Tag: Life

Ritual Swim

Saturday’s I have a new morning ritual. I go for a swim, then Sox drops Sprout off at the pool for his swim lesson. After the lesson we stop at the cafeteria for a snack before walking home.

Yesterday I managed to swim 600 or 700 m before the lesson. It wasn’t continual, but it was a good workout. The first 300 were the hardest, and I think that I got warmed up and was able to keep going for the rest of my swim. I probably could have done more too, but I think that next time I go I will work on swimming more continually instead of distance.

Anyone have any tips on how to keep track of how much distance you have covered while swimming? I always lose track of it.

Canada Camping

The Canada Day camping trip has been an awesome tradition amongst my group of friends. I don’t remember the exact details about how it got started, but I am thankful it did.

This year was an interesting year. Sprout was definitely coming with us, but Gramma made us an offer we couldn’t refuse. Sprout stayed over at Gramma’s house which gave Sox and I time to set up camp without him.

This turned out to be a great luxury since we had to set up camp in the rain.

Camping pics are here.

It was a strange experience not having Sprout with us. Sox and I were able to enjoy a dinner out Thursday night, sleep in on Friday, pack the car, and drive to Parksville on our own schedule. I missed him, but it was great to spend some alone time with Sox .

Camping was very fun. I have lots of memories of camping when I was young, and I definitely want Sprout to have something similar.

Sprout seemed to enjoy his time in the campsite too. He played with the golf set, the trike, the scooters, balls, dogs, walking Yoshi, and pretty much any other toy he could get his hands on.


The only issues we had were some minor sleeping issues. Sprout went to bed with ease, but one morning he woke at 2 am and was unhappy until we brought him to bed. We think he was cold. Another morning he woke up early (around 5:30am I think). The last morning he slept until a reasonable time (6:30).


We had some fun on the beach too. Sprout had fun playing in the sand, and I had fun making sand castles for the other kids to destroy. I did get busted for having Yoshi on the beach though. Sox and Sprout were playing on the beach, and I had headed out towards the water with Yoshi. I saw Sox running out towards me so I headed in. A warden had come by, and Sox saved her the trouble of heading out. I forgot that he wasn’t allowed out there. I thought he was allowed there, but on leash only (he was off leash too). Apparently the warden was very nice, and I had no problem removing Yoshi from the beach.

The first day we were there, before I picked up Sprout, Sox and I took Yoshi for a walk on the trails. We came across a large field, and I quickly grabbed Yoshi since I saw a few deer in the field. At first I saw 4, but then more raised their heads until there was 7 visible. Pretty cool.


The big thing we kept an eye on for the weekend was the weather. Thunderstorms and rain were predicted for the weekend, so everyone came prepared with rain gear, tarps, and ropes. Sox and I, along with KaptainK and JJ put up a tarp over our cooking area and that was it. We sat back and enjoyed the show as the rest of the guys spent hours tarping almost every square inch of our campsite. It was quite the show. Tree climbing to get the ropes up high, complicated rope schemes, bungy cords, and the biggest dams tarps I have ever seen.

We also had camp fires every night. Nothing says camping like a good camp fire.







Dogs, kids, good friends, good food, good times. Those are the makings of the best kind of a celebration.


Monday was time to pack up. I did the majority of it while Sox played with Sprout and some of the other kids. I like the challenge of packing. I got everything in its spot, except for one table. I had to pull out half a dozen things to get that in. The scary incident I had was when I was trying to close the Yakima. I was on the roof of the car and managed to get the pod closed with a lot of effort. Then I lost my balance, and almost fell off the roof into a bramble bush. I caught myself with my foot and was able to right myself before falling. Close, but scary. I think I scared a couple other people too.


The last part of this story is the drive home. Sox and I stopped at Starbucks in Nanaimo before hitting the road for home. The first sip I took, I was disgusted. It tasted like coffee mixed with cherries. It was the most disgusting concoction I have ever tasted. I could smell the syrup when I brought the cup to my mouth, and could not stomach another sip. We had already started the drive home, and going back was not an option. We ended up stopping in Duncan, and the shop there fixed the mistake. It was a very disappointing discovery, but I was happy when it got fixed.

The camping trip was great. I can’t wait for next year.

Cheeping Nest

We’ve got babies!

Last night I was taking the garbage out, and I heard a sound I had heard a few times before. Rapid, but soft cheeping. When I passed by one of our bushes, the noise stopped. I had heard this sound a couple times, but was never able to pinpoint

Investigating I was able to peak into part of the bush, and was able to spot the nest. Just above the edge of the nest I could see two beaks poking up vertically, and perfectly still. Baby birds, most likely robins I would say.

Pretty cool. We were going to trim back that bush severely a few weekends ago, and decided to postpone it until the fall so we could see it bloom. In retrospect that was a good thing. Now we need to wait until the young’uns have flown the coop. Hopefully they will vacate by the fall.

Espresso Idea

Sox and I splurged recently and got ourselves our first espresso machine. We actually got one as a wedding gift, but returned it since it wasn’t the right kind (we learned that after putting one on our registry).

A friend told me that Starbucks was selling their Barista machines for close to half price. Seemed like a good idea, and so far has been. I’ve been enjoying Americano’s every day now, and have made a couple latte’s as well. Mmmm. Now to figure out where to get great beans, and is convenient to get those beans. So far Serious Coffee Espresso roast isn’t cutting it.

Life Release

When life gets busy, my hobbies seem to take a back seat. Pretty normal I guess.

Lots has happened in the last couple weeks.

The truck was in for regular maintenance, and to check out a couple noises. One noise cost $800 to repair. The catalytic converter was shot. I had decided to try out Victoria Car Clinic too. As a first experience I was less than thrilled since they didn’t remember I dropped off the truck in the morning, and when I called to see if it would be ready, they panicked and I ended up leaving it with them for another day.

I upgraded this site to the latest Drupal release. Very cool. I worked on the theme today to get it more to my liking.

I’ve ridden to work a few times.

Last weekend some good friends of ours got married. It was a very, very fun wedding, and it also marked the first time I have been hired as a photographer. It was fun being the wedding photog, but I don’t think I want to do that full time.

I also finished with my probation period at my new company. I am now a fully fledged Kodak employee!

Life. Nutshell. That’s it.

Movie Choice

Sox and I got out to see a movie last night. Gramma was in town and looked after Sprout while we took off. It is nice to have the freedom to do that.

We saw Spidey 3, and I enjoyed it. Action flick, good effects, characters that I am somewhat familiar with. Downsides were tackyness (gratuitous american flag), bad casting choice with Topher Grace, and overall cheesiness.

As we were leaving I realized my leg was stuck to my seat. Someone before me had stuck their gum to the bottom of the seat, and my jeans stuck to it. I was pretty angry and disgusted with that. Now I have to figure out how to get gum off my pants.

Speakers Problem

A couple weekends ago I went to Future Shock Shop and got myself some new speakers for my work computer. I don’t need anything fancy, so cheapies will do. I found some $30 Logitech speakers that looked like they would do the deed. My only requirements were somewhat decent sound, and a speaker jack on the front.

I unboxed them at work, set them up, and plugged them in. It all went bad when I plugged in the headphones. There was a lot of background static that was loud when the volume was turned down. I was pretty unhappy since the speakers were unusable.

The following weekend I was in London Drugs and saw the same speakers for $10 cheaper. I tested out a set there since I had brought along some headphones, and those had the same problem. I guess it was indicative of the design. Instead I bought a Creative Labs set. These sound awesome with or without headphones, so I am once again a happy camper.

Something I did like about Logitech ones though was that it didn’t have a power brick to plug in. Something else that was well done was the packaging. They wrapped plastic around the plug ends, and taped it closed, but the tape was dog eared so it was very easy to get off. The Creative Labs packaging wasn’t nearly as easy to unravel.