Posted on 2 March 2018

This week’s edition of my newsletter.

Hello! I’m sending this out early this week because I will be busy tomorrow and also wanted to let you know about the Weaving Words celebration happening at UNBC and around the city. Last night I went to the opening concert with the Khast’an drummers and Mob Bounce and it was a good time. There are events throughout the day and tomorrow, including a discussion on reconciliation I’ll be taking part in.

And while you’re planning your social calendar, next weekend is Cinema CNC’s film festival and the lineup looks great. I’ve already learned that this instrumental guitar song was banned from the radio (!) which is crazy.  And then there’s For the People the week after — plus lots more. A busy social calendar, but I often find out people haven’t heard of these things, or I miss things. I’m curious: how do you find out about events happening around the city? Is it a good way, or do you think there’s a better solution?
Because it’s a short week, I’ve only got a top five:

1. When it snows in Vancouver we all have a good laugh about schools shutting down and campuses canceling classes. But there is a wisdom to it– it doesn’t snow often enough for people to have winter tires, and driving in snow without winter tires is dangerous.        It can also be dangerous to drive in extreme snowfall, which is what happened in Prince George earlier this month. But we don’t declare snow days, and the District Teacher’s Association is suggesting maybe that should change. They don’t want to close schools, but they want to make it clear its optional for parents to drive their kids in and give staff an out if the road isn’t safe to pass. The idea has prompted a lot of discussion in my Twitter replies and I think it’s an interesting question, especially when I recall the number of cars I’ve seen stuck a ditch after a heavy snowfall.

1. I was asked by Jeremy Sroka of the website “High Five For” to contribute to the Highly Recommended Feature. I wrote about my favourite music, TV, book, internet thing and thing to do of the moment (actually of January, but they are still highly recommended). You can read it here.

2. I’ve been noticing some cool graphic representations of Prince George lately. I think it’s great.

3. BBC Radio 6 asked people for their favourite three-songs runs. It was a fun question, and I came up with my own.

4. I’ve been spending time trying to get my website to work properly this week. It made me think the internet is getting too complicated (and lots of smart internet people agree).

News:
First thing I’ll be doing when I get to work is putting together a new podcast for your weekend.
Also, wrote about: a fossil-hunting family in Tumbler Ridge, some great research from UNBC that could bring clean water to the world, and whether convicted criminals should be allowed to serve as mayor in British Columbia. More stories coming out on the weekend.

this dude reacting to a bad idea in a training resource is my new favourite mood pic.twitter.com/Dut0GHd6S5

— Andrew Kurjata 📻 (@akurjata) February 26, 2018

Have a great weekend!

Filed under: letters