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It’s been awhile since we could go to Katie’s cottage for a full weekend so it was gearing up to the event of the summer judging from the amount of people invited to the event!

We picked up Carrie and instead of sitting in traffic for a billion hours, we decided to get our grocery/beer/dinner shopping done. We ended up going to Istanbouli’s Schwarma for dinner and it was excellent as always. It would have been good to know that they moved onto Parkdale though!

The trip was fairly uneventful other than hearing about Carrie’s decision to move to Berlin. We were quite excited to hear this as Carrie has been talking about moving abroad for approximately ten years! I can’t believe it’s actually happening!

We arrived and the party was in FULL force. At 11PM, you can only expect to encounter a few people who have been drinking all day. Katie was quite happy to see us and I believe the entire lake heard her! The rest of the night descended into campfire antics, skinny dipping by some, and all around happiness as we have been away from each other for a long time. There was a full complement on hand this weekend: Katie, Wilkins, Paul, Sarah, Lydia, Sabrina, Pete, Adrianna, Karen, Tania and Val with new boyfriend in tow!

Saturday was our day of getting breakfast ready. French toast was on deck and everyone loved us for it. I really enjoy Katie’s schedule for food items. Instead of everyone bringing their own food, they are tasked with a meal (and maybe an appetizer during the day). So there is usually a breakfast, afternoon snack and a supper and people go all out…we aren’t talking about just any burgers on the BBQ…we are talking mega-burgers made with love, and corn and whatever else you love in the world.

We decided to try and swim across the lake. I must admit that it was always a goal of mine and figured it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. Katie was smart enough to have some people canoe next to us in case we ran into trouble. The first quarter was going fine although I was basically doggy-paddling the trip…no intense swimming on a cottage weekend! By the time we got to the other side, I was quite winded but not down for the count. The trip back was a pain in the ass as my leg was cramping up so it was hard to swim any longer. Then the current was taking us off course most of the time.

By the time we got back, there was some good appetizers happening and Val and her new boyfriend Jamie had arrived. We chatted music and best albums of all time and he was quite entertaining to chat with.

The rest of the night brought us an amazing dinner, a game of Werewolf and we finally put on Shark Attack 3: Megaladon. It was described to me as the ‘worst movie ever, but so bad that it’s good.’ I love a good b-movie so we were entertained by bad overdubbing, incredulous situations of sharks attacking and what can only be described as the single most ridiculous line uttered in any film. Ever. Really. It was THAT ridiculous. So the movie went over the top awesome after that point and it was definitely the hit of the weekend. Talks of Sharks Attacking were mentioned at every moment.

Sunday has us load up the canoe for an epic trip. Adrianna, Tania and I were in one of them, Carrie and Vero in the other and Sarah was in the kayak. We weren’t planning on going too far until I realized that we could probably try and make it to the fabled beer bottle in the tree. However, Philipp was the last one to see it so I have no idea where he placed it on the river. So we gave’r for awhile, went over a few beaver dams “Ride! RIDE!” and eventually gave up the quest for the beer bottle in a tree. Plus, our beer supply was dwindling so it was time to go back.

Seeing that it was late afternoon, I decided to haul out the guitar to entertain the masses while others played a game of Koob. My hands were cramping up quite badly from the swim yesterday and the canoeing that afternoon. I had to power through a couple of hours of playing, but the crowd loved it. Vero even got on the plastic pail as the drums and it was excellent! The voice was shot, my hands were shot…it was time to call it a day!

That evening we watched [REC] which is an interesting horror movie. I can’t say it was over the top awesome, but the concept was neat. It deals with an apartment building which ends up in quarantine and even the rescue officials don’t know what the heck is going on while they are trapped inside it. It’s all filmed with a news camera so it has that ‘shaky-cam’ feel. Not over the top amazing, but there were a few scary spots.

The next morning we packed up and headed home after a weekend of amazing sun and fun! Thanks once again to Katie for the amazing weekend!

Rarely does a website pop up that astounds me.

Such is that of historypin…an integration of photography with Google Maps to show you how a certain street corner appeared years ago. It’s user-populated so upload a few key photos that you have!

http://www.historypin.com/

Where else can you go to see kids running around screaming in princess costumes?

Only Jenna’s birthday party which looked like it was a success (judging by the amount of cake left on kids faces!). I did feel bad for leaving Rob with about two dozen burgers at his house, but what can you do?

Saturday morning, we had a great breakfast at Lynn and Dave’s place, got dressed and hit the road for Stittsville for Colin and Becky’s wedding. We didn’t know what to expect as we figured we would know only a handful of people at the wedding and we weren’t sure was invited or not. We had a good laugh when Duncan said the same thing and he was afraid to ask people if they were coming or not.

We went to the most amazing modern church I have ever seen. That town of Stittsville sure has some cash to spend on their church! I swear the ceilings must have been 100 feet high!

It was a great ceremony. The priest was quite amusing and the married couple were having a great time up front. I love weddings where the groom and bride can have a good time and not be nervous. I even saw the groom point out my moustache at one point! The moustache has become a mainstay at weddings during the summer. In fact, my favourite part of the night was when Kevin (a guest) introduced himself and said “We have actually met a few years back and I have to ask…is the moustache a permanent fixture on that face or does it only come out for weddings?” Classic!

We then headed over to Becky’s parents place a few blocks away for some refreshments. It was a sweltering day and the suit jacket had to go at one point! There was some good appetizers though and I got to chat with Amanda and Nicolas whose own wedding was coming up in a few weeks so we were taking notes of what to do.

Afterward we headed over to Mike and Mel’s so they could get changed. I had a quick nap as the MOHO Part Deux was catching up with me! It must have caught up with Vero as well as she snoozed for awhile as well. Duncan, Vero and I then headed over to the Golf Club (I can’t remember the name at this point…it’s off of Greenbank) which was quite the nice greens.

Unfortunately, because of this being the first wedding of the year, I had completely forgot to set up the car with proper beer and flask capabilities so I ended up paying through the teeth for beverages that night. It really irks me that golf clubs get away with charging $7 for a pint of beer these days. I bet if we were golfing that day, it would have been half that price! They did have Beau’s Beer on tap which was great.

I really enjoyed the fact that each table were tasked with coming up with some items that they would have to announce to get the couple to kiss…list the top five things the groom won’t hear from the wife, list the top five things the bride loves about the groom, etc. It was quite hilarious.

Food was great, speeches were great, all that jazz was great.

Some highlights:
– Matt and I spied a garter belt caught up in the light fixture above the dance floor. Matt MacGyvered a device out of coat hangers which would fetch the thing. The crowd roared when he finally got it down.
– The Billy Idol Trifecta was witnessed for the first time at this wedding! For a few years now, I have been trying to get DJs to play the Billy Idol Trifecta…Mony Mony, Dancing with Myself and White Wedding. Not necessarily in that order, but you had to play those three songs sequentially. No DJ ever agreed to it. “It’s DJ suicide if I try that!” uttered one DJ years ago. So there I went ahead and put it on the request card not thinking that it would happen.

There I was in the washroom and I heard White Wedding start up and the crowd cheering my name! I had to run back out and dance along to the excellent tune and we waited with anticipation to see if the second song would be played.

EPIC SUCCESS! Dancing with Myself came over the PA system and the crowd went wild! However, there was a major setback in the Trifecta in that no one came to the dance floor! In terms of a scientific experiment, I need to get the Trifecta played at another wedding in the future to see if it has the same effect. Then I will know that the Trifecta is only amazing in my own head!

Either way, when Mony Mony came on, children across the land wondered how extra lyrics were added to this song and grandparents cringed. Ah well…so be it.
– Vero looked quite smashing once again.

I believe we left a few moments before the end as we were beat and we braved the backroads going back home to Vars. We definitely took a wrong turn at one point but all in all, it was definitely quicker than heading back through Ottawa (although Vero would have been more comfortable doing so!).

Colin and Becky…an excellent wedding was had! Thanks for the invite!

Friday evening Vero and I headed out to MOHO Part Two…a continuation of the winner of my favourite summer moment of 2009…a trip to see Krista’s parents in Peterborough. We ended up at the Montreal House (MOHO) to see Matt Mays so that weekend will forever be known as the MOHO Weekend.

Krista’s parents have moved to a new house closer to Ottawa so we hightailed it there for Friday evening. The rest of the people (Krista, Ben, Mike, Jill) were going to spend the weekend whereas we would spend the one night as we had a wedding to get to the next day.

The first thing I spied upon entry to the house was the amazing 50″ Plasma sitting in the living room and I got talking about what one I should pick up from my own place. Dave and Lynn were adamant that I should go bigger (this is a blatant lie for Vero’s sake!) and I thought they were wise on their choice.

Everyone else showed up within 30 minutes and we settled in with some beer, a tour of the amazing house and some talks about how long it must take to mow the lawn.

The supper was fantastic and I believe I may or may not have been the one yukking it up for everyone at the dinner table. I was on fire that night knowing that I had to get my full MOHO in before the night ended.

We set up shop in the garage which had an excellent man’s lounge complete with a beer fridge! Mike and I played guitar for about four hours and life was good with a rye in hand. I even shaved the bottom of my chin so I could get the full-on moustache effect (in preparation of the wedding the next day!).

All in all, an excellent time at MOHO Part Deux and I heard that Mike was on fire at lawn darts the next day with beer in hand. You can’t get much sweeter than that.

Thanks to Dave and Lynn for having us up!

My letter to the editor was published in today’s Ottawa Citizen! Nanny Ruth, Spec-writer for many years, would be proud!

I will try and scan a copy this weekend considering the print version is awesome…I was the largest article on the page and there was a picture with it as well!

But I am posting my original unedited article for you all to read here, as faithful readers of Palmer’s World. I enjoyed my comment about OC Transpo, but they had to cut it out due to length.

Also, I hope you enjoy the little tease about rock etiquette…as you may or may not know, I’m working on a book about the subject.

—-
Re: Bigger, hotter, quieter, tastier, July 19.
I was surprised to read in Lynn Saxberg’s excellent write-up of Bluesfest that fans at the Santana concert were reminded about the policy regarding folding up their lawn chairs during the concert for safety reasons.
While I cannot say that I am able to find this policy anywhere on the Ottawa Cisco Bluefest website, I must applaud the organizers for creating it.
I’m not sure if Mark Monahan and the other organizers of Bluesfest lose sleep over the never-ending lawn chair debate, but I feel that this policy is a fair one and encourages a few key points:
Safety – When you have 35,000 people attending a concert, it is quite alarming when you come upon a cluster of lawn chairs that forms a barrier. This creates heavy congestion, which has led to tripping, bruises and heated debates. In fact, I would be interested to hear from a paramedic as to whether it’s easier to get through a crowd of people who are standing or a crowd of people sitting in lawn chairs.
Personal Space – It is one thing to stand up and move around a little to the music, but it’s quite another to set up your lawn chair, sit in it until show time, and then leave it unfolded while you stand in front of it. It’s true that we would all love to have a little personal space within a crowd of music lovers, but it is common courtesy to share the same amount of space. If it helps, a person should just imagine that they are on the OC Transpo bus during rush hour but with the delight of Santana playing on the bus for them!
Proper Rock Etiquette – While there isn’t any proof of this, I have a feeling that many bands prefer to see people stand up during a concert instead of sitting there quietly!
While I am making light of the situation with my last comment, I do not see a problem with festival-goers bringing their lawn chairs to relax in during the better part of the day/evening. I have friends who do this and I am fine with it. But as soon as the event starts, they have the courtesy to stand up and fold up their lawn chair and place it in front of them. They are conscious of the fact that they may be impeding crowd movement (and, in the worst case scenario, paramedics coming through the crowd) and they want to ensure that everyone is having a good time at the festival.
If the organizers of the world-class Bluesfest decide to post this policy on their website in the future, I will be the first in line to agree with it. It promotes an atmosphere of safety and fun at a good old blues festival. Isn’t that what we are all there for?
By the way, two thumbs up to the organizers of Bluefest 2010. Once again, you have outdone yourselves.
Bravo.

iplaying: Stand-down at Sundown – Matt Mays + El Torpedo

This looks like a great book to pick up! The rise of Chinese Food take-out joints in small-town Canada!

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/life/Chopsticks+onion+rings/3292632/story.html

I love, love, love books like this. Books that get to the heart of Canada.

iplaying Exterminator (Massive Attack Remix) – Dirty Hits

Vero’s cousin Melissa called up on Thursday night and things were going down at her own place so she moved in with Vero and I for the moment.

I must admit that she’s quite fun and handy to have around…she knows a thing or two about gardening so she showed us how to weed the garden (and how to keep up with it!) and her hatchback has been instrumental in getting the big screen TV to our place! Plus, she’s fun to have around so it’s not even an inconvenience to have her shack up for awhile with us.

After a lot of researching, I finally went ahead and purchased a Mac Mini to act as my media center…or in the land of acronyms…my HTPC (home theater personal computer). If you have seen my setup at my house currently, you know that I have my Xbox running as my media center. The problem works like a dream when it comes to non-HD content. But the time is getting closer to when we’ll be picking up a big screen TV…I am waited with baited breath. I wonder what the term means?

Oh! Here’s an interesting point. It’s not ‘baited’ breath, but ‘bated’ breath! Upon further research, here’s some links that are interesting to read if you want to know what the phrase means. Neat!

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-bai1.htm
http://www.darrenbarefoot.com/archives/2004/04/waiting-with-bated-breath.html

Back to technology talk…the Mac Mini was the chosen victor amongst a number of candidates…the big runner-up was the PlayStation 3. But the fact that I don’t play video games kind of left a bad taste in my mouth with purchasing that device. But one may wonder “Didn’t you have an Xbox as well?” Touché.

Anyhow, on a whim, I went down to the Rideau Center with Nat at lunchtime to pick it up. I had a few weeks left before my student card expired and that would save me $50.

I got there and chatted with the guy at the Apple Store (who was excellent help) and we got things going. Then all of a sudden he says “So do you want the free iPod touch with this purchase?” My eyes shone like the sun but then he realized that I was only eligible for the free printer. Basically I pay $100 up front and get a mail-in rebate of $100. Easy money! We don’t exactly need a printer considering we got a sweet one for Christmas (this was the first time I have benefited from a Christmas gift that was given to Vero and not me! Sweet!) but I took it anyhow thinking I could either give it away or sell it someone.

Funny enough, this sucker was quite huge and I had to haul it back onto the bus to work with me. I was sitting there thinking “What am I going to do with this thing? Bring it home?” As I was pondering this, I showed it to my colleague Andrea and she said she needed a new one, so $90 later, it was hers. Things worked out perfectly!

In the end, if I were to purchase the Mac Mini, outright with no discounts, I probably wouldn’t have. It’s quite an expensive device to use primarily for a HTPC. There are many other great alternatives such as the PS3, the WD-Live device, or a PC with Windows Home Media Center (or something like that) installed into it.

But I was lucky enough to have a few discounts coming my way…I had a gift card for $250, a $50 student rebate and I suppose I can consider the $90 for the printer as going towards the Mac Mini. So in the end the thing cost me $359 which ain’t too shabby.

I plugged it in last night after getting some house work done. My favourite house chore last night was watering the garden only to have a thunderstorm come through an hour later. Woops? Vero and I also went next door to welcome the new neighbours to the area with a bottle of wine. They seemed like nice people and I was jealous of his ride-on lawnmower.

Speaking about lawnmowers, my lawn is a haven for gnomes to hide inside so I was happy when Vero showed up with the lawnmower back from the shop today. It was leaking gas before and we figured it was this cracked primer button. I assembled it and put some gas in it and voila! It worked! But then I noticed it was still leaking gas! What the heck? We were not impressed with this small engine repair shop and will be calling them back up saying “So when you say it’s fixed, what does that actually mean?”

We also met another neighbour down the street who was the first house built on the street 20+ years ago! They said that their sister ended up moving across from them and their brother next to them! That is fantastic. I believe they said they had since moved on, but that must have been great while growing up with a bunch of cousins all on the same street. They were laughing at the fact that young folks like us are moving in now and the neighbourhood will be running around with kids again. Real nice people.

Clearly this Mac Mini discussion has taken a turn away from proper discussion. Vero and I hooked up the Mac Mini and I really enjoyed how it had a migration assistant which would copy my settings from my Time Machine backup. That was quite slick of them. I was in the middle of updating some software when the power went out because of the thunderstorm. I decided not to boot back up right away in case the power went out again so I’ll have to restart the process again tonight.

If yesterday’s trip is any indication of what to expect, things will be good in terms of commuting. It took me 50 minutes to return from work yesterday which puts me directly in line with the amount of time it took me to get back home to the old house (45-60 minutes). So my first fear of it being a longer commute has vanished for the time being. I say the time being considering it’s the middle of the summer and traffic is usually pretty light at this time of year. Heck, Vero let me know that she made it home in 35 minutes last night! That’s quite the difference considering it used to take her 60 minutes!

I hit the road around 6:30 and headed out on a sunny morning. I would say that the trip to the mall takes about 20-23 minutes of my morning. That’s quite different than my usual 10 minute trip from the old house. But it’s a fair trade-off for the Utopia we live in.

This time around, I parked in the far corner of the mall parking lot and walked a few minutes to get the bus. This way, I mentally avoid getting a ticket (more-so than parking right next to the station!) and I get a little exercise. Bonus! I also hopped on the first bus that would take me out of the tunnel, got off at Hurdman Station and caught the first bus to my place of work. In the end, I made it to work in 5 minutes early which is fine by me!

All in all, I think I will not mind the commute. Especially considering I heard the following two facts about parking near Hull:
– Prices for parking are increasing significantly…$170/month for a parking pass!
– Supposedly it is illegal for someone who lives around Hull to rent out a parking spot ON THEIR OWN PROPERTY! I cannot believe this can happen, but sure enough, a colleague of mine indicated that five years ago, she was parking at a friend’s place, in their driveway and eventually the owner received a letter from the municipality indicating that wasn’t allowed. I’m not even going to begin to get into how ludicrous that sounds. Imagine not being able to let your friend use your own driveway!

I’m sure there will be days where it will be hell to commute (read: snow days) but I have a few plans up my sleeve to counter those.