Thinking Outside the Box

I realize it's been a while since I posted anything up on here. I've been busy the last two weeks trying to get stuff ready for the show that was held in the Roundup Center today. I didn't have as much stuff as I wanted to, but I was able to put together four decent pinups and some preview pages of Nein. Thanks to Richard and Kevin from Out of Mind Studios for asking me along to take up space at their booth too! There were a lot of cool guests from the comic, animation, tv and film industries. Since I was manning a table I didn't have a chance to meet many of them. I did speak with Gail Simone for a little while. She's a very friendly and personable lady, and I would strongly recommend reading some of her work. My personal favorite was the 6-issue "Villains United" series that ran last year. She said she'll be taking over the writing for Wonder Woman beginning on issue 13 as well, so that is definitely worth a look. Unfortunately, in my rus...

Congratulations to Jim Byrnes on winning Blues Album of the Year at the 2007 Juno Awards for his latest album, House of Refuge . Jim is one of the most entertaining and friendly performers I've ever had the chance to see. For more of my thoughts about Jim and his music read my concert review here . If you want to check out Jim live he'll be in Calgary in July for the Folk Music Festival, July 27th - 29th. I know I'll be there! Other tour dates and info can be found on his label's website http://www.blackhenmusic.com/

This may be a little weird for some of you. Others will simply nod to themselves and say "of course, it's the most obvious thing in the world." However, stop and think about this for a few moments, and then really ask yourself the question I pose at the end. You have to answer honestly. If you don't, the only person you're cheating is yourself. :) Your thoughts define your life. The current state of your life, your body, your relationships and everything else is a net result of our thoughts up until now. If you're thinking about all the things you don't have, aren't, or don't want...that's what your life is now. So ask yourself this question: What do you want your life to be?

Confused yet? The title of the article has a reason for being, honest! First, I'm talking about a point in time last week that comes before the wedding. Second, I'm talking about an event that kinda takes me back in time...at least in my mind anyway. "What the f**k am yammering on about now?" you're wondering at this point right? Well ok fine, I'm talking about the Heaven and Hell concert on March 14th. The what? Yeah, that's exactly what I thought when I heard about it too. Well apparently due to some conflict with Ozzy Osbourne's control freak wife Sharon, the rest of the band Black Sabbath isn't allowed to use that name Black Sabbath unless Ozzy's performing too. Or something, I don't know all the details. Anyway, the concert featured the Sabbath line-up from the Dio years: Tony, Geezer, Vince and of course Dio. I have to admit I wasn't all that interested in seeing Dio, but figured it'd probably be the only time I'd be able ...

This'll be a short one, but it's pretty important I think. Probably the biggest news I'll be posting on here to date, or possibly all year. Over the weekend my sister got married! Yep, you read that right. It'd take me several hours to cover everything that happened over the weekend away, so I'm not even going to try. The location they chose was great. The weather was quite warm considering how high up in the mountains we were and there were no major problems with the day at all. Of course, a few small glitches popped up, but that's bound to happen with any event. All in all everything went great, a good time was had by all and my sister is now a happily married woman. Congratulations to my sister and her new husband! ( Click here to see a few pictures )

Sorry folks, this one's all in Japanese. じゃ。。。この　ポスト　の　中　には　けっこ　たくさん　まちがう。　もし　見たら　なおして　ね？　今日　ちょっと　書く　の　わだい　を　しらない。　時　に　書く　したい　だけ。　けど、　だれ　が　よんで　います　か？　それ　も　しらない。 にほん　の　いる　時　で　ともだちたち　は　みじかい　えいが　を　作った。　今年　の　一月　で　DVD　は　来た。　”たぶん　ここ　の　ともだち　は　えいが　を　見たい。。。”　と　思うた。　それかか　先週まつ　いろいろ　人　を　しょたい　した。　半分　（はんぶん）　ぐらい　は　へんじ　した、”ごめん。　もう　ほか　の　よてい　ある。”　ほか　の　人　は　”今　まで　しらない。　その　ひ　に　電話　する。”　と　へんじ　した。　その　日　に　一人　だけ　来た！ 本当　に　がっかり　でした　よ！　前時　の　ともだち　は　かわった　と　思う。　日本　に　行った　の　前　おたがい　は　よく　会う。　カナダ　ヘ　もどた　の　あと　は　ちがう。　いま、　もし　私　は　だれか　に　しょうたい　しなければ、だれも　会いない。　わずらわしくて　きたいはずれ　だ。 しかし　すぐ　いい　こと　が　来る。　さらい週末　で　おねえさん　は　けっこん　します。　する　場所　は　とっても　きれい。　あそこ　で　たくさん　しゃしん　を　とる　つもり。　あと　で　あなた　に　見せる。　：）

A while back I mentioned that one of my past students had come over to Canada for a month to study English. He arrived here early in January and studied on the weekdays. It seemed that there wasn't much in the way of homework, so his afternoons and weekends were free to go siteseeing and things. Disappointingly (at least to me) it seemed that the school he'd arranged his homestay and studies through didn't really organize any extracurricular activities for the visiting students. Knowing roughly how much the cost of coming here to study is, that was a big let down for me, and I can only imagine how frustrating it was for Shuhei. Since i also had to work full time, I didn't have much free time to show him around that much but I tried. Not having a car made it even more difficult! Rather than going into the details I'll just give a quick rundown of some of the things we did and places we went. First weekend: Calgary Roughnecks season opener Pic 1 Pic 2 Pic 3 Seco...