Got up this morning afternoon a bit hung over from last night's revelries. I had apparently survived Montreal's first Santarchy. Also known as Santacon or Santa Rampage, this event was invented in San Francisco by the Cacaphony Society in the mid-1990's. It has now spread (like a beer stain) all over the world: London, Tokyo, Sydney -- even Bangkok, Bahrain, and Phnom Penh. There's also a Santarctica at the South Pole! Montreal has shamefully lagged behind the rest of the world in getting hip to this madcap tradition.







By 18:00 yesterday, a vast number of Santas (er, well, seven actually) had converged on the Old Dublin pub, scarfed down overpriced food, and tossed back a few for the road. From there, the Santas kept the party moving, through Les Promenades de Cathedrale to the Metro, thence to Berri/UQAM, to St-Sulpice.







Staggering through icy streets, Santa decided he didn't like the cold at all. The North Pole is actually kinda warm compared to Montreal. Black ice made the sidewalks treacherous, and Santa's beard kept blowing into his face.







So the Santas landed at Bily Kun for a bit, downing a lot of Flaming Sambucas. Santa can still taste the licorice liqueur today, but at least they were hot. Girls came to sit on Santa's lap to say what they wanted for Xmess.







Later Santa stopped briefly at Bieres et Compagnie -- a bit upscale for Santa's tastes -- then it was off to Bar L'Officiel on Roy for some art appreciation.







A slowly dwindling number of Santas crawled through a howling blizzard to get to Casa del Popolo for the monthly NinjaTune Clockout event, which was entirely worth it. Santa was soon revived and energized by the choice beats of DJ Lou and DJ Ghostbeard.







Clockout was a gas, and a great way to cap off a crazed evening of Santa Rampaging. Santa wants to do that again!



All the appalling photo evidence can be found in this photoset on Flickr.



Merry Ho's to all, and to all a Good Night!

It has taken me a few days to recover -- not only from the party but from the drive to and from Montreal -- but I finally collected and reconnected enough of my exploded neurons to be able to edit, crop, tweak, upload, caption, re-date, and tag my photos of the weekend's festivities.



I rode down to Toronto with several other Burners -- the intrepid Edweirdo at the wheel, plus JJ, Montreal, and Kay O'Sweaver. After a quick dinner of quesadillas on College St, we stopped at my sister's place to get into our playa gear, then we bounced off to The Centre of Gravity -- a crazy circus school on Gerrard East in Little Hindustan -- for the annual Toronto Burning Man soirée. Dubbed this year "In Dust We Trust", or "T-Comp", it was a "Decompression" party in all but name.



Was it a good party? And how!









Nobody throws a better party than the Ontario Region Burners. This one had it all: fire spinners...





...women suspended from ropes...





...wild people in crazy costumes...





...an adult teeter totter, strange art installations, a bit of Burlesque, smokin' hot DJs, and the most positive vibe this side of Black Rock City. I had a wonderful time and was sorry to have to leave early -- at 4:30am.







See the whole photo set here.



Kudos to the Toronto region Burners for putting together such an amazing event!

The last few weeks have been action packed. On the Wednesday 17th I went to hear my friend Nalo Hopkinson read from her latest novel, The New Moon's Arms. On Friday 19th I went to a Ninja Tune party at the SAT and danced up a storm with kino_kid and friends. Then there was iangurudata's birthday/costume party on Saturday 20th, for which I dressed as a generic Mad Scientist:







The party's hosts had wired up almost every room in their apartment with ultraviolet fluorescents, and painted murals on the walls in UV-reactive paint. Under normal light you can't see the paintings, but switch on the UV's and suddenly there are glowing hieroglyphs, pagan symbols, and groves of trees all over the walls. The lights made my costume glow spectacularly.







Monday the 22nd I went to see The New Pornographers at Le National. I was right down front, about six feet from Kathryn Calder, AC Newman, and (when he popped onstage to sing) Dan Bejar. I must've had a dumb grin plastered to my face through the whole show.



On Thursday 25th was a Full Moon Party, which was very groovy, with excellent DJs, and a video projection of a 1977 episode of The James Brown Show(!) (a lot of polyester, Black Panther chic, and serious 'fros).



Friday night was another terrific Halloween party, hosted by messiahdivine and cloquewerk. Much fun was had, well into the wee hours. On Saturday 27th I had another party to go to, but by that point I was seriously partied out. I was barely able to drag myself out to the Scrabble meet-up on Sunday at Le Divan Orange. Despite feeling very tired I somehow managed to win a three-person game. That night I realized why I felt so run down -- I had definitely caught a bug. My life of debauchery had finally caught up with me.



Been sick for a couple o' days now. Stayed home from wurk on Monday, and only dropped in for two hours on Tuesday. I expect to be mostly back to "normal" by tomorrow afternoon. Let's hope....

For Montreal folks, some stuff happening this week:



Tuesday, 9 October, 7pm to 9pm: a meeting of the Brûleurs de Montreal Burners, at the notoriously hidden Café L'Utopik, 552 Ste Catherine E., just east of Berri, across from Berri-UQAM Metro. A small doorway next to the magazine shop leads to the café upstairs. It's a vegan place, kid-friendly, and they have beer and wine. Topics of discussion: sharing stories and photos from Burning Man 2007; plans for local Burning Man events in Montreal. Whether you've been to That Thing In The Desert, or you're thinking of going next year, or maybe you're just curious about what this Burning Man craziness is all about -- do come to the meeting and participate!



Wednesday, 10 October, at 7pm: Jo Walton (aka papersky) launches her new book, Ha'Penny, the sequel to her award-winning alternate-WWII novel, Farthing, at Paragraphe, on McGill College just south of Sherbrooke.



Friday-Sunday, 12-14 October, the fan-run Montreal science fiction convention Con*Cept, at the Day's Hotel on Guy, just below René Levesque. I'll be appearing on panels.



At 1pm to 3pm on Saturday, in the St-Laurent room at Con*Cept will be an information meeting about Anticipation, the 2009 World Science Fiction Convention, to be held here in Montreal. The meeting will be open to the public. (You do not need to buy a convention membership if you only attend the meeting. Just show up 15 minutes beforehand.)

On Wednesday I got my 'puter back from two weeks in the repair shop. Works nicely now, except for the CD drive, which is kaput -- something i-Technique managed to completely overlook. Ah well, now I can upgrade to a Superdrive DVD burner. (For which I will be paying $30 more than an American would, despite the Dollars being at par. Hmph.)



[Oooo -- just heard a big, window-rattling clap o' thunder. (Either that, or NDG just exploded.)]



Now that my Mac is back, I've finally been able to upload my photos from late September, when I wandered through the Montreal Botanical Gardens with photogeek_mtl and friends.







I attempted some macro photography, sorta kinda. My PowerShot A95 isn't well suited for macro, and I really didn't know what I was doing. But I think I got some very colorful results at least. I particularly like the multi-hued decay in the shot above.







Don't ask me what the various flowers are called; botany is not one of my interests, and I wasn't taking notes.







We also saw the first night of the "Magic of Lanterns" festival in the Chinese Garden. The illuminated silk lanterns were lovely -- though I felt the show needed some real fire to make it more interesting '-]







And hey: penguins!







A festival just ain't festive without penguins.



The full photoset can be seen on my Flickr account.