Atlantic Film Festival Concludes

Whew!
I did it. During the Atlantic Film Festival this year I managed to see 46 films in total. The breakdown is 16 feature films and 30 short films. I saw my last batch of shorts this afternoon and actually reached the 43 mark last night.
It’s been an exhausting week both physically and emotionally. The emotional exhaustion comes from the rapid shifts in tone from film to film. Each film that you see requires a bit of an emotional investment and I think that I’m a bit emotionally overdrawn and fragile now. Films that normally wouldn’t have a great effect on me seem to be more powerful than they should be. The steady flow of images and characters and stories on the screens in front of me is wonderful and overwhelming.
It all comes to a conclusion this evening with the closing party which is even more special as this is the 25th year of the festival. It should be fun and I’m looking forward to the party and also looking forward to being home and getting some rest.

See more progress on: see at least 43 films during the Atlantic Film Festival

tags: aff2005, filmfestival, films, halifax, 43things

Atlantic Film Festival Opening Party

I went to the opening party of the Atlantic Film Festival last night. It was a very nice event that was held on a blocked-off street in Halifax. The gala film that opened the festival was Thom Fitzgerald’s 3 Needles which stars Lucy Liu, Olympia Dukakis, Stockard Channing, and Chlöe Sevigny. Ms. Sevigny was at the party which was exciting, but I didn’t talk to her. It was neat to have it outside and I had a chance to talk with lots of people from the business and many students and graduates and friends as well.

See more progress on: Atlantic Film Festival

tags: 43places, aff2005, filmfestival, halifax

The Atlantic Film Festival's 25th

This year is the 25th anniversary of the Atlantic Film Festival , which is held in Halifax, Nova Scotia every year in September. It’s a great, friendly festival that is big enough to have a great selection of films, but small enough that you’ll get to know lots of people during the festival. I’m lucky because we’ve been able to integrate attending the festival with teaching people to make films, so attending the festival, seeing films and networking is part of my job. It’s one of the best times of the year and I’m hoping that this year I’ll see as many films as possible and I should be able to see at least 43 films (including shorts) in the 10 days of the festival.

See more progress on: see at least 43 films during the Atlantic Film Festival

tags: aff2005, 43things, film

Carolyn's Mac mini

The Mac mini is a very neat machine. Carolyn's PowerBook was near the end of its life and it was becoming difficult for her to do much work with it, so we decided to buy a Mac mini as it was relatively cheap and would let her do everything that she needed to do. I found a refurbished Sharp flat panel monitor so we ordered it.
It arrived in about a week and everything seemed to be overpackaged. The computer is beautifully designed and is elegant as is the box that it comes in, but that box was packed in foam and two other boxes! So it was a huge box filled with packing material and other boxes.
The computer itself is almost impossibly small and quiet. Setting it up was very easy and simple and we used the setup assistant to move all of Carolyn's stuff over. Her account, applications, mail, preferences, and documents all moved over without a hitch.
The only odd problem was when we connected to our wireless network and everything got strange. For some reason the new computer disrupted our whole network. The network would be there, disappear and then reappear. A similar thing happened when I reinstalled OS X on a machine, so I figured that there was an update that I needed for the Mac mini to bring it up to speed. But how to connect to the network, since I didn't want to unplug the mini and all of the other stuff to move it to the router. What I did was shut off Airport on the mini and share the internet connection through FireWire on my PowerBook. It worked and after the update everything is working very well. Aside from the networking trouble at the end (which I think is a problem with our router) it was a painless experience.
tags: computer, apple, macmini

Ministers Island

Ministers Island is a short drive from St. Andrews and you can only get to the island by driving across the ocean floor during low tide. The name of the island comes from the home of an Anglican minister that was built in 1790.
The real attraction is the summer estate that was built by railway baron William Van Horne in 1890. An extension to the rail line was made so Van Horne could travel to the island in his hown personal train car.
As you go onto the island there is a road that is covered with cedar trees which makes it look like a tunnel and the buildings are spectacular. It’s a beautiful, pastoral island with many fields and interesting flora and fauna. There is a circular bathhouse where the tide comes in and fills the bottom so you could bathe. Now you only can go on the island as part of a two-hour guided tour, but it’s still would be interesting.

I was able to go onto Minister’s Island a few years ago before it was renovated when the Province of NB owned the property, but hadn’t decided what to do yet. We were shooting a film on the island and drove over at low tide and stayed on the island and shot until the tide went out again and then left. It was beautiful and the fascinating thing was that renovations within the buildings were made in the 1960s or 1970s and many of the excesses of the time were throughout the buildings… shag carpets, bright greens and oranges, which seemed to be a startling contrast to the stately architecture of the summer home. At the end of the day we rushed to finish shooting before the tide came in and blocked the road.
I’m assuming that it’s a lot different now with the guided tours and the restoration that has taken place. A few years ago I took a quick look around (I missed the tour) close to the gate after climbing past it. I want to go back and see inside to see what it was like in the past.

See more progress on: Ministers Island

tags: 43places, newbrunswick, travel, ministersisland, standrews

Tickets for the Chocolate Fest

The tickets have arrived for the tour of the Ganong Factory Tour which is part of the Chocolate Fest in St. Stephen, New Brunswick. They’re not golden tickets, but pink, probably because Ganong’s famous “Chicken Bones” candy is pink. The tour happens a week from tomorrow and it should be a lot of fun. One disappointing thing was to see that “jewelry and cameras” are not allowed in. So I won’t be able to take any pictures inside. Apparently there is still a lot of secrecy in the manufacture of chocolate and candy. It will still be enjoyable to see the process of making chocolate and candy (and I think that I may buy some of their products as well.)

See more progress on: Ganong Bros. Chocolate Factory

tags: chocolate, tour, ganong, 43places

43 Places

I didn’t think that I had a huge desire to travel, but looking at my 43 Places makes me realize that I do want to travel. What is wonderful about the way 43 Things and 43 Places work are the elements of randomness and connectivity. You can find out where people want to go and what they want to do in an organized way if you like or you can just look at the thing or place cloud at the bottom of pages. I like to click on intriguing places and then cheer people on.
It’s fun and I’m discovering all sorts of amazing places (and people) and it also is helping me remember some of the places that I’ve visited as well as places where I want to go.

See more progress on: Help test Tootietails: the next new thing from The Robot Co-op

tags: 43places, 43things, robotcoop, travel

43 Things T-Shirt

I wore my 43 Things t-shirt today and when I was getting coffee I was asked, “what are the other 42 things that you’re doing”. It was kind of neat. While 43 Things is public, there is a level of anonymity that is connected with the sharing. I’m glad that I’m sharing the 43 Things vibe with the world outside of my keyboard and screen.

See more progress on: wear my 43 Things t-shirt

tags: 43things, t-shirt

My iPod Shuffle

I’ve had my iPod Shuffle for a few days now and I really like it. I’m thinking that this may be my iPod for a while now. When I ordered it with saved airline reward miles I thought that it would be a little thing that I’d use until I got a larger iPod, but I’m loving it so much I’m wondering if I need to get a larger iPod.
The iPod Shuffle is beautiful in the minimalist design and functionality. You can’t play games or look at your calendar or photos on it – you just listen to music. The interface on the front of it consists of a play/pause button surrounded by a ring that has left and right arrows for forward or back or scanning and plus and minus on the top and bottom for volume. An LED below the surface blinks green when you press one of the buttons and blinks continuously when paused. When it’s attached to my PowerBook it’s orange and blinks when it is transferring songs. On the back there is a slider that turns on the power and you slide it one notch down to play tracks in order or all the way down to play tracks randomly. There is also a small button on the back with a tiny LED to check battery status. You press it and it blinks green if it is full, orange in the middle, and red if the battery is low.
I just have it about half full (it’s a 512 MB model) and I have three recent albums on it as well as some other songs. Before I take a walk I’ll put one or two podcasts on it. I have to experiment with the autofill function which will randomly fill the shuffle, but for now I’m loving my tiny friend. I store it in a very low-tech Altoids tin with the headphones – simple!

See more progress on: get an ipod

tags: ipod, shuffle, 43things

A Tale of Two Top Tens

I looked at the top 10 podcasts on Odeo and on iTunes to see if I can figure anything out from the lists.

Here are the top 10 from Odeo:

1. MAKE Magazine Audio Show
2. IT Conversations
3. SuicideGirls
4. The Odeo Channel
5. Engadget Podcast
6. this WEEK in TECH
7. Adam Curry: Daily Source Code
8. NPR's Science Friday
9. Free Radio SubPop
10. Future Tense

and the top 10 from iTunes:

1. CBC Radio 3 Podcast
2. iTunes New Music Tuesday
3. Quirks and Quarks
4. Z100 Phone Taps
5. Queer Eye Hip Tips
6. The Al Franken Show
7. Podfinder
8. Inside Mac Radio
9. this WEEK in TECH
10. ESPN Radio Podcast

What does this mean?
I think that both services have a lot of featured podcasts that show up in the top 10. I'm guessing that people see a featured podcast and subscribe to it (which makes sense). There are more mainstream media-based podcasts on iTunes than on Odeo. It's interesting how there are two CBC radio shows in the top 10 on iTunes and that's almost the entire CBC podcast lineup now.

The Odeo top 10 is closer to my own personal taste which is probably why I'm getting my podcasts through Odeo now (with my personalized RSS feed going into iTunes 4.9). Odeo users seem to be interested in more alternative music, technology, science and sex, while iTunes users are interested in music, technology, science, fashion and sports.

It will be interesting to see how the top 10 lists evolve as more people use these services and find new and interesting podcasts. With Odeo I'm a huge fan of tagging to generate categories and the ease of adding a podcast to the directory. You basically just add the feed and it shows up. While you can subscribe to outside feeds with iTunes, it takes a while for a feed to be added to their directory. But iTunes integrates it all into the iTunes interface, which makes it very easy to subscribe. But you can't change the category or add it it and your input (via iTunes) is limited to "Report a concern".

Another intuitive and neat thing about Odeo is how you can click on a link to update a podcast feed. It makes sense to let people do that. If nobody is wondering about updates it will automatically be updated the next time the system checks, but if someone wants to check sooner, it can happen. That's smart and simple and good.
technorati tags: podcasts, odeo, itunes, top10

Bat!

Yesterday a bat flew into the house through the chimney. I found out about it when everyone in the living room started screaming and yelling. I looked in and there was a bat flying around. Everyone was ducking as it came around. We managed to get it into the sun room and closed the doors and were able to watch it. It flew around and landed in various places. The dog was outside the door and she kept trying to get in and get the bat.
The outside door of the sun room was locked, so I couldn't open it from outside. But I noticed that one of the windows was open, so I went outside, took the screen off and then opened the window a bit more. Then we waited as the bat flew around and noticed the open window.
A bat is a fascinating creature. Tiny little claws and wings that fold up. Watching it fly around and try to figure a way out was kind of neat. Having the glass between us and the bat helped. Even though it probably woundn't have attacked me, I didn't want to go in and open the door from the inside. I think that Batman was onto something when he chose his symbol.
Our bat made several attempts to get to the ledge and managed to get a spiderweb tangled on one of it's arms. Then it was able to get to the ledge and pull itself up onto the ledge and then it flew to freedom. It was cute in a slightly scary way.
technorati tags: bat, house

Language is a Virus

Language is a virus from outer space.

Stuck when you're trying to write something? Want to play some word games? Language is a Virus has a comprehensive collection of things to do with writing and language. Hours of fun if you're into that sort of thing.

(Via 43 Folders.)

technorati tags: language, words, writing

NetNewsWire 2.0

Sometimes you forget about something that's always there, and with NetNewsWire, it's the only program that I consistently use as much as or more than email, or even my web browser. It's transformed how I see the web and stay up-to-date. It's a simple, clean and essential application for me. I've used NetNewsWire since the beginning and it made feeds make sense and become useful to me. Version 2.0 was released recently and looking through a list of More features in NetNewsWire 2.0 you might not know about made me realize how I'm just scratching the surface of Ranchero's wonderful application. My personal favourite feature is flagging. I flag things that I want to remember and keep them around until I blog about them or add them to my del.icio.us links. I also use MarsEdit to edit and create some posts and as MarsEdit develops I think that I'll use it even more. NNW is one of the best software purchases that I've ever made and it's the only application that I use every single day for the whole day.
technorati tags: netnewswire, ranchero, marsedit, applications, osx

BLEEP

While Apple has the dominant position with digital downloads and the iTunes Music Store is easy to use, I love BLEEP, which is the digital download service from Warp Records. It's simple and clean and works very well. The music is not DRMed and is high quality. While I've used the site for a while, it wasn't until yesterday that I realized something else about it - it's very friendly to write about on the web. When you're on a release you can click on the "WEB TOOLS" link and it gives you a hand URL for the release, but it also lets you configure and embed a player that gives you a picture of the release (if you want) as well as a track and entire album listing. That means you can preview the track or the whole album. It's a great way to let people know what you're writing about. I hope that more labels do this online.
technorati tags: music, mp3, download, bleep, warprecords

The Art of Project Management

Scott Berkun’s The Art of Project Management is an essential book for those who manage projects. You can read it straight through and it serves as a comprehensive course in how to make things happen, keep them going and deal with people and political situations in almost any organization. You can also just keep the book next to you desk and dip into it from time to time for some solid advice on what to do in almost any situation that will come up. Written with a sense of humour and drawing on years of experience, it doesn’t provide an overarching philosophy or elaborate system, but practical and honest guidelines for getting your project completed and learning lessons from your team and the processes that you follow. I loved it and will probably use it every day.

See more progress on: read “The Art of Project Management”

technorati tags: management, artofpm, scottberkun, process, book

Goodbye to Bell Road

Today was the last day of work for me before the Summer break. We're all moved in to the new location for the Applied Arts above Mountain Equipment Co-op in downtown Halifax now. I stopped by the old building on Bell Road today to pick up a couple of maps that were on the walls inside. It was strange to go in as the building is being stripped and it was dark inside, with all sorts things missing. It was an odd experience. Outside they had begun to put the poles in the ground to build a fence around the building to prepare for the demolition. See the two bas reliefs at the front of the building missing made the fact that this will be gone soon hit home.
I started working at the location on Bell Road three years ago and I'll miss the old building.

technorati tags: bellroad, nscc

Bloomsday

Happy Bloomsday everyone! I have to read Ulysses again...and I seem to have that thought every year on this day. James Joyce created an amazing novel that creates a vivid portrait of Dublin. Someday I want to visit Dublin, but I suspect that the version that is there does not completely correspond to the one that Joyce created.
technorati tags: jamesjoyce, ulysses, bloomsday, ireland, literature

24 Season 4

I watched every episode of the most recent season of “24”. It’s a guilty pleasure, but I love Kiefer Sutherland’s character and performance and the constant cliffhangers are funny in their absurdity. What makes the show work is that it combines soap-opera-style personal relationships with an action-filled thriller. With dozens of separate plot strands, it’s tv that you have to watch closely as it doesn’t give you a chance to lose interest as it switches to a different plot.
It was fun and I’m surprised that I was able to actually watch every single episode as it was on. Nothing on tape. I haven’t done something like that for a long time and I think that it says a lot about that show that it kept me tuning in for so long.

See more progress on: watch all of the new season of 24

technorati tags: 43things, 24, tv, drama

Productivity

One of the biggest challenges in any project is figuring out how to do things and manage the whole process. Whether it is making a film or renovating a house or developing software, if it involves more than one person, you’ve got to do some managing of the project. Scott Berkun has been writing some of the best essays and giving out lots of advice on how to manage projects and people. Through his essays and the great collected wisdom of the crowd of PM Clinic I often find useful advice that helps me a better teacher and project manager.
Now he’s got a new book, The Art of Project Management and I can’t wait to read it. It’s great to have a perspective and common sense for making things happen and keeping things going. If only more people would follow the advice, as it would be a calmer, more productive world.

See more progress on: read “The Art of Project Management”

Technorati Tags: managing, productivity, projects, book, artofpm, scottberkun

A Place For My Stuff

I go through cycles of organizing and throwing things out in the various places where I live and work. When it’s organized, it’s great, but when it’s not…it’s a bit messy. One of the problems that I have is that I tend to not throw a lot of things out. Keeping stuff isn’t a problem if you have a place to keep it, but if you don’t have a place for stuff it just piles up.
Things were more organized in my home office when I was working in there a lot, but now it’s not organized at all. What I need is to clean it out and then find a place to put everything and to put things in the proper place when I decide to keep them.
With a well-organized room, I think that I’ll use it more as well.

See more progress on: Organize my home office

technorati tags: 43things, home, organize