It is perhaps a sad thing that the first time that I have heard of Quebecois musician Jorane is in a San Francisco newspaper!

It’s altogether pathetic to think that most Canadian media will ignore performers from Quebec unless they can be presented as a novelty act.

Please take the time now to visit the SFGate website, part of the San Francisco Chronicle, and see what they have to say about cellist/singer Jorane. They have no less than four of her recordings available for download, and I think that you’ll like them.

During the 2001 Festival d’Été in Quebec City, I sat in an ultramodern café in the old walled city, chatting with a young, ambitious musician who could take an audience of thousands into an ecstatic reverie from one of the festival’s biggest outdoor stages, but who seemed unlikely to break across the Canadian border to the big time in the United States.

Hey, there’s even a Donna Summer cover! And one track with Hamilton boy Daniel Lanois.

Powerpoint as Art. Surely a ridiculous idea. In fact in recent months Powerpoint has been ridiculed many times, and relegated to the trash heap of communicative technologies that simply are Not Cool.

This is not a Magazine is a web site that embraces Internet graphics technologies to create lovely and thoughtful documents and experiences. The latest issue , titled “Everything will be OK” uses Powerpoint as a medium.

You can download it from here.

It actually includes the work of a number of artists, in widely differing styles. My favorites include “Developing the latent image”, an analysis of Vogue Magazine in classic Powerpoint style by Karen ann Donnachie. Somehow when you take the pinnacle of haute couture and present it as a series of Excel charts you find all manner of fascinating insights.

Also of note was “The Works of George W. Bush”, an examination of Shrub’s real work as a Performance Artist. As presented by Dyske Suematsu and A. Simionato this seems to be an entirely rational and sensible premise, with George playing the role of simulated President.

Working Artists may also find some chuckles in the new and improved “Current Art Practice Categorized by Strategy”, by Jennifer Dalton.

Be sure to also check out the notes that go with the slides. I was led to this gem from Jason Kottke’s blog, which also notes that Doogie Howser MD may have been the first blogger….

Thanks to the glories of Google, I discover that November’s tale called The Stubbs Island Chronicles has been reprinted in its entirety at Trucking 101 – News and Jobs for truckers.

The link above is actually to the Google cache since the original seems difficult to track down.

Nonetheless, if you’re a trucker check them out.

And, if that wasn’t enough, I now discover that the Opinionated Lesbian has described me as “the very charming Barry Rueger”. I really don’t know that I’ll be able to live with myself if this continues!

Today’s San Francisco Chronicle includes an article in which Sandra S. Froman, the first vice president of the National Rifle Association, suggests that school teachers should be armed.

“”I’m not saying that that means every teacher should have a gun or not, but what I am saying is we need to look at all the options at what will truly protect the students,” the NRA’s first vice president, Sandra S. Froman, told The Associated Press.”

“Froman said if it is the responsibility of teachers to protect students in a school, “then we as a society, we as a community have to provide a way for the teachers to do that.”"

I suppose that those teachers, and the armed students that they expect to battle, will appreciate the NRA’s handy Firearms Glossary.

Regular readers will recall that week or two back I told how I have been working through The Artist’s Way and had reached Chapter Four. Part of the exercizes included in that chapter required that I give up words for a week.

?If you feel stuck in your life or in your art, few jump starts are more effective than a week of reading deprivation.

No reading? That?s right: no reading. For most artists words are like tiny little tranquilizers. We have a daily quota of media chat that we swallow up. Like greasy food it clogs our system. Too much of it and we feel, yes, fried.?

Now I took this challenge seriously, and adapted it to suit the media universe within which I live. I did though have some advantages as I was house sitting for a friend who had no cable TV, only one small radio, and no local newspaper.

So with a change of environment I set out to replace media consumption with more thoughtful activities.

Losing TV really didn’t pose a hardship because I really don’t watch it much. Honestly I’ve seen every “Law and Order” rerun ever made, and can’t see the point of say “That 70′s Show“. I did though rent some movies – Dr Strangelove, Trainspotting, Henry and June, In Praise of Older Women, and 8 Mile.

Radio I ignored entirely except for in the car. One big change was to not set the clock radio. For the first time in years I have gone two weeks without hearing a CBC morning show.

I’ll admit that I did skim a couple of copies of the Toronto Star, especially the big Saturday edition, but other than that I didn’t read a paper or magazine.

Fiction? Despite a stack of library books, including one by Philip K Dick, I did not touch one bit of fiction.

So the only thing left was the good old Internet.

My big habit, the thing that will keep me glued to a LCD screen for hours at a time.

Amazingly I cut that way back too. I made a point of limiting e-mail to a couple of times a day, and aside from half dozen sites that I check daily ignored everything else. No random surfing, no idle research, no wasted hours on the ‘net.

So what did I do with all of that time? What filled my head when I wasn’t filling it with endless streams of printed text?

Journal writing, something that’s new to me but incredibly valuable. That of course is also part of the Artist’s Way, a regime of three pages every morning no matter how lousy or uninspired you feel.

What’s more amazing for me than the actual words that I put down though is the act of writing at length with a pen. After decades when I typed everything I am suddenly revelling in the luxury of writing by hand.

It changes the way that you think, making you at once slower because of the time it takes to shape letters and words, and yet with a feeling that your mind is rushing ahead, out of control, generating words and pictures faster than you can ever hope to capture them.

But that sensation is part of why I have come to enjoy the Morning Pages. In writing them, scribbling as fast as I can to keep up with ideas, I have realized that I don’t need to capture everything, that ideas can come and go an it’s all right. That’s a kind of freedom that can’t be described.

And that’s when I actually slowed down enough to begin, tentatively, to think in terms of penmanship. That is something that has never happened to me, even as far back as Grade Three when I was taught cursive script.

The other thing that I’ve been doing to fill my time is spending literally hours on the phone with people all over North America. Because the computer, and TV, and books aren’t eating up my time, tempting me with their siren call, I was able to take time to just sit and chat with some lovely and wonderful people.

This too was a new experience, and one that I came to enjoy very quickly.

And finally I have been walking, walking, walking. Some of that has been with a kind hearted friend who has made it her mission to get me into good physical shape. Some has been with our dog Ursula, who seems to have the same thing in mind and helps me to meet lots of nice kids and people. Some of it though was by myself, just for the joy of fresh air and exercize.

Think about it: when was the last time that you walked all the way across town?

If you’re like me it’s likely that you have needed this web site at least once or twice in your life. Frank da Cruz, from Columbia University in New York, has written what he calls Frank’s Compulsive Guide To Postal Addresses.

What this does is tell you the proper way of writing the postal address for every country in the world. And boy, are there ever a lot of variations.

Not only is this guide exhaustive and engrossing, it’s actually downright entertaining, with asides and jokes scattered throughout, and even items of historical interest. Trust me, if you’re the least bit curious you’ll lose at least three quarters of an hour here.

Under Canada:

“On 1 April 1999, Northwest Territories split in two. The new (eastern) half is called Nunavut and the western half is still called Northwest Territories (not “Bob“). “

Under Cuba:

Cuban addresses are written like this:

Sr. Héctor García Marizá
Reina #35, apt. 4a, e/ Gervasio y Escobar
Ciudad de La Habana, CP 11900
CUBA

where:

Reina #35 = street and number
apt. 4a = apartment number
e/ = between streets Gervasio and Escobar
CP = Código Postal (postal code)

“esq.” (esquina, corner) can be used instead of “e/” (between) when the house is on the corner…

Under Pitcairn Island:

PITCAIRN ISLAND (a British Overseas Territory and home of the descendents of the Bounty mutineers and their wives) normally receives mail through New Zealand about four times a year. Yet it is listed as a primary destination by the USPS; I suppose the mail is simply delivered to New Zealand. There is only one town — Adamstown — so town names or street addresses don’t seem to be needed or used; you can address people by name or PO Box. Ted Cookson (who has visited every country in the world, and who has been to Pitcairn three times) reports: “Adamstown is the only settlement on Pitcairn. The longboats are kept at Bounty Bay, which is down the Hill of Difficulty from Adamstown. But no one lives at Bounty Bay. Actually, there are only about 45 people on the island these days anyway. In spite of all the talk over the years, there is still no airport on Pitcairn and will not be one in the short-term. And there is no shipping service from the U.S. to Pitcairn. Cruise ships call from four to six times a year. Expensive yachts also go to Pitcairn now and again from Mangareva in French Polynesia. The islanders arrange for freight to be delivered to the island once or more annually on ships which normally originate in New Zealand and stop off en route to the Panama Canal. Mail is carried on all of these vessels.”

A lovely rant at Brain Frieze which asks the question: can you create imaginative, creative high tech employees if all that you do is train them to complete standardized tests? Read it here.

“We educators sure have a lot to apologize for. Seems we can’t get anything right. We’re told that schools need to be accountable through testing of our students, but then get faulted when kids graduate without the needed skills to actually do productive high-tech work.”

“Our kids are really good at bubbling answer sheets and counting pages in text booklets too. Man, can they ever bubble! We get them on that in Grade 3 and for the next 7 years they’ll be bubbling little fools. Bubble, bubble, bubble. Oh yes, they’re also very good at Remaining Quiet Until All Text Booklets Have Been Collected. There has to be some money available in that area. Hey, you’re the entrepreneurs. You’ll figure something out.

There are many other jobs that we’ve prepared our students to perform. Do you have a need for workers who can choose between 4 options? As long as they’re are labeled A through D, then we’re ready there too.”

My quest for Snow White led me to a wonderful collection of images by an artist named Paula Rego.

I first found a series of images on a Disney theme, including work based on Snow White, Pinocchio, and Peter Pan. Included in that grouping is a collection of paintings of ballet dancers titled ostriches.

“The Ostriches couldn’t have been done if I hadn’t been the age I am. A younger woman wouldn’t know what it was like; longing for things that are not gone, because they’re inside one, but that are inaccessible.”

I was also taken by the “dogwoman” series of paintings.

“To be a dog woman is not necessarily to be downtrodden; that has very little to do with it. In these pictures every woman’s a dog woman, not downtrodden, but powerful. To be bestial is good. It’s physical. Eating, snarling, all activities to do with sensation are positive. To picture a woman as a dog is utterly believable.”

Allow at least a half an hour to make your way through Rego’s site. It’s quite amazing.

Once again the Opinionated Lesbian unearths a story too good to be true. If you’re not reading her daily you’re missing far too many wonderful things. Like her comments on the demise of Jetsgo.

Kudos though go the Chicago’s Marshall Fields for not caving in to idiotic “family values” types.

From the Chicago Tribune:

Move over Tinky Winky and SpongeBob SquarePants.

When Marshall Field’s employed a Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs theme for its 2004 holiday festivities, the Chicago-born retailer received some complaints that it was promoting the homosexual lifestyle, an executive said recently.

The concerned citizens divined that there was a “hidden gay agenda” in Field’s theme “because seven men were living together,” Gregory Clark, vice president of creative services for Field’s in Minneapolis, recounted last month at a Retail Advertising & Marketing Association conference in Chicago.

Last weekend my partner Victoria Fenner presented her popular workshop called “The Art of Radio Documentary”.

I now find glowing praise for that weekend on the blog of one of the participants, Peter West.

Peter’s blog focuses on Public Relations, but in a way that covers a lot of ground. Check it out.

The Lexington Herald Leader features three stories this weekend about American military deserters that have come to Canada. The first is a lengthy profile of refugee claimant Army Specialist Darrell Anderson, 22, of Lexington, Ky. The second talks about that status of deserters while they wait for the Canadian refugee board to decide if they can remain in Canada, and the third talks about the role that sixties era draft dodgers are playing in this campaign.

There are also web sites on-line for deserters Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey. You can find out how to play a role at War Resisters Support Campaign

For the last couple of months I have been working my way through a book by screenwriter Julia Cameron called “The Artist’s Way“. I’m sure that many people have heard of it, read it, used it, but it essentially is a tool for unlocking creative abilities and generally sorting out your life in ways that will make you happier or more empowered. It’s good.

This morning I sat down to read Chapter Four. (Fans of the Artist’s Way will of course realize that that chapter is supposed to be Week Four, but I’m taking this seriously and not rushing through it.)

At the end of the chapter are a number of exercizes for the following week. That’s seemed quite attainable until I read this:

“If you feel stuck in your life or in your art, few jump starts are more effective than a week of reading deprivation.

No reading? That’s right: no reading. For most artists words are like tiny little tranquilizers. We have a daily quota of media chat that we swallow up. Like greasy food it clogs our system. Too much of it and we feel, yes, fried.”

I sat back for a minute to think about this. Like most people that I know my life is awash in words. In a given day I will read a variety if things.

Of course, my edition of the Artist’s Way was published in 2002, and consequently was written before we were all drawn into the ever expanding Internet. So I need to also add on-line reading including twelve or fifteen blogs, three or four news sites, and dozens of e-mail mailing lists.

I set out to catalogue what words I consume, and how important each is to me.

The question for me now is how I could ever survive a week without reading? With so much of my work and my life tied to e-mail and Internet can I function without sitting at a keyboard for several hours each day?

If the Artist’s Way was updated today (and probably it has been) how would they deal with the avalanche of words that appear on our computer screens?

Actually I know from past experience that I can ignore newspapers for days or weeks at a time and miss very little that affects my life. Reading the Spec each morning is maybe a ten minute drill of headlines, specific local news and columns, and the comics. I ignore fashion, food, advice columns, sports, and the classifieds.

Most of my international and current news comes from a handful of news sites or blogs. Most of my work specific information comes from another set of specialized writers that manage to capture the information that I need.

I believe that I can reduce my general work and news related reading to perhaps a twenty minutes a day or less.

E-mail though is another matter. I live and breathe e-mail, and that’s how most people know me best. One of the reasons that they know me is because I monitor a lot of lists and make a point of sending along information that they need but wouldn’t have noticed.

The question becomes one of whether I can curtail e-mail monitoring to a couple of times a day without also curtailing that work.

All of this will be difficult though because I have built myself a constantly wired universe where e-mail and websites are within three or four feet of me at almost every minute of the day. If I’m bored I surf and check e-mail. If I have an a idle question I surf or check e-mail. If I need to do research I surf or do e-mail.

All in all it’s going to be an interesting week. I can see no way to eliminate the printed word entirely from my life, but wonder just how much I can reduce my consumption of verbs, nouns, and all of the other constructs that surround me.

* OK, I’ll admit that all of these are piled in the bathroom and read two or three pages at a time.

A recent discussion on slashdot revolved around The Repercussions of Blogging, in particular, what may happen if you dis your employer on your blog and they notice.

Consensus was that you could expect to be fired.

Midway through the discussion though a fellow called Rich appeared with the list below.

In Rich’s words “The first part of each paragraph is verbatim from “I am a gentle bunny“, by boojum the brown bunny. Applying it to American Corporate life was not at all difficult.

Read on.

I am a gentle employee bunny.

1) I am a gentle bunny. I will listen carefully before I speak. In so
doing I might get some faint clues from my manager as to who is going to
get screwed next, and so take steps to make sure I am not in the penumbra of
blame when it happens.

2) I am a gentle bunny. I will think before I speak. I will make very
sure I don’t violate my employer’s non-disclosures or talk about the stock
during blackout periods. Nor will I reveal what I know about management’s
little hobbies. I will remember that my employer is *not* a gentle bunny, but
is part wolf, part rat, and part Emperor Palpitine; and his lawyers are
even worse.

3) I am a gentle bunny. I will remember that when I speak I can hurt
others. Will what I say cause others pain? Will they take it out on me in
my next review? (more…)

Bill Doskoch offers a really nice summary of CBC Radio‘s ongoing efforts to totally not understand anyone under 43 years of age. And to do so with the latest in cutting edge Web technology…

Read it here

One choice quote:

Here is what former Radio Three director Robert Ouimet had to say:

“Radio Three is intended to speak to a, quote, younger audience,” he says, noting that in the five years he was at Radio Three, the CBC spent only $100,000 promoting it. “Younger audiences do not listen to CBC One or Two. They never have. I’m sure the new unit is going to make great items for traditional CBC audiences, but they’re not going to be attracting a new audience.

“And now you have this whole community of freelancers [at Radio Three] who were making really interesting art and stories and editorial positions on everything from Kyoto to new music and they will be gone. They’ll be picked up by new-media companies and ad agencies and the whole vision will be lost.

CBC Radio Three actually did some nice work, but woe be the person who tries to access it with a dial up connection! Oh yes – and Brave New Waves may also be on the chopping block.

Ohmygod! Eleanor Brown’s Opinionated Lesbian blog has a delicious and thoughtful post describing her passion for the newly liberated Martha Stewart.

“My hotsie totsie dream girl Martha Stewart was released from prison this morning. “I don’t understand why so few lesbians want a naked Martha Stewart in their beds, complaining about the low thread count in their cheap sheets.” More on why she’s my va-va-voom here.”

This you really do need to read!

Then check out the Gothic Martha Stewart….