Changes

As you can see, the blog looks quite a bit different now. I have upgraded to the Blogger Beta version and am quite excited by how easy it is to work with. There were some causalties in the process of transferring over however. As you can see, it got rid of the clock announcing how long Sarah and I have been married. It also got rid of the counter at the bottom, telling me how many hits the blog was getting. The biggest change is that Sarah and I have created a new blog, a blog to chronicle our family events. As we talked about creating a Christmas letter with all our recent news, we thought it would be much easier and more fun to begin a blog together. We hope this will fill much of the same role my blog has played recently, to update our family on everything that's going on. I will still keep my blog and there will probably be some overlap, but this will be my venue for political and social commentary, as well as the occassional proseltying message about my Church, the Yankees or Phish. I hope you'll bookmark both, or follow the links we have on the side, and check them often. Enjoy the changes! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Canadian National Gallery of Art

The other night Sarah and I took advantage of the fact that museums are free on Thursday evenings and went to the National Gallery of Art. We had a wonderful experience and were deeply impressed by the unique building which itself is a work of art. It includes two or three wonderful atriums like the one pictured above, including one with a fountain on glass, so that you can stand underneath it from one floor below. You can also see the stories high Christmas tree they had in the entryway. But the highlight for me was the giant baby's head in the entrance of the contemporary art section. I still can't get over how cool this thing was in person! Maybe I'll post a video of it so you can get a better perspective on what it looks like.

Barack Obama on Monday Night Football

Have you been hearing all the hype about Barak Obama lately? I've been following him closely for the last year, listening to his weekly podcasts, etc and I am really impressed. He is extremely intelligent and straight forward. A lot of people are hoping he's going to run for President in 2008 and he gets questions about it all the time. There was even an editorial in the Washington Post this week by George Will, encouraging him to run. As this video demonstrates, he also has a sense of humor.

Spectacle

On Tuesday night I played a gig with Dylan Morgan on bass guitar. We had a lot of fun preparing for this event. It was a cool feeling to see our names in the paper in the upcoming events section, to drive up to the venue and see the board out front, as well as a little poster advertising our show. How was the music? Well...I've decided to stick with health policy! The title of this post is a play on the french word meaning "concert." Many thanks to Sarah for her wonderful support, she's the best.

Christmas Staff Dinner

One of the reasons I pushed so hard to get from NYC early this week was so I could make it back in time for my staff Christmas dinner. Rob Merrifield, the Member of Parliament I've been interning with since September was nice enough to take the three of us and our spouses out to dinner at the Parliamentary Restaurant. It's a pretty swank place on the 6th floor of Parliament. You need to be staff or a member to eat there, but the prices are quite reasonable ($15 for a phenomenal filet mignon). We had a great time and it meant a lot to me that Sarah and I were included. Before dinner we met in his office to take pictures and exchange gifts. The staff gave Rob a copy of the most recent Canadian Bill of Rights signed by the Prime Minister at the time (it was fairly recent, 20th century). They all gave Sarah and I a beautiful portrait of the Parliament Building, a beautiful coffee-table dish and coasters that were from the floor of the original library of parliament! If you remember my October post about how amazing the Library is then you'll know how cool a gift this is. My internship will end next week and I feel so grateful for the experience I've had working with Rob and becoming friends with Michael and Ranelle. I have learned a ton about politics and legislating, and my love for Canada has deepened considerably (especially since they keep letting me back in the country!)

DC Photos

Over the weekend I took a bus down to Washington DC so I could spend some time with my mom, who was there for a conference. She was in meetings during the day Saturday, so I had a great time sight-seeing. If you've seen my last DC post, from June 2005, then I can't use my joke about all the good real estate being taken. If you haven't, then you should explore the archives a little. The top picture is of the Capital Building from Pennsylvania Ave. The 2nd picture is the inside of the beautiful dome. It's so high that if you took the Statue of Liberty off her pedestal, she could stand up in there and still not touch the top! The third is the room where the House of Reps used to sit back when Abraham Lincoln was a Congressman. The acoustics in there are crazy, such that you can't whisper without everyone hearing every word you say. Terrible for politicians! In the basement of the Capital is the old Supreme Court chambers, which is still only lit by oil lamps. Of course the room isn't used for anything now, but it's fun to imagine how dark it must've been for those judges. As for the White House photo, you should have seen the protesters out front. There is one guy who beats a drum constantly, and apparently has a 24 hour vigil going with a couple other people. There was another guy dressed up as Pres Bush, but with horns and other devilish apparel. I don't like Pres. Bush's policies, but that might be a little over the top!

The Intrepid

It's funny how quickly things change. I was in NYC all last week, and just 2 days ago rode past the intrepid in a cab on my way to the bus station. If you've never been to the Intrepid, it's a former World War II battleship which has been turned into a museum. It's really pretty cool to sit inside one of the planes or imagine what it was like to live on the ship. It's been sitting at its home in the west 50's in Manhattan that it was so stuck in the mud they couldn't get it out! Apparently they finally suceeded yesterday, and there were some great pictures on the NY Times website of its trip to Bayonne, NJ where it is going to be cleaned up. I love this image of the skyline and can't believe I've said goodbye to it again. Truth be told, however, I am so happy to be up in Canada where even though temperatures are already below freezing and our car is covered in snow, I am eveloped by the warmth of my wife's love!

NYC?

You'll never guess where I am right now... at work in downtown Manhattan! It's been so wierd to be home, and although I've had a great time, I really look to being back in Canada with Sarah. I came down a week ago so that I could get a study permit to take a graduate level seminar in Canadian Health Policy at the Univ of Ottawa. But wasn't I already in Canada you ask? True, but it's actually much more difficult to apply for a Canadian study permit from within Canada. Because I'm from the States, I can just do it at the border when I come up on the bus. Since being down I've been staying at my father's apt and have enjoyed spending time with him. My mom was in Washington D.C. for a conference, so I took the bus down Friday night and spent the weekend with her. It was great, I toured the Capital Building, walked around the White House and had dinner in Georgetown. In all honesty, this was hardly a vacation though. I've been home in NewYork City for 5 days, the first was spent recovering from an overnight bus trip. The other four weekdays were all spent working down at my old summer job, as a Temp in the Tax deparment for Legg Mason's Mutual Fund Accounting. It's so surreal to be back, but I'm very grateful to have a job where I can call up on Monday and essentially say, "Well, I thought it was good-bye when I left in July, but I'm going to be in the city this week and I'm hoping to start working on Wednesday," and for them to say "ok, great, come get as many hours as you want." Tonight I catch the 9:30 bus back north, crossing the border around 4am, but not getting into Ottawa until 9am. Ahh, I'm so happy I'll have 12 hours on the bus to look forward to tonight! I promise to post pictures soon.

Gig: Dec 12th

I'm real excited to have a gig booked at the Avant Garde Bar in downtown Ottawa for Dec 12th at 8pm. I'm going to be debuting a bunch of songs I've written and am very excited that bassist Dylan Morgan will be joining me. I hope to see you all there! Here's the link to the venue: Avant Garde Bar

PHISH-

Here's another fun memory. This is New Years Eve Dec 31,1999. Peter Jennings did a 24 hour broadcast of NYE celebrations in each time zone. I stayed up until 3am to see this clip and was so dissapointed I wasn't down in Florida for what is widely considered the best Phish concert in their more than 20 year history. They played 3 sets on the 30th, 1 on the afternoon of the 31st and then from just before midnight until after the sunrose at 7:30 am the next day! I've listened to the whole set a few times, including once or twice listening to it non-stop and it's phenomenal. Here's a phun little taste for you.

Foo Fighters - Big Me

Bring back some memories?