Bottles, Gigs, and Snot

A viscious head cold has had me using vast amounts of tissue this week and fighting the urge to take the power drill to my sinuses.

Okay, I feel a rant coming on....I got a notice in my recycling box about wine bottles no longer belonging there from my friendly neighbourhood waste disposal agent. I'm thinking that we could save our municipalities a whole lot of money by eliminating recycling altogether. Half the big garbage trucks on the road, too - that will help traffic and the environment. And our provincial government has already started the process; they just need to continue it. Whenever you buy a newspaper, you should pay, let's say, a quarter deposit on it. When you are done, bring it back to the store - who will be obligated to recycle it - and get the quarter back. When you buy a can of beans, another quarter. Bring back the empty can to the grocery store and get it back. If you buy something packaged in cardboard, maybe a fifty cent deposit, a loonie if it's big like a TV, and then bring it back to Future Shop to get the loonie back. (Although, if my plan was to mirror the government's, you'd return Future Shop cardboard to Leon's, Loblaws bean cans to A&P, newspapers bought at 7-11 to Mac's, but hey, I'm not as forward thinking as our MPP's).
Does anyone else see this bottle thing as stupid? Does anyone out there NOT put their wine bottles in the recycling bin already? Great move, Dalton McGinty. And when election time comes and we ask what you did, we'll have this plan and falacious statistics about hospital wait times for specific proceedures and more slanted numbers about educational improvements and class sizes (40 students in a class isn't too high, is it Dalton? And who names their kid Dalton? The only Daltons I've heard of were the Dalton Gang in the Old West and they robbed people....hey wait...let me think about that for a second....)
I'm Bill Needle, for SCTV.

Gigs last weekend went well. More studio stuff keeps coming up for me. Kris Myles, a KW troubadour has asked me about recording with him in March, the Butcher project continues to simmer, Kevin Coates is looking at going into a local studio here, and work on Alysha's material with Toronto producer Gary LaBarr continues.

Off to a gig in Waterloo now. Hope my mucus behaves itself.

Nod

Snow Dog is victorious

The snow is here!!!!

I get today off from school....but will spend most of it shovelling, it looks like.

People always talk about the weather; it is a universal topic everyone uses, stranger or friend. Neighbour can talk with neighbour about it, millionaire with welfare recipient, priest with satanist, everyone has common ground with the weather. You can talk to your best friend about it or converse with someone you secretly despise and it's still all good. The weather....always topical, neutral and never awkward...I nominate you for topic of the day. It'll be -20 tonight with more snow, by the way...

I digress....again...

Second semester is starting up at school. I lent one of the newer teachers my course binder for a class I'm teaching this semester and it has disappeared...very annoying. Lots of work was in there! My classes seem pretty good, but the honeymoon isn't over, yet.

This weekend is a crazy one for music - I thought I'd have less of them now that I'm down to two bands. Thursday I rehearse with Alysha, Friday I gig with Kevin, Saturday I gig with Alysha in Orangeville, and Sunday is another pre-recording session with the producer of Alysha's next project.

Now, it is Valentine's Day (if you were not aware of this, you are in big trouble) and so I am posting my favourite love poem, dedicated to Sandra, of course:

A Drinking Song

WINE comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That's all we shall know for truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift the glass to my mouth,
I look at you, and sigh.
- William Butler Yeats

We bottled some wine for the wedding last night, so this poem is perhaps even more appropriate on this Valentine's Day.

I hope you have a good one!

Peace. Out.

Nod