But on a more serious note

It has come to my attention, just today, that The Big Bop and the Cameron House, two enjoyable and familiar Toronto bars-cum-music venues, will be closing pretty soon.

Yesterday, I read with significantly greater shock and horror that the Carlton Cinema is sharing a similar fate after today--its last day, December 6--when they'll be screening Monty Python and the Holy Grail with popcorn as its own Last Supper.

I don't live in Toronto most months out of the year anymore, so my sentimentality may be unfounded, even exaggerated. But I am sad. Mostly for the Carlton. Regardless of my support for the establishment as of late, and regardless of how much direct involvement I'd had with any of the three above mentioned venues in my meager near-21 years of being, it never occurred to me that they would die.

(I won't pretend to make this a universal message, because it's pretty specific; if you don't want to indulge my sentimentality, you can scroll away now, leaving with the simple message that the closure of these Toronto sites is sad and makes me feel old.)

I can recall a dark night in June of '05 (I think it was '05) when ICGYABL and I went to the Aquabats show at the Reverb and Bernice slept through it; or when some of us saw Juice Money Orchestra at the Kathedral, immediately surprised at how not-shitty they were. There was a time when some of us stumbled, underage, into the Cameron House, never carded, and ICGYABL bought a CD from some hip indie-folk four-piece on a whim. Perhaps most importantly, I can remember going on several--and I mean several--dates at the Carlton, and seeing some of the best films of the last five years there.

It's inevitable that venues close, money gets tight, and the Capital-M-"Mainstream" wins out over smaller film and music spots. I am not surprised that these venues have finished, nor do I think it's for the worst that they did. Mostly, what is affecting me is the realization that moving away from home does not keep it preserved in a museum or cryogenic ice-chamber. I cannot return and find everything the way it was. Though I experience this every year, the Carlton's death was the final nail in the coffin of my childhood.

Soon I will be 21. That's adulthood no matter where you are on the map. The closer school gets to completion, the closer my summer jobs get to becoming life careers, I begin to ask: where is there stability?

Because I'm not That Interested in the Dickens I'm Supposed to be Talking About

Hard Times is very heavy-handed. I understand that, Social Divide, etc etc.




A very happy birthday to the Weaselbag. Everyone is getting older, its kinda freaking me out.
Eh, not really. But, our fleeting youth must be celebrated!
Remember That, Friends.

Oh Baby, Sneeze On Me.

WHAT THE HELL!?!?

all i can say is.... Awesome.

In a futile attempt to do further research, i came across a pornography website called "Sneezing Beauties"
The World/Internet/Science is awesome.