Juno, it's good when...

Construction east of the Varsity theatre.

Using a movie voucher I received for Christmas I took Leanna and myself to see Juno. I didn't know what the film was about and never really knew much about it. The only reference I had to the film before Leanna had selected it was that on Facebook you could send your friends a free gift, a burger phone icon with the word JUNO across it. I thought the movie had something to do with owning a burger phone and that was a cool enough hook to get me to go see it.

During the movie the burger phone made it's appearance and for some reason I perked up saying "There's the burger phone!". It wasn't just a item that wasn't related to the movie at all. There is was in it's full glory. The crappy working burger phone. It was a shot of satisfaction that I had gone to see a movie and wasn't duped by a non-existent phone. After all how many times have you seen a movie trailer and saw a scene that never showed up in the movie. I hate that.

So besides the burger phone making an appearance I thought the movie overall was entertaining and worth the price of admission, if we were to have paid for admission that is.

The Trek to Whitby

Our snow covered street.

It was a snow day today. At least that's what I heard on the radio, from friends, the Juicystuff editor, even on the Wii five day forecast. It was going to snow. The words didn't really sink in. I had spent most of the day emailing people about purchasing photos from London Fashion Week, trying to find buyers, publishing contacts, and filling out forms for the British Fashion Council so I could attend fashion week and didn't really have the time to stick my head out the window.

It wasn't until I stepped out the door to go to Whitby that I noticed the abundance of snow at my feet. There were some snow drifts that were just above my ankle and it was still snowing. Was there even snow the night before? Maybe there was, I just don't remember.



More of the same.

I had been promising Vanessa all week that I would drop by and give her some photos I shot of her and her girl friends on Saturday night. But each night something came up. It was easy to just email her that I wouldn't be going out tonight due to the snow, the lazy part of me just wanted to go back in the house and go to sleep. I thought about it and decided to trudge on. If I wasn't going to go tonight when would I have a chance? This coming week would be nutty with all the last minute London planning. Next Saturday I'd be on a plane. I wouldn't be able to go to Whitby until after the 20th when I got back. Today was the "good" day to go.


The GO train

If lighting my own fire under my butt wasn't enough to persude me to go, James had called saying that he wasn't doing anything and wanted to tag along. He, after all, also knew the girls and had bumped into them that same saturday night. So we both met at Main station walked over to the GO train and bought two two way tickets to Whitby.

We trudged through the Whitby snow for about half an hour walking north up to Dundas. Once there we realized that we would have to walk east for another half an hour or an hour based on the address numbers. During the summer it would have been different but the snow slowed us down quite a bit. At one point we were walking on the road against traffic just because no one had shovelled their walk way for blocks. We grabbed a cab. Ten minutes later we were in the cozy warmth of the local restaurant.


Vanessa and the girls peruse photos


James waits for his sandwich.


The girls in their black uniforms.


Contemplating whether I should be in a photo with Vanessa or not... too late.

Wild West movie

Felix watching me make my laundry rounds.



Met up with Hugh to see a special sneak preview of a film called "Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Show" with special guest Ahmed Ahmed (not the terrorist but the comedian - to fully understand this inside gag you would have had to have been there). The film is more of a documentary than a movie. It follows the bus load of actors and comedians (Ahmed Ahmed, John Caparulo, Bret Ernst, Sebastian Maniscalco and Vince Vaughn) around the American heartland. I would recommend this movie to anyone that needs a good laugh or wants to be entertained.

After the credits, Ahmed Ahmed stood before the audience, took questions, then video interviewed some of the fans.


Ahmed digitally captures fans.


Hugh at Xelua

From VIDEO assist to FASHION assist

Setting monitors using color bars.

My day started off attending a course held by TellaVision, an introduction to Video Assist. While it's not my intention to want to do video assist... ever, I did want to play around with the hardware involved as it helps when doing 24 frame playback and having an overall tech skill set. It was a nice introduction/rehash of stuff I already knew but never really did anything with on a regular basis. (Including how to set a monitor using color bars - see photo).

The class lasted the morning and finished around 3:30pm. Not bad for a $50 course fee and that includes lunch. After that I hopped onto the TTC to go to Josie's place where Robert was helping Andrew by cutting fabric from designed patterns. He needed a bit of help so I volunteered.

I was to help cut the fabric. It seems like an easy job cutting around stencils attached to fabric by pins. I am not a tailor and if I ever become one I'll need a lot of work getting there. My scissor technique was quite bad. I ended up tracing outlines around the stencils with chalk so that Robert could cut the fabric later.


Robert cuts fabric for Andrew's clothing line.


Working away into the wee hours of the night.

Passport Pickup

I met up with Emmanuel for food today at the Stem. After that it was off to get my passport. Yep, two weeks have gone by already since I applied for a new one. Today was the day it was supposed to be ready.

This time I took preliminary measures before entering the government office and picked up some Lupin III comic novels to help pass the time waiting in line. As with anything unexpected, the waiting in line was less than a minute. Most likely my personal best in terms of waiting in a government line. I almost wondered if something was wrong.

Literally there was only one person in front of me being served and he was leaving. I walked up to the counter gave them my pick up slip and they gave me my passport. Really, in under one minute! "Crazy!", I say.

Zee and Juley's second edition

Madison, baby number two


Dim sum club

Sunday. The newly expanded gang of dim sum goers met today at a new place for soup dumplings. Yes I didn't think it was really dim sum as we've had in the traditional sense but it was still really good food.

The big item today was Madison. Zee and Juley's newly born baby girl. I think that was really why we had such a great turn out as we don't really get to see each other as often as we'd like. Madison was a good excuse to meet up and stuff our faces.


Juley and Michaela


Team Zanette.

Tailgate Party

The stage with "This side up"

Later on in the evening I met up with James. He had won tickets to a tailgate party sponsored by Budweiser. While I'm not a beer drinker on a regular basis or even semi-regular basis, I do appreciate the beer women that make drinking beer appealing. James suggested I bring my camera as there would most likely be eye candy to shoot. Like anyone would have to tell me to bring a camera.

The theme of the party was actually quite well thought out. At least I thought so. I could imagine some poor slob slaving away trying to work out said theme in some brain room somewhere at the Budweiser head office.

At the entrance we each got a ticket in the form of a plane ticket with a seat number. There were no seats at this event. The ticket number (seat number) was used as a raffle ticket number. Out of whatever number of people showed up, 10 people were picked to go up on stage to compete against each other. The person to come out ahead in first place won tickets and travel to the superbowl. The second place winner won a samsung 42 inch LCD TV.

To add to the whole airplane theme all the gals working the event were dressed as air flight stewardesses, the guys as pilots. There was even a girl at a metal detector archway with one of those wands that beep. I think it was a prop as she tended to pass her wand over the cuter guys going through. I was not checked. I'm thinking it was my innocent looking, non terrorist demeaner (yeah sure).

While mingling around in the crowd comprised of other party types, a live band played on stage. The band, as read on the drum kit, was named "This side up". They were from Montreal, not to be confused with the country band of the same name. Nope this band was a rock and roll cover band. They were great, playing everything from AC/DC to Simple Plan to Guns and Roses to the Ramones.

If that wasn't worth the price of admission the other interesting thing that happened that night was I heard my name being called. I thought someone was calling out for someone else with the same name. When I eventually squinted over into the darkness to look over I was surprised that it was some of the girls I had met in Whitby. They had recognized me. Most likely because of the camera.

It was nice seeing familiar faces in a sea of strangers, especially good looking young women. At this point I'd have to agree with Colin, I do have a charmed life.

The Whiby Girls. Ruth, Vanessa, and Katie.


Sébastien Brault, lead vocals and guitar

"This Side Up" the band

Flight crew gives out free hats.

"Enjoy your flight"

Vanessa bites my cheek.

Flaming Sausage

I met Josie and Darryl today to go look at Andrew's new studio space. It's located in the newly developed Liberty Village area (near King and Dufferin). The studio, or room rather, is located in a group of office spaces that share a large common room. A lounge area essentially that can be converted into a meeting room, conference room or waiting area. After checking out the place we went for Portuguese food at some small corner restaurant. Portuguese, to me, are known for their amazing ability to cook chicken and seafood. What I wasn't aware of, was the "Burning Sausage" dish. I liked the presentation of the flaming sauage in the pig pan (see photo).

The flaming pig.

I'd buy that for a dollar

At Innis College, a building part of the University of Toronto, it was double feature movie night. A free night of movies put on by a cinema group at UofT. The two movies were Robocop and Starship Troopers.

As noted by the movie geek before the films were shown, both movies were directed by the same director (Paul Verhoven), had the same visual effects company (Phil Tippet) and had the same movie composer (the same guy that did Conan the barbarian).

It was interesting to be around film geeks that were so passionate about a few movies. It then occurred to me that Darryl, Robin and me were a small minority of the entire group watching the films that were old enough to see the films in the theatre the first time. Yikes!

Somewhere I actually have a polaroid photo of me at the premiere movie showing of RoboCop at the now defunct Plaza theatre. In the picture was me standing next to a guy shorter than me in a RoboCop outfit.


"Bin there done that"


Chris and Robin at Xulah

After the two movies we met up with Chris and ended up at the new Xelua, a vietnamese restaurant.

Korean BBQ

The inital spread of the "All you can eat" Korean barbecue

For a late lunch early dinner I went to Korean barbecue house located on Yonge just south of Bloor. Dave, not pictured due to just having a hair cut, had gotten the idea to do the all you can eat thing.

A bunch of dishes are placed on the table containing raw meat. Beef, Chicken Pork, liver, squid, and salmon, plus a bowl of rice. You cook the food yourself by placing the food on the cooker. At any time you can order more food. I'm not sure if there's a charge on the food you order that you don't end up eating. If you go to sushi buffets there's usually a fee so you don't waste food. Not that we let anything go to waste.


Cook it yourself.

We stuffed ourselves to the point of requiring to waddle out the door. At least I did. Come to think of it Dave didn't seem to be affected.