Enter The Dragon

Ladies and Gentlemen...
I am proud to introduce to you...
The newest member of the Taylor family...
Bruce Lee!


Those of you who are keeping up with our misadventures may recall Mikala mentioning the "moving centerpieces" from Anna's wedding the other weekend. Well, those centerpieces just happened to be the most adorable little Siamese Fighting Fish (hence the snappily monikered "Bruce").

These fish, also known as Betta fish, are pretty amazing. Here are a few Betta facts...

• Betta fish are the only pet fish that will recognise their owners face and swim up to it
• They can jump 3 inches out of the water to escape their bowls
• They change colour depending what mood they are in.
• They are carnivorous
  
• They HATE other Betta fish - that's why they are called Siamese Fighting Fish. Because they fight.

While Bruce was chillin' in his bowl at the wedding, our chum Andy (animator extraordinaire and most excellent creator of videogame Otsel, Daxter) pointed out that if you show a Betta fish its reflection it will go ape shit. The disclosure of this fishy factlet promptly preceded all the boys stealing the compacts from their ladies' handbags for a bit of fish-baiting while their better-halves went off to dance to Duran Duran.

Unfortunately Bruce's style, much like his namesake, was the art of fighting... without fighting. After a few minutes of trying to freak the fish out with mirrors a less labor-intensive plan was divised...


A piscine, gladiatorial arena! The three combatants actually got quite lary, changing colour and puffing their fins up like scaly little Chuck Norrises.

Anyway, as the evening came to a close, the partygoers tripped home (and I mean tripped) with their fish in hand (I don't mean that - the fish were in the bowls, Stupid.)

The next morning it dawned on Mikala and I that trying to board an aeroplane with a fish might be problematic given the ridiculous post-9/11 restrictions on fluids... It looked like Bruce was for the flush...

Fortunately we hatched a cunning plan worthy of Lord Blackadder himself. (Cue Mission Impossible theme music...)

1615 hours: Bruce is transfered from his bowl to a 1 liter Tupperware container
1630 hours: Mikala and I check in while Ninna looks after "the package"
1645 hours: The merchandise is transfered from the Tupperware to an Airport-approved fluids bag containing 100ml of water (the legally allowed maximum amount of any single fluid)
1650 hours: We explain to the nice customs officials that x-rays are lethal to small fish and that Bruce was a wedding present (well... he was a present and we did get him at a wedding)
1655 hours: After a thorough inspection by the mildy entertained customs staff we are waved through - fortunately one of the x-ray operators keeps Betta fish and even advised us to open the bag a bit as Bettas actually like to breathe air through their mouths (I shit ye not).
1700 hours: Mikala and I hot-foot it to the nearest baby-change and prep Bruce's Tupperware with room-temperature mineral water and fish conditioner
1705 hours: Bruce is safe in his watery mobile home
1800 hours: board plane and relax - phew!

Fortunately fish, unlike lobsters, do not explode at altitude. Thank Christ.

2200 hours (PST): Bruce touches down safely in Vancouver. Hurrah!


Anyway, Bruce is now happily ensconced in his bowl, atop our dining-room table enjoying a healthy diet of blood-worms and other such fishy delights.


Now where did I put that mirror...

Anna and Rahul's Big Fat Greek Wedding

My Best Friend got married in Toronto this weekend in what can only be described as a Big Fat Greek Wedding.The bride was 20 minutes late, the grumpy old priest rushed through the lovely Greek Orthodox ceremony (he had to, they'd booked like forty squillion weddings back to back), and the lovely couple made the mad dash to the white limo. Meanwhile...

....new husband and old ex of Mikala caught up outside. Al looking furrowed. Dan looking Dan-ish. Both looking sharp.

The reception was at a monster banquet hall, where Greeks jostled for space with Filipinos at the next wedding over. After the 1.5hour-long reception line (with Rahul doing Jager shots at the end of it with us) the wedding party-cipants were announced by the DJ. In danced Anna's sister Lydia and friend Cherilee to "Girls on Film" - a song, Lyd said, they'd chosen just for me.

And then there was the food. Thank Christos for Greeks and their food.

To complement the open bar were tables of antipasto, spanikopita, lamb meatballs, tzatziki, shrimp, pita, a separate saganaki flaming cheese bar, followed by filet mignon AND chicken dinner. At midnight came the most amazing pairing: the petit fours, cake and ROAST LAMB station. *burp*. During all this...
...me and my best girlfriends from uni Sher (L) and Jenell (R) caught up on what seemed like 40 years of history. Then came the speeches. Some were sweet, others funny, some bizarre. A fave moment? Besides Anna's sister Lydia counselling her new brother in law to stock up Midol (like Feminax), it was when Anna asked the assembled masses to show how many of us had had HER in their own wedding parties....and more than a half-dozen hands shot up. Always a bridesmaid, finally a fekkin' bride. :-)

The speeches were then followed by dancing. Man alive, was there a lot of dancing. Them Greeks can move! From the gorgeous couple's sashay, to Anna's parents cutting a rug Athens-style, the highlight was the dance by the astoundingly sexy beast Anna herself...... doing a Greek goddess waltz, which ended with her downing a shot of Ouzo that had been placed at her feet. Soon every Souvlakian in the house joined in. And then, as the wine soothed our souls, even us whiteys got involved...
...then the waiters came out waving sparklers....
...which was followed by the drunken "let's get all of us from Ryerson (our uni) together for a group shot" moment...
...which was then superbly capped off by the superb lime green ice fish. Of course! To which Anna proclaimed: "What the fuck is that?"

I haven't even mentioned the moving centrepieces (more on that in Dan's blog soon).

But in a word or two, it was fookin' fantastic. So let's raise a glass to the Greeky pipsqueak. My best friend, maid of honour and divine goddess, Anna and her it's-actually-awesome-how-much-I-like-the-guy husband, Rahul. Opa!

NOTE: Because we're all lushes and like a party, let's also raise a bottle to lovely and fabulous Andrea Lofthouse (now Garske!) who got married on the day after Anna's (or same day if you're considering the time difference), in Port Douglas Australia. We're sorry we couldn't make it, but we had ice (and real) fish to contend with. We wish you both all the extreme-sports-love in the world.

GroupieDar™ and How Timing is Everything

My first-year journalism professor Loren once said: "Mikala, you seem to have the knack of being at the right place at the right time."

Massey Hall is a venerable concert venue in Toronto and on August 13 played home to Crowded House's reunion visit to T.dot. It's also my old stomping grounds: I met Steve Earle, Andy Summers from the Police, The Mission, Erasure, David Sylvian (of Japan), Crowded House and countless of Canadian musicians here. I have great affection for this venue and my arse has graced its rusted stairwell near the stage door on many an occasion.

I was going to be in town that week (for my best mate's wedding) so picked up some tickets in advance. Now I just needed to pass some time before the gig. I sent mum on her way home from our shopping excursion, and thought about bimbling down the Box Office to collect my tix in advance and checked my watch.

Hmmm, sez I. "Sound-check o'clock".

Off I trundled and when I saw the tour bus, went round back, you know, for old time's sake. Chatted with the five earnest CH fans who were waiting to get their albums signed. "The band are inside and are not coming out for the rest of the night", one said to me.

I snorted. "No, no (pshaw). All you need to do is find a guy with a laminate - not a security guard, mind, because they can't do anything to help - and perhaps ask him to get the boys to come out. They may do." The guys were silent, waiting, hoping. Shy.I laughed as a guy with a laminate comes 'round the corner. "Excuse me, mate," I say, "if the guys are inside could you let them know that there are a just a few fans out here who'd love to get their stuff signed."

Roadie grunts. "Well, if you go round the corner, Neil Finn's standing right there."So I trundle around the corner like a Goth Pied Piper being followed by her band of meek mice. (Probably thinking "Who the hell is this girl in black and with shades?"). Sure enough, Neil Finn is outside, with his son Liam and I ask him if he'd spend a few minutes. Neil, being game, pops inside the tourbus but promises to come back, then apologizes for not being able to stay longer.

My timing, it has to be said, is pretty fucking excellent. I had been there all of five minutes.

I tell Neil that I'd seen a London Albert Hall show (a mere day after their original drummer Paul Hester - a kind and lovely man I've met several times - hung himself from a tree in Australia) and that it was beautiful ("Oh those. Those were intense"), that I'm going to see them again in Vancouver and did he still speak with Sebastian Steinberg (the most excellent bassist from Soul Coughing who I know)? Then I wave at the five patient boys behind me and say "would you mind signing these for these guys?". The boys inch up and the signing begins. Neil pops back in and it's a fait accompli.

My work here is done. I say goodbye to the grateful fans and wander to get my tickets and meet up with my loverly gig buddy (and CH afficionada) Candice.

Oh, and the show was excellent. Note how Neil Finn (above) was playing just for us. :-)

Pride (in the name of love)

It appears that living in Vancouver's "quiet" burb can't slow a good hag down.

After the gracious invitation of my lovely "cousin" Colin (my mum has known his mum for 40 years and he lives with a gorgeous man named Pieter), I was invited to celebrate the first night of Vancouver's Pride Weekend.

Vancouver, for those of you out-of-the-know, is pretty gay. It's a tiny village, but there's a gay YMCA of sorts (Denman Fitness), a huge Gay Pride parade (methinks 100K people showed up this past Sunday) and oh, the bus stops are painted fuschia on Davie St (the heart of the Friends of Dorothy village). It's about as camp as a row of pink tents.

Naturally, as I am missing some of my best gay mates (Paul, Contessa, take note), I greedily accepted a chance to go out on the town with Colin, Pieter and their impossibly high-powered and handsome mates.

Dan, bless 'im, took our visiting friends (Al, Fluffy John and Mayumi) to Subeez, Lucy Mae Brown and the El Furniture for dinner and drinks. I didn't want to burden our vistors with my enormous need for fag haggery. And we've learned that in Vancouver, you shouldn't turn down an invite.

So I rock up at Gay Central (Colin and Pieter's uber cool downtown apartment - it helps when one half of the couple is a designer), and meet all the other couples, husbands, husbands of husbands, boys in tight white, erm, wife-beaters, jeans, the works.

We drink champers, I make a joke about someone's sandals not being made BY small children, but OF small children, everyone laughs, deems me "outrageous and fabulous" and my induction is complete.

We head off to 1181 on Davie Street around 9ish and I marvel at the bar's superior design - it is, in fact, a tiny cramped bar with open areas (think a capital letter I) and a long, ass-grabbingly tight bar space, where the queens ponce up and down, showing off their trade.

Nice!

But trade indeed. I swear, for all the gay bars in all the world that I've been to (London, Toronto, Copenhagen, Essex ;-), I have never seen a more pretty, fit, fresh-faced, biceped group of handsome men in my life.

It didn't hurt that they were playing the latest French Rugby Team's video/porn on the back wall. Christ almighty.

Anyway, we drank, we cavorted, we were sorted...and then, get this, I ran into an advertising dude/media darling I knew of from Vancouver. Last time I set eyes on him? When I was doing a profile on his new agency some 10 years ago, for Canadian Business magazine. Pretty cool to see someone you know, somewhere you're not expecting it.

Of course, Advertising Homo knows everyone - and he looks fit doing it, too. And so I reintroduce myself. He praises me for my "long-term memory" and then flits away. Probably threatened by my boobs, but never mind.

And so, the evening continues. Until it is time that I, one of only six females in this impossibly gorgeous bar, headed home. To find Dan, John, Mayumi and Al, heating up a DVD - XMen 2. I snuggle in, safe in the knowledge that at least I've had a taste of the Pink....

....and it is good.