May the Season Pass Me By

Lights in our 'hood.

We have no lights up. We have no tree.

All of our Christmas decorations are still in a bin, stored away in our basement. If I have any say in it, that's where they'll stay.

DW wants a tree: with the exception of one year, during the pandemic, we've always had a real tree in our living room. But I told her that prices for trees, this season, are astronomical, with prices ranging from $70 to $120, and the type of tree we usually get ranging around the $100 mark.

Paying that much for a tree that we'll only have up for two weeks is excessive, I've said. DW isn't convinced.

But there's no way we'll have time to get a tree and have it put up by Friday night. And early, on Saturday morning, we're flying to Mexico for a week. The earliest we can shop for a tree is December 22. Plus, my home office occupies the space in our living room where we've always placed our tree. It's impractical to move my desk and there's nowhere to practically set it up.

DW said she'd put it in our family room, but even there, space is at a premium.

I'm not optimistic.

I haven't hung our outdoor lights, and now that the snow has come, I won't be doing it. It's just not safe.

I'm not the only one in our family that has lost the Christmas spirit. Kid 1 hasn't shown any enthusiasm. Kid 2 would like to come home to spend time with us and with her friends, but she has to work over the holidays.

We're considering visiting her, in Toronto, for a couple of days. In which case, what's the point of setting up a tree and decorating? And could we trust our three cats with the tree, unsupervised? Who would water it?

My parents aren't planning to do anything for Christmas day. My mom told me that she always loves spending time with us but doesn't need to limit it to December 25.

I agree.

So I'm hoping that we just let the holiday pass us by. We'll take the time off but it doesn't have to centre around Christmas.

Does that make me a Grinch? Maybe. But the holidays have always been about time with loved ones. It doesn't need the decorations.

How about you?

Keeping Score

Well, our first snowfall of the season hit Ottawa last week, and since then I've been being careful, not wanting to injure or over-exert myself. I'm going on vacation, this coming weekend, and I don't want to do anything to jeopardize my having a good time in the Caribbean.

I'm no spring chicken.

First snowfall.

In the two storms that we've had, so far, we've had snow accumulations of about 10 to 15 centimetres, each. And with the second snowfall, temperatures rose overnight, making the snow heavy to lift the next morning.

To avoid risk to myself, I've headed out with my shovel a couple of times, removing snow from my driveway and walkway when we've hit about five centimetres. When we reached another five, I'd go back out and shovel again.

So far, so good, although the Sunday-morning task went slower because, as I said, the temperature was above freezing and so the snow weighed a lot, even for about five or six centimetres.

Two winters ago, I thought I'd keep track of the number of times I'd have to go outside to clear off the driveway. I counted every time my driveway had at least a centimetre of the white stuff. In 2022-2023, I shovelled the driveway 55 times; in 2023-2024, it was half that amount, with only 26 times out.

When DW and I went to Costa Rica, for two weeks, Ottawa received no snow during that period between late January and early February of this year. Kid 1, who was at home and tasked with keeping the driveway clear, didn't have to lift a finger.

I hope she's that lucky, next week, when she'll again be responsible for keeping the driveway clear.

But so far, this season, I've been out eight times with my shovel. And my driveway is snow-free.

After the weekend storm.

We're expecting more snow, today, and possibly another accumulation on Thursday. But that's okay: I'll be ready with my shovel.

And keeping score.

Happy Monday!

Beautiful Dead

It still amazes me that the orchid plant that we bought almost 10 years ago is still thriving.

Before we bought it, DW and I were notorious for letting these beautiful plants die. We'd water them—but not too much—and give them the right amount of light, but as soon as their flowers shrivelled and fell from the stems, the plant would cease to produce any more.

It would dry up, no matter how we cared for it, and died.

But this particular plant has beat the odds, lasting since spring of 2015. It receives the same care that we gave to all other orchid plants before it, and it thrives.

Still, I get nervous when the flowers wither, dry up, and fall off. Will we ever see the orchid blossom again? Is this finally the end?

A few weeks ago, several of the flowers withered and dropped at the same time, and the same fear entered my mind. There are no fresh buds forming on the stem, and half of the stem has dried and needs to be trimmed back.

But this happens all the time.

I gathered up the dried flowers and arranged them in a pile, for posterity, and took a photo to remember them. Just in case we never see a bloom again.

Until I see new buds, there's always hope.

Happy Friday!

Beer O'Clock: Pilly

One thing that I try to do, when I visit Toronto, is to visit an LCBO store and search for beer that I haven't seen at my neighbourhood liquor store. And there are a lot to choose from.

When I saw a pilsner from an Etobicoke brewery, I knew that I'd be hard-pressed to find it on my local shelves, so I picked it up. And because I'm not usually one to pick up a pilsner, I thought I'd give this one a shot.

Pilly (5% ABV)
Mascot Brewery
Etobicoke ON

Appearance: initially pours a clear, yellowy-gold with a foamy, white head that settles to a solid cap. The head was thick, out of the can, so I held onto the rest until the head settled (after I shot my photo). When there was enough room in the glass to empty the rest of the can, the clarity changed to an unfiltered haze, albeit slight.

Nose: lemons, with a hint of flint.

Palate: citrus and mineral tones, and a slight piney finish that was clean and palate-cleansing. There's a good body to it, if a bit on the light side.

Overall impression: this is a quaffable pilsner that I quite enjoyed. I don't know why I shy away from pilsners because they are easy-going brews. I'd drink this one any time it was offered.

Beer O'Clock rating: 🍺🍺

I picked up another beer on my last trip to Toronto, and I'll review that next week (it's been a while since I've reviewed beer on my blog).

Cheers!

La Fortuna and Monteverde

I've finally seen what other people see in me.

I have a resting-bitch face. I have a look, when I'm relaxed, that indicates that I'm pissed off, bothered that someone is paying attention to me.

People have told me this look can be a little off-putting but I never knew what they were talking about until I put together DW's and my Costa Rica video.

When DW was shooting video, I stayed fairly quiet when she had her camera pointed at me. I didn't know what she was going to say and I didn't want to interrupt her, so I sat quietly until I felt there was a point in which she wanted me to speak.

And while I was in a good mood and was just sitting there, waiting for her lead, I seem either pissed off or non-participatory. And it's a bad look.

At the beginning of the year, for those of you who don't know or might have forgotten, DW and I spent a couple of weeks travelling Costa Rica. Shortly after our return, I made a short video that highlighted those travels.

In that video, I promised to share more over the course of this year, but I never found the time to go through all of the video footage. I was too wrapped up in all of the kayaking videos that you can see on my YouTube channel.

I was hoping that DW and I could sit down, together, and storyboard our trip. We'd have a few videos that covered separate parts of our trip. I was able to get all of DW's video footage together, with mine, but we never found a good time to sit down and put something together.

DW created an animation of our flight from Ottawa to Toronto, and continuing to San Jose, but that was the extent in her participation for the video editing. The rest was up to me, and I was tired of waiting.

This video took three sittings to put together, including the time it took me to learn how to create animations (I created the map illustrations between various points of our drives), to line up and put the clips together, create voiceovers, and get this 25-minute video produced.

Altogether, I probably spent close to 20 hours to make this video, the most time I've spent since we've updated our computer and software.

So, more than 11 months after we left for Costa Rica, here's the first part of our travels, starting with our exploration of La Fortuna and Monteverde. Take a break and have a look.

December is pretty busy: we'll be heading to Mexico in just over a week, Christmas will follow, and I'm looking to create a video that will highlight my favourite photos of 2024 (I promise, it'll be a better video than the last time—and I won't have a resting bitch face!).

Part 2 of our Costa Rica travels won't be ready until January. I'll probably have the vacation broken up into no more than four parts, though three parts might be enough. Stay tuned.

As always, if you like my video, please give it a thumbs-up, and subscribe to my channel to help it grow.

Happy Wednesday!