As my wife Jill and I crossed a stormy Strait of Georgia on our way to the first date of our Vancouver Island Book Tour, we received one of those exciting emails, saying that Adventures in Solitude had reached #1 on the BC Bestsellers List. Needless to say, I am humbled, honoured and very surprised that such a thing could ever happen… at ALL. So, to the book buyers of BC, THANK YOU for your support, for your passion, and for surprising a whole lot of people, most especially me.

To celebrate, here is the latest Adventures in Solitude Home Movie, #6. In this episode, my best pal Nick (featured prominently in Part Two of the book) threw the remains of a lingcod into our cove in Desolation Sound. He waited five minutes, then dove down twelve feet and found these two red rock crabs munching on the remains, grabbed them, and popped out of the water with them seconds later… and there’s enough power in those pinchers to break a human finger.

Tonight… the Nanaimo Harbourfront Library! Thanks to everyone in Parksville BC last night, and especially Mulberry Books and Lefty’s Restaurant, for a great first night.

Um... "dancing" at the afterparty, hosted by Yukon Music. Photo by the lovely Janine Verreault.

OK… I had a crazy great time at the Western Canadian Music Awards and Breakout West in Kelowna BC this past weekend! Thanks to all who made sure that my time was fantastic and packed to the max with fantastic music.

I loved hosting the awards show last night with my new friend Miche, too. Top highlights included You Say Party and Grand Analog‘s collaborative performance at the awards (they both went on to win their categories), same goes for Aidan Knight with Said the Whale and Maurice, and the legendary Grapes of Wrath paired up with We Are The City (my new band, apparently). Also a huge thanks to Michael Bernard Fitzgerald and Said the Whale for both performing at my Kelowna book launch at Mosaic Books.

Up next for me is a week-long Adventures in Solitude Book Tour of Vancouver Island! Looking forward to it, hope to see you at one of these events! My lovely wife Jill Barber is playing every one.

Lake Okanagan, Kelowna BC

Hey folks! I’m spending the weekend in Kelowna BC, the capital of the lovely Okanagan Valley. I’m here for a very busy four days of BreakoutWest, the music festival and conference that leads up to the Western Canadian Music Awards on Sunday. Last night things got off to a great start… I dined with the CBC crew at an amazing local restaurant called RauDZ (weird name, amazing food, wine and beer – best Arctic char I’ve EVER had).

Then it was off to Habitat, Kelowna’s best club, for Aidan Knight, Victoria’s young pop prodigy, who was awesome and managed to control the all-ages crowd like Reveen! After Aidan wrapped it was time for Said the Whale… who did their entire set… in reverse. Just like that Seinfeld episode. They started with the encore, then left the stage, then came back and profusely thanked the crowd, then did their regular set backwards! Amazing!

Here’s my schedule for the rest of the weekend:

Friday Oct 22, 2:30pm – 4:30pm: Making Friends with the Media seminar

Friday Oct 22, 5pm: Live interview on All Points West, CBC Radio One, at Habitat

Saturday Oct 23, 2pm – 3pm: Adventures in Solitude Kelowna Book Launch (reading, signing, and special music performance from Michael Bernard Fitzgerald)

Sunday Oct 24, 8pm – 11pm: Western Canadian Music Awards, Kelowna Community Theatre

… And did I mention my hotel room has a “South Pacific” theme?!