Contributed by Alanah
It’s the early evening on a lovely Vancouver Island Saturday, and I think to myself, “What could be more fun than reading Rebecca’s Blogathon posts as she struggles through 24 hours of charitable goodness?” And then it occurred to me… “I know what would be more fun: giving Rebecca a hard time while having a nice cold beer!”
Unfortunately, I’m not a “planner” (to put it mildly) so the beers were still sitting at comfortable room temperature, and me without a plan beyond “stick ’em in the freezer and thank God for electricity.” That accomplished, I wasn’t sure what to do with myself, and since Miss604 didn’t seem bothered to entertain me with more than a post every 30 minutes (slacker!) I decided to find out more about my beer.
See, I’m a hockey blogger and editor and podcaster (with Miss604 herself). So I spend an alarming amount of time considering issues related to both hockey and beer. If I’m not talking about hockey, I’m thinking about beer. Or sometimes I’m thinking about hockey while having a beer. Or maybe talking about hockey while thinking about beer? Or…
Well, you get the idea. Hockey is important. Beer is important. Even when I’m on a diet and not allowed to have one. (Which I’m not right now, even though I should be. So hurry up and chill in the freezer!)
Anyway, the beer on my menu tonight is a Vancouver staple: the illustrious lager of the Granville Island Brewing Company (don’t click that link if you’re underage, now). I realize there are far more glamorous choices… honey ales and the like. But those are for sophisticated types. I know I probably seem like the most elegant lady ever (ha!) but really? Not so much. Here’s the proof.
As I looked around the internet, I discovered something quite fantastic about my upcoming beer: it provides tourist benefits! Seriously. A check through the Find Family Fun in Vancouver website (don’t you love that beer tours are listed as “family fun”?!) unearthed the fact that there are tours of the brewery 7 days a week (children get soda pop, if you’re concerned). You can find the brewery at 1441 Cartwright Street on Granville Island, or call them at 604.685.0504 for more information.
Mmmm. How fun would that be? Anyway, that’s enough tourism for me. Now I’m going to crack open my beer and send the photo to Rebecca along with this blog post. That way Miss604 knows exactly what she’s missing as she drowns herself in caffeine.
But hey, I’m not the meanest girl in the world. Shall we do the brewery tour sometime before hockey season, Rebecca? Say “yes” and it’ll be my treat. 🙂
Blogathon: Post #28
Contributed by Keira-Anne
As Becky and I sat here in her living room on a semi-sunny Saturday afternoon, we decided to recapture a sliver of our youths by watching Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989). As the first notes of Big Pig’s “I Can’t Break Away” filled our ears during the opening sequence, Becky turned to me and said “you know, movie soundtracks now just aren’t the same as they used to be. Now it’s all Top 40 stuff instead of good songs.” And you know what? She’s right. And from there we discussed how movies, in general, are nothing like they used to be.
The years between 1980 and 1989 were a cornucopia of films that haven’t, nor will they ever, be duplicated in a way that lives up to the quality of that decade. Movies of that era are ones that are forever imprinted in the minds of people in my and in Becky’s age group. Everything from Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) to The Princess Bride (1987), Working Girl (1988) to Uncle Buck (1989). The numerous moments are still celebrated, from Tom Cruise sliding across the living room floor in his skivvies and Ray Bans in Risky Business (1983) to Mr. Miyagi’s lessons in waxing on and off in The Karate Kid (1984). Moments like that can never be replicated or recaptured. Countless “teen” movies of the 1990s and 2000s have tried, but crashed and burned miserably. There’s something so untouchable about movies from the 80s – a quality that neither Becky or I were able to place our fingers on. There was a certain magic to them.
Photo courtesy of
Answers.com‘s List of Fictional Music Groups.
What is most beautiful and most exciting, aside from being able to relive those moments today through the medium of DVD, is that when our children are pre-teens, we’ll be able to watch a whole new generation of kids find the magic that enchanted us so long ago. Of course, if one were to do the math, and the first child I have in, say, five years from now first travels back in time with Bill and Ted when he or she is ten, that movie will be an astonishing 35 years old. Put that in your phone booth and dial it.
Blogathon: Post #27
Contributed by Isabella Mori
This blogathon really got me going. Too bad I can’t participate; can’t wait to be part of this next year! So at least this year I want to stand at the sidelines and cheer real loud!
Since Rebecca is blogging for the Surrey Food Bank, I thought I’d talk a bit about my experience with food and poverty.
Fortunately, I’ve never been so down on my luck that I didn’t have enough to eat. I got really close once, though, in Chile. We were waiting for money to arrive from Germany and it just wouldn’t show up. We were stranded in this quaint little fishing village about 100 miles north of Valparaiso (a beautiful port city, quite similar to san Francisco or vancouver in many ways), and our host was away for a day or so.
She was something else. Maria Gloria was her name, an eccentric ageing actor from Spain, from the time before Franco. Anyway, Maria Gloria was gone – and all we had left were a big pack of rice, a fig tree full of ripe fruit in the garden, and a well stocked bar, with quite a selection of Grappa. We survived, listening to Violeta Parra, Mercedes Sosa and Georges Moustaki, getting drunkerer and drunkerer as the day went on.
It was different for my parents. They were literally starving artists. The post-war years in Germany, where I was born, saw many people with very, very little food. But even as it started to get better, my parents didn’t quite catch on because my father was busy being a painter (a very good one, might I add) and was not busy hunting down the bacon.
His interest in (cough) illegal substances had him disinherited so there just weren’t any sources of money anywhere. My parents spent days and days not eating at all. I was born a bit after that but for a long time, my parents were still poor. To this day, eating a soft pretzel with butter on it – both luxuries back then – imbues me with a feeling of incredibly delectable decadence.
These experiences are probably part of the reason why I feel pretty strongly about the need for everyone to be fed. When I ran a small social service organization in the Downtown Eastside for a while, we had a ritual of making lunch for our clients on the last day before many of them would receive their income assistance cheques. That’s usually a tough week. We didn’t really have the budget for it and certainly not the mandate – but how can you let anyone go hungry? People get weak and grumpy and confused when they’re hungry. That’s no fun.
So here’s my cheer for Rebecca and the surrey food bank. Let’s make sure people don’t go hungry!
Yeeehawwwwwww!
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Blogathon: Post #26 – Sponsor me to keep going for the Surrey Food Bank
For Blogathon can I scoop another blogathoner‘s post? I think it’s allowed, I ‘ve actually just been wondering how the Simpsons Movie is being received. I was seriously nervous about it, wondering if it would live up to 18 years of faithful episode-watching all culminating into a few hours of would-be-glory on the big screen. What if it sucked? That would be a total let down. Luckily, it seems as though all early reviews are quite positive.
I loved it. I laughed like I had not laughed in years, and at one point I couldn’t stop until tears welled my eyes. It is a really funny movie. Granted, it has an environmental theme and given that environmental affairs are issues that are near and dear to my heart, I was particularly pleased that these topics were touched upon. [Hummingbird604]
Hummingbird604 another Vancouverite who is blogathoning, head on over in case you need more selection in your blog reads today.
Blogathon: Post #25
Although Phillip was at Northern Voice, I didn’t meet him until the Gastown photowalk just a short while ago. It was a most excellent photowalk and we also met up to watch Transformers when it came out. Phillip actually lead a session at NV:
For moosecamp today I will be running a discussion group/chat session about facebook, a social networking site primarily used by students (e.g. What is going on there? What is it about?).
Relevance: What can I learn from bloggers that is of relevance to my research? What can I learn from this community to help me better understand digital spaces such as facebook? [Fade to Play]
This was back in February, right before the mainsteam Facebook explosion, it would definitely been a good session to sit in on. Phillip’s got quite the educational background and is very involved with digital culture and media which he discusses on his blog, Fade to Play.
Thanks for the support and linkage via Twitter!
Blogathon: Post #24
