New year, New job, Cool books

Well, Barack Obama is starting his new job as the 44th President tomorrow. Good for him! Congratulations Barack! Historic, unprecedented, inspring. And William Peterson (aka Gil Grissom on CSI) is leaving and Morpheus (aka Lawrence Fishburne) is joining the team in Vegas.

I started a new job too! I am on a 6 month secondment with the Ministry of the Environment as Senior Project Advisor for the new Environmental Programs Division (EPD). That means I'm still with the Ontario Public Service (OPS) and working in a new ministry for awhile. I am really enjoying my new position. I love the job and the people I work with and I'm learning a lot of new things every day.

Also enjoying my new Digital Video Editing course at George Brown College on Monday nights. If you get a chance, read the compelling book In the Blink of an Eye by iconic editor Walter Murch. He edited Godfather Part 2, Apocalypse Now (it took over 2 years) and The Conversation starring Gene Hackman. Another great book on film is The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film. Michael Ondaatje interviews Walter Murch. Fascinating stuff. Murch is a genius.

Sending all my American friends lots of love (Canada has already given Obama a 52% approval rating and he hasn't even done anything yet!) Hearts to my favourite Obama Mama in Ancaster. GO MARY! Love, MM

haikugirl.com, STITCH and Book Club

I finally had a chance to update haikugirl.com - the springboard to my media empire ;-)

I also have hundreds of photos I need to download. We need to send the IDC Producer our behind-the-scenes footage from the weekend so he can edit in Team haikugirl.

Last Thursday I was ON FIRE with ideas and energy. I was problem-solver extraordinaire at work and giving people marketing ideas in the evening when we went to Terroni for dinner and on to a play.

STITCH was an amazing opera that was more like a musical performance installation. Brilliant staging, music and lyrics. BRAVO to all the women involved! I told them to take it to the Edinburgh Fringe (or even Edmonton or Winnipeg) since it was really innovative.

PLUS we got a new title for our book club: Toronto, je t'aime. Written by Alison's neighbour Didier Leclair it won a Trillium Book Award and we'll get to read it in the original French. I thought maybe we could meet him for drinks whenever we discuss his book. On verra....