Exile

Now when I come back to Ottawa, hopefully I won't have to suffer that "graduated learning" b*llocks!

No Christmas card - I got a letter from gentlemonkey, and failed miserably to respond to it.

How's the job hunt going, my friend?

Hey Giggles - music over here is just fine. I must say that I probably err on the side of techno dance music and some of the "post-rave" stuff that is around. Arab Strap a good example of the latter.

Or, my pal's outfit Bows...(CD available at Black Tomato in Ottawa, I noticed), which is sort of stop-start mellow drum and bass with female singing in Danish. Air (from France) are great, as is the wonderful BJ Cole.

But in term of "jam bands", I guess there there would be less of a scene here than in North America. Not sure why...maybe 15 years of neo-liberal conservatism under the Tories knocked any slightly hippyish residual "non-structured" thinking out of people's heads?! Then again, maybe not.

We survive, but it would be nice to see a nero show in Edinburgh!! Everyone here thinks that Canadian music starts with Rush, prgresses to Bryan Adams, and ends with Celine Dion...

You're up early!

Last year, my girlfriend and brother secretly arranged for my Dad to come over to Scotland for Christmas (he lives in Ottawa).

I was in a bar in Leith (the port area of Edinburgh) with said younger brother, giving him Christmas presents to deliver to family in Canada. He was to leave the next day, to stay with Dad over the holidays.

We had a few beers, and were chatting away happily (me occasionally saying "make sure you don't miss your flight tomorrow"), when who should walk into my local but the Old Man himself.

Much hilarity - "just in time, it's your round" etc etc. He stayed for two weeks, and we had a top holiday.

Surprise presents are best, because they show that the other person is thinking of you without being prompted to!

Wait a minute - for my birthday that year (b-day in December), she gave me a surprise weekend at a converted lighthouse hotel on the west coast of Scotland. We were meant to be driving to Glasgow to do some Christmas shopiing - it was only when we missed the last turn off to Glasgow that I suspected anything. What a woman. Must marry her...

I'm beginning to realise that I will have to raise my game on the old presents front...

Gentlemonkey - it is indeed the Burglar! By a complex process of elimination (ie only one of you b*stards ever wrote me...), I have divined your identity.

As for the others...I wait for them to come out of the woodwork.

Rubberdinghy - I paid a gut-wenching amount of money to get digital TV (the alternative in the UK is 4 channels), in order to watch the Olympics. Imagine my disgust when I realised that the sports channel required, although included in my package, was "unavailable in my area"! They did show the final on "terrestrial" TV , however. I wish I could have been in Ottawa that day! The upshot is that if I stay up 'til 3am, and the Limeys show the right games, I may be able to watch Jacques' Jokers bomb out of the playoffs. Shame about Montreal, by the way...

In other news - I passed my driving test! Years of forced pedestrianism now at an end!

Give my love to all

Exile

Rubberdingy! What's up, brother?!

I hear Roy's obsession with fart jokes in the locker room upset the sophisticated Europeans, so he had to go. I can imagine Don Cherry's reaction...

Sometimes on a Sunday I put on my Sens shirt and watch Ayr Scottish Eagles against Belfast Lightning on the BBC. It's sad.

How is with you and the gang?