HEY! Any Nova Soctia bike or bike-supportive people – particularly in or near Halifax – here? Time to show up!
“Mayor Fillmore has called for a halt to all new cycling infrastructure, using “rationale” very similar to what Premier Doug Ford has used in Ontario to attack Toronto. There will be a vote on Tuesday.”
Deets saying what to do are on Mastodon. You don’t need an account to read it. Let him know what you think.
Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.
Here’s the Canadian Tory party leader going in on anti-LGBTQ shit, as relayed on Mastodon.
But let’s break it down a little.
Trudeau posted a fairly generic statement against anti-LGBTQ hate.
Tory leader Pierre Poilievre condemned that statement as “demonizing concerned parents,” pulling that in out of apparently nowhere.
But it’s not out of nowhere. It has a specific meaning and history. And, as the Republicans have done, it signals a return to the many decades of “all queers are pedophiles who want to rape your children and turn them queer” accusations.
I’ve talked about this before, but Project 2025 – which isn’t the Republican platform offically, but is basically the Republican platform since they no longer have one and it was made by the Republican power block – outlines the plan. They’re going to make all LGBT people illegal again, using the old fundamentalist argument that any mention of LGBT people is intrinsically sexual and thus pornographic, and thus unsuitable first for children, then for all adults.
They also say that if local prosecutors don’t act, they will charge the prosecutors until they’re replaced with ones who will. It’s all there.
This plan was refined and shaken out in Russia, and they’re just out and out saying they’re going to do it if they get power. It’s part of the Republican Project.
And this twisting of “LGBTQ people shouldn’t be subject to hate” into “demonizing concerned parents” is absolutely the entry point to that in Canada.
Just as it has been here.
(After this, a school right next to Poilievre’s riding got another round of bomb threats. Just saying.)
Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.
The CBC/Radio Canada have paused twitter over Elon’s mislabelling / mischaracterisation of their service.
Canadians, now’s the time to tell the CBC you approve of the suspension, and tell them to set up elsewhere – such as Mastodon, or some other aspect of the Fediverse. Particularly since we broke the one billion posts-per-month mark just now.
Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.
Back from beautiful British Columbia, and on to Conflikt! We came back with cider and bagels, as is tradition, and a good time was had by all.
Here’s a pretty good shot of the three regular members of Le Vent du Nord – I didn’t get a great photo of the substitute fiddler (here’s the best of them), but he did a very nice job. And got fired four times in one night! That’s pretty good too.
Busy loading gear at the moment so I can’t make a big post, but hopefully I’ll see some of you at Conflikt. Here’s the schedule; my show is at 8:30 tonight. Day memberships are available, and it’s a two-show bill with Betsy Tinney opening at 7:30. TOTALLY WORTH IT C’MON OUT.
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Off to Vancouver for a show! Not one of mine tho’, we’re seeing Le Vent du Nord tonight at the Rogue.
I mentioned that the instrument pickup I built last week sounded really good if I used my finger, but terrible using their standard attachment methods. I tried attaching it using a plastic clamp, but at first, that didn’t seem to help, so I rebuilt the piezo portion of the device, without the double-sided tape which had confused me the first time around.
That’s had an interesting effect. Held on by hand, the sound is definitely different – lots more low-end – but I think I like it less. But at the same time, using the clamp now works – it sounds the same with the plastic clamp as it does held on with finger, which is a huge improvement, and makes it usable on stage.
This is definitely something which requires more tinkering, but I’ve got it far enough along to try using during Friday’s show. Because SURE UNTESTED GEAR WHY NOT right? Well, you have to test it sometime. XD
Time to fly. See you at the Rogue?
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Citizenship and Immigration Canada just made it easier to book gigs – the work-permit requirement to perform anywhere serving food and drinks as a major part of their business model has been removed! Well, mostly – you can’t work anywhere on an ongoing basis without a work permit, and that includes bars and restaurants. But still!
This is a big deal for some of us. Everyone else, carry on as usual.
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Before the show on Tuesday, we went hiking up in the hills around Cumberland, then came back into town and ate a late lunch, and played some because we good. Anna saw Simon getting ready for the show out the living room window – being next to the venue has advantages!
The show photos, I posted on Friday, but here, have some hiking:
One of the effects of having been under and up against the ice shield is that the topsoil – like that of many rainforests – is thin topsoil, particularly in mountains. The rock you see here is actual bedrock. These mountains pushed back the glaciers, but everything else was pushed away:
Further down the hill we walk past the site of the former Cumberland Chinatown – this used to be a much larger town, back in the mining days – and get down the slough. It’s a bit mosquito-heavy in the summer, I’m told – particularly for Cascadia! – but this time of year, no such problem:
After hiking around all morning, we stopped at Tarbell’s for lunch – Anna didn’t quite buy the hot chocolate with sortilege (feeling it’s a bit early to be drinking at 2pm) but the pastries were all quite good, were the sandwiches. Anna had a breakfast biscuit with egg she quite liked, too.
After that, of course, the show at the Cumberland Public House. Then next morning we headed back to Vancouver for bagels and cider and then home. Lots of fun all around.
This photo came from that trip back, but still on the island, the last time we stopped before hitting Victoria on the way to the ferry:
I didn’t really have anywhere else to put it so it’s here. So how’ve you been? ^_^
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Up late until 1am comping mandolin. So it’s PHOTOSPAM DAY!
The primary reason Anna and I went up island was to see Le Vent du Nord – Anna had bought tickets to the symphony show they were doing with the Victoria Symphony almost a year ago, and friends bought tickets to their more typical bar show up in Cumberland which followed.
The symphony show was a little too respectable for my tastes. The group tends to the conservative – lots of Bach in the programme this year I see, oh look, you’ve got a Beethoven show – and I was in the washroom queue before the show listening to the somewhat older regulars saying things like, “Well, it’ll be different” with a small about of disapproval.
They won the crowd over, in the end, which was a bit of an achievement. And it’s a nice theatre.
Anyway, after that, we headed up island. The Cumberland show was in a local pub in the actual traditional sense – they have a Dominion-era license from the 1840s and it is indeed a public house. Anna brought Jean-Claude, of course – it’s required!
As you can see, we were front row, again. Anna is a huge fangirl and will not be denied; I’m mostly brought along for the ride. XD Camera conditions were difficult, but I got a few nice shots:
The energy was good in the pub and we had a lot of fun. After this we went hiking before heading home; I’ll post some nature pictures next.
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First: I got the CD orders shipped this afternoon! So if you’re waiting for those, you should have email with dates. ^_^
Okay, now, to the rocks. I’m not a geologist, and being all Fire Nation Asshole, not much of an earth-bender sort, but the south coast of Vancouver Island will turn anybody into a geologist.
We actually discovered this kind of by accident. Trans-Canada Highway 1, one of the longer highways on the planet, starts in Victoria. It heads north up the island, then ferries over to the mainland, then goes back to BC and makes its way east eventually via bridge and ferries and such alllll the way out to St. John’s, Newfoundland. And I knew there was a marker monument at the road’s start, so we went to see that.
So on Sunday after the symphony show, we went to High Tea:
And before going to play at Norway House – which I did later that evening – we went to see Mile 0. On the way there, we found this:
Now, Mile 0 is obviously pre-metric, which is kind of hilarious, since everything else is metric. But more hilariously, TC-1 gets really tiny on the way to the end. In town, it’s a large city street – like Aurora, only not as big and far better controlled – and at the end, it’s basically a park access road.
And after wandering through the very nice Beacon Hill Park, we got to Mile 0 and Terry Fox’s statue.
And while taking pictures, we saw someone run somebody else off the seashore road. We were already going to explore that a bit anyway, since it’s the meeting really of the Salish Sea and the Pacific Ocean, but the near-accident pointed us to a stairwell down the cliff, where we found this insanity.
See how all those pretty much unlike rocks are crammed up against and into each other and shit? That is madness. Welcome to the subduction zone. According to Fishy, Vancouver Island was actually – many millions of years ago – torn off from Alaska as the Alaskan plate moved north. So it’s violent and different and merged and mixed up in all sorts of crazy ways. To wit:
And some places it just looks like a volcano went off. Which… arguably it has. Fairly recently. But that’s not what made these rocks. All these rocks are dozens of millions of years old.
I’m telling you, the Doctor Who episodes you could film here would be epic.
We hiked around for – I don’t know, really, I’m bad at time. A couple of hours, climbing up and down things. As everywhere in Cascadia, they have beach logs, one of which apparently belongs to a giant robot.
(Larger versions of all these are on my Flickr photostream.)
After that we hiked on back to the hotel, from which we headed north to the show. And I’ll post about those bits tomorrow, while the water heater is being replaced. My first stage experience in four and a half months! How did it go? Find out tomorrow. ^_^
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We’ve about wrapped up our Victoria adventures for this trip and will be heading up island later today; the town had been great as always, and south island will make anyone into a geologist.
The Le Vent du Nord symphany show was pretty good, but way too respectable for me. The crowd pre-show particularly seemed a bit dismayed. It’s a fairly conservative programme here, with a… somewhat elderly audience, and I kept hearing things beforehand like, “well, it’ll be different,” with a bit of a “what exactly have I signed up for here?” air. That the boys managed to win that crowd over was a bit of an achievement.
Then last night I went up to Norway Hall and got my first stage time since GeekGirlCon and round one of emergency eye surgery; they’re big into singalong at the Victoria Folk Music Society, so I loaded up heavy with singalong-able choruses. They are the most sing-alongy audience i’ve ever seen, which is saying something.
Nice hall, too. Loads of fun. Thanks, VFMS!
Next: further north!
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Heading north again tomorrow, to Victoria and then up the island to Cumberland. This time I’ll try to remember to take the camera, tho’ I’ll have less, sadly, to photograph. Ah well, such is the way of things.
MIDI is still giving me problems on Ardour; everything works (including the on-screen mouse-click keyboard) except it’s ignoring/not seeing my actual MIDI keyboard, the one pictured yesterday. I know the keyboard works, I used it with Garage Band a week ago when using those other chimes. I don’t suppose anyone has experience with this, do you?
On the other hand, I’ve been shown Sound Fonts. Sound Fonts are like fonts, but for sound, and are plug-in/software independent (to the same degree typography fonts are) and this is super awesome. Imagine that you had to get a different company’s word processor to use this other typeface you like, and that’s what instrument VSTs seem to be like. Then someone throws typefaces at you and suddenly you’re all I LOVE YOU FORVER.
That’s what sound fonts are, for sound font supporting plugins. It’s so obvious and yet soooooo cooool. Or will be, if I can get Ardour to see my @&$#(*!!! keyboard.
Separately, the water heater has sprung a leak. It’s not much of a leak, but any leak is much worse than no leak. That’s what I get for playing with the 15 tesla pocket magnetic field generator in the basement, I guess. Live and learn. And mutate some genomes. But really, that goes without saying.
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Back from Maillardville and Festival du Bois! Here, have a bunch of festival pictures. I saw things exploded and posted about it, but it was over in six hours, making it possibly the shortest-duration F&SF explosifluffle I’ve ever seen.
And how was your weekend?
Thanks again to Geri and Robert for putting us up, and putting up with us. Next week, Victoria and up the island points north!
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Off to Festival du Bois for the weekend, soon; won’t be back until late Monday night. I feel strange heading out after four months mostly stuck at home recovering from eye surgeries, but a little stranger stepping out while the Bone Walker soundtrack is going so well! My calendar feels like one unending game of Jenga sometimes.
I’m keeping the collective noun for a group of microphones poll open until I get back. If you haven’t seen that list, do – everybody came up with great suggestions, and some of them are really funny. The poll for favourite is surprisingly close.
Meanwhile, I’ll be on twitter and stuff, but have some links to keep you busy ’till I get back.
Enjoy! And see you Tuesday.
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Experiencing VCON from the programming side… isn’t all that much different to experiencing it from the attendee side. Which is good, since I love attending the convention and didn’t want to lose that part.
Anna and I drove to Vancouver – and yes, we did go to Vancouver, even if the hotel was in Richmond – which we never do. I vastly prefer to go by train, but with all the cargo we had this year? If you’re bringing me in to do panels and a show, I am coming prepared. Handouts, multiple costume changes, gear for the show, bits to show during howto panels, extra instruments to be extra lively at panels – I don’t screw around.
Programming front-loaded me pretty solidly, with three presentations and panels on Friday. From 6-8pm I was talking about building an audio kit on the cheap and, with the help of Joe Fulgham from The Caustic Soda Podcast, the Home Recording 101 panel. We had a funny moment when a few people showed up asking where the knitting panel was – they came back a couple of times until we all figured out what was going on.
Bloginhood gave some very positive feedback, and yeah, I did kind of go off briefly on condenser vs. magnetic-field-vibration microphone head technologies, but dammit, how are you going to do mad science if you don’t know how these things work? Still, I can probably save that for second quarter.
After that, I hopped over to the Kaiju Konfessions Monster Movie Sing-A-Long, which Stan Hyde runs most(?) years, with updates and new material. Stan is a monster kaiju fan (ar ar ar) and really, really knows his kaiju flicks; he’s a lot of fun to listen to. I also ran into Jax, who came as a late-80s Software Pirate, and who lugged a (working!) Commodore SX-64 around all weekend and set it up for games several times.
Friday night’s “Collaborative Filk Creation” panel mostly just turned into a jam, but really, isn’t that kind of the point? I met Greg Cairns there, and we ended up hanging about some at music panels and jamming in the con suite on Sunday. He’s a guitarist and vocalist, and also does DJ work on the side.
My biggest worry on Saturday – the Songwriting Workshop – actually went really well. I’d never hosted one of these before, but had three people (of the four maximum allowed), so it took the form of a presentation followed by work on individual songs. Since it’s an F&SF kind of crowd, that meant I could talk wave physics, so I did. Also maths. I went in all I DO WHAT I WANT and fortunately the audience turned out to be quite receptive. XD
Also, Conflikt have asked me to rerun it at their convention in January, and I’ve said yes. You’d almost think I was getting a reputation for songwriting or something. ^_^
This has got awfully long, so I’m going to post the next part tomorrow.
Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come check out our music at:
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Hello, VCON attendees and members of the West Coast Science Fiction Association! Click here to download your very own copy of the Kitting Out Cheap handout, in convenient PDF form. You’ll also probably be interested in the Studio Buildout Series of blog posts, and maybe the the Home Recording 101 outline.
This post is going up before VCON even starts! If you see it before or during, my concert is Saturday at 10pm, in Sea Island Ballroom A. That sounds like a very large room. Please come fill it or I will be lonely and sad. Also, I have a fifteen tesla magnetic field generator, and I suspect many of you have vehicles. Don’t let me get bored. I’m just saying.
Regardless, enjoy our new free-download single, “Kaiju Meat”, and the Cracksman Betty bonus free download track, “The S-100 Bus.”
Welcome to the Lair! Oh, and, try not to die. (That’s supervillain for “I like you.”)
eta: And here’s songwriting workshop supplemental material version 0.1 alpha.
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Heading off today, north! To festival! To Harrison Hot Springs! Back on Monday. I’ll probably be tweeting a lot tho’. Remember: send any geekmusic news you have for the podcast by Monday if at all possible! If you don’t have any, forward that link around to people who might.
Here, have an awesome link – I actually already knew some of this but not this particular early outright-digital state. Ironically, I think this process got more analogue before it got less – there were comparably-small machines in the 60s and 70s which did more or less this, only with a single copy of the photo print. But they sent over ordinary phone lines, and I think those machines were varying tone in a more analogue fashion. But I could be wrong; maybe they were digitising down to these same five-bit images. Anyway, enjoy:
Finally, welcome Radish Review readers; I think you’ll find this post on harassment in person vs. online trenchant. It’s called “Power and Supervillainy.” And my regular readers may also enjoy Scalzi’s Q&A on his anti-harassment-policy policy, including complaints made by some calling his policy anti-free-speech, an idea about which I can only giggle sadly, not manically. And if I’m not giggling manically, you are doing it wrong and I have a heat ray. Shape up – or else.
TO THE NORTH!
Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!
Apparently I have an opposite number here in Victoria – the male version of me, musically. A bunch of the audience were all, “We have GOT to get them both in the aame room!” But then others were, “No! No! That would be very danerous!”
I guess that makes me the gatekeeper and him the keymaster? I’m not sure. THERE IS NO MUSIC ONLY ZUUL.
Either way: STEWART IN VICTORIA! THERE IS A NEW SUPERVILLAIN IN TOWN AND SHE IS CALLING YOU OUT. By whom I mean mean me. I’m calling you out. See how that worked there?
Anyway that went well, my just-over-the-head-cold voice let me make it though my songs, if just barely. (Halfway through Anarchy Now my throat said, “TWO MINUTES! That’s all I got!”)
I want to embed a picture Anna took, but it’s not letting me, because ARG DIE. So here’s a link. Fernwood is great. Cornerstone Cafe is also great. Victoria: so far, you’re kind of awesome.
Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!
On the Clipper ferry heading to Victoria! I’m not as fond of the Clipper as the other ferries; it’s not bad but it… it’s kind of airplanish. Not as bad as an airplane, not at all, but there’s no lounge or anything like the train or the peninsula ferries.
My head cold seems to be letting up, so I might do an open mic at Cornerstone Cafe, but no promises. I haven’t played since Monday, between replacing hard drive – we’re up to five, honestly, what is this – and this cold, and the post-convention cleanup.
Oh, and I managed to get Ubuntu to reinstall the 3.2.0 kernel, and this time it worked! So I’ll be putting that through its paces as soon as I get home, but in initial teating, we look pretty good. Most importantly, my weird hardware is still working. The funny part is that the more modern version of Jack sees, complains about, and reports the device enumating things wrong – the problem which crashed the 2.x kernels (!) which prompted the 3.1.5 install to begin with.
All of which means basically nothing to anyone! Except that it means things should work better in general in production. And I can use other plugins I couldn’t use before, which is awesome. I’ll be downloading those on Monday. :D
Anyway, have a good weekend, everybody! Anybody going to be at the Le Vent du Nord show tomorrow?
Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!
First: Wednesday’s DIY post is going to be special. We have a guest appearance by Pegasus-award-winner Jeff Bohnhoff, of Jeff and Maya Bohnhoff. Jeff has been performing for 30 years, and has recorded and engineered literally dozens of albums from the studio he built in California.
Jeff brings far more experience and theory to it than I have, but is still delivering an affordable approach to the topic. If you’re into DIY and home recording, you will want to read this column.
As for me; Anna and I are back from VCON! Being all the way out in Surrey, it was Far Far Away times this weekend – I mean, I had to take a bus to the Skytrain – but the hotel was nice, and we brought home the usual collection of books (via a Friday morning run into Vancouver proper), bagels (courtesy Geri, who drive two dozen out to us all the way from Kitsilano, omg thank you!) and cider! Yum.
Lots of kaiju programming this year, which we thoroughly enjoyed, and the El Rons were funny as usual. We had to leave too early to make the Turkey Readings, though! So sad. I love acting those out. Schedule those before Sunday afternoon next year, guys! Some of us have to catch trains. ;_;
There was an extended panel on the pulp aesthetic which talked I quite enjoyed as well; I have a theory now that a lot of what broke the Action Hero Scientist – alive in well in the 1930s, mostly dead by the early 1950s – was the Nazi movement and World War II. Seriously, I mean it; that whole Ubermench/superman thing was entirely the point, and I think they threw it out of fashion for decades.
Before you say Jonny Quest: Jonny Quest tried to square the circle. He had two dads (and no mom: exploitable), effectively; Race was the physical half of the adventurer, Dr. Quest (Sr.) was the scientist half, and Jonny, the child of both, was of an age where he wasn’t either yet, but had the potential to be both. It’s a nice finesse, and I think has a lot to do with why it works. (Despite all its very, very, many problems.)
(And before you say Superman qua Superman: I think Superman survived because he isn’t human. But even with that, he went from “super-evolved/optimised super-man,” the pinnacle of ubermench achievement, to, effectively, “otherworldly demigod.” It’s a different category.)
KNEEL before SUPERGOD, KING of SUPERDICKERY!
Strangely, I saw no music programming on the grid. At opening ceremonies, a couple of different people asked what was up with that, and it turns out that their music lead had had to drop out on short notice before the convention, as had a couple of their music pros, so: no filk! But they also said that spontaneous filk was welcome.
And since, as Anna put it, she “can’t take me anywhere,” I found VCON Programming Head after opening ceremonies. Her first words to me were, “NO MORE CHANGES,” so I said, “Just gimmie a room, whaddya got?” She hesitated until I added, “You don’t have to do anything. Just give me a room.”
So she did and I, um, kinda, fixed the hotel printer (you’re welcome, Sheraton Surrey) and Doctor Who-ed my way through VCON Ops for supplies. And that’s how there were eight hours of filk programming and notices and wayfinding signs, and if I’d had any of my own equipment around (or wanted to fight the hotel’s systems some more) there also would’ve been branding, because that’s the kind of shit I do.
Then I went back to the restaurant, finished dinner, and had dessert. Custard. It was lovely.
Actually, creme brulee. Not so different.
I have to admit, I love Doctor Whoing my way through an organisation. And I love that fannish organisations tend to make it easy. “Hi, I’m the Musician. I desperately need gaffers tape and a marker of substance. What’ve you got?” XD
Friday night was a bit thin and only ran two and a half hours, but Saturday filled the Cypress Room. Hopefully everyone had a good time – we were going until something like 1:30 so that’s certainly a good sign. I certainly did. (Overdid it a bit, to tell the truth – my voice on Sunday was a tad… gritty.)
Sadly, I missed the Battlestar Galactica fan club party! I got there literally 30 seconds before they closed. I wish I’d got up there earlier, guys! I honestly didn’t expect Saturday filk to run so late. Thanks for the cupcake, though; it was yummy. ^_^
Anyway, that’s what I did. I hope you had a good weekend, and tell anyone interested in studio DIY about Jeff Bohnhoff’s guest post on Wednesday; they’ll want to give it a look. See you next time!
Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!
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