Ten things I miss about Montreal
My strange start to 2012 has given me plenty of perspective on my life, as well as helping me to learn what’s important in my life, it’s also helping me to figure out what things I value. Which brings me to this, ten things I miss about Montreal, in descending order of importance:
- Movie night and all my movie night friends
- The Writers’ Bloc writers group where i get my fortnightly writer’s kick.
- Working face to face with my coworkers
Is home where the heart is?
Well, here we are two weeks into 2012. 2012! A date that sounds so incredibly futuristic I am surprised I am not writing this by talking to my computer or travelling to work in an electric self-driving car. Although of course these things are almost possible now.
Anyway, as one of my New Year’s resolutions, I am going to try once again to do a series of regular informal journal-type posts every couple of weeks. This time, not so much about relationships, more just about my life as I try and figure out a new direction. 2012 will be a year of triangulation I think, as I adjust my heading and set course towards a new future, whatever that might be.
It’s been an odd start to the year. My 2012 Canadian work visa, applied for in early November, has not yet been issued by Quebec, and so having returned to the UK for Christmas, I am now unable to return to Canada. I expect it to be processed and to get back to Montreal some time before the end of January, but in the meantime, I have had to build myself a sort of temporary life here in the UK for a few (who knows how many) weeks.
Read MoreWhy intelligent agents could free us from information overload
The launch of the iPhone 4S with Siri, the first large-scale consumer “intelligent agent” technology marks the beginning of a new form of computer interface – computers we can talk to, and ask what we want. Of course, there is a long way to go, but it is clear this is a new paradigm.
I’ll be writing more about Siri and its potential in future posts, but this seems a good time to publish the following essay, which I wrote a year ago for the forthcoming e-book “The future we deserve” being curated by Vinay Gupta. All the short essays for the book explain a point of view about what we (humanity) deserve in order to build a better future for ourselves.
Read MoreSeparation Journal #3: A new chapter begins
This is the third in a series of personal journal entries. If you don’t know me well you may wish to skip this and visit some of the other categories such as Technology & Society, Travel or Canada.
As one chapter ends a new one begins, full of possibility.
Well, another month has gone by. And what a month. I never quite hit that two-weekly cycle… but this time there was good reason. Things were happening, relationships were changing, and sometimes life doesn’t fit into convenient two week chunks. This was the month where my life got back on track. So, where to begin?
I think the catalyst for everything that’s happened was my trip to the UK a couple of weeks ago.
Read MoreWhy is it still so difficult to send files?
From the always brilliant xkcd.com
Maybe we should just do away with files all together… ;-)
Read MoreSeparation Journal #2: Becalmed
This is the second in a continuing series of personal journal entries. If you don’t know me well you may wish to skip this and visit some of the other categories such as Technology & Society, Travel or Canada.
Steve Carell as Cal in the movie Crazy Stupid Love
Well, looks like I didn’t manage to keep to my two-week blogging schedule. I did start something two weeks ago, but it was getting long, and life got busy and I didn’t finish it. Still, here I am now, and four weeks is better than seven. I will try and keep it at two weeks next time.
Lately, people ask me how I’m doing and I say half-jokingly “Fine.. apart from separating from my wife”. But that doesn’t really describe how I feel. If I had to sum up how I’ve felt most of this month, in one word, I would say “calm”.
In my day-to-day life, I am happy.
Read MoreFantasia Festival 2011 Roundup
The Fantasia 2011 logo - the Cheval Noir, also the name and likeness for a new Fantasia prize, this year awarded to John Landis.
For the last three and half weeks, I have had the pleasure of watching some outstanding movies from around the world at the Fantasia Festival 2011. Ever since I first attended a few films at Fantasia last year I eagerly awaited this event, because the bar they set for the movies they show at Fantasia is so incredibly high.
With the never-ending stream of sequels and recycled storylines that Hollywood churns out these days, festivals like Fantasia are a breath of fresh air. They remind us that filmmaking is an art, that out there skilled and dedicated individuals are pouring their love and creativity into works of real quality. Movies for which telling a good story and taking the audience on a journey, perhaps even changing them a little, is what matters – not the takings at the box office.
If you love movies and have noticed the decline in quality of movies you see in the megaplexes you should really seek out and attend independent film festivals like Fantasia.
At this year’s Fantasia I was lucky enough to see 27 new movies, only one of which I actively disliked. I’d also seen a couple of the films showing before. So, now that the festival has drawn to a close, it’s time to look back at the movies I watched and share with you my opinions, recommendations and rankings. So here they are, arranged in order of how much I loved them, with a one sentence review of each:
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