I get a lot of questions when I wear bow ties. The most common question is whether it’s a pre-tied tie, or if I tied it myself. As someone who knows how to tie a bow tie, I can’t fathom any reason someone would wear a pre-tied bow tie. it’s like someone older than 10 wearing a pre-tied tie. Silly, right? The difference is that any man older than 16 should know how to tie a tie, but it’s much rarer to know how to tie a bow tie.

The second question I often get is how I learned to tie a bow tie. The answer… THE INTERNET. Yes ladies and gentlemen, I learned on the internet. The above photo actually shows me tying my bow tie. You see, I went out for New Year’s Eve with some friends, and we danced, and had fun. In between sets of the band Oldies 990, I went outside with my friend Nick, undid my bow tie and my top collar. Did you know that The Magpie is extremely hot when it’s packed with people dancing? Cool winter air was nice on my skin. I was chatting with band member Ben, and friend Nick and they asked me to show them how to tie a bow tie. So I did up my tie. As you can see in the above photo.

Tying isn’t that hard. The problem is all the YouTube videos and diagrams I saw online showed me that it’s a simple, basic knot, then you form the bow with one strand, then you drop the longer strand over the bow, then you sacrifice a goat, pray to the lord Satan, and you have a bow tie.

It really did seem like simple, simple, simple, MAGIC. I couldn’t understand. I watched video after video, with bow tie around my neck, practising and practising. Failing and failing. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Or more precisely I couldn’t wrap it around my neck.

Eventually I found one video that explained it perfectly. Sadly I don’t know where the video is, but here’s the key. Watch video after video, and don’t get frustrated. It’s a simple process, but finding someone who explains it right TO YOU is the difficult thing. Once you find that one video, it all makes perfect sense. I’ll try to explain it for those reading, if you care.

1. Flip up your collar.
2. Drape the bow tie around my neck, with one end longer than the other (I do the right side, shouldn’t matter). We’re going to call this end LONGY. The other will be SHORTY.
3. Make a simple knot. Make sure the LONGY is pointed up and SHORTY is pointed down.
4. Grab SHORTY and fold him over at the widest point so you’re forming the bow.
5. Drape LONGY over SHORTY’s thinest point. This is forming the piece that sits in the centre of bow tie. Keep it neat, or leave it messy, it’s how you decide to tie your tie. It’s a reflection of you.
6. Now the part that seems like MAGIC. Just fold the formed part of the bow tie forward running perpendicular to you. What you’ll notice is that there’s a loop underneath there, I have no idea where in this step that loop comes from, but oh my god there’s a loop. Grab LONGY from the point that’s closest to the loop, and feed it through the loop.
7. From there you’re just tidying it up and making it pretty.

Photo by Nicholas Warzin

Season 4
Episode 17
“The Drum Major”

Season 4
Episode 16
“The Visit”

A few days ago I realized that I haven’t changed my iPhone password since I first purchased the device a year and a half ago. So I did what any normal person would do, I changed my password. After that I spent two days typing in my old password, getting rejected, and putting in the new password. No problem. I’d get used to the password.

I was out at the Horseshoe Tavern with two thirds of Daniel, Fred, and Julie, and a friend of Julie’s from Hot Docs¹. I was using my phone, I was still entering the wrong password initially and then putting in the right one, and all was working.

Suddenly I put in my new password, and it rejected it. I put it in again. And again, and again, until I saw my phone was temporarily disabled. I tried my new password, I tried my old password. I typed it in super-meticulously and nothing worked. Sigh.

I can blame the phone and say that it’s the phone’s fault. It somehow corrupted the password and wasn’t accepting it, but we all know that it was most likely that I thought I knew the new password but confused it somehow in my mind, but I can’t see how I did that.

So in other words, it was probably my fault, but I want to blame the phone.

Eventually I got to the point where my phone was disabled for 60 minutes. They decided to go see a late show at the Bloor for Hot Docs. I was interested in the documentary, but decided my time was better spent going home and fixing my phone, so that I’d have an alarm clock to wake me in the morning.

When I got home, I logged into iCloud and remote wiped my phone. I then plugged it into my media machine, and let it sync. After half an hour of restoring from backup, I realized that it was restoring with a year old back up. That won’t do. I wiped the phone once again, and then I unplugged it. Turns out if you want to restore from an iCloud backup, you have to do it when the phone is NOT plugged into a computer.

I ran the iCloud restore, and it took a long time. It was pretty wonderful. Everything came down rather quickly. The restore happened faster than from the computer, which I don’t quite understand how that happens. It had to redownload all the apps, but it kept my screen layouts, and placement of all the apps and folders. However, if you’re going to restore your iPhone, make sure your iTunes account is up to date with the corrected credit card info. It wouldn’t download my apps that were attached to my anklewicz.com Apple ID. It did deal with the multiple Apple ID situation quite well, and the work apps (Server Admin, Workgroup Manager, etc.) all came down no problem.

It attached all my settings, and all my content, all my iPhone photos, except for iTunes, and photos from my Aperture library, but those are all on my media machine, and ready to be synced.

The only thing missing is yesterday’s text messages, as the last backup was from yesterday morning. Other than that. I have my phone as I left it.

iCloud is pretty bloody awesome. Daily zero-effort backups are nice.

1. A hot Hot Docs chick.

Season 4
Episode 15
“Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”

I will start by saying that I’m not a big fan of horror. I like the occasional horror film, but it’s never been a genre to float my boat, and then have zombies climb aboard, and sink the boat while they eat my brains.

Cabin In The Woods is not your average horror film. It was written by Joss Whedon (Toy Story, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Firefly) and Drew Goddard (Buffy, Lost, Alias) and directed by Goddard. Obviously two talented writers who have already given us some great and original genre fiction.

The film circles around five university students who hop into an RV and head to a… cabin in the woods. OOOO! They, however, are being watched. Bets are being placed, their paths are being planned, for some sinister game the audience is not privy to.

The film is fabulous, the film is creepy, the film is clever, the film makes you contemplate. You don’t know who to cheer for, you don’t know how you want it resolved, but when the resolution comes it’s fulfilling.

Go see this.

One of the architects of the Charter, former Prime Minister Jean Chretien once said:

To have a referendum to decide on the fate of the minority, it’s a problem. It’s why we have constitutions – to protect the rights of the minority. It’s why we have the Charter of Rights. So if it is always the majority vote by referendum, who will defend the minorities?

Yes, he was talking about gay marriage, and yes he was talking about a referendum, but that’s not the point. The majority cannot dictate the rights of the minorities. It is the duty of those in public service to protect the rights of the minorities, and this is why we have the Charter. Mr. Rae, it is your duty to whip your party, it is your duty to uphold those things that Canadians believe it, creating equality and creating a community. We cannot do those things while the Conservatives attempt to undermine rights, nor when the Liberal Party supports their goals through inaction.

Take a stand Mr. Rae. Don’t make me regret being a member of the Liberal Party.

Sincerely,
Adam

Season 4
Episode 13
“The Show Must Go On”

He didn’t reply to this for some odd reason. Never got a letter from either one of them, so I figured they just wanted me to go. So I went. The courthouse is on University Avenue, across from the American consulate. You go through security, and then to the end of a hallway, when you sit in what’s known as the jury “lounge.” They sign you in and divide you into four groups. I was red. We sat, and then they played us a video made in the 1980s. It was terrible. The construction worker, everyday man was amazing, but I think my favourite was the judge.

Then they informed us that anyone with any issue should raise their summons, and they’d collect them, and call them. There was a small coffee counter, so I grabbed a green tea and a mediocre muffin. Mediocre was a lot better than I expected. I sat there and read Have Not Been The Same. After a while they started calling those who handed in their summons (aka, those weaseling out of jury duty), and went over why they couldn’t serve. I sat there reading, as I expected to be there for the long haul. They called people. My favourite was when they called Adam Vaughan. I was confused, turned around, and sitting a few rows behind me was City Councillor Adam Vaughan, and he was trying to weasel out of jury duty. I can’t blame him, as I was soon about to do that, AND he has much better things to do, like represent his ward in council.

Then they called the blue group to go into a court room for the selection process. I loved the announcement because they reminded them to turn off their pagers and cell phone… their pagers…. their pagers… yes, we’re in the 1990s.

Around that point I got a call from the COO, asking me how long I anticipated being there. I had no answers. She mentioned that it was a shame I didn’t ask for a letter earlier (I didn’t know my first officer would have strep), and then I asked if she wanted me to try. She did.

So I went up and tried, and after standing in line, I was told that I can get out if I promise to come back in September. I weaseled out!