Fun Match

Ran in a fun match this afternoon. Courses were the 2007 Cynosport Grand Prix Finals and the Steeplechase Finals. Did pretty well on contacts but Tyra was struggling with doubles again.

Sloooow Friday

Work again. Even less incentive than normal to go in. Finished off a photo order in the morning. Little Avery label printer no longer works properly, don't know if it's a Vista drivers thing. It used to be fine on the other computer with XP. Ended up printing sheet of stickers with logo and writing file name on back. Not quite as elegant but does the job.
Heather rang, she and Lois were taking the dogs to the chiropractor in the afternoon. Arranged to go to lunch at the Cheshire Cat. That killed a couple of hours. Lamb curry and a pint of Marston's Pedigree

Back to Work

No more vacation days left this year, so in work again.
Anyway, guess what - It's snowing!
Looking pretty white again out there. Should make for interesting driving home and out to RedGate for agility practice. Better make the effort.
Premium lists are out for all Dreamfields trials up to end of May. It's official - my name is written down in black and white - I'm a judge! OK, just a probationer, but still a judge. I know I have loads of time but should think about designing my courses now.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Day. Matthew stayed last night and got to open presents with us. Clothes, chocs, DVDs and books were the order of the day. Catherine bought Matthew an acoustic guitar. Took him a while to figure out how to attach the strap.
Spoke to mum. Grant, Scott and Alex were over and playing the traditional games :-). Paul's mum & dad rang too. They were at John and Jacqui's for a few days. Seemed to like their "luxury" hamper present.
Had a pretty lazy day. Bucks fizz before Xmas dinner and just finished the rest of the wine off with the food. Ate around one and then just lounged around.
Yesterday, a softbox I'd got from eBay arrived. I figured out how to set it up after a bit of trial and error. I was hoping to take pictures of Catherine & Matthew but they didn't seem too keen. Matthew skipped off to see his girlfriend and just arrived home late enough for Catherine to be in bed. She has to get up to be in work for 5am, working at the Future Shop Boxing day sales. Anyway, managed to get Ivan to sit for a couple of shots. Still need some work on lighting techniques but I got one nice shot.
Watched an old film on the History channel but didn't break open the DVDs yet.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve, and I'm at work :-(
It rained all yesterday and washed away a lot of the snow. Then it froze overnight so it's very slippy out. Flurries threatened for this afternoon. That's all we need. Snow on top of ice.
It's lunchtime now so I'm off to the Barley Mow to stuff my face.
Later..
So much for that idea. A pub closed on Christmas Eve! What sort of country is this? At home in England it would be standing room only and you'd have to book a couple of months in advance for food in the evening!
Went to the vietnamese restaurant in the same block instead. Still ate loads. Chicken chop suey. ~burp~
Oh, it's snowing lots now. I'd better leave before the shops shut. Still a few things to get yet - like something for Catherine's boyfriend, Alan, and something for Matthew's girlfriend, Tristan. Paul just dropped that one on me.

Photo Session

Natalie came round today to show me what she'd learned at a recent lighting lesson with a local photographer. We set up the lights. Main was fairly low, bounced into umbrella with the light set horizontal and positioned to the side of the subject. Fill light was also horizontal, bounced into an umbrella but set as high as possible and placed in the centre behind the camera. Fill light should be set about 1 stop less than the main. I think the lights were set to output a bit too much power. Note to self: Dial down a notch next time. Flash meter was reading f11 at 1/125 and ISO 120. I was aiming for f5.6-6.3 at 1/125 and ISO 100 as ideal. With the overhead room light switched off and just working with ambient and modelling lights, the Mk3 had no trouble focusing. Looking at the preview, noticed a grey rectangle on the lower left of the display. Switched cards and it still appeared so switched over to using the Mk2. Focusing the mk2 was much more difficult in the same light. Shot some pics of Tyra, Ivan and Natalie's dog Sparky. Many mediocre shots. A couple of nice ones but there were some hot spots because of the lights being set to too high a power. Practice makes perfect :-)
Went out to agility practice afterwards and on to Mexi's in Carleton Place. Ready to sleep it off now.

A Lazy Day

A lazy day which starts with a trip to the gym :-)
Get up, watched Eastenders, went to the Post Office, came back, ate French Onion Soup and went to the gym for 2pm.
Tip: Don't eat French Onion Soup before going to the gym. It makes you thirsty!
Had to make a trip to Canadian Tire on the way home to return boots I'd bought for Paul the day before. He came back from Walmart this morning with some new boots! Battled my way through the traffic to visit the sports equipment store to look for a replacement Xmas present. Settled on a Polar Heart monitor and a balancing ball thingy. Didn't think there's be much chance of him coming home with either of those two items.
Brushed the dogs and did nails. Boris is leaving bits of himself all over the floor. He's the worst. Tyra comes a close second. She was looking pretty scruffy. Looking a lot better now.

Christmas shopping

I had a few items to pick up at lunchtime today. One of them being a laminated print from Costco. Horrors! The parking lot was insane! I'm glad I only had to go to the photodesk to pickup and not do any shopping in that place. The thought of the long lines of people at the checkout with their trolleys piled high with "stuff" made me shudder.
Next stop Canadian Tire. I wanted to find a pair of winter boots for Paul. Not a great selection, but I fond a pair which promised warmth down to -40C. That'll do, I thought. Picked up 3 toblerones on the way to the cash. Then came the lunchtime treat. Poutine from Glen's Chip van. He makes the best chips in the area. Mmmm.
Chips eaten, I then went to the shoe shop to ask about replacing a zip in my almost-new winter boots. Some one, not mentioning any names but it begins with a "P", had left the door to the shoe cupboard open allowing Ivan to sneak off with one of them. Couldn't resist calling in the "things" store next door to browse the kitchen items. Didn't buy anything for myself, but would love one of those gaggia coffee machines..

Published!

So Indy has her photo in the Ottawa Citizen today. This one. Looks good in print! Already had one e-mail from a friend who was obviously up and reading the paper before I was. A work colleague spotted it too and was asking me about Belgian Shepherds.
It's the works Christmas outing today. A lunchtime trip to the comedy club downtown. Haven't been to one of these places before. Apparently the comedians can be good or absolutely terrible. You never know what you're going to get.
Had some good news yesterday. I've been approved to judge up to advanced level for AAC. My first judging assignments will be at Dreamfields. Starters on May 3rd and Advanced on May 30th. Heard that Peter passed too. Curious to find out how the others from our group did.

Shoegazing

Don't believe it. It's snowing again! When will it ever stop! Sky is full and it's really grey. Think I'll be leaving work early this afternoon. Went out for a curry at lunchtime with Paul and a couple of his colleagues (ex colleagues he used to work with until November). Can't really concentrate now, ready for hibernation, I think. You can see I'm bored...

More Snow

It's snowing again. Though they just call it "flurries". Still pretty cold. Cold enough for me to want to go and buy some new boots. I'm looking out of my office window at the roads below, thinking about whether I want to venture out at all. Actually, I will have to go out at some point. The dogs need food and I have to go to the pet shop. Better do it now before the flurries turn to "real" snow.

The day after the storm

Sunny but cold. The agility equipment is almost buried. The jumps with the top bar at 26" show how deep the snow is. The upside - the wind isn't as fierce. It's still cold at around -12C but the sun is shining. Makes all the difference!

The snow storm

So we had a big snowstorm here in Ottawa. A couple of foot of snow fell during the day. This is the view from out of the front door. Pretty grey looking!
The dogs had lots of fun playing in the snow, but us humans didn't have as much fun as it was not only cold and snowing, but WINDY!