I was the happy recipient of my first ever, bona fide media pass this weekend:

Yup, that’s my real last name. Kinda underwhelming, huh? And you wanna know the strangest thing? Never did the kids tease me with Patrick Gay when I was young. Nope, it was always, “So did you score a hat-trick, Patrick?” “Hells yeah, dumbass,” I’d reply in my best Czech-English hybrid, “everyone in my country plays hockey like stars. Don’t you?”

I remember being friends after that.

Sorry, I’m getting off track. The point was that I was invited to come see an exhibit as a rep of TCL. I went disguised as myself; totally got away with it! Neat :)

This time, security apologized to me for asking me not to take photos. “Oh, sorry, sir. Wish they’d make those tags bigger!” “Hehe, that’s okay. By the way, I need to speak to your superior regarding your atrocious behaviour, swine!”

The power. *shiver*

I would’ve been very interested to see this exhibit anyway, so getting an invite was like a cherry on the whipped cream. With my favourite dessert underneath. Alas, I received no remuneration, alcoholic beverages, or comely female accompaniment, so I feel my hosts could’ve done better in those areas. But good on the Science Centre for inviting a good cross-section of media, even the little guys. *sniff*

And I must say, it’s really nice to be able to share a few photos with you, dear reader, in a much more relaxed manner.

Yeah, not that relaxed. But close.

This was one of those things where I just needed to move slowly and take photos of everything; no rush. The exhibit was all about athletics. Or love. Or something. I think. There were lots of smaller bits in display cases interspersed throughout that provided close-up details of something or other, and always in full colour:

Those are real human body parts, dear reader. Preserved for a good long time through a process called plastination. To sum it up, the sliced-up body part is submerged in acetone which replaces the water in the cells. Under a vacuum, the acetone boils off while a polymer (plastic) gets sucked in.  The cell walls are basically filled in with plastic. Then they add soul-piercing eyes:

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I took in an evening of Qubit tonight. It’s a new science quiz show that will probably play on the Discovery Channel and maybe other CTV affiliates soon(ish).

The audience line waiting outside the Masonic Temple studio was  a curious mix of downtown sophistiques who had undoubtedly just come in straight from the Annex, a ragtag group of teenagers for whom adolescence seemed to be going especially painfully, and other assorted people who served mostly as organic wallpaper. There was some drama in the air above us as a flock of pigeons circled a hawk; I think he had encroached on their turf and shit was about to go down.

Unfortunately, they huddled us in and up the stairs to the second floor of the studio before I had a chance to see how it ended. I remembered being here before; with my sister and friends; when the walls were sweating and the Beastie Boys were discussing the importance of the individual freedom to celebrate and enjoy oneself. The Temple staff certainly got the stank out good since then.

The Qubit set was pretty neat; at the center was a very large sheet of of plastic or maybe polarized glass leaning diagonally like a big canopy over the main stage. From below, some kind of projector shone a moving image of a glassy 3D cube (the logo), onto the screen creating a pretty realistic hologram effect. I sat right in front of it and that shit was trippy. On camera, you can’t see the screen at all so the effect is even better.

You’d think they’d use this in some cool way, wouldn’t you? You know, have the contestants duke it out virtually with the dreaded cube in the final round or something. Unfortunately, no, the entire show takes place in front of the hologram screen which, though admittedly cool, seems a bit gimmicky.

Nothing about the show was explained to us except that we should clap — at a moderate level — whenever the contestants hit a “Wildside!”. Whatever that was. The whole thing had a slightly first-day-of-grade-1 tinge to it: we practiced clapping and then the audience host gave out pens and book bags to those who participated in his activities. The female half of the nice couple that sat beside me remarked that he was probably a comedian from Yuk Yuk’s. I think she was right. I didn’t realize they let those people out on the streets!

After a lot of movement, light checks, and swooshy sound effects, they finally brought out the three contestants: two men and a woman. The men were comprised of David, a stout gentleman with a British accent and regular make-up reapplications, and John, what Spud from the Trainspotting movie would have looked like had he not done so much smack. The lady’s name utterly escapes me but I remember her being short and unremarkable, so it’s just as well.

This being the first taping, I don’t think it’s surprising that there were a few glitches. The most outstanding one was when the entire hologram shut down and a singular “Unlicensed” floated above the contestants’ heads. I don’t think they downloaded the entire show off BitTorrent though because everything else in the studio seemed to work well.

The game isn’t based on a dazzling or particularly unique concept: contestants choose a prize amount which represents the difficulty of a question in a category. Think Jeopardy but with a cube instead of a board.  There are a couple of twists such as questions that can be made easier during timed rounds in exchange for penalties, but nothing to write home about. No full-contact anything here, that’s for sure.

Bob McDonald, angelically illuminated by a studio light over his seat at the back of the studio, was quizzed by the audience host (not the show’s host), to pass time during breaks. I’m fairly certain that the comedian completely failed to recognize who he was talking to. You can taste the sweet, tangy irony, can’t you? The studio host of a highly science-focused quiz show talking to the science guy of Toronto, maybe even of Canada, and he doesn’t know who he is. “Are you retired, sir?”, was the question he asked Bob.

I sure do hope Qubit does well and that I can sell my first-show ticket on eBay years from now at a considerable markup. The game could do well if they ratcheted up the volume a bit; have the host smoke some crack before the show; intercut the segments with softcore erotica; a pool filled with gelatin for the two-people round. I still think that 3D projector should be interactive somehow. Who’s to say all these concepts couldn’t be combined in some way?

It’s been a soggy couple of days in the city. When it wasn’t outright raining, a maritime mist kept everything slick, and the fog that followed ensured it stayed that way. I was starting to feel a bit under the clouds as I sat on the Dundas West streetcar, wondering what the heck I was going to write about today. See how much I care about you?

I was flipping around the idea of mentioning some of the outrageously asinine conversations I’ve been overhearing lately on the same route, but that was quickly dismissed when I spotted this thing:

A giant demi-sperm stuck to a wall; brilliant! At first I thought it might be an installation that spilled across the street from the AGO, but a mere two photos later, a goggle-headed face appeared from behind the glare in the window beckoning me in.

This actually happened some time back in March. I kept putting off writing about it until I completely forgot. Until today, that is.

I was schlepping groceries from Chinatown on my way home when I spotted the worm (called Nessie). Steve Mann’s get-up initially startled me, mostly because he looked like an extra from a Mad Max movie. But those dreamy eyes…

Without a second thought, I lept up those steps with bags, camera ‘n all, and parked myself in the middle of the space.

That’s Steve at the back there.

As you can see, the stuff inside is even more interesting than the halved spermatozoa stuck to the outside. The bathtub is actually being fitted to become a musical instrument called a Hydraulophone. Instead of blowing air through the pipes as you would with a standard instrument, this one uses water which vibrates various pipes, each of which is tuned to a produce a different frequency. In this case, the instrumentalist sits inside the tub, which is often done up for public appearances to look like a real bathing scene. Except here the lady sings and plays the tub. I know, I’m blushing too.

It’s an exact science and Professor Mann’s the man in the field. He does the Hydraulophone thing professionally, between stints as a teacher and a cyborg, I guess. I can barely hold down a job and a blog, so I have to respect the guy. He’s also got a permanent Hydraulphone exhibit in front of the Science Centre. I accidentally dropped one of Oliver’s  poops while disposing of them behind the building; it’s probably still there. Just doesn’t really compare somehow.

At least I managed to go the whole post without making any off-colour references about music being made by inserting fingers into wet holes. See how much I care about you?