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Great Atlantic Canadian Trainventure!

As I posted on the social networks earlier tonight, Dara and I will very soon be commencing the formal planning of the Great Atlantic Canadian Trainventure! We are looking at a rough range of dates from July 21st through August 7th, as that’s about as much time off as I can spare and still account for Norwescon and for the minor oral surgery I have to have in May. (It’s a dental thing, and no real big deal, but I need to take a day off for it.)

We will be targeting arriving in St. John’s in Newfoundland on the 2nd so we can be there in time for the festival to start on the 3rd, and we’ll come home on the 6th, and I’ll take the 7th to get over being jetlagged and to decompress from OMG 2 1/2 weeks in Canada. :D

And that, O Internets, means that depending on when Dara and I can catch a train from Vancouver to Toronto, we will be arriving in Toronto somewhere between the 24th and 26th of July! We want to visit people in the Toronto area (including userinfocow and possibly also userinfoeeyorerin), but also to make bonus stops in Montreal and Moncton! So if you’re in any of these places OR within shouting distance of St. John’s, and you’d like to meet a couple of friendly and musical Cascadian elfchicks, I want to hear from you! Let me know if I should factor you into my plannings!

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Festival du Bois in Maillardville, BC, 3/3/2012

Day 3 of my and Dara’s Grand Four-Day Weekend of Marriage and Music was Festival du Bois!
I wanted to go to this pretty much as soon as I found out that there was an entire festival of French Canadian and Acadian music going on the very same weekend we were coming up for Le Vent–and, of course, it made utter sense that the concert was being held in conjunction with the festival in question! We wound up only going on Saturday instead of both days, but nonetheless, the one day turned out to be quite fun indeed.
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Anna and Dara get Canada-married, 3/2/2012

This being Part 2, and the biggest part by far, of my and userinfosolarbird‘s Grand Four Day Weekend of Marriage and Music!

Though that said, it was also actually one of the simplest days of the entire weekend. Here’s the thing, O Internets: if you’ve read Elfquest, you’ll know what I mean when I say that Dara and I got as close as you can get in real life to Recognition, and we went from 0 to lifemates in pretty much no time flat. For us, there’s no particular difference between that and being legally married. This entire affair therefore was a lot more about just reinforcing the legal status as far as Canada (and hopefully soon by extension, the state of Washington) was concerned, as opposed to any real change in status between us as far as we are concerned.

So I hope I won’t disappoint any of you all when I say that this was the most relaxed and groovy wedding ceremony ever! We didn’t dress up, and we didn’t exchange rings–though we probably would have done the latter if Dara didn’t have an issue with rings that keeps her from wearing them (she gets a mild claustrophobia reaction off of them).

Here’s how the whole thing went!

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Le Vent du Nord at St. James Hall in Vancouver, 3/1/2012

As you know, O Internets, I was extremely eager for my first Le Vent Du Nord show. I’ve been getting ridiculous amounts of glee out of listening to their albums and watching their YouTube videos, and of course, I had the challenge laid down by fellow Le Vent fan Susan that in her considered opinion, Le Vent gives much better concerts than Great Big Sea! Which, of course, is a mighty challenge indeed to issue to this passionate Great Big Sea fangirl. And so, the question of the hour is: how did Le Vent do?

Let’s put it this way. I ain’t saying I’m throwing over The Doyle for Simon Beaudry, when it comes down to Most Favored Bouzouki Player Who Isn’t Dara–but I will say it’s a damn fine thing that I have room in my heart for all manner of joyous music. And love my B’ys as I do, they better be bringing their A game when they go back on tour next year, because the show Le Vent put on for us in Vancouver shot straight up to stratospheric levels of awesome, and it will be extremely hard to top.

I hadn’t been to a GBS show that tiny since they stopped playing the Showbox in Seattle, and the level of energy they let loose was every bit the rival of those earlier GBS shows. Le Vent might not have the same sheer physicality that the B’ys do; they don’t bounce around the stage the same way at all. But that’s every bit of quite all right, because all the energy they didn’t spend bouncing came right out their instruments. They were charming and funny, especially Réjean Brunet. Simon’s singing is a direct threat to the structural integrity of my knees. Olivier Demers does amazing things with his fiddle, especially given the amazing things he does at the same time with his feet. And Nicolas Boulerice? That man commands a room with his voice, and when he unleashed a solo that caused Dara to use the phrase “bitchin’ metal hurdy-gurdy solo”, he was channelling lightning.

But that’s just the picoreview! This being a patented Anna the Piper In-Depth Concert Squeefest, let me get into the details!

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Le Vent du Nord concert sneak peek

The full extended play by play concert blog post is on the way, O Internets, but until I get back to my computer and can write it up properly (with pics because OH MY YES got some), let me share with you some prominent highlights!

  1. Dara being stunned to be able to use the phrase “bitchin’ metal hurdy-gurdy solo”
  2. Serious La Danse Verticale once the second set started and the show’s host and the band themselves started encouraging people to come up and dance
  3. Dancing with my girl, and singing along, while Simon Beaudry sang “Écris-moi”!
  4. I had a Cunning Plan come to fruition when the band came back out for the encore, and sang “Vive l’amour” for me and Dara and and ! And Dara was all “what did you do?!” and I chirped “Surprise!” and then OMG champagne showed up, because fellow Le Vent fan Susan is made ENTIRELY OF AWESOME.
  5. And because M. Olivier Demers is also made entirely of awesome from his mighty fiddling hands down to his stompy, stompy feet, I made a point of going over to thank him to his face for the band’s participation in the aforementioned Cunning Plan! And he gave me and Dara and maellenkleth all hugs and the very French air kiss to each cheek!

Stand by for the full report in technicolor glory on Sunday!

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2012 Book Log #9: Richard Castle’s Deadly Storm, by Brian Michael Bendis and Kelly Sue DeConnick

Richard Castle's Deadly Storm: A Derrick Storm Mystery (Derrick Storm, #1)

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

As any good fan of the TV show Castle knows, Nikki Heat is by no means Richard Castle’s first famous character. The show starts off with his concluding his long-running Derrick Storm series, and the particular explosive ending he gives those books is a nice little character development point for Castle since it leads right into why he tags along with the NYPD. And given the success of the Nikki Heat tie-in novels, it was pretty much inevitable that additional material involving Derrick Storm would be eventually made available to us fans. This time around, though, they’ve elected to give us a graphic novelization of the “first Derrick Storm novel”.

It’s a clever choice, and certainly provides some nice variety for the Castle tie-in material as well as general versimilitude–since quite a few well-known authors in SF have graphic novelizations of their work going, such as Jim Butcher and Richelle Mead. But the important question is, as a graphic novel, does Richard Castle’s Deadly Storm work?

Art-wise, it will probably surprise no one who glances through this work that Derrick Storm comes out looking suspiciously Nathan-Fillion-esque. Other than that, I vacillated between quite liking several panels and being indifferent to several others, so I ultimately came out uncertain if I liked the art style. Story-wise, I was definitely ambivalent. It read like a truncated version of a meatier story–certainly, given the overall style of the Nikki Heat novels, this seemed much jerkier of pacing by comparison. And while this might only add to the versimilitude of a “graphic novel adaptation”, it nonetheless left me wishing I’d actually gotten a novel version of this story instead.

All in all if you’re enough of a Castle fan to be a completist, you might want to pick this up. Otherwise, for now, the Nikki Heat novels are actually more amusing. Two stars.

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2011 Book Log #46: The Thirteenth House, by Sharon Shinn

The Thirteenth House

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When I read Sharon Shinn’s first book in her Twelve Houses series, I found it a bit shaky in its initial chapters, at least till it got its feet under it. I was very pleased to discover that I had no such problem with Book 2, The Thirteenth House.

This book continues the adventures of the overall cast of characters established in Mystic and Rider as they pursue the greater plot arc of anti-magic sentiment sweeping their kingdom and threatening to plunge them all into outright war. However, the focus shifts now from Senneth and Tayse over to the shapeshifter Kirra, whose participation in the rescue of their king’s kidnapped regent, Lord Romar, leads to a stormy affair with said regent. The catch: Romar is married, and Kirra is impersonating her own half-sister. Between that and Kirra’s need to keep her true identify and her talents secret, the affair is perilous to them both. Kirra’s soon swamped in intrigue–and comes under the threat of the ringleaders of the growing potential rebellion.

Overall I liked this book quite a bit, despite the fact that as a character, Kirra is definitely more flawed than Senneth. She’s impulsive to a fault, and at first this is frustrating. Yet she did well riding the line between “I want to smack her for her choices” and “I am nonetheless sympathizing with her”, and she shows some admirable development when faced with the consequences of her actions. (Even as she’s ultimately forced into a difficult and ethically shady choice indeed, about which I shall not elaborate, because spoilers.)

I did also like Romar, and was relieved to see that Shinn did not go the too-easy route of making his wife unlikeable. Some readers may find the fact that Kirra’s carrying on with a married man ethically shady all by itself; if you’re one of those readers, this book won’t be for you. But for what it’s worth, I did appreciate that Shinn didn’t make it easy on either character.

On the bigger level of the overall story arc, I liked the advancements in this one quite a bit. After I finished this one off as a library checkout, I went ahead and committed to buying the series, and I’ll look forward to finishing them off. For this one, four stars.

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A modest announcement :)

For those of you who have not already seen this breaking across Facebook, Google+, or Twitter tonight, userinfosolarbird and I would like to announce that on March 2nd, we will be getting a Canadian marriage license!

We were already planning this before today’s Washington state law signed by Governor Christine Gregoire. In fact, we are planning this as part of a Grand Four-Day Weekend of Marriage and Music, starting off with seeing these handsome boys perform on the night of March 1st! On March 2nd, Dara and I (and two other friends of ours who I will not identify publicly so as to respect their privacy, but who will be joining us for a dual ceremony) will be taking the appropriate steps to get legally married in Canada! On March 3rd, we will have yet more music as we attend Festival du Bois!

Mad props to userinfogerimaple who has very kindly agreed to put Dara and me up for the weekend!

I have been asked as well if Dara and I are planning anything with the new law being passed in Washington state. To this, I note that to the best of our knowledge, if we are legally married in Canada, then that will count in the state of Washington–assuming that the law is not shot down in November. So for now we will be focusing on Canadian marriage fun, and getting in a boatload of awesome Quebecois music to go with it. :D

And! And! And! This being my and Dara’s 25th year of being together, there’s a whole extra layer of anniversarial awesomeness to celebrate here as well! So if you’re so inclined, raise a jar on March 2nd and think of us!

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Album review: N2, by Norouet

Here’s something I’ve come to learn in my explorations of current Quebecois trad bands: Éric Beaudry is apparently in half of them, or at least so it seems! And given my rapidly growing respect for Monsieur Beaudry’s musical prowess, this is as far as I’m concerned all to the awesome.
I’ve found references to him being in four bands to date. La Bottine Souriante and De Temps Antan I’ve already found and fallen in love with, but M. Beaudry is also involved with the bands Norouet and Ni Sarpe Ni Branche. Those two groups aren’t as high profile as La Bottine and De Temps Antan, so their music is harder for us in the States to find–but happily, Norouet’s album N2 is on iTunes and CD Baby.
“Norouet”, or so the Googles inform me, is slang for a northwesterly gale. It’s an excellent word, very much capturing the energy of the band while falling delicately upon the ear. This seeming contradiction of a gale and delicacy captures my overall impression of N2 as an album, as well.
N2 slants heavily instrumental, with over half the tracks being entirely without vocals. This is not a bad thing, though initially I found it a bit odd that their overall (instrumental, at least) sound reminds me a lot more of Solas or Altan from Celtic/Irish music than other Quebecois bands that boast M. Beaudry among their members. The distinct lack of footwork on several of the tracks throws me off, since I’ve trained my ear to listen for that now!
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