So houseboating trip this coming weekend!! This should be a rediculous party. I really don't know what to expect. People keep telling me its insane. I think i'm going to need an IV for the following week or two.
Anyone have any houseboating stories they care to share? maybe some advice?

Completely unrelated...did a little cliff jumping...or i should say jump. I only went once. It was a crzy beautiful spot in north van. Hopefully murf send me some pics so i can post a couple. The jumping spots there ranged from 20 ft to over 80 ft. I did the 30 ft'er. It was deceivingly high. The biggest shock was hitting the freezing cold water! That water was ice cold! It is quite the shock to the system. Might go back tomorrow, depending on how brave i'm feeling.
I've never been a huge fan of heights, its not as though i'm phobically afraid of them, but they definitly bother me. So it was quite a rush for me jumping off that cliff today. That first initial feeling when you leave the solid ground behind you and begin your descent is beyond words. When the water hits, your whole body tenses right up. The first thought i had was ' get me the fuck out of this water now'. You actually drop down pretty deep into the water, so it takes a few seconds to get back to the top. When I came up for air, I swam as fast as i could to shore. Once you step out, you feel soooo good! its such a refreshing and liberating feeling.

The build up to facing any type of fear is always super tough to deal with, but the feeling afterwards is always worth it.

Concerts
In the last month i've been to a few concerts that i thought i would review quickly.
This first of which was a very random out of the blue experience. I was at home in pg visiting for the weekend when my cousin from the island called the house. She wanted to know if her boyfriend's band could come over to our house to shower up and get ready for their next show. (they were on the tail end of a nationwide tour, coming down through northern bc) I haven't seen my cousin in many years so I had no idea what type of boyfriend she had, so i had no idea what type of band was going to be coming over to our house. I was guessing some sort of folk music or something mellow. Anyways, they came over and it turns out they are a metal/experimental band. These guys come over and they are all tatted and pierced, they definitly looked like a metal band. I was a little surprised and not too sure what to expect from them. It turned out that they were super nice guys. They hung out for a while, showered, ate, and chatted with my fam for a while before heading out to the concert venue. I decided to go check out the concert with my brother. The band is called Kincaide, they are from victoria. They played at the shittiest venue i have seen in a long time in PG. It was a dump. The band before them was pretty much just death metal. I'm ok with stuff like that except when its just screaming the whole time. I enjoy the screaming but only when its done properly and not all the time. Anyways, when Kincaide came on I was pleasantly surprised. They were quite a bit better than the first band. They weren't just screamers. The lead singer has a pretty sweet stage presence and the whole band rocked out pretty hard. The lead singer reminded me of Serj Tankian of system of a down. If I had to compare them to someone I would say they would be a cross between tool, system of a down, and alexisonfire. They put on a good show even though they were playing in a shit hole.
The next show I went to was Donovan Frankenreiter in Vancouver at the Commodore. Quite the change of pace compared to Kincaide. It was a pretty good show. Nothing special but I still had a good time. I like the atmosphere at the commodore, even though its just a huge bar. Donovan has a sweet look going on. The guy played in some sort of tie died or acid washed jeans and some sort of pirate hat, while sporting a sweet 'stache. If you like jack j, donovan sounds quite similar. His music is pretty straight forward, simple lyrics with a catchy beat.
Just the other night I went to see Jose Gonzalez at Richards on Richards. The first two bands opening for him were strange. They were kind of obsessed with cats and other animal noises. They weren't bad when they just sang normally but they kept making weird random noises and using some pretty strange instruments. Jose was sweet though. Super mellow style, amazing guitarist with a cool sounding voice. The only song I knew going into this concert was his cover song 'heartbeats'. I only know it cuz its on that commercial on tv with those balls of color bouncing down the street. It turns out he's got a bunch of sweet songs, i still like heartbeats the best though. Its worth checking out if you haven't heard it.

Clivers

So I moved to Vancouver this summer to play as much beach vball as possible. So far it has been going really well. We play anywhere from 3-10 times during the week depending on the weather and our motivation levels and there are tournaments every weekend. Here in Van there are two organizations that put on tournaments on a regular basis. One is BCVA(British Columbia Volleyball Assoc.) and the other is KBVA (Kits Beach Vball Assoc.). The BCVA tourneys are generally average overall. They don't pay out very well and they are usually run a little strangely. They aren't too bad though because they do still attract 5-8 good teams on a regular basis. Their big Molson open tourney in July is the biggest tourney of the summer at Kits Beach and it pays out over 10'gs and attracts top players from around the country.

The KBVA tourneys are super sweet. They are run by living legend Jim Clive and are appropriately name 'Clivers'. Jim is a pretty sweet guy, he does a ton of work setting up these tourneys strictly because he loves the game. KBVA is a completely non-profit organization, its tournaments are put on by the players and for the players. Every penny that comes in from registration fees gets sent right back to the players in prize money. This makes for a decent size prize pool. The payout structure is well set up also, consolation side winners get paid as well as first to third on the winning side.
What really makes Clivers sweet is the atmosphere. Kits beach is a pretty sweet place to start with but it gets even sweeter on a beautiful summer day with a Cliver tourney going on. Even though the competition usually gets a little heated, the general atmosphere is a very chill and relaxed one. Everyone shows up between 8-9am for regsitration and right from the get go everyone is joking around and having a good time. The tournament goes on all day with the finals starting at around 6pm. Everyone from who plays in the tourney usually sticks around to watch the final and heckal the players and also to give props for good plays. Molson sponsors the tourneys, thanks to Rene Holt, so there are free beers for everyone during the finals. After the finals everyone usually hangs out at the beach for a bit, slams the last few beers, and heads to the Sunset Grill just up a block from the beach. At the Grill there is always a huge table reserved for us and the drinking continues.

Anyways, if you ever get a chance to play in a Cliver I would definitely recommend doing so.

So far out best result in the clivers are a 2^nd and a couple thirds. My goal is to win one by the end of the summer.

Master of Horror

Wow...quite the interesting first day of work! So I did my first day of work as an extra today. I showed up in the morning/afternoon (the ideal start time for me) and checked in to the 'extra holding tent'. The first thing they was go through the wardrobe that I brought to decide what I should wear. In the first scene I was a 'library patron'. They picked out my dress shirt and grey gap pants. Next up was 'hair and makeup'...ya...wtf...some chick did my makeup for me! Super weird experience. They then shipped me to the upstairs of the Vancouver Art Gallery (where the shoot was all taking place) to the library scene. My role in this scene was to walk towards the entrance of the libary carrying a butload of books and try to get in the way of the main actor in one of those akward-headfaking-can't-decide-which-way-to-pass moments and then exit the room. So i got some solid close up camera time in that shot. The lead actor in this show is the dude from Devil's Advocate who plays the pedophile that Keanu Reeves gets off in court in the beginning of the movie. He is a pretty weird guy. Anyways, we shot that scene like 8-10 times from numerous angles. Most of the time I spent chilling in a room upstairs with the other extras not in the scene at that exact moment. For the first half of the day I thought that I was on the set of the show '4400' because thats what our agency told us we were doing, but it turns out its some Horror series called Master of Horror. Everyone kept saying that there were supposed to be a bunch of sweet directors working on it. I have no idea though. I kept telling people it was the '4400'. Apparently the plotline of this episode is that the main guy has super hearing for some reason and he goes crazy because all the sounds being magnified drive him up the wall. By the end he gets so nuts that he cuts his own ears off and murders his wife...ya i dont know why he kills his wife.
Anyways the next scene we did was outside in the rain, except it wasn't raining. I changed wardrobe and arrived on the scene. They set up these water towers way up high on a crane and hooked them up to a fire hidrant to create a torrential downpoor. My role in this one was pretty boring. I just walked up and down this street from different spots about 200 times in the poring rain. Tony had his debue in this scene but he wasn't as fortunate as I was. I got to wear a raincoat and have an umbrella and was only in the rain for second at a time. Tony on the other hand had to walk his bike ( that he borrowed from brooks) up and down the street wearing only shorts and a shirt. He was the wettest guy on set by far.
Anyways i know i missing a ton of stuff but i'm fucking tired from standing in the rain for the past 3 hours. Overall it was a pretty surreal experience and i'm looking forward to doing it again.

Xtra Xtra!

So I finally found some sort of employment I haven't started yet but it sounds pretty sweet. Tony and I went down to a 'talent' agency the other day and dropped off applications. Two hours later they called back and said they have work for us! We are now doing what they call 'background' work on tv shows. We are professional extras, which means we are pretty much on call whenever they need people to stand around in the background of a scene. Tomorrow we are working on the '4400' show. The next day we might get on the showcase tv show called 'Street Huslters' where we will play street pimps in the background! I can't wait!
So next time you are watching tv, remember to pay attention to the people in background, you just might spot one of us!

Random Tuesday thoughts

Well not much has changed lately. Still unemployed... but haven't really been looking very hard lately. We took last week to get better on the beach and I think it helped. Today I returned to the job hunt though. Hit the pavement for at least 3 hours walking around dropping off resumes. If nothing comes out of this i'm going to be pissed!

So how bout the oil?!?! WTF! Could game one have gone any worse?? What is more deflating than blowing a 3-1 lead going into the third period, getting down, losing your star goaltender, catching up and then handing the game winning goal to the ugliest guy in the nhl.
How brutal was Bergeron in that game??

Anyways i'm off to the beach!