Responses to My Un-Vegetarianism

Responses to my whole 'not being a vegetarian' thing have been varied. Most have been supportive; none have been mean. But some have been hilarious. Some have also been shockingly dumb.

I am choosing to share the latter responses with you due to hilarity.

• My boss: comes up to my office in the morning and says "I didn't know how to respond to your email, so here" and hands me a package of ground beef from his farm. In all seriousness.
• "Welcome to the dark side" - from a coworker. Thanks, needed that.
• "Murderer" - from my vegetarian friend Kyle who eats fish (he was joking).
• "I'm impressed you lasted 6 years. I know I had meat cravings for the one or two days I tried it" - from a co-worker.
• And by far the best (and by best, I mean most hilariously retarded): a conversation with a coworker. Those of you who know me well know who this is.

Coworker: "So you're not doing the vegetarianism thing?"
Me: "No."
Coworker: "I didn't even know that was a word"
Me: *pause* "Yes. It's a word"
Coworker:"Why? Is it like bodily stuff?"
Me: "No. It just doesn't make sense for me anymore."
Coworker: "Oh. I could see that. I could never give up meat. I mean, when I went to help brand those cattle, it was like....." and he goes off in great detail about how you brand a cow, how they shit themselves because they're scared and it hurts, and how we then "cut off their heads and eat them".

And this has been one day. SWEET. I can hardly wait til everyone at work all sits down together this Friday afternoon.

Ditching the Label

I'm not a vegetarian anymore.

After giving it a lot of critical, analytical thought, I've decided simply not to do it any longer. To be totally honest, for me to continue with the self-appointed label 'vegetarian' is inaccurate, extremist and hypocritical, with regards to the society I live in and the personal choices I make. I would rather make honest, morally-conscious decisions regarding the meat I buy (organic and/or free-range when I can) and improve my quality of life as opposed to continuing with the facade of being 'pro-animal' while still consuming animal-based goods (film, leather, gelatin etc). Also, to paraphrase my friend Naomi, 'my devotion to the cause has waned'.

This doesn't mean I don't care about animals; this doesn't mean I don't care about the earth; this doesn't mean that I think factory farms are okay. It also doesn't mean that I'm going to eat plates of meat at every opportunity, and it doesn't mean that if YOU are a vegetarian I disagree with you. It means that, for me personally, I'm being blunt with myself and realizing that the vegetarian diet and 'lifestyle' isn't a good fit anymore. In 6 years, my personal take on the subject, as well as my desire, has grown and changed and this is the end result.

So that's that. I would really prefer it if any and all would respect my personal decision and try your best to refrain from celebratory messages 'welcoming me back to the dark side', calling me a murderer, or things of that nature. While I know they would/will all be in jest, I still don't want to hear them. If I do, I will murder YOU*.

*empty threat

ps. Thanks to everyone who engaged in the cyber-discussion on this very subject a while ago. Great information and opinions on both sides of the fence that helped me out a lot.

Blogging is for Chumps

That's not true. But I'm not blogging anymore, so yeah.

I'll leave this up because it's a link to my photography site and some other good ones, but don't expect any real updates. Maybe down the road I'll start a niche photography blog a la the Strobist, but for now I think I can spend my time more efficiently in other areas.

Thanks & onward!

Tenfold Photography

Tenfold Photography, my new photography business, is now a reality.

Click the logo below to check out the website.

Tour est Complete

That killer French is for you, Matt.

Not sure if anyone still reads the ol' Radio Dial anymore, but in case some do: I'm home from tour, not dead, all limbs intact.

Quick summary: BC was sweet. Alberta was pretty good. Saskatchewan fucking sucked. Worst shows of my life. Winnipeg didn't happen. Not glad I'm home, but glad to not be on tour if that makes sense.

Overall, though, it was a positive experience. I got some killer stories, met cool people, and can now finally say I'm a touring musician. Hurrah.

jeff

"Let's Just Take Off our Shirts and be Assholes"

Holy shit.

Taking a break from almost getting beat up by bikers in BC to let you guys know what's up.
Started the tour in Hinton with the Johnsons. Super fun dingy basement tavern show - played barefoot on the dirty concrete floor next to the drain they had. The Johnnsons ruled and Kelvin' and I sang "Gypsies for Life" cuz Nate was sick. Drank til 4:30am and played Wii.

Next up was Wells BC and the Artwells Festival. Never seen so many drawstring pants in my life. Total hippyfest, but an awesome time. Missed our original time slot due to miscommunication, but got on the next day. Ate like a champ, lost my sleeping bag so I slept with the curtain as a blanket and froze my ass off. Played a set to 40 year-old hippies and some infants. AWESOME

After that we rolled into Vancouver to play the Balmoral Hotel. Which is on Main & Hastings (the sketchiest intersection in Western Canada, for those who don't know). Literally junkies shooting heroin while we loaded gear. Played to 8 people, but the sound guy was Jody from Nothing At All/Careworn (old Edmonton band), so he was stoked and got us hammered. So we decided to take off our shirts and be assholes. It was a blast. Loaded out gear amongst used needles and garbage falling from the apartments above. Drove all night (yeah coffee and Red Bull!) to Vernon.

Got to Vernon - supposed to play at a little pub in this town 5 minutes away called Grindrod. Got bumped for a magician. Yeah, you read that right. Not any magician - the creepiest looking magician ever. Wouldn't be surprised if his final act was to lure kids into his van with his creep-stache and bowl of candy. So we got drunk at Kelvin's sister's place and went to Prince George the next day.

Prince George - wow. Best show of the tour thus far. Played the Arbitrarys CD release show ([url]http://www.myspace.com/teharbitrarys[/url]) to about 100 people and sold a ton of merch. Oh, and on the way there our rooftop luggage carrier exploded and sent all of our personal gear (sleeping bags, tents, clothes etc) crashing onto Highway 97 at 120km/h. So we were running down the highway dodging cars in barefeet, picking up our gear. Had to stop at WalMart in Kamloops and buy a new rooftop carrier. Made it to the show in PG as it started. Drank and played FIFA Soccer on XBox til 2am.

Went back to Grindrod to play that bar we got bumped from (by Johno the Molesting Magician) the next day. Turns out it was a total biker bar, and the house band didn't take kindly to us wanting to use our own gear. A 'nice gentleman' kindly suggested that we 'take our nice gear and pack it back into our van' because 'this is a biker bar, and you don't want to make any more enemies'. I'd like to say we went all punk-rock and didn't, but we did. When a bunch of bikers are passive-aggressively talking about shanking you, you listen. So we played after the house band (FUCK YOU, "STRAIGHT UP") and people surprisingly watched. Interesting. We immediately left and are currently drinking at Kelvin's sister's place again. So, in summary, fuck Grindrod, fuck wannabe Hells Angels, and fuck the RIverfront Pub. But man, did we have fun. It was awesome.

Next up is Calgary tomorrow at the Castle Pub, Canmore at the Canmore Hotel, then east in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Stay tuned!

Still Alive

Quick update! We're in Vernon right now - played Hinton, played the Artwells Festival in Wells BC, played Vancouver, and are playing Grindrod (haha) tonight.

Tour has been a blast so far - a couple good parties, a ridiculous variety of shows, and some funny stories already. I won't have time to update this as regularly as I'd wished; however, I am keeping a point-form journal which I will type up and post at the end of the tour.

Hope all is well!