Sunday afternoon food groups: nuts and jelly beans
I have to pick up patients at 7am for their 8am chemo appointments, so I’ll leave this post extremely brief but loaded with calories. After the cupcakes in the last post, it was more sugar on the brain while editing these photos of cakes and desserts and jelly beans.
sweet gifts
guess how many?
my weakness: cookies!
And on a related note, if I could be reincarnated, I would come back sounding like this — Chanda Rule covering Nina Simone’s song of the title:
I’ve had a productive day of editing work, and now I’m a little brain-dead. So I leave you with a video that I tweeted a while back but wanted to show, because of its storytelling. Even if you aren’t a fan of Robyn’s music (I only know her from the ’90s, her sound is different now), it’s worth a 3-minute look.
I first wrote about Amy Winehouse back in May 2007 after I heard her on CBC. I bought “Back To Black” and listened to it countless times on road trips that summer. This song is from her first album, “Frank”, when she was younger and her voice sounds quite different.
This song, “Stronger Than Me”, is from when Amy Winehouse was around 19. No beehive hairdo, not a tattoo in sight. She looks healthy. Parts of the video are amusing to me, probably because it reminds me of when I was 18-22: liberal amounts of youthful stupidity. It’s a lifestyle far, far removed from the here-and-now but I still remember it well.
During this time I lived briefly with drug addicts — in Australia, and in Scotland. It’s because of these experiences that I can never chime in with the internet chorus that’s always ready to condemn and send these people off to their graves. There is no compassion from the smug who can never imagine what it’s like to be addicted, until one day when someone they know — maybe even a relative or a friend — becomes “one of those people”.
This is not about just another celebrity unable to handle fame, it’s about a young human being losing control but who wasn’t strong enough to get it back. Mocking the weak does nothing for society, it just makes us look like jackals.
I don’t know how Amy Winehouse died (and might I remind the internet that nobody else knows for sure, either), but people have already assumed it was a drug overdose. Maybe it was suicide. Maybe her heart just stopped.
The only thing I do know is that there won’t be any more music from her, and that’s everyone’s loss.
Not all addicts have Amy’s incredible talent. Or Kurt’s or Jimi’s or Janis’s, some people just get the affliction. All we can do is adapt the way we view this condition, not as a crime or a romantic affectation but as a disease that will kill. We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care.
Loved these two! David was always a big fan of jug bands, and he introduced an appreciation for them to me. Check them out online: www.jitterbugswing.com
Roaming performers at the Place des Arts:
Saxophonist Allan McLean with the Jacek Kochan Quartet:
Childhood living is easy to do
The things you wanted I bought them for you
Graceless lady, you know HOW I am
You know I can’t let you slide through my hands
Wild horses couldn’t drag me away
Wild, wild horses, couldn’t drag me away
I watched you suffer a dull aching pain
Now you’ve decided to show me the same
But no sweet, vain exits or offstage lines
Could make me feel bitter or treat you unkind
Wild horses couldn’t drag me away
Wild, wild horses, couldn’t drag me away
I know I dreamed you a sin and a lie
I have my freedom, but I don’t have much time
Faith has been broken, tears must be cried
Let’s do some living after love dies
Wild horses couldn’t drag me away
Wild, wild horses, we’ll ride them some day
Wild horses couldn’t drag me away
Wild, wild horses, we’ll ride them some day
Greg recorded/posted this video to YouTube on September 4, 2007, just a few weeks before he died in a motorcycle accident in Lisbon at the age of 28. I moved mountains trying to get to his funeral, but in the end my passport renewal timing worked against me (it didn’t arrive in time to catch my flight), and instead of attending a funeral in France my car broke down in Bath, New York.
For two years, since before the time David entered cancer treatment, Greg was a consistent presence in our online lives: email, Skype, messages, doing whatever he could to stay in touch. He was in the same online community (Orkut) where David and I had met, but we hadn’t met him yet. We’d been planning a honeymoon in Europe that included a stop in Lisbon, where he was living at the time with his Estonian wife.
Greg was an exceptionally talented guy, an artist: musician (guitar, piano), photographer, designer, an expert in post-production just like David, and would communicate with us in these ways. In the second half of 2005 he sent us messages of encouragement, prank Photoshopped photos, music files, and kept reaching out to us. After David died, he tried to Skype with me all through 2006, but I was depressed and didn’t feel like talking. In 2007 Greg was still living the good life in Lisbon — surfing, always going out, busy. But he hadn’t given up trying to get me to visit Portugal. Greg loved it there, and he thought I’d love it, too, but I don’t think I was in the right headspace to enjoy it properly yet.
By Summer 2007, after my trip to Iceland, I was beginning to live outside of my head again and Greg was finally able to persuade me to Skype with him. I don’t have a webcam on the PowerBook G4, so it was just me viewing him and me on a microphone. He played a Damien Rice song on his guitar and we talked for at least an hour, maybe even two. I lost track — there was a lot to say. There is no archive of that Skype session, but what I would give to live it again… by coincidence, it was exactly four years ago now and all I remember is the good feeling afterward, that we could talk about David and me and finally make some plans for me to visit him in Portugal and get a taste of his life.
And then, in the early hours of September 29, Greg lost his life. I later realized exactly where I was at the same time when the accident happened in Lisbon, five time zones away. I was also driving around, but in Pennsylvania, in the pitch dark rural roads of Lake Wallenpaupack, searching for the way to my friends’ house. I was overtired, driving after work from Toronto like I always do, and nothing looked familiar. I was running out of fuel and I couldn’t find a station that was open. It was the middle of the night. I’d been lost for over an hour but I didn’t want to call and wake anyone up. I was in the danger zone for being able to drive. For the first time ever, I made the decision to find a place to pull over in the blackness and sleep by the side of the road. Meanwhile, Greg was in Lisbon after a night out with friends and faced the same decision — stop or go — but he chose to go, to ride his motorcycle home. From what his friend told me, Greg likely fell asleep at the wheel and was killed on impact.
That was a huge wake-up call for me. Pun intended. Since 2007, I have pulled over and slept in my car many times on the long distance trips I’ve taken since. Most of them have been 8-10 hours of driving in a single stretch, more than most people attempt. I used to push through the sleep barrier, but I don’t anymore. Last December, when it turned out I had pneumonia, I slept in the car at a service plaza along the New York Thruway for four hours with the engine running until the snowplows woke me up.
I think about Greg from time to time, especially when people search for him online and find my website, which shows in my stats. I also think of him in random moments: whenever I see Sony Alpha DSLRs, guys playing guitars, motorcycles, maps of Estonia, surfing, and other disconnected things. When I think of Greg I can’t help but think of Portugal. He was from France, but he really loved Portugal. I’m sure my subconscious (and Greg) has been prodding me to go ever since, and this year I finally listened.
I kept my promise, Greg. Wild horses couldn’t drag keep me away.
I wanted to post a better-quality videoclip of Frankie Chavez playing live since my little digicam did a rubbish job of capturing the sound and video from his performance last Saturday. The guy deserves better! He brought five guitars on stage with him and played them all, including a Portuguese guitar that I was told was meant for fado (the traditional Portuguese mournful music). It’s the third photo below. Opinions were split among our group whether this went over well, but to each his own. Personally, I love guitar and to see someone playing five different ones is a treat, especially since it was my birthday*.
However, I’m a huge dork about obeying the “no photography” rule at concerts — I get easily embarrassed if I’m scolded about breaking rules so it takes a lot for me to break them, even if I’m surrounded by people completely ignoring them. Remember the Sistine Chapel a couple of years ago? Everyone was taking photos, but it still took me ages to actually bring out my camera.
Well, my dorkness — and the fact that I’m shooting with a DSLR — is what kept me from getting in better positions for these photos. I was there for the music, and the photography came second. But at least I thought ahead and put on the discreet prime (50mm f/1.4), timing my shutter release for the louder moments, because that mirror clap has the aural equivalent of a door slamming when it’s quiet (something I’m very aware of during religious weddings).
* Turns out it was also the venue Tertulia Castelense‘s 9th birthday, which means I predated it by exactly 30 years. Oy!
Portuguese blues guitarist Frankie Chavez at Tertulia Castelense, Maia
Portuguese blues guitarist Frankie Chavez at Tertulia Castelense, Maia
Frankie Chavez playing blues with a Portuguese guitar
Portuguese blues guitarist Frankie Chavez at Tertulia Castelense, Maia
Portuguese blues guitarist Frankie Chavez at Tertulia Castelense, Maia
Brueggergosman hails from Fredericton, New Brunswick, having achieved an impressive amount of success as a soprano by the time she reached 30. (She will be 33 this year.) What strikes me about Measha is not just her ability to speak several languages with ease, but her personality combined with her talent and expressiveness (to be expected in theatre, but still notable). She’s making her own way in classical music, a genre where vocalists are older, more experienced, and aren’t sporting nose rings, afros, or even a dark complexion. Go Measha!
If I had seen the opening ceremony for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver I would’ve seen her perform the Olympic Hymn in amazement. Maybe you did? I watched it on YouTube over a year later. (Isn’t there a better version of this?) Then I clicked over to this video:
Not being a pop culture maven or a TV-watcher or much of a magazine reader, it appears I’ve missed out on the buzz about this lady: Toronto Life May 2008: The Cult of Measha
There are few videos of her online, but this one’s a good example of her stage presence:
After watching several of her interviews, it’s easy to see what the buzz is about — in addition to being musically skilled, Brueggergosman is also articulate, passionate, and confident, in a non-diva-ish way. It’ll be interesting to watch her grow as an artist, and humanitarian (she’s AMREF Canada’s Goodwill Ambassador). I may even bump into her sometime because apparently she lives in my neighbourhood. If that does happen, you bet I’ll be writing about it.
The immensely talented British singer Adele speaks about making her second album, accompanied by her video of “Rolling In The Deep”. I have both albums, the second one I bought over the weekend. The more I listen to Adele the more I like her, and I hope she keeps making music for a long time.
For one thing, she’s beautiful but she’s down-to-earth and doesn’t look like she’s starving herself. (Plus, her look is very 60′s, which is probably my favourite era, style-wise.)
And, unlike much of what charts, Adele’s material is actually her own. Apparently this second album was recorded right after a breakup, and no doubt follows the tendency of such events to inspire great art — especially music. Why rant when you can sing it out? (And win accolades and earn lots of money while you’re at it.)
Favourite tracks on ’21′:
1. Rolling In The Deep
6. He Won’t Go
8. I’ll Be Waiting
10. Lovesong
11. Someone Like You
Just booked a floatplane joyride tomorrow morning (10:00), departing Billy Bishop Airport. You still have time to get in on the flight! #fb10 hours ago
Calling all #aviation buffs! Booking scenic ride in floatplane tomorrow am out of YTZ, takes up to 3 pax & need 2. DM me if interested! #fb13 hours ago
