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Dr. Robert Runté on popular culture, education, and life. Recent Posts
Pure Speculation Hope, BC. Kelowna, BC Revelstoke Maple and Banff Lipizzaner Stallions, Magicians, Calgary Dining Tigana and Story Time Kasia's Play and Stories New Job Comments or Email Runté
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The Princess, The Mermaid, and Their Hot Air Ballon by Tigana Runté March 2003 Blog Indexes:
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Anthem for SF Writers![]() Mark Shainblum nominates this for science fiction's national anthem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc Labels: video clips Pure SpeculationI attended the Pure Speculation conference in Edmonton on the weekend and was pleasantly surprised by how much it has grown. I was especially pleased with the Friday evening entertainment at Happy Harbour, which included an excellent performance by author GoH and professional singer Edward Willett, and a fascinating talk by Rick Green on Prisoner of Gravity series.![]() me with author/singer Edward Willett. He's only two years younger than I; so why does he still have hair and look so fit? And that voice! The man definitely has stage presence. (Photo by author Barb Baller-Smith, whose book Druids was released at the convention.) ![]() Me with authors Ann Marston, Edward Willett, Aaron Humphrey, and Nicole Luiken (Humphrey) (Photo Barb Baller-Smith) ![]() Awaiting my turn to speak on one of the panels. (Photo by Ron Sannachan) Hope, BC.We stayed the night at the Lucky Strike Motel. This motel was strongly reminiscent of those I stayed in when as I was a kid, and an important balance for our kids from the four and five star hotels we often end up in traveling for work. (I still remember the first time we had traveled on our own nickel when Tigana was young, and she had folded her four year old arms and contemptuously demanded, “What kind of a dump is this? Where’s the marble? Where are the gold panels? Look, the paint is even chipped here!” And we’d realized that through traveling with us for work, she had become accustomed to a lifestyle that we couldn’t actually sustain. Time to deprogram ‘spoilt kid’ mode!) This time, the kids were fine with the room, especially since we were just spending the night and moving on.(I made the mandatory jokes about Hope, which while new to the kids, still struck Tigana as pretty lame. And inappropriate, as it later turned out, given that Ryan Jenkins had hung himself in one of Hope’s hotels, his own having run out, about a week later.) Labels: vacation Kelowna, BCThen on to Kelowna. We stayed at the Delta and got a fantastic room, complete with gigantic balcony. Super at Hector's Casa. Breakfast on the balcony. Lunch at great brunch place whose name I've forgotten. And in between paddle boats round the lake, shopping at their Lulu Lemon outlet.We quite liked Kelowna. Even upon such a cursory examination, it seemed a very artsy community, lots of interesting restaurants, art gallery, bookstore, and relaxed ambiance. And nice views. ![]() I loved the self-satire of this beach sculpture, which suggests a nice artsy orientation on the part of the town fathers. Revelstoke![]() We stopped for lunch in Revelstoke at the Modern Bakeshop and Cafe and were surprised by another really great meal! You never know what you’re going to get when you stop in smaller towns, because the captive market often means restaurants survive that could not last against city competition; but on the other hand, you often get independents that really represent home cooking at it’s best. The Modern was an example of the latter, only with a hippie twist that suited us very well indeed. Vegetarian and glutton-free options weren’t just after thoughts, as they so often in mainstream cafes, but things you’d actually order just because they tasted fantastic. We grabbed a bunch of their fruit granola bars and comped on those in the car for the next couple of days. Full four stars for this one. Maple and BanffOur next stop was Banff.![]() Kasia explains to her Mom the difference between squirrels and chipmunks as they meet this guy at the top of sulphur mountain. ![]() Mary took the kids up the Sulfur mountain cable-car, a mandatory excursion in their view, but one I skipped to work on my novel. (My knees had been bothering me so paying to limp around a mountain top seemed like a bad idea.) The kids reportedly had a great time, though they’ve done this one repeatedly; and I had a wonderful time writing overlooking the valley forest. There is something about basking in the sun, writing, that significantly improves productivity. ![]() Then checking into the Brewster hotel, quick walking tour of the townsite, hitting the usual kid-friendly shops (e.g., COWS ice cream), plus the Banff Tea Shop. We ate at the Maple restaurant because a $40 voucher came with our hotel room, but it was one of the few disappointments of the trip. The food, while adequate, was overpriced even with the $40 discount; and the service inflexible to the point of being ridiculous: we couldn’t help but overhear the next table being told all the things that couldn’t be done for their toddlers, the substitutions that couldn’t be accommodated, and the allergies that couldn’t be vouched for. So lots of pretensions towards being a high end restaurant, but neither the service nor food preparation to carry it off. Just the prices. Lipizzaner Stallions, Magicians, Calgary Dining Lipizzaner StallionSummer vacation started with our taking in Lipizzaner Stallions show in Calgary as a special treat for horse-mad Kasia. In this regard, the show was a bit of a disappointment, as Kasia was clearly bored. Upon reflection, we realized that the finer points of dessage may have been a bit too esoteric for a five year old; or as Mary put it, if you’re of an age where you believe your toy Pegasus can fly and talk, seeing a horse stagger around on it’s hind legs for ten seconds may not seem that impressive. Lipizzaner Stallion takes a bow Kasia much preferred the Arabian Nights show we’d seen in Florida the previous summer, in which equally impressive animals were combined with a princess/fairy storyline and a good deal more racing around with acrobats on horseback. So, no reflection on the good work of the Lipizzaner Stallions in keeping alive an important European tradition, but Kasia turned out to be the wrong target audience. ![]() Kasia yawns
Tigana and Story TimeUntil recently, story time has been very different for Kasia than for Tigana at this age. Tigana loved having books read to her, as does Kasia, but Tigana also insisted on us telling her our own original bedtime stories.When very young, we told Tigana the standard fairy tales, which would then have to be retold exactly the same way each night, until each story eventually reached saturation and we moved onto the next. Then Mary started a continuing series of stories featuring Peter (a Tom Thumb character) and “the little Girl” (who was of course Tigana). Tigana loved these stories beyond reason, as Mary retold the day’s highlights from the perspective of Peter. Tigana would always ask if she was ‘the little girl’, which Mary would neither confirm nor deny, but the events of ‘the little girl’s’ life strangely mirrored those of Tigana’s. Then one time I covered off the Peter stories when Mary was away, not realizing that Mary considered them her special thing with Tigana. But the deed done, I was permitted to tell Peter stories when Mary was busy, so that we were soon alternating nights. It was some time before we realized that we had quite different styles and had evolved the character of Peter in quite different directions. Mary’s Peter was mostly comical, getting himself into silly situations or misunderstandings, like the title character of the Amelia Bedelia books. My Peter stories were more plot driven and about Peter having adventures. Again, I wondered if this reflected a gender difference, or just personal style. When Tigana was five, we moved to a new home in anticipation of Kasia’s arrival. Following a series of Peter adventures/misadventures over the move, I introduced the new character of Rhubarb, who lived in the Rhubarb plant in our new yard. As Peter and Rhubarb explored the new neighbourhood, they came into contact with a host of new characters who lived by the rules of magic I adopted holus-bolus from Dave Duncan’s A Man of His Word series. Bedtime stories became a 1,500 episode serial, building one to the next, and often ending on a cliffhanger to be resolved the next evening. Like any B movie serial, much of each episode included stock footage. In our case the nightly prologue was getting Tigana and her companions out her bedroom window (stealing from Dave Duncan’s The Magic Casement) to the Giant’s castle in Cloudland, from whence her nightly adventures began. (Originally, Tigana and Peter had snuck out into the garden, and then out into the neighbourhood, but after the first couple of weeks of sneaking past Mom in the kitchen, the sequence started to lose credibility, and the storyline started to chaff against the confines of the neighbourhood. So I had the giant invite Tigana back to his castle in the clouds, and introduced the magic window to get her there. Once I exhausted the potential of Cloudland, I introduced the new characters of Dr. Who and Romana. Tigana was delighted with these characters -- and the infusion of 25 years of plagiarized episodes, adapted only enough to make Tigana the star of each adventure. There were two problems with a continuing series of bedtime stories lasted over 1500 different episodes, First, having stolen every story idea I've ever read over the past 45 years, I was worried there for awhile that I might have ruined fantasy for Tigana. I could just see her discovering Dr. Who or Dave Duncan's books, and instead of the pleasure they have given me over the years, quickly discard them on the basis "They're not very original -- I've heard it all a hundred times before!" Fortunately, in the event, Tigana instead has discovered the dozen of new great authors writing for kids her age, and still loves fantasy. (Though lately she is into the preteen reading of novels about dating, most of which make my brain hurt. But that's another post.) Second, since I wasn’t writing any of this down, I would frequently lose track of some of the characters or occasionally start to repeat a particular storyline. Tigana would immediately interrupt and ask, "Is this like where they went into the castle and found the bomb?" or "Is this like the time the got caught in a time loop?" "Somewhat similar," I would stall, improvising madly, "but in this case the time loop was running in the opposite direction!" or "No, no! No bomb in this one!" and then beat my brain against the bed post trying to come up with some different angle on an overused story steal. Explaining what had happened to the characters I left hanging from a cliff a couple of episodes back and completely forgot about was similarly challenging. Some days I rose to the challenge magnificently, and would go out from Tigana's bedroom to regal Mary with the evening's story, and bask in her agreement that ''that was a good one!" Other days, not so much. On more than one occasion, I was so tired by the time we got Tigana to bed, that I would actually fall asleep before her... This did not, to the amazement of all, actually keep me from finishing the story. The first time this happened, I came back awake to Tigana saying, "That was terrific Dad, but I didn't quite get the part about the train." "Train? What train?" And Tigana recited back to me a whole 10 minutes of story that I had no recollection of telling, and which frankly made no sense within the context of the story I had started out to tell. But dream like, it had all sort of blurred together, and apparently my mouth had kept recounting as I drifted off to sleep. I wasn't entirely sure I believed this was possible until it had happened several times, and had been witnessed by both Tigana and Mary. I loved telling Tigana bed time stories, and was sad when she finally out grew that nightly ritual in favor of her reading to herself. My only regret was that I never thought to record any of those stories/episodes. In retrospect, there were enough 'good' nights, and enough original material (given Tigana and in the latter years, her sister) were added to the standard fantasy storylines for me to have gotten the rough draft of a novel or story collection out of it. And then I thought maybe I could record my stories to Kasia, and was shocked to discover her complete lack of interest in anything other than the stories she dictated to me.... But then, at five and a half, it's early days yet. Tigana is insistent I don't tell Kasia any of my Dr. Who episodes, since in Tigana's view those belong solely to her, but as I begin linking together the stories of Princess HummingBird and her Pink Pony -- and more significantly -- the newly introduced character of tinyweenie -- there is hope yet that the process will repeat. I hope so. Labels: Popular culture, Tigana, writing Kasia's Play and StoriesWhile sorting through my mom’s stuff, preparatory to putting her condo on the market, I came across a box of my old matchbox cars. This immediately brought back memories of hours of car chases round the border of the front room carpet. Even after 45 years, I still remembered what each car represented – the crooked racecar driver, the target treasure on the moving truck, the ploy of hiding the getaway car in the blue carrier behind the citron, the detective in the silver shadow Rolls-Royce who always figured out each case in the end, the decoy milk truck – the whole set of complicated plotlines that kept me happily engaged for years. I was surprised to find them, having thought I had passed all my toys on to another family’s youngsters decades before when I’d left home, but this particular set had somehow survived the general purge. So, naturally the shoebox of matchbox toys went into the ‘keepers’ pile.Where it was shortly discovered by my own 5 year old. She opened the box with a ‘Wow, cars! Can I play with them?” I of course consented, especially since they were clearly already too banged up to be considered any sort of collector’s items. What harm could she do? Momentarily distracted with other sorting duties, it has half an hour or so before I could return to explain what each vehicle represented, how they drove around the ‘roads’ on the carpet, which flowers in the carpet represented cloverleaf interchanges, all the complicated rules it taken me years to work out. And a good thing too as it turned out. ![]() The carpet I grew up with -- "note highway" border strips with flower "interchanges".
Labels: Kasia, Popular culture New JobSee announcement of my new positionwith Five Rivers (moonlighting of course; I'm still a professor for my day job) .It's been an interesting journey: I started by reading and reviewing Lorina's first novel, Shadow Song, which is a brilliant example of why some great literature has to be self-published (in contrast to most self-publishing, which has been turned down for good reason.) That led to me discussing trends in publishing with Lorina and her role as a rapidly growing micropublisher (see earlier posts). The more we talked, the more I became convinced that she and others like her represent the future of SF publishing, And I've been looking for an oopertunity to get back into SF editing but all the other presses I was looking at kept missing what are for me the obvious trends of where things are going in the future. Lorina Stephens and Five Rivers seem to be positioning themselves at the cutting edge, right where I wanted to be. I look forward to a long and fascinating association with Five Rivers. Labels: Five Rivers, work, writing On Writing by Stephen KingOn Writing: A memoir of the CraftBy Stephen King 297pp.
Freelancing Video![]() Writer Simon Rose pointed out this hilarious and painfully accurate video on what it's like to be a freelance writer/editor/professional. Should be viewed by anyone thinking of 'going consultant' or of hiring one. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2a8TRSgzZY Labels: video clips, writing Hawaii in the Summer![]() Our balcony at the Waikiki Sheraton -- Mary was able to get the room for $100 a night on Priceline, which has to be the deal of the year We had only previously been to Hawaii in the winter. When I was growing up, Hawaii is where Edmontonians who could afford it went to escape Winter over Christmas. I never got to go as a kid, but I had always therefore assumed that Hawaii would be more crowded over Christmas holidays than at other times of year, and that Hawaii would be nearly deserted in the summer, because why would you pay all that money to leave Alberta for the two months Canada has decent weather? But of course, that understanding of Hawaii tourism turned out to be completely wrong-headed. Hawaii is way MORE crowded in the summer, filled to capacity with Americans from Texas and Arizona etc escaping the heat. So the experience of Hawaii is a little different in the summer, because the place is filled with American tourists (and a few Australians escaping their winter) rather than Canadians. Having done Honolulu previously, we were focused primarily on the beach and fine dining this time through. One of Lethbridge's deficits is that there are no really fine restaurants, just chains (though that is slowly improving). So Mary and I in particular were really looking forward to Roy's, one of our favorite restaurants anywhere. We ate there twice, Hulla Grill twice, Duke's once, Keo's (a Thai restaurant -- order the 'Evil Jungle Prince'!), and Eggs and Things once (all highly recommended). We made up the rest of our meals at Planet Hollywood, the Cheeseburger Waikiki and Maui Taccos (which spoils you for any Canadian tacco chain ever again) because sometimes you just have to, you know, eat. Planet Hollywood is only okay chain restaurant food, but really good value for the money if you order the half price appetizers during happy hour or the breakfast. (We didn't get to eat at Le Mar, but we would have needed babysitting and a bigger budget to go there.) Roy's is especially wonderful, and to our amazement, a favorite of the kids' too. They have a great kid's menu, and give the kids the same three course dinning experience as adults, just with more kid-friendly food and prices. Almost worth the trip to Hawaii for Roy's alone. Mary took the kids to the beach twice without me, giving me two mornings to write. That was great! Sitting on a balcony in Hawaii overlooking the beach and the ocean, is the way to write! An unexpected bonus was that, since I was essentially sitting still for hours keyboarding, a wonderful variety of birds came and sat on the edge of the balcony with me. I've never seen so many different types in a single day. And I made quite a bit of progress on my book. Other days I went with them to the beach, but since I can't swim, and burn at the mere sight of sunlight, Mary was still mostly stuck with supervising kids while I just found some shade and read. (Stephen King's On Writing, about which more in another post.) ![]() The four day trips we planned were the trip to Sea Life Park, where we had the dolphin encounters (see earlier blog entry); the Hawaii Fire Surf Lessons for Tigana and Kasia; a trip to the Dole Plantation: a pleasant afternoon touring the historic plantation and doing the maze; and an afternoon in the Honolulu Zoo. ![]() Tigana surfing well ![]() Tigana surfing well -- but right into Kasia and her instructor! (The instructor had to pull Kasia under the water to keep Tigana's board from hitting her) ![]() both kids going out to the waves ![]() close up of Kasia with her instructor going out We would highly recommend Hawaii Fire over other surfing lessons, especially when as in our case, kids are involved. Much cheaper lessons are available all along the beach at Waikiki, but the Hawaii Fire folk have two key advantages: one, they take you to a more sheltered, shallower beach which is ideal for learning on (lots of waves but manageable waves); and all the instructors are firemen --so, if you're going to have problems, these are the guys you want to respond. ![]() The Zoo is considered a small one, but we found it highly enjoyable. As Mary pointed out, the entrance fee would have been worth it just to walk through the trees, bushes and flowers between the animal exhibits -- a great botanical garden. And the Zoo is cleverly laid out so that although its footprint in Waikiki is small, it seems quite big and takes a full afternoon to walk through. I was fascinated that even though we were only a few yards from apartment blocks on one side, the beach on the other, we felt completely isolated from the rest of the city; one really did feel as if one were out on the African savannah. ![]() One of my favorites were the hippos, who were not only hugely huge magnificent beasties, but were enjoying themselves hugely playing ball -- no question about it, they were tossing that enormous green sphere around between them. ![]() ![]() Kasia's favorites were the Zebras. Kasia is hypnotized by all things pony, and Zebras are apparently close enough to count. Here a zebra rolls in the dust to cool off. (I was tempted to point my hand like a gun and shout bang as it started to go over for a roll, but that probably would have meant years of therapy for Kasia, so I let it go.) I'd recommend the zoo for anyone looking for a couple of hours away from the beach. So, overall, a nice quiet vacation -- quiet days at the beach alternated with low key day trips. A great chance to detox from email and the stresses of our day jobs. Dolphins Again![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Strictly speaking, that's a Walphin that Tigana is dancing with: a dolphin -killer whale cross. But Kasia had so much fun kissing a dolphin on our first trip to Hawaii, we decided that the rest of us should try it. Back to Hawaii![]() Following my teaching in Summer Session this June, we took off for vacation in Hawaii. Well, I went to Edmonton to check on my Mom for a couple of days first, and I took the dog with me to confuse the kids. Because we hadn't told the kids they were going to Hawaii, only that they would 'be joining Dad', whom they knew had gone to Edmonton. They understand the need to be in Edmonton to visit family and to attend to all the Estate matters I am still plowing through (even after all this time). Not fun for them, but borne with stoic understanding that the family needed to do this. So Mary picked them up from school on their last day, drove them to the airport in Lethbridge, where they boarded a plane for Calgary, the usual transfer point to Edmonton. Mary had set them up perfectly by telling Tigana that they would drive up, but then giving in to Tigana's asking to fly up instead. (Tigana had used the argument that since I had already driven up earlier in the week, we already had a car in Edmonton, so there was no need for them to endure the six hour car trip. Mary had graciously acceeded to this request, never letting on that it was all a con.) So I flew down to Calgary from Edmonton, and was sitting in the airport Tim Horton's as they got off the plane. Kasia sees me, runs over and hugs me, as Tigana goes, "I thought we would be meeting you in Edmonton?" Robert: "Ready to start the Grand Adventure of Summer in Edmonton." Tigana: "Yeah, right." Robert:" What, you don't want to spend summer in Edmonton?" Mary: "Kasia, where do you want to go?" Kasia: "Hawaii!" (This was a safe bet: Kasia always answers 'Hawaii' to questions like 'where would you like to have dinner tonight?' Besides a standing joke, Kasia asks us at least once a week why don't we live in Hawaii. We're having an increasingly difficult time thinking up an answer.) Mary and I look at each other and shrug. "Okay, why didn't you say so. Let's go to Hawaii." Tigana: "Whaatt? Youmeanaghghghghghghghghghgyeaahhhwhoooo!" And so on. So an hour later, three hours after school ends, we're enroute to Hawaii via Vancouver. Of course, we will be paying for this for the rest of our lives because now every time we take them to Edmonton they're going to be spending the entire trip saying, "Yeah, where are we going really?" |