Description: Valerie In Toronto

On the Fourth of July, I show enough audacity of hope to dress in the colours of my old flag (sorta) and walk over a bridge so people can take pictures. With music by The Diableros and the inspirational honking of passing cars. Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly Associated links Another excuse for a Doodlebops link! Barack Obama (duh) Blog post about primary voting Democrats Abroad VoteFromAbroad.org (and it's Linux!) The World Wants Obama Coalition Bridges For Obama pool on flickr The Diableros @publicbroadcasting.ca (with other links) The Fringe show from which I got the flyer CBC story on Corey Glass An unintentional running theme of this podcast has been people who have moved here from the U.S. and made a difference here in Toronto - Jane Jacobs and Ed Mirvish likely near the top of that list. Another person to add is the woman I spoke to in the second half of this episode. At the time, all I knew of her was that she came to Canada with her then-husband as he was evading the draft for the Vietnam War, had absolutely no citizenship from anywhere when the U.S. took theirs away without telling anyone, regained it in 1994 (allowing her to move toward getting dual status), recently had a show of her photography in Washington D.C. (an article about it in the Post earned a nasty email from some bigtime military guy), made a movie with her son about Iraq War veterans coming home, and currently teaches at George Brown College here. That sounds like enough, doesn't it? But with the details, it gets better. Her name is Laura Jones. Once she moved up here with her husband John Phillips, they owned and managed the The Baldwin Street Gallery of Photography for 13 years. That show in D.C. consisted of her photos from Martin Luther King's "Poor People's Campaign" of 1968, which was about economic inequality among all races. Significant as it was, it's only a part of her ongoing career in photography. The movie, Fayetteville: Forward March Toward Peace, which is about a bit more than those veterans coming home, is available via stream through the NFB's CITIZENShift website. But there's more. She spent a couple years as a research consultant for the Riverdale Immigrant Women’s Centre, then was a member of Toronto City Council for another couple years. Throughout, she's served in all sorts of capacities on any number of environmental committees and projects, and was awarded the Commemorative Medal for the 125th anniversary of the Confederation of Canada. Man, good thing I didn't know all that stuff then, or else I'd have barely gotten out a few words to talk to the woman. :-) Most of what we actually talked about was blogging and podcasting: she wants to learn more about it so she can talk about it with her students and maybe use it for some of her other work. So I gave her cursory introductions to the world of Blogger/Live Journal/Wordpress; mentioned Google Video and Vimeo for possible longer-form video; and pointed her sharply toward the Rabble Podcast Network (which of course includes CITIZENShift). So I have a very strong feeling we have not heard the last of her. And we will be the better for it.

Done with business, I look around Edmonton and find what's changed since the days I admired it from afar. Includes music from The Ambers, wading in wading pools, and taking pictures of Wayne Gretzky's immortalized nose. Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly Associated links Edmonton.com Get "Gretzky Rocks" from Maplemusic! West Edmonton Mall Sir Winston Churchill Square Art Gallery of Alberta That building I thought was part of the university is Edmonton City Hall! Stanley A. Milner Library Edmonton City Centre and CBC Edmonton Citadel Theatre (it's rambling because it's a few theatres in one) Winspear Centre @wikipedia The Ambers @myspace! (Go bug them to put up more new music!) Southbound on the LRT on YouTube (I went from Churchill Station to Health Sciences Station, later from Coliseum to Corona) Whyte Avenue @Trip Advisor Old Strathcona (of which Whyte Ave. is a part) Blackbyrd Myoozik Blues on Whyte Rexall Place Edmonton Oilers Heritage Website The CD I was looking for at Blackbyrd is by these guys, who are not remotely Canadian. Thanks again to Pam for her local knowledge that finally got me to Churchill Square. She'd also wanted to take me to Rexall Place, but she was doing her main work on our CRTC project while I was doing my running around and found my way up there myself on the LRT. The previous night at dinner, she'd also told me an amazing story from her youth that made my jaw drop further and further as she went along. I'll try to recount it here, though I know my memory will screw up the details very badly. During those halcyon days of the Oilers in the '80's, she was a teenager. One hot summerish day, she and some friends held a car wash around the West Edmonton Mall to raise money for something (a dance, or a kids' charity...can't remember). Things were going pretty slowly. Out of nowhere arrived an extremely expensive car requiring no washing whatsoever, and it was soon followed by another one, more of a very sexy Italian sports car. Some young men stepped out - including Mark Messier and Wayne Gretzky. Of course, the girls did their best to not totally freak out. Everyone chatted a little bit, autographs were signed, pictures were taken, and Messier asked what was going on. Seeing these kids were suffering in the hot sun, he offered to get them something to eat and/or drink. A trip was made to a nearby store for many Slurpees. Then he asked how much money the girls were trying to make, and the reply was something like $1500. The guys looked around among each other like any other group of guys pooling together for cab fare to get an out-of-town buddy home after a long night at the bar. Scrounging in their pockets, they easily found enough money to reach their goal, and then some. With smiles and hugs all around, they got back in their extremely expensive cars and drove away. I couldn't have daydreamed that any better reading my Sports Illustrated back in Ohio.

It's new media vs. old media, and only one makes me break out into song. I give an idea of how podcasting helped change my life and why commercial radio is the way it is, featuring a mashup, some power tools and not enough water. Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly Associated links Podcasters Across Borders Mark Blevis and Bob Goyetche Danny Michel and Wallace Hartley Canadian Podcast Buffet The QN Podcast Talking Stick Podcast Wooby Communications chrisbrogan.com Christopher S. Penn's Awaken Your Superhero In Over Your Head (Julien Smith) Tod F-ing Maffin :-) Terry Fallis' The Best Laid Plans Nora Young: CBC's Spark and The Sniffer Dan Misener: Jim Dupree: Enthusiast and Grownups Read Things They Wrote As Kids A plus D The CRTC and the transcript of my day at the Edmonton hearing (my group was second) Painting With Ella videos on myspace Tech note: because this episode is so long, it's at 96kbps to save on file size. You can find Danny Michel doing the second verse of "Hartley" by going to his music page, scrolling down to his 1999 album Fibsville, playing the streamed sample and listening for the third clip in the montage. Yep, dude makes it easy, don't he? Of course, no kind of media is all good or bad. Podcasting is not all a warm and fuzzy diary room, nor should it be, and commercial radio is not inherently evil. Even the prevailing mindsets involved have their myriad variations. The people I worked with for the CRTC hearings were wonderful, the commissioners themselves were understanding and patient (I wouldn't give my worst enemy their job of having to listen to people like us for days and days at a time) and mean well. Also while I find the attitude behind CCD programs sometimes patronizing, I also know artists/bands who have been really helped by them (The Ambers, for one - money from Rawlco funded the recording of the song I'll be playing in the next episode). It's just Joe Average and grassroots podcasters don't know well the motivations of "old media" and radio/government folks don't quite get what's behind much of this "amateur" podcasting thing. There wasn't much time to mention Bruce Murray, known as being the force of The Zedcast, and the kind of guy who would walk up to me on the boat cruise last year, start chatting with me, and introduce me to some great people to give me some social momentum. This year, he had to stay in Nova Scotia, and was greatly missed at PAB. Yet he made his presence known in a very funny video he sent, that was played during the opening of the conference. It was a riff on podfading (when podcasters stop podcasting so much, which Bruce can be accused of) which included some silly video footage he'd shot during past PABs...including of me. This of course I didn't see coming. So along with everything else, I'm known as the girl who flipped her hair and said she was feeling "conferency". I gave him hell in my special way over the phone later, but certainly it could've been more embarrassing (he's probably working on ways to make it so in the future), and considering his past work, it was an honour to be included. And no, I'm not being diplomatic about that.

Part of me going to Podcasters Across Borders this weekend has involved sending in a "PAB Teaser," or a 2-3 minute sample of the show. So I went through all 53 episodes of this podcast, took clips from all of them, then edited everything down into under 3 minutes. The process was a bit of a trip, and I hope listeners get a kick out of the result. Here's the Description PAB Teaser! As for folks who are actually going to PAB and haven't been here before, it doesn't look like I'm getting Description 54 done in time, so scroll on down past Gooch and the Doctor (which you can thrill to later) to the latest episode, Description 53.

I'm in the seat of Canadian power (probably), reading a pamphlet, admiring statues of people holding documents, reducing an important monument to a Renaissance Faire hat and saying "awesome" too much. But the kitty-cats make up for it. Click here to subscribe Click to download directly Associated links Ottawa Tourism National Arts Centre A Treasure to Explore: Parliament Hill, including history, the "Hill Cam" and a Flash Virtual Tour The statues discussed: John Diefenbaker, Queen Victoria, Lester Pearson, Baldwin and Lafontaine, Sir John A. MacDonald Lester B. Pearson @The Greatest Canadian Canadian Parliamentary Cats @Wikipedia Canadian Museum of Civilization The Women Are Persons! Monument The song I "sing" at the beginning is a mocking Rhapsody In Blue. In one of the sections I had to cut for time, I talked about a kiosk with ads of upcoming events at the NAC, and one was for Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting the NACO in a program which includes George Gershwin's Piano Concerto In F. I was relieved they were doing that instead of that other Gershwin piece that has become such a cliché, then demonstrated what a cliché it's become. To give you an idea of the multimedia brilliance of the NAC, on that page I've linked for the event, there's a link to an episode of their "Explore the Symphony" podcast, which discusses another composer featured in that night's program, Johannes Brahms. I just had to stop writing this post to listen to it. The NAC has been an important part of the Canadian podcasting community (a word used almost as much as Rhapsody In Blue has been played) for a few years now - in fact, I remember them doing video blogs before the concept was even invented, as early as 2000 (my friend Gavin worked on them). I highly recommend you explore all of their podcasts in English and French. There's even a cooking podcast, for heaven's sake! Other great podcasts produced in Ottawa include Fear and Loathing In Ottawa, The Gaelic Hour, and pretty much everything done by Mark Blevis. Something else I cut was any mention of the big event going on in town at the time: the Canadian Tulip Festival (though there is the odd mention of tulips). Basically, through most of May every year, there are tulips just about everywhere they can be planted in Ottawa and Gatineau, with the biggest display at Major's Hill Park, sort of across from the U.S. Embassy. It is a pretty spectacular thing if you're so enclined. Btw, I remember the location of that park in relation to the embassy not because of my background, but because of a time I attended the other big event that happens in Ottawa, Bluesfest in July. A few years ago, I went to see Danny Michel play in Major's Hill Park. During the set, Danny noticed an inexplicable echo. Trying to figure it out, he started playing short bursts to bounce back at him. The echo was a result of the sound going across the park to the tremendous wall of glass on the modern, imposing embassy. Once that was determined, he played a couple more echo games with us, then noted how symbolic it was that no matter what we tried to say to the Americans, it would just get bounced back at us.

Breasts! Refrigerator noise! Gowns with three sleeves! Baskets of knitting! And me actually talking to people! It's all to celebrate our fine health-care system just slightly less than Michael Moore has. Also with great music by Colleen Brown...and by the pesky neighbours downstairs. Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care "The Birth of Medicare" @ CBC Digital Archives Health Care in Canada @ wikipedia St. Michael's Hospital CIBC Breast Clinic Rethink Breast Cancer Colleen Brown: official site, myspace, New Music Canada, CD Baby and... publicbroadcasting.ca! Second Cup CP24 (They don't have it on a stream anymore? Crap!) Stand Up Tragedy X, totally explaining the TTC Strike (Thanks, Todd!) Until this experience, I'd never been in a waiting room where so many people were talking with each other. To me, waiting rooms have always been places where you come in, (present your health card if you live here), sit down and read something, or in my case listen to an iPod. But when I donned the three-sleeved pink gown and entered, about four other women in similar gowns were chatting. Three of them had finished and were waiting for the okay to go, and they were trying to comfort the other woman, who was waiting to get her mammogram and was very nervous about it, having had a bad experience last time. My rationale was 1) my mom said it's never been too bad, and 2) compared to other exams we have to endure, how bad can it be? Another said it was nothing compared to being in a full MRI machine closed in around you like a smooth white coffin for a half hour. Totally soothing, weren't we? But if nothing else, we emphasized that however bad it would be, stressing about it would make it much worse. True enough. So that nervous woman is the one I'm talking to in the episode after we'd both done our thing; she'd survived, and was a bit calmer. The waiting room chat was an odd thing for me not just because of the waiting room, but in being some sort of female bonding experience. As you might have figured, I've never been part of many dishy, soul-baring little coffee klatches you might find on any number of tv shows; or identified myself with a kind of sisterhood. But there we were - people with the same pink gowns and the same body parts being tested for cancer. No avoiding that. So somehow talking happened, and it was okay. Now that I think of it, that idea of strangers connected by a medical procedure reminds me of a more trivial but stranger circumstance. I briefly mention in the episode that I had (and still do to an extent) scoliosis, or curvature of the spine. I put it down to slumping and always cocking the same hip when I stood. I was diagnosed when most kids are, at about 12 or 13 years old, and it mainly involved skipping school once every couple months to get x-rays (for which I waited all day at my local hospital) and then an examination by some doctor who'd come in from Cleveland to check a bunch of us to see if we were getting worse. When he found I was, I was assigned exercises and later a brace (not for the neck, but more like a big thick corset) for a lovely couple years in 8th and 9th grade. Eventually, things solidified, they didn't have to run a steel bar up my back, and I went on with my life with the odd back complaint. Hardly a rare story...and by the way, Dad had excellent health insurance from his work up until a few years after his retirement. Shortly after Kurt Cobain died, I read a report of his myriad ailments both natural and man-made. Among his natural ones: scoliosis. Suddenly, I could picture the poor kid going through those screenings, the x-rays, the exams, one of the few boys. Still, I concluded that for all the suffering Kurt Cobain endured, I was very thankful scoliosis was the only one to which I could truly relate.

I wander through Vancouver, land of "verdant-ness" and floatplanes, and consider the arrogance of Canada's biggest cities - like my own. Includes music by Allison Crowe, moss on the 37th floor, a silver shack on stilts and the inevitable connection between Stargate and Creative Anachronism. Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly Associated links Why I was in Vancouver Tourism Vancouver Vancouver-Alaska cruises Grouse Mountain Vancouver 2010 Triple A radio Allison Crowe: official, myspace, maplemusic, and at publicbroadcasting.ca! Blue Horizon Hotel Blenz Coffee Great Lakes Medieval Faire Some Vancouver locations for Stargate SG-1 Gateworld! Coal Harbour Vancouver Convention and Exhibition Centre Cut an awful lot out of this one, particularly more details on the CRTC stuff and the mysteries of trying to start a commercial radio station in this country (which may help explain why some of us are podcasting), but I suspect there'll be other chances to discuss that. Then there are other wonders of Vancouver cut out like DaVinci's Inquest, The Beachcombers, Capers Community Markets and the best strip clubs in the world. Then there was the preponderance of Dutch restaurants in Vancouver. The city is known for its great Indian, Chinese and Japanese cuisine (especially sushi, imho). But Dutch??? In my wanderings, I'd discovered there's this chain of restaurants called De Dutch Pannekoek House, which seems to be what Chez Cora is in Quebec - a happy, homey place specializing in breakfast, brunch and lunch. It turns out a Pannekoek is a big freaking pancake you often serve with other food on top, although De Dutch does say on their website "we're not just Pannekoeken!" (well, thank God for that!). If I had walked past one of these places while they were open (almost all of them close after lunch), I swear I would have taken the iRiver in there and really dug in. But I had to content myself with gawking in windows and posted menus, still marvelling, "Dutch? Why Dutch?" It turns out 50 years ago, some Dutch guy wanted out of the Dutch Army. So he emigrated to Vancouver. After working odd jobs and recovering from a car accident, he found work in the restaurant business, eventually got known for a place called "The Frying Dutchman" then took a shot at this Pannekoek thing in 1975. Now they have 17 of these things in the area. So there you go. One immigrant comes to Canada and gives a city something you're sure as heck not going to find in Toronto or Montreal. At least not yet.

I lace 'em up for one of Canada's great pastimes (besides complaining, maybe), which turns out to be nothing like riding a bike. Includes lots of non-podsafe music in the background, spilled chocolate milk, wobbly ankles...and yes, a zamboni. Click here to subscribe, so all you gotta do is sharpen occasionally. Click here to download directly like you're just renting. Associated links The Natrel Rink @ Harbourfront Centre QuickTime VR panorama of the Harbourfront Stage next door Other outdoor rinks in Toronto Great Canadian male figure skaters: Toller Cranston, Brian Orser, Kurt Browning on The Hour, Elvis Stojko, Jeff Buttle, Emanuel Sandhu and new champion Patrick Chan Play It Again Sports Learn to skate with wikiHow (I was supposed to push off with the other foot! Damn!) I would've gotten this episode done a couple weeks ago, but instead I went on a pretty crazy trip which you'll hear more about in the next episode. Yes, it'll actually be here in less than a month. I just got back last night, so I'm still zoned enough to not have a heck of a lot more to say about this skating stuff. However... In researching links for this, I went looking for stuff about Kurt Browning, and fell down a youtube rabbit hole. Seriously, I loved this guy, and probably still do now he's lost most of his hair, is long married with kids, is transitioning from the ice to the broadcast booth, and could walk past me on the street at any moment. While I did find the program that got me to fall in love with him, "Johnny Guitar" for the 1991 World Championships Gala (see, I told you I used to be a geek with this stuff!), a better primer for anyone who has forgotten or has no idea what the deal is with Kurt Browning would be this clip from a "Skate the Nation" special in '95, where he eventually does his Lyle Lovett thing while hooked up to a microphone. Enjoy, as I step back away from that rabbit hole...

The two cities of my life are connected by one movie, so I review the career of the ex-pat who made it happen and visit a magical land of fake overdone turkeys, "headknockers" and leg lamps that go on forever. Promise you won't shoot your eye out. Subscribe here - I triple-dog dare ya! Download directly, and you'll feel like you've won a major award. Associated links Canuxsploitation interview with Bob Clark Bob Clark @ the Film Reference Library A Christmas Story @ wikipedia A Christmas Story House! (even the site is great!) How the house happened, in the New York Times A Christmas Story in 30 Seconds With Bunnies Who was Jean Shepherd? Thanks, Jules! My apologies to anyone who hasn't seen this movie. It's sort of ubiquitous in North America, most likely because the TV station TBS runs it for 24 hours over Christmas Day. But while we make a ton of obscure references to lines and terms in the film, there was a point where we all had to admit that probably none of us had seen the whole thing from beginning to end in one shot - we'd seen different chunks of it at different times, and it eventually added up to seeing all of it. So if you don't have the slightest clue what we're talking about, follow the links up there for the wikipedia article and the 30 second version with bunnies, and I think you'll be pretty well caught up. In order to keep in the stories from that nasty elf, the lovely Patty Johnson (LaFontaine), I had to cut pretty well everything else in the museum, which is a trove of memorabilia with everything from scripts and behind-the-scenes photos to Randy's snowsuit. But I think you can tell anyway that the guys who put that place together weren't half-assed about anything. Researching the links, I learned that the man whose stories made up A Christmas Story, Jean Shepherd, was not just a writer (though that would have been plenty), but a radio personality and voiceover artist. That might not be such a surprise considering his voiceover performance as adult Ralphie in the movie. Shepherd first worked in radio as a DJ, but he started telling stories more than he was playing music, so his path in radio soon changed to becoming a storyteller full-time. In fact, that was how Bob Clark discovered him. According to one of the trivia articles on the A Christmas Story House site:In the late 1960s, "A Christmas Story" director Bob Clark was driving to a date's house when he happened upon a broadcast of radio personality and writer Jean Shepherd's recollections of growing up in Indiana in the late '30s and early '40s. Clark wound up driving around the block for almost an hour, glued to the radio until the program was over. "My date was not happy," Clark said, but he knew right away he wanted to make a movie out of the stories, many of which first appeared in Playboy magazine and were collected in Shepherd’s 1966 book, "In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash."Jim Clavin, of the Shepherd fansite Flick Lives, writes about listening to Shepherd on New York's WOR: Here, he spent the next 22 years talking to "me". Every Jean Shepherd listener will tell you that, as he sat there in front of the radio, or had it tucked beneath his pillow, Shep was talking only to "me". He had a method of talking as if he were sitting in your living room holding a casual conversation, discussing auto racing, or a recent trip abroad.Sounds like that guy would've made a damn good podcaster.

The Dalai Lama classes up an episode with two blizzards, official Canadian Football League turf, a lot of heavy breathing and an explanation why I don't sound quite as sad as I once did. Click here to subscribe and go on the path Click here to download directly and take one breath at a time. Associated links Toronto "blizzard" flickr set (by Robin Yap) Zen Buddhist Centre Edmund Bergler @ Quest For Self DicksnJanes podcast Allan Watts Theater! Urban Dharma - the podcast Pema Chodron Ajahn Brahm podcast via Buddhist Society of Western Australia Tengye Ling Tibetan Buddhist Temple NOW Magazine on the Dalai Lama's visit to Toronto Dalai Lama interview on CBC News Sunday I'm posting this while sitting in the Kingsville Public Library, my nearest source of wi-fi happiness. Thanks, guys. While all the podcasts I've linked up there are excellent, if you have any passing interest in Buddhism, your primary one-stop shop for a crazy load of info on this stuff can be found at BuddhaNet. From the simplest thing to the lists upon lists upon lists, it's really all there, and for free. Being home for this long (it will be about ten days in total) is quite the tough proving ground for my nascent buddhist mindfulness. To paraphrase The Feeling, this place makes my head soft. But work like getting this episode together has helped. With tales of family selfishness, sniping and martyrdom (like with all families...and stupid judge shows that are on every frigging hour of the day around here), it wasn't a bad idea to sit myself down in the rocker/recliner in front of one of a half-dozen space heaters and strain to make out what the hell I was saying about inpermanence and unsatistfactoriness while tromping through the snow a couple weeks ago - not to mention trying to make out the echoes (literally) of the Dalai Lama. The much harder work here has been shutting up the chorus of judgements that roar in my head. Strangely, during my time here so far, I'm getting an idea where I got that chorus long ago. Maybe that will help the noise-reduction. We will see.

Back in Ohio for U.S. Thanksgiving, I give thanks for Canadian soldiers past and present, and try to explain what the deal is with those red plastic flowers on our coats. Also features a tiny dog wrapped in a towel and guys in fluffy hats! Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly Associated links Remembrance Day @ wikipedia CBC News In Depth on Vimy Ridge The Royal Canadian Legion explains the poppy pin LibriVox reads "In Flanders Fields" The Suez Crisis and peacekeeping Kandahar Journal from the National Post CBC Kandahar Dispatches blog Torontoist on Remembrance and Public Commemoration The guy who spoke after Toronto Mayor David Miller at the ceremony was Dr. Ron N. Nickle, Padre (that's kind of like a chaplain) for the Toronto Fire Services. For a benediction, it was pretty strongly-worded concerning religion's relation to war, with the hope we will never feel our way is the only way. Pretty cool. A few things in the ceremony I had to edit out for time. Shortly after the two minutes of silence at 11am, there was a fly-by of old warplanes, where one plane veered off to the side out of formation to honour those who have fallen. Soon after, we all sang O Canada, and near the end of the ceremony, it seems more people sang God Save the Queen (which I don't know how to sing without doing "my country tis of thee..."). And somewhere in the middle was the laying of the wreaths, where it seems every bloody group in this town laid a wreath - public services, reps from every consulate, unions, different sections of unions, and seemingly every little sub-group of every ethnic group and interest. It took forever. Okay, so it's great all these groups saw fit to honour our soldiers and their loved ones, but I had to wonder if there was something a bit political about it, i.e. "oh, if that group is laying a wreath, surely we must." I wondered if some of those groups could have just gotten together on some of those wreaths, maybe it would have demonstrated a little more of a sense of community that could contribute to some more peace in this world. But y'know, that may be just me being cynical.

While listening for fighter jets, I talk about another immigrant who did great things for Toronto and then visit one of the greatest things he did. Yes, there's opera, as well as a steel drum band playing U2. But there are no frosted glass escalators. Click here to subscribe and pay way less than you'd have to for a COC subscription. Click here to download directly, knowing rush tickets are subject to availability. Associated links Canadian International Air Show Canadian Opera Company Four Seasons Centre For the Performing Arts The (other) Opera House CBC Arts on Richard Bradshaw and what he meant to the COC The Toronto Star article I read, by John Terauds Atom Egoyan talks about Bradshaw (Sorry, it's Real Player.) National Ballet of Canada Toronto Life on architect Jack Diamond World Partnership Walk (I kept saying it wrong.) Aga Khan Foundation My opera house photos on flickr (take that, camera cops!) In this vast world of the internet, there must be an mp3 floating around of Anna Russell's legendary and freaking funny "Analysis of Wagner's 'Ring der Nibelungen'". The best I can find is a transcription someone kindly did. But you don't get her classic, Bob Newhart-level pauses that just make the piece. Sigh... Okay, Blog Day. I'm supposed to share 5 blogs I like. Again, I barely ever read blogs back when they were the thing before podcasts - no real reason - and I don't think I'm very voracious now, but I have a pretty long list of feeds on bloglines, so that must count for something. Everybody reads Boing Boing, right? Okay, I won't count that... First, I must note there's a huge list/feed of Canadian blogs at publicbroadcasting.ca, the domain (literally and figuratively) of my podcast landlord Justin, so you should really stop there first. It also has its own group blog here, and it's pretty darn good, though I'm often too lazy to post anything to it. That's where the "group" thing comes in handy. :-) Now, finally, for my list, which is mainly comprised of places where I can actually learn something. You've pretty much figured by now that I like Andrew Dubber's blog New Music Strategies. Even if the guy hadn't inspired me to buy an iRiver two years ago, I would still recommend his thoughtful, passionate yet not-bossy opinions and findings on music and musicians online. Required reading for any musician trying to make a living today, but not the equivalent of eating your vegetables. (btw, he's looking for somewhere to stay while he's at CMJ in New York in October, so email me if you have any ideas for him that do not involve putting up a mortgage or needing vaccinations.) Still on the subject of music but getting a bit muckier, No Rock'n'Roll Fun can be catty and whinge on a bit, but that's part of why I like it. It's simple, constantly updated and takes absolutely no crap. It's really more about the media coverage of music and what gets said there than it is of the music itself, and unfortunately we seem to be in a world where the media does take precedence - at least in the mainstream. But that also means it gets savaged here all the more. My fave Toronto blog is Torontoist, which is of course part of the "ist" clan. It still feels authentic, it has a little bit of everything, and I like the writing and attitude. Wish I could give an honourable mention to Antonia Zerbisias' media blog for the Star, but it seems it is no more, as the muckety-mucks got all nervous and shuffled her off to the Life section. She still has her columns, though. Instead, I must be content with the TV Newser blog at mediabistro. American and very level-headed, its strength is not in presenting a snarky opinion, but in delivering the stories that make you come up with your own snarky opinion. Oh, and I have to be a girl and give props to the Rabbit Blog, where wicked Salon TV critic Heather Havrilesky turns into Dear Abby on crack to dispense very real, very funny and very verbose (see how I can relate) advice to the otherwise-smart lovelorn. Since her baby was born, she slacked off on the posts, understandably, but she's been revving her engines throughout August. My favourite blog of all time (still a dubious honour coming from me) was the one by "Rance," supposedly an A-list movie star sharing bemusing tales of life in Hollywood. Part of the fun was trying to guess who this guy was - the most popular guesses were George Clooney, Ben Affleck and Owen Wilson - but for me, the attraction was just fantastic writing. As so often happens with the best blogs, Rance found it harder and harder to keep up the posts, and while some very able readers did their best to carry on in his stead at his request (because he respected their writing), the magic had gone. To this day, not even the Museum of Hoaxes is sure of who Rance was, be he actual celebrity or mere insider, though theories remain. It may be just as well to let it stand as the cracking piece of interactive fiction that it was.

So what have I been doing for money? Standing around so Hollywood North can make its magic. Enjoy great rock from The Left and join me for tales of parking battles, cans of snow, mysterious crystals, cardboard-covered walls and the eternal search for a place to urinate. Click here to subscribe, because it's your permit. Click here to download directly and pretend your permit hasn't expired. Associated links My new podcast!! The movie I was working on A location support company I don't work for, but has a website The Left: on myspace, on iTunes and on CD Baby A couple days later, I did get a folding chair - not one of those deals with the back and the beverage holder like some of the other guys have, because I don't think I can sit in those and look like I'm working. After another more arduous shift (and a sit-down lunch), I went to the Canadian Tire featured in Description 02 and got a folding three-legged stool, which must be made for hunters because the slip of fabric where you put your ass is in camouflage. (Otherwise, of course, the deer will see you.) Very light, very cheap and therefore losable. It served me very very well a couple days later when I had to watch trucks pull out of a base camp in thick fog at 6am behind a Hamilton mental hospital. Yes, I know - you wish I'd recorded that day. When I went to Showline to pick up my cheque, a woman in a familiar orange vest was watching the parking lot. Turns out that same film was starting filming in those studios. I realise that's less work for folks like me, but it was nice the actors and the crew were finally working in some more comfortable environs made for folks like them. For what I did record, I didn't have the chance to mention that across the road where I was, on the huge, forested bank of the conservation area, there are two spectacular houses - real Frank Lloyd Wright kind of stuff. One seems only accessible via a long set of wooden steps (and some sort of ramp/pulley system for deliveries) from the garage on the side of the road; the other accessible via a long, perilous-looking driveway. With about an hour left in my shift, I sat on the location house's steps to the sidewalk watching an Audi pull into that driveway when it stopped. Stepping from the passenger side was a very well-kept woman in her 70's with glasses and her lustrous silver hair cut in a bob. She bent down to me. "Excuse me, dear - do you need any help?" I glanced around. "No, ma'am, I'm fine, thank you." "Oh, all right. You see, we live across the street and have been seeing you sitting here in the cold, and we were concerned someone was supposed to pick you up and never came. We wanted to check to see if you needed anything, like to make a call or something." I chuckled and smiled. "Sorry, I understand how you'd think that. No, I'm working security for this film set here, guarding the equipment for when they film here tomorrow, and someone else will be here soon to relieve me. It won't be long now." She nodded, a little embarrassed. "Ah, I see. That's fine then." "Thank you so much for asking, though. I appreciate it." "Thank you, dear. You have a good night." She wrapped herself back in her taupe pashmina and got back into the Audi, which then crawled carefully down that driveway.

The mega-success returns, but can the art really hold out 'til the break of day? I get answers from a church, from under an iceberg and inside a port-a-potty. With cameos by The Gap Band, Clint Eastwood and manicurist furries. Click here to subscribe to some sort of groupthink. Click here to download directly and say you meant to do that. Associated links Official Nuit Blanche website again blogTO review Torontoist photo album The real Leonard Cohen quote about the ROM Crystal The Crystal itself The Word on the Street Bravo!FACT Gardiner Museum Queen's Park @ Wikipedia As I'd noted briefly, Nuit Blanche actually started at 7pm the previous night, which was when I got off work. Hobbling up Queen's Park to Bloor, I saw coming in my direction a small group of young people in formal clothes, like they came out of the movie Metropolitan. They were trying to dance, but were somewhat restricted by the fact they were attached to each other by the chest or shoulder, so they were this modest, happy mass of limbs toddling down the street toward me. Fortunately, I had read somewhere there'd be this group "dancing" throughout Zone A, so I said aloud "And so it begins," wished them a good night and went on my way. I hope you around town heeded my recommendation to check out Nuit Blanche yourself. For me, at that time of morning in my little corner of my zone, it was lamer than depicted in the episode (and I know that's saying something). I cut my trip through a piece at St. Thomas' church that was pretty well finished and cut my discovery that a piece on the front of the Bata Shoe Museum had been taken down by the time I'd gotten there. But I hear other zones were still hopping, and that in the end, the event attracted way more people than last year, which I guess would put the attendance over half a million. Man. Can you believe that? I do. I don't think they're lying. But that just blows my mind. When I got to my work location at the Christie Mansion, the guy I was relieving asked me whether I went to the piece in Lower Bay Station. D'OH! I really wanted to see that! But I later learned that the line to get in was every bit as long as the line to go down there during Doors Open, which was give-up-your-day long, so I wouldn't have made it in anyway. However, those kids at Torontoist (to be exact, Tony Makepeace) did a wicked 360-degree panorama of it! So go here and dig it with QuickTime VR. And one of these days, maybe I'll finally make it into that mysterious abandoned subway station known for its appearances in movies. Ha - maybe I'll have to be on a film crew to get there.

My (usually) annual trip to watch my two hometown baseball teams inspires plenty of memories of better days. Still, we can enjoy music from Great Big Sea, browse some "Yorkville Yummies", hear two cowbells and walk through the airport of the apocalypse. Click here to subscribe and have your season's ticket. Click here to download directly and pick your game. Associated links Official Site of the Toronto Blue Jays Official Site of the Cleveland Indians Lovely SkyWalk photo by Snuffy on flickr. Porter Airlines The Rogers Centre (Skydome) in wikipedia Pizza Pizza! Great Big Sea (and thanks again to the Podsafe Music Network) Arrrrrgooooos.... Toronto's Sports Radio, the FAN 590 Tom Cheek, RIP Toronto Mike remembers Tom Cheek with streaming audio of his greatest calls Batter's Box Q&A with Jerry Howarth Toronto Blue Jays history The "OK Blue Jays" song! (via Toronto Mike again) The stars of that night's game... Vernon Wells, who hit that home run: Roy Halliday, who fell short of winning us pizza: I'm giving those guys props because I've learned in all the years I've supported teams who suck, it's really important to support and praise the guys who are still awesome and are working their asses off no matter how crappy things get. For the record, Toronto won that game 8-6. Time of the game was two hours and fifty-seven minutes, and the attendance was 28,526. (And yes, I know Left Behind was originally a book. Shudder.) My favourite baseball memory does not involve the Blue Jays, but the Indians, and it's not something they'll have an exhibit about at the Hall of Fame. Back when I was a kid, Dad and I would go see the Tribe one or two times a year at Cleveland Municipal Stadium, and often these games would involve the Yankees. These were the great and universally despised Yankees of the '70's, the subject of that ESPN miniseries we didn't get to see here, The Bronx Is Burning. Indians fans hated the Yankees, with the exception of the late Thurman Thomas because he was from nearby, and regaled them during games with hardy chants of "YANKEES SUCK!" or "REGGIE SUCKS" (for Reggie Jackson) or "BILLY SUCKS" (for manager Billy Martin). Hearing 70,000 people doing that at once is pretty cool. Anyway, we happened to choose that night to sit in the bleachers, but early on in the game, it started raining, and it rained for long enough that we were allowed into the main section of the stadium to wait it out. Time passed, it kept pouring rain. Sometimes back then, some drunk guy would try to run across the field, and inevitably, the Cleveland cops would catch up with him and beat the crap out of him with clubs. (What can I say - it was the '70's.) I noticed a group of about a half dozen guys in the front row of box seats along one foul line, and wondered what that was about. They suddenly jumped over the little barrier and sprinted to the centre of the tarp on the diamond. Of course, the cops were on their way. Then, the group of intruders all took off, each one going in a different direction! There must have been a bet on for who would make it back off the field without being caught. I thought in its way, this was brilliant. Sure enough, the cops were initially perplexed, but adjusted themselves as best they could. The chases were on. One by one, each guy was caught and pounded, then my eyes would dart to the next one, and the next one. As you're picturing this in your head, remember this is in pouring rain, and people on both sides of the law are sliding everywhere. The crowd would cheer and laugh and go "awww" when someone was caught. One intruder had drawn the short stick of running to the outfield fence (which at the time didn't have fancy LCD screens on it), which was maybe six feet high. It looked like he was going to make it - I cheered and yelled for him - but then he had to climb that fence. He reached and scrambled as best he could...but didn't make it. Poundpoundpound! One of them did actually make it, getting back into the box seats on the other side of the field where they'd started. It was euphoric, except for the fact he was running into the welcoming arms of more members of the Cleveland Police, who smacked him around and dragged him off to where he and his friends would dry out (in more ways than one) in a lovely local jail cell. Yes, that is my great baseball memory from my childhood. Kinda shows you I've been this way all my life. Of course, though, there are lessons to be learned about divide and conquer, working as a team, and knowing that no matter what, eventually we all face an end of getting smacked around by cops and getting thrown in a drunk tank, so run as well and as far as you can.

After some screw-ups, we finally go to a store without a country and without taxes. Featuring rawk from Iron Giant, wine by golfers vs. wine by fishermen, moose stuffies and me calling Bonnie Hunt "f-ing wicked awesome". Click here to subscribe and save on bandwidth duty. Click here to download directly and hide your smokes under the back seat. Associated links: Peace Bridge Duty Free Town of Fort Erie, Ontario The Shopping Bags LCBO (that's Liquor Control Board of Ontario - sounds fun, huh?) Mike Weir Estate Winery And who is Mike Weir again? Bob Izumi Wines from Coyote's Run Estate Winery Ice Wine in Wikipedia Iceberg Vodka Iron Giant on myspace, at underdogma (buy the album!) and playing live on YouTube! Transcanada Transpondency Part 3 (with the Steam Whistle Brewery tour) What the hell is Clamato? Tim Goodman eulogizes Tom Snyder NBC's tribute (where I got the opening) Flash opening for Snyder's defunct colortini.com Tom Snyder and Bonnie Hunt's last time on the Late Late Show: part 1 and part 2 (with her song) The chili ended up okay...or at least I thought before I got violently sick, sicker than any food has made me. So much for that recipe. For the opening, I couldn't find a clip of Tom Snyder's complete trademark line, "Fire up a colortini, sit back, relax, and watch the pictures, now, as they fly through the air," so I went with the truncated version on his CNBC show. Consistent with the main subject of the episode, a "colortini" was an alcoholic beverage one may choose to imbibe whilst watching television at that late hour. Also, I don't think Bonnie was on Tom's last Late Late Show, but on the last week. Other classic recurring guests on that show were Dennis Miller (before he jumped the political shark), the author Dean Koontz - and maybe towering over them all, Robert Blake, who spun the most remarkable tales of Hollywood, destruction and redemption. It makes what happened to Blake (or what he did, depending on your point of view) several years later that much more unfortunate, yet somehow fitting into the whole epic. Chris of Iron Giant offered to send me the new album, but asked if he could snail-mail me a CD because he hadn't quite figured out this mp3 conversion thing. :-) We take a lot for granted, gang. I think they've got it sorted, since new tracks are popping up around the net, so I'll get something postage-free in my gmail one of these days and will play it for you. Thanks again, Chris...and you may want to download iTunes. Here's my greatest PJ memory (which may not be precisely correct detail-wise). About 10 years ago, PJ, Derek, Steve and Ken were The Monoxides and in Toronto to make their fortune. (When The Darkness first hit, I thought, "hmmm, somebody got some Monoxides records in England.") Not surprisingly, Moe produced their major label album and so the boys became part of the Berg posse, and that's how I got to know PJ. Q107 put on a huge concert at The Docks with The Pursuit of Happiness, Headstones and Honeymoon Suite, with The Monoxides as one of the opening bands. I had brought shirts for Steve and PJ from the first KISS comeback tour (which I'd gotten from my friend Julie, who had done the merch), and they were like kids finding cool bikes under the Christmas tree. The band did their thing and rocked as usual, and soon after, the Suite came on. I dug them back in tha day, and Julie and Gord had worked with them while still living here. By this time, that band had kind of started to run on fumes - only Johnny and Derry remained from the original lineup, I think - and it was becoming clear their hit-making years were behind them. No sin in that (and in fact they have continued, touring successfully), but needless to say, they could not be considered even remotely hot or trendy at that point. So we're being all cool and stuff near the back of this cavernous space, and they start playing...I want to say it was "Burning In Love," it could've been "Feel It Again." It definitely wasn't "New Girl Now" yet in the set. PJ, Steve and Kevin (Hilliard, did you think he wouldn't be there?) suddenly whooped and ran, RAN across the club to the stage and went nuts, jumping up and down and singing along at the top of their lungs with fists aloft. I followed them. I'd never seen such absolute joy in my life. That may be how I always remember PJ, while he will always know me as that girl who gave him that wicked KISS shirt.

Theatre, theatre everywhere as I take the iRiver through four productions in this year's Toronto Fringe. Featuring a navigation triumph, a dance contest that never happened, flyers from textile stores, and a Marillion song. Click here to subscribe, even better than a Buddy Pass! Click here to download directly, "At the door" Associated links Fringe of Toronto Theatre Festival Theatre Passe-Muraille Walmer Centre Theatre Tarragon Theatre Factory Theatre Edinburgh Festival Fringe the brilliant Edinburgh Fringe Show podcast Fringes in Winnipeg (about to end at post time), Edmonton (in August!) and Vancouver (in September!). Also Ottawa, Calgary (in August!), Montreal, Regina...and others, but I'm tired. The Melbourne Fringe is more about art, but there are Fringes in Adelaide and Sydney. Quirky Nomads Marillion! some Young Ones The featured shows (um, which I recorded some of without permission...but hey! Links!) The Fugue Code Like, Omigawd! (with music!) Curriculum Vitae (actually, Jimmy Hogg's myspace because there's no site for the show itself, strangely) Dickens of the Mounted And yes, there are Fringes in the U.S., more than a dozen of them. Just think of a city, google it with the word "fringe" after it, and there you go. I think you can tell something about a person by the Fringe shows he/she attends. It's clear here that I have a penchant for guys with British accents who perform alone with humour and pathos. That seems fair. :-) There are many other Fringe shows that involve more than one person (some of whom aren't men) who don't have British accents and are very very dramatic. I just didn't happen to see them. There was also math in my favour in that because of the economics of putting on a Fringe show, lots of them just have one actor, often playing more than one character. I can think of three right off the bat from past Fringes: one last year had Brian Froud doing the Swiss Family Robinson story only with characters from "Family Guy" (Fox later made him cease and desist - drag), one a couple years back was this British guy detailing the history of football (soccer) in England, and one of the first Fringe shows I ever saw was comedienne Brigitte Gall as a young female hockey goalie in Quebec in the 1970's who is told by God to try out for the NHL (it later became a tv special). Now that I think about it, she did have an accent, albeit a Quebec one. My thing about British/UK accents, along with me just having a thing for them, is probably about me wishing I could go to the Edinburgh Fringe someday, damn Ewan Spence and his addictive podcast with entertaining people. :-) At the moment, it looks pretty impossible to get a flight to Scotland without coughing up thousands or hiding under a wheel rim. Much like a male athlete preferring to be interviewed by an attractive woman so he has something nice to look at while being grilled, I seem to prefer looking at men while getting my theatre messages delivered to me. In all media, I always pick comedy over drama, since drama is inherently a part of good comedy anyway. And my penchant for solo shows reflects my abilty to understand individual expression better than the dynamics among people. So it goes here.

A couple eras end in Toronto, so I go to Gould and Yonge, where the end was a long time coming. But I still play music I found there, wonder where the hell the chess tables went and find videos involving Dana Carvey and Richard Grieco. Click here to subscribe like Columbia House, only without the rip-off part. Click here to download directly with that "technology" Sam's says killed them. Associated links: Torontoist on Honest Ed... ...and on Sam the Record Man Yes, the Belleville Sam's is in the Quinte Mall. Canadian Content rules CBC.ca on the Sam's auction Why there was a rack just for Blue Peter Goin' Down the Road in the Canadian Encyclopedia Buy Jennifer Foster's Speedyhead from Maplemusic! Ryerson University, the guys who'll probably get the building While Speedyhead was mostly produced by Moe Berg (try to contain your shock), Ukelele Dropout was one of the songs produced by Paul Myers, known to some as former leader of The Gravelberrys, journalist, author, talk radio host and witty pundit with lush white hair; known to others as Mike's brother. I still haven't quite gotten used to Ryerson being a real university. For most of my life, it was just the most glamorous art and tech school in Ontario, and as an art and tech school, it gave me little-to-no chance to get into their big-time TV/Radio programme because I was American and therefore was low-priority for a school sponsored by the province. (But I'm not bitter...) In the time since I lived in the area, the place has expanded into quite expensive land surrounding and nearby with very snazzy buildings whose architectural merit is considered a bit dubious. This is why I am equally dubious about the future of the Sam's building and the precious neon on its facade. Often I walked through the original campus to and on Gould past Sam's, where those several stone (I thought) tables stood with chess/checkerboards cut into them. Usually there would be at least a couple games going on, almost always involving men, while other tables would be taken up with people just chatting and maybe a few homeless folks (often from Seaton House, behind my apartment) resting their feet. So maybe you can see why I was more disturbed seeing those tables gone than I was about Sam's closing. A couple years ago in the old job, I got to work on describing Goin' Down the Road for Citytv (so if you see it turn up on City or Bravo, try to turn on the Secondary Audio Program and maybe you'll hear me). Oh, btw, if you don't know the movie, you may remember the parody SCTV did in their all-Cancon episode (hint: in the original, the guys are not doctor and lawyer and a CBC guy doesn't try to revive a dead woodchuck). Anyway...so as I worked on the movie, I noticed the boarding house Pete and Joey had to move into with Joey's knocked-up wife as they continue their downward spiral. To this day, I'm almost positive it was the same boarding house as the one on Pembroke, just up the little street from my apartment. Not much had changed in 30 years - people come here thinking it's a city of opportunity, they find they were wrong, and they get desperate. We'll see where I am a few months from now.

It's all about the music, playing some of the greatest hits of the podcast while I hang out at a North By Northeast event and talk about how I got to play those songs - and why shouldn't all podcasters be able to play whatever the hell they want? Click here to subscribe like you got your wristband. Click here to download directly like you're going club to club. (note: this episode is at 96kbps because it's so fricking long, so if you try playing it in a Flash player, it'll be chipmunky.) Associated links: Moe Berg and TPOH mp3s and CDs on sale at Maplemusic Incompletely Conspicuous: The Pursuit of Happiness and the Press Galore: offical site and on myspace Kevin Hilliard is "The Clapper" (go bug him to get that National Anthem album I mentioned for you) Memory Bank on myspace (with new music!) Jennifer Foster: on myspace and CD Baby The Supers on myspace Danko Jones Podsafe Music Network North By Northeast C'mon The Diodes: on myspace and on BongoBeat Download Andrew Dubber's The 20 Things You Must Know About Music Online free as a .pdf For more info and to give feedback, go to his blog New Music Strategies Don't worry, the Duty Free episode is coming (in case you were actually worrying about a Duty Free episode). While I was hanging out at the Indie Market recording, I blew not one, but two chances to snag some sweet music for the podcast. I ran into New Brunswick's own lovely and talented PJ Dunphy, previously known for proto-retro rawk of The Monoxides but now known for the mighty sludge metal of Iron Giant. Some buddies were kind enough to bring him in from Moncton for a week of debauchery, and he was looking around for them. Not long after, I exchanged hellos with the charming Thom D'Arcy of the terribly cool and frequently touring Small Sins (a band for which Kevin is "The Clapper"). Did I ask EITHER of these guys if I could play their stuff on the podcast? OF COURSE NOT! Why? Well, this time, it's not so much a matter of being a pussy as just being a dumb-ass and not thinking of it. So hey, dudes! How about it? Huh? (Keep in mind, though, that Thom's stuff is on a label, albeit an indie one, and I think they still get along, so I'm not sure about the chances there.) I give big props to music podcasts in general for going through stupid crap for doing what they do, so I should mention some. To be honest, I don't listen to a lot of them, but I admire what they do and know what good they do for musicians and listeners. The biggest music podcast in Canada and probably the world is the CBC Radio3 podcast, which is now past 100 episodes and has spawned a couple spinoffs. However, they're the CBC and have lawyers and stuff to help out with the rights business. Still, they make the best of the advantages they have. The brilliant digital music store/label Zunior.com has their own fine podcast, though they have the advantage of being, well, a digital music store/label. The godfather of all music podcasters IMHO is Julien Smith of In Over Your Head, which keeps gliding along as its creator happens to approach social networking guru status. Then there's the less-glamorous but equally-busy Bob Goyetche, who besides doing the Canadian Podcast Buffet and The Bob and AJ Show (soooo, now you think you're gonna make 100 by PAB?), also shows his knack for music that doesn't suck with mostlytunes. Look for more shows fighting the good fight of music podcasting in the music category of the directory CanadaPodcasts.ca - which Bob also has something to do with, but whatever... :-) One more thing Bob is involved in is trying to get some of the muckety-mucks in charge of publishing and related copyright organizations in Canada to turn up at the upcoming Podcasters Across Borders conference in Kingston. From what I could tell from the Buffet this week, at least one person agreed to come, while another has "scheduling conflicts" (on a Sunday. okay-doke.). It's a noble effort, which I hope is a first step toward getting these guys to understand that indie podcasters mean no harm, but wish to help with a promotional reach that goes far beyond anyone they've ever dealt with. If you look at situations in various countries around the world, there are many, many steps to be taken. Meanwhile, artists who aren't Danko Jones who I played on this episode: would it KILL you to throw a couple songs up on the PMN?!?

A simple brunch gets over-analysed as I review some life changes and how they relate to Podcasters Across Borders - because doesn't everything relate to Podcasters Across Borders? Includes music by Mantler, a wind machine and a rooster in a bag. Click here to subscribe Click here to download directly (the flu has left me too weak for snappy link similes) Associated links: Future Bakery (reviewed by the King of Kensington's real life widow!) Podcasters Across Borders (Is that enough mentions, guys?) :-) Mantler: at tomlab and on myspace CBC Museum Why CBC has Mr. Rogers' first trolley. Foster Hewitt @ Histori.ca "Sesame Park" @ the Muppet Wiki Remembering Mr. Dressup A history of CBC English radio drama Cart machines! The Friendly Giant CBC Broadcast Centre Castella @ Wikipedia Poko kicks ass! Man, I sound so weak in this episode, like I'm just getting over the flu or something. And okay, it's been more than 10 years since cart machines were the main means of playing stuff on the radio. The first time I dealt with digital spots was in the fall of 1995 in Belleville. The music was still on CD, but in this elaborate computerized digital jukebox thing, which would provide much comedy when it screwed up - even more so when I had already recorded my bits digitally (voicetracking, the first nail in radio's coffin) and would outro the wrong song. Ah, modern radio...almost like being there... At the beginning of that year, I was working away at CKDR in Dryden, Ontario (holy crap! they have FM now!), and here's how that system went: every week, all the music came from head office in order on eight full-size reel-to-reel tapes - four for day, four with more hip and happenin' stuff for evening (and I was usually the lucky gal who switched them). Each tape had one category of music, and the "clock" (what category got played when) was pretty much pre-programmed - we only stopped it to do our short bits and fire off the commercials, which ran on...wait for it it...NINE CART MACHINES! A three-cart deck for central Dryden, and a deck for each repeater station in Red Lake and Sioux Lookout. And did I mention the live phone-in Shop'n'Swap show I had to do middays? Yes, it was an I Love Lucy episode waiting to happen. And it happened. Damn. Now that I think about pulling that off, how hard can this new life direction possibly be?

You've heard Toronto, you've heard Ohio - now hear what's in between as I take the Subaru on its zillionth trip across the border. Featuring music from The Ambers, mashups, service roads, mysterious medians and the anti-Tim's. Click here to subscribe and take that thruway (only free!) Click here to download directly and enjoy every exit And if you want pictures, there's the enhanced version! Associated links: Country Style 680 News The QEW on list of Ontario Provincial Highways (about as geeky as it sounds) Thorold Tunnel Jordan Village Anna Olson's bakery (okay, so she's in Port Dalhousie now. Close. She was here.) Anna and Sugar on Food Network Canada The Ambers on myspace (the only other place you can hear "Endless Summer"!) The Peace Bridge Consulate General Buffalo WGR SportsRadio (was listening to the Sabres/Senators game) New York State Thruway Authority Angola Travel Plaza 102ZOO Yes, on part of the trip, I was playing mashups from my nano. Let's see if I can keep track of them... Air 52's by ToToM, Electro Punk (Iggy vs. Bloc Party) by Electrosound, Last Minute Man (Missy vs. NIN) by Hidden Signal, Crazy Logic by Arty Fufkin (who I met on SL a while back), and Highway to Hell & Back (AC/DC vs. Kelly Clarkson vs. John Cougar vs. Green Day vs. some other things) as well as the absolute classic Juke Box Hero Project (Foreigner vs. Seger vs. others) by DJ John. Mashuptown and the BootieSF site are excellent places to get brilliant mashups, and I know they would appreciate your support. My two-year love affair with mashups was fostered by Adam Curry, so I'm very happy to hear he's back to playing them on the Daily Source Code, having ceased giving a crap. I've tried a few times to record my visits with US customs on the other side of the Peace Bridge. The sound was always too bad (and coming from me, that's saying something) because I'd be there in the car and the officer would be in his/her little booth - the distance was too much. I got lucky this time with a cop who got off his ass to check around. Also, I keep trying to have the iRiver going in case one of them gets smart-assy, which sometimes happens but hasn't happened lately. I get asked the usual citizenship question and I answer as usual "dual - US and Canada", and once the guy asked "which one do you want to be now?" Hmmm. Sometimes they just want to know what set of questions to ask ("how long have you been in Canada" or "how long will you be in the US"). A few months before the 2002 US election, a customs officer said, "but you come from America, right?" Right. "Okay, so you're American." Well, partially. "No, if you're a dual citizen, but you're from America, that's the only thing we care about. You're a US citizen. The other one doesn't matter." Hmph. Technically, this is pretty much true. But I kinda wanted to ask, "would it matter if my other citizenship was...say...Syrian? Or Iranian? Maybe Pakistani? Or maybe if I wasn't a blonde white girl fluent in English with no suspicious accent? Then would my other citizenship matter?" But of course, that is not the time to ask questions like that, unless you want to pull over to that nice building over to the right and hang out for a little while. I just nodded with understanding, answered the rest of my questions and went on my way. And I decided that since I was such a US citizen, I'd vote in that damn election and the one after that. For all the good it did. Oh, well.

We walk through The Annex again, but this time we're led by someone who knows what the hell he's talking about - like why's it called The Annex? And what's that lady doing across the street? May include chalk drawings, but no tv shoes. Click here to subscribe so the episodes can form an ecosystem (er...okay) Click here to download directly if you like things organic, spontaneous and untidy. Associated links Doors Open Toronto 2007 Jane's Walk Angus Skene's Architours Structures on Rogers Television Our first stop at the Medical Arts Building Our second stop at the York Club Madison Manor Boutique Hotel (part of our third stop) The Jane's Walk gallery Spacing Wire blogs about it. The book Angus recommended about Robert Moses Jane Jacobs @ Project for Public Spaces Good ol' Description 17 the TTC's moment of silence I gotta get a handle on how to read levels in GarageBand. If the start of this episode doesn't blow your ears out like the last episode, you can thank my Australian friend in Second Life. We were in-world together when he got to this blog from my SL profile and started playing Description 35, then said "ouch". When you look through some of those photos of the walk and you see this person looking kind of uncomfortable in a long black coat accented by a white cable strung across her, that would be me. Move along... The post in Spacing Wire estimates that a couple thousand people participated in Jane's Walk. Again, the people's interest in their own city without a ton of promotion never ceases to amaze me. If it didn't amaze me, I guess I wouldn't be a proper Torontonian. :-)

In the kitchen, I contemplate the significance of elbow macaroni with frighteningly orange powder; and in a Canadian grocery store, contemplate the significance of tomato soup with cheese portobello mushroom ravioli. With music by The Pursuit of Happiness, Danny Michel in the background, and a certified parking lot freak-out. Click here to subscribe like you're in the express line. Click here to download directly to pick and choose in the market. Associated links: The Official Kraft Dinner site CBC Midday does Kraft Dinner! (with Brent Bambury!) Danny Michel:official, MySpace and buy the new DVD/CD combo here! Oh, and this was the album I was playing. Time to plug my TPOH site again. The Daily Bread Food Bank Loblaws SModcast, via Quick Stop Entertainment Okay, I admit: no one will give their right arm for wild mushroom risotto. Note that my freak-out was not about losing a huge amount of food, but that I was going to have to talk to someone about it. That should give you an idea about my social nature. Listening back, I wondered if I was inferring that a lot of immigrants use food banks. Coming from Ohio, I can tell you that folks born and raised are every bit as likely to need them. Anyone can fall on hard times. I guess the points I was trying to make in that wrong inference start with Toronto being such a multicultural place, and that's reflected in the grocery stores. People could be second or third generation Canadians, and carry on the culinary traditions their family taught them, and this isn't easy with peanut butter and no name mac'n'cheese. But beyond that, it isn't even a matter of ethnic food or culture or whatever. It's a matter of quality - of food, of life. Everyone deserves that. And what are my culinary traditions? Er...Swanson Fried Chicken and Hostess Ho-ho's? Don't laugh, Yanks. You can't get Hostess Ho-ho's here. Seriously. And Canadians who think they're no different from Swiss Rolls? Just as well you keep thinking that...

What is this town with two names? Why does everything look closed? And what the hell was I doing there? Features music by The Hundreds and Thousands, a contemplation of nigiri vs. galettes, two waterfalls and a very special cameo by Maurice Chevalier. Click here to subscribe, conditional upon licence renewal. Click here to download directly, like you're just here for the later last call. Associated links: Musimax! Hull in Wikipedia (where we learn I was wrong about "Chaudières" meaning "rapids") Cool stuff to do and see in Gatineau Official site for the CRTC The tv station we were proposing to the CRTC Me in the application hearing the next day - yikes! The Hundreds and Thousands Hour Magazine reviews L'Argoät, and digs them too. L'Argoät was the restaurant where I ended up, and it was really great. I had a savory galette (which is really a crepe) which had these roasted potatoes and camenbert inside; and the traditional drink with galettes in Brittany (I learned), "un bolle du cidre" or a bowl of this alcoholic apple cider. Then, once my server told me that I could pay by interac (whew!), I had a dessert galette just with chocolate sauce, but the best chocolate sauce EVER. So you see, Gatineau - formerly known as Hull to everyone but the cab drivers - isn't as bad as I made it sound. Pretty close to the hotel was the vast Gatineau Park, across town is the Museum of Civilisation (like a Canadian natural history museum - its architecture is so cool, it totally sticks out like a sore thumb), and in the other direction is Casino Lac-Leamy, which I still call by its original and way-less-glamorous name, Casino d'Hull. That's right - casino dull. Genius. It turns out the Quebec election that day was pretty damn interesting. Jean Charest and the Liberals held on to power, but only got a minority government. The Parti Québecois stunk up the joint, so the cute and gay André Boisclair is probably going to lose his job. The big shock winner was Action démocratique du Québec (see, told you there was a "democratic" in there), who've gone from not even being an official party to being The Opposition. So things in Quebec become as hard-to-predict as ever, just in a whole different way. Something I didn't get to do while I was in the area was meet up with my friend Gavin, who I've known ever since we were smart-ass writers for our college paper at York University. He lives in Ottawa, but had business out of town most of the time I was there. We've had our ups and downs, and go in and out of touch, but I've always found him a remarkable, funny guy with my favourite voice in history. Late last year, an email came from him out of the blue about this thing he was doing: he was running a marathon and a half (literally) at Disney World to raise money toward building a school in Kathmandu, Nepal. Okey-doke. It was a great cause of Sean Egan, the man who led Gavin's first expedition up Mount Everest - an expedition that Egan did not survive. So Gavin ran what's left of his ass off (I think the last time I'd seen him, he was running the marathon in Ottawa) and raised thousands of dollars. These folks have just about made it to their goal of $150,000 to build the school, so why not help get them over the top by going to the Ad Astra (which means "aim high") site and coughing up some coin.

Still not in Canada, but in London (England) to walk across a bridge, sit on some rubber and go down a slide. Not exciting enough? How about a creaking door? Click here to subscribe, guaranteeing your spot in line. Click here to download directly and just jump on for now. Associated links: Millennium Bridge The new Globe Theatre The Tate Modern Watch the live webcam at the base of the slides, or watch video of the ride down each of them (I was on Slide 2). Gilbert & George: in Wikipedia, their exhibition at the Tate Modern, and them discussing the exhibition Originally, this episode was going to be called "Art For All," which is Gilbert & George's credo. In their manifesto What Our Art Means, they put it this way: We want Our Art to speak across the barriers of knowledge directly to People about their Life and not about their knowledge of art. The 20th century has been cursed with an art that cannot be understood. The decadent artists stand for themselves and their chosen few, laughing and dismissing the normal outsider. We say that puzzling, obscure and form-obsessed art is decadent and a cruel denial of the Life of People.While the slides have no nudity, bodily fluids, or run-down house (though possibly the odd cute boy in a hoodie), I think they express this intention pretty well. I'm not a huge fan of modern art, because I can't always relate to it - which for some, is the point. But it is nice to have some art that can be quickly understood on a visceral level by anyone, which pretty much forces you to participate in its themes and prove them...and while having fun. Very skillful stuff.

There is a nice town called Paris in Ontario, but it is not the Paris where this show was recorded. It includes me buying toothpaste while listening to Boney M - do I really have to say any more? Click here to subscribe for prix fixe. Click here to download directly for à la carte. Associated links: Rue Mouffetard featured in the Project For Public Spaces Mon ami Xavier: his publishers and a gallery of some of his work. (please allow pop-ups and click on "book") The Tabacaria blog gives love to Xavier's comic Les Indégivrables Musée Marmottan That Monet painting I remembered from childhood. Fondation Le Corbusier OChef makes duck confit! Petite Anglaise blogs about Paris driving I've since determined that the cheese-and-potato thing I ate that night was not cassoulet, since that is a way to use white-or-other beans, and no way were they involved in that dish. It was more like a gratin, but I know that's not what they called it on the menu - I could have sworn the word was "cassoulet" or "cassoulette", but I guess I was wrong. I'll have to ask Xavier... You'll notice the link that talks about Rue Mouffetard is from a site about public spaces. This is something I didn't discuss while blathering this episode: that there are many, many places in Paris for people to gather. Because it has this ersatz network of odd corners and roundabouts and streets that emit from a centre, there are dozens of spots like where I stood at Place de la Contrescape, with a fountain in the middle and a little area around it, then the small roundabout surrounded by cafés and shops where people sit out front. And I wasn't even around for what is the best-known thing about the area: the open-air market at the other end of the street at Square St. Medard, nearer to my hotel. I was always either too early or late to check out the vendors there. And as the name suggests, it starts in a sort of square, which is yet another area where people walk around or hang out. And most of these areas are very focused on pedestrians - which may have something to do with the fact that when all this got started hundreds of years ago, you had your feet and maybe a horse or a cart. Still, I think that's part of what makes it such a "vibrant" city, to use the parlance of purple travel prose. I think it's really hard to plan for something like that, but those carrying the Jane Jacobs torch will do what they can. Oh, and the toothpaste I bought? Would you believe...it was made in Canada!

Sitting smack in front of a space heater, I talk about what's great and not-so-great about winter in Canada, then check out how Toronto does its damndest to celebrate it, with help from The Bicycles, some Royal Conservatory of Music bassoon players, and lots of people of stilts. Click here to subscribe for regular heat delivery. Click here to download directly like activating those hot shot things you put inside your gloves. (Man, I could use those right about now.) Associated links: City of Toronto WinterCity 2007 Peyton Manning: "Cut That Meat!" Tandoori Doritos @ Snackspot.org.uk Toronto's "Snow Management" page (bastards!) Dryden, Ontario Nathan Phillips Square Buckley's Mixture and the Bad Taste Tour The Podcast of My Discontent (Tristan's fine video podcast) The Ontario Travel Snowglobe the freakin' awesome Dave Bidini Royal Conservatory of Music The Bicycles! From what I understand, the pre-eminent winter festival in this country is Carnaval de Québec. It is HUGE. Okay, so Ottawa has Winterlude with the skating on the canal and the Beaver Tails and stuff. But do they have Bonhomme? No stay-puff marshmallow man voyageur snowman mascot? Then I rest my case. Then again, can Bonhomme play bassoon? Uh...yeah, I guess he probably can.

Sitting smack in front of a space heater, I talk about what's great and not-so-great about winter in Canada, then check out how Toronto does its damndest to celebrate it, with help from The Bicycles, some Royal Conservatory of Music bassoon players, and lots of people of stilts. Click here to subscribe for regular heat delivery. Click here to download directly like activating those hot shot things you put inside your gloves. (Man, I could use those right about now.) Associated links: City of Toronto WinterCity 2007 Peyton Manning: "Cut That Meat!" Tandoori Doritos @ Snackspot.org.uk Toronto's "Snow Management" page (bastards!) Dryden, Ontario Nathan Phillips Square Buckley's Mixture and the Bad Taste Tour The Podcast of My Discontent (Tristan's fine video podcast) The Ontario Travel Snowglobe the freakin' awesome Dave Bidini Royal Conservatory of Music The Bicycles! From what I understand, the pre-eminent winter festival in this country is Carnaval de Québec. It is HUGE. Okay, so Ottawa has Winterlude with the skating on the canal and the Beaver Tails and stuff. But do they have Bonhomme? No stay-puff marshmallow man voyageur snowman mascot? Then I rest my case. Then again, can Bonhomme play bassoon? Uh...yeah, I guess he probably can.

Finding a Canadian institution where I least expected it, I follow its history and the life of its namesake as I drive back to Toronto after the holidays. Features music by Memory Bank, a mic that will never be the same, and a kid dressed like a jelly bean. Click here to subscribe and have your treats delivered. Click here to download directly to make sure you're getting the chocolate danish instead of the chocolate glazed. Associated links: Tim Horton's the place (a vastly-improved site, btw) Tim Horton the man (a very good biography @ about.com) Quaker Steak and Lube Grimsby, Ontario Memory Bank @ myspace Timbit Minor Hockey does good in Erie Sydney Crosby Timbits commercial on YouTube Okay, so why'd it take a whole frigging month? Uh... To be honest, I think it's because I've been in Second Life too much. My best friends there now are in Europe, so when I get home from work, there's a short time before they sleep, so we hang out...and then when they're gone, I hang out some more. Sheesh. Sorry. So if you're there and see Valerie Bethune... ...you can say hi and ask what the hell I'm doing there instead of doing a show. And then I'll probably mute you. :-) This episode marks the début of the GarageBand I got for Christmas. I've started out by just using it for the mixing (which is the main reason I wanted it) and will eventually learn more about editing and the EQ settings. So far, it's much easier in a few ways than Audacity, but based on what little I know, there's way less control over the formats for export. I'll keep futzing. The location where I started the episode was about half a mile up the street from where three years ago, a man went through a horrible experience you might recall. He was the pizza delivery man who got attached to a bomb by someone who then forced him to attempt to rob a bank on Upper Peach Street in Erie. Later caught in a standoff, with no one having any idea how to defuse the bomb, with cops and media watching, the bomb went off and the guy was killed. It's odd to drive by some place where you know someone has been blown up. But if you're doing that, it's nice to drive into Tim's, get some coffee and donuts and head back up to Canada.

Finding a Canadian institution where I least expected it, I follow its history and the life of its namesake as I drive back to Toronto after the holidays. Features music by Memory Bank, a mic that will never be the same, and a kid dressed like a jelly bean. Click here to subscribe and have your treats delivered. Click here to download directly to make sure you're getting the chocolate danish instead of the chocolate glazed. Associated links: Tim Horton's the place (a vastly-improved site, btw) Tim Horton the man (a very good biography @ about.com) Quaker Steak and Lube Grimsby, Ontario Memory Bank @ myspace Timbit Minor Hockey does good in Erie Sydney Crosby Timbits commercial on YouTube Okay, so why'd it take a whole frigging month? Uh... To be honest, I think it's because I've been in Second Life too much. My best friends there now are in Europe, so when I get home from work, there's a short time before they sleep, so we hang out...and then when they're gone, I hang out some more. Sheesh. Sorry. So if you're there and see Valerie Bethune... ...you can say hi and ask what the hell I'm doing there instead of doing a show. And then I'll probably mute you. :-) This episode marks the début of the GarageBand I got for Christmas. I've started out by just using it for the mixing (which is the main reason I wanted it) and will eventually learn more about editing and the EQ settings. So far, it's much easier in a few ways than Audacity, but based on what little I know, there's way less control over the formats for export. I'll keep futzing. The location where I started the episode was about half a mile up the street from where three years ago, a man went through a horrible experience you might recall. He was the pizza delivery man who got attached to a bomb by someone who then forced him to attempt to rob a bank on Upper Peach Street in Erie. Later caught in a standoff, with no one having any idea how to defuse the bomb, with cops and media watching, the bomb went off and the guy was killed. It's odd to drive by some place where you know someone has been blown up. But if you're doing that, it's nice to drive into Tim's, get some coffee and donuts and head back up to Canada.