Today is Tony Pierce’s 104th birthday. Tony’s a great guy who has built himself quite the media empire down in LA. The last time I saw Tony, it was at some dimly lit, somewhat seedy strip club in east Hollywood. Prior to that, Tony and I sat in his car in some parking lot, drinking cheap beer out of a brown bag and reminiscing about life. Good times. Have yourself a good birthday dude, and try not to get into too much trouble. ...

I was catching up on Tony’s site tonight and stumbled across this photo of Tony from 2006. Apparently he ended up on Hot Chicks With Douche Bags back then, which I think is awesome. Tony spends his days injecting massive amounts of awesome into the LA Times as the head of their 40-some odd blogs, and his nights attending cool music and social events in Los Angeles, so I think it’s pretty funny he’d end up there. But hey, getting your photo taken with a cute girl is always a good thing. I hung out with Tony for New Year’s out in Toronto last year, and we had a lot of fun drinking beer ...

I live right near English Bay, and right now most of Vancouver is gathering outside my front door to see the second night of the fireworks. As a kid, seeing the fireworks was something I used to really enjoy. But as an adult, I don’t really enjoy large crowds anymore, or fighting to get a spot to sit. That being said, I appreciate that the event brings a lot of people together from various parts of Vancouver, and the Fraser Valley. Last year, our good pal Tony was visiting Vancouver, and we all got to hang out, drink a few beers, and watch the fireworks together. And while we didn’t make it ...

I just caught this video over on Tony’s blog. I have a hard time watching confrontations like this — I don’t even know what I’d do if I were ever put in a situation with an asshole cop like that. ...

I spent most of the morning in bed on my second day of Toronto, which was fine by me since the bed here is super comfy. The rest of the day is pretty much a blur for me. Tony and I met Christie for lunch, and then walked around and did a bit of shopping. I picked up a nice scarf and Tony got some gloves and a hat, so we’re both officially winter people now. After that I went back to the hotel and had a little nap prior to the little hockey game party we had at my hotel. I wasn’t planning on getting super loaded, but somehow between the lack of food in my stomach, the martini Raymi made for ...

In Toronto and in the hotel. Fuckers gave me a king sized bed when I asked specifically for two doubles or whatever. Still an ongoing battle there. I changed my seat around prior to the flight so that hopefully nobody was going to be sitting next to me. Thankfully that plan came together and I had the whole row to myself. About 2 seconds after lifting up I made a make-shift bed out of all three seats and someone managed to sleep for most of the flight. Just waiting for Raymi to come pick me up from the hotel and the adventure will begin. ...

Tony officially booked all his flights and everything for New Year’s in Toronto, at which point he tossed the email-gauntlet towards me and said “what’s up now?’ So, I have stepped up to the challenge and have also booked a flight for Toronto. Unfortunately, flying in Canada at that time of year is pretty pricy, so my flights are all at weird times to save money (and coming home it’s a three-city milk-run). The Guy On The Left Should Really Come Too I’ll be spending Christmas at home with the family, and then heading out to Toronto to enjoy the cold for a few days. I’ll probably ...

So I spent about two hours tonight talking to Tony, and I think we both agreed on one thing — spending New Years in our own cities was pretty fucking lame. So, right now, we’re both thinking about heading to Toronto for New Year’s eve, which might be a fairly large mistake for me, I’m not sure.. To be honest, I’m not sure Toronto wants to handle me for that long. I need to convince Chad and Danielle to come with me. But, I’d love to get out of Vancouver for the holidays and just be me for a while. Not Duane the programmer, or Duane the engineer, or Duane the anything.. Just duane ...

Tony Pierce is currently in town checking out some of the Canadian sights and trying his hand at drinking Canadian beer. Tonight Tony, Robyn, Rebecca, John, Keira, Adam and Corinna all came down to my place for some pre-fireworks drinking. I wasn’t up to my typical drinking self, but I still managed to demolish 6 or 7 beers in fairly short order. I didn’t really eat any type of supper, so I’m a bit hungry now. On Friday some of us are going to meet up after work for a longer version of tonight, with hopefully a larger group. It was a cool night though, and it is the first time since ...