And so happy Christmas and a happy New Year

I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to do much posting in the next couple of days. My in-laws are set to arrive tomorrow evening sometime and most of the next few days will be spent in the traditional holiday activities: eating, watching movies and avoiding conflict. I do have some excellent stories to share, but I'm afraid they'll have to wait until the New Year. I want to tell you all about my experience with Grapples (apples that have been genetically modified to taste like grapes) as well as my first experience curling, for which I was rewarded with an orange. I didn't really see the whole "fruit theme" until I wrote that.

Mmm. Interesting. Who doesn't like fruit? Communists and hooligans, that's who.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a good holiday.

Merry Christmas, baby

Congratualtions are in order once more as my friends jpunk5 and kimbee gave birth (well, kimbee gave birth) to a lovely daughter on Dec 12th. The baby is healthy and happy and the lucky owner of a skull emblazoned onesy made for her by her proud papa.

A hundred floors above me in the Tower of Song

I read an interesting article in the Pamphleteer (the Providence College student paper) about their peaceful protest at St. Vital for Buy Nothing Day. I didn't know about this event, but I can tell you this: I agree with the sentiment.

I was in St. Vital on Friday night. Now I'm not really a mall person at the best of times, but to be in mall on a Friday evening just a few short weeks before Christmas? I'd rather be whipped naked through the streets of Transcona.

After five minutes of browsing in Chapters (which used to sell books), I found my way to a bench to wait out my time. Sitting on that bench, I was saddened at the sights around me: children whining for "more, more, more;" parents spoiling their offspring by giving in to their every whim; parcels, bags and package.

Later, when I got home, I put in "A Charlie Brown Christmas." As Charlie lamented the commercialization of the holiday, I thought back to my time at St. Vital and my inner-Brown sighed: Good grief.

Preserving the old ways from being abused

Happy St. Nicholas Eve, everybody. I hope that the former bishop of Turkey stops by your house with his six to eight black friends. "They might put some candy in your shoes, they might stuff you in a sack and take you to Spain, or they might just pretend to kick you."

God save Donald Duck, Vaudeville and Variety

I haven't updated in a while. There have been plenty of things to write about but most of them are/were either a) somewhat confidental and therefore inappropiate to comment on, or b) time sensitive and time just passed me by.

Despite the fact that it doesn't officially begin for another few weeks, it's winter. Winnipeg is capital-C cold. And snowy. Althought we didn't get dumped with as much snow as most of the country, I'm feeling the lower-back tightening that comes from shovelling. There have been more than a few white-knuckled drives home from Otterburne, which segues nicely into my big bit o' news. I won't have to make that long drive after June: I've been offered a full-time position at Booth College as Assistant Professor of English Literature and Film. I begin my new job July 1st.