Friday, June 20, 2025

Dow's Lake, Differently

On Monday, I left the house early-ish to go for a solo paddle on the Rideau Canal, through the heart of my city. I put my kayak in at the Hartwell Lockstation and paddled all the way to the locks that cut between Parliament Hill and the Chateau Laurier, and back.

I have a YouTube video that documents the trek.

When I reached Dow's Lake, shortly after setting out, I couldn't help but pause and take in how calm the water was. Naturally, I had to take a picture of it.


I've taken countless images of this Ottawa landmark, and even though the background has more tall buildings, it seems, every time I visit Dow's Lake, I wanted to do something different, so that this image wouldn't be like every one before it.

Did you notice what's different right away or did you have to take a second look?

Using Snapseed, I gave the sky, water, and buildings a dramatic look. But that's not how I made this image different. Still not see it?

I've turned the image upside-down and flipped it so that the buildings aren't mirrored.

Whilst in my kayak, I had to paddle backwards to stop my forward momentum, and unfortunately, I added ripples to the water where it was like glass only moments earlier. I should have glided, which would have made the illusion more convincing.

Oh, well.

Happy Friday!

Thursday, June 19, 2025

Die Laughing

I couldn't stop laughing and I was worried. But it would have been a great way to go out.

The last time I hung out with my brother, Chris, before the pandemic, was in a social setting with my family, his daughter, and our folks. We wanted to get out and do something that everyone could enjoy, at all age levels: Chris' daughter, Piper, was under 10; my kids were 18 and 16.

We decided to go to Level One Game Pub, near the ByWard Market, because it had games for every age level and the adults could enjoy drinks, too. It was our first time checking the place out and I'm glad we did so, even though it nearly killed me.

Much like fine restaurants have sommeliers to help you choose the best wine to go with a meal, there were experts at Level One that could determine the best games to play, based on age, level of complexity, and the interests of the gamers. Because there were eight of us, we had various games at our table and we split up the players into groups of four.

At one point, Kid 1 and Kid 2, Chris, and I played What Do You Meme?, where you try to match images with relatable memes, much like how you try to pair questions and answers in the game, Cards Against Humanity. And like CAH, some of the choices are rather risqué.

And hilarious.


My girls have pretty twisted senses of humour, much like their dad, and some of their photo-meme pairings were downright hilarious. Also, when I was trying to match up my own memes to images, I'd start laughing before playing the cards.

And I mean laughing hard.

So hard, that I couldn't stop. My face turned a garnet red and I had difficulty catching my breath. My laughing fit became so intense, so unstoppable, that everyone at the table stopped what they were doing. My brother asked me if I was okay, and I said, between gasps, that I didn't know.

DW captured some images before putting her phone down and wondering if I was going to keel over. Even people at surrounding tables couldn't help but notice.


Of course, I didn't collapse, didn't drop dead. After a couple of minutes, I was able to get my breathing under control, slow my guffaws to a mere giggle, to sighs, and regain my composure.

But we had to end the game. Any match I tried to make would get me going again. Not as bad but we didn't want me returning to that state.

Yes, when I finally go out, I would love to die laughing. At least then, anyone around me would know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I died a happy man.

Happy Thursday!

Wednesday, June 18, 2025

Visualizing Roland

As I said in yesterday's post, how I find it a challenge to visualize the characters in my books, and how I asked ChatGPT to create the detectives in my novel, Dark Water, based on my descriptions, I was finally able to visualize inspectors Mickey Calloway and Erin Hayes, which has actually helped me develop their characters more.

Thanks, AI.

For fun, whilst creating that post, I uploaded images of singer-songwriter Midge Ure and of myself, from when I lived in Korea, and asked ChatGPT to merge the images to come up with Roland Axam, the central character to my novel, Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary. Here's what it came up with:

Image: ChatGPT

Not bad. Not bad at all.

Though the film noir feeling that Ure's portrait for his The Gift album cover suits him perfectly, I wasn't feeling it for Roland (though, as my novel tells, he has a dark past). So I asked ChatGPT to add colour to the image and use the background from the photo of me.

Image: ChatGPT

And while it still looks like the person in the first image, I felt the face was too round for Roland (it captured the roundness of my face perfectly) and it had also created somewhat of a double chin for the character, something that I definitely didn't have in 1998. So, I told the AI tool to slim the face and lose the double chin.

Image: ChatGPT

I can actually see this as Roland Axam. Well done.

I can finally stop visualizing either myself or Midge Ure when I think about my character, who will make an appearance in another book, someday.

Happy Wednesday!

Tuesday, June 17, 2025

Visualizing Characters

Midge Ure in 1985.

When I created Roland Axam, more than 40 years ago, I had a clear picture of how I wanted him to look. My favourite band at the time was UK new-wave band Ultravox. Around that time, front man Midge Ure had started releasing solo albums, and the cover for his first one, The Gift, featured Ure in a black-and-white, slightly noir head shot.

Roland Axam, in my mind, didn't look exactly like Ure but close enough to win a look-alike contest. Roland had a more-defined jawline and eyes that always looked half-closed, like he was either in deep thought or was sizing you up.

If you ever looked at Roland, you would never know what he was thinking. And that was perfect for the short stories and trilogy that I wrote, in the late 80s, where Axam was a spy.

Me, in 1998.

By the time I wrote Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary, Roland looked like a cross between Midge Ure and myself, especially how I looked at the end of my first year whilst living in South Korea. I often visualized Ure, on the cover of The Gift, and a photo of me in a Seoul market, and I mashed them up in my head to create an image, but that image was never clear to me.

When I write about other characters, however, I don't always see a face.

When I started writing Dark Water, a few months ago, I didn't have images for most of the characters. When I created the victim that is discovered in the Rideau River, I just imagined a woman in her late 20s or early 30s, with long, red hair.

Once she was extracted from the water, I kept picturing one face as I wrote about her. And I'm a bit disturbed to have my image be that of Ottawa journalist, Rachel Gilmore.

I say 'disturbed' because while she fits the profile of my victim, I would never want to see any harm come to Gilmore. She's great at her job and I enjoy following her on Bluesky and YouTube.

So far, I've been unable to clearly visualize my two inspectors, Mickey Calloway and Erin Hayes. In fact, a couple of weeks ago, when I asked ChatGPT to create a book cover that included these characters, I purposely requested that the detectives faced away.

The AI tool was actually pretty good at visualizing my description of the detective duo.

But this week, as I was reading through my rough manuscript, trying to flesh out the characters more, I still couldn't give Calloway or Hayes a face. So I finally asked ChatGPT to do it.

Image: ChatGPT

The first attempt was pretty good and I liked the face that was given to Calloway. I think he could be 'drawn' taller and more imposing (he's a solid 2 metres and broad-shouldered).

And while the image of Hayes is good, I think she appears in the image older than she is in the book. She's supposed to be 28 and, as Calloway put it, is "ridiculously beautiful." I mean, the woman in the ChatGPT image is pretty but not ridiculously so, IMHO.

I then asked the tool to make her prettier and younger, reminding ChatGPT that she's supposed to look 28. I think the woman in the first image looks mid-30s.

Here's what it gave me in its second attempt:

Image: ChatGPT

Closer. I prefer the Calloway rendering in the first image but Hayes looks closer to her age this time.

As I've written her, Inspector Hayes is half a metre shorter than Calloway. In the image that I had ChatGPT create where the detectives are faced away, I asked it to change the image so that she was 75 percent shorter than Calloway, and the tool gave her the legs of a child but kept the proportions above her legs the same.

Talk about ridiculous. Obviously, I didn't keep that image.

I'm not going to mess with the characters' height in this image. It's not important. I just wanted to create some faces to give me a better visualization for when I write the story, and I think these images help accomplish this objective.

Unlike how ChatGPT visualized Roland Axam when it merged our photos.

Happy Tuesday!

ChatGPT's first interpretation of a merge of me and Midge Ure, as Roland Axam. Hmm...

Monday, June 16, 2025

Learning to Fly

I'm a lazy SOB.

I bought my DJI Neo drone on Black Friday, last November, as an early Christmas gift to myself. And because it was my Christmas Gift, DW made me wait until December 25 to open it.

In the meantime, I watched countless YouTube videos about the best settings for the drone and about the best way to configure the drone, and several reviews that put the Neo through its paces. And even though DJI doesn't recommend flying the drone in sub-zero weather, I saw one reviewer fly it in –20°C, in Saskatchewan, without any issues.

I can do that, I told myself after watching the video. I live in a similar climate. As soon as I have some free time, I assured myself, and as long as the wind wasn't too strong (I find that it's much windier in the Ottawa area than it used to be), I was going to head out.

Of course, I hate going outside when it's –20.

I did drive out to the Experimental Farm, one weekend, to try my hand at my drone, using the automatic functions, while DW waited in the car, keeping the head going. I had the drone follow me, fly straight up for 10 metres, while the gimbal was pointed straight down. I had it fly an orbit around me and had it perform a 'selfie' flight, where it backs away from you while climbing, and then coming back along the same route.

That's about as much as I did before I felt too cold, and we returned home to a nice, warm house.

I did take it out again, one weekend, when I was snowshoeing on a trail. I had it perform the dronie manoeuvre and follow me as I ran in my snowshoes. I also had it follow DW and she skied along a parallel trail. But I didn't have it do much else because while we were out, it started to snow.

I shared that footage as part of a video about winter in Ottawa.

I wanted to get more practice with the drone but I've turned lazy when it comes to going outside and doing this sort of thing. I bought a large telephoto lens so that I could photograph birds, and knew that I should practice using it with the birds at Mud Lake, in preparation for our trip to Peru, but I was too lazy to go out.

I knew that I really needed practice with my drone before going to Peru but apart from flying it, one afternoon, in Claudette Cain Park and getting it up high for a sunset hover above my neighbourhood, I didn't master my drone before our trip.

As it turned out, there were so many places that we visited where drones were prohibited that I only flew it a couple of times. It wasn't worth bringing it on the trip.

I initially bought the Neo because I thought it would be good to have when DW, our Paddlefolk, and I got out in our kayaks. I thought it would be good to get some video from high above, while we paddled on a river or lake.

The previous weekend, we went out for our inaugural paddle with our kayaks, and I brought my drone along. But because we were setting out from one of the Rideau River lock stations, which are run by Parks Canada, the drone was prohibited. I knew that you couldn't fly a drone in a national or provincial park without special permission, but I didn't realize that the rule applied to the locks.

When we got away from the locks, I thought it would be fine to fly the drone but the wind became blustery and there was no way that I was going to attempt to land my drone on a moving kayak.

This weekend, we went kayaking on the Ottawa River at Petrie Island, in the city's far east end. We've never paddled here before but we had heard great things about the place, so it was high time that we checked it out.

We were meeting our Paddlefolk but DW and I arrived early so that I could fly my drone. But when we reached the canoe and kayak put-in area, we discovered that there was a race event going on. I could have walked over to the north-east end of Petrie Island to fly my drone, but I got lazy and instead packed my carry case in the storage compartment at the bow of my boat.

We set out and moved away from the race area, and headed west along the southern part of the chain of islands. There were so many people out in kayaks at canoes that I didn't want to fly my drone in this part (also, because I don't feel confident enough to land the drone while in my kayak).

When we got into the main channel of the Ottawa River, we made our way eastward, following the northern shores of the islands. The wind had picked up and caused little swells on the water, but it was nothing that our new kayaks couldn't handle (they're made for this kind of water).

There are sandy beaches all along the northern shores, so at one point, we moved in to take a break and stretch. I find, lately, that I just don't have enough padding on my ass and it gets sore when I sit for too long.

While we took this break, I thought I'd try using my drone. The wind was a bit strong but I figured that the Neo could still handle it. I also hooked it up to the dedicated remote-control unit so that I could have better control.

Almost immediately, I could see that the Neo was working hard to maintain its position against the wind, leaning into it and boosting its motors. Because I had it over water, I was very cautious about how I wanted to position it to capture video. I couldn't fly it too high because the wind was too strong above the trees.


My anxiety shoots up when the Neo gets to a certain height and this flight, over the choppy and fast-moving Ottawa River stressed me out. But I did get enough video to make it worthwhile.

But this flight told me one thing: I have to stop being lazy and take the time to properly learn how to fly the drone. Because even though I'm on the ground, I'm still considered a pilot of this flying machine.

Because of its size, I don't need to be certified nor do I need a permit for it, but I still need to fly responsibly.

It's no longer –20°. I have no excuses for staying indoors.

Also, I'm currently putting together a video of our Petrie Island paddle. It'll be ready later this week: stay tuned. (Here's a sneak peek at the thumbnail shot for the video.)

Friday, June 13, 2025

The Hidden Door

I didn't notice it until the day after I had taken the photo.

I can usually park on Kid 2's street, and had I been able to do so, last Friday, I would have never seen the artwork, let alone what it concealed. But there was construction that had a huge swath of the road torn up, including in front of her house, so I had to keep driving and found a vacant spot four blocks away.

It's hot in Toronto and our kid lives in a triplex where her bedroom occupies the third floor, and because heat rises, this room swelters. She had the same issue in the last apartment she kept, and so DW and I bought a small, portable air-conditioning unit that didn't draw a ton of power but kept her room cool enough to sleep comfortably.

But when our daughter moved out of that place and was going to be staying in a new place that was too small to afford space for the AC unit, DW and I brought it back home, where we kept it in the basement, waiting for when she'd have a place that had room for it.

Little did we know that she'd be moving out of that small place a few days later.

Shortly after we returned from vacation, Kid 2 contacted me to say that her new apartment was becoming hot and she'd need the AC unit as soon as it was possible to bring it down. Because I'm not working* these days, I said I could bring it down on her next day off.

That next day was last Friday.

Thankfully, the drive to Toronto was uneventful that day and I made it down fairly quickly. As I reached Scarborough, Kid 2 called me to let me know that there was no parking on her street due to construction. I said no problem, that I would find a place nearby and call her once I had, so that she could meet me and help me carry the parts for the AC unit.

Hence the space four blocks away.

Kid 2 led me along a side street that was a bit longer of a route than the main street, but she thought it would be easier to wheel the AC unit along a sidewalk with fewer people, and she was right, though the sidewalk on the side street was somewhat uneven for the small wheels of the unit.

When we reached her house, I realized that I had forgotten her jacket, which was in the back seat of the car. Kid 2 had worn it to Ottawa the day before we flew to Peru, and because it was too warm for where we were going, she had to leave it behind.

Kid 2 needed to take a shower so I told her that I'd go back to the car while she did so. This time, I walked along the main street, as it was a shorter route.

But I also noticed, as I got to the car, that there was an alley that ran immediately behind the buildings on the main street and it seemed to go all the way back to Kid 2's street. And so, once I had her coat, I took this seemingly deserted lane.

Toronto, like many cities, is full of graffiti. It's something that I love to see, and as you may know from many of my previous posts, I love capturing some great examples of this street art. About halfway down the lane, there was one piece of graffiti that caught my attention, so I stopped to photograph it. Though I did throw one of my D-SLRs in the back of the car before I left for Toronto, I only had my phone on me.

By the time I got back to Kid 2's place, she was showered and dressed, so we went out for lunch. Though brief, it was a nice visit. But because I wanted to beat Toronto's rush-hour traffic, I gave her a hug after lunch and said goodbye.

Toronto traffic is unpredictable and even at 3:00, it still took me an hour to get through the city and reach the 401.

I didn't look at the photo that I had shot until the next day. And looking at the relatively small size of my smartphone's screen, I thought that the colours and the texture of the snail were particularly good. It was a shame that some of the paint had been scratched off and that there was some sort of sticker on the shell.

It was then that I looked closer and saw that it wasn't a sticker on the paint. It was a steel plate and a handle to a door. When I had taken the photo, I hadn't seen the door on the wall at all.

If I hadn't mentioned the hidden door in the title or said anything about it at all, would you have noticed it right away?

Happy Friday!

Thursday, June 12, 2025

Milestones

Sometimes, it's hard for me to believe that I've had my Kia Niro for more than five years.

It was bought as a replacement for my Ford Focus, which suffered mechanical issues shortly after I bought it and continued having issues over the nearly seven-and-a-half years that I kept it. The Niro was going to be my new commuter vehicle and, being a hybrid, it was going to save me even more money because of its low fuel consumption.

Of course, two weeks after bringing the Niro home, the pandemic forced us into lockdown and I had never returned to the office on a regular basis again.

So yeah, the fuel economy to work was great.

Despite working from home, we've driven this car a lot. We take it with us more than 99 percent of the time that DW and I go kayaking. I've driven to the GTA several times because Kid 1 and Kid 2 attended university down there and because Kid 2 still calls Toronto her home (more on that, tomorrow).

Still, I've put fewer kilometres on the Niro than I did with the Focus, which averaged more than 20,000 kms each year (it was over the 150,000-km mark when I said goodbye to it). I've averaged fewer than 20,000 kms per year in the Niro.

Last week, I drove down to Toronto once again. And as I headed out, I noticed that the odometer was over the 99,000 km mark. Doing some quick calculations in my head, it was apparent that I was going to hit the 100,000 milestone (kilometrestone?) on this round-trip drive.

The only question was where I'd reach it and whether I'd be able to record it.

I managed to be stopped when I recorded 77,777 on the odometer and 88,888 more than six months later. Having witnessed these numbers (and I don't know why they appeal to me, but here we are), I wanted to notice the 99,999 km reading.

I have a routine when I drive to Toronto. I fill the gas tank at the Barrhaven Costco before I hit Hwy 416, nearby. And though I burn less than a quarter of a tank by the time I reach Napanee, I always stop to top up the tank at the W.O. Stinson station that's across from the Flying J. There are three gas stations at this intersection (there's also a Petro-Canada) and the W.O. Stinson always has the lowest price when I'm there.

I'm then able to continue to Toronto, and when I head home, I stop in Napanee to fill the tank again, which is usually still a third full.

Last Friday, because I wanted to get to Toronto ASAP, I filled up at my local Costco but didn't stop for fuel on the way to my kid's place. Looking at the odometer, I knew that I'd reach 100,000 kms on the way home.

I've never driven from Barrhaven to Toronto, and back, on a single tank. I think it's possible but I wouldn't want to try it because it's hard on the electric motor to run without fuel to back it up. But I knew that it was no problem to get from Barrhaven to Toronto, to Napanee, without any issues.

And that's what I did last Friday.

I really wanted to see the odometer turn over to 99,999 but my first priority was to concentrate on the road. It was a long day and I needed to be alert.

As I passed road signs that indicated distances to fuel stations, I made some mental calculations. I would reach Napanee at about 100,000 kms on the odometer, give or take a kilometre or two. And as I saw the road markers (still called milestones, even though they're marking kilometres) that lead up to the exit for my gas station, I calculated that I'd actually see my odometer reach my goal.

At exit 579, the odometer rolled over to 99,998. And, as I pulled in front of a pump at W.O. Stinson, I took this photo:


I also wanted to capture my dashboard as it rolled over one more kilometre but I didn't want to be back on the 401. The entrance to the gas station is on a dead-end street, so I drove back and forth on it.


Milestone reached.

And yeah, I'm kind of weird about the odometer readings on my Niro.

More than five years after buying my Kia and 100,000 kms in, I'm still happy that I bought the car, which is something that I couldn't say for the Ford Focus at the same point in its life.

Wednesday, June 11, 2025

New Season, New Kayaks

Image: ChatGPT
I've been dying to get in the water for almost two months.

Last September, DW and I drove to Frontenac County to test some kayaks. We were looking to upgrade our already excellent kayaks that we used extensively for five seasons on rivers and lakes all over Ontario and parts of Québec, and thought we could use longer crafts with rudders.

Within an hour, we put a deposit down on two Delta 14s with rudders, with a pre-order that wouldn't see the kayaks arrive until spring of this year.

Since mid April, when the snow had melted and temperatures were climbing, I anxiously awaited a call from Frontenac Outfitters to tell us that our kayaks were in. We had some good weekends and I thought it would be great to try out our new boats, even anticipating it by writing a chapter in my crime novel that fictionalized our first paddle.

As May approached and I worried that we wouldn't get our kayaks in time before we left for our vacation in Peru, I called the shop to get the status of their delivery. And as it turned out, I was told that Delta had shipped the kayaks and that they were either due to arrive at Frontenac Outfitters later that day or the next. Once the kayaks arrived, the folks at the shop would confirm the inventory and then call us.

They called on a Friday (one week before we were to fly out of Ottawa) and the next day, we were back in Frontenac County to collect our new kayaks. I was hoping to get in the boats, on the lake onto which Frontenac Outfitter backs, and create a video all about the new acquisitions.

Unfortunately, it was raining steadily while we were at Frontenac Outfitters so we simply inspected the kayaks, loaded them onto our car, and drove home.

While we were exploring the Amazon basin in Peru, cruising up and down the Tambopata River, I told DW several times about how great it would have been to be on the river in our kayaks and how I couldn't wait to get our new boats in the water.

Unfortunately, when we returned, DW fell ill. She unknowingly brought back a few nasty parasites from the jungle and was bedridden for more than two weeks. Thankfully, after several trips to her doctor, she's on medication that seems to be killing whatever was knocking her down.

I was lucky enough to return from Peru unscathed (except for my breathing problems while we were in the Andes and that bout of food poisoning in Lima), and I was tempted to take my kayak out on my own, but because this was to be our inaugural paddle with our new kayaks, I wanted DW at my side.

She felt well enough to head out on Sunday.

Like I had fictionalized in my novel, we went for just a short paddle on the Rideau River but we were joined by our Paddlefolk and we put in further upstream, at Burritts Rapids Lockstation. And, fortunately, we found no bodies floating in the water.

The last time that DW and I had been on the water at this part of the Rideau River was in 2013, when we had journeyed from Kingston to Ottawa in a 17-foot canoe with both of our kids and tons of camping equipment. Sunday's paddle was much easier.

We made our way toward the Lower Nicholsons Lockstation but only got halfway there before we decided to turn around. The wind was gusting at our backs on the way upstream and we didn't want a long fight back to Burritts Rapids.

Of course, I marked this maiden voyage with a video. It's short, at only five-and-a-half minutes long. Have a look:

As always, if you like the video, give it a Thumbs Up and subscribe to my channel. I'm also an affiliate of Insta360, and have links that help me out if you are interested in purchasing an action camera, such as the X3, which I use, or even the new X5 (which is one that I've been eyeing, much to DW's chagrin).

I can't wait to get back into the kayak and hope that this weekend, we really put our new boats to the test.

Image: ChatGPT
Happy Wednesday!

Tuesday, June 10, 2025

Plot Twists

One of the great things about being a writer is that you think you have a story all figured out in your head (or jotted down in notes and storyboards) but then the story takes you for a surprise turn and you end up following it, rather than leading the narrative, yourself.

That's exactly what happened to me, last week, as I was working on my crime novel, Dark Water.

Image: ChatGPT
Now, I have to be careful, here, as I can't tip my hand and spoil anything. I'll have to write this post in general terms and not leave any clues about who dunnit.

Before I even wrote the prologue, I had a murder victim. I knew who the killer was and why that person committed the crime. I had suspects, I had timelines, I had primary and secondary characters.

And I knew how the story will end.

All I had to do, in writing the story, was to fill in the gaps by providing detail to the outline I had devised. As I said in a previous post, I needed to put meat on the bones.

By the time I hit my first 100 pages, I had a good storyline, with one suspect in custody but with the true story unfinished. There was still a lot to go, but I was on the right track.

One of the fears in writing the story was that I thought I was going a bit too fast. I was worried that my novel was becoming a novella. Not that there is anything wrong with that. If it's a good story, what does it matter how long it is.

As I said, I had the story mapped out, with the timeline for the crime and the direction the detectives would take in solving it. But as I wrote from the detectives' point of view (yes, there are two lead inspectors—if you didn't know that, I've already mentioned this fact in a brief synopsis), I tried hard to put myself in their heads, without the knowledge of my notes and storyboard.

And, as would be expected, Inspectors Calloway and Hayes have different thoughts, different ideas for what went down on the night that a woman ended up dead in the Rideau River (again, this is not breaking news).

In their investigation, the two detectives follow various lines of inquiry and meet all sorts of characters, many who I just make up as I go along. And with each new character, I come up with a name and add it to my spreadsheet that holds all of the characters and their role in the story, no matter how small. I do this because I never know if I'll have to circle back to the person, and it's good to have a list of names so I don't have to dig unnecessarily through the body of content to find them again.

Last week, my character list came in particularly handy.

(Again, I have to be careful about what I might give away. If you are interested in reading my book, when it's eventually released, you might want to skip the rest of this post. I'll see you tomorrow.)

There are a lot of throwaway characters, so far. Some names that came up because I simply needed a name. In other instances, the detectives needed to talk to someone and I needed to give that someone some substance, no matter how small.

And they needed a name.

But I've just hit a point in Dark Water where I've realized that I've needed to loop back, and I'm now writing something that I didn't expect to write. I didn't expect the story to go in this direction.

It's exciting for me. I feel as though I'm discovering something new, another layer that needs bringing into the light. I need to keep digging.

To quote from Inspector Calloway, "Some stories are buried too deep to stay hidden." (I had written this line before taking a break and going on vacation but recently found a good place to add it, and it was just as the story was taking this new direction.)

When I wrote Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary, I was faced with a similar twist. The main part of the story was simple because the book was largely based on my own experiences while living in South Korea from 1997 to 1999. That part of the story is almost autobiographical.

But the main character, Roland Axam, was purely fictional and his past was completely made up. I knew why Roland went to Korea but as his past came to light, I was treading down an unknown path, and there were times where I surprised myself.

It's not quite the same way with Dark Water. All of it is fiction. And as I focus on the two detectives, especially Mickey Calloway, I'm finding myself discovering that the meat that I'm putting on the bones of the outline can be unexpected cuts

It's all so exciting.

I'm moving at a slower pace than I had been going for the first 100 pages but I don't mind. The plot twist has me in unfamiliar territory, making the dark waters of my imagination as thrilling for me as I hope they'll be for you.

Monday, June 9, 2025

AITA?

We're pretty lucky: we have good neighbours.

We've lived in our house for more than 25 years and have seen a lot of changes. Neighbours have come and gone, bringing new families from various backgrounds. There has always been a sense of community, especially in the circle at the end of our cul-de-sac.

There aren't a lot of original owners left. Including ourselves, there are four original families. All of our kids were born around the same time and grew up together, and it's been great watching these individuals go from babies to adults.

New families have come into our neighbourhood and for the most part, they've been a great addition to our street. There is a family, a few doors down, where the kids don't seem to understand boundaries and whose parents are quite noisy.

Privately, I call the dad 'Foghorn Leghorn.' He's a loudmouth schnook.

Our house is bookended by two families with young kids. We're the old folks in the middle. The kids are well-behaved and the parents are great. It's always nice to chat with them when we're outside.

The newest neighbours have a young daughter, and she and the mom love cats. When they learned that we have three, they asked if they could visit: the husband was allergic to cats so they couldn't have one of their own.

Sure, absolutely, they were welcome to come over. We'd make tea for the mom and offer milk or juice to the daughter, and we'd have a lovely visit. On subsequent visits, they'd even bring toys for the cats.

After a while, they were able to find a cat of their own that was hypoallergenic, and the father got shots so that he could tolerate the cat (he liked cats, too, but his allergies had forced him to keep a distance). The cat is extremely cute and playful.

The neighbours have bought a harness and leash, and the mom brings the cat outside for walks, but lately I've been noticing a habit that has made me uncomfortable to the point that I want to say something, but have been reluctant out of fear that I'll come off as being an asshole.

Hence, the title to this blog post (I bet you were wondering when I'd get around to that, weren't you?)

As part of their walk, the mom brings the cat onto our property. Generally, I don't mind the daughter cutting across our front lawn and walkway to visit the kids that live on the side of our house, where our front porches are side-by-side.

And the mom also has done the same, accompanying her daughter and chatting with these neighbours. I've never had an issue with this behaviour.

But the mom will walk the cat, on its leash, and come onto our porch, right up to our door, without necessarily wanting to knock on the door. She'll also sit on the chairs on our porch to have a rest while the cat sniffs our doormat.

Our doorbell cam, with another visitor.

We have surveillance cameras at the front of our house. One monitors our driveway; the other is a camera on our doorbell, which is activated any time someone is spotted on our pathway or porch. For the doorbell camera, we've turned down the sensitivity so that it doesn't pick up movement on our neighbour's porch.

We respect their privacy.

We receive a notification on our smartphones any time the cameras are activated. Whenever there's a delivery, the camera will tell us it thinks a package has been left on our front steps. If a squirrel, rabbit, or other creature wanders on our porch, we are notified.

Lately, I've seen a lot of notifications that a person was spotted on our porch, and when I check the video, it's our neighbour and her cat, out for a walk. Sometimes, the daughter will also visit, on her own, and will sit on one of our chairs.

I received several such notifications while we were travelling in Peru. Our neighbours knew that we were away, that my parents were looking after our cats, so there really wasn't a reason to be hanging out on our porch.

I realize that they live next to the loudmouth schnook on the other side of their house. I know that he can be a bit much—even I'll go inside if I'm sitting on my porch and hear him going on and on about something—and she might need a bit of a reprieve.

But I find it odd to see the mom hanging out on my property all the time, whether we're at home or not, and for her to not be there to hang out with us. One morning, I pulled the blinds on my bedroom window, and there she was, on my lawn, with her cat on its leash, sniffing around in our flower garden (the cat, not the neighbour).

DW says she doesn't mind but I find it a little odd. No other neighbour just comes onto other neighbours' properties. If a neighbour is walking their dog, they keep it off of other people's lawns.

Nobody else just comes to my front porch and has a seat when I'm not there, too.

Even though DW doesn't mind, it makes me uncomfortable. I find it somewhat invasive. I feel that boundaries aren't being respected.

I'd like to say something but I don't want to come across as the curmudgeonly neighbour who is yelling, "Get off of my lawn." I want to convey how I find it odd to have them hanging out on my property without offending them.

So, I'm turning to you, my dear readers. What do you think? Am I being an a-hole for feeling this way and for wanting to politely tell them to knock it off? If I'm justified, how should I approach our neighbour to let her know?

For the most part, we've always had good neighbours and I want to be a good neighbour, too. But I find these neighbours need to know that I'm not comfortable with seeing them constantly hanging out in spaces that aren't public.

What do you think? AITA?

Friday, June 6, 2025

Still Shopping Canadian

I shook my head as I walked out of the store. I shouldn't have gone in at all.

Kid 1 didn't tell me that her toilet was broken. Unbeknownst to me, she's been lifting the lid of the tank, reaching into the frigid water, and manually pulling up the flapper to flush the toilet.

I don't know how long she's been doing this but it was DW who told me that the toilet was broken. I avoid our kid's bathroom because, like her bedroom, it's always a mess. Items all over the counter; clothes piled up on the floor. I only ever go in every other week, when I empty her garbage pail as part of taking out the trash.

But the other day, DW mentioned that our kid's toilet wasn't working properly. When I went in to investigate, I discovered that the rubber ring that holds the chain to the flapper was broken. It was an easy enough fix: replace the flapper.

For years, we've shopped for home-repair and improvement items at our local Home Depot. There's a Canadian Tire store that is a bit closer to home but went in years after Home Depot, and we were used to shopping at this chain store. Also, I find the Canadian Tire to be cluttered, so I preferred the other store.

It was my first time in the Home Depot since DW and I made the decision to stop buying American products, to not give our business to American companies. But when I was out on this mission, it didn't even occur to me that the Home Depot is an American chain.

Not right away, anyway.

In the plumbing section, I came up to the display of toilet-repair items just as a young sales associate was finishing with another customer. "Can I help you find anything?" he asked.

I was already standing in front of the flappers, looking at all the different sizes and brands. "I'm looking for a flapper but didn't realize there were so many different types." I've replaced flappers on toilets before and never gave it any thought: I just saw the one size and that was it. "It's for an American Standard toilet."

"Two-inch or four-inch?"

"Good question," I replied, thinking about the ones I had bought before. "I'm thinking a two-inch flapper."

"How old is the toilet?"

"More than 25 years old."

"Definitely, the two-inch," he said, pulling one off the rack and handing it to me.

I couldn't help but see the American flag on the label and Proudly made in America printed underneath the image. "Um, do you have any that aren't made in the U.S.?"

"Yeah, but they're made in China." The young lad was clearly of East-Asian ancestry and I also noticed another Asian man standing not too far away, within earshot.

"These days, I'll take Chinese-made goods over American-made ones," I said.

"I don't think these items are affected by tariffs."

"That's not the point."

"Do you mind me asking why you don't want the American-made flapper?"

I was a bit surprised that the young guy would ask that question. Did he not follow the news? I mean, he did know about the trade war and the Orange Felonious Turd's tariffs. "I'm not buying anything that's American-made. It's as simple as that. As Canadians, we should all avoid American products. I have American friends, living in the U.S., who are avoiding American products."

"The American flapper is better made. I'd trust any silicone coming out of North America than those coming out of China." He seemed offended, as if he had made the product, himself.

"Pardon me for saying so," I said, "but the Americans are fucking around with us. They need to find out what consequences are. For eight bucks, I'll take my chances with the Chinese flapper." I handed him back the flapper that he had given me and pulled the other one off the rack.

"Suit yourself," he said. I couldn't get over how little he seemed to care about our relationship with the United States. As someone in sales, I get that he wanted me to buy the more-expensive item (it was four dollars more) but he didn't seem to understand my decision to avoid American products.

It wasn't until I walked out of the store and reached my car that it hit me that I had just purchased something from an American-owned store. I almost turned around but I really needed the flapper and wasn't sure I'd fine what I needed elsewhere.

From the Home Depot, I drove to the nearby Canadian Tire store. Even if they have the same products, I told myself, I'd buy the Chinese flapper and then go back to Home Depot, where I'd return the original one.

At least I'd be giving my business to a Canadian company.

There was only one two-inch flapper at the Canadian Tire store, and it was from a Canadian company. I could hear the young sales associates voice in my head: "I'd trust any silicone coming out of North America than those coming out of China."

"I agree, my friend," I said as I made my way to the cash registers.

The return at Home Depot was quick, with no questions asked. It would be my last time visiting this store. I would get into the habit of shopping at Canadian Tire, even though it can often get a bit cluttered.

At least I was still shopping Canadian.

Thursday, June 5, 2025

Old Socks

I have enough clothes to go at least two weeks before I have to do laundry.

I have a large drawer full of socks and underwear. On socks alone, I could probably go a month, but certain socks have specific purposes. I have my everyday socks, my winter socks, and ankle socks, for when I wear shorts or am on my bike.

Same with t-shirts. I could easily go a month before I ran out of them. Pants are another matter, because depending on my level of activity, I can wear the same pants for several days, so I have enough pairs to go at least a month.

I know that I'm running low on underwear when I get down to the four pairs of travel undies, which are lightweight and are able to hang dry in less than a day. I brought them with me to Peru and was laughing for 16 days: I'd wear a pair, wash a pair and hang them up to dry, and still have two back-up pairs available, just in case the humidity levels slowed down the drying time or I had an emergency.

At this time of year, I know that I'm desperate for socks—everyday socks, not the winter or ankle socks—when I get to the back of the drawer and pull out a black pair of old, polyester socks.

I dislike these socks and try to keep my laundry up to date so that I don't have to wear them. They're hot and make my feet sweat, and I pride myself on having feet that don't stink.

Well, on Monday, I realized that I had run out of socks as I got dressed and pulled out these old socks. And when I put them on, I noticed a tiny hole under the big toe on my right foot.

Because they were the only 'normal' socks that I had and because it was too warm to be putting on winter socks, I kept them on but told myself that this would be the last time I wore them. Like a pair of the cotton Tommy Hilfiger socks that had also developed a hole near the heel, last week, I'd be throwing this pair out.

When I realized that I was finally getting rid of these socks, I started thinking about when I had originally acquired them. I know I wouldn't have bought them myself because I don't like polyester as a rule, and especially not for my feet.

The socks were a simple black with a vertical ribbing that helped keep them up. Practical but as basic as they come.

And then the memory of getting them hit me like a ton of bricks.

In my youth, I had enlisted in the Canadian Armed Services with my best friend, Stuart. We were going to be weekend warriors, in the militia. We trained on Thursday evenings and on weekends at the drill hall near city hall, and during the summer we would be spending time at the base in Petawawa.

We were in the Cameron Highlanders, a proud outfit with strong Scottish roots. As part of our kit, we were issued a kilt, tam-o'-shanter, and special knee-high socks for when we wore the kilt. We also had green fatigues that we wore most of the time.

I wrote about my kilt in another blog post many years ago.

As part of our dress kit, we were provided with several pairs of socks, which we had to wear as part of our uniform. They were basic-black polyester socks.

The same pair that I wore this week. Folks, this pair of socks is 43 years old. I've had them since I was 17.

I mustered out of the Cameron Highlanders a few weeks after joining, after breaking my leg while playing soccer at school, just a week before we were going to be let out for the summer. I had to return all of my kit but was told to keep the socks. Understandably, they wouldn't be reused.

I kept the socks with my others, only wearing them when I dressed for occasions such as weddings and funerals. I had better socks for when I worked in sales and at a bank, but the military-issued socks would come out every once in a while.

Over the decades, they would eventually wear a hole and be discarded. But because I had enough socks that I would wear regularly, the last pair of these black socks stayed tucked away at the back of my sock drawer, pulled out only when I was desperate for socks and hadn't done laundry in a while.

On Monday night, I took the socks off and took a final photo of them before chucking them out. After 43 years, the last evidence that I had been a soldier—albeit for only a month—was gone.

Of course, I still had the photos that my mom snapped.


Happy Thursday!

Tuesday, June 3, 2025

Running on Empty

Don't panic, I told myself.

I knew that I was running low on beer in the days leading up to our Peru trip but I didn't worry. I was going to be away for more than two weeks so I would order more when I returned.

Usually, my beer fridge that I keep in the basement is full. Not that I consume a lot: it's just that I stock up and never have to think about it for a couple of months.

It's a far cry from early 2020, when the pandemic kept us at home and, worried for my local craft breweries, I ordered weekly and drank far too much beer for my gut. I've seriously cut back but still liked to see a full fridge.

About a week after we returned from our vacation, my parents came over for a visit and I pulled four of my remaining cans of beer from that fridge to share. I don't know why but I didn't think about it right there and then, didn't place an order from one of my favourite breweries, but I didn't.

And besides, the fridge wasn't completely empty. There was still a can of non-alcoholic beer, a can of non-alcoholic radler, and two cans of cider, though those belong to DW.

I suppose she deserves some space in my fridge, though we do have a larger mini-fridge below the tiny one that I use to keep my beer cool.

Last week, after spending some time working on Dark Water, I thought I'd crack open a cold brew and went to my beer fridge, only to find the aforementioned cans of non-alcoholic beer and ciders. And I gasped.


Don't panic
, I told myself.

And, in truth, I didn't. I wasn't desperate for a beer but thought one would have been nice. The weather was still not nice enough to sit on the front porch, as I often did after work during the late spring, early summer, and early fall months in previous years.

Kid 1 had prepared a meal, last week, that required a cup of white wine. I remembered that the remainder of the bottle was sitting in the kitchen fridge. It needed to be consumed before it passed its peak, and even though I'm not a big fan of Pinot Grigio, I hate seeing wine go to waste.

As of yet, I still haven't ordered more beer. Honestly, my consumption at home has been so low that the last time I ordered beer was in January; and, in March, some friends gave me some beer for my birthday, which, added to what I already hadn't consumed, made my beer fridge packed to the gills.

What my father and I had consumed, after my return from Peru, was beer that had been around since the beginning of the year and my birthday. That just goes to show how little I drink these days.

Every Thursday, when I join my singing friends at karaoke night, I'll consume one or two pints of IPA. If DW and I treat ourselves by going out for dinner, I'll usually order a beer. But other than that, I don't feel like drinking through the week.

Maybe it has something to do with age. Maybe my body no longer feels the need to end the day with a cold brew.

So, for now, I'm going to hold off on ordering beer, with my apologies to my local craft breweries. I won't forsake you; I'm just going to run on empty in the house for a while.

The last drink I had was on Saturday, when I finished the end of that Pinot Grigio bottle. It was past its prime but still quaffable. I'm curious to see how long I go before my next one. Maybe, I'll make June a dry one.

Who knows?

Monday, June 2, 2025

Momentum

In the days that led up to my family's departure for Peru, I didn't do much writing on my novel, Dark Water. I had surpassed the hundred-page mark, congratulated myself on a great achievement, and then promptly stalled.

I had reached the start of a new chapter but I wasn't sure how I wanted to start it. I felt that I was blindly going forward with the investigation part of the story at a very fast pace and wanted to slow down, but wasn't sure how to do that.

So, I started reading what I had written so far, to see if there was something that I could take out of the first 100 pages and possibly put further in. I made notes and changes to the timeline that I've sketched out in a spreadsheet, and told myself that when I returned from vacation, I'd be ready to take up where I had left off.

While in Peru, I kept a notepad with me, and little ideas would pop up for which I'd jot down. There were some changes that I'd have to make to the story when I returned home and I had other ideas that would pop up in what I had already written.

During the first week that I was home, I set my novel aside, focusing on getting the images that I had captured on my camera edited and filed away. If you are a regular follower of my blog, you've seen many of my photos.

Last week, I turned my attention to Dark Water, applying the notes I had made in Peru and pulling some parts of the investigation out, placing them in a separate file that I can pull from later. I went to Chapter 8, which is where I had stalled, and looked at the page.

There was a heading at the top of the page that read "Thursday." It's the seventh day since the body of a woman was found in the Rideau River, near the Vimy Memorial Bridge. Below the heading is "Calloway," the lead inspector.

And below that, I wrote, "Some stories are buried too deep to stay hidden." Whatever the hell that means.

I was still drawing blanks, so I decided to go back to the beginning, to read the story yet again. As I read, other ideas came to me and I added them to the story. There were things that I thought an investigator should follow but hadn't come up with them before. They're there now.

It took me most of last week to re-read and build on what had taken me nearly five weeks to write, and as I approached Chapter 7, I felt I had an idea of where I wanted to go with Chapter 8.

Writing that chapter starts today.

I'm encouraged by what I've written so far. While I was on vacation, I read a murder mystery from another local author. The story was set in the Ottawa area and I chose this book because I thought it might inspire me for when I returned from my trip.

It didn't. It was, in my opinion, awful. I found relationships with the characters confusing and awkward. I found the story of the murder investigation trite and, at times, unbelievable. Several times, while reading the book, I wanted to put it down and walk away but I kept telling myself that this author has written dozens of books: that this book was actually short-listed for an award.

The story had to get better.

It didn't. I finished the book, feeling disappointed*. While it didn't inspire me, it made me think that my own story was on the right track, that it was a compelling read.

Over the weekend, I asked DW if I could share what I've written so far, to get her take on Dark Water. She's one of my biggest critics and she's a fan of murder mysteries, so hopefully she can provide some helpful feedback.

Meanwhile, the story continues. I'm hoping that I can maintain the 20-pages-per-week pace that I had before I stalled on Chapter 8.

Wish me luck.


* I finished that book while DW and I were flying from Lima to Atlanta, Georgia. I did not take the book with me when we departed the plane.