River City Writer

I’m sure that many of you have been waiting for the Raving Poets to begin the 10th year of their infamous open stage reading series. Well, it’s started, and this year’s spring season has been dubbed Sofa King.

Raving Poets: Sofa King
April 1st to May 27th, 2009
The Kasbar Lounge below Yianni’s Taverna
10444 – Whyte Ave. Edmonton

I believe that emcee Michael Gravel has decided to take the year off, and that some-time host Jadon Rempel will step in to fill his rather large shoes. Jadon has always done a kick-ass job filling in for Mike in the past, so I have no doubt that he’ll slip into the role of full-time emcee with ease.

Other than that, the format that has become standard in the past few years is going to be in place this year, as well, as far as I know:

• Sign-up at 7:30pm; show at 8pm.
• 16 readers will be randomly draw from those who put their name in the hat; there is no special requirement to read (beyond signing-up).
• Give the band directions and they’ll improvise a soundtrack for your poem; keep the poem under 5 minutes or die.

That’s pretty much it. If you’ve never come down before, I highly recommend it. And, of course, you don’t have to be a poet hoping to read in order to enjoy the show.

Come out and see some of the best poets in Edmonton rock the stage every Wednesday from April through to the end of May.

Edmonton is home to at least 3 2 microbreweries: Alley Kat, Amber’s Brewing, and Prairie Boy Brewing. At least 2 of these breweries—Alley Kat and Amber’s—make really good beer.

Prairie Boy’s Fort Garry and Two Rivers lines may well be excellent beers, but I’ve never tried them. I have, however, tried their Ridin’ Dirty Malt Liquor and I have to be honest: it’s fucking awful. There’s really no other way to describe it. It’s just terrible.

Having said that, I will reiterate: Prairie Boy Brewing may make some damn fine beer, but Ridin’ Dirty ain’t it.

My Favourite Local Beers

Before we get to the results of the Twitter poll I ran on Friday afternoon, I figured I would share my favourite Edmonton-brewed beers with you. I didn’t mention them on Twitter, because I didn’t want to bias the results too much (I did mention my least favourite, though), but here they are now:

• Alley Kat Charlie Flint’s Lager is exactly what it sounds like, a simple lager named after the grandfather of Alberta brewing, Charlie Flint. It’s a bit more malty than most Canadian lagers—perhaps borrowing it’s style more from European beer than from the North American industry—but it’s still crisp and clean. Excellent for drinking on a hot day.
• Alley Kat Full Moon Pale Ale is one of the better pale ales I’ve had the pleasure of tasting. It’s not the best I’ve ever had, but it’s definitely the best in Edmonton. That said, it was a close race between Full Moon and Amber’s Pale Ale. Both are brews that are worth picking up.
• Amber’s Australian Mountain Pepper Berry Lager is a unique lager that is quite unassuming at first. However, after a couple of sips the subtle fruit flavours will start to turn up on your palette. Shortly after, the pepper flavour will begin to assert itself and you’ll find yourself pleasantly surprised. I must advise tasting this one while you’re still relatively sober, though. The flavours are quite subtle and it risks tasting like an unremarkable lager if your senses have been dulled by more than 1 or 2 drinks prior to tasting it.

The beers listed above are not the only good brews being crafted in Edmonton these days, they’re just my personal favourites. I’ve tried most of the beers being brewed at both Alley Kat and Amber’s and I enjoy almost all of them. There are, however, a couple that I don’t like.

• Amber’s Sap Vampire Maple Lager is a maple-flavoured beer that is way too sweet for my liking. However, as you’ll see later, one of the people who answered my Twitter poll claimed that it’s a great breakfast beer. While I’ve never tried drinking it with breakfast (I’m not that much of a drunk), I will concede that it probably does go really well with bacon & eggs.
• Alley Kat’s Aprikat is an apricot-flavoured beer cooler. Like the Sap Vampire, I find it too sweet. I’m not opposed to fruit-flavoured beer—I really enjoy a nice raspberry beer on a hot day, for example—but Aprikat is one that I just can’t stand. That said, I know a lot of people who enjoy it, so try it for yourself…you just might like it.

Your Favourite Local Beers

Now that I’ve told you about my favourite locally-brewed beers, let’s get to the results of that Twitter poll, shall we?

The question I asked was: E-town folk: do you drink locally brewed beer? Why/why not? What is your favourite/least favourite local brew? #yeg

I followed that up with: To answer my own question: Yes, I drink local beer. Hard to pick a favourite, but my least favourite is Amber’s Sap Vampire Maple Lager #yeg

With those 2 tweets in mind, you should be able to make sense of the answers that followed:

DougKyle@ink_slinger I really liked Maverick, but I could only find it on tap at the Metro, and they’ve stopped carrying it . Any recommends? #yeg

lsfloyd@ink_slinger Amber’s Sap Vampire Maple Lager… That sounds like a beer I would avoid.

selenized@ink_slinger Other than beer brewed in brewsters I generally don’t drink local beer. Mostly because I haven’t found one I like. #yeg

BrockSky@ink_slinger I agree wholeheartedly with you on the Vampire Maple Lager dislike. It nearly ruined a lovely evening at Ric’s Grill for me.

rafaldyrda@ink_slinger I drink Alley Cat. Love darker beer and for now that’s my favourite. Well, besides Guinness #yeg

mijustin@ink_slinger @BrockSky @lsfloyd No way… Vampire Maple Sap by Amber’s is a great beer… for breakfast!

BrockSky@ink_slinger I really like the Flying Frog lager from Brewsters. I know that is not completely local but it is good.

GregWalker@ink_slinger I do Kokanee. I have since high school cause thats what the older kids drank so I did to fit in. Peer Pressure FTW!!!

DougKyle@ink_slinger cool, have never tried any of the Amber’s. May make a beer run seeing as my afternoon attempt at being productive isn’t working

apotheos@ink_slinger I don’t drink beer regularly enough to support an unpreserved microbrew. Too many calories.

It seems like local beers haven’t developed a very large following, at least among people I follow on Twitter. It’s a shame, really. Some of the best beer I’ve ever tasted is from right here in Edmonton.

For those wondering about Maverick (mentioned by @DougKyle), and why I didn’t mention it at the start of this post, it is unfortunately no longer being brewed.

Maverick Brewing Company was a brewery located in downtown Edmonton. They folded a few years ago (in 2007, I believe) due to financing and distribution issues. It’s a shame, because I really enjoyed their beer. It was a European-style lager that put macro-brewed lagers like Molson and Labatt to shame.

I’d love for someone to buy the recipe and begin brewing Maverick again. I think, with the right marketing, it could succeed in the local market and eventually expand across Alberta (and the rest of Canada). Unfortunately, there is little chance of this actually occurring.

Do you drink local beers? What are your favourites and/or least favourites? I’d love to hear from you in the comments section.

Living in close proximity to multiple murders does something to the psyche. For most people, it causes fear. The desire to move to a new home is often strengthened (assuming it’s a possibility).

Some of us, though, turn to dark humour to get through the tough times.

When a murder occurred just steps from my apartment, I actually thought nothing of it. It was a bit unsettling, but my building feels safe to me, as do most of the surrounding streets and avenues. The Avenue of Nations can be a river of pain, but my building is upstream from the worst of it.

But, eventually, the violence gets to a person. Driving past the scene of another stabbing this morning, I launched into a darkly humourous mode after Sara turned to me and said, “Someone’s in trouble.” (At this point, we were unaware exactly what had occurred, but the police presence was heavy.)

“Someone probably got shot,” I said.

“Well, someone’s still in trouble. Two people, actually,” came Sara’s response.

“Can’t be in trouble if you’re dead,” I said.

Of course, that’s a terrible joke, and not very funny, but that’s how it goes when you start to become accustomed to murder in your neighbourhood.

Drugs, alcoholism, and poverty plague my community. Violent crime follows at the heels of these ills as if by force of nature. Breaking the cycle seems like an uphill battle.

In addition to the poor, the area is home to many of the city’s newest immigrants. Some of these people bring their foreign conflicts with them to their new home, and continue the violence in a land that is supposed to bring them peace and prosperity. Others find themselves overcome by culture shock, and fall into gangs in a misguided effort to find a sense of community.

This problem, perhaps, is more easily remedied than the cycle of poverty and crime that is too often intertwined with it.

The solution is deceptively simple. Make these people a part of the community as quickly as possible. Help them to integrate into Canadian culture. Provide them with support when they find themselves overwhelmed by the differences between their old home and this new one.

Such an effort is, of course, not as simple as it sounds. Numerous people and organizations would need to be involved. Financing needs to be greater than that which is already spent on similar efforts.

People from all walks of life would need to volunteer their time to such a program, but most importantly, immigrants who have successfully navigated the difficulties of moving to a new country would need to offer their guidance to those in need. Those who have been in the situation can offer advice that may never occur to those of us who are native to Canada.

Now, I believe that some organizations already work toward this goal. And families make an effort to help their newly immigrated relatives adapt to their new life. But, surely there is more that can be done.

Unfortunately, I have no idea who to talk to or how to get this sort of effort underway. Perhaps, though, I could donate my time or money to an existing organization. Does anyone know of any groups in the city who are making an effort to improve conditions on 107 Avenue or for immigrants in general?

This place is abandoned and cold. A broken down truck lays in a heap on the curb. It’s as invisible in the daylight as the rest of the street is now. I am seeing it for the first time.

The light plays tricks in this witching hour. Icy fog and sodium vapour throw spears of light skyward, an artificial aurora borealis.

Even with the radio on, I can hear the sound of my tires against the road. I can feel only calm when that noise vibrates my ear drums. The late-night road brings peace.

CBC plays midnight hymns to keep my coffee warm as I enter and then leave the industrial park. It’s a different place in the darkness.

Like a temple that’s abandoned after the worshippers realize it houses false gods, there are only the faintest shadows of life here. I am alone. I stand silent in the parking lot and inhale. The air is fresh.

The scent of car breath and truck sputum is absent from the air for the first time ever. There are no courier vans idling in the lot. There are no lunch time smokers polluting the wind.

I enter the car as silently as possible and let the sound of rubber on asphalt wash over me.

I’ve long wondered why restaurants and bars insist upon placing TVs in their establishments. Unless the place is a sports bar, it makes very little sense.

TVs naturally draw the eye. It is very hard to resist watching a bright LCD screen in the background. When I’m out with Sara, I want to look at her. I want to talk to her. When I’m out with friends, I want to talk to them.

In neither of these situations do I want to be distracted by a television screen just behind the person I’ve out with.

It was great interest, then, that I read Todd Babiak’s recent column on the subject.

He quotes the assistant general manager of the Hat on Jasper Avenue, a restro-pub that is beautifully designed—except for the damn TVs—as saying, “No politics in a bar.”

That strikes me as absurd. Where else but a bar are people able to meet and discuss politics, or art, or anything that matters in the world?

Unless we are to isolate ourselves to our homes or our Facebook profiles, we must have public spaces like the bar where we can congregate and discuss things both important and trivial, without the distraction of a television screen. (I would argue that, in many places, WiFi access is also a distraction that prevents patrons from actually interacting with one another.)

Such places are rapidly disappearing, especially in North American cities like Edmonton. As Babiak sees it:

The problem is, there are scant public places in the city where we can think. Once, long ago it seems, restaurants and cafes weren’t only for dates and to share the pain of another Oilers game gone terribly wrong. They operated as active meeting places. We argued over coffee, beer and wine. There was plenty of politics in the bar. Revolutions were planned, great poems recited, business schemes hatched.

Here, I agree 100%. Public spaces—third places, that are neither work nor home—are rapidly disappearing. With TVs and WiFi access becoming so popular, public spaces are becoming places where we can remain as isolated from the world as we can in our own living rooms.

That is not the kind of world I want to live in.

While I certainly appreciate that WiFi is becoming more ubiquitous, it strikes me as odd that I can enter an upscale restaurant and see someone surfing the Internet while eating their foie gras. I would much rather focus on enjoying my meal and perhaps chatting with the server if I were eating alone, than on trying to finish this month’s sales report. But, that’s just me.

When I’m out for dinner or drinks, I’m interested in my relationship with the people around me, not in a relationship with the TV screen. What about you?

I’ve long heard amazing things about Sunday brunch at the High Level Diner. Perhaps even more often, I’ve heard wonderful things about their homemade ketchup.

I don’t understand any of these comments.

While I don’t have anything against High Level Diner and, in fact, I enjoy their lunch and dinner menus, I don’t see what all the fuss is about brunch. Nor do I understand all the fuss about the homemade ketchup.

Let’s deal with the ketchup first. It doesn’t taste good. While I’m sure it’s healthier than sugar-laden ketchup like Heinz, it just doesn’t taste good. Honestly, it doesn’t even really taste like tomatoes. It kind of tastes like dirt.

What’s the appeal, people?

As for brunch, well, that doesn’t inspire such strong feelings in me. I do occasionally eat brunch at High Level Diner, usually at the suggestion of someone else.

It’s not that I dislike brunch of the Diner, it’s just that I don’t understand why people rave about it. It’s no different than brunch at any other run-of-the-mill diner. In fact, the last time I was there my hash-browns and those of my date were burnt.

I can burn my own hashbrowns for free, thanks very much.

So, why the long lineups every weekend? Why do people rave about the High Level Diner’s brunches?

Because I don’t understand, I took the question to Twitter and got a few responses. Unfortunately, most of them were from people who agree with me, so I still don’t have the answers I’m looking for.

If you are one of the people who loves brunch at the High Level Diner, please leave me a comment explaining what it is that you enjoy about it.

But, first, the Twitter responses:

apotheos @ink_slinger the homemade ketchup does suck although its good if your into that sorta thing, the food is great though, but the menu is small

mark_wells @ink_slinger I’m a big fan of Fiore across the street. Prices are good, food is really tasty, and brunch is served until 3pm.

britl @ink_slinger I’m with you. I’m no fan of the High Level diner.

Contrary to popular belief, Mingus Tourette reproduces asexually.

Via Warren Ellis.

Despite the fact that, just 2 days ago, the media was reporting that rodeo would be Alberta’s official sport, the news now is that it won’t be. Culture Minister Lindsay Blackett curtailed the motion, saying that there are other sports just as deserving, and that rodeo should not be given any special status.

Kevin Taft, of course, was upset that he won’t be able to leave this small legacy behind when he steps down as Liberal leader next month.

Read the full story…

Quite a few days ago, I mentioned on my other blog that I would be writing a review of Pub 1905. I’ve put it off for quite a while now because I wasn’t sure what to write about that I haven’t already covered in my review on Yelp.

Here are the main points from that review:

• Pub 1905 is my new favourite Edmonton pub.
• The drink prices are good; where else can you get a pint of Guinness for less than $7?
• The servers are among the friendliest bar staff I’ve ever had the pleasure of being served by.
• The menu is incredibly diverse; do you know of another pub that serves escargot or warmed goat cheese?
• They have some of the greatest hot dogs in the city, perhaps even better than Fat Franks.

The only thing I can think to add is the reason why Pub 1905 is now my favourite pub in the city. Obviously, the points listed above are major factors, but there’s a bit more to it than that.

For quite a long time, I’ve wanted a place I could go that felt like “my place;” a place where I might be on a first name basis with the staff; and a place that felt, in some ways, like home, despite being a public space.

I had this to a certain extent when I used to frequent Halo, but I’m not really clubber anymore, and I lost that intimacy when I stopped being a regular customer.

In addition to wanting a place that like feels “my place,” I wanted a place that isn’t a part of a chain or a franchise. As much as I love, for example, The Sherlock Holmes, it doesn’t meet this criteria. Plus, there are just too many faces coming and going on both the customer and server side to ever really get that feeling of home.

Pub 1905 is different. It’s not a chain. It’s an independant pub. Even on a night when there is a hockey game, it’s not particularly busy, and the music is kept low enough that you can actually hold a conversation without having to yell across the table. (Speaking of the music: it’s eclectic as hell, Johnny Cash followed by Green Day followed by ’80s electro-pop followed by…)

There’s also an odd, undefineable quality about the place that just makes me feel happy. It feels welcoming and personable. Even though I’ve only been once, it feels like my place.

Plus, there are those hot dogs. Those wonderful, wonderful hot dogs.

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders Fields.

- John McCrae

List of Remembrance Day Events in Edmonton