First Light

Well, I'll have to get myself a copy, but did want to mention that Michelle over at Crow's Feet has had her book published. Congrat's Michelle!

Brilliant

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42E2fAWM6rA

Sunday is for Painting

I'm stealing Petra's Sunday tagline and altering it a bit. Actually, my youngest wanted to paint and didn't want to paint alone, so I tried to create something. I'll share my creation here:



Never lose hope!

Something Personal

I'm thinking it's high time I again blog something personal. Trying to think of what, but how about I just share something?

How about my favorite times of day (outside of dinner time ;)

Dawn & Dusk

Dawn:
Darkness gradually giving way to light. Creeping slowly from the eastern horizon. Light gradually increasing. Gray images arising from the surrounding earth. A hint of colour in the sky as stars fade away into memories. Light building brightly and dawn breaks across the horizon. Blazingly bright red sun crests the horizon. The sun loses it's red and becomes intensely white. Colours burst forth from the gray. Definition and clarity. Birds twitter, animals rejoice. A new day! Promise.

Hope.


Dusk:
Quietly the day fades away. Colours fade to reds, then gray as the sun gives up and drifts below the horizon. Nature - still, quiet. Slowly light fades from the west as darkness seeps in from the east. The air cools. Planets jump out to dot the sky as stars slowly awake, fading gradually into view. Light lingers in the western sky. Faint as the memories of the day. A universe appears in the sky, stars numbering in the millions. Galaxies and other worlds, yet here, all quiet and calm.

Peace.

I'm really looking forward to the summer and camping.

Conflict

Watching the Foo Fighters in concert on Much. Really like that band. One of the lyrics in "The Best of You" caught my attention ( as lyrics often do)

I was too weak to give in
Too strong to lose

Caught my mind how apt a description of conflict this often is.

Perspective

Sometimes things are all a matter of perspective. How we look at them. How we feel or where we are when we look at them. The grass looks greener on the other side. If only I had that job or that thing. Whatever it is, perspective plays a big part. Sometimes we get that job, that thing. We end up on the other side, only to find it's just grass, and the grass now looks just as green or greener where we came from. Take these photos of some signs I took for example.



The perspective on the top photo is just of a sign that does not make a lot of sense. The second photo is a similar sign, but with the items in the background, resembles more the way a restaurant might treat a single adult. LOL

OK. Alright. I have a sad sense of humour. I admit it.

Spring is almost here!

Here's an e-mail I was sent today. It seems fitting, maybe as I just finished shoveling out the drive once again...


-----------------------------------

SPRING IS HERE...

Winter is almost over and we can see the deer wandering around now.

Inaguration Crazy

Washington's gone wild. Practice procession runs, closed streets, lots of hype. All around next Tuesday.

I just left there yesterday. Did have a chance to take a walk and see some of the stuff being set up.

First I had a chat with the man himself. Gave him some ideas about foreign policy. Told him to be nice to Canadians:



Then I walked along the set-up by the Lincoln memorial



On this stage, and around various places in the mall area, they have set up giant video displays:



Here's the view out from center stage:



There are porta-potties everywhere. 5000 in total apparently. I hope it gets a lot warmer for them, as these porta-potties are all frozen solid. Think their capacity could be a bit limited....



And one last shot, with Capital Hill in the distance:

Air Travel

up early
get ready
call cab
wait
off to airport
check in
wait
clear customs
wait
place all the items with you on display on a belt
clear security
gather up all those displayed items
have time to kill
breakfast
find gate
wait

More time to kill…

so some observations at an airport:
• A lot of people, rather an amazing amount of people, travel on airplanes each day
• A lot of people, rather an amazing amount of people, travel between Canada and the United States each day
• Some travelers really dress fancy for their trip
• Some travelers dress like slobs and perhaps could even use a shower
• Some people have way too much baggage
• In general, women age better than men
• In general, men look less frail than women when they age. They may not look good, but they are sturdy.
• You can spot couples who have been married for a long time from a fair distance, they often disagree on which way to go, don’t listen to each other, and head off in different directions
• If you watch the above couples long enough, they’ll come back, then head the right way
• For the above, the right way often wasn’t chosen by either initially…
• The stunning blond who just walked by is likely half my age
• I’m getting old to have stunning people walking by at half my age
• Congratulations me on making it this far.
• Still have more to go
• Airport travelers, for the most part, look bored, tired, frustrated or all three
• Some airport travelers do not fit the above sentence. Instead they stare at passerby’s and look like they are making up stories in their heads about said passerby’s
• The above passengers are making up stories in their head about passerby’s
• Especially stunning blonde passerby’s ;)
• A lot of people (not an amazing amount) can’t figure out how to find where they are going. Once they are told which gate, they then don’t see the signs directing one to the gates, so they ask about that. These people are all over 60.
• Restaurants in airports are all about speed

board plane
wait
taxi back
wait
takeoff
wait
have coffee
wait
give back cup
wait
more waiting
land
wait
dock with gate
wait
open door
wait
leave plane

Free again!

Mistakes

Mistakes are those things you make when you do things. Try things. For one reason or a million reasons, things don't work out like you thought, or just were not as you thought or whatever, but the outcome was not as desired, and thus a mistake.

What to do then? Well, one can try to fix mistakes, but then can make mistakes in the approach to what fixes the mistake....It's a convoluted and cruel world, isn't it?

Maybe James Blunt puts it best in "Same Mistake"

Give me reason but don't give me choice.
'Cause I'll just make the same mistake again.

Sometimes it seems we need to make the same mistake a few times in a row before the lesson finally sinks in. Other times, once is more than enough. Then sometimes, we never seem to learn. Pick any of the international conflicts you wish, or any of the recent genocides. History, it seems, repeats itself, mistakes and all. Perhaps one day, a lyric from the same song will come to pass:

And maybe someday we will meet, and maybe talk and not just speak.

Anyway, like it or not, mistakes are just things that will continue to happen. The only way they couldn't is if everyone did nothing. Trick is to learn from past mistakes and try not to repeat them.

Fun Questions

From Crow's Feet:

1. Have you ever been on TV?
*Yes, but then my mom commanded me to get down from up there.

2. Have you ever sung in public?
*Unfortunately, yes. But I did win some drinks.

3. Have you ever dyed your hair blond?
*Do blond streaks count?

4. Have you ever eaten frogs' legs?
*Unfortunately for me, no, but quite fortunate for the frogs in question.

5. Have you ever received a present that you really hated?
*Yes.

6. Have you ever walked into a lamp post?
*What haven't I walked into?

7. Have you ever cooked a meal by yourself for more than 15 people?
No, fortunately for said 15 people.

8. Have you ever fallen or stumbled in front of others?
*This question would be better stated as "How many times have you fallen or stumbled in front of others.....

9. Have you ever done volunteer work?
*Yes

Cold!

Well, only two and a half or so more months of winter left. Not a whole lot of snow here in Toronto, but it's cold at the moment, and going to get colder for a couple of days.



But, snow sure is pretty, even when viewed as piled beside the driveway as in the above photo (taken from inside my apartment....if you look closely, you'll see the reflection of the lens of the camera in the neighbours garage.)

Winter.........

Happy New Year!

Well, guess it's time I post something here eh? What can I say. I was out and about, having fun and enjoying some vacation from work, some of it with my kids, some of it without. Then back to work and back on the road for a couple trips for work. just back from (miserable) St John's Newfoundland. OK, only miserable as I think in the summer it would be a great place to visit. In the winter with the wind off the water and me with no body fat....well, somehow I found the damp cold just chilled me to the bone, and even thought it was a damp cold, I fell as though every ounce of moisture has been sucked out of me. Not the place for me in the winter, I'm afraid.

Happy 2009 everyone. I hope it is a great year for each and every one of you. Overall, I'm pretty happy with 2008. After a couple really quiet years for me, it was a really great year. I made mistakes too. Lots of them, but it wasn't 1 step forward, 2 steps back. No, more like two steps forward, one step back.

Anyway, yes, I know I'm a bit late, but again, all the best!