VANCOUVER - Why We Love Shades of Grey

Ah, Spring Break. A sort of break. In the Spring. Whilst my youth types are off gallivanting around the country for late season skiing or early season sunbathing; I've had the chance to go off and explore a little more of British Columbia. Oh no, wait. I have wanted to be doing that. But then came the rain. You've heard of this. yes? As a result, those travels have been postponed all week. Since, really; much of the excitement of going into the province would be to enjoy a sort of mini-roadtrip-type-of-thing. And, as we all know, mucho-rain-does-not-an-enjoyable-mini-roadtrip-type-of-a-thing make.

Until that point, I've been making do touching in on some as yet unexplored regions of Vancouver.


Big ol' mountains as viewed from another big ol' mountain. Do mountains get bored being climbed and skied upon, and looking at each other all day?

Mount Seymour is the third of the local mountains, after Cypress and Grouse. Each has a slightly different atmosphere. Grouse, with its cable car system and mountain top restaurant, feels the most commercial. Cypress is typical West Vancouver efficiency all over leaving Seymour to feel like the wild, untamed looking stepchild on the east of the North Shore. There is, of course, skiing and views galore available from the top but the more interesting aspects of Seymour are beneath the summit. It has a great deal of forest on and around its slopes; a few metres walk into being enough to make one feel incredibly isolated. (These, incidentally, were the forests used to double for numerous 'backside of nowhere' locations in The X-Files) I guess the perfect description of a couple of hours hiking around the lower, snow free trails in late winter would be 'gloomy.' But really rather enjoyable. That tells you all you need to know about the place, really. And this author.


Rock pools and the lingering smell of sea life on the air. That'll be Deep Cove, then.

Just down the road from Seymour and at the eastern edge of the North Shore is Deep Cove. West Vancouver may have the reputation but there are other pretty corners of Vancouver which are slowly becoming more built up and exclusive. Deep Cove, though, still has a fishing community kind of charm, even if the boats are all a bit too white, shiny and onboard motor filled. There is a great little ice cream place on the main street, near a tiny theatre and souvenir shops boasting all manner of Deep Cove merchandise (I didn't go in but I can honestly believe you could get more lost in the shop than you could in the Cove) Sitting on a rotten log down on the grey, rocky beach I had vague memories of New Zealand's west coast north island. But maybe that's just me mixing up my coves.

That's your travel-log for the week. Apologies for the long delay between entries but I've been without computer for several weeks (apparently my hard drive is defective. Which, if you know anything about computers, should make you feel incredibly sorry for me as that's a one-in-ten-thousand type problem for a new computer to have. Sympathise, darn you!) but I do aim to write some more interesting things soon. Maybe something about what life in Canada is really like and how it differs from the UK. Hmmm. That sounds like fun.

Mission of the week for North American readers and those who have no guilt about YouTube piracy; watch the season three finale of the marvellous Battlestar Galactica this Sunday and find out who those naughty final five Cylons really are, whilst marvelling at the scary way Mary McConnell's increasingly dark President Roslin always smiles when relaying dire news. Sorry for those for whom all that means nothing. Make it your duty to rectify such a sorry state of affairs.

VANCOUVER - Battle of the Operas

I have much more blog worthy things to talk about; but I couldn't let this particular gem of a report from BBC News pass:

US woman crashes into test centre

There are two things going on in this story which I draw your attention to. Firstly, and obviously, anything about people having more trouble with their driving tests than yours truly is always pleasing to read. And, thanks to the foresight of BBC journalists who know those old adages about people loving car wrecks, they even provided video of the incident for our voyeuristic pleasure.

And I'm obviously not the only one enjoying the pleasure as, at time of posting, this was the most read story on the BBC News website (eclipsing such non-stories as the abduction of tourists in northern Ethiopia and the murder of several Iraqi police by insurgents) But even that is not the reason for my real interest.

No, that's not what really interests me. It's the last paragraph:

The videotape also shows a man in a Superman costume walking around the car, but he did not stop to help the driver or any of the victims. His identity is unknown.

Aside from the sheer randomness (always a plus, in my book) it's the implied accusation here which makes me wonder if there is any hope left for modern journalism in the Internet age. Since, apparently, not only is it relevant to tell us that there was a man dressed as Superman in a story about eleven people being injured by a driving accident, but it is important to note that the mystery man wasn't actually Superman because he didn't help anyone out. And that this revelation is more important than reporting the actual incident; since that's what the article's concluding paragrpah is solely concerned with.

There are two conclusions to be drawn from this: (1) The BBC is implying that people who dress in superhero costumes have some sort of implicit mandate and responcibility to be getting involved in world events. And that faliure to do so is a newsworthy event. Or (2) Clearly, the process of reportage from this incident was someone at the BBC finding this rather funny video on some sort of file sharing site and then playing 'say what you see' to create a news story around it.

BBC News were moaning and groaning about job cuts towards the end of last year. Stories like this do not, I feel, help their case. That said; it was a heck of a lot funnier than that Ethiopia story.