Nathan Veldhoen

Spent my Saturday night hitting up a few events in Vancouver, first was a show and auction held by PUBLIC magazine! in  a cool little space across from the  new Woodwards building.  Some really cool pieces and a good mix of different talent.  Shots from the show can be seen here.

After the Public magazine launch party, we headed down to Chapel Arts for I heart Van Arts Launch Party for a festival that will be during the Olympics in Yaletown.  The crew that put this event on did an amazing job and used the the chapel to perfection .  A lot of  talented artists, as well as a large range of mediums from the music, art, and sculpture.  I was impressed with the overall set up and huge turn out.  They are also looking for volunteers for the festival during the olympics, so check out their site if your interested.

After the night out, headed down to some of the main venue that will house the Olympics.  Some really interesting structures and buildings all around the false creek area.  The hype has  started.  I don’t have any tickets but I will have to head down and see the gears turning, maybe check out a few of the free things going on.  Found a list free music concerts from vancouverisawesome.com.

Things are looking all good. There is the half a million affordable housing.

The non science world, its the center to learn about 2014 in Russia. I think...

See a hint of Cypress from Downtown.

Headed out Thursday morning for a nice little weekend houseboat trip on the Shuswap.  We used the Waterwaves houseboat company for our little trip on the lake,  slept 14, and comes with a good size hot tub.  Not totally pleased with the service aspect of the whole operation but the boat worked,  the design and layout was pretty solid.

Apparently Waterwaves is one of the larger companies in Sicamous with the option to build your own boat if you have the money and ideas.  After a weekend of houseboating I don’t know how they can even stay  in business.  The amount of shit you have to sign, rules, and bullshit that no one follows, would not be something I would invest in…Also sounded like this thing called the recession is hurting them a little as well.

Anywayz, fun weekend all together and everything seemed to work out.  Good weather, good people and a lot of beer to drink.  Now time to try and catch up on some sleep.  Photos attached.

Getting on the ship around 7ish I think.

Heading out for the night.

Sunetting on our first night.

I ended up sleeping in my tent on the top of the boat. 7am

Same morning at about 8am

Afternoon drinks and hot tub

afternoon sun tanning...(not my feet )

Forest Fire Sunset

Morning after a solid party night.

Sitting on the front of the boat

Floating store...

Nother sunset pic.

Drive home just outside of Kamloops

Added a bit more to the fridge.  I think I am done, for now…

I get a call from my pops saying he wants me to come with him to pick up a fridge and freezer from my grandmps neighbor.  I was like ah ok.  Well all this shit ends up at my house.  Free none the less but more shit to move once I sell the house.  Here is a project that turns more shit into a fun little project.  Kinda always wanted to draw on a fridge…

Tools for this project

Da Fridge

Boom!

Pretty solid weekend in Calgary, AB for our big art show.  Had great weather and the drive went pretty good.  We also didn’t have to haul too much art home since we got rid of some inventory while we were there.  Not too much to say but it was pretty rocking and the morning came too quick.  I think the show finally got shut down around 2:00-3:00 am, somewhere in that area.  Good space, and a pretty good location.  We hope to have future shows there, so stay tuned.  Pictures below are taken by Grubbe. check his flickr out!

Winding down.

Outside looking in.

Showtime

Dealin

www.theartprojectonline.com we added a new front page artist to the site…check it out.

We got in Thursday night and hit Artlife Friday afternoon to hit the walls with our Art.  Things turned out really well, and the space was amazing for our little show.  I still have to get show images up but here are some shots of what we had to deal with as well as some of the set up to get the show ready.

Store Front Friday Afternoon

The Space before we started hanging.

My Shit on the Wall

Getting things in Place...

Artlife is located  at 1312 1st SW Calgary Alberta Canada.  Website is here.

After doing some running around Saturday morning, picked up a few friends in Vancouver and headed up to meet up with others down in Squamish.  The group we met up with was up there for a month to climb.   Since the crew and I didn’t climb, we found a local lake and spent both days jumping of cliffs and soaking up the sun.  We drank a lot of beer and did a lot of jumping.

The name of the lake slips my mind but it was pretty warm and seems like it would be a good one for some open water swimming.

Little dive--Someone rock climbing in the back.

A group Beer Jump

Group of guys hanging out on the rock

Saturday got the best of a few people...

I scored a free case of beer at the beginning of the week. There was a reason why I go it free, its Rickards White…not a huge fan, wheat ale brewed with orange peel not a great combo. Its a bit too bitter, for someone who likes a  dark beer or  more honey taste, don’t bother even trying this guy.

Flexisonic will be rocking our show down at Artlife in Calgary on July 17, and these guys have made an absolute gem of a mix.  So good that I will probably be listening to it on loop 6 times for the drive from Vancouver to Calgary.  Check out there site for the mixtape.

LINK!!!!

If your in the Calgary area while we are there look us up on the 17th.  I am scrabblin to get my art in gear for this one-Game on…

Also check our the groups listening ear on the rest of their blog.

Spent my weekend up in Tulameen, British Columbia,  3 hours Northeast from Vancouver up the number 3 highway.  Tulameen can also be accessed  from the Highway 97c, Coquihalla Connector Highway.  It was a very warm weekend with a large group of people gathering at a friends cabin a few blocks form Otter Lake.  Lucky we had a boat and a few quads to enjoy while we where up there.  We took  full potential of this area.  This is quickly becoming one of my favorite spots to go in the summer for many reasons.

1) its an all year round spot if you enjoy sledding in the winter, and quading in the spring and summer

2)lake is big enough for wake boarding with multiple boats.

A Ski before the Sun Goes Down

3)small community

4) corner store with everything in it, including liquor, gas, ice cream, a restaurant for when your hungover, and fireworks.

Canada Day Boom

Here is a web cam of the store.  We spent one day hangout in front drinking beers on there supreme outside seating.  http://www.tulameenbc.com/map.html

5) the rope swing

Last years shot from the Rope

We did some early Canada day drinking and fireworks, while some of us got on the boat for a ski.  Water was warm enough not to wear a wetsuit, so that also meant that it was go time for the rope swing.

I was also able to grab some night time shots of the outdoor rink that they have up there, even found some pink skate gards that where left from the winter.  check out my flickr.

This weekend was another softball tournament weekend.  Had a team entered in the Aldergrove Days tournament in Aldergrove BC.  Was a fun little weekend but we didn’t do terribly well.  Single knock out on Sunday, with three round robin games on Saturday to see which tier you end up with.  There was a little beer garden at the middle school with games going on all over the city.   All and all was a pretty good little weekend with some good weather mixed in.

Final Jersey Design for the tournament

Spent my hungover ass with my pops getting the shed closer to completion.  Spent about 10-15 hours total and can’t wait to get my tools out of the house and into the shed.  It will end up being a 8×12, so a pretty good size.  Adding a little loft in the A frame of the shed giving me a few for extra square feet.

We used all reused form lumber for the walls and trusses, and then had to get 4 sheets of half inch plywood for the roof.  I’ll be using a used front door from my folks place and then once the door is set in place it, i’ll add the tar paper and siding.   I am not sure what type of siding I’ll be adding but kinda thinking i’ll be doing the same cedar type thats already on the house.  It’ll be nice to have the extra storage once its all finished up.

So far project project tally is under a hundred dollars.

The few days in Banff managed to be a pretty successful with a mix of good luck with the weather.  Had a lot of snow every day I was there but did manage to get some good shots from the top of Sulphur Mountain when it finally broke for a bit.  It climbs to 2,281m at peak and then a few more meters after you walk up their skywalk.  Pretty cool set up, I’m not sure that its worth 30 bucks for an 8 minute gondola ride.  I ended up riding for free since I stole my buddies drivers license, apparently if you live in Banff or Canmore you can ride for free.  After that did some spa clubbing up at the Rimrock resort with their pretty insane pool and hot tub combo since we knew someone saying there.

Rimrock Pool ---

After my few days in Banff I managed to ram into Calgary yesterday afternoon.  Did some walking around later in the evening and picked up a new backpack to go running with so I can carry my camera on my back while I’m out pounding the pavement.  Ended up getting the mec Drangonfly 17 litre daypack, ran with it today and was pretty happy with it and also got some pretty good shots at the same time.  Weather is nice and warm, nice change from the snow storm in banff that was going on a few days ago.

Later on the night turned to drunkered party with a stop a new pub then a trip to the saddledom to watch the Roughreck lacrosse team win the league championship.  Pretty crazy game, good time and looked like it was close to being a sell out. Here  an article about the game…  After the game we ended up a some bar, was pretty fun til they blew the fuse on the sound system and took them for ever to get it up again.  After that not sure what happened but my head hurt when I got up.

Check out my flickr for the updates on my shots of the week.  Took some nice shot while running today, we’ll see if I get around to adding them today.

Shot close to COP

Top Left corner has a special message.

So its playoff hockey time, or I mean time to get on the wagon time.  I do a ton a driving and man I have seen some really funny/ stupid/awesome shit since the play-offs started.  From cars with Canuck flags duct taped on both sides of their  new van, to brooms strapped on the back of their car with a Canuck flag off the top, to a mounted Stanley cup on the roof.  I haven’t been too quick with my phone or I would add a ton of images to this post but here is a funny one by my house.  I didn’t get the Canuck part but I did manage to get the flames section of the message.

I think it would be good if we met them in the playoffs, it would be so intense.  I have too many flames fan friends, or would it be, friends that are flamers…?

You sit at home on a friday just after work wondering, hmm what could I do this weekend?  Some weekends you just want to sit and hang out at home and not hung over all weekend.  Some weekends you want to party, get drunk, run wild, and do things that most people think is totally stupid.  The kinda stuff you wake up in the morning and laugh at yourself.    I don’t even come close to these guys.  They call it  Skull X Skull and  is the second one.  They have all types of crazy stupid events that result in nudity or blood.  There is  mud, fire, paint, bikes, beer and seems like more beer.  Thesse guys show no shame, its freaking awesome.  Not sure if I really would want to be around when this goes down but I  love looking at the carnage.

It happens in Austin at something called the shitpit.  (name fits).  Here is a giant list of events from Sucka Pants.

Jumping over the junk car on bikes, only one guy made it.
- Jumping on a trampoline where the windshield should be, until one girl misses and cuts her leg to the bone.
- Mad Dog challenge = Six-pack-attack relay race with Mad Dog booze (equals more colorful puking).
- Obstacle course along the side of the house, complete with flying folding tables.
- A car drove dangerously and aggressively through the slowly dispersing crowd in the street in front of the house, resulting in someone knocking their rear view mirror off. The driver then came back with his mom who was yelling at everyone and calling the cops. One guy’s response was to pull out his dick and pour beer on it. Everyone shuffles to the back when the cops come.
- Mosh pit and metal bands in the backyard, this time with flying cans of yellow and white house paint.
- Nothing is complete without roman candles into the crowd.
- Junk mattress catches fire next to the shack, pee and water put it out (three times).
- The strange band Funderstorm that ran around in the crowd on a megaphone yelling at people to tear his clothes off. He ended up naked (even the fishnets and purple undies came off) and then lit microphones on fire and swung them at people.
- Mud wrestling commences, this year with more friendly mud (less broken glass and rocks, more smell of manure) and mostly mixed (boy/girl) matches.
- Neighborhood kids hammering forever on the car with bats and pipes.
- One dude who was there on crutches had been clocking people when they bumped into him throughout the night. One majorly drunk dude really pissed him off and received a few decent whacks, prompting him to complain, cry, and call the cops (again). Four cars roll up this time, and people either take off or chill in the backyard to wait for them to leave.
- Once the cops disperse, bike-jousting gets rolling.
- After bike-jousting, the grand finale: blowing up the car. It’s done with some sort of explosive device detonated by gunfire. A healthy fireball erupts and the car burns for a while before being put out and re-lit a handful of times.
- Before taking off, the guys from Chief Mag set off a barrage of fireworks inside the car, causing them to ricochet off the ceiling and out the windows in all different directions.

More images and Image gallery can be seen here.