the pod bay door

.: What’s up with the Finns? Why are they so cranky? Who cares? These videos are hilarious, and the school children’s song is even better knowing that the class, from the Poikkilaakso Elementary School in Helsinki, wrote the lyrics themselves. The chorus is brilliant. But I think what makes it so funny is that none of the children ever smiles – how could they record this without cracking up? They all look so serious singing these lyrics, and it just makes the video even funnier. Plus, each line of the lyrics doesn’t necessarily fit into the rhythm of the song compared to the previous line but still works somehow, which for me as a musician, just increases the hilarity of the entire production. God bless the music teacher who put this together. Who wants to start a complaints choir? WHY must we take it so easy? I want to learn how to play this song. Can someone teach me how to sing in Finnish?

Then you can enjoy a group of Finnish adults singing out their collective woes. Helsingin Valituskuoro, otherwise known as the Helsinki Complaints Choir.

I didn’t realize there are other such choirs, including:

• Beschwerdechor Wilhelmsburg (Hamburg Complaints Choir)
• Complaints Choir of Birmingham
• St Petersburg Complaints Choir (Russia)

.: I am the guitarist in the Edmonton-based band, Hardy Drew & the Nancy Boys, and this is a basement video of us playing the song, “Heavy Early”, written by drummer David Leigh.

 

Who am I, What is This Place?

Welcome to the pod bay door, and thank you for visiting this site. I am Randy Reichardt, a librarian and musician living in Edmonton AB. I was born and raised in St Boniface MB (Winnipeg), and moved to Edmonton in December 1978. Currently I am an engineering librarian at the University of Alberta, and the guitarist in the band, Hardy Boys & Nancy Boys. I am also the guitarist for the Edmonton fiddler, Amelia Kaminski.

This blog began in July 2002 on Blogger. Over time it has changed platforms to Movable Type, and then WordPress. There is no consistent theme on the pod bay door. I will write about whatever, whenever. Early on, I was posting a few times a week, but well into my fifth year of blogging, the initial enthusiasm has waned considerably. That said, I don’t plan to end this activity any time soon, and will continue to maintain my blog, and my domain, for a time to come.

For those wondering, the name is taken from the movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey. You can hear it about 53 seconds into this clip.

.: Various people including Keith and Taras forwarded some of these links to short videos, most of which are on Glumbert.com. Each is worth a look.

• Stop Motion Battle – I cannot imagine how long it to to film this, and then edit it; it’s brilliant
• What Happens When Graphic Artists Get Bored – idle minds can be quite creative
• The Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain – a new take on Kurt Cobain
• Cat Obsessed With Flushing A Toilet – a lot of water down the, er, drain
• If Martin Scorses Made A Movie of Sesame Street – yes, the language is foul, you’ve been warned, but what else would you expect from Scorsese?
• Wood Spiders on Drugs – as might be reported by the Canadian Wildlife Service

.: Speaking of Keith, he is due some props. Last December, I wrote about my Dell Dimension 4400 freezing and crashing after I connected a 320GB external drive to one of its USB ports. The machine froze because its USB ports, all 1.1, could not handle the Maxtor, designed for USB 2.0 and Firewire connections. It took me a few weeks to recover the data on the hard drive, and get it functional again. A few days subsequent to the blog entry, Keith appeared at my house with a “Christmas card” – a USB 2.0 card, which he proceeded to install in the Dell, giving it four 2.0 USB ports. His generosity and kindness didn’t end there however – knowing that the four new ports would be on the back of the computer, he also brought a USB extension cable, so that I wouldn’t need to turn the computer around every time I wanted to use one of the 2.0 ports. Thank you, Keith, for making my life a wee bit easier.