I got my new/old theme up but there are definitely some kinks to work out. For now I am going to leave it up, and hope that I can look into the bugs soon. The big one I see right now is that the left column isn’t quite wide enough. Oh well. I will get to it.
Pleasant Sock
Downtown in any largeish city is bound to have some interesting people. Throw in a rather pleasant climate, and you get all kinds of poeple living on the streets.
Today I saw one such person. Many street people have a dog with them. I can understand this.
Today I saw a new twist.
I saw a guy walking down the sidewalk with a huge back pack. So far so good. What was perched on top of the backpack? A cat. That is a little different. The cat was on a leash. Good thinking, you wouldn’t want fluffy to run away. The ca was wearing a sweater. Aww, he wants the cat to stay warm. The sweater made from an old work sock (you know the kind, it is grey with a white then red band at the top). That is a little odd, but to each their own.
Pandora Blocks
Today the PhotoClub met. I wanted to try something a little different, so I decided to use the theme 2 X 4 the I had read on PhotoFriday. Basically from your starting point you choose a direction. You walk two blocks in the chosen direction, then turn right or left, and walk four blocks in that direction. Once you arrive, you take pictures of what you find. I chose the starting point of Cook and Pandora, and the 4 of us that were there split into two, and headed off in different directions.
Tim and I stuck together, and when we arrived at our destination, started taking pictures. We got bored of the location quickly, so we sort of wandered aimlessly back to the starting point, taking pictures along the way. It was actually a lot of fun, and I think I ended up with some pretty good shots.
Parade Friends
After riding, I spent a couple hours disposing of the leaves in our yard. What a pain! I must say that I rather hate Gerry Oak trees (we have two of them in our yard).
After cleaning myself up, I met up with Suede and K and E downtown. After grabbing hot drink we walked over to the parade grounds, and met up with some more friends, the Patricks. We settled in and soon the parade began.
It was pretty neat how all the kids got so excited to see the cars all decorated with lights. I had fun to trying to capture some of the essence of the parade. It was difficult, and I look forward to the day I buy a new camera (soon). It wasn’t a long parade, so the ending was disappointing to some.
My pics are here.
Leaked Leaves
Jam packed weekend! Yesterday morning I met up with a couple friends for a ride a the dump. It was my first ride on my Bullit since I hurt my back during my last visit to Whistler in July. I was pretty apprehensive about getting back on that machine, and I really wanted to make sure I was feeling fit before I did. In preparation for my return I have been riding my road bike on the trainer.
I can say that the trainer has paid off. Yesterdays ride was great. Although, when I went to load the bike in the truck I got a little scare. Both tires were flat. My first reaction was “Oh crap, I don’t have any tubes”. Then I realized it had been 4 months since that bike has been moved. The air had simply leaked out, and some quick work with the pump had things back in order.
After meeting Sean and Darryll, we mounted up and headed out. I flet pretty good, but I was paying a lot of attention to how my back was feeling. The loop we did was pretty short, but lots of fun. We took some of the main trails up to the switchbacks, then played on the log a bit. I have noticed lately that sometimes Yoshi will start to act really weird when we stop for too long. A couple times on Lumpy Pants he has taken off on me, and it seemed like he was scared of the area. See, when Yoshi is scared, he tends to run off and hide. While we were playing on the log, I noticed Yoshi was hanging out a ways down the trail, and in the bush. Maybe he doesn’t like it when we stop for too long, or maybe he smells something he doesn’t like. Either way, I took off with Yoshi while Sean and Darryll played on the log a little more.
We met up near Snakes and Ladders, a classic trail at Hartland. During the rip don S&L I was very conscious of how my back handled the drops. Nothing out of the ordinary, but I was a little nervous.
Basically from there we headed down to Skull, then out. It was a quick jaunt, but I loved it. The fall air was nice and crisp, the trails had oodles of traction, the trees had shed most of their leaves which turned roads into singletrack after several passes by mountain bikers, the streams burbled, and the park felt empty. I love riding this time of year!
Orca Range
This was one of several Orca’s that Suede and I saw from the ferry when we were returning from the Tragically Hip concert. The picture isn’t very good, but it was the best I could get. They certainly don’t surface for long, and it is hard to predict where they will surface. Also, my camera doesn’t have the greatest zoom range, so the Orca is pretty tiny in the full res version.
Still, it was very cool to see them from the ferry. This is only the second time I have spotted Killer Whales from the ferry while travelling to or from Tsawassen.
Dawg Food
Ahh, is there nothing quite so grand as an excited dawg? Yes, Yoshi certainly likes his food, but sometimes he gets a little too excited. Throw in his clumsiness (where he steps on things without knowing it) and you get a new way to present a dogs dinner.
The best part is that Suede and I usually make Yoshi wait a second or two after we put his food down. After flipping his bowl, he kept looking at me like he was trying to say “WOW, how did that happen? Can I eat now?”. I was in a slight state of shock, but when I said OK, he went about eating each kibble off the floor. It took him at least twice as long to eat tonight (and he usually takes a long time to begin with).
Dogs, you gotta love them!
Stormy Circle
Stormy day here in Victoria. I awoke to the sounds of a huge downpour. Just before leaving for work, the sun tried to come out from the clouds, and this sunrise was the result. Gorgeous! I would have liked to get better angles and better compositions on these shots, but it was still raining quite heavily when I took them, so I couldn’t go outside. Still, I like how they turned out. Later in the day the rain gave way to wind. It was pretty neat walking around downtown seeing huge columns of leaves swriling around in a circle.
Driveway River
I feel the need to relate the story of the hole in my front yard. It is a nice hole, but I would rather it get filled. Also, it isn’t a hole that I created.
It started last Friday (Nov 5) when Suede and I came home for lunch. As we were pulling into the driveway I noticed that the grass was really wet, and that the street was a little wet. On closer inspection I saw that some water was flowing up through the ground right beside the end of our driveway.
Hmm, not good.
We called the city, and notified our landlord.
What follows next is quite funny.
Suede took Yoshi for a walk, and when she came home, there was a orange pylon by the end of the driveway.
A little later a Victoria City works truck showed up, and two guys got out and inspected the leak. One of them placed a cell phone call, and all he said was “Yep, there is a leak”. Meanwhile, the other pops off the closest manhole cover, and confirms that he can see water leaking down there too. Then they get in their truck and leave. They told Suede that they should get to it by Wednesday (Nov 10).
At some point in the afternoon our pylon got upgraded from a orange pylon to one of those construction, sandwich board, blinky signs. Wooooo!
Over the weekend the water started to really come out of the leak. It was sending quite a river of water down our road, and into the storm drain. The grass was supersaturated, and the edge of the driveway had no support under it any more.
Tuesday (Nov 9) we came home to a large hole in the front yard, dug right beside the end of the driveway. There are now 4 of the blinky signs, all connected with flagging tape (another upgrade). The hole is about 5 feet long, 2 feet wide, and about 6 feet deep. Really, it is a nice hole, but every day when I drive down my street I have a slight anticipation of what I am going to find. Unfortunately there is still a hole, and there hasn’t been any progress in a while.
There is always tomorrow though.
Hip Bent
Saw a great concert last night. The Tragically Hip! The show was at GMplace, and it was great. I wasn’t feeling all too great while waiting for them to start, and the opening band I really didn’t care for. I would even go so far as to say that they sucked!
The Hip though, were magnificent. They played a combination of new stuff, and a lot of older stuff. I much prefer their older material. To me their past couple releases have had a lot of songs that sound very similar. Their newest releases have felt very flat to me.
The sound was pretty good, but I felt that the mix was a little off. I someimes found it difficult to hear Gord Downie over the rest of the band, especially when he went off on a rant (which he did a few times). I was happy to see that Mr. Downie hasn’t changed much on stage. He is still as strange as ever! His antics up there were priceless. I remember one time I saw them in concert he was riding his mic stand like it was a horse. He rode it so hard that he bent the thing and a rodaie had to bring him a new one for the next song!
In that respect he really hasn’t changed. At times he looked like he was in the middle of some bizzarre seizure. Ahh, good Canadian boys!
After the concert we headed back to Suede’s moms place, and then this morning (after getting too few hours of sleep), we hopped back on the ferry and came home. Whirlwind trip to Vancouver, but as usual, it was fun!
The set list (from thehip.com)
Vaccination Scar
Grace, Too
Poets
It’s A Good Life If You Don’t Weaken
Summer’s Killing Us
Courage
Bobcaygeon
Nautical Disaster
It Can’t Be Nashville Every Night
Boots Or Hearts
Inevitability Of Death
Gus: The Polar Bear From Central Park
At The Hundredth Meridian
As Makeshift As We Are
Springtime In Vienna
Goodnight Josephine
My Music @ Work
New Orleans Is Sinking
1st Encore:
You’re Everywhere
Ahead By A Century
Blow At High Dough
2nd Encore:
Fully, Completely
Heaven Is A Better Place Today