Ask Saro

A lot of Montrealers are quite displeased with the city’s new international logo. For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, the Montreal Metropolitan Community decided to come up with a new image to brand itself on the international scene. Here’s the beauty in a nutshell:

Montreal's M Logo

The logo’s cost? 487,000$ CDN. An additional 200,000$ will be spent to market the thing. There are so many things that are wrong here besides how the logo looks, but I don’t know where to begin. Half a million dollars are being spent on a graphic… did anyone recently take a look at the market we are currently living in?

The Gazette (newspaper) had some humorous comments today. One I will remember the most is some guy saying we can get 2/3 of our money back by selling the logo to Winnipeg and Edmonton by flipping the image around (a W and an E). Classic.

In all honesty, the stylized M looks nice, but the colours really throw it off. If we were to stick to 2 colours (ones that weren’t quite fruity) the logo would definitely look a lot better. See an example with blue:

Montreal's M Logo in a Blue Gradient

See? An improvement already. I’ll be sending my bill to the city shortly for collection.

I can’t believe I got my hands on these tickets. Floor tickets at that.

While I shelled out double than what the face value of the tickets are, I seriously don’t mind the cost one bit. For those out of the loop, NIN is back in town November 12th in Montreal. After 3 years of silence, they’re touring North and South America all over again. As of this writing, they’re on a two week ‘off’ period, taking a break. There’s roughly 2 months to go before I see them perform, which is going to kill me as I have no patience these days.

There’s an article over at Wired’s site discussing the tech behind a Nine Inch Nails show. When I saw them live three years ago, their visual effects were superb. Supposedly this time around, the effects far surpass anything they have done before. I can’t wait.

I would like to take a small opportunity and introduce everyone to a new website that deals with educational toys: Jouets Choo Choo. They launched this week after several months of website development, and the site looks great. For anyone looking to buy educational toys (such as Playmobil, Schleich, Meccano, Ravensburger puzzles, Plan Toys, Thomas the Tank Engine, etc) then look no further, as their prices are the best. These guys have been in business for over ten (10) years now, with two stores active. One of the stores is located in Pointe-Claire (next to Fairview) and the other one, which was recently opened, is located at Quartier Dix-30 (right across Indigo mall). I actually know the owners personally (family friends) and they’re very friendly people with tons of experience in the toys department. If you ever wanted to get a gift for a newborn, young child or games that are non-violent for the kids, and you’re out of town, in a different province or simply too far away to visit the stores, Jouets Choo Choo’s online retail outlet is the answer to getting educational toys and games delivered to you. Check them out today!

Yesterday night I went out to celebrate my birthday. A friend of mine invited me to go to club Moomba, so I agreed to join her (since I had nothing else planned). I got into the line at about 11:45 PM and waited for about 40 minutes until I decided to leave and meet up with another friend (I was too impatient to wait in line for any longer). I wasn’t really in the mood to go clubbing anyway, so I just left, even though another 15 minutes could’ve gotten me inside. I met up with Raf at Foufounes Electriques for some cheap beers and it was probably the best choice. Since it was Daylight Savings Time today, we managed to benefit another hour of drinks. It was nearing 3 AM now, so Raf and his friends had to leave (Raf worked the next day). I was really loaded at the time and I was so hellbent on going to an after-hours that I just did that. It had been over a year since I last went to Stereo, and since it was close-by, I walked to it from Foufs. Cover was 40.00$ as Derrick L. Carter was playing as the main attraction. I quickly tried to recall who he was and if he was any good, but I didn’t care really. Fourty dollars on the table, I was walking into Stereo afterhours. Remarkably, there were a few people inside already dancing away. I picked up a can of Red Bull from the bar and started chugging it down. Within minutes, I was on the floor dancing to some wonderful house music. Man, it had been a while! Stereo hasn’t changed much (and so hasn’t the clientele) and that’s a good thing. I would have to say that Stereo is a one-of-a-kind place: the people, the music, the staff and the overall vibe is amazing. You don’t need the drugs to enjoy it either. I was sobering up fairly quickly at the time, but with the caffeine kicking in, I managed to last until 6 AM when I decided to call it quits for the night. Overall, I had a great night at Stereo, and I’m considering going back there every weekend or two for the experience.

There’s a small bar in downtown Montreal that I like to frequent every so often with my friends, it’s called “Vol de Nuit”, situated at the corner of Prince Arthur and St-Laurent street (next to the Scotia Bank). I was there recently and noticed a decrease in clientèle. While I prefer nights when it’s not as packed, I felt bad for the waitresses who live off the amount of tips they make every night. With that said, here’s a review of the place for everyone’s pleasure.

First thing you’ll notice is that there is no flashy sign outside (just a small neon saying “Vol de Nuit”) the place is pretty low-key and secluded from St-Laurent. A lot of people seem to miss it when they walk by it, but the place still gets quite a bit of traffic. I think a lot of their clientèle is word of mouth. I only knew about this place after my friend Alex brought me there one night. In return, I brought my other group of friends there and we’ve found it to be quite an enjoyable spot for having a drink or two.

Once inside, you’re usually greeted by the bouncer (who happens to change every time I’m there) who nods firmly and says hello. You should obviously return the greet and smile at the same time. Vol de Nuit isn’t a big place, but it can easily pack 100 people from what I can estimate. You’ll find a decent amount of tables and chairs for all your friends to sit. Of course, when it gets packed, you’ll have to either stand at the bar or simply drink standing up (which I oh-so-despise doing). But every time I’ve been there, I’ve been lucky to find a table and some chairs with my buddies.

On one side of the room, there is a jukebox machine loaded with music. For 50 cents or so, you get to choose a song to play over the loudspeakers in the bar. I find it’s a great addition to the place. Fortunately, the songs aren’t blasted in your ears so having a conversation between your friends without screaming and listening to the song is very possible. This type of atmosphere is usually very hard to find in many bars these days, as they usually turn up the music so loudly that your conversations are washed out.

In one corner of the place, there’s a slew of video lottery terminals (VLTs) with keno and some card games. A few of my buddies are junkies when it comes to these machines, and they play on them each time we go there.

The place is decently clean but one must remember that this is a bar. The washrooms aren’t the greatest but they’re better than other places I’ve been to. One thing I’ve noticed is that the soap dispensers actually dispense soap. A rare find indeed.

To conclude this review, I give Vol the Nuit an 8/10. I just wish the place was a little bigger and that parking downtown wasn’t such a chore (good luck finding a spot nearby!). But the latter is not the bar’s fault, so this is a great place nonetheless for some weekend fun with your friends.