James and the Tiny Deersicle

February 12th, 2009, 5 Comments »

When it comes to the outdoors, James is ridiculously capable. A couple of years ago he took me fishing up in Squamish. Well, he went fishing. I floundered around in a freezing river, waving a long graphite stick at the fish who mocked me with their toothy grins. That followed the time we went snorkeling for crabs.

Here’s James’s latest demonstration of woodsy prowess (caution: graphic photos of the inside of a small deer ahead). Boris, Travis and James, among others, discovered a fawn that had frozen to death in Boris’s parents’ backyard on Bowen Island:

In truth, I felt pretty unsure. ‘Doing something’ meant butchering the fawn. I was all for wild game but I didn’t know that everyone at the open house would be as open. And I didn’t have any hunting knives. I had excuses: I had never butchered a deer that wasn’t a fresh kill, I had never butchered a deer, never mind a fawn, in BC, within sight of downtown Vancouver and the birthplace of Greenpeace and all those moral vegetarians.

But, in the end, he went to town and they had a deer feast. I might have even temporarily suspended my no-red-meat habits for a taste of Bowen Island deer.

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Two New-to-Me Local Sites

December 4th, 2008, No Comments »

I’ve been meaning to mention two local sites that I recently discovered:

  • VancouverBC.com is a kind of portal site run by the guys who publish Vancouver View magazine (which I used to write for about four years ago). It’s focused, I gather, on locals–most of the other Vancouver portals seem to target tourists. There’s a schwack of blogs on the site, as well as a smorgasbord of event listings and other stuff you’d expect. The Vancouver hyper-local web is a competitive place (compared to sleepy, old-school Victoria), so it’ll be interesting to see how this one fairs.
  • The Big Wild is an environmental outreach site run by Mountain Equipment Co-op (disclosure: for whom I’ve done a bit of consulting, though not on this site). It’s an advocacy site, with causes to support, green event listings, news and a way to turn your wilderness adventure into a pledge drive.

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