Another Hijacking - Will It Ever End?

I'm quite the hacker and hijacker!  Who knew this would be so easy?  I guess since I'm the ONLY ONE using this blog so far THIS YEAR, I can get away with it.

Below are a few photos taken in Griffintown which is one of my favorite spots in Montréal.  I only wish more of it still remained.

I'll take the credit for the photos....well no, I guess I can't.  Joe's name is on the blog and anyway, what kind of hacker signs her name?  Oops.....caught in the act.....

Jeesh!!... you leave a blog alone for  two years and someone  just marches right in and steals it! These were some photos I took in the Fall of 2012  a few months after the transformation had begun. I'm heading back next month to see what it looks like now.

Stolen Blog

I just HAVE to see some of Joe's latest photos on his blog so I've highjacked it.  Don't tell.......

Isn't this a beauty?  I just love it. 

Shhhh.

Life, Laughter and Paris

Paris in November

We generally go to Paris in the autumn.  I took these pictures in November 2007- a spectacular sunset over Place de la Concorde, so spectacular that even Parisians getting off the Metro stopped and stared.

But this year we're waiting until spring. I'd like to go in March to  see Tindersticks who'll be kicking off their European tour in Paris early that month. Tindersticks is a remarkable blend of melancholy, humour, beautiful orchestration  punctuated by Stuart Staples' wonderful baritone.

Related articles

• New Tindersticks Album, Tour in 2012 (obscuresound.com)

In An Abstract Mood

Remembrance Day

It's been a year since my last blog but I'm determined to do at the very least, a weekly posting from here on.

Remembrance Day is very much in my thoughts this morning. I'd missed the ceremony the past few years. This marked my first visit to the McGill University location. The bigger site attracted far more people than in the past at the cenotaph at Place du Canada. While it was heartening to see the large crowd, a mix of young and old, honour our veterans of  far too many conflicts, there's always of course a tinge of sadness to Remembrance Day. Let's hope we'll always feel that sense of sadness and regret, and always remember them.

Between City and Country

I'm an unabashed urbanite and I like my cities big! My wife Susan and I have been to Paris at least fifteen times with trips to New York mixed in every couple of years.

We haven't been to Paris for nine months and I'm feeling pangs of withdrawal but I do make occasional day trips (or longer) with camera in tow to some great choice locales in Quebec and Ontario trying to capture the landscape. A day or two in the country can recharge one's batteries and gives a photographer a chance to challenge himself to find something new in shooting a stream or pond he may have visited a hundred times before.

Chris Whitley (1960-2005) was a musician who also moved easily between urban and country. His discography includes solo guitar, full rock bands, jazz trios and sets with experimental German avant gardists. He'd cover songs by Lou Reed, Dylan, Muddy Waters, The Ramones, Kraftwerk and Eden Ahbez (Nature Boy) and everyone in between. We were fortunate to see him perform several times.

The sidebar video is Whitley's Living With the Law. Check out also the video for O God My Heart is ready.

Paris On My Mind

Perhaps it's because I saw a couple of interesting art exhibits today or maybe it was a passing scene or odor in the air but for whatever reason I can't get Paris out of my mind right now. We always go every Autumn but pressures of work may compel us to skip a year.

From the Artist's Book, Paris Eclectique, Joe Donohue 2005 -

I see a little girl running in the park

I can hear the music playing in the background,

feel the wind on my face and taste the rain.

I can see the light in the church apse,

smell the street on a sunny day.

I can sense the echoes of past conflicts

and in my mind's eye the history unfolds

and becomes real.

Paris is art and music,

long walks along the Seine

Shadows of the Marais and the glow

of the Champs Elysees.

I gaze upon the never ending spectacle

knowing

the memories will never fade.