Appropriately enough, my 2010 ends with technology ruling the day, if not my entire flippin’ life.
My main website is still MIA, with my host not even responding to trouble tickets and e-mails. Once I get the transfer authorization I need, I will be switching to a new provider I’ve already signed up with.
I also recently realized that I’ve only tweeted (twittered??) twice since opening my Twitter account, so even though there’s always a lot of cluckin’ going on here, I intend on getting more active on that front as well:

http://twitter.com/#!/thatdanguy1

Check it out, and follow me! If I ever know where I’m going, you’ll be along for the ride!

Aside from that, looks like I’ve got a bit of a bug, so I’m crawling back into bed for a bit.
Happy New Year ALL!!!

Chow for now…

Arrghh!!
I was killing time waiting for an oil change, and decided to try posting a blog via my i-phone app. It was a funky rhyme, with delusions of grandeur as perhaps a future rap work-out - maybe something Justin Beiber could have worked into a hit.
Although, truth be told, waiting for your oil to get changed might not strike a chord with his core audience...
Anyhoo...I had turned my phone sideways, which made the "Post" button disappear. My legendary patience with inanimate objects had me doing everything but righting the phone before the post was lost forever, depriving you, my dear reader(s) of a possible nugget.
Technology hates me...
Chow for now!!

Waiting on an oil change

Lost the entire frickin' post I just typed out on this stupid miniature phone keyboard. Oh joy, oh thrill!!
Let's see if this blasted post works...
Chow for now.

Decided to address our cabin fever yesterday by taking a short drive along the Trans-Canada Highway. Under an hour from our garage door is Kananaskis, just before Banff. Very picturesque, with delightful walking trails – featuring spectacular views. Plus, we had heard that elk were in the area, and hoped to see some of these reindeer-like aminals…


Alas, as we were heading up the final stretch to our destination, it was starting to snow, so we chickened out and turned back towards home. Good, thing, as we found out later watching The Weather Network that the avalanche risk in Kananaskis was “considerable”.

Egads!

Still, we did stop to snap a few pictures. No elk…

Chow for now!

I think I’m going to do like so many other workers out there today, and take today off in lieu of Boxing Day. Or Boxing Fortnight. Or just general Holiday Malaise Week.


Hey, that commute from my kitchen down to my office is a killer, even with the reduced traffic during the holiday season. Plus, my gnarled knuckles, clenched in permanent curl from thousands of hours over keyboards of varying shapes and sizes, need a chance (however brief) to extend, like Olympic javelins extending from a fleshy hub.

I can wait until tomorrow to find out what restaurant the Kardashian sisters are eating at…

Chow for now.

I wonder where South Lanarkshire (Great Britain) is located? Close to London? Not too far from another British city(sure do need to brush up on my geography, apparently)?


Someone there downloaded an episode of my audio interview series – making that a truly international experience (la-de-dah). I’ve already tracked listeners all across North America, so it’s interesting to see the growth expanding beyond those borders.

Chow for now!

Sigh…


I always dread Boxing Day, after a generally relaxing Christmas day.

As tradition dictates, I will face off against a boxing kangaroo later this afternoon, to see who emerges victorious from the ring after 6 rounds. Those blasted kangaroos are sneaky, let me tell you – this year I intend on “opening a can of whoop-asp” on my opponent, and walking away with the Burger King Crown Of Victory.

Just have to avoid getting knocked out again…

Chow for now!!

Chicken Scratch

(posted by weekend guest blogger Charlie Chicken…)

Ho Ho Ho!

Merry Cluckin’ Chrsmas!!

Ho Ho Ho!!

I’m upta my runny nostrils in eggnog here this mornin’ – I loves me my Chrsmass!!

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

Of course, I may get inta sum trouble openin’ OTHER pipl’s presents…but hey, peas on earth, goodwill in Ward 10!!

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

Hope I can fine tha receipt fer these socks – they’re too big fer one thing, and too clingy on my claws fer another.

Don pipl give out booze no more??

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

Wonder when tha hoomans is getting’ up aroun’ here? Spooky quiet so far, altho I heer sum snorin’, so they hasn’t gone inta hidin’

Well, I got me some stockins ta rifle thru, so better get scitterin’…

Cluck fer now!

Have yourself a Mary Whittle Christmas


With your mule Tide brights,

From now all may all your cottons come out wide.

Here we are in bold pee-jays,

Happy woven scarves of Raid.

Full full friends and deer of rust,

Gather wood afar.

So half your cells a Mary Whittle Christmas now…

Chow for now!

Well, as Christmas Day fast approaches, I discover that:


a) I just managed to get the cards mailed YESTERDAY (that should be the last time Mrs. That Dan Guy leaves ME in charge of distribution…),

b) Haven’t even begun to shop, and

c) My Santa hat was eaten over the summer by moths.

To make things easier for myself today, I will post a link to a Christmas piece from my old newspaper column:

http://www.eventpub.com/includes/datafiles/print.php?id=153494&title=Santa%E2%80%98s

Enjoy!

Chow for now…

I’ll bet I just might be the only person out there that took pictures of the lunar eclipse last night.


I bet I’m going to amaze and dazzle you with these attached pics.

I’m going to bet that if you haven’t already navigated away by now, you need to get to get a life as badly as I do…

Enjoy! Or wait another 456 years until it occurs again.

Wonder how bald I’ll be by then?

Chow for now!

Oh My Word!!


As I started to type this post…this 12 21 10 post…I noticed that it was 12:21 AM!!!

I KID YOU NOT!!!!

AAA-YII-YIII!!!

Anyhoo, just watching the lunar eclipse.

For something almost as “luney”, here’s a link to my monthly national humour column for the real estate industry:

http://www.remonline.com/home/?p=7282

Here in Canada this past year, the Competition Bureau stepped in and made a fuss about the industry. I took a little liberty with helping them out, with respect to some other potential targets.

FYI – as I copied this link, this column was part of the front page leads on the website!

Chow for now…

I remembered (for no apparent reason) the other day that I have a small bit of history with Motown, therefore legitimizing even more my recent review of the current show “Motown Gold”, running now at Stage West Calgary (until Jan 30, 2011).


We once met a Supreme. Or a Supremes, I suppose might be more accurate, although awkward:

http://thatdanguy.blogspot.com/2007/05/sunday-morning-nobody-asked-me-to-but_27.html

Mary Wilson, one of the legendary Motown greats, just one of many we’ve seen perform live.

Chow for now!!

It appears that it’s been some time since I posted about my ongoing head-smacking by numbers – most specifically eleven, and eleven-eleven. It’s certainly not like they have relented in any way recently. Now more than ever as this current year prepares to roll over to 2011, those numbers are pretty much everywhere I look.


Case in point, the picture posted above. Last night I was watching Hockey Night In Canada, as I am legally required to do as a male citizen in this country, when there was a scrum along the boards early in the game. When the two players separated and pulled away, my eyes damn near popped out of my head like Jim Carrey’s character in The Mask. Of all the myriad numbers, of all the myriad players, there was 11 and 11.

Aye Caramba!!

I could go on, but let’s just say that if I were one of those conspiracy theory wing-nuts, I’d be hiring a detective to follow around math teachers…

Chow for now!!

Chicken Scratch

(pothted by an increathingly perturbed poultry..who could uthe a thnack…)

I bin tho lonely…

I bin tho lonely…

I bin tho lonely, I coulde die…

AAAAWK!!!!

Thith is really thtartin’ to pith me oth…

Where’th tha rethkue Thaint Bernard when ya need one?

AAAAWK!!!!

Man, it’th cluckin’ cold out here – an I mithed Glee a few dayth ago…

It’th pluckin’ revoltin’!!!

AAAAWK!!!

Look, if yer readin’ thith, PLEATHE, call emergenthy thervithes, or tha fire department. If they rethcue catth from treeth, they oughta rethcue a bird from a balcony!!!

On the pluth thide tho, Day Thix no thmokin’…

AAAAWK!!!!

Oh, great – now I got ithicles on my knuckles!! Oh, cruel fates!! Thou have forthaken me!!

For tha luv a everythin’ holey – HEEEEELP!!!!

Cluck fer now…

Wow!


As of last night, I have surpassed 1500 downloads of my audio “Talkin’ With” series – from the main site I linked to on my blog, and from worldwide i-Tunes clients.

I regularly see downloads from Germany – so I apparently have something in common now with former Baywatch star David Hasselhoff – I’m big in Germany!

Now if I could only figure out how to make money from that venture…

Have a great weekend, y’all!

Chow for now.

(PS - May have to watch some Pink Panther movies tonight - farewell, Mr. Edwards!)

As much as I’ve come to believe recently that Technology is a relentless one-eyed mafia hit man with hemorrhoids looking to whack a naively earnest Canadian humour and entertainment writer, there have been a few good things to come from it (technology) lately.


Sure, my main website is still hopelessly MIA, my provider not returning e-mails, clearly disinterested in allowing me to transfer to a more reliable carrier.

Moronic spammers with no grasp of their own language, let alone English continue to plague my other sites - and yes, my Windows Vista computer still acts like a ceiling fan with half a blade, but I can see the glass-half-full side of things as well. Half full of what would be the bigger concern, but hey – who can be fussy these days?

The one bright spot I note is that my interviews and reviews are expanding regularly. My recent Calgary Herald review got picked up by the online Ottawa Citizen feed, and I just discovered last night that Yahoo referred to the review in an article!

Sweet!! (for the third world spammers out there today – “kee-daa-yii!”)

A silver lining in my technological black cloud skies…

Chow for now!!

“Oh what fun it is…” to paraphrase a classic song of the season.


The other day, I had to spend a considerable amount of time removing spammer posts from my podcast interview site, and then convert the posting options there to now having to monitor and approve them.

Now I see more spammer comments on this site today – so I will likely have to change the options here as well – which blows because there’s usually lots of legitimate comments posted.

This I suspect is the negative side to having both sites attracting attention worldwide.

Well, I’ll try keeping the comments section open for now, but that may have to change down the road.

Where’s the lump of coal for these cyber-clowns???

Chow for now!

It would appear that I now have to take aggressive action…


About a year ago, maybe more now, my internet domain host provider folded up shop and arbitrarily transferred my service elsewhere. That process set me down a long and winding road for my main website (nonsenseandstuff.com) that often leads away into the darkest corners of the woods – where there is no fabled Gingerbread house to dance naked outside of…

What I mean to say is that I discovered the other day that my main website is MIA yet again, and
at a time where I have a lot of eyes pointed to it. The service provider’s site is also unreachable. Just dandy.

I tried to transfer my domain and hosting services yesterday, but likely due to the inability to contact them, was denied. I’ll have to get far more aggressive today.

To make matters even more interesting, I almost fell victim to a very sophisticated hack attack yesterday, from pirates pretending to be PayPal. This was the most elaborate ruse I’ve seen yet, and I had already started to enter personal information before I figured out the site was not legit.

Technology…

Chow for now!!

When I say “Fuzzy”, you say “BEAR”!!


“FUZZY!”

______________

Hmmm…this didn’t work as well as I had expected…perhaps you could e-mail me a short audio clip…

The best laid plans…

Chow for now!

(Bear???)

It’s that time again, readers!


That time where I’ve scratched my head long and hard enough, without eking out anything to post here.

So, I’ve dug around online, and found this seasonal old newspaper column of mine, from December 2008.

Enjoy:

http://www.eventpub.com/includes/datafiles/print.php?id=150897&title  

(Hmmm...may have to cut and paste...)

Chow for now!

Chicken Scratch

(pothted by weekend guetht blogga Chah-lee Chicken…)

Thith ith not good…

AAAWK!!!!

Thweet Caroline, thith hurth like tha Dickenth…

AAAAWK!!!!

Boyth an girlth – PLEATHE don try thtuff you thee on tha innernet…

Thumb thtuff ith juth plain dumb…

AAAAWK!!!!

OWWWW!!!

Muther uv merthy…that hurtth!!!

Why din I bring my cluckin’ thigarette lighter with me??

AAAAWK!!!!

Thay, would you be tho kind ath to pour a glath of wam watr ova my tongue??

Pleath????

No??

Mebbe if I breath real hard…an real hot...

Cluck fer now…

Well, it is the holiday season after all….


Decided to check out “The Nutcracker” last night, something that seems to turn up every year around this time.

Frankly, I don’t see what the big deal is.

Did manage to snap a picture though:

Chow for now!

Holey Toledo – where the heck is December in such a hurry to get off to? The 9th already? What’s up with that (ooo eee, wut’s up wit dat, wut’s up wit dat…).


I’d better slip on my sneakers, and try to catch up with this hasty little month…

Chow for now!!

I like to believe that I’ve been very honest here on the days where absolutely nothing is between my ears when I fire up the computer, and sit down to make a fresh post.


On those days, sometimes I desperately look around the house and find inspiration in something on TV, something that Mrs. Dan Guy happens to mention…but today, I am fortunate - my task is relatively easy.

Reading the newspaper yesterday, I came upon a regular feature there – “Word Of The Day” – a feature they run in conjunction with Canspell, to improve vocabularies. What was the word yesterday?

“Crapulous”.

Yes, there really is such a word. How would you use it? Not like you would think, as in “those Jonas Brothers are really crapulous”, or “even though I told my wife that her chicken meatloaf surprise was delicious, it was actually pretty crapulous”.

“Crapulous” means “sick from excessive indulgence in liquor”.

So, I guess one could feel crapulous in that regard…

Chow for now!!

If an apple a day keeps the doctor way, are they generally unable to go anywhere near the produce section in grocery stores?


Chow for now!

I don’t normally direct folks that stop by this space to a link I haven’t created myself – but what the hell, it is the holiday season after all – and who doesn’t appreciate a drunk Russian squirrel?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73cjNp7n75o

If you haven’t already seen this, it also gets my voted for rattiest looking squirrel ever…

Chow for now!!!

Chicken Scratch

(posted by weekend guest blogger Charlie Chicken…)

BRRRR!!!!

Hello, hoomans – and hope yur as cozy as I am this mornin’, now that I got my new winter coat!!

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

An I ain’t talkin’ “coat” like dogs or kats get – I bought me a bran-new top-a-tha-line tooth-chatter repeller, with manly (or chickenly) tones a blue.

Is ya jealous? Huh?

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

Yessir, when I hit tha ski hill this affernoon, I’ll be gettin’ some looks, lemme tell ya!

Ya ever seed such a dashin’ bird before?

I didn’t think so…

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

Strangest thing tho, it sure seems to attract household dust when I walk by things.

Oh well, thas wut dry cleaners is for!

Cluck fer now, my featherless friends!!

BUK-AAAAWK!!!!

Stage West Calgary

Motown Gold

Here's the "Motown Gold" cast interview, hot off the press!

Either convert this page to an RSS feed, or click (cut and paste maybe) this link:

http://thatdanguy.libsyn.com/

Subscribe, and/or download from i-Tunes (thatdanguy's podcast)

Enjoy!

(Chow for now...)

Potpourri


A slew of general items for my first post of the day (which is my semi-clever way of saying check back again later today):

1) My posted review a day or so ago of “Children Of A Lesser God” had an error regarding one of the cast members' family members, which I have now rectified (I hope…).

2) One way or another, I WILL have a link posted to my interview with the cast of Stage West Calgary’s “Motown Gold” – a great bunch of actors and singers. Look for that here later this morning, maybe afternoon. Possibly late in the evening.

3) Made myself a cup of instant hot chocolate last night while I was working on editing that “Motown Gold” interview. While the kettle was boiling, I noticed a blurb on the can indicating the “best-before” date on the bottom of the tin. From what I could glance through quickly, the product had expired in 2006. The fresh knowledge of that concerning information didn’t deter me one bit regarding having my cup of hot chocolate. For the record, it was yummy, if not a bit whiskery…

Chow for now!!

Fro-dian Slip??


Lately I’ve been transposing letters while I type, most likely due to this accursed netbook’s minute keyboard. If it doesn’t add in three letters for most every one I try to type, it will mess up what I do get right.

“The” becomes “teh”. “Are” becomes “ear” (sometimes Spell-check “helps”).

Yesterday, while typing up the quick intro to my Calgary Herald column link, I accidentally neglected to check for errors before hitting “post”. Well, maybe it could have been acceptable, considering the costumes and wigs used for the “Motown Gold “show.

I had typed in: click the link “fro”, instead of “for”.

I hastily corrected it…

Hairy situations…

Chow for now!

Workshop Theatre

Calgary Alberta Canada

“Children Of A Lesser God”

The Wednesday Morning (almost afternoon, technically) “Somebody-Asked-Me-To, So-Here-I-Go” Theatre Review: “Children Of A Lesser God”, presented by Workshop Theatre.

Who gets to determine what defines “normal”, after all is said and done? If one is born deaf, wouldn’t that be deemed as normal to their own experience? Why would hearing people feel to seem superior by comparison?

“Children Of A Lesser God” examines so much over the course of this 3-hour production presented by Calgary’s Workshop Theatre. While it certainly touches on the conflict between the majority versus the minority as the larger group attempts to help members of the deaf community appear more “normal”, the play sheds a light on so much more. Human foibles and frailties shared by both communities, relationships swirled about in simmering pots of desire, and ultimately the folly of assuming there even needs to be a one-size-fits-all definition of normal.

This is heavy stuff, as the story arcs from the introduction of teacher James Leeds to student Sarah Norman, carrying on through a considerable chunk of their lives - the awkward and professionally inappropriate relationship that develops, the ultimate marriage, and an eventual climax that builds on conflict and expectations illustrated by the actors throughout. The load is as heavy as the subject matter, especially for the Leeds character portrayed here by Brian Doyle. Leeds speaks not only for himself throughout, but also for many of the other characters, including Sarah.

The two lead actors are never alone too long onstage. Some terrific supporting performances help to flesh out the scenes, notably James Bell as Orin Dennis, and Jade Coultman as Lydia – fellow deaf students with their own agendas. Rounding out the cast is Jerry Callaghan as the deaf school’s bridge-playing Mr. Franklin, Donna Barnfield as Sarah’s mother, and Shannon Jones as the lawyer recruited later in the show.

Incidentally, I note that in the playbill bios Shannon’s grandmother Mary was educated at the Winnipeg school for the deaf – which is my own hometown, and where my sister has worked in the deaf community herself for many years. Through her association there, I had the opportunity several times to play recorded music for dance parties for the deaf. It is a small world after all…

On that “small world” note, a particularly difficult scene between James & Sarah in this play mirrored the real-life relationship that disintegrated between the movie stars of the film version, William Hurt and Marlee Matlin (Hurt turned out to be an appropriate surname with respect to his co-star and off-screen partner). Truth really is stranger than fiction…      

If you’re in the Calgary area, the Workshop Theatre company resides in the historic Pumphouse Theatre – find out more about them at http://www.workshoptheatre.org/

“Children Of A Lesser God” runs here until Dec 4, 2010.

Stage West Calgary
"Motown Gold"
Here's that official Calgary Herald review - check back later this week for my interview with some of the cast members!

---

Motown Gold captures spirit of iconic artists
Dan St. Yves Dan St. Yves is a Calgary writer whose writing on theatre can be found at thatdanguy.libsyn.com
Calgary Herald
01 Dec 2010
The doo-wop and soul tracks of the ’50s and the ’60s. The disco grooves of the ’70s. The funky fun sounds of the ’80s. Director, choreographer and co-writer Timothy French appears to have co-crafted a big hit with Motown Gold, a musical retrospective...read more...

Tech Tags: Calgary Herald newspaper ENTERTAINMENT