From the Weekend: Backyard Sunset Wedding x Winnipeg

Winnipeg Wedding Weekend in friendly Manitoba on August 4, 2012.



Over the weekend, I made the trip to Winnipeg (where my family originally hails from, by way of Vietnam).

You Say Party Leaves the 'Prom' Early

"Becky, Derek and I are announcing the immediate cease to activity as YSP. Call it a hiatus. Call it a break. Call it whatever you want..."

I really do love You Say Party. They were/are one of my favourite bands. Obviously, it's been a rough go for them. I was looking forward to seeing perform again on tour before they had to cancel once again.

Failing at Life: Trolls Ruin the Internet for Everyone

"You are [...] the scum of the Earth. You have failed at life."

I was pretty viciously attacked by a negative nelly via Twitter, who called me the above things. Like always, I decided to try and reason with this person in order to diffuse the situation. Judge for yourself how I did below.

The Kind of Week It Has Been

It was a good week. A good couple of weeks, actually. It is incredibly satisfying knowing people out there not only consume but enjoy the work you produce.

Mixed Feelings (Or "Responsible Journalism"?)

"You come to me in the dark days."

Life is full of many sudden twists and turns and how you react to them reveals exactly who you are and what you are made of and I continue to be reminded of the futility and fatality of life and loss. To those you love, tell them often and always, young and old.

The sad beauty in life is its tragic circumstances. You are what you love and sometimes you must lose what you love. Loss is essential to life to make it special, but it really sucks anyway. Hopefully, you can go out doing what you love surrounded by those you love.

Over the weekend, I broke my first real news story on the world wide web as a blogger and sort of journalist, but with extremely mixed feelings. As a journalism student with just a year of training under my belt, I am only partially pleased with myself. Sadly for more obvious reasons, I feel much more terribly about it and wish I never got the opportunity at all.

Where I refrained earlier from relaying my more detailed sad feelings as an individual, reporting aside, I sincerely offer my sincerest condolences and thoughts for anyone blessed enough to be touched by the music of and/or the person that was Devon Clifford, may he rest in peace.

On Friday night, my friends and I were very much looking forward to an evening of live music. I have written in the past about my admiration for the music of Abbotsford rockers, You Say Party! We Say Die! (now called You Say Party) I attended their free show they did a couple months ago and was thoroughly impressed being a fan of their music. When it was announced that they would come here again on their North American tour, I quickly trekked over to Zulu Records to get tickets for all my friends and I. I am pretty we are responsible for the most sales from that concert considering we bought five tickets, four t-shirts, and five beers.

Blue Valentine

There's nothing like Valentine's Day to remind you just exactly how single and alone you really are.

Last year was probably my only really significant Valentine's Day as part of a meaningful romantic couple on record. In retrospect, it was probably a lot more special than I realized. My better half at the time and I agreed that Valentine's Day was a lame and artificial holiday neither of us care for so we decided not to anything special apart from spend our time together. She met me after work and presented to me my first and only real Valentine's Day gift (that I can recall, anyways).

My 22nd Year

XXIII. hate birthdays. I always have, my own anyways. They are meaningless, random days of the year. A hollow, empty measure of numbers that act as made up milestones for what is essentially any other day. Any day derives its meaning and memories from what happened that particular day, whether seized, lived to the fullest or not.

Anyhow, twenty-three short years ago today, I was born. This past year, years twenty-two to twenty-three of my life, I do not think I have ever felt so much loss in one single year in my entire life. My twenty-second year of living was less than stellar and failed to live up to the promise of its potential. In other words, it was not so great. I am already usually moody on my birthdays, but this year will be a doozy. Aside: on my eighth birthday, my father and I discovered my grandfather dead in his apartment. That was not fun.