i love biking at night

it was jessie's birthday this evening, so we ended up at Lucky (which is now officially the only bar I go to) and it was, as usual, a great time.

Everyone there just wants to have a good time. How great is that? No fights, no blatant picking up (although my roomate definitely got a little gross, right-in-front-of-everyone, drunk-as-a- punk, action on), no disgusting alcoholism, the bartenders give you tap water without condescension and, most importantly, amazingly attractive people who can look good without wearing anything see-through. Wait, the most important thing is the lack of grinding. God, I despise grinding. Now.

but the best part of the evening was the end, when we rounded up a group of bikers and formed a little posse. We had no agenda (unfortunately?) but we certainly got our bike posse on. I like getting "things" on. And i love biking at night. There is really nothing better. You just float along.

Everyone should bike all the time.

new sheik website

check it:

the new sheik website. make sure you refresh a few time.

and also check out the hidden video (if you can't find it). You may need quicktime 7.

The shots and clothes look great - I found that sweet safari suit on the Calgary trip - but we are still a ways away from a finished product.

Just need more clothes.

Must get cards made.

homoerotic adventures

last night was the most incredible night of my life.

it was decided, a day late (although that resulted in some good), that The Sheik should do a photo shoot. There was cursory talk of getting a girl to come, but frankly no one was that interested.

So our new friend Caleb brought his brother Matt (who rides BMX for Oakley) to the warehouse as our sole model.

Caleb is an art freak, so it was his vision we were to be following - he wanted dark shots. Uber-fashiony. Matt got dressed up in outfits of mainly my choosing and tippi, chris and caleb took hundreds of shots, adjusted lights and background, got boozed up and filmed the whole event.

After an hour, I had to go get Natalie. It was just that gay.

Matt is a tad ripped, but we dressed him up in belly shirts and half gloves, made him stand in unnatural poses. We gayed him up. And he went pretty willingly. The whole thing went on for hours. Natalie couldn't stop laughing.

And we got some great shots - a little too great. It really enforced my belief that photography is a bit of a crock. Although, now I am thinking that, at least with fashion or people shots, one must be able to make strangers relax and look natural. Maybe that is the skill in itself.

anyway, I hope this sheik thing works out. My whole leaving thing is going to throw a wrench in the works, but good ideas can ride out a storm.

I hav decided to make no new friends in Waterloo. Rather, I will attempt to get published, work on the IR code, read a lot, learn to sew (Natalis is giving me her sewing machine until she returns from india) and learn french. I can do all that, but only if I don't have to deal with annoying "others."

good news

So it is now official - I am taking a year long hiatus from school.

4 months in Waterloo and 8 month in Montreal. Sweet.

I gotta start learning french.

The Nasties

School has started again. This is a relatively good thing though I dread the return of the 20 page lab reports. I am just not organised enough for this.

The Sheik progresses, albeit slowly. We are trying to incorporate both a Sheik Market (consignment goods) and a Sheik Boutique (designed goods). A series of guest designers will be able to root through the Sheik Market items and choose pieces they feel can be best remade and have at 'er. Should make for some interesting clothing. And we made psuedo-friends with the owner of a toronto vintage store, 69Vintage, who may be able to help us with procurring wholesale items. She has been working on her store for ages, so it makes me feel a little better that the Sheik is not further along.

And yesterday, I asked Natalie to help me to learn how to sew. We made a bag. And it wasn't even a disaster.

In other, school based news, I got an NSERC award enabling me to go out and do research with Dr. Peter Bernath at Waterloo part of the Atmospheric Chemistry Experiment (in conjunction with the Canadian Space Agency!) I am pretty excited. Who knows what I will be doing, but I am going to carve my initials into something that is going into space.

And hopefully, if it works out, I will also get to go and work with Dr. Christopher Bayly at Merck Frosst in Montreal. I would be working on making a better model of a forcefield used in computation chemistry experiments. The current version, which I will be making better, is already one of the best. But that is still in the works - I had an hour long interview, which went well, but I really want to stay there for 8 months (Natalie wants to move out with me and it would not be pleasant for her to have to move repeatedly) and I am not sure that they will want to do more that the normal 4 month term. Soon. He should email me soon.

And Big Brother/Big Sisters will not let me volunteer, understandably, since I am leaving in 4 months. I should have got on this a while ago. They provided another option, so hopefully that will work out. For Montreal, I have to plan in advance, so that I can start pretty much as soon as I arrive. I really suck at this volunteer thing. I want to do something, but move so often that I just can't promise to be anywhere for a year at a time. I could have done something last year, but who knew that I would be around. I have no problem lying to jobs, but not to volunteer positions. Maybe I can find some volunteer work I can do online. Or soup kitchens - they don't require any special time commitments. Or human rights stuff - that is something I am working on right now. I need alex's email.