the $5000 weekend

First and foremost: happy birthday, Talktalk. I know you don’t like celebrating your b-day but some of us love you so you’ll just have to sit there and take it. Happy birthday, Mike. My life is so much better for having you in it. I can only hope I contribute half so much to yours.

And now…

It’s not my fault. She followed me home. She smelled an easy mark and she seduced me with the flick of an eyelash and a sway of her hip.

She could sense poor G3 was struggling. And she showed up, the New Best Thing, and G3 didn’t stand a chance.

So now I’m a slave to her smirk. She crooks a finger and I follow, the eager lapdog. She commands and I obey.

Or at least that’s how I feel. $3300 (after the lens and such) is a stunning amount of money for me to drop on anything. I went balls-out on my computer and still just tickled past $2000. She’s cruising around $2500 now but that’s a few face-lifts later and it’s got everything I want. The G3 was $1100, also everything I wanted at the time. This. This is an investment I have to make worthwhile.

I’ve sold a couple of pictures now. I’m booked for a couple of shoots. It looks like I’m at the starting gate. Now I just have to apply some pressure. Get the site up. Work out some promotion. Take some pictures.

Ooo! I bought frames at Ikea. Or is that IKEA? Is IKEA an acronym? Or is it “Swedish for good sense”?

Whatev. I bought frames for the right price. Now I can stick stuff on my walls. Woo! That gets me a little hawt. Verihawt, as they say. “They” being me. What is it about that place that takes you from “I just need to grab a $2 scrub brush” all the way to “I just applied for the credit card so I can defer paying for this massive cartload of stuff for six months.”?

It wasn’t all shopping over there. Migs celebrated his birthday Friday night. A long stream of Vancouver’s cool kids swung through the Alibi and eventually I stopped trying to keep track of names or faces. Those are some beautiful people. Neil is still kicking himself but it’s the old rule: you know it’s going to be huge if you can’t be there. I’m sure davin will tell him about the hotties he missed.

Lee was working so he couldn’t be there, but Dobson made a good showing with his girlfriend Karen. I haven’t seen him in a couple years, not really, so it was very good to have a few minutes to chat. He’s the guy who directed when I did those few spots of voice acting. And by voice acting I mean walla, which is mostly just background mutter in crowd scenes and soldiers getting their asses blown off in shows like Stargate and Andromeda but it was still some of the most fun I’ve ever had. His Skeletor gig is on hiatus so he actually looks well rested these days. (Voice acting? Why yes, Dave, I’d love to help you out with your homework assignment. I look forward to your email!)

Migs was having a blast and I wasn’t keeping up with him. It’s easier to do that if you know more people there, in my experience. So for the first time in history he outlasted me. I know! He was shocked too. As interesting a time as I was having I called it a night at about 2.

Saturday was brunch and cruising a couple malls and finally succumbing to temptation (& buying my new girl) and a very quick meal and finally seeing Lee at work: a very swag joint called Coast. I wouldn’t try Googling this one, people. “Coast, seafood, Vancouver…” Come on now. Anyway, Coast is the sort of place where they repress a laugh if you say you don’t have a reservation. And you get to repress a smug smile when you say quite innocently that you’re all there to visit Lee and oh there he is now.

After Coast we went to Crush, where Megan had been kind enough to put us on the list. Crush is a very laid back establishment. What you’d call tres chic. The music was unsurprising but the atmosphere is vericool. Everyone is… groovy. The dj on Saturday nights is a lass named Karen who I know from her days at the Roller. Yes. The Roxy. Roller. You see? Never mind. Nice girl.

Travis works at Crush. Travis is the stallion who grabbed my mic at the peak hour of a Saturday night at 11Stones and got everyone (everyone) to sing Happy Birthday, Dear DJ. He’s a good lad. And he’s looking good these days. It was great to see him, and I’ll be going back to see him again. His band was playing Sunday night but my plans were taking me out of town Sunday afternoon. A pity. And of course Wes was there, complete with white hat. Another great guy. He took verigood care of us. (I’ve now officially commandeered veri* from davin & Jim.)

Speaking of bands and Sunday night I also didn’t go to an event Lee co-organized. Convolve was six bands made up of industry-types. The guest list looked pretty phenom and it was really tempting to stick around. If I was seriously entertaining thoughts of returning to Van in the next year I might just have hung out. I don’t think you would have found a better hotbed of contacts that Sunday night. Day-um.

Sunday, however, after a quality brunch with Neil and Migs, Jen and I made tracks for Bellis Fair. Shnykees. They have a website. What am I saying. Even *I* have a website. Ha!

We spent an afternoon covering the mall. I got shoes. I didn’t get the Millenium Falcon. And I didn’t punch out a single American. Jen was worried in a half-joking way. She’s a doll. I did a lot of people watching while we were there and it’s like I’ve been saying all along: it’s not Americans I can’t stand. My experience with Washingtonians is that they’re a lot like British Columbians. Pretty friendly folk. Our dining experience at the Olive Garden was faboo.

But then there was a stunner line-up to get back across the border. An hour & a half to roll just over a kilometer. We missed the last ferry and ended up staying at a Holiday Inn Express in Richmond (very nice place, I must say) so we could use the extra day to go to Ikea. Jen is a fabulous travel partner. You rawk, sugar.

And that sorta brings us full circle. I have an incredible new camera. I’m set to do honest and for real photo shoots. I’m working on the portfolio site and I’ll keep you posted.

Don’t forget Tuesday night (tonight!) at 8pm I’ll be on stage with a few other Impromaniacs at The Old Bailey. I haven’t done any performing in ages so I’m sure I’ll suck, but they have beer there so maybe you won’t notice. I’d love to see you there, regardless. Come on out. We will have the good times.