LINKS

Humorous sites

• Overheard in New York, and its sister sites Overheard at the Beach, Overheard in the Office and Overheard Everywhere: Very funny (foul-language warning), and even funnier if you read the overheard dialogue first, then the headline over it.
  
  From Overheard in the Office, July 17, 2007:
  

  Teacher in Arlington, Virginia: "I'm reading this book that will teach you all the Italian you'll ever need to visit Canada!"
  
  And the headline is...
  
  More of a Pamphlet, Really
  

  From Overheard Everywhere (but the exchange took place in New York), September 10, 2007:

  Tourist lady, very slowly: Uhhh, can you... Um, excuse me, can you... um, tell me where... that place downtown... I think it's, ummm...
  
  Lady suit, interrupting: Christ on a crutch! What are you, Canadian or retarded?!
  
  And the headline is...
  
  Um... Yes?

  Sent in from "Ottawa, Canadia" to Overheard in the Office, October 23, 2007:

  Consultant on phone: You need to set corporate goals. Without goals, you're like a boat on the water.
  
  And the headline is...
  
  Sailing in Search of the Rest of Your Simile
  

  If dialogue is submitted from Canada, the source-line is altered to "Canadia" before it's posted by the people who run the site—an in-joke to which Canucks are not privy—and remonstrative e-mails are merely rendered anonymous and dumped into the page "Urgent Communiqués from the Giant to the North".


From Overheard in New York, January 27, 2008:

Canadian girl, about Project Runway: It really irritates me every time she says "auf Wiedersehen." I mean, get over yourself.

American girl: Yeah, that's how we feel every time you say "Kraft dinner."

And the headline is...

K.D. Lang: So That's What My Initials Stand For!

From Overheard in the Office, December 20, 2007:

Professor (at the University of North Texas): So, what did you think of the reading?

Student: Well, when I read the first part, I was like, "Dang!"

Professor: Um...

Student: And when I read the last part, I was like, "Dang! I mean, dang!"

And the headline is...

Why Professors Drink

From Overheard in New York, June 20, 2009:

Somewhat large woman: And then the orangutan started totally groping me!

Passerby, stopping: You've got my attention.

And the headline is...

Do You Mind? This Is a Primate Conversation.

• Refresh thyself with multitudinous yuks: Behold the winners of the 2011 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which is an international literary parody contest that seeks bad opening sentences to imaginary novels. Among the categories for submission are fantasy fiction, science fiction and vile puns. The deadline for each year's contest is April 15.
  
  Among other deathless tomes, Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1803–73), he whose name is immortalized by the bad-fiction contest, wrote an SF novel called The Coming Race (1870; reissued 2007 by Hesperus Press), about a superpowered vegetarian people, the Vril-ya, who live in deep caverns amid plans to emerge and destroy mankind. According to the Times Literary Supplement of June 29, 2007, the novel "helped to form a number of the stock tropes of popular culture; it also, by inventing a magic substance called vril, provided Bovril with a snappy name. The novel itself is dull, however; its unfortunate narrator hero spends the entire book nodding enthusiastically while his captors explain to him their superiority in all things."
  
  Bulwer-Lytton's fame also lives on in the town of Lytton, the "rafting capital of British Columbia." When B-L was the British Interior Secretary, he was responsible for building many roads in Western Canada and in Australia. (Who knew?)

Writers' sites

• Places for Writers; the link is to their "calls for submissions" page.
• A Newbie's Guide to Publishing, the blog of mystery/thriller writer J.A. Konrath (author of Whiskey Sour, Bloody Mary, Dirty Martini, etc.).
• The Critters Workshop, "an on-line workshop/critique group for serious writers of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror."
• Online Writing Workshop for Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror.

Folk dancing

• I mentioned this topic in About Me, and FAQs. I've been dancing for more than 35 years, and teaching for a great part of that. See the first topic on my Other Writing page for articles of folk dance/ethnology interest. I'm steadily adding to the supply.
• International (as opposed to "ethnic") folk dance: I belong to the Ontario Folk Dance Association (OFDA) and have been on its executive numerous times over the years. I also belong to the Folk Dance Federation of California (North).

Collecting

• Art: I've attended the Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition in Nathan Phillips Square (City Hall, downtown Toronto) for many years, and picked up some of my favourite art there, sold directly by the artist. This is where I met watercolour artist David McEown, a number of whose works I have. He teaches, too. He's a member of the Canadian Society of Painters in Watercolour, and many other Society members attend the Outdoor Art event as well.
• I have many small watercolours by Vermont artist Robert Sydorowich.
• Among other artists whose work I collect are Brian Atyeo (linked to the gallery where I bought his work), Gisèle Comtois, Art Cunanan, Alain Lacaze (a painter/engraver, now living in Quebec City), Alan Ho, Nell LaMarsh (whom I first met folk dancing), Margaret Roseman, Yaohua Yan, Jan Peng Wang and Charles Spratt. The watercolour of Charles Spratt that I own reminds me of the Eastern Ontario hamlet where my mother grew up (Easton's Corners). Spratt painted the work in the Eastern Townships, Quebec.
• Costumes: I own dozens of original ethnic costumes, mostly from Europe but some from Asia. To the right is a 19th-century long Ottoman robe made in Albania (and known in Albanian as a pirpiri), consisting of gold and silver embroidery on red velvet, lined in silk and satin.

Environment/Wildlife

• Climate change: The David Suzuki Foundation
• PollutionWatch
• Toronto and Region Conservation Authority
• Toronto Wildlife Centre, which has grown into Canada's busiest wildlife centre since opening in 1993.
• World Wildlife Fund-Canada, besides being a worthy organization doing essential work, is the beneficiary of the annual CN Tower fund-raising climb (used in a scene in Tanya Huff's novel Blood Lines in the Fantastic Toronto survey).
• Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (U.K.)
• Photo gallery of The Cloud Appreciation Society.

Domesticated animals

• I highly recommend Annex Cat Rescue of Toronto, a wonderful bunch of volunteers who make sure that all rescued cats are spayed or neutered before being adopted or replaced in feral colonies. Their website lists the cats or kittens available for adoption and provides photos and vital information on their age, sex, health and personalities, such as "very loving, affectionate cat," "needs to be only cat," "thinks he's a dog," so potential adopters can figure out ahead of time which cat will best fit into their home. (They then have to go see the cat and its foster mother.) I've adopted two cats from them—Georgie (pictured left) and Marcus—who were strangers when they met but are best buds now. This non-profit organization welcomes new volunteers and philanthropic donations—including Canadian Tire money!

Web design

• Web Pages that Suck: Learn Good Web Design by Looking at Bad Web Design.
• I designed this site from scratch using basic html. Nothing flashy (in fact, I hate sites that flash at me), but it serves. A typical compliment I've gotten is, "Great, clean layout and beautiful photos." It is meant as a site for readers, after all, and for people who'd rather their art sat still while they looked at it. And definitely for people without ADD.