Category Archives: Travel

US military makes, breaks amnesty deal

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I guess we’ll be getting used to hearing those funny accents around Vancouver again. Ah, everything old is new again!

“My enemy isn’t foreign now. It’s domestic.”

Kyle SnyderAWOL American military personnel, fearing redeployment to Iraq, have observed with frustration as the amnesty and discharge deal reached by 23-year-old Kyle Snyder was apparently disregarded once the soldier had surrendered himself at Fort Knox as per the agreement.

The AP via the Guardian has the full report.

“They’re not going to win the hearts and minds like that,” said Glass, 24, who signed on with the Indiana National Guard in 2002…

“Nobody’s going to come back from Canada anymore,” said James Fennerty, a Chicago-based attorney who represents Snyder and other AWOL soldiers.

Several soldiers who went to Canada have said they don’t want to return to Iraq. Sgt. Patrick Hart, who deserted the Fort Campbell, Ky.-based 101st Airborne Division in August 2005, a month before his second deployment, said he felt misled about the reasons for the war.

“How can I go over there if I don’t believe in the cause? I still consider myself a soldier, but I can’t do that,” said Hart, a Buffalo, N.Y., native who served more than nine years in the military.

“The whole story behind it, it all feels like a big lie,” Glass said. “I ain’t fighting for no lie…”

Some are seeking refugee status in Canada. Hart, who was joined in Toronto by his wife and their 3-year-old son, served time in Bosnia in the early 1990s, became a reserve, then went to Iraq after returning to active duty. The idea of returning to the United States is appealing to Hart, because he would like to see family and friends.

“I could see going back under some kind of amnesty program or something like that,” Hart said. “But I don’t trust them. My enemy isn’t foreign now. It’s domestic.”  

Donald Rumsfeld, kung fu master

Camp Crystal Lake: seasons in the sun, serial killers in the shadows

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welcome to camp jellyjamFrom Duct Tape and Rouge, via Defamer, even though I’m still mad at them, dammit. Okay, so they read BoingBoing too; that doesn’t mean I didn’t send them the Brian Atene 2.0. Remember that Star Trek where the green Batgirl recites a piece, saying “I wrote that yesterday” and her boyfriend yells “It’s Shakespeare, and he wrote it centuries ago!” to which she both rightfully and indignantly replied, “that doesn’t mean that I didn’t write it yesterday!”

Quite right, too.

Here is Camp Crystal Lake‘s post-season debrief, with an emphasis on increasing camper retention by decreasing the Gory Death Quotient.

With November’s cold weather quickly approaching, we’re once again faced with the end of another camping season here at Camp Crystal Lake. This will be the last newsletter until next March when we begin the staffing process for our summer camp programs. I’d like to thank our Cheerleader Camp!camp counselors for a job well done. As always, I’d like to use this final letter to talk about the things that worked this past year and also to address some possible changes we can make to make next season that much more successful and enjoyable…

Try to decrease employee turnover rate by 10%
While I love to hire new people for our camp counselor program each year, I would love to see some of our older counselors take a more proactive approach in pursuing a career with Camp Crystal Lake. At the beginning of the summer, I really felt like one of our counselors, Adam, was going to do great things with us well into the future, but sadly, he took his own life after a canoeing session by pinning himself against a tree and twisting his own head around 360 degrees. Of the remaining counselors, the ones who weren’t murdered are currently in therapy to help them cope with watching their peers get slaughtered like cattle. I went ahead and told some of them to stay in touch if they are looking for future employment, but I’m not banking on anything there since I really don’t know a lot about the duration of that kind of therapy.

Operation Global Media Domination: i luv Brian Atene

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TIAAnd also Steve Carrell and Stephen Colbert. But me wuvs Brian Atene best of all. Why? Check it out! I may have momentarily gone down six hundred thousand places on Technorati thanks to switching from raincoaster.wordpress.com to raincoaster.com, but I am #1 on Google when you’re looking for a horrific trainwreck of a video audition for Stanley Kubrick (CUE-brick!). It’s really just a matter of time until the G-gle catches on to the second in the series, Brian Atene 2.0: Good Day Mr. Kubrick 2006!

In related famewhoredom news, I applied for a job at Gridskipper, although my current state of penury precludes travel on anything grander than the Seabus, so wish me luck. Somebody’s been checking my Gawker Comments, so go me! Is that “break a keyboard?” Although I debate whether it was smart of me to give them the link to the tag “Operation Global Media Domination but not the one to Travel“. Live and learn; they can, presumably, operate a sidebar.

Also, got links on two pretty darned impressive sites this week. Not only are they among the Technorati darlings, but they’re readable besides, and Pharyngula is almost entirely focused on Squid and politics. Believe me, it’s extremely tempting to reference every single post in that one, but so far I’ve restricted myself to the Cthlhu license plate and the Octoporn. I am itching, however, to do something on the Mystery Blob from the Fjord that Time Forgot…all in good time, all in good time. Full disclosure: I am the one that dropped the link in the comments section (Blog Pimping 101) but in that case I had to link to my blog because the damn computer was overloaded and wouldn’t let me go to YouTube directly. I hope the vid worked for them.

Ace of Spades is the second new blog to give me a link, and they picked the Brian Atene 2.0 update. There’s no way that is the real Brian Atene, but we can only hope he grew up to be that funny. When is Defamer going to catch on to this? I emailed them days ago, dammit! When is Defamer going to say thanks?

In other news, posting is going to slow right down around here, because I am SICKSICKSICK (yeah, what else is new? Har, har) and tomorrow I have to take a teenager to Fright Night at the PNE, thanks to wrobitaille from Waiterblog Forum, who just up and gave me free tickets, cuz that’s how he rolls, yo. At least if I barf I can blame it on the icky zombies.

Wish me luck.

jackbooted Chinese authorities finally get SOMETHING right

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don't expect these two to be hugging soonThey’re arresting the street hug thugs.

Reuters via Fark

Chinese appear not to have warmed to a “free hugs” campaign aimed at cheering up strangers by hugging them on the street, with some huggers even being hauled away by police for questioning, media said Monday.

The campaign hit the streets of Beijing, Changsha and Xian this weekend, with participants opening their arms to embrace passers-by and brandishing cards saying “free hugs,” “care from strangers,” “refuse to be apathetic,” the Beijing News said…

“Though some people refused (to be hugged), I hugged 20 people in one minute,” one girl was quoted as saying.

The Free Hugs campaign started in Australia and gained fame with a music video this year.

Well that explains it; any woman who’s ever been in a bar with Aussies knows they can’t keep their hands to themselves. They probably promised those Chinese Hug Thugs free work visas in exchange for promiscuous stranger-fondling.

Go Team Authoritarian Crackdown! They must never reach our fair shores.

fundraiser at Rare and Welcome to the blogroll Urban Diner

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happy meals from happy chefs (oh god, if they see this caption I'm toast!)Background on the event is here.

 The MC: Tamara Taggart, CTV

The Music: Adam Woodall

The chefs:

  • Robert Belcham (C, Fuel)
  • Brian Fowke (Rare One)
  • Sean Heather (The Irish Heather, Salt, Pepper)
  • Colin Johnson (Parkside)
  • Neil Wyles (Hamilton Street Grill)

The catch:

  • All local ingredients
  • All items made from ingredients procured the same day

The menu:

  • Champagne & canapes
  • cauliflower & truffle shooter
  • pumpkin ravioli • beurre noisette emulsion • amarettini-sage crumble
  • fenel risotto • neon squid • malt-cured oak-smoked bacon
  • duck soup • black beluga lentils & evergreen organic autumn vegetables
  • butter-sauteed sablefsh • tarragon • chantrelles & porcini • apple puree
  • Blue Goose organic beef • Dungeness mashed potatoes • red wine reduction
  • Okanagan apples five ways • Gala • Ambrosia • Granny Smith
  • local cheeses & charcuterie

Thanks to my good friends and sugar-daddy and -mommy Raj Taneja and Nina Sohi I was able to get to this, the finest meal I have had in many years. I’m cross-posting this from the Waiterblog forum because I am A) sick and B) lazy, and because I want to welcome Waiterblog‘s parent site Urban Diner to the blogroll. Like you didn’t know both of those fun facts about me already! But I’m already running into problems, as I imagine much of social and single Vancouver will be (before the latte hits) trying to keep my synapses routing me through the Urban Jungle of Urban Mixer, Urban Diner, and Urban Fare. We need a new word, yo, for verily, we are easily confused.

the glamourous aftermath

It was a fantastic event. Tamara Taggert was an enthusiastic and friendly emcee, and every one of the silent auction items was sold. The event raised a truly useful sum for a very good cause, and it was, quite frankly, the best meal I have had in years, course after course of it. An example: I could happily dine on the pumpkin ravioli with beurre noisette daily until June. The wines were up to the same rarified (ha!) standard, and were an education in themselves: I thought I didn’t like Chardonnay! The matchings were outstanding, and the Muscat comes in for special mention.

A big shout out to the Urban Mixers Nina Sohi, who bought me a ticket, and Raj Taneja, who bought me wine, for lo I am way poor; without these two I would never be able to sample the delights of a meal like this. I just had to get that out of my system.

Tina looked beautiful, and it added so much to the evening to have her there. Neil and Brian should have their own tv show: why not cut out the middle man? And it was delightful to share a table with Tara and her friend (whose name escapes me…did I mention the wine?).

neon squid, baby!

Trivia for fans of the Neon Squid: It’s actually a flying squid! It was marvelous, of course.

Tina’s family will now be able to hire a full-time nanny, enabling her to devote her vitality to fighting both the disease of breast cancer and the side-effects of aggressive chemotherapy, which can be dangerous and draining in themselves.