September…..the beginning of my favourite time of year. There’s something so crisp and refreshing…..a newness spring doesn’t possess. New jobs, new schools, new grades, new homes, new lives…..September to me has always meant “beginning”. Maybe because it’s the month of my birth, or maybe it’s all the fall colours and brightness of the air, but I always feel inspired and invigorated in the comfortable cool months of fall. Of course, all things pumpkin spice doesn’t hurt either!
Continue readingI’ve actually remembered how to use that contraption they call a camera and now I have two! I used them both for the first time last night photographing the Forever Seger band at their rehearsals. What a joy to have two cameras set up with different lenses…..sort of a “grab-and-go” scenario. Just pop the lens cover, make sure the camera is “on” (this is always helpful), point, focus and shoot. So good to be back!
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It’s 9 o’clock on a……no, no, no, wrong song. Betcha ya got an earworm now….before you even listen to the song.
The business of business cards….little pieces of history….a nostalgic trail of change of memories. Each one has its own story….of the owner, the business, the year, even the decade. Headed to the basement to check the dehumidifier and stood gaping in overwhelming awe at what still has to be done with much of Chris’s “stuff” over five years after his death. Okay…..deep breath…..one box at a time. My eyes landed on the “box o’ cards” so upstairs it came. It resulted in a magical wander back in time for an entire afternoon. I do not exaggerate when I say the man kept EVERYTHING. I was stunned to find my very first business card from Associated Creative Talent (ACT). Ahhhh, was the summer of ‘79. I had only been in Toronto three months. What a life-changing year that turned out to be.
Well Trumpelthinskin sure went off his script at last weekend’s well publicized 1% group grope. He went well off his message, well off on a tangent,; (well off his rocker?) His word salad of an address would probably have sounded better if his “speech writers” had taken an Oxford Dictionary, put it through a shredder, stuffed the resultant paper “scrap” into a muzzle loading cannon and promptly fired it at a wall covered with paper glue and begged him to read the result! America, I weep for you. You have “elected” a grifter, a cheat, a conman, a nepotistic thief who would gladly sell off everything that makes America great for 5 cents on the dollar, if it would fill his pockets and those of his dreadful family.
It’s been busy the past few weeks. What with fighting that ghastly, intrusive flu/cold (whatever the hell it was) while still cruising the concert halls and clubs, celebrating a special day with my sons and generally trying to keep in or out of trouble….. depending on your point of view. I’ve also been rooting around in the basement searching for more of Chris’s work and I discovered not only his collection of slides but a brand new, unopened box containing a Kodak (remember them) slide projector complete with three carousels and a carousel stack loader. Never used. I cracked it open, plugged it in and everything worked like a charm. Now, if I can just remember how to put the slides in…..I keep getting them backwards or upside down. So I continue to catalogue, digitize and view slides. My drum stool just got delivered (thank you Kid Carson) so now, instead of sliding across the floor every time I use the kick drum, I’ll stay put.
I’m getting to this column a little earlier than usual. It’s a Monday night and one project has blurred into another today. The computer has captured most of my time along with a little redecorating. My friggin’ eyes are going square! One thing has been swirling around in my cranium today and it’s this, when are we going to stop “cutifying” and beautifying little girls because someone posts a really cute pic of one? It’s really starting to seriously bug me. The comments all focus on looks….and we wonder why females are objectified, dumbed down, not taken seriously….and the list goes on. ….and it’s not just the words themselves but the verbal intonations we use when talking to them as babies and toddlers. By the time these little princesses learn to walk, they’ve also learned how to use their tiny feminine wiles (oh yes, they’ve already figured out how to wrap daddy around their finger) to get their way. Damn, it starts early, waaaaaaay to early.
It’s snowing!!!! Not those big, fat, fluffy flakes where one can almost cover your face. But it’s snowing…. Sigh. The grey, dull days of January with just a mere hint that the sun actually exists…..which begs the question, why doesn’t Bell Canada hold their “Let’s Talk” campaign on Blue Monday? That makes infinitely more sense than say, Robbie Burns Day. Why in heaven’s name would you pick the 25th of January for mental health awareness??? According to a number of sources, the term “Blue Monday” was coined by holiday company Sky Travel in a 2005 press release. Cliff Arnall, at the time a tutor at Cardiff University, had come up with a light-hearted formula to determine the most depressing day of the year which commonly falls on the third Monday in January. It’s now a worldwide phenomena. Everyone has jumped on the bandwagon and the term is used repeatedly by companies and organizations (there’s even a BlueMonday.org) and stories in all sorts of media abound. Newspapers recommend taking the day off, there are various sites that will calculate, on a yearly basis, which Monday is going to be “blue” so you can prepare…..the power of suggestion. Although the entire idea is considered pseudoscience by the scientific community, Blue Monday is not going away anytime soon. Did you know mosquitoes are attracted to the colour blue twice as much as any other colour?
Well…..here it is already…..2017! Blink and both Christmas and New Year’s Eve are over, a fait accompli. Phffft….gone! Tout fini! Finito! Done and dusted! ….and here we are…. Has much changed? No, not really. Resolutions? Nope. Heading to the gym? Not on your life!!! The dance floor suits me just fine. Focus? I’m working on it. Oh look, a shiny thing……
I’m going to start calling this column Pat’s Diary (nope, too blah), or maybe Zippy’s Musical Journey, or maybe….My Life As A Crazy Lady….. Welcome to my world of music, pictures, and general mayhem. So we begin another 10 days of zipping (get it haha) around this wonderful city of ours enjoying the nightlife. I’m starting backwards…..
Bullseye Records of Canada
Segarini: Don't Believe a Word I Say 