Photography and GPS

December 15/11.

There are thousands of things I don't know how to do.

Top of the list right now?

Photography, and using the GPS.

Trying to get a grip on both. Not much success on the photog front, (although this one in the Beaches turned out kinda interesting, I guess). GPS, coming along. Will keep workin'!

Ever since starting the blog back in February, have been attempting to master the art of using a digi-cam. LOVE posting pix and writing about them, but taking them? Not so much.

Despite countless calm, cool, collected construction workers at Princess Margaret Hospital, who attempted to show me how to use the camera, (during my 16 radiation days back in the summer - this was treatment #7), -plus "mini-lessons" from so many (frustrated) others,

my shots almost always, inevitably turn out blurry -

and bad. (Have been trying to shoot these particularly gorgeous blue Christmas lights on the Danforth for weeks, but can't capture them the way I want them to look!) Will keep trying.
Meanwhile,

a fabulous Facebook friend of mine, Matthew McMahon, (is he not adorable?) - gave me an unexpected gift about a week ago, leaving me in tears, in the process. (Granted, NOT tough to do these days, but this particular generous gesture got me, BIGtime).

I first met Matthew, (who uses the above, insanely crazy caricature portrait, as his FB status pic), on the Danforth, back in mid-September. Unbeknownst to me, while driving around on his motorized scooter, Matthew quietly witnessed (in hysterical laughter), my futile attempt to catch an auto-pic shot with my high school pal, Dean, in front of a church at Danforth & Hampton.

Once Matthew stopped laughing, he offered his professional services as a photog, to take this pic of Dean & me. (which is pretty much my fave of the two of us, EVER!) At the time, I thought, "What the hell?" - Handed Matthew my camera, he snapped the shot from his scooter, and the rest is history!

Flash forward, weeks later, and Matthew, (who works at the Second Cup building,

just blocks from my house), offered to GIVE me a tripod, because he'd read of my interest in photography on FB. I tried to stop by to pick it up, but couldn't FIND him! Then one day, Matthew proclaimed he was driving over on his scooter, (in freezing cold weather), to drop off the tripod -

at my house! I answered the door, makeupless, in a mess, and promptly broke into tears when I saw he had managed to leave his scooter on the sidewalk, somehow made his way up the front steps to my doorway, and handed me the heavy tripod in person. Some people are really TOO much. Matthew is one of them. He doesn't KNOW me. There's no REASON he needed to put himself through this, but he did it anyway. (I thanked him and will try to pay his kindness forward in the future!) And I hope to use the tripod soon!!!

Continuing on the the photog front, my cousin, Kev, told me about this weird contraption called a Gorillapod. You can use it to wrap your digi-cam around a tree, a branch, a pole, whatever, (to take an auto-pic), instead of always attempting to stick the camera on the hood of a car.

Since I was in the area of Queen & Church this week to visit St. Mike's Hospital, (in memory of the death of my beloved Uncle Ev there one year ago), decided to stop by a couple of camera stores. The first one had the mini Gorillapod selling for just under $27. WHAT? Then,

went to Henry's, where the Gorillapod was on sale for 17 bucks. Dealo!

My radio hero,

Howard Stern, recently got into photography. He loves taking pics of his stunning wife, Beth O, and all the money he raises goes to charity.

Beth's worthy cause - The North Shore Animal League America, receives the proceeds from the one-of-a kind 2012 calendar showcasing her with cute, cuddly, healthy canines and felines

found in local shelters.

Howard talks a LOT about his passion for photography, his fancy Nikon, expensive lighting equipment, etc., on SIRIUS. (I've been taking notes).

Howard says the true key to everything is lighting. I KNOW! Without great lighting, you might as well just jump off a bridge. - So, for fun, looked at fancy lights! (camera! action!)...

with really pretty pricetags! - Yikes!

Umbrella lights. (reminded me of my old master Global TV cameraman, known far & wide as Yhoram "every frame a Rembrandt" Pirotsky)!

(Without Yhoram's supreme lighting skills, I would NEVER have had a job at Global for 18 years!) - This pic was taken at his retirement from Global in 2009.

I tried to take some auto shots at Henry's, behind their fab, floor model lights,

(but of course, only I COULD manage to make them look blurry, in a pro-camera store)!

Left Henry's, took off, walked across the street and spotted a trio of wildly mismatched dogs in front of the Metropolitan United Church!

The owners were kind enough to allow me to photograph their beloved pets. (left to right) - Owner, Dexter, with tiny 12-year-old, pomeranian- chihuahua, "Duke" and teeny 6-year-old, chihuahua, "Bijou",

plus owner, Gary with his 18-month-old Great Dane, "Billy the Kid!" (These owners and dogs had NEVER met before)!

Hiked up to 133 Church Street to check out the over 70-year-old Ontario Specialty Company toy store.

WOW! Sure brought back a lot of wacky memories!

And sunglasses-r-us. Sadly, the store is closing its doors next year.

Also looked in many pawn shop windows. This one featured old Canuck dollar bills and a shiny sax. Thought my bro-in-law, Garth Mosbaugh, of The Nylons, (who plays a mean sax), might like to see this one! - OK, so photography 101 is over for the moment.

ONWARDS now to the dreaded GPS mission!

Decided to throw caution to the wind. My new-found photog interest draws my eye to things I NEVER would have noticed before!

Set myself a goal to drive to a random airport hotel. Typed the Airport Road address into the GPS and actually DROVE there,

& arrived safely, without incident! Miracle!

However, after taking an auto-pic, a guy drove up beside me

and seemed to be offering to shoot a photo for me. A surprise, but then, found out, he really just wanted to take a shot of me on his phone! WTF? Well, OK buddy. Whatever. Aiga Hessein took this wild & hair-raising pic,

and drove off before I could even ask him which direction was west or east! Got lost on the way home. Bossy GPS broad ordered me to make an immediate u-turn ASAP, which I did, in rather dangerous circumstances, and managed to make it back to the city, unscathed. (Maybe there's hope for me yet)!

Ended up back at the Eaton Centre,

watching Marilyn Monroe in the new Charlize Theron J'Adore Dior commercial!
(what MORE could I ASK for?)

Cornucopia of Crap!

September 19/11.

Since starting this blog, I think this is the longest I've gone without writing! Gak. Don't know if that radio report on Friday tore out part of my soul, or whether I'm just zonked these days.

Whatever. It was a pretty wild weekend. Not that I was over-worked and underpaid, but just busier than a one-armed paper-hanger. (stupid old joke).

On the GOOD side, my "Rough Trade" cuz, Kevio, FINALLY got his cast cut off! He had to "vacate" Bridgepoint for a few hours by ambulance at 7 a.m.!!, go to Mount Sinai Hospital, and then wait an hour or so for cast-cutting and x-rays.

Kevan with me, (his slightly over-exuberant cuz)!!

When I showed up at his rehab room later, as I do every day, and saw the cast gone, I INSISTED on doing a few auto-pics (since it's a MAJOR milestone)!! Had to photoshop this one, because, well, hmmmmmmmm, was showing TOO MUCH LEG!! (HIS? MINE? I'll never TELL!) I just tossed the digi-cam up on his dinner tray table, hopped onto Kev's bed, and, snap! - LOL! (sorry Marilyn!) All in good fun! I mean, I didn't want his 79-year-old roommate,

LEO, to have to bounce out of bed, celebrate and crack another bone before he's even HEALED! - SO I DID!!!

Kev's castless feet!! - Yippee! FYI - Kevan says the flesh-toned sock/bandages are very soft and comfy and keep his legs warm! He is SOOOOOOOO happy to be rid of the cast!!

However, Kev still can't WALK. He's not allowed to put ANY weight on his feet, for at least a few more weeks. He needs to use his wheelchair to get around everywhere, and is doing great! Leo yelled to Kev, "Show her yer boots!"

So, Kev yanked up what he calls his "moon-walking boots", which he wears whenever he leaves the building, just to protect his bones!! Such a drag. He says they are ridiculously heavy and he hopes to be able to go bootless in the very near future!!

Kevio told me he was a tad freaked, since the young woman doing the cast cutting was a newbie, unsure of using the electric saw! Yikes! WTF? Kev was worried he might lose a limb altogether! But, thankfully, he survived!!

The weekend continued with lots of work at home, with breaks to enjoy my kids -

Max, here with his adorable girlfriend, Robyn,

My daughter, Kate and her boyfriend, Damian, were also hanging out at the house. I love it when the place is filled with kids, laughter and music!

Meanwhile, in my constant crappy photographic experiments, I keep TRYING to get ONE decent shot in front of the cityscape on Broadview Avenue. You'd THINK with such an excellent background, it would be EASY, but NOOOOOOOO! So far, I haven't taken a SINGLE shot I've been happy with, but will continue to work on it! One of these days!

Lousy lighting. Building growing out of my head.

As for THIS one, great sky! (but nothing else!) Ai yi yi.

Max went to Steve's Music Store (one of his fave places) to buy a new xylophone to practice for school band.

His Gramma (my Mum) would be so very happy to know he used some of the money she left him to purchase an instrument to further his musical career. Nothing made Mum happier than music!!

After a successful Tafelmusik tour in Montreal, Carrie got home and was able to pay a visit to Kev (whom she adores as much as I DO!)

THIS time, SHE delivered the Henkell for dinner, had a great chat, and then, came to OUR place for dinner (and ya, I actually "cooked" - sort of)

and Cayr played Max's new xylophone, (BONK!!)- impressing the heck out of ALL of us, since we had never seen her play one before! She did a great rendition of Chopsticks!! Carrie can do ANYTHING!!

As day turned to night, the racoonies gathered on the back deck. Carrie tried to photograph them, (not an easy task), and ended up with some funny pics!

And even caught a shot of our cat, Tru, (below),

in raccoon mode!

During the raccoon hijinks, Damian was upstairs, assembling IKEA dressers in Kate and Max's bedrooms!

He offered, we accepted and he did a fabulous job!!

So, after many weeks,

of clothing on the floor, due to broken dressers,

all of this, can FINALLY go back into dresser drawers! A miracle! Can't thank you enough Damian!

On Sunday, not only did I get to visit Kevio with Henkell piccolos in time for dinner at Bridgepoint, (to jazzify his bland rehab menu), but my old high school pal, Dean Rogers, invited me out for tea on the Danforth.

Had a great time hearing about his four days in Curacao. After all the months of looking after his Mum, (followed by her passing), he was sure up for a few days off. While in Second Cup, Dean showed me photos from his own album as well as from the local magazine, simply called Curacao.

Dean brought me a couple of gifts,

including a cute little bottle of Curacao, (liqueur made with the dried peel of the laraha citrus fruit - orange-flavoured), plus a pretty print I can hang up or have framed.

Dean took a shot of me on the Danforth after tea.

Then, a man named Matthew McMahon, driving a motorized wheelchair, asked if we'd like a shot taken of the two of us together. He lives in the building that houses the Second Cup and is quite the photographer. He showed us his amazing mini video-cam (now I want to OWN one!), and then took this pic. (since posting this blog entry, he has FB messaged me to become "official friends" and says, I can be a guest at Second Cup, anytime!) Thanks Matthew! SO happy to have met you. Dean and I LOVE the pic you took! GREAT making new friends. Second Cup is blocks from my house, so will see you again soon, I am sure!!! Maybe you can help me with my useless photography skills! I keep trying!!

Lain & Dean!

It was such a beautiful sunny day! Stopped by Withrow Park at the end of our street to check out the new fencing built around the off-leash area for dogs!

Kinda cool! Not being a dog owner, I'm not sure how people feel about it!

I tried to watch some of The Emmys on Sunday night, but kept getting interrupted by laundry, dishwasher and dinner bells, cat calls, phone calls, you name it. Doesn't matter. I PVR'd it, but I've kinda lost track of a lot of the TV shows anyway. Will have to get caught up again when all the premieres start up in the next few weeks. Can't wait for the return of SNL this coming Saturday!!!!!!!! And the season premiere of HOUSE is set for October 3rd!

Hugh Laurie! I'm waiting for you!!