Stoney Creek Music Video

Just one final post on the Battle of Stoney Creek!

Mark McNeil, a veteran journalist at The Hamilton Spectator and a talented singer-songwriter, wrote a wonderful song about the battle to mark its bicentennial. In this recently-posted video, he performs it against a backdrop of locations that you will recognize from my previous posts -- the Gage House, the Battlefield Monument, Smith's Knoll, the battle re-enactment field complete with re-enactors -- and even the actual trickling water of Stoney Creek!



Many thanks to Kay G. of Georgia Girl with an English Heart who found this video on YouTube and passed its link along to me!

The Rage of the Maple Leaf

Move over, Hulk! There's a new mild-mannered-to-enraged superhero on the scene!

Maybe it's just me but every time I see this photo sequence, I laugh so hard that I nearly pee my pants. I found these pix over at Calvin's Canadian Cave of Cool but where Cal got them from I don't know. So may I just say: BRAVO to whoever created our latest Canuckian superhero!

Cats Behaving Badly

In My Own Defence

Yes, I am a middle-aged lesbian who has an inexplicable fascination with Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy. But in my own defence, at least I'm not one of those crazy Janeites who worship all things Austen. Their obsessiveness is satirized in this new over-the-top movie Austenland. It looks like a total hoot! I MUST see it when it comes to Edmonton!



I wonder if My Rare One would buy me one of those life-sized cardboard cut-out figures of Mr. Darcy/Colin Firth for Christmas? Hmmm . . . .

Mr. Darcy in the News

Every Mr. Darcy fan loves the iconic "lake scene" in the 1995 BBC production of Pride and Prejudice. Who can forget Mr. Darcy after his swim, with his tousled hair and clingy wet shirt, as he unexpectedly and awkwardly encounters Elizabeth Bennet touring his family estate? It's the scene that made Colin Firth a sex symbol. (I can't embed it due to copyright reasons but you can see it on YouTube by clicking here.)

So take a peek at this next video and see what those crazy Brits are doing to mark the bicentennial of Pride and Prejudice's publication --



The irony, of course, is that the lake scene was not actually written by Jane Austen at all. No, it's purely a creation of the TV version. Oh well, who cares? It's Colin Firth in a wet cotton shirt -- YAY!!!!

Monday, Bloody Monday

Mondays are when we need coffee the most to jump-start our mornings. Oh, if only coffee could rescue us from having to go to work too!

HRH is not above needing a little caffeine pick-me-up too.

Although she prefers fish-flavoured coffee.

Anyway, have a good Monday and here are some words to live by:

HRH the Pirate Queen

Remember earlier this year when I wrote how HRH had ditched me in order to be a Pirate Queen over at another blog? Well, she's back now from her adventures at O'Leary Miniatures -- and she didn't come home alone! She brought along Suzie Swagger, the first mate on her pirate ship. Suzie is a high-spirited gal with a penchant for bikini bottoms and mayhem. She and HRH get along famously.

Both these wee miniatures are only 32 mm (1 inch) high. Isn't that incredible? Thank you, Anne, for painting them so beautifully and sending them to Edmonton. I was only expecting HRH in the mail but Anne included Suzie Swagger as a surprise for My Rare One. And Anne correctly divined her exact taste in pirate babes! It's uncanny but then again, Anne is Irish.

[Photo courtesy of Anne O'Leary]