Category Archives: Diary

Round-Up, Part The Second: The Camera

Hmm, what next. Oh; the camera.

We took the camera in to a local shop to consult with someone about the popped-off lens, and were told that it would cost as much to fix it as to buy a new camera. When I expressed incredulity because the rest of the camera is fine, the clerk said apologetically that the lens was the most expensive part of a camera, and we’d need a new one. It was going to cost us somewhere in the range of $150 to $180, as well as losing our camera for six to eight weeks.

At this time of year? No thanks. So I did my homework and read reviews until I was cross-eyed, and bought a Canon A430 4.0mpx Powershot. It takes lovely pictures, and the lag time between shots is minimal, as all the reviews said — so long as you’re not using the flash. If the flash is being used (which, let’s face it, is most of the time for me because I do a lot of indoor photography and it’s December, for heaven’s sake, which means there’s next to no light anyway), depending on the ambient light it can take up to 15 seconds to recharge. I’m wondering if this has something to do with the level of the rechargeable batteries that I put in the camera, so I’ll be experimenting with other batteries over the next little while to see if that affects the wait time as the troubleshooting section of the manual said that low battery power can slow the flash down.

A marvellous redeeming feature, however, is the continuous shooting option. When set to this function, the camera will take pictures about every half-second for as long as you hold down the shutter (or until you run out of room on your memory card). (The flash still needs to recharge though, damn it.) And the focusing half-step before pressing the shutter down completely is great too.

Overall, I’m very pleased with it. It’s got a lot of terrific settings and modes, equivalent to or greater than our Olympus camera had. In lag time between when the shutter is pressed and the picture taken, it’s faster than the other camera in capturing a moment; but the other camera was quicker at recharging the flash and being ready to take a second photo. Win some, lose some. December light isn’t exactly ideal for photography anyway, so that can only get better.

Round-Up, Part The First: The Tree

I think I’ll start with the tree.

Because HRH was home on Thursday, we took the opportunity to go get the Chistmas tree. We decided to go to the IKEA lot, because hey, twenty dollars for a tree is a good deal, and so is the coupon for $20 off a purchase in-store as of January 1. And you can’t beat the promise that IKEA will donate a seedling to a tree-planting project for every tree sold. We’ve had good experiences with IKEA trees in the past.

Despite the weather being very warm, we were in a very seasonal mood as all three of us bundled into the car and drove up. All the trees were still wrapped up, so we couldn’t see what shape they were, which was only a very mild handicap to the process because all trees change shape radically once they’re in stands for a few days, I find. Besides, wrapped trees are easier to transport. All of them were green green green and very fresh, and the lot smelled wonderful. HRH pulled a tree up and looked at it, and I picked one up and looked at it, and then we made polite noises at one another about how we really didn’t have a preference. (We honestly didn’t — well, at least I didn’t.) The decision was made by Liam in the end, and he chose mine. (Toddlers point a lot.)

It fit in our car, and Liam talked to it all the way home. HRH set it up in the stand and we cut the string that held it all together, and when released the branches began to settle into an interesting shape — it’s kind of an oval. It’s wider than it is deep, and it fits right up against our bookcases.

Liam was all for stroking the branches, and we kept saying “no no no, look don’t touch” in the sing-song way that means “you’re not being bad per se, you’re just doing something that we don’t want to encourage”. By Friday he would walk up to the tree, put his hands behind his back, and say “no no no” in the same sing-song fashion, showing us how good he was!

Sunday afternoon was the day we had blocked on the calendar to decorate it. HRH did the lights in the late afternoon, which excited Liam to no end, and I started to hang ornaments. I stopped, however, when Liam darted in and grabbed a life-sized apple ornament rolled in tiny artificial ice crystals, brought it to his mouth, and tried to take a big bite. He froze, released it and handed it back to me with a look of distaste, saying “no no no” before walking away. I laughed so hard that I was almost in tears, holding the ornament with a set of teeth marks in it. I will keep this apple and years from now I will pull it out and show him how at the first Christmas he could walk, he tried to eat the first ornament he got his hands on. Although I can’t blame him; it looks exactly like a real apple with ice on it, size, colour, and all.

We finished decorating it after he went to bed. I put the old pompom ornaments from my childhood tree on the lower branches, along with Jan’s ice-drop ornaments, because he can’t break those. Yesterday morning he came out of his room and stared at the tree, then ran up to it. We reminded him that the tree was for looking not touching, and we have had to remind him several times, but overall he’s been good. He does have to be reminded every morning again, though, and when he gets overexcited because he’s tired or hungry. And I caught him kissing a wooden penguin ornament today, and later he tried to feed it a cracker. He absolutely loves it all.

Notes

Not dead.

Concert was brilliant. The church was standing room only, and the overflow of people was directed to the church hall where there was a closed-circuit AV broadcast of the concert on a 20-inch monitor. That hall was filled to twice legal capacity (shh). And they had to turn people away because there was no more room anywhere. Thanks to Tal and Lu for coming out, and to Jeff and Paze and Devon for making the attempt!

So yes; I’d say it was a success. I even ran into an old high school friend whom I haven’t seen in about fifteen years, and it was terrific to see him.

I am completely wiped. I was tired going into the last few days, but now I’m utterly exhausted.

Also, Yule gift exchange party thing yesterday afternoon. Liam was awesome. Had a lovely relaxing chat and drank tea from real china cups with saucers and ate delicious cheese.

More later when I have time and a functioning brain.

Quiet

I’ve been getting things done: Christmas shopping (finished!), reloading programs as I need them, designing a new website, sleeping. Plus I haven’t been very talkative in general, so that translates to not much journaling in any form.

In other news, we have had two roasts and a lasagne in the past seven days. Apparently the comfort food season is upon us.

We had an exhausting but encouraging Messiah rehearsal last night, our first with the choir and soloists. By the end of it I was so weary that I couldn’t translate the music I was reading into actual movement. We’re playing the Skaters’ Waltz again to accompany the freewill offering, which means I have to (a) remember the bassline because I’m actually playing an octave lower than the bass music is written, and (b) remember the triangle parts. The carols and the Messiah sound excellent, however, and I’m looking forward to Saturday night. The only hitch is that I have to be there for six in the evening, which is usually when we’re finishing up the boy’s bath. We’re going to try to get him down a bit early so the neighbours who will be staying the evening don’t have to try to put him to bed, but I don’t know if it’s going to work. It depends on what his day has been like. If it goes badly I may have to leave HRH at home.

Also, due to rearranged seating to fit the orchestra into a small space, I am sitting directly in front of the conductor, which is very odd.

Remember: This Saturday night at 7:30, The Messiah at Cedar Park United church, corner Lakeview and St John’s Blvd in Pointe-Claire (one block south of autoroute 20)! Admission is free; a freewill offering will be taken halfway through the concert for various charities.

HRH’s work appointment was cancelled today, so we’ll be going to get our tree once Liam wakes up from his nap instead of doing it on Sunday as was our original plan. There’s something mildly disturbing about shopping for Christmas trees in temperatures that are ten degrees above the seasonal average.

Big Day

We all went to get our flu shots today. The very excellent nurse at our GP’s office gave them to us smoothly and swiftly, as always. HRH went first while Liam watched, then I got mine, and then Liam got his. He was fine until the needle actually went in, and then he yelled and gave poor Marilyn such a look, as if to say, “How dare you?”. Of course the needle was out of his arm and out of sight by that point, so he cried a couple of insulted tears and then everything was fine a moment later. He played with the office toys for the requisite fifteen minutes to ensure no one had a bad reaction to the vaccination, and then we went home for lunch and a nap.

When Liam woke up we got back into our coats and the car to do some holiday shopping. But first we checked to see if Mr S. Claus was receiving. He was, and there was no one in line, so we walked through the lovely little landscape our mall has set up to meet him. Liam was very interested in the elf who met us. He was interested in everything actually, so interested that Santa himself was kind of “Yeah, so, it’s Santa” experience despite this being the first time he’d seen him in person. He wanted to look at the bows on the prop presents, and at the sparkly snow that was part of the landscape (“Snow! Cold,” he told the elf), and at the tiny Christmas tree with lights (Santa explained that all the trees at the North Pole were Christmas trees), and to hold the elf’s hand. Liam even got a little stuffed penguin from Santa. The picture they took shows a very serious little boy (who isn’t so little, yikes) on Santa’s lap, and it’s the only one they got because Liam slid down to check out the set. “He’s curious. That’s a sign of intelligence,” Santa told us, which was very kind of him; we just laughed as we chased after the boy before he wandered off the walkway into the snow-covered forest and oversized instruments.

It was lots of fun, and Liam seemed to enjoy the whole thing. We expected him to be fine, but there’s always that little dash of anxiety about how a toddler is going to handle a new person, particularly a stranger in a red velvet suit who holds said toddler on his lap when the child doesn’t yet fully understand the concept of Santa Claus. The staff was excellent with him, though, and it helped that we went in the afternoon on a weekday so there weren’t millions of people around.

Evening Recap

Every time I leave my office I step over the red plush d20 Tal gave to Liam for Christmas last night. Liam knew what to do with it right away, too.

The evening was lovely. The roast beef was absolutely to die for, although the Yorkshire pudding was a bit more dense than I was expecting (it still tasted perfect), and I will never again use whatever type of potatoes I used last night to roast, because they took two hours in the oven and then another seven minutes in the microwave to cook them through. I’m always amazed at how easy big dinners like this are now, as compared to when I started cooking them fifteen years ago. Then it was all about the timing and the oh no and the angst. Now things just work.

There was wine, and little pastries for dessert, and a wonderfully relaxed atmosphere. It was a good evening, the kind I really needed. And I slept very well afterwards, which was a nice change.