Jason doing his best impersonation of
“The Blair Witch Project.”

The Ghost Train through Stanley Park was more goofy than spooky, more cheesy than chilling, but it was a good excuse to go out with friends for Halloween.

Eliza, Tom, me

Jason and Eliza

My friend Lisa is caught in the middle of the fires raging in Southern California at the moment.

She says they’re tense, but coping. Freeways, schools, county offices, and many stores are closed and ash covers everything. The air quality is terrible and she says they have to wear masks even though they don’t make much difference. They’ve packed up their things so they can evacuate if necessary. They’re suffering from headaches, sore throats, and burning eyes. She says the authorities think they’ll have the fire north of them contained by Saturday, the one south by Nov. 4.

Fires Continue to Ravage Southern California (washingtonpost.com)

I’m listening to Prince’s “Purple Rain” at the moment and lamenting over his conversion to the Jehovah’s Witnesses. There goes all his creative energy. Yesterday I received a random phone call from a Jehovah’s Witness and was surprised that they’ve expanded from handing out pamphlets on the streets to phoning people at home. Maybe they’ve done this for years and I just haven’t been “lucky” enough to get a call. Highly doubtful, though, since I’ve been working from home for years now, so I’d be an easy target. My number’s even in the book — I haven’t resorted to my little trick in the past of listing my phone number under a different name to avoid the ex-directory charge. The Caller ID device is a pretty good filter as it is.

The Jehovah’s Witness guy wasn’t pushy, though, to his credit. When I was a teenager and they’d ring my parents’ bell, it took a lot more effort to get rid of them. This guy kept it short and to the point.

Now, if Prince had phoned me, would he be short and to the point?

Ananova - October 15, 2003

Watchtower’s press clipping from USA Today, 2001

Lay off 1,000 people in New York on Monday to open a new call centre across the continent in a Vancouver suburb in April.

J.P. Morgan Chase to shut U.S. call centre, moving jobs to B.C.

I’m surprised the second largest American bank would make such a move. It’s a vote of non-confidence in the U.S. economy.

Hmmmm….. The White House whine: ‘It’s all the media’s fault’ | csmonitor.com

Maddy actually turned 2 last Wednesday, but we postponed the celebration until Sunday, when I was able to put the books aside for some F-U-N.

Ofoto Photos

Am I a Michael Moore fan? I wouldn’t call myself that. Heaven forbid that I should call myself a fan of anybody. That said, I find it difficult sometimes to get past his style to get to his substance. But kudos to anyone who takes risks to state opinions that challenge the status quo. Being of an incurably curious nature, I decided to go to Seattle to check out Michael Moore live, to follow up on his words since the brouhaha of Bowling for Columbine.

I enjoyed Bowling for Columbine. Was it entertaining? Hell yes. Did I think it deserved an Oscar on its own merits as a documentary? Hell no. But it led to an opportunity for Michael Moore to be in front of a microphone at what could very well be called the throne of undeserved self-congratulatory spectacle — the Academy Awards. For that I say give the man an Oscar! The Academy Awards needs humour and chutzpah!

Kevin dropped off my car in the morning, and I decided to drive it down to Seattle. After introducing May to the weekend hangout Bon’s on Broadway ($2.95 all-day breakfast), she and I hit the road. At the border we were unlucky enough to get randomly selected for an agricultural search, which meant they took their sweet-ass time ransacking the car, but it was already a mess so I wasn’t concerned. At least they didn’t take it apart, looking for marijuana or gay marriage licenses or any one of the many other vestiges of abhorrent liberal-mindedness that some Americans find somewhat loathesome in us. (Not that they’d find any of that stuff, anyway.) But the border was otherwise fairly uneventful — in this case a good thing — and the U.S. Immigration guy had no idea who Michael Moore was. I have long ago learned to reign in my sarcasm with immigration officers, but I did have the tiniest of urges to play around with this guy and say something like Michael Moore was a good friend of Osama…

Anyway, the drive felt easy and the weather was impeccable… traffic heading into Seattle was heavy, so we ended up getting to the Paramount with less time to spare than we’d anticipated. But it was all good: the show itself was entertaining and definitely worth the trip. I was wondering if the show would resemble an evangelical revivalist meeting — after all, wasn’t Michael Moore preaching to the converted?? Instead of hallelujahs and amens, it would be rousing applause. I couldn’t imagine Republicans or conservatives paying their hard-earned corporate dollars to listen to Michael Moore’s political diatribes in person, but partway through the show he asked if there were any conservatives there, and one brave soul did identify himself.

I’ll get into the details of the show (and our evening that followed) later, but for now I’ll post some links of e-pinions:

Shame on You, Michael Moore : Vancouver Indymedia

Moore’s Oscar Speech - Mark Caro, Chicago Tribune, Tuesday, March 25, 2003

BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE - Documentary or Fiction? - David T. Hardy

Michael Moore responds to attacks

Allan phoned me after Cheryl’s ultrasound yesterday, and they are expecting TWINS in March!!

I’m researching double strollers and equipment for twins. I will probably do a trip down to the U.S. after Christmas for a week and bring back some stuff using duty-free allowance. One possibility is to drive down the coast to San Francisco again like I did in 2000. That way I’ve got a trunk to put this stuff in.

If anyone has any ideas, I’d love to hear them!

The paper’s been faxed and now I can… ?? sleep?? eat?? I’m so lost!!

What???? Ananova - Elliott Smith dead at 34 of apparent ’suicide’