Movember!

October 31st.

One duo of trick-or-treaters visited our house.

That's it.

Were the rest intimidated by our 11th-regeneration Doctor-Who-in-a-Fez pumpkin? Probably not. Anyway, I've got a lot of sour gummy candy for the folks at work tomorrow.

Our own trick-or-treating was moderately successful. My son, dressed as batman, briefly teamed up with two girls from the neighbourhood, so we wandered around with their moms for a block. We complimented the costumes of each other's kids. The princess's mom said "there are always creative costumes in this neighbourhood. Last year I saw a great robot costume with blinking lights and a colander helmet, it was awesome but the kid could hardly move."

"Yeah," we replied. "That was us."

So that's halloween 2011. And tomorrow is Movember. I've never participated before, but since I shaved off my 18 month-old beard on Saturday to dress in drag for an event at work, I may as well. Later, I'll post info about donations and the like. And maybe some photographic documentation is in order.

But hey! There's a gig coming up, so let's talk about that.

Thursday, November 3rd. At the good old Elmdale Tavern. With Shannon Rose & The Thorns. It'll be my first time working with her, but I've been a fan ever since Mike Schultz, who plays keyboards with The Thorns and trombone with me in the Mashers, brought her out to the pub. She seems like a lovely person and I dig her music. It's everything I like about Nina Persson and everything I don't dislike about Feist. I highly recommend you check her out. Preferably on Thursday at the Elmdale Tavern!

Calves and Emotionlessness

Two great things I came across today: one uplifting, one sort-of-weirdly-uplifting.



Apparently this dude was in the middle of a race, and stopped to rescue a calf. Possibly the best thing ever.

Also, a new post about depression, and not so much overcoming it as transcending it, over at Hyperbole and a Half.

Movie review tomorrow, if I get around to it!

Work

Does anybody else ever feel like this when leaving work after a long day?

The song title, for those in the know, is absolutely no reflection on any of the people I work with. Honest! I just get the tune in my head.

 

Portents of Good

I woke up this morning (da naaaaa na na) not hungry, which is odd. Then, after putzing around for a few hours, I suddenly got a really strong craving for eggs. Well I cracked one of those bad boys open and for the first time ever - DOUBLE YOLK! What does it mean???

Well, probably it just means that I've eaten some of the building blocks for some unrealized fraternal twins. But there's a good chance it also means that the egg gods are smiling upon Mike Essoudry's Mash Potato Mashers and our upcoming mini-tour!

Tomorrow night (Friday, Oct. 21) we hit LopLop, the most happening place in Sault Buffy Sainte Marie the Vampire Slayer. And Saulters who just can't get enough can catch us again the following night (Saturday, Oct. 22 for those not good at basic temporal mathematics) at the Townehouse in Sudbury!

 Happy Lucky Double Yolk Day!

Iceland

Midnight Sun | Iceland from SCIENTIFANTASTIC on Vimeo.

Busy weekend

What a great weekend!

Friday night was the CD Release Party for Mike Essoudry's Mashed Potato Mashers. We tore up the Black Sheep with our more familiar material, as well as rocking the new stuff from our 2nd full-length CD, "HOO-RAY!" Where can you buy a copy? I don't know! Stay tuned!

Saturday night found the "mini-mashers" (five of the nine usual mashers) playing flashmob-style for a flashmob! How meta. Harvest Noir is an event where hundreds of people dress all in fancy black, bring locally-produced food, and party. We infiltrated the crowd, posing as participants (thanks for the soup and the conversation, Erin and Tyrreny!) until we heard that ominously funky bass-drum-plus-sousaphone groove, then we pulled out our horns and put on a show. In the cold, wind, and rain. A good time was had by all.

On Sunday, it was back to IMOO at Umi Café in Ottawa, to hear Montreal improvising trio "Bean". With Marie-Claire Durand on keyboards (specifically on this occasion, on Megan Jerome's Wurlitzer), Mark Nelson on drums, and my old pal Joel Kerr on bass, they sounded amazing. In their second set, they invited a few guests up from the audience: Craig Pedersen on trumpet, then me on alto trombone, then Linsey Wellman on sax, and then all six of us for a little "two-minute miracle" to close the night. I'm so lucky to get to play with amazing musicians so often! I'm hoping to get a recording soon, which I will post on the website.

Also on Saturday, I deleted my facebook account. So long, everyone! I sure will miss helping someone I haven't seen since the seventh grade name the stray cat who lives under their porch. Honestly though, I did like facebook... at its best, it was like a giant pub with almost everyone I knew in it, and I could just wander over to see what they're up to these days. But I was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the way my personal information (including browser history and who knows what else) was being collected. So I'm out. I anticipate a mass exodus over the next few years, followed my a MySpace-esque demise while everyone gloms onto the next big thing. With any luck, I'll miss the whole thing while drinking tea and reading.

Funny jokes that cause me to laugh

Cyanide & Happiness

Pain

Came across this article today. Interesting stuff. I've been saying this for years, mostly to people who derive great pleasure from saying "Wrong. Next topic."

Taraf. Paganini.

Mike Essoudry's Mash Potato Mashers - CD Release Party!

On October 14th at the Black Sheep Inn in Wakefield, Quebec, we'll be celebrating the release of our 2nd CD, "Hoo-Ray!".

Everything you need to know is right here: http://www.theblacksheepinn.com/

Actually, no. There's one more thing you need to know, and it's this:

We've had a busy summer of touring around. We played with Broken Social Scene in Sudbury (and rocked the pants off the Townehouse Pub, where we'll be making our triumphant return on Saturday, October 22nd), had our megaphone stolen at Guelph's Nuit Blanche, and closed the Peterborough Folk Festival to a very hip, dance-hungry crowd!