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30/11/02- Welcome...
  
30/11/02(330pm)-so that site humanforsale.com tells you how much you're apparently worth. average value for a male is $1,839,168.00. last year (probably about this time) i was valued at $1,856,550.00, a smidge over average. i just took it again and my worth has gone up to $2,010,670.00. interesting though, somedays you just dont feel like it though. new jean leloup disc out tuesday!
(200pm)-new survey. rather than waste screen space here on the main page, im gonna do surveys on separate pages and date them as i do them. i think im gonna do tremblant this week sometime, hopefully with david. was thinking tomorrow, but ive got other shit ive gotta get done and with the game/parties tonight, im probably gonna faire une grasse matinée tomorrow so tremblant will be tough since the number of shuttles is limited. whoa, did i just franglais? lol, cool. i finally found someone (zoya) to go to the habs game with tonight, then the hillel party maybe for a bit, then the trib staff party. so yeah, onto some work maybe eh?
29/11/02(930pm)-HAPPY 20th BIRTHDAY NICK!!! i'm a little disappointed. weather's stranded my parents back in ct and thus, they're not coming up to montreal this weekend :'( there goes the chicken soup, cheesecake brownies, my pajama scrubs...such is life though. i was really looking forward to taking my dad to the habs game, but i guess that aint happening now. i might take nick for his birthday instead. yesterday was an interesting arab politics review, then i went running around the city again, and i dont even know what i did, but eventually came home, david cooked the 22lb bird and then everyone started coming over. so basically it was me, nick, seth, yin, amanda, claire, dani, zoya, veronica, veronica's friend lisette, indi, and jessica and miriam came over. or as they like to be called, "my super intelligent and sexy friends jessica and miriam." :-p
anyways, it was fun times. nick and seth were calling random people in rez again, then calling everyone they knew, then everyone jessica knew. man i was over at jessicas today and the message they left on her machine was hilARious. nick made the call and it was something like, "hello jessica, this is pablo. i'm 6'7" and im tan like you wouldnt believe. i have big muscles. my friend says its not how big they are, its how you use them. i can move them like you wouldnt believe. we could even have a menage a trois. wait, ixnay on the menageay. helllooooo nurse!! my friend has something to tell you. [seth: shallllooooommm!!!]" yeah it was damn funny. so there was 13 bottles of wine and a 12 pk of sleemans for 13 people. quite the night. check out pictures from that and from halloween at the newer pictures site. eventually, im gonna create a page which archives all the pictures pages so they'll be easier referenced. anyways. not much doing today either- just snow basically- its one of those days. finished my nero article and i think it came out pretty decently. thats about it i think. anything else i can think of ill put it up. im trying a new ftp program since my old one died on me, so hopefully ill work smoother with time. thats it for now.
28/11/02(1250am)-dream number three in the "spencer was really born canadian" series":
i dreamt last night that my dad went back to the hotel this friday. then he turned on the cbs evening news and i immediately turned it to global's the national. then we started fighting and i proceeded to argue that peter mansbridge is a better newsanchor than dan rather ever was. (for those of you who dont know, the national is CBC's evening news and peter mansbridge is the long time anchor).
today was eh. wesley willis is postponed due to his tour being postponed due to health reasons. blah. talked to brandee on the phone for the first time in like 2, 3 years? french was soso but i was kinda confused by the directions with what we're doing. went for coffee with miriam and jessica and had a nice long conversation about all kinds of stuff (as usual). went to the trib office to phone interview nero, but that was a no go. as for coldplay,nuthe venue is still tba, although im willing to bet its at bell centre. i wrote to the senior gazette music critic hoping to network out an interview with the band when they come here. scott already said that ive claimed the story first. had something else to say. gotta work on some french tomorrow, read a book on confederation, do laundry, interview nero, thanksgiving dinner...maybe friday ill call jessi. ooh ooh, star trek commercial! i call that article when the trib gets its free press tix. opens dec. 13, but i think they're doing advance screening dec 11. anywhosy...oh yeah. 2 days til the fam comes up. i love how they love to consciously remind me that im american. elise says to me tonight "have a happy thanksgiving tomorrow (dont forget you're still american)." apparently being canadian is a bad thing? i dont get it sometimes, theres some mentality somewhere... *shrug*
26/11/02(1030pm)-oh man oh man oh man...i just got the new coldplay newsletter and they're coming to montreal feb 25th!!! now thats during reading week so i could either be here or back home. i mail ordered for phish @ worcester and that's feb 26th. obviously a dilemma since i cant do everything. plus... feb 25 is the marsalis bros. at place des arts. and thats all the brothers. and its only one of 5 north american dates where they're playing together. but its possible that tix could be really expensive for a show like that. and coldplay is my second favourite band... too many choices, so little time, so little money. aahhhh coldplay in montreal!!!!
(1230pm)-jesus h. christ. that paper's finally done. i think when i first picked the topic, i was looking forward to writing it but the more i got into it, the more i realised how boring it was. wenl, not necessarily how boring it was per se, but how little there really was to say without getting repetative. i had a pretty hard time doing that. but its in and now up for viewing. http://www.smalrus.com/rentierism.doc.
in other news, it was suggested that i become more involved with the trib next year. wont say much more on that for the meantime. my sondre lerche review didnt get published in this weeks issue, but no biggie- cant hog every issue eh? besides, ive got an 800 word nero interview going into next weeks issue, so that'll be a doozy. plus... i'm interviewing wesley willis when he plays la salla rosa on the 4th. thats gonna be a fuckin sick interview. i saw him at cafe campus last year and he took off his shirt, drank a carton of soy milk, and then sang a song about it. im looking forward to it, but im kinda intimidated cause of his size. hopefully he headbutts me (thats his sign that he likes you) and i get a decent story out of it. i know the daily will scoop me on that one too because EVERYONE loves when wesley willis comes to town, but it'll be cool cause ill just write the better story :-p as for anything else yesterday, nope. clean as a whistle, just working on the damn paper, also chatting some with my website fan. she's really cool, amazingly beautiful, and i like talking to her a lot. too bad shes in louisiana :-p
anyways tonight is just chilling, maybe the belgian beer experience, and also 24. yeah about this belgian beer experience- i found that iga had a packaged deal of leffe, höegaarden, and stella artois, with their respective glasses. its aptly titled "the belgian beer experience." so maybe there'll be a little novemberfest while watching 24 tonight, we'll see. i should probably sleep some first, no? 3 days til the fam comes up...
25/11/02(1020pm)-fixed the last couple of comments. for some reason, wordpad sometimes fucks up and deletes shit down the page, so it needed recoding. yesterday the als won the grey cup 25-16. i think next year i might get into cfl more. beats the nfl and we've actually got a somewhat winning team here (even though its been 25 years since their last grey cup victory). so apparently there's gonna be a victory parade here in montreal wednesday? not sure of any other details but it should be fairly cool.
also went to the nero show last night. really really good. its only 3 guys and they're very similar to rane in their sound. theres no lyrics to any of the songs, they played 2 1 1/2 hr sets and each set was 4 approximately 20 minute jams. so i met up with a girl that was supposed to review last night's the slip show and then met up with the trib photographer who was sent to get a couple2 pictures of the band. anyways, there's three guys and apparently the bassist is new. their songs are of an ambient psychedelic groove, sounding a lot like rane's "center of ourselves" only on all the songs. the guitarist is amazing and his sound is almost a combination of alans and bowmans. he uses a lot of loops to compensate for lack of another guitarist. so im gonna phone interview them on wednesday and also i hooked up with the guys and their manager in hoping to get some networking with rane dates. both bands are playing nyc on dec 7 (i thought we were playing the 9th) but nero's got a lull in dates from the 8th-11th, so id like to ask tom if they could set up some sort of impromptu gig. their manager was suggesting that if rane comes up here that they do a mini tour, hitting montreal, ottawa, kitchner, toronto, and possibly guelph. yeah, now i gotta talk to tom about all this.
anyways, its off to class for me now, as well as a trib staff meeting and working so yeah. 4 days til the fam comes up...
24/11/02(1210pm)-today's the grey cup (cfl's equivalent of the super bowl). and its the edmonton eskimos vs. the montreal alouettes (seemingly our best pro team). 6pm on CBC. go als go!
23/11/02(850pm)-lemme try something new: the start of my weekly habs rankings, coming to you every saturday during the game. not decided whether these are cumulative rankings or just plain weekly rankings, but we'll see by next saturday's rankings.
1. Yanic Perrault
2. Saku Koivu
3. Richard Zednik
4. Andrei Markov
5. Jeff Hackett
6. Oleg Petrov
7. Jan Bulis
8. Stephane Quintal
9. Jose Theodore
10. Donald Audette
11. Doug Gilmour
12. Chad Kilger
13. Joe Juneau
14. Craig Rivet
15. Karl Dykhuis
16. Patrice Brisebois
17. Andreas Dackell
18. Mariusz Czerkawski
19. Bill Lindsay
20. Mike Ribero
21. Randy McKay
22. Patrick Traverse
23. Sylvain Blouin
22/11/02(1045pm)-lets see... im still looking for pictures to fill in the space above. im kinda lacking in good stuff so im back to recycling my material. not good. yesterday i went to arab politics, which went okay. went backpack and cd player shopping with david, then ended up going to see trembling before G-d with david and claire. it was a documentary about gay and lesbian chasids and their rejection by the orthodox community. interesting subject although at times the movie got tedious and the point was too dragged on. like, okay theres a rejection of homosexuality in torah and obviously its contradictory to human emotion, but how many more people could give you similar stories...? anyways, after that i dunno what i did although i wrote my review of the sondre lerche album, faces down. my review is now up on my reviews page. i basically give it **1/2 stars. stayed up fairly late and talked to jessi online til late evening. she's pretty cool and fun to talk to.
woke up and went to french. another boring class blah blah. then went to lunch with the girls and shot a little pool with jessica. from there met the gang at amc to see die another day. i'd give that one **1/2 stars. im not sure im gonna do a full review, but first off, the opening sequence wasnt separate from the whole movie, unlike all the other bond movies. second of all, the action was great, but there wasnt the whole bond sexiness and suaveness that sean connery had. action is great, but ever since connery left its still not the same. which also makes for cheesier plots. gadgetry was still cool and car was awesome. halle berry was okay but had the cheesiest/funniest lines. it was pretty bad. anyways. after that, david and i went to dinner at this place, les deux oliviers. the waitress was pretty good looking so i decided to give her my number, only she came back to the table while i was writing it. then as we left, klutzy me knocked over the glass off the table and it shattered on the floor. so the guy told me not to worry but she kinda was meandering over and cracking up. yeah, im not expecting her call anytime soon?
not sure what else is up for tonight. probably not much. tomorrow is heavy arab politics paper workday. not sure what else will be going on. i started working on a short story. still formulating plot ideas with it, but its set somewhere in a rural suburbia, possibly in the midwest. i started the setting intro and im thinking it sounds pretty decent- maybe ill post it here when im done with it. yeah so again im not sure what else is doing tomorrow. oh yeah im still not getting whats the deal with my keyboard. i wrote a song but i cant upload to edit and put up here. :-( anyways, im actually feeling a little nappy right now so i may or maynot lie down.
21/11/02(1235am)-ma reponse:
first off, id like to say that your email made my day. no offence, it was the funniest thing i think ive seen. ironically, i had a bet with one of my roommates whether you're hot or not, so we're looking for pictures to settle it :-) anyways. the answer to your question is.....
(scroll down- what, you think this was easy? not for a months supply of beer!!! :))
i was born in boston, mass. that makes me an american citizen. however, i go to mcgill university in montreal. i have a student visa allowing my entrance into canada. so....i suppose that means you'll have to interpret how you wish :) seriously though, im american, although ive got serious thoughts of applying for canadian citizenship somewhere down the line. yeah thanks for reading though and one day, i will actually finish the entire lewis black transcript (ive gotten done with all but 2 tracks). feel free to write back, leave comments, etc. i love meeting people on the net, and apparently you guys care enough to read my site :-P in summary, im 20, from connecticut, go to school in montreal, polisci major, looking to go into law/journalism/communications, and theres obviously a couple pics on my site. anywhos, its bedtime for class tomorrow am. good luck with the beer and remember, drink canadian beer- its better than the american pisswater they serve :)
(1200am)-happy 50th birthday dad! this officially puts him into the realm of old geezer.
20/11/02(1150pm)-in spite of the fact that im pissed off about my backpack, this has to be the bright spot of my last couple days. i received this email a couple hours ago from my first fan ( :-D ) and its the funniest email i think ive ever gotten.
From :
"jessi *******" (*****@****.com)
To :
smalrus@hotmail.com
Subject :
about your web page
Date :
Wed, 20 Nov 2002 22:36:49 -0600
hi!
my name is jenni, you don't know me, but i accidently came across your web page the other day, and although i do have better things to do, you wouldn't know it, cause i sat there and read the whole thing vs. the better things....i..have..to..do....anyway, my roomate and i got to arguing (something we are never shy of when in the same room) about whether or not you are American or Canadian (once again, we do have better things to do with our time...but what's the fun in that?), and we ended up making a bet about it. now in light of me being a blond, and her having the equal mentallity of one, we decided to tap into our genius and bet that whoever lost had to buy beer (for the apartment) for the next month, parties included. i saw the email address at the bottom, and curiosity(and a victory quest) got the better of me, and although it did kill the cat, satisfaction brought it back, so i decided to write you and see if you would settle the bet. sorry, i know this is kind of wierd, but if you could write back, that would be great! thanks,
jenni
p.s. the ny-quil thing was funny
anyways, i shall be supplying my response now that im done cracking up, and please, i invite comments and emails always. even if it requires me to settle bets. :-D
19/11/02(515pm)-bloody effin hell. thats what i have to say. i went to la cage today- still no sign of my bag. which sucks the proverbial big dick. especially since my reading glasses are in there and i kinda need them for the reading so my eyes dont tire and i dont keep falling asleep. GAHHHHH!!!!! got a student privilege card and a monthly subway pass for the month. ive been kinda doing the math and its about the same for the amount of tix you get for 25$ as you do a month unlimited pass. that would be 16 tickets (8 round trips) for the same amount as unlimited round trips. might as welL?
so i took julian to the bus station this am around 915 and then went to the stm picture place. after that, went to shatner to read the paper, read my article, read the gazette, do the crossword, went to get some peer advising from nick and seth. i think basically im kinda blinding myself with the thought of law school that only over the last week or so, ive been thinking how i need other options. so included in those options are journalism and/or communications schools. would northwestern vindicate me? so yeah after that, i shot a little pool with jessica and miriam, then ate lunch with nick, went to la cage, and here i am until something else comes along. oh, theres a new 24 on tonight. anyways, yeah thats about it for now. im just very uptight that in 1 hour, someone stole my bag and now im missing my discman and my glasses.
(100am)-i think murphy's law applies to today. everything that can go wrong will go wrong.
lets see, i lucked out and got a 16/20 on a french quiz that i barely skimmed the story for. i barely got my art of listening paper in. my backpack got left in the restaurant for dinner and within an hour of me forgetting it, no one found it, i almost was on tv, but jacques demers is too fat and my head woulda barely gotten on, my tribune story got scooped by the daily, i lost my glasses, cd player and a cd im reviewing for next weeks trib, i ended up with the shittiest of the 3 simpsons rolling stone covers (the bruce springsteen one), we didnt go to upstairs, and we didnt go to bifteck.
highlights of today- almost finishing the crossword puzzle, having a mini snowball fight with julian, the habs blanking pittsburgh in overtime 5-4, im writing an 800 word review of sunday's nero concert at le swimming. that's about it. tonight's julian's last night and he's taking the 10am bus out tomorrow. last night we watched the senior video that we taped at andrews night 3 days and 18 hours before my first departure to mcgill. david was in hysterics over the chumbawamba story. man, its weird to see me back then. it was so obvious how much i feared coming here and feared losing friends. and its all happened, but then i walk through the city and think just how much ive evolved since ive been here.
the evolution of me
thats the phrase that i coined that everyone wants to use now. but its true. i think in the last 2 1/2 years, ive definitely evolved. montreal to me is what amsterdam is like to most people. nothing surprises me anymore. i think ive learned that in order to change our attitudes, we need to change our behaviours. we need to do things because they need to be done, regardless of whether we want to do them or not. openmindedness is key to survival. coming in, i thought i was openminded. and i wanted the city environment. but i overloaded. and i wasnt openminded, but in order to adapt to living here, i had to recognize things from smoking to weed to alcohol to sex...you name it, its stuff that ive come now to accept as part of real life. anyways yeah, im rambling now, still pissed most of all about having lost my bag. so i think im gonna go. maybe it'll have turned up and will be at la cage tomorrow. and maybe tomorrow will be better. *sigh* who knows. ps, who are the molson people reading my site? leave a comment, im always interested in talking to other mcgillers
17/11/02(1130pm)-still broked. i think it just needs to be taken in to get physically cleaned. ill have to do that once my paper is done. been doing some work on the research aspect, taking some notes from this book, etc etc. yesterday, went to place milton with julian for some lunch, then went to the library. saw lauren, introduced julian, then went to work while julian looked around. he's applying here for the graduate school of information and library sciences. so after that, we went home and then waited for nick and david to go to the habs game. we won 3-1 in a better performance than friday night. some guys were in town for the als-argos game today and they were sitting behind us routing for the devils, but we actually played decently. so after the game we came back, chilled, and watched some snl. i have to say, the cast has gotten somewhat better over the last season or so. then amanda went to blizzarts and i goin t a hold of jessica and so me, julian, david and jessica went to blizzarts. had some drinks, chilled for a while, and then jessica went to get a cab home and that was it for our night.
today, we kinda skipped breakfast, then went to lunch at belle province, walked to uqam and i ended up doing some more work at second cup til around 5 whence we came home and cooked dinner. then went to the haydn/mozart concerto competition at pollack hall since i need to do a concert review for class tomorrow. and right now, claire, david and julian are downstairs watching mullholland drive. since last night, it started snowing and we've got about 5-6 inches so far. thats about it to report right now i think. ive gotta work on this concert review, which im sincerely not looking forward to. then theres a quiz on this reading we have for french class. and at 530 is the trib staff meeting. hopefully there'll be some good press release this week because jai guru was pretty fun. anyways, everyone just kinda dropped off of aim so ill listen to sigur ros, try and find the art of listening selections online so i can relisten for my paper, and yeah girls are weird. anyways, going to work on my paper now. and read this french short story. more later.
16/11/02(1210pm)-num lock key is still broked. so are the habs. whats up with them? last night? 5-1. its weird cause i had a dream that we played detroit and hackett was in the net and gave up 4 goals in 4 shots. just about what it was like last night. maybe tonight will be better.
so wednesday night david and i went out to shoot some late night pool at bifteck. woke up the next morning for arab politics, of which the lecture topic was basically islamic politics. interesting stuff and of course, brynen opened lecture with his usual Q and A. after class, went to lunch at shatner with david for a while, came home, did some work, etc etc. thursday evening, i went over to this girl ingrid's house and me, her, and this other guy rod were jamming for a bit- some wilco songs, some ben harper, etc etc. which was pretty cool. came home from that late at night and then went to start working on my french assignment, bmy ut that wasnt happening cause i couldnt think of anything good to write. so i ended up talking to andrew and carrie and lauren and then lauren called me around 1 and we were on the phone til 3. sometimes i just dont understand it. sometimes things get too weird for words.
so i woke up the next morning, started working on my french composition. then went to drop off my laundry, come back to finish my french presentation and head to class. some more presentations during class and then jessica and i went off around the city for the next two hours or so. she had to get a pair of white sweatpants and then i went to get some swimming goggles cause i told her that we're gonna do 1/2 hr of laps twice a week. so we walked a little more, then went to nickels for late lunch, talked a bit about all kinds of shit (for some reason, she's probably one of the easiest people to talk to about all kinds of shit), and then came back home. julian came around 630 and he's here til tuesday i believe. so we were hanging around the apartment for a bit, then i had to go get my laundry and call home around 8. so we did so, then went to thai express for some pha thai and back here. david came over, we had a drink and then went to le swimming, no cover, shot some pool for a while, came home and watched waynes world.
today's basically gonna be a work afternoon. ive gotta do some arab politics research for my paper, so we'll probably get brunch or something, then ill work. we're gonna try to go to the habs game tonight with everybody and then after that, i know the girls wanted to go out or something. i'll probably call up jessica later too, see if she wants to join depending on if she's tired or not. maybe lauren too. or anyone else that would like to come out with us after the game could give a call to find out whats doing. thats it for now. more later.
13/11/02(1145pm)-well, today was fun. canadian history was a waste. seriously, canadians pride themselves on having history, but prior to confederation, there really was none. the entire lecture was on the methodists and the fact that there was only a 17% catholic population and that ryerson was the father figure for publicly funded schooling. yeah whoopadeedoo. then was lunch at shatner with david and dani. which is cool cause ive been talking to david about winter break and his coming down for it is a possibility. elise is gonna be gone at usy international convention most of the week so maybe he could use my room and ill use hers. plus we'll have the third car to use. whee! ski trip! anyways yeah. so then was french class, whence jessica was talking about her big black cock. so we went to al van houtte's after, talked over some coffee, then i came back here, did some stuff, wrote my trib article for next week's issue. kicked ass at jeopardy. whi'y wont they get back to me on auditions? i really want to be on the college tournament. :-/ id kick everyones asses. yeah so thats about it for now, i gotta go. no really, im meeting david in 10 minutes to do a little late night pool. later.
12/11/02(1000pm)-my first article in the mcgill tribune :-D. good news. so today i interviewed jai guru, which went pretty well and so now i can start work on my first feature assignment. my grand uncle died this morning. it was sad news, but it was sort of expected, and at 91, he led a long and successful life. so ill dedicate that article to his memory. anyways. 24 was pretty good tonight with the bomb actually going off at ctu. we didnt think they'd show it in this week's episode. we'll probably watch the star wars dvd after i go check out christie's computer next door. not sure exactly what im gonna accomplish by going over since i cant even get my computer working right, but whatever. tomorrow is another fun and exciting day of classes, im gonna work on my trib article and then maybe also some of my arab politics paper. oh, one thing i forgot to mention earlier- julian's coming up friday and staying til tuesday. that should be cool since last time he was here, there was a little fiasco with the whole cheers incident. but like now that im by st. laurent it should be a little more fun, plus im not in rez (obviously) so its a little different. plus i know montreal better now, so yeah...good times. i like visitors.
(1010am)-yeah, thats mike komisarek skating at a practice in hamilton. apparently he's been showing some really good improvement. maybe soon he'll be playing with the big boys :)
well i was gonna update yesterday and do a remembrance day tribute like i did last year, but i was lugging my computer around most of the day. basically sunday afternoon, not much was going on and then was the simpsons with the rolling stones. during the evening, i was working on my french presentation, doing it up on powerpoint, when the num lock key got stuck. so it started typing out numbers instead of letters. by then i couldnt do anything. so i started backing up my entire hard drive and working on my presentation written out. finally in the morning i fixed the num lock problem so it doesnt type out numbers. but i needed num lock to work for accents. so yeah. thats the state of my computer right now- broken. i took it to the campus computer store, they told me that it probably needs to be reformatted to help with my speed problems and maybe the num lock problem, but that they cant do it for another 5 days. so i figured as long as its functional again, ill take it now and come back later. meanwhile, i just cant type accents or anything.
basically i gave my french presentation on joual- was highly exciting. not! powerpoint was gonna be better cause i was gonna use sounds and pictures. but nope. so after that, i talked with jess a while, then went to participate in a psychological study on societal norms. she used sexism as her examples- how we perceive whether we're making a sexist comment in a given situation or not- basically the point is that we dont always know what the norms are in a situation when we go into it and whether something we percieve as socially acceptable is otherwise offencive to someone else. after that, went to the trib staff meeting, but nothing really that interesting. i wonder if i can get to do a nero show review. rane tom sent me a thing last night when he was music editor at the paper back at UMASS. a lot of it looks really good- form letters for getting major labels to send you free tickets to shows/press release passes/free cds, etc...he says that the labels thrive on university publicity. so maybe i'll be able to get that shit working. shakira here i come!
today is my interview with jai guru. i think it should go pretty well. also on later is 24 and hockey vs. dallas. plus star wars episode II comes out today. thats about it for me for now. gotta do some work before all the fun. more later.
10/11/02(1230pm)-i was gonna update last night but i ended up crashing before snl was even over. was really tired- had a long friday, a late friday, and an early saturday. recapping whats going on- friday after french i went to see 8 mile. was a pretty good movie- reminded me of a greek tragedy in the sense that you have this guy who faces adversity and his adversity (a white guy living with his mom in the black trailer park) becomes his weakness. he tries to overcome it with his rhymes, chickens out, gets made fun of more, and finally goes into the final battle, exposing his weaknesses before his opponent can, thus defeating his opponent. obviously semi-autobiographical, but fairly well made, fairly well told, and fairly well acted. although im not sure that kim basinger's part really was that effective. but eminem did a good job acting out his own life and the story is definitely told rhymes in the music. then i essentially went straight to services. no one really was there that i knew so i left during the dinner shuffle. it was only 8 so i decided to see if i could still catch the tsool show at cafe campus. i went to the show (cato sala experience was really good), and ebbot lundgren, the lead singer of tsool signed my ticket. they were standing on the street in front of cafe campus (dont forget its a block away from my apartment :)) shooting for the news broadcast or something and i was outside and i asked and he signed. dude looks like fuckin abba in a muumuu with some alien symbols on it. he was so wasted that he was hanging himself with the mic cord. yeah, i almost got the drumstick they tossed out. and what was up with the drummer's twirling drumsticks? i think the swedes are the cockiest musicians EV-ER.
thing was the show was way too loud. tsool's music is like a combination of rolling stones, doors, and led zeppelin. but it was probably one of the loudest shows ive been to and cafe campus isnt overly big (although it was fairly full). so i left probably about 3/4 away through the show. went back home and chilled out, debated going to le swimming or not after all, last time i met jessica at cheers, it turned out to be me having a beer and then leaving. and i was really tired, and it seemed like everything id done friday had been me getting bored and walking. but everyone else was going out somewhere and i even though i was exhausted, i decided what the hell- atleast there'd be a live band there. so i went to le swimming- it was basically a going away party for their friend who was leaving mcgill to go work back at home. at first the night was kinda boring and i was getting that "im bored and going home" feeling again, but we decided to shoot some pool and the night got better from there. yeah.
ended up going to bed late and getting up early. was gonna work on my french presentation yesterday but i really wasnt in the mood for doing anything. so i really didnt do much of anything- played music a lot with the keyboards, watched the habs beat the kings 3-1. jeff hackett has kinda readapted his goaltending style to that of the roll-around dominik hasek style of play. but he's been unbeaten thus far, so i guess i cant complain. i never thought id be glad to have him in net. talked to julian a bit online since he got back from his walk on thursday night. he's still planning on applying here for grad school, so it'll be cool if he gets in and decides to come here. but i guess its not my call, eh? so i stuck around to watch snl and fell asleep before it was over. and here i am. basically today ive gotta do my french presentation (im doing powerpoint). and then tomorrow is classes, doing the presentation, doing some arab politics paper work. im kinda not sure of the rest of the week, although julian was also talking about coming up next weekend- we might go see the habs-devils game with everyone on saturday. basically im done with exams/papers with the exception of arab politics, so my schedule's a little more eased up. though im hoping the jai guru guys will call me back for that interview cause my article's due by friday. anyways, thats about it for now, i think im gonna go work on this presentation. more people need to leave comments. i know ive got some regulars whom i dont think ive met, or maybe i have, but i never hear from them. send a shout out sometime. p.s. two days ago, it was -5 out, now its 15. what gives?
08/11/02(1105pm)-im tired. very tired. i went to sleep last night at 230am and woke up today at 630am. that book- the worst book i ever read. dont get me wrong, it had historical merit. but i can say a lot less for the writing style. and then figuring out how to write the book review on a book that contradicted itself repeatedly on a vague thesis? horrible. the worst books ive read were for that class. after class, and french class, i went to see 8 mile. very good movie ****. as far as i say as a story, it was essentially a greek tragedy. but im really not getting into detail because im tired. and so i came home, went to services, didnt stay for dinner, went to cafe campus to see the soundtrack of our lives. a little on that later, but i got my ticket signed by the lead singer. and then jessica wants me to go to le swimming. im so tired though, but maybe ill go a bit. oh yeah, ed my plane tix- leaving dorval dec 18 4pm, returning dorval dec 31 705pm. thats about it for now. oh yeah, and band practice is looking like sunday i think.
07/11/02(515pm)-blah, i so dont want to read this book. on the other hand, my other book came today, so once i finish the one for class, i can read it. kinda looking forward to tomorrow being friday, namely because i just am? this week kinda sucked, basically because of the exams and this book (why do they always pick uninteresting topics to have you read about?). so atleast tomorrow i can look forward to the following: the week will be done, nothing to worry about schoolwise other than my french presentation on monday, and working leisurely on my arab politics paper, eminem's movie comes out- maybe ill see it?, the soundtrack of our lives is playing cafe campus- maybe ill go to that instead?, services at ghetto shul-why dont i go more regularly?, being able to do some leisure reading, and by default, its friday.
anyways, i gotta get back to some reading on B.C. again so i can also watch the habs game. here's a little response i wrote to maddox in response to his latest piece entitled "CNN Sucks."
maddox-
ive been reading your site for a couple weeks now and i feel compelled to write after reading your latest installment on how cnn sucks.
basically, i agree with you 100% (as do agree with most of what you write on your site). im from connecticut, a third year university student in montreal. i get both the american network affiliates, and obviously the canadian networks, as well as cnn, bbc world, and cbc newsworld. quite frankly it is appalling how much shit american media spits out. if you go see michael moore's bowling for columbine, he talks about news media in the states impelling fear into the hearts of americans. then he visits canada and they're talking about chumming up america and speedbumps and shit.
america is ted turner's fucking dream and its the reason why the world is in the state it is. why did the republicans win every goddamn branch of government? because ted turner is running "america votes" the whole day. because we need to spend a day analysing the fact that people are going to the polls. how does that constitute breaking news? is the fact that americans are actually voting breaking news? could be. and the thing is, the american journalists take their neverending drivel of information so seriously too- that you cant help but think that theres some new information to be ascertained. if the sniper gets another federal charge tacked onto his list of charges, is that going to affect anyones life? how bout the fact that turkey's elections went back to islamists? russia's decision to allow statues of former communists in public spaces? and damned if aids was ever cured and the african continent was saved...
if theres anything ive learned from living in canada, its that america is the most ethnocentric country there is. thats why people hate americans. no one hates freedom. but everyone hates when corporations shove shit down peoples throats. and americans are content with that. thats why isolationism has worked. thats why republicans won. when youve got ted turner telling you what to think and what is reputable news, of course you're not gonna give a flying fuck if sri lankan rebels are trying to gain independence. lord help me for saying it, but some days, im glad im living in canada. sure, they've got their own shit- no country's perfect. but atleast theres a world outside of america.
keep on saying what you've got to say man, im loving it.
06/11/02(930pm)-art of listening midterm went okay. basically thats my news for the day cause thats mostly what i did today was more studying and taking the test. i found out this girl from ghetto shul is in that class cause i ended up sitting next to her during the exam. unfortunately the exam got in the way, but theres fridays class and services. tonight ive gotta do some reading on the formation of B.C. which should be a lot of fun considering none of that pre-confederation history really interests me. i think im most fascinated with 20th century history. like 20th century world history. everything before that is kinda bleh. aye. yeah this french presentation has me a little worried too. i mean, how long can you possibly talk about a dialect (long, being how am i supposed to talk almost 20 minutes on the topic of joual?) i read all the stuff that was on webct on joual and its basically repetative and has told me nothing on joual that i didnt know. and definitely not enough information to fill 20 minutes of presentation time. ubersucky. i wish i had more memory on my keyboard. i kinda reworked the song i did last night, but i couldnt finish the third track cause it ran out of memory and stopped writing more. that and i want to move it to computer, dammit. i think tomorrow im gonna call jai guru to schedule the interview before it gets too late since i still have to write the article. this weekend also i want to get a lot of research done on my arab politics paper. after doing last years us government paper, i think that writing this should be about the same. a good week or so of typed notes research and then another week or so editing the notes into paper form. then submitting it to andrew for proofing. :-P (besides, doesnt everyone want to know more about rentierism?) anyways.
im trying a new thing. no one who reads my site sends feedback (which is fine because its not like im changing what ive got to say). but if you wish to leave a comment and dont want to scroll down to the page bottom to find my email address, then you can now post comments.
(1215pm)-i improved out this funk jazz kinda song on my keyboard and created a basic drum beat to go with it. its basically centred around a and bm chords as well as d and e chords. sounds kinda cool although i wish i could figure out how to get it and bownicity back onto this laptop to work with them. still chived about us elections. and some other stuff. how bout the habs losing to st. louis 5-2. what a way to go. and how bout that book i ordered online on sunday. where the hell is that at? it was supposed to ship within 24 hours. apparently theres a new book this week entitled The Modern Gentleman: A Guide to Essential Manners, Savvy & Vice. its written by a guy named 'phineas.' i want to know what crack he's smoking, cause sure that shit doesnt work anymore. but of course we all know chivalry's dead. its been replaced with uberjerkism. but im not getting into that, ive done enough "chivalry is dead" stuff on my site. one day when im like 30 or 40, ill look back on it and laugh at my youthful naivete. but that day ain't today. other stuff to bitch about...ive got a french presentation to work on for monday and also i have to start working on my arab politics paper. of course theres tomorrows art of listening midterm. how bout the canadian history book summary on british columbia due friday? the fact that its -1 out now and next monday its 17? what ever happened to predictibility, the milkman, the paperboy, even the tv? oh wait, thats the full house theme song (note: i can see random google hits here for the phrase "full house theme song"+download+mp3). honestly? i had more to say here. but i forgot it. and im going to bed now. so maybe ill remember for tomorrow or something.
i think i want to learn icelandic once im done with french. if not icelandic, then some other scandinavian language like norweigian or swedish- stuff that not many people choose to learn but it sounds pretty cool. not to mention their culture is pretty cool- i mean the whole nordic atmosphere...?
05/11/02(1045pm)-arab politics went surprisingly well. i was expecting essays and the likes, but it was only multiple choice, and not bad questions either. of course it sucks that ive been up since 615 (havent done that in a while). anyways. election results not looking too good. we ran our college democrats of america booth in leacock today- got a bunch of signups, including the president of liberal mcgill, which im thinking of joining. but yeah, goodbye america, hello reaganism. we're gonna conservatively stack the house, the senate, the executive, and coming soon, the judiciary. hell hole here we come.
im more fascinated with todays house of commons vote with voting against chretien. yeah.
04/11/02(1030pm)-you always like taking a class until its exams. we never had this problem in high school. you did what you had to do and that was that. maybe its cause you're more enjoying LEARNING than being TESTED. oh well sucking it up and breaking from arab politics a couple minutes. cant remember what happened yesterday but i did some work and the likes. that was about it. went to bed on the fairly early side to shock myself into a better schedule again, although midterms this week will temporarily ruin that. woke up today, went to canadian politics all rested and then fell asleep during the latter half of lecture because she had absolutely nothing worthwhile to say. she just talked about métis, and didnt say anything i didnt know. so i went to see the editor of the arts&entertainment section of the tribune today. he liked my sigur rós review and said he might run that with lauren's concert review next issue cause they're backlogged this week. so we were talking about how he went to see disco biscuits on halloween and saw rane on their website so that was cool. told me that they meet mondays @ 530 and to come to the meeting. so i went to french, tried not to fall asleep through art of listening (those damn music samples!) and then hung around did some work til the trib meeting. trib meeting was basically them going through the press releases that they receive from everything around the city and dispatching people to do the reviews of them- plays, concerts, albums, etc... so straight off the bat, i picked this interview/cd review/concert preview of this montreal-based band, jai guru (which it turns out that nick had briefly tried out for). started listening to the cd already and it sounds interesting. very...worldbeat-ish. like theres some latin influences in some songs, some reggae influences in others, some soul, etc. so im gonna have to set up to interview them later this week. should be cool doing reviews and shit, afterall i do it already anyways. so yeah, i think thats it for me now. basically ive gotta get back to work again so. heres a little bit of poetry i started in the meantime (or maybe i finished it?):
i wanted to find
all the universe possessed inside
of black holes and horizons on the brink of destruction
shed behind the light
a teardrop shape around oblivion
infinity is eternal
and we are the messengers
02/11/02(115pm)-suffice to say, i had some weird dreams last night. really weird.
ok, lets go back to thursday first. i got up late for some reason. so i went to jean coutu for black hairspray for my costume. suffice to say, there was none. so i went to sara for some shish taouk and then went to indigo to pick up the copy of the life of pi that i had put on reserve. basically its been selling out here in montreal like water since it was shortlisted for the booker prize- one of england's most prestigious literary awards. and yann martel, the author, is a montrealer. yeah, so i wanted to get a copy to read.
on my way back, i realised it was 230 and time for the ftaa protest on the lower field. so i went and everyone was starting to group at roddick gates for the march to concordia- north america's hotbed for political activism. basically this protest was for education to not be included in ftaa negotiations. doing so might cheapen the reputation of a mcgill degree, increase tuition cost mays, blah blah. so i started to do some thinking as the 6500+ people waited for picket signs. the far-left complains that the world is being controlled by the top 10% who have all the money. meanwhile, all of these demonstrations are in democratically elected countries where, only there, would their right to protest go unstiffled. now granted, im not a right-winger in the least. but why does it matter? because despite the fact that the 10% on the top are in power to make the money, we elected them. and so id be willing to say that of all the protesters, only 10% think they're gonna make a difference, make themselves heard. and if the purpose for a protest is to make yourselves heard to exact change, then good, youve made your point. either the top 10 will care or not. this basically means that 80% of the people are either protesting cause its fun or protesting because they're sorta into the cause. 80% of people in democratically elected countries are content to live with the status quo. oh dont get me wrong, this isnt to say that 80% necessarily enjoy whats going on, or dont have opinions on it, etc etc. but they're content to live with it. sure, call it "settling" but thats what it is. why? because the masses dont care. we may not like the clowns in power, but we gave them political legitimacy to make the decisions for us. take george bush. i hate his policy, etc...i didnt vote for him. but, the majority did. sure, i can voice myself, blah blah. but really i do not effect [sic] change. so despite my differences, im not going to greenpeace it up by sabotaging nuclear power plants or whatever to get him to ratify kyoto. and while i think the fact that the earth is gonna turn into water with the melting of the ice caps, theres not much i think im gonna do about it. why? because the only alternative to it is anarchy. which doesnt work, based on man's natural tendencies. think about it. the extreme left (communism) would be great. but human nature doesnt comply. thats why it failed. the 80% (the proletariat) decided they didnt like the system of capitalism, and overthrew it. what happened, over half century of communism. but then what happened? the 80% overthrew the communists. why? because communism is destined to fail. oh, it works as an ideal system. hell, seeing everyone get equal shares would be great. but man is greedy, and greed is eternal. so now russia is, albeit economically struggling, capitalist again. the fact of the matter is, if the status quo didnt work, then we all would have revolted against our governments. we havent. why? because for all the worlds problems, its just as easy to sit back and let the people we elected as our leaders to do their jobs. i disagree with most of bush's middle east policy and hes gonna fuck the us up the ass, but the majority elected him to fuck the us up the ass. so what then is the point of radical activism? the masses havent overthrown jean chrétien yet, in fact they elected him to 3 terms. so either he's gonna listen to the 10% leftist radicals and 80% wannabe leftist radicals, or he's gonna commit to what the 80% are just as content with. the system is fucked, but thats just plain the reality of it: what we want and what we've got are two completely different things.
so im continuing on, deciding not really to join the protest and go to second cup to get a few pages into my book. came home, did a little sigur ros on guitar and then went to zoyas to get the superman shirt. costume came out pretty cool and claire and i went to the concert at 715, show was at 830.
Sigur Rós-10.31.02, Metropolis, Montreal, PQ
Track 1>Track 2, Track 3, Ný Batterí, Track 4, Svefn-G-Englar, Track 6, Track 8
i think i shit myself twice over last night. the show was amazing. they opened with this guy, Siggi Ármann, who played a solo acoustic set. he was really good and the keyboardist and drummer from sigur ros did backing on a couple of his songs. icelandians sure know how to write some good poetry.
sigur ros came on. unbelieveable. first off, if you do not have their new cd, ( ), then you are truly missing out. for starters, the sound quality was A1. levels on everything were 100% PERFECT. they came on and opened with the first song on the track, also backed by a string quartet. basically they were doing everything- using a drumstick to beat the bass, viola bow on the guitar, bow on the cymbals...it was euphoric to say the least, particularly if you've heard their music. they used a lot of natural reverb and a lot of natural feedback- not to say none of it was processed, but it sounded like most wasnt. for instance, their singer was singing INTO the guitar. i took claire to the show and played agaetis byrjun for her for the first time earlier in the day- we both walked away floored. and the thing was, while it played exactly like the album, the album DOESNT do their sound justice like the live show does- starting with the dynamics of the drums themselves. my tip: if you're into music recording, music technology, sound recording, all that kind of shit buy the album, and then go see the show. listening to them should be a requisite for that kind of stuff. and if you're just plain into music, well i couldnt recommend it further.
let me say this: ive been to 41 rane shows, concerts varied from classical to jazz to mainstream...this was the best concert i've EV-ER seen. its been two days now and im still reeling from it, trying to listen to the cd a lot, but even that just doesnt capture the show. i went into the show with incredibly high expectations, and not only were they met, but probably a thousand times over. sure, i want to see coldplay, st. germain, rane...but i'm hard pressed to think i'll ever see a concert like that again. trust me, when i make a statement like that over comparison to rane shows, that's an extremely bold statement. you either do one of three things after the show: 1) orgasm 2) shit yourself 3) cry. wow.
so claire and i came back to the party and i changed from clark kent into superman. ive got some pictures but they're not developed. it was an excellent costume, and definitely ended up getting girls looking :-P anyways, so we werent here at the party for long before me david noah rachel amanda and roxy (:)) went to this party on st. denis. fairly large party, but walking around in panties and tights was kinda weird at a strangers place. then again, i was fairly drunk, so i wasnt caring. that party was pretty cool though and we got back around 3-330. so i went to bed, but sigur ros was still in my head.
as for yesterday, got up, still had sigur ros in my head. went to french, listened to some presentations and then went shopping downtown with lauren at hmv. got and you shall know us from the trail of dead's source tags and codes (***1/2), and disco biscuit's senor boombox (***1/2). then got some gloves, a new wallet insert, went to subway for lunch and came home. was gonna go to services at ghetto shul but david cancelled out and came over, so we ended up hanging out in my room, and then going out for some pad thai at the chinese restaurant on st. laurent. went to blockbuster to rent the sum of all fears and patriot games, then came back to watch it. that was about it yesterday.
today's mostly a work day until the evening when the habs play toronto. blah blah. um, so also, i have some practicing of wilco songs and whatnot cause im starting a band up i think. i responded to an ad on mcgill classifieds from somone looking for people for a band to do wilco covers in the likes. i think thats the kind of shit i want to be doing and if something comes out of it- could end up writing music like that? perhaps add some jam influence? anyways, sounding like plan. i dont know when we're getting together- possibly next weekend. anyways yeah, that should be pretty cool. but im gonna go do stuff now so i guess that covers most of what i wanted to say. til next time...
(340am)-back to this bad schedule of going to bed around 4am. actually, i think it was last night that did it, but hopefully i'll be off it for monday morning. todays news: classes, shopping, jamming, forming a band, dinner and tom clancy night. not all exciting news, but im moreso itching to give my thoughts on yesterday and specifically last nights concert, which is still playing in my head. there werent any sigur ros desktop wallpapers on the net however, so i compiled a couple of band graphics from www.oknos.net and made a nice, yet extremely simple desktop available for download at http://www.smalrus.com/Pics/sigurrosdesktop.jpg. right now it's currently only available at 1024x768 resolution (to fit my laptop desktop). so if you have another resolution, deal for now. i'll update more on everything else when i wake up. i promise this time :-P
01/11/02(400am)-im not going to elaborate right now, because a)im drunk b)its 4am, but sigur rós was fucking unbelievable. this is a hard thing to admit, particularly since ive been to 41 rane concerts amongst other concerts ive seen, but the gur rós concert has to have been the best concert i've ever seen. hands down amazing. blown away. ripped my fuckin mind. anyways, im not gonna go into more tonight. suffice to say, today was soso. went to get life of pi, walked by the ftaa protest, jammed, party here, party on st. denis. etc... i just dont have time to elaborate right now, so later today before ghetto shul i will...
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