My What?

Everyone who knows me really well also knows that around Christmas time, shortly after returning from an extended surfing trip to Costa Rica, I became a fan.

Yes, a fan. Of a TV Show, about football and feelings.

I, who had sworn to never watch TV again, had somehow fallen under the spell of Friday Night Lights (aka FNL), the little show that could, if only more than fifty people would start watching it.

I’d like to blame my “intense appreciation” on the fact that I was introduced to the show while holed up with a fever in my hotel room in Costa Rica. And, although I’m sure that had something to do with it, not to mention my long-standing appreciation of Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton, I really have to blame it on the fact that the person behind music direction at FNL honed in on my achilles heel: Post-Rock.

I think you could show me an entire hour of a football sitting on a field beside a bottle of beer, and as long as it was scored to anything by Explosions in the Sky, I would watch it. Many times.

Throw in Kyle Chandler’s voice, Connie Britton’s acting, a little bit of football, an awful lot of feelings and Zach Gilford’s nice-kid-on-the-verge-of-a-nervous-breakdown good looks, and well, you’ve got a dedicated fan in me. I even signed online “Save the Show” surveys. Yes, it’s true.

Post-Rock and Me

I was not an Explosions in the Sky fan before I saw FNL, but I was enough of a post-rock fan to rejoice when, in my fever-induced stupor, I really believed, as the football team approached Texas Stadium, that the soundtrack was by the cutest Japanese Post-Rock band ever, Mono.

Mono? you ask. If Explosions in the Sky played with guitar strings that were actually ramen noodles, they would sound like Mono. Well, maybe not quite. But, I’m sure you get the idea.

After scratching my head for a couple minutes, wondering how anyone had ever been so out-of-their-mind goofy as to use Japanese Post-Rock to score a television show about football in Texas, I came to my senses and realized that it had to be another band.

But, it didn’t matter. I was already hooked.

Is there Life After Explosions in the Sky?

I could go on and trace my post-rock/shoegazing history way back into the last millenium, but I’ll finish off with a few comments about the post-rock/math-rock/future-funk/just-plain-awesome-good band that I finally had a chance to see live a couple weeks ago at the Starlite Room: Battles.

Now, I realize I might be violating some cardinal law of coolness that restricts mentioning Battles and Explosions in the Sky in the same blog post. I’m sure the law exists, but I’m over thirty, so it doesn’t really matter.

If you’ve never heard their music before, you should definitely check them out. Maybe even start with their most popular song, Atlas.

Somehow, Battles manage to deliver endlessly satisfying tracks that are both organic and complex. Yes, the vocals sometimes sound like Will Ferrell on speed. But, it works.

In some ways, Battles sound like what I imagine Joanna Newsom would sound like if you put her in a proton accelerator, wrapped it up in ten rolls of duct tape and shot her into Outer Space. I won’t link to any of her music here. Trust me. It’s for your own good.

Some Battles-Inspired TV Show Pitches

I must admit, however, that it is quite possible that my standards have changed overnight. I haven’t tested it out yet, but I suspect that my blind love affair with Explosions in the Sky might have come to an end.

The main problem for me now: waiting for the powers-that-be to come up with the kind of ground-breaking ratings-repelling TV show that could only be scored by Battles.

Here are a few of my TV Show ideas. Cue the music.

• A women’s water polo team on tour in Siberia. Broken down buses, snow, vodka, some water polo, a lot of feelings, more vodka. And dancing bears. Lots of dancing bears.
• An underdog team of cricket-playing leprechauns from the forrest just outside of Dublin. I’ll just let that one speak for itself.
• A high-school drama about ostracized zombie teenagers who form a chart-topping band, thus gaining the admiration of their peers, until they turn around and eat everyone in site.

Hmmm. Maybe I should just leave that kind of thinking to the pros. But, I’m pretty sure there’s a perfect show out there just waiting to be scored by Battles. And, I can guarantee this much: I will be watching.

After returning to Edmonton last month, my friend kidnapped me and took me out to a new restaurant in her neighborhood, Bacon.

Yes, Bacon.

A dream come true for vegan carnivores across the planet (okay, maybe just the ones in Edmonton), the restaurant offers a selection of meat, vegetarian, and vegan dishes, to which you can add a side order of homemade pierogies, chapati, and/or bacon.

Yes, bacon.

My friend and I each had a bowl of borscht (beet soup for those of you who were not weaned on Ukrainian food in the ‘Chuck.) Then she had the Vancouver Rice Bowl, an assortment of veggies, tofu, brown rice and miso sesame gravy. I had the Prairie Paella, a non-seafood variation on the Spanish classic with Andouille sausage, exquisite marinated chicken, wild mushrooms, green beans, and chick peas.

Guess what we had on the side?

Two orders of bacon. Yes, bacon!!!

And, none of those late-night post-bar overcooked and far-too-thin 24-hour-breakfast-restaurant slices of bacon. The proud proprietors of this new porcine loving establishment, they serve the real deal. Thick, full-flavored, and lots of it.

Yes, I love bacon.

So, if you ever happen to find yourself driving North along Wayne Gretzky Drive, hankering for some prairie-style vegan-carnivore cooking, be sure to turn right at the 112th Avenue exit and head straight to Bacon.

I’m not sure if it’s a sign of the times or just a sign of my poor packing skills, but after spending Wednesday afternoon running errands in Todos Santos, Baja Sur, Mexico, I’ve learned the following:

For the brave and the bored, here is a description of the events that caused me to acquire the above knowledge.

One Convertidor a Tierra and a Wackload of Wifi

Everyone I asked was able to direct me towards wireless Internet access within minutes.

Minor setback. I needed to recharge my MacBook battery, and I forgot to bring the appropriate adaptor for two-hole sockets.

The gringa running one of the expat art galleries told me to just make the appropriate gestures for two-hole versus three hole sockets. She didn’t know the Spanish for grounding adaptor. To her credit, however, she did direct me to the nearest hardware store.

I found the hardware store and the elusive grounding adaptor within minutes of leaving the art gallery. Turns out the owner spoke English, and my adaptor costs 10 pesos (roughly $1 US). “Convertidor a tierra” is Spanish for grounding adaptor.

Roughly 15 minutes in total were spent in the effort to get my computer up and running.

Looking for a Needle in a Village (with free WiFi)

I ripped a giant hole in my very travel-friendly black capris on Sunday. By the time I managed to find the Convertido a Tierra, I’d already asked six people and gone to four stores in search of needle and thread to fix my pants.

After solving the adaptor issue, I walked up the street to a tourist-oriented ceramic tile shop and asked the owner how to say needle and thread in Spanish. The answer: aguja y ilo. She spent a couple minutes teaching me how to pronounce “Aguja” (the “g” is pronounced like an “h” if you tried to pronounce an “h” with a jawbreaker stuck in your throat; the “j” is pronounced like a normal “h”).

Then off I went in search of farmacias and any other store that might carry the ever elusive “aguja y ilo”.

Armed with my phrase of the day, I walked across the street to the nearest Farmacia. “Tiennes aguja y ilo, por favor?” I asked quietly. The answer: something in spanish which roughly translates to “No, but maybe at the pharmacy down the street.”

The woman at the next pharmacy was not as helpful, and simply answered my question with a curt “Non” and a smile. I stood there for a moment, hoping for more information, but the smile had already disappeared.

Throughout my quest, I’d been rehearsing the broken conversation I would have once I found a place that actually carried needle and thread. Potential questions about color and needle size and possible “package deals”. Like maybe an extra spool or fancy scissors, or one of those little travel kits with 20 different colors of thread, a useless seam ripper, and a couple of dull needles — just like the one I left at home on top of my dresser.

I took a deep breathe. I was ready for anything. Anything except the fact that nobody in Todos Santos seemed to know where I could buy needle and thread.

I went to another four stores, but still nothing. I asked the woman at the hotel. Nothing.

Frustrated and sunburned, I headed back to my hotel, plugged my new “Convertidor a tierra” into the wall, turned on my laptop, and considered surfing the net in search of needle and thread.

But by that point I was hungry.

Maybe the Internet Can Fix My Pants?

After forgetting about my rant and my beloved ripped pants for a couple days, I decided to google “needle and thread” and “Todos Santos”.

At the top of the results, a link to a tripadvisor review for the Todos Santos Inn, including the following:

Loved my lavish Room 6, the care of the fabulous staff, the perfect grotto of a swimming pool. Only 8 rooms and the guests were interesting. John, the owner, saw to my needs, down to needle and thread!

The most amusing part? I actually went to the Todos Santos Inn for dinner on Wednesday and met the amazingly resourceful John. It didn’t even occur to me to ask him for a needle and thread.

If only I’d had my laptop with me.

I went snorkling near La Paz today (in Baja, Mexico), and gave a ride into town to a Brazilian girl who has been studying in Kamloops, BC for the last two years. We talked about some of the culture shock she experienced.

“Canadians are so polite.” She said. Then she laughed and told me that she and her friend had figured out the easiest way to get a Canadian to say “I’m Sorry.”

Just step on a Canadian’s foot.

Warning: Do not attempt this experiment outside of Canada. Results may vary.

I used to give piano lessons after I finished my degree, when I was figuring out how to effectively market my knowledge about the Romanov dynasty and Peter the Great’s ship-building practices.

Known for my goofy sense of humour (as demonstrated by the “Laurie Rea is very funy” graffiti on my kitchen wall), I tended to attract parents looking for a “creative” alternative to the more traditional music schools. In other words, they thought I wouldn’t yell at their kids if they didn’t practise.

Basically, I violated rule number one of every handbook ever written about effective piano teaching: Don’t ever try to make them like you!

I was recently informed that one of my former students is now a professional musician and that her parents consider me a key source of inspiration. Flattering? A little bit. Certainly something worth adding to that “important achievements/contributions” list I keep telling myself to create.

Then again, I’m pretty certain I can pinpoint the pivotal pedogical event that sent my former student (let’s call her Julia) down the path towards musical greatness. I’d love to claim that it was my fine performance as a piano teacher, or even a particularly moving piece of music, but sadly I cannot.

For the first six months or so of lessons, Julia was like any other student. That is, she rarely practised, she enjoyed hanging upside down from the piano bench, and she liked to fidget. A lot. Then one day, when I was overtired and she was particularly intent on ignoring everything that I asked her to do, I suddenly blurted out “Fuck Julia!” and then gasped and covered my mouth while she stared at me in wide-eyed silence.

“You said a bad word,” she finally said while I stared at the Breughel painting on the wall above the piano, frantically looking for some way to escape.

“Yes Julia.” I finally said. “I did say a bad word, and I should not have said it, but sometimes…” (I cannot help cringing as I write this.) “…I get very frustrated when you don’t listen.”

I don’t remember much of what ensued immediately afterwards, but in the following months she showed remarkable improvement. Not only did she practise every day, she actually seemed to enjoy it.

Now, rest assured that I am not advocating random profane outbursts as a motivational tool. And I’m not even sure there’s an actual lesson to be found in this story. Except perhaps that sometimes the roots of inspiration are not nearly as “inspirational” as we’d like them to be.

Then again, what the F*** do I know about pedagogy?

A good friend of mine recently abandoned his dissertation on the dialectics of desire to learn about the exciting world of software development. Here’s a recent message:

So I’m going to try to fix my Swing troubles by using net beans
it’s kinda cheating if it works
only in this bizarre field could a sentence fragment like “try to fix my Swing troubles by using net beans” make sense, that’s worse than fisolophy

The other day, I suddenly had a lot more energy than I’ve had in months. Unable to suppress my inner five year old, I couldn’t resist the temptation to jump up and down on a large sheet of bubble wrap (the kind with the big bubbles).

Talk about release.

Unfortunately, it also scared the crap out of everyone else in the house.

Note to self: Bubble wrap dancing is about the very personal connection between a man (or woman) and his (or her) sheet of bubblewrap. Never do it in the company of strangers.

So, it turns out that after two years of tests, visits to somewhat flaky homeopaths, and a misguided six month gluten-and-wheat-free diet, I happen to be extremely allergic to eggs and dairy products. Sigh. Serves me right for making fun of vegans, I suppose.

To my many (former and current) vegan friends, a thousand apologies for all those times I called you soulless fools behind your backs and for performing bacon exorcisms in the apartment when you were out of town (okay, that was only once, but damn did it ever feel good).

To all the beloved varieties of cheese, especially cambazola and seven-year-old cheddar, I will miss you. Thanks for the memories!

A friend of mine sent me the following birthday message on Tuesday morning:

Hey Laurie, Happy Birthday, I’ll try my hand at your horoscope: socializing will go swimmingly, look out for low ceilings, and spent batteries, left turns will lead to food opportunities, your magic words are: Rick, small, berries, softness monitor, and JohnsonStylings. Enjoy!

Not quite sure what to make of it, but will definitely try to take more left turns, assuming he actually meant “food” opportunities and it wasn’t just a typo.

Many thanks for all the wonderful Birthday wishes that I’ve received, plus the very tasty dinners, especially the fantastic pirate food that we were fortunate enough to enjoy in spite of the horrible weather.