Staying Close to Home

When GMaps sent me a summary of my November ramblings, it was apparent that we hadn't rambled very far.

That map ↑ pretty much sums it up. It appears as though we confined ourselves to about 9km² or about 3.5mi². That's a rough estimate only, but we're all friends here so absolute precision doesn't matter too very much. Eh?

We did extend ourselves beyond those limits twice, once north and once east, but GMaps didn't pick up on it as it usually does. 

No wonder that I only have to fill up with gas once in a typical month – at least in a typical winter month, and November is darn close to winter hereabouts. 

Considering the price of gas, I guess that isn't a bad thing.

Perception

I am contemplating what our own senses tell us compared to what others’ senses tell them. Do you really see what I see? Do I hear what you hear? And what about taste and smell?

It was Sue who got me started on this track.

If we are outdoors you will only very infrequently see a picture of Sue sans sunglasses, except perhaps if we’re doing coffee in the car on an overcast day. Or maybe even outside in winter under a very cloudy sky.  I swear that she considers donning them during a full moon at midnight.

But I didn’t know until just yesterday that even as a child she had to sit facing away from the window at dinner hour. And they didn’t have a big window either. I do wonder what it would be like to see as she does, but other than having an inkling, I will never know for sure.

Add it to the growing list of things I don't know, not really about Sue, but I am referring to my lack of knowledge in general.

Is my azure blue sky the same colour as yours? We assume so, but we don’t know. Surely, an artistic person sees differently than the rest of us. We know about colour-blind people, but I expect there are all sort of gradations of colour perception.

Just as surely, a musician must hear differently than I do, especially those gifted (or cursed?) with perfect pitch. Also consider how we hear at different volume levels. In my case, my hearing loss frightens me when my hearing aids are out. And sometimes when they're in too.

Taste is so obvious, isn’t it? While broccoli is anathema to me, Frumpy Prof  Pipe loves it. Jonathan will only eat raw carrots, but I need them so highly roasted that the carroty taste is obliterated. Even then, gravy helps. Sue loves to put cauliflower in a salad; I can only handle it well cooked and smothered in cheese. These are not things that we choose but the way that we are.

Clearly our brains all work differently too, other than just what our senses perceive. My introverted brain, doubtless, perceives and processes differently that your more extroverted brain. While you may be stimulated by social situations, they likely tire me. I can handle them well in moderation, but then I will be happy to withdraw and recharge.

I don’t have any great insight or conclusion to draw from these ruminations (which spellcheck tells me I can’t pluralize) because I am just an old guy sitting in his easy chair, with vague notions fleetingly passing through his wee brain.

The Caturday Trail

Every winter, for 16 years in this house, there has been a cat following this route from wherever to wherever. They cross in front of the porch from left to right and then wend their way down the driveway. They do this is summer too, but their pussy toes leave no evidential trace then. We have to be in the right place at the right time to spot them in summer, but it does happen.

I wonder how many cats have made this their habitual path. It always seems to be just one at a time, and we know that the first one, who belonged to a neighbour, has long since departed for the great tuna dish in the sky.

And that is the whole post for this Caturday. Have a good weekend.

My Prerogative

I am sure that my hockey photos are not fascinating to most people, but since I spend time taking and processing them, it is my prerogative lol to post them (see below for prerogative). For the next few months I will probably post, one game per week although I am sure there will be a Christmas break. 

I do my best with these, but in case you are new, I will tell you that I am shooting through glass, and the glass is often marked where pucks have hit it. So, I do my my best, often in not super lighting, and post on the team's fb page for the parents to see.

I like the posture in this first photo with the taller guy (on our team) bending so low that he's at the height of the shorter opposition player. The faces of the three boys behind also adds interest. ↓

A shot was attempted, and they look to see where it goes. so there is both action and facial expression in the photo. ↓

Another peak action shot of an intense scramble at the goal mouth. ↓

Number 12 was the player of the game – the King. He scored three of the team's five goals, and I am pretty sure that this was one of the goals. ↓

When I look at the spelling of prerogative, I begin to think I have been saying it wrong all of my life, but then I see that it is also considered correct to say it my way puh-rog-uh-tiv, and I feel better. lol https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day/prerogative-2021-12-02/

In His Buppa's Footsteps Trod JJ

Do you see what Jonathan did?

Yup. He made this hockey card from a photo that I had done. This one ↓ 

Pretty smart, and he did it all from his phone. He explains:

I added the picture and the logo with an app called picsart. I added the name with another app called phon.to and I got the overlay online.

He's 12, which is probably three years younger than me when I learned to tie my shoes. 😁😎

Back when he was just beginning hockey, I did do a card in Photoshop. Ain't he cute?

An 8x10 of that still hangs on my wall, or at least on my cupboard door. As does this collage, which I quite like.

I photographed a game last night, so I may bore you with another hockey pic post tomorrow. But for today, I wanted to showoff JJ's excellent work. My stuff was just filler.

Bokeh Balls

How did I get this effect? They're called bokeh balls, but for all I know there may also be other names. It's a fun effect with Christmas lights.

I opened the aperture (IOW, made the lens hole as wide as I could) then I focused on a close object. I kept the shutter button half depressed while I recomposed the photo. That mean the focus was still locked on something close, and therefore, the far away lights of the tree were thrown way out of focus.

You will probably need an actual camera to really make this work. Because you can't control the aperture in a phone camera (at least in none that I know of), you can't get the background that far out of focus. You should be able to get some blur, but nothing like this.

I also have a few photos of the party that Sue took on here phone, and I promise that will be the end of the tree party for another year.

JJ and me early on. Unplanned, we were both wearing our team's logo.

When Danica got home from work Sue wanted a picture of the cutie in the hat that she wears to work, and I had to get a photo with her. In addition to the hat, she must also wear a net over her hair because she cuts fruit and veggies all day. I never though of this until now.

And here are two of mom's smocked balls, hanging in the tree.

I think that will do for the tree party, but fair warning, there's a hockey game tonight.

Present Via Her Crafting

Some of you asked about the lack of masks for most people at the Christmas Parade. I wondered about what would be the protocol before going, but rightly or wrongly, I figured that the cold would really inhibit the transmission of water droplets. And . . . this is a big one . . . there was not a single active case in our slice of the health unit region.

Now, back to the tree party. No, I am not going rehash the whole thing, but I do want to declare that my dearly departed mother was remembered and did play her usual part in the festivities. (Have you ever heard of festivity being used in the singular?)

Unexpectedly, Shauna produced my mother's little sewing basket which she had covered with smocking. I don't know where she got the cigarette case because no one in our family has ever smoked, but it contained some of her buttons. I have a vague memory of playing with a larger button collection than this when I was quite a wee tyke. 

I purposefully included the afghan, which is a Sue creation. It is one of three candy cane afghans that Sue has crocheted. I thought the juxtaposition of my mother's crafty stuff and Sue's afghan was appropriate.

Then, near the end of the decorating of the tree, out came Mom's smocked Christmas balls.

If I am counting correctly she smocked 17 balls over 17 years. We have another set, for she would do two similar ones every year, one for each of her two granddaughters. 

We all want to be remembered by our children and grandchildren, and I am sure she had this in mind when she did the work. I'd say that her work has been effective.

I don't know if it is obvious, but I did have a bit of a moment looking at and touching them again. My smile wasn't very smiley when Sue prompted me in the second photo. Shauna calls them The Feels.

We're not quite done with my mother's lingering presence at the party, for the last touch was putting the skirt at the bottom of the tree, which Mom made, possibly ~1990.

Some say that in one way of looking at life and death, there can be said to be three deaths. The first is when your heart stops beating. The second is when they put you in the ground. The third occurs when your name is spoken for the last time. Even though Mary has been gone for almost 19 years, she is still around us and is remembered, and we trust that this will continue for a few decades yet – every year when Christmas rolls around, and probably at other times too.