CaptainOrange

Warning this post contains spoilers regarding the Tooth Fairy and Santa Clause! This is a scan of a letter that Leora recently wrote. As you can see, she has just lost her first tooth. Translated, it reads: "Dear Tooth Fairy, I want to meet you one of these days. Love Leora." You will not be shocked to learn that we have never mislead her about the identity of the Tooth Fairy, nor Santa, Easter Bunny et. al. Still she has a very strong desire to pretend to herself that they are real. I think the essence of this desire is the need for magic. I can remember wanting magic to exist. I wanted there to be dragons and dwarves and lightening bolts from my fingertips. Never mind the terrible consequences of orcs and power hungry mages, I wanted my levitate spell. I never had the belief for as long as I can remember--even though I can recall my parents playing into the Santa mythology and my dad making coins dissappear. I always thought that there was a strange truth of the universe. L...

The Jr. Questers have had back-to-back releases of the Chicken Pox (wikipedia). Leora was first, and got rave reviews at the box office. I would estimate her pox count at around 300-400. After her 10-day stint Anwyn decided to cash in. She has just released Chicken Pox -- The Directors Cut. It is much more graphic and true to the original vision of the disease. Her audience has been treated to a digitally enhanced fever using 103.8F technology, several never before seen sequences of poc-marks with extra dynamic range in swelling AND Low estimates suggest as many as 600-700 EXTRA pox have been added for general viewing pleasure. Beyond this exciting time of childhood-rights-of-passage, I have recently auditioned for Off Broadway's production of Little Shop of Horrors (imdb). It was great fun auditioning, but I think I will decline if I am offered a role. I very much want to work with Summer Players again and I was a bit nervous about some of the things I saw at the audition. That...

Vin has made the observation that popular music from the year 2000 and on has nothing to offer history. It will not matter in 20 years (the way we now revere our beloved 80s tunes). Maybe this is a complaint against 4/4 time. It could be that the stranglehold that big media has on the production of pop culture has caused it to be sterile. Or, maybe it is a statement that the metaphor is dead. I don't know. And, quite possibly he is right. I don't have a strong interest in pop culture and I can't claim to be an expert in any of its various venues. But I have heard this argument applied in many areas before and I find I inherently rebel against it. I spent my teens and twenties in a state of rebellion. I think it is fair to say that this is common and part of growing up. Not everyone rebels, but most need to find some way to differentiate themselves from their families and friends from youth. You may wind up being able to reconcile a relationship with these people in the ...

or as I have affectionately come to call it QT . The acronym can also currently be used for "Quest Tuesday," the mysterious " on the q.t. ", or (as it happens) quite a few other things . What the hell is it? What is it good for? As with many things worth explaining , the answer is (too?) complex. I use The Quest as a way of describing my approach to life. I don't think that is uncommon. It is an ideal -- a personal measure of the quality of how I am living. I could (and will eventually) spend pages trying to prosify what is a very simple idea which still seems ineffable. Instead, for now, I will offer two poems that I have written which may clarify my particular approach. We'll talk more of this later... Sherandilin He Who Watches Sherandilin, the city fair. The questor's souls have perched 'mongst rare And wondrous beings of power and might Whose deeds become my dreams at night. When last I lay my wearied head, The questor's trail-song stands i...

If you want spoiler info, comment and I will email you. As you may be aware from reading CO and LittleScratches, I was really excited about the movie. I own the series on DVD and have watched most of the episodes 3-5 times. Let us say that I was very prepared to love the movie. I didn't. The movie opens with a flashback sequence that flies in the face of direct testimony from the first episode of the series. I'm not talking inconsequential--the movie utilizes this flashback to establish a totally different personality for one of the main characters. It sort of deteriorates from there: Explanations are given for Reavers , and although it stays tight with classic SF, the way it plays out in the FireFly 'Verse just dosen't cut it. Several of the principals exhibit personalities in some degree different from the series. The main antagonist disapoints (I can't really say more) Characters, several times, exhibit odd behavior for the sake of the plot. They rea...

I had a great time with everyone at the Roastery. Rainswept and Starcat were already there for a while before Handwing and I arrived on our bikes. The conversation was whimsical with a dose of nostalgia thrown in for good measure. I'm sure that is why RS posted his fav movie list as several of them were topics of brief discussion. Rutger Hauer was the man of the evening. If we had known in advance, I could have contacted him to see if he was available for a keynote or something. I'm going to be seeing Serenity tomorrow night--with or with out you, aa haa. Wendy is going with me, as are my cousin David an (I think) Handwing and perhaps Mrs. 'Wing too. Probably an early show. If you want to sit with us, let me know so we can meet up. Damn! I still don't know what theatre it will be at. We'll just have to wing it. I'll update tomorrow...

Bookmarks Bookmarks Toolbar Folder Add bookmarks to this folder to see them displayed on the Bookmarks Toolbar Refrence Google Maps Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Encyclopædia Britannica dict.org Dictionary.com RhymeZone rhyming dictionary and thesaurus AltaVista's Babel Fish Translation Service The Encyclopedia of Arda Canada Post - business/personal Saskatoon Airport Authority - Flight Info - Arrivals temp GRUB Manual: Commands Google Search: howto mouse config xfree86 debian Gentoo Linux Documentation -- The X Server Configuration HOWTO how do i setup a scroll wheel mouse in xfree86 4.0.x? Mik News Weather Forecast www.cbc.ca - news Little Scratches Slashdot: News...

I like to think of myself as a strange combination of strict and lenient. I am willing to let my children do things that often will make others shudder with fear or loathing or both -- for a variety of reasons. Yet, at the same time, I require them to hold themselves to behavioral guidelines that many adults I know find distasteful or just plain impossible. I don't do it for the shock value. There is a method to the madness, as it were. So you will have to take my word for it that during the taking of these pictures, Reid and Anwyn were models of perfect behavior [and me too ;) ] with the singular exception that they were climbing all over pieces of artwork. Notice how I am in none of these pictures? That is 'cause I would never do such things... September 7th was a beautiful day. I wanted to test out the new trailer that my grant money (hope, hope) was going to pay for. And I was begining to miss the time that would not come again; Reid and Anwyn were to start Kindergarten in...

So, we are already ahead of schedule on our quest to watch the run of Firefly before the movie comes out at the end of the month. I took that as a cue to do something a bit different this week. I was feeling guilty that I hadn't managed to go listen to Kyro at his doo a few weeks back. The least I could do is listen to some of what makes his world go round . What a treat! Kyro, that is some great stuff. I enjoyed them all quite well, but particularly "Stream of Consciousness". Please keep us informed of your next chance to perform. I will try a bit harder to attend. After making Vin listen to the afore mentioned tracks, we spun a few old AMIGA tunes : Blood Money, Shadow of the Beast, and Cannon Fodder are among my favorites. They are .mod files and you will need an Amiga, or failing that, winamp, or something akin to listen to them. I showed him a few ancient family pics that I have been editing for our grandmother, including this great one of my Dad and his owl. Farley...

Quite a few exciting things have been happening... James and I, with the help of David and Matthew gutted Jim's PS2 in an attempt to add a mod-chip allowing him to play games of Asian origin. The theory sounded simple enough, but when it came time to do the soldering -- wow! We manged the 15 solders to the chip just fine, but on the motherboard was entirely different. I guess we needed specialized tools because the places we were expected to solder to were about 5 times smaller than I could imagine doing with our tools. We have enlisted help and I will let you know how it turns out. I've been painting the trim on our house. Fans may notice that the "Bunisher", courtesey Brad Sawatzky, is helping out. Almost, but not quite, done. The rain has put a halt to production. Fortunately, I managed to get the front door done. I'm insanely pleased with it. Those of you who don't remember the boring and offensive original can be reminded here. I think the black and silve...

Until Serenity opens. Fourteen episodes in the original one-season series (+ three on DVD that were never aired ). If my math is any good, that means we have but to watch three episodes per Tuesday and pull an extended four-episode night twice. The episodes run about fo r ty five minutes each -- SHAZAM ! Two point two five hrs per night (on the three ep nights). A small price to pay for being all primed and ready to go on the thirtieth. River says "Move It or I'll turn your brain to jelly". Takers?

Took the kids to the exhibition on the weekend. $10 to ride to their hearts desire. They stayed for 8hrs! We pooped out after 5, but thank my lucky stars for aunts, visiting and otherwise. Anyway, you know all about it, but here are some pics for your e-wallet.

Once we got to Lee and Sandy's it was more relaxing. The first thing upon pulling into the driveway, Lee was waiting there for us claiming he was just out for a stroll in the dark. Not at all excited to see us. We disembarked and were greeted by a little toad who was hopping through the nearby flower bed. We thanked him for his welcome by picking him up and terrorizing him as he was passed from hand to hand to hand. We finally released the exhausted amphibian and went up to bed. I will not distinguish the individual days that we stayed in Ottawa. They were slow paced, relaxed and fun. A typical day was like this... Leora and Anwyn were too hot, too scared, or too awake to sleep well. They got up several times each in the night, making me a bit grumpy and leaving me just as tired as all the driving had already made me. The girls got up at about 6am local time and woke everyone but me. I was lucky enough to sleep in until 8:30 or 9am! By the time I got up, Leora would have already be...

The OPP (the Ontario analogue to the RCMP) are omnipresent. During this day of driving, I spotted no less than 15 of their cruisers on the highway--AND they have been busy. Many empty cars line the ditches, attesting to what must be the many DUI's over the long weekend. Combine that with the stupidly low speedlimit on the highways (70-90kmph) and it makes for one long day of driving. We anticipated getting to Lee and Sandy's around 7pm local time, but bad news for us, because we found about 3hrs of extra highway somewhere. Speed limits may have had an impact as well as Anwyn's funnel-like digestive tract. During parts of the day, we were compelled to stop more than hourly! Anyway it was close to 10pm when we arrived at 8161 fallowfield road (googlemaps). Their house is actually right above the google marker and the dark mark beside the house is Sandy's very large and beautiful pond. I was very tired and I'm not sure I've ever felt more glad to be at a journey...

It has been a busy few days on the highway. With only minor bathroom breaks, we made it all the way to the Manitoba boarder. We had a picnic lunch at the tourism center with a very large bull and a curious buzzing sound, which turned out to be a miniature motorcycle. We drove most of the way to Winnipeg, staying at a very well maintained campground called Rivers. Due to the time change, the girls missed playing mini-golf, but we did have a terrific marshmallow roast before the mosquitoes chased us to our tent. In the morning we drove speedy-quick into Winnipeg and checked out the Manitoba Museum . It was nice. The kids really enjoyed it, but in the end it was like any other museum of man and nature, only with a prairie slant. The one exception to this was the Nonsuch . Describing it would be a sham, but fortunately, I have pictures. Vin must see. We ate another great cooler lunch and made for Lake Superior. We reached Thunder Bay late in the day (11:30 pm local) and stayed with Wendy’s...

Ever used one of the vacuum cleaners at a car-wash? Probably... Do you recall the sorry shit that gets sucked up from your floor, change holder and in the cracks of the seats. Now multiply by about 250 and add a bunch of muddy, tar-water with a hint of gasoline. I got to play in that today. I took the girls to the car-wash and sucked up a piece from my spiffy lock-picking set as it lay on the floor in the back of my Honda. Arrrrggggghhhhh! The crud in that vacuum repository was FOUL . It stank like the Beer-pissed-on-floor from a senior prom bathroom ball. To top it off, I never did find the missing tool I was looking for. But ahhh, the memories.

Click on the image to see it larger...

Kyro gets honors for arriving at my house first last night. Irish arrived second, followed by Rainswept and finally Handwing. Since he brought the game, we'll say we saved the best for last. Peurto Rico was our weapon of choice. This one , not this one . (what a crappy website. I think someone should offer their services...) Apparently, as we have noticed before, it is also available for online play. Rainy and I tied in our efforts to bludgeon the rest of the fervent settlers. I think I made no less than 6 Bodums of Dark Sumatra-- a house record I'm sure. My regrets go out to Kyro's missus (does she have a handle?), who was forgotten when we broke after midnight and did not receive her strawberry pie. If you hurry by this morning, you could snag one of the six remaining pieces...

At the risk of seeming obsessed I thought I should include a few of the pictures from my show. It consumed a huge amount of my time and it requires some documentation and a bit of a denoument. It has been said that I was lucky enough to have had the best costume in the show. I can't say as I disagree. It was a real pleasure to wear all of it, especially the sword (which was quite real). I don't miss the huge hoop earing, however. My ear was in terrible pain by the end of the run. I'm happy to say that it has now mostly recovered.

What a great event at my place last night. QTs have essentially been off-line during my tenure as Pirate King, but last night was a great way to reboot the tradition. In attendance: Mik, Brad, Geof, James and (much later) Vin You can't go wrong starting out with some fresh brew followed by a surprise game of 4-player TROG . What a blast that was. Geof observed that Enter Sandman should have been playing in the background. It was a great taste of 1991. Moving upstairs we tried out Jim's board-game Blokus (which you can play free online). It is a terrific little game. Easy to learn, fast to play, and simple to throw insults during play -- OK, that's any game!

A few things have fallen by the wayside lately. I can't find the post where I mentioned it, but I guess that is just as well. I have started drinking coffee alone again. I plan to cease once the play is done, but for now, I am just missing too much sleep. And of course my once-a-week posts are looking more like once-a-month. Screw 'em if they can't take a joke. I have just been way too busy. Let's have a look, shall we... And let's remember that today I actually have time to post to this blog (a huge luxury in my mind). Last night, I finished rehearsal at 11pm and was able to sleep by midnight. Woke at 7am and had breakfast with the family. As a special treat, Wendy made me breakfast (normally it is my job). Today I work from 9:15 until 4:30. Leora has a school BBQ starting at 5pm and then a choir performance at 7pm (the latter I will have to miss). As luck would have it I get to forgo my 6pm call time and instead will show up at 7pm and sing and dance for 3-4hrs. ...

Perhaps I mean my life. Maybe. Or it might just be library books, videos, blogging, and quality time with my wife. The musical has a way of eating all my spare time. The problem is the singing, or rather, my singing. It is a real challenge for me. I'm used to doing things that I am already good enough at to get by. But for this music, that is definitely not the case. So I spend as much of my spare time as possible trying to get all the notes right. It is pretty hard when you can't read music and there is no melody to follow. I'm getting better. Last night our musical director, Dr. David Kaplan, did his best to reassure me that it was 'all a process' and that I was getting the job done. On the flip, as I have always found, it is terrific to work with so many young, talented, or (my favorite) young AND talented people. I can come home from a rehearsal at 10pm, exhausted, and still not be able to sleep for an hour or two because I am so full of adrenaline. Bad news for...

Present... Geof, Mike, Vin, James Regrets... Dave What a glorious sight; four hulking copies of House of Leaves , three caffinated beverages, two pirate shirts and... (you know the rest, sing along). Vin presented his fully fleshed theory on the central truth behind the characters in the book. No surprises, but his evidence was very well supported and will make a nice way to try and get a little extra mileage out of some of the (not so) minor characters. In deference to James, I will not mention some of the other things that were discussed. To hell with it. James, spoiler alert... Vin contends that everything comes down to the relationsip between Truant and his mother.. The realities of all the other characters are called into question in this vision. They can all be generalized into a formula where one person represents Truant (or an aspect of) and another, Pelafina. It all works rather smartly . Especially when looking at the Minotaur as Pelafina and Truant as Theseus.. We have no...

First off, I have to publicly pity all persons who were not present at this discussion. If you were in the hospital, we could have brought the conversation to you. When we all finish the book, don't let yourself be let out of the second installment of flavoured milk and double-shot Americano's. Going into The Roastery , I already knew that Danielewski was a brilliant writer. In the midst of our discussion I was struck with the depth of his skill and genius. Were the book not finite, I would be tempted into saying his genius was indeed without limit. I'm not really sure how to proceed with this post. I don't want to make it a catalogue of all the cool things that we discussed, or how we sat there for several hours pouring over the two copies of the book and kept finding new things that we had missed in the first or second readings. What I want to do is make sure that everyone gets out of the house next week so that we are all there the next time. I'm sure that the ex...

QT was full of both surprise and stimulating conversation. The recent TV scheduling shift thanks to the SK nemesis D.S.T. has done Tuesday evenings a favour. Vin can come out and play a bit earlier.* After picking up a mint used copy of Eggers' AHWoSG at Westgate for $12.50, Vin and I met James at Joe Bean on 8th. They have a wonderous beverage there known as the red-eye. A double shot of espresso calmed to a mere state of nervous fury by about 10 oz of medium or dark roast coffee.* Conversation centered on Jim's dilemma as a band teacher. To copy or not to copy. Or rather, how to not copy and still manage to be a teacher, or alternately, how to copy and have it be legal. I doubt any of us has put in the thought on this idea that is one of the hallmarks of Lawrence Lessig . One of his books, Free Culture is available for free download. Anyway, it's there, so I suggest you read it. A more general link that James might be intersted in. *and there was great rejoicing .

Not Coca-Cola, of course, but rather the Faith No More variant. I'm sitting here at nap time, avoiding my taxes and ripping the songs from a cassette tape that I found in my closet. Damn fine stuff. One of only a few albums to really take me all the way back to the begining and still not entice me to skip a single song.

After a teriffic audition, I have officially been cast as The Pirate King in GIlbert and sullivan's Pirates of Penzance Still have some scheduling to discuss with the director before I can be full steam ahead on this one, but it is looking good. QT was quiet last eve. James and I played a magnetic varient of connect-4. The board has randomizable magnets beneath each of the board squares and the player pieces also contain magnets which flip-flop depending on their placement on the board. Vin arrived and, as if by magic, a variety of teas (spicey and not so) were served... following which,we moved to Magettigan's for beverages, desserts and wireless internet madness. Conversation fluctuated between the PSP and roleplaying.

kudos to the Dr. for calling me up. I celebrate the first unsolicited call from you in recent memory! We met at the roastery on Broadway. Topics for discussion included: what to do with a blog, and the nature (or lack of) intelligence. keep your fingers crossed for Dave's take on intelligence on his blog. I shared my feelings about House of Leaves. Specifically, that it has been at least as much fun to describe my reading of it as it is to actually read. James is still sick,but was good enough to call me at the Roastery and invite me over for a brief chat. Possible highlights... seeing Matthew's TMNT Lego and disussing the difficulty in watching your children do something you deem as incorrect. Drove to vin's and had popcorn while watching THE APPRENTICE. I hope and pray that the 2-hr episodes of AMAZING RACE will end for a while.

CO 

I was pleasantly surprised to find that Vin's apartment was sporting a fire upon my arrival for our continuing QT ritual. This particular log was a 'crackler' which came equipped with sounds approximating real wood (tip of the hat). As encouragement to those of you who feel disinclined to acquiesce to our requests to appear, Vin suggests that the next one he buys will be a 'java log'. Woe to he that misses out. Chantelle thinks that The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is the cat's ass, so to speak. Vin has been finnished it for several days already and has passed it onto her. That was the most memorable thing that came from QT last night I am gratified that I remembered to bring the book to QE13 at all. I was in real dispair regarding a Quest book and it was only a last moment remembrance that saw its inclusion at all. Shame on me. I think as pennance, I SHOULD read it again. Especially since we tried to have a conversation about it and my memories of ...

Vin has been looking to change up his coffee experience. Always a good thing. I have a mortar and pestle (like this only green). Dave had time to sit and watch. Shazam in about 5 minutes I had ground up 8 beans into fine powder and added the boiling water right to the mortar. Amazing. And like most other things worth doing, the work is it's own reward. It was especially nice that not only did I know exactly how many beans it took to make a good cup, but I had consumed the entire bean. None of this filtering and discarding the mangled carcass to rot. After trying his hand at grinding, Vin suggested that maybe there were more elegant ways to do it. As per our new year's discussion, I believe it is safe to say that we should substitute 'easier' for 'more elegant.' I suppose he either meant this , this , or this .

Quest scarf 

captain 

hot new year We can see here that Geof's 'watch destroying field' is not strong enough to cross the table and prevent me from telling the time

what vin couldn't shut up about