SaskTel Max, a Saskatchewan-based cable TV service has a feature where they have local content available on-demand for their subscribers. This might be a clip profiling an upcoming festival or visiting a few of the best known restaurants around town. Or, in a week or two, it will include a guided tour to the services available at Regina Public Library co-hosted by yours truly.
Our Marketing Department asked me to participate in the video along with our most recently hired librarian (she said that someone was joking with her that this meant she couldn't be fired since she'll now be the “face of Regina Public Library”. As the second-newest hired librarian at RPL, I hope this is true! )
It was a fun afternoon and definitely something out of the ordinary. I can't wait to see how it comes out (or maybe I can? My joke at the outset about needing thirty-seven takes just to say my name almost came true a couple times as I delivered my lines throughout the afternoon!)
Not sure if you heard but apparently the Wet & Rainy Olympics are in Canada this year and the opening ceremonies are tonight.
The Olympics are once again a lightning rod of controversy and having them on our own doorstep has perhaps brought this home in a way that doesn't happen when they're in Italy or Japan or even next door in the US.
Even Vancouver's libraries aren't immune, a controversy having stirred around a directive from VPL's marketing department about which sponsors to use during the period when the Winter Games are happening and which to avoid as well as asking staff to put pieces of tape over non-sponsor logos on things like electronic equipment. (I wonder if they were asked to do the same as what happened at the last Olympics when black tape was apparently placed over the logo of the urinal maker in the bathrooms at Olympic venues since Moens or Delta or whoever weren't the official plumbing sponsor of the Olympics!) [Edit: or worse]
I'm mixed in my feelings towards the Olympics. I like the idea of what they're supposed to represent – the pinnacle of athletic achievement taking place on a global stage for international competition within international cooperation. But I'm not naive enough to dismiss the rampant commercialism and corporatization of the Games which has long replaced the ideals of the games as the most important thing. That's not even mentioning the massive expenses associated with hosting the Games and long-term debts that are always incurred (I think Calgary 1988 was the only modern Olympic Games – summer or winter – that ended up being debt-free at the end of it.)
I've got lots more thoughts but I won't get into them there. I will say that I also have mixed thoughts about nationalism and patriotism. But one of the places where I don't is in regards to the Olympic hockey tournament. So Go Canada Go and here's a little clip to get your blood stirring, not least because whoever picked the song chose a great under-the-radar Canadian songwriter named Mike Plume…(ffwd to 2:57)
I gotta admit – I kinda like it. I like the Web 2.0-y logo. I like that the web site has lots of bite-sized goodies about the city I call home (although a broken video link three days into the campaign isn't a good sign!) I like that this new slogan isn't cheesy like our last one, “I <heart> Regina” (although the mayor is saying that one will stay too – not sure how that works?) I especially like how “Infinite Horizons” ties in so nicely to our provincial motto of “Land of the Living Skies”. (Next up: “Saskatoon: City of Bridges (Er, And Clouds)”)
There are some legitimate criticisms – the City used a Winnipeg firm when perhaps preference should've been given to a Regina company (plus the cost of the whole endeavour which was somewhere around $300 000.) For some, “Infinite Horizons” reinforces stereotypes of Saskatchewan as flat and boring. And of course, I always find things like this pretty funny in that they're trying to convey that Regina is Dynamic ™, Unique ™ and Independent ™ – all marketing buzzwords that couldn't possibly be used to describe, well, pretty much every other mid-sized city in Canada.
Not sure what my personal answer would be – maybe the print version of the Encylopedia of Saskatchewan? It's a massive book that's beautifully designed with tons of photos, charts and highly readable entries. Great for browsing.
Oh, okay, one more. Here's our family farm overlooking the Qu'Appelle Valley. (It's not documented but someone said that a lot of small towns are in the database now too. Indian Head didn't work but the major highways running by it (including #56 which goes from IH to our farm and on to the Qu'Appelle Valley) are mapped. Pretty cool!
Okay, I won't keep adding more maps in here but I just wanted to mention that I was wrong above – Indian Head is one of the small towns that's been mapped (I must've clicked wrong or something to miss it the first time) and I got to see a view of the house I grew up in. Then we flipped down to Shea's parents' house in Weyburn to see her parent's house and there's my brother-in-law in the garage, working on my father-in-law's truck!
I know I could get my entire month's worth of Freedom to Read Week Month “Music Monday” clips out of this list but I'll post them as a group since that's how I found them.
Used a poor man's hack (point iPhone at TV) to get a clip from our local TV news about RPL joining our new province-wide consortium onto YouTube. Sorry for the crappy sound…
A friend had introduced me to “Reservoir Dogs” soon after it came out on video and I quickly became a Tarantino junkie. When I found out that “True Romance“, a movie he'd written but not directed was coming out, I was pretty pumped to go see it.
The release of this movie happened to coincide with me being introduced to a rather nice young woman by mutual friends. As these things go, I asked her to a movie but somewhat selfishly, decided that I really wanted to see “True Romance” so I suggested that this be the movie we go see. She hadn't heard of the film or Tarantino or “Reservoir Dogs” so agreed. I mean, to her the title had “Romance” in it and it started Christian Slater who'd been in “The Legend of Billie Jean” and “Young Guns II” – how bad could it be?
I picked her up and while waiting for her to get ready, checked out her movie collection. She had a VHS copy of every Disney movie ever released and really, not much else. “Oh-oh” I remember thinking. But I was *really* excited to see the Tarantino film and the thought of doing a quick switch to a different film didn't even cross my mind.
Well, you can imagine how things went. The film about a young couple (one a comic store loser, one a hooker who his boss hires for him as a birthday present) who accidentally end up in possession of a suitcase full of cocaine. It contains all the elements of the best (you may choose to put that word in quotes, depending on your personal taste – I know she would've) elements of a Tarantino movie – violence, dark humour, pop culture references, a wicked soundtrack. One scene where a mobster ends up beating the hooker (who'd been left in the room while her boyfriend goes to get ice cream! ) was so disturbing that I was cringing in my seat (and not just because I was on a first date with a Disney chick sitting beside me!)
The movie ended, I took her home and we parted ways. Believe it or not, I think we may have seen each other a few more times after that although honestly, I think the magic was gone about two minutes into the movie where it became clear that this movie wasn't anywhere near “The Lady and The Tramp” but would be a really intense version of “The Loser and The Tramp”.
TL;DR: For a first date, I took a huge Disney Fangirl to a Movie That Ranks Near The Top of “Films That Most Frequently Use The Word 'Fuck'” right up there with “Eddie Murphy: Raw” and “The Departed”.
Oh, and the movie also features perhaps the greatest scene of dialogue in the history of film between Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper…
So many choice quotes in this article – unfortunately, you can't make this stuff up:
“The row even spread to this year's Fourth of July parade, which
included a float featuring a washing machine and a sign that read “keep
our library clean.”
“Outside West Bend, the fight caught the attention of Robert Braun,
who, with three other Milwaukee-area men, filed a claim against West
Bend calling for one of the library's books to be publicly burned,
along with financial damages.
The four plaintiffs — who
describe themselves as “elderly” in their complaint — claim their
“mental and emotional well-being was damaged by [the] book at the
library.”
“We want parents to decide whether they want their children to have
access to these books … and we want the library's help in identifying
[them through labeling and moving],” Maziarka said. “It's just common
sense.”
I think it's fair to say that the majority of the battles around Freedom of Expression are taking place in schools these days.
“The Diary of Anne Frank” is one of my favourite books of all-time and a book I probably first read when I was 12 or 13. So in a world where all kinds of censorship is happening in schools, this story where a newer, expanded version of the autobiography with more sexually explicit material that wasn't in the original release is pulled from the classroom after a single complaint and without following the school's only policies, really irked me. The decision to keep the book in the school library does little to correct the injustice of pulling it from the classroom that's happened here.
“Culpeper's policy on “public complaints about learning resources” calls
for complaints to be submitted in writing and for a review committee to
research the materials and deliberate, Allen said. In this case, the
policy was not followed. Allen said the parent registered the complaint
orally, no review committee was created and a decision was made quickly
by at least one school administrator. He said he is uncertain about the
details because he was out of town.”
) 
“The row even spread to this year's Fourth of July parade, which
