Morning Brew: August 1, 2008

Monday is B.C. Day, so, uh... long weekend! The Straight has got your festival linkfest. But if you're not aching for another street festival (Wow, Vancouverites still can't walk and, check, dippin' dots are still inedible. Ok, maybe the Jamaican Festival sounds fun...) you could go out to Abbostford and check out/sabotage the North West Skydive Boogie. There'll be "dual plane formations of up to 30 people along with high speed landings." High speed landings? Well, I suppose hurling yourself out of a plane and into the dirt is a fitter way to celebrate B.C than street sushi or homoerotic exhibitionism.

And while we're talking Pride Parade; I'm sorry I didn't link to it earlier, but I hope all my neighbors have already placed their orders at Pride Pup, so all those pugs are properly decked out come Sunday. I'm totally ordering some stuff to flesh out my (most certainly hidden) hipster cache. Who needs a V-neck or shitty beer when you've got a sweet ironic barrette?

So Translink put on their dictator hat and decided we'll be building a new, tolled Pattullo bridge. Whatever, I sincerely hope we're not all driving this much in ten years time.

Meanwhile, the combination of that rock slide and the five-hour drunken drive to Pemberton makes it pretty obvious we need to figure out how we're going to confidently get the masses to Whistler and back come 2010. People were already pretty pissed last weekend and they had Tom Petty & Jay Z waiting for them. All those Olympic fools have on the other end is twiggy guys in spandex and bobsled replays. Meh, I'd rather sit in my car with the radio and cheap beer anyway.

'Plan A' will change the face of Abbotsford. You know what'll really change the face of Abbotsford? When we're all forced to relocate there thanks to rising tides. Dudes better open up one of those cupcake joints stat...

Yaletown is the sexiest place in Canada. Definitely helps when all life in Yaletown amounts to for most is a neverending plight to look "sexier". Suckin' back caffeine and walkin' the dog while debating how best to maintain that cardboard-cutout look; maybe taking the occasional break to bitch about how difficult said image-driven life is, "network," order a protein shake, fill out a survey...

An American coffee chain called Starbucks posted its first quarterly loss ever. Did you know the first Starbucks outside of Seattle opened in Vancouver? And here's another one of those eerie slices of web-life for you: the unofficial company layoff thread: life after Starbucks? But don't cry too hard, since they're officially keeping those breakfast sandwiches! You know you'll be back when R&D puts the finishing touches on that zero-carb Egg Nog latte (only $8.99 and 16 grams of protein!) Is there such a thing as life after Starbucks? If so... take me there.

B.C. plans to legislate the CanLit content of its high school English courses. I'm with Bookninja on this one: sounds like an effort to support the industry more than anything. Any teacher with his head screwed on would be impelled to show their students that Canucks produce great art... but forcing them to read a quota of Canadian writing won't do anything to help foster an already waning interest in literature, nor do anything to help enliven the staid world of mainstream Canadian Lit.

Read about the scary backroom deal between ISPs and Record Companies in the UK that might actually have an impact on online piracy.

Black Mountain has been added as a "special guest" to The New Pornographer's Stanley Park Singing Exhibition. Will they be like that one kid at the party who shows up late and spikes the punch with acid? Newman's all slipping coasters under drinks, Bejar's stoned and on the couch playing 'Rock Band' while Andrew Bird sips wine and tries to turn it all into a poem... this is too much fun.

I'm gonna refrain from making any jokes about not being able to keep their pants on (...oops), but the Pride society is hosting the Koodo's Big Night Out Davie Street Party tonight. Sounds like fun and all, but I think I'll be fleeing Davie for the Faunts/Clips show at the Sweatshop.

A Good Summer to Stay Inside also opens tonight at the LES Gallery, and looks worth a visit.

Saturday night: Japanese experimental pop artist Shugo Tokumaru is probably worth seeing as part of the Powell Street Festival. Check out the video for his song 'Parachute'. There's also Basketball & Secret Mommy at the Peanut Gallery, or Better Than Nothing has Japandroids at the Astoria if you're into that kind of thing.

Am I the only one a little surprised by the amount of intelligent people whining about the loss of Scrabulous? Get a board and 'socialize' with those 'friends' face-to-face for an hour (Senegalese style), while you spend the rest of those 'free spots' doing something a little more productive. Shit is addictive, and me and the girl almost always have a scrabble game in process on the coffee table... but you're fooling yourself if you think you're doing something intellectually noble just 'cause you're spelling.

Alright, I take that whole 'productivity' rant back after seeing that it took a team of six at SFU to come up with this.

photo of the fireworks boat frenzy by digitAL animAL in the BR flickr group