Death's Dominion

As we head into the Canada Day Weekend, I'm reminded of a rather spectacular event that took place out here in the prairies. I'm talking about the 1912 Regina Tornado. It hit Regina, Saskatchewan on June 30, 1912 as the town was preparing for its Dominion Day celebrations. This website has all the details, but here's the meat of it:

June 30, 1912 was an extremely hot day in the prairie city of Regina, Saskatchewan. Most of the 10,000 inhabitants spent the Sunday afternoon trying to get cool. Suddenly, a breeze blew through the city. Dark clouds gathered in the southeast. But instead of bringing cooling rain, this storm brought a twirling tornado. Moving at speeds up to 200 miles per hour, the tornado ploughed across the lake and destroyed a swath of the city’s center four blocks wide and ten blocks long. It passed through the city in three minutes. Twenty-eight people died in the disaster, and 2,500 were left homeless. At the time, the disaster was the worst in Canadian history. The repair costs plunged the city into dept for over 40 years afterwards.

Needless to say, the next day's celebrations were cancelled. Worst Dominion Day EVER. So be safe this weekend -- no tornado-chasing; no boating and drinking; no sticking fireworks down your pants.

Knit one, purl two

This has nothing to do with Winnipeg. But it did remind me of friends back home, as well as my own dad. Who knew you could combine high-level math with knitting/crocheting? Click here to read about one woman's representation of hyperbolic space using yarn.

Oh, and the coolest part is that her research is funded by something called The Institute For Figuring (free crazy hat with every new membership).

These eyes have seen a lot of love

It was another weekend of music in the Peg. The jazz fest just ended and I caught the tail end of it. Saturday night saw the city's entire population of 20-35-year-olds gather at the Pyramid Cabaret to see Seu Jorge do his thing. This is the guitarist who covered all those Bowie songs translated into Portuguese in Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. I gotta tell you, yeah he has chops and yeah he has style -- but I couldn't help thinking: "Dude's not as interesting when he's not covering Bowie." His samba tunes were groovy but repetitive, and not quite fun enough to make me want to dance.

Sunday night and a free pass from Anthony Del Col, hoops-star and token white guy at Chris Smith Management back in the T-dot, brought me to the Burton Cummings Theatre to see the Jacksoul/Divine Brown concert. Didn't know too much about their music before going, but it didn't matter -- both acts put on great live shows (Divine's voice is exactly that). But again, the highlights were the COVERS. Jacksoul pandered to the crowd with, appropriately, Burton Cummings' "These Eyes", and followed that up with Blue Rodeo's "Try". Great versions of these tunes. And they easily got the biggest crowd reactions of the night (okay, yes, it was an audience of suburban white folks, but still...). In fact, Jacksoul's new album is all covers.

Which shows to go ya, you can't beat good songwriting. As always, writing is key. And I'm only being a little self-serving when I say that.

Addendum (in which our intrepid explorer discovers yet again, just how small Winnipeg is): Sitting beside me at the Burton Cummings Theatre were two friendly young women. One is the ex-girlfriend of Jacksoul's guitarist. The other works for a manitoba film producers agency, and knows everything there is to know about Falcon Beach.

Make your own damn art

The Winnipeg Art Gallery (the WAG), is Canada's oldest public art gallery. It's also either the bow of a proud ship or a block of cheese, depending on how hungry you are when you're looking at it. Gorgeous building. It's made from Tyndall Stone, of which Carol Shields writes in The Stone Diaries: "Some folks call it tapestry stone, and they prize, especially, its random fossils: gastropods, brachiopods, trilobites, corals and snails. As the flesh of these once-living creatures decayed, a limey mud filled the casings and hardened to rock."

Apparently this limestone, which comes from a quarry in the village of Garson near Winnipeg, is used all across Canada in buildings (including the Museum of Civilization in Hull). It's pretty. So pretty it makes me wonder why Winnipeg founders didn't make a bylaw back in the 18whatevers that required all buildings in the city core to be made from the stuff. Winnipeg could have been a city of white gleaming on the plains -- a Jerusalem of the prairies (or for you Tolkien fans -- a Gondor of the north).

Like I say, pretty building. Too bad it's located along a stretch of urban wasteland. At least it's walking distance from my place. Went last Sunday to check out the exhibitions, and was impressed with the place. It's not huge, but it is full of good stuff. Currently it's showing off some cool Marvel comic book cover art, an exhibition of funny (or funny-ish) pieces that includes a stand-up comedy karaoke installation, and a collection of mind-blowingly beautiful prints by Aboriginal artist Daphne Odjig, as well as a permanent collection of Group of Sevens and First Nations sculptures.

Fittingly (for a building that looks like it's built out of the same stone as all the buildings in the holy city), Odjig's collection features prints from her Jerusalem Series -- which came out of a trip to the Holy Land. These pieces have an obvious Judaic visual style -- and it's cool to see how easily that flows into Odjig's Aboriginal design.

Which makes me wonder: Did one of the lost tribes of Israel make it over to North America a couple of thousand years ago and bring their fingerpaints with them? Maybe that can be the subject of Dan Brown's next book, with Spielberg directing the inevitable movie adaptation.

Big screen, little score

Sunday afternoon was the perfect time to check out the Winnipeg Art Gallery. On the way, I passed Memorial Park. Instead of a small game of pick-up soccer, the park was hosting a large gathering of fans of the Korean soccer team, all of them dressed in red T-shirts and watching their team play France on an outdoor video screen. Quite a sight. Actually, the teams were playing on turf, but you get the idea. Final score: 1-1.

NEXT: Art at the WAG...

Hollow peg leg

This is the Fort Garry Hotel. Nice, isn't it? That slab of ugliness pressed right up against its backside is Fort Garry Place, which is where I live. If you haven't seen the view from my balcony, click here. It's actually a fine apartment. Just a shame it's such a tumour on the ass of an otherwise beautiful and historic building.

Every Sunday the hotel offers a popular brunch buffet. Since my fellow writer David's girlfriend was in town for the weekend, we decided to give the all-you-can-eat fine dining thing a whirl.

So after I managed to drag my punked-out sorry self out of bed Sunday morning, David, Anne and I went to feed at the upscale trough with a herd of Peggers in their Father's Day best. The hotel lobby was full of tables so obscenely laden with food that my pen ran out of ink just now while I was trying to draw a diagram to describe it. But it included all the regular breakfast foods (eggs, bacon, sausages, potatoes), an omelette station, waffles, pastries, cheese, crackers, salads, sea food, terrines (bison with blueberries for example), roast prime rib, leg of lamb, chicken, a desert table, and fruit to dip in a chocolate fountain (note: apparently chocolate fountains are not to be used in the same way as drinking fountains). I could only handle three plates before I cried uncle and rolled myself around the corner back to my apartment, where I stretched out on the couch and napped the nap of the righteous buffet-loving Jew.

Isn't it strange how a sandwich and a piece of fruit can often make for a satisfying meal, but when confronted with a hotel lobby full of food, multiple heaping plates seems not just good but absolutely necessary? Turns out it might not just be a matter of trying to get your money's worth. This website describes a recently published book about over-eating that claims our appetite expands as we're exposed to greater number of flavours:

"We stay hungry longer the more diverse the flavors in a meal or snack," said Katz, a professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at Yale School of Medicine. "If flavors are thoughtfully distributed, we fill up on fewer calories. This explains why, for instance, people can eat a holiday meal to the point of feeling unpleasantly full, yet still have room for dessert. No, that's not because you have a 'hollow leg!' It's because of sensory specific satiety; the hypothalamus is hard-wired to respond to flavors."

I guess it's simple: if you want to stop eating so much, limit your exposure to tasty foods.

Shrimp, battered and fried

Caught Shrimp's show Saturday night at the Collective Cabaret in Osbourne Village Saturday night. The punk chicks rocketed through their set at full pelvic thrust, middle fingers blazing, deep throats barking out lyrics I'm sure would have been witty and rude if the sound mix had let me hear them. But what the hell's a sound mix got to do with punk? A proper punk band should barely be able to play their instruments. I'll just have to read the liner notes.

Shrimp turned over the still-burning stage to Ted, who poured some crystal-meth-laced gasoline on the flames. Big Trouble in Little China finished the night off with some long-haired head-banging, make-your-eardrums bleed rock and roll. Crowd-pleasers, the lot of them, fun for the whole family.

Had drinks with Jason Lapeyre last week in the Palm Room of the Fort Garry Hotel, which sits blocking the view from my balcony -- or filling the view, depending on your mood. His big piece of advice about social life in Winnipeg was: Go to a show, hang out, find another show.

And that's exactly what we did. Since Winnipeg is currently throwing its annual jazz festival, a number of bars hosting jazz performances have applied for extended drinking hours. Next door to the Collective is the Cavern, styled (so I was told) after the Cavern Club in which the Beatles got their start. It was was open until 3:30 or so to accomodate a ska band that was playing but who's name I didn't catch (no, they weren't jazz, but they had a horn section). After the show, the rag-tag lot of us ended up at Arlea and her boyfriend Mike's apartment, hungry enough to get Mike to fire up the barbeque to warm up some shrimp and perogies, but tired enough so that by 4:30 a.m. when the food was ready actually all we wanted to do was go home and sleep. I finally crawled under my sheets at 5, as the sun was rising and my hearing was finally coming back.

Stay tuned

Chugging like a freight train through work... Which means I'm falling behind on the bloggity-blog. But rest assured the next missive will be an exciting one, touching upon World Cup soccer, punk rock, Aboriginal art, and obscene amounts of food.

Bank shots

It's eerie driving through the downtown core of a city on a Friday night and noticing you're the only car out there. Ah well, such is Winnipeg. If you're looking for crowds, best get yourself to neighbourhoods outside the core, such as Corydon Avenue. Which has restaurants and patios and pretty people in great enough numbers to feel like Toronto's Little Italy. Except the action goes on for fewer blocks -- and on ONLY ONE SIDE OF THE STREET. Could be the local BIA is worried the things will look too sparse if folks are allowed to spread to both sides.

While sitting on a Corydon patio last night we had our first encounter with the city's fabled mosquitoes. One could easily pick us out as non-locals -- we were the only ones swatting the suckers. No one else even flinched.

But I came across a wonderous sight on the walk back from the night out: the mysterious river bank artist had struck again. Colour had spread. Here's the daytime view:

It's either one hell of an art project -- hopefully designed to encompass the entire length of the bank of the Mighty Assiniboine! -- or it's a real-time map showing the spread of the mosquitoe population. Wonder which colour represents West Nile carriers?

Open for business

Heads up: it's now easier than ever to join in the fun. I found the setting that allows you to leave comments without having to register first.

Brief thought: I like that rain doesn't seem to last too long here. Clouds roll in, lightning flashes, there's a crack of thunder, a brief shower, and it's back to sunshine and songbirds.

Winnipeg haiku:

On elevator
Man says, "Figures it's raining --
I just washed my car."

Like a fridge full of turbid water

Here's the deal: I like Toronto tap water. Winnipeg tap water? Not so much. There's something a little... funky about it. The city's own water website even admits there might be a bit of a problem here:

Manitoba Health and Manitoba Water Stewardship regulate the quality of our drinking water using the Manitoba Drinking Water Safety Act and the Guidelines for Canadian Drinking Water Quality .

We have good quality drinking water that usually meets most of the more than 80 guidelines. However, we are not always able to meet the guidelines for turbidity (clearness of the water), odour, and disinfection by-products. Disinfection by-products are formed when chlorine reacts with organic matter (e.g., vegetation) in the water.

How do you like that? "Usually meets most". What the hell does that mean? Does it mean sometimes Winnipeg water meets NONE of the guidelines? That's not encouraging. Coupled with the flavour problem, that's enough to drive a guy to all bottled water, all the time. Which is a problem of its own. Because my bottled water of choice is Gerolsteiner. I like the flavour. I like the packaging. Bold and classy, all the way around. But the local Safeway doesn't carry it. So I have to choose between Perrier and San Pellegrino for my hydration needs (yes, if I drink bottled water I like it bubbly). Neither of which quite measures up.

I thought I'd try to figure out what gives Gerolsteiner its flavour edge. Turns out it has more than double the mineral content of San Pellegrino, and more than quadruple the mineral content of Perrier. What does that say about me? Does it mean I have a mineral defficiency, one that drives me to suckle on the German springwater teat? Would I be better off just licking exposed Canadian Shield?

(Interesting to note that San Pellegrino has such a high sulphate content (549.2 mg/L) that it has laxative properties (which kick in at 500 mg/L). Is this a selling point in Italy? Must be something to do with flushing out all that pasta that tends to bung up the works.)

Luckily, Winnipeg is building a new water treatment plant. So if I stick around until 2007 I'll be able to enjoy water that really meets the national guidelines and is even free of the diarrhea-causing bug Cryptosporidium. Can't wait!

Vaginal itch

So our lovely and talented script coordinator Arlea has directed me to the website for her punk band Shrimp. They sure look like they fuck shit up old school, and I'm sorry I missed their gig on the first weekend I was here. Next time, front row, no earplugs.

Here's a link to their video "Vaginal Itch". Your co-workers will love it.

Still life with office accoutrements

Sometimes when I'm waiting for 2 hours for a meeting to start I get very bored.

Falcon Biotch

Take that Beyond the Break! From the New York Times article by Alessandra Stanley dated June 2nd:

For all the beer, bikinis and bare-chested boy toys, "Beyond the Break" has a slightly plodding, after-school-special tone: there are all kinds of lessons about self-reliance and self-respect (but not sunblock) tucked into the plot. The characters on "Falcon Beach" are more appealing, better looking, and the story is more soap opera than soap box, though of course even in the two-hour premiere it is made clear that drugs are bad and that sex should be meaningful. But if summer fun is actually supposed to be fun, then "Falcon Beach" is the better choice of the two.

Sure, Stanley also mentions that Falcon Beach is "a watered-down version of 'The O.C.'". But she's saying it in THE NEW YORK TIMES. Bitchin'.

It's all gotta mean something, right?

Back when I was doing my film degree at Queen's, there were these two friends, Elan Mastai and Jason Lapeyre. Best buds, film fanatics, cool pupils of all things pop culture. After school they split up. Elan eventually ended up in Toronto while Jason settled in the Chicago of the North -- yes, Winnipeg.

Elan has a strange way of popping up in my life. I'll be working on my tow truck feature film script with my producer Tyler -- and it turns out Elan's girlfriend is Tyler's colleague in a Film Centre programme; I'll be getting onto the ice at Nathan Phillips Square with Ayako -- and Elan and his girlfriend are just coming off; I'll be returning to the hotel from an afternoon tour of Lake Winnipeg (during my first, week long, visit to the Peg) -- and Elan is checking in to the same hotel because he's come to Winnipeg for a script meeting with a local producer -- the same producer who's working on Falcon Beach. So, you know, it's weird.

Now here I am for the summer and I get to thinking, who the hell do I know in town who's in the position to point me toward a bar/restaurant that isn't Earl's (for you Eastern-Standard-Time-Zoners, Earl's is a sports bar/restaurant chain that's popular in the west; it boasts tasty food, bellinis, and hot waitresses in tight outfits -- basically an upscale Hooter's)? Now I haven't seen or spoken to Jason in, oh, 6 years, but I find his website and contact the guy. Turns out he's in Toronto looking for an apartment and taking meetings. He's moving to the Big Smoke in 3 weeks to pursue his career as a writer. We make plans to get together (not at Earl's) upon his return to the Peg later this week.

Earlier this eve: After my workout at the gym in the building (I have a cell phone, a company car, and I belong to a gym -- what the hell's happened to my life?) I'm chatting with one of the trainers, Brian, comparing his job working at the gym with my job working on Falcon Beach --

Brian: Must be hard making a living as a writer.

Me: Yeah. It's nice to be working.

Brian: A good buddy of mine is trying to make a go of it. He's in Toronto right now looking for a place and taking meetings.

Pause.

Me: Jason Lapeyre?

Pause.

Brian: Are you shitting me?

All of which is to say A) The world is small, and B) Winnipeg is smaller.

The Riel deal

Louis Riel -- Hero? Murderer? Religious nut with delusions of grandeur? I'm sure folks at the time said, "History will be the judge." Well, history still hasn't sorted it out -- though it did see fit to very nearly put him in the top ten of the CBC's The Greatest Canadian. Below Don Cherry, but above Mike Myers.

He helped found Manitoba, negotiated its entry into Canadian Confederation, led the Métis, helmed a rebellion or two, and was eventually executed for treason. He also boasted one of the greatest coifs in the history of our country. Damn right dude deserves a statue!

Chester Brown's graphic novel version of Riel's jam-packed life, Louis Riel, is a must-read. It makes Canadian politics so damn exciting and poetic and beautiful and tragic that you'll reconsider all your assumptions about the universe.

The statue in the watercolour sketch up there overlooks the Assiniboine just behind the Legislature. As I was finishing up, a Francophone pulling stunts on his BMX bike saw what I was doing and said, "You should add the noose around his neck." Guess some people are still touchy when it comes to the guy.

Curiouser and curiouser

Exhibit 1: The above photo of the north bank of the Assiniboine River. Note painted mud -- new as of today.

Exhibit 2: While walking to Osbourne Village this morning I passed a woman jogging with a pet ferret. The ferret was on a leash, and they were both sticking to a good pace -- probably a six-minute K.

Exhibit 3: The Fabulous Kildonans apparently played not too long after we left Pyramid Cabaret Friday night. Arlea (AR-lee), the stupendous script coordinator of Falcon Beach, was there, though we didn't connect. She reports via e-mail: "They trashed their drumkit and all hell broke loose. I have no idea why they've never gone to those extremes. It was a mouth hanging open in awe moment."

Verdict: Patience pays off in this city. Stick around long enough and Winnipeg will smack you with some strange surprises.

Moshing at the end of the world

Caught a punk show last night at the Pyramid Cabaret. Couldn't tell you which two bands from the poster we stayed for (not the Fabulous Kildonans, sadly), but band #1 took the Sea World approach to the set, with the singer (screamer) throwing water and distance-spitting at the top of every four-beat. Result: high-energy mosh pit. Band #2 veered from straight punk into ska territory, packing the stage with horn players. Result: giddy dancing throughout the club. Good times.

But then I returned home to the internet news that terror suspects had just been arrested in Toronto. A news conference today, as reported by CTV.ca, offers details:

Police arrested 12 men and five young offenders on terrorism related charges in the Toronto area Friday night, allegedly foiling a series of planned bombings against targets in Southern Ontario, the RCMP announced Saturday morning.

Police said the suspects possessed massive amounts of fertilizer, often used to make bombs.

The individuals are all residents of Canada, and "for the most part citizens of Canada," said Mike McDonell, assistant commissioner of the RCMP.

The individuals were charged with offences under the Criminal Code of Canada, after police staged a sweeping raid Friday night in the Toronto area.

The RCMP says these guys are not Al Qaeda, but "were allegedly inspired by militant Islamic groups." Also, they were based in Mississauga, Toronto, Kingston. Which raises the question (no, it does not "beg" the question -- for the proper use of the phrase "begs the question", click here): Is there another story fomenting, one about how these 17 suspects know each other and decided to come together to blow shit up?

Anyway, go live life -- drink, dance, fuck, sing, mosh, scream, puke; you never know when you'll be sitting on 3 tonnes of fertilizer waiting to go off.

Cryptozoology on the Assiniboine

I've been making the walk from my apartment on Garry St. to Osbourne Village for a little over a week now. It takes me along the banks of the MIGHTY ASSINIBOINE! River. I make this journey because the area around my apartment is essentially dead, while the area around Osbourne Village is essentially alive. Picture if you will Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan -- the barren surface of the moon vs. its teeming, luscious inner core after the Genesis Project has had its way with it; the juxtaposition is apt. It's a 10 minute walk, but the 10 minutes makes all the difference.

The first time I saw the sign along the banks of the MIGHTY ASSINIBOINE! I thought, "Ha, clever vandals." The second time I saw the sign, I thought, "How long has that sign been like that, and why hasn't anyone fixed it yet?" Considering the sign is located between the Legislature and the proud statue of Louis Riel that overlooks the banks of the MIGHTY ASSINIBOINE!, you'd think the civil servants would've been right on top of that business as soon as it hit. Doesn't this area deserve some respect? Doesn't anyone look after it? Isn't correcting this (admittedly humorous) prank someone's responsibility?

And then I thought, "Wait. Someone has taken the trouble to deface BOTH sides of this sign. Someone else has let it stand. Could it be a message of some kind?" Loch Ness has the Loch Ness Monster; the Okinagan Lake has Ogopogo; Lake Manitoba has Manipogo; Lake Champlain has Champ. Perhaps the MIGHTY ASSINIBOINE! has its own resident sea-monster, and some local cryptozoologist has taken it upon him/herself to revise area signage as a helpful tourist service. Just follow the arrow, and you too might catch a glimpse of the mysterious ASSINIBOINE RIVER SPIRIT WATERBUS COCK! Like its counterpart denizens of the deep, it's often spotted in foggy conditions, a smooth small head attached to a snake-like neck breaking the water's surface and lazily rolling under again before your camera's autofocus can properly wrack.

So from now on I'll keep my eyes peeled as I daily stroll the length of the green river, looking for signs of our modern-day plesiosaur, camera at the ready. But "Assiniboine River Spirit Waterbus Cock" is a mouthful, and the creature deserves a nickname. If the Loch Ness Monster gets the diminutive Nessie, I think there can be only one choice for the moniker of our local monster: Ass-Cock.