The Brown Knowser

As this week drew to a close, I realized that I haven't taken many photos this week. Apart from my Bate Island Project photos, I haven't pulled my camera out since before the snow fell. As a precursor to the snow, we had a very foggy Friday, last week. From my office, I would look out the window and see the fog intensify. At one point, it looked like my office building was up in the clouds, that I was looking out into nothing. As I left the office, camera bag slung over my shoulder, I knew that I couldn't let the weather opportunity pass. I took this photo from the parking lot of my company, looking out onto Highway 5 in Gatineau. The next day, the snow fell. It wasn't much, but the temperatures refused to let it melt. Wednesday's snowfall covered the grass for the season. But I'm certain that the fog will return. Happy Friday!

So, we've had it: the first snow storm of the season. Though we don't officially reach winter for more than three weeks, we in Canada typically think of late November as winter. Because, really, any time after November 1st, and on rare occasions, before, the snow can come to Ottawa, turning the city into a winter wonderland. And yesterday's storm packed a good punch. Almost 25cm (almost 10 inches) of wet, heavy snow blanketed the city by the morning. It was a good cardio workout, clearing the driveway (and again, later, after the plow pushed a short wall back in. I don't mind the snow too much, just as long as I have enough time in the morning to clear it, and the roads are plowed, for when I have to get somewhere. Luckily, for this dump, I was planning to work from home anyway. But what gets me is how people seem to freak out at the prospect of snow, how the Twitterverse and radio were trying to come up with a name for the impending storm. All day, on Tuesda...

It just keeps getting weirder and weirder. I had my suspicions about Bate Island more than a year ago, when I would stop on it to take the occasional photo—a sunset, mist steaming off the cold river on a winter's morning, kayakers in the spring rush of water—before my photo project. I saw the parked cars, the men sitting in them, seemingly doing nothing. It was none of my business, so I payed people no mind. Until Creepy Guy * . That early morning guy was somewhat disturbing, but he was harmless. After our strange encounter, he mostly kept his distance, but still watched me as I took my morning photo of the Ottawa skyline. And it only took me one time to point my camera at him to never see him again. But he wasn't the only one to approach me. Now that we have set our clocks back an hour and the days have become increasingly shorter, I find myself on Bate Island in low light in the mornings and late afternoons. I fear, soon, that my photographs will look more and more ...

Though I'm not a football fan, this post is dedicated to you, Regina. Congratulations to the Saskatchewan Roughriders on their Grey Cup win. Have you ever heard a song that you liked so much the first time you heard it that you had to have it? That's how I felt when I heard a song that Alan Neal of CBC's All In a Day played one Wednesday when I was working from home. Halfway through the song, I found myself tapping my feet and bobbing my head as my fingers worked the keyboard of my work laptop. I grabbed my iPhone, activated SoundHound, and before the song was over, I had purchased a copy of it and played it again through my device. Thanks, Alan. Library Voices is a Regina, Saskatchewan, band that has been around since 2008, but I don't really know anything more about them. As much as I like their song, Drinking Games , I haven't really pursued other songs by the band. What I like about this song is how it builds from a quiet, sleepy state to full-blow...

Last Saturday was a gorgeous day. Sunshine and warm temperatures meant that my family and I took advantage of the day and headed downtown to check out the Poutine Festival, on Sparks Street. If you saw this week's Wordless Wednesday , you saw some of the photos I took while we waited in line and sampled some interesting variations on a classic Québec dish . After we had sufficiently stuffed ourselves (I love poutine, but after four different samples I thought I would be sick), we further wandered the downtown area to try to burn off some of those evil calories (Lori and I aren't doing very well with our diet). We visited the War Memorial and went to the Byward Market. I took some photos of the memorial with my iPhone, marveling at the beautiful blue background of the sky, and I decided to play with the photos to give the effect of turning the day to night. A great way to do that is to convert the photo to black and white and apply a red filter to intensify the contrast be...

Stephen Harper must have been loving the last couple of weeks. While Rob Ford has been stealing the headlines, the Canadian media hasn't been focused on the federal government's scandal. Let me remind you. I'm going to go back a bit, as a refresher. Stephen Harper appointed two well-known media bigwigs, Pamela Wallin and Mike Duffy, to the senate. He did so, placing them in ridings in which they did not live, ignoring the rules, because they drew a great deal of support (translation: money) for the Conservatives. Duffy might have had a cottage on PEI and Wallin originally came from Saskatchewan and apparently owned property there: close enough. Both Wallin and Duffy claimed their respective riding dwellings as their primary place of residence, knowing full well that it wasn't, and claimed travel expenses. These educated senators, working in the chamber of sober second thought, claimed, when it was discovered that these residences weren't their primary places of...

Several months ago, when my family and I were visiting our favourite sporting-goods store, I took a photo as we were walking up to the building. I don't know why I had decided to take the shot: most likely, because the lighting was so good. I'm glad I took the photo. This photo has not been retouched: the colours and lighting are exactly as I shot them. Maybe that's why I kept the photo: the colours and clean letters really pop out. A month ago, driving through Westboro, I passed MEC (pronounced "meck") and noticed something different: the sign had changed. I noticed the new logo when I downloaded the store's app on my iPhone and also saw it when I received ads by e-mail, but it didn't sink in until I saw the large green square and three initials on the store. Yes, the difference is like day and night (see what I did there?) The new logo sucks. The old logo identified the store, showed it's purpose. The mountains, M-shaped and an...

I'm going to try something new on The Brown Knowser , something that will take a few minutes of your time but where you won't have to do much reading. It's called Music Mondays . I will take some time to share some music with you, be it a SoundCloud clip or a video. It's music that I like for various reasons, whether I've followed a band or a performer for a period of time and thought you might like to be introduced to him, her, or them, or to maybe share a song that you may also know and like. The first song I want to share is a song by Matthew Good, called Non Populus , from his album Lights of Endangered Species . I've been following Matthew Good's music for about five or six years, long after the Matthew Good Band split up, but I liked the power of the lyrics, the driving beats, and the powerful guitars and keyboards. Matt Good's voice can be charged, powerful, and emotional. I have sometimes described him as Canada's answer to Morrissey,...

My wife thinks I'm a perv. It's simply not true: I'm a dirty old man. But when it comes to studio photography, and using nude models, I'm at my most mature. I'm respectful towards the model and I like to think my work is tasteful. When I'm taking a picture, my mind is too focused on the lighting, on the angles, and on the exposure settings to really think about the person in any other sense than my subject. I don't give a lot of thought to the fact that the person has no clothes on. When I do my studio photography, I'm not a perv. I'm not even a dirty old man. I'm a photographer, trying to improve my skills. What do you think? Happy Friday!

The other day, I wrote five pages for my latest novel, and for the first time in a long time, I'm happy with my work. I actually feel that I don't need to revise those pages. That almost never happens. I will be taking the rough chapters to Gyeosunim down in the next few days, and I'll be adding the revised and new material in the coming weeks. I'm planning to take some time over the upcoming holidays to concentrate on getting more of this book completed. I really feel I've neglected my fiction writing for this blog and my beer blog. That has to stop. I'll still be producing regular posts for my blogs, but I'm going to put most of my effort to my novel. And then you'll have a third blog to read, as I continue to add chapters. If you haven't read my first book, Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary , please go to my book site and read the first chapter . If you like what you read, please buy the book. And then you can read the rough draft to the sequ...

It took me a while to learn that when I put myself out in social media, be it through my blogging, through Facebook, or through Twitter, I open myself up to people who will disagree with my opinion. And that's okay. You may not like the fact that I have a general loathing of dogs. Or that sometimes my photography may not be to your liking. You may not share my political views and hate when I go on a rant. I don't mind. If someone disagrees with me, that's fair: everyone is entitled to his and her opinion, and by me sharing my thoughts or views in such a public manner, it's okay if someone decides to speak out and disagree with me, to voice his or her disdain. If someone were to call me names, or spread hatred toward me, that would be a different matter. While I am open to hearing about opposing views, I'm not open to personal attacks. That has happened to me a couple of times, and it was awful. I was made to feel badly about myself and to question my val...

I remember when Remembrance Day was a time where we didn't work, we didn't go to school. It was a time when we really stopped and thought about the men an women who served their country, who sacrificed so much for the lifestyle that we now seem to take for granted. Today, our war veterans must feel that they've been given the bum shaft. With the exception of the civil servants, most people go about their daily routine as though November 11 was just another day. For those who take that day off, the stores are happy to serve them: Christmas is just a little more than six weeks away, after all. Not even our government seems to give our veterans the respect that they deserve. Cuts to funding, deeming that injured veterans, who can no longer serve their country because they've been injured overseas, mean that these poor people are cut loose without pensions. Veterans Affairs offices are closing across the country, leaving vets without support systems. Clearly, the g...

Remember that Doctor Who episode, entitled " Blink "? That is my favourite of all Doctor Who episodes. Lori even returned from New York City, this summer, with a blue t-shirt with the TARDIS on it, and it read: Keep Calm and Don't Blink . Great shirt, only it was a women's shirt that was way too small for me. I want that shirt. In a men's large size. There are a set of statues downtown, at Sussex and Rideau streets, that remind me of that Doctor Who episode. The statues are angels, but don't really look like the weeping angels that sent the Doctor and Martha back in time. However, whenever I see these statues, I don't dare take my eyes off them. I don't dare blink. Happy Friday.

I'm so glad that Rob Ford has come clean, opened up to the people of Toronto, exposed his demon, and then forgiven himself so that business could continue as usual. What a relief. Unfortunately for Mr. Ford, it's not up to him. While he may not care what people think of him, because he feels that he's dealt with making his secret public, he should care about what people think of Toronto's city hall. He should think about what the world thinks about Toronto and the image he wants to instill with regards to the city that is going to be in the spotlight for a long time to come. It seems that Rob Ford thinks that this issue is all about him. And, for some part, it is. He has an addiction problem and he needs to deal with it. That's right, Mr. Ford: we all know that this wasn't just one isolated incident of you getting hammered and smoking crack. We all know that you are a crack head, possibly a dealer. Why else would the police department spend so much t...

Yesterday, I awoke, got showered and dressed, made lunch for my kids, and saw them off to school. I then drove my wife to work, stopped on Bate Island for my project photo shoot, and then went to work. I turned on my computer, logged on, checked my e-mail, only to find that the Where In Ottawa challenge had already been solved: six minutes after the blog post was published. I knew this was an easy one. Not only had Jason Fournier correctly identified this month's photo challenge as the lighthouse at the Museum of Science and Technology , in less than six minutes, no less, he even added a link to an Instagram image that he had previously shot. Nice one, Jay! (He's a great photographer, too.) The lighthouse is easily viewed from St. Laurent Boulevard. Anyone, and most likely, everyone, has been to this museum at some point in their lives in Ottawa. Next month's challenge will be tough. You have been warned. Would the challenge have been harder if I had post...

I had a photo that I had shot a month ago, that I thought was perfect for Where In Ottawa . And then, yesterday, I thought that I wanted to do something else. So, I packed up my camera, hopped in the car, and headed out. I had no idea where I wanted to go, so I let my car point the way. This month's photo may be the easiest one I've shot, or it will leave you kicking yourself for not getting it right away. Everyone who knows Ottawa knows this place. But first, let's get the rules out of the way. If you were with me when the photo was taken, you are ineligible to play. If you have won the challenge in the past, you can still play, but no prize will be awarded. ONLY GUESSES THAT ARE SUBMITTED TO THE COMMENTS SECTION OF THIS POST WILL BE CONSIDERED FOR THE CHALLENGE—THAT MEANS NO TWEETS, E-MAIL MESSAGES, OR FACEBOOK POSTS. You may guess as often as you like. The first person to correctly identify the location of this photo will receive a PDF copy of my novel, S...

One of the things I like the most about participating in a photo walk that covers a great distance is that I can shoot so many different photos of so many different subjects that I have many to choose from for a very long time. Almost a month after the walk, I'm still using material. On the Worldwide Photo Walk, I took many pictures of people and buildings , but I also looked at some of the empty spaces: the places devoid of people, areas that didn't take in full buildings. When I walked past the patio area of Metropolitain Brasserie , which was largely unpopulated, all I could see was the red of the chairs and the umbrellas. In the shot I took, all I could envisage was the boldness of my favourite colour. For me, in that moment, no other colour existed. I wanted to capture the image and convey what I saw. This is the best I could do. Happy Friday!