Mathers' Blog

Camping in hope at Othello Caves. Our neighbors have a pot belly pig which I want to roast. It’s really just emergency BBQ right?

A quick walk behind the TRU Trades Building can have more pricks stuck to you than going out friday night. These are from early july. The prickly pear is still flowering and looking good. It’s almost a better walk than the horticulture gardens.

In other news, I was the winner of two ebay auctions last night, each for a minolta lens. One was a 28/2.8 the other a 40/2. These are older, manual lenses which i will use on the minolta xd11 I’m trying to win later this week. My before shipping grand ebay total for both pieces of photographic glass was $4.25. That’s less than your soy latte london fog whatever $8 drink.

The Lac Le Jeune Ski Ranch is a former Kamloops ski hill that was popular in the 60′s and 70′s (?); my dad used to ski there. It’s is now overrun with both garbage and marmots. Cola RoC and I wanted the geocache at Ridge Lakes so we parked at the ski hill and hiked up batting away the bugs whilst debating the finer points of nerd speak. We both irritated by the “know-it-all-nerd”. You know?

Enjoy the trip selection below of photos from the trip. There may be a return trip for a camp and fire; super nice lake.

A page load of photos from around 5am July 10, 2010 of the sun rising over Kamloops.

I should have used a tripod, many of the shots are not as clear as they could be.

There was also excessive camera shake due to mosquitoes trying to devour me. I’ll do this again but maybe in the fall. peace out

It’s Cupcake here, the resident Kamloopsian ready to embark on a step by step story of the Vancouver show that happened here about a month ago. Whoever said Petty is too old to rock is completely wrong. I would have written a review earlier, but I got stuck under the car seat. So here’s my personal story of my first ever Tom Petty concert, and the best concert I’ve been to in my entire life (and I’ve been to at least 1)… so that says a lot about Tuesday’s show!

I woke up early Tuesday morning to guarantee myself a spot in front of the line up. We arrived at GM Place by 10:30am. There were about 2 others infront of us at Gate 9… some had camped out overnight, but most people like me, arrived that morning.

I introduced myself to a bunch of others sitting in the area – 2 guys, Trevor & Eric from Victoria BC, a couple Jen & Jeremy from North Vancouver, and a Guatemalan Vancouverite whom I forget his name, but was very friendly. I didn’t recall seeing anyone with a yellow Wildflower tag, so I brought mine out. Most people were curious as to what is was, but weren’t familiar with the Wildflower mailing list.

The lineup was rather smallish to begin with, but soon started to grow. Around 1pm the GM Place security started to give out the wristbands to the 5 or so people in line. They first inspected the ticket, stamped the ticket, then put the purple wristband on our wrist. I don’t have any wrists so they threw me in the dumpster. How am I supposed to see the show from here!!

I managed to climb out and roll into the arena around the same time Tom came onstage. It took me a long time to find my seat, boy it’s a big stadium! When I finally sat down the band was starting the encore. omg tom petty! lets’ smoke weed! Then someone tried to eat me.

A good quick hike up the brock beacon. posted pics of this before here and here but these are better.

SIFE, the annoying student group dedicated to themselves, have picked up their backpacks and stormed off of campus. I was unable to confirm if the smell emanating from this story was poop in their pants or just their bad attitude.

Here’s the story:

• SIFE has had a monopoly on Thursday’s at Heroes for the past 7 years.
• Their group made a lot of money doing this.
• Other campus clubs wanted in on the action and, over the past two years, TRU has been talking to SIFE about sharing.
• Earlier this year, TRU gave the Adventure Club a thursday to host a Where’s Waldo night.
• SIFE was told one night out of seven would go to another club.

So rather than sharing and allowing other clubs to raise money, SIFE decided to move their event to Cactus Jacks. They tried to take the Thirsty Thursday name with them, but had  no rights to it.

Heroes will continue to have a Thirsty Thursday event. The difference is that each night will benefit a different campus club.

This is good for students and good for TRU. A stronger and  more diverse set of campus clubs will benefit the TRU Community. Wouldn’t you rather see the Nurses hosting a thursday night? And how much money does SIFE spend shipping themselves all over Canada to “compete”?

For more info check out these blogs:

Cam On Campus: Is Dan Erickson just viciously unaware?

Tab on TRUSU: TRUSU gives SIFE $2000 to run one of Kamloops’ Thirsty Thursdays

Rock Trivia at Hereos Pub circa 2008

Has anyone noticed the new game in town? It’s like cops and robbers, but the kids dress up like journalists and abuse a newspaper. Our once weekly source of student drama and campus comedy is now ploughing a field of the mundane and inconsequential. And mmm mmm mm does it taste insipid!

This past edition featured the boy band ‘hey we’re short on cash let’s tour’  Backstreet Boys on the cover. I guess there was nothing else important going on?

Turning the page, which gets harder the further you go, you’ll find an insightful article on how gosh darn irritating bad drivers are. Hey if your cheese is sweaty does that make page 3? You know what else is annoying: wasted journalism! Your paper is sweaty and smells like brie.

Underneath the road lamage is a predictable and clichéd article on how early Christmas starts. Other topics they considered for this spot included: What Women Really Want, How to Avoid a Hangover, Stock Markets are Down, Video Games are Bad for Kids, Tiger Woods is Pretty Good, Snow is Cold and Stock Markets are Up.

We all recognize the challenges of being a student journalist. There are only so many times you can interview your parents and so many times you can criticize the street cleaner and the snow plow for always doing your street last. So here are some tips to help you along. I know you’re busy with homework and handjobs but the more you put into it, the more lives you could ruin, and that’s what being a journalist is all about!

Today’s tip is: If any of these phrases appear in your article, trash it:
- “don’t get me wrong”
- “I just don’t get why”
- “I can’t wait for it to come” (yeah me neither)
- “but I realize I can’t force it to come” (try harder)
- “believe me”
- “it can’t be that hard, can it?” (it’s the pills)
- “not only does he look like an idiot” (but he smells like cheese?)
- “Mr. Advice Guy”
- “students only have the option of calling campus security if they want an escort” (little known fact: maglite brothel)