We went for a picnic in the park today and I brought along the new camera. Pretty happy with the camera, not so much with my photography skills. Oh well, the first 1000 shots are the worst they say, usually meaning your first thousand ever but I take it to mean with any new camera, especially for me using a dSLR for the first time. And anyways all the shots of Pallas just turn out great cause she's the cuteling!

Happy Expatriation Day!
Five years ago today gabrielle and I left on an excursion that would take us to Malaysia, Singapore and New Zealand. Although I came home after two and a half months or so, gabrielle never did. She's still there and that deserves a hearty congratulations! Crazy. What a great trip that was. Remember these? We were pretty much the third (4th? 8th? 999th?) unit for the LOTR trilogy back then. Sadly all our scenes were deleted, even the one where Elrond wins the Stanley Cup in beach hockey.




And I was going through the archives from this very blog- they start here, go here and here and then here.

So my whole family chipped in and got me this sweet new camera for my birthday. A DSLR! How sweet is that? Thanks to everyone who contributed!
Here's a picture I took with it:


Here's some pics of Edmonton's main square I took from my Mom's 23rd floor office today- with my old camera and through a slightly dirty window.

Slipknot is coming to town, and Michelle and I are going! Sweet! It's only a couple of weeks before Halloween too, so that will be cool. Maybe we should go wearing masks too- I bet I could find a really cute polar bear mask!
Also, just now we registered for San Diego Comic Con 2010! We talked about going this past summer but by the time we looked it was long since sold out so we decided to go next year come hell or H1N1.

It's like a puzzle! Except I had to cheat a little.

So even though I had to work today it wasn't a bad birthday. First dayshifts are always busy and I was doing all sorts of stuff but nothing really hard. Took a staff pickup down to the other end to retire it and get a new one. Ran shovel 10 for an hour. Then Robin called me down because we had to take two wrecked haultrucks down to the other end to get fixed. "Since it's your birthday you can choose which truck you want to bring down- do you want 18 or 37?"
"18."
"But you haven't heard what's wrong with 37 yet. Turns out you have to drive it super slow so that you won't hit any bumps and knock the back tires off."
"Oh! Is it too late to change my mind? Because I still choose 18."
Anyways after that we had time to find a few adventures, the details of which it would be wiser for me not to write down on the internet. Although with all the cameras we have all over the site . . . well, we can always say "You never told us we couldn't _____ ____ ______."

Anyways, my little daughter is in Calgary for the weekend so I will just have to make do with this:

As my 35th birthday rapidly approaches I am thinking about mortality. I mean, I'm halfway to 70 right? And only five years away from 40. I don't feel old. This morning I was sitting on the couch reading a Star Wars comic book, so really nothing has changed in 30 years. And yet. The grey hairs. The sore muscles alla time. The constant tiredness. I guess ole Father Time hasn't forgotten me after all. Well, what can you do?
Plan your epitaph, that's what.
I remember in junior high or sometime, maybe grade 8, we did a little unit on graveyards and epitaphs. You know, the funny ones like "Here lies Les Moore- no Les, no more." So our assignment was to think of what we wanted on our headstone. I still remember mine and am kind of tempted to use it- "I might be dead but the joke's on you- someday soon you're gonna die too!" Sepultura says something similar but with much more death metally-coolness:
Who are you to criticize, to judge and burn the tribes? Your world will go extinct, and your flesh will rot with mine!
That would be the coolest tombstone ever. Though now I wonder if that's the right message to leave my daughter, grand-daughter, widow and all those great-grand-children I'm sure to have someday. Maybe Royal Tenenbaum had the right idea: