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Disclosure Day - Steven Spielberg

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 20 June 2026

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I'd looked forward to this for a while and it delivered exactly what I would have/should have expected.

Classic Spielberg, in the same mold as ET, Close Encounters, etc. That said, it's a formula, he has it down, but it's not groundbreaking cinematography or a great interpretive twist on the possibilities of alien life. It's just a summer blockbuster.

Local Author

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Books

Published: 15 June 2026

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A regular customer, close to my age, he and his wife, they talk for hours. Still. I can't speak to the quality of the conversation, but clearly it suits them, nice to see familiarity hasn't bored them and they're still in love. 

We chat, they're both bright, we know R*** from the liquor store, R*** who only took the job so he could read his books, a dozen on the go at a time. He has a shelf behind him for books customers bring him to read, his own mini-lending library...He's his own story, and when I have it I'll share. 

Anyways, it turns out he's an artist/author, so I order a copy of his book and he brings it down to the restaurant to give to me. Thick-ish, self published through the Friesen Press, a better edition than the book Nanu sold me years ago, the photocopy- and stapled together 10 page opus about mushrooms and kayaking the island. So for $20 not too bad. He's written a damnable dedication in it to me, which means I can't pawn it off having read it to the bookstore, and I would feel guilty taking it in but god-damn he didn't write it for me and the dedication - well, it ruins the resale...

So, in keeping with my anonymity I can't name him, or the book, lest I be outed as a cynic or creative as well, but it's based on his years as an indie film director in So-Cal, illustrated with his computer clip art (He's an artist, the same few images recycled throughout the book) - weird characters, poems, the narration of events in the film. It's a peculiar thing. I am going to be hard pressed when I speak to him next to ask how this all came about...

Out of Peanuts, & Other events....

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Blog

Published: 15 June 2026

Hits: 71

I wonder, I mean, so much is made of their intelligence and yet - when I appear they caw three times and signal all the crows surrounding that I am “here”. They recognize me regardless of my clothing, and I change sometimes 3 times a day (painting, out and about, work). Nonetheless they find me. Yet when they summon all kith and kin they joust and steal and harass each other for the peanuts I throw out? Now, if you wanted exclusivity on a resource wouldn’t you just keep quiet about it? Not let the others know? Nope, Invite everyone to the feast and fight and quarrel over the spoils…..

Watching the battle, one small crow being bullied by the big shoe-fucking pigeon, who after bullying the crow comes after me, flapping around my head, landing beside me, trying to peck me (and I shove it away, sky-rat's pissing me off).

A Murder of Crows, now a plague, a pestilence, a disappointment, discouragement, Dollarama is out of peanuts and so I’m forced to by the bulk blanched peanuts, sunflower seeds, and a small bag of expensive cashews. The crows love the cashews, the new favourite, ignoring the peanuts now, waiting for the cashew throw, and the pigeons are as stupid and annoying as ever. I conceive the brilliant idea of buying a few bulk bags of tiny seed - Quinoa, Flax, Sesame, Millet, crush up some peanuts and sunflower seeds, sprinkle this away from the theatre of crows and it stops the pigeons harassing them and me, a cup of this mix will keep a dozen of them busy for about 20 minutes, peck-peck-pecking the ground, the crows run them off to investigate but there's nothing of interest to them there...

I ran out of peanuts to feed the crows,

wherein their disappointment was quite profound,

Circled me and landed, looked askance at the ground,

Looked away, looked up, looked down, just waited in sorrow, 

or perched above while I explained,

and they all pace aimlessly around

quite dismal, neglected, abject in their despair, their distress surrounds me 

there's no doubt they've been let-down... 

Dollarama still out of peanuts, I go to Save-On, theirs - inferior quality, triple the price, asking where they are and the clerk knows - “You have a crow as well?”, we banter - could be the same ones that are touching me; hard to tell, “IS yours black as well?” I have a dozen, two of which are friendly, even without peanuts.

I suck it up and pay too much for too few peanuts of an inferior quality. I'd continue with the cashews, only I'm not rich.

***

I've tidied my apartment to a passable state for Inspection. Which won't happen until tomorrow, I'm thinking it should pass, but every closet is filled to bursting, I have far too much stuff - still, and working through it, bit by bit, piece by piece...The art supplies alone, enough to fill a 1000 sq foot studio, and they have to be used up, there's no pawning them off on anybody else, time to get to work...

***

Sleep, waking at 4:00 AM, my thoughts are rattling around my head uneasy dreams like restless rusty thoughts that clank around and around my head, inescapable loops of the days news, dire current events, stressful days at work, nothing worth dreaming about and still the thoughts go on, best described as the dry rattling of rusty chains on broken rusty sprockets, less dreams than noise. I try but the CBD, it’s a different thing, I sleep deep, well, wake and my thoughts are more like smooth, like on a cotton cloud, warm, lie in, enjoy the slightly stoned lying in before getting up and productive for the day. I need a break from social media, reddit, the internet...