As their name suggests, Tremendous Dynamite are powerful 4 piece musical unit producing sounds that are perfect for blasting from your stereo! Their second release aptly titled “Invitation” happens to be the first full length CD featuring the new line up of the band which includes: Nick Piche (Lead Vocals & Guitar), Mike Posthumus (Lead Guitar & Bkgd Vocals), Kevin Blair (Bass & Backing Vocals) and Paul Roozendaal (Drums). The 11 track disc begins with the title track that packs a powerful 1 – 2 punch combination of raging rock that resembles Radiohead meets the Chilli Peppers. Piche’s vocal phrasing is reminiscent of earlier Bowie on this track that sets a perfect pace for this album packed with guitar heavy tracks.  The tight and powerful interaction of the band is obvious on every track of “Invitation” as drummer extraordinaire Paul Rosenthal and Bassist Kevin Blair add the perfect ingredients to enhance TD’s powerful delivery if not push it right over the top. These two veterans of the Westman music scene provide a solid platform for Posthumus and Piche to consistently let powerful riffs fly from. Indeed this commanding and cohesive group have composed a disc packed full of potent beats and riffs! Turn your stereo up to 10 and have a listen to the riff and roll arrangement of Over the Edge (track 2) for an exceptional example of this. However it’s not all serious business on Invitation as the guys prove how playful yet punchy they can be on the Danko Jones like “Basement Ghost Blues” perfectly placed in the track 3 position of the album. The crunching guitars and bouncy beat combine to create a persistently pulverizing effect that drives home the angst within every word Piche spews during the chorus demanding that he indeed has a mean case of “THE BASEMENT GHOST BLUES”!! This particular selection provides the perfect soundtrack for a killer mosh pit scene! For me it’s one of the many highlights on the album which there are many. There are enough memorable musical moments on “Invitation” that propel the listening experience. The twin guitar interplay is outstanding on several tracks including the outro sections of Drinks are Cheap and Watching The Paint Dry (Tracks 4 & 5). The comical “Style is Everything” (Track 6) displays Piche’s skillful blend of spoken work and singing style that adds the perfect flair for this track. Could it perhaps be aimed at an unsuspecting member of the peanut gallery? Desert Walk (Track 7) is reminiscent of Rage Against the Machine meets Rush with its crushing combination of a plodding section that contains a wall of raunchy riffs and fantastic drum fills that transitions seamlessly into a galloping progressive section. Your Madness (Track 8) the darkest and perhaps heaviest track on the album showcases Piche’s penchant for a spoken word singing style that really paints the gloomy picture this track portrays, the vocal delivery suggest a Grohlesque sneer that helps drive the point home. This selection also displays the band’s ability to effectively punctuate a composition in every section. Get a load of how they set up the guitar solo section. It produces an ass kicking jolt that any hard rock fan would appreciate. Leaves and Whisper (Tracks 9 & 10) are two more prime examples of the guitar heavy riff rockers this band is aptly capable of. Something Red (Track 11) is a perfect way to end this musical journey. It ideally encompasses the efforts which came from the countless hours this band invested during recording sessions in Garageland Studios located in Brandon’s west end. What starts off as a moody mid tempo acoustic track laced with tasty bass and guitar arpeggios, leads into a pleasing chord change complete with a straight ahead riff. The aforementioned change up provides the perfect foundation for the coda of this composition that comes complete with smoldering guitar work and flourish of drum fills overlapped with the vocal refrain of “it’s all the same”! Interestingly enough this is actually the most dissimilar track on the disc but turns out to be the perfect way to wrap things up and it may have you singing along before the final fade out…    Not only does Tremendous Dynamite deliver in the studio, they are also a blast to see live! Your next opportunity to check out their intense riff rock blast to your senses is April 15th & 16th at the 40. They’ll be ripping it up on stage during the official CD release bash for “Invitation”. The evening kicks off with an instrumental set by Brandon’s newest power trio “The Daughters of Creation” lead by guitarist extraordinaire Matt Cory and you are invited to join in on what should prove to be an outstanding live music experience. Invitation track listing: Invitation Over the edge Basement ghost blues Drinks are cheap Watching the paint dry Style is everything Desert walk Your madness Leaves Whisper Something Red

Brandon Troyanda School of Ukrainian Dance 2016 Festival WHEN: Friday, April 15: 9 am – 11 pm Saturday, April 16: 8 am – 10:30 pm Sunday, April 17: 8 am – 5 pm WHERE:    Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium 205-20th Street WHY:         This bi-annual competition is a celebration of Ukrainian dance that showcases the artistic and cultural expressions of this form of dance. This year over 1000 dancers and instructors from 39 clubs throughout Manitoba & Saskatchewan will attend! We will showcase more than 440 dances – this is our biggest competition to date. The club began hosting the event in 2000.       We welcome members of the general public to attend to enjoy the culture (various displays and vendors), the dancing and the music.   Admission Fees: Friday $10 Saturday $10 Sunday $10 Weekend Pass $25 *Children 10 & under are free. http://www.brandontroyanda.com/festival.html

So far today. Somebody peed on the floor.  At least he told me. It WAS an accident. We read a book about trees. I dressed up like Dora the explorer. Not on purpose. I look remarkably similar though. Kids have been threatened once that they'll lose their allowance. They stand by their claim that they didn't hear me when I went down the hallway, said both of their names, first, middle and last, and made them both look right in my eyes and said "get dressed please". Didn't hear me. Riiiiiggt. Hence threat. Little one just announced he spilled his whole bowl of cereal on/in the couch. Kids are watching ice road truckers.  And I had birthday cake for breakfast.And came within fraction of an inch of falling face first in a swamp.  On my way to work. And I laughed. All by myself. And somewhere out there, somebody, someone is reading this and saying "Yes!  Me too!" Your's truly, Caley

The first is a price war on flights to Florida. If you act quickly, you can grab an outstanding deal on a flight from Winnipeg (YWG) to Florida (numerous airports), to travel April through June.  Return tickets, with taxes included can be easily found for Orlando ($330), Fort Lauderdale ($348), Tampa ($389) or Fort Myers ($391). These prices are in Canadian funds, with searches completed by myself on March 30th. Airlines with the lowest prices are Delta and United. Air Canada and Westjet are in the mix, typically about 10% higher.  Use your favourite APP (like Kayak or OnTheFly) to find dates that work for you. Don't expect these prices to last long. Exceptional discounts like the will be snapped up faster than the hot pancakes at the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair kickoff breakfast!  Secondly, it looks like NewLeaf "airlines" is back in business. The Canadian Transportation Agency has ruled that they are A-OK to use Flair Airlines' license and brand themselves as a "reseller." However, they are not technically allowed to call themselves an airline.  Cbc.ca offers more on this story.  The reason this is big news is that they will spark some great competition for prices in Canada. The most important factor to know is that, their routes are limited as are the days of the week you can fly with them. So, in terms of convenience, Westjet and Air Canada are still your best options.  The best part of this story is that, if you pay close attention to NewLeaf.ca when they relaunch, you might be able to snag a real deal (on the identical route) from Westjet. I speak from first hand knowledge here. When NewLeaf launched originally in January, Westjet silently and without fanfare, beat the prices. My kids took advantage of Winnipeg to Kelowna flights at $176 (yes, TOTAL price and offered by Westjet) and booked a spring break ski vacation.  I originally talked about this in January.  One of the routes price matched was Winnipeg to Toronto. So consider this your official heads-up to great deals to Kelowna, Vancouver and Toronto when NewLeaf looks to relaunch in the coming weeks. 

The CryptoWall 3.0 virus has been circulating for a while now. I know it has affected a number of businesses in the Westman region. CryptoWall is spread primarily as an email attachment. Here's how the story went for one of my clients. My client received what looked like a very legitimate email from someone with an attached resume. The attachment was a zip file which when opened installed the CryptoWall 3.0 virus on the computer. Clicking on the attachment appeared like it didn't do anything as the expected resume did not appear. However, that's all it took to install the virus. CryptoWall 3.0 creates a private encryption key on the attacker's server and goes through all the folders of your computer encrypting them with that key. It also goes through the folders on any mapped network drives and encrypts them as well. Once the files have been encrypted, they are no longer useful to you. They can't be opened as the programs will now see them as invalid files. The only way to decrypt the files is with the public key the attacker has. In each of the folders with encrypted files, there are also a number of ransom notes named "HELP_DECRYPT". Those files give instructions about how to send the money to get the encryption key for your files. They have been asking for $500 USD if paid within 5 days or $1000 USD if paid after that. Fortunately for my client, they had our Off-Site Backup service for their server. So, we were able to restore copies of all the files on the server from just minutes before the virus encrypted them. However, we did not have backup service on the computer which opened the email attachment. So, all they had left on that computer were some files they had recently backed up to a USB stick. We could have paid the money to the attacker to decrypt the files from that computer, but in this case my client felt it wasn't worth it. I'm glad the attacker didn't get any money out of this situation. In each of the cases I have seen, this virus has arrived as an email attachment. Most of the time it has been an email claiming to have a resume attached. Take away notes: 1) Be careful what email attachments you open. - This one is so tricky because legitimate resumes often come from people we don't know and sometimes when we're not expecting them. The only thing that could have tipped this one off is that it was a zip file - which may be suspicious. The other thing is there was no other contact info such as a phone number, or introductory info in the body of the email. 2) Make sure you have a good backup plan in place. - If you have a regular backup of your critical files, the effects of an attack such as this are greatly minimized. Being able to go back to the way things were just before the attack can help you get back up and running quickly. 3) Make sure you have good AntiVirus software installed on your computers. - There is no perfect AntiVirus, and unfortunately the installed AntiVirus did not stop the attack in the example above. However, it did help with removing the virus. Of course this is not the only threat and a good AntiVirus will stop most of these attacks. The most recent Trend Micro Worry-Free Business Security has added features to help prevent this kind of attack. 4) Check your security policies. - This attack could have been minimized if the user who opened the attachment did not have Administrative privileges on their local computer. On a Windows computer, only a user with Administrative privileges can install software. In larger organizations, most users don't have admin privileges. However, in smaller businesses, it is very common for a user to have admin rights on their local computer so that they can install their own software and updates. Your network administrator can help with removing Admin rights for most if not all users. Here's some more interesting reading about CryptoWall 3.0: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/cryptowall-3-0-ransomware-partners-with-fareit-spyware/ CryptoWall 3.0 is pretty scary stuff, but these tips should help minimize the potential risk to your business.