• Recommendations,  Required Reading

    Read This

    Required Reading. As an avid fan of live theatre and dance and music, and as someone who used to perform in front of people relatively regularly, I have a more than a few thoughts on the various end of show rituals. Clapping is weird when you really start to think about it. Standing ovations should be reserved for really spectacular performances. And bows should be kept to a minimum. They are important for both audiences and performers. Like a mutual exchange of thanks. The audience thanks the performers for their work and the performers thank the audiences for the chance to share their performance. However, curtain calls that last forever and ever…

  • Mantras,  Quotations

    Quoted

    And then the dreams break into a million tiny pieces. The dream dies. Which leaves you with a choice: you can settle for reality, or you can go off, like a fool, and dream another dream. — Nora Ephron

  • Reading Watching Listening,  Recommendations

    Reading Watching Listening

    Reading… We Are What We Mourn by Pricilla Uppal. It’s easily the most interesting research-related book I’ve read for a while. Her writing is compelling, and her ability to synthesize historical arcs is enviable.   Watching… What I Like About You. This show is so peak-2000s that Jesse McCartney guest starred in an episode I just watched and performed “Beautiful Soul”. Also, were we all engaged in some weird game of chicken trying to determine how short a rise we could have in pants before they just fell down? The show though, is pretty delightful.   Listening… “Cake by the Ocean” by DNCE. This song, and the whole EP, is really…

  • Recommendations,  Required Reading

    Read This

    Required Reading. I am an avid reader of the blog A Beautiful Mess. It’s fun. It’s colourful. It inspires me to try new things. It inspires me to pick up habits I have let lapse. In general I love it. But this post, this post has a special place in my heart. Emma’s story really resonates with me. Not because I am where she is at, but because I often feel like I am in the middle of it. I particularly love this bit: “Out of money and ideas, I finally gave in to her requests and moved home. Elsie was moving her business into a much larger building and…

  • Photography

    Safe Harbour

    I think a lot about the concept of safety. Not “look both ways before you cross the street” safety. Not “learn your WHIMIS symbols” safety. Not “double check you turned off your straightener” safety. But some sort of existential, opposite of precarity, sense of safety. Okay, I think about the straightener one all of the time too. For some reason fog has always made me feel safe. All that to say, this image is now up in the print shop. Maybe you feel the same way about fog and want some of it in your home at all times. Maybe you have a friend who desperately misses the East Coast. Maybe…

  • Reading Watching Listening,  Recommendations,  Required Reading

    Reading Watching Listening

    Reading… Grief is the Thing With Feathers by Max Porter. I actually read this a few weeks ago on the plane back from London. It’s moving and beautiful and I am still trying to work through everything it offers.   Watching… Downton Abbey, season 6. Finally finished this one and am now going through some major withdrawal. I’m pretty happy with how everything shook out in the end though.   Listening… Hubert Parry’s Songs of Farewell performed by Tenebrae. My fabulous hosts in England introduced me to this album and I’ve been recommending it to all of my friends ever since.  

  • Photography

    Peggy’s Cove

    I just added this gem to the shop. I love that this isn’t the traditional image of Peggy’s Cove. It’s a beautiful place, but so many of the photos people take end up looking like the kinds of postcard, tourist images you would expect. Blue sky, blue ocean, grey rocks, bright red lighthouse roof…these kinds of pictures are beautiful, but I always want to look at tourist spots slightly differently, find novelty in things people have seen countless times. I actually used to love visiting Peggy’s Cove in the off season. I would drive out, wander the rocks until I was so cold I couldn’t stand it, and then have a…