Saturday, April 2, 2011

What happens when spring arrives

Change is in the air. The signs of Spring are everywhere lately, from the improving weather to a general feeling of restlessness and excitement. It's time to get out more. Keep calm, open your eyes, and be amazed by new things. (Is that cheesy enough for you?)

-  Trying New Things, Exhibit A: I spent last night learning to salsa dance (dance the salsa?) with some soon-to-be-married friends and a crowd of strangers. I do not dance in general, so the reason I put my embarrassment on hold was to support this couple's wedding plan. The verdict: Not as terrifying as I imagined. I know the basic steps now, and it turns out that dancing can be fun.

-  Speaking of marriage, one of my band-mates got engaged a few days ago, making him the first of my long-time friends to pop the question. I spent some time thinking about how far we've come as people and as friends. The two of us started off as bitter enemies. That changed after a couple of years, and it wasn't too long before we were in a band together. He and the third member of the band are still my closest friends, and I'm incredibly happy for him. Now I have to plan a road trip to go visit him and his fiance. Woohoo! Road trip!

-  April Fools' Day just passed, and I don't remember another one with as many good hoaxes. A lot of them were book industry related, so I'll spare you the details here, but on a more global scale, it looked like Google had several things on the go, from the elaborate Gmail Motion, to placing a smiling narwhal in the Thames River on Google Maps (since disappeared), to changing all the letters on your screen to Comic Sans if you did a search for Helvetica. If anyone has other fun examples, let me know.

-  Something that wasn't a hoax was the food truck for A Game of Thrones. If you're a fan of the series, perhaps you've wondered what the food in Westeros tastes like. Have you ever eaten lamprey pie? Me neither. Yet if you were in New York City this week, there was a chance to sample some of the dishes described in the book. It's all part of the marketing plan for the TV series, and it's a pretty neat concept.

-  This is fun. For the chemistry nerds out there: The Periodic Table of Videos. Contains explosions and wacky scientists. It's like Bill Nye the Science Guy never left. (Maybe he hasn't. I used to watch his program as a kid, and I assumed he'd faded away, but his site makes it look otherwise. Never in a million years did I think I would need to link to Bill Nye. Science rules!)

-  Baseball is back. Apparently, so are the Blue Jay Bombers. I'm trying to remain realistic about their chances this year.

-  I was searching for new music this week, and the results left something to be desired. What I liked was I Follow Rivers, by Lykke Li.


She has some quality songs. However, the week was dominated by older tracks that I was hearing for the first time. Chief among these was They Can't Take That Away From Me, by Frank Sinatra. (I apologize for my ignorance if everyone already knows this song.)


Seriously swinging stuff. It's the kind of song that I can see some people really dancing to.

-  A final few words to end on a serious note. It is election season in Canada. We're going to the polls for the fourth time in seven years, and I'm a little disappointed at the number of people grumbling about this. The last few months have shown us the extent that people in other countries will go to for democracy and a chance to have their voices heard, yet this country will likely see a pitiful voter turnout. Democracy is precious, so why the voter apathy? If it's because you don't like the candidates, democracy provides ways to show your discontent and change the focus to the issues you find important. If teenagers and adults in Egypt can make it work, then so can we.

Spring means change.

1 comment:

Darth Rachel said...

Yay, thanks for the linkage!

Those foodtrucks were great. Like we've discussed I'm not exactly sure how many NEW fans they garnered, but they sure did get everyone talking, and it gave us fans a week long excuse to never stop talking about the show to each other (and everyone we knew).

I actually met the guys responsible for the trucks (marketing company called Campfire) and they were just as into it as the fans. (went to the winter-is-coming.net meet up on friday) and they brought the scent box with them as well! was so glad I got to see/smell that in person!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...