Way Past Time

So the real news of the election yesterday were the votes in Colorado and Washington state to legalize recreational pot.

Also, Massachusetts voted in favor of medical marijuana bringing the number of states allowing it to 17. As far as I'm concerned, "medical marijuana" is bullshit. Not that I don't believe it has medicinal benefits, au contraire, it absolutely does. It's just that it is a half-assed, pretend approach to legalization. It's like saying you can't have that double bourbon on the rocks if you're doing it because you like the taste, or you like the way it makes you feel or whatever, but you can if it helps your migraine. Sissies.

Happy Day

Today was blue sky sun shining, for the first time in well over a week. And why not? Today was my birthday after all. Forever young in Qualicum Beach. Works for me.

Last week we were in Vancouver where I had to travel to get an appointment with a specialist, sooner, that is, than the year it would take me to wait for one over here on The Island. Yes, year-long waiting lists. It's a little strange, stepping back into the Canadian/BC health care system after being away. In Manila the quality of care and the ability to access medical specialists when you want to, totally depends on money. Want an appointment with a specialist over there? "Yes, Mam, when would you like to come?" Medical tourism is big in places like Thailand and Malaysia, and the Philippines is trying to get a piece of the action - they even built a shiny, new hospital down the road from where we used to live, just for that business. Meanwhile, millions of their citizens have limited, if any, access to anywhere near decent healthcare.

So... I don't think I'll complain too loudly about wait times here, and a few days in Vancouver is hardly a hardship. The ferry ride over is totally relaxed, and it was about time anyway for a change of scenery and a taste of the big city. We always stay at my absolutely favorite hotel of anywhere, a suite hotel on a residential street in the West End, a block from Davie Street.

The West End is a mixture of low- and high-rise buildings, most of a vintage, although there are more and more signs of renovations. Renovations, not tear-downs, which I think is great. I have no clue about the politics and real estate of Vancouver, and why this is so; it's just me walking around this wonderful neighborhood and looking. It reminds me a little of urban neighborhoods of Montreal, where I grew up. We're 3 blocks from the water and close to Grenville Island, via the ultra-cool little passenger ferryettes, as well as to Stanley Park, to Yaletown, downtown and anywhere else we care to go - most of the time walking. On this visit it was grey and rainy, but looking way good to me.

The entire West End is all about walking and looking and vibrant main streets with lots of pedestrian traffic just blocks from where you live. I especially like Davie Street, or Davie VILLAGE as I see it is being called - our neighborhood. where there is such a great mix of people, most of them colorful, in one way or another. We've stayed there so many times these past years, it now feels like OUR neighborhood in Vancouver.

And not coincidentally to my love for it,  there is a cheekiness to Davie Street that is fun, fun fun. Love some of the window displays and the signs are terrific.

And P.S. to the healthcare story. After 22 years with Type 1 Diabetes, it seems I have no apparent complications, which is huge. This won't last. But for now, and for today's day, I am so very grateful for my good health. I feel great. And I don't even care that I just turned xx.

Quake

At 9:00 on Saturday night I had a call from a very bleary-sounding Number One Son, calling from Ottawa where it was midnight. "Did you hear about the earthquake?"

I hadn't. I had been putzing around the intertube looking at this and that. It seems a 7.7 earthquake had struck off Haida Gwaii and a tsunami warning was in place for the west side of Vancouver Island, including Tofino of course, and beyond. For the next few hours I kept my eye on the reports, waiting to see what would happen with the tsunami. Despite the fact that I'm not on Facebook (closed up shop there after a very short time), don't twit or tweet or whatever, nonetheless the word was spreading among friends and family - the phone call, a few emails and text messages. After a few hours the tsunami warning was cancelled and off I went to bed but not before I had thought a lot about earthquakes and Tofino, among other things.

Since 2004, I have looked at some of the sea level, beach front places we've stayed at on the island and elsewhere, calling them "tsunami bait". In recent trips in Ucluelet and Tofino this year, I've been very aware of the fact that if a tsunami did hit, as it has in the past, if we didn't get to higher ground in time we'd be toast. On our last trip to Tofino in September I checked out the evacuation route on our way in to town so I'd know where it was - safe ground is a bit of a hike along the two-lane highway past Long Beach. I wondered at the time how the town would be informed and what an evacuation would look like. I even said to the others that we should park outside in front of the condo building rather than underground behind the electric-run gates. Perhaps my imagination is too vivid, I'm sure it is, which I don't consider a bad thing, but I started imagining what it would be like if an earthquake happened at Tofino and you had to hightail it out of there after finding your car in the darkness of a power outage (as it was in Haida Gwai on Saturday night) and getting it out of the garage - all the while chaos reigns and somewhere out there a big wave is headed your way.

I also noticed during that trip, that the vacation rental condo we stayed at had no information about what to do if... No maps, directions or instructions about how to proceed if natural disaster struck - information I would think would be useful to travellers who don't know their way around, or are even aware of what a precarious part of the planet this is. Check out this map - in the past month over a hundred earthquakes have occurred in coastal British Columbia up through Alaska. Not all of course were felt but it is continuous, all around the Pacific Ring of Fire.

And more big ones are to come.
 

I've been reading a book lately called Cascadia's Fault which is a science thriller - but all true. It tells how scientists have over time found out that the Cascadian fault line which stretches along the North American coast from northern California up along Vancouver Island, that they used to think was inactive, is "virtually identical to the tectonic time bomb that decimated Japan in 2011, and when Cascadia's fault ruptures, it will generate the same kind of earthquake, at magnitude 9 or higher."  It is this type of fault that will cause a huge tsunami, unlike Saturday's which is on a different fault line, the Queen Charlotte Fault and generated a sideward movement of the plates which doesn't cause the big tsunamis an upward thrusting plate movement does.

The author, Jerry Thompson, has been on the earthquake story for 25 years and is brilliant at explaining the science and following the story of the earthquake scientists as they puzzled out the truth about the Cascadia subduction zone. The last big one was January 26th, 1700 (the story of how they figured out that particular date is a good read in itself) and according to the people who get paid to know these things, another one is coming, bigger than anyone has prepared for (or built schools and hospitals to withstand). Certainly the ordinary Joe Blow citizen (or another JB I could mention) is not at all prepared for natural disaster.  They know they should be, but they're not. And I'm sure, most aren't even aware they're living on a timebomb.

Back to Saturday night's Haida Gwaii earthquake. A couple of weeks ago we were at Thanksgiving dinner at our neighbor's house across the street where I met her grandson, a commercial diver. He  was about to leave for a couple of months work up in Haida Gwaii, harvesting geoducks (pronounced 'gooey duck', a species of large clam) for export to Asia. As it turns out, shortly after he started work up there one of the divers on the project died on the job. Not only that, the young man was involved in the rescue and performed CPR on the man, to no avail. I can only imagine how he must be feeling. Now this earthquake has literally rocked their boat. I think it's time for him to come home.

While the scientists know that this part of the Ring of Fire is due for a big one, there is still no way to predict exactly when, which makes the recent criminal conviction of 6 earthquake scientists in Italy particularly bizarre. Convicted of manslaughter, last week they were sentenced to 6 years in prison for failing to warn the public prior to the L'Aquila earthquake in 2009 which destroyed the town and killed 300 people. Other Italian scientists are now saying "take this job and shove it". There is some precedent for this trial and conviction it seems. In 1633 Galileo was tried by the Vatican for claiming the earth revolved around the sun. How far we've come. Not.

The Pepper (uh) Grinder

One of my all time huge peeves is the restaurant pepper grinder. You know the one. After the plates have been delivered to the table the waiter or waitress shows up wielding this enormous implement, "Fresh ground pepper?". Or even worse, shows up with the plates and the implement tucked under the arm, like where the Right Guard goes. Makes me mental. I decline out of principle. I've finally settled on saying, "No thanks, I think I'll TASTE IT FIRST." Which is probably a more reasoned response than my other inclination which is to grab the thing and clobber someone. Hard.

In the first place, I think it is very rude and disrespectful to the dish's creator, to start throwing salt and pepper on something before you know whether you need it or not. Give it a rest. Why not taste to see what the chef has in mind, before modifying? So to offer it at that point is retarded.

Secondly, why should someone else be grinding this stuff (with this 2 foot long phallic symbol) on your plate. "Say when", they say. Well how are you supposed to you know when "when" is, when no one has even tasted the thing? If freshly ground pepper is so important to provide then why not put a pepper grinder on the individual tables along with the salt? Only a few restaurants do this and believe me, when they do, I notice.

Porfirio Rubirosa was a notorious international jet setting playboy, originally from the Dominican Republic, whose main occupation was bedding and marrying women of the seriously rich and famous persuasion. A big time player. Among his wives was France's biggest film star Danielle Darrieux and the uber-wealthy American gals, Doris Duke and Barbara Hutton. Doris Duke paid Danielle a couple of million to divorce Rubirosa so she could have him. He had affairs with Marilyn Monroe, Tina Onassis, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Ava Gardner and anything else that moved, although richer was better. These wealthy dames paid big bucks when the time came to get rid of him.

He was quite the party slut his entire life and died in 1965 at the age of 56 after crashing his Ferrari into a tree after an all night celebration in Paris after winning the Coupe de France polo cup.

So why this apparent digression?

Well, they say that among his charms for all of these women, was his anatomical endowment. Parisian waiters to this day call these oversized pepper grinders "Rubirosas". Now there's an image to come to mind the next time a waiter comes at you with the Freshly Ground Pepper.

Rain Walk in the Forest

At the end of our street (3 houses down) is the Heritage Forest, a 55 acre parcel of old growth forest land around a huge ravine, a property that was saved from development by concerned townspeople a few years ago. Many different tree species are to be found within, including some very old Douglas Firs that are well over 700 years old, huge and wide. It is a magical place and one of the major reasons we moved to this house and this neighborhood. When I walk through, breathing that amazing air, I feel myself changing and I always leave with a different attitude than when I enter. Healthier.

Over time I have become very aware of what I call the "imaginary conversations" that people, including myself, indulge in. Indulge is not really the right word perhaps - it's more like falling into a downward spiral of negativity. Imaginary conversations could be things like replaying in the mind a difficult conversation you have had sometime over and over. Or, thinking of what you should have said and then going back over an entire changed conversation. Or, planning what you might say next time and imagining how that conversation would go. Pretending you know what is in another's thoughts. It's really not a good idea, upsets peace of mind and whenever I catch myself talking to somebody entirely in my own head, I try nip it in the bud, distracting myself towards something more positive. Still, sometimes when I'm particularly upset about something, like I am now, just telling myself to knock it off is not enough. It needs heavier artillery. That's when I visit the forest.

For the first 5 or 10 minutes along the pathways I distract myself from these thoughts by playing little games like how many Douglas Firs can I spot, how many yellow ferns, how many slugs on the path, how many burnt tree trunks from long ago forest fires, how many mushrooms have popped up since last time. I don't actually count anything, it is more about creating categories for seeing, to observe, pay attention and focus. To stop the internal noise and absorb, along with the amazing air, the (fill in the adjective-words fail) forest in all its changing glory. It doesn't take long to change through this walking meditation. It works like a charm. Attitude adjustment.

Some say that there is a particular chemistry in old growth forest that has physiological effects on humans as they breath the air, itself filled with the breathing of these huge giants. The Japanese have a name for it - shinrin-yoku, wood-air bathing. Chemical compounds in the forest air from soil bacteria, fungi and the trees themselves have effects on humans that are certainly acknowledged by anecdotal reports but not entirely understood yet. Some studies of shinrin-yoku have shown that forest breathing reduces stress and, not coincidentally I would think, blood pressure and blood sugar levels in diabetics. Botanist Joan Maloof has written a charming book about all this, Teaching the Trees, questioning what we may be losing as our old growth woods recede across this planet humans are ravaging so well.

Yesterday was gray and drizzly, and this weather is expected to continue for awhile. Our fantastic sunny, dry September/October weather is over. Not to worry, I love it. I pulled my raincoat hood over my head and away I went. The cloudy day in the forest was an entirely different place from those sunny days when streaks of dappled sunshine change the colors, the shades and textures of the forest. This time, in the rain, contrasts were more intense. Dark patterns of the thick bark of the huge Douglas Firs stand out against the paler smoother more vertical bark of the cedars. A pop of yellow where a deciduous bush has turned color in the autumn appears against the calm forest colors like spotlights. Many different types of mushrooms were newly appearing in only a matter of days from the previous dryness where it seemed there was nothing. The ferns are now all shades of green, yellow and brown as they shift and change with the seasons.

I found a cluster of striking deep orange-brown mushrooms growing on top of an old tree stump that stopped me in my tracks. I didn't have my camera - this never happens - but for some unknown reason I had made a conscious decision to leave it behind and just look on this walk. Silly me. I wanted the shot but had to kept walking without, until I realized I had a phone in my pocket and therefore a camera. I pulled it out and spent a good 5 minutes on the path in front of the stump trying to figure out how to take a picture on this fancy pants cell phone I hate so much. I'm not making this up. (Cue howls of laughter).

Eventually I gave up, went back to the house to collect my camera, and returned to the scene with my trusty Canon and, after hanging out this day in the forest,  a much improved mood.

Holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting your enemy to die - Buddha
When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping walking - Me

P.S. Just heard a news item on the radio. Three guys were walking in the woods in Saanich with their dogs when all of a sudden there was a crashing sound around them. A big tree fell over, knocking one man unconscious and injuring a second. Oh.

Back in the Saddle Again

Today, for the first time since the last trip in July that fatally damaged our sail, we went sailing. After a couple of months, the new sail was finally delivered from the Barbados where it was made, and off we went to check it out.

The days are still sunny and glorious but out on the open water, marine wind conditions are very changeable this time of year. We have been trying to go out for about a week now, but many days we woke to forecasts of "strong wind warnings" or even "gale force winds", so cancel that plan.  Of course since I'm still traumatized by the last time, a forecast of "no wind" would suit me fine, but that wouldn't do for the captain. Thoughts of an overnighter are long over this season - it was 2 degrees C this morning when I woke up, the overnight low. Sleeping aboard, heater or no, sounds to me like winter camping.

But this afternoon was warm and beautiful with enough wind to check out the new sail, and also enough to ease my way back into it. I'm still afraid, but it was so much better to end the season on this happy sunny blue note, rather than spend the winter stewing over one bad experience.

September

Every morning, while waiting for the coffee machine to heat up,  I have been looking through the garden doors at the clear cloudless blue sky sunshine,  smiling and saying out loud, "another lousy day in paradise", a line from a 'you had to be there' running joke from a long ago trip. Just when I had been, almost, bemoaning the short 6 week summer we had, along comes this - 10 days, and counting, of warm, sunny days. Record breaking highs for this time of year I'm informed by the online local papers (which is not all that high, if the truth be known, but it's all relative I guess).

It appears that this is a new season, an in-between summer and fall season. It very clearly is not summer. Although sunny and warm in that sunshine, at night those 20-something temperatures fall to lows of 8-9 and boy is it brisk out there as I venture out into the dew with coffee in hand to see what's happened overnight in the garden.

The garden is gorgeous. Things that have been underwhelming performers through the summer's heat are now putting on new growth and flowers. Everything was newly planted this year, as there was nothing when we came here, and shrubs and perennials are settling in, and those that aren't are being moved or sent to compost. I've been scrubbing out hundreds of pots (note to self - clean as you go), and caulking the windows of the GreenHouse, which I'm not at all sure will solve my leakage problems. New planting beds are being prepared, and ongoing water and deadheading maintenance gets one up close and personal with each plant. I spend almost all my time outside in the garden, working or reading - the rest I spend taking pictures, blackberry picking and exploring new beaches in nearby communities.

When Number 2 Son Mike was here a few weeks ago we went for a walk along a nearby trail and found a big blackberry patch. We stopped and picked and picked and ate and ate, until finally I had to say "I'm STUFFED", which is not a usual description of berry eating. I have been back to that patch several times since, picking pounds/kilos of the stuff, or "kilometers of blackberries", which refers to my ill advised attempt to speak Italian in Ischia, where one afternoon, while everyone on the island was in siesta mode, I was trying to order a "kilometer of cherries" in the local language. I recognized my mistake almost immediately, but the old woman in the shop didn't bat an eye and weighed them up for me, no doubt laughing her head off once I was out of sight. I certainly was.

The Fuchsia Summer GreenHouse

I've been photographing the Fuchsia Ranch collection and taking note of how the plants have behaved this season and what I may do with them next season. I use Aperture for my photo library and post-production and I'm playing with its book making feature as a way to keep a record of The Ranch this year.  This is in keeping with what has become a feeling that if I don't start to organize and produce something I can touch and keep, all these thousands and thousands of digital images I have on my computer and add to every day will end up one day in some massive crash or change of software or whatever. Which might not be a bad thing for most of it which leads to the point that it is also a way to better pay attention, select the best, critique the composition, reshoot, compare shots, adjust, and generally learn my craft. I have a few other projects in mind to get these photos off digital and published in hard copy form to share, so learning what this book feature can do, or learning enough to know whether I want to continue to use this software or go on to try something else.

Screenshot of the Aperture Book software

Fuchsia Deep Purple

Living these days outside in the sunshine has been wonderful but clearly this season is changing. The light is different, the angle of the sun is decidedly lower and by late afternoon the once long sunny backyard is in full shade as the sun quickly disappears behind the tall trees of the forest at the end of the street. Here at 49.3564 N by 7:30 it is dark out.

The town also feels different. The tourists are gone and even with days and days of sunshine, the vibe of this summer town has changed. We've been here, in this new home, for about a year, and we've barely scratched the surface.

Still. May be time for a change of scenery.

Freedom Cove

We stayed in the town of Tofino looking out on the view that had captured my heart the first time I ever saw it and for every visit since - across Clayoquot Sound to Meares Island and the other smaller islands,  with the Vancouver Island mountain peaks behind. Watching the boat traffic in the Sound, going to and fro, weaving through the islands till lost sight of around the bend and behind. It makes me want to go across, go further, see what lies behind up the inlets and coves further up Clayoquot Sound and beyond.

The view from my pillow in the loft of the condo in Tofino - dawn - the sport fishermen are just leaving

So, we hired a boat with Captain Mike Little of Browning Passage Boat Charters to go take a look at what lay beyond.

It was 3:00 in the afternoon when we climbed aboard, heading around the back of Meares Island and beyond to a place called, by its residents, Freedom Cove. The boat would take a minimum of 3 people, maximum 12. Howard, Number 2 Son Mike and I make 3. It's just slightly passed high tourist season this day in early September, and we find we have the boat to ourselves.

We travel across the harbor towards the native village that has been there continuously for 5000 years. At least. Then around the west side of Meares Island where we pass a complex of old buildings. This used to be a residential school for native children. Even the sound of those words these days sends a chill but Captain Mike who was born here talks of friends of his who were there and who themselves speak of the education they got as worthwhile, as well as some usefulness of learning the ways of the "white guy", which was the point of the schools. Lots of points of view I guess.

We continue past a view of a looming Cat Mountain, a wall of green forest, where some company is proposing building a copper mine. Friends of Clayoquot appear to be all over that one, I was asked to sign something, or send a postcard or whatever, when I stopped at their booth at the Saturday market. Apparently it would mean defacing the mountain. According to our Captain Mike, a retired Coast Guard captain, he can't see how they'd get the copper out of there, through the relatively shallow entrances to Clayoquot Sound from the Pacific. Apparently something similar was proposed many years ago and not proceeded with for this same reason.

 Then past more small islands, past several large fish farms, till we reached the entrance to a small bay, turned the corner into its smoother waters and came upon a quite amazing sight. The floating gardens of Freedom Cove.

You won't find the name "Freedom Cove" on any local chart, but that is what it is called by its residents,  Catherine King and Wayne Adams, who approached us as we stepped off the boat to their dock. They welcomed us with hands full of containers of cherry tomatoes, gifts for us.  Here we are at their float home, with its huge connecting floating gardens, greenhouses, studios, guest houses, dance platforms, candle studio, carving studios...This is their home of 20 years, and their ever changing art installation.

An aerial view...

Catherine takes us on a tour - she is a dancer, a poet and a sculptor, and above all a gardener. She explains that they have live a subsistence lifestyle out on their float home, an hour's boat ride from the town of Tofino. All the building materials for their floating garden and its multiple greenhouses and other structures are from salvaged materials, some from the neighboring fish farms. They grow all their vegetables and fruits, everything in containers as the whole structure floats in the bay, tethered in multiple locations to the cliffs along the shore. They are not alongside the shore, they can't step off the dock to go for a walk, they are surrounded by water. Fresh water for themselves and for the gardens comes from a waterfall on land a distance away, gravity fed to their complex. The whole structure looks like a series of lagoons, you walk along deckways and across bridges to get from one greenhouse (there are about 6) or studio to another.

One of their greenhouses is dedicated to growing strawberries. They have every other berry as well as apple, pear, fig and other trees growing in huge pots. They grow every kind of vegetable you can imagine, and then some.

We were with them for about an hour and a half, looking at their structures, their art projects, their home, their plants, garden art, candles they pour from molds made from their carvings from bone and other materials. I could barely follow half of what she was saying, as I looked at her pots and plants and how her irrigation system was set up and all that.

I told Wayne about my desire to see what lay beyond my view from the town of Tofino. He said that he had felt the same way in the years he lived there and then look what happened - he ended up living out beyond these past 20 years.

What a great visit, to an artistic couple whose art is also about how they live their lives in this place of isolation and breathtaking beauty. A chance to get to know, if briefly, some of the people who have made this far place home for so many years. They are not the only artists who live on float homes in the wilderness around here, but they may have the most extensive structure and certainly the most flamboyant.

Meanwhile, later that day, back in Tofino's waterfront...

Slipstreamed

In early August Howard, Maristella and I piled into the car and took the ferry to Vancouver. Off to see Bonnie Raitt in concert and also to meet up with Number 1 Son who was flying in from the east for a 10-day West Coast vacation.

I hadn't been to a concert in I don't know how long but when, last spring, I first heard she was coming to Vancouver I knew I had to go. My track record on actually following up on events I'd like to go to is pretty pathetic but this time I thought, "Enough of the "should do" and just "do". The last time I was in the same city as one of Bonnie Raitt's concerts was in Ottawa a decade or so ago when she was performing with Eric Clapton. I did not go to my everlasting regret. I had been out in Victoria for the summer and didn't know, until too late, about the Ottawa concert. This time that wouldn't happen again and I was first on line for my tickets.

Getting to Vancouver is easy and way pleasant. The ferry terminal in Nanaimo is 30 minutes away from our house, the boat ride across the Strait is about an hour and a half, then it's a 30 minute drive to downtown Vancouver. We stay at the Sunset Inn in the West End on a quiet tree-lined residential street a block from Davie Street and within walking distance to everything - Granville Island, downtown, Stanley Park. I think the building used to be an apartment building, so lots of space and balconies. Perfect. This particular weekend was hot and sunny and totally gorgeous and everybody was outside.

We arrived early at the concert on Friday night, which gave lots of time for people watching. I was immediately struck by the age of the audience - almost all of a certain vintage. Lots of (male) grey ponytails, and not a few canes, something I can now relate to this past week. It is always a shock to me to look in the mirror, which in this case was the audience of the full Queen Elizabeth Theater on this night. After an opening act by a Delta blues guy, out came Bonnie with her amazing band. All but one band member has been touring with her for decades - plenty of time to get really hot!

Bonnie Raitt reminds us that she is 62 and is very funny about it. Knows her audience. She says she hopes she'll be at it for another 10 years but jokes that they might have to widen the aisles in the theater to accommodate all the scooters. She doesn't appear to have changed a bit in 30 years - same hair, same clothes, same guitar playing, same voice. It was a fine concert, just fine. Colin James came out to jam at the end, the home town blues player appears to be a Vancouver crowd favorite. I'm so glad I went, I'm still feeling the energy of that live performance all these weeks later.

I listen to Bonnie Raitt a lot and have for many years. The new album, the first since many years, Slipstream, is great. Her cover of Bob Dylan's Million Miles is outstanding, is getting lots of air play on the blues radio programs, and will, I predict win awards.

As it turned out, music was to play a very key role in our subsequent travels in the weeks following the Vancouver weekend.

I love music stores, especially used CD music stores. I like working my way through piles of CD's, looking for something I don't know I'm looking for. I like the cover art, and I especially like the liner notes. Every now and then quite by chance as happened recently, I'll find something that really gets me excited, like the Oscar Brown Jr. CD. Recorded in 1972, I first heard it in its entirety late one night on CBC and promptly went out to get it. On vinyl I guess, though no one ever called it that, back in the day. It was a record, plain and simple. I like the tactile nature of a CD store, or that of my own collection of hundreds of CD's and I like the sense of surprise to find something, or rediscover something, something that doesn't really happen for me online. Although I do buy from Amazon often (along with books which is another story), I still like the stores.

On this trip to Vancouver, I went off to find a music store I knew on Granville Street, Charlies Music City. This was a large used and new CD shop that also had a huge DVD selection. It was there last summer and had been for decades - it is now closed. The big, multi-level flagship HMV music store also closed this past year, which didn't surprise a lot of people, but I still managed to find stuff there. This got me thinking about how I access music, how everyone else seems to be accessing music, and what I should do next. I don't download music for free. I decided to have another look at the iTunes store and found it's still the same crap website I remembered it to be, so I'll not be going in that direction, along with some of the Apple proprietary shit that goes on with the iTunes store.

I had also been looking for something to play music on. My wish list included, in one unit, a radio, a CD player, a dock for my iPad, and great sound. All in one, but I had been having trouble finding what I wanted.  One day Maristella and I were in a big chain electronics store (that is also now selling vacuums and dishwashers) looking at something else and I went looking for music machines. I couldn't find them. All I could find were cheap looking iPod docks. I asked the sales clerk about it. "What do people listen to music on?" "Their computers mostly", he replied. Maristella and I looked at each other. "Great sound quality" we both said at the same time. "Not".

That was the low point.  But later we found Ditch Records on Fort at Blanchard in Victoria and all was right with the world again. I left with a pile of CD's from their very eclectic mix, as well as a recommendation from the clerk where to go for my magic music machine - a real old-fashioned audio store, Sound Hounds on Pandora, with people working there who really love music and sound.  Got into a long conversation about music quality through CD vs MP3 or whatever that was pretty enlightening. I ended up buying a TEAC receiver, with radio, internet radio, CD player and iPod connection, with small but wonderful Boston speakers and it sounds great in the space we have for it. However when I returned home with this new music machine in tow, I soon discovered that my ancient iPod did not work on it, its technology too old for all this new-fangled stuff, so I had to go out and invest in a new iPod Classic and transfer my collection. More money to Apple.

Here's what I'm listening to these days on my new magic music machine - on CD:

Slipstream - Bonnie Raitt
Shape Shifter - Santana
Spirit Rising - Angelique Kidjo
Sin & Soul - Oscar Brown Jr.
Locked Down - Dr. John

Here's a list of someone's recommendations for some of the best new music (so far) 2012. Lots to explore.

My Summer Vacation v.2012

 

Today is September and Labor Day Weekend, so that's that. Summer is over. It felt so short, and indeed it was.  Real summer weather started this year on July 4th and lasted all of seven weeks. Now the days are noticeably shorter, evenings are cool, early mornings brisk. The pattern of shadows in the backyard has changed as the sun is lower in the sky. It's completely dark by 9.

It's been a busy summer and the time passed too quickly. After the fateful boat trip which grounded us, house guests arrived and we hung out at the house planning dinner, shopping for dinner, cooking dinner and eating dinner. Sleep, wake up and repeat. In between all this gorging on fresh seafood and local market produce, we did manage to squeeze in some walks, local exploring and a few road/boat trips, one to the unpopulated west coast of Vancouver Island and by contrast to both major cities - Victoria and Vancouver.

Now everyone has dispersed to their respective homes and this past week we've been on our own for the first time in over a month. Quiet time, decompression time. The relaxation has been fine but at the same time there is so much I am itching to do - clean out the GreenHouse and get it ready for  fall when the fuchsias come back in, put in a new bed in the back to be ready for spring planting, remove a few shrubs that are ill placed. We found a hydrangea growing in the front of the house which is in total shade and gets little rain as it is mostly under roof overhang. It is a large shrub but with such conditions it was no surprise when it yielded exactly one flower, which I promptly cut off and brought inside to enjoy it close up.  Perhaps it was planted by the same tenant who mistakenly planted hostas along that same front bed. Deer food. They munch on it all summer and leave their "evidence" on the lawn. Time for a deer-resistant, full-shade change of plantings. I also want to go for longer walks now that the heat of the days is no more, exploring new trails. I also plan to rearrange all the art in the house and take on a couple of decorating projects.

But I can't. Do anything. I've been sidelined by not one, but two different injuries to my back. The first happened while I was in bed sleeping - when I woke up I was in pain and couldn't get out of bed. I'm wondering if it has anything to do with 4 hours of spring cleaning (a little late) the day before and if that is the case I'll make sure it never happens again. The second happened 5 days later when I finally felt able to walk a little further and went off to pick blackberries. I ended up falling down a bank by the railroad track and hurting the other side of my back.

So these days I am alternating hobbling around the house and garden and lying on a chaise in the garden shading by a big orange hat and wrapped in a blanket. I read books and self medicate, stare at the sky and the top of the huge cedar out front and watch the bees in the garden that is now a riot of blue and purple flowers. Yesterday morning I got in the car to go to the Saturday market to pick up flowers and the Saturday papers. I had a hard time getting in and out of the car and once on the pavement shuffled my way along like everyone else in this geriatric town. Stiff and sore. My future flashed before my eyes.

I need to get better soon, so I won't push it. All those projects can wait. Next week Number Two Son comes to visit and we're off for a few days in Tofino on the west coast, a place for walking and hiking and kayaking and, uh, surfing. I'd hate to show up there pushing my new walker.