Dernier jour de janvier

C'est le dernier jour de janvier, enfin, au moment où j'écris ces lignes la dernière soirée de janvier. Janvier au travail est relativement tranquille, alors ça n'a pas été une fin de mois trop difficile. Tout de même, il y a toujours une certaine fatigue qui vient à la fin du mois. Et le mois se termine un jeudi, ce qui donne une certaine nature à la fin du mois: une certaine énergie en réserve parce qu'on n'est pas tout à fait la fin de semaine. Je dis sans doute n'importe quoi. Cela dit, j'aimerais entendre votre avis là dessus.

The Day of Odin

I know I have blogged about the very same topic before. Maybe this post is just a cheap excuse to upload another picture of Giovanni Caselli from Gods and Heroes from Viking Mythology. But I love this picture, heck all the ones of this book and today is, well, Wednesday, the Day of Odin. At the beginning of each chapter, there is a drawing by Caselli that looks like a bookmark, reprensenting symbols related to the story or the subject featured in the chapter. This one is for the chapter called Odin prepares for the Ragnarok. You see the throne of Odin, his spear, his two ravens Huginn (Thought) and Muninn (Memory), the eagle "from his helmet", his two wolves Geri Greediguts and Freki Gobble-up and his eight legged horse Sleipnir and I think what seems to be at the bottom an hourglass, obviously to symbolise the passing of time and the upcoming doom that it the Viking end of days. Pretty much how I often feel every Wednesday, with a certain ominous unease, as if some catastrophe was about to happen. Apart from this flimsy association, the image is just... cool. With two of my favourite animals, the ravens and the wolves. I hope you enjoy. In the meantime, try to remember all these names and you'll impress people with your knowledge of Viking lore.

Un air d'opérette

Je ne sais pas pourquoi, mais j'écouterais/je regarderais une opérette d'Offenbach s'il y en avait une produite quelque part aux alentours d'ici ce soir. Je crois que je m'ennuie de l'opérette du défunt Carnaval-Souvenir de Chicoutimi. Ca m'arrive parfois. L'aria que j'ai décidé de télécharger vient de La Fille du Tambour-Major, l'une des dernières opérettes que j'ai vue. La cantatrice est Anne Sofie Von Otter. Une Suédoise, chantant le rôle d'une Française qui se croit italienne. Ca a disons déjà un certain charme. Quand je l'avais vue à Chicoutimi, la production avait ajouté pleins de québécisme à l'opérette, changeant notamment le tricolore pour le fleurdelisé. Enfin bref, j'espère que vous apprécierez l'interprétation pleine d'énergie.

January in a nutshell

Today, I asked a colleague how he was. he said "Ok". I asked: "Only ok?" he answered, laughing: "Well, it could be worse." To which I replied: "Ok is as good as it gets in January". It qualifies, I think, as a great unknown line. And it describes January in a nutshell, at least in the Northern Emisphere.

Les Bouquinistes (encore)

J'ai été très dur envers ma région et ma ville dans mon dernier billet en français. Or, il reste quand même que c'est ma région, ma ville et qu'il y a quand même du bon en elle. Je me suis rendu compte que, lors des dernières vacances de Noël, je ne suis pas allé aux Bouquinistes. Ma dernière visite date de bientôt un an. Les Bouquinistes, c'est sans doute la meilleure librairie de la région. Elle m'a fait découvrir Oscar Wilde, Anthony Burgess, Walter Scott, William Shakespeare, Gaston Leroux, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Tonino Benacquista, Racine, Molière, Machiavel et beaucoup d'autres, de grands et petits auteurs. La librairie me rappelle que les Saguenéens ne sont pas tous des grenouilles de bénitier ignares. Ils ont une page Facebook, soit dit en passant. Avoir pignon sur rue à Chicoutimi ne doit pas être facile tous les jours, alors je tenais à leur rendre hommage ici et à les faire connaître. Si vous faites un tour dans le coin, allez les voir.

I missed Mozart's birthday

Well, I did not miss it completely, as I remembered it at the end of the day yesterday. But I did not blog about it until tonight. Last time I blogged about Mozart and uploaded his music here on Vraie Fiction was a very long time ago, so it is about time I add some. I tried to find something I had not uploaded yet. I hope nobody minds if it is more opera. An aria I sang myself, here interpreted bu Erwin Schrott. it is Se vuol ballare from Le Nozze di Figaro.I know Mozart wrote so much more, but I truly discovered him through opera and it is by far this part of his work that I love most.

Le Saguenay soviétique

Il y a des jours comme ça... J'ai lu cette nouvelle hier, ça m'a gâché mon dimanche. Jean Tremblay, le misérable petit potentat qui sert de maire à Ville de Saguenay, est appuyé par 87% de la population. C'est tout simplement un appui soviétique. J'ai honte d'être Bleuet à en rougir. Un ami m'a dit sur Facebook, où tout le monde se passait la nouvelle: "j'espère que tu n'es pas surpris". Je ne suis pas surpris, simplement déçu. Je vais donc souligner la nouvelle comme je peux, en téléchargeant ici pour ce billet Le roi des cons de Georges Brassens. je me console en me disant qu'il y a des cons partout, qui élisent souvent plus cons qu'eux. En l'honneur de Jean Tremblay et de 87% de la population saguenéenne:

A great villain

I have finished reading Ice by Ed McBain at the beginning of the month. I blogged about it here. It is from the 87th Precinct series, which I find thoroughly entertaining. McBain's novels are police procedural, so the criminals in them are often common, ordinary people. Either men who killed, or small time hoods. They are rarely larger-than-life, except a few like the Deaf Man, who is a recurring nemesis akin to Moriarty. In Ice, I was surprised to see in Ice a larger than life villain. He is a massive (but without an ounce of fat), hardened ex-convict wanting to have a piece in the local drug trade and dressing himself and passing as a... Catholic monk. He calls himself Brother Anthony. In the movie adaptation, he was played by British actor Nigel Bennett. I don't think I watched Bennett in anything else than this.

Brother Anthony is a great badguy for many reasons. I am usually not keen on weirdos in crime fiction, because they often end up too eccentric and thus not scary, but his anachronistic monk's clothes and tonsure make him just this side of weird, enough to be unsettling, but too much to make him unbelievable. And it makes sense that he tries to hide his true nature by disguising as a monk: people forget the huge frame, the thugish look and think he is a man of God. His disguise is in such contrast with his personality. Brother Anthony is not ascetic, he likes food and drinks and women (his girlfriend is a large lady just as evil as he is), he is eager to use violence and even torture to get what he wants. I don't want to give too much away, but as far as I know Brother Anthony was a one novel character in the novels of Ed McBain. I wish I could see more of him. At least, he could be the prototype of some badguy in another series of novels. Just a thought.

Question existentielle (168)

J'écris des questions existentielles de moins en moins (la dernière date de presque deux semaines), d'abord parce qu'à plus de 150, ça devient de plus en plus difficile d'en trouver des originales, ensuite parce que j'ai peur de me répéter. Enfin bref, voici la 168:

-Quelle est l'heure idéale pour se lever un samedi matin?

Montreal's Irish Mafia

The title of this post is also the title of this book. Written by the journalist D'Arcy O'Connor and Miranda O'Connor. It is a little known book of an often forgotten but important part of Montreal's crime history: the contribution to crime in general and organised crime in particular of the Irish community. I am not reading it just yet, as I read many books at the same time and still reading another crime history book. But I am eager to read this one, to further my (amateur) knowledge of crime history and learn more about our Irish community, even though it is its darker (and even bloody) side.

Crime history is also, as I mentioned (again) here, a source of inspiration for crime fiction. The Italian mafia has been maybe not quite done to death, but certainly used too often (I am not the only one thinking it). In Montreal, the mafia has been widely featured, in our TV series especially. Yet it is the Irish mob that traditionally controls the port of Montreal. Reading real crime stories, I wish some of them could make their way into fiction.

L'hiver vert à nouveau (misère!)

Petite allitération comme titre. Je l'écris parce que la neige a cessé de tomber: il va même faire bien au dessus de zéro en fin de semaine. Janvier en Angleterre, c'est vert. Et brun. Et gris. Gris drabe. Je ne me ferai jamais à l'hiver anglais. Je ne devrais pas me plaindre: je sais qu'au Québec il faut moins 30. Mais moins 30 en janvier, je m'y attendrais et je peux ensuite mieux apprécier le beau temps. L'hiver vert, c'est beige.

Snickers in the Snow

This is a completely anecdotal post, about a piece of chocolate that is now my comfort food as well as my daily energy boost. I am blogging about it again, because I (re)discovered that the settings enhance the experience.

So it has been regularly snowing over England. It feels pretty much like winter and it is almost cold. I guess it is cold for here. As I mentioned before, at work I have a Snickers bar after lunch, to give myself an energy boost. it is all the more necessary to have sugar to get through wintery temperature.  So today and yesterday I had my Snickers straight after lunch, as usual. I ate it outside, walking in the snow. It was a lovely feeling. Snickers is delicious on a cool August afternoon, but in winter it tastes a thousand times better.

La malédiction de l'Auditorium Dufour

Photo de gauche prise sans gêne sur Google Images, elle date d'une autre époque, hélas. Petit préambule: il est (était?) quand même laid de l'extérieur, l'Auditorium Dufour, comme d'ailleurs toute cette partie du cégep. Mais enfin bref, comme je l'avais annoncé, il a été rebaptisé en Théâtre Banque Nationale. Calvaire! Et qu'ai-je appris sur facebook de l'un ami saguenéen pas expatrié? Que l'inauguration du "théâtre" (ciboire!) avait été perturbé par une alerte à la bombe. Ca commence bien. L'auteur de l'alerte serait en plus un universitaire, un certain Pierre Demers, qui est apparemment un farouche adversaire de Jean Tremblay. Première morale de l'histoire: il y a des imbéciles partout, même chez ceux qui comme moi ne peuvent voir en peinture le sale petit potentat qui sert de maire à Saguenay. Seconde morale de l'histoire: je ne suis pas superstitieux, mais si je l'étais je croirais bien que le changement de nom a transformé l'Auditorium en salle maudite.

A thought about Obama

I am a bit late commenting the news. Four years ago, I was three quarters unemployed (I mean unemployed most of the time), so I watched live the inauguration of Barack Obama. History had been made that day, of course I did not write a long analysis of it, I was speechless about it, I am still speechless now. I did, however, made an interesting (if I may say so myself) observation about the passing of a morally bankrupt, backward administration to another that we hoped would be better: more modern, more progressist, more liberating. The president of United States is not only the chief of state of the most powerful nation in the world, he is the de facto leader of the free world.

I know Obama disappointed in many ways. He was condemned to disappoint, at least in his own country. However, he has been so far a much better president than his predecessor and we are in a much, much better place since he has been in power. I feared that he would lose the elections last November, that the US would go backwards again. The Republican party being hijacked by ignorant, religious wackos, and gun loving madmen (yes, I mean that idiot). And, well, I love the man. I blogged once that I shared two things with Obama: same tastes in TV dramas and a book. I should have said three: Barack Obama, like me, prefers Dijon mustard on his burgers. True anecdotal story, which some right-wing retards created a controversy about. His opponents were often, are often, ignorant Philistines, even when it comes to condiments. I, for one, find it reassuring that the leader of the free world is a man of taste. On a more serious note, I am glad that we are going to have four more years of him, which means four years without a war on contraceptives, four years of a bit more gun control, four years where gay rights will progress in the United States (maybe even to the point where same-sex marriages will be legal), four years of secularism, four years of something we can call progress.

Le Privilège (plogue gastronomique)

Je l'ai déjà plogué en décembre dernier, mais je tiens à le refaire pour la nouvelle année afin de le rappeler à mon lectorat gastronome: le restaurant Le Privilège, LE restaurant haut de gamme de Chicoutimi, là où j'ai travaillé comme plongeurs quelques étés, est réouvert et il a même sa page Facebook. Alors si vous êtes dans la région du Saguenay et plus particulièrement à Chicoutimi ou pas loin, ET que vous avez quelques dollars à dépenser, essayez d'aller y faire un tour. Et bon appétit.

A quote from Nabokov

“Knowing you have something good to read before bed is among the most pleasurable of sensations.” 

-Vladimir Nabokov

I found this on my Facebook page, because I clicked "like" on Nabokov. I read only Lolita. His most famous (and notorious) novel, but not his best I have been told, but I loved it nevertheless. I need to read more Nabokov. Until then, I have this quote, which reminds me that the greatest pleasures are often the simplest ones.

Je veux hiberner

Photo prise l'année dernière à Chicoutimi. Elle représente le dessous de la galerie du solarium sous la neige. Je ne sais pas trop pourquoi je l'ai prise, je viens de me rencontre qu'elle aurait pu être la photo du mois. Elle a aussi l'air d'une tanière. C'est donc un peu arbitrairement que je la mets ici pour accompagner ce billet.

Il a neigé toute la journée aujourd'hui et une bonne partie de la soirée. Il neigera sans doute dans la nuit de mardi également. Ce qui veut dire que les routes seront encore difficiles et qu'il se peut que je tombe en congé forcé, comme vendredi dernier. Je ne m'en plaindrais pas: l'hiver comme ça j'aime bien les congés forcés. Malheureusement, si les réseaux routiers et les réseaux de transports en général sont souvent en déroute avec la neige qui tombe, le réseau ferroviaire jusqu'ici a tenu bon, en tout cas dans mon coin. Si j'étais en voyage, j'en serais fort aise, mais là j'ai comme des envies de fonctionner au ralenti. Ca m'arrive souvent en hiver. Je trouve que c'est une saison pour rester inactif et se reposer. Surtout lorsqu'il fait froid ou qu'il neige. Je suis un brin porté à l'inaction.

More on the beaver's diet

Well, not exactly. I mean yes, this post is a sort of follow up on this one. It is snowy outside and I feel very much like I need sugar to keep me going, if I don't want to start hibernating out of wintery numbness. I could have caffeine, but I don't like coffee. So I have decided to fall at least partially into temptation and eat stuff high in sugar, like cakes and chocolate. In moderation, if I can (I am somewhat immoderate when I crave something, especially sugar). Sugar keeps me going when I feel tired or sleepy. Sugar gives me endorphin. Beavers must know how to survive in rough wintery weather (they even swim in water during winter), so having a sugar diet right now is a wise idea.

I uploaded this picture from Dropbox. It is a rolled cake that has, like all sweet roulade an uncanny ressemblance to a Yule log. Not too much to be out of place in a blog post written in January. And since it still looks like a log, it is kind of fitting. In fact, this could be the human adaptation of the beaver's diet. Instead of bark, I could get the sugar from the cake and the chocolate icing.

Une réflexion sur le cégep

La photo de droite a été prise sur Google Images, elle n'est pas de moi. C'est celle de l'entrée de l'ancien Séminaire, maintenant celle du Cégep de Chicoutimi. Elle montre le cégep sous son angle le plus avantageux, malheureusement je ne rentrais pas par cette porte chaque matin. Le reste du cégep est plutôt laid.

Enfin bref, mon petit frère, lequel est incidemment prof de philosophie au cégep. a aujourd'hui publié un lien sur Facebook menant à une lettre d'opinion publiée sur Le Devoir. J'en parle ici, parce que la lettre rejoint un peu ce que j'ai écrit sur le sujet ici. J'y disais alors que c'est à partir du cégep "que l'on développe son esprit critique, que l'on quitte pour de bon la petite école et l'enfance". Je ne partage pas l'opinion de David Desjardins sur l'université, sans doute parce que j'y ai étudié très longtemps et y ai également enseigné. Cela dit, je suis entièrement d'accord sur ce qu'il dit à propos du cégep.

Sigurd and the Dragon

I left work earlier because of the snow that fell over the UK. Luckily, the trains left on time, so I was not stranded anywhere. Anyway, I spent my free afternoon reading, amont other things (as I read many books at the same time) Gods and Heroes from Viking Mythology. I am still at the creation of the world, with frost giants being very loud when they are having council, which is irritating Odin and his brothers. I am looking forward to get into the stories of Viking heroes.

Last Christmas, I read the story of Sigurd to my godson, because he had been very impressed by the image I uploaded on the right (drawing by Giovanni Caselli). I say I read it, but I didn't read it much, as it was quite a long story. I barely had time to read the introduction, until Fafnir murders his father Hreidmar and turns into a dragon. At least my godson had time to see the dragon get into the story. My mother kept telling me: "Oh, just read the bit about the dragon!". But it is difficult for the story to make any sense without any context. So I read it from the beginning, until he started dozing off. Of course I looove the legend of Sigurd. I read the Sigurd legend before the stories it had inspired, among them The Lord of The Rings, so it has an "original" charm to me.