Limes with Orange

I guess this will be a massive catch up post. First of all...

Shame on you, Mr. Harper, for breaking your original campaign promise of no early elections and for wasting Canada's time and money to get essentially the same minority government you had before. And shame on those Canadian voters who voted this liar back into office. But greater shame to those 40% of eligible voters who didn't bother to exercise their democratic right and so let this imbecile be voted back into office (though if you tried to vote but the new, under-publicized changes to voter identification resulted in you getting turned away from the polls, my apologies). Congratulations to Jack Layton for strengthening the New Democratic Party by eight seats! And now we'll see what happens to poor Dion. I don't blame him for losing the election. I blame Gerard Kennedy for making Dion leader of the Liberal Party in the first place. Dion's a good guy but lacks the charisma needed to oust Harper. So I'll wager that Ignatieff will end up the next Liberal leader, which was the expected result last time. Though I've still got my fingers crossed that it will be Bob Rae.

But enough about the Canadian election, now let's hope the Americans choose more wisely!

The imagineNATIVE Film + Media Festival is a bit of a blur to me. Participating in the pitch workshop and session were great (Deborah Day's workshop was a truly positive experience) and very educational (with the pitch session a crashing-down-to-earth reminder that my artistic sensibility isn't really broadcast friendly) but I did end up missing a lot of screenings because I was so focused on my pitch. (But I got to see "Before Tomorrow," the film by the Arnait Collective from Nunavut, and I highly recommend it. And I think my favourite film from the experimental program that "Coda" screened in had to be "Alice Eaton," a rather gothic flavoured film that used highly-stylized characters from Alice in Wonderland as inspiration to tell the story.) Next time I go to imagineNATIVE, I'd still like to have a film screening but I'll be glad to have more free time and get more involved in the festival. And don't get me started talking about how great it was to be back in Toronto, otherwise I'll start waxing rhapsodic about the food (and there might be drool, which would not be pretty).

My older cat has been quite sick and requiring what feels like constant treatment (but I think it’s more like constant worry) so all of my "free time" and "extra money" has been focused on her lately (I felt it necessary to use the quotation marks since I rarely feel that I have time or money to excess anyway). I almost didn't go to imagineNATIVE because I was so worried about leaving her. As it was, she threw a small blood clot the day after I got back which convinced me that I'm not leaving her again until things change. I anticipate that my resulting hibernation will continue until either her condition improves or she needs to be put down (which will then, undoubtedly, result in a different kind of hibernation). Oh and for those who are keeping track, this current state of affairs had an "interesting" effect on my pitch session at the film festival... when I got to the euthanasia scene in my pitch, I had to struggle to maintain composure (which I then proceeded to lose seconds later anyway... *sigh*). Oh well, at least it shows I’m "connected" to the material, right?

And that's the kind of day... er... several weeks... it’s been.

Labels: animals, film, harper bashing, politics