Well, here we are, Edmonton. Time to shut off the lights and close down the joint.

Two or so years ago, if you had told either of us that we’d reach this point – 1500+ posts, a 6 part TV series, a variety of live webcasts, a fancy pants best blog award and the funniest, smartest, best-looking audience in the city – we’d have called you crazy. And not just because we lacked a basic understanding of the INTERNETS (the files are IN the computer?).

the edmontonian has come farther than we ever thought it could, and honest to God, no one is more surprised by that than we are. So we’d like to take this last minute to thank you guys, truly, and from the bottom of our hearts, for welcoming us into your lives for the last 2+ years. Whether you were writing or reading, talking or listening, commenting or contributing – every time you guys took a chance and got involved, trusting us with your stories, your submissions or your attention, we marveled. We marveled that for some reason, in this metal box full of lol cats and juggalos, you chose to talk to us.  There is no greater compliment, and we have been humbled by it every single day.

As you may know (we talked about this with our friends at the Unknown Studio), we didn’t start out as Edmonton enthusiasts. In fact, neither of us were particularly thrilled to find ourselves living in the City of Champions, but we decided to make the best of it and kill some time by starting a website. And two years later, here we are.

That is likely the biggest thing we’ve learned from the edmontonian: that when you stop trying desperately to get somewhere else, and you show up to what’s really happening right here, right now – magic happens. Every time, without fail.

You get one life, guys. Let’s make a joint agreement that we won’t spend it waiting for the perfect moment, the perfect bank balance, the perfect job opportunity, the perfect weight, the perfect education, the perfect someone. Figure out what matters to you and go get it – not as a means to get somewhere else, but for its own sake; because you love it so much it keeps you awake at night. That’s all we ever did, nothing more – and it turned out pretty well for us.

So let us dedicate the last two years to all of you guys – for your ideas, your kindness, your generosity, and more than anything, for giving us a reason to show up right here, every day. There are no words to ever sufficiently express our appreciation, our respect, our love. If the edmontonian was ever anything special, it was only because of you.

Until we meet again!

Your friends,

Jeff and Sally

Where would the edmontonian be without our many contributors, collaborators, and commenters?

Sally and I never set out to make the edmontonian our blog. Sure, we had our names all over it editing submissions and authoring a majority of items, but the edmontonian was always supposed to be a community blog. Jeff and Sally could always go get their own damn vlog.

Whether it was a conversation about A Taste of Edmonton and deep-fried foods that spawned its own video, photos that made up many of our quirky looks at the city, writers that posted items here when they certainly had plenty of other good stuff going on, or collaborating with Edmonton’s online content generatOne year of thanksors, it was joining forces and cross-posting that took the edmontonian from a blog belonging to two people to a true community news source.

Some contributors wrote one post, others became synonymous with the site. Some of our same website contributors made appearances on our ShawTV show, but new friends helped on that too. And we always had a steady crew of commenters (and we consider them part of the overall Edmonton conversation).

Together, that group of people is what made the edmontonian such a good time.

(Photos are deep frying and democracy. Two things we take very seriously.)

When we published our feature on the Culina family of restaurants we began with a note that said: A little backstory: Sally and I wrote this story for a new Edmonton food magazine…alas it never hit the news stands. You, dear friends, can still enjoy our glowing words about Culina. 

The Culina story remains one of my favourites for a number of reasons. Brad Lazarenko is passionate about food and I could have spent days interviewing him. Culina puts out amazing food. We landed some great photos from a friend of a friend who got married at Culina Mill Creek. But my favourite reason to mention the story in our long look back is that it highlights something the Internet has made possible in journalism: no story need go untold.

Sally and I wrote the Culina story after pitching it to the editor (I think he was the editor?) of a new Edmonton food magazine. But that magazine – of the old fashioned paper variety – never saw its first issue printed. So, we had a finished story and photos and nowhere for them to go.

Wait. Scratch that. We would have had a finished story and photos and nowhere for them to go if this was 1998. But we had an Edmonton-focused website that suited the story just fine.

If this was 1998 we probably would have then tried to pitch the story to a few places. And if no other editor would have run the story it would have sat unpublished next to my seven unfinished novels. Thus, the great advantage of the Internet is the wide, and free, availability of publishing tools.

As I mentioned in an interview on the end of our website you can begin telling your Edmonton story right now. You can tell the stories you don’t hear in traditional news (or from other blogs) and you can probably do that as well as anyone.

And you don’t have to wait for permission from some crusty old editor to do it.

Look, George, the special editions really don’t bother me that much. Cleaner special effects and cool rings around explosions get me clapping like a seal turning tricks for fish, but when you change fundamental moments in a classic film, that is just irritating! It’s bad enough we have to watch Greedo shoot first, ruining an age old sci-fi debate for nerds (while also making Han Solo less cool), but now, if we want a hi-def version of the original trilogy in our collection, we have to listen to the same cringe worthy dialogue James Earl Jones was forced to utter in Revenge of the Sith? Fuck you, buddy!

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got to say to you, Lucas, your antics are distracting me. I’m supposed to be talking to the edmontonian’s audience. What’s up guys? Anything new?

…the edmontonian is ending?

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

It feels like such a short time ago I wrote the first of my many rants for the edmontonian. When I looked into the archives I was shocked to find that my first contribution came way back in September of 2009. That’s like a million years ago…or two years ago, depending on your understanding of math.

Jeff once told me I have a gift for making things that shouldn’t be controversial, controversial. I’ve made a habit of drawing ire writing about nuclear power, speed limits, the downtown arena and, of course, that first 2009 article extolling my love for the city centre movie theater. That piece somehow got me called me judgmental and pretentious!

I’ve really enjoyed my time contributing to Jeff and Sally’s collaborative local project. the edmontonian gave a voice to the everyday shlub and his angry keyboard, a chance to factor into a larger discussion about his city, province and country.

Unless you go after SEE Magazine. You’re not allowed to do that.

I am truly grateful to have been a part of the edmontonian, and to count Jeff and Sally as friends. They are two of the most supportive people I have ever met; I swear if I told Sally I was running for President of Canada she’d say “Yeah, man, you could totally be president!”

So as I begin my campaign to become supreme chancellor of Canada, I bid the readers of the edmontonian a fond farewell. Thanks for reading.

Gregg Beever isn’t done with the Edmonton Internet. You can find him over at web comic Inglorious Hipsters, Tweeting about stuff, guesting on podcasts, and he even has his own blog.