Borrowed Lyrics and References

Friday night, while my husband was cooking dinner, we were watching an Oasis DVD. My husband began by selecting my favourite Oasis song...Don't Look Back in Anger.

I was debating whether I would ever see Oasis live, having missed the Virgin Festival from last year. I was saying that seeing them sing DLBIA live would be worth it...until the crowd was doing most of the singing in the chorus. I figured I wouldn't want to pay a lot of money to go listen to a crowd sing. But I was quite enjoying seeing them perform.

Being the multi-tasker that I am, while watching the DVD, I was also checking Twitter for any interesting tidbits when I saw someone mention that Oasis will never be the same. They were breaking up. I tried to go to their site (to confirm) - should I really trust Twitter with news? - but I couldn't log on to their site. I googled Oasis news and read an article quoting Liam's wife saying that they would never break up. So I let the matter go, until the next morning, when I saw in the news that Noel did confirm on their website that he had left the group.

So in honour of Oasis...I figured it was a good time to reveal my list of borrowed lyrics because two of my favourites are borrowed from Oasis. When I say "borrowed", sometimes it's intended and other times not.

What's the story morning glory
I feel so low and worthless
(It's My Own Cheating Heart That Makes Me Cry by Glasvegas
borrowed from (What's The Story) Morning Glory by Oasis)

The radio is playing all the usual
What's a Wonderwall anyway?
(Writing to Reach You by Travis
borrowed from Wonderwall by Oasis)

There is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
(The Saints are Coming by Green Day and U2 (cover of The Skids' song)
borrowed from House of the Rising Sun by The Animals

Singing Sweet Home Alabama all summer long
(All Summer Long by Kid Rock
borrowed from Sweet Home Alabama by Lynard Skynard)

And he told Roxanne to put on her red light
(When The Sun Goes Down by Arctic Monkeys
borrowed from Roxanne by Sting)

Let the love tear us apart
I found the cure for a broken heart
(Let's Dance to Joy Division by The Wombats
borrowed from Love Will Tear Us Apart by Joy Division)

How far will you go?
How deep is your love?
(Can't Stop the World by Gavin Rossdale
borrowed from How Deep is Your Love by The Bee Gees)

We live in a wheel
Where everyone steals
But when we rise it's like strawberry fields
(Glycerine by Bush
borrowed from Strawberry Fields Forever by The Beatles)

Baby I was born to run
I won't be back to kiss you goodnight
(I Won't Be Back by Daniel Powter
borrowed from Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen)

I miss my wife and family
(Frontline by Gavin Rossdale
borrowed from Rocket Man by Elton John)

And I know that it's a wonderful world
But I can't feel it right now
(Wonderful World by James Morrison
borrowed from Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong)

There we were dying of frustration
Saying, "Lord lead me not into temptation"
(Yes by Coldplay
borrowed from The Bible)

Thinking of you

I ran out for a very late lunch break today and while passing through Atrium on Bay, my good friend DA popped into my head as he works in the building and I hadn't seen him for a long time. I run back across the street to return to the office and I get a tap on the shoulder and there's DA. We had a nice catch-up and promised to get together soon. The power of thinking of friends.

The cottage dream

I drove up to Muskoka this past weekend to pick up my son from camp. Whenever I'm driving back from this beautiful part of Ontario, or just passing through, or even after short visits, I have a very strong feeling that I want a cottage for me and the family. But it's not just a cottage that fills my dreamy head, it's the water, the dock, the boat, the whole shabang. There is just something relaxing about being close to water, maybe it's the sounds, or even the smell, but it's definitely how clean lake water feels on your feet, or as it cools you down with a summer swim. I love how tired you get when you're at the cottage, it's all that fresh air in your lungs, the sun still warm on your skin, your face weathered from the boat ride.

I truly think that Muskoka is one the Ontario's best assets, the water is clean and deep, the shorelines are rocky and dramatic and mostly free of weeds. There are many lakes or varying sizes (but none too big) and every one of their bays is unique. If you can afford a a property, they are spread out, strategically situated for lake and sun angles. The cottages are large with separate guest and boat houses. A Muskoka chair adorns almost every deck. Muskoka is a true outdoors escape just a few hours drive from Canada's largest metropolis. If a vistor to Ontario was to ask what the most beautiful and truly Canadian thing to see was - I'd say Muskoka.

But this is where the dream luckily ends. I've been able to create a nice little argument against the idea of a cottage. First, the traffic. A normal drive from Toronto to Barrie (half way to Muskoka) is about an hour; on Saturday morning (of the long weekend), it took me two and a half hours to get to Barrie. It was bumper to bumper for almost 100kms with only an occasional (and very dangerous) speed up break. People often say the Friday traffic is terrible and I've been caught in Sunday drive home traffic too. Net, the traffic to and from Muskoka around and on the weekends is very bad. Second, money. Ok, obvious I know, but lets peel back a few layers. A cottage is a second home and it would require just as much maintenance and maybe more over the years. It takes a lot of my energy to destroy my city home, do I have the time (no) or money to pay someone to do all the work on a cottage. Plus, contractors and trades are known to be more expensive in prime cottage country. Then there's the furnishing costs, I'd surely want most of the comforts of home in my new cottage, incl. an adequate entertainment system and a decent kitchen. Toys - well that can get expensive, from additional bikes to the highly desirable ski boat. And last of course, is the cottage itself, better-than-the-city size and parking (guests welcome), waterfront with dock and a deck with a view. I hate to be a snob, but what good would a small shack in a field within "walking" distance to the lake be ? If I'm going to have a cottage, it has to fit the dream. But I'm afraid, that picture is just too costly for this dude.

My Mom's crazed namesake

I was rather shocked to see my Mom's name (under a picture of a smirky 43 year old Wisconsin woman) on the front page of the Metro today. My Mom's namesake had been involved in a bizarre lover's quadrangle resulting in a rather humiliating outburst of female revenge on their lover. Come to think of it, my cousin shares my Mom's name and is much closer in age and looks to the crazy lady ! A rather unsettling coincidence.

The Shepherd's Song

We were talking about jazz tonight and Dad was remembering going to to see "trad Jazz" in Britain in the early 60's. Dad got one of his favourites out and played us some Acker Bilk. We then bounced around music genres for a long time and I then played one of my favourites of the day - Pete Doherty. So as Pete's singing, I pick up the Acky Bilk CD and I'm scanning the song titles and just as I'm reading the title of track - The Shepherd's Song, Pete sings "as simple as The Shepherd's Song". Wow.

A perfect new morning

Kooper woke me up around 6:15. I didn't mind the early wake up call, I had a good night's sleep. I'm starting vacation this week, so no work reminders, ideas or problems rattling around my head. No puppy mistakes this morning and he played nice and gentle with some timely treats and some lovin'. He's getting at that bonding stage where he wants to be close to one of us a lot of the time and when I sat with him this morning, he wanted to straddle me and sit on my lap - part dominant move perhaps, but still nice. Had enough mini-breaks to check computer stuff (still trying to figure best backup process), and he had a little snooze, timed perfectly for me to grab a shower. He woke up and I just took him for a little walk to the corner and back. It's one of those summer mornings where there's a slight coolness riding the gentle breeze, like that morning when you're up before everyone else in the cottage and you go out to the dock and you're alone with the water, the rising sun and splashes of fish and some merry birds. Well, here, there's no water, and the sounds are rather more urban, but accompanied with that fresh scented, summer morning breeze, they feel gentle enough to great a summer Monday morn. Kooper is loving his newly introduced walks and is very excited at the possibility of meeting new people. Not a lot of people out at 7:30am, but there was a work crew assembling for their job down the street. Sure enough, one of the rough looking guys asked about Kooper and came over to get some licks. I'm loving our new walks too ! Now, just getting enough minutes to record some thoughts on the deck with Kooper on this perfect new morning.

Joe

I had to do a double-take on the latest comment on my Flickr pictures...the name of the person providing the comment (also from Toronto) was almost the same as my next door neighbour. The best coincidence is that the second picture in his photostream is of a baby (born July 4th) and our neighbour brought home his new son yesterday (born July 3rd).

Photo Blog #14: Mani

Mani, originally uploaded by PJMixer.

Mani is #16 in my 100 Stranger project...click on the pic to read the full story - the hardest photo in the project so far.

Photo Blog #13: Acton meadow

Acton meadow, originally uploaded by PJMixer.

Simple rules of composition, well balanced colour and exposure seem to work well. New Flickr config allows me to now post to my blog a little more conveniently.

Happy Canada Day

These three people sum up what I love about Canada. They are caring, compassionate and loving. They like an adventure and discovering new things, but are firmly rooted in family traditions. They accept and enjoy our cosmopolitan cities and multicultural mosaic. They are interested in the world beyond our borders, but understand the beauty of Canada. They love the outdoors, but also like the simple joys of life inside (which is especially useful during winter). They are kind and polite to friends and neighbours and are fair to all.

I put together a quick Flickr photo set celebrating Canada in pictures. These pics are all quite recent, so along with the Ontario countryside and lakes, Toronto and Ottawa, I'd like to use photography as an excuse to revisit a few of my other favourite Canadian places: Whistler, Montreal and Halifax.

I'm listening to iTunes set to Canadian artists today and enjoying a little time on the deck with my dog Kooper before the weather turns. I was going to add a playlist on Finetune, but for some reason they've disabled the create playlist feature, so I'll just Blip Sam Roberts instead.

Happy Canada Day

The dog blog

Thursday, June 25th. We've had our new puppy Kooper for almost 2 weeks now. He is a 2 month Australian Shepherd. We had done quite a lot of research about the breed, visited with another Aussie owner and talked extensively with the breeder. We chose Kooper from the litter when he was just a month old based on what appeared to be his nice, calm nature and his beautiful colouring. However, since picking him up and bringing him home he is showing the true Aussie in him. That is, high energy, strength and intelligence, constant gnawing and chewing, frequent nipping and the occasional angry snarl and bite. It also appears that we have the potential for quite a large dog as opposed to the medium size more characteristic for the breed. At this time, I think he thinks he's the boss, perhaps enjoying his new role having come from more dominate pups at the breeders.

We had our first puppy training on Thursday night. I think it went quite well, no human or puppy was hurt, he didn't pee or poop on the floor and he wasn't barking uncontrollably. The little guy was so tired afterward though, all that play time and constant pulling on his leash. I could probably say Kooper was the most entertaining of the 7 dogs present. He definitely tried to assert himself, but was overpowered a few times by an older and larger labradoodle. Nice that he got a bit of a reality check. The one takeaway from the trainer on how to deal with his biting and nipping was consistently use food as reward for all good behaviour (playing nice, sitting and lying, waiting, leaving temptations alone etc).

Friday didn't end well. We tried some of the new ideas, but today it seems that every time we were playing with him it quickly came to an end when he began to bite. We even saw some true doggy aggression today with nasty growls and far from playful biting. We knew it would be difficult, but we didn't expect such a level of biting issues and aggression. We know its not his fault, and it must something we were doing wrong. We felt we are approaching his training as best we could, applying what we were reading and learning from other dog experts. We were putting a lot of energy, time and effort into his training and we seemed to be only making matters worse. My wife and I were very stressed out and I admitted that I was thinking that perhaps we'd made a mistake. It appears that Kooper felt the stress and sadness in the air and was very quiet in the evening.

One of his good traits is his nightime behaviour. He is quite easy to settle down now at night and there haven't been too many peeing accidents. Sometimes we'll sleep for a while beside his pen and we're testing the crate at bedtime on occasion as well.

We had a good Saturday, we probably gave half of his food today as treat rewards for obeying simple sit, wait and down tests and for leaving certain objects alone and listening to corrective instructions. We had family visitors in the evening and it went well with only occasional nipping.

I also had my second puppy driven stranger meeting in as many days on Saturday. On Friday, Kooper was the perfect chick magnate, attracting two attractive ladies over for a chat. And then on Saturday, I'm sitting with Kooper at the front of the house and one of our neighbours drives by and pulls his car into his driveway. Now this gentleman lives across the road and I've never met him. He always appears very serious, never noticing me or any of our family - quite an unfriendly fellow. He is however, a dog owner. On this day, he sees Kooper and I and as soon as he's parked his car, comes across the street to meet us. And what a nice man he is, I found out he's also from England and we talked about our dgos for a little while. Kooper lives up to being a true dog icebreaker.

It's Sunday morning now, the good news is that he lasted over 7 hours without needing to pee in the night. This morning's energy spurts were all fun and games but perhaps we let them go on a bit too long, so he's been getting rather nasty a few times this morning. He's having he morning nap now and the house is quiet. We'll pick up the new treat training when he wakes up and keep a close eye on his mood.

We are also starting to understand his daily moods, his eating and pee and poop timing and recognizing when he's over stimulated, when he needs some crazy time and when to just let him be. Hopefully, Kooper is starting to understand how we work too. We noticed that Friday was not a usual day as I worked from home and the kids were off school, so maybe that had some effect on his behaviour. Let's hope we don't have many more days like Friday.

Our new addition to our family is already changing our family in many ways. There are many challenges, but I can clearly see the positives and beginning to see the progress with his training. He has been part of our lives for just 2 weeks, but the emotional bond is already there. We love our Kooper.

Branded golf shirt

Without really thinking about it, I donned a bright green golf shirt this morning for work. I got it a while back from a charity golf tournament. The logo is simply the company name and not really recognizable outside the financial industry. It has a few snags and a splattering of chalky dog medicine from this morning, but it does the job.

This morning I'm going through my flagged inbox items, seeing if there was a follow up I'd missed or needed to try again. So I give this guy a call and finally reach him and get some updates. As we're talking I realize, hey, I'm wearing a shirt with this guy's company name on it !

So, I have a few logo'd shirts, not surprisingly some overlap with companies I do business with. However, to pick this day to call this one person (which I hadn't tried in quite a few months and only ever talked to once in about the last 5 years), the same day I pick the shirt (and a have a few different shirts), well that's a pretty interesting coincidence. Maybe wearing it and subconsciously seeing the logo made me seek out that old email ?

Sidenote - this financial services company recently purchased a software company, my contact was actually at their offices this morning. Without going through stacks of old business cards, I'm pretty sure the acquired company was one I'd targeted for a new job a long while ago ! Small world.

Role Models

I was in the waiting room of my physiotherapist's office and a father and son walked in from the elevator and the son was wearing a t-shirt with Role Model written on it. I couldn't see the logo or a clue to the inner meaning, but fair enough, maybe this kid really is a role model, say for other students at his school. Anyway, I was enjoying reading a novel called No Time for Goodbye as I'm waiting for my appointment, and a few pages after I see the kid, I read "I'm not the best role model". Which is rather an understatement coming from this criminal character in the book. Just as I'm writing this I remember a clever mass email I got around to reading today from my brother-in-law in Manitoba. It was entitled Who is your Role Model ? It goes something like this...

Each of us is the result of the influence of many people. However some individuals have played a significant role in our development, They are often called "role models" that we consciously or unconsciously imitate. Perhaps you know who that person is, or perhaps you don't. The world renowned Sir Trevoir Rigelsworth, Ph.D, has given us a simple way to determine our role model. It is easy and only takes a minute and it may surprise you.

WHO IS YOUR ROLE MODEL???*

Be sure not to peek! You don't want to skew your answer.
Try this - it's really neat ..
Don't look at the answers:

1) Pick your favourite number between 1-9

2) Multiply by 3 then

3) Add 3, then again Multiply by 3 (I'll wait while you get the Calculator....)

4) You'll get a 2 or 3 digit number....

5) Add the digits together


Now Scroll down ..............



With that number, see who your ROLE MODEL is from the list below:

1. Einstein
2. Oprah Winfrey
3. Mother Teresa
4. Randubius Raji
5. Bill Gates
6. Johann Von Stueckenberg
7. Brad Pitt
8. Babe Ruth
9. PJMixer
10. Barack Obama

I haven't done the math, but the simple logic is there somewhere, but these games are still a fun.

Loyalty ?

My wife was blogging and ranting about customer loyalty today (Bell vs Rogers). I stopped in at World's Biggest Bookstore (not sure if it truly is, but it is the closest bog book store to my office, and it is big and has a great selection) after work and the first book that caught my attention was Loyalty Management.

Off season football treat

Here's something to brighten up this rather dull, gray Thursday. First shot I've seen of one of the new stadiums for next year's World Cup in South Africa. This is in Johannesburg and will be the site of the final. The colours are amazing and immediately say Africa.

Construction (less pretty) pics.

Coincidence versus Fate

Woman who missed Flight 447 is killed in car crash

Unfortunate coincidences

We hear about car crashes all the time when we're dialed in to traffic reports, and over our lifetimes we are all involved in at least one car accident (I've had three I believe). But sometimes we forget how dangerous driving can really be.

This week, I talked with a customer who I hadn't heard of for a few weeks. It turns out he was involved in a serious accident with his family on the 401 and is suffering from back and neck pain. Today, I learned that the family of a work colleague in Ottawa were involved in a serious car accident yesterday and his daughter is in the hospital. My thoughts are with them.

I once heard that the car, most times, our comfortable and loyal "friend", can turn into your worst enemy in a blink of eye when things go wrong. Please drive safely, for yourself and fellow travelers on the road.

Downer start, but ending on the up

I played soccer tonight and I must say, apart from the good workout, it wasn't a lot of fun. I now have ice on my ankle and my jaw hurts from a full blast goalie clearance I took in the face. I think I may actually pack it in. My ankle, which in normal situations doesn't give me any trouble these days (after the break and surgery last year), is just not strong enough to make a convincing pass or worse, a threatening shot on goal. If you have access to my health file, you'll know about my "frozen shoulder" so I'm not playing my regular ultimate or golf this summer. I thought soccer may be a decent substitute but and I'm a little tentative on the soccer field too. Maybe someone is trying to tell me something ?

So, foot up and on ice, wondering whether to do some physio for my shoulder and if I need to treat my other problem (I'm still a little uncomfortable sharing the details, but let's just say, PA is forcing me to change my diet and is taking forever to cure). I'm actually saying screw it tonight and enjoying a beer as I feel sorry for myself.

So what else is keeping me busy these days ? Well from the business side, I'm enjoying having my evenings and weekends free until the next busy cycle hits. I'm probably spending the most time with photography and building a good collection of public content on Flickr and sharing personal photos via Picasa. Actually, I'm getting a lot more viewers and comments on Flickr than all my other online sharing these days. New music has fallen on the list, but I'm still downloading quite a bit of new stuff every month. I picked up the latest Q mag today and quickly found some interesting stuff, incl Canadian electronic act Junior Boys, the cool sounds of Camera Obscura (playing at Lees on June 27th), and the hard rocking new album from The Manic Street Preachers.

The other big news that is about to change my life is Kooper. Kooper is our new Australian Shepherd puppy who we're bringing home on Saturday. I'm sure he'll generate quite a bit of content here over the next few months. Still have some prep work to do, incl. installing some extra fencing in the back yard. We picked an Aussie because they are more of a medium sized dog, a super smart, athletic and very loyal.

Watching a little Derek Trucks in High Def (HDNet from the weekend) before heading to bed, hoping to log a few REM meets the sandman hours.

Photo Blog #12: Luminato Long Wave

This is one of the reasons I haven't been blogging much these days. I've been immersed in a couple of photography projects: 100 Strangers and capturing all the wonderful things to see at the Luminato Festival that is running thru next weekend here in Toronto.

Lightening strikes twice

I was having a great little drawing session with my daughter after work today and out of the miscellany of items we were drawing I asked if she knew how to draw lightening bolts. Then on Twitter shortly after I follow a link to art work on my sister-in-law's Flickr page - whatja know - lightening !