http://jam.canoe.ca/Music/2005/11/20/1315314-ap.htm
Interesting article on John Lennon.
Categories
Author: admin
Categories
Review: COUTEAU… SEPT FACONS ORIGINALES
Last night, I went to La Nouvelle Scene on King Edward to watch the play Couteau…SEPT FACONS ORIGINALES DE TUER QUELQU’UN AVEC.
This is another forray into the theatrical arts wish I thoroughly enjoy. I like going to see people act in front of me…if I may say so, it may even be better than watching a movie. I prefer the smaller productions than the massive ones where you are a kilometer away from the stage.
Let’s be honest. My first language is not French. I am not perfectly bilingual. I think I’m above average. So how is watching a French play?
Not bad. I get the gist of much of the play usually (with the help of watching actions also). Sometimes they go off on monologues with lingo I don’t understand…it’s understandable as not many people speak the language they learn in school. Take the difference between yes/yeah and oui/ouai.
Anyhow, the play was pretty good. Actually, I personally thought it was quite disturbing. It revolved around a simple premise…a knife (couteau). The knife was shown in many different ways, whether it be in killing someone, shaving, cutting St. Hubert chicken (no joke!), or (my personal fave) being advertised on an informercial (these knives can cut through anything!).
The play revolved around a psychologist analyzing a patient who was saddened because he threw away a fisherman’s knife into the water when he was a child, and that this knife was the sole thing that the fisherman loved. He ruined the fisherman’s life. A dialogue would take place between the psychologist and the patient, and then the play would switch over to a different skit involving a knife…whether it be a murder, or someone shaving, etc.
The more disturbing scene was when the knife is used in a very violent fashion and you were left in shock, and then it changes the scene to the most satirical use of a knife I’ve ever seen – the infomercial; where the knife does not become some object of violence, but a wonder tool which can bring you happiness. I found this concept to be enthralling after witnessing the brutality of what a knife can do to a human being. Instill fear, inflict pain.
All in all, I was impressed with the entire production and one day hope to understand French just a little more so I can go back and watch this again.
Categories
Review: Lenny Kravitz & Aerosmith
Ottawa Sun Review: http://jam.canoe.ca/Music/2005/11/17/1310651.html
Wednesday night came and went in a hail of rock n’ roll fury. Showed up past 7:30 but luckily the concert didn’t start for another 15 minutes. Trish, Holly and Vero accompanied me on this rock n’ roll experience.
Go to Row 38 and there are people in our seats. It’s very tough to try and convince someone that they are in the wrong seats once the concert gets started. Very loud and you have to use a lot of hand signals. Turns out these guys were supposed to be in Row 29, not 38. If it was only two of us at the concert, I would have just given up and went to take his seats in Row 29 (which coincidentally was right in front of the freakin’ catwalk!). Anyhow, he finally realized that he can be 10 rows up and bailed.
Lenny…what can I say about him? He can rock. He can groove. He can make the ladies swoon. I think I saw a few women pass out as he winked at them. Even though Lenny could hold his own in a headline spot, he took the 70 minute set instead. All the hits, including a balls-to-the-wall version of American Woman which lead quite nicely into Fly Away. I have visions of me also learning to play Are you Gonna Go My Way after seeing that in the flesh. Let Love Rule was a highlight of the night as the crowd was singing along and Steve Tyler came out to lend some vocal ramblings (read: Ramblings. You can’t understand the guy!)
In between sets, Trish bought a nice Aerosmith tank top and when she was trying it on (while taking off her shirt) one dude yells out “Take it all off!” in which I promptly said “That’s my sister!”. Ha! Man, I love that line. Gets them every time. Turns out that Trish saw this guy being thrown out during the concert. What are the odds?
Lights go down…giant video screens play images and music of Aerosmith. I felt like I was watching a promo campaign. Very hilarious.
- Helter Skelter
- Walk this Way
- Same Old
- Cryin
- Edge
- No More
- Jaded
- Shakin My Cage
- Sweet Emotion
- Miss A Thing
- Dream On
- Thighs
- Other Side
- Baby Please
- Train-Slow Train
- Encore
- Saddle
- Draw THe Line
Highlights:
- Steve Tyler can move for an old man. I think he is more youthful than Mick Jagger and Bono.
- Joe Perry can wail on his guitar. Holly asked if what he was doing was hard. If she only really knew that we were in the presence of a God.
- I was SUPER impressed with the two ramps which went out into the arena bowl 100 level seats. Never seen that before and I think they got more audience interaction at those spots than throughout the catwalk into the floor.
- Seats on the floor area suck.
- Sweet Emotion was my personal fave. Followed closely by Baby Please.
- Paranoia by Sam Roberts just came on random shuffle on my iPod. Today will be a good day. One of my fave tunes.
- Holly was commenting on how she wished there were more new (read: 80/90s) tunes. Aerosmith must have a hard time with their fans since it’s like they are in two different groups. Some prefer the old stuff, some prefer the new.
- Some dude asked me how he can go up closer in which I responded “Just walk up.” Am I a wise sage or something that can magically teleport him?
- Steve Tyler can really rock. He can move more than me. The other guys appeared to be fossils on stage. Other than Joe Perry. He still has it. I think he had flames coming from his guitar at one point. That’s what I’m talking about.
All in all, I was hesistant to pay $130 to go to this show, but it was justified by seeing Lenny AND Aerosmith. Two class acts. Go see them if you can.
Up next: U2. I’m trying to convince Vero that they are a decent band and she should give them a chance.
Also…Coldplay tix on sale tomorrow in Toronto. Hmm…
iplaying: (still) Paranoia by Sam Roberts – We Were Born in A Flame
Categories
Excellent Day
Yesterday was an awful day for weather…I was stuck in both snow, freezing rain and rain at various times yesterday. It felt good to get home at night and do the running man in my bed.
Woke up in a nice toasty house. That’s what life is all about. Waking up with some socks on your feet because it was freaking cold and then getting up to warm heat waves hitting your body.
Going to see Aerosmith and Lenny Kravitz tonight which should be great! Also, I picked up the U2 tix the other day, and even though they are the worst seats in the world (aka nosebleed section), I cannot knock free tix. Actually, Joelle and I are thinking of going to a scalper and upgrading to floor tix. Heck, why not?
Random things that are keeping me having an excellent day so far:
– James creating a survey on Holly-isms
– Getting paid
– Reading my Dune book
– Thinking about Christmas holidays coming up
– Not looking at my credit card statement
I like to think it’s the little things in life that make me happy. ACTUALLY, this brings up an excellent lecture I was at last night on Advertising.
Supposedly, a survey was made on what people cherish most (aka material items vs. immaterial items) and of course, the immaterial items won out (aka, love, companionship, healthy lifestyle, good friends, yada yada yada) but then it goes to talk about how there are so many advertisements out there than ever before and how this has become a very material world.
My favourite part of the night was when they were talking about DeBeers and how they started the slogan for diamonds – “Diamonds are Forever.”. Well, during the 30s, people were selling off their diamonds for cash so they had to think of a way for that not to happen anymore. So they started the Diamonds are Forever campaign. Essentially, never sell your diamonds because you can pass them on to family members. Hence, they can sell a whole lot more original stock since no one resells them.
This was an interesting point brought up because a) No one in the class could admit that they would ever part with their diamonds and b) It shows how advertising has influenced us.
In reality, diamonds are just another material possession. I buy a car for $25K and then I try and sell it years later. Why? Why not keep it? Cars are forever? Alright, bad example, cars break down.
What about all the junk which is in your house right now, but at the moment, you just HAD to have it? It was interesting for the teacher to imply that diamonds are just another material object that people implant thoughts into your brain about.
One woman even said that for her, diamonds represent a good, solid, healthy relationship between your partner. Well, the diamond companies really did their work on that one! (at this point in my rant, I’m not knocking anyone who have bought diamond rings for their loved ones for a marriage. Heck, I’ll be doing it also.) Shouldn’t our emotions and actions show that we have a good, solid, healthy relationship and not a rock? I guess a diamond is to represent this bond between two people.
That’s great and all, but what if I chose to get my wife a necklace, or a colour bracelet (like everyone has nowadays) to show my love for her, and she wore it until the day she died? Is there anything wrong with that? Sure there is…people would look at us like we were freaks!
Why?
Because advertising tells us so.
I find the lecture on advertising an interesting one because a) I think a LOT of us realize what advertising does (or attempts to do) to us and b) There is no B.
Categories
Sony DOWN!
Verdict: Tenant in the right, Landlord in the wrong.
Result: $120 to replace groceries, $30 for beer.
What the heck am I talking about?
In short, a week after I moved out of Beverley House, the landlord phoned Carrie to see if it’s alright to come and clean up the kitchen. No problem!
Problem is that Carrie came home to find all the contents of the cupboards in a box, as well as all food from the fridge thrown into garbage bags. We’re talking condiments, frozen food (gone bad by this point of course), recently cooked stuff, juice, you name it, it was there.
So of course retaliation is in order but it turns out that the landlord doesn’t think he did anything wrong since he had to make the place presentable for potential tenants. I suppose he forgot that we are doing him a favour by letting him into the place before we move out, and…oh yes, the most important thing: Carrie is still living there, hence she needs food to survive.
Anyhow, the landlord didn’t budge so we went to the Housing Tribunal this morning where we got some free legal advice from an Ottawa U student (awesome! Thanks Mark!) as well as went to a mediator instead of having to go in front of the court. The landlord wouldn’t budge while talking with the mediator, but after she spoke to him alone, we came back in and he offered to pay $150 which we gladly accepted.
Lesson #1 Learned: Did you know that legal advice is free in a lot of places? Bring it to the University’s if you need to! They handle tenant cases a lot of the time.
In the end, justice prevailed. We are happy with the result, although are still baffled as to how someone could manage to believe they have the right to do something like that to us. All along, we were just trying to be nice and let them work on the house before we left.
Lesson #2 Learned: When it comes to landlords and tenants, sometimes it doesn’t pay to be nice.
Categories
Scrooge!
Someone just called me Scrooge because I did not wish to partake in:
a) Helping out at a soup kitchen
b) Going carolling
before/during/after a Christmas party I’m holding.
Their reason for calling me Scrooge was this: “Because you don’t want to do a charity thing…”
I know this person does not have ill intentions at saying this, but at the same time, I have to wonder, does everyone automatically feel this way when you approach them with a charitable idea and you kindly refuse because you either
a) Have other plans
b) Do your own charity thing throughout the Holidays
Just because someone says they are not interested in helping out does not mean that they don’t want to do charity things.
Now I’m in a position where I feel like a Scrooge, but at the same time, I don’t feel like I have to rhyme off every good thing I do for charity just to prove a point.
Lesson Learned: Don’t call anyone Scrooge (unless their name is actually Scrooge. Or if they blatantly tell you that they abhor charity work and do not believe in helping others. That’s just plain mean. They really ARE Scrooge!)
Categories
Date with the Devil
Have a court date with the Housing Tribunal vs. our old landlord. Carrie and I think we’ll nail the session, but who knows how these things work? I’m thinking it won’t be anything like Law and Order and I won’t have the opportunity to yell out “I WANT THE TRUTH!”
Perhaps I can blog live from the event…
iplaying: The Hardest Part – Coldplay (coming on tour again! Here’s hoping I actually get to go this time!)
Categories
Review: The Machinist
Want to see a kid have the fear of God put into him? Go to Blockbuster and have the clerk tell you that if you don’t bring in that video game you rented, you owe Blockbuster $60 for the game. But you get to keep it.
Wanted to rent The Devil’s Rejects, sequel to House of 1000 Corpses (only one of the cooler horror films I’ve seen in awhile), but they were out. So why not purchase a few films while I’m there? I rarely rent movies anymore because it’s just as expensive as buying previously viewed ones.
Picked up The Machinist and Sin City. The Machinist has Christian Bale (aka the American Psycho, aka the dude behind the Batsuit with the big gruff voice) who is a favourite actor of mine. Eric and I sat down to watch the movie on a cloudy Sunday afternoon where we proceeded to get freaked out from the movie soundtrack. It didn’t help when a picture fell down behind us (which was leaning on top of the couch) and scared the bejeezus out of us.
Anyhow, the movie is excellent. For a long, long time, I didn’t know where the movie was going. But once again, one of those movies that pulls you in throughout the entire 2 hours and then the big payoff is the ending where you go “NO WAY! I can’t believe they did that!”.
5 stars, 2 thumbs, whatever you want to use to measure a success. Go see this flick.
Categories
Review: Matt’s Mitts
Matt picked up a new pair of leather mitts while in Montreal at Simon’s. This was before he got told he wasn’t supposed to take pictures within the store.
Query: That’s the second time that day that he was told ‘No pictures tabernac!’. What’s up with that? Are they scared of us stealing fashion secrets. Pssst…you have a flyer! We can see your clothing outside your store!
Anyhow, Matt left these mitts in my car and so I thought I would let you all know how they fare in certain scenarios.
Scenario #1: Cold Weather Testing
Well, I put them on and walked outside for awhile. My fingers did not get cold at all. Two thumbs up (literally. They are mitts!). However, to give the ultimate test I went down the street to pick up some liquid nitrogen. I dipped these bad boys in and am happy to say that my fingers survived the ordeal.
Scenario #2: Hot Weather Testing
Chances are, you don’t wear your mitts outside in hot weather. But you never know. So I went ahead and fired up the BBQ to put a steak on and decided to use the mitts to flip the steak. My only beef with the mitts is that licking the BBQ sauce off your fingers doesn’t really taste that great when your fingers are leather. Other than a few grill marks on the mitts, I would say that the gloves protected my hands, but they did become very hot and sweaty. One (mitt) thumb up for that test.
Scenario #3: Cleaning up Dog Poop.
What can I say? I didn’t get any on my fingers. The mitts did their job.
There you have it. Matt’s mitts are excellent and I’m sure he will be happy with them as soon as he picks them up.