Spring Time In The Neighbourhood

WOW! The cherry blossoms in the hood are just lovely right now. The whole city is blooming. Streets and gardens are looking fantastic. The early architects of this city had great vision, lining the streets of the entire city with magnificent trees.

Strikers In Town

Everybody loves some PEP Productions time, so when the Original Powderhound (OP) rolled into town we was more than happy to see him.

We got the weekend started by relaxing in the garden, enjoying the sun and catching up. I gave Strikes his gift from our most-recent trip to England... a bottle of the one and only Brut aftershave. Laughing hysterically, he reached into to his British ex-pat past to remember the aftershave which was a right of passage for all teenage lads in 70''s/80's Britain. "Splash it all over!".

The sun fell. We headed off to our fave Cuban restaurant for good food, good times and good mojitos.

Saturday we headed into the mountains for some perfect spring time ski-ing. Boiling hot, decent snow and epic, epic views.

Anvil Island From Cyprus

The Original PowderHound

Heading back down into Vancouver we we're hungry, hungry ... so we took a detour through Stanley Park to snack on a hot-dog on check out the sunshine and epic view of the bay and Cyprus mountain

English Bay

In the evening we took a lovely walk through the neighborhood, headed over to a Jamaican restaurant for tasty spicy food.

Sunday we explored Chinatown, had more food adventures.Good times.

Weekend Soundtrack: Bed & Breakfast Man - Madness

The Goods From Back Home

Our neightbour B just got back from the old country and brought us back some of our favourite English goodies. MmMm-Mmmmm. All this talk makes me want to get of this computer and munch down one of those Walnut Whips. Here I go..

Ricky Trooper - AWOL In Jamaica


So last Thursday we had the international massif heading down to Richards On Richards to watch Ricky Trooper of Kingston Jamaica. There was me (English), Dubmaster C (Canadian), Mr Mutter (Indian) & Mr Clouseau (French) all in fine form after a great office party and ready to hear some killa sound system. After pre-func'ing in our fave downtown bar/cafe - Tafts - we headed down to the show only to find out Ricky had not showed up from his flight from Jamaica! What? Come on! He missed the flight and missed the show!

Soo... we decided not to accept the refund but check out his support/stand-in DJ's .. which were kool. Lots of dance-hall reggae, old_skool and new ragga. Aside from Dubmaster C's living room, it's not often you get the chance to hear this music booming, plus it's always good to check a show down at Richards. Get this - I'm really looking fwd to the forthcoming Australian band -- WOLFMOTHER @ Richards.... I'm telling you - these guys are going to be big. You watch!

Van Deusen Gardens

Today we spent a delightful afternoon strolling around Van Deusen Gardens here in Vancouver . This time we took a guided tour of the 43 acre park, and got to see some new parts of the garden. The guide was really interesting and shared some history with us ...

>A< The good old pacific cedar tree is actually not a ceder tree but part of the cypress tree family.

>B< The Douglas fir tree is named after some Scottish dude (Douglas) who took the species back to Scotland to re-plant after it was lost post ice-age. Actually, I'm going to check this story out on Wikipedia.

Enjoy our pictures from this afternoon ...

Goosebusters !

Here's one of my old games - GOOSBUSTERS. It's a Commodore 64 light gun game, written in 1990, coded in 100% 6502 Assembly language and took only one week to develop. Ahhh, the good old days.

I don't recall who actually came up with the name. LOL!. The player racks up points by shooting clay pigeons, balloons, falling bombs (what!) and moving targets within a 60 second time period. Lots of fun for the whole family.

Indian Festival

This afternoon we headed down to the Punjab Village on 49th & Main to check out the Indian Festival. We strolled around the food stalls, bobbing around to the sounds of booming bhangra as the rain poured. All the food and drink was free for the festival - how generous. We sampled two curry plates, 1xmmm, 2xmmm, and some super delicious chai tea.

Plate 1 x mmm - basmati rice, chana & dal

Plate 2 x mmm - chana, bhaji & carrot/tamarand/chilli chutney

Azalea

Yesterday we spent most of the day gardening. The new additions are plants for our fall/winter garden. We've added a new azalea (pictured above) and two evergreen clematis plants that we're training to grow over our arbour.

Day On The Slopes

Me & Oz headed into the mountains the other day for some snow fun. After a short drive we found ourselves practically alone on the slopes.The snow was great, we were in good moods, we had the day off - life is good.

Late afternoon the skies cleared and we're treated with someepic views of the Howe Sound, Bowen Island and Vancouver. It's just incredible to be boarding down the mountain looking over the city to the left, the ocean Bowen Island and the Sunshine coast to your right.

Bowen Island & The Sunsine Coast

City of Vancouver View From The Sky Chair

City of Vancouver From The Top Of Cyprus Mountain

We had many good runs, and at times I gloated to myself as I zoomed down the black-diamond runs fearlessly at 30mph.

The afternoon rolled on and Oz's BlackBerry started buzzing. "Hang on, let me get this". "Ohh it's Queen asking for a paid-bar after the show tommorow. Let me sort this out". LOL!. (Oz is a band promotor). A hard day at the office! Technology living out it's wireless/paperless office dream here on the mountain. Fantastic!

Oz sorting out a bar for Queen

Kurt Cobain

Last week was the anniversary of Kurt Cobains death, and so KormaCurry feels he should reflect .... .... ....

The first time I heard Nirvana was on the radio in Manchester. "Smells Like Teen Spirit" was tearing through the airwaves. At that time I was in a band and some of us were thinking about calling it a day. The song totally re-energised me. The phone rang, the singer Zig goes "What's going on?, you still interested". I was so in. That song like all inspirational gigs/songs ... Sex Pistols in Manchester, "I Wanna Be Adored' .. Stone Roses, made me feel "We can do better than that!". Of course we couldn't, but that was the power of that song. The sands of time have given us many bands that were inspired by "Smells Like Teen Spirit".


In 92 I headed off for a travel of the US, starting in the Santa Cruz Mountains of Northern California and in New York City ~6 months later. The soundtrack for that summer was Nevermind which my Mum had bought me for my birthday.. All summer it wailed on my walkman.

Fast fwd 2 more years, I moved to Seattle to start my Pacific Northwest odyssey. My first job was in the Terminal Sales building, ~6 floors below Sub Pop records. On the rooftop was a deck/garden area that was shared by the tennents of the building. We always went up there to catch the epic sunsets, smell the fresh sea breeze .. clear our head of code. We'd 'mingle' with the prickly sub-pop types, mostly far too stand-offish for their own good. Yeah, we're all kool .. but get this .. we like living and want to live. You can chat with us. Eventually they warmed up to us. Our fave dude was a guy we called "Green Day", who changed his hair colour every other week.

So... one day we're working away on a 20th Century Fox game - The Tick, and my boss rushes out .. "Kurt's dead". Whoah!. His friend from LA had heard on the news. Next thing .. Sub Pop shut down, and they all walk down the stairs shocked, upset..

The following Sunday, my friend and I went to his wake at the Seattle Center. I'll skip this details because it's all been documented well.

After the wake, the crowd headed over to the fountain where Nirvana was being piped through the sound system. All the kids headed into the fountain, hundreds and hundreds them. They all danced, wailed as the fountain sprayed the air. I have to say, it was one of the most profoundly poetic images I've ever seen. Kids clinging on to this mine like fountain structure, water jetting everywhere with "All Apologies" booming in the background.

A few years later we headed out to the mighty Pacific Coast of Washington State to a town called Moclips. After checking into the cabin and walking the ocean we fancied a beer so we headed into the local bar. What a trip. It was like a Fellini film full of characters: The bar maid was a lesbian biker chic, hosting a karokoe night ... the cast ... elder logger and his young son (son looked well old!), several smashed Native Americans, a Diana Ross look-a-like and a bunch of hillbillys.

To the point .. A native chatted with us for a while, said his name was "Speedy" -- "Cuz, the cops can't catch me!". His in-law was a judge, "A hanging judge".. Speedy reckoned he hanged around with Kurt in his Garage in Hoquiam (not the purpoted town of Aberdeen) making all kinds of racket. He said "Kurts Mom used to come on down and yell at us to be quiet". Who knows if it's true? It made for a good conversation. One thing he did say that struck a chord with me, was... apparently... he used to motion a gesture to Kurt - which was to hunch his shoulder and rub his elbow into a him? "You know what that means?", "No!", "It's Indian and means .. give, but don't give all yourself ... keep some hidden for yourself". The look in his eye was wild.

The Hermit - My Fave Vancouver Band

Me and the Dubmaster C headed downtown this evening to primarly celbrate promotions and the intrinsic financial goodness in association. The festivities flowed in the form of Pale Ale and we decided to head down to the Media Club and check out a few Vancouver bands... Windows '78 (really great band, we bouught a t-shirt because we was, ermmm..... drunk and loved the name!), Arctic (missed them, sorry!) and The Hermit. What a treat! They weren't the headliner, but blew them all away. The sound --- Acid Ska, Pj Harvey vs Karen 0 (yes!), meets Beastie Boys vs Tangerine Dream. Yes, yes, yes, that eclectic. Fantastic!

They get the Kormacurry & Dubmaster C - 2 excited thumbs up , so Vancouverites check them out and check out their website.... Click Me

Logo In The Sand

Poor Dudes

Olympia, Washington. Someone lost their rent money...

Fireworks On The Hood Canal

Heading down the Hood Canal, WA. we came across the 'IllEagle' fireworks stand.

Anyone Want A Free Car?

This one can be found in Hoodsport, Washington...

Go Canucks, Go!

This week we went to watch the local Vancouver hockey team - the Canucks. Good times aside the in-yer-face over-advertising.

Hey Neighbour,
Happy Birthday!

Look what the birthday boy woke upto this morning...

Spring Is Here!

And daylight savings starts tommorow. We're looking forward to the longer days and enjoying the blooming city, Already the Japanese cherry trees are blossoming and everyones garden is starting to look vibrant. It's a time for growth and optimisim.

When we lived on the island, spring was always a profound change. Animials returned, mud vapourized and the trees looked fantastic. Vancouver has an equally impressive spring.

Boulevard Of Dreams

It's been a busy week of gardening. Last weekend we extended the garden area, cleared the old plants, added fresh soil and fertilized ready for fresh plants and seeds. As soon as temperature rises we'll plant and sow seeds.

Today we got super motivated and decided to extended the garden onto the boulevard. For the Europeans reading - this is the grass area bordering the road which is owned by the city - but your free to plant on. So we did!

We started by digging a nice big hole and then headed off to the garden centres to find something to fill it. We came back with fresh soil, ground cover and a majestic magnolia tree. Ignoring the rain we gardened away, and I have to tell you - it looks awesome... This is phase#1, and we'll do more as the weather improves..

Road>>Trip

Here's some pictures and stats from our road>trip:

* 1251 Miles

* 2 Countries

* 2 States, 1 Province

* 5 Parallel Lines Crossed

* 3 Ferry Rides

* Sea Level -> 3500 ft