Recent reads

What the first 3 books have in common is that I searched for them in the library database, put them on hold, and since I was #1 on the wait list they all arrived the same day. The paperback was found during pickup. It isn't nearly so much fun as finding books on the shelf during a browse, but it is a way of finding the books in the collection that are not in the local branch.

Finding Bones by Grey Crawford. 

What you see on the cover is what you get more of in the book. Lots of walls. Is it art? You decide.

Black and White Photography, Manifest Vision, an International Collection by James Luciana.

The intro says these photo were chosen because they "coalesce into a striking cohesive group." I don't see a group, but maybe that's just me being a Philistine.

Mastering Black & White Photography, a unique case study approach to achieving professional results, by Mitchell Beazley.

An experienced photographer talking about how he handled various photographic challenges, right down to exposure times, developers, and the dodging and burning done during the printing process. He must have been taking good notes along the way.

Meditations for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman.

Relax. Chill. You're doing the best you can. I just saved you $23 and a half hour. Thank me later.

Underwhelmed by all of these. I actually think I've read the Beazley book before, but didn't have a photo of the cover, or mentioned in my blog. I often use the blog as a reference to see if I've read something. But if in fact I had got it out before, I was underwhelmed enough to not mention it, so I'll mention it this time so I don't get underwhelmed again some time down the road. I hope all that made sense.

Yesterday was a sunscreen day. During a walk along Fish Creek near bridge 8, I saw a couple of stand up paddleboarders. That was a first on Fish Creek. I don't think they were local, and I don't think they knew what they were getting into. They ended up portaging around some rapids. It didn't look like they were having any fun. I was, though, working on some long exposure photos.

Of the Day

Driftwood (NZ)

Driftwood (NB)

Film

Linda

Beach artsy, same beach as above

Newfoundland

New Brunswick

Why ever didn't I publish this, and maybe I did

90 days, or so ago

Crossing this log was the only way to continue along this walk. I declined, and headed back the way I came.

Flower

Landscape

Celina

A dozen purple for Susi

I was looking over the garden this morning, and thinking there happened to be lots of purple just now. So of course that brought back memories of Susi. We met because we started at the same time at Skystone. She had the window office and I had the inside office just opposite. She was a young engineer fresh out of school, while I was an old cynical worker bee. (As an aside, 20-some years later, she's still young, and I'm still old and cynical.) She's the one that infected me with the triathlon bug.

As a bonus, there's a bee butt shot for her, though it isn't quite as clear as I'd like it. Wrong lens and it took me by surprise. Again, no of the day suspects, just so you aren't scrolling forever.

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3. The mint is just getting started. It's a bee magnet throughout the summer, but there's just a few bees checking it out now, no doubt making plans for future expeditions.

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9. The surprise bee butt photo. You'll have to look for it.

10. Almost more of bee wing photo than anything else. For the technically curious, this is 1/100 second.

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A walk along the Bow River, carefully

I mentioned the deluge a few days ago. No surprise, all the rivers are way up. I walked along Fish Creek near Shannon Terrace the other day with the film camera. Lots of trees have fallen into the river, and the bank has moved in several places.

Here's what I saw walking along the Bow at Mallard Point yesterday. Some are documentary, some might be interesting. There was at least one point where the walking path along the bank had fallen into the river, so I was really careful. I figure the water level is at least 2 feet above the normal summer water level. With 20 photos, I'll skip the Of the Day feature, but it will return.

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6. You can normally walk directly to that right-most tree, and at worst the ground is a bit swampy.

7. The path to the bridge had several inches of water on it.

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9. There's normally lots of gravel riverbank extending for quite a ways from the bike path.

10. I didn't want to get my feet wet to go over the bridge.

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15. I kept well away from the cobra chicken and their offspring. They were giving me the stink eye.

16. That used to be the footpath.

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Flowery Friday 4

As an aside, it's been amusing to watch the recent moving hijinks of people we know. 

Starting with our next door neighbours. M has only been there a couple years, but got a permanent fly-in job way north of Edmonton. The commute to the Edmonton airport was getting old, so he bought an acreage near Rocky Mountain House. He's a hunting and fishing and camping kind of guy, so that will give him lots of room for the toys. There was a small garbage skip on the driveway a couple days, but it was mostly stuff the previous owners had left. A U-Haul van was here one day and gone the next. The motorcycle and patio gear are gone from the back yard. The garage is mostly empty. He anticipated no difficulty being out on time. We are anxiously awaiting meeting the new neighbours.

J has lived in the cul-de-sac behind us for about 20 years. I've often chatted to him. He installed our garage doors, and did a recent repair. He's a handy sort of guy but a bit of a hoarder. Let's just say he has lots of stuff, and the moving process got away from him. The new owners wanted everything gone, including a shed and greenhouse in the back yard. Including the shingles he got a deal on and was going to use after the next big hail storm. We all suspect that lots of renos are going to be happening, and hope it isn't some monstrous multi-family thing. He was moving stuff out to a sea can on an RV storage yard out on 22X. And moving stuff, and moving stuff, and moving stuff, and well, you get the idea. He missed the possession date. Oops. And during the pouring rain earlier this week, a bunch of it went into the garage and driveway of our neighbour across the alley behind us just so he could be out. There's still lots of work. He wants to move to an acreage east of Edmonton.

Lastly, our downtown friends. One of them recently retired (Yay!) and thought there would be time for seeing friends, reading, working on the garden, blah blah blah as Dwen likes to say. Nope. An idle review of properties for sale found one they liked, in a place they wanted to be. An island. Buy. Sell. Wham bam thank you ma'am, done. The new retiree was put to work. Imagine that in capitals. Bold. Underlined. Exclamation marks. The move has mostly happened, mostly via hired help. Final move out is awaiting the  completion of high school exams. The house was largely emptied for staging, and has the bare minimum in it now. We ate out at a really good Indian restaurant to celebrate. Unpacking is happening at the new place. Everything is reasonably well in hand for such a complicated move. We've known them 30 years, hard as that is to believe. We're going to miss them.

When we built this place more than 40 years ago, hard as that is to believe, we planned to stay here till we got dragged out. Or wandered out in a dementia fog to be eaten by polar bears, whichever came first. The thought was to have paid help come in to deal with things as we became unable. I'm pretty sure that time is coming quicker than we think. Both of us dread the thought of moving. The wine. The books. The stuff. So much stuff. It breeds in the dark, you know.

Anyways, you came here for the flowers. 

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5. One of the few tulips that survived the voles, rabbits, and deer.

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Of the Day

Driftwood (NZ)

Driftwood (NB)

Film

Linda

Newfoundland

New Brunswick

Why ever didn't I publish this, and maybe I did

90 days, or so ago

Landscape