Transcript from my cell phone voicemail.
Call from: 905 XXX XXXX
Time: 1:10am

“Hey. This is Leo (Could have been “Theo” or “Neo”). Uh. I know it’s late at night. *mumble* like 1am. I was just callin’ you know. Just wondering how you *mumble*.

Anyway I was just got up and *mumble*. Like lots of memories.

(Pause)

And I haven’t even met your dude yet. So call me. I know it’s late. Maybe call me tomorrow, like around noon.”

The poor guy sounded pretty desperate. I knew a Theo back in the early 90s but he’s in London Ont and could not have got my cell number from anywhere, anyone. The only Leo I know was a customer from the Eagle who I would not give my number to. The only Neo I know is stuck in a matrix.

I hope he found the boody he was calling.

1) She talks. Non stop. But I guess that is on par for anyone who has their fingers in your mouth. No chance whatsoever of getting a word in edgewise. At the end of the cleaning, my Dentist came in to inspect her work and looked up at the TV to see Dr Phil (more on that in a moment) and he asks what today’s show is about. She launches into such a disjointed monologue, emphasized with finger pointing at the screen, that the writers for LOST would have been envious: “He’s got two girlfriends but one is his wife and she the girlfriend, is her ex best friend and he’s had two kids with them within a month of each other and he cant decide…”

I shoot a look at my Dentist. His eyes are sheilded of course but they tell all. Nothing. He’s sat through this rant before.

2) She has a sense of humour. On her “Wall of Teef” or “Wall of Great Gums” or something, there is an area of nothing but cats. I am assuming cats from clients. Unless she’s a crazy cat lady, which wouldnt surprise me one bit. Smack dab in the centre of the cat collage is a picture of ALF. I dont know if its a sick joke or what. But it’s funny.

3) She loves Dr Phil. I have never seen a show of his, nor have I seen his initial appearances on Oprah, either. It was like watching Desperate Housewives on Quaaludes. “I. Will. Leave. Him.” chants a upper middle class woman so mired in low self esteem, she makes Kirstie Alley look like… Dr Phil. Of course, I am biased because of all the screaming, punching Springer/Montel/Maury/Ricky Lake shows I’ve seen.

• My sister’s house is massive. I really hope that she can offload it without any loss.
• I also hope she can build the house she wants beside the house she needs to offload. She’s busier than a paper wasp at a pulp fiction convention.
• I wore Government of Canada, Parks Canada rented shorts. I looked like I had canvas diapers on. Mike oddly enough looked kind of like a 1950s dad at a cottage…
• The mountains smell…like pine… We speculated as to whether or not there was a car freshener factory near by when in Kananaskis.
• There are some wicked used book stores in Calgary: I got Caves of Steel and Foundation, Issac Asimov; Salmon of a Doubt, Douglas Adams (I recommend. I was a bit aprehensive when I heard they were raiding his hard drives…Im glad they did); Crytonomicon, Neal Stephenson (I was reading it on the streetcar the other day and this guy punched his girlfriend and pointed at me “HE’S READING IT!!”)

Hello. I’m not good at introductions. I generally do the cop out thing and say “Introduce yourselves” when I have to do 2 or more people standing about. So mumble under your breath your name and say Hi.

Okay so this is my first blog. I haven’t a real exciting life. I collect robots and I run another site called Dead Robot, which I should update much more often than I like. I’m a culture vulture and will use any excuse to watch tv or bad sci fi at any given moment. I think that’s all I’m gonna reveal right now…if you read on you will get the gist of who I am. If you click on the stuff at the side you will be dissapointed. I’ve hacked this site from my boss. Its mine now. I own it. Me. Not him. Mine.

Cartoon Brew tells me that Rock and Rule (aka DRATS, to you Canadians) will be out on DVD next week.

I remember one of my teachers at Sheridan College going all glassy-eyed when discussing the making of this movie. He told us how for the final scene where the demon rises up, the animators tried to film/rotoscope real blood spilling out over a sheet of glass with a camera underneath. Heady NFB-esque experimental stuff. Which didn’t work so well because they were really really high. Seems part of the money for art supplies was being funneled to midday cannibis breaks while Clive Smith would change things on the fly, making the final storyboard a piecemeal of bar napkin scribbles and effectively sending the writers to early graves. With this kind of kinetic filmmaking going on, it’s a wonder the movie is as coherent as it is.

Overheard at a rush screening:
“Jesus, guys… this makes no sense…”
“What doesn’t?”
“What?”
“What doesn’t make sense?”
“I see trails.”

My teacher (no I won’t name him) also talked about how cool it was to have Lou Reed, Iggy Pop and Deborah Harry (at that time still hanging around Toronto from Videodrome shoots?) in and out of the studio, trying hard to jumpstart their careers by recording songs for the movie. I still hum “My name is Mok. Thanks a lot.” every so often.

Pay attention to the lips of the lead character, Mok. Yes, they’re Mick’s. You’d have to be living under a box not to realize that, but they’re really the star of the movie. Never has a facial part been so lovingly animated. Disney always went after the eyes. The animators of Rock and Rule were so high, they never got off the lips.

I want Cory Doctorow. Not because he’s like, smart and stuff. No. Other than being geek-sexy, I love his glasses. Soon I will have a vintage pair as well.

If you have an iPod you can read his latest Sci Fi “Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town“. Its available off his site and can be read through the “notes” feature. He’s so cutting edge I want to save his stem cells.

ROTC tried to open the event. Why were they performing in the beer garden where nobody could see them? It started to rain pretty hard and we stuck around as long as we could, which in the past, seems to always kick off FFN. Maybe next year they could start it later and give themselves more time to recoop from the dance the night before? Bitsie performed her act for all of 5 people.

Mike, dilligent volunteer when the rain started to come down. Thunder and lightning forced us back to Sharkboy’s and we returned after 3pm. As we were leaving, a homeless guy asked one of the security volunteers what was going on. “Folsom Fair North,” says the volunteer. “Falcon Fair?” asks the rubbie. “Yeah,” says the volunteer.

We came back after the rain stopped. Public displays of S&M. The booths were plentiful and the location was great. Much better than a parking lot.

Blair, a manager at Woody’s, possibly the nicest man on Church Street. Great idea of having live stage apart from the dance area. It seperated the hard core punk/s&m crowd from the tweaking circuit kids.

Kids On TV: the best thing about Folsom. I publically take back everything I ever said about them last year. They brought life to the party. Crackpuppy was a messy live band. We didn’t stick around for Lesbians on Ecstacy.

I’d give the day a B.

I so want to see The Aristocrats! Here’s a clip of the South Park kids’ version of the joke (via World of Wonder). Crappy animation safe for work, but audio certainly isn’t.

In a word: Weak. Spread out venues and lack of advertising beyond Xtra ads and the banners up on the street poles lead to a watered down day. The fact that The Black Eagle, the only leather bar in Toronto, didn’t utilized their storefront speaks volumes.

Currently there is a divide going on within the Leather community, all vying for your leather cash: Folsom Fair North, official holders of the Canadian name of the popular American fair, and The Church Street Business Improvement Association who hold the power to shut down Church street from Isabella to Alexander, with their own Church Street Fetish Fair. These two events are slated a couple weeks apart which makes me wonder if Toronto will experience some sort of fetish-fatigue.

While FFN has the organization and polish, the BIA has the strength of venue. Rumor has it that these two groups are unwilling to combine and so they both remain seperate and weak. Imagine if the FFN boys had the area of Church Street to put on their party. Throw in the co-operation of MLT and Spearhead and that would be a weekend that would be proud enough to sell internationally. Sadly, they can’t come together due to some pissing contest that happened behind the scenes. The ironic part is that the leather community, when commenting on itself, always mention comradery and inclusiveness in leather.

I did notice that both events had pretty much the same volunteers and same merchants, so that is a start. Which leads me back to the fatigue issue again. Nothing new was offered (other than the demos going on in Kawartha Park) that was already displayed at FFN so CSFF lost out on that.

In all, I’d give the day a C-

This morning, Toronto was treated to 5 light aircraft dragging huge banners behind them extolling the new services Air Canada has to offer. I’m sorry I didnt get a photo, I havent worked out taking clear shots using the camera on the new phone (yeah we broke down and got one each).

The first aircraft was dragging an Inuit bird design. The second was a cropped headshot of the Statue of Liberty. The third a cowboy. Fourth: a cropped “OLLYWOO”. And lastly, AC’s URL.

Nice stunt. The one colour illustrations were clear enough to be seen from that height, but I am sure the Inuit bird might have been lost on some. It took me a while to realize that in context of the other banners, it was to represent B.C. or Vancouver or Emily Carr’s floating ghost. Or something. The Liberty head could have been replaced with a stinky cab driver and they could have dropped garbage on the city with NYC verve and attitude, while the Calgary Cowboy banner plane could have just dropped bombs on our overly-Liberal Toronto. Lastly the OLLYWOO banner was a nice touch for all the industry types in town for the TIFF.

Now. About that whole bankruptcy thing a couple years back…?

While this was effective (Im writing about it, yeah?) I think Im starting to get Ad-fatigue while scooting around Toronto. Dundas Square isnt done yet and I dread going there because I’m either so dazed at all the crap to look at, like some Eastern Bloc European let loose at Costco, or Im bumping into Eastern Bloc Europeans dazed at all the crap to look at. At Yonge and Isabella, by my Da’s condo, up on the side of the ever deteriorating Church of Scientology, there’s a video billboard that makes his livingroom look like something from Blade Runner on good nights. If they’re shilling anything using bright and gaudy images, his condo is lit up like an acid trip. When circuit parties roll into town, advertisers have taken to spraypainting the URLs of the event on the sidewalks of Church Street. Now keeping your head down to avoid a constant barrage of ads while out for a stroll is no longer an option. While trying to drive by Yorkville during TIFF, I was held up at a light by one of those roving billboards, the midsized trucks with nothing on their flatbeds other than a poster for a movie or some such nonsense. The truck had t-boned the intersection, not allowing north bound traffic past it. I leaned out my window and yelled “I am SOOO NOT going to see that movie because you’re blocking traffic!” I got the finger.

Dont get me wrong. I think the anti-postering law was a foolish waste of debate. I like street posters when they’re put up with respect of property and other posters. But the large stuff like the blimps and the planes and the video walls are making me think we’re living in a city of booming carnies vying for your attention.