Launches; WitWorks 4 in the works

It wouldn't be fall without book launches, and I'm looking forward to the launch of Lee Kvern's new novel, The Matter of Sylvie, at Shelf Life Books, corner of 13th Ave and 4 St. SW at 7 PM this Thursday. I'm also interested to see what Shelf Life is like -- not only is it Calgary's newest bookstore, it's also located in the very spot where the Interfaith Thrift Store I used to work in many years ago was. Other upcoming launches include Maureen Bush's new YA novel Cursed! on October 16th at Monkeyshines Books, and Rona Altrows' new collection of short fiction, Key in Lock, at Memorial Park Library on Oct. 23rd. Nothing more fun than a good launch. Assuming I stay well enough to go to any of them. It also wouldn't be fall without colds and flu, and Dan is home today with some kind of nasty cold, which I've been staving off with Cold FX.

Speaking of Memorial Park Library, Writing in the Works 4 is set to take place there on Saturday, May 14th, 2011 at 1:30 PM. This year's lineup is comprised of Naomi K. Lewis, Leslie Gavel, Susan Calder, Inge Trueman and myself. Always a great show!

Well, speaking of writing, that's what I ought to be doing right now.

Another W-i-R; Punk History; WitWorks 4 looms

Enjoyed a reading last Saturday by Gail Bowen at the launch of her new book The Nesting Dolls and the kickoff of her term as this year's Writer-in-Residence for Calgary Public Library. She will be giving manuscript consultations and giving a variety of programs until the end of November. If you have a manuscript you want some feedback on, I'd encourage you to get it in early as the spaces do fill up.

Speaking of Calgary Public Library, as I mentioned earlier Dan Hayes of The Golden Calgarians and myself are putting on a program entitled Cow Town / Punk Town on November 6th, as part of CPL's inaugural One Book, One Calgary project. Aritha van Herk's Mavericks is the book this year, and it's inspired the library to put together a whole slew of really interesting programs. Looking forward to reminiscing...or trying to. I'll be reading and Dan and his lovely assistant Christine are putting together a really rockin' multimedia thing. Should be a blast.

In mundane daily news, chugging away on this novel revision, which I'm hoping to have wrapped up once and for all by next spring. I was a little bit afraid that I'd been away from it for too long and that the whole thing would have gone cold for me. But actually, I think I have abundant objectivity now and am able to make some big changes -- improvements, one hopes.

My mom is hanging in there, but her ALS continues to progress and almost weekly she loses more and more physical capabilities. It's meant lots of challenges, no question. I have to hand it to her, though -- she is coming through this with grace and dignity intact, as well as her sense of humour. Food for thought indeed. All of this has had me thinking about the nature of compassion quite a bit, and I happened to come across The Charter for Compassion a little while ago. That food for thought is everywhere, I tell you.

Finally, looking forward to a beer tomorrow eve with my friends on the Writing in the Works organizing committee. Watch for our fourth annual fabulous showcase of local writing coming out sometime in the spring. Seems far away right now, but you know how that goes.

CAA w-i-r; Key in Lock; Bottled Poets, etc.

So here's the contact for Rona Altrows if anyone is interested in sending her a manuscript through the Canadian Authors Association Writer-in-Residence program:

cwir@canauthorsalberta.ca

She can give you details on manuscript length, appointment times and so on. Rona's got a busy fall coming up this year, kind of like me last year, in that as well as doing this residency, she's also bringing out her second book of short fiction, Key in Lock, being published by Calgary's own Recliner Books. Yeah! Looking forward to the launch: 2 PM, Saturday Oct. 23 at Memorial Park Library, 1221- 2 St. SW.

As usual, school's back in session, and the weather turns from August-miserable to September-gorgeous. And here I am with my nose to the grindstone. The proverbial grindstone. Not that I'm complaining. I'm trying to be mindful lately, to stay in the moment; my mother's illness has certainly made me realize of late the importance of staying in the moment. Yes, I could have been looking at life this way for the previous forty-seven years. But. At least I'm starting to figure it out a little -- is that to my credit? Anyway, happy to look at the blue sky from my office window, indeed.

Aritha van Herk's talk for AWCS last Saturday was great; very refreshing and down-to-earth. And here's an awesome picture, unphotoshopped, of the old Inglewood Bottle Depot a little ways down the street from the Alexandra Centre, courtesy of my pal Jan Markley over at Three Dead Moths in my Mailbox. Enjoy:

Stevie Ray; Virginsfest; Aritha van Herk; CAA W-i-R 2010 - 2011

Can't let this day go by without a tip of the hat to Stevie Ray Vaughan, massively talented blues guitarist who died in a helicopter crash twenty years ago today. I saw him and his band Double Trouble play at the Jubilee Auditorium, of all places, in 1984. The air was blue with dope smoke, and Stevie Ray put on an amazing show. They kicked down the baffles the Jube staff had put up in front of their stacks and went for it. A great evening.

Had a swell time with members of The Virgins (and our later incarnation, The Strangeloves) over drinks last night. We tried to hang out on the deck in my backyard but it was just too windy. Calgary.

Heading to the Alexandra Centre tomorrow for a talk by Aritha van Herk on Writing: The Dubious Occupation . Indeed it is.

Finally, I'm happy to announce that my friend and colleague Rona Altrows will be acting as Canadian Authors Association's Calgary Writer-in-Residence for the 2010 - 2011 term, starting Sept. 15th. Congratulations, Rona! I encourage anyone who may be looking for feedback on their work or a friendly ear to submit your work to her. We're fortunate to have these kinds of opportunities in Calgary -- take advantage!

Archeaology; Return of the Natives; Now what?

Adele Wolfe, old chum and former Virgins' bassist and vocalist, dug up some of our old gig posters and stuck them up on Facebook, so I thought I'd repost them here for poster-ity:

I made this one for a show we were going to play at our high school. It was cancelled due to the furor the poster itself caused, but the music teacher got us a gig at the Stampede to make up for it.

This one I made for a memorable show at Hillhurst Sunnyside where we jettisoned black bras into the audience at the end of our set. Silicone Injection's set was brought to an abrupt halt by the arrival of the police, who shut the place down and poured out all the booze. The Verdix never did play that night. The photo of us that ran with the The Calgary Herald article last year was taken outside the hall before this show.

Finally, I didn't make this poster (Mark I., perhaps?) but I did have it hanging in my room for a long time. On the other hand, I have no memory of this show at all. Hmmph.

So, there you go. A little blast from the past. These ought to come in handy for the program Dan Hayes of The Golden Calgarians and I are doing for Calgary Public Library on ancient Calgary punk in November. More about which later.

Other news: we made it back from Van Isle without incident and now it seems like we were never gone. The usual thing, you know. Last week I managed to get a grant application wrapped up and finished off a new story which I've submitted to a hopefully-forthcoming anthology. Thanks to Diane and Rona for your help with it.

Funny how things go. I'm facing a period of uncertain length where I will be just writing -- not teaching, or promoting a new book or working on edits for a forthcoming one -- just writing. And as it turns out, my mom's ALS seems to be  progressing fairly rapidly at this point.  So I will definitely be spending some time in the coming months visiting her and taking care of a number of matters for her. Although I'm not actually glad this is happening, I'm glad it's happening now and not in the previous two years -- it would have been a lot harder. So for that, and many other things, I am grateful.

Island; Canadian Literature

Been on Vancouver Island the last week. Enjoyed Nanaimo, Tofino and Ucluelet over the weekend and early part of this week. Cold and foggy out on the west side, especially since we camped at Pacific Rim National Park three nights. Now we're back on the mild and calm east side, hoping to visit Comox and Mount Washington tomorrow. More Qualicum and Bowser relaxing until Monday when we go to Victoria for three days starting Monday and then make the trek back to Alberta starting Thursday.


I was very pleased to see Timothy Dugdale's review of  Love Minus Zero (along with Silver Salts by Mark Blagrave) for an upcoming issue of Canadian Literature, available on the web here. Cool!


Well, enough of this stuff. Too much like work. Back to relaxing!

Betty's Run; Summertide; Beer; Writing

This year's Betty's Run for ALS raised almost $400,000. When the website is updated I'll link to it here. Thanks again to everyone who made a donation on behalf of my mom. Took my dog along for the walk and I was amazed at the number of other participants who were there for someone else. It certainly puts things into perspective, something that I've really needed lately. For a supposedly rare condition, it amazes me how many people I talk to who know someone who's had to deal with it.

In other news, summer is upon us again and now that Nick and Dan are becoming more prodigious sleepers I find myself defaulting to my natural sleep patttern, which is heading to bed around 12:30 - 1:00 and getting up around 8:30. We are looking forward to setting off for Van Isle later in the month.

Went to a session on crafting an Alberta Foundation for the Arts grant proposal last night (this is what I'm supposed to be doing right now) and picked up some tips. Then headed out for beer with Rona and Maureen. Yum. Talked books all night of course. What else is there?

And have been doing pretty well, I think, with ye olde writing. Pumped out the first draft of another (!) new story for a proposed anthology I've been invited to submit to. And yes, there's that novel, which I'll be getting back at as soon as I get this grant application off the ground. Really. Speaking of which...