This photo of me was taken at a swim meet here at the U of L a couple years ago, but this weekend the Pronghorns are once again hosting their annual swim meet at the Max Bell Pool. I’ve been asked to do the announcing for the finals on Saturday and Sunday. Go Horns!
Disney-Pixar Merger Op-Ed Piece in the New York Times
I came across this great editorial in the New York Times about the Disney-Pixar deal. One thing I’ve learned recently about the deal is that the company is purging itself of most of the middle management that isn’t directly involved in creating the artwork. What they are doing is recreating the old Disney studio from the 1930s when Walt was in charge and story was king.
In the end, Disney is doing something that perhaps no other corporation of this size has ever done: actively de-corporatizing itself. It is reassigning authority from the bureaucracy to a small group of creative individuals. It is, in short, trying to resurrect Walt Disney and his early hands-on management style. Running the company out of his own head was a difficult enough task for Walt Disney himself. Whether the new crew can pull it off is anyone’s guess. But if they do, it will reverse the dynamics of the entire entertainment industry by empowering the putative visionaries over the suits.
Times Article – When You Wish Upon a Merger.
Moving to Quebec
I’ve been thinking about this for awhile and so today I filled out the application for the Explore program, which means that (assuming I’m accepted) I’ll be moving travelling to Quebec sometime in either the spring or summer for a five week course in beginner’s level French and I’ll be living either in a residence or with a home-stay family. This is the most excited I’ve been about the French I’ve been slowly learning for the past six months.
Interview with The Hour
Meeting with Yasir Khan and doing the interview for “The Hour” was a lot of fun. The interview will be played during the live airing of the show this Monday, February 6th Tuesday, February 7th at 8:00pm (Eastern) on CBC Newsworld. I’m going to go to Calgary to be a part of the studio audience—I’m looking forward to it.
A Sneak Peek at Mother Earth’s Aurora
I came across these beautiful— images and videos of auroras taken from the International Space Station.
I’m thinking this particular aurora video must be a simulation, but either way, WOW.
Four Things Meme Reaches A-List Bloggers
The other day, my friend Kim Siever hit me with the four things meme. Apparently it started on LiveJournal and has spread across the blogosphere. Some of the bigger sites that I follow on my RSS reader have been participating too.
There is something particularly intriguing about the simplicity of the meme and yet it seems to derive answers that you might never expect. For instance, who would have ever thought that I had experience burying mines? (They weren’t live and they were for de-mining research purposes).
There are many more examples of the meme via google search four things meme.
Television Interview
I’m going to be doing a television interview this Wednesday which will air during a live taping of CBC Newsworld’s The Hour on either February 6th or 7th.
Update: It looks like it’s going to air on Tuesday at 8:00pm MST on Newsworld.
Four Things
Tagged by Kim Siever.
Four jobs I’ve had in my life
- Corn Packer at Eldorado Farms
- Pre-Press Assistant at the Medicine Hat News
- Mine Layer
- Lifeguard
Four movies I can watch over and over
- The Royal Tenenbaums
- Forrest Gump
- Back to the Future
- The Princess Bride
Four places I have lived
- Medicine Hat
- Salt Lake City
- Lethbridge
- Malaysia (6 weeks)
Four TV shows I love to watch
- Daily Show
- Boston Legal
- Seinfeld
- Clone High
Four places I have been on vacation
- Japan
- Hawaii
- Australia
- Israel
Four of my favorite dishes
- Pizza
- Balsamic Chicken
- Chicken Vindaloo
- Stir Fry
Four websites I visit daily
Four places I would rather be right now
- Australia
- Europe (perhaps Poland?)
- Vancouver
- Montreal
Four bloggers I am tagging
Toy Story 3 Shelved
It has only been a short time since Disney’s all stock buy-out of Pixar and already some big changes are under way. The Los Angeles Times reports that with this deal comes an end to quarrel over Pixar sequels.
In remarks made during a Tuesday conference call with analysts, Iger and Pixar Chief Executive Steve Jobs implied what other sources confirmed Wednesday: that Disney’s 150-plus-person Pixar sequels unit — which is housed in a Glendale warehouse and is already at work on Toy Story 3 — will soon be no more.
“We feel very strongly that if the sequels are going to be made, we want the people who were involved in the original films involved in the sequels,” Jobs said.
Iger sounded the same note.
“It was really important to me that the people who made the films originally, who had the vision, who knew the characters and the essence of these films get a shot at making any films that were derivative,” the Disney chief said.
“While Disney might have been able to make them, Pixar making them is just so much different,” Iger added. “Not to take away from the talent of other people who might have been picked to make them.”
The announcement isn’t a complete surprise since Disney making Pixar sequels (or not making them) was a major factor during negotiations. Still it’s nice to see that Disney will no longer be destroying classics as they have done in the past. And because Pixar is taking over for Walt Disney Feature Animation, I guess this also means no more Dumbo 2? (Yes, they really were thinking about it.)
Enschede Fireworks Disaster
On May 13, 2000, in the eastern Dutch town of Enschede, a fire broke out in the S.E Fireworks depot. Twenty-two people died and a neighbourhood was destroyed.
Check out the awesome and terrible power of the disaster in the Enschede fireworks disaster video.
Also see the Wikipedia entry on Enschede fireworks disaster.