A kiss on the cheek

I went out dancing with holly cee tonight. It was mo-town night tonight, and I just finished writing a controversial email regarding something that happened tonight. I love that girl. She fights for her right to party.

Right now I'm talking to the lovely Crystal. I don't know what to think about her. She's full of funk and glory.

I was thinking of a solo project name today, seeing as I have a lot of my own songs that I'd love to lay down in the studio some day. The best name so far is.....

Dead Lover Saskatchewan

I like it.

Anyway, I had a great night dancing tonight, and now I'm talking to crystal about her old dorm room in UBC and reading some random girls live journal. I've never met this girl before but I will soon enough because she's friends with alex, and I'm spending new years with Al this year.

Two years ago I was in thailand with annie shaw from ancaster. We made a fort and missed the big countdown. Last year I spend new years wandering about the streets with rod and anders.

Last year I had the best christmas and new years of my life, both in hong kong.

I really don't think new year's is a big deal. I'm just interested in spending it with a few old faces.

It's almost six in the morning at my house now, and someone's in the washroom blowing their nose very loudly.

I love my life.

Lately I've been thinking about moving out to BC for a month or so, but I'm not sure. The only thing really directing me back to hong kong is doublethinks and the prospect of a new love.

I don't want to teach forever.

Oh yeah, my parents are moving back to Ireland. They've been in canada for the past thirty years but they're ready to get the fuck out of the cold, and into the rain. I think it's a great idea for them to move on. They're not sure when the big official day is, but it's likely going to be sometime within the next six or seven months.

vote NDP

Brendan

RELEASE THE TIGERS!!!

Alright fella's, it looks like we've got some very odd competition.
I was browsing around this, "tinternet" thing and I somehow managed to find another band by the name of, doublethinks. And let me be the first to say...........WOW, lol, they are quite the odd bunch.

Check out a couple of their tunes, and a very memorable photo of the group here.
http://music.download.com/doublethink/3600-8691_32-100082425.html

I'm feeling much more focused today, though incredibly bored. This is the first time since I got home that I actually miss hong kong. I was thinking about hiring a load of the chinese international students in hamilton, and get them to walk in front of me, or push me out of the way as I'm about to step onto the bus........you know.....in the spirit of hk.

I hope you lazy doublethinks buggers have been practicing regularly, because I've been working my fingers off working on my guitar technique. I have yet to lay my hands on a bass guitar, but i've been practicing all the tastey doublethinks licks on my acoustic, the lovely, Ho Wing Ka.

I've hung out with melissa and ana (last years elta's) every so often. Last night Mel and I went down to the Underground to catch a local bands set. The hamilton, Underground, is far fucking superior to the vagabond style one in hong kong. In general the music scene here is going to be the only thing that keeps me alive.

I have to push myself to do any sort of work on my tefl programme. It's at the point now that I'm almost positive that I won't finish it all before I come back to everyone's favourite S.A.R.

My mate alex is back from uni today, so I'm going to give her a ring later and do the whole catching up bit.

I saw a band called, Bad Flirt play at the casbah last thursday and I really enjoyed their set. They weren't a really great band or anything, but they definately have a lot of potential, and some serious staying power. Seeing as the show was at the casbah and it's winter in the hammer, there weren't a tonne of people there, so I was able to hang around and talk with the band for a while afterwards. I've been plugging the doublethinks name quite a lot since I got back home, handing out our tasty little blueman cards very liberally.
Kachun, I can assure you that I'll have none left by the time I get back home to hk, and let me know if you've been getting anymore hits on the site from canada......that way I can know if i've just been wasting my time on lazy computerless buggers or not.

After talking with Bad Flirt for a bit I told them I'd meet them in toronto the next night for their gig at a place called, the bagel. I had no idea who I was going to go with, but I didn't really care. I'm used to traveling on my own, and for the most part during shows I don't talk anyway. So, any awkward moments that might come up during set changes I could just pass with the company of a book and a beer.

Sometime friday afternoon I made plans to meet my friend Holly in oakville for a few preshow drinks, and then we could make our way to TO for the nights musical festivities.
Yeah........that never happened.

Bad Flirt were playing their TO show with a band called Femme Generation, who are a lot of fun, playing a sort of indie dance rock style. I wanted to see FG quite a bit. I was definately in the mood to dance.

Alas, after hanging out at Holly's place for a bit (steadily doing away with a large bottle of red) we both felt too lazy to go anywhere, especially somewhere that we needed to take a couple of bused to get to.

I had a awesome night to oakville with holly cee, drinking wine, beer, and I even saw
two of my old friends matt and andrian. I have a lot of respect for those two jokers. They started dating in highschool and six years later they're still together. I'm not sure which that makes me feel more, frightened or amazed. Probably a healthy mix of both.

I have more to say but I don't think it's incredibly important, and the lovely alexandra just called me! I need to eat something quickly, brush my teeth, and then I'm outta here!!!

www.badflirt.com
www.femmegeneration.com/
http://www.theadambrown.com/


8000miles from my music
brendan

Too Tired to Write

too tired to write. I've been working on my tefl course......writing essays. I think there are 26 essays in total, the majority of which are about boring technical english crap.

I tried to write an email to my friend crystal today, but I haven't been able to concentrate my thoughts into more than a few cohesive sentences. I also tried to update my blog more than a few times today but obviously not much has come out of that ambition.

Earlier today I watched some horrible/awesome movie called Tekwars, that was made by everyone's favourite william shatner. lol, it was so bad.

Anyway, my head's full of a lot of useless teaching jargon now, so it's time for this lanky bastard to hit the hay.

goodnight cruel world!
mr. harrington

Oh my head...

Well, the pub crawl went off without a hitch. Now, four or five pubs later I'm left feeling pretty crappy, and I've got a job interview at the Slainte in a couple of hours. The Slainte is an irish pub downtown that gets quite busy during the winter months. I'm not looking for much really....I don't want much responsibility at all, so it would be ideal to be a bar runner for a bit.

Time to shower now.
cheers
brendan

Pub Crawl Tonight Baby!!

I'm waiting now to go out our local/massive thirft shop, where I spend much of my allowance when I was younger. Value Village is the perfect place to find random t-shirts and the funkiest and funky pants. It's the sort of place where clothing finds a home to either those who can't afford to buy new clothes, or the young and lively who choose to not where all the big brands.

Friday night was very busy at the harrington house. From what I can remember I did nothing particularily special all day......I think I just hung around relaxing, reading and playing guitar. At night, however, my sister caroline came back from sarnia for the weekend. She's being working up there doing a co-op semester with esso canada, and still has to the 23rd before her contract is up. Caroline arrived home at about half five, and I quickly helped her move her stuff in the spare room, knowing that the other two would be home shortly. Steph and Josh came home about half an hour later with a load of bags, and the house quickly got much noisier. I think the last time all of us were together must have been four or five years ago. I stayed at home for an hour until my ride knocked on the door.

I bought a ticket to see Iron and Wine and Calexico at the Docks in toronto a few days earlier. Luckly an old friend, Steph say my msn name, which announced my wanting to see Iron and Wine...and also with good chance she was coming back from kingston the same weekend of the show. The last time I met Steph was probably the staircase a couple of summers ago, but neither of us could remember for sure.

Anyway, after getting a bit lost, and a call to montreal for someone to mapquest us back on track, we finally managed to find the docks. We hadn't missed much at all, as the show must have kicked off a bit later than schedualed. The Docks, for anyone who's never been there before, is in the middle of nowhere. Seriously, when you're driving down towards it's general area the buildings fall away and you can't help but feel you just purchased a joke ticket to a show thats never going to happen. Alas, after driving into the abyss for a while you do indeed reach the Docks.

It was an alright venue, though not particularly suiting for a fairly quiet artist like Iron and Wine. I had a lovely time watching a couple of bands, including one very unexpected though delightfully entertaining mexican artist. He must have been in his late forties, had long aging dark hair tied into a pony tail, and was boyterious and flamboyant to say the least. Awesome.

Saturday was steph's birthday, and caroline and I shared a laugh when we both looked at eachother with somewhat puzzeled faces asking, "did you get her anything for her birthday?" Of course the answer was, No. haha, It didn't even cross my mind to buy anything for my big sis's birthday. Oh well. I don't think she cared or even noticed. We had a great dinner that night, with the main course being my mother's famous home made lasagne. Steph had some of her friends come over for the festivities and it was a great night, full of booze, music and food.

Lauren and her boyfriend Ryan came over as well, which was great because I hadn't seen Ms. L in ages, and Ryan for much longer. I know the both of them from highschool though I never much spoke to Ryan, he's a nice guy, and the two of them get along famously. Ryan was driving so he had a drink, whilst lauren and I plentifully filled our wine glasses again and again. We caught up as best as we could. It's always tricky answering the question, "so, what have you been up to during the past year?" giving them enough detail to satisfy their query. I never feel much like talking about what I've been doing in Hong Kong, because really, no matter where you are it's always the same sort of routine. Time keeps on kicking, and before you know it your unpacking your sweaters for a visit home.

Last night I went out with Steph and Josh to the Casbah to watch a great local talent, Caribou. It's a three piece act but I think it's mainly just the one dude, who does most of the work. There were two opening acts as well. The first was a waterloo/dundas based act called Winter Equinox. They had a big post rock mellow flavour that did them well, though I wasn't too impressed by their whole set. The first two songs involved a lot of changing of instruments that gave me an ametuer choppy feel. The other tunes were much better, but they still just followed your standard song pattern of big, quiet, big, bang! or quiet, big, bang, quiet. Up and down, up and down, up and down.
The next act called, Holy Fuck were really good. The lead fella feed off his own querky, "i've done too much crystal meth" sort of stage presents, but all in all they did make a very interesting tune.
Crap, it's time to go to the wonderful value village.
So, to shorten this one up a bit, Caribou was fucking great, and I had the pleasure of running into my friend from hong kong, anna!! It was so nice seeing her again, and she looked great with her cool new short hairdo.

Alright, time to head out.
Cheers!
brendan.

I love Nintendo

If you walk so quietly...

I arrived back in Canada on Friday night. I've been meaning to update my blog during these past two days, but I haven't been able to get myself to sit down, in front of the computer until now.

First to report......It's cold here....really cold. I'm not at all used to the harsh winter winds, or the long waits for the bus. Hong Kong has made me soft. I can only imagine how fun it's going to be to tease Josh once he and Steph get here on this coming Friday.

My plane ride from Hong Kong was actually a great one. I never thought I'd ever have a good time flying in a place for sixteen straight hours, but then again, I have never had four seats all to myself before. I was able to lay down fairly comfortably with two pillows, and a blanket to keep me extra comfortable. Kit Ming, thankfully, got a hold of some natural sleep aids, which helped me just a little bit. I can never sleep on planes (not that I sleep much now anyway). These little blue pills seemed to give me just enough of a nudge to push me into the wonderful land of sleep. I think I got about four hours of rest throughout the flight.

My father (Pop's) met me in Toronto airport, and it didn't take us too long to make it back into Hamilton. I remember experiencing a lot more culture shock when I last returned in the summer of 2004. This time the dramatic change of scenery didn't seem too odd at all. I'm surprised at how much of my local geography I've become unfamiliar with, such as street names, and in general the location of a lot of bus stops.

Right now, I'm sitting upstairs listening to the sounds of my mum doing some christmas baking, while pop's and my brother, Ian, figure out how to record tv shows on our complicated cable box, without using a tape.

Friday night I spent relaxing at home, doing nothing in particular. I sat with pop's listening to my band Doublethinks' live recording, from our show last Wednesday. It was nice to just sit back not doing much of anything.

As I was going to bed Friday night I could feel the characteristic signs of my stupid reoccurring throat problem. So, I took a few antibiotic pills from my stash and lay down in my cold, cold bed.
I didn't do anything on Saturday but stay up late, play guitar, and eat a lot of delicious home cooked food.
Sunday night I met up with two hongkongy friends, ye ol' Melissa and the ever pleasant Laura at the Snooty Fox for some karaoke. It was a very nice night.
Before I left for the snooty fox I found Annie's old phone number and hoped that she was home. She was working on a piece for her jazz harmony class that was due the next day. We spoke for maybe ten minutes, having no trouble what so ever picking up conversation as if no time at all had passed. I told her about going down to the Fox and she said that she'd pop in, as long as she finished the piece she was working on.
I didn't drink much at all that night. I think I had about four pints over four hours. Annie did show up sometime around midnight and joined myself and a few of Melissa’s mates who drove down from Bolton for the night. Everyone was friendly and there was a carefree, comfortable atmosphere throughout the night.
I stayed at Mel's place in westdale, where she lives with three other uni mates. I woke up a lot during the night, but I didn't actually rouse from bed until Mel came back from her first class at half two. We hung out in her room for a bit, and then I took the bus just down the street from her place.

I was sitting on the bus for about three stops past, when a bunch of students from Columbia International College came on. Columbia's student body is pretty much ninety percent Hong Kong based. I was way too happy to hear cantonese again. It felt like a slice of home. After listening in to bits of a conversation that two people were having in front of my seat, I build up the courage to talk to them. I tapped the young guy on the arm, looking up at him from my seat and asked, "Lei hi mm hi Heung Gong yen a?"
Let me just say....I HAVE NEVER SEEN SUCH CLASSICALY DUMBFOUNDED FACES IN MY ENTIRE LIFE! It was so good. The guy I asked the question, "are you from Hong Kong?" was just gawking at me with a half open mouth, while the girl he was previously talking to stood there with nearly the exact same expression. Once again....IT WAS SO GOOD. The girl was the first to recover enough to answer my question, which she thankfully did in cantonese. I spoke to them for about ten minutes before the bus came to their stop, and most of our conversation was in cantonese, with partial bits of english to clarify some bits of my makeshift conversational skills. I ended speaking to three people by the end of the ride, and they were all genuinely nice people. They seemed eager to help me practice my canto, and I complimented the one girl on her english speaking abilities.
Definitely the best bus ride I've ever had in Hamilton.

Last night I got a call from CJ, and though I didn't at all want to leave my lovely warm house, I really wanted to see Carla. So, we agreed to meet at King and James st downtown for half ten. Being unfamiliar with the current bus times I ended up getting the 22 ottawa far too early, which resulted in my sitting on a cold bench for twenty minutes, keeping a look out for CJ. We hit up the closest warm place we could think of that was nearby, which, not so surprisingly, turned out to be a Tim Hortons. We didn't stay too long though. We ended up going back to her fairly new apartment that she shares with a friend Darcy, and another fella whom I don't know, Mike. Neither of them were home when we got there, so she gave me a little tour, and we made ourselves comfortable in front of a game of checkers. Checkers, by the way, is a terribly uninteresting game. Checkers is Chess for Squirrels. We originally wanted to play chess, but only half the pieces were in the drawer. Boo.
Darcy came home later in the night, and hung out with us, eating peanuts and goofing around for a couple of hours, before hitting the ol' dusty trail. CJ and I both hit the hay in the early morning, and grabbed a few hours rest before waking up at eight. She had things to do, and I was happy to be up early, depriving myself of sleep....I'm hoping that such choices will make me tired enough to put me to sleep at a decent hour tonight.
Speaking of tonight, I have no plans at all. I was thinking about heading down to the Casbah for a couple of solo drinks. They used to have this gig called, "Record Geeks Unite" every Tuesday in the lounge, just off of the casbah. That was always a great gig, having different people come up and spin for a bit. I used to love the casbah. I hope it hasn't changed much during the past thirteen months. They always had some local artists' work hanging from the walls, and the people were layed back and friendly.

That's it for now though. I'll update again soon, though I can't promise anything terribly interesting.

Cheers
Brendan

Back in the great white north