Domain of the Ill Literati

The best - and most terrifying - news I've had this year.

2008-08-27T21:42:00.001-06:00

Chomp me.

2008-04-16T20:36:00.002-06:00

Because I wasn't insanely busy enough already, I replied to a post on craigslist Vancouver. A "coming soon" comedy website was looking for cast members. The concept was that there would be a main writing cast, and a section where the public could submit their own stuff. The lowest-ranked writer on the main cast would be dropped every week, and the highest-ranked public contributor would be promoted to the main site.

The site's name was chompchompdead.com - the sound it makes when you are eaten by a shark, which evokes the idea of a writer being demoted to the "chum bucket".

I submitted a couple of pieces - one a plea to Vancouver that asked they keep all the pilgrims from across the prairie provinces that make the trek but then return, disillusioned yet morally superior, to the people that stayed behind. They wrote me back and welcomed me to the first cast.

The result is a fun collection of wannabe comedy writers who post random shit in hopes of your approval. Who knows? Maybe I'm a comedy writer. I won't know unless I try - and unless you go over there and Chomp me.

Who represents humanity?

2008-04-15T09:33:00.005-06:00

Macleans blogger Andrew Potter posted the following scenario:
So the aliens have finally arrived, the spaceships are hovering over all the major cities of the earth, and the following request arrives: Please send three representatives to meet with your new overlords.

Ok, so, who do we send? Who are humanity's envoys to the men from the stars? His choices were William Shatner, Pamela Anderson and Keanu Reeves - which I can only assume is tongue-in-cheek or an effort to rid the planet of some deadweight. But who do you think it should be?

My vote:
1. Sylvio Berlusconi: the guy won a fourth majority in the most notoriously unstable government in Europe; not only can he talk, but he can listen and judge both alien position and Earth capabilities in moments... he would do what was politically necessary at the time without moral qualms.
2. Some top-trained superspy: the inspiration for Jack Bauer or James Bond, the person who can observe what needs to be seen, MacGyver what needs to be constructed and do what needs to be done in order to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat - with the patience to wait for the right time.
3. Heidi Fleiss: after catering to the peccadillos of Hollywood's A-list, how tough could it be to manage her disgust and source the demands of our new alien overlords?

What do you think?

Peace out.

Up to 566 today!

2008-04-14T10:00:00.002-06:00

I'm an avowed self-Googler, which sounds dirtier than it really is. I'm positive that this is a much more widespread phenomenon than is currently reported, especially by the most minor of quasi-celebrity-ish types who fuel the mediaverse with droplets of their heart's blood.

I meant, like me. If the reference was too subtle, let me know. I'll go slower.

Anyway, I found 566 Google returns on "Christopher Thrall" today. Highest-ranked was this lovely blogospot, and the article below was the first piece returned. There are a couple of people that mess up the math: as soon as I've convinced a 25-year-old rowdy, a tech headhunter from Illinois and a Private in WWI to get off the Interweb, it will be all me, baby.

I also have a fan... A gratuitous shout-out to Rochelle. You rock!

Peace out.

Killing Us Sweetly

2008-04-14T09:57:00.002-06:00

Out of the 566 Google results for "Christopher Thrall" today, this was my highest-ranked story. I'm such an activist.

Killing us sweetly
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

As long as aspartame kills fewer than 300 people per year in the United States, the American Food and Drug Administration will continue to consider it “safe.”

This, despite an increase in fibromyalgia, lupus, brain tumours and cancer in heavy users of the product since its approval in 1983. This, despite scientific shenanigans in GD Searle research labs during their efforts to get aspartame approved. This, despite a damning report from the US Center for Disease Control and political maneuverings that forced the FDA to approve aspartame over the objections of its own scientists. In her first film, Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World, Cori Brackett’s personal quest for the facts behind her own medical condition became a scathing indictment of the institutions meant to protect us from harm.

In 2001, Brackett was a health-conscious young video and film producer with a taste for six to 10 cans of diet soda per day. “I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in February of 2002,” she says from her production company office in Arizona. “My diagnosis really helped restructure and refocus my life. I found that I had been planning so much for the future that I wasn’t really living in the now.”

When Brackett’s condition started to improve after cutting out the diet pop, her husband began researching a long-circulated urban legend regarding aspartame’s toxicity. What he found sent them on a 7,000-mile journey across the country, conducting interviews with medical specialists and fellow sufferers. “We financed the project ourselves,” she confides. “We’re not big media moguls, but we were driven to do this film.” She felt that the story behind this all-pervasive artificial sweetener needed to be told.

With Sweet Misery, which is being screened at this year’s North of Nowhere Expo, Brackett exposes aspartame as a toxic compound that affects protein synthesis and synapse function in the brain. While some people may experience immediate reactions including headaches and dizziness, others suffer from the slow accumulation of toxins in their bodies. She delves into the three components of aspartame: aspartic acid, phenylalanine and methyl ester. One is an excitotoxin that leaves holes in the brains of lab mice; one is an amino acid that affects serotonin levels to produce mood swings or seizures; and the last breaks down into formaldehyde, which is a poison the body is unable to eliminate. “Since aspartame is considered a food additive rather than a drug,” states one of her medical sources in a level voice, “any dangerous side effects do not have to be reported to the FDA.”

Brackett found that aspartame experiments in the 1970s resulted in death or grand mal seizures in monkeys and a significantly higher occurrence of brain tumours in mice. GD Searle, the company seeking FDA approval for aspartame, suppressed or manipulated any unfavourable results. In response, the FDA attempted to indict GD Searle for fraud in 1977. In one of the most politically charged conversations of the film, Brackett learns from lawyer Jim Turner that Searle’s new president was none other than current US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. “He moved ahead with the goal on legal and political grounds,” Turner recalls, “not scientific or factual. He put all of his resources into accomplishing the goal at hand.”

According to the film, the Grand Jury prosecuting attorney and his assistant were hired by Searle’s legal firm and the statute of limitations ran out on the case, but the FDA still refused to approve aspartame. In 1981, on the day after his inauguration, Ronald Reagan suspended the FDA commissioner’s authority, and the newly appointed commissioner overruled the Public Board of Inquiry’s demand for further research and approved aspartame for use in dry food. Two years later, he approved this additive for use in carbonated beverages and immediately resigned to become a $1000-a-day consultant for GD Searle. A backroom deal in Great Britain led to its approval there without testing, and the chemical has since been approved in over 90 other countries. Health Canada, which approved its use in 1981, disputes each point of the “aspartame toxicity hoax.”

Brackett keeps Sweet Misery moving from medical experts to personal stories while telling her terrifying story. She speaks to a woman jailed for killing her husband by methanol poisoning and suggests that the aspartame in diet drinks could have been the culprit. People across the United States tell the director stories of their ruined health and careers. When they stopped their aspartame intake, their conditions improved, but their doctors were unwilling to identify the additive as the cause. Brackett also speaks to the organizer of Mission Possible, a non-profit organization that supports and lobbies for people affected of aspartame poisoning.

“A lot of names came up in my research,” Brackett says, “but Betty Francini of Mission Possible was my best resource for victims of aspartame. She does good work.” In her conversation with Francini, the term “coverup” is never spoken, but never far away. Brackett must have been prepared to be lambasted by Searle or the FDA in the courts or the media.

“We haven’t heard a thing from them,” she says with a laugh. Otherwise, the film has seen overwhelmingly positive response. “We have opened a lot of eyes about the subject,” Brackett says with a note of pride, “and we’ve helped a lot of people identify the symptoms they have experienced.” Sweet Misery has relied on word-of-mouth promotion through private viewings in living rooms around the world. Since starting her project, Brackett has noticed more people becoming aware of the aspartame issue. “There was a recent story published in London’s The Ecologist,” she says, “and we have shipped copies of the film to people in Nigeria, Israel, France and all over Canada.”

In the end, Brackett is optimistic about the future of her film, as she has just signed with indie distributor Cinema Libre for wider distribution. The aspartame issue is receiving more attention as well: a recent Italian study reaffirms its link to cancer in mice, a $350 million class action lawsuit has been filed in San Francisco and New Mexico is considering a state-wide ban on the over 6,000 consumer products that contain aspartame. Even Brackett’s own future has taken a turn for the better. She is now almost fully recovered, has published a collection of poetry about her experience with multiple sclerosis and the follow-up to Sweet Misery, titled Sweet Remedy, is in post-production. However, she knows there is still a long way to go.

As long as aspartame kills fewer than 300 people per year, there is no clear resolution in sight. The number of symptoms associated with aspartame poisoning, the slow spread of information about its risks and the economic power of the additive industry make the challenge Sisyphean. At best, Brackett hopes for clearly labeled products that list both ingredients and potential side effects so that consumers can make informed decisions. “I think we have to take back control of our health care, our bodies and our lives,” she says wistfully. “We have surrendered too much to the government already.”

Let the Bodies Hit the Floor - Update

2008-04-09T15:52:00.002-06:00

Well, I think I did some pop culture osmosis to catch this line from a Drowning Pool song. (Mainly because I don't think the genteel tune is one that I would have allowed to continue without being physically restrained in some way...)

However, I did find an abso-friggin-lutely hilarious video for the song. Faith healers make me smile.

Keepin' busy

2008-04-09T15:32:00.003-06:00

Well, one project is in the hopper, I am cranking through those astrological blurbs and trying to keep on top of Vue work. You know what I need? Another daily writing gig! Check out Edmonton's CityGuide for everything that is fantabulous in this town.

We are planning something pretty special, though. Leonard Cohen announced his first tour in 15 years, and the bride and I are going to try to make a five-year-anniversary trip of it. So far, there are only dates announced in eastern Canada so we'll try to make the Montreal show, or perhaps one around Toronto. If you have tickets that you feel like donating to a romantic cause - in exchange for a rhapsodic elegy on this website, even - let me know!

We intend to let the children spend some quality time with her parents while we're away, which will be a bit more liberating - as much as I adore them, they definitely cramp our style when we have to stay with them in a hotel room from 6 pm to 6 am, y'know?

Tonight, more astrology. Tomorrow, more astrology. Friday night, more astrology - possibly while sitting at Bohemia Cyber Cafe. Swing by to say hi.

Best Restaurant in Edmonton

2008-04-09T15:28:00.003-06:00

So I figured I would split up a day's posts with one review, one update. That way, my legions of fans can spend their time on what they wanted to most. Let me know if it rocks your socks off, eh?

As a restaurant reviewer, I get asked all the time for the best restaurant in the city. This totally depends on price, cuisine and "luck o' the draw" in terms of cook and server, but I have one restaurant we go to for our anniversary. I hope that tells you everything you need to know.

Seeking Culina pastures
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

Dinner without my wife? Ridiculous! Having been married only 14 months, wherever we go, we go together. But she was at her mother’s, and so I asked a friend to join me at Culina, if for no other reason than I wanted a second opinion and another meal to sample. The fact that I would be dining in one of Edmonton’s most romantic spots with a beautiful Japanese writer was completely lost on me—I swear!

Despite its enviable location, the restaurant felt intimately hidden, a secret shared between lovers. Tabletop flames flickered through frosted glass windows, half-lighting an empty patio on a cool October evening. First impressions were sensual and sensational: warm chocolate and cream tones enveloped the tables as soft jazz drifted across the room.

Since both of us had skipped lunch, we needed an appetizer right away. However, we forgot entirely about selection as we lost ourselves in description: the menu, clipboard-mounted to accommodate a rotating wine list, read like tiny poems about exquisite dining experiences. Our server returned to perform the specials, her gestures and words crafting culinary objets d’art in our appetites. I wanted it all. We gave our drink orders and huddled again over the menus.

By the time our drinks arrived—rich cappuccino ($3) for me, refreshing lingonberry soda ($2) for her and water in a chilled white wine bottle (nice touch) for us both—we had remembered our hunger. We requested the calamari in sweet coconut-curry sauce ($9) to start, and for the main course, my guest took the bison meatloaf special ($14) our server had described so well. For me, would it be the exotic goatcheese and channa dal baked in phyllo, or the lamb sausage on spinach leaves with chickpeas, asiago and roast garlic? I was told the chef has a deft touch with meats and I’m a diehard carnivore, so I went with the lamb ($15).

As I watched the restaurant fill up, my companion told me about her last experience at Culina—a Saturday brunch of bacon and eggs on the grandest scale. She’s loved this place ever since, and her description of a Sunday night three-course dinner for an incredible $20 made me a convert. We were just about through our Culina discussion when the appetizer arrived. I’d never had unbreaded calamari before: tender but not chewy in a fresh, spicy chutney, it was fantastic. The dish was also about twice the size I would have expected for "cuisine," so we were well satisfied.

Deep into a chat about her enchanting new boyfriend, we fell silent when our entrées arrived. They deserved fanfare. Size, presentation and aroma were all off the charts. Nestled beside meatloaf swimming in a sea of gravy, her mashed potatoes peeked out from under melted cheese. Two lengths of cobbed corn stood guard over her plate. My dinner, meanwhile, was a symphony of colour: a bed of fresh spinach was strewn with crisp chickpeas and gilded with a light garlic sauce. The lamb sausage was tender and savoury, but I would have traded my magnificent meal for half her bison. Both heavier and with a stronger flavour than the beef I’m accustomed to, her meatloaf put the cattle industry to shame.

We had wrapped up a discussion about her upcoming public reading by the time plates were cleared and dessert broached. Our minds snapped back to an eloquent description of the overbaked pumpkin cheesecake ($5), but my friend claimed it first. It turns out that "overbaked" means light, fluffy and delicious—not at all the kind of dense confection I tend to avoid.

Thrown, I was reaching for the menu when our server stopped me with a suggestion I couldn’t refuse: cambazola toasts dulce de leche ($5). Caramelized cream and sugar are drizzled over toasted French bread and thick slabs of a mild blue cheese are melted on top for a treat that’s simultaneously crispy, salty and sweet. A $5 pot of the Queen’s Jubilee black tea with loose flowers, herbs and grasses settled our fantastic meals.

We tottered out of Culina exquisitely satisfied and aware of just how dangerous a place it is. As friends, we had spent nearly three pleasant hours over dinner. If this had been a date, who knows what could have happened? Just don’t tell my wife.

My posts are too long

2008-04-07T13:38:00.000-06:00

I'll fix it - I promise.

SPOON!

Let the Bodies Hit the Floor

2008-04-07T11:30:00.004-06:00

I've been muttering that line, over and over, lately. I don't remember hearing it, but it sounds like something rap-oriented. It would sound pretty killer laid over a baseline.

Then I started spinning it the way that Clinton and I used to do on the long drives back and forth from Beaumont to Edmonton: we used to rework advertising lines into amusing one-offs. Imagine these lines laid over the same beats...
"Two times two equals four"
"Washing dishes is a chore"
"The god of thunder's name is Thor"
Hm. I think it loses something in text form.

Anyway - good news! I got the nod as one of the first cast members of that humor site, chompchompdead.com (it's the experience of being consumed by a shark). I sent in an "Open Letter to Vancouver", asking the city to keep all the people it tempts away from prairie cities like Edmonton. (We don't want them back.) I also fired in that "Choose Your Own Adventure" restaurant review I did for the Dish & Runaway Spoon.

It should be fun! The idea is that readers vote on the best pieces of the week, and the lowest-rated contributor is chucked into the "Chum Bucket" area. From that Chum Bucket, the highest-rated contributor gets promoted to the primary cast. Sort of like if SNL had a Second City crew next door, and they would swap lowest-ranked SNLer with highest-ranked SCer.

Wish me luck - come by the site, vote for me and get some chuckles at the same time!

Peace.

For a shorter read today, I raided my (slim) stash of Vuepoint articles. I wrote this one when I heard that the provincial government lowered the minimum age for fast food workers to 12. Yeah, that's right. Twelve.

VuePoint
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

Well, that fury died down pretty quickly. But I suppose it’s hard to maintain an appropriate level of outrage during Alberta’s too-short summer season, what with all the festivaling, Fringing and camping to do. Which is precisely why our noble provincial government chose this time of year to announce a blanket exception to our child labour laws.

Unable to find people who are willing to work in abysmal conditions for the lowest possible legal wage, any other industry would have to improve in order to attract employees or fall to Darwinian capitalism. Instead, a little over a month ago the restaurant industry lobbied the government for a return to Dickens, and the elected stewards of our public welfare rolled over and dropped the hiring age to 12, giving the industry access to a whole new pool of exploitable kids.

Everyone can relate a horror story of their first job: long, unpaid hours or dipshit managers two years your senior. At the time, few of us felt able to stand up for ourselves or our rights. If children start working at an even younger age, how will they be able to defend themselves? When I was 12, I was in Grade Six. I read, played kick the can and had a totally unfair eight o’clock curfew. I wasn’t standing around in a polyester uniform.

As a completely hypothetical situation, imagine that a restaurant or popular nightclub changes management. They fire all of their employees and tell everyone to reapply for their former jobs. Then, they re-hire only the people they want to keep. Even an adult would be hard pressed to say, “This isn’t right!” But what can a 12 year-old child do?

A child would not know to demand compensation or report their employer. Preteens are not emotionally mature enough to stand up to these gross violations, let alone sexual harassment by older staff or denial of required rest breaks. Of course, there is also the issue of preserving what little childhood preteens have left.

We developed child labour laws for a reason. They were not intended to be bent or modified just to accommodate an industry’s profit margin. Why are we shoveling children into these greedy corporate maws so the industry can stagger a little farther before it collapses under the weight of its own labour practices? Do we legalize 10-year-olds next time?

We can hit the festivals and express our outrage at the same time. Don’t let them get away with this one.

Let's Hear It For The (Robot) Girl!

2008-04-03T10:39:00.004-06:00

If I don't keep up the posting pace, I'll lose the drive to keep up the blog. And neither of us want that - how else will I dazzle you with my witty dialogue? How else will I land a lucrative writer/showrunner spot on a remake of Small Wonder? (V.I.C.I. was hot.)

You know, it's not a bad idea. I think it could balance the Sarah Connor Chronicles with something more pure, more wholesome, FAR less expensive and more likely to be picked up by all sorts of networks, spun out into movie, game and merchandise tie-ins, and continue on into syndication for generations to come!

Sorry - got a little excited there. But anyway - call me. My people and your people can do lunch, as long as my people get to take home the leftovers.

Peace.

This one I wrote after watching a documentary film that Vue Weekly wanted reviewed for the Anarchist Book Fair. I enjoyed the documentary and connected with the director. He called me up to say that he loved the story - it's still on the movie's website and I've seen it discussed on a couple of discussion boards. I rock.

Beads of sweatshops
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

A matronly woman dressed like a Vegas showgirl leers suggestively into the camera. Years of celebration are deeply etched into the painted features beneath her dyed red hair. “You’ll sell your soul at Mardi Gras for a strand of beads,” she laughs, fingering the plastic finery draped around her neck. This is the final scene of David Redmon’s documentary Mardi Gras: Made in China, screening at the Anarchist Book Fair this Friday (March 25), and its impact is staggering.

This exquisite final line is the culmination of an exposé of the migrant Chinese labourers who assemble the trinkets for sale at New Orleans’ annual bacchanal. Mostly women under 20 who earn up to $1.20 (U.S.) a day, the workers’ stories contrast sharply with those of the factory owner who makes $2 million per year, the importer who makes up to $25 million per year and the young Americans who couldn’t care less where their celebration’s accessories come from. Mardi Gras: Made in China forces viewers to reconsider a renegade capitalist system that seeks the lowest price regardless of human cost.

The result of five years’ work for David Redmon, the documentary, which was an official selection at this year’s Sundance Festival, evolved from subjects he explored in his Masters and Ph.D. dissertations. Redmon bought his first video camera four weeks before his first visit to the Tai Kuen Bead Factory in Fuzhou, China; he had no idea what to expect when he arrived. Through his interviews, Redmon realized that he had touched upon a story that needed telling, so he returned a few months after being kicked out of the country for filming without a license. His second visit expanded on the personal stories of the factory workers and included a labourer’s visit home for the Chinese New Year celebration, as well as frank discussions with the factory owner, Roger Wong.

“That Roger was quite a character,” says Redmon, his youthful voice echoing with laughter over the phone. “I think he assumed I was there to make a promotional video about his factory that I would show to American businesses.” The preconception is a relief: otherwise, Wong’s gleeful focus on strict discipline, drastic punishment and fines for the slightest infraction paint him as an absurd ogre. Wong is proud of his working conditions and high production targets, even boasting that he uses 95 per cent female labour because they are easier to control. In fact, Wong is so positive and affable that the viewer ends up wondering if the factory could possibly be as bad as the workers claim. And they have a lot to claim.

Running 24 hours a day, many of the machines lack even the simplest safety features. Shifts are a minimum of 12 hours (and usually average 15 or 16). The factory produces nearly 8,000 pounds of beads every day, and if a worker doesn’t meet her quota, her pay is cut. She is fined for talking during work hours and docked a month’s pay for having a male visitor in the 20-by-24-foot dorm room she shares with nine other women. Workers can only leave the barbed-wire-enclosed compound on Sundays, and only if they are not required to work.

Redmon says that it took a while to get the workers to open up to him. “I could only interview people on their days off,” he reveals, “and we would have to go to an isolated area of the compound.” Slowly, after days of talking through interpreters, the women started to reveal the real conditions at the factory. Each one extracted a promise from Redmon, however: “They were terrified. They said that Roger [Wong] had warned them I was coming and not to say anything bad. Each one begged me not to show the footage to Roger, not to show anyone until after they had left the factory.”

During the interviews, Redmon talks to a dispirited 18-year-old woman with no plans for her future besides helping her younger brother go to school; a 14-year-old girl who never meets her quota is paid less than $1 a day to paint ceramic Mardi Gras masks that sell for up to $20 each on the streets of New Orleans. Somewhat unexpectedly, the documentary shows the workers coping. Dancing together, playing cards and learning English in the few hours they have to themselves, the workers demonstrate a stunning ability to adjust to conditions that were eliminated from Western society so long ago. While yearning for their families, the girls remember home life as boring and oppressive. At the factory, they are able to relieve their parents of a financial burden and even send money home while gaining experiences and freedom they never would have enjoyed otherwise.

The film highlights a jagged contrast between the Chinese factory workers and the partiers at Mardi Gras. The products of their bone-wearying labour are bought 12 strands for a dollar or caught from one of the passing floats, then bartered for flashes of tit-flesh or deep kisses from inebriated women. The tradition started in 1978, and on the streets of New Orleans, there are an estimated 1,000 exposures every three minutes. “It makes me horny,” claims one reveler. Her friend agrees: “Yeah—all that attention is on you!”

The funniest part of the documentary, though the comedy remains black, comes when the factory workers are shown pictures of street scenes from Mardi Gras. “You mean people expose themselves for the beads we make?” one girl asks, almost collapsing with laughter. “They must love them very much.” Another factory worker is more pensive. “On us these beads are very ugly,” she whispers, “but on these Americans, they look very beautiful.” The difference is seen as cultural: Chinese girls would be ashamed to show their bodies in such a way, especially in exchange for such cheap plastic beads.

Back on the streets of New Orleans, the last thing anybody wants to hear about is the medieval conditions of the beads’ origins. During the carnival, Redmon attracted attention by projecting interviews with the workers onto the walls of the French Quarter. “Don’t bring my conscience into this!” pleaded a partier from New York as he walked away to barter his beads. “Ten cents an hour, for them, is a lot of money,” said one MBA grad from the University of Florida, alleviating his guilt. (The mean income in Fuzhou actually falls around 60 cents an hour for an eight-hour day.) The brief twinges of conscience Redmon presents fade quickly, however, and not a single interviewee gave up their beads.

According to Redmon, the original intent for the film was to convey globalization from the perspective of the invisible workers. “At the time I began the project, documentaries on globalization only showed talking heads who said how good it was,” Redmon explains. “I wanted to show and tell the other story.” He feels that he has met this goal, but the results have far surpassed anything he had ever dreamed.

“About two years ago,” Redmon remembers, “I was working, paying for everything, showing rough cuts of the film to anybody who would watch. Anything I made went into translating more of the interviews. I sold a copy for $20 to a couple who couldn’t make it to that night’s screening. They watched it, came to the screening anyway, and three days later sent me $5,000 to finish the project!” Redmon sent his tape to the Sundance Festival two months later, never expecting his would be one of the 16 documentaries selected from the United States. Since then, he has been working on putting together a theatrical release of the film while responding to the unprecedented attention his directorial debut is receiving.

Redmon is enthusiastic about his unexpected success and is eager to discuss his next project. “I’m looking at the globalized concept of intimacy as it’s portrayed in the Victoria’s Secret marketing machine,” he explains. “Behind that, I’m exploring intimacy from the perspective of the Mexican labourers who actually sew the lingerie.” Redmon’s camera will continue to seek those who sell their souls for a strand of beads or a scrap of silk, the global capitalists who collect the fees and the invisible workers who pay the price.

Still too busy...

2008-04-01T12:00:00.003-06:00

... but this was way too funny to let slide. The dedicated theists in my world-wide audience might object, but I actually almost lol'ed. New post coming... eventually? I'll let you know when I have caught up on the Astrology project.

Too busy to post

2008-03-31T14:43:00.003-06:00

I'll let you know how the humour site goes when I hear back. I shortcutted with a preliminary draft of Edmontonians who become Vancouverites, then return, plus my Dish and Runaway Spoon Choose Your Own Adventure from a few years ago. I thought it was pretty damned funny.

If they do, too, then I'm in. If not, then I will have slightly less extra work to do every week - either way, I... um... win?

C.

Hey - I'll throw on another one of my more enjoyable reviews from the vault. This was for the Wok King, where we ordered from the roundeye section of the menu. (sigh)

The greatest story ever stirfried
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

“Tell us the story of the Wok King!”

Conversation stopped on the hot table as every dish turned its attention to the Egg Foo Yung. “Haven’t you already heard that story?” Egg teased; it had been around the mall kiosk the longest and was always pressed for stories by the fresher dishes. The story of the Wok King was their favourite, however.

Harsh lighting from the food court cast shadows across its craggy surface as Egg began, “There exists a place…” A couple of voices from the ginger beef echoed the oft-repeated tale, but Egg waited until silence returned. “There exists a place far from any mall,” Egg began again, “a cheerful place where visitors are greeted with an aquarium full of carp. There are powder pink tablecloths under plastic covers, and turntables on every table. Traditional Chinese décor lines the walls on three sides and on the fourth, floor-to-ceiling windows gaze upon the Outside.”

“The Outside…” murmured the dishes in unison.

“This happiest place of all is called the Wok King Seafood Restaurant,” Egg whispered. “At the Wok King, green tea is served to every guest and the menu goes on forever.”

“The menu goes on forever,” Egg repeated, “from snacks and congee to noodle dishes, bean curd and hot pots with a variety of meats!” They despaired at the eight stainless steel bins that held the range of choices at their kiosk. “The prices average under $12,” Egg continued, “and the house combinations offer more variety than you can dream.”

“I heard of one group who went,” Egg shared, settling into the story. “They ordered the Combination for Two at $22.50, then added another person for $9. The fourth person of the group—a vegetarian—added the Pan-Fried Shrimp with Chili for $13.50!” The hot table tittered with delight as one of the Sacred Four was included in the tale. They couldn’t imagine real shrimp in Asian cuisine.

“The wonton soup arrives immediately, not strongly flavoured, but very nuanced,” Egg goes on, “with a range of vegetables and plenty of meaty wontons.” The anemic broth in a nearby tureen splashed wistfully. “Spring rolls are crisp and served with a mild homemade dipping sauce. Soon, five heaping platters are brought to the table at the same time as two other guests arrive!” The chow mein gasped: what would they do? They only ordered for four people!

“The group gazed upon the bounty and decided not to order more,” Egg murmured. “The chicken fried rice provided a moist, flavourful base to the other dishes. Both the chicken chop suey and the sweet and sour ribs struck a fine balance between tender meats and crisp vegetables, but the rich, delicate sweet & sour sauce was treasured.” Nearby, the sweet and sour pork sank a little lower, ashamed of its gristly meat and gloopy sauce.

“Beef ‘n’ greens delighted everyone with succulent meat mixed with a host of crisp vegetables in a light soya glaze. But the real winner of the evening,” Egg began, its own excitement mounting, “was the vegetarian’s add-on. Though the menu warned of heat, the Pan-Fried Shrimp with Chili offered a mild bite that perfectly balanced the loads of juicy shrimp and crisp pea pods!” The other dishes broke into a spontaneous cheer. “Even the largest appetites around the table were blunted. All six ate a meal meant for four and the remainder fit into a single take-out container.”

“But what of the price?” asked the lemon chicken in a small voice.

“All six dined for under $10 each, including tax and tip,” Egg replied indulgently. Each dish peered upwards at the prices above their hot table and realized that there wasn’t much of a difference. Why would anyone come to them when the Wok King was possible?

“And the Wok King’s promise?” the ginger beef asked, irritated that the flow of the story was broken.

“Ah, yes: a promise was made to every fast food kiosk,” Egg smiled, reciting the food bins’ most sacred belief. “Any dish that worked hard to be the tastiest, most satisfying mall cuisine could become one of the Four!” Everyone chimed in: “Black Pepper Chicken, Rock Cod with Corn Sauce, Pork Canton or Pan Fried-Shrimp with Chili!”

Unexpectedly, a serving spoon flashed and Egg Foo Yung was lifted on to the plate of a mallrat. “Goodbye!” the other dishes chorused. “May we meet again at the Wok King!” Egg prayed that they would, and that they would keep the stories alive.

Boycott Beijing 2008

2008-03-28T14:58:00.002-06:00

Daveberta has said it far better than I could, but I am going to sit this Summer Olympics out. For all my loyal fans who were looking forward to me liveblogging my gold medal victories in fencing and the javelin, you will have to be disappointed. If the IOC decides to hold the Games somewhere with a better human-health-ecological rights record than the Ninth Circle of Hell, I'll check them out.

Wanna Writer?

2008-03-28T10:35:00.002-06:00

I guess this is turning into a little showcase of my mad writing skillz. I thought to start posting my favourite pieces so that I could resurrect them, perhaps expose them to a new audience, or just remember how much fun they were to write. Maybe they will also serve as a portfolio? I haven't updated my website since I was at the Citadel, so this could be a good online business card for employers.

Hey - are you looking for a hired pen? Check me out.

I was busy last night, spittin' out the Aries-Leo astrological blurb while doing laundry. The bride was out (until 3:30 am!) so I handled the chitlins without much difficulty. We're off to Cowtown today after work, and I shall return to the homestead come Sunday afternoon.

As the Milk guy, I get some inside info from the industry that just begs to be shared... Did you know that Nestle might be possibly considering the option to think about maybe changing some of their labelling to read "iced dessert" instead of "ice cream"? It's a European technique that allows the company to use vegetable oils instead of cream in their products. Um... yum? On dairy products, check the label for cream, milk, partly skimmed milk or skim milk powder. "Milk ingredients" can be OK. However, you might reconsider "modified milk ingredients" if you are looking for actual dairy in your graocery cart.

I know - it's my day job to lobby for Alberta's milk producers, so my interests are suspect, but I thought I'd share.

Adios.

Today's selection is from yet another venue. The owner of EdmontonDining.com read a piece I wrote about the Lemongrass Cafe and wrote me an email... he was looking for freelance restaurant reviewers to populate his site. Was I interested? Damn straight! Here is one of my favourites from the site:

Da*De*O Restaurant
By Christopher Thrall

Da*De*O's retro '50s décor was here long before it was officially cool again: the chrome-trimmed Formica tables and red vinyl chairs trigger fantasies of soda jerks and poodle skirts. Feel free to drop a quarter into one of the mini juke boxes mounted at each booth. The lighting in this busy, narrow restaurant is dim and intentionally low key. Only minor decorative touches, soft jazz and outstanding Cajun cuisine forge its link with New Orleans.

I met my coworker and her husband, a pair of graphic designers that haunted Da*De*O regularly, after work on a Tuesday evening. This adults-only diner & bar felt like the type of place that the coolest person you knew in University worked. (Oddly enough, one of the coolest people I knew in University was working there.) The mix of clientele included University girls in de-objectifying clothing, nervous first dates, couples who have been coming for years and small business groups.

I snagged a table by the window to watch Whyte Avenue's gorgeous strollers, each of whom glanced in to meet my eye. While waiting for my guests, I glanced through the menu and savoured the lyrical Louisiana syllables. Fritters, crab cakes and catfish fingers topped out at $10, while the gumbos, jambalayas and more conventional cuisine like pastas and pizzas came in below $15. Under advisement, however, I skipped to the page of Po' Boy sandwiches for $10 a pop.

My guides to Da*De*O arrived and signaled for their beloved cherry Cokes ($2.50), while I requested an Iced Tea ($2). My coworker decided against her regular blackened chicken Po' Boy in favour of fried Tiger prawns and I bounced from fried oysters to crab cakes on mine. Her husband chose the Bayou Burger and we ordered a set of crab & parmesan fritters ($7) to start. On his way back to the kitchen, our waiter left us each a scone and jalapeno jelly.

The scone was tasty, if a little small, and the jelly's sweet bite was tantalizing. I considered requesting more as we chatted, but the fritters arrived quickly. They were a little overdone, but the warm, fragrant interiors were divine under the zesty mayo dipping sauce.

Although I was hungry walking into Da*De*O's, I don't think I will ever be hungry again: each dinner covered a large oval plate with its hefty French loaf and pair of side orders. My coworker's hubby chose potato hash with his cornslaw and he praised the two warm scoops that landed somewhere this side of "dirty mashed potatoes." My coworker and I had decided on the famous sweet potato fries for an extra 75 cents.

My cornslaw was fresh and tasty, while those crunchy sticks of battered sweet potato were pure sinful indulgence when dipped in herb mayo. Even so, the Po' Boys themselves were the real stars. The loaves were fresh and yielding, and my crab cakes were a stunning combination of crisp exterior and hot, spiced crab salad within. Hers boasted an excellent jumbo-shrimp-to-fresh-tomato ratio and his was a substantial Cajun beef feast with tequila salsa and melted cheddar cheese.

We discovered that Po' Boys are on special for $7.75 every Monday and Tuesday, so we were stuffed full for less than $20 each, including tax and tip. We waddled out, exquisitely fed and ready for anything that Edmonton's trendiest area had to offer.

Anticipation...

2008-03-27T10:39:00.006-06:00

OK, I admit it. I get a little excited when the bride and chitlins go down to Calgary for a week. I get home late Sunday afternoon and return to them after work on Friday: for four shining evenings, I can indulge in unbridled hedonism! (Thursday is reserved for cleaning, laundry and packing.)

Granted, it's not like I have house parties, get hammered every night or go out dancin' 'til dawn - I have a full-time job and a load of writing to do. However... however, however... I can finish stuff up at work without watching the clock to make sure that I am out the door on time to make it home as expected. I can go out for a drink or meet a friend for coffee.

I can get home and lie down on the couch.

This, my friends and loyal readers, is the purest form of self-indulgence for a dad. I love them all, but it is... nice... to get some time to myself. I feel for my bride, who doesn't get quite the same time off. We'll fix that someday.

Todd Babiak had a good piece today on the International Olympic Committee's absolutely silent (and completely ineffective) diplomacy with China. Just to combine his insightful look into justifiable condemnation of China's human (and every other) rights record with something prurient and titillating, check out some favourite body painting. I admire the art, not the... canvasses.

Peace out.

Today, let's change things up a little. I have the Chili Hot Hot article framed in my office, and I scanned the Funeral Crashing piece to dry-mount it. The third piece that I dry-mounted was Spa Dating, which ran in the Edmonton Journal's ed Magazine in November 2005. This article spawned the famous "bubbles controversy" with my wife. (I swear, honey, nobody could see a thing!) We have the original picture that ran as a centre spread so you can form your own opinion - I think it is otherwise lost to history.

How's this for a hot date?
With spa packages for couples on the rise, treatments are taking into account the togetherness factor

Christopher Thrall, For CanWest News Service
Friday, November 11, 2005

Spas are for chicks, with all that waxing, nail polish and chit chat. No self-respecting guy would be caught dead in a soft, comfortable robe, getting pampered by skilled professionals.

Yeah, right.

Fact is, about one-third of all the spa treatments at Perugia Salon Spa in Edmonton are booked for men. And most of these bookings are treatments for couples: part of a quiet revolution in the spa industry.

"When you're tired of the bar scene, where do you go?" asks Janie Neves, managing partner at Perugia. "We have a number of couples who enjoy our unpretentious environment and group atmosphere."

Adrienne and David Beaulac first came to Perugia together almost a year ago.

"We came on a tour. Then, later, on an event night for yoga and a scalp massage," says Adrienne. "The yoga instructor from Ashanti was amazing and we tried the specially designed scalp massage table. Then, we signed up for a couple's membership."

Unlike her husband, Adrienne had been to spas before, but not regularly. Now, the community service workers make a point of getting to Perugia's monthly events.

"We both felt really comfortable right away," she continues. "We felt good about the staff. Now, even though I see a few new faces each time I come back, everybody knows my name."

According to the International Spa Association, men represent the fastest growing segment of the spa industry, accounting for nearly 30 per cent of last year's business.

That has spas looking for ways to capitalize on the trend.

For example, at Calgary's RnR Wellness The Spa, men can have their shiatsu and hot stone massages in complete seclusion. A private male suite, with its own bathroom and steam room, alleviates men's fears that they will be seen walking around in a fuzzy robe.

Other spas are incorporating the idea of couples' treatments, with many offering special deals for a romantic spa day away or designing rooms for two.

Life Stiles spa in Edmonton has a romantic couples' package on its spa menu. For $300, both people get a manicure, pedicure and one-hour massage.

"There is definitely a demand for it," manager David Middleton says. "It makes a lovely Christmas present."

For many, though, the couples experience is all about the coupling.

"We see many couples here," says Anna Navrovla of the Dr. Wilkinson's Hot Springs Resort in Calistoga, Calif., "and very few of them want to be separated, even for a minute."

Affectionate pairs on their fifth dates, special celebrations or second honeymoons enjoy any number of services.

The most popular, however, is the resort's thick mud bath (actually a combination of local volcanic ash, imported peat and naturally boiling hot springs water). Anything goes, and despite their loudest knocks, staff still walk in on rather intense displays of affection.

"We've always had men in the spa, but not nearly so many," says Navrovla. "It was only in the last 10 years or so that men started coming in higher numbers, usually as part of a couple. Now, they are about one-third of our clients."

The resort has adjusted accordingly, expanding the men's change rooms and stocking them with top-of-the-line toiletries. The resort also adjusted the decor from soft pastels to warm, modern tones and now both sexes can relax in their comfortable atmosphere.

It's the same story at Perugia, where soothing music fills every room, dark orange hues, rich wood accents, lustrous copper fixtures and light suede furnishings ensure that nothing is overtly masculine or feminine. It's simply relaxing and romantic.

Deft, professional hands and a soothing environment provide something beyond the ordinary. You can find a quiet that's unavailable in the normal workday world.

Couples come back, not necessarily to enjoy treatments together all the time, but to be carried away by the experience. And the romance is simply beyond compare.

- - -

Make it a spa date

Spa dates are a romantic, sensual and pampered treat for anyone tired of the bar scene or looking for an evening that blows dinner and a movie out of the water. Here are some tips to maximize your spa experience.

1. Arrive at least 15 minutes early to change and relax prior to your treatment.

2. Drink a full glass of water. Stay hydrated.

3. Take advantage of valet parking, when offered, so you don't have to rush.

4. If waxing, refrain from tanning for at least 24 hours prior to the service.

5. Inform your technician of any medications, maladies or concerns.

6. If you enjoyed your experience, a gratuity is appreciated by the technicians. Tip based on how you feel after your service. If you are uncertain, give 15 per cent. Renew, relax and enjoy.

Second Post of a... Never mind.

2008-03-26T09:48:00.005-06:00

Yeah, that titling format got old quickly. Great news! I finished the cane culture piece for /ed, and I'll let you know when it runs. It was a fun one, and I hope that I am at the forefront of media coverage on the revival of walking sticks as a fashion must-have. You heard it here first!

You might be asking yourself - as I work full time, play husband and father, do my chores, beaver away at astrological compatability blurbs, play ATTACK! on Facebook (it's Risk! online! am I in heaven?) and pitch/land more pieces - what do I do in my spare time? Instead of beating you with a shovel, I am actually glad you asked.

Welcome to my updated blogroll:
News
CBC Edmonton
Edmonton Journal
Vue Weekly
See Magazine
Blogs
Macleans Blogs (especially Inkless Wells, Inside the Queensway and Scott Feschuk)
Daveberta (yes, a Liberal blog - in Alberta)
Idealistic Pragmatist (even stranger, an NDPer's blog - in Alberta)
Todd Babiak (I admire that he seems to support himself entirely with his pen - and he's published!)
Personal
What Would Tyler Durden Do? (funny, with a soupcon of offensiveness)
Cracked (yes, the venerable humour mag went online - and it's funny!)
College Humor (I have never visited the "Cute College Girl of the Day" section)
I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER (OK, I find lolcats strangely amusing at times...)
Gutenberg Project (This one is great: public domain books converted to text files for palm organizer or laptop reading - catch up on your Oz, Barsoom and Sherlock Holmes!)

Visit any of the above for more fun than french kissing a skunk!

Today, I decided to include another first of mine: my first cover piece. I pitched it after I attended the funeral of my cousin and groomsman, who I still miss. It turned out... interesting.

Not a mourning person
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

“But tell me, what do you do for fun?... What do you find fulfilling? What gives you that special satisfaction?”
“I go to funerals.”
—Harold and Maude

A few weeks ago, I attended the funeral of my cousin, who died unexpectedly in his sleep at the age of 27. (Rest in peace, Mike.) From my seat near the front of the church, I listened to the service and took comfort in my family’s presence. I took in the words of those who knew him and the supplications to gather him up and keep him safe. Tears streamed freely, sobs were suppressed, tissues were wadded into sweaty palms and reassuring embraces were free to all. Even in my sorrow at the loss of such a dear man, I glanced around at heads bowed in prayer and marveled at the turnout.

Cars were parked blocks away and well-dressed mourners walked solemnly to the weekday afternoon service. Rows of chairs had to be set up behind the last pew to accommodate the attendees. People of all ages, from all walks of life, had come to share in the ceremony and say their final goodbyes. The receiving line for my aunt and uncle went on for an hour and a half. Even the interment in a rural cemetery south of Edmonton saw a circle of people four or five deep surrounding his grave. As I grieved, I considered the draw of this ritual for a man who had touched so many in his life. I witnessed how safe it was for naked expressions of sorrow, how those present radiated warmth and support for each other, even in the midst of their despair. I thought about how comforting this environment was, how inclusive it was to all that suffered. I realized how attractive all this could be for anyone wanting to feel emotions this intense. I caught myself wondering how many people at the funeral actually knew Mike, and whether or not anyone was crashing the service for some other reason.

Despite the taboo nature of the subject, the image of the funeral-crasher has long been part of popular culture. The titular characters in the 1971 cult movie Harold and Maude were funeral crashers brought together by their shared appreciation for these ceremonies. Douglas Coupland wrote about “Harolding” in his novel Polaroids From the Dead, in which teens obsessed with cemeteries loiter on the cusp between life and death. Two friends crash a service and accidentally topple a coffin in Clerks. I remember my own experiences taking gravestone rubbings in my youth. With my new appreciation for these havens of intense emotion, I began to understand Harold and his desire to share funeral experiences with people he didn’t know in honour of someone he had never met. I resolved to find him and ask him about it.

This task proved to be far more difficult than I thought. As a technophile, I rely on the Internet as a font of information on all that is bizarre—and I was more than a little surprised when Google failed to turn up any sort of hobbyist’s group for funeral crashers. (I had imagined sites where hot topics would include fashion tips, codes of conduct for different religious services and foolproof responses for inquisitive family members.) Research yielded a number of sites devoted to obsessions with cemeteries or death, some frighteningly factual and others downright creepy. I found a multitude of inadvertent or fictional funeral-crashing accounts, but no real reports from enthusiasts.

Conversations with funeral directors, officiates and caretakers earned me responses ranging from hostile to incredulous, but no insights. “We have the occasional problem with unwelcome family members of the deceased,” replied one director who asked not to be named. “But that’s the only example of crashing that comes to mind. You do hear about vandalism in the graveyards too.” An evening of desperately approaching random strangers in a city cemetery probably brought me close to being arrested, but still I found nobody who would admit to being there for fun. It was quickly becoming apparent that if I was going to gain any special insight into the world of funeral-crashing, I was going to have to do it myself.

The reactions to my project from friends and family drove me on. Especially among my peers, I triggered a wellspring of anger, outrage and disapproval for my actions, which were deemed clearly inappropriate. I found myself explaining at length what I was doing and why. Among older acquaintances with more funeral experience behind them, the idea was met with bemusement: why would I go if I didn’t know the person? In nearly every case, the listener became intrigued, and the storm of conflicting emotions I encountered kept me believing that I was on to something big.

I perused the obituaries for funerals, in particular those that promised to be large enough for me to blend in unobtrusively and that provided enough information on the deceased for me to build a plausible cover story. I planned to attend two funerals in a row that day, wearing the suit I was married in—the same suit I was wearing when I said goodbye to my cousin. I wore my glasses and tamed my normally mussed hair out of respect for these people I didn’t know. Nervous and agitated, I changed my mind about this ridiculously gruesome project about 15 times on the way to the first service.

I parked my ’93 Mazda hatchback among the conspicuously expensive vehicles in the funeral home’s parking lot. I passed through the tastefully furnished lobby, noting the excessive use of soothing pastels, and made my way to the service. Carefully avoiding the gazes of three men standing outside the doors, I entered and froze. The silence was broken only by quiet violin music coming in over the speakers and I felt like every eye was on me. I hunched over, scurried forward three or four rows, nipped in to the fifth chair and sat down—I made it! It didn’t take me long to realize, however, that nobody was paying me any mind. I heard sobs and murmurred conversation as I looked around.

The coffin was at the front of the room, one side open, with someone (I tried desperately not to see) barely visible over the rim. Dramatically framed by draperies, flower arrangements on pedestals and artificial candles, the polished dark wood casket with its silver carrying bar and erstwhile occupant brought to mind all of the brutal reality of this ritual, and my role in it as an outsider. Hot guilt pounded through my veins. My face was flushed, my breathing shallow and quick. I kept my head bowed: I couldn’t have met anyone’s eye even if I’d wanted to. I rehearsed my relationships with the deceased, just in case I was asked. I barely noticed more seats filling and missed the beginning of the service.

My attention only returned to the ceremony when friends and family were asked if they wanted to share memories of the deceased. An older man in my row got up immediately and his simple, honest words brought a lump to my throat. I listened to others share their memories, and could feel myself moved by their grief. I started to feel titillated by being somewhere I was definitely not supposed to be. My impostor’s guilt grew. Dreading the upcoming reception, I started to get angry: I was sharing in this moment of sorrow, genuinely moved by the stories that were being told. Why couldn’t I simply tell them what I was doing there? I wrestled with this question, more and more agitated, until the service ended and I bolted from the room with as much dignity as I could muster. It wasn’t one of my proudest moments.

My pulse was racing, and it took a few minutes of inattentive driving to calm the panic. What was I afraid of? Despite being the youngest one there by a couple of decades, no one had given me a second glance until I sprinted out of the home. I hadn’t run out on a bill or done anything illegal. Maybe this guilt-induced flight reflex was a funeral crasher’s rush? I resolved to do better next time and try—try—to stay for the reception afterwards.

I rehearsed my fictional relationship again as I parked in the huge church lot, which was less than a quarter full. Feeling a little less terrified than I had been at the first funeral, I made my way up to the front to pay my respects before finding a seat. I was more at ease this time, better able to examine the relaxed, slightly misshapen features of the careworn face in the casket as I waited my turn. I stood in front of the guest of honour with my head bowed, counted 20 hippopotami, then took my seat in a pew near the back. I had just discovered that I could make slight marks in the back of the pew with my thumbnail when I was relocated by the officiate, along with four others, to make a tighter group in the front half of the church. From the environment to the ceremony itself, everything about this funeral was more formal than the last. The soaring scale of the church and the solemn weight of the service threatened to overwhelm the fragile mortal grief around me.

Tears weren’t appropriate here. Open expressions of grief seemed out of place in sight of the stone-faced family members in the front most pews. Nonetheless—or perhaps for this very reason—I found it easier this time to engage myself in the sorrow around me. I took the time to read the small program, getting acquainted with this person for the first and last time. As the outsider, I could step back from the immediate loss felt by those around me, but could allow myself the full range of heartache that we repress so much in our society. Ultimately, I began to feel sympathy for the people around me who had lost this beloved soul. My heart went out to them, these mourners, and I mourned the loss of my cousin again.

This time, I stayed for the reception. I waited through the short line in the basement of the church to shake the hands of relatives, offering my sympathies. Asked three times how I knew the deceased, I rattled off my preconceived replies without a pause. My knees were shaking, but my cover story held. With the worst part over with, I grabbed a butter tart and sat down in relief, only to be immediately approached by another mourner. I answered his questions blithely enough, though he brushed aside my own queries with one-word replies. Alarm bells started to go off as he questioned me more closely. He knew I didn’t belong here. I was busted. Icy terror slammed into my spine and I began to look for an escape. But after calming down and listening for a second, I discovered that he simply didn’t speak English very well: his aggressive repetition was borne of a lack of comprehension, not of suspicion. I fled to the refreshment table for another tart. I welcomed a remark from a sprightly senior with a sparkly lapel pin and sat down with her. Gradually, conversations grew from twosomes to the entire group as the mourners started speaking of the deceased, sharing precious moments and treasured memories that almost always involved laughter. I avoided contributing by simply shaking my head whenever anyone looked at me; an hour later, I left the service, feeling good about being alive and richer for having shared a special time with exceptional people.

Obviously, intruding on funerals is wrong, much in the same way that stowing away on a railcar is wrong: in both cases, you’re hitching a ride to a destination without paying your way or even seeking permission. But still, there has always been a darkly romantic element to both that will never lose its appeal. In the same breath that our society marginalizes and sterilizes death, it glamourizes it with television dramas like Six Feet Under and Dead Like Me, leaving us conflicted and confused about how to feel when death comes for those we know. Funerals are safe environments for authentic displays of grief. They are for remembering someone dear to us, and for honouring their memory. They’re for saying goodbye. If you don’t know the person, you simply don’t belong there.

In the end, I came to understand, at least a little, why someone like Harold would crash funerals. Besides the demystification of death and the titillation of doing the forbidden, it comes down to finding a safe place to feel. When these sanctuaries are found, they should be treasured: safe places to expose our most intense inner emotions are few and far between. V

The First Post of a New Blog Order

2008-03-25T11:54:00.004-06:00

OK - perhaps I'm being unnecessarily melodramatic, but the title really gives this a sense of occasion, you know?

I've been pretty busy recently, as I have shifted my focus from hard-to-get communications gigs to pitching stories. My darling bride has also adopted freelance-finder site eLance as her new favourite. March 6th was a big Vue issue for me: a review of Zucchero Panini Bar, an Education piece on Harcourt House's art classes and my killer snowmobile/dogsled weekend in Valemount.

I really need to finish one outstanding communications contract and an article on the Culture of the Walking Stick for /ed. I would love to get back to work on the book I was editing. Hey - do you know anyone who works in a downtown office tower? It would help for an upcoming story.

I'm also working on an eLance job, writing astrological compatability blurbs. It's as much fun as it sounds! I plan to get even with all of my ex-girlfriends by making our relationship problems the fault of their star signs... Heh heh... People say I'm passive-aggressive: I say, Pshaw! Then I complain about them behind their backs.

I've pitched a few ideas to the new Dish editor, and he's given me green lights on many. However, I can't tell my legions of fans about them, since I know that the sinister twinisters Scott Lingley and Monte Kruger at See Magazine are waiting to drink my milkshake. Scour my blog for hints all you want, See minions! You will never find the Grail! Bwahahahahaha!

That made a lot more sense in my head than it did typed out.

I have also been in touch with a Vancouver comedy website in development, which craigslisted a call for writers. I've never written comedy before, but I thought I would give it a shot. Depite an encouraging exchange of emails, I have yet to hear back - I'll keep you posted, though. If it doesn't work out, I could try posting some of my ideas up here. You can let me know if I've got what it takes - gently, of course, in consideration for my feelings and the fact that I cry like a little girl with a skinned knee whenever anyone criticizes me. Or critiques me. Or says something noncommittal about my writing. Or butts in front of me. Or clears their throat near me. I'm a delicate flower and my mommy loves me.

Duty calls - enjoy the review!

Christopher

I figured I would post my very first restaurant review with Vue Weekly as part of this new approach. You can find it in its original context in the July 29, 2004 issue, but why? This is where it all began, people - let's have a moment of awed silence.

Stop giggling in back.

Hot Hot Eats
By CHRISTOPHER THRALL

Located on the corner of Jasper Ave and 109 St, Chili Hot Hot is one of the most prominent undiscovered treasures in Edmonton.
Unlike those flashier Chinese places, you won’t find any jade dragon sculptures, intricate wood screens or gold leaf paintings. The eating area feels like a conference room, well-lit and inexpensively reclaimed with paint; the furniture is “early ’80s Chinese restaurant” to the point of cliché, complete with burgundy vinyl tablecloths, cushioned chairs with gold accents and terrible carpet. But what Chili Hot Hot lacks in decor they more than make up for in great food.
The menu is approachable and seems fairly standard, with a list of items like “shrimp and chicken in nest” and “beef in black bean sauce” that goes on for pages. The prices fall on either side of $10, depending on how much meat is involved.
As I skim the menu, I find a few pages full of Asian characters with prices scattered randomly. Daunted, I skip to the back of the menu to check out the combos. My wife and I decide on the Shangri-La combo for two, which at $14 per person is the most expensive of their set meal options and includes soup and spring rolls to start and five entrées.
The hot and sour soup arrives almost immediately and is a delight: the spicy broth has become a stew of tofu, carrots, sprouts, green onion, peas and various unidentifiable bits. Halfway through, the spring rolls arrive and my wife’s eyes light up: “Spring rolls are my favourite!” We’re even more impressed when we bite in. Light, crunchy and piping hot, these rolls are incredible; the only disappointment is that there are only two of them.
The five main courses hit the table at the same time. I scoop us some tasty and filling chicken fried rice as a base and my wife digs into the shrimp with mixed greens. She counts seven huge shrimp, the pea pods are crispy and the bok choi is not. A couple of bites in, she informs me that this is officially her new favourite dish.
I help myself to the ginger hot beef and chicken with lemon sauce. As someone used to the gooey, coated ginger beef of mall food courts, this platter of tender beef and julienned vegetables in a light ginger sauce simply dazzles me (although I’m not sure what exactly the “hot” in the dish’s name refers to). The chicken has a light, crispy batter and the sauce is absolutely out of this world, but unfortunately the chicken itself is a little too chewy for our tastes.
My biggest surprise is the honey garlic ribs. Expecting them to be the standard kind of dry ribs you can pick up anywhere, I’m surprised to bite into a warm, moist, largely boneless treat drizzled with honey. My wife isn’t crazy about honey, so I have a hedonistic time with these succulent bits of heaven. Green tea, frequently topped up by the restaurant’s polite, unobtrusive and sometimes less-than-comprehensible waitstaff, complements the entire meal.
The language barrier became a factor when we asked to see the dessert menu and were told about a mango pudding and something involving coconut. Thinking they were one and the same, we ordered one to split. $2.50 bought us a bowl full of paradise: thick pudding with chunks of mango topped with heavy cream. The taste was fresh, clean and a terrific pick-me-up after the intense flavours of the meal.
Overall, the value can’t be beat: for less than $40 we had a great, filling meal and were leaving with enough for lunches or a midnight meal for two. Chili Hot Hot offers free delivery within five miles and a lunch buffet I’ll definitely try anytime I’m downtown at noon. Drop off your leftovers in the car and you’re ready for your evening to begin in the heart of downtown.

Chili Hot Hot
10909 Jasper Avenue
428-3336

Are you looking for me? Are YOU looking for ME?

2008-03-24T11:55:00.003-06:00

Hey, neat - it's been almost two years, several enormous life changes and a few gray hairs. It turns out that this little corner of the interweb still exists to serve me. Wild!

Now, I know you have been checking religiously for updates, so you might be in for a bit of a surprise. I might be, too. I seem to always come back with the best of intentions, but then saunter astray. ("Saunter Astray" - not a bad name for a band...)

I'll try approaching this a little differently this time. I'm going to try posting regularly on my current projects/pitches, plus include a classic from my stacks of written material. Consider it a two for one special at the ol' Ill Literati's Domain.

For the rushed, here are some thumbnail updates:
June 2006: Started with Alberta Milk as their Corporate Communications Coordinator. I represent the province's dairy producers to the public, the media, government and... well, themselves.
Aug 2006: Sold the downtown condo and moved into a half-duplex in Beaumont - across the street from my ol' junior high school. Weirdness, but a better place for kids.
Nov 2006: Baby Faye-bee was born. Faye Grace Marie Thrall graced us with her presence. She gave us a little start on her way in: my wife was forced to lunge to catch her as the medical staff clustered on the other side of the room...
Jan 2008: Resigned the Vue Weekly editorship in order to freelance (writing and communications).

I probably forgot some pretty significant milestones, but if you were looking for an update, there it is.

Blogs I'm reading today

2006-04-19T08:57:00.000-06:00

So, this little corner of unreal estate allows me to publish opinions all over the blogosphere. (What is it about that word that reminds me of "the information superhighway"?) Check out some of the places I go regularly:

The Rebel Sell blog: haven't read the book, but the insights are deep
Ironic Sans: awesome name for a font and a terrific blog (he came up with those pre-pixelated shirts for use in reality TV shows)
Design Observer: thoughts on design & culture
Three Minds @ Organic: marketing-watch site, including outstanding viral and e-campaigns

Of course, there are a bunch of personal sites I visit as well, but I don't know you well enough to tell you about them.

I refuse to be a statistic!

2006-04-19T08:50:00.000-06:00

I am taking a stand: I refuse to be one of the 45% of people who drop their blog within three months of starting it. I admit, I teetered on the edge, but I'm back and in full effect!

Well, medium effect. My bride just finished her paper, and it will take a few days to get back to full production. Now my little girl is turning two and then the wife goes back to the books at the beginning of May... Whew.

I had a little boost yesterday: I swung by the downtown Funky Pickle for a slice (nasty - ALWAYS order fresh, Christopher), and watched a pretty young twenty-something read the Oodle Noodle review that ran in Vue this week. She was spending time with my words, completely oblivious to the fact that the "tiny fingers" in the title were attached to the toddler scarfing pizza beside her.

As a writer, I get a bit disconnected from the result of my writing. Sometimes I'm so buried in the production of the articles that I forget people actually read them. It give me quite a thrill. Thanks, anonymous young lady. Please know that it took everything I had to avoid introducing myself. (I wanted a random-sample poll about how much ink I spend on my daughter.)

Spent the rest of the evening at the park. A good soiree all around.

A nice place to visit

2006-04-12T13:35:00.000-06:00

Yowzers, but it's been a long time since I visited the ol' homestead. Still looks good around here, though. I enjoy the freedom of wandering around, reading and posting comments to the Wide World of Blogging, rather than offering up my own particular insights into the Universe in general.

Plus, when you're paid to write for a living, it can stop being a recreational activity, y'know?

Anyways, updates for my legions of Thrallformation-starved fans...

I took the editing gig for Vue's Dish section, which means that I not only write about eating, I also mangle what other people write about eating. The Ultimate Cosmic Power factor is low, but it's challenging to herd the stylish cats who now write for me. Be nice to your friendly neighbourhood editor: their job is tougher than you think.
With two bars showing up on a urine-drenched stick, we are celebrating an upcoming arrival for the end of November! (Woohoo!) We debated "Rowan" for a boy or girl, but my beloved bride has cooled on the name, so I'm currently engaged in a stealth-campaign for "Cohen" if it's a boy. (Stole it from my coworker's friend, and it rocks. I love you Leonard - call me.) If you have any suggestions, let me know and we'll mock them behind your back.
My Lady is toiling away at her online Masters' program in Counselling Psychology, which is both more wonderful and brutally harder than it looks. Spare a thought for her as you complain about your day at work: sure, she gets to be at home (going stir-crazy), but you don't have to maintain a particularly attention-starved toddler, grow an infant inside of you and pursue higher education with drying apple juice stains on your text books.
Of course, a new arrival means that we will officially burst the seams of our sweet downtown condo. Renovations are more-or-less under way, and we're hoping to list it in Edmonton's uber-hot real estate market for the beginning of June. Then we'll be homeless! Yay!

So, that's it. If you want more updates, beg me. Otherwise, read Vue Weekly to find out where I went to eat this week. Or visit my latest favourite site, The Gallery of Regrettable Food, for images of food you will never, ever want to eat - plus the funniest commentary this side of... um... funny.

However, if you want to buy a gorgeous downtown condo on the top floor, I may be able to hook you up. Two bedrooms with a breathtaking wood-burning brick fireplace, five appliances and an apartment-length east-facing balcony in a secure building. Saltwater pool, sauna and exercise room on site! It doesn't get any better than this...

Don't believe your eyes

2005-09-01T14:54:00.000-06:00

I love this guy's work. "Retouching" photos is one thing...

If I don't post now, I never will.

2005-08-30T12:46:00.000-06:00

Ahhhh! OK - my own fault for not posting lately. I have finally given in to the stacks of mail clamouring for my return to let you know just how freakin' wonderful things are! Big shout out to my returning fans from Utah, Debbie-boo and the Lady Heidi. Smokin' hot Mormon girls make for good friends...

First off, that Wi-Fi theft piece that I wrote in Ed Magazine was strung to the Calgary Herald. My mumsy-in-law was reading an article that had her thinking it sounded like me, and when she glanced at the byline - lo and behold! I'll collect a little more scratch for that one, and hope for the piece to show up all over the tentacles of the CanWest Global chain.

Pitching, pitching - the "massage parlour demystification" piece seems to be sinking slowly into the murk, since not a single lady from the industry will talk to me. I guess my PR background is showing, but I would have thought they would jump on an opportunity to clear away some of the misunderstandings. Ah, well. We'll see if I'm moving forward with two thirds of the piece: first-person perspective and legal questions.

As for Ed, my mirror fetishes piece was bumped to September 17th, but my editor tells me that she has some exceptional photos. Got a great interview with a U of A anthro prof (no thanks to the seriously deficient public relations staff at the U), and I think that one is going to fly. The next piece down the pipe is a bar guide for which I'm running two big articles and MAYBE the profile piece. But for now, let's keep it on the Q-T, OK?

I'm at the day job (on lunch - don't worry) alone today. The boss is at home because her kids don't go back to school until next week, and the graphic designer is getting inspected by the modern medical industry to see if her appendix needs attention. Poor thing was in pain all yesterday, but way too dedicated to say, "Screw this - something's wrong and I'm leaving."

And finally, my Dad and sister are up from Manitoba with my grandmother. (Unfortunately, Grammy Pat couldn't come along.) Maeryn is having so much fun with them, and I hope that my bride is getting a bit of a rest. I know I love it when family is totally into our daughter - it means we can sit and chat without running interference all the time.

This parenting thing gets easier as you go along, right? Right?

Your Forgotten English: "take a flourish"
To enjoy a woman in a hasty manner, to take a flyer... to enjoy a woman with her clothes on, or without going to bed.

I will state for the record that this was on my desk calendar of Forgotten English, and not in response to hot Mormon girls.

Studying Hiring Policies

2005-08-17T12:58:00.000-06:00

It seems that the Canadian Department of Multiculturalism and Heritage recently announced that MediaWitch will receive a $1.6M grant to study the lack of transgendered feminist-lesbian wiccan role models in TV beer commercials. They claim to be systemically stigmatized when passed over by the beer ad and shampoo people.

Labatt and Molson state that it is not formal policy to exclude transgendered feminist-lesbian wiccans from their ads, but their employees are now being enrolled in sensitivity courses.

I have an opinion: perhaps the target market for Labatt products are not moved to make their buying decisions through visual imagery of transgendered feminist-lesbian wiccans? I'm not claiming that these individuals and fans of theirs do not buy beer (I'll avoid the obvious quip about shampoo).

However, I figure they represent about 0.0001% of the market dominated by individuals who are moved to buying decisions by seeing the "beautiful, shapely women, their large, gravity-defying breasts barely contained by teensy-weensie bikini tops, just having a great time jumping up and down" that they're objecting to. It's a cost-benefit analysis, not a denigration of a "lifestyle choice".

Bah.