A Return from The Keystone Province

I'm back from Holidays, and couldn't be less refreshed. But in a good way.

I took a whirlwind five day trip from Grande Prairie to my hometown of Pierson, Manitoba for Christmas to visit family and friends I haven't seen in over a year. I was awesome to see everyone, and I took a few photos to show the highlights:

Here's my girlfriend after I forced her part-way across the Souris River Swinging Bridge:
This was the biggest smile she could muster, as she was in sheer terror most of the time while going across the oldest and longest cable stayed footbridge in Canada. Apparently she doesn't like rickety wooden bridges, and my constant jumping up and down to make it bounce didn't improve her attitude towards them.

Next, here I am in front of a giant statue of a banana that's been built in the town of Melita since I was last home.
Apparently our part of Manitoba is called the "Banana Belt" because it's warmer than the rest of the province. I don't think anyone knew this, or really cared, until this statue was built. It's very, almost exactly, reminiscent of an episode of Corner Gas I once saw...



I also gave out a lot of presents to family this year too. What I like to do is buy stuff from the internet, get it mailed to my parent's house where they wrap and deliver the gifts from there. But I neglected to read the fine print of a "Darwin Awards" book from Amazon I purchased, which turned out to be more literal than I realized, as the book was roughly two inches square in size.

My sister's boyfriend still liked it though.

I also got to see my niece Elizabeth for the first time ever.
She took a small break from screaming after being put in this Santa outfit for a picture.

And that's pretty much it. I did some math and we flew and drove roughly 4,800 kilometres, that's just under the length of Canada from the Pacific to the Atlantic.

Happy New Year everyone, it was nice seeing all of you from back home. Hopefully it's not an entire year before I can come back.

Nickel Creek - When In Rome

Christmas Party 2010

This weekend I held "Jake's Stupendous Christmas Bash."
It's currently the most popular annual party in the central region of Grande Prairie in the back alley of 104th ave. I made some calls to confirm this fact.

We had a giant supper with turkey, ham, veggies, taters', salad, tons of snacks, and lots of liquor and booze. This is the third turkey I've cooked this year actually, and next to the deep fried bird I made in September, probably the best. Of course, I'm always too busy to take a picture of the bird before I cut it up, but you can tell it was delicious (the secret is bacon).
I had lots of friends from both work and outside work come by, and to everyone who brought liquor mix, buns, gravy, snacks, and everything tyo contribute, I have to give a big thanks!
Also, kudos to Ashley, who gave me the best drinking game I've ever seen in my life, "Drinko!"

It's like Plinko, but with booze!

And speaking of booze, we drank a lot of it.
Next year I'm going to have to rent out a community hall to fit everyone, as I'm moving in with my girlfriend and unless the party is going to be held in a dark unfinished basement, her house probably won't be the best place to fit 20+ people.

On an extra note, this was the last big party at my house ever, and for a change the neighbors didn't call the cops on us! I'm very happy that this didn't become the fourth time I've had the po-po brought down on me, but in a way, it's a little disappointing.

Merry Christmas everyone, and a happy New Year! Hammelltime will be on hiatus til' maybe December 30th, or January 3rd, as I'll be in Manitoba on holiday. See you in the New Year!

Grande Prairie Parking #1

Grande Prairie is notorious for the fantastic job people do of parking around the city, and today, I think I found the grand champion of them all parked right in front of my workplace!

Now note here, the excellent parking this individual has done, with the front end sticking well into the driving lane and the parking spot infront of it.

But this was not an ill-attempt at parallel parking. No sir, if we follow this vehicles stealthy tracks, we find that this was in-fact a case of driving up...
right on to the sidewalk around other vehicles...
and back out again!


Excellent work! I actually know whose car this is, and I'm sure she has a good reason for this...maybe.

Man do I love Alberta.

Evilnine Crooked ft. Aesop Rock

Review: Stone

Stone

Starring Al Pacino, Edward Norton, and Milla Jovovich

Before I begin, I've summed up my review in large bold text at the bottom of this page. Go if you like for the cripplingly, yet entirely accurate summary of my review.

Stone is a crime thriller, starring Al Pacino who a distant, uncaring man, whose wife who cowers from his every move. Pacino is a prison correctional officer, about to retire, whose final case is to review Edward Norton file to determine whether he is eligible for parole.

Norton is in prison for arson, and is quickly losing his sanity. Beyond the walls of the prison, Norton uses his wife (Milla Jovovich) to seduce and manipulate Pacino in order to improve his chances of getting out of prison.

If that description seems disjointed and uninteresting, it's because I found this film to be exactly that. The first third of the movie really set the roles of these characters up to be really exciting.
Pacino is a father and husband who seems to be, at best, entirely displeased with his life and family.
Norton plays a criminal whose sanity begins to ebb away from the constant strain of prison.
Jovovich plays a loving wife who is prepared to do absolutely anything to free her husband from jail.

But then...the movie quit making sense. It certainly had some interesting concepts, everything to make this a good film was there, but instead of putting it all together, the film just geared down and left me totally baffled.

I have no idea what they were trying to get at this movie. Maybe it was something about not lying to yourself? I need to talk to the director or writer of this film, because I have absolutely no clue what the hell I just saw this weekend.

So, overall:

3/10

The Pros: Edward Norton's character was really enjoyable. He transforms from an accusatory criminal, to a depressed inmate, to an enlightened ex-con. It's an excellent role for him; And in a better movie, it would have been of noteworthy consideration come Oscar season.

The Cons: The story wasn't cohesive, any “subtle undertones” that were attempted were lost to Stone's incomprehensible plot, Pacino's role was nothing new, exciting, or exceptional, and I just didn't enjoy this movie.

This wasn't a “Crime Thriller” in any sense of the word. There was no “How is this going to end up? What's going to happen? What needs to be figured out?”

I'm not criticizing this movie for not fitting the 'formula' of a standard crime thriller, or for being above its viewers, I'm criticizing it because it wasn't good. It was lacking in pretty much every aspect.

Should you see Stone?

No.

No you should not see Stone.

If you skipped here, that's cool. If not, thanks for sitting through a largely negative review. I really needed to vent about how bad this movie was.

Turning Into a Wino

This past year I've been drinking a lot of wine. Not just taste testing either, I mean really giving it on the fermented grape juice. So obviously my nearly 12 months of serious wine drinking means I'm an authority on the subject.

And for a lack of anything else to talk about, here's a few of my preferred wines you should check out if your standing at the local liquor commission looking for something new to try:

Luchador Wine - Shiraz

This stuff rocks! I bought it because I was impressed with the label, but when I tried it my tastebuds were body-slammed with flavour!
This is my favourite wine by far. I have no idea how to describe tastes or smells of wine, so all I can really say is that lunchador wine is BIG. It smells bold, its taste explodes when you sip it, and it makes any other red wines you try afterwards taste like muddy water by comparison.

Jacob's Creek - Merlot

I bought this because it had my name on the bottle. It's kind of bitter, but easy to drink. But beware, it's cheap, and it packs a hell-of-a-hangover the next morning, and you can feel it coming on even after only two glasses. As far as red wines go, Jacob's Creek isn't bad. There's better wine out there, but I've always found it's had an interesting enough of a taste to make it worth drinking.

Kung Fu Girl - Riesling

This was introduced to me by my girlfriend, and it's her favourite. Initially I scoffed at it, but after trying it I found it was an entirely unique wine of its own. It's got a bit of carbonation that makes it bubbly, it's sort of tangy (if that's the right word) like citrus, and the aftertaste rolls over your tastebuds with a soothing glow. Definitely needs to be chilled though, drinking it at room temperature is practically a sin. If you have to bring a bottle of something to a friend's house and want to impress your Wine Expert friends, go with Kung Fu Girl.

I'm always up for trying new wines too, so lay it on me. What's good? What do you like? What do you hate?

Hail Mary Mallon - D-Up

Final Movember Update

My facial hair has gone down the drain. Literally.

I shaved the "Hammellbar" off this morning, but luckily I happened to snap just one photo of it before saying goodbye to my ginger whiskers


As you can see it really filled in over the course of the last week. I was having trouble trimming it, but otherwise it's pretty nice. Next year I'll have a better idea of how exactly I'd like to shape it.

It was in suppourt of the Cancer Society, and in Canada last year 7.8 million dollars was raised in donations; The total was even larger globally. I didn't get on board with for any reason other than I lost a bet, but in the end it was fun to take part in, and I'll probably do it again and actually do some serious fundraising.

Caro Emerald - Bad Romance (Lady Gaga Cover)

Gingerbread Competition 2010

My coworkers and I constructed another gingerbread house for a local Christmas show/fundraiser. Last year we learned quit a bit from our successes and failures from trying to build a stone church so this year's went slightly better.

We decided to scrap the idea of a gingerbread "house" and go for something completely different. After some humming a hawing, we settled upon the idea of a Lighthouse Keeper's Christmas, and here's the final result:



I forgot my camera so I don't have any other pictures from the Festival of Trees, but I'd say we were in the top half of gingerbread creations. You can't see it, but there's a little light in the top of the lighthouse that blinks so it actually looks like a lighthouse giving off a signal.

It's a little plain, but I figure it does the trick. There were lots of good ones this year, for example there was a castle, a mountainside ski lodge, an Eiffel Tower made of chocolate, and this insane fondant doghouse.

So I guess this means it's Christmas-time now! What kind of stuff are you doing to get ready for the holidays?

Nothing to Talk About

Man, this blog thing is tough. It's been two years since I started blogging steadily, and I'm running out of subject material.

This week has been quite bland. I just have nothing to talk about. So you know what? It's time for The Highlights of My Week so Far:

Monday – Had a Papa Murphy's pizza for dinner. For those not in the know, Papa Murphys is a take'n'bake pizza joint. I didn't know this when I first went there. I ordered a large pepperoni pizza, and they handed me this raw pie. Being the totally passive person I am, I just accepted it. I imagined for a moment them saying “You want a cooked pizza? Too bad! Deal with this, fucker!” and then I'd hang my head and sadly say “Okay.”

But I then I figured out that uncooked pizza is what they sell, and everything turned out better when I got free cookie dough.

Tuesday: Wing night at The Basement! The Basement is my favourite place to go drinking. Lately my budget hasn't been as conducive to just sitting down there on a Friday night and drinking my way through three or four beer towers, but I still make it for wing nights occasionally. However, service is usually slow because the place is totally packed on Tuesdays. So we got some free shots! Yeah!
Then I was a little tipsy (actually, a lot) and the girlfriend and I went to her parent's house to play with their new puppy. I collected twenty dollars for Movember and ate some pickled herring. It was salty. End of story.

Wednesday: I saw the movie Secretariat last night. What can I say about it? It was a Disney movie about horse racing. I wasn't a big fan, but it wasn't the worst movie I've seen either.

And that leads us to today. Later I'm going on a booze run for my staff Christmas party, and after work I'm going to sit at home and watch Star Trek. Because that's what cool people do.

So...How has your week been?

Goldfinger - 99 Red Balloons

Movember Moustache...Mupdate?

Photos stolen courtesy of Tatiana and my Aunty Pat.

I lost a bet, and now I have to grow a moustache. I started it slightly before November 1st (cheating, I know) and now we're just over halfway through the month I figured it was time for an update on the situation at hand.


Now, before we get to the before and afters, I just want to make it clear that I'm an embarrassment to hairier folk of my family. My father for instance grows a full beard during winter so well formed that he often gets mistaken for Santa Clause by small children. No kidding, it seriously happens.

(this is the only bearded photo I could find)

And my older brother? I'm quite certain that when he sneezes hairs instantly sprout from his chin.

(The least blurry, hairiest photo I could find. I'm really missing the mark this week with photos.)

I used to have a good photo of him with a Ron Jeremy quality porn-stache, but I've since lost it. Trust me though, it was skeezy.


Now here's me unshaved:


And here's me with about three week's worth of growth:

Can you see it?

I grow the gingerest ginger hair that ever gingered on man's face; It's practically translucent. Anyway, I will admit that it's growing in better than I thought. It doesn't look like the pubescent caterpillar I was expecting to grow. Unfortunately though, as this is the first time I've ever attempted to groom facial hair, I keep shaving it crooked.

Anyway, only one a half weeks left!

For any other participants, let's see your stache

Gord Bamford - Day Job

What didn't sex ed teach you in school?

I was reading the forums on Reddit.com today, and came across this comment in reply to a question “What didn't sex ed teach you in school?”:

“I could label a vas deferens and urethra on a diagram of a penis, but they never actually said what the penis was for.”

Suddenly I was hit with a vivid memory of Sex Ed in grade 5.

Labeling the genitals.

We were given a quick test after learning all the different parts of both male and female reproductive organs; Label the major parts of a penis and a vagina on a diagram.

Me being the diligent student I was at that age, I could have labeled both diagrams %100 correct, but a terrible truth had popped in my head. I was dead-set convinced that if I got all answers right on the female diagram, everyone would think I was a pervert. But on the opposite hand, if I got all the questions right on the penis everyone would naturally assume I was gayer than Elton John.

So, stuck between a rock and a hard place, I came up with a genius solution only a ten year old could think of (Before you ask, it wasn't to label both diagrams %100 correct).

I scribbled down my answers whilst glancing to and fro to make sure nobody was looking my way or stealing my idea. I strode up to the front of the class, handed my paper in as if I were presenting the teacher with the map to El Dorado itself, and smugly took my seat. She quickly marked each test, and passed them back.

When the results came back, I had scored %55 correct on male genitals, %55 on the female genitals.

High enough to pass, to not look like a perv, and to not look gay. Thinking back on it though, it's a good thing I didn't know about bisexuality in grade 5. Think of the rumors that one might have started!

The Most Hurtful Fax

This was a reply fax sent to me after I was having trouble sending a fax. When I received it a little piece of me died...


She must have forgot the word "Having" in there, right?

Right?

*single tear*

Review: Flipped

Flipped

Directed by Rob Reiner

Flipped follows the lives of two kids in the late 1950s. A girl who instantly falls in love with the new boy who's moved in across the street from her, and the new boy who is quite annoyed by the advances of this young lass. As they grow up, their feelings and relationship change, blah blah blah, you get the gist.

I totally did not have expectations of what this film was going to be about. I'd heard of it in passing, never seen a preview, and by reading it's synopsis I assumed it was a chick flick. But, since the bowling alley was %100 packed last night, I opted for a date-night featuring a movie instead.

Coming out of the theatre, I was blown away. This was an excellent film! I got completely sucked in by the multitude of characters, the cinematography was so rich and bright, the story was equal parts funny and compelling, and it was just an excellent movie.

It's unique feature is that it flips first person perspective throughout the film. So you hear the lead male's point of view about what he thinks of this creepy stalker neighbor girl, and then the same story is retold but from the little girl's perspective. It was great! And so well written too. Fifty years difference or not, this movie goes to show that pubescent kids really do think the same way now as they did then.

Overall I give Flipped:

8.5/10

The Pros: It was funny, it looked great, the dialogue was memorable, and it's unique approach to storytelling was a totally fresh perspective.

The Cons: Flipped didn't waste a lot of time at any point in the movie except for one small portion in the middle. Although I praise this movie for it's quick paced plot, I also have to take half a point away from it for the ending. While it was quite good, I felt that resolution was too quick/inconsistent with the tone of the last ten minutes or so of the movie.

This is a movie anyone aged 12 and up would really enjoy. It definitely hasn't gotten enough press or mention (that I've seen). If you're looking for a good way to spend an evening, go sit your rear end in the theatre and see Flipped.

A Real Life Conversation, EP: 1

Me: Can't head out tonight, I'm gingerbreading.*

Friend: Haha. Man, what activities are you going to do when you're sixty?

Me: MMA Shark Wrestling and Sexbot fabrication.

Friend: You will require a robot penis for both of those activities.




*Gingerbreading: Building a ginerbread house.

Steven Page - Wilted Rose

I Made a Mistake

UFC 121 was this past weekend, in which everyone's favourite fighter that you love to hate, Brock Lesnar, was defending his heavyweight championship belt.

For those that don't follow UFC, here's the quick summary:

• Lesnar is a giant freak of an athlete. The man's hands are literally the size of those football hams. He has specially made gloves.

• He started in the WWE, which everyone knows is choreographed fighting. You do have to be an athlete, you do get seriously injured, and you do have to seriously train to be a pro wrestler. But there were lots of raised eyebrows and incredulous looks at Lesnar when he was signed to the UFC.

• He was given a chance at the UFC heavyweight championship belt well before any fighter normally gets, and this was somewhat controversial.

There's more to the story, but that's all you really need to know.

There were a number of bets made on Lesnar's fight this weekend, as it could have gone one of two ways. Lesnar would either sit on his competitor Cain Velasquez for five rounds, or Velasquez would completely walk all over Lesnar.

I decided to bet on Lesnar winning.

The stakes? Whoever loses the bet has to grow a moustache for the month of November. My friend I was gambling with is much like me in that I can't grow facial hair. Our facial hair is easily rivaled by many 16 year old boys.

And I lost the bet. Miserably. Lesnar got his face totally punched all to hell in the first minute of the fight. It was pretty sad actually.

So now I have to grow a moustache. I hope it'll turn out like this with a matching chest fro':

But more likely, it'll look like this:

Any tips on moustaches maintenance anyone can share with me?

So many babies!

I've been rather tardy on updating my blog, I know, but I have big news!

I just became an Uncle!

My family welcomed a new addition into our clan Saturday, October 16th, when my older sister gave birth to healthy baby girl.

Here's the wee baby and her father

Congratulations to my big sister and the new dad. Also, welcome to the family Elizabeth Victoria! I look forward to many years of buying you the most annoying toys, craziest stuffed animals, and ridiculous clothing possible.

On a sidenote, not only am I an uncle for the first time ever, but a coworker's , a very good friend's, and an old co-worker all have family members who gave birth to baby girls this week too. Weird, eh?

Okta Logue - Bright Lights

More Treasures

As you may recall from an earlier blog, I talked about how I find things all the time lying on the ground. Last time it was a giant wad of bubblegum as large as a man's head I tell you!

Well, about a month ago I discovered a much tastier morsel on the ground.

It was just after noon, sun shining brightly in the sky, a fine fall day by any account. The skies were clear for the first time in weeks, Though everyone still wore sweaters to keep the slight breeze from giving you a chill, the warmth felt refreshing.

I stepped outside, and there, in the middle of the street, nary a soul in sight to claim it, lay a single strip of Jack Link's Original Beef Steak.


Its packaging was a little dirty, suggesting it had lain in the street most of the morning, possibly through the night, but remained sealed. Someone without keen scavenger eyesight as I possess probably would have spotted it lying there and mistook it for refuse.

But I, being a natural “Indiana Jones” of sort, saw that 'refuse' and discovered treasure.

I picked it up and looked to my left...

All clear.

To my right?

All clear.

The beef jerky was mine.

But did I dare eat it? On closer inspection, the jerky was still hermetically sealed. The expiration date was months away. With careful unwrapping I wouldn't even get any dirt from the external packaging on it! Just as I was about to tear into it, I stopped for a moment to consider that perhaps this was a clever trap.

As anyone should know, Beef Jerky makes perfect Jake Hammell bait. It's practically irresistible!

Assured that the possibilities of the jerky being a trap were too great to ignore I placed it aside, and left it.

A day later, the jerky was gone. Vanished. Wrapper and all.

While I can't confirm my theory, I'm quite certain it was some sort of teleportation device, laid to capture an unsuspecting person. More than likely laid there by the Jack Link's Sasquatch himself.


Pretty clever if you ask me.

Or maybe the shirtless from down the street whose redneck parents insist upon barbecueing on their car's hood found it and ate it.

Either way, we'll never know.

Edit: According to a reader, the beef jerky was spotted first by Jen Baron, and not myself. Upon reflection, this is probably true. So finder's rights do not go to myself. However, I was the one to pick it up and take a good look at it.

The Kills - Tape Song

Review: Cat Ladies

Update Sept 8/2011, Check the bottom of the comments for an update on the Cat Ladies. One of the producers of this documentary found this review, and graciously provided an update on the status of the "Cat Ladies."

Cat Ladies
Directed by Christine Callan Jones

Yesterday being a holiday, I took the opportunity of a day off to rent movies with the girlfriend and fold laundry (mine, not hers). One of the films I rented was 'Cat Ladies' a Canadian-made documentary about the lives of four different 'Crazy Cat Women.'

They range from a lonely older woman obsessed with her three cats (this one has collected nearly 1,000 whiskers from a single cat, and calls them 'presents') to another weirdly cold woman in her mid-thirties who seems bitter about the relationships in her life, and has 14 or so cats to fill the void of the relationships she doesn't have. Finally, the last two women both own more than 140 cats and believe themselves to be 'rescuing' lost and abandoned kitties.

This documentary was like watching an hour and a half long video of 'Hoarders,' but presented more objectively, and with far better story telling. It delves not only into the lives of these Cat Ladies, but also what led them to the point they're at, and how they deal both internally and externally with being Cat Ladies.

This documentary makes you want to reach into the TV and shake sense into some of these women, and other times you just sit back in awe at their lifestyle. It's entirely engrossing and makes it so you can't stop watching.

The trailer is posted below, and trust, you're going to be hard pressed not to watch this film after viewing it.






Overall I give Cat Ladies

8.5/10

It's a great documentary! You learn a lot about the people in it, their life stories, and it's presented in a completely objective manner. There's absolutely no spin. At no point does it judge them, nor does it say “These are bad people.” There's obviously something not-quite-right with some of them, others seems to be simply victims of circumstance, and others just can't interact with humans. From the first five minutes in, Cat Ladies has you hooked.

I take points away from it because occasionally it seems like they forgot a couple of segway clips and subsequently some scenes seemed completely out of context. Also, since this documentary just came out last year, it would be nice to see it re-released with some follow-up interviews to see where these people's lives ended up after the documentary.

So go rent Cat Ladies! This is an outstanding piece of Canadian produced film that you have to see to believe.

Battle of the Bone 2010 Wrap Up

Photos courtesy of Amanda Wiebe

My team did not win The Battle of the Bone 2010. It's disappointing, it sucks, I wanted it real bad, but it just didn't come to fruition. My team and I didn't stack up.

The team from left to right, Jim, Myself, last minute addition Andy, and Steve

However, this year's contest has, to put it simply, been fraught through and through with controversy.

During the qualifying rounds, allegations that teams weren't eating enough meat on the chicken wing bones flew around, and that makes a huge difference in a team's performance and finishing time.

But I'll cut to the chase. Last Wednesday five teams met to compete. It was Big Country (my team), two other radio stations, the local rugby team, and Grande Prairie's football team The Drillers, featuring Shannon George, the man who narrowly defeated me last year.


So anyway, our teams was strategy was to be fast, but do an excellent job of cleaning the meat off the bones. I had confirmed the day of the contest that we would indeed be weighing the buckets of chicken both before and after to determine who ate the most chicken, as that does affect the standings of the team to finish first.

Basically, Big Country didn't finish anywhere near first. I think we might even have been last. But we ate all the wings. I'm not %100 if teams that didn't finish first did as well.

I even ate the one wing I dropped on the ground.


They weighed the buckets and Big Country had eaten 58 ounces of chicken, roughly 3.6 pounds (that “pound” of wings you're eating isn't actually a pound by the way). But when the announcement came down as to who had eaten the most chicken, it wasn't Big Country, is was another radio station, who ate about 47 ounces.

Whaaaaat?

Well, as it turns out, the judges mixed their numbers up, and the fastest team (who people complained were barely eating their wings) also ate the least amount of chicken.

But because I'm not going to be the team that complains over losing a charity eating contest, I just let it go. Big Country obviously wasn't the fastest team, and regardless of how much we ate, the championship belt wasn't going to us.

Congratualtions to the United Way, I hope that this year's competition raised lots of money, and that they see what a unique and fun fundraiser this is to keep doing it. This is only year 2 for the Battle of the Bone, and now that more people are competing, some bad blood and rivalries are developing, I think things for the United Way are only going to get better.

Next year we'll see how this goes. I think I need to recruit some serious ringers, because we keep losing to giant football players.

And believe it or not, giant football players eat more than starving radio people.

Field Music - Let's Write a Book

Scarecrow Festival 2010

The scarecrow festival begins in Grande Prairie today, and I've made another entry this year. To you I present the Big Country 93.1 "Dragon Warrior"

This took about two to three weeks of steady work. No single thing took all that long, but cumulatively it took forever to make.

My big issues are that I didn't have time to make him a tail that would swing and sway, his hips are too wide, and his head is too small. All of these were things I ran out of time, or didn't have the ability, to fix. Oh well, It's done I'm not looking back!

Basically I wanted to make something that I thought geeky kids who were like me would think is cool. Plus, Scarecrows should be one of two things, funny, or scary. None of this self-promotional BS. (except for the logo on his belt, that was the only thing I was told to include)


Unfortunately I'm very bad at genre specifics, and I wanted to do something related to country music I should have done the zombie of Marty Robbins or Johnny Cash. Maybe I'll do that next year!

The scarecrows are on display around Grande Prairie til' October 15th, from which point they go up for auction to suppourt the local rodeo association. If you're in Grande Prairie, you vote for, and see all of the competing radio station's scarecrows at Canadian Tire, and tons of other scarecrows around town at various businesses. If you're not from GP, you can just wait two weeks for me to post photos of all the decent Scarecrows. Either way, you're a weiner.

Review: Hell Ride

Hell Ride,

Written by, directed and starring Larry Bishop

The premise: In the world of biker gangs, 'bad blood' doesn't even begin to describe the hatred that exists between the The Victors and The Six-Six-Sixers. The Sixers are moving in on Victor territory, infiltrating their gang, and brutally slaughtering their members.
Pistolero, the “Pres” of the Victors has only a few fellow gang-members he truly trusts, and The Sixers have him outnumbered, outmaneuvered, and outclassed, or so they think.

Hell Ride, a tale of vengeance, moves from one violently brutal moment to the next in a non-stop bath of blood. For people who like a simple plot, with a few twists here and there, and tons of action, you have to see Hell Ride.

A friend lent me this movie over the weekend, and I haven't seen anything like this where I was blown away by it for hours afterwards in a long time.

I'll face the facts though, this isn't a movie everyone is going to enjoy.

The plot? It's Thin.

Is it over-the-top violent? Hell yes.

Is this a movie you should hide from children? Absolutely.

If you don't like Tarantino or Robert Rodriguez style action and violence, then you're not going to like this movie.

Overall:

8/10

The Pros: It had action, it had a great cast, it had scenes whose violence left me cringing, it had some light comedy here and there, it had a plot that left me totally satisfied with its outcome, and by the time the credits had rolled I was completely blown away.

The Cons: Some of the dialogue was uninspired, and sometimes things happened that left me a little confused. It's going to need a re-watch before I return it (which I plan on taking my sweet time doing). Also, the epic struggle that the film built towards fell a little flat. Good, but flat.

So quit watching terrible action movies with no plot and see Hell Ride. Do it. Now.

Thanksgiving Approaches

Every now and then I voice a commercial which is just embarrassing, even for me.

My station gives away Turkeys for Thanksgiving, (which is coming right up October 11th) and we have some contest called “Turkey Lurkey.” For two years now I've been the voice of Turkey Lurkey himself, due to my experience in raising turkeys. I have keen synergy and understanding as to what a turkey thinks about...


So to you I present the Blackman's Turkey Lurkey Promo, as produced and voiced-in-part by Tom Laird.

Eat Them Wings

Photos Courtesy of Steve Suk

I don't have a whole lot of photo evidence to back this up, but Team Big Country is through to the finals of the wing eating competition. Last Wednesday we came in second on qualifying night, and they pushed us through because we're likable I guess.


The contest this year, as I said in my last blog, is about speed, not endurance. Last year, 40 wings was what a single competitor had to eat to win the contest. That maybe doesn't sound like all that much, but after 30, you really start to drag.

With teams of four eating at 100 wings (that's only 25 a person) this throws the doors of victory wide open. But the rules on cleaning the bones need to be more stringent. Our team did a fine job of stripping the meat off the bones and leaving little behind. Some of the competitors however...well let's just say some feathers may be ruffled over this issue.

This is the destruction wrought by our team

We were bested by Shannon George, my nemesis from last year, and some football players. I feel a rivalry coming on, and if Shannon wasn't the god damned nicest person I've ever competed against I'd be angrier than I am right now.

In the end though, the contest is all for the United Way. But I really want that belt. I mean I'm willing to do unlawful things to people to get it. It's like chasing the dragon...

I almost have it this time! I know I can get it!

Happy Birthday to Me!

It's my birthday today! Being that it's Monday however I'm not really celebrating today. I actually have to deliver magazines after work today. But luckily, I took the day to party properly on Saturday!

My friend's birthday was last Tuesday, so we had a joint party that included these sweet invites

Yes, I know potatoes is spelled wrong. I realized immediately after I wrote it down.

Because it was my party, I decided dress however the F I felt,

which happen to mean I was dressed in my Han Solo costume from last Halloween.

We deep fried a turkey,

It was a little scary, all that scalding hot oil and stuff...

but it was the most amazing turkey I have ever eaten in my life. Seriously. It was phenomenal. We're going to fry another one later this week.

Then we had cake and drank way too much beer.


Overall, great birthday party! Thanks to all the well-wishers and everyone who came!

To those who didn't, you missed out on beer-pong, hottubbing, and turkey. Now how do you feel about yourself?

You could have tired yourself out like these two boys. Just imagine how much fun they had!

Dirty Heads - Stand Tall