That's a pretty dignified road to starvation

Hey, y'all. Hope that your boxing day vacations have been as loverly as mine has been. Woke up this morning, travelled to a snowy lake, went skiing, got totally bogged down in slush, hitched a ride on a snowmachine, sat by a campfire, strapped on a pair of defective snowshoes, stumbled around on an island, took pictures, ate sausage and moose meat, went back home. Nice. The lake was frozen and covered with low-lying fog. The sun must have been out higher above, however, because the day was infused with a soft golden light and quite warm. Also at the lake was a young couple from Chilliwack who are crazy smart and talented. I have known the guy forever; I was actually his candlebearer way back when. I can't remember many of his accomplishments, but he can build anything, fix anything, and I believe he is designing a cooling system for the medical isotope reactors. She is working towards a Masters in Biology, makes her own cheese, skis really well and is beautiful. I want to be both of them when I grow up.

The picture at the top always makes me laugh. Hope that your holidays are treating you well and that you are consuming vast amounts of delicious food with slightly exasperating, though lovable, family members.

Watched The New Animated Astro-Boy, I Cried. I highly Recommend it.

The Title says it all. I also nearly peed my pants twice while at the proper christmas dinner yesterday (We finally have the dinning table up and going) and the dinner featured my lovely pickled beets. Its differant though, I used whole chilies and Cardamon in the mix. The laughter came from my younger-bigger brother, throwing chunks of sausages to the dog, and then chunks of brie to the dog. He threw a chunk of sausage the size of a babies hand.

Merry Christmas Eve Noon

well well well. I wish it would stop raining for 30 mins so I could stretch them legs you know? Sounds like nice adventures you two.
Anyway in the mail today we got a letter from my aunt giving the details of her mad traveling adventures of 2010. She went to Ellis Island (NYC) in the spring to look up some family details. Looks like my great-grandmother arrived in North America from Germany in 1894 at the age of 6 months, with 6 siblings and a single mother. Can you imagine? And here I am complaining about the weather.

You're taking me to concerts and you're taking off your top

Hey, island folk. Crazy weather you guys are having! Can't say I'm jealous, though it is supposed to get up to +6 here on Saturday and start slushing. Ugh.

I have been listening to music that is not explicit, exactly, but has very intimate lyrics. Intimate enough to wear my headphones when my mom is in the kitchen. She has noticed me half-dancing while heating up soup and just keeps shaking her head.

I baked peanut butter cookies yesterday (with applesauce; fancy, fancy) and went for a ski. The lake was covered with low, yellowish clouds, and the light was really strange. It made me feel restless, and I went a lot further than I intended. But it was calming, and quiet, and there were miles and miles of snowy lake with no one around.

Somehow, I found myself in Fort Fraser a few days ago mushing a crrrazy dog team. My lead dogs were named Higgins and Hans, and my wheel dog was named Emma (hah!). Everything went well until we had to cross a field with about 30 horses in it. That was not so much fun.

I do miss Victoria. A week in close quarters with my little brother has made me fantasize about throwing him through the kitchen window. Try not to get swept out to sea in those massive ocean waves, you two.

When I'm overseas your love just come over me, Attacking me viciously in a sweet way that's loving to me

HELLO. The Gods are angry. Do you hear them outside? Howling? Growling? FOR YOU. (Laura; It's just hella angry outside stormy. The island is missing you.) I just went down to the beach, and the wind is too strong for me. The waves are too big for me. Pushing whole trees uplong everywhere. I felt tiny, I saw a deer run away. I know now to put apples down there for them.

Last night, I met Zoola, for a christmas skating adventure. We skated for over an hour. Saw some old friends, I fell on the ice twice, I have a bruised leg now. We then back to her humble adove for hot chocolate, and just sat at her island, talking. We gave love to the dog, we walked into town, around town, and then back along rupert road, eventually just sitting infront of the crazy house, with like, 10 trees on their property covered in intense christmas lights. Have you seen it?

I have something exciting to tell you. All about me though.

If life is sex and entertainment I am dying slowly.

Hey so nice turn of events... I'm sleeping on the couch for Christmas. What else you ask?

Well Sir, last night some of the old frenchies decided it would be nice to go to the Rod and Gun (only bar in town, equipped with a bartender named Ryan Reynolds, no joke) for a few drinks and some ketchup/ catch up. Anyway we get there and there is all these kids that we graduated with, who made my last year at high school the most boring living hell I have lived through, if you know what I mean. Anyway, everyone I arrived with ended up trashed and we saw this kid Trevor Panton who used to eat glue in elementary school and this other kid named Dan who's mother is a Buddhist accountant that worked at the same place as me this summer. Either way the night was a gong show and I felt weird and out of place for most of it. Shoulda drank more.

I'm Thanking the Lord for Blessing You With Hockey Teeth

So here we are in full Christmas mode (happy Soulstice by the way) My father has managed, true to form, to squeeze a ful sized douglas fir into our comparitively smaller living room. If you don't hear from me in a week its because I have been buried in an avalanche of pine-needles. Or fir needles I guess. And my aunt's most precious 12 year old dog swallowed a popsicle stick last night, reaffirming the distinction between DOG TREATS and POPSICLES. So my mom was on the phone with her on and off trying to talk her through the dilemma. Because when in doubt, one calls Leigh, not the vet. (please don't live by this rule, my mother has enough siblings without you too)

Not a whole lot else has happened around here. Here's a picture of baseball guys fighting.

Hey we saw the moon ring too! We were walking down this path between town and the boonies in Qualicum, through the bushes, and then we look up and there is the moon! And Shark goes "I really like the moon right now, it's not too bright." and I go " I wonder what that ring is called, doesn't it mean something?"

And then we got to a Christmas party and ate chocolate and these funny Vietnamese prawn things on sugar cane sticks and nicked beer out of the fridge. And that basically sets the theme for the next two weeks.

Greetings from the northern interior

Hey girlies. So, um, this will be my first guest post on your blog. And that's great, because I really feel like writing this morning.

Ended up getting up at 4 yesterday and heading off to the airport to fly back to the land of snow and ice, which is inhabited people who dress up for ev-ery-thing and pluck their eyebrows into funny shapes. On the bus I was checking out my fellow passengers and Just Knew that three of them were hockey players. None of them were carrying any sports paraphenilia, but sure enough, just as we got to the airport their conversation turned to Our Nation's Game. I'm like a drug-sniffing dog, but with a less useful talent.

Last night, some family friends threw a lavish Danish Christmas party, complete with little homemade chocolates and these dee-lish fluffy pastry balls with a name I can't pronounce (Sarah, you may know what I am talking about here) and real candles on the tree. And one of my favorite people whom I had not seen for over half a year came up to me and told me the titles of books that I should read. It was nice, because he didn't ask about school or anything, just what books I had enjoyed recently. Awsome.

I really like the idea behind the painting at the top of the page. You would never run out of subject material.

The stars were blazing last night, and there was a massive silver ring around the moon. It is easy to feel small here.

toppa ten

HI. I realize that we are not a music blog, per se. But I thought it would be fun to enter this music zeitgeist thing that Hypem does every thistimeof year, you know, participate?
So here 'tis, starting at the top.
Number one being the Suburbs by the Arcade Fire. I know this is typical history of art kid, but I love the song Rococo, mostly because it is fun to say. Hate the art period though. Bunch of fluff.
annnd number two will have to be Mt.Chimaera by our friends Brasstronaut, of Vancouver. Decent live show(at one point the keyboarder was hammering out notes on the trumpet and the keys At The Same Time), decent enough to make me buy the record anyway. Good West Coast indie sound without all that hip-ster nonsense.
And Number Three. I'mma say Wild Hunt by the Tallest Man on Earth. Mostly because I, too, want to be the King of Spain. But seriously he sounds like Bob Dylan AND his lyrics make sense. What more can a person ask for?
Number Four is going to be Behave Yourself Ep by the Cold War Kids. Because I love them. It sonds like they are smoothing things out a little, sound-wise which is nice too. They are maturing like good ol' cheese. And the lead singer is damn-tattooed. I reccomend you check that out. Also check out "Audience" if you don't feel like listening to the whole thing, at least do this one.
Five: Forgiveness Rock Record by Broken Social Scene. I have waited for 5 years for this. And not even listening to this record non-stop on a 14 hour road trip from Calgary will diminsh my love for it. My dad bought it as soon as it came out. Classic.
Six: Work by the Shout Out Louds, not to be confused with that other bands with a lot of shouting in the name. I feel like these guys too have matured into their sound. From snot nose teenage boys to men with arm tattoos and really expensive tshirts. And a nice sound.
ok and Seven: Heartland by Owen Pallett, previously named after his favourite video game. I always love albums in the form of little stories, especially when they are epic farming/pioneering stories, as this one and Midlake's The Trials of Van Occupanther of a few years back. Apparently Midlake put out a new one this year too but I haven't heard it yet.
Eight will be: Die Stadt Muzikanten by Woodpigeon. A charmingly German name for a charmingly Canadian band. Saw these guys at the Rifflandia festival last year with their hauntingly sweet vocals and their syncronized foot stomping. Very nice.
And nearing the end... Nine: Broken Bells' self titled debut. From the guy who brought you the vocals in the Shins comes a funky new sound. I swear at the beginning of the summer I was going to shoot every radio station if they played "the High Road" one more time. But gee Isure like it now. I'm serious.
And the last one! Ten: High Violet by The National. Since my brother has an addiction to men with very very deep voices (you should hear his roommate) he snatched up this album as soon as the ink had dried on the cover art. May I reccoment putting this on on a rainy Sunday morning? Maybe with pancakes? And loved ones? Then again that's my reccomendation for every album. If you are completely comfortable and reeelaxed than you will more fully enjoy what you are hearing. Believe you me.

And folks I am going home for the holidays tomorrow so I probably won't be writing as often. And lucky me: I get to sleep on the counch for two weeks as my grandmother is coming to stay. Lovely.