Hustling to a bus, Uncle Weed ends the festive period with vaporization session and recounts highlights, hi-jinks and life remixes from 2010 including gut surgery, True North Media House social reporting at the Olympics including Olympic Outsider podcasts, Subpop Records, Hockey Hall of Fame, SXSW, Komasket Music Festival, UW40 party, Halloween at the Waldorf hotel, visits from friends, and then a decompression road trip to Nelson with forays to ferries, hot springs and local organic beers. Ends with clumsy thanks to the Chooglers who had my back during the past year.
Musical interludes including an skat/vocal rendition of a Charlie Parker tune by Nico from Savage Blade.
Poet Randall Maggs discusses his book “Night Work” about the troubled soul of legendary hockey goalie Terry Sawchuk plus the nuances of story-telling, conversations with goaltenders, Sawchuk’s Ukrainian heritage and convergence of history and hockey with host Dave Thorvald Olson at the Robson Square covered outdoor rink in Vancouver following a poetry reading promoted by publisher Brick Books.
“On the Vancouver question, that is my birthplace and, though I haven’t lived there in a long while, I still think of it as home. The Canucks are my team. Over the years I have travelled back to the city often to visit my relatives and family. My grandparents lived in South Burnaby off Kingsway pretty much all their adult lives, my grandfather being a millwright and playing an important role in building many of the lumber mills in and around the city. A couple of summers ago my mother and I were having lunch on a terrace on Granville Island and my mother pointed out the remnants of one of my grandfather’s mills. Even after his retirement he’d be called back in to solve a problem that university-trained engineers couldn’t handle. He’d give mill officials fits, scrambling up long ladders long past the age of 80. I attended grade school in South Burnaby, I think Strathmillan School. After her years of following my Air Force father back and forth across the country, my mother went home to live in Surrey and White Rock where she lives at present. My son has been living out there as much as in Newfoundland for most of the past dozen years, having done an MA in Piano Performance with Jane Coop at UBC and working on his PhD in the Arts and Sustainability with John Robinson at UBC.”
In the last narrative from the Clayquot trip in Summer 2006, the water ban is lifted and Uncle Weed discuses the economic costs caused by the shutdown as well as the tensions about tourist based economy and village lifestyle, considers ingredients for positive development, and tries to resolve some conundrums by evoking Henry David Thoreau while stepping on barnacle encrusted shells on a muddy beach.
Participate
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – “Lonesome (Lost) Traveler”
Segue: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from “Heaven Holds a Place” Rose Cousins – “One Love”
Interludes: William Elliott Whitmore – “Hell or High Water”
Chris Sullivan – unknown from “La La Land”
Background
This is Part 9 of 9 (or more) in the Rainforest Dispatches series on Choogle On with Uncle Weed a series of explorations and soliloquies from the Clayoquot Sound area on the west coast of Vancouver Island during a summertime water outage in the midst of a temperate rainforest. While figuring out what happened, Uncle Weed recollects the tense logging blockades in early 1990s and compares current conditions through lens of deep ecology and sustainable development practices.
Sometimes all the bits which don’t fit make the tastiest morsels. With this in mind, Uncle Weed dishes up a smorgasbord of leftover spiels, intros, set-ups, and observations from the Clayoquot trip including narrative about camptime beverages, glass pipe cleaning tips, local sticky nuggets, eagles flying amongst the Broken Islands, historic Pacific lighthouse, skateboard contests at Tough City Skatepark, Florencia Beach driftwood hut, foiled visits to municipal office and chamber of commerce, and full version of Bex‘s Lonesome (Lost) Traveler song.
Participate
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – “Lonesome (Lost) Traveler”
Segue: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from “Heaven Holds a Place”
Background
This is Part 8 of 9 (or more) in the Rainforest Dispatches series on Choogle On with Uncle Weed a series of explorations and soliloquies from the Clayoquot Sound area on the west coast of Vancouver Island during a summertime water outage in the midst of a temperate rainforest. While figuring out what happened, Uncle Weed recollects the tense logging blockades in early 1990s and compares current conditions through lens of deep ecology and sustainable development practices.
Visiting again with friend Kevin, Uncle Weed discusses the negative impact salmon fish farms impart on the local aquaculture. Specifically, Atlantic salmon living in pens attract hazardous sea lice, are unable to spawn, are fed with small fish imported from South America, and are dyed to appear more attractive in the supermarket. Further the politically controversial fish farms add little benefit to the local economy.
Participate
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – “Lonesome (Lost) Traveler”
Segue: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from “Heaven Holds a Place”
Interludes: Grateful Dead – “Throwing Stones”
Insert: Bob and Doug McKenzie (recorded from CBC TV) thanks to @JMV
Background
This is Part 7 of 9 (or more) in the Rainforest Dispatches series on Choogle On with Uncle Weed a series of explorations and soliloquies from the Clayoquot Sound area on the west coast of Vancouver Island during a summertime water outage in the midst of a temperate rainforest. While figuring out what happened, Uncle Weed recollects the tense logging blockades in early 1990s and compares current conditions through lens of deep ecology and sustainable development practices.
At the headquarters of Friends of Clayoqout Sound advocacy organization, Uncle Weed talks with Kevin Bruce, a concerned citizen newly arrived in Tofino to work as the office coordinator for the FOCS.
With the sound of passing cars and buses, they discuss the economics of logging, stumpage fees, value of wilderness, conundrums of interconnectedness and property lines, the memorandum of understanding, logging on First Nations land and ways to help attain the Friends’ goal of ending all old-growth clearcuts on public lands.
Participate
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – “Lonesome (Lost) Traveler”
Seque: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from “Heaven Holds a Place”
Interludes: D.O.A. – “Only Thing Green” & Rose Cousins “One Love”
Background
This is Part 6 of 9 (or more) in the Rainforest Dispatches series on Choogle On with Uncle Weed a series of explorations and soliloquies from the Clayoquot Sound area on the west coast of Vancouver Island during a summertime water outage in the midst of a temperate rainforest. While figuring out what happened, Uncle Weed recollects the tense logging blockades in early 1990s and compares current conditions through lens of deep ecology and sustainable development practices.
After a few days of frustration and confusion, Uncle Weed sits down on the trail and digs into a variety of essays from Beloved of the Sky by Gary Snyder, Howie Wolk, and Michael Frome plus riffs on painter Emily Carr, love/hate with the commercialized Wild Pacific trail, shore pines, lighthouses, volcanic outcroppings, leaning trees, branches covered in lichen, and sub-division developments.
Topics include the US Forest Service’s traditional commitment to conservation and subsequent effects of policy after cozying up to industry, a plea for less waste and sustainable forestry, public expectations and costs of lost wilderness, and ponderings about whether recreation and wildlife matter.
Participate
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – Lonesome (Lost) Traveler
Seque: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from Heaven Holds a Place
Interlude: William Elliott Whitmore – Lifetime Underground
Background
This is Part 5 of 9 (or more) in the Rainforest Dispatches series on Choogle On with Uncle Weed a series of explorations and soliloquies from the Clayoquot Sound area on the west coast of Vancouver Island during a summertime water outage in the midst of a temperate rainforest. While figuring out what happened, Uncle Weed recollects the tense logging blockades in early 1990s and compares current conditions through lens of deep ecology and sustainable development practices.
While watching fishing boats ply the inlet, Uncle Weed checks in from Ucluelet to describe the cultural and municipal differences between neighboring villages of Tofino and Ucluelet after a thwarted drive towards Kennedy Lake bridge – the scene of the blockades – and examines Ucluelet’s ballyhooed reaction to Tofino’s shortage through the eyes of locals at the hardware store.
With Tofino out of water, the news media have arrived and the tourists are kicked out, so from Whiskey Dock, UW riffs about RV rentals, housing developments, mountains ringed with roads and clearcuts, park fees, logging trucks warnings, jurisdictional confusion about UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and park concessionaires, plus a tip on a head shop in town.
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – Lonesome (Lost) Traveler
Seque: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from Heaven Holds a Place
Interlude: William Elliott Whitmore – Mutiny (on this ship)
After recalling beach camp-outs, rainy days and salmon feasts, Uncle Weed finds out commercial water usage is banned in Tofino and closing down for the tourist operations for the busy weekend ~ thusly he sets out on the trail from Half Moon Bay to Wickaninnish Bay to discover what’s up.
Includes riffs and spiels about local geography, traveler accommodations like zimmers, campgrounds, resorts, park concessionaires, permits, beach access, war memorial plaques, low impact tourism, priorities, RVs, parking tickets, municipal investment, float planes, coffee shops, boat docks and surf breaks, roaming bears, and shipwrecks in Florencia Bay.
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – Lonesome (Lost) Traveler
Seque: Wm. Lenker – excerpts from Heaven Holds a Place
Interlude: William Elliott Whitmore – Let the Rain Come in
Out on a trail, Uncle Weed shares a few lessons learned bearing witness to the blockade lines including thoughts about non-violence and pacifism, importance of respecting others, and the common desire for trees which the ecologists and workers unwittingly share. Plus discourse on ways to replace economic gains from industrial logging with value-added finished products and alternative sources of pulp and fiber including hemp.
Participate
Your input on this topic is invited – particularly if you participated in the protests or traveled to this area. Consider leaving a comment and/or recording an audio missive of your own to use in a future episode. Let me know where you stashed your blockade memories or other rainforest thoughts by emailing: choogleon (at) uncleweed (dot) net or via Twitter @choogleon and/or @uncleweed, etc.
Music
Theme: Bex – Lonesome (Lost) Traveler
Seque: Wm. Lenker – Heaven Holds a Place
Interlude: Geoff Berner – Light Enough to Travel
Background
This is Part 2 of 9 (or more) in the Rainforest Dispatches series on Choogle On with Uncle Weed a series of explorations and soliloquies from the Clayoquot Sound area on the west coast of Vancouver Island during a summertime water outage in the midst of a temperate rainforest. While figuring out what happened, Uncle Weed recollects the tense logging blockades in early 1990s and compares current conditions through lens of deep ecology and sustainable development practices.
Yup, it's a podcast - featuring Uncle Weed on random sound-seeing adventures around Vancouver and international exploits spieling on with anecdotes and observations about communities, public policy, transportation, economics, architecture, entrepreneurship and enjoying herb, ya know ganja.
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