Roundhouse Refurbish

I was at Vic West Fest on Saturday, and came across a display for the proposed changes to the Esquimalt Roundhouse. I’ve been to the Roundhouse on a couple picture shoots (Oct 2005, Feb 2006) and it is a pretty amazing historical site. Here is the development’s website.

The problem is that the buildings are in disrepair and partially condemned. Many people want to save the site but they cannot raise the funds to preserve and refurbish the site to its former glory. The plan I read is to revitalize the area and completely redevelop it into a live/work arrangement that saves the Roundhouse, and its usage for the E&N dayliner while introducing high rises, shopping, restaurants, a brew pub, a market, and condos.

I really have mixed feelings about this. I’d love to see the site preserved as is, but without the money, it just isn’t going to happen. It is sad to think that the site may cease to exist in its current state, and only the roundhouse building will be saved. Even at that, the roundhouse will be forever changed into mixed use.

Lose it and save it. I guess that is better than losing it altogether.

Pictures Engage

Monday (day 3 of the vacation) I got out to shoot some pictures. I ended up at the Kinsmen Gorge Park which has some excellent flower beds. Unfortunately I didn’t hit them at their peak. The Tulips and Daffodils were ending so they were very bland, and nothing else had really taken off yet. Some of the Rhododendrons were blooming, but I find it difficult to get good shots of them.

I was struggling creatively too. It has been a while since I was out on a real photoshoot and my brain would not engage. I took approx 130 pictures, and most of those were discarded.

This heather (I think it is called) provided some opportunity to play with depth of field. Most of the plants like this I find have a purple flower, yet this one was white.

These were the only decent Tulips in the park, and the sun hadn’t reached them yet. I still have a hard time taking good pictures of Tulips. The flower is so simple, it is very easy to end up with a picture that doesn’t highlight it.

I’m not 100% sure, but I think this was a weed. It was a few feet high, and had these clusters of buds. I played with the aperture to change the depth of field, and this was my favorite setting.

I’ve experimented with HDR images a little bit. Below are two examples. The Rhodo and the bridge shots are composed of 5 exposures, ranging from -2 ev to +2 ev. PaintShop Pro took care of the rest.

Adventure Trailer

Sunday was day 2 of my extended vacation and Sprout and I had a grand adventure. Sox and Beet were off visiting a friend, and we wanted to head down to the petting zoo. The big hurdle was that Sox had taken the car, but the solution was to ride a bike.

Sprout was pretty eager to get in the trailer and head down there. It was a lot of fun, and good workout too. Nothing like towing over 45 pounds up a hill on a bike.

The ride there was very uneventful. Once I got there my plan was to lock the trailer to the bike. This was complicated by the fact that we had brought too much stuff to carry by hand (extra clothes for he and I, snacks, non biking shoes for me, toys). I was going to just push the strollerized trailer until I remembered that I hadn’t brought the front wheel with me. Actually I left it at home on purpose. Not sure where my head was.

Sprout had fun at the zoo with his buddy, and when it was time to leave he hopped right back into the trailer. During the ride home he sat quietly and ate his snack. At one point I could hear him telling me something so I pulled over and stopped. He was pointing out a parked car ๐Ÿ™‚

I really enjoyed this outing with my son, and look forward to many more.

Vacation Planned

Today is the first day of vacation. I don’t return to work until June! This is the longest vacation I have had in probably close to 20 years. We have all sorts of things planned for the month, many are chores, and many things should be lots of fun too. Parks, beaches, Vancouver, bike riding, swimming lessons, Duncan, Yoshi walks, photography and catching up with friends are all some of the fun things.

Yard work, cleaning the house, and selling unnecessary furniture all some of the work things.

This is going to be an excellent month to spend time with Sox, Sprout, and Beet. I am hoping that the weather improves though. Today’s Yoshi walk got a little wet, and that made me a little cranky.

Cory Dwellers

I was doing some running around today, and needed to get Yoshi some food. Since I would be at Petsmart anyway, I decided on getting a couple new fish for the tank.

I perused the tanks looking for something to be compatible with my guppy, my platy, and my danio’s. I came across a tank full of Platy’s and some Albino Cory’s . I thought they looked pretty cool so I got a couple of them for the tank.

The Cory’s look similar to tiny catfish, and are definitely bottom dwellers, which is an excellent fit for my tank. Turns out they need a different type of food so I had to get some of that. I rounded out my purchase with a couple more live plants, and a new snail.

I’m very proud of my tank now. I think I have an excellent blend of fish and plants and I can spend a long time watching my tank.

Power Mower

We’ve got power!

After using a battery powered lawn mower for so long, we finally decided to get a new mower. After dealing with electric ones for so long I made the decision to go gas. Maybe not the most environmental choice, but it is newer technology.

Also, it must be better than wasting electricity on the batteries. It also wastes way less time too. The old electric would start to die quite quickly and I would have to spend ridiculous amounts of time cutting the grass.

With the new mower I was able to rip across the grass and get it nicely trimmed in half the time it normally takes. Nice!

Yoshi Busted

We were out at a playground yesterday, and Yoshi stayed home. We always take the cushions off the couch, otherwise Yoshi will sleep on the couch. Apparently that isn’t a deterrent as we busted him sleeping on the couch. As we pulled into the driveway I saw his head in the window. I snuck up to the window with my trusty camera and snapped a few pictures.

Once satisfied that I had enough evidence to convict him I knocked on the window to wake him. He had the gall to stand on the couch and bark at me, presumably because I woke him up. Nice try Yoshi.

Searching Wallet

This morning ended a rather trying 24 hours. Yesterday morning I wanted to do some running around. I made my list, prepared Sprout, grabed my keys and wallet … wait. Where is that wallet?

My wallet was not in its usual spot, and that is pretty strange for me. I began searching the house top to bottom. No sign of it. I looked in the laundry, in the bathroom, the bedroom, rooms my wallet really should not be in. No signs of it anywhere.

Last time I remembered seeing it was at work. Off to Oak Bay. Nope. We were at Kaptain K’s for dinner, so I called over there. They had not seen it. Back home there was more searching by the entire family. Could not find it. I even went back to work a second time and scoured my office.

I gave up the search for dinner, and decided I was stressed enough and didn’t want to keep looking. As we were climbing in to bed Sox asked me when I would call and cancel all the cards. In my mind it must have fallen out of my pocket, and I wanted to give the locater time to get it back to me. I decided Monday morning I would call the banks and cancel the cards.

As I was drifting off to sleep I was still thinking of more places to look. An odd one popped into my mind: in the closet under Sox’s hanging clothes.

This morning after breakfast I looked in that spot, and as I peeled back the clothes, there was my wallet! Weird. I really have no idea how it got there, but it may have been sitting on some clothes, and as they were picked up it bounced under the clothing, neatly hidden from sight.

It got me thinking about all the cards I have in my wallet. I don’t have an inventory of what’s there and what phone numbers to call. Perhaps I should make such a listing.

Grinder Drinks

Sox got me a new grinder for my birthday, and it is way, way better than my old one. The first time I ground some beans I knew it was going to make a difference in the coffee I make. At a medium setting, the grounds were finer than the finest setting of the old one.

Sure enough, my morning Americano’s are tastier than every.

The grinder has all the features I really wanted. A timer instead of just a button, better grind controls, and a way to disassemble for cleaning. Switching to grinding for a bodum is the simple turn of a knob. The new grinder is also a lot quieter than most others, which is an excellent feature for a parent.

To complement my drinks, perhaps I need some new mugs?

via BoingBoing

via Gizmodo