Class of 2000 |
Chad Boudreau |
|
The Graduates
Bonnie Allen
Larry Todd Jim McKenzie Roy Bonisteel Patricia Bell Wendy Tebb Lindsay Crysler Renee Pellerin |
Current LocationRegina, Saskatchewanboudreau@sk.sympatico.ca
Wow, its been a while since I posted anything. A lot of folks have been asking so I've finally gotten around to posting some wedding pictures. But more on that later. I've decided to start from the present and work to the past. As of about 1 week ago, Shelley and I are now home owners! Yes, we bought a house. Those of you I've been speaking to in person over the last few months will likely remember Shelley and I were thinking of being in a home by spring. Things happened a little quicker than we thought, but we are very happy nonetheles. Our new home is located on Grant Rd, just down the street from the small research building on the same street (it used to be a fire hall). It's a bungalow, approximately 1200 sq ft and has a full finished basement. It has 4 bedrooms, which is great because it means we can grow into the house. In the meantime, however, one room will be an office and the other (the bigger room) will be a craft room for Shelley. The house is in immaculate condition. Our real estate agent, home inspector and engineer all said we were very lucky to have this as our first home. A house of that good condition, they all said, is an exception in Whitmore Park, not the rule. We take possession on January 24. A few weeks later will be the house warming party! In work news, Shelley and I are both doing very at our jobs. Shelley is still the directory of Wise Owl and she is doing a fantastic job. She has received nothing but praise and gratitude from her staff, parents and board members (who are parents). I'm still at DirectWest and I'm still doing all sorts of cool stuff. I continue to project manage some of our larger custom developments and its going exceptionally well. My managers are very happy with my work and I am very happy there. canadiancreative.com continues to expand in content and in popularity. We broke 12,000 page impressions per month recently and continue to climb. The second year anniversary is just around the corner! I continue to find my work with that web site to be very rewarding and fulfilling. I've received great feedback from the artists featured on the site and that makes it all worth while. Caper Away Productions has added another web site under its belt. I've been working with my good friend Dana (who owns Reader's Book Shop here in Regina) and his friend BT (who owns Reader's Book Shop in Medicine Hat), to create comicreaders.com, a comics related web site that seeks to create a comics community on the Internet. The version that is currently active is a temp version. We are currently working on another version of the site that has a lot of enhanced functionality. That second version should be unrolled shortly into the new year. A third version of the site will then follow. This newest version will have an online store. In the meantime you can visit the site and read all about comics! Please don't do yourself injury rushing over to the site to check it out. :) In all honesty though, comicreaders.com has been an exciting project to work on. Dana is a friend of mine and our designer and programmer are also good friends of mine too, so its been a lot of fun and hard work. We'll be updating the site regularly, so keep going back to see what is new. You never know...you might find something you'd like to read! Dave, I know you'll be checking it out. I seem to recall some comic geek roots in your past! And now the moment you've all been waiting for....the wedding. There is no way I could possibly describe the excitement and happiness we experienced when we went home in August. It was beautiful weather. It rained only once (which is very rare for Cape Breton) all the time we were home...and would you believe it didn't start raining until about 2 hours after the wedding reception had ended! And it stopped just after sunrise! Perfect timing. The weather was absolutely beautiful all the time we were home. We were able to have BBQs, go hiking and go swimming in the ocean. It was great for us, but it was even better for our friends and family from the Prairies who've never been to the East Coast before. I suspect they won't soon forget their visit. Wow! What a time we had! We saw a lot of relatives and friends we've not seen in a few years. Our parents got to see family they've not seen in years. My dad got to see some of my mom's relatives (including her mother) who he's not seen in 15 years! 15 years! Everyone had a great time. Our wedding was beautiful. We got married on my parent's property and it was amazing. I helped plant all the pine trees that surround my parents yard so it was really special to be married among those trees and among our friends and family. It was the best way to go home. Our wedding reception was the party to be at that night! The place was rocking. Shelley's mother's fella, Ron, is the lead singer in a very popular local band that plays old rock and roll tunes. There wasn't one single dance where people weren't up dancing and most of the time the dance floor was packed with people! We didn't even know this, but one of the new band members plays the fiddle and for a couple of songs that fiddle came out and a fury was ripped up on those strings. We made sure all of Prairie friends were whirled into a jig and as the fiddle rose to a frenzied pace I swear I burned a hole in my shoes! Almost everyone stayed to the very end. Shelley and I pulled out 1/2 hour before things shut down and still the place was packed and was rockin. Once the reception closed down at 1:00 am, a pack of our friends from the East Coast took our friends from the West to Smooth Herman's and made sure they had a great time until the bitter wee hours of the morning. I seem to recall my best man and Dana saying they didn't get home until something like 5:00 am. Jeff had to be on a plane back to Toronto at like 11:00 am and his mom actually had to call around and try to locate him. We found out later he was passed out like Jesus on the cross on Shelley's mom's living room floor, still in his tuxedo. So it was a great time. One we will likely not soon forget. We have tonnes of pictures and tonnes of memories. The scans I've included below don't do justice to the pictures, but I hope my description of our trip gives you a good picture of what a great time it truly was.
Picture #1 Talk to you again soon. Take care.
It's been a while since I've posted any news, so let's see what I have to pass along... Wedding plans are going well. If you recall, Shelley and I will be tying the knot on August 24 back in good ole Cape Breton. The planning is going so smoothly I almost don't want to tell you about it because you will think I'm pulling your leg. The guest list is rather lengthy since both of my parents and Shelley's dad come from rather large families. My mother's family is mostly in Saskatchewan and it turns out many of her siblings and her mother will be making the trip to Cape Breton. It will be an exciting reunion for my mom who usually comes out this way to visit her family. Work is going well for both myself and Shelley. Shelley has more exciting news on her front as just last night she learned she will be the director of Wise Owl School Age Care in two weeks time. Yup, Shelley be running the show, which means Wise Owl will be the best damn School Age Care facility in the city. Not much new at my workplace over at DirectWest Internet Business Solutions (we changed our name from New Media). I'm keeping busy and my job description continues to shift and grow, the newest addition of which is project managing large custom website projects. Very exciting. www.canadiancreative.com is still going strong after a year and a half. We reached another milestone in the month of May. We broke 10,000 page impressions in one month. Very nice. I guess that is about all the news for now. Keep in touch.
Yup, I'm heading back to j-school, not as a student, but as a instructor of sorts. Too cool. I got a call from Pat Bell early in the month. Her Print II class has an Internet component where the students post their articles on the Internet in a sort of small webmagazine. Since Jim's passing, there hasn't really been anyone in the faculty to take the reins of Jim enthusiasm or know-how with the Internet and website design with FrontPage Editor. I guess Pat and the students and perhaps members of the faculty were brainstorming who they could bring in to assist and one way or another someone thought of me. I was quite surprised and honoured to be offered such an exciting opportunity. I'm not really teaching FrontPage or web design perse. I'm more of an on-hand troubleshooter and or helper in case the students run into trouble. My first day was Monday, November 19, 2001 and I go back today (November 20) for another class. 1:30 PM - 4:30 PM each day. My first day went really well. It was amazing to go in there and help out and guide the students in the process of creating a website. We pretty much started from scratch. Due to time/technical/skill restraints, we are keeping it simple, but there was still a lot of work to do and I think it went quite well. The students seemed quite interested too. I had always thought it would be too cool to go back to the j-school some day as a quest speaker or some such (you know, in the far future when I'm like big and famous and all!), but I never thought it would happen so soon (the going back, not the big and famous!!!!). It has been totally fun and exciting and an awesome experience. That's it for now.
Shelley and I checked out Hawksley Workman who played at the Exchange on September 30. Man, what a show. Great tunes, great performer, great night. If Hawksley Worman makes it to your part of town I highly recommend you make it a point to check him out. Wow. If you're not too familiar with this fantastic Canadian performer, you can sample some of his songs on the file sharing software of your choice. Off the top of my head, I'd recommend "Little Tragedies", "Jealous of Your Cigarette", "No Beginning No End" and "Striptease" as fine representations of his mussic. And for those of you looking for something off the beaten path in terms of motion pictures, I'd recommend Hedwig and the Angry Inch (which has a rockin' soundtrack too) or Project Grizzly (for the documentary lovers). And that's it for now.
****Something bad happened and my page was deleted. I happened to have an older version on my computer, but you will notice almost a year's worth of my postings have gone bye-bye**** I got some good news this week at work. I got my contract renewed for another year, so it looks like I'll be wearing the New Media hat for a little while longer. I certainly don't mind. I really do enjoy my job over there and considering the raise I got and praise my bosses heaped on me during contract talks it looks like they are happy to have me there. Since I've been at DirecWest, I've learned a lot of new things and have taken on new responsibilities as my job description changes and expands. It sounds like in this coming year, I can expect more opportunities to take on new challenges. Man, I'm pumped. It's really exciting to be in a workplace that is moving forward. In other news, the wedding plans for Shelley and I are going really well. We even have a date set! August 24, 2002. Yup, just a little less than year now. And we're thinking of taking a honeymoon to Lac des Roches resort in BC (near Kamloops). Have any of you been there or in the area? Give me some details if you have been.... My sister has moved to Cold Lake, Alberta for another library job. She's pretty much running the three libraries in the city/town. She likes the place so far. She enjoys having trees around her once again. (If you recall, she was in Saskatoon for a year). And that's about it for now. Talk to you all again soon.
Hello there! I don't have much to report but I do have something I would like to show you all. canadiancreative.com continues to develop. Kevin is just about done designed the full site and the pages I've seen just about knocked me on my ass. Beautiful! Anyway, I've said this before and I imagine I'll say it again, but this is not a hobby site. This is my big kick at the can. This is what I hope to be doing five years down the road. You may recall back in the good ole school days that I mentioned that one of my dream jobs would be publishing my own magazine. Well, it costs a lot of money to do that and I got tired or dreaming so I figured something like canadiancreative.com is a lot like a magazine, only in electronic form. Anyway, take a look at this business card that Kevin designed for me. I think you'll agree that it kicks ass and them some. Click here to take a look.. I have more cards on hand so if any of you would like one (or some) or know of anyone that might be interested in the site, let me know and I'll drop some in the mail for ya'. I'm such a promotional whore, but it's what ya' got to do!
It is with great pleasure that I announce to you all that canadiancreative is now up and running. The pages that are up are place holder pages, the main page, the submission guidelines and a little explanation as to what canadiancreative is and why people should submit their work to us. We are looking at a full site launch on January 1, 2001. Check it out at www.canadiancreative.com. The main page just totally blows my mind. Kevin Bekar designed it and I just love it. He's currently putting together all the pages for the 2001 launch and I haven't seen them yet, but I expect nothing less than amazing work from him. It's going to be awesome.
Hey there! I'm going to take this opportunity to shamelessly promote the upcoming canadiancreative.com website I am putting together. I've registered the unique URL(www.canadiancreative.com), but don't go there because there isn't anything there...yet. Anyway, Kevin Bekar is hard at work putting together some pages for the website so we can get it up on the Internet with submission guidelines. He's hoping to have those pages ready to roll by the end of the month, which is plenty awesome to hear because I'm hoping to launch this puppy before Christmas or in the first week of the new year at the latest. So, I know some of are you are considering submitting something for the site and I'm really excited to see your work. I hope you're all spreading the word! This is the email address where people can start sending their work....caper.away.productions@sk.sympatico.ca. Stay tuned to this website for the more information on when guidelines will be posted on canadiancreative.com. In other news, work is going great. I've had busy weeks and some slow weeks, which is a great combination because the good paychecks keep coming in plus I have time to work on canadiancreative.com and troubled-youth.com. Speaking of the latter, the second issue is currently up and running and the third issue will be out soon. We've been getting some good feedback, and have added a fourth member to our troubled writing staff. Shelley is still doing great in her work placement and is set to start her three week teaching block next week. She's nervous and excited all at the same time, but she will undoubtedly do great. Jill MacPherson: If you're reading this, why haven't you written in to tell us about the CBC job! Details, details! I've had two people ask me if I've gotten emails they've sent in recently. In both cases, I had not received their messages. Please make sure you are using my new sympatico email address and not my old Cable Regina address. Also, if you don't see your message posted on this website within two days after you sent the email, it's likely that I did not get the message, and you should send it to me again. I check my email at least 3 times a day and have time to update this site every morning before I go to work. Cheers.
Here it is. Another idea from my brainpan, and I'm asking all of you to help me spread the good word.... It's called Canadian Creative, and it's going to be an online resource centre, gallery and all around kick-ass place for unpublished, unestablished Canadian writers, poets, visual artists, new media artists, musicians and comic creators. First a little background... My new job here at mysask is a contract job, and mysask doesn't contract work out to a person, they contract out to a business. This means that I had to register a business name before I started working here. So I did. I am now the owner of Caper Away Productions, specializing in new and traditional media. So, since I'm joe-entrepreneur (in a thin sense of the word) I've been thinking of possible business ventures. Canadian Creative is that venture. I like to write, and have been messing around with fiction writing for some time. Recently, I've been seeking markets and as I did some online searching for Canadian markets (both online and offline publications) I was horrified at the little information out there. Where were the the Canadian online markets? Where was the information on Canadian offline markets? Where were the resourcces? Where was anything Canadian? The Canadian sites I came across were poorly designed, often out-of-date and usually included a fare amount of American market information as well. I was disheartened and a little pissed off. And then I decided to do something about it. The primary goal of Canadian Creative is to provide unpublished and unestablished Canadian artists a place to showcase their talents. Writers can submit their fiction and it will be posted on the site. Musicians can send their bios and samples of their original music (mp3 format or on CD). The list goes on and on. I remember a time in Cape Breton when two buddies of mine (who were brothers) had a band. It was just the two of them, each on guitar and a keyboard they would program to spit forth drum beats. They were called FusionFan and the first time they got a gig I was in the audience. It was a free all ages show put on by some local university folk who called themselves Crack Industries. They were big into promoting local bands, giving them a chance to play in front of a crowd. When FusionFan's set was over, the little crowd of about 40 people broke into wild applause and there was much chatter and encouragement. It was quite a feeling to be a part of that. If Canadian Creative can give some new writer of some band that feeling than Canadian Creative is a success. Kevin Bekar (who I work with at mysask) has signed on to do the website design. Kevin is a artist when it comes to website and graphic design. This website is going to be beautiful to the eye, easy to navigate and jammed packed with showcases and information. Alright, so what the hell does this have to do with you? Here it is...When Kevin and I put up the first issue of Canadian Creative, I want it to have some content, some fiction writing, some poetry, some music stuff, etc. So, I'm asking all of you, to put the word out to any of your friends or family who might want to submit some work. That means you guys and gals too. I know some of you tinker with fiction. Your previously unpublished submission would be greatly appreciated. Fiction Guidelines
Submissions can be sent via email to boudreau@sk.sympatico.ca. Send email submissions as a Microsoft Word or plain text attachment. Submissions can be sent via s-mail to Canadian Creative c/o Caper Away Productions, 4-2166 Retallack Street, Regina, SK, S4T 2K4. If you are sending through s-mail, submissions should be typed, double-spaced with pages numbered. Include your name on each page of the manuscript. Your name, mailing address, phone number and email should be included wit submissions. You can also send a brief bio. If any of you or anyone you know would like more information about fiction guidelines or music guidelines (or other types of submissions), or information about myself or Canadian Creative, please write to me at boudreau@sk.sympatico.ca. Thanks for reading this long letter and I will thank you all in advance for any help you might be able to give to help Canadian Creative start making dreams come true.
Hi there all you hard working j-school graduates! I'm so impressed with how everyone is doing. Everyone is so busy and working so hard. And we were always told there were no jobs in journalism today! It just goes to show that there WILL always be work for talented and skilled people! Anyway, I have a piece of news. The website I was talking about in my September 1 posting is finally up and running. This is issue #1 of what is going to be a monthly online publication. There are currently a couple of small elements missing from the site, but it is almost 100% complete and we figured we should put it up, get some folks to look at it, work out the bugs and take what we have learned to make a better and stronger issue #2 which should come out in November. So, what the hell is this site? Well, it's called troubled youth, and it ain't for the faint at heart. It's got attitude, and cussing, and inflammatory remarks and great wit and a sarcastic, cynical view that comes from growing up in world that is filled with misplaced values and a lack of concern for the individual person. It's a site that we hope will make you laugh, make you think and make you say "These guys are assholes." Intrigued? Repulsed? Scared? Why don't you check it out at www.troubled-youth.com. Consider yourself warned, however. Some of the content may offend... Having said that I'm very excited about this project. Will it be as popular as we hope? I think it can be with a lot of hard work. Either way, I'm just excited to be working with Mike Gillis and Rob Gildert, two very talented and funny people I have the honour of calling my friends.
It's finally happened! After two years of having to satisfy the craving in small amounts. After two years of fruitless searching. It has finally happened. I've found big bags of Hickory Sticks! There they were lying on the chip rack between the cheesies and Old Dutch chips. Hickory Sticks in full big bag glory. I blinked twice thinking I was seeing a mirage, so bad was my craving for Hickory Sticks. But, to my joy, they were real. Big glorious bags. In other news, the website I mentioned in my September 1 posting is now up and running. However, we have yet to proofread the content so I'm going to hold off posting the website address until later this week. In job news, my first two weeks have past. Each day has been full 8 hour works days. The work just keeps coming in when I think it about to dwindle off. Next week is looking to start off busy too! Nothing wrong with full weeks of work when I was expecting an average of 20-30 hours a week. That's all the news for now.
The contract is for 1 year, ending on September 10, 2001. There is no mention of work hours in the contract, because it is on a as need basis. Although it is early to tell, it will probably entail approximately 20-30 hours a week. However, it could also entail 40 hours a week if new contracts keep coming in. It could also only mean 10 hours a week, though that isn't likely. Even though it is a one year contract, my job can be ended if the work just isn't there. I don't think this is going to happen. This company keeps on growing, new contracts and new websites all the time. I am also able to leave the company before my contract ends if I so see fit. I think I'll stick around! I'm not overly heart-broken that it might not be a 40 hour a week job. It will be a good opportunity for me to try my hand a freelance writing, maybe help get that comic newsletter off the ground and do some fiction writing. Also, a couple of friends and I are putting together a online magazine of sorts. It was Rob Gildert's idea (he's in London, Ontario) and he enlisted Mike Gillis (he's in Cape Breton) and myself to help him flesh out the content. The launch date is September 15 of this year, so keep an eye out for the URL which I will be posting on this site when we go live. I won't tell you too much about the site, except that we've been working on it for about 3 months now and we are quite proud with the way it is turning out. Rob wants the site to start making money sometime down the road, with merchandising. I won't go into that right now because that would mean I would have to explain what the site is about... Anyway, if anyone can pull this off it's going to Rob. The guy is a work horse and everything he touches has a way of turning into gold. So, keep your eyes peeled for this exciting publication! I guess that is about all the news for now.
Well, yesterday I received some good news. I got that job applied for a DirectWest. The details of my contract are not yet worked out, but the figures of 4 to 6 months were tossed around. I'll be doing some different stuff this time around, working more on the technical side, helping set up and administrate e-commerce stores. I've been helping out with that a little bit these past couple of months and it's entirely new to me but I'm learning quick and everyone seems very happy with my work. How strange life can be. 4 years ago I never would have thought I would have graduated from a journalism school. 2 years ago I never would have thought I'd be working in new media. That's it for now. Oh, in less happy news, I lost my f****** wallet yesterday too. I had no money in it, no credit cards, but it's going to be a pain in the ass to change my PIN numbers and get some new ID.
Anyway, I have some news to report. This is old news to some of you, but for the rest it will be an exciting read filled with much colourful meandering. My job at mysask.com ends in just about a month. In about 3 weeks time the next intern will arrive, fresh to be trained by little old me. I did know at one time who the new blood was, but I cannot remember anymore. Anyway, I've applied for another job that has opened up at mysask. It's a job in the same department, doing basically the same kind of stuff, but not as much writing. It will have more focus on helping out with web design and another associated tasks in the DirectWest New Media department. It's not one hundred per cent certain that I will get this job. However, I've been told that if the workload keeps up, then the job will be mine. And so far, it seems as if the workload is keeping up. It's a little unnerving not knowing if I'll have the job or not, especially with the end of my term quickly approaching. I'm very optimistic, however. Some people have asked, "What do you do over there at mysask." Reading over my previous postings, I realize that I've never actually said what I do over there. It's a great job, combining writing, web design and administrative duties all into one tight package. On the writing side, I write 22 lifestyle features a month. If you check out www.mysask.com, and surf around until you find the lifestyles section, you can see what kind of writing I've been up to. It's not exactly hard journalism, but it certainly is writing. On the web design area I'm basically a helper. There are three designers who actually construct the pages. I do all the changes that need to be made to the site once the customer has a look at it. This means, touching up writing, formating text, adding images, etc. It's low end HTML stuff, but it's still fun. On the administrative side, I monitor the discussions in the cyber soapbox section of the site, posting new topics and posting all the discussions that come in from the readers. That's my job in a nutshell, but I also do a lot of other tasks that spring up from time to time. I'm kind of a jack-of-all-trades, helping out whenever and where ever I can. That's about it for now. I have to go to work!
Tanya has a really great place. She's living in an apartment complex up in the Lawson Heights area. So, if any of you Saskatooners are in the area, keep your eyes open for a petite woman with long straight brown hair with the unmistakeable Boudreau good looks! In other news, it seems as if that comics newsletter isn't going to get off the ground. The comic shop guy is really busy and in fact he just took off on his Harley to cruise out to Ontario on his vacation. Oh well, perhaps the newsletter will come to fruition sometime down the road. Here's a quick summer movie reference guide for you. Movies you should see this summer:
There. That is all for now.
My sister, who is a recent graduate with her Masters of Library Sciences, was offered a job in Saskatoon. It's very likely that she will accept. That means she'll be moving out here in about one month. Exciting! The other news is that Shelley has won a new computer. It's being shipped to us as we speak. She won it through a Scope website. Too cool.
Well, it's all over now. May 7 was my last shift at Montana's. So, when you come back to Regina for a visit, don't look for me at the Slop Shop. I'll be relaxing at home on the weekends, probably reading and reviewing comics for a local comics newsletter that Reader's Book Shop is putting together on a monthly basis. The plans are a little sketchy, but it's going to be distributed to all Reader's Book Shop file customers, and probably distributed around to other shops in the city, and maybe even Moose Jaw, Saskatoon and Medicine Hat. I'll keep you posted on the details as I find out more.
And there is a lot of work to do, and that sounds good to me. Plus, it's practically right outside my door, just a 10 minute walk from home. The days begin at 8 a.m. and end at 4:30 p.m. In other work news, my last day at Montana's is this coming Sunday. After that, I'll have my weekends free. Oh sweet glory.
Well, right now I'm gearing up for my new job at DirectWest, doing some writing and other assorted jobs for the website www.mysask.com. Don't go racing to the site to check out my work because I don't start until May 1, 2000. As of April 27, 2000, I'm still doing the whole serving thing down at Montana's Cookhouse Saloon, also affectionately known as Billy Bob's Slop Shop. But here it is, the first bit of news that you all might not know about my plans since our little graduation gig. I'm quitting. I'll be finished at Montana's in about a week and a half. My job at DirectWest will end in four months, on September 1, 2000, and that means I'll have no job, facing the great unknown without Montana's as a backup. To tell the truth, that to me, sounds pretty damn good. |
