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While I tend to pull into a left lane if there is an emergency vehicle on the side of the road, I never knew it was a law…until now.

Here’s an article from a man in Ottawa who got nailed with a $490 ticket and three demerit points for not knowing that it is law to pull into the left hand lane (on multi-lane highways) so you don’t go near an emergency vehicle.

My thoughts: I do agree with the law wholeheartedly.  However, I do not agree that people should be getting fines of this extreme nature on a law that (according to the Ottawa Citizen article) has been in effect for the past three years and I am one of the many who have not heard about it.  You would think that new driving laws of this serious nature would have an advertising campaign of sorts.

Here’s the article.

iplaying: Set The Fire To the Third Bar – Snow Patrol – Eyes Open

We headed out to New York Subway for an excellent jumbo satay lamb burrito while also taking a look at the fire damage on Queen Street West. It is a shame that the old building were destroyed. Hopefully some new age condo doesn’t take its place.

I managed to find Fleetwood Mac’s debut album on vinyl for $5 downtown. After witnessing Uncle Greg’s vinyl collection a few weeks back, I’ve realized that if I can find any old classic rock albums on vinyl for cheap, it is a bonus to my collection. So if anyone out there is getting rid of their vinyl, let me know!

Krista ended up meeting up with Jill further downtown (after a mishap with Jill staying at a friends overnight but waking up to some swollen eyes because she is allergic to down pillows!) and Mike and I met up with Miguel. I haven’t seen him since our trip to New York City so it was good to hook up. We ended up at a random corned beef house and then headed to Smokeless Joe’s which is a great time if you like some imported beers. We tried a few beers from around the world, with Mike starting from the top of the list in Belgium.

Considering the sun was going down, Mike and I left Miguel to head back to the homestead, ordered some Chinese food (which was AMAZING the last time we were in town a few weeks before but pretty horrible this time around….how does that happen?), played some cards and then headed out to the Swan and Firkin on Bloor Street (which was just down the block from us). It was a decent time and we all had some good laughs when I (supposedly) proposed to Mike (because he’s just that swell of a guy) and Krista kept getting some awful martinis delivered to her.

Headed home, watched some Boogie Nights on television and then awoke the next morning to clean up a little, grab some breakfast at the Swan and Firkin (not the best…everyone should head for the Sunset Grill) and hit the road back to Ottawa.

All in all, a good trip to Toronto with good times, good friends and good music!

After waiting a bit for a seat sale for my trip to Vancouver in the spring, I stumbled upon one today and was excited for my great find.

But then Krista reminded me that I had an Aeroplan card and I should see if I have enough points.  Considering I’ve never used the card, it didn’t hurt.

It didn’t hurt at all finding out I could take a flight on 25,000 points and I had 40,000!  Bonus!  I’m stoked!

So I’m flying out to Vancouver in June to meet up with my folks and head to Uncle Brent’s.  I am also hoping to see my cousin Troy and Connie there as well but that depends on whether or not Troy can get time off.

I am looking forward to this trip as it will be my first time out West.  Should be a good time.

In other travel news, I am hitting the road this weekend to head to Toronto to see Matchbox Twenty on Friday night.  Unfortunately, Queen Street West burned a few stores down yesterday so I will not be able to hit up Suspect Video while there, but at least New York Subway is still standing (I hope!).  I expect a road trip filled with really bad music (really, can anyone beat the mix CD that Trish brought on the United States trip?  I think not.)

Quote of the Year: Taken from last night’s lunar eclipse…from our very own Michael.  “What is this?  A solar eclipse?”

iplaying: Eye – The Smashing Pumpkins – Still Becoming Apart

So I went to the Doctor today to find out how I fared in lowering my cholesterol over the past five months.

A steady diet of oatmeal and fish has brought my cholesterol down from 5.8 to 5.2.  I can’t recall if that is HDL, LDL, or WTHDL (I have no idea nor ambition to become like my parents who sit around talking about this kind of thing!) but all I know is the doctor said he was impressed with the change and that I should keep up the lifestyle change and see him in October.

That being said, I would like to share my story of how I lowered my cholesterol for those out there who feel that it’s hard to do so.

Things I have Changed:
– In the morning, instead of having a yogurt, I switched to oatmeal.  I’m talking about the oatmeal that I can put into a bowl and microwave for 45 seconds.  Dad went to a cardio-training center and they told him this type of oatmeal is a higher in fat than regular oatmeal.  I think I’ll stick with this stuff for the time being.

Because I ate oatmeal in the morning, I had to start waking up 10 minutes earlier to accommodate this new change in my lifestyle.  While you all are probably having a good laugh at reading about this slight change, I’m just listing everything I can think of that I have changed so I can look back in years and say “Oh yeah!  That’s when I started eating oatmeal.”

– I ate more fish.  A lot more.  3-4 times a week.  The doctor thought four times a week was pushing it so he recommended 2-3 times a week.  I like my fish.  I usually pick up salmon or trout and put it on a bed of rice.  Grill that thing on the George Foreman and you’re set.  While this may be a little more costly, in the long run, I would like to think that it helped in the lowering of cholesterol.

– I was more conscious of things that contained cholesterol.  For example, I avoided the bacon at breakfast the other morning at Uncle Greg’s.  I also try and avoid pizza whenever I can (which is sometimes hard considering pizza is the ultimate easy-order item when there are a group of people).  But I can honestly say that the times I’ve eaten pizza on average in a month would be once a month.  I didn’t tend to eat that much pizza anyhow.  Is pizza bad for you?  Unsure, but I guess the cheese doesn’t help in cholesterol matters.

– Exercised: Well I did join a gym in the new year.  Considering I just went for my blood test in February, I don’t know if exercise changed my cholesterol in a grand fashion considering I had only been going to the gym for awhile (whereas I had changed my eating habits since October).

In the end, I consider it to be very simple changes to my dietary system to achieve the result I did.  I would like to think that oatmeal and fish were the key factors, but who knows?  I will continue on this track and see what happens in October.  At least I am happy that it is something I can control and not something that I couldn’t control and would have to take medication for it.

I found out from Larisa that my friend Greg Barker passed away during the weekend from an automobile accident. I don’t have many other details yet as my only connection to him was through my friend Phil and I have been unable to reach him at this point.

All I know is that the car slid on some ice sometime during the weekend.

When I got the news that Greg passed away, all I could think about was his music for some reason. Greg was a great pianist and even though I can’t recall any specific tunes he played for me, I remember the feeling of awe whenever he plunked his fingers down on the piano and played something. It was really beautiful. Last time I saw him he was playing oldies tunes in old age homes to entertain the folks there.

The last time I saw Greg was last summer when I was visiting Philipp in Montreal. Philipp, Greg and I scaled up Mont Royal at night and sat and marveled at the city in all its glory and talked about whatever came to our mind.

Greg always enjoyed a good laugh and it was always a good time when I got together with him. I will miss him dearly. He was my friend.

This occurrence has also made me think of driving in bad weather conditions. While I do not know the circumstances of what happened, I can only imagine that it may have happened over the weekend on the Sunday where Southern Ontario was an ice rink. If so, let this occurrence put a thought into everyone’s head on the decision to either take another day to travel home and stay safe, or to take a risk (however slight it may be).

Greg is spreading joy through his music elsewhere now.

***update*** I found out from Phil that Greg and his friend were travelling on HWY 148 last Wednesday and hit some black ice and it was bad luck that had a car coming from the opposite direction.

His funeral is in Montreal this Saturday, but if there are people in Ottawa who wish to go to his memorial, it is next Thursday in town and you can find more information in his obituary which is in the Ottawa Citizen today.

This past weekend, I hit the road with Krista along Highway 7 towards Havelock, Ontario.  My parents were up there visiting Uncle Greg and Aunt Mariette so I figured it was a great time to pay everyone a visit.  Krista’s parents live in Peterborough so I convinced her to go visit them and drop me off along the way.

During a fairly uneventful road trip (which involved the obligatory stop-over at Wendy’s in Perth), I arrived around 9:30, had some beers, listened to some tunes and went to bed.

The next morning I got the royal treat of some great breakfast and Uncle Greg showed me his vinyl collection which was pretty well a classic rock lover’s dream collection.  I had no idea that Uncle Greg was that much into music and I was amazed at how similar our tastes were.  We ended up hooking up the record player and listening to a few albums – Supertramp’s Indeliby Stamped which was decent upon first listen, The Beatles’ Abbey Road (our favourite) and some Blues artist that I can’t remember right now.  I also got him to hook me up with some great mix albums that he made and some Ted Hawkins and Mark Knopfler’ solo projects.  I will have to take a listen to them soon enough.

I also had a hand in shoveling the mile long driveway which was alright considering it was a mild day.  On the way up, Krista asked if I felt like more of an equal around my family now that I was an adult.  I thought about this and thought “Well, I suppose so?”.  But when I went to go shovel the driveway and I heard questions like “Do you have a toque?” or “Where are your mitts?” I realized that I shall always be a kid to these folks, which is fine by me.

We headed into Peterborough in the afternoon to the Toyota dealership where Mom and Dad tried out a few Camry’s.  In the end, they decided to wait for the 2009 models to come out (which is soon considering the 2009 Corolla’s are already out!) to see if the 2008 models will drop in price.

After a drop into Dairy Queen, we headed home, had some beer, listened to tunes (on a Gramophone!  Cross-Eyed Sue was a hit!) and played pool all night long (with a break in between consisting of a scrumptious club house sandwich and fries.  Yum!).  Unfortunately, Dad and I had a curse put upon us and we lost ten games of pool in a row to Mom and Uncle Greg.  We managed to squeak out four wins afterwards but as soon as we lost another game we realized it was futile to continue.

I then took out the guitar and must have played for a couple of hours.  The beer had hit me so I definitely wasn’t playing up to my usual standards but I was surrounded by family who are tone deaf anyhow so I had nothing to worry about.  I premiered In the 705, a song written about my Dad living in Sudbury in the 70s and I think it went over well.  I also played The Stomper and an old tune called Down That Old Road which got the fabled question “Who sings that song?” which can only mean that they enjoyed it.  It was with pleasure that I said that it was a Palmer original from years ago.  Good to see it had an effect on the crowd.

We retired for the night (I got to crash on the most comfortable sofa anyone has ever sat on) and the next morning Krista picked me up and we headed home with the crappiest pair of wipers I’ve ever had the pleasure of using and it didn’t help that freezing rain was hitting the windshield and making the wipers virtually useless.  We stopped into downtown Perth and went to the Crown pub for some lunch.  I had a great smoked meat sandwich and a Guinness before we headed on home.  While it was a long detour, it beat eating at Wendy’s again.  Clearly the weather was getting bad as I slipped on some ice and took a header into the road before getting into the car!

I arrived back in Ottawa to pick up Vero and we headed over to Carrie’s place where Katie and Jen were hanging out after a great night at the Heart and Crown.  We hung out there until the evening and then headed home in the desolate skating rink which was Ottawa before settling in to watch an episode of Flight of the Conchords.  The episode I watched may in fact be the funniest episode I’ve seen so far; it’s the one where they speak French to a bunch of Croissant-selling ladies.  Very hilarious.

iplaying: Head Like A Hole (Copper) – Nine Inch Nails (Head Like A Hole Single)

The Smashing Pumpkins are looking for some correspondents to work on their website and asked for a resume and an essay to be submitted. While I did not originally think of submitting anything, I had a brainwave of how I would answer one of the proposed questions and thought it was worthy of submission (or at the very least, worthy of my thoughts being put to print). So here’s what I’ll submit. Most of you won’t even realize what the heck I’m talking about unless you know anything about The Smashing Pumpkins.

In Response to the Question: What kind of album would adore have been if Jimmy Chamberlain had played drums on it?

(Palmer’s Notes for the Wicked: Jimmy Chamberlain was kicked out of the band for drug use during the 1996-97 Mellon Collie World Tour. They subsequently recorded their next album Adore without him, but he returned to the band aftewards.)

To look at what kind of album Adore would have turned out to be if Jimmy Chamberlain would have been involved is to look more than him simply drumming on it, but to see what Jimmy had to offer as a member of the Smashing Pumpkins.

It’s been said before in interviews post-Adore era that when Billy and Jimmy get together, there is a spark that occurs. Billy may have a riff that he’s playing around with but Jimmy will push him to go further with it. He gives Billy a different direction to follow in creating the music.

It is well known (through interviews, documentaries, etc.) that the recording of Adore was a period of extreme stress on the members of the Smashing Pumpkins, but for Billy most of all, considering the loss of his mother at the time, as well as the loss of a crucial member of the band. It probably wasn’t until the band was starting to write songs for Adore that they realized that there was something missing with Jimmy not taking part in the creation process and they struggled through the process.

What would Adore be if Jimmy were part of it? I would think that it would have been a little more rocking. It is hard to theorize on this notion as the band would still have a lot of the same issues facing them even if Jimmy was part of the band at the time; the loss of a loved one, the immense pressure of a follow-up to a successful album…perhaps Adore needed to be less rocking to pave the way for a more dynamic Smashing Pumpkins. You could see that once the album morphed into the live show that the songs were rawer and so much more different that the recorded versions in some cases. I think that ‘Live Adore’ is much better than ‘Recorded Adore’. Perhaps they were trying to recapture a little spark of Jimmy when they thought about how the songs should be in a live setting.

Judging from the songs created around the Pre-Machina (Arising Tour Era), you can tell that Jimmy’s influence made the songs more rocking. The spark was back and the Pumpkins were back in full force once again. Adore would have probably had some of the same introspective songs on it (For Martha for example), but there would be a little more oomph added to the album.

Let’s not forget that Adore would be bad-ass if we heard Mr. Chamberlain’s drumming on the album as well! He is arguably the top drummer in the modern age and his drumming only gets better with time (as seen with the release of Zeitgeist; a welcome change from the standard drumming fare seen in the past decade in alternative circles). Not that there is anything wrong with the session drummers (can Matt Cameron really be referred to as a session drummer? It seems so cruel…) on the album, but we would love to hear the drum fills and bombastic playing of Jimmy on the album.

That being said, I know there have been rumours through the years of some Adore tracks existing with Jimmy playing drums on them. While this may just be a fan boy’s dream (and would still be interesting to hear) I think that Adore would have much different than just having his drumming over all the tracks. They would have been completely different songs in spirit.

If I can offer one surefire way to brighten your day, it’s to subscribe to your favourite daily comic and have it sent to your email box in the morning.

I signed up for the Calvin and Hobbes daily strip and every morning around 8AM, it puts a smile on my face.  I know Trish subscribes to Dilbert as I see them come my way once in awhile.

Ween yourself off of the coffee in the morning as the picker-upper!  Get your daily laugh!