Karaoke PEI-style was lots of fun

No one could ever call me an early adopter and nowhere is this more true than in respect to karaoke — a recreational activity which probably peaked in excitement about 20+ years ago.

But when Greg and I heard about Karaoke Night at the local community centre, we felt we had to go to this our first karaoke night. Doing karaoke — or is it singing along to karaoke — wasn't exactly on my bucket list, but then, I like adding things to a list after I've done them just for the joy of crossing them off.

We had a little nap after dinner and then set out on the five-minute drive to the Fortune Community Centre, site of bingo, trivial pursuit nights, wedding receptions, Michael Smith’s Fund-Raising Night, and now, for the first time, karaoke.

From the web-site  http://www.fortunecommunitycentre.com

We arrived on time, for once. And for once, we didn’t need to have worried about being prompt. There were a couple of attendees smoking outside with whom we exchanged hellos. Inside, the DJ had all the equipment set up; the bar was open; I ordered a Keith’s; Greg got an Alpine, and we surveyed the mostly empty room. A couple of tables over, there were six other attendees poring over the karaoke book listing the music, but that was about it.

Later one of the organizers explained that people just don’t come out to things early in the evening (it was about 10:30 by this time). He recalled a dance held earlier this year. The band cost a lot of money, and at midnight, there were only three people there. At 12:15 a.m., another 75 suddenly arrived — to his enormous relief. The dances around here “start” at 10:00 p.m. and end at 2:00 a.m. Local customs can sometimes be a bit puzzling to people like us “from away.”   

Be that as it may, I did learn a few more things that night.

First of all, you don’t start singing until the words on the screen turn green.

Also, it is a good idea to have some familiarity with how the words fit the tune before you choose a song. And it should go without saying that you should have a pretty firm  handle on that tune.  Just because I like Time after Time didn’t mean I should have chosen it. Cyndi Lauper packed way more words into that song than I remembered.  And they (and I) turned green in an awful hurry. 

You can hear for yourself what I was up against lyrics-wise: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PqhOrgk11A

I did much better with Somewhere over the Rainbow. I even held the long note at the end without going flat. The DJ  remarked positively to me about my interpretation. Wow! I acknowledged the applause from the audience with a small self-deprecating bow.

Then I realized I had received almost as much applause when I bombed as when I did better.  Admittedly, it was kind of like singing in a nursing home. In a long-term care facility, people are listening, but they can’t all hear.  At karaoke, they were hearing but, because they were busy leafing through the song book and writing down the titles they were going to perform, they were not really listening.  Nevertheless, whenever anyone finished, the handful of people in the audience paused and heartily applauded.

This held an important lesson for me.  It’s good to get up and sing in front of an audience just for the heck of it no matter how it goes. In life, sometimes you should just get up for fun and thank your lucky stars you are in a group of people who applaud you for doing just that, even when the results are not the greatest. 

It’s nice not to be judged and likely found wanting. Having people applaud even a feeble attempt gives you the confidence that you can do better the next time.

Also, you are inclined to return the favour and give others hearty applause too. To me, that greases the social machinery in a very nice way.

I was chatting with the organist at church the next day and mentioned my adventures the night before. He nodded and said that people around here are always very supportive of one another. I like that.

So much so that I’m looking forward to the next karaoke evening. I may sing Elvis Presley’s Teddy Bear, a featured song of the Ausable Singers, a seniors' choir in which I am an alto. I shall have to master the soprano part, however.

On a different inspirational note, B.B. King’s Stand by Me comes to mind as well. It has a catchy tune but relatively few words. 

I noticed both pieces were both in the DJ’s book, and I can practise them ahead of time via YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3byPGrsvyVY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ky0x3_0li2I

The Village Feast was a super treat

We had a great time at this event. Every year for the past seven years, Chef Michael Smith and a vast army of local volunteers (including members of the actual armed forces) make it happen. The dinner is a fundraiser for four charities. PEI-based Farmer Helping Farmers builds cook-houses  in Kenya with donations from the feast. Other money goes locally to the Souris Food Bank, Coats for Kids, and the Main Street Family Resource Centre. 

What struck me was how well-organized it was and how helpful and cheerful the volunteers were. One of them told me they had 1,100 meals ready to go this year. And as you shall see, this wasn't just hot-dogs-on-a-bun fare, but a delicious three-course locally provisioned meal. When you consider Souris, the largest place around here for about 25 miles, has a population of 1,600, that is quite a feat. 

The physical layout  was a big part of the success. Moving so many people through the event over just three hours and keeping everyone was happy was what  really impressed me. It was like going through a combination of  IKEA and that Swiss-based restaurant in downtown Toronto whose name I forget.  Aha ... Movenpick!

Our ticket is propped up against a bag of lettuce as a centrepiece. It had tear-offs all around it — missing in the photo, but you can see the perforations — which we used at each food station.

 

Because of the high winds due to Tropical Storm Arthur, the event was held inside this year — necessitating last minute changes that seemed to us — as mere attendees — to go off without a hitch.The entrance to the Eastern Kings Sportsplex is not pretty, but the bales of hay were placed in such a way that a large crowd could congregate but then get narrowed into a line to go in to the building. You just followed the labyrinthine path.

I  suspect the same farmer who last year donated the hay bales at Micheal Smith's wedding also donated to the Feast. We visited Sweetwater Farms last year; this is the hay barn.

Anyhow, once inside, we were met with a volunteer at the entrance to the dining area,which is the ice rink in the winter. Her sole duty was to give us and everyone else useful advice to make getting our food easy.

Find your chairs first, tip them up, go get your chowder and dessert, and then afterwards, head out for your main course. Sounded sensible to me!

However, we were immediately distracted by the oysters, and not reading the sign too carefully decided on two for $5, much to the amusement of the volunteer shuckers.

As the salty dog on the left said, it's all for a good cause.

Having tipped up their chairs,  our table mates had gone for their dinner:

The chowder stand was out back. The shrimp, lobster, and potato-filled  delight was served  by members of the Canadian Armed Forces.

Next, each of us picked up one of the 1,100 rhubarb shortcakes and whipped cream for our dessert:

Here is what things looked like at about 5:00. The feast ran from 3:00 to 6:00 in the afternoon.

Chowder eaten,  it was back out the way we came in for our main course:

The steak, garlic mashed potatoes, and gravy station was first.  Such a clever way of dividing the crowd: by the degree of doneness each person wanted for their meat.  But no well-done steaks on offer, as you can see.

The lobster station was next, made obvious by the lobster boat! I wonder who lent it.

A couple of eager young people handed out the greens with gloved hands from huge bowls, another time saver. Alas, no picture of them in action.

A nod to Kenyan cuisine was given in curry-flavoured githeri, consisting of beans and maize. It was a tasty vegetarian addition.

Next stop: Acadian bread baked in that nifty oven, which usually lives near Michael Smith's kitchen.

Here is the final product; we had already devoured the lobster- and shrimp-laden  chowder.

Greg had gone the surf and turf route and did not have enough room for the lobster, which we took home for our next day's supper.

Lots of silly entertainment was orchestrated by Michael Smith while we ate. These 12 people paid $100 each to wear a funny Anne-hat, put on a potato bag apron, shuck an oyster, peel a potato and apologize (we're Canadians) to the person next to them. The money was donated to Farmers Helping Farmers.

I think they also had to drink the strawberry cordial:

Later, the crown gave a standing ovation to the orange-clad Feast volunteers.

Time to go home. The crowd is breaking up.

We stopped off at the gift stand and looked over African-made wares.

I suggested to Greg he buy another giraffe, as his previous one had its nose knocked off in one of our moves. This one does have feet; I was concentrating on its snout  for the picture.

So many sponsors:

I can hardly wait until next year.  I may not only attend, but also  volunteer to peel potatoes or maybe slice up rhubarb.

No more talking with trolls

I usually don’t comment on public venues on anything controversial (religion and politics come to mind), but something came over me the other day. Likely it was boredom.  I joined a slew of people on a CBC string on Facebook commenting on Rob Ford’s return to the city after rehab.

I opined that he did not look a lot slimmer.  Almost immediately someone accused me of fat shaming.  Oh dear, was I doing that? I reflected briefly, then wrote back to say I was just puzzled: he didn’t look to have dropped as many pant sizes as his brother said. That threw the fat onto the Internet fire:

Well, said the other person, I should look at his face to see the evidence. I did look and did not see a lot of change. However, at this point, I left the conversation, as boredom now seemed a better alternative to engaging in this any further.  I was feeling “trolled.”

Being something of a coward by nature, I thought withdrawing was the intelligent thing to do. Also I was beginning to wonder about my own inner troll. Was I being disingenuous saying I was “puzzled” when really I was “fat shaming” and didn’t want to admit it? I needed to think about this dark side of myself for a while.

However, things on the mini-string I started did not end there, and I had the dubious pleasure of seeing what happened next.

Someone posted a bit of uncomplimentary name-calling: to wit that the mayor was not only sizable but also a liar.  In response, the troll opined that not only was the new commenter fat and ugly, but she had something inappropriate on her chest (not exactly the words he or she used, but decency requires a euphemism).  Well this was a bit off-topic, I thought, deleted the item, and went to the next message in my in-box.

The next thing I knew, into my email popped the next round of chat. Someone else had entered the conversation and had rushed to my defense, saying that calling me fat and old was not at all sporting and was just as bad in its way as fat shaming.

To say I was startled would be putting it mildly. How on earth had the troll accessed my Facebook page!  So much for remaining aloof. Curiosity immediately got the better of me.  

I opened the link provided by Troll and found myself on Facebook looking at an image purportedly of me. But what on earth was I doing in a wading pool – haven’t done that for years, if ever. Then I looked at who was splashing about: a hearty woman of a certain age with a tattoo on her chest. She looked to be having lots of fun.

But the photo was most assuredly not of me. 

Thank goodness. I breathed a hearty sigh of relief:  Troll had not found me.

It turned out that commenter who had rushed to my defense had confused my name with that frolicking woman’s. Having no desire to draw further attention to myself, I did not correct that error!

The next thing I did was to re-check the privacy settings on my FB page and tighten them up. I also deleted my comment, and with it the string of subsequent comments, from the original posting.

I looked up Troll and found a Facebook page with nothing on it: no pictures, posts, nothing except a brief reference to attendance at a high school. There was next to nothing on the Internet as well.

This spooked me; it’s a cruel, mad word out there and I am not going to engage, even briefly, with trolls ever again!

The Deer Hunter then and now

At the cottage, we are in the dark ages electronically-speaking. On our 30-year-old workhorse of a television, we can watch only VHS tapes. So we have been enjoying a lot of pre-DVD movies.  A few nights ago we watched The Deer Hunter.  Directed by Michael Cimino, it won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1978. I am not sure when I first saw this film, but likely after it came out in the theatres. In any event, it was probably 30 years ago or more — a whole generation.

At the time it was released, there was a lot of talk about the film’s treatment of the Viet Cong, especially in the Russian roulette scenes, about director Cimino’s overbearing personality, and about the length and cost of the film.  Aside from the length, I didn't know about any of this controversy until reading about the film a few days ago.

So when (uninformed) I saw this movie again after such a long time, what did I notice?   Well, the length for one thing. I didn't recall it as a tediously long movie, but this time around, I found the wedding scenes overly drawn out, and I got tired of the ongoing buffoonery of the young men. I also noticed the huge role the Russian Orthodox Church still played in the characters’ lives.

However, what captured my attention most was the characters’ attitude towards guns. I am not a hunter, but I could see that hunting was part of the definition of manliness for those steelworkers.  It struck me that there was an unspoken ethos around the proper use for guns.

They carried their rifles in gun cases when going hunting in the wilderness. Now maybe this was just for the movie and was not realistic, but nevertheless I was surprised at their restraint and care.

Eventually that pastime was challenged — at least by Michael , the “single-shot “deer hunter played by Robert De Niro. Having experienced the war and its aftermath, he declines to shoot a prize buck and instead shoots in the air and watches the majestic animal disappear from sight.  Is this an affirmation of his true manliness, as it seems Cimino is suggesting, or is it wimpiness?  Michael offers no explanation to his friends when they express surprise that he didn’t get a kill.

However much the possession and use of long guns were taken for granted for hunting, carrying a concealed weapon was frowned on. One of the characters is asked, “Why are you carrying that little thing?”  in reference to his hand gun.  Partly this taunt was a reference to the character’s manliness, but it struck me that there was also the feeling that there was something not right about having a gun concealed on one’s person.

What a contrast to American attitudes today:  Not only is carrying a  concealed weapon perfectly acceptable in many people’s eyes, but so is flaunting exposed AK-47s — and these are far removed from hunting rifles— in such places as retail stores. Apparently some churches give them away to attract adherents.  It is such false heroism.   

Where does this attitude come from?  The futility and brutality of the Vietnam war and later the war in Iraq and other American foreign policy disasters come to mind. Since 9/11, fear of the Other has been ratcheted up many notches —although harm from domestic terrorism seems much more likely than from external threats.

In an early scene in The Deer Hunter, an unknown serviceman comes in during the wedding and sits alone at the bar. He refuses to engage the boisterous, naive young men who want to celebrate him as a war hero. Later, Michael comes quietly home from the war with much the same attitude.  The movie-going audience has seen the trauma he experienced; the characters in the movie know little or nothing about it.

For Cimino, the chief image for the Viet Nam experience is the game of Russian roulette: gambling taken to the extreme. I think of all the associations that come to my mind around gambling in general:  a waste of time, luck of the draw, chance, unfeeling, unforgiving, amoral, winner take all …

Even though the Russian roulette scenes may not be factually correct, they act as a metaphor for the moral quagmire of that war and of the generation time that has followed it:  at times, life seems to  be a meaningless, merciless, and psychologically, if not physically,  deadening game of pure chance.   In the characters of Nicky and Steve, the film suggests the damage done to the American psyche will be both long-lasting and corrosive, although the characters that remained at home seem to want to ignore that possibility.

When God Bless America is sung at the end of the film, was it a neat and tidy way to end an overly long movie on some kind of optimistic note?  Viewed at the time, it could be seen as the characters’ moving on and leaving the war behind — a variation perhaps on the theme of American exceptionalism:  This war’s devastating aftermath will never happen here again, so don’t think about it much now that it is over. 

However, seen from the point of view of over 30 years down the road, the last scene is so sentimental, the  irony is grim. To an outsider, it seems that many Americans’ optimism has hardened and coarsened into extreme fear and mistrust.  When we viewed The Deer Hunter the first time, who would have predicted assault rifles in the grocery store or at church? 

Gardening progresses at Tyn Y Maes

At the end of Candide, Voltaire advises his readers simply to cultivate their own gardens. Aside from this practical  advice, not a lot in that novella has remained in my memory over the years since university. Voltaire, also a gardener apparently, would be happy: over the last few weeks, I have been digging, hoeing, raking, and planting to a fare-thee-well.  I am turning part of our erstwhile hay field into a garden. 

I have approached the task in stages. I do about two hours a day and then take a day off. Today is an off-day due to the rain. I am thankful I have this excuse because a few of my muscles are crying for respite. On the plus side (sorry, Voltaire, I am engaging in optimism here), my leg muscles are growing much stronger. Building up muscle mass in preparation for my upcoming hip operation is one of my goals for over the summer.  Gardening  is so much more useful than doing strengthening exercises, as the latter are boring and don’t have any supplementary benefits.

However, gardening not only adds muscle mass to my arms and legs but, I hope, beauty to our surroundings. It’s also great to be in the fresh air and to admire one’s handiwork afterwards. It occurred to me that in the story about how the Creator looked upon his creation and pronounced it good, he may have been commenting  not only on Eden but on how great he felt having made it. It does feel good!

The first thing I had to do was to plant the perennials we brought with us. They were beginning to out-grow the car. 

By the time we left Mt Carmel, the hostas had grown about eight inches!

They had to withstand not only the shock of being planted in red soil, having grown up in black, but also a significant plunge in temperature — even to a frost one night. All is well with them now although some still appear a bit traumatized:

The hostas look a bit battle-weary. The sedum is fine, and the brown things are last year's.

Next was planting what we fondly call the Friendly Giant’s burial mound — a long, rectangular, raised bed just outside the windows along the back of the cottage (or front, if you consider the view as the front). If you are curious about the Friendly Giant, check out this link:  . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WV2P6P4p6Hg&feature=kp

This is what it looked like last summer after the lawn was seeded: 

We are not sure what made the indentations. We suspect skunks looking for grubs.

Anyhow, back to the present, thankfully we hesitated just long enough before planting the tomatoes and missed the frosty night.

Tomatoes are to the left and strawberries to the right, but you probably saw that already.

One of the  rhubarb roots did not fare so well and got a bit touched by the frost; however, I think it will survive. It really is hard to kill rhubarb, as my many friends with a surplus can attest.

Only one leaf survived on this one.

Its mate is fine.

I have on-going misgivings about the asparagus. I did not soak the roots before planting nor did I dig a hump in the trench over which to droop the roots. I firmly believe that plants intend to grow unless you really do your best to kill them, so I wait in hope.

Some but not all the roots have sprigs growing. It can take up to three weeks from planting.

The strawberries have suffered only one fatality, which I can’t account for. Maybe the seedling just didn't like it here and died.

I ordered way too many seeds from Vesey’s and planted them  in my next round of garden work.  Most are for perennials – both flowers and herbs – and with any luck and lots of rain, sunshine and weeding, I will not have to plant them again.

The perennial bed at the other side of the cottage - with lilac bush.

Equally fascinating, with only parsley and a peony in evidence, is the herb garden.

The planters on the deck are now pregnant with nasturtiums and lettuces and up out of the way of marauding wild life. We hope.

Hmmmmm...

Greg and I  planted the sugar maple tree yesterday, as it was rainy and cool then too. We put it about 40 feet from the septic system. When it reaches its full height in about 25 years, it should be far enough away that no one, least of all the two of us, will need to worry about its roots mangling the septic bed.

If it can outgrow the dandelions, the sugar maple will be fine.

Yesterday I spent an hour digging up the bed by the road. The weeds have gotten away from me, and I shall have to admit defeat and hire someone with a rototiller. I want to put pumpkins and squash out there as well as some annuals that like dry sunny conditions. The hose won’t reach that far – nor will I and the watering can!

There remains only a dawning of sunflowers to plant as well as, more prosaically, a couple of rows of beans  in front  of the forsythia.  

The forsythia will add a blast of yellow next spring. 

Mind you, I got the fall bulb catalogue in the mail yesterday, and I am only a “place order” away from even more gardening fun.

An abiding image ...

Eastertime 1962

That day in April

I left my grandparents’ house

and walked to the river,

the majestic St. Lawrence.

Beside it sheep grazed,

their paddock filled with yellow daffodils:

yellow beyond yellow,

green beyond green.

Willow trees arched over the low stone walls,

their branches veiled against the blue-sky sunshine:

I walked on to where a young boy was fishing.

As I watched, he hauled in his catch:

not the delicate silvery fish I was expecting

but a long, thin, black creature,

the embodiment of a hiss:

S-shaped and angry,

muscular, coiling, wrestling on the hook.

How could such a thing be in that water?

The sheep, oblivious to menace, kept their heads down.

But I kept watching that startled boy and his writhing fish.

© Lorna Harris

May 5, 2014


I wrote this poem as an informal assignment for the final Spiritual Direction intensive at Mt. Carmel. At the previous intensive last fall, Cathy Smith-Bowers asked each of us to choose a colour or have a colour choose us and, using it, find an abiding image as the basis for our poem. I struggled with yellow all winter as I did not feel at all yellow. Several days before we were due to be in Niagara Falls I wrote this. You would hardly guess that yellow was the colour, would you!

The poems of the other members of my group were really wonderful, and I venture to say, none of us considers ourself as a poet. But of course, somewhere inside, we all are.

We watch The Wolf of Wall Street

With nothing else on television last night, Greg and I  decided to use the On Demand feature in our cable package for the first time. We chose The Wolf of Wall Street figuring for $5.99 we could turn off the television and go back to reading our books, and not have wasted much time, money or energy if we were too shocked and appalled to watch very long.

Much as I hate to admit it, I found it very funny. What on earth is wrong with me? It’s raunchy beyond belief (well my belief, anyway), misogynistic, violent, and laden with scenes of illicit drug-taking. The so-called hero — convicted swindler, money-launderer and erstwhile stockbroker Jordan Belfort, played by Leonardo di Caprio — gets away with it, more or less. He does have to spend a few months in an upscale prison post-conviction, playing tennis a good deal of the time, poor fellow, before reinventing himself as a motivational speaker.

This movie, directed by Martin Scorcese,  reminded me of Pulp Fiction, Borat and Catch Me if You Can (where Leonardo di Caprio was directed by Steven Spielberg). There is even a hint of A Fish Called Wanda both in the goldfish swallowing scene and in the unholy desire of this audience of two to see what the villains would get up to next. These movies involve trickster figures: mischievous, rascally, really bad characters devoid of guilt, shame or restraint.  Their behaviour is sent up by the movie-makers almost to the point of farce.  Black humour abounds.

I was expecting a much darker movie along the lines of No Country for Old Men (the character played by Javier Bardem is terrifyingly wolfish) or of Glengarry Glen Ross, which portrays the cut-throat, amoral aspect of sales as very definitely unfunny.  Most of the dark aspects in The Wolf of Wall Street  are either alluded to only briefly (the bathtub suicide) or occur to other unlikeable characters (the butler hung over the balcony). You know that if the butler had fallen, it wouldn’t have been intentional, but just a big mistake. It was cartoonish.

The only time in the movie I felt a quiver of genuine fear and misgiving occurred when, after a fight with his wife,  Belfort kidnapped his own daughter, placed her in his car and tore out of the garage in reverse, only to hit a tree in the front yard. He was stopped before too much damage was done. Shades of Tiger Williams and his misadventures, sexual and automotive.

Another reason I liked this movie was that having spent four unenjoyable years in insurance sales in the late 80s, I was reminded all too vividly of learning the art of the sales pitch. It’s not about the product: it’s all about the buyer and motivating their desire. I loved the contrast in the two scenes about the pen. Those Australians—or were they New Zealanders? — attending the motivation seminar at the end of the movie sure have a lot to learn.

When you watch the stock brokers in action in this film, you are given a sense that they swindled so egregiously well  because their victims were as greedy as they were for easy money. Not a lot of sympathy is extended to them.

 

This was more of a caper movie than a particularly serious reflection about greed, self-promotion and moral decay.  If you want a more sobering look at Wall Street, watch Margin Call (2011) written and directed by J. C. Chandor. Or remember Renata Ford's expression when Rob Ford apologized on camera for his comments about his sexual preferences and drug use. No stiletto heel in the face there. That  news conference was not funny in the least.