I want to be on a board, I need to be on a board...

So it is official now. I will be a member of the reelout Board of Directors. With my safety net Dan and Meghan along for the ride as well. Oh there is still the formality of having to be officially voted in at the Annual General Meeting but given the small current membership and the general excitement of said membership that we are interested (along with two others) I think we have it in the bag. Of the other two, one seems like they will be up for it and one seems to need to review the organization before deciding. Mark, the one who does seem likely to go for it, will help even out the gender division which currently skews female. There are still more women involved but we do have Meghan who is as much a gay boy as a lesbian could be and more of a gay boy than some gay boys.

The introductory meeting was a cramped little affair in the reelout office seated around a Rubbermaid bin set with tablecloth, crackers, carrot sticks and hummis. An actually quite cute effort. The meeting was fairly general, more an introduction than anything else. It most definitely increased my interest in the project. I definitely see oppertunity for me to help manage an event that, frankly, is pretty important to me.

The next step will be a "Vision Retreat" to bounce ideas off each other and to help get things going for the next Reelout.

I think my main reason for wanting to do this is not because "I want to be on a board" but because I do love the festival and I do think I have something to offer the organization. Though contrary to my own personal observations reelout is apparently doing quite well despite empty seats at the screenings and the November departure of the Director it seems to be in no danger of folding. That perceived danger was my first reason for wanting to get involved as it is something I did not want to see lost. Impending doom or not I'm still in. I think it has potential to be a rewarding experience and it won't look bad on the resume either.

So look for more updates in the future and get ready for reelout 2010

New direction

So I did something pretty unexpected. I applied for an internal position at work. I have done that on a couple of occaisions in the past and only got one interview. That was several years ago and because of my dislike for the way my workplace is run I have avoided making any other attempts to advance. I think it speaks to the vast improvements our current director has made that I am even considering it. Now it is just a matter of waiting to see if I am granted an interview. I am being optimistic that they maybe have not already got their candidate lined up and the posting is just a formality. Time will tell and I will keep you posted.

Reelout Wrap-Up

Here is a link to a video taken by Miss Tyffanie at the reelout Wrapup. Since we don't come off as total dorks I thought I'd share it.

reelout Wrap-Up

What is my address?

I was given the oppertunity to plug my blog the other day but I actually didn't know the URL for it. I think the person interviewing me thought I was just not wanting to release the address. Truth is I have not ever advertised my blog other than to my friends in my MSN tag. I have never really cared if anyone is reading my blog or not. I am not even sure why anyone would want to read it in fact. That being said though, I do enjoy the fact that some people have happened accross it and do read it. I have received some positive feedback from readers.

So to my readers: Thanks for looking inside my head. Thanks for standing by those dry spells when not much was happening inside my head. Thanks for the comments and encouragement along the way.

The Queer Community

Well Reelout is done and gone for another year and though they had some (major) bumps along the way they did manage to pull together a decent festival. If you don't know what Reelout is you should check out their website.

Amonng my Kingston family (Meghan, Tim, Dan and I) the festival this year sparked an interest to get involved. Well it did for 3 out of the family at least. We will be attending our first Reelout board meeting on February 24th and barring any major issues I believe Meghan, Dan and I will be full on members of the Reelout Board of Directors for the 2010 Kingston Reelout Queer Film Festival. We believe we have some good ideas to contribute to Reelout and hope that we can make a little bit of difference within the Kingston queer community.

We have had a lot of conversation lately about the Kingston queer community and how fragmented it seems to be. There seem to be many groups with many interests but there seems to be very little to bring those groups together. We are really hoping that we can find ways to get more of the community out to things like Reelout. Grad Club dances can be fun but they are not for everyone. I guess that could be said for any queer event in Kingston, hence the fragmentation.

Well time to go get ready for Brunch, my favourite part of Sunday. More to come on my thoughts about the Kingston queer community.

First glimpse of the end of winter...

Here it is February 2nd and though the groundhogs were 3 for 3 predicting 6 more weeks, I can actually feel the end coming. Today is sunny and above freezing. I can actually feel a difference in my spirits and I think it might be because of the shining sun. A couple days like this, here and there, might just get me through the rest of the winter.

I don't think I am the only one feeling it because there seems to be an abundance of people downtown today. Anyone who knows me knows one of my favourite things to do is sit in the front window of Starbucks and watch people. That's what I am doing right now and a day like today gives me lots to watch. I even saw a guy in shorts today, how can that not lift my spirits?

Brush with fame...

So if this guy hit on you in a bar would you walk away awkwardly? Thats what I did. DOH!

Here's how it went down. We went to The Grad Club for the Reelout Opening Gala on Friday. Preceding that was the screening of Were the World Mine which was a lot of fun. We went straight upstairs to the more loungy part of the Club. Dirty loungy but still loungy. We grabbed some couch space and settled in. I headed to the bar to grab us a drink. Stood there for a bit waiting for someone to show up when a cute boy came up to me and asked me how I enjoyed the movie. I said I though it was a lot of fun and he said it was his favourie on "the circuit" right now. The circuit should have been my first clue. At that point I pretty much ran out of things to say and thankfully my phone rang. It was Dan from about 20 feet away telling me the upstairs bar was not open yet. So I awkwardly excused myself from the "conversation" and headed to the downstairs bar for those drinks.

Only about 20 minutes later did Miss Tyffanie inform me that the cute boy was Charlie David, writer and star of the following nights feature screening Mulligans, as well as a regular on Dante's Cove and several other movies and television shows.

So now that I have all that out, I should add that Charlie probably wasn't hitting on me but I like the story better this way. Except for the part where I awkwardly wander off.