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Stanley Park storm damage – day 12

IMG_9670 Being that the park is one of my favorite places to tread through, I thought I would give a periodical report on the things that I am noticing as the clean up grinds along from the storm that damaged thousands of trees in Stanley Park on December 15, 2006.

One thing that bothers me to no end is the fact that I cannot run on the trails through the park right now. The furthest I have been able to get into the park, aside from our picture taking expedition[flickr], is the trail that goes around Lost Lagoon. That’s not to say that there isn’t a fair amount of damage to that area alone.

Talking to some friends who live on the north shore last night, the damage is not just inside Stanley Park. I’m not sure many people understand how badly the area was hit because they seemed to be surprised at what we were telling them. Our pal Preston did hit the nail on the head when we were trying to describe it to him. Indeed, it does look like the Iron Giant[imdb] took a nice stroll through the park.

The other day, I came across the point where the Tatlow comes out at Lost Lagoon. Of course, there are barricades preventing you from taking the trail into the heart of the park. I have to question why. Directly on the other side of the orange and white gate, there is a mess of trees lying crisscrossed over the trail. You couldn’t get too far if you tried.

Closed areas of Stanley Park (Credit: Vancouver Park Board)
Courtesy of Vancouver Park Board

The whole route around the lagoon took a hit as well. There are numerous points where a fallen tree has been sliced through the middle at the width of the pathway it blocked off. Sawdust is all over the ground in some areas, but the trail is easily accessible without having to crawl over or duck under anything. The forest of the entire park is noticeably not as dense as it was when you peer into the now forbidden zone. There are a bunch of branches and trunks resting at various angles as well.

I’ll do my best to relay other things that I notice as things progress. It’s taking some time for the clean up to really take shape, but the park is massive in scale. Access by vehicle is one thing, but without the trails being open, what’s the point? I think that’s going to take the most time to recover from.

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Using MAMP for local site development

Those who pay close attention to the various projects that I get myself involved with will notice that I like to play around with the design of the sites. Call it whatever you want, but it always seems like there is something better that I can add or change to the way a site looks. It’s all apart of learning. You try to do something the old or stupid way, only to discover there is a new way that all the cool kids are using that makes things so much more simple.

The worst part about changing a lot of things is doing them publicly. You just can’t go in with an idea, make the change, and go about your business. When you are restless as I am, and I know there are lots of people out there with similar mindsets, the idea you tryout might not look as good as you originally thought. Even worse, it mucks up the whole site and makes it not function at all. Not a good thing, so you might try something else or go back to the way it was in the first place.

MAMPMAMP has really helped with that. It’s allowed me to install and run numerous test sites of WordPress locally[wordpress]. I play around and change things on the fly. Install plugins and surf the site in a browser with full function. Everything that MAMP can do is already there on the Mac(Apache, MySQL, and PHP) these days, but this application makes it work with far less headache. Launch it, do your work, and you’re golden. When I’m settled with what I want, the site goes into the wild.

Lately, I’ve been experimenting with WordPress 2.1, and the changes to the next version are looking promising. Drupal can also be managed this way. That took me a little more thinking to get that sorted out, but I was working without an explicit, step-by-step tutorial for MAMP.

I’ve also tried to install WordPress MU, but stopped short of being successful. Actually, I hit some snags and simply gave up. Some quick searches for solutions came up short, but I know that it can work with MAMP. Will have to give it another shot in the near future.

Tricks of the trade, and this might be more obvious to some. I figured I’d share because this has made work on my projects easier, especially taking that FTP part out of the equation. There are various ways to do local installs for WordPress and Drupal development for the Mac and PC, but I can seriously vouch for this one.

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RadioZoom Video Podcast #8 – Cruising in the car with the camera phone

Taking the cellphone into new territory. Check out the latest video podcast of RadioZoom.

This is a major experiment with cellphone technology to do a video podcast. Not the best quality in the world, but in a pinch, this Nokia can do some nice stuff. Leave comments and do your worst. I told you we’d do something before Christmas, and this is coming in right under the wire.

We were driving around, checking out the festive lights in the area, so I had the idea to make this vid while we made our way back home from Christmas Eve gatherings. A year in review, hopes for the new year, and other various things that I can’t remember. Watch it to find out. We have Christmas things to enjoy right now.

Best wishes this holiday! 🙂

radiozoom.net

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It’s gotta be funky

The one thing to bring you down on Christmas Day, isn’t it? The godfather of soul passing away was enough to make me gasp and let out an, “Oh no!”

NEW YORK (AP) — James Brown’s music career will come full circle when his body is brought to rest on the stage of the legendary Apollo Theater in Harlem, where he made his explosive debut, and the world changed to his beat.

The public will be permitted on Thursday to visit the Apollo to have one more look at a man who helped steer modern musical tastes toward rhythm-and-blues, funk, hip-hop, disco and rap, the Rev. Al Sharpton said Tuesday. The reverend has been a close friend of Brown for decades. […]

Brown, known as the Godfather of Soul, died of congestive heart failure on Christmas morning in Atlanta at age 73. He had been scheduled to perform on New Year’s Eve in Manhattan at B.B. King’s blues club. [cnn]

Doing the live, morning shows at The Java House in downtown Iowa City, my favorite CD to throw in as a preshow warm-up was none other than James Brown[wiki] himself. It wouldn’t make the annoyed crowd sing along over their lattes as much as The Beatles would, but I know we, the setup crew, loved it. Makes me sad, but I bet those guys are still using his tunes for pregame.

You have to admire the man. Not only did he make some great music, but he was simply crazy.

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And a beer in a tree

We just got back from hauling the three kids of Rebecca’s sister through Stanley Park to check out the lights that are on display there. I know that this video from my cellphone isn’t of the greatest quality. I thought I would give it a try, and at least you can actually see that we were there. What you don’t see is how packed it was. People everywhere and a three hour wait to ride that train. Borderline chaos.

20061223(007) Now to try my hand at baking. Then it’s pretty much eating for two straight days. Welcome to the holidays, but I won’t be complaining.

Best wishes to everyone, everywhere this season. May it treat you well.


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Can’t escape the fire

Seriously, you stand no chance of avoiding it.

VANCOUVER/CKNW(AM980) – Back by popular demand…

Shaw’s holiday fire log is celebrating its 20th anniversary and will be rolled out again this holiday season.

No need to chop or haul wood or stoke the fire.

For those who don’t experience the crackling of a warm fireside hearth over the holidays, Shaw Communications is once again comforting TV viewers with its yuletide fire log.

Beginning December 23rd and continuing through to December 27th, fire log fans can cozy up in front of their television sets for what’s become a holiday tradition for many viewers. [cknw]

Ah geez. Alright, I can’t quite say why I’m waging my own personal war against this. Maybe it’s because I would love more than anything to have our own fireplace. I don’t know. All I know is that this bugs me to no end.

Seriously…

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T(I)NC to release a live jazz album

Are you as puzzled over reading that as I am? A politically-outspoken rock band fusing its material with the sounds of jazz? Have faith because I think that if anyone can pull it off, The (International) Noise Conspiracy are the ones to do it.

Alternative Tentacles has announced the release of Live at Oslo Jazz Festival, a special live recording featuring The (International) Noise Conspiracy in collaboration with noted jazz musicians Jonas Kullhammar and Sven-Erik Dahlberg.

The album was previously available only through Swedish jazz imprint Moserobie and includes tracks from Survival Sickness and A New Morning Changing Weather. The label describes the tracks as ” retaining the T(I)NC-ness of the original material” but with more dreamy arrangements. […]

The record is due out March 13, 2007. The band released their last studio record, Armed Love in North America in 2005. [punknews.org]

IMG_7768 It’s not that I think this is a bad idea at all. I am all for artists taking a chance to explore what else they can do musically, but this is insane. And I mean that in the completely good sense of the word. I’ve seen T(I)NC twice now, and the thought of setting their music to a complete jazz arrangement is enthralling.

Anyone who is familiar with their music wouldn’t be overly surprised. Sure, the whole band has punk and hardcore roots from the Swedish scene, but every album has had hints of a jazz influence. From the rhythms on the drums to the full out saxophone solo in the middle of a track, I can’t say that this is too far off the radar. Now I just want to get my hands on it. More so, this is a tour I wouldn’t mind seeing for myself, but I’m not sure North America would be up for it.

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The Crazy Canucks #12 – Not too wild about the Wild

It’s like Alanah said in one of her posts. More than anything, doing The Crazy Canucks is just fun. Check out the latest episode if you’d like to join in.

This episode caught some of us off guard, but anytime you throw a bunch of Canucks fans together, it’s not hard to talk hockey for a half hour. The whole gang was here, but our connection to Dave cut out towards the end. That didn’t stop the podcast, you can count on that.

Record as of this episode: 17-16-1 (5th in the Northwest Division)

We cover the last three games, but we only played two teams during that stretch; Calgary and Minnesota. Luongo takes center stage for some discussion, we pick out the rag of the week(only because it seems that whoever we pick on tends to start doing better), and wonder what the heck is going on with the officiating during some of the games. Dave also gives a first hand report on venturing out for a Vancouver Giants (WHL) game, J.J. gives us a Vote for Rory update(listen to an interview with Rory on the website under “Rory Speaks!”), and Alanah is live with her new blog, canucksandbeyond.com.

This is our last episode before the Christmas holiday, so all the best wishes to our listeners, subscribers, and readers. (Look for another episode before the end of year)

The Crazy Canucks

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Fake fire on demand

20061220
Oh for the love of god, make it stop. The thing that kills me is that it costs $1.99 for a 24 hour purchase. There are three flavors; music only, sounds of fire with music, or just the sound of fire. Classy.