"Promoting a band is hard. And all the while I've been working on the album I've been trying to think of how I can promote it — how I can get noticed.
"When Google announced that Street View was coming to Saskatoon, a light bulb went on," he said. "I just thought Street View would allow anyone on any corner to be seen by any number of people anywhere."
Hatching the plan was one thing, execution was another.
"I figured Saskatoon's not that big, I could probably find the Google car if I really wanted to," he said. "So I built a sign, and kept it in the trunk of my car."
Heagy said he enlisted friends to keep an eye out for the vehicle and to call him if they spotted something with a large camera mounted on a tripod on the roof.
As it turned out, Heagy was having lunch one day and saw the Google car himself. He rushed to his own car to catch up to it and figure out where it would be going.
"Rolling Through the Bay" is 9 feet tall, 7 feet wide and 2 feet deep. It sports four pingpong ball tracks with more than a dozen entry points.
There's the Golden Gate tour, which snakes through Chinatown and Aquatic Park and ends at the old Fleishhacker Pool. There's the Cable Car tour, which travels past the painted ladies of Alamo Square into Golden Gate Park and onto the old Ferris wheel at Ocean Beach. There's even a nod to the East Bay that features a BART train and the Bay Bridge.
Look closely, though, and an even more detailed world appears. Surfers give the peace sign as they ride the waves near Ocean Beach. Two crabs are escaping from Fisherman's Wharf. The tail of Humphrey the humpback whale splashes by the bay.
It's amazingly nontechnical, it's literally just lights taped to a truck. According to Marshall "It's not very scientific, it's a hideous site in the daylight, there's black tape and wires in the daytime." But at night it's amazing. Marshall has used eight trucks and added dozens of strand since, though it's always a 2WD Chevy/GMC with a regular cab and eight-foot truck bed "the way a truck ought to look."
By his own estimate there are 50-to-70 strings with a mixture of 50 and 100 lights each, making a conservative estimate of 3,000 lights. There are no LEDs, just the cheap $0.89 strings, though he'd like to add some to take pressure off the taxed generator
What a selection! Marvel at the 47-page menu of hot entrees, most of which are sourced from other, better restaurants. While you can't beat the price, remember that you get what you pay for: The food is often reheated and many of the "celebrity chefs" who dabble in the kitchen don't appear to know how to cook. Remember to pay cash, as the staff has been known to "aggregate" patrons' credit card numbers.
While the dishes are sometimes unappetizing, the kitchen will occasionally convince you that everything you know about curly fries is wrong. The opinionated waitstaff makes it clear that they know what you want better than you do; don't be surprised if your order of chicken elicits a riff on why you actually wanted trout. We hope the owners know what they're doing, because the business model—the food is free, but there are ads on the plates, glasses, tablecloths, and forks—seems iffy at best.
