Life in progress


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Just Jot It Jan 12 – Tingle, with Thursday Doors

One of the amazing things about writing a novel set in a real city is the opportunity to visit it. I went even further in my book, The Great Dagmaru, and had my main character, Stephen Dagmar, go to school at Queen’s University, in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. That I get tingles walking around the beautiful old campus is an understatement.

When I took these pictures, I thought of our dear departed friend, Paul Curran. He went to this school too. I hoped to show them to him, but I never had the chance.

Enjoy.

The links:

Thursday Doors is brought to you by the awesome Norm Frampton. You can find him and his awesome pictures here: https://miscellaneousmusingsofamiddleagedmind.wordpress.com/2017/01/12/thursday-doors-january-12-2017/

The Just Jot It January prompt of the day, “tingle,” is brought to you by the awesome Tessa. Check out her blog here: https://finallyawriter.com/

And you can be awesome too, by joining in JusJoJan! Check out the prompt post of the day, where you can find the rules and lots of other awesome posts, here: https://lindaghill.com/2017/01/12/jusjojan-daily-prompt-jan-12th17/


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Just Jot It Jan 8 – Mongrel

I’d never had a mongrel before I got Winston. But that’s okay;

mongrel

Winston has never had a human before.

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Thanks so much, Geoff, for the prompt today! You can find him here, at TanGental.

And a special thank you to Dan for hosting today’s Just Jot It January! Dan can be found at No Facilities.

This post is part of JusJoJan: https://lindaghill.com/2017/01/08/jusjojan-daily-prompt-jan-8th17/


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Just Jot It Jan 2 – Time

Since the prompt for K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge today is about time as well, I’ve decided to combine this JusJoJan post with theirs.

I took these pictures while I was waiting for the Super Moon to rise in November. The sun was setting quite prettily in the west, beyond the bridge. There’s always been something about the transition between day and night for me that denotes peace. And yet the images my camera picked up were decidedly more along the lines of apocalyptic.

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These are just as my phone camera took them, using the built-in software on the device. It’s nice for someone like me with little in the way of photographic skill to have my camera do such nice things for me.

Thanks to JoAnna for today’s JusJoJan prompt, “Time.” You can find her post here: https://joannesilvia.com/2017/01/02/time-time-time-catching-up/

If you you’d like to join in the Cosmic Challenge, you can find the prompt here: https://diaryofaninternetnobody.com/2016/12/30/cosmic-photo-prompt-34/

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And finally, you can find today’s Just Jot It January prompt here: https://lindaghill.com/2017/01/02/jusjojan-daily-prompt-jan-2nd17/ Click the link and join in today!


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#ThursdayDoors and Cee’s Fun Photos – Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada

In August, I went with my museum-loving son to Ottawa to visit, among others, the Canadian Museum of Nature. The museum is housed in a beautiful, historic building.

There’s more history to this place than I can recount in one sitting. Here’s just a small sample:
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“After the burning of the Parliament Buildings on the night of 3rd February, 1916, the House of Commons assembled in this building on the 4th and the Senate on the 8th February. Parliament met here for the last time on the 10th November, 1919 and assembled for the first time in the rebuilt Parliament Buildings on 26th February, 1920.”

I love taking pictures of doors when I can see them from the outside as well as in. Please click on any of the images to take a closer look.

It’s impossible to get the whole building in one shot from the front because the road is too narrow and there are houses across the street. But I did find this neat site, where you can slide the cursor back and forth to see a before (1912) and after (2013, when they renovated): http://www.pastottawa.com/comparison/canadian-museum-of-nature/113/ The photo is taken from the northeast – apparently the road was too narrow to get a full shot even a century ago.

If you enjoyed this post and would like to see more doors and participate, too, please visit Norm Frampton’s site here for links and instructions.

Cee’s Fun Photo Challenge this week is also all about entrances and doors! Here’s her link as well: https://ceenphotography.com/2016/11/08/cees-fun-foto-challenge-entrances-and-doors/

Thanks to Norm and Cee for the prompts!


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One-Liner Wednesday – Turn, turn, turn

benchb

Plus ça change,

 

benchaplus c’est la même chose.

http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/pluscachange.htm

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Anyone who would like to participate, feel free to use the “One-Liner Wednesday” title in your post, and if you do,
you can ping back here to help your blog get more exposure. To execute a ping back, just copy the URL in the address bar on this post, and paste it somewhere in the body of your post. Your link will show up in the comments below. Please ensure that the One-Liner Wednesday you’re pinging back to is this week’s! Otherwise, no one will likely see it but me.

NOTE: Pingbacks only work from WordPress sites. If you’re self-hosted or are participating from another host, like Blogger, please leave a link to your post in the comments below.

As with Stream of Consciousness Saturday (SoCS), if you see a ping back from someone else in my comment section, click and have a read. It’s bound to be short and sweet.

Unlike SoCS, this is not a prompt so there’s no need to stick to the same “theme.”

The rules that I’ve made for myself (but don’t always follow) for “One-Liner Wednesday” are:

1. Make it one sentence.

2. Try to make it either funny or inspirational.

3. Use our unique tag #1linerWeds.

4. Add our very cool badge to your post for extra exposure!

5. Have fun!

#1linerWeds badge by nearlywes.com

#1linerWeds badge by nearlywes.com


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K’Lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Prompt – Reflections

I was playing around with my phone camera last week and realized there were some cool settings on it. I hadn’t noticed before that I can take a negative picture, or a monochrome or sepia, or solarized…

I had no idea what I was doing at the time; I couldn’t see the screen for the sunshine, so I just started snapping photos. The first two are solarized shots of the sun setting over the water. I did nothing to alter these after they were taken.

All-focus

All-focus

All-focus

All-focus

Here’s a panoramic shot I took, without filters, of the same scene.

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And here’s one I took a couple of weeks ago from the same spot.

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Unaltered.

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And mucked about with.

This collection of shots is brought to you by K’Lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge where the theme this week is “reflections.”


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#ThursdayDoors – My Neighbourhood

I’ve always been a little fascinated with this little house around the corner from where I live. As I walked past it a few weeks back, I decided to take a picture.

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It’s not just the narrow doors that intrigue me, it’s the iron bars on the upper windows and the lace curtains in the lower ones that really bring the whole thing together, which sparks my imagination.

Here’s a closeup of the lovely doors.

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I live in a decidedly old part of town. Many Loyalists settled here in the 1850s, and quite a few of the houses from that era still stand. Here’s one that’s a bit different.

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I’ll have to go back after the leaves fall to get a picture of it all the way to the top.

Here’s the door, in all its yellow splendour.

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I’ve missed participating in this prompt. It’s good to be back. Thank you to Norm Frampton, our host. You can find him here https://miscellaneousmusingsofamiddleagedmind.wordpress.com/2016/10/13/thursday-doors-october-13-2016/ Why don’t you join in too? 🙂


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#SoCS – Your Servant

Ah, the things we do for our kids. I drove to Ottawa today for our (my son, Chris, and I) other annual museum pilgrimage. This one is a tour of four different museums – today was the History museum (in Gatineau, where above-mentioned son was born) and the War museum. It’s doubtful I’d ever have visited either of them on my own, but now, after having been to each at least half a dozen times, they feel like home. I seem to discover something new each year – the War museum never fails to humble.

The back of Canada's Parliament buildings from across the river

The back of Canada’s Parliament buildings from across the river

Canadian Museum of History

Canadian Museum of History

Now I’m sitting in my own room, having procured a suite at the St. Paul University residence with two separate bedrooms and a kitchen for under $100. Not bad, eh? Apparently I snore, so my poor son doesn’t like to sleep in the same room as me. (Yes, this is how you know this is stream of consciousness. Normally I wouldn’t admit to such a thing, but no editing…)

Tomorrow we’ll visit the Agriculture and Food Museum (oooh, that might be nice) in lieu of the Science museum we usually go to but can’t because it’s closed. Then it will be on to the Nature museum. Another one I’ve been to, actually more times than the others, because I went there once on a field trip as well. Chris has probably been to them all a dozen times. But he’s Autistic, so he enjoys the repetition.

We got lost when we were looking for the hotel/residence. The street address doesn’t show up from the street – it’s tucked in behind the university and there is loads of construction as well. Chris began to freak out, so I went to one of the local businesses and asked where the place was. He keeps telling me he wants to come to Japan with me. I found today to be a perfect time to explain to him that I get lost often. In Canada, where I speak the language (and can even get by in French), it’s easy to ask for directions. In Japan… I walk around a lot, looking for things myself, even when I’m lost. I can’t imagine what it would be like, as anxious as I sometimes get when I can’t find where I’m supposed to go, having an Autistic 21 year old going through a conniption with me.

So yeah, that probably won’t happen. But the things we do for our kids.

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This has been a perfect example of not using the prompt other than in the title of a post for Stream of Consciousness Saturday. But that’s fair! Because the title prompted what came next. Feel free to follow this and all the other (lax) rules you’ll find here, for SoCS: https://lindaghill.com/2016/08/26/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-august-2716/


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It’s A Winner!

For most of the day yesterday the race for our new Stream of Consciousness Saturday badge was a close one. When I posted last night’s reminder, Willow’s “Wildflowers,” JoAnna’s “Rocks and Water,” and John’s “Digital Sky” were neck in neck for the lead. Trailing not far behind were Helen’s “Fast-Moving Stream,” Deborah’s “Firework Fantasy,” Dale’s “Thoughts,” and “ KG’s “Long and Winding Road” in that order.

Then I posted my reminder to vote and one badge took off! Though most of the other badges gained votes, the winner became clear. By a landslide, with 38% of the votes, the winner is…

Oh wait. I should take a moment to honour our outgoing badge. Thank you for serving us so well for the past year. And here’s hoping our friend “Hope Floats” returns to WordPress soon! We miss you!

SoCS badge 2015

So now, without further ado…

except for a drum roll…

of course…

our new SoCS badge is brought to you by…

John Holton!!

John Holton!!

Congratulations, John!

The two runners up were JoAnna with 22% of the votes and Willow with 16%.

Thanks so much to all our lovely contestants for your amazing efforts. And congratulations to all for entering!


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Last Chance to Vote

We’re down to the wire for choosing our new Stream of Consciousness Saturday badge and it’s so close! It’s a race between three of the contestants with only one vote between each, but it’s still not too late for the other four to catch up.

Tell your friends! Send up a plane with a banner! And if you haven’t voted yet, vote here!:

It’s Time To Vote for the 2016-17 #SoCS Badge!