mess something up on your body and you go in there willingly.

So now I have to head back into the dentist AGAIN (three times in three weeks! Cripes!) so hopefully all will be good after that point on.

Palmer’s Rant about Dentists: $150 for someone to take a tool which looks like a metal toothpick out and scrape your teeth doesn’t sound worth it to me. I can scrape my own teeth I would think. What are people’s thoughts? I can see if they put the polish on there – that’s something I can’t have handy at home. But a metal toothpick? That’s all that happened yesterday.

Ah, the Spring. Where the birds are chirping (actually, they are chirping way too much. Time to see if there’s a nest up in the eaves trough), the sun is shining (argh, my skin is on fire!!!) and the grass is growing (but still wet. Don’t step into it).

I also dig the Spring because of garage sales. More importantly, ‘free’ garage sales. My friend Mary had a dining room set that she wanted to get rid of so Mike, Eric and I headed over there on Friday night to pick it up. We had no idea what condition it was in, but I figured if I can help her by taking it off her hands, by Jove, I’ll help her out.

I was pleasantly surprised with the dining room set and it now resides in my kitchen which is great as there were never any chairs there for people to park their ass onto. We even scored a ladder that Mary’s husband Stuart (Stewart?) never used before! Bonus! We were eying up their table saw but he wouldn’t budge on that item.

It’s interesting to think about the history of furniture. Mary mentioned how that dining room set was home to many family dinners over the past 14 years. Think about that. Think about the conversations and the witness of children growing up. I know it may be a silly thing to say about a piece of furniture. I remember my parents gave me their old furniture from the house when I moved to Ottawa and unfortunately they were pretty much unusable after some more years. But I remember going to Duncan’s place at Hallowe’een and finding one of those old chairs and just sitting in it and remembering old times that I’ve had in that chair. Many Christmases, birthday parties, just hanging out after school with my milk…actually, I just emailed Duncan to let him know that he should never throw that chair out and I’ll come pick it up from his place one of these days.

Anyhow, I’m glad to have some old furniture that I can continue making memories with. Granted, it’s a dining room table. All the memories will involve good food and burping.

Well, another year of constant schooling is done with. That’s 2 out of 4, not too shabby.

Last night’s exam was…interesting. I feel that the professor pulls questions out of thin air which are not based within the textbook or the lectures. So then I have to take wild guesses at the answers. I find her to be very unprofessional – as in she is telling everyone to shut up while the exam is occuring but then is passing out essays (by calling out people’s names). Way to let people concentrate lady!

I am on Day One of Freedom and am pondering what to do with it. It looks like it’s going to be a killer weekend coming so I will have time to finally clean my car after a winter of neglect. I also have to map out what the heck I want to do for summer holidays. I am toying around with the idea of doing some camping in the Adirondacks/Catskill and then heading into New York City to see the sights. But at the same time, I think it would be cool to go down to Gaspé for a bit to hang out with the folks. Haven’t figured out if I will head home for summer this year. There is a wedding I could go to, and there’s also Lumberjack Festival but I really didn’t care for the festival last year so I don’t know if my time could be spent elsewhere. Plans to plan, that’s the rub of it. I have to submit my vacation want list by next week. Yikes!

I am also looking forward to catching up on some reading of things I LIKE, rather than school readings. I am nearly down Stompin’ Tom’s second autobiography and I am starting a book Krista lent me which is called The Rebel Sell which talks about how culture can’t really be jammed because it just envelops the jam itself. For example, when a little revolution comes along (like punks for example), culture just wraps themselves around it and then it becomes a commodity (like how it’s cool to be punk). I am interested to hit upon talks of the alternative scene and how Kurt Cobain couldn’t handle the stress of it all – wanting to be anti-establishment when he eventually became the establishment. He was the figurehead of the alternative scene which is an oxymoron later on as it really wasn’t an alternative scene, it was THE scene of the moment.

Also want to buckle down and get some songwriting done. I have bits and pieces of riffs, lyrics and song ideas floating in my head which I need to solidify into actual songs.

I also want to reconnect with friends – it’s not like I’ve lost touch (well, not in my mind at least) but I don’t get to see people all that much due to school.

All in all, I am looking forward to the next few months before school hits up again and I get sucked into its pit of doom. Until then, p-a-r-t-y time!

To learn an instrument, I think you really need to start young. If you’re forty years old and pick up a guitar, I don’t think you’re gonna be able to play the B.B. King licks. You have to spend more time with that guitar than you do with your wife. That’s why I’m by myself now. I had to come up with a divorce, because my wife would tell me, “You’re putting too much time into the guitar and ain’t givin’ me none.” And I said, “You go, I’m keepin’ my guitar.”

– Buddy Guy – Rolling Stone interview 2005

Well well, looks like I may be buying an all access pass to Bluesfest this year as the lineup is stellar. Let’s take a gander at some of the neat bands coming our way that I’m interested in seeing:

Thursday, July 5 – Bob Dylan, City and Colour
Friday – George Thorogood and the Destroyers, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones
Saturday – Nothing really of interest yet.
Sunday – The White Stripes, Hawksley Workman
Monday – Hedley, Jonny Lang
Tuesday – George Clinton and the P-Funk All-Stars (awww yeah!)
Wednesday – STEVE MILLER BAND!!!
Thursday – Blue Rodeo, Robert Cray Band (of Eric Clapton fame), Xavier Rudd
Friday – INXS, Metric
Saturday – Nothing much of interest.
Sunday, July 15 – Sam Roberts Band, Alexisonfire.

Honestly, you can’t go wrong with a lineup like that. I am actually thinking it’s better for my body to just take the entire week off of work to compensate for the beer drinking that will occur. We all know what happened last year after going for one night…I can only imagine an entire week!

I was talking to Troy last night after commending him on his stellar demos that he and his bass playing buddy Oram (assuming this is a last name…) recorded (which are amazing by the way. Their cover of Living on A Prayer is by far the best cover I’ve ever heard) (way too many parentheses scattered around)(this)(entry).

Anyhow, Troy was talking about how he loves Guitar World – the must have magazine for guitar players.

I’ve given up on magazines for the past few years as I really didn’t feel they had much to offer that I couldn’t get off the Internet. Sure, they are great for reading when you have a moment but if I’m looking for some hardcore information, it’s usually out there somewhere in cyberspace.

However, he piqued my interest when he mentioned how this month’s issue has a great write-up from the engineer of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Well, I can’t really pass this up!

Until I get to the newsstand and I notice the price tag.

$10.

$10?! For a magazine? What the heck? Where I have been all these years? Do people actually pay this much for a magazine? Granted, this magazine had a swell CD along with it, but still!

I checked out the Guitar World website (Troy, this is some good info for you buddy) and they say a subscription is $40. That is awesome, yet utterly ridiculous.

I understand why they do this. Subscriptions are guaranteed sales. Newsstands are not. Numbers are the new king in the world. If I can tell my boss that we have 90 subscribers that guarantee some revenue, but only 50 newsstand issues that may get returned…well, the outlook is still good.

So there is the potential that they will get some unsold copies returned to them at the end of the month. So why not slash the price of the magazine for some guaranteed sales numbers so they look good?

I must admit that as a subscriber, you can’t really complain. If I get this subscription, I’ll be getting 12 mags and 12 CDs for $3.33 an issue as opposed to $10.

But what about the casual readers like me? Doesn’t make much sense to me to go out and pick up an issue for $10. That’s 3 issues in subscription land!

In the end, they achieve the result they wished for. I will go forth and order a subscription in hopes that if it processes fast enough, I will get the Sgt. Pepper’s issue. It’s a different world nowadays. When I was a kid, subscriptions would get processed 2 months later and then you would wonder if you would get the newest issue or the one from two months ago! I had a subscription to a Star Wars mag last year and I was afraid of missing an issue so I bought the 2 issues in the meantime, but they sent them to me! Argh, what a rip. So this time, I’ll go ahead and order the subscription and not bother buying any off the newsstand. Worst case scenario, I’ll just borrow Troy’s issue one day while I’m visiting.

Memory: This brings up a memory of how…I think one of my grandmothers got me a subscription to Spider-Man. Coolness! Until I got them in the mail. Mail is NOT the way to get a comic. Not only was it bent, mutilated, etc., but inside the plastic bag when I opened it, the cover was off! What kind of collectible is this? I had to go out and buy the issues anyhow so I could have one in pristine condition. Not impressed. I can’t remember if I wrote to Marvel Comics or not, but that was ridiculous. So Nanny, if you’re reading this, the gift idea was great, but it really didn’t work out.

iplaying: Everything Back But You (Avril Lavigne – The Best Damn Thing)