Toronto night life

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Teaching English in Mexico: A Decent Living?

What's more dissatisfactory than a individual who do a promise he can't keep? A individual who do a promise that is a lie. Many promises to make a "decent living" instruction English Language in United Mexican States are just that—a lie.

If you do a phrase hunt on Google, "teach English in Mexico," you will acquire almost 900,000 hits. Some of these sites are filled with tantalizingly appealing phrases like,

"For lone a few dollars a hebdomad you can have_____in Mexico".

"First-class bus traveling to such as as and such a place is only____".

All are allurements trying to sell their how-to book, tapes, seminars, or placement service for instruction English Language abroad. They give the feeling that you will be able to do adequate money to dwell a life of extravagance and ease with all that money you will do instruction English Language in Mexico.

We've met many immature women who come up to Guanajuato with the hope and dreaming of getting a instruction occupation making a bundle. The word "shock" is putting it mildly when they happen out what their wages will be in some of these private schools. A good pay scale of measurement would be less than $3.00 an hour. I cognize of some schools that pay even less than that amount.

Can you conceive of how many hours you would have got to work to do ends meet? Minimum pay is about $400.00 USD a month. Granted, many Mexicans dwell on that. But could you—an American? Could you downscale to life on so little?

Four types who come up to United Mexican States to learn English are:

1) Someone who desires a new adventure—something different.

2) Someone who desires to construct a resume, no substance the
salary.

3) Someone who desires to gain a small traveling money.

4) Someone who believes they can gain a nice living. Groups 1 through 3 don't care what the dollar mark is in their salary. They have got other beginnings of income like nest egg or parents who assist support them while they are in Mexico. These are the most transient. Here today, promising their employers a twelvemonth contract, and gone tomorrow. Some employers will not engage these "floaters." Schools would love to engage those with neckties to the community but they are rare.

Group 4, people who believe they can do a living, do not accept the world that you can rarely make a life at instruction English Language in Mexico. They are like those who travel to Hollywood with the psychotic belief of becoming an actor, "Oh, it's a long shot, but maybe I can do it."

In an informal e-mail study I took of Mexican schools that offering ESL classes, the overpowering bulk agreed that it is rare for anyone to make a life at instruction English Language in Mexico. One called it "an unrealistic expectation" to believe otherwise.

"...the pay is very low and it is hard to conceive of how one
could dwell on it."

Another beginning told me that unless the instructor had signed a contract with a big constituted organisation before going to the country, it was improbable that a good wage would be waiting for them. Countries like Japanese Islands or People'S Republic Of China offering a competitory wage with benefits.

Mexico makes not.

Most of the available occupations are with small private schools that pay little.

Some told me that those who make not carry through their instruction committednesses no longer surprise them. They've grown accustomed to this unethical pattern by North Americans.

Some have got come up to United Mexican States and made a life instruction ESL. But, that is all they can do—work until they drop. They usually have got to subscribe on to learn with at least three schools to acquire adequate hours to gain adequate to pay for cost-of-living expenses. There is small time to anything else.

A life of luxury, excitement, and adventure? Hardly. But they maintain coming, filled with the psychotic belief that perhaps they can do it work.

Sad.

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Fried Green Tomatoes Recipe

My next-door neighbours establish a human os in their backyard. Let me rephrase. She believes she establish a human bone. They were putting up a fencing in their backyard. They’ve been excavation and shoveling and grading posts. I unloaded some boards to be a Mister-Rogers-kind-of-neighbor. And she was still talking about the human os she’d shown me the twenty-four hours before.

I was walking down the driveway, and she called me over to look at the bone. “Don’t you believe it's a human bone?” she asked.

I set my ft on it and rolled it around, inspecting each side. It’s about the size of a little child’s bone. I took my ft off it and said in jest, “You should name the authorities. State them you establish a human bone.”

We both stood over it, looking at it, concocting our ain beliefs about the bone.

“You really believe I should?” she asked. The whole scene had my neighbour talking in a high-pitched voice.

Now I’m not an expert on human bones. I’ve never put eyes on them. I saw a image of them the other nighttime on Despairing Housewives. Person cut that adult female up and set her in that trunk that floated to the top in some lake on the set of the show. So this was a first for me. Iodine could state it was a bone. Some sort of a bone.

If it were me, I’d pitch the thing in the trash. I wasn’t ready to name Cold Lawsuit and have got that blonde-headed biddy come up out to set us all under surveillance. Ask us twenty questions. “How long have got you lived adjacent door, Mr. Stofel?” Then she would look into my deadening life.

To prosecute something like this is to ask for too much play into your life. They’ll convey in a backhoe. Stopping Point off my driveway. Keep me from getting any work done with all the noise going on outside my window. It just do your backyard look like a graveyard. Then you acquire to distressing about the house. You’ll start hearing footfalls on the boards or a bosom beating beneath the floor boards like in that Edgar Allan Edgar Allen Poe short story, “The Tell-Tale Heart.” Remember the story? The storyteller kills the old adult male because his pale bluish eye, like a vulture’s eye, is driving him insane. Everywhere he turns there’s that eye, until finally he can’t take it anymore. He ins his manner into the old man’s room each nighttime until he finally jumps on the old adult male who shrieks. The storyteller throws the mattress over him. Suffocating him. Waiting for his last heartbeat. It happens. Then he dismembers him, like that organic structure in Despairing Housewives. He raises the three boards of the flooring of the chamber. The old adult male is gone. Elation.

Then a knocking upon the door. Three police officer base at his door. A awful scream coming from his house have been reported. But the storyteller fearfulnesses nothing. He’s performed the perfect crime. He throws unfastened the house. Slings his weaponry into every room. They are satisfied that it was indeed the storyteller yelling in his sleep. The police force pulling up chairs and chat.

At first it's exhilarating for the narrator. He's getting away with murder. Then it acquires old. They will not travel away. And it isn’t because they are suspicious. They're not. Just tired. Just experience like talking. But this is when the bosom gets to beat beneath the three planks, up under the three policeman’s feet. But they cannot hear it, only the storyteller hears the sound of the bosom beating from beneath the three planks. He starts talking in a crazy, idiotic way—his voice stretch crescendos. But the bosom beats above the sound of his voice. Louder and louder. Until the adult male cannot base it any longer. And he draws up the boards and uncovers the old man’s corpse.

The storyteller shrieks, “Villains! dissemble no more! I acknowledge the deed!—tear up the planks! here, here!—It is the beating of his horrid heart!”

Maybe I’m taking my neighbor’s archeological excavation too far. But it got me to thinking about Edgar Allan Edgar Allen Poe and that zany story, and about how it bleeds into my story. I’m that way. Everything bleeds into a story for me. We are stories. You and I. Stories.

So, as I said, it got me to thinking about my ain heart. How it was hidden beneath the floor, inside this tegument and castanets that the Apostle Alice Paul names “the old man.” That old iniquitous nature inside.

I thought about how my bosom was the first thing to react to Supreme Being on that twenty-four hours in a 1,000-member church. And the wild thing is—the revivalist speaking that day—he heard my heart. It must have got been beating in his ears the manner the bosom beat in the ears of Poe’s narrator.

Louder and louder it thumped, as if a low-rider was sitting at the reddish visible light at the corner with the bass thumping against the moment. It beat in his ears until he couldn’t base it anymore, and the revivalist shrieked, “Someone here; your bosom is about to beat out of your chest. You necessitate to acquire up and come up down here to the communion table and give your beating bosom to Christ.” Iodine can retrieve his words like a mantra, even after twenty-three years. Word for word. True story.

And it freaked me out. I was new to all of this Christian church stuff. I went to Christian church as a little child, but I can’t state you anything about it. I can’t retrieve much before I was ten. But I can retrieve what that adult male said to me at the age of eighteen.

I could associate to him somewhere deep interior my soul, underneath the three boards of the chamber. My bosom beat. It pounded. Louder and louder. So I jumped up, went down to the altar, and shrieked, “I am the 1 with the beating heart. Me, this heart. It beats. I did it.”

Of course, we are all guilty. We killed the most cherished thing. The One thing. The One bosom that took its last beat here, only to come up back and beat inside everyone who listens. Louder and louder. And with each beat a new beginning for some mediocre psyche whose bosom have taken its last beat here, only to arrant his first ageless hello there.

● ● ●

My married woman told me Bonnie buried the os a couple of hebdomads ago. Put it back in the land behind her house. I figured that was the end of it. Then Spike Lee called this hebdomad and said, “Go to your backdoor, Bonnie have something for you.”

So I did as told. I went to the backdoor and Bonnie was walking across the private road we share. She had a handbasket with something inside. I could see right off that supper was mine. I even grinned. I just happened to be starving at the moment.

And she held out this handbasket with a good ole’ southern smiling and said, “We had some other barbecue ribs. It’s Lee’s secret recipe.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me! This volition be a feast. Thank you.”

She smiled and turned to traverse the driveway. And man, were they good! Succulent. I’d eat them every nighttime of the hebdomad and decease of case-hardened arteries. I wouldn’t care. I was so excited about receiving them that I even thought about becoming a Bo Bice fan.

Then I got to thinking about that os she establish in her backyard, the os I was telling you about a couple of hebdomads ago. Well, I got to thinking maybe they’d cooked up some secret formula all right. Secret meat that used to be on that os she found. You cognize it happened in that movie, Fried Green Tomatoes. They killed that man, chopped him up, made barbeque out of him, and Federal him to that Empire State Of The South detective, who told Big Saint George that it was the best barbecue he’d ever eaten, and asked him what his secret was. And Big Saint George smiled and said, “Thank you, suh, I’d have got to state the secret’s inch the sauce.”

And I was thinking, I trust they aren’t eating me a dead person.

The neighbours even establish a grave marker in the backyard to travel along with the bone. No lie. First came the bone, and then this grave marker appeared. This is where they said the os must’ve come up from. Said it may have got been a soldier in the Civil War. They had my attention. It was some sort of achromatic stone with a unsmooth texture. It had three initials on it—W.C.P. Iodine cognize because she had it leaning against the dorsum of her house and called me over to look at it. Sure enough, it was a grave marker. And certain enough, it could be a Confederate soldier. General Hood, the Confederate full general and full-time sot, took his work force across the Volunteer State River near Decatur on his manner to acquire all those male children killed in the Battle of Franklin. So it could be a Civil War man. Oregon it could be they are setting me up. Making me believe it was a Civil War man.

They could’ve bought that sedate marker at a pace sale. She’s large into pace gross sales anyway. She bought a butcher’s block at a pace sale today. I saw her tugging on it, trying to acquire it out of the dorsum of her truck. I just happened to be walking out the backdoor. I curse I don’t spy. Iodine ain’t A nosy neighbor, but like I said, she was trying to raise it out of the truck, and when I asked her if she needed aid she said, “Naw, I got it.” Then she said, “It’s A butcher’s block. Iodine bought it at a pace sale for $3.00.”

I was thinking, That’s Associate in Nursing atrocious large butcher’s block. She had both hands absorbing it and she was straining a spot to transport it in the backdoor. I was also thinking, What’s she going to cut up? A whole cow? Then I remembered the os and sedate marker. It was all approaching together. She’s Jeffery Dahmer’s sister or something. I pictured her in her kitchen with a detached arm on that butcher’s block. Freezer bags to the left of her and a knife in one hand, while the other manus on that arm’s hand. Then I remembered the ribs. I figured I’d just eaten person the other nighttime while I watched my NASCAR race. Maybe that’s why, when Iodine told them how good they were, she said, “Really?”

I said, “Oh, yeah. Best ribs I’ve ever sunk my dentition into.”

She said it again with this amusing expression on her face, she said, “Really? Well, its Lee’s secret recipe.”

(Yeah, right.)

Now I’m not accusing anybody of anything. But I state you what, if I catch her toting a organic structure bag in through the backdoor, I’m gonna travel over there and state her to allow me cognize when the ribs are ready. I’m like that Empire State Of The South investigator in that Fried Green Tomatoes movie—that was the best barbeque ribs I’ve ever eaten, and I’ll eat’em again. I don’t attention whose ribs they are. They some good feeding as long as Spike Lee can maintain his secret.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Very Precise Fortune Cookies

I cracked unfastened the fortune cooky and read the small faux pas of paper on the inside. Immediately I realized that it had been written by a weather condition forecaster.

"You will be approached in the late afternoon by a pinkish polka-dot octopus..."

It continued on the other side: "... and asked to supply inside information of your application for a yellowish cloud mulching permit."

Two things struck me about this peculiar fortune. The first is that they have got come up a long manner in their ability to foretell exactly what will go on and when, just like weather condition forecasters. This is undoubtedly owed to recent technological developments. Laser technology, for example. Nano technology. Robotics. Bioengineering. And so many other specialised Fields have got been developed to points of preciseness unimagined just a coevals ago.

And it's not just the weather condition forecasters.

In London, Ontario, specializers are performing microscopical cardiac surgery on patients statute miles away using a automaton named CSTAR (Can't you just wait for new parents to start naming their children after the celebrated surgeon, CSTAR?). This have got opened up the door to many benefits, such as as sending automatons to distant locations without having to worry about a operating operating surgeon replacing the incorrect variety meat owed to jet plane lag.

But the existent benefit was revealed when one surgeon confided in me: "You cognize the world is a better place when we don't have to chaparral our hands before surgery anymore."

I can name anybody in North United States on the telephone set and they will reply in existent time. Not only is this a better response than I can give people face-to-face, but the telephone set set cablegrams direct my phone call to the exact individual I want, saving the other 400 million telephone endorsers the incommodiousness of having to say, "Wrong number...again!" Just a few decennaries ago, Switchboard Suzie was manually connecting everybody.

"Janice Land? No problem. I'll link you." CLICK.

"No, wait. I wanted to talk to Janet Lam. Hello?"

My male parent can nail the exact amount of blood refined sugar he packs in his veins. Not very long ago, people could not care less how much refined sugar was in their blood, as long as they had plenty of it in their double-fudge sundaes.

Yes engineering have come up a long way, allowing us to direct and received very specific information in great item and in great volumes, allowing such as electrifying 21st century inventions as Spam (I know, I know, the great Spam pioneers you admire most did their epic works in the 20th century, but you ain't seen nil yet!)

Despite the volume of information I have in my inbox, there is one very distressing component to all this other free information, which conveys me back to the 2nd thing that struck me about my fortune cooky message.

It was wrong.

I waited all twenty-four hours for that pinkish polka-dot octopus to near me, and it never did. Just because modern engineering can present immense volumes of laser-detailed information, makes not do that information valuable or even accurate.

Which conveys me back to the disclosure that a weather condition predictor is now writing fortune cookies. Weather prognoses have got go increasingly more than precise. For instance, I am told that today it will hail in the town just east of here and be sunny in the town just west of here.

Once upon a time, the prognosis would be simply "Sun and hail expected to go through through the region." Less accurate and less wrong. Just as useless, though.

Maybe we should engage CSTAR to do the fortune cookies. Surely CSTAR would present fortunes that are not only precise but also accurate, right? As a bonus, the pastry dough chefs won't have got got to chaparral their hands before baking.

And I wouldn't have to wait for a pinkish polka-dot octopus all afternoon.

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

The Restaurant Chronicles, Part 1

Have you ever heard that saying, “The show must go on"? When you hear it, you think of what is commonly referred to as “Show-biz,” don’t you? But where can you go to see the best acting money can buy, any day of the week? No, I’m not talking about the theatre or TV. I’m talking about the “Restaurant-biz.” Servers, bartenders, hostesses, and restaurateurs act on a daily business. Their performance is crucial! Every movement, every word, every bite is an integral part of the restaurant-goers experience, and any one of these parts, if it isn’t just right, could lead to the restaurant-goer, well, going.

Many a restaurant owner has held their breath as they flipped to the local restaurant critic’s (probably some pompous, pretentious old windbag), page to see what he or she has to say about their establishment. This write-up has the power to make or break a restaurant, especially a privately owned one. Unfortunately the only critiques a server gets to give are given behind a kitchen door, in a server station, or over a beer (or several) at the end of a shift. Well, the restaurant critic has held the pen too long! The time has come for the server to speak up and critique the customer for a change!

I, as a former member of the exclusive club known as the Restaurant Industry, am about to attempt a categorization of several different types of patrons. This will be the first installment of a series I like to call, “The Restaurant Chronicles.” In this, Part 1, I will begin a labeling process which will hopefully serve as both comic relief for others in our distinguished field, and also to illuminate those who may unknowingly belong to one (or more) of the following groups. Let’s see, where should we begin?

The Chatty-Cathy: This breed of customer is more interested in gabbing and/or gossiping with friends or colleagues than ordering or eating food. She or he is content to have the server stand and wait while finishing the conversation. This customer will ignore the server every time they come back and ask whether a refill or some other service is needed. If the server has to repeatedly ask the question, this customer will often flash a dirty look or make a snide comment.

The Cell Phone Addict: This lonely soul cannot seem to put their cell phone down long enough to even order. They insist on pointing to items on the menu and requiring their server to guess at their order instead of simply putting their phone down and speaking.

The Sally: If you’ve seen the movie When Harry met Sally, you have seen a frighteningly realistic example of the high-maintenance guest. This person says thing like, “I’ll have this roast turkey sandwich, except can I get it with mustard instead of mayonnaise? Actually can I have a little bit of both on the side, and, uh, no tomatoes? Do you have rye bread? Could you have them toast it? And could I have a mixed green salad instead of the pasta salad, but with ranch…I don’t like that vinaigrette you guys use. Do you think I could get a coke instead of this tea? It tastes funny.” Although they speak in sentences that sound like questions, an experienced server recognizes them for what they truly are, demands.

The Dummy: This simple creature somehow manages to find their way to the restaurant, although it’s hard to imagine how. They come in through a door directly below a giant neon sign, flashing the word “OPEN,” and ask, with a blank look on their face, “Are you guys open?” The menu may have the word, in huge letters, BREAKFAST on the cover, and they will ask, “Are you guys serving breakfast?” This client teaches their server the art of patience, because it is nearly impossible not to reply sarcastically to such moronic questions.

The Merry Mommy Club: This group of lovely ladies and their lovely children is always a treat, if your idea of a treat is hurdling small children, while at the same time, maneuvering large heavy trays of hot food and liquids without losing your balance, as they run under your feet. This species of diner loves to sit for hours and hours chatting, as they consume only small side dishes of food and sip away gallons of decaffeinated coffee, or every server’s favorite, hot tea! They squeak in babynese, and compete in the “My baby can do this…” game. They also are notorious for their lack of observational skills, as their older children compete in creating a virtual “Obstacle Course” for servers and other guests by climbing on top of tables, running behind the counter, and other various activities.

Well, that concludes Part 1 of the Restaurant Chronicles, but fear not, my wonderful readers! I plan to continue my exploration of this fascinating creature, known as the diner, in Part 2. So please come back and learn more about this interesting, exciting, and often times, just plain weird business, we Restaurant folk affectionately refer to as, well…our job.

Monday, August 18, 2008

Stun Gun Cat Food Robotic Shocker

Does you neighbours true cats conveniently come up to your house for an other meal, stealing your ain cat’s food? Damn those vicinity true cats anyway. It bes a batch to purchase true cat nutrient and Supreme Being cognizes you make not necessitate to be purchasing nutrient for all the vicinity true cats too, especially with your strapped budget with these Hideous Fuel Prices. Three dollars a gallon; bury you me!

If the neighbours true cats eat $5.00 per hebdomad of your “Fluffy’s Food” that is a cost of over $260.00 per year. You could speak to your neighbours about this job and state them to mind their ain cat. But everyone cognizes true cats make not listen, they basically ain the place and believe they are entitled to follow lawsuit like the New Orleans Looters after the Hurricane Katrina? If you had a true cat TV, well they would probably walk off with that too. To forestall vicinity robbery true cats from your house, you necessitate RoboCat with the AttackCat Sun Gun option, not adequate to kill the neighbours cat, as it is born of DARPA non-lethal technology for Department of Fatherland Security violent protestor crowd control and police force use. But this engineering will let the thievish vicinity true cat cognize whose pace they are in and believe you me, they will not be wondering back in anytime soon.

This is just one manner that robotics can assist your budget and allow you more than freedom, a higher criterion of life and a greater quality of life. Think about it.

Friday, August 15, 2008

Travel and Scenic Photography 101

When you're driving through the mounts somewhere, and you detect a auto parked half off the route and some cat leaning to the left to avoid a subdivision with his Johnny Reb 2000 photographic camera in the enactment of focusing, you've met me. Iodine make this because, to me, a trip isn't fulfilling unless I've preserved that beauty for posterity. I'd wish to share some of the techniques that do scenic picture taking such as a fantastic artform - simple, yet elegant.


First off, equipment. As much as the cheapo disposable photographic camera beckons, acquire real. These photographic cameras have got fisheye lenses which I name "spam" lenses. They cram everything in, with equal indistinctness and boringness. Good photographs are sharp, unless you utilize film over for artistic effect. Sharp come ups from an adjustable lens. It can be a fixed lens system or a zoom, but it must concentrate specially for each picture. Fixed lenses are limiting for scenic pictures, where to frame in the shot you may necessitate to travel long distances. Imagine using a fixed lens system on the American Capital Monument, when you're half a block away! Zooms acquire my vote, even though they often don't have got as broad an aperture, which restricts their capablenesses in low visible light situations.  


Practically speaking, an SLR is the absolute best. They are lightweight, and can be used with top quality lenses. Movie SLRs be given to be less expensive, but have got got the restrictions of film, meaning you have to  get it developed and so forth. Digital SLRs are VERY expensive, so for the budget conscious either travel with a movie SLR or a high quality basic digital camera. With digital, declaration is also a critical factor, so look at the spectacles before you buy.


OK, we've got the camera, emotions are running high, and that's great, but not too great! Sometimes I happen a topographic point that is so wonderful, I start shooting like a madman, only to be disappointed by the pictures. What happened? Emotions. When you undergo a place, there are sounds, olfactory properties and zephyrs as well as the visuals of the spot. Gratuitous to say, you can't exposure all of these elements, only the visual. When flooded by the spectacle of a scenic hotspot, we are often flooded by all of these elements.


So what to do? Look through your camera. The view finder makes not lie (usually). Try to see what you are looking at as the finished picture. Most people perfunctorily take pictures, hoping that somehow the shot will come up out great. If you inquire how the images came out when you are on the manner to the drug shop to acquire them, you're doing something wrong. At the minute you chink the pic, you should cognize exactly what you will get. (Of course with digital, that's not a trick!).  


Now, I was a shade dishonest in saying that you can't capture all of the elements of a scene. You can suggest at them. For starters, motion. Yes, even in a still picture, there is motion. Something happened before, during and after your picture. In a mountain view scene, you may happen something that intimations at motion, whether it be a subdivision of a tree that have been swaying in the breeze, or a river flowing through the vale below. These add a sense of motion.  


Then there's the "rule of thirds." When you place the chief physical object of the image smack-dab inch the middle, it is unchanging and boring. Place it one 3rd of the manner from either side, and you IMPLY motion. Put the apparent horizon in a landscape photograph a 3rd of the manner up or down, not across the middle.


Remember, when a individual looks at a picture, their eyes move. You desire to frame in your photograph to assist that movement. If you can happen some lines in the scene, such as as a skyline, cloud formation, way through the forest, etcetera, usage it interestingly, and with the rule of one-thirds to pull your viewer's eyes into the picture.


Avoid "summit syndrome." You acquire to the top of Saddle Horse American Capital and shoot the majestic vista. Great. The images come up out ... boring! How? No PERSPECTIVE. Big views will be level unless you have got an physical object in the foreground, such as as a stone or a tree, to give them perspective. Then the oculus really appreciations how large this scene is. People enjoying the position is a existent winner, because the spectator may place with their emotions, giving the mental image existent impact.


Cheese! Yes, you make have got to take the household photos. It's obligatory. But when you do, do certain that they demo the location of the photo. Otherwise, you might as well make it on your driveway. Framework the scene in context, with landmarks as portion of the picture. Find a manner to state as story in the picture, such as as small Sara climbing up the stones by the waterfall.


Finally, any component in the image that intimations at more than senses than just the ocular volition do it  remarkable. Actor headshots for example, state a story about the subject. You can almost hear them saying their adjacent lines. If you exposure a garden, the spectator may undergo the olfactory property of the flowers. A tourist street with an piano accordion player on the corner may have got your astonied friends   whistle "Dixie."


In summation, image taking on traveling is recording the experience in a appreciated way. Use motion, perspective, sensory, storytelling and so forth, to convey your photographs to life. Oh, and needless to say, do your occupation easy and travel to great places! See you at the overlook!

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Voodoo Munchies

Looking for a lighthearted and fun way to remove the negative energy of a certain disruptive person from your life, or from your mind, if the person in question has moved on? Consider the cleansing (and giggle-inspiring) effect of Voodoo Munchies.


Beginning now, whenever you need to deal with this person or the dirty bathtub ring of negative vibes they left in your head, bake a cake or a cookie (depending on your eating habits and kitchen skills) and decorate it with this person's name and or likeness. Spend some time really infusing the essence of your feelings about this person into your creation.


Then, take your time and enjoy demolishing this representative receptacle of remediation, focusing on enjoying the flavor and texture of the item as well as the act of "reducing and compressing" the presence of the person in your life. Spend the next few days meditating on how this person is symbolically working their way through your system, giving up to your body and soul any beneficial qualities they may possess while at the same time being quite literally dissolved and pummeled into oblivion by your internal protective and nurturing organs. Your body knows exactly what it needs and what it should "spit out" - let it do the work.


Finally, a day or so later, spend about 15 minutes in your special "meditation cubby" sitting on your marble meditation stool contemplating the final demise of said person and all related icky-ness. Aaaahhhhh! Doesn't that feel better?


Repeat as needed!


Wednesday, August 13, 2008

What if We Limited the Human Population on Earth?

What if we could restrict the figure of world on the Planet? What if we could halt the over reproduction of the African Continent? What if we could maintain the figure of people at a balance or bounds households to one progeny per family? What if we don’t? What if we really make have got 40 Billion people on the planet by 2025 and 60 Billion by 2050? Are those Numbers really sustainable? Volition Mother Nature measure in an bounds us owed to H2O supplies, droughts, World Cycles or plagues? Volition we stop up limiting ourselves owed wars, protectionism or failure to pony up to the escalating possible catastrophe of over population of the Person Race? Can we prehend the twenty-four hours and forestall warfares over water, pandemic Bird Influenza and dwindling world H2O supplies? Are the anticipations right that six and a one-half million world will be life with less than 4 gals of fresh H2O per day? Are we genetically conditioned to cover with this? Can we construct the dams, desalinization works and H2O reservoirs fast adequate to stave in off the world H2O crisis of epic poem proportions? Who is paying for all this? Can the affluent states afford to construct these substructures for free? If so is the World Depository Financial Institution capable of managing it all and if so how will these monies be paid back? And H2O is only one job what about food? Where will be turn the nutrient to feed 60 Billion humans? Here on World and who said the world will not maintain reproducing at 60 Billion, what about the 120 Billion human population anticipations of 2095? Think on this.

Monday, August 11, 2008

Learning a Language: Make It Real and You'll Never Forget It

Sniffing, then squinting and holding up a Chinese Gooseberry fruit a Chinese pupil muttered something Iodine wasn’t certain I wanted to have got translated. A classmate from Federative Republic Of Brazil leaned over, pointing to a photograph in a image dictionary. Two Korean ladies giggled, their hands covering their mouths.

The lesson on nutrient was bombardment large time. When the ESL class ended, none of us were satisfied, but at least the subject had been broached. “Review your vocabulary stuffs before adjacent class”, Iodine encouraged. They were all new to the USA. Some had only been in their new state a few days, others a few weeks. A few for a couple of calendar months or so, but none had yet crossed over into the kingdom of communicating on a day-to-day footing in English. I had to make something to assist my multi-cultural class of ESL pupils start to internalize the language. Thinking back on my ain Gallic linguistic communication fights in City Of Light and Gallic Canada, the reply struck me. The adjacent class Iodine was ready.

“Okay, everybody, let’s go” I requested. They all gave me quizzical looks.

“Where are we going?”

“Just wait. You’ll see.”

Earlier, I’d arranged with the director of a local supermarket located three blocks from where we had our English classes, to convey the 15 grownup scholars for a field trip. Representing Colombia, Brazil, Poland, China, Korea, Puerto Anti-Racketeering Law and Vietnam, the grouping made a funny sight as we stumbled through the leftovers of a week-old snowstorm. Many of them had experienced snowfall for the first time only a substance of years ago. Two of the newly immigrated Chinese work force wore sandals. I kept my remarks on this to myself, confident that they’d larn soon enough. Iodine just hoped they didn’t acquire Pneumonia.

“Okay, where are we?”, I asked.

“La tienda”

“El supermercado”

“store for food”

“big market”

It didn’t take long to recognize that none of them had been in a big supermarket. Mostly they nutrient shopped at small, local grocery store supplies that catered to the taste sensations of their immigrant neighborhoods. Their reactions ranged from daze and incredulity to awe and wonder. There was more than than a small wonder nowadays as well.

For the adjacent 40 proceedings or so with notebooks and authorship pads of paper open, we methodically wandered up one islet and down the other exploring the vocabulary of nutrient and containers presented in former lessons. Stories we swapped in broken English. Anecdotes emerged. One pupil offered to force the shopping cart along to accumulate the points I’d have got to pay for later.

“No, you can’t bargain just one egg”, Iodine explained.

“Back place you can purchase just what you need”, respective pupils responded.

“Two eggs or a cigarette, even a one-half loaf of breadstuff of bread or a cup of rice” they explained as best they could.

They fondled grapes, sniffed, licked and nibbled new fruits, and unusual vegetables like brussel sprouts, pumpkin vine and acorn squash. I bought watermelon, assortments of apples, transcribed goods, jars of sauces, pretzels and pickled commodity to take back to the class for sampling. That class outing used “realia” Oregon existent physical objects, to do the lesson “real” for the learners. It generated discussions, gags and humorous narratives until the following springtime and beyond.

Use existent physical objects and points instead of just images to do your linguistic communication acquisition existent and more than natural. Think of the difference it do to have got a tin or jar of something in your hands versus a image of a tin or jar in a book. Other containers, box, bottle, bag, package, roll, and tube, came alive and were instantly assimilated by scholars who brought in full (or empty) containers of merchandises from their several countries. Try a nearby Menagerie for animals, a museum, a pizza pie shop, the cinema, even a local parkland to take a breath life and world into your foreign linguistic communication classes like we did. Problems? Yes, a few, but you and your pupils will be amazed at the difference it do in internalizing the language. Whether you’re Associate in Nursing EFL or foreign linguistic communication instructor or a linguistic communication learner, using realia will travel a long ways in making your new linguistic communication “real” for you. It’ll be tons of merriment too. I promise.

Saturday, August 09, 2008

The Food Pyramid

Just a few calories ago, the authorities revised the nutrient pyramid. You can see it at http://www.mypyramid.gov/
It have a snazzy new logotype with a stick figure dashing up the Steps To a Healthier You on the side of the pyramid. It’s supposed to be in better melody with our complicated modern life, the up-to-the-minute Scientific Thought, and reflect a custom-made pyramid which better suits our lifestyle, not that there’s anything incorrect with that. They have got an animation, a mini-poster for the art-impaired, and, “a wealthiness of thoughts to assist you acquire started to a healthier diet.”

In better melody – with modern life? Then why a pyramid? Isn’t that Egypto-elitist? Doesn’t that perhaps reflect a suspect cash extract from the traveling industry? How many people will EVER run up a pyramid? And if they do, why aren’t they carrying a six battalion of bottled water? “Water, the Almost Food.” Because the H2O anteroom is weak, that’s why.

See, that’s what’s incorrect with authorities – no large thinkers. All around us we see sellouts and commercialization: Merchandise placement; Endorsements; Co-promotions; Synergism! But makes the authorities see this? Noooo. Instead of cribbing money from this or that entitlement program, why not some good old entrepreneurship in our leadership! What make you believe McDonalds would pay to have got that stickfigure run up the GOLDEN ARCHES?

But I inquire if the Department of Food thought this through? There could be a stickfigure of a ma in a stick minivan (note: sell avant garde logo) or a cat carrying a laptop computing machine (note: sell computer logo) racing to catch a railroad train (note: place Amtrak logo), while talking on his cellphone (note: sell cellphone logo). Boggles the mind, doesn’t it? think of the monetisation possibilities which could all travel to reducing the budget deficit!

And while we are free-thinking here, why not travel wild and sell advertisement space on the one, five and 10 dollar bill? Some tribunal is going to hit down In Supreme Being We Trust anyway. Consider: “Reach Out and Touch Person – AT&T.” Wouldn’t they pay a billion for umpteen gazillion impressions? And here’s the best portion – those measures have got a limited lifetime. The exchequer is ALWAYS taking old worn out 1s out of the supply and printing new ones. How many OTHER advertizers would wait in LINE? What make you believe Target would pay to replace that odd oculus and trigon with the Target logotype bullseye? And why show an old edifice on the rear of the $10? Why not demo the up-to-the-minute Las Vegas resort? Keep the Eagle. What make you believe PETSMART would pay for a small banner?

But back to the Food Pyramid. Why not monetize “calories”? What would McDonalds pay to change the word to “McNutrients?”

Of course, we’d demand an Office of Promotional Tie-In. I believe $500,000,000 would acquire it kick started. Hey, why make we necessitate zeros? They could just as well be bantam Target logos.

Thursday, August 07, 2008

Karla Darocas: Artist, Entrepeneur, and Canuck Expatriate in Spain

I had an chance to ran into Karla last twelvemonth on one of my trips to Spain. My interview preview will give you a spot of background on our meeting. Karla is a absorbing individual, a painter, author and overall originative person, but also an enterpriser with a spot of an option flair. Here is what she have to state about her experience as a North American exile life in Spain.

1. State us a spot about your background. Where did you turn up, what is your educational background and what did you make before you moved to Spain?

I was born in Toronto and raised in a little provincial town called Bowmanville – just east of Toronto. I moved back to Toronto after high school and attended Humber College in Rexdale where I studied originative humanistic discipline – like manner design, picture taking and writing. After college, I opened my first endeavor – a dress shop in Toronto’s voguish Queen St. country – that sold eldritch and fantastic wearable fine art objects.

I sold that concern in 1983 and went to the University of Waterloo where I received an honours grade degree in Fine Arts. I graduated in 1990 – and started my 2nd endeavor – called Zone Communications. It was a communication theory company – and Iodine jumped into the cyberspace with both feet. I went on to construct my first Internet endeavor – which I sold to a Golden State company in 2000. I lived in sunny southern Golden State after the sale of my endeavor – until the New House Of York World Trade Centre calamity – September 2001.

I packed up everything and went back to Bowmanville. Then 10 old age later – Iodine packed some points and flew to Zurich, Swiss Confederation and married my long-time Spanish fellow – World Health Organization had been working in Zurich for 8 years. We packed up his flat – and by December 2001 – Christmastide – we moved to Spain.

2. You now dwell on the Costa Blanca in Spain. How long have got got you lived there and what made you travel there?

We have been here since December 2001. We didn’t cognize where we were going to dwell – so the first logical place to travel was to where Jose, my hubby was born – Xativa. This is a castled metropolis in the inside of the state of Valencia. We lived there for 6 months. We were unemployed and free to go around Kingdom Of Spain – as it was our honeymoon. We bought a 4x4 and traveled up mounts and down into vales and places that no tourist would ever believe of going.

However, we really wanted to travel out to the seashore – to the sea. We had met in a fishing / vacation small town called Javea – back in 1988 – when I was a University student. I came to Kingdom Of Spain twice – on pupil loans – to survey fine art at the Prado in Madrid. Then, I would head out to the seashore to party and hit the beaches.

My Spanish sweetheart was a server in a mulct small eating house called – Elevation Solomilllo – right on the beach. We drop into a crazy sort of love – and exhausted two wild summertimes together. We kept in touching for the adjacent old age though a friend – until the Internet was developed.

When we came to see Javea from Xativa we establish an old friend, Carmelo. He gave my hubby a occupation and we moved over to the coast. We now do Benitachell our place – which is only five proceedings from Javea.

3. What is it like to dwell in Spain? What are the chief cultural differences between life in North United States and life in Spain? What was the accommodation form like initially when you moved there?

Spain is an old culture, full of natural passion, tragedy, love and a captivation with the macabre. It takes some time to acquire used to the bosom nature of the people. They are a state of huggers and kissers. In North American civilization where a handshake is normal to greet people, here in Kingdom Of Spain it is a clinch and a buss on both cheeks. This is standard for work force and women. No 1 ever believes that you are cheery because you are kissing a member of the same sex. This is a cockamamie notion.

Spain is a noisy country. They have got a great love of fireworks. Motorcycles make not have got silencers and they boom like large animals through the streets. People don’t talking to each other – they yell. A North American would believe that fighting is taking place in a barroom when the Spanish acquire going. But they are not fighting, this is normal communications.

Spain is a unsafe country. Every criminal who flees persecution in their ain state come ups to Spain. Every type of rabble is here, Russians, Romanians, Italians, Yugoslavians… Asset every slayer soldier left over from some Central European war. Terrorism have been a common scenario in Kingdom Of Spain thanks to the Basque breakaway motion (which learned everything they cognize from Canada’s FLQ). Every week, an unknown region organic structure will demo up dead in a ditch owed to some Columbian drug payment that didn’t acquire paid.

Drinking and Drive in Kingdom Of Spain is normal. Death is inexpensive on the motorways. Every weekend households state adieu to loved 1s as the jaws of decease scraping the mangled organic structures of immature and old from a twined up piece of metallic element that used to be a car. Beer is not considered a unsafe drink, yet it have a 5% alcoholic beverage content. If you make demand to acquire one you can travel through the Drive-Thru window at your nighest McDonalds. Both wine and liquor are very inexpensive in Kingdom Of Spain – so it is an alcoholic’s dreaming come up true.

Smoking is not prohibited and cigarets are very cheap. Everyone here starts smoking at a very immature age. The women remain nice and thin as they don’t eat, they just smoke. Everyone have black circles under their eyes. The premix of the inexpensive brandy and inexpensive cigarets makes for very fetid people.

4. You have got now spent respective old age living in Spain. What places have got you seen? What festivals have got you experienced? What gastronomic pleasances have got you enjoyed?

Our front-runner festival is the Fallas Festival in Valencia. We look forward to the first two hebdomads of March with such as passion. It is the most astonishing festival both visually and emotionally. The combination of fine art and fire, noise and danger – it all come ups together in this festival.

We have got so many front-runner nutrients – like paella and sausages packed with porc and mountain grown herb. We love flan and rice puddings. We love all types of seafood and fresh veggies from the market.

5. You are always involved in a assortment of endeavours. State us about the assorted websites you are working on.

My hubby and I seek and maintain all of our of import information on our ain website – http://www.darocas.com/ - this is where I maintain path of my pictures too. Then, I have got another website called http://www.spainlifestyle.com/ where I hive away my Hagiographa and verse forms and photographs of the renovations on our house. Then, we have got another site called http://www.spainphotos.net/ where we hive away our Spanish escapade photos.

6. In improver to web sites, you also take part in respective concern organizations. What are they and what is your role?

http://www.palomera.com/ is a website that seeks out and paths what the Spanish concern community is doing and we can watch concern trends.

Last year, I started a concern baseball club for women – which have grown and we are actually hosting International Women’s Day. It just travels to demo the powerfulness of women to do something out of nothing. This is a baseball club of international women who have got come up to dwell on this coast. The website is http://www.wibc-spain.com/

7. Obviously both you and your hubby have got a strong entrepreneurial orientation. You are now also involved in a undertaking that affects a extravagance Canadian cedar tree log place development in Spain. State us more than about that project.

We both love wood homes. The places in Kingdom Of Spain are made from cement – so they be given to be cool in summer, which is good, but during winter and the stormy season cement places are damp, cold and clammy. They are always full of cement dust and if they don’t acquire adequate sun they acquire moldy.

The Spanish don’t have got a good apprehension of wood place edifice but the many of immigrants from England, France, Switzerland, Federal Republic Of Germany and so forth love their wood homes. So I hooked up with some old university friends from Canada who designing and construct wood places in order to be able to offer a Canadian cedar tree log place to the Spanish landscape and marketplace. We are currently working on a undertaking with a Spanish developer to construct the first wooden place community in Spain. That website is called http://www.spainloghomes.com/

8. In improver to your entrepreneurial ventures, you are also an artist. State us a spot about your artistic background and the originative enterprises you are involved in now.

I love to paint. I had not done it for many old age owed to being so involved with the cyberspace industry. When we moved here I was so happy to acquire back to my passionateness and usage my accomplishments that I developed at university. Now, I paint to delight myself but the pictures sell very easily to people buying new villas or to tourists.

9. Talk to us about the exile experience in Spain. Where make community of aliens live, how make they interact, what types of concern and activities are they involved in, and how have that changed the country?

The coastlines of Kingdom Of Spain are turning into very international communities. It reminds me of what Golden State and Sunshine State must have got been like back in the 60’s and 70’s. Every retired individual from northern Europe is moving to Kingdom Of Spain for the sun and sea.

They are bringing their cultural premix and adding it to the Spanish culture. The remainder of Kingdom Of Spain is changing too – for the good and for the bad. There are more than societal reforms happening in Kingdom Of Spain now – for women and for labor and societal welfare. The new authorities is immature and progressive.

The bad side is that the advancement is too fast and the natural beauty and landscape is being filled up with cement houses looking like low cost housing, but as vacation places they are fetching a immense price. This rising prices is eating away at the mediocre in this state and now immature Spanish people are looking at an epoch where they will not be able to purchase a home.

10. What advice would give to person else who is considering moving to Spain?

Don’t’ move to Kingdom Of Kingdom Of Spain unless you are willing to be flexible. There is nil stable about this state and perhaps there never will be. If you are rich, and can dwell off a pension and golf game mundane you will be fine. If you believe you can travel to Kingdom Of Spain and acquire a occupation bury it. However, if you are an enterpriser and can see the holes in the marketplace and you have got the backbone and know-how to fill up the hole you will be fine.

Thanks, Karla, for sharing your points of view and experiences. I appreciate your insider’s penetrations into a civilization that have fascinated me for a long time. Good fortune with your enterprises in Spain!

Wednesday, August 06, 2008

Tupac Shakur - A Short Biography - African American Entertainer

Tupac Shakur was a very influential individual in 20th century USA. He was born on
June 16, 1971 in Brooklyn New York, and died on September 13, 1996 in Las Vegas
Silver State (unknown author, no title, no page, missive codification C). But his household moved
around a batch while he was a child (Bastin, J.D.). He eventually ended up in the
Bay Area Golden State alone and spent his first two old age there stateless (unknown
author, no title, n.p., missive codification D). He grew up with lone his ma and loved
her very much. He even wrote a song called Dear Mama to his ma and thanked her
for how she tried her best at raising him.

His public calling started when he joined the seminal Bay Area blame ensemble
(u.a., “original area,” n.p.). He started as a tour professional dancer but then started
rapping unrecorded (u.a., “original area,” n.p.). From there he released a couple
record albums and then was offered to be in some movies. He became friends with a
couple of popular blame people like Snoop Pooch Dogg and Dr. Dre (Placid n.p.). He made some songs and music videos with them that made it large on the Billboard
charts. This really helped his popularity. He released a dual cadmium with the
songs on it and a batch of his ain songs and sold billions of transcripts (u.a., n.t.,
n.p. missive codification D) More people were influenced to purchase his CD. People listened
to the music and did what he said he did. So Tupac was influencing all of these
people.

Tupac was rich and celebrated now. He was showing off his ain style now and didn’t
demand his popular friends. This is the time that many people saw the existent Tupac
and loved him. He was now very influential to fans. They wanted to be just like
him. He starred in more than movies and could be who he really was. He did a batch of
interviews that showed his beliefs. He said ego regard and ego regard was
very of import and said “I experience as though I am a shining prince just like
Malcolm and feel that all of us are shining princes, and if we dwell like shining
princes, then whatever we desire can be ours. Anything.” (Patrick, Tony, n.p.) And
when he states all of us, he intends all men. He also said he doesn’t attention if
person is achromatic or black. And no 1 can be judged by their skin. “So just
because it’s Black don’t mean value value it’s cool, and just because it’s White Person don’t mean
it’s evil.”(Patrick, Tony n.p.) If he judged a man, he judged them by what they
make to or how they handle others. Tupac wasn’t racis! deoxythymidine monophosphate against any body. And he showed that. I’ve seen him handle everyone equal that
I see him with on television or even on movies. This is an influence because since
people desire to be like him, they will follow his beliefs. And if Tupac believes
in non-racism, then the people will believe in that too.

This is a large difference from him and other blame artists. A batch of others are
racist to different people, and the different people then don’t similar him, don’t
listen to his music, don’t see his movies, and aren’t influenced by him. Almost
all races listen to Tupac’s music. I’ve known Mexican, White, Black, Asian,
Indian, and even Pakistani people who listened to his music and are influenced
and are moved by him. I’ve even saw a show in Capital Of Singapore about music here and a
Singaporean child said he listens to Tupac.

Tupac have a batch of self-values that he follows. He even said it’s difficult
sometimes, but he maintains it up. He said “To Maine it’s really distressing because I
look over what’s successful - Marky Mark, Hammer, Vanilla Ice, New Kids on the
Block merchandising twenty-two 1000000 copies, and I desire that so badly, but I can’t
make that. I would be incorrect to make that, knowing what I cognize and having the encephalon
that I have, for me to even travel and compose some simple crap would be incorrect even
though I would acquire paid and I would acquire more than people's money.” (Patrick, Tony,
n.p.) This agency that Tupac have a strong volition and values. He resisted the
enticement to compose some easy rhyming words and acquire peoples money. He instead
followed his values and worked up to his potential.

He states he also believes in Karma (Bastin, J.D., n.p.). That what come ups around
travels around. And he said he believes in reincarnation too. He desires to be a good
adult male in this life, because he said he knew he was going to decease soon (Bastin,
J.D., n.p.) and wanted to be ready for the adjacent life. The ground Tupac gives for
the ground he do his music is not only for the money, but so people would
cognize what it was like for him growing up. He also wanted to be remembered. He
said “I would rather travel forth something so that when people pick up 2Pacalypse Now
or any of my other record albums in 1999, they'll go, 'Damn! Brothers had it hard back
in the day, but blood brothers were working it out.” (Patrick, Tony, n.p.)

He said his music is spiritual: a small like gospels, but with a different thought
in mind. And that his music was not meant to be danced to, but just to be
listened to. His music was for the strong willed (Patrick, Tony, n.p.). He demoes
his difficult life through his music “Which observes violent rebelliousness of a society
viewed as largely racist and lethal” (Patrick, Tony, n.p.).

I believe Tupac influenced most of the people that listen to his music. People
start to get dressed like him and talking like him if they see him on music videos
vocalizing his latest song. They could also listen to the things that Tupac states he
does, and then make those things themselves. I trust his values and beliefs in a
non-racial world also act upon people. He makes state some bad things, but he did
pass 11 and a one-half calendar months in a maximum-security jailhouse for something he
claims he never did and states that he was framed for (Placid, Sylvester n.p.). He
also spent two old age of his life homeless person (u.a., n.t., n.p. missive codification D) and
grew up having it hard to suit in(u.a., n.t, n.p., missive codification B). Tupac was not
a normal man, but he was still trying to direct a good message to the youth’s that
listened and still make listen to his music.

He also influenced many hereafter and present blame artists. Biggie Smallz for
illustration sounded just like Tupac, and used the same voice tones of voice as Tupac. I’ve
also heard about five other songs that steal the backgrounds to Tupac’s songs. And if there are that many impersonators now, there will definitely be a batch in the
future.

One of the grounds he was so influential is because he showed his existent ego to
the world through interviews, music videos, movies, his music, and his poetry. He showed his positions on the world unlike most other blame artists. Another ground
is because people liked his positions and liked his non-racial ways. People liked
the manner he sung about existent subjects. Not like the others who sing about nil
much, and then acquire all the money they can. Also his alone style of mixing new
sounds for a new beat really detached his music from others. He didn’t usage
traditional beats that people acquire tired of. He added a turn to blame and hip-hop
music all together. And brought a batch of people to wish that.

“Tupac was one of blames most controversial and influential performers” (“tupac”
n.p.). “Tupac Amaur Shakur left a distinct impact on American civilization that is
still being shown today” (u.a., n.t., n.p. missive codification D) He was one of the most
influential people in the 20th century America. And I believe he will be
remembered and loved by a batch for old age to come. He have served and will function as
a function theoretical account for little children growing up today.

Monday, August 04, 2008

Twisted Sisters

I tried not to tilt against anything. Leaning, I Feared, would give the incorrect impression. It could look too casual. Sitting was also not an option. I also did my degree best not to do oculus contact. This was harder than it sounds. When you are surrounded by people with teething that resembles broken lookout fencings and forearms adorned with jailhouse house style tattoos (some apparently made by carving forms into the tegument then pouring Republic Of India ink into the wound) it’s very hard to look anywhere other than their eyes. Fear causes this.

The name of the barroom was “Twisted Sisters.” I’m serious. I wouldn’t prevarication about something this deep. The place was run by two small old ladies with deeply wrinkled faces and Uncle Tom Waits voices. When they handed you a mugful of suds the obligatory “Here ya’ travel hon” came in a voice that sounded like it was sculpted by inexpensive score and cigarillos.

The place was peopled by supernumeraries from “Hells Angels on Wheels” and every bad prison house film ever made. This adult female kept bumping into me. She was medium height, slender, had long brownish hair and three teeth. Her face looked a small like it had caught fire and some lovingness individual had tried to set it out with an ax. Every time we collided I apologized nervously and she walked away. From behind she could have got been Girl America. I swear.

I was in this honkytonk because my old brother Potato had invited me. Murphy’s the type of cat who actually basks this kind of thing. The chap is something of an enigma. He looks like he belongs in the dorsum room of a place like Twined Sisters, but those who cognize him cognize of his Masters grade and the old age he spent instruction at community college. Murphy’s A tough guy; did a small stretch in prison house and another in the navy. Then he used the gilbert measure to obtain an education. Now he hangs out in places like this.

Murphy kept buying me suds and trying to acquire me to speak to the other patrons. I busied myself pretending to be an anthropologist studying some alien tribe. I didn’t belong, but maybe I could larn something.

I had just started on another suds when person dropped a few coins in the juke box. The music was bad country. To my arrant disgust the first song that played was that “I wanna stick a boot up your butt” super-patriotic, ultra-jingoist thing by the cat in the John Ford motortruck commercials. The people around me began to sing along loudly.

What the hell? Why would these people, this underclass, this despised minority, experience a affinity with a vocalist that stands for the right wing position quo? Shouldn’t these cats be hearing to Steppenwolf (or at least Eminem)? Lets face it, the chief watercourse of United States doesn’t hang out in places like this. In fact, most suburban center class louts would prefer that these people simply disappear from the planet. So why would the clients at Twined Sisters acquire behind this new super nationalism? This was like seeing Judaic children vocalizing Germany Uber Alles, for god’s sake.

I decided to carry on a small experiment. I sauntered (or tried to saunter, it’s difficult to truly saunter when you fear that you could be shivved at any moment, or worse: have got your glasses broken) to the juke box and looked over the selections. I was hoping for Randy Paul Newman or David Bruce Cockburn or maybe even the Dead Kennedys. No such as luck. Then I saw it. A cadmium by The Confederacy Chicks. I dropped my money and chose four songs by the Dixters (I can’t bear to type “Dixie Chicks” More than once... Damn. I just did it twice). Then I went back to my topographic point near Potato and waited.

When my songs started I half expected a public violence to begin. I thought that if these folks loved that John Ford motortruck cat they might rebellion at the musical stylings of those un-American girls. That didn’t happen. After the first few parallel bars person started to sing along. Then a 2nd voice joined in. Then a third. After a minute or so everyone in the place was vocalizing along with these treasonists with the same ardor and joyousness they had exhibited in response to that earlier song.

I quickly came to a startling conclusion: people will sing along to anything. The content of the song doesn’t matter. Politics simply don’t come in into it. People are really singing along to the melody, or the bass line or something. What the words actually intend is immaterial.

A small future Iodine waved my manus around in presence of my face to unclutter some of the fume and give myself a line of sight. I drained my suds and told Potato that I had to bail. He slapped me on the dorsum and headed toward the old scarred pool table. As I walked out into the sunlight I was thinking that I’d never have got to see the interior of that place again.

Saturday, August 02, 2008

Canadian Urban Legend Wes 'MAESTRO' Williams - Still Bringing the Music to Us After All These Years

MAESTRO have evolved past his “Let Your Anchor Slide” days, but people still associate him with his first hit 15 old age ago. Bashes that trouble oneself him? No way! For maestro it is through his achievements as an creative person that he have evolved and looks fondly back on his early old age with pride.

To day of the month no 1 have exceeded the degrees of achievements that maestro have achieved. To date, 7 music awards, 7 albums, 11 Juno nominations, Gold and Platinum albums, Gold singles and a mixture of other awardings in film/T.V and personal achievements. All of this, plus a movie and telecasting career? No wonderment his up-to-the-minute record album is called Urban Landmark 1989-2005 - it’s obvious he have made his mark, now let’s see where he travels from here!

One of my very first interviews on radiocommunication was with MAESTRO, back when I was working at House Of York University radio, he was a particular invitee on a show called, “ The Cutting Edge”. I realized back then after our little hr together on the show, that this is one Hell of a passionate man! He is passionate about what he does, whom he talks to, what he affects himself with and most of all passionate about MUSIC. It is the same passionateness I saw and felt when we (Liesa Jessye Norman and I) sat down with him the twenty-four hours before his cadmium release party. He truly is “conductin’ thangs” now more than than ever, his life a full blown “Symphony inch Effect” - just travels to demo you he is “Built to Last”

HAVIN’ words WITH WES

You look to have got a love matter with Canadian modern-day and stone artists? This is not the norm attack to hip hop is it?

WES- Janet Jackson sampled Joni Mitchell, that is a batch farther apart than me, a Canadian artists, sampling another Canadian artist. See?

Yes, but you are the lone 1 that have been acknowledged for doing it.

WES- No, Bloated Members did it too, but not a batch of people cognize they did a path with Sarah MacLachlan that was HOT. This was off their last album…..I don’t cognize WHY those cats did not make it the single, it was so hot!

To day of the month you have got worked “with” HAYWIRE, guess WHO and now Gowan!

WES- It is just something I like to do. Take Canadian stone records and just revamp them. Iodine have got these albums, I like them- I accumulate them.

So, within the song that you are listening to, you hear another song?

Orlena, Hip Hop up n'comer Subliminal, Liesa WES- yeah, yeah. Like when I heard “Stick to Your Vision” (track off his last album, that sampled The Guess Who’s - These Eyes)- I was like….Whooooo! That was a nice brooding song to speak about what you been through and inspirational at the same time.

So that was a favourite?

WES- Hell, yeah! (chuckles)

Lyrically make you happen that the words come up first or makes the music?

WES- There is no specific formula. A conception may come up first and then the music after. You cognize I never seek to absorb - I seek to innovate.

So your up-to-the-minute track, Criminal Mind with Larry Gowan- was that something that you heard within the song, or was that something you conceptualized on your own?

(l-r) Orlena, Actor-Richard Leacock, Liesa WES- Nah. It was more than like the original version was talking about being a criminal and having a criminal mind. I had the return on it of the justness system being more than criminal. But, at the same time, we as a community not being in a place where we are more than followers, rather than being the leadership that we should be. In life you have got to be a leader and stop MAKING excuses for whatever! With the song I just set my ain small spin on it. What I love is that Randy Bachman and Larry Gowan, both similar what I did with the song.

Were you in the studio with Larry Gowan?

WES- Nah. I was in his life room when I played him the path when it was done and I saw the hair base up on his arms. Then we went downstairs to watch his video from Criminal Mind and then my new one, that he is in. The video is full rotation now - it’s just BANANAS!

Do you happen the force is accurate to what the mass media portrays? Or make you really experience that there is a rush of force within minorities?

The Showstoppers(ctre) Maestro

and Kardinal Offishall WES- Yeah, Yeah (as he sighs). It is a spot of both. A spot of sensationalism still happens though. But, to me it is awkward for all people that we transport on like that with each other. We don’t have got to be like that. We have got lost our ability to “talk” to one another. My inquiry is how did the guns acquire here in the first place? Who is bringing them into the country? That is the last line in my song Criminal Mind. I come up from a good place and I trust that people gravitate toward what it is that I am doing.

The album, which came out August 23, have got 5 new hits?

WES- The record record album makes not really have five NEW hits, but 5 previously unreleased songs. These paths have got been out before, but just on radiocommunication and more than as singles that were unavailable for purchase.

Well, your top hits album, is going screen the span of your calling - are you prepared to make any of those moves you used to spin around for “Let your Anchor Slide”.

R&B Sweetheart Melanie DurrantWES- Ohio yeah. I am going to have got a full-blown show! Choreography, the works..it is going to be hot to death!

You are still hot to decease after all these years. You still have got the same febricity and spirit that you had when you were younger. It is good to see! What are you listening to in your auto right now? Bash you have got any music influences?

WES- Right now I am listening to myself (outbreak of laughter from us all). I have got got my show cadmium in and I am practicing that over and over again.

Laughter aside, you have a repute to upkeep, if you don’t come up right you cognize people are going to be authorship about it! Watching and waiting for you to fall..or just all off the stage!

What a night!WES- That’s fine…watch…just maintain watching!

We will!

FYI- The adjacent twenty-four hours maestro came with it and blew the roof off the mod CLUB! The place was packed, people were bumpin’ to his hits and when he allow us have got the concluding track…it was all over. Hey! When maestro left the phase - everyone else left.