Blog: Articles from July 2006

No, I didn’t go to Rock the Fort this year (you American people of course have no idea what I’m talking about, let alone you poor people in Britain, Singapore, Ireland, India, etc., but bear with me). However, today my friend Laura and I did take a trip out to Old Fort William Historical Park to take a tour and have some fun (and to laugh at our friends who were working out there).

For those of you who don’t know, Fort William was the largest fur trading fort west of Montreal and was essentially the “bottleneck” for furs coming eastward from the interior of the country. Back in the nineteenth century, this is why people settled here. The Historical Park, rebuilt to detail after the original Fort burned down, attempts to bring that atmosphere alive with costumed guides who play the roles of all sorts of people there, including the famous voyageurs.

Several of my friends work there, including Graham and Cortney, so Laura and I agreed that it would be cool to spend the day down there and take a guided tour and see if we could locate our friends. Unfortunately, that was easier said than done. Once we paid at the Visitor Centre for admission, we sort of got…lost. I blame it on the maps; they really weren’t that nice and accurate, so how were we supposed to know which way to go? Anyway, we spent a full ten minutes wandering aimlessly and ended up all the way behind the fort, where a kindly costumed fellow supervising some day campers pointed us in the right direction of the main gate. Once there, we waited a bit more and then the tour started.

Our tour took us around a bunch of the fort, although not all of it. We got to learn a lot about the history of the fort, the fur trade, etc. It was really very fascinating and brought back a lot of memories of grade eight history (when we first learned this). After the initial tour ended, Laura and I left and ran into one of her friends. Then we ran into Graham, a fellow of Scottish descent who proudly plays the bagpipes and wears a kilt. He pointed us in the direction of another friend, Cortney, who gets to play a voyageur’s wife (which is really a tough life indeed).

Cortney was in the process of giving another tour, so Laura and I tagged along. She took us to different places than the other guide; we got to see the hospital, kitchens (from which I tried a bit of hardtack). We went to the shops to see what the latest fashions were (apparently my shorts were out of style at the time and leggings were in). Then we went out to join in some singing and dancing.

We sang and danced (some of which I got on video ) until it was virtually closing time. It was a great time, nice to see my friends and a nice way to spend the day, which was very hot but had a cooling breeze. Then, after a nice group photo, it was time to go home and make this blog entry. Which you have now read.

I bought the original soundtrack for Superman Returns today. Wow. It’s so awesome.

I don’t know if John Williams knew what he was creating when he composed the original Superman theme, but I love that music sooo much it’s not even funny. So to here it again in theatres was absolutely amazing, and now I can play it anytime I want! John Ottman did a tremendous job composing new music that was based off Williams’ themes but that would work with the new movie, and this CD was definitely worth the buy.

Muwahahahaha.

I was reading up on hanging according to Wikipedia because I’ve got a scene coming up in my novel wherein some of the characters are slated to be hanged. My original reason for looking up the article was to see if it had information on why we use “hanged” instead of “hung” for the past participle when referring to the capital punishment. It does have such a section, although the reason behind the grammatical discrepancy isn’t obvious; it’s more of a note than an explanation.

So my curiosity wasn’t really sated, but here’s some funny things I saw in the article.

Until 1808 the law in Britain offered the death penalty for some 200 offenses, including attempting suicide, being in the company of gypsies for one month, and vagrancy (for soldiers and sailors); even children aged 7–14 years old could be executed if they committed a capital crime and showed “strong evidence of malice”.

(Bolding added for emphasis). Excuse me? People were killed for attempting to kill themselves? I’m sorry, but that seems rather silly to me, since you are essentially granting their wish. “What are you doing honey?” “Oh dear, I’m just trying to kill myself?” “But you were never a good shot; what if you miss?” “Don’t worry about it, muffin, they’ll execute me anyway.”

By the mid-20th century the average time between taking a victim from the cell and death was around fifteen seconds — although on May 8, 1951 Albert Pierrepoint conducted the fastest hanging on record when James Inglis, whom a court had only three weeks earlier convicted and sentenced for the murder of a prostitute, fell through the trap only seven seconds after leaving his cell.

(Again, I added the bold.) Now this isn’t mockery so much as fascination. Seven seconds after leaving his cell? Where were the gallows, next door? I’m not being sceptical here; I‘m just impressed by that figure.

Anyway, just some interesting things I noticed while I was reading the article that I thought I’d share.

It’s true, Apple has sucked me into the world of bottled music.

While I enjoy my job at the gallery far too much for my own good, I do bike to and from work 40 minutes a day, five days a week. For the past week or so I’ve been toying with the idea of getting some sort of portable music player to help relieve the monotony of such rides. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to get one, however, because I was concerned that I wouldn’t use it much and that it would distract me from hearing traffic.

Today I went shopping, though. I decided that it would be worth a purchase, since I spend most of the journey on sparsely-populated bike trails anyway, and can simply turn it off or pause it for the parts where I must traverse roads. I didn’t have my heart set on any one type of player; I was keeping my eyes open for which ones were the best deals.

Although I found a relatively cheaply priced MP3 player from The Source, I decided to go with the slightly pricier iPod nano from CompuSmart, largely because I prefer CompuSmart to The Source when it comes to vendor. I went for their warranty too, so at the end of the day I paid a bit more than I had expected, but that’s okay. I’m working throughout the summer, so I’ll earn it back and then some.

’Tis shiny and black and nice.

On another note, when I got home from the excursion I discovered that Firefox had decided to delete all the preferences of my extensions. This was rather inconvenient, because even though I could restore my bookmarks, the extensions took a bit longer. Luckily I don’t have that many. I had to restore my Greasemonkey user scripts and redo my ChatZilla preferences.

Literally just when I was thinking about embedding media and how much trouble I’ve had with it in the past, Elizabeth Castro and A List Apart publish “Bye, Bye <embed>”.

It’s almost as if they read my minds. h34r:

I love A List Apart because of their wealth of articles. They provide such interesting information that I often experience the “Wikipedia effect” (where I just follow links for hours on end from one article to the next).

So yes, I have thoughts about media.

There is only one word that can describe Superman Returns: iconic.

That’s what Superman is to people; an icon for all that is good. And I think that Superman Returns captures that in its purest form. I went into the movie expecting it to be great; not excellent, but okay. I came out from an awesome experience that left me nearly breathless. It was way better than I expected.

Spoilers are ahead.

The best parts of the movie were by far the parts that showed Superman’s humanity. That was really the true conflict; summarized by Lois Lane’s article “Why the World Doesn’t Need Superman”. But the world does need Superman, and as this film shows, Superman needs the world.

Both Viv and I expected Lois‘ fiancé, Richard, to be a jerk. We expected him to be overbearing, arrogant, over-compensating in the face of Superman’s return to Lois’ life…and we could not have been more wrong. When I think back to everything that happens to Richard over the course of the film, he emerges as a mature character. He knows his wife still loves Superman (even if she doesn’t at first), and I think he realizes the truth about her son’s father. Yet he shows humanity’s best side when he follows Lois back to the Krypton continent to rescue Superman. And it was quite big of him to let Lois go into the hospital to see Superman near the end of the film.

Lex Luthor? Boy that man has a complex. Throughout the movie he is obsessed with Superman—it’s comic, in a way, and I think that this was a good choice because it helps contrast the ruthlessness that he displays at times. He can be a very cold character, for example when Kitty asks if billions of people will really die, or when he stabs Superman. So the comedic, almost Saturday-cartoon villain obsession he has with defeating his arch-foe helps lighten that.

Superman’s “defeat” and return? Awesome. The movie would not have been the same if Superman just beat Lex Luthor easily, nor would it have been the same if Lex Luthor weakened Superman, left him for dead, and then Superman mysteriously returned. But the ending was a combination of those that had one important element: we humans. In the end, it isn’t the world who needs Superman, it is Superman who needs the world. Lois saves him once, and then after he foils Luthor’s plot nearly at the cost of his life, she saves him again, in a different way—you need to watch it to see it. I cried during those scenes with Superman and the hospital and…

It is definitely worth the money to go see it. Oh, and the music! The opening credits were a trip of a lifetime. Honestly, if someone had pulled me out of that theatre after just those credits, I would have been a happy man. To hear that theme pumped out through the movie theatre speakers, to feel that electric charge running through my body, that’s why Superman Returns was so great. It captured lightning in a bottle.

Tomorrow I’m going to see Pirates of the Caribbean: The Dead Man’s Chest with my dad (and maybe my brother). That’s back-to-back movie-going.

I biked to work today even though it wasn’t the smartest thing to do, what with having a sunburn and no sunscreen. But it worked. So I worked for five hours, then biked home and relaxed until we went to another baseball game.

Everything started well. Cody Allen hit a home run in the second inning, much to the cheers of the crowd. Unfortunately as the game progressed Mankato snuck in a three-run homer to tie us 5-5. Several pitching changes and an infield game of musical chairs for Mankato to cover an injury slowed down the game in the last innings. It all came down to this: bottom of the ninth, one man on base, two outs, and Joey Lieberman up to bat. Would he make the cut?

Well, of course, he’s Joey! At first it looks like he’ll strike out, but suddenly the ball comes cleanly off his bat. Nothing fancy, just a deep hit to the outfield, enough that Marcus Jones can score from first base to win the game! Now that’s baseball.

Incidentally, I got a photo taken of Slugger and I. You can also check it out on my Flickr account. I decided to give Flickr a try—not sure if I’ll stick with it or how much I’ll use it, but we’ll see.

Yes, Canada Day was yesterday, and I fully intended to post yesterday, but wouldn’t you know…

I spent Canada Day doing one of the best things possible: going to a baseball game with my dad. It was raining, unfortunately, so the 1:05 start turned into a 2:05 start, and for a reason which I have yet to discern, the auctioned Border Cats jerseys were yellow, not red. Way to go with tradition. olleyes: But the game did not disappoint. We won 8-3 with some awesome plays that I don’t remember anymore. It was great.

Afterward we rented Fantastic Four, which was okay but not great, and ordered in Chinese food which I shall warm up in about ten minutes for breakfast. Then it’s time for work, and then more food, and then relaxation before I sleep.

That’s what this week is about. I’m officially off school, and I have this amazing urge still to be productive in other ventures. Maybe I should. But I also think that a lot of my stress comes from the fact that I am too stubborn to ever relax or completely take a break—even when I am “relaxing”, I have to be doing something. So this week might be unproductive, but hopefully in a good way.