I don't get enough time to read other people's blogs and then when I do I always find something really cool.
Today I had a quick look at Gnotalex's vastly underrated Blog Quebecois and he links to this other site I had never been to called The Morning News which has a great article on the different tricks people use in different trades such as:
Cartographer
Mapmakers will often use "copyright traps", bits of information in their maps that are purposefully wrong. They might label a body of water "Lake Strongbad" for instance, and then examine the next editions of competitors' maps to see if the incorrect information makes an appearance.
This would explain why every map of Newfoundland I have seen incorrectly places The Gulch outside of Riverhead St. Mary's Bay instead of next to Gaskiers and Pointe-La-Haye. Although the copyright trap doesn't seem to have stopped other people from ripping off the same map because they all have the same mistake. So if you are driving down through St.Mary's Bay don't worry if you don't see The Gulch until you're well down the road into the bay.
But that's not I wanted to talk about. I liked the layout of the site so I started looking around at some other articles they had and discovered this one which is a roundtable discussion of "MP3 Bloggers"
I am intrigued and click the link to find this explanation:
"Mp3 blogs (or audio blogs or music blogs) are the newest frontier in online music-sharing a groundswell has appeared in the last year of people posting mp3 files of songs they love, free of charge on personal web sites (but only available for a short period of time), and usually annotated with biographical and contextual notes about the artist and the music. The phenomenon has been noticed but only barely, and the recording industry, if wise to the trend, isn't protesting."
I have looked at some of the blogs in question and they are quite good. I didn't try downloading the songs but just to read about musicians and artists you haven't heard about before and someone's take on them is quite fascinating. I would like to do this but it sounds like work. Well maybe not but I am going to look into it more.
I have been thinking for some time that the next phase of blogging is adding various multimedia elements. Photos were the first step, now we have music. Soon our blogs will be our own mini TV Stations.
The blogs listed in the roundtable seem to all have other MP3 bloggers on their blogrolls (natch)
Surfing around I find one cleverly titled "Something I Learned Today" which is devoted to punk and hardcore. And this one called "Lost Bands of The New Wave Era" I haven't found one which specializes in Americana or Alt.Country yet. But hey maybe there's a niche?
I would love to start converting all my vinyl to digital and posting songs from old obscure punk records I have from the early 80's.
Anyone with the knowledge to convert vinyl to mp3 out there? and create this type of blog?
Actually it appears from my sound card manual that I can do it by plugging the turntable directly into the soundcard's "line in" jack but wouldnt' that be mono since it only accepts one input. I guess I would have to get one of those stereo to mono converters from Radio Shack eh?
Folks around the net seem to be big believers in using a pre-amp as well. Boy this gets complicated in a hurry.
Just in case you think I have forgotten here's a link to some pictures of that 6 pound burger that I plan on traveling to Pennsylvania to eat - or die trying.
If you scroll down you can see just how big the friggin thing is when held in someone's hand. Now I am totally into going down and besting that behemoth!!. I got real hungry just looking at the friggin thing.
Thanks to Bob of Autononomous Source for sending the link. Hey Bob how's life in sunny Iqaluit?
I don't often agree with William Houston of the Globe who's snarky sports commentary often smacks of sour grapes and envy more than anything else.
But Houston is correct in that CBC (and other media outlets) hyped Perdita Felicien as being an absolute lock for the gold medal in women's hurdles.
Of course no one could have expected her to fail so dramatically but you have to wonder if the pressure didn't affect her in some manner. Says Houston:
Felicien was the centrepiece of the CBC's Olympic coverage. She was to be the first Canadian woman in decades to win a gold medal at the track.
But the CBC hyped expectations to unreasonable proportions, and if she didn't feel the weight of a country as well as a network, it was no thanks to the CBC.
The silliness yesterday started early when Renaldo Nehemiah, Felicien's agent, told the CBC that "almost an act of God" was the only thing that would deny Felicien the top spot on the podium.
Perdita's disaster capped a truly disappointing day at the games which started brightly enough with a gold medal in women's cycling but went downhill from there. Alexandre Despatie the sullen Quebec diver who's gloomy puss was outdone only by his perpetually angry coach blew one dive and ended up with the silver.
And then there was Canada's baseball team who needed to beat Cuba to advance to a Gold medal game against underdog Australia. Prior to the Olympics local sports station The FAN 590 was hyping the men's 9 as having a real shot at a gold medal. Where they got that idea I'll never know. Cuba has a huge baseball tradition and like the old Russian hockey team is stacked with players who could easily play for the Majors in the US. Of course they crushed Canada and went on to win the gold. Which left Canada to play Japan for the bronze yesterday. Japan is the only other nation outside the US that has a legitimate pro baseball league which can compete with the Americans in terms of quality. Is it any surprise that they in turn crushed the Canucks yesterday? I guess it would be to the folks at The FAN many of whom were giving Canada the chance to win 16 medals this time around. Well we have about 4 days to win 9 medals. Anyone think it is possible now?
So I am not the only one who thinks the version of our anthem played at the games is kinda weird. Turns out it is an "interpretation" by a Czech immigrant.
Actually I couldn't care less- I've never seen a single episode of the show. I also haven't seen a single episode of "Survivor" or any reality show.
I tried to watch Amish in the City because we live not far from St. Jacobs Ontario which is heavily populated by another Anabaptist sect - the Mennonites. Sometimes we go up to the farmer's market on Saturdays and they are all there with their horses and buggies and beards and homemade clothes (but modern footwear). I kinda like the fact that they have retained the knowledge that our parents and grandparents willingly discarded. Not that I would give up the modern world but I would like to know how to build a barn and raise crops and livestock without the benefit of modern technology. Just in case we did have that big shit storm all the survivalists were predicting in the 70's.
Any way Amish in the City was completely boring (I watched about 10 minutes of it). The thing is these kids have never seen anything of the big city so for them a parking meter is a major event. So they are walking down the street and one of the girls spots a parking meter. "Is this a parking meter?" she asks. When informed that yes it was a parking meter she asks "Where do you put the quarters in?" Then they continue on.
Not. Riveting. TV.
I was hoping that they would have some sort of adventure where the Amish kids had to use their Amish knowledge to save the day. Like maybe they get caught in a rain storm and the Amish kids build a barn in five minutes to keep everyone warm and dry and there would be all kinds of flirting and giggling in the hayloft. Or at the very least could they whip up some of those black shapeless clothes?
Or maybe they could try to convert the other kids to Amish? That would be funny "Reject your cell phone and come live with me in Pennsylvania and build furniture"
By the way notice how I said earlier regarding West Wing that I "couldn't care less"?? That is the proper way to say it not "I could care less" as a lot of people say. If you say that you "could" care less it implies that you care to some degree. If you say that you "couldn't" care less you are in effect saying you don't care at all. This is what most people seem to mean when they improperly say "I could care less". Please fix that in your daily speech.
And be ashamed that a Newfie is giving you grammar lessons.
PETA hasn't had any success peddling it's anti-meat propaganda in my home province of Newfoundland. A billboard proposed by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals featured a chubby faced child about to eat a hamburger and carried the tagline: Feeding kids meat is child abuse.
PETA decided to erect the billboard in St. John's after a Memorial University study reported alarming levels of obesity in Newfoundland preschoolers.
The animal-rights group was told through its booking agent that it was "not going to be able to place this board...
PETA would do well to study the diet of its target audience. Newfoundlanders are certainly no vegetarians but eliminating meat wouldn't necessarily slim down the kids. First of all the cooking method of choice "down home" is to deep fry everything. Well not everything but fish and chips is one of the most popular meals on the Island. That's deep fried cod with deep fried potatoes and usually smothered in gravy.
Also popular is "chips dressing and gravy" French fries, gravy and the stuffing you would normally put in a turkey (called dressing by Newfies). A meatless dish that would pack the pounds on any vegetarian.
To top it off Newfies children (until they graduate to beer) are prodigious consumers of soft drinks. Newfoundlanders consume oceans of Pepsi (which easily outsells coke there) to wash down their deep fried food.
And let's not forget the salt. Dine on almost any dish on the "rock" and you might be forgiven for thinking that the only spice used in cooking is salt.
If PETA were truly worried about the health of Newfoundland children they would focus on the overall high fat, sodium and sugar content of their diet. Eliminating the meat wouldn't do much to make these kids healthier. Back in my punk rock days I knew lot's of vegetarians. One of them was so fat we nicknamed him "the Tofu Blob". I guess PETA doesn't give a shit about him.
As for me whenever I go home I gorge myself on Newfie dishes. A few years back on a blistering hot summer day I stopped off at Ches's fish and chips and picked up a large order of fish and chips (with dressing and gravy of course) to go. I headed up to historic Signal Hill and hiked my way to a rocky outcropping which gave me a perfect view of the harbour and its entrance (called the Narrows) I spent a good hour enjoying the food, salt air, and the coming and goings of assorted ships (including a Canadian Naval Frigate) and listening to the Herring Gulls and Black Backed Gulls argue over who was going to get the last of my fries.
It is one of my favorite memories.
For those looking to sample Newfie cuisine you don't have to travel all the way to the rock. "Louanne's Famous Fries" a the corner of Trafalgar Road and #10 Sideroad in Halton serves big portions of Chips Dressing and Gravy or the other "distinct society's dish" "poutine".
