Confidence Shots

On Sunday we took Heart out to Beaver Lake for a walk. The kids had a great time and walked a long way. Heart did excellent too. She sticks closer to us than Yoshi did, which is kind of nice when we are still getting used to her. She went up to many other people and dogs, and did so with confidence.

I took my macro lens out again. Excellent portrait lens, but some day I need to get out with my tripod for some real macro shots.


Serious girl.


Serious smile.


Cold day for sure. We had lots of fun tossing rocks, pine cones, and sticks onto the ice to hear the cool noises they made.


Trying for a nice picture.


Silly face time.


Heart is still a little unsure of what a camera does.

The sun was nice, but it was still pretty chilly out. I tried dressing as warmly as I could, and it was just enough to prevent me from feeling too cold, but I was definitely not comfortably warm. I swear my kids are impervious to cold.

Swampy Twirly

A few weeks ago we headed to the “boat” park (Veterans Memorial Park in Esquimalt) to listen to some Christmas Carols. Unfortunately we were late to the event, and they packed up early. As we were arriving a gentleman mentioned the park was a little swampy.

This was not swampy, but in fact lake-like.

Things went well there, until Elliot went down the twirly slide. He came off at Mach 1, and landed on his side in 4 inches of water. He got up quickly, shrieked for a little bit, then calmed down. We took off his wet jacket, dried him off, and warmed him up.

Sue and I figured that was the end of the park trip, but his jacket was still dry inside, so we stayed and played some more. The kids had a great time getting totally soaking wet, running around, playing, splashing. The were totally dressed for it though, muddy buddies and boots.

Landlord Inspection

I’ve been wanting to blog about this for a long time, but now I finally can. This is the story of my former landlord. He turned out to be quite a piece of work.

In October 2008 I gave notice to our landlord. Up to that point we had a decent relationship. He always told us to treat the yard as our own. He never minded the state the yard was in. He was a bit of a hands off landlord and never did any regular maintenance on the house. The only things he did were at our request. In all we rented the house for 6 years from him. We were excellent tenants and he told us that on more than one occasion.

That all changed with the one phone call. As soon as I told him the news, his demeanour changed. He quickly became hostile and told me he was keeping our damage deposit. He told us that the yard was trashed, the hedge was dieing, and a few other things. He lived in Halifax so he got all this information from his friend who was acting as our property manager. He always lived paycheque to paycheque and I figured that he really needed the house rented to make his mortgage payments.

I took lots of notes, and consulted with the Residential Tenancy Office (RTO) more than a few times. They were excellent and offered lots of advice to me on how to handle the situation. The biggest thing was to document everything.

The next couple months were stressful as we packed up the house, cleaned it, and got ready for Christmas. At the end of November we took possession of our new house and moved. We were glad to be in a bigger house. We were ecstatic the kids each had their own rooms, and we loved the new neighbourhood.

The day we moved out I took pictures of every corner of every room in the house paying special attention to the damaged areas. I then called up the property manager and pressed him into meeting me at the house for an inspection (he was reluctant to do it). I pointed out to him the damages to the house that were caused by us.

I then handed over the keys and waited. The former landlord and I went back on forth on getting estimates for fixing the damages. At one point he wanted to replace the entire door whose paint had been scratched by Yoshi. I pushed back on that one (he quoted up to $1000 to replace a cheap wood core door).

I gave him lots of time and when we were approaching the 15 post move out limit I reminded him about that. In BC, the landlord MUST give back the damage deposit withing 15 days, or else they automatically owe twice the deposit back. If there are damages that need to be taken care of they need to get a quote on fixing them, then file a dispute with the RTO.

I let the 15 day limit slide in hopes we could work things out. I even suggested at one point he keep all but $400 of the deposit. That email went ignored.

time dragged on and nothing was getting done to get us our money. I was getting really stressed out about this which was really unfortunate since we were just about to head to New Zealand. I decided that if there was not a cheque waiting for me when we got back then I would file a dispute with the RTO.

After New Zealand, there was no cheque. I gathered the evidence I needed, including pictures of the damage (I wasn’t trying to hide anything), and went down to the RTO office and started the paper work. I had to photocopy everything and send him copies of it. With that process started I felt better. I was fighting for my rights and felt good about it.

I got the date for the hearing and when the day approached, I got reviewed everything so that I was fully prepared.

The hearing was a conference call with the adjudicator. I got to present my case first, then he got to give his side of things. Finally I got to respond to his comments.

I felt my case went well. I stuck to the facts, outlined what I had done, what I was hoping for, gave all the facts, explained all the evidence. Then it was his turn. It was evident he wasn’t prepared. He rambled on about sick dogs, busted computers, how much he spent on painting the house after we left, and proved he didn’t know the laws very well when it came to being a landlord. I found this a little funny since he quite often mentioned the RTO while we were tenants.

After he was done I got to correct a couple things he said since they weren’t totally true. When the call was done the adjudicator said she would review the evidence, and inform us of the decision by mail.

I won.

The former landlord then had a certain number of days to pay us double the damage deposit. He took the maximum amount of time possible, and was actually late by a few days. If it had gone on any longer I could have taken him to small claims court.

Now, why did I wait so long to write this? Well, he still had 2 years from the date we moved out to file a claim for damages done to the house. The 2 year time limit is up.

Now I see why the laws are so skewed to the tenant. It really is very easy for a landlord to screw over a tenant. To anyone who rents, my advice is this. Do your paperwork. Keeps copies of everything. Get a written inspection report done when you move in. Take pictures of everything before you move in, and after you move out. Get a written inspection report when you move out. Most important, know your rights and don’t be afraid to stand up for them.

Incidentally, if he had filed a dispute for the damages I likely would have paid it straight away. I never claimed there were no damages, I just wanted my portion of the damage deposit back. In the 6 years we were there, the only damage was a broken hearth tile, and a scratched door. Some people tried to convince me that those were regular wear and tear on a house. I was all about being fair and didn’t feel like those were normal.

Confident Office

Heart is working out wonderfully for us. She has her quirks (like licking us), but she is an absolute sweetie. She is definitely coming out of her shell too. She is way more confident around people and around the house. We are trusting her off leash now even though she is thoroughly distracted by squirrels.

Best of all, she is turning into an excellent office dog. I am thankful the my current work situation permits me to take her to work. She (and any dog in the office for that matter) is an excellent distraction throughout the day.

She can be quite playful at times too. She is four now, but after having an older dog, and not seeing the puppy-like playing, this is a welcome sight.

Staggering Progress

Once again November saw me shave completely and grown a Mo for Movember. Over the course of Movember I raised $480 for team Muddylaces. My goal was $500 so I am pretty happy that I got as close as I did.

This year’s results are staggering. Canda and Australia each gathered over $21 million dollars, with the total being well over $60 million. Amazing.

Even more amazing is the recognition and involvement of the event. Throughout Movember I saw men everywhere sporting the Mo. Well done guys! And thanks to all the ladies and women who put up with their funny looking guys for one month.

Here are my pics this year of my progress.


Sleep Bolted

Heart is working out very well for us. She is a lovable sweet dog that relishes any attention we give her. She is getting more and more confident while outside and that is very good to see. Heart is even starting to spend less time right by our side, which to me indicates she is feeling more comfortable in “her” house.

Some nights she even does not sleep in our bedroom, which is pretty nice.

Last night though, Heart did sleep in our bedroom.

Recently Amy has had trouble sleeping through the night which has made Sue and I very tired. Amy yells out for us to help her put her Bopp (blanket) back on. We’re working to get her to do it herself.

Amazingly, last night Amy did not call for us. Sleeping soundly I was rudely awakened when Heart got up and started making those horrible dog puking noises at 4:20 am. I bolted out of bed and tried to convince her to get outside. She puked a little in our room, then made her way downstairs and out the front door.

I waited outside with her only wearing a pair of pajama pants, while she puked a couple more times. Tired, cold, and wide awake I cleaned up the mess in our room, then climbed back into bed. A little over an hour later I finally got back to sleep.

What should have been a good sleep, wasn’t.

Lighted Horns

A couple weekends ago we went to the lighted truck parade. Like every year it was very, very, very cold. Even though I thought I dressed warmly enough, I was sadly mistaken. Once the parade got to us though, it was fine. I took a bunch of pictures even though my fingers didn’t want to move.

The kids enjoyed the parade. Elliot watched with his hands over his ears, and Amy was in her stroller with the top pulled down over top of her.

The trucks were pretty amazing. Every year they get more and more decked out. Despite the fact that I have seen the parade a few times now, I always forget how loud their horns are, how much they honk, and how fast they drive past us. Makes for a spectacular parade that is over quickly.

Back in the car we unbundled, got the heat going, and headed home.


Biking Favourite

A couple mountain biking videos for you today. Well, sort of.

Kris Holm is a unicyclist who used to ride some pretty gnarly trails (yes, on the unicycle). You can see some of this on youtube. Looks like he has gotten more into more of a trials/street form of riding.

NAUCC 2010 from Max Schulze on Vimeo.

The next video is sort of a promo for a Contour video camera. I love this vid though. It just gets me stoked to go out and ride. Mike Kinrade is know for his big mountain riding style and it shows here. Looks like he was just out having a great time with his buddies which is my favourite reason to go mountain biking.


Dog Duration

As many people already know, we got a new dog. Well, new to us. We are in the trial phase of adopting a 4 year old German Short Hair Pointer from the same breeder that Sox got Yoshi from.

We went and got her last weekend. All we knew at the time was that she was very timid, eager to please, she was in good health, and her name was Heart. The breeder felt she would do well in a house that could give her more attention. We also saw one picture of her.

Sox and I went up to Squamish last weekend to meet her and make a snap decision about whether we wanted to take her for a trial.

As soon as we got into her house, we could see the timidness. Other dogs were crowding around us to say hi, but she tucked her tail, backed away and peed on the floor. Within a couple minutes though we could see she wanted to come say hi. Any loud noise, or sudden movement would see her jump back and run to hide. Seconds later she would come back.

Sox and I talked briefly about her and decided to go for it. We loaded her in our car and drove her away from the only life she has ever known. She did well in the car and laid down for most of the drive. We took the ferry to Departure Bay, then drove down to Victoria. She was quiet the entire time.

That night we had a bed in our room for her and she curled up for most of the night, though she did whine a little at 2am. By midday Sunday she was way more comfortable with us. Her tail would come untucked a little and she followed us everywhere.

When we brought the kids home (they were at Gramma’s house), she was a little scared, but quickly got over it.

Every day since then we have seen remarkable improvements in her confidence. She doesn’t jump at every noise, she will sometimes wander away to sleep on her own, and she can even stand the kids running around screaming without going into a tizzy (tonight there were four kids in the house running around and she just lay on her bed watching them).

I am a little concerned about separation anxiety though. If Sox and I are home and Sox leaves the room, Heart will start to whine. If Sox leaves the house, there isn’t any whining. Yesterday she spent some alone time in the car and she handled that well. During this upcoming week we will spend some time leaving her alone in the house, slowly building up the duration.

Now, some things I never expected from having Heart. I am thinking about Yoshi a lot more that I expected. Heart looks similar to Yoshi, but is much smaller. Some of Heart’s behaviours, noises, and actions are a lot like Yoshi. Either this means they are pointer traits, or they are ancestral traits (Heart is Yoshi’s grand niece). I really, really missed having a dog around the house. A dog can complicate our life a little, but the companionship is amazing. The energy they give off fills a room, even when they are sleeping.

We have three more weeks to decide if we are going to keep her. We will have some work to do with her if we do keep her to build her confidence, but so far things are going really well. I can already feel myself falling for her. She is a sweet and gentle dog.

One thing Sox and I talked about before we got Heart is that we are afraid we will forget about Yoshi. After having Heart a short while and learning she is so similar to Yoshi, that fear is still there. Like I mentioned though, I am thinking about Yoshi a lot more. Maybe having Heart will help us remember Yoshi more than we would have without her? After losing Yoshi, a good friend said we had a Yoshi sized hole in our lives. Maybe Heart can partially fill that hole for us. We aren’t trying to replace Yoshi (nothing ever could), but Heart may be a good stand in.