the road to ottawa is paved with snow

I'm on the road to our nations capital. Dad is driving,  his girlfriend Doriane is in the passenger seat and im in the backseat.
The rental has sirius, the veriety is a blessing and a curse since dad is a compulsive chanel switcher. We land on Howard Stern for a bit but without knowing the context he loses intrest quickly. We switch through music stations but most new music pisses him off so the shuffle continues till we hit George Harison singing My Sweet Lord.
We left Timmins at 7:20am. I slept on my friend Bree's sofa till dad woke me with a rap at the door. We hit snow just outside Timmins, most news is warning of the impending Frankenstorm but it won't hit us(but i bet the ride to MTL will be fucked).
Why Ottawa? Do's folks live there and its a great chance to visit on the way back to Montreal tomorrow. I will spend the week in MTL then cruise home on a stinky bus to Toronto.
My travel plans seem to unfold enroute.

Smashing Pumpkins can take all of my money

It's late and I don't know how much sense I will make but if I don't get this down now I never will and what a shame. I had a great night with some good friends watching my favourite band in the fucking world, The Smashing Pumpkins. I've got a bad habit of buying two tickets for everything without a plan of who to go with. My friend Chris Regimbal was supposed to come to Radiohead earlier this summer but the show was cancelled due to a tragic accident. I asked him to come and rock out with me at the Pumpkins and he obliged.

I have seen the Pumpkins live about a dozen times but this was the first time without Jimmy Chamberlain on drums. The current band consists of Billy Corgan (of course), Nicole Fiorentino(bass), Jeff Schroeder, and Mike Byrne on drums. This drummer is just a kid, but he rocks.

They played the new album Oceania start to finish. I really enjoy this record, but I was apprehensive about how the crowd would respond to not hearing the hits. The new stuff went over great, some of the arrangements were really interesting live. After they played through Oceania and rocked my socks half-way off they finished the job with a solid set of classics, highlights being MCIS era tracks X.Y.U., Muzzle, tonite reprise, Bullet With Butterfly Wings (the jungle version from '98). Concert tickets are expensive, but this show was worth every penny.

I took this video of Pinwheels, a standout track from the album. If you like what you hear you can Click here to buy Oceania.

Super pooched out now. In a few hours I hop in a car with my Dad and head to my place of birth, Timmins, to celebrate my Peppere's 80th birthday.

Ballon Boy Puked on TV twice

The plan was to go to my mom's house yesterday but the doctors office took longer than expected.
I got the doctor to write me a referral for a sleep test. I wake up a lot every night and have for years. I snore, or so I've been told. I don't sleep proper and it's possible modern science might have some answers.

I ran into a friend I haven't seen in forever, got coffee and browsed for some Hallowe'en costumes. Some people seem so positive and always moving forward, this is one of those people.

I woke up this morning thinking about how Felix Baumgartner is remenicent of a kick-ass version of that Balloon Boy, and realized it was 3 years ago yesterday that some asshole faked sending his kid up in a ballon to get some television airtime. The kid spilled the beans and then tossed his cookies. In one more year they can start to profit off the hoax, so we will see some shitty reality tv show.

I quit the gym, it felt like I was paying a lazy tax. My friend Aaron teaches yoga and I would rather pay for that once a week (still cheaper than the freaking gym). I might have said "I need to start going to the gym" more times on this blog than I've been.

I hate the comute to Missassauga but even more durring rush hour. Mom and I agreed to postpone our rendezvous till today.

Blogging? It reads more like Blah-ging. I'm gonna try something different tomorrow with this blog. Start a series of posts on specific subjects. more to follow.

This gets posted.

This gets posted finished or not. I have a bunch of posts on the back-burner that just sit there.

Nothing since mid-September, on any of my numerous blogs. Was nothing happening? No that's not it, I'm just lazy and depressed. I'm using the excuse of seasonal affective disorder (I feel S.A.D. about this time every year). I think the emotional high of Burning Man and tiff12 lasted a decent amount of time, but the buzz dies off so abruptly in October it's a bit of a shock to the system.

I get distracted easy enough. I would call today productive. I was off my ass today. Retuned some empties to the Beer Store (four bucks worth!).  
Did I mention I'm broke? All the more reason for me to be blogging, make a few cents off ads. At pennies a day I won't get a cheque for another few years.

I need to get a job. I think I found something I'm suited for at the lightbox, but I need to dust off the ol' resumé.

Tomorrow I promise to get my shit together and generate some actual content.

If I'm not posting, something is wrong.