Come for the blank stares…stay for the laughs.    Andrew Alexander photography, yo.

This ‘Bout Time, taking place on December 3rd and starting at 8, features the usual pay-what-you-can door price (5$ suggested, payable to the lovely Jen Jarvis) has a twist for the holidays.  Crush is encouraging everyone to bring along a non-perishable food donation for the Ottawa Food Bank, which you will cast as your vote at the end of the night towards the team you want to win.  Personally, I challenge everyone who plans to attend RIGHT HERE AND NOW to bring more stuff than me!  Bring as much cans and pasta as you can carry, I say…that way your fav’rit team is SURE to win (or, you could vote honestly, and just donate extra stuff later on…entirely up to you, I’m sure)!  Also, it’d be a nice thing to do, and cool on Crush for doing this and warming up a chilly winter.  And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that earlier in the day AL Connors will be leading an improv workshop which you should totally go to (starts at 430 at the Hintonburg community centre).  That’s a solid day of Improv right there, folks.

But wait, there’s MORE!  Because somehow, incredibly, IMPOSSIBLY, Crush Improv has been around for FIVE WHOLE YEARS now!  And by golly, they’re gonna celebrate.  This December the 7th at Academic Hall, the gang will be assembling with a cavalcade of guest-talent in an epic Improv team-up that will be all the entertainment you need to tide you over ’til the New Year.  What’s the evening all about, and how did Crush get to where they are today?  I sat down with Crush co-founder AL Connors, and swell guy Tim Anderson, and they talked all about it…which was AWESOME, and then my phone deleted the interview spontaneously, so I’m just gonna copy some stuff off of their website now if that’s okay.  Okay?  Great.

Along with the current spectacular  Crush lineup of AL, Desiree, Dan, Tim and Glen Gower, the gang will be joined onstage by enough improv talent to choke the biggest horse in the WHOLE WORLD.  Hopefully they won’t be doing that, of course, but you never know where these things will end up.  I’m getting off topic.  Who’ll be there?  Kirsten Rasmussen, that’s who!  Recently in town to deliver a workshop that I missed because I suck, the amazingly funny co-founder of Monteal Improv is just the first of much monumental guest-starrage.  Crush alumni Jordan Moffat will also put in an appearance, which is great because Jordan is pretty goddam funny, and wrote the book on Elvis Costello jokes.  Plus ya got Micheal Grajewski who, from his writeup on the website, has worked everywhere and with everyone.  And Sean Tabares, who recently got paid to be funny on a cruise ship, and also won a Canadian Comedy Award…have YOU won a Canadian Comedy Award??  I bet not.  And CRUSH co-founders Cari Leslie, live from Amsterdam, and the Brad MacNeil himself, not-so-live via somebody else (or something like that).  Can you beat THAT for $25 ($20 in advance)?  Of course you can’t, you were dumb to even try.  But I forgive you, and so does Crush Improv.  So come on out and celebrate with the mightiest gang of improvisers in this town, and get yer funny on, because it’ the right thing to do.  Peace, love and soul,

The Visitor (and Winston)

The  Ottawa Senators are one of several NHL teams with their own customized tunes.  The Ottawa Senators Theme Song is used as the team’s entrance anthem. “It was a local composer in Ottawa who put it together,” says Glen Gower, director of game entertainment for the Sens.

The team replaced it with Rev Theory’s Hell Yeah for the 2008-09 season, which prompted some fans to start a Facebook page to bring back the Theme Song.

“It wasn’t like a massive campaign, but certainly we know that fans really like that song and identify it as a tradition, so we use it all of our games right now,” says Gower.

The St. Louis Blues are actually named after W.C. Handy’s 1914  tune, St. Louis Blues, and use Glenn Miller’s version at games. The New York Rangers have a customized goal song, Slapshot, written by the team’s DJ/organist Ray Castoldi.

The Minnesota Wild‘s anthem, State of Hockey, is a rousing, Celtic-folk, beer-drinkin’ tune:

We were raised
With the stick
And a pair of blades
On the ice we cut our teeth
We took our knocks
In the penalty box
Our mother was the referee

This sport was here
Before we came
It will be here when we’re gone
The game’s in our blood
And our blood’s in the game
Lay us down under
A frozen pond

We will fight to the end
We will stand and defend
Our flag flying high and free
We were born the child
Of the strong and Wild
In the State, the State of Hockey

A big blue line runs around our state
A line that can’t be crossed
The day they try to take this game
Is the day the gloves come off

We will fight to the end
We will stand and defend
Our flag flying high and free
We were born the child
Of the strong and Wild
In the State, the State of Hockey.

Click here to read more about music at NHL games and team DJs, including Oilers music man Dragan Jargic.

We asked three Edmonton acts to write hockey anthems. Vote here for your favourite. You have until noon on Monday, Oct. 24 to cast your digital ballot. The winner will receive $500. We’ll announce the results on Thursday, Oct. 27.

(Photo by Andrea Cardin/Freestyle Photography/OSHC.)

Click here to head on over to OttawaStart's Weekely Event Round-Up

Whether you’re looking for something to do with the kids, a party to hit up Saturday night…or joining us at Oktoberfest (don’t miss it!), OttawaStart always has a fantastic community-based rundown of what’s up this weekend.

Mosaika light show on Parliament Hill

Glen Gower is the owner and editor of OttawaStart.com, a great friend to Local Tourist Ottawa, and a life-long Ottawa resident. This list appears on his own blog, but we thought it was so great that it needed to be shared here too.

It’s August already.  Here’s what you still need to get done before September:

1. Go see Mosaika and/or do yoga on Parliament Hill.
2. Ride your bike on a parkway during Alcatel Sunday Bikedays.
3. Have another beer on another patio.
4. Buy fresh food at a local farmers’ market.
5. Take a road trip to Almonte or Merrickville or Perth or Wakefield or even Cornwall.
6. Listen to some music at an outdoor music festival.
7. Go to an electronic music festival.
8. Go to a food festival, like garlic or cheese curds or ice cream.
9. Watch some theatre in a park from A Company of Fools or Odyssey Theatre.
10. Go to the fair. 
11. Take in a Fat Cats baseball game.
12. Skateboard.
13. Go ghost hunting or take a haunted walk.
14. Go see Caravaggio at the National Gallery.
15. Walk around and admire Ottawa’s street art.
16. Explore a cave.
17. Eat some french fries from a chip truck.
18. Take a photo of a gorgeous sunset.
19. Go to a drive-in movie.  There’s one in Gatineau and one near Perth.
20. Walk through the grounds at Rideau Hall.
21. Rent a paddleboat at Dow’s Lake.
22. Watch a movie in a park in Centretown.  
23. Play mini-golf.
24. Take your dog for a run at Lemieux Island.
25. Take a hike in the Greenbelt.
26. Go to a water park.  Calypso or Mont Cascades.
27. See some fireworks at Lac Leamy.
28. Go to a beach in the Gatineaus.
29. Bike down that really steep hill behind Major’s Hill Park.
30. Sit around the campfire.

Bonus ideas:

31. Test drive an expensive car you can’t afford.
32. Invite your neighbours over for a bbq.

Thanks, Glen! Have any ideas still on your summer fun list? Share them with us!

Check out what everyone has been up to this week:

• Brie at Kids in the Capital published a post about Dancing in the Street, a project from The School of Dance that has performers and musicians dancing in streets across Ottawa

• Erika Cuccaro blogged over at A Peek Inside the Fishbowl about four fabulous Lowertown walks for dogs (and the people that love them) 

• Glen Gower at OttawaStart published his weekly (awesome) event round-up

• Claire at foodiePrints wrote up a great snapshot of Brookstreet Hotel’s happy hour (yum)

• Trevor at Apartment 613 wrote about Ottawa garage rockers The Polymorphines, who are playing a show Saturday at Mavericks

• Laura K. at Mindful Merchant posted a wonderful wrap (great photos!) of her time at the Rideau Woodland Ramble near Merrickville

Glen Gower and the fam on a perfect night out in Ottawa

Glen Gower is the owner and editor of OttawaStart.com, a great friend to Local Tourist Ottawa, and a life-long Ottawa resident.

One of our favourite nights last summer was an evening spent downtown with our daughters (almost five and three at the time). 

We made the trek from the exciting suburb of Stittsville with a plan to check out the Busker Festival on Sparks Street.

Here’s what happened:

• 

  Silver Elvis

  We parked at the World Exchange Plaza, walked through the main level, and identified the flying whales as Narwhals and Belugas.

• The first busking show we saw on Sparks Street featured a performer who juggled a chainsaw, then mounted a bike atop a 30-foot poll and juggled knives and torches.  Not quite the usual thing you see on Sparks Street.

• Walked down Sparks Street, and found Silver Elvis in front of D’Arcy McGee’s at Elgin.  He’s a coin-operated Elvis impersonator, dressed from head to toe in silver.  The girls emptied my pockets looking for coins to make him dance.  (Overheard one spectator asking “is he real?”)

• 

  Glen's daughter and Oscar Peterson

  Crossed the street and found the Oscar Peterson statue.  Our youngest daughter was terrified that it would come alive, just like Silver Elvis.  It didn’t.

• From there, we walked across the street and found the Shoescape art installation at Confederation Park, part of the Rideau Canal Festival.  Our girls love footwear so it was a hit.  Hope it’s back again in some form this year.

• Next stop was dinner.  We asked ourselves, “what is the most touristy place we can think of downtown, and therefore the most likely to be kid-friendly”. Answer: Hard Rock Cafe in the ByWard Market. Our booth was right below a Queen electric guitar and the girls thought the Beatles Room was cool. (They are already rock nerds like their dad.)

• 

  Shoescape in Confederation Park

  Strolled down William Street, checked out the Crocs store, and then tried on sunglasses at Le Xuan.

• Dessert at Pure Gelato.  Busy night outside on the patio.

• The kids were getting tired so we splurged on a rickshaw ride to take us back to Sparks Street, where the girls were mesmerized by Silver Elvis, again.

All in all a perfect night. Highly recommended for all Local Tourists, especially Local Tourists with young kids.

Thanks for the downtown tour Glen!

Are you interested in hitting up Ottawa’s 20th annual Busker Festival? It takes place from July 28 to August 1, 2011 on the Sparks Street Mall. There are more than 40 performances daily, with entertainers from across Canada and around the world. For more information, head on over to OttawaStart.

The Rideau Canal Festival also takes place this weekend, from July 28 to August 1.

Give us a brief overview of the Social Capital conference.

Lara Wellman

Social Capital is a one-day conference where people with all levels of experience in social media will come together to learn from each other. There will be three streams of sessions: fundamental, advanced and business and we will also have a series of roundtable sessions that will be an informal conversation on a variety of topics with an expert to lead the discussion.

The website said the conference was inspired by the BlogHer social media conference you attended in New York City in 2010. What about this event was so inspirational to you?

The opportunity to be with a large group of people with the same interests as you, who understand your passion for social media and who don’t think you’re “geeky” for liking it so much is fabulous!  We get together, have a blast and learn a lot.  For me, social media’s real success is the “in real life” moments.

You’re a social media strategist – how are events like this conference in tune with what you do for your job?

I get to meet other people who are in the same industry as me as well as meet people who are looking to learn more – whether it is for personal use or business.  My job is to help people understand the tools that are out there and how they can best utilize them.  I love helping people figure out what’s out there.  One of my favourite things is to convince someone that one of the tools they previously never considered because of a pre-conceived notion might be worth a second look.

The logo for the Social Capital conference

Being a “learnathon,” how does this make Social Capital different from other conferences?

We wanted to make sure people left the conference with some tangible pieces of information they could take away with them they didn’t have when they arrived.  We’ve tried to create a schedule that will give people a lot of opportunities to not only hear about some great things people are doing but also to have tools they can use when they get back home or to work.

Ottawa has a great online community – who are some of the talented speakers that attendees will have the chance to hear from?

Andrea Tomkins, Social Capital speaker and local blogger

Our lineup of speakers is an amazing mix of almost entirely Ottawa folks.  We’ve tried to keep it as local as possible to capitalize on our amazing community starting with Glen Gower, creator of Ottawa Start who will be our keynote.  Glen will take us through the past, present and look at the future of social media with his thoughts about how its power can be harnessed to make Ottawa (or any other city) a better place to live.

Another one of the speakers is Andrea Tomkins who has one of the most popular Ottawa blogs - A Peek Inside the Fishbowl.  She’s been blogging since the 90’s and has a wealth of information but will be specifically talking on a panel with Rebecca Stanisic and Shannon McKarney about monetization, an issue so many bloggers grapple with.

They are really just the tip of the iceberg. I invite you to check out our blog where there is not only information about our speakers but they’ve answered some really great questions about themselves and their views on social media!

What are you most looking forward to?

I’m looking forward to an amazing day with friends, meeting people I’ve talked to online that I’ve never met in person, and learning!  I’m already trying to figure out how I can make it to some of the other sessions while I’m talking myself – I think that part may be challenging!

Thanks for letting us know more about the conference, Lara! Does this sound like something you’re interested in?  If so, tickets are $75 and can be purchased from the website up until the day of the conference (unless they sell out, in which case get them while you can!).

Collage credit: Glen Gower, Ottawa Start

Thanks for including our shot, Glen!