City Birds

Went to my other favourite park in Vancouver yesterday, the big one known as Stanley.  Another glorious sunny day here.  As I was aiming to get a traditional picture of English Bay harbour, a crow flew into the frame.

I was actually very happy with this guest appearance as I can never catch them in flight when I try.

Although it can be annoying when someone wanders into the picture I'm trying to get, I really didn't mind this walk-on by Mr. Crow.

Not to be outdone,

a flock of Canada Geese honoured me with a sail past (safer than a fly-over from an observer's point of view, if you catch my drift).

And then to top it all off, while waiting for my bus home, I caught this gull doing a magic act!  See how he's making the paper bag hover in mid-air?!

(also caught a glimpse of this funny bird standing across the street from where I was. She looked oddly familiar somehow...)

Daring Exposé

C'est moi, captured with my laptop's webcam, altered online with

Pixlr-o-matic

Picmonkey

Perfect Effects 4 (free download)

to participate in Bonnie's photo art self-portrait challenge at Pixel Dust Photo Art

If you want to experiment with different effects for your photos, these sites are each a fun place to play.  They won't replace Photoshop for me, or the subtlety of adjusting layers of textures and blending modes, but they're a good outlet for some whooping and hollering with pixels.

(and are less costly and invasive than a facelift)

(PS. I chickened out and took this post down last night, but Christine of Mystic Meandering caught me out and encouraged me with kind words, so I'm sucking it up and sticking my face back on top of my Décolleté.)

La Bolduc

One of the many things I love about Montreal is the wide choice of restaurants, cafés and bistros.

 A colourful favourite is La Bolduc,

Echoing the writing on the wall of the post just previous to this, La Bolduc sports a fine specimen of graffiti.  I can't help but wonder, though, if it's been commissioned to be painted, does it still qualify as graffiti?

Or is wall art by any other name still graffiti?  In any case, this rather abstract design looks to me like an artist's impression of the hefty lunch I ordered.

After consuming the whole thing, I felt very familiar with the concept of "hefty."  This burger involved ground lamb (oh, that does sound barbaric!  My apologies to any vegetarians out there) and goat cheese; two things I almost never eat at home so am compelled to order when confronted with them on a menu.

The restaurant is named after a colourful and extremely popular Quebecoise entertainer who made her way to widespread popularity (that is, within the confines of the province of Quebec) in the 1930's.

 Wikipedia informs us:

Mary Rose-Anna Travers, (June 4, 1894 – February 20, 1941) was   a French Canadian singer and musician. She was known as Madame Bolduc or La Bolduc. During the peak of her popularity in the 1930s, she was known as the Queen of Canadian Folksingers. Bolduc is often considered to be Quebec's first singer/songwriter. Her style combined the traditional folk music of Ireland and Quebec, usually in upbeat, comedic songs.

Let's add a tinge of nostalgia to the scene, shall we?

Eh oui,, c'est bien moi p'is mon chum, Pierre
(*thanks to Kim Klassen for the photo texture)

At any rate, these two oldies but goodies had a wonderful lunch in great company, 

sitting out on la terrasse chez Mme. Bolduc.

And here, for your further edification and entertainment is a little "heritage moment" from the annals of Canadian popular history.

Apologies

I extend my apologies from the bottom of my glass heart to those dear blog friends who so kindly left me farewell messages and welcome back notes and where-the-hell-are-you SOS's in these past few days.  I have, indeed, burrowed back into the bosom of the hills in which I live and am enjoying lazing about on the decrepit wicker, making an occasional foray to the beach, or town, or even an island.  I do have some photos to share and am working on getting them ready.  I apologise for posting my mug here but it's to toast my blog friends and ask you all over for a refreshing drink while you're waiting for me to pop up with something a little tastier. 

Back very soon--I promise!

Cheers!

Why I'm Still at the Computer at 1:30 a.m.--er--better make that 2:30 now...

I was conscientiously sorting through my confusing filing system of photos in the computer when I got distracted by images that cried out to be messed around with. These are generally photos that aren't so hot but maybe they could be rescued or changed up into something other than what they started out as (ie. a crummy picture). This is the work of an obsessive/compulsive type personality, I am beginning to think. Art-making is kind of like that.

Early this week I was surprised to find the sky startlingly bright when I went to close my curtains before going to bed after a long session at the computer.  "Oh, it must be the full moon," I thought.  But then it kept getting lighter and I realized, "This is what dawn looks like!"  It happened to me again the other night, after working on a little painting in my studio from 11 p.m. until 5 a.m.  I had just wandered into my studio to take a last look at the painting I'd struggled with earlier in the day,  but then I was seized with an impulse to change a little something in it, which led to a bigger something needing adjustment, and so it went, quietly and with great concentration and energy, oblivious to the passing of the hours.

This is an already altered photo of stitching by a friend of mine. The two images above are the result of a couple more hours worth of fiddling with this photo and a blurry one of my daughter, then converting them both into "brushes" in Photoshop.   The brush actually works like a stamp, so I can use it again and again, willy-nilly, anywhere I want, within the confines of Photoshop.  How cool is that!?  Cool enough to keep me up till the wee small hours of the morning.

I must admit, I do feel extremely bleary-eyed at the end of the day and my glasses seem to stop working long before I do.  It's all about artistic vision I guess, and bearing witness to the darkest hour just before dawn.

(Perhaps the biggest challenge with staying up so late, or going to bed so early, is whether or not to have breakfast before going to sleep.  Peanut-buttered toast with sliced peaches and a big glass of milk...mmmm.  Better not.  Signing off now, 3:00 a.m.)

P.S.  Couldn't leave well enough alone.  Began my computing day at 11 this morning and puttered about in Adobeland some more. 

I think I may need an intervention!

We interrupt this program...

At last, the glider swing is up!  Refurbished, renovated, rejuvenated, revived, revitalized, revamped.  Pierre has been sweating long hard laborious hours to get the glider up and swingworthy for the visit of our daughter this weekend.  Today it was ready to reassemble and we helped him heave it into place.

Let the G & T's begin!

Wish you were here!

Sail Away

I sailed away to Vancouver Island for the weekend. 

It was sunny enough to sport my new shades.

The mountains rose from the ocean but thankfully did not erupt. 

Sticks, stones, sea.

I did find a totem pole...

as well as a totem of a different sort!

I wished I had an Orca I could sail away on.

So you see, I have been busy.

Boogey On

One of the ways I cheer myself up and get my energy flowing is to dance.  Yup.  All by myself, groovin' away in my studio most afternoons, CBC Radio 2's Drive cranked up whenever a good tune comes on.  I find having some good loud music playing also helps me attack whatever painting I'm working on.  But if something with an irresistible groove comes on, I just have to lay down the paint brush and take to the "dance floor."  Dancing has been an outlet for me most of my life, starting dance classes at age 3.  For a time, I was a dancer on stages in front of audiences.  Nothing big, but enough to feed my passion, if not to put food on my table.

Here's a newspaper clipping of moi, many many moons ago, that I touched up to fit with the lyrics of a song I rocked out to in my studio this afternoon ("rocking out" being a relative term these days).

"Oh baby blue oh baby blue

come here I'm gonna smear another colour over you

get out of bed you little sleepy head your black

and white needs a little bit of red

your black and white needs a little bit of red."

A pared-down version, but nice and raw.
Turn up the volume!

Apologies

I'm feeling like an idiot!  I must apologise to those cherished blog friends who have recently left comments to which I failed to reply.  It wasn't that I was ignoring you, it was that I hadn't found them.  Clever clogs that I am, I had recently changed my blog settings so that any comments made 2 or more days after my posting appeared would have to be "moderated" by me.  I then never checked the place where such notifications appear.  So if you have been feeling slighted or ignored by me in the past week, it was purely unintentional on my part.  Tonight  I found  buried treasures from Owen, Saj, Driftwood, Gwen, Shirl and Anya, waiting for me to unearth and put up on my blog mantlepiece, framed in shiny new responses from moi.  I have reset the blog to immediately wing-up your cherished comments as soon as you have deciphered the mystery of the word verification.  In the future, if you do not have a response from me, it means that, yes, I am ignoring you!  But if your comment hasn't been deleted, it could also meant that I am secretly delighted and at a loss for words.  Or, unlikely though it may be, actually out somewhere doing something else not blog-related.

We 3 Kinks of Orient Tar

Actually, we're more like wool-gatherers as we 3 kinks were sporting skeins of yummy indigo-hued yarn on our heads while hanging out in our hostess's kitchen in Montreal.  It's just something we do. 

From this post and the one below, you might surmise that I'm getting into a Christmas Mood.  Now, a Christmas Mood might be a good thing or a bad thing, but the Buddhists would say "not good/not bad, just is."  It is what it is.Whatever that is. 

***

I must admit, with the recent snowfall, the Christmas lights that many houses and yards are displaying do reflect charmingly in the night white.  We witnessed many such delights on our way to yoga class tonight.  Oh, we don't attend any fancy Lulu Lemon attired hot yoga spots for our weekly stretch and centering dose; our little group meets in someone's finished basement room.  A room with a labyrinth painted on the wood floor underneath the carpets, no less.  We walked the labyrinth tonight.  I felt in a hurry to get to the middle but had to continue round and out and in and about at a slow, meditative pace.  And once I'd reached the middle, suddenly, unexpectedly, I had no choice but to continue moving on, outward, inward, until I found myself at the outer opening--unceremoniously and quietly expelled, like a dying breath, finished.  A labyrinth, I learned, reflects the Path of Life.

But I was talking about Christmas Moods and kinkiness and wooly ways.  Some years I'm very into the whole decorating for the holidays thing.  I have a few stalwartly unusual ornaments stashed in the attic and I usually finagle Pierre into chopping down a stunted pine tree from out back.  I make incredible Nanaimo Bars, disastrous shortbread, amazing California Fruit Cake, and macaroons that fall to pieces before you can lift them to your mouth.  Tradition, you know?  But this year we are going elsewhere for Christmas so the pressure is off.  No decorating.  No one is coming here.  No need to put up a jolly front.

I do like seeing outher people's decorated homes.  Mostly.  But I admit I have trouble understanding or tolerating those weird blow-up lawn ornaments that began cropping up a few years ago.  Do you have them where you live?  I'm sorry if I offend any one's sensibilities here, but I, personally, think those things are a god-awful blight upon any neighbourhood in which they appear.  Polar bears with top hats, Santa Claus with his bag of tricks, penguins with scarves, and to top it all off, a merry-go-round (that acutally goes round) inside a giant snow-globe with fake snowflakes flying, thanks to some monstrous generator roaring beside the house.  I suppose retired folks put the things up to please the grandkids.  What sort of example are they setting?!  What sort of aesthetic are they presenting to those innocent, unsuspecting, untrammelled minds?  Do they think they are installing a miniature, stationary Macy's Santa Claus Parade?  I just don't get it.

On my neighbourhood walk the other day, I noticed several examples of all the above-mentioned inflated atrocities.  They were repulsive and seductive at the same time, like an over-aged hooker.  "Practice tolerance," I thought to myself.  "They are not good or bad, they simply are."

The next day, however, I could not repress a small chuckle when I strolled through the same neighbourhood and discovered that all the air-filled Christmas lawn monstrosities had been deflated!  It seems that someone had skulked through the area in the dead of night and taken a small, sharp object to every last one of them.   Now, I do not in any way wish to promote vandalism of any sort:  I prefer to think of it as a desperate act of good taste.  And no, officer, it wasn't me! 

I was busy at home pulling the wool over my eyes.

We Interrupt This Blog...

New and Improved: Movin' On Bonus Valu-Pak!

We interrupt this blog to bring you a bonus illustration, generously suggested by FCW (that's a Fart in the Cosmic Wind for those of you who haven't caught a whiff of his blog before) who sent me a link to a (White) Spot of nostalgia that beautifully illustrates the drive-in I mentioned in the post below (see: "Movin' On").

White Spot No1, Granville Street - 1958

20"H x 32"W; Limited Edition Giclee ; Price:$700

Artist:  Brian Croft

The folks here at Décolleté (well, me) have also thoughtfully provided a video of the tune "Beep beep!" where you can view some pretty sweet little Nash Ramblers and join in the singing with Margaret over at Margaret Panpipes, who knows all the words to the chorus.



Happy Days, indeed.  At least for a kid like me who enjoyed riding around in the back seat of her parents' car, going to the drive-in restaurant for supper, and listening to goofy pop songs on the radio. 

I hope my little self-indulgent trip down Memory Lane will not make too many of you younger folk out there, such as my dear blog pal the  Sagittarian, or my adoptive baby brother  Owen,  feel that their childhoods were deprived in any way!

And here's a family photo, taken round about this time.  I'm sitting on my grandmother's lap (note my poodle skirt! My saddle shoes, alas, had already worn out), my great-grandfather sits behind us, my dad sits in the centre of the picture (note his cool jacket with the leather sleeves), my mother (note the bright red lipstick and long hair pulled back in a braid) holds my relatively new baby sister on her lap, while my great-grandmother sports a jaunty neckerchief.  My grandfather is behind the camera.

There and Back Again

So, last time we spoke, I was telling you that I was about to head back to the east coast.
This is how it went...

After taking a bus to downtown Vancouver, I connected with the new Canada Line Sky Train. Half of the ride, though, is underground, so it's not technically a "sky" train at that point. But let's not get picky; it's too early in the morning to split hairs about terminology. I'm just happy to clamber on board and be whisked (again, not shaken or stirred--well, maybe a little stirred, emotionally speaking) out to the airport.




En route, we pass over the mighty Fraser River. Still enough trees to be cut down for the logging industry, apparently. Out the front window of the sky train, we see YVR getting closer. I must admit that it freaks me out a bit to not have a human driver on the train. It's all computerized. And very new.





Here's the other side of that carving I photographed upon my arrival here 5 weeks ago. Remember the surprised face? Well, it was on the backside (literally) of "Big Bird" here. Maybe that's why it had such a shocked look on its face. Inside the airport are more examples of native art, which I love.





And this is a parting shot of yours truly, taken inside the cavernous, colourful, and sparkly clean ladies' washroom. I added a few special FX to disguise my true identity...and age!

As The Crow Flies...

I am having such a good time being on the road, I think I'll just keep on going! Next time I blog to you, I'll be in Vancouver. West Coast or Bust, babies!

Please stay tuned...

Song Saturday

Here's a retro shot. One of my 2nd year art school courses was photography. I had a 35 mm Konica and took black and white pictures only. I had the whole kit & caboodle to develop my film. It was a tricky business of mixing the right ratio of chemicals, winding the unexposed film onto a spindle, fitting it all into a magic canister, and shaking it all up for a specified amount of seconds. This was done while shut away in a pitch black chamber the size of a broom closet. Not my favourite part of the process, being slightly claustrophobic. I must have been particularly anxious on the day I developed this film as it came out exceedingly grainy. Given the subject of the picture, though, I thought the (unintentional) effect added to the atmosphere.

A favourite album of mine during this time was by Jeff Beck. It's one of the few records I still have stashed up in the attic (but am too lazy to go to the top of the house right now to check the title). This tune isn't on the album but it's suitably short for a blog posting and one that I really like. I thought this picture would go well with the song's title, "Drown in my own Tears."