Head Tale

(Belated) Saturday Snap – Giant Checkers

Having a fun day at Nickle Lake’s activity shack (which, almost unbelievably, they chose to call “The Beaver Shack” during a contest last summer!)

However, it shall always be “Nickle Make” to me after the name I submitted! 😉

¶ Posted 06 July 2019 § Family § Pace § Saskatchewan § SaturdaySnap ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: camping, education

(Belated) Friday Fun Link – Game of Thrones Characters Reimagined as Disney Characters

Fun stuff.

¶ Posted 05 July 2019 § FridayFunLink § PopCulture ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: movies, television

Throwback Thursday – #tbt – I Miss America (March 2009)

Happy (?) Fourth of July.

I think I’ve mentioned that Shea’s and my “mini protest’ after Trump was elected was deciding not to go to the USA – mostly because of him but also because I just found the USA to be increasingly at odds with my personal values in general – from the gun violence to the overt displays of religion to the general ignorance of much of the population. (I think I’ve told the story of meeting a guy from Montana in Mexico and him not knowing where Saskatchewan was – even though our borders literally touch!)

Anyhow, we didn’t go to the US a lot but we had visited a handful of times over the years including everywhere from North Dakota to Hawaii so deciding to boycott an entire country does rule out opportunities to explore some of the most interesting, unique places and landscapes on earth.

The photo above is from a trip to one of those places – Las Vegas – which we got to for a weekend in 2009 and where my “twenty bucks a day max” gambling limit led to me hitting a pretty decent (relatively) jackpot!

Oh well – hopefully in 2020, the US will be back on our “Yes Fly” list. 😉

¶ Posted 04 July 2019 § Family § MemoryLane § News § Photo § Politics § ThrowbackThursday § Travel § United States ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: economics, holiday, unitedstates

Ten Things I’m Thinking About Lately

Hand dryers and noise pollution (especially in libraries)
How we’re always saying goodbye to people we love without realising it. (h/t to JB on FB)
How come Photos on my Macbook stopped showing recently uploaded photos a month ago even though I can see all my latest photos when I log in to Photos through iCloud?
How no company should *ever* be allowed to name their product something generic like “Photos” if they ever want people to be able to find solutions to their problems.
How could I ever get mad at Sasha for making up “recipes” of all the shampoos while in the tub when I used to do the same thing myself as a kid? (But did she have to add a whole bag of expensive epsom salts in her mix???)
I wonder if my parents thought I was wasting my time with all of my focus on computers growing up and now those skills are a large part of my current job. So why do I have those same worries about my kids doing things differently than when I was a kid when they might be learning future skills too? (Watching iPad videos and playing XBox One are life skills, right?)
Ian Noe.
When a voice-to-text phone message at work says “We’re looking for opportunities in vagina” and I still get a chuckle from the oldest joke that exists about Regina, Saskatchewan.
How I’m against censorship but I self-censored the joke I was actually going to make in that last bullet point.
What other things I believe strongly that I might be wrong or lying to myself about.

¶ Posted 03 July 2019 § Humour § Library § List § Politics § Randomness § Sasha ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: health, language, parents

Bohemian Rhapsody (2018) and Live Aid (1985) Scene Comparison

This is pretty cool!

¶ Posted 02 July 2019 § MemoryLane § PopCulture § UK § Video ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: cool, music

Music Monday – “Well, Canada’s been good to us/We’ve a living and a home/We’ve all got central heating air/And most are on the phone/I’m a citizen of both countries/And very proud to be/For the thistle and the maple leaf/Are the emblems of the free”

Happy Canada Day!

I recently re-discovered this photo of myself and four other four Canadians on exchange to the University College of Ripon & York St. John (say that three times fast!) in 1995.

I can’t remember the impetus for our fashion choice – maybe at a dance or for the new student orientation? – but anyhow, we all decided to dress as Canadians (and yes, we all had plaid in our wardrobes though one of the cooler exchange students decided to go with leather!)

Anyhow, this was in the cassette days and I still remember going to a nearby pawn shop when I first arrived in York as a priority was to get a radio/alarm for school. I think I paid ten pounds for a great one that even had dual cassette capabilities but then realised I didn’t have any good tapes to play in it.

Luckily, Tyler who was my fellow exchange student on the far left in the photo above had a few mix tapes – Tragically Hip, Blue Rodeo, Spirit of the West – and since I had a decent cassette player, was able to make copies of them all.

I listened to those tapes non-stop (and my sister mailed me a few to supplement my meagre collection) but Spirit of the West was probably the band that defined the trip for me more than any other – to the degree that I had printed out the lyrics to “Home For A Rest” and posted them on my dorm room door.

Anyhow, there’s lots of SOTW songs I could post today but this one feels right – it’s about Scottish people abroad but could also easily apply in reverse to a Scottish/Irish/English kid from the prairies visiting northern England, not too far from Scotland.