4 1/2

It's the night of the big date. She gets really excited just thinking about it. Everything you tried on didn't seem to make your extremely high standards for the evening. The pants fit funny. The collar on your shirt is creased weird. After numerous changes, you settle on something, though you're not convinced it's good enough for her. You get in the car and are finally on your way to pick her up but realize you forgot your camera and go back to get it. Great, another set back. FINALLY you're on your way; wait, where are your sunglasses?! Forget it, you're already late.

You get to her house, late, sweaty. She walks up looking a bit perturbed about your tardiness, yet looking as stunning as the first time you laid eyes on her. You get to the parking garage and notice you're short change for parking. You ask her, shyly for a loonie. She hands one over. The back of your shirt is creased because your back was sweating profusely on the car ride over.

You start walking around the park and notice your shoe rubbing your heel in an uncomfortable manner. You hope it's not a blister. You stop for a second to check the damage and there is a hole in the skin of your heel the size of a dime. You hobble over to the hot dog stand and ask for a band-aid. You soon realize one isn't enough. You ask her, embarassed, to get you another. She does and now your heel is heavily padded. You walk a bit, cautiously... what a disaster

You survive long enough to get to the restaurant. You both settle down inside and notice the calm summer breeze through the wide open window that over looks the river and park. You sip on your ginger mojito as she does the same with her mamosa. This all feels more familiar. You're with the girl of your dreams. 4 and a half years to the day. Yet it still felt like the first date.

AWESOME!

I'm such a disaster, but I'm your disaster. Love you!

New York City Giants

You didn't think that was all I had from New York, did you?! Actually, I forgot these photo's existed until last night. When we went to the MoMA, Chloe was scheduled to meet her Aunt at the Ritz-Carlton to enjoy a spa treatment. I chose to opt out and explore the city a little bit. I ended up walking South on 5th Ave and took these photos of some of New York's iconic giants. I took the photos as a series of landscapes and combined them into large collages. The idea came to me in the spur of the moment and I don't think anyone else is shooting architecture like this. It's very hard to make the photos merge seemlessly due to plain geometry but it adds a sense of surrealism to the pieces and makes them more visually appealing. Unfortunately I didn't get to shoot all of the buildings I wanted to, but I'll be back. Enjoy.

The Sherry-Netherland Hotel

The Solow Building

Trump Tower

St. Patrick's Cathedral

Rockafeller Plaza

Radio City Music Hall

stv

Check the Rhime

The city has a Stampede hangover

stv

Wanna Bite?

Summer means Bar-B-Q's. BBQ's mean smokies. Smokies mean satisfied palets! MMMMmmmm, I bet this is going to make you crave a phalic shaped piece of meat. Yeah, I'm reaching for content.

1. Buy it.

2. Dress it.

3. Chomp it!

stv

Everyone Loves a Parade

It's that time of the year again. That's right, cow-pokes, it's the Calgary Stampede. The time of the year when the city becomes bi-polar for 10 straight days. When business casual is replaced with western tacky. That time of the year when pancake batter and sausage grease is seeping through your pores. That time of the year when safety meetings are held on sun drenched patios. Yeah, I'm not the biggest fan of the ''Ol Pede, but I do enjoy the amount of chaos and disorder the yearly extravaganza causes. Parade day was amazing out and I couldn't resist heading out to snap some shots. And of course, in STV style, the focus wasn't as much on the parade but on the people around the parade. I'm a bit of a people watcher, but you have to admit that the kiddies are just too cute to resist! Enjoy.

stv

Movie Review: Toy Story 3

This is going to be the easiest and shortest movie review I have ever written. This one comment will pretty much describe the film in its entirety and describe how important it is that you see it. Are you all ready for it? Here we go! I'll even bold it for effect.

Toy Story 3 is the best Pixar movie ever made

(thus far).

Thanks for reading, go see it.






Ok, so maybe it can't be that simple, but you have to admit that single comment says so much. Pixar has a strong history of amazing animated feature films. Their stories always have amazing depth and feeling, sometimes more depth and feeling then most films these days. For a child, the films are fun and for the adults they are all too human. To say that Toy Story 3 is the best Pixar movie yet is a monumental judgment call considering Pixar is the juggernaut studio that produced such masterpieces as the first two Toy Stories, the futuristic Wall-E, the romantic Up and the fun-fueled Monsters Inc. (just to name a few). And while I am now reminded how amazing each movie is, I am still willing to stand behind my initial statement.

Andy is now graduating from high school and I getting prepared to go to college, yet he can think of no better way of repelling the ladies then by having a full toy chest at the foot of his bed. After numerous unsuccessful attempts by Woody, Buzz and crew to get Andy to play with them, the forever loyal toys decide it is time to pack up and retire to the attic where Andy may sometime call upon them again in the future. Following a mishap, the crew splits up and an impending doom is thrust upon them. It is now for the toys to decide whether to ride out a sticky situation or get back to their rightful owner, Andy, before it is too late.

The technical aspects of the film should go without saying. Pixar is always the best studio when it comes to their animation, voice acting and soundtrack. They truly have mastered the art of computer animation to the point that it is seamless and you forget that it is in fact an animated feature. Everything just seems to fit and act natural. Nothing unexpected here.

The story is what really gets me. Now, the love sequence from the film Up has to be one of the best sequences of all Pixar films but Toy Story 3,in its entirety, has the strongest story. It is a seemingly complex story of loyalty and love that harps back to the original two films of the franchise. Yes, we are talking about toys here, but what Toy Story 3 has done is masterfully tricked you into believing that Andy and his toys are bff's! What we're really looking at then is how do you feel about saying goodbye to your best friends? Heavy, right? With tons of laughs and gratuitous slapstick humor, the film flawlessly weaves a spectacular web that concludes that greatest animated franchise of all time perfectly. The Gypsy Kings even cover "You Got A Friend In Me" for the credits! What more could you ask for?!

I'm sure you've seen the other two Toy Stories, right? So what are you waiting for? Forget vampires and werewolves. Forget air (gender)benders. Who cares about A-teams or Kung-fu kids?! Toy Story 3 is the best film of the year so far and, in my opinion, as close are you're going to get to a perfect movie!

9.9/10

stv

FYI. I'm saving my strongest statement of all for the end. I saw this movie two weeks ago and all I can come up with is the most un-clever review I have ever written. HIYO!

A Time to Kill

“Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

Steve Jobs



“The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once.”

Albert Einstein