Toboggan Innovation

Talk about an innovation that could transform the winter experience that’s about to blizzard into our lives – saw these SnowShorts at the Orvis store in Boston the other day. Now that’s meeting an unmet and unarticulated consumer need!

 

World Class Wines

As Ontarians or even Canadians, what are we championing? That we’ve got some truly ‘world class’ wines (world class, of course, being Canada-speak for ‘Can we join the club’?)? That we’ve finally got a real opportunity to put our grapes budget into local, rather than distant, economies? Or that our locally-generated hype machine is working at maximum efficiency? Probably all three. At least, that seems to be the case in the context of Malivoire.

The Beamsville winery getting as attention from its gravity pull method as from the taste in its bottles is a case study in the Canadian ‘world class’ phenomenon. There was the much hyped tasting release back in April. There was the Jamie Kennedy event this past weekend in Beamsville. And, for those of us not attending either, there is equal parts buzz at the right LCBO stores. But is Malivoire all it’s hyped up to be?

High scores on both Pinot Noirs, the ‘06 and ‘07. But both, quite frankly, are overpriced. $30+ is a risk for most middle-budget wine consumers to take on a Canadian red and, at the end of the bottle, I’m not so sure wouldn’t have been better spent on something from Oregon or Washington.

$32 for the 2007 Old Vines Foch definitely would be spent better elsewhere. As the label explains these 33-year old vines are “Well into their declining years….” I’d say – declined. There are definitely some jump outs with the first few sips, but a glass later it’s like drinking a bottle of red that has been open for a day or two.

The 2008 Pinot Gris? Sadly, a disappointment. More Grigio than Gris, there’s just no Alsace in your glass. Low juice concentration, very little peachiness and almost the level of acidity that had me take that Anne Boecklin back to the LCBO last week for a refund.

All is not lost, however: the 2008 Gewurztraminer is a surprising stunner with everything you’d expect from the grape, the 2006 Chardonnay isn’t super complex or anything but very fresh and juicy, and the Lady Bug Rosé continues to impress after a number of bottles.

Malivoire is certainly getting much-deserved local attention for its wines, and my uncle from Cali was impressed – maybe more for the gravity pull than the wines, though. Is this enough to believe the hype? Or are we just engaging in another round of Canadian cultural cartography?

 

Design Info on the Hood

more about “Slagsmålsklubben – Sponsored by desti…“, posted with vodpod

Great info-design spin on a classic fairy tale, tipped this way by Ms. King.

 

The Summer’s Rosé

Steve Friedmann was right. Malivoire is, arguably, at the very top of the Canadian wine game right now. Their 2008’s are stunning, and well worth a trip to wherever the best of Beamsville is carried. Of the winery’s selection, it’s their Lady Bug rosé that will shine this summer: better than virtually anything in the $14 range – including the best of French or Spanish rosés – it also wins awards for being able to play in the same branding market as all those shitty wines with the ridiculous animals names. Why? Playful and pretty – like the taste – with a simple spin on design that equally reflects what’s on the nose and in the mouth. Congrats to them – another  Canadian producer (and that really only makes 3 or 4) worth writing home about if you live in France or Spain (or Oregon).

 

The Finger…for plagiarists

Today, I’m giving a proper Ape Notes finger to a blogger who decided to change 5 or 10% of the words from one of my postings last month and call his/her most recent post his/her own. Ironic that this person chose to do so using one of my posts (there have been a few) where I write about the value/effect etc/ of Google alert keywords. Duh, fucker – you didn’t think that shit would be key-worded for me to bump into? Names and URLs we won’t use, lest he/she get more hits at my expense. Bottom line: lame. Main line: get a comments section so I can call you out direct.

 

Why no anthro on Academic Earth?

Wikipedia has given everyone the keyword-game to act like they know. C’mon – like you haven’t been at a cocktail party with someone dropping action-network theory into the mix?! Now, in the Ted vein, Academic Earth steps it up by offering viewers the confidence and cadence to talk like an expert. Lectures, lecture series and courses in a variety of disciplines delivered by profs around the globe, it’s cool(ish), useful(ish) and occasionally very engaging. It’s also a little amiss: in this most liminal of ages, with so many reconfigurations of social symbols, rife with pregnant rifts in how we communicate, gestative of new rituals and performances – the topic list has a glaring absence and a Search comes up with the unthinkable…”No Results Were Found. Try A New Search.” Sort by Relevancy? Ouch!

 

Tokyo Newspaper Etiquette

Stephen Colbert’s been taking some shots at a failing newspaper industry of late, but this new campaign from the Tokyo subway authority will be far more damaging to the space, place and time that the newspaper occupies in our lives. Begin your eulogies (again)………….now!

 

Tailing Portigal’s persona post

A quickie on Steve Portigal’s blog gets cred for posting me towards the new Firefox personas. Like him, I’m not the biggest fan of amalgamated humans transformed from lives and emotions to bullet points and recommendations, but I have eased up a bit in recent months (on the conditions that the thickest description possible and a direct line from researchers to authors to designers is followed). Still, gotta laugh at how the designers who these tools are meant for have so sucked them into their creative realm and spit them out that now we can dress up our Firefox in personalities. Just like so many of the personas folks are passing off as consumers, the Firefox skins are “lightweight, easy-to-install and easy-to-change.”

 

TV Wives

more about “The Women of ‘Lost’ video on Music Video“, posted with vodpod

A month or so ago, after coming in to the office from watching Daniel Craig in Defiance the night before, one of the movie’s side-stories emerged as a fleeting hot topic between me and a few colleagues: forest wives. Maybe just one colleague. It grabbed my imagination. It grabbed Andrew’s imagination. I don’t think it totally grabbed the imagination of everyone else. Whatever, we got it: the idea that, removed from the relationships forged through social reality (because you’re hiding in the forest to avoid the SS), a man would take on a ‘forest wife’. Conversely, so as not to seem as if this forest phenomena was a one-way gender thing – the movie was, after all, told primarily from the position of the men engaged in fighting the Nazis – it’s likely that the women in the film reality were, off camera, talking about their forest husbands. What struck us, I think, was not only the catchy phrase (forest wife does sound sort of fun) but also how, when social realities inspire, necessitate or motivate them to do so, people can be very fluid, flexible and creative when it comes to defining, pursuing and living their relationships. And so we joked about office wives, club wives, grocery store wives…all the wives in all the social settings that might be married in and by the imagination.

As a blissfully married man, I won’t be taking any imaginative wives in those places. I’ll leave that up to my unmarried colleague. However, I will admit a soft-spot for occasionally taking on a TV wife. A TV wife, for me, is often my portal to fully immersing myself in and committing to a show. While I’m not sure I was married to them, there have been definite attractions to both Claire and Brenda in Six Feet Under; Karen in Californication; Bette on The L Word (I know, I know); Kate, Sun and the blonde doctor who lived with the Others on the current season of Lost; and, when she’s not coked-out, even Kimber on Nip/Tuck.  I’m currently watching the second season of Big Love, so full disclosure is required. My TV wife is Margene.

I love Margene because she’s full of energy, she’s hot, she’s (at least in Season Two) an anchor between Barb, Nicki and Bill, she’s an anchor for Benny, she’s fun, she’s a survivor and she’s lots more. A TV wife’s characteristics are central to marrying her, but I’ll skip from those to why I’m writing about my fictional nuptials.

In the literature on communication, performance, theatre and other cultural studies, the act of identifying and building an imaginative relationship with someone on TV has been variously tagged as para-social interaction, subjective dramatic play and inter-subjectivity. The same phenomena occurs while reading a book – and there’s some very insightful essays that look into how this process occurs in romance novels where, in a twist of identification, women readers adopt the position/character of the rogue or romantic male in order to imaginatively engage with the female characters.

What we engage with differs. On Families.com you’ll find a list and discussion of  one blogger’s greatest TV wives from the 1950s onwards. It includes the likes of Elyse Keaton (Family Ties), Jennifer Hart (Hart to Hart), Roseanne Connor (Roseanne),  Tami Taylor (Friday Night Lights) and, of course, Marge Simpson. These women made this woman’s list primarily for qualities that speak to strength of character. Another list on Starpulse.com measures TV wives much the same way. It lists Louise Jefferson, Peggy Bundy, Clair Huxtable, Carmela Soprano and, of course, Marge Simpson. Then there are those who would marry for hotness alone. On Rock The List you’ll find a list of The 28 Most Ravishing TV Wives – fictional women like Mary Tyler Moore, Linda Evans, Eva Gabor, Cheryl Hiens and, in hindsight, my first TV wife: Elizabeth Montgomery from Bewitched.

Based on their character, quality and beauty and through the narratives emerge between how they are written and how we write them, TV wives could – and should – be a model for building brands and customer experiences. Then again, I’ll take Margene (until the next wife?) and my own imaginative aspirationalism over that of a sneaker, a soft drink or a mobile phone any day. Sorry, Bill.

 

Junglists for Jesus

You know He would approve. Make sure watch through them all.