mr. sinister

new blog

Wed, 21 Jan 2009 18:32:58 GMT

I've started a new blog, so I don't think I'll be posting in this one anymore, in case anyone actually reads this thing.

Check it out, bring the kids:

http://brainjunk.wordpress.com/

obama is addicted to crackberry

Thu, 08 Jan 2009 15:52:10 GMT

Obama can't give up his blackberry.

I feel you. PIN me later, brobama!

bloor cinema

Wed, 07 Jan 2009 05:37:00 GMT

Photo credit: this guy

Kim, Rick and I went to Bloor Cinema tonight to catch a one-night-only showing of Repo! The Genetic Rock Opera, a kind of gothy, rocky, musical of a movie.

Bloor Cinema is an interesting place. A movie theatre from the golden age of films, so it feels, with its small box office outside of doors that open onto the street (not into a mall), its singular screen, balcony seating and the kind of weird red carpeting I remember seeing in theatres when I was a kid, too young to go to the movies unaccompanied. It reminded me a lot of Capitol Theatre, an old cinema in London I had only the chance to visit once before it was closed down with the intention of conversion into a parking lot.

If only for the novelty, the three of us grabbed some seats up on the balcony. The seats were old and a bit rickety, their frames made from actual wood. I noticed an older man (probably in his 70s) sitting near us, I think he was alone. I imagined he was the type who'd lived in the area for decades, the Bloor Cinema being one of the simple neighborhood pleasures that he'd be indulging in since a time long before anyone knew what a MegaPlex was. The only ads that ran on the screen before the movie were for the cinema itself, just a rotating slide show of the theatre's upcoming schedule. There was no 20 minute string of trailers. In fact, I don't think they ran a single one. They went straight into the movie - during which people applauded, people laughed, people cheered. People clapped at the end of it.

After the movie, on the landing between the stairs to the balcony and the stairs to the main floor, I saw the older man sitting on one of the couches there. His friend approached, another man of about the same age. They were both smiling widely. I might not have expected to see a 70-year-old man so delighted by a such a gothy film, but maybe it's not so hard to see why they were smiling after all.

winter

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 04:27:02 GMT

For some reason, winter just makes me want to hide in my apartment amongst piles of inspirational clutter and read books or watch documentaries or write poetry or some shit. I guess winter is the time for the brain to shine while the body hibernates.

I have a couple of ideas I should be working on. It's go time. Mandelbaum! Mandelbaum! Mandelbaum!

i barely noticed

Wed, 17 Dec 2008 22:21:56 GMT

On my way to work this morning, as I rounded the corner transferring from stairway to escalator, I noticed a couple of older guys talking in the tunnel that leads down towards the subway station. One of the guys was Middle-Eastern or something, and the other guy was a grey-haired European, with his eyes closed and carrying one of those sticks that people who are visually impaired use to feel out the ground in front of them.

"Thank you," said the brown man, "you've made my day."

They were shaking hands, but in the way people do when they're extra appreciative, using both hands to clasp around the other's.

"You write that book!" replied the blind man.

By this time, I was half way down the escalator, noticing that a subway train was about to pull out of the station. I scuttled onto the train just as the doors slid closed, and it whisked me away to work.

thanks, unions

Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:59:22 GMT

I hear a lot of people say that unions are dinosaurs, that they are no longer necessary in our times and only contribute to bloat and inefficiency in the companies that they infest. I guess they were right. The UAW (United Auto Workers) union refused to allow pay cuts that would put wages in line with those paid by Japanese automakers. A reasonable request, I would think, if you're working for a company that is facing potential bankruptcy. But they refused. So the entire bailout was pulled off the table. Awes. Economic meltdown, here we come!

pitchfork.tv

Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:30:21 GMT

Soooo, pitchfork.tv is the best site ever. It's a site full of streaming videos of bands performing live. I've got this little piece of software that allows me to save the videos to my HD, so now, if I play the videos on my TV (which I do), and listen to them on good speakers (which I have), and I'm a little drunk (which is more often than not the case), it always kind of feels like I'm at a show.

(Side note: I saw the Walkmen a while back at the Horseshoe Tavern. Picture the linked video at about a million decibels, and that's kind of what it was like at the show. In other words, awesome.)

eighty percent of success is showing up

Wed, 10 Dec 2008 05:03:50 GMT

I got this fortune in a cookie a few years ago (don't ask me how that happened - they don't usually give fortune cookies to Chinese people. Maybe I'm just that white-washed). Pretty much the coolest fortune-cookie fortune I have ever seen. Normally they are really lame, like "A kiss isn't a kiss without the heart" or some other bullshit which isn't actually predicting anything. It's called a "fortune" cookie, tell me my fortune, you play-it-safe bastards.

Anyway, this was right before I opened the video store and lost my safety-net of a day job, so I kept it in my wallet. I found it in there today, which is pretty amazing, considering how much junk goes in and out of that thing. So now it's on my fridge.

I hope that cookie wasn't bullshitting me. Or maybe I need to get off my ass and make that cookie proud.

FOR SALE

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:15:56 GMT

Buy one, get one free on American cars! Coooome and git 'em!

Also for sale: 1 failing economy. Definitely a fix'er upper. Can also be used for parts. Sold as-is.

Roger Ebert, you magnificent bastard

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 04:37:01 GMT

In his blog, Roger Ebert writes:

The CelebCult virus is eating our culture alive, and newspapers voluntarily expose themselves to it. It teaches shabby values to young people, festers unwholesome curiosity, violates privacy, and is indifferent to meaningful achievement.
...
The celebrity culture is infantilizing us. We are being trained not to think. It is not about the disappearance of film critics. We are the canaries. It is about the death of an intelligent and curious readership, interested in significant things and able to think critically. It is about the failure of our educational system. It is not about dumbing-down. It is about snuffing out."

I don't believe I have ever read anything describing what's going on in our media today (and what it's doing to our standards and morals) that I so whole-heartedly agree with. You can tell Ebert's thought about this for awhile, because he really hit the nail on the head with those two paragraphs.

the gravy train has derailed. pretty sure it's on fire.

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:04:30 GMT

A sampling of the news feeds on my google home page this morning. For those keeping score, that's 6 out of 9 or two-thirds of the headlines saying "WE ARE FUCKED" (I'm paraphrasing).

But I guess that shouldn't be too surprising. I think us fat cats in N. America have been working our "me! me! me!" mentality of entitlement for a little too long - the subprime mortgage debacle only brought that situation to a head. We have people buying houses they can't afford, people re-mortgaging the houses they couldn't afford to buy gas-guzzling SUVs, unionized workers making $75/hr for unskilled labour, CEOs being paid tens of millions for fucking up their companies. We were/are being assholes pretty much across the board, and now it's time to pay the piper.

hockey night in canada and james bond

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 04:41:36 GMT

The other night Alice got some free tickets to go see the latest Bond film, Quantum of Solace, so I went with her. I have no idea what the fuck that title means, even after seeing the movie, but I like free shit. Alice gets free shit because she has a cool job. She works in the media industry so they are always getting to go to parties or getting free tickets to things. Sometimes at my job, they give me a free pen or some thumb tacks. Tomato, tomahto, I guess. Anyway, it's good to make friends with people who have cool jobs, because then you can leech off of them.

Look at all those mooching free-loaders. If you look closely, you can kind of see my head.

They gave us free popcorn and drinks, too, which at movie theatre prices, is like a $30 value.

They gave us free popcorn, but too bad they didn't spring for complimentary fake-butter because that shit is gooood. That fake movie theatre popcorn butter is pretty much the same thing as cigarettes - you really enjoy it, but you know it's giving you cancer.

I managed to finish half the bag of popcorn before Ron MacLean even finished talking. Oh yeah, Ron MacLean was there, from Hockey Night In Canada. The whole free movie thing was sponsored by CBC and Hockey Night in Canada because apparently they were trying to get people like Alice to buy ad-time during the 2009 NHL playoffs. That seems kind of like a long time away, but whatever, I work in computers. Anyway, Ron and Kelly Hrudey and some other dude from CBC were there to woo us media buyers with their polished TV charm. Ron is full of stories that end with puns such as "premature jacket elation". That guy is awesome.

After the movie, Alice and I found this place on Yonge just south of Bloor called "Ginger". We had these bowls of pho that were only $5.25, which is pretty amazing. The owners also let homeless people come in and use the washroom, which I thought was pretty cool. It was pretty cool because normally Asian store owners yell at everybody and anybody, even if they're not homeless.

why failure is good

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 21:20:16 GMT

Through my travels across the great expanses of Southern Ontario over the past number of years, I have often had the chance to meet people who instantly struck me as creatively gifted. People who had the passion or drive or sheer creative brain power to widen my eyes and make me say, "Cooool." I'm not just talking about people in artistic fields, either - I've seen and heard great things on topics ranging from business plans to book ideas to websites. Seemingly, there is no shortage of good ideas out there.

What does seem to be in shorter supply, however, is a willingness to fail. It sounds funny, but a lot of stuff never happens not because the potential for success isn't worth the effort, but because the fear of failure is overwhelming. Sometimes people don't try things because they're afraid the end result won't be any good, and they're afraid of being judged.

Well guess what, you shouldn't be afraid to fail, you should expect it. And maybe, you should even welcome it. Only through failure can you learn and improve. You're going to scrape your knee a few times as you learn to ride that bike, that's just how it works.

The company I currently work for has an entire operational model built on this idea. They had no pretensions of being the best out of the gate, and they knew their product wasn't polished or functionally complete when they launched it. They also knew that through being open to feedback, trial and error, and some plain and simple fuck-ups, they were going to get better and adapt. In about four years, the company has gone from 3 employees to about 100, with offices in 3 continents. Not bad for a bunch of people starting off not knowing what the hell they were doing.

"The irony of commitment is that it's deeply liberating - in work, in play, in love. The act frees you from the tyranny of your internal critic, from the heart that likes to dress itself up and parade around as rational hesitation. To commit is to remove your head as the barrier to your life."
- Anne Morriss

politics CAN be entertaining

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 15:33:50 GMT

Bush: 'I regret saying some things I shouldn't have said'

President Palin? Alaska governor ponders her future - or, "Sarah Palin serves moose hotdogs"

Obama's photostream

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 19:54:58 GMT

Apparently Obama has a flickr account:

http://flickr.com/photos/barackobamadotcom/

I'm going to see if I can add him as a friend.

making pictures of making history

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 16:36:30 GMT

Sometimes photographs have the ability to capture the emotion and energy of a specific slice in time or even what's on the minds of an entire nation. I feel like people will be looking at pics like these from last night for decades to come.

From Spiegel Online

check out my 16 GB iVote

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 15:47:32 GMT

So, like, wtf is up with the voting machines they use in the US? We now have the ability to make remote controls that can program 15 VCRs at once and fucking iPhones, but for some reason, they can't get the voting machines working quite right.

I think they should contract out a new company to do these machines, because, you know, getting accurate results here is kind of important.

ahhhh haaaa!

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 03:39:31 GMT

Finally, a reputable and reliable source like Yahoo Canada has reiterated and underscored what I've always believed: Sex and the City rots the minds of young women everywhere, like some kind of insatiable brain-eating tape worm. Don't get me wrong - judging by the episodes I have seen, it's a well-written and entertaining show. But I also think that's all it should be taken as. I'm almost certain its creators never intended to present a lifestyle that developing young girls should aspire to live. The point was to empathize with these dysfunctional women in the hopes of better understanding one's own social and emotional missteps, not to glorify fucked up relationships and expensive shoes.

But instead of entertaining fluff, we wound up with accidental role models for an entire generation of girls who eagerly click through an endless stream of "Which Sex and the City Character are You Most Like?" quizzes on myspace. Instead of aiming to be like Carrie, I'd rather girls be happy with the result:

Congratulations! The Sex and the City character you are most like is: None of those crazy broads! Your ability to get over your emotional baggage and move on with your life, keep your materialistic tendencies in check, and not self-sabotage your relationships gives you a shot at actually being happy! Celebrate, hooray!

(Ok, so maybe the article pictured said almost nothing to corroborate my opinions stated here. I just needed an excuse to write this).

the beginning and end of my acting career

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 18:23:56 GMT

There is a video crew rolling around the office today, filming footage for a corporate/marketing video for our company. Pretty sure we are the most boring subject matter these guys have ever filmed.

"Now type something... nod your head... pretend like you've just got a call.. now type as you're on the phone!"

If they use the footage of me, I hope it's overdubbed with an 80s speed metal soundtrack because that is the only kind of music that truly captures the excitement I feel whilst performing my job.

gettin' face cancer

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 05:20:56 GMT

My home workspace has instantly become about five times more worktastic with the edition of this 24" Samsung LCD. One must see it in person to truly appreciate its majestic size and sheer awesomeness. It's like my eyes have died and gone to heaven and are being massaged by topless Swedish women. The increase in productivity is totally worth the amount of radiation my face is absorbing just from sitting in front of this thing. Brightness, contrast, colour vibrance, sharpness - all at all-time highs. It is hard to continue blogging with the tears of pure joy that are now obscuring my vision.

Shout outs to Ty for selling me this thing on the cheap.

i turn my camera on

Wed, 29 Oct 2008 03:54:29 GMT

I'm trying to get better at Lightroom and Photoshop. Who knew you could use this stuff for more than just drawing stick figures of your friends being boned by donkeys or other such creative expressions. Click here to see what I mean.

eli "paperboy" reed vids

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 15:52:56 GMT

Here’s another take of "It's Easier":

And here's "Am I Wasting My Time?":

Electric blues tones and that distressed wail - even if that pain is faked, it sounds good.

down at the end of lonely street

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 02:56:12 GMT

Click for a slightly larger version.

There is this amazing sign on my street that I've been trying to photograph, although I just haven't been happy with the results. It's a bit hard to read if you shoot it from an angle, but it's an old, dilapidated, out-of-use sign that says, "Hotel Heartbreak". How fucking cool is that?

Hype Machine

Mon, 27 Oct 2008 18:53:32 GMT

If you don't regularly check out Hype Machine, you really should. Especially if you like finding new music, or just impressing your friends with the sheer number of obscure bands you know about.

What the smart fellows at Hype Machine have done, is created a website that aggregates all these other music related blog posts. You can then stream the MP3s posted in all these other blogs, or click through to the original posts and download like the pirate that you truly are. It's pretty much genius. Go forth, dear hipster, and discover.

synecdoche

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 14:34:02 GMT

Seeing as how Adaptation is one of my favourite movies of all time, I'm very excited to see Synecdoche, Charlie Kaufman's first effort as a writer AND director.

Apparently this is a pretty unusual movie, even by Charlie Kaufman standards. The guys is not afraid to take risks, you have to give him that much.