And blogging is what, again?

Seems like I do most of my blogging-type rambling on social media these days, but just for old times sake here's a couple of Christmas pictures. First, our tree, and second, how you can recognise my Dad's car in a parking lot.

And, erm, that's it. See you on Instagram or wherever else for the rest.

So, about the Christmas photos...

I brought my camera -- actual camera -- to Dad's place for Christmas. It hasn't been out of its bag, I'm afraid. There's a couple of reasons for that, really. The biggest was that it's been very, very cold (right now my phone says that it's -30C. Yes, that's a minus. That's -22F, for those who find that measurement easier to comprehend. I don't, but that's what Google's for. Needless to say, it hasn't made me especially enthusiastic to wander around taking yard pictures.

The second reason for the lack of real camera is that it's too damned easy to pick up the phone, and yes, that makes me lazy. Ah well, here's a few random phone camera shots from the past week, at least.

Christmas for cats

Do I really need to caption this?

Looking at this, you'd think that the Turkey Brothers get along.

One of the two pictures I took outside, a few steps from the back door. I needed a photo for a work post. This is wild Purple Clematis, even if it is growing in the yard.

Random photo of my ear, to show my uncle what his studs look like. Nothing like wearing someone else's cast-offs. When they're diamond studs, at least.

Let's end the blog's year with a tea photo, since it was a bit of a theme.

Well, that's it for the year, I guess. I'm going to scan a couple of doodles for the other blog since I've been pretty lax at that, go upstairs to find some lunch, and then... well, probably make more tea. Did I mention that baby, it's cold outside?

Good luck with the new year,everyone.

Ok, tea

I've been holding off on buying tea, just in case my sister-in-law (there has to be a shorter way of saying that) decided to buy me tea for Christmas. She did. Here's what I've found.

Hot Chocolate: is. Yeah, it's tea, but it may as well be hot chocolate. I'm not complaining.

Apple Cider: tastes fake. A look at the ingredients shows that it IS fake. You can do better, @davidstea.

Organic The Big Chill: I've had this before, to be honest. It's pleasant.

Chocolate Chili Chai: I haven't had this from the box yet, but I've bought it. Memory says it's tasty but needed more chili to be called a chili chai.

Spiced Apple: I usually avoid teas with black pepper, since it overwhelms everything else. They've kept it low here, though. I enjoyed it.

Snow Day: another one I've had before. It's fine, and almost has something to do with its name.

Sleigh Ride: yeah, this is an old familiar. Don't add sugar to it. It's already one of the few items in the bunch that has a sugar listing.

Alpine Punch: is good, but has nothing to do with alpine anything. Coconut?

Toasted Walnut: you do get that walnut aftertaste, for better or worse. Actually, this one's not bad.



So, overall, drinkable except for that unforgivable fake-tasting one that makes me wish that David's Tea would learn to stick to actual tea. Next up? Whatever I get to augment the current supply.

Doodling

This is the time of year when, thanks to a generous gift card from my brother and sister-in-law, I generally end up with more art stuff. I say generally because last year I ended up buying beads and some other stuff and just a little bit of art stuff. Back to the art stuff again this year, though.

Are you tired of me typing "stuff" yet?

What you're seeing to the left in today's pointless photo(s) is mixed media paper, black 110 lb paper (I was going to buy an art pad of heavy-ish paper, and then it occurred to me that I could find it cheaper in the scrapbooking section. Turned out to be heavier paper, even.), a General's sketch set with charcoals, pastel pencils, and graphite (just to replace some of my stubs, really), a package of store brand coloured pencils in neons and metallics (for a change from my normal, usable colours?), and a set of Stabilo Point 88 Fineliners. That's nylon tip pens, good for writing or drawing. The picture to the right is me testing the pens to make sure none of them were dry. Oh, and I was drinking tea, obviously.

I went all art with my gift card this year partly to give myself a figurative kick in the butt. I've been lazy about art lately. It's been happening, but I slowed down a lot to give my stupid wrist a rest while it was being, well, stupid, this fall. It's an old injury that I periodically re-injure. Unfortunately, it also means that on my bad days I get a very shaky hand, because it's your wrist that controls most of your hand movements. If you're interested in anatomy, look up a picture of the human hand. There are surprisingly few muscles in the hand itself. Your wrist is the puppet master.

Anyway. Shaky wrist equalled shaky hand this fall -- still does, now and then -- so I backed off a bit to let things heal. The problem with that is that you get out of the habit. Oh, I've still been doodling (it's pretty hard to stop that) but I haven't produced much that's worth public viewing. In fact, I see that the last time I posted to my art blog it was August. I guess I should do something about that.

That's the plan. So, fineliners to convince myself that pen lines don't have to be perfect to be valid (shakes really show in fine pen, but that's okay... she tries to believe...) and pencils because I used to do a lot of pencil work and I should get back to it.

The other thing that usually helps is doing an inventory. I started one a few months ago, but got stalled. If you follow me on Instagram, then, don't be surprised if art supplies start showing up in my posts again. Photos remind me of what I have and how far I got, and if I've got the photos I may as well post them, right? That way it's not just me that knows the scale of years of buying.



Well, this turned into a post. Fancy that. Next time will probably be tea, you know. It wouldn't be the holiday season if I wasn't reviewing my tea presents.

You've been warned.

T'was the day after Christmas...

Otherwise known as Boxing Day here in Canada (and the UK, and probably other Commonwealth Countries as well. I'm too lazy to check, to be honest).

To the left, you'll see my annual slow shutter speed photo of the Christmas tree, because it's more fun that way. Plus, you can tell by the dotted lines up top and the solid lines below that Dad has one string of LED lights and one string of old-fashioned incandescents, and that appeals to the nerd in me.

And that implies that there are parts of me that aren't nerd, I suppose. I'm not entirely sure that it's true, but we'll roll with it.

And how was Christmas? Not too bad, actually. Dad didn't think that the gifts I gave him were too stupid (gifts, plural, only because he got a few little things this year instead of one big thing), I made out nicely myself, I was (as usual) spoiled by my brother and sister-in-law and will have a shopping trip to blog about when I get the chance, and the turkey was pretty good.

We didn't go out to view the Christmas lights this time, as we often do, because it was bloody cold out there. Ah well, I was inside so that's all right. I managed to make it into town just before a heavy snowfall and will leave (probably tomorrow) as it's warming up, so my timing was pretty good for a change.

And as for Boxing Day sales? Just online ones this year for me. I don't exactly have to budget to find more things than I need, anyway.

I'll leave you with a few shots of... well, any cat owner can guess who enjoys Christmas the most, I guess.

Hope you had a merry/happy whatever.

Christmas: finally over

But first: David Bowie. Of course I had to mention him. Diehard fans will roll their eyes when I say that my fondest memories are of the Thin White Duke period, but when you consider the fact that those songs came out when I was an impressionable teenager who didn't know much pop music beyond what was on AM radio (please tell me that I don't have to explain AM radio...), I think that I can be forgiven. Obviously I discovered the vastness of his other work later. One thing I hope that people will remember is that yes, he was a showman. Yes, he shocked people, BUT THE MUSIC WAS STILL FANTASTIC. How many other showmen/shockers can even approach that?

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My two fans will know about this time of year for me, but for those new to the program I should say that every year my brother and sister-in-law act as my art supply enablers by giving me a gift card to go out and buy something new for myself. Usually it's already been spent by now since I generally try to get out early and hit the Boxing Day Week sale and get as much as I can out of it, but this year for a multitude of reasons it just didn't happen. On Sunday, though, we finally had a decent day (the day before had been bitterly cold. Go figure. It's Alberta in January) and I decided that I was in the mood for shopping.

I've mentioned this before, but I have a general philosophy about gift cards. Since a gift card has been given as I gift, I try to avoid buying practical things with them and instead go for the I kinda want that... arena. It can be hard since it goes against the grain in my normal life, but hey. It's a gift. Treat it as a gift.

I broke that philosophy a little this year since I really did need some more workable fixative, but otherwise what you see up there is what came out of my wants this time. From... whatever order I pull up the links... you'll find Koh-I-Noor Magic pencils because I'm a five-year-old; Liquitex Pools, Puddles, & Drips, which contains paints, pouring medium, string gel, and two completely useless canvas boards (yep. Someone's planning on getting messy); Staedtler watercolour crayons because I somehow didn't have any even though I have scads of watercolour pencils, and some cheap-ass acrylics because a) I'm not much of a painter and b) they were on sale. Oh, and my travel mug is in there partly to keep the fixative can from falling over and partly to remind myself that I also made a stop to buy tea.

And why tea, when I'm still working my way through my Christmas stash? Well, mostly because I wanted to check out their matcha make travel mug since I've never tried making matcha and it seemed like an easy way to get into it. Apparently I'm not the only one who's had that idea, though, since I see that the thing's sold out even online. Ah well, something to keep in mind for later. It wasn't a wasted trip in the end anyway, because I was out of two of my regular favourites so I got refills while I was there.



Of which teas? I'm afraid this post is long enough for a work day now.  I'll end with a quick look at me at work back in 1995. Yes, I've been here that long. Longer, in fact. You kids get off of my lawn.

The Naming of Cats

 Before I start, if for some reason you haven't read the poem that goes with the title, read it now. And remember that Andrew Lloyd freaking Webber had nothing to do with it.

Come to think of it, you should probably read all of Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. It doesn't take long, and it's nice to remember that the same person who wrote The Waste Land had his fun side.

Um, anyway.

Today's featured cats are, as usual, the Turkey Brothers. For those new to the program, that's Tom on the left (and the ugly candy cane is his fetch toy. He's asking me if I'm going to throw it. And yes, I did.) and Bob on the right. And yes (again), if you think that you're seeing an absolutely humongous lava lamp behind him, you're right. The thing takes about two hours to get warm enough to blob.

The Turkey Brothers are, indeed, brothers, and they have perfectly sensible names. Tom Cat and Bob Cat. There shouldn't be any sort of weirdness there, right?

Well, there is. The weirdness is me.

For most of my life I've seemed to be unable to call an animal by the name the owner's given it. Our last dog was pretty much always Dogbreath to me rather than Rikki. Todd's (that would be the office mate formerly known as Wheat on the blog. Long story) dog Arthur is Doofus. You'd know why if you met him. Our last cats, Max and Penny, were Smack and Lump. Actually, Max probably thought that Max (or Smack) was his second name. His first name? Jesus. As in, Jesus, Max...

And the Turkey Brothers? Once I noticed that they were responding to their names I honestly tried to do my best to use them. Tried. I do on occasion, but the urge to rename -- or alter names -- is, I guess, too strong. The result? Well, Tom often gets Thomas, which isn't so bad. Bob, however, I started calling Bobimus from early on. It was suggested by Terry Jones's Nicobobinus, which I'll leave you to look up yourselves this time. I don't know why I went for M instead of N, though. Bobimus naturally led to Tomamus, sadly. He doesn't get that too often. I'm sure he's happy about that.

Lately Bobimus is evolving (devolving?) into Bobule. As in Globule. He's a big, round cat who's pretty good at being a speed bump rather than getting out of a person's way, so the name seemed kind of obvious.

Where to next with them? Who knows. They're only a year and a half old or so, so I'm sure that over the course of long lives they'll develop more names from Yours Blatheringly. Since they're called the Turkey Brothers for a reason they already have a multitude of other names from both Dad and me depending on their behaviour. None of those really stick, though, since they're not exactly polite.

I'll end with the proof that we actually do have a Christmas tree, with minimal decorations in case the cats went full-on turkey. You can't really see the lights because of the flash, but they're there.

I have no idea what Dad's cowboy hat is doing on the lampshade. For that matter, I'm not really even sure why Dad has a cowboy hat at all. Stampede is only once a year.



I suppose that the hats don't just disappear after that, do they? Kind of like Christmas trees.

Something vaguely Christmas, I suppose, is appropriate.

Well hey, it looks like at least one reindeer was here.

Or maybe it was a Mule Deer?

Ok, let's try this again.

If I'm yet again scarved, wearing penguin earrings, and taking photos of the side of my head, it must be Christmas. Right?

Actually, Christmas almost didn't happen for me this year; at least not on Christmas itself. After yet another bout of insomnia, I was left headachy, brainless, and knowing full well that I wasn't fit to hit the highway (sleepless driving is still impaired driving, folks. You don't have to be drunk to be charged). I was planning to be in at Dad's place on the 23rd, but it was the 24th before he got the teary, probably slightly incoherent call that I just couldn't do it even then. What would have happened? A day's delay, maybe, which doesn't sound so bad except... well, Christmas, you know? Christmas should be on Christmas, if you're going to celebrate at all.

Long story short (too late for that?), I did manage to get some sleep that night and was able to make it in for Christmas morning. Gifts happened, turkey happened, and that evening we drove around and looked at Christmas lights. That's become a bit of a thing with the two of us: tooling around town, Christmas carols on the radio station because pretty much everyone has the night off, and both of us singing along. That last part is accidental. It just kind of happens.

It ended up being a good day, and I'm glad that I made it.

What else? Well, it was the Turkey Brothers' first Christmas with a tree, and they didn't destroy it. Granted, it was only partially decorated, but it's a good sign for next year.

In the gift department, you'll no doubt be hearing about my latest tech toy, so I'll save it for now. I did get a much nicer bluetooth speaker than the one I would have picked up at the after Christmas sales, though. Guess I'll be making more use of that Spotify deal from Rogers than I assumed that I would. And I won't just be throwing my phone into a cup to amplify it, although that works better than it should.

Also, tea. And when I make it back into town, my yearly art supply geek-out. So now you know what to look forward to on the blog in the future.



All in all, a pretty good day, and I'm glad I had it. I'll try to get out the camera and get some better (or at least a little more interesting) photos for the blog soon. Hope everyone's having (had, or whatever) a good holiday.





Don't let the Boxing Day sales wear you down.

Random post

As in, I have no idea what it'll be about.

This is my new favourite version of Carol of the Bells, though.

We could talk (briefly, since I have to get back to work) about this year's winner for Inappropriate Use of Christmas Music, I guess. This time around it's Coke  -- at least I think it's Coke. I haven't paid that much attention -- for its choice of Christmas (Baby Please Come Home). Advertising folks, that is NOT a song about getting the family together around the Christmas tree to enjoy a fizzy beverage. It's about losing a lover for whatever reason and wishing s/he'd come back. Total, total misread there, boys and girls.

It's a song I'm actually pretty tired of anyway. All those years of Darlene Love on Letterman just really set in fatigue for me. I know, almost sacrilege, but what can I say? I'm not much for pop versions (geez. Pun completely unintended) of Christmas as it is. I you are, however, here's the non-sodafied, remastered Darlene Love version of A Wall of Sound Christmas.

Later, folks.

Random signs of Christmas

1. Very annoying music in stores. Seriously, there are plenty of good Christmas recordings out there. You must have to work hard to find such bad ones.
2. My Dad playing Santa at local functions.
3. My Dad putting reindeer antlers and a red nose on his Trail Blazer. Because Santa.
4. My Dad finding out that the Santa costume scares the bejeezus out of his cats. Wish I'd been there for that one.
5. Books of Christmas carols on my desk in case anyone at work feels like playing the piano. It won't happen, but I try.
6. Inappropriate music on TV ads. Actually, I might save that one for another post because it's a good topic.
7. The food in the usual staff snack area gaining an astonishing amount of calories.
8. This:

Oddly enough, not my usual work attire. Ah well, if we're lucky it won't be cold enough this year for me to break out the Christmas stocking cap.

Yeah, I have one. Made it, in fact.

Anyway, there's your quick post of the day. Bad to work for me.


Enjoy the pseudoselfie.

So, what shall we talk about?

The weather? The fact that I'm currently listening to Josh White in a hopefully not-futile attempt to get my brain off of Sousa marches (yeah, I don't know either. Maybe too much Monty Python over Christmas)? The fact that milk chocolate, no matter how high quality, is always going to be somewhat of a disappointment when what you really want is dark chocolate?

Nah, let's talk tea. We haven't done that for a while.

Christmas having just passed, of course I have new teas. Today's was Uncle Lee's oolong with ginseng. Not bad at all, but I have to tell you that I've got so used to loose teas that it felt kind of weird to use a bag. Not in a tea snob kind of way; just a this is a little different.

Back over Christmas I was drinking a vanilla almond rooibos tea from Whispering Wind out of Alix. I'd love to tell you anything about them (the tea was pretty good), but it seems that they're not very internet-savvy. A very inactive Etsy shop was the best that I could do. Too bad, really.

So let's move on to the extremely internet-savvy. The last few days have found me trying out the teas from DAVIDsTEA Winter Collection, which overall has been a hit. The Apple Custard is, for me, saved by the coriander from being yet another apple tea (I'm becoming more and more aware that I'm a spicy tea person over a fruity tea person). Bubbie's Baklava was maybe my least favourite, but that's least out of a pretty good group and it's still a tasty tea. It just didn't seem that out of the ordinary, is all. Cocomint Cream should not work. It just shouldn't. Mint and coconut? Strange. Strange, but awfully good, and I managed to use up all of my mint-based tea remnants during this last cold (which has almost passed, thank Whomever) so the timing's right to have a new one. Sugar Plum Forest was a great surprise. With a name like that I was expecting overly fruity -- and, obviously, sweet -- but instead I got cardamom, cinnamon, clove... I'm such a clovehead... um, yeah. It's more like a mulled wine than anything, and I do like me some mulled wine. Lastly, the Vanilla Chai is a very nice tea, but as I've ranted (slightly) about before, I wish that they wouldn't call teas like this chai. Yes, I know that chai basically just means tea, but the word chai in this part of the world generally has specific (specifically Indian) connotations. Just adding cinnamon and ginger to a black tea does not a chai make.

It's still good, though. And as I said above, the whole collection is a hit. Nice job, tea people.





All of this linkage means that this took longer than I meant for it to. Back to work for me. Tealess at the moment, though. I finished my morning's mug-worth ages ago...

Bob Watching

 I called this photo Bob Watching. It fits. Bob was inside watching the birds; I was outside watching Bob.

I kind of like this shot, actually. There's more going on than you first see. There's Bob, there's me taking the picture, there's the living room inside, and the bird feeders and bird bath outside. A bit of a story, I suppose.

Not bad for a mostly accident.

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So how was everyone's Christmas? Ours was quiet, as it usually is. No tree, as I said, but presents anyway. Turkey supper, to which my uncle (other uncle, not recently-dead uncle) even came this time. He usually just does Christmas by himself, but for whatever reason Dad managed to get him out of the house this year. I'm glad. It was a nice visit.

Later on Dad and I took a drive around town to see what Christmas lights were up. There were some nice ones, but overall there were far less than there used to be when I was a kid... or at least that's the way it seemed. I can't say that I blame people for not wanting to go to the fuss. I probably wouldn't if I had a house. Still, it's one more thing missing, like the old NORAD Santa reports on the radio. Yeah, I know that the reports are still around, but tracking via twitter is just never going to be the same, boys and girls.

Speaking of boys, the Turkey Brothers made it through the day without destroying anything. I imagine that's partly because we're low-key, but it's also partly because the boys are growing up. They're definitely little cats now, and, I think, a little past due to make the Big Trip to the Vet.

Here's the latest photo of the two of them on their bed, and just for comparison... oh, hang on. I was just going to give you a link, but why don't I pull the photo instead? Just a sec...

There. First bed photo, back in September. My caption for this picture was Kind of hoping that they don't grow into this bed...

They sort of did, didn't they?

Ah well. They're growing up, and they're turning into mostly nice cats with just the occasional hint of shit to remind us what they're capable of.




I suppose that without that, they wouldn't be cats.



Anyway, that's about it from me. And to all those idiots who were so happy that we got Christmas snow after all even though it wasn't in the forecast, all I can say is enjoy the slippery roads, twits.





There's your bah humbug for the day.

Something about the 25th, maybe

 Well, so far it's been pretty much the usual Christmas around here. We have, of course, the opening of the cats, the wearing of the Christmas socks, and the washing up before putting the meal on...

Um, file that last pic under Bad Cat. And he wasn't any good at all at doing the dishes.

Enjoy the rest of your day, everyone. I'll aim for a more thorough blather tomorrow.

Thursday Eve

Title? Well, Hugh Laurie wished his twitter fans a happy Thursday, which of course brought up the very predictable flurry of "why you take X out of Xmas" semi-literate comments that make a person wonder how any celebrity actually manages to stay on social media for more than five minutes before wanting to smash any and all technology. It's especially astounding with that particular account, since so many of his followers don't seem to get it when the COMEDIAN and actor (and musician and whatever else I need to add for the Hughheads) is making a joke...

Today's photo, by the way, is the closest you're getting to a Christmas tree from me. I told you that we weren't going to have one, courtesy of the Turkey Brothers, and we don't.

Can't say that I miss cleaning up the mess anyway. We'll try for one next year, though.



And no doubt spend a lot of time cleaning up the mess.

Anyway, I feel like I should be trying to blather something to make up for the lame posts of the last few days, but I'm not sure what I have. Well, I do have a cold, but that's been going on since about last Thursday so by now it's not exactly newsworthy. I've been taking otc meds, which have taken the edge off, but that's about it. I suppose if I took the full dose it would help more, but that would mean a whack of acetominophen and that's so completely unnecessary -- and potentially bad for a person's liver -- that I just don't want to do it. Edge off is fine, then.

What else? Well, what with the hospital stuff and using this excuse to get my diet (which wasn't horrible, but could have been better) a little more up to par, I've lost a bit of weight and it all seems to be from my fingers. Seriously. One of my newer pinkie rings (which, admittedly, was a tad big to begin with) now fits most of the way onto my ring finger. Do I smell a reason for more new toys, then? Possibly, depending on the finances. Luckily for me I prefer silver anyway, so picking up a cheap ring or two won't be a big deal. Not giving up on the infamous rolling ring, however. Even if it ends up moving to my middle finger.

You needed to know all of this, of course.

Lastly (for the moment), if I'd had time yesterday I definitely would have made mention of Joe Cocker's death. Sad, that. He was an acquired taste for me, for sure, but once it hit there used to be nothing better than coming home from work, putting my head between the speakers of my old bookshelf stereo (which sat on the floor, in case anyone was wondering if I actually crawled up on the bookshelf) and blasting through Delta Lady or She Came in Through the Bathroom Window. The man was definite proof that it's not so much the instrument you have as what you can do with it, and I spent a fair amount of time at work yesterday with a Joe Cocker soundtrack.

And there's a good excuse to wrap up with my personal all-time favourite. I've linked to it before, but I'm going to again. And I hope that, in the lead-up to the Big Day, my two fans are also feelin' alright (must... not... fix... spelling... gah).



See you later.

Tradition

I was sort of joking about traditions on my Christmas post, but here's on that's a real thing. These little felt mitts -- homemade and supported by a hair clip -- always have to go on the tree. Always. It and a bird (which Dad didn't put on the tree this year. It's probably pretty ratty by now, though) were, according to my mother, the first decorations she and Dad had on their first tree. The mitts have gone up every year since, with the exception of one Christmas that we spent in Hawaii.

That's a tradition that's headed rapidly to its 50th year. Wow, now that I say that it really does count as a tradition, doesn't it?

And don't you dare stop to figure out how old that must make me. You kids get off of my lawn.

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I'll be headed back to my place today (and back to work tomorrow. Weekend work is what I end up with when Christmas and New Years fall so stupidly mid-week), with a stop on the way to see if the licensing office is open so that I can get my 2014 tag before my plate expires. Yes, somebody left her renewal until the last minute again. I guess I like standing in line with all the other idiots who don't take advantage of the months (literal months) in advance that they send out the notices. I haven't decided yet whether I'll stop on my way out of town or stop once I'm back in the city. The advantage of stopping on my way is that it'd be done while it's in my head, but the disadvantage is that the local office only takes cash.

That's right, cash. There are still some businesses out there in this day and age that  (gasp!) don't have debit machines. It's a real pain in the behind, and I'm not sure how they've managed it for so long. Yeah, there's a third-party cash machine in the building, but seeing as I'm too cheap to pay the charges it'll mean a trek down to my much-beloved bank if I stop there.

Um, don't get me started on how much I hate my bank. I'd like to save that topic for another day.

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And now, the return of Today's Tea!

Well, not today's, to be honest. I haven't had any tea yet today. The past two days' teas, though, have been from the David's Tea (sorry, DAVIDsTEA) Christmas collection, and I can't give you a direct link to it because it's no longer Christmas and I've noticed that they're very, very quick to remove their seasonal collections from the website. Anyway, I've tried the Gingerbread and Santa's Secret, which is a black tea with peppermint leaves. Both very nice even without sweetener, which is saying something coming from a habitual honey user. I don't think either of them needed it, though. Coming up? Well, I think I'll leave you on tenterhooks because I know you like a little suspense.

Everybody's feeling the suspense, not knowing what tea I'll be drinking next, right?





You people are no fun. Type at you later.

WAIT WAIT WAIT. One last thing, as I see by the open tab. I meant to share this link, which is one of those things that talks about how Canadian vocabulary is different from other English-speaking nations' vocabularies. I find them interesting, if a little well, duh at times. Different countries, different histories, different vocabs. Anyway, I'm posting it here because for a change I've used every single one of the words listed (yes, even the alcohol ones). Often these lists are so regional that even I'm stumped by a lot of them. This time, though... if any of my two fans that aren't from here find these words odd then you honestly might have a little trouble understanding me at times. Funny.

And hooped, by the way, is a very useful word. It needs to become universal. You know, like toque.

Going for real this time. Byyye.

So I was sitting out on the patio...

Ok, maybe I wasn't.

There's a bit of snow, you see.

Seriously, though. That's a lot of snow. I know I've been complaining about it, but since I finally got around to taking a few pictures of it the other day I thought maybe now you'd believe me.

For anyone not familiar with Alberta in the winter, we're not exactly known for having lots of snow. Some snow, yeah, and it does get cold (I'm sure you've heard about that part. Everyone seems to), but we don't usually get piled on like this. It's been pretty much unbelievable. And it's not even January yet. Almost, but it's not. To have this much snow right now? Well, I have childhood pictures of a couple of years when we really got dumped on, but it hasn't happened for a long time.

I mean, look at this. What you might not notice right away is that the hedge is so weighted down that it toppled right into the pathway. Dad went out and knocked some of the snow off after I took this photo, but it wouldn't surprise me if we find out that it's permanently bent in the spring.

The snow's up to the deers' bellies when they leave the path and try to wade through towards the dogwood.

Um, big hint, by the way. If you're in this area and you have deer around, don't plant dogwood if you don't want them in your yard. It's one of their favourite winter browses.

I actually saw deer yesterday. Two whitetails, and then later about five or six mulies. It's not all that uncommon to see the mulies, but we hardly ever see the whitetails in the yard. They're too skittish to stay around for very long. I suppose that it might seem a little odd to some of you that we have deer herds just wandering around the neighbourhood, but Dad's place is fairly close to the outskirts of town and there are a couple of wooded lots in the area, so there are plenty of places for deer to hang out.

Um, anyway. You didn't come here to read about deer and snow, I suppose. I'm not sure why you did come here, though. Maybe you want to hear about...

CHRISTMAS PRESENTS?

Yeah, I did pretty well as usual. I got a gift card that I very much look forward to using, and you'll be hearing lots more about tea (lucky you. I'm sure my two fans are really looking forward to it. Toughies, though. I like tea), but the one that's going to affect the blog the most is the fact that I got a new lens.

Did you hear? I got a new lens.

It's my first prime lens for this camera, and it's been years since I've used a prime lens at all so I'm looking forward to it. It's a 50mm f/1.8... oh, hang on. I'll just link for the nerds out there. Gimme a sec.

Here it is.

Now, bear in mind that I'm a neophyte when it comes to all the specs, but what all that stuff means to me and my style of pointless photography is that even though it's a wide angle rather than a macro (or micro, as Nikon calls them) I should be able to get some decent close-ups while still using it for more general portraits and things like that. The reviews are good, it should work well in low light, the bokeh's supposed to be great, and the little bit of playing around the house I did yesterday makes me happy.

Let the search for even weirder pointless photography begin.



You're ready for this, right? It's gonna mean more spiders come spring...





Yay spiders.

Christmas: a photoessay

We have some traditions here at our house, as pretty much everybody does. Since we haven't had dinner yet and there's still a couple of things to do, I thought I'd just give you a few slightly less pointless photos than usual rather than a lot of words. Ready? Let's begin.

 

I take a picture of the tree every year.

 

I celebrate my Christmas feet.

And of course we grill the turkey...

 

 

Um. I guess we won't be grilling the turkey. Actually, as I mention every time we do a turkey, around here it's done on the rotisserie. So much better than roasting that you wouldn't believe it. I can already smell it even down here in the basement. And for those new to the program, I'm not in the basement as a punishment. It's just where the computer is. I'll be going back up as soon as I'm done with this.

Merry Christmas or whatever you're celebrating to everyone out there in blogland. Be good to each other. If anyone wondered what our tree really looks like, here's a last shot for the day:

Stay tuned in the new year. I got a present that pretty much guarantees that weirdness (even more weirdness, yes) will be happening on the blog. Yay weirdness.

Something something something

Something daylily something.

Yeah, I have no idea what to write about. I could mention that there were three moose browsing the shrubs right outside our office window the other day, and a few days later a bunch of whitetails did the same thing, and that it can be neat having a wildlife sanctuary as your back yard.

What would I say after that, though? It'd be an awfully short post.

I could bring up the fact that my father still doesn't have a Christmas present because I have no idea what to get him. That's pretty depressing, though, considering that it means I'll likely be shopping this weekend. Either that or hellooo gift card. Which is all right, really. I don't object to gift cards in the slightest. Better to let someone choose his present than to buy something totally lame that won't ever be used.

That's kind of a short post too.

I could talk about snow.

I don't want to talk about snow.

So...

Um...

sigh

There are chickadees outside the window right now cracking sunflower seeds open on the branches. I love chickadees. They're always around when you need something to talk about on a nature walk. You can train them to take seed from your hand as well, if you're into that sort of thing. I'm not, personally, because I worry a little about introducing inappropriate behaviours, but the birds are at least smart enough to fly away pretty quickly if they sense that something's not right.

Ok, that last was veering a little too close to what I do for a living, and this isn't the work blog. Speaking of work, though, I've now wasted enough time not having anything to talk about that I should probably stop typing. I hope you enjoyed this non-post. See you in a couple of days or so.

Merry Christmas

No, I'm not kidding. Merry Christmas to all of my two fans who are Ukrainian, Greek, or belong to any other church that follows the Julian calendar.

I've never celebrated Ukrainian Christmas, but I make note of it every year because my paternal grandfather was Ukrainian-Canadian. Yep, one quarter Ukrainian, me. It breaks up the English, English, Welsh, English, Irish, and English in my background, at least.

One of my (surprise! English!) ancestors is apparently listed in the Domesday Book, at least according to family tradition. He was a swineherd for Cedric the Saxon. Let's just say I'm not going to find out that I'm the long-lost heir to the British throne with the people in my family tree. And since I'm at work and don't really have time to get into all the genealogy stuff just at the moment, let's just say that there are bits of my history that amuse me for reasons that are probably a little immature. But seriously -- doesn't anyone else out there find it odd that a family named Drinkall (NOT my last name, if you're out to look for me. One of my ancestors, though) was Primitive Methodist?

I'll leave you to look up the Primitive Methodists on your own, if you're interested. Let's just say that there was a reason they were known as the Ranters.

Aaanyway. It's been that kind of a day that hasn't left me much time for blathering, so I'm going to have to leave it at that. Merry Christmas to those who are celebrating.



Take down your Christmas lights to those who aren't...

Art-like things and pointless photography

My two fans will know that today's title is one of my regular post labels. It's typically me, really. My doodles? I can't think of them as art, so they become art-like things. My photography? Well, I'm not being modest when I say that it's pointless. It's meant to be pointless. I've been doing it with a little autofocus camera that's (more than) a few years and 10, 000 photos old now, and while it's been a good little camera there's no doubt that it has limitations. That's been part of the fun, really. A lot of the photos you see here on the blog are the result of me trying to fool the camera into doing things that it doesn't think it can do. What can I say? I like playing with futility.

I also like taking pictures. I've liked it since I was a kid with a 110 camera. Um... for those of you out there who don't actually remember film cameras (sigh), here's what I mean. I took loads of pictures with that and a few other cameras. Dad even taught me the basics of f-stops and shutter speeds with his Pentax. I loved taking photos... until I was old enough to pay for my own developing.

Ouch.

Boys and girls, photography used to be expensive.

I still took pictures after that, but not quite as... extensively, shall we say. I still took pictures, and my parents bought me a nice Minolta SLR in high school for the trip to France that wasn't (our school trip supervisor used a flimsy excuse to back out at the last minute, so we never got to go. I've still never been to Europe. Thanks a lot, Teacher-who's-pointless-to-mention-since-she's-dead-now). The camera got used, though. I took it on tour with my university choir, and if you look through my photo albums you can even see the barest beginnings of my current (weird) photographic point of view. Only the barest, though. We're still talking film cameras here, and I couldn't really afford to waste money on experiments.

But then. Oh, then.

Digital, baby.

As many  pictures as you wanted, and you could see them without paying the local film lab.

Awesome.

First, I played around with the 1M jobby that my father bought once the units became less expensive (and faster. How many of you out there remember how slooow digital cameras were at first? The one we had at work -- for a nature centre -- couldn't have taken a picture of an animal unless it was stuffed). A few years later, I was given the Lumix I have now. 3M, Leica lens, tiny screen, no image stabilisation or anything fancy like that, but I've sure enjoyed it. My dad currently has a... 5M, I want to say... autofocus that I've used a few times, but the vast majority of the pictures I've taken in the past few years have been with the Lumix. As a bonus, by the way, images from a 3M camera don't take up too much of the limited memory space that Blogger offers for their in-house image hosting, so even after all these years of pointless blog photos I haven't had to switch to linking from my Flickr account (which so far hasn't even been used, so don't bother looking for it) or anything like that.

I wonder how that's going to change now?





I GOT A CAMERA FOR CHRISTMAS!

Of course, anyone with half a brain who read yesterday's post had probably guessed that already. Or anyone with less than half of a brain who's been reading this one.

Yours Pointlessly has officially entered the world of DSLRs, folks. I'm debating on whether to give you the specs of the thing (although it'll be pretty easy to find that out from the Exif data once I start posting photos from the camera), but let's just say that it's considered an "entry level" camera (which is plenty for the kind of puttering around that I do) that I see has some decent reviews. It came with the pretty standard 18-55mm zoom, and I expect that I'll be saving my pennies for a macro in the nearest possible future.

Yep. I'm actually going to have to start thinking about photography again instead of just point-and-shooting it. I'm reeeally rusty on SLRs at this point, but the advantage of today's cameras and their automatic features is that I'll be able to use the camera even while I'm still figuring it out.

I have to say, I'm looking forward to actually being able to focus a shot the way I want to. I haven't done that for a long time. And I must admit, there's something very satisfying about feeling a shutter snap when you take a picture, rather than just hearing a computer simulation.

So when will you be seeing my first efforts? There's a question. The camera didn't come with a cable (which, wtf company-that-I-haven't-named-yet? You can't be bothered to include a cable? It was bad enough when they started doing that with DVD players), and the card reader on this computer has never worked properly. It'll probably have to wait at least until I can get in to work, I guess. By then, though, I might even manage to have something worth looking at.

Or maybe I should make it completely pointless, just to show you that better equipment doesn't change the weirdness of the photographer.

Either way, I'm feeling -- as I said yesterday -- royally spoiled, but at least it's spoiled with something that will be put to good use. Or pointless use. But use all the same.



Poor blog. What are you in for?