cyan's Journal: Everything is Under Control

So I had the pleasure of attending an Edmonton Symphony Orchestra concert last night. It was titled "A Night in Vienna", which I found to be slightly amusing, having actually been to Vienna in person. To anyone thinking of going to Paris, *forget all that* and go to Vienna instead. It's a really classy city without so much of the tacky tourism.

The nice thing about "A Night in Vienna" is that the symphony played a whole range of melodic pieces: polkas, waltzes, and various other dances. I really, really dig this stuff, and it reminded me of why I love the symphony so much. Really, I should just bite the bullet and buy season tickets. See, most folks go to hockey games. I go to the symphony.

Andrew Wan was the night's star solo violinist, playing a violin circa 1740. We've all read enough fantasy books to know about that one legendary sword or whatever, that special item from generations long gone that causes us to be overwhelmed with rapture. Don't worry, folks, we still have that sort of thing in the modern world. It was right there on stage in front of me in the form of a violin from 1740. And let me tell you, this thing *sang*. It sung loud and clear, straight from the 18th century. Mozart's Serenade No. 7 now has a special place in my heart because of that violin and Mr. Wan. It was *that* impressive.

I brought a date along with me to the symphony, and she's never been before. It's pretty tough to impress a woman with the symphony these days, and while most people would probably suggest that I don't have my priorities straight, or that I'm a little behind the times, I just don't care. Taking a date out to the symphony used to be one of the classiest things you could do for a date, and I'd like to think that the tradition continues in some respect, especially in Vienna. What's a guy to do?

Oh, and I don't know what the deal is with women and heels. You know, if you don't know how to wear heels, it's okay. You don't have to wear them on my account. I certainly won't care (nor notice the difference) if you just wear pumps or something.

Anyway.

Afterwards, I went home and checked out the freshly released Breakpoint 2009 invitation. In sharp contrast to the smooth melodies of the ESO, the group mfx gives us an in-your-face, ugly demo reflective of the current economic climate. The style of the message was distinctly dystopian ("War is Peace", "Freedom is Slavery", "Ignorance is Strength", "Big Brother is Watching You"), combined with epilipsy-inducing flash visuals of soldiers and closed circuit cameras followed by more messages delivered propaganda-style: "Consuming is Creativity", "Art is Terrorism", "Innovation is Cancer", "DRM is Freedom." All this while a hard, bass-heavy techno/industrial soundtrack rolls on. As you can imagine, I was rather pleased.

So, I take possession of a 1993 Jeep tomorrow morning. Manual transmission, five speed, with 230,000 kilometers on the odometer. My first trip is to Fort Saskatchewan to drop off the vehicle's previous owner (so that he can pick up his new car). Then, I'm off to Vegreville, a little town 100km east of Edmonton that I haven't been to since I was about eight years old. I still remember the entire town layout in my head, so it should be interesting to see what's still there, and what isn't. I'll be sure to take some photos and report back. I'll be going via Highway 15 (Scotford, Lamont, Chipman, Hilliard, Mundare), which is the long way around, but I've never been up there, nor to any of those respective towns. Call me curious. Going back to Edmonton will be via the Yellowhead.

I'm also driving to Grande Cache next week, to visit Stephen/Samael and his cohort. By that time, I should have an APRS tracker installed in the Jeep, so you can watch my driving progress, on the net, in realtime. Hopefully, I'll be able to stop in at some interesting pawn and thrift shops in Edson and Hinton. Here's to hoping that they haven't been picked entirely clean by video game collectors.

Oh, and I've got a Lenovo Ideabook S10e on the way, too. I've always had an obsession with small laptops, and the current 'netbook' craze means nothing but good news for me. I just wish the screen resolution was a tad better. Is 720p too much to ask?

But I completed Disgaea 3 last week, bought Street Fighter IV, and stocked up the fridge with Clamato. Yeah, life's pretty good.