I used to have a huge crush on Sarah McLaughlin, but not under the circumstances that you might imagine. I don't know how old she was - maybe nineteen or so - but it was well before she was signed by Arista or released her first album. No, we were in the late-1980s, frustrated version of Halifax. She was in a band with Barry Walsh (who's sister, Janice, I was madly in love with) called the October Game, one of those pumping synth bands that lives on only on CFNY all-request mornings. I was a tortured proto-Goth/jazz kid slaving away at the Dalhousie college radio station trying to organize everything, including my own life, and heaven only knows how I did.

My feverish, simple desire for her reached its zenith at Gillian McCain's post-Lawn Jam party. All the kids were there, each, I expect, with their own fevers, most in various hues and tints of black. There was plenty of alcohol and loud, embarrassing voices. The evening culminated in Gillian's version of a love-in - we played Spin-the-Bottle. This was my first and, I am sad to say, last experience with this wondrous activity. Squeals of joy from the assembled multitudes met Janet and Sean, old lovers who one never saw together in public, as they kissed and kissed and kissed. And when I spun the bottle, it stopped at Sarah.

But there was nothing more after that moment. Nature may abhor a vacuum, or so I have read, but that moment had no substance beyond itself - it is good for a story only.

What do you want to know about me?

I moderate the Electronic Frontier forum here on MAGIC, an area that brings together some of the most diverse and strangely focused people I have ever met. TEF focuses on the cultural and legal aspects of technological change. You can draw your own conclusions about my hacker activity from TEF - just don't jump to any.

I studied theatre for four years at Dalhousie University, and both my love and fear of performance grew during this time. My world became big during this time with radio - I worked at CKDU-FM, Dalhousie's campus station, from the time it went FM right until 1988. It grew, really grew, in that time, becoming a diverse place.

More later.

JS

I miss the storms my father and I used to watch roll in off Northumberland Straight.