2016

Just Days Before Christmas, I Finally Got The NES Classic Edition – S12E06

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The NES Classic Edition is one of the hot sellers of 2016 and a must get for Christmas. I was able to get it at EB Games on December 22nd and they had a minimum of 4 per store. It goes to show how crazy buyers and video games fans are trying to scoop up this retro video game system.

I wasn’t trying hard enough to finding it when it was released in late November but I was convinced by my brother to get it. It was quite the hunt to finding the product around stores. A nice way to get it before Christmas.

Changes to the Blog
Just to let everyone know that WildWorks.ca shifted to a web hosting service. The reason for it being that I bought web hosting for the lion dance website and with the shared hosting, I can also use up to 3 websites. I might as well move my blog as WordPress.com has given me limited ability to style the pages and having some complications. It will be powered by WordPress.org, which gives me more freedom with using plugins.
At the moment, some of the older entries are missing photos and other content. The migration will take awhile and I will probably have a new theme layout sometime in 2017.

Wanting to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
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Time for Winter, Time for a New Parka – S12E05

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The Signature Parka
It was a week after Black Friday and being a Hudson’s Bay fanatic, they had a one day sale for the Hudson’s Bay Collection products. This particular jacket caught my interest and it has been released since September. Just in time for Winter, it’s the Hudson’s Bay Collection Signature Parka.

Regular price at $499 (Canadian), on that Friday (December 2nd), it was on sale for $299. I couldn’t pass up on the deal since I was in need of a new winter jacket. The previous winter jacket has shown some wear and tear. There’s no to continue wearing it for Winter 2016 and 2017.

The HBC Signature Parka looks very stylish with the famous multistripes. There’s several pockets and two drawcords for the hood and waist. The fur from the hood is coyote. It’s puffy throughout the jacket but more noticeable in the bottom. I have worn it inside the house and it got pretty warm.

I can’t wait to wear it outside as Ottawa got some snow and hope to keep it in good care and have it last for years to come.

You can check out the photos below.
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The 24 Days of Candies and Tea – S12E04

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advent-calendars-2016
It’s that yearly time on the final month of the year. It’s the popular advent calendars in the form of DAVIDsTEA and Squish Candy. Squish Candy has opened a location in Rideau Centre for several months and it’s been a great convenience in getting the 24 Days of Candy. DAVIDsTEA offered their hot selling 24 Days of Tea in late October. It used to be released on November.

Here’s the list of the advents calendars. They will be updated for the 24 days.
The openings will be shown on Instagram. Continue reading →

Siberian Cat Café in Chelsea, Quebec – S12E03

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On Thanksgiving Monday (Canadian holiday), I had the opportunity to check out the Café Chat Siberien, the French name or the English name, Siberian Cat Café over in Chelsea, Quebec. Cat cafes have become pretty popular throughout the world. I’ve been wanting to check it out as I enjoy seeing adorable cats.

The Siberian Cat Café has opened for over a year and it’s become a fun destination when heading down to Gatineau Park. Being a holiday, there was traffic for people going to Gatineau Park. Luckily for Google Maps, it gave us another route to avoiding the car pileup.

Getting inside to the café and to see the cats, you need to order either a drink (tea, coffee and cola) and grill cheese sandwich or some small sweet bites. They also had the Montreal cola, 1642 Cola. I heard good things about it. It’s a cola with maple syrup in it.

Heading inside the cat room, there were some cats hanging around and some sleeping. The cats were friendly and they didn’t bite or scratch patrons and myself. There were also art installations throughout the building.

Overall, it was a quaint and relaxing Thanksgiving holiday going to the cat cafe. You can check out the photos below.

Hope you have a great Thanksgiving holiday!

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Beau’s Oktoberfest 2016 – S12E02

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It was a fine Saturday afternoon as I went to Vankleek Hill (an hour’s ride from Ottawa) for the 8th annual Beau’s Oktoberfest. I had to go along with my dad and I’m not total beer drinker. He had extra tickets and why not go to the event for the third year.

The 2016 edition of Beau’s Oktoberfest had a lot of craft beer from Ottawa, Quebec, and Toronto (including the GTA and Golden Horseshoe area). Beau’s brought their 16 beers and tap. Aside from the beer, there were restaurants from Ontario and Quebec serving their kind of Bavarian styled food.

This year’s main concert lineup had 54•40 and Born Ruffians for Friday. k-os and Hannah Georgas for Saturday. Even though, I didn’t stay past 6pm at Oktoberfest, I was able to check out part of Montreal’s Motel Raphaël. I haven’t seen the band live for quite awhile and they recently released a new album, System.
Oh yes, Alan Neal of CBC’s All In A Day was MC for Saturday’s concert lineup.

All in all, it was great to be at Beau’s Oktoberfest and it was quite a big turnout as people will have fun and drink beer.

 

The 2016 Polaris Music Prize Gala – S12E01

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It’s become a tradition to start the new season in Toronto for the Polaris Music Prize Gala at The Carlu. Congratulations goes out to Kaytranada for winning the 2016 edition of the music prize for the album, 99.9%. It beat out the likes of 9 artists and bands from Black Mountain, Basia Bulat, Grimes, Carly Rae Jepsen, Jessy Lanza, Pup, Andy Shauf, U.S. Girls and White Lung.

At the gala, there were live performances from Black Mountain, Jessy Lanza, Basia Bulat, Andy Shauf, White Lung, Carly Rae Jepsen and U.S. Girls. All of the performances were. The Toronto Symphony Orchestra assisted in Bulat’s and Jepsen’s performances. The gala were hosted by Amanda Parris of The Exhibitionist on CBC and Tom Power, new host of CBC Radio q.

To my own delight, there were food served at the Gala. There were perogies, sliders and five spices pork.

Got to hand to Steve Jordan and the Polaris Music Prize staff for the great work as usual.

Don’t forget to check out the photos here.
Enjoy!
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Summer Happenings

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It’s a summer entry as I won’t be posting regularly and it’s considered the off-season.

The biggest craze to hit parts of the world is Pokémon Go. Canadians have been waiting for the release, which came out on July 17th and made the game’s server crash. I haven’t played like crazy with the worry of the phone’s battery life. I’ve noticed seeing people play around my neighbourhood as there’s several Pokéstops located and a competitive gym to clash with.

On Tuesday afternoon, there was a Pokémon Go event in Ottawa called the Confederation Park Lure Party. There were lots of people convening at the park and catch whatever Pokémon are available.

Even the Mayor of Ottawa, Jim Watson came out and joined in the fun to trying out Pokémon Go.
You can check the photos from below.

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Sunday at Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival – S11E34

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ODBF 2016 Sunday Main-1

It was quite a weekend to be at the Tim Hortons Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival. I wasn’t planning to go to Sunday’s event but decided to go because one of my lion dance member was participating in the race and also support Loon Choir play live.

Despite being another scorcher, there were some winds helping cool things slightly. It was fun to hop on the raft to check out the races as mentioned that my lion dance member taking part in it. The schedule for the races were delayed and I was able to catch it while on the raft. It’s just the thrill to seeing the races on the waters. Photos are posted below.

The concert series ended with Loon Choir, Young Empires (from Toronto) and Ottawa’s own A Tribe Called Red. Winds were blowing during Loon Choir’s performance while the loud tone from Young Empires rocked through. Lastly, A Tribe Called Red brought loud, strong beats and getting to crowd to dance it out with excitement. Don’t forget to check out the photos below.

Overall, an excellent 2016 edition of the Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival and the organizers and volunteers have done a great job holding the festival. It’s become the best in North America. Dragon boat racing, various activities and live music in the hot Summer, you can’t beat it in Ottawa.

This wraps up season 11 of the blog. It’s been fun filled ride with the music and lifestyle events covered in Ottawa. See you in the Fall.

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Saturday at Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival and the Percy Station Opening – S11E33

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ODBF 2016 Saturday Main

There were a lot of events happening in Ottawa. From the Ottawa International Jazz Festival to Escapade to House Of Paint’s Community Jam and the Tim Hortons Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival.

My afternoon started in Chinatown as there was a popup structure on Somerset and Percy. There was a fire that destroyed businesses in 2015 and the city decided to create a pilot project to transform the streetside parking to space of activity and renewing the urban space. Local businesses from Jackpine and Atelier Ruderal help made the creation possible. On hand at the opening were Somerset Ward Councillor, Catherine McKenney, the Somerset BIA and Awesome Ottawa. Photos from the event are posted below.

After that was off to Mooney’s Bay Park for Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival again. I never had a chance to take photos of the actual race, I have participated in dragon boat race back in the mid/late 1990s but it was the first time to hop on the boat and just have fun shooting the races.

The concert lineup for Saturday night was a good one. It started with Ottawa’s Pony Girl, then Halifax’s Nap Eyes (they’re on the 2016 Polaris Music Prize Long List) and topping it off was Alvvays. All three bands were excellent. I originally planned to leave after the third song of Alvvays but I saw a few friends I know that were in the crowd. I decided to dropped by for a bit. The crowd was quite the spontaneity with the crazy jumping, dancing and bumping around.

You can view the photos below.
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Friday at Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival – S11E32

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ODBF Friday Main

Friday night at the Tim Hortons Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival was crazy hot. I had to do a lot of running around because I decided to take some photos of The Beaches playing and then rush to my lion dance troupe for the opening ceremony. I definitely was in a sweaty mess.

I’ve been hearing good things about the Toronto female indie rock band, The Beaches. Their music is like glam rock meets new wave and just having a good time. It was a short time checking them out but they’re just wonderful. The band opened up Mia Rae and Mother Mother.

Onto the lion dance performance, it was different than the previous years because we were part of the parade of champions led by the RCAF Pipes and Drums. At least it was time efficient for us to start lion dancing right away than to wait for the speeches.

It was crazy and fun Friday night to be at Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival. The concert lineup is the best there is with Canadian content and it’s totally free.

The photos are below and there’s a lot to look at.
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