:: W4B photography's companion blog ::

:: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 ::

It was a photographic weekend. As I mentioned I had it off and I Saturday was gorgeous for weather. light jacket weather. in january. while it is bad for farmers and snow plow operators, I am all for this global warming thing. I drove and wandered around an industrial section of London on Saturday. In an area bounded by on the West by Quebec/Egerton and East by Highbury and the rail line north of Dundas, and Trafalgar to the South, I found lots of interesting things, such as on the left.

This building is located north of Kelloggs on the rail spur that you cross on Dundas East. It's official address is 471 Nightingale and is a warehouse built in 1917. Completely closed off, surrounded by razor wire, the structure looks sound but is full of pigeons roosting on at least the top two floors. Think of the bird crap in there!

On the rail line at the top end of McCormick near Princess, I started to think trains. There was a long freight train on the spur there with no fence so I went for a look see. Nice pleasing curve of cars and I got a couple of close ups in the sun. I was thinking to myself as I walked away from the train that if the thing had started to move while I was inches from it taking pics I would crap my pants. And then all of a sudden, the rippling bang-bang-bang-bang of the cars tugging on each other started as some far away engine pulled them to life. :)

Now being in a train mode, I recce'd the rail yard that you cross on Egerton. I parked at the Western fair ice rink and wandered over. This was after Western Fair security asked me what I was doing in the closed off harness racing prep area before that... :). I was shooting pics of the lone engine from the crossing area there when someone from CN rail came up to me. With 9-11 not too far in the past, he said security is on everyone's mind. We chatted for a bit and when he found I was no harm to anyone, he told me the best location to watch some movement of engines and cars would be down at the East end near Highbury in about 20 mins. He offered to give me a lift down there, but since I had the CRV, I declined the cool offer. Nice of him to provide the info though.

I grabbed a Timmies and headed over to the south section of Oakland ave. I waited for a bit, watched a Via Rail train blur by ( when I had the wrong ISO setting on the camera...) and then a lone yard engine came by and was taking some shots for a bout 45mins. First time I had watched the, I was going to say ballet, but that is cliche and not completely right. The coordinated movement of engine and car over a dozen branching lines, grabbing and releasing single cars or a half dozen at a time was fun to watch from different angles.

On Sunday, I headed to Toronto in a heavy driving rain. I stopped in Brantford to get some pics of St Andrew's Church which burned the other week. I Googlemapped it and found it without issue. It was raining hard so some of the shots were spotty. I wanted to get a couple of different angles, and I asked the police officer on point duty in his car if I could get closer. He initially said no that I had to stay in front of the line. Then he waved me over again and told me that if I went down an alley that paralleled the back of the church between Market and George I could get some shots there. I crossed the police barricades at that point and grabbed the through the window and collapsed wall shots posted on flickr. I know it isn't something really special, but I am amazed the places I get to go now and then.

Later in Toronto, I met up with the Scarlet Sins at Stephanie's place. They were already looking awesome in their Victorian dresses and pretty much good to go. They had just come back from hair and makeup and we headed out to the location. Despite the rain and poor light, we made it work. It was a lot colder for them than me, and I was reminded of a ANTM shoot on a roof top in bikini's in winter. In both cases, the photographer was warm enough... :) We did some cool group shots and some individual portraits as well before heading over to a second location that had promise but was not what I had in mind. I have barely started to go through the 200 odd shots and will post some in a few days, but this was certainly a fun experience. And spending time with the girls over dinner after was good. More when I post some pics...

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 22:42 [+] :: 0 comments
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"Roger, go at throttle up."
history: Those were the last words spoken by Commander Francis R.Scobee spoken at T+ 1:10 into the flight. The last words in the official Challenger voice recorder transcript are from Pilot Michael J. Smith three seconds later. A simple "Uhoh."

It is difficult to think that it was twenty years ago today that the shuttle Challenger roared from the pad at KSC, and minutes later it exploded off the Florida coast destroying the ship and dooming the crew. I was in highschool getting ready for a history class where we were going to watch the launch because of the tie in to having the first teacher, Christa McAuliffe, go into space. It was a staggering thing to see that white puff of smoke and the SRBs careen off slowly and wildly. That, the WTC, and the Columbia breaking up over Texas in 2003, I all saw live. They were a few of my "where were you when?" moments.

President Reagan, in a nation wide address from the White House said the following which sums it up nicely:

"The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave. The Challenger crew was pulling us into the future, and we'll continue to follow them."

More from CNN, and some links from the official Challenger page at NASA are here.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 11:30 [+] :: 0 comments
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"If you saw a man drowning and you could either save him or photograph the event...what kind of film would you use?" -Anonymous

From photoQuotes.com

I had fun planning some of the shots I would like to do of the Scarlet Sins in Toronto on Sunday. I am excited to try out some stuff. I never rented some proper lights, but the work lights I have throw 1000w of light on twin heads so I think that will be sufficient.

On the way down to the tee Dot, I am going to swing through Brantford. A church burned down there the other day and is likely to be demolished for safety reasons and I would like to get some shots of it. It might be rainy on Sunday so it could be a really moody series of BW shots.

I really need to find some studio space. Really itching to do some more pics in a controlled setting. Want to play with lights and shadows. And shoot some models who have less inhibitions too - of course. :)

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 00:52 [+] :: 0 comments
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Nigerian Spam!
internet lore: It took more than 12 years of being online, but I actually got the infamous Nigerian banking spam email to my myspace account. I thought this was pretty cool. Never received one before. I guess this means I have arrived. ;)

From:.Dr.Sola Williams,
Manager Union Bank,
of Nigeria.

Dear Friend,
My name is Dr.Sola Williams, I am the regional manager of the Union Bank lagos branch Nigeria. I got your information during my search through the Internet...

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 23:51 [+] :: 0 comments
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End of trek again
entertainment: Watched the final episode of Star Trek: Enterprise again last night on Space. I thought it was as sad seeing the finale the second time around as it was the first. The series, which I felt had come into it's own, ended prematurely. I know it was a vehicle to give some back story to the Trek universe, but there were some good stories and good character growth. Stories that I know I can watch again. I hope they do movies with this cast. Until then, I suppose I will fork over some money for some DVDs.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 21:14 [+] :: 0 comments
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conservative Cabinet revealed
misc: Rick Mercer has discovered what the new conservative cabinet will look like. Yikes.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 12:12 [+] :: 0 comments
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West Wing is done.
TV: NBC announced yesterday that The West Wing has been cancelled. While not having the worst ratings, it is done at the end of the season when the new President is inaugerated. No word on what is going to happen to John Spencer's character. When he died, the producers found there was no provision in the US constitution to deal with how a VP nominee death would be addressed so close to the election. More from CNN.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 11:41 [+] :: 1 comments
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MSN Block Checker is spyware
Instant Messaging: If you use IM - and who doesn't - there is a thing going around which I encountered for the first time on MSN tonite. It is the MSN block checker. I messaged someone and got an autoresponder message "Did they block you too? Download a free MSN Block Checker http://]www.block-checker.com ". Given everyone loves me, and no one would block me ( heheh), I Googled the message. I didn't intially come up with any hits that made me suspicious, but on the second page of the results ( I do 50 a page), I came up with a Symantec hit. Yeah. It's adware/spyware. Don't download it when a friend sends it to you. Systems affected: Windows 2000, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP. It is a low risk, mainly I assume because you have to manually install it. So don't install it.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 22:36 [+] :: 0 comments
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Complicated subway
Maps: I was checking out Scott 5x5 who is a photog from Toronto currently working in Tokyo. He posted a pic of the Toyko subway system. Man that is a big subway.

Been working on my photoshoot for the Scarlet Sins in Toronto next weekend. I have enjoyed planning this. Got lots of ideas. Then I picked up a copy of Rolling Stone and saw some real photogs seasoned pro's work. I am like Damn! I have lots to grow still. :) I am not minimizing how much I have developed in the last year though...

***(developed? Is that a photography pun?)

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 01:54 [+] :: 0 comments
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Timeless
photography: After completing this pic, I thought that if you saw it in an archive, you could say that it was a contemporary shot sometime around it's construction. The shot is of workers on top of an early 20th Century building in Toronto. I took the pic from my room at the Sheraton in December. It was very cold and windy at ground level on this Saturday morning. I can only imagine what it was like on top of a elevator machine room of this building.

Taking and tweaking the pic was one thing. It was much harder to identify it. I knew the room I had faced South and emmediately below me was Richmond St, and to my right York St. The building was a hard left out my window. It was a really tough angle, but where was it?

Well, I went to Google maps first to get the lay of the land. I used the towers at night shot to narrow my arc of research to ESE (East South East) on the compass rose from my building as the bank towers were out of the view to the right. I assumed that the building was pretty close by, no more than a couple of blocks and likely on Bay near Richmond. Not very tall. Perhaps 20-30 stories though I couldn't tell exactly as it's base was blocked in the shot.

I started to type in searches in Google. Came across a couple of hits but nothing too specific. Then I remembered I had used a semi public search service called Emporis which has a fantastic catalog of buildings in Toronto ( and around the world). Dates of contruction/ demolition, factoids, and most importantly locations and photos. I narrowed it down to the core of the city, and then started to check the older ones. I figured the building - from it's stone work, style and ornamentation - was likely late 1920s or early 1930. After three or four false positives I had it. The address was 372 Bay Street and the building was the Sterling Tower.

I used the same sort of research with GoogleMaps and Emporis to identify the Commerce Court North tower in this picture. And learned some fascinating facts as well. At 34 stories, upon it's completion in 1931, the Commerce Court North Tower was the tallest building in the British Empire and remained that way till 1962. It is located at King and Jordan St (between Bay St and Yonge St), Toronto.

And if you want something cool, click again on the Google Maps link for the 372 Bay St, and zoom out about 50 percent. Using the hybrid map/satellite view, you can see most of the Great Lakes. Never seen that particular view and all the green was quite cool.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 11:45 [+] :: 0 comments
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Been under the wx again
life: got socked by another bad cold - perhaps the flu? - this week. Tried to go to work twice and in total missed I think two full days and a bit more. I hate being sick. And I don't like using sick days at work. Ever. So I slept a lot and watch too much in the way of crappy TV. The PVR should have anticipated my needs and recorded a few movies in advance. I did get to watch some of the Australian Open tennis. Maria Sarapova. What can you say. And she is a spokesperson (spokesmodel?) for Canon. Makes me want to shoot tennis. Of course the Canadian pro women's tennis this year is in Montreal. Go figure... It alternates between there and Toronto's Rexall Centre at York U - where I went to school. And Martina Hingis is back too after a couple of years off. If you have to be sick, recording some tennis is a good thing.

I put up a couple of pics today as well. Urban stuff. The above one, was taken in Toronto in mid December. It is the Lifeguard station at Cherry Beach. This beach is outside the confines of the Inner Harbour near the Eastern Gap entrance - and at the foot of Cherry Street. I think the beach actually has a different name now, but growing up, it was always Cherry Beach to our family. On weekends we would occasionally go for a drive and explore the city and now and then ended up driving through the docklands. At the time, the docks were more vibrant and alive than today. Well, there was container ship traffic and it was all industrial. Not the in flux, driving ranges, big open bars and sound stages with hopes of housing down the road.

And each time we would go over the green lift bridge half way down Cherry St from Lakeshore Blvd., it would be a cool thing because car tires crossing the open grid of the draw bridge made a sound which is why the bridge became known to us as the "orrrrrrr bridge". I think this was the first time I had driven down there in the CRV and the sound was exactly the same. And still cool. I need to take some pics around there this summer when it is not so freakin' cold.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 19:46 [+] :: 0 comments
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Routing problems with Flickr
tech: seems like San Jose Ca is not the place to be when it comes to having reliable internet connections over the past couple of days. Especially if you are Flickr. I have been sick since Sunday evening with some bug or other so when not dozing and drinking lots of liquids etc, I thought it would be a good idea to drag the laptop to bed and go through some Flickr sites and check out more than just the few favourites i normally scope out.

Well, it was sluggish so I thought I would run a tracert as part of the throughput troubleshooting. Was only a few routers in the Palo Alto node of teleglobe.net that were a problem and then the Yahoo routers themselves. It is rare you see 1200ms results in a tracert regularly:

C:\tracert www.flickr.com

Tracing route to www.flickr.vip.mud.yahoo.com [68.142.214.24]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 60 ms 59 ms 55 ms 64.230.197.53
2 54 ms 55 ms 55 ms 64.230.238.221
3 59 ms 59 ms 55 ms 64.230.240.177
4 64 ms 59 ms 63 ms 64.230.242.189
5 57 ms 62 ms 59 ms 64.230.242.197
6 61 ms 63 ms 63 ms bx3-toronto12-pos5-0.in.bellnexxia.net [206.108.
107.234]
7 57 ms 59 ms 63 ms if-7-0.core1.TTT-Scarborough.teleglobe.net [209.
58.25.69]
8 151 ms 155 ms 151 ms if-3-3.mcore3.NJY-Newark.teleglobe.net [216.6.57
.33]
9 154 ms 151 ms 151 ms if-5-0.mcore4.NQT-NewYork.teleglobe.net [216.6.5
7.14]
10 154 ms 155 ms 175 ms if-4-0.mcore4.PDI-PaloAlto.teleglobe.net [216.6.
86.13]
11 153 ms 151 ms 151 ms if-5-0.core2.PDI-PaloAlto.teleglobe.net [216.6.8
6.6]
12 1258 ms 1244 ms 1159 ms ix-1-0.core2.PDI-PaloAlto.Teleglobe.net [64.86.8
4.146]
13 1167 ms 1200 ms 1208 ms so-1-0-0.pat1.dax.yahoo.com [216.115.101.133]
14 1225 ms 1204 ms 1220 ms UNKNOWN-216-115-104-101.yahoo.com [216.115.104.1
01]
15 1194 ms * 1191 ms v203.bas3.mud.yahoo.com [68.142.209.5]
16 1167 ms 1152 ms 1168 ms www.flickr.vip.mud.yahoo.com [68.142.214.24]

Trace complete.

It was like that most of the day and only settled down to normal-ish results late into the evening. And now it is back up to being crap again. So of course I emailed the teleglobe.net folks and included part of my tracert results. :)

I figure if their boxes are on a path to Flickr for most - if not all- people, then they have a million customer base group from around the world that are being affected. And I am sure they know about it, but if not, they do now.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 11:21 [+] :: 0 comments
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Camera equipment rentals?
photography: You would think that finding a listing for camera equipment rentals here in London would be easy. Apparently I am losing my touch when it comes to Googling. Forest City Imaging has some but no prices. There has to be someone. I think after experimenting with indoor portraits this weekend I need some. And when I shoot the Sins at the end of the month for their promo stuff I might need some if it is inside. soft boxes mainly, a synch unit with remote flashheads. Anyone? Beuler?

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 22:35 [+] :: 0 comments
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Ambiguous turn down
photos: I recently applied to be a member of sportsshooter.com. It's a site where photo pros who mainly shoot sports can meet, network and such. Well turns out they don't like my pics and not specifically one or the other. The response was:

Technical Quality Of Images
Quality reasons include: Images are overly compressed; images are improperly
toned (too flat, too contrasty, have color balance problems, etc); images
are too dark/light. This also includes images that have been noticeably
retouched in Photoshop (backgrounds removed, the scene changed, 'special
effects' added, etc.)

The email said that I could resubmit within 48hrs. After that, my initial request would be deleted and I would have to start from scratch again and get someone to sponsor me again - the latter not being an issue luckily.

Since I don't know which image or images of the nine I submitted was at issue, or was done up too much, too little, cropped, retouched or too contrasty, I have no where to start. It is like The Price is Right. You want all the grocery items to add up to $8.67 or less. You can add and remove all the items you want, but there are only so many combinations that will work. And until get that combination right you can't win. In fact, since I know nothing about what they nitpicked over, it is tougher. I can guess what a can of soup costs... but this? M'eh. It's winter and there are no sports to shoot right now. And heck I prefer models anyway. :)

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 01:15 [+] :: 0 comments
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Scarlet Sins


Nice eh? The Scarlet Sins are using my group shot in their promo for some upcoming shows this month. Saw it first on their Myspace.com site a few mins ago. :)

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 02:32 [+] :: 0 comments
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Myspace. the new crack
blogging: Myspace, the friends and networking community online seems to have sucked me in. It is primarily aimed at teens and 20somethings, but it is a great location to do some informal networking. It is fairly arts oriented - lots of indie and mainstream bands have presences on myspace for instance. As I mentioned on the 30th of December, I created a site there and Myspace is a closed community when it comes to commenting on content, viewing some content, and posting messages. The owner of the site has to "Add" you before you can interact with the site other than just read. cuts down on comment spam.

It reminds me of the early days of the web in some respects, because you can edit your site template and make some gawd awful designs and garish colours and backgrounds and multiple fonts and clashing elements and streaming video and audio on by default ( till I found the option to turn it off in my profile, well I could go on. Some people seem interesting, but their sites are just too damn painful to read and look through. When the web was new this was commonplace. Going from text only to graphics made people OD. This has a similar feel. I might be making it out to be a hellish place, but it isn't really. It is low rent for sure and that is probably why I like it. :)

I only had a couple of people in my group initially, then started to search around and found that there were a few people at work, and then some photographers, and the Scarlet Sins, and Repair, and so on. I feel fake just sending 'Add requests' to people 'just because'. I am sure that there is already too much of that crap going on, but I did do it to a few people whom I found interesting and they added me. I even struck up an MSN conversation or two with someone who seems pretty cool and lives in the London area. And found someone else in London that Steph knows. Small world.

And then I discovered they have groups similar to newsgroups. So I subscribed to a few photography ones and started reading and posting to them. Then found there was one for photographers and models to let the world know they were there and looking for work. And I am the only one in Ontario in it - or will be when I finish crafting my calling card message. And curiously there is only one woman listed as a model in Ontario (Ottawa). And then I found a modelling site called one model place where photographers and models can list and locate each other.

Needless to say I have been completely sucked in by all of this over the last couple of days. I thought of posting about the Microsoft virus and then subsequent patch but that is now history. Or Gates doing his keynote at CES about Windows Vista. Or that I found this LED light that would be retarded to wear in the day but would kick ass if camping or needing light at night - say for fixing a flat tire.

I completed the editing of the pics for JJ and Sarah which they want to use as an insert in their wedding invites and mailed them off too. Took a few hours as I was distracted by the 5-0 drubbing we gave the Russians in the hockey on Thursday. I'll post a couple in the next while. And since I have not had any other modelling opportunities recently, I decided to post a retrospective of sorts. One pic each of Mandy, Amanda, Kelly and Dawn from their sessions in the late summer and fall. Going through the shots in their folders looking for new ones, I realized how much I have changed in terms of my eye for detail. Things in the images I didn't pic up on before are now catching my interest. And good pics are not so good as I see subtle flaws to be corrected or disgarded.

And for those keeping score, Mandy wins the views tally. Her 15 pics have been viewed over 5700 times since they were first posted in November! The Scarlet Sins come next with about 4500 hits in December alone. Not bad, eh? :)

And this blog has still to hit 30,000 hits. Flickr keeps chugging along at nearly 34,500 as of a little while ago. When they hit 50,000 each that will be cool. :)

I might set up my own photo site before the winter is out. Not abandon Flickr, just have a more pro presence on the internet. I might get someone to code it for me in exchange for some portraits. Soon I need to set up a set on Flickr of the best of the best. It is getting too big to just sift through. Use it as a starting point for sorting pics as well. I can certainly do it by views or favourites. And my personal favs too. Might take some time to build that set.

During the week, I managed to get a cold, and beat a cold, and move on from that. Mind over matter. Just a simple little Jedi mind trick and two days later it was done - "these are not the cold viruses I am looking for..." :)

Watched Ali with Wil Smith the other night as well. Good show that. Interesting biopic. Not sure how much is accurate, but I began to beleive he was Ali. And to give him credit, I never once thought of the Fresh Prince during the show. Not till writing this anyway. :)

Later everyone. Going to catch up on some of Carmi's blog which I have been neglecting for the past few weeks.


** excuse any spelling and inconsistencies. It's late. I might clean them up tomorrow depending how much I groan when I see them.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 02:02 [+] :: 0 comments
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179 till the TdF
cycling: Yeah. As I get pudgy while winter wears on, I realized via my Konfabulator countdown timer that it is exactly 179 days till the Tour de France begins. At this point, as the above poster indicates clearly, it's a Post Lance tour despite his maybe/maybe not comments in the fall. Will Jan win? Will Basso?



Following the progress around the map counter clock around France from July 1st to July 23rd will tell. And on July 18th they will be racing up L'Alpe d'Huez! Awesome.

Here are some details from the Official TdF site:

A prologue and 20 stages and will cover a total distance of 3,600 kilometres.

These 20 stages have the following profiles:
* 9 flat stages,
* 4 medium mountain stages,
* 5 mountain stages,
* 2 individual time-trial stages,

Distinctive aspects of the race
* 3 mountain finishes,
* 2 rest days,
* 116 kilometres of individual time-trials (including the prologue)
* 22 Category 1, Category 2 and highest level passes will be climbed

I watched last year's Tour de Flanders - a one day race held in April and nothing to do with Homer's neighbour - that I saved on the PVR for mid winter motivation. I also have 5 or 6 of the more exciting 2005 Tour stages. At 3 hours a piece, I figure by mid March I will be done with them and hopefully outside and riding again. Kelly and I talked about that the other day. First good (dry and roads free of snow) day we have off together we are going to go riding.

Nothing like watching Discovery, T-Mobile, CSC, FDJ, and the others go at it on European country roads and cobblestones and 15% hills while there is snow outside here. It motivates you to build a time travel machine. And get back to the gym. When this cold - which I have aquired yesterday - is out of my system, I am there.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 11:13 [+] :: 1 comments
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Russian urban Climbing
video: this guy is completely nuts. But it certainly a product of the former Soviet Union's passion for gymnastics. He is beyond impressive in his stunts. This 8 min video is worth the watch . Takes the term 'no fear' to new heights. Pun intended.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 10:47 [+] :: 1 comments
...

New years fill of TV.
life: Decided to stay in despite having a couple of offers to go out. And I thought it might be interesting to go to Victoria Park and take some pics there of the live music and such. I had gone by during the day and it was cold and damp at that point. I took some disappointing shots of the Holy Roller Sherman tank with the Olympus point n shoot and came home before dark. Once in and full of dinner and nice n warm, staying in seemed to be the better option instead of going stag to a party or going to the Salt Lounge and lining up and paying some stupid cover which was plan B.

As I had promised someone that I would not spend the evening editing pictures so I decided to catch up on some TV and podcasts. Seeing the Sherman, I decided to watch Hart's War that I had PVR'd last week from the History Channel. It's set in a German Luftstallag around the time of the Battle of the Ardennes. Not a bad movie and apparently technically accurate in terms of the prison details.

I watched all of the episodes of the Star Wars: Clone Wars animated series on TeleToon from like 8-12pm. And interspersed in there was some OCC bike building, and UFC. And while doing that I framed some pics to swap out some of what I have on my walls, and on my desk at work. I had printed out a few shots of the Scarlet Sins and my neice too and they turned out pretty OK.

One pain in the ass is some Ikea frames matt sizes. They are wierd. Not 8x10. 8x 10 1/4. Which means none fit. I might get a couple retrofitted at some point since I like the frame thickness.

I also listened to about 10 episodes of the Adam Curry's Daily Source Code. I seem to listen to them in batches. And am still behind: I am still at the end of October for the shows!

With four days off, I cleaned up the apartment this weekend and sorted and tossed a fair bit of stuff - I better not miss the recycling this week. And will bring in some magazines and stuff to work for the lunch room.

At the laundromat at one point on Friday afternoon when transferring the contents from washers to heavy dryers - nice and clean comforter covers and linen's y'all - I couldn't figure out what the nasty smell was. There was no one around me and I had showered - ;) - so I know it wasn't me. It was the unmistakable smell of massive B.O and stale cigarettes and Nicotine that you normally associate with homeless people. I came across a few instances of this doing security on the central Toronto harbourfront in the late 80s and early 90s when the place was a lot more industrial than it is now. Then I located the source when he and his associate came in to swap their stuff over. This guy reeked.

The clothes he was wearing had that through and through absorbed look of someone who worn the same dress shirt for weeks on end. Not the dirtiest clothes, but in a laundromat where normally wash soap and Bounce anti fabric sheets - and great toasted sandwiches - permeate the air it stood out. And he was obviously jumped up on something from his agitated state and scrawny, sallow appearance. His friend was probably taking him to do the laundry and keeping an eye on him during the process, but he was making people a little uncomfortable and furtive glances were made towards him as he kept going outside for smokes. One of the joys of doing laundry non-ensuite style.

While having lunch at the Market Grill on the 30th, I was told - albeit indirectly - that I am too old to date someone in their mid to late 20s! It was the first time in my life that I had been told that I was too old for something or someone. I know it was only one woman's opinion and stemmed out of their frustration of being messaged constantly on LavaLife by older men (read: My Age) and no it wasn't me... I dunno. While it was unintentional, it was a little unsettling and initially affected me more than I would have thought. I guess it was something I didn't really need to hear. I know age, and age difference, is in the eye of the beholder's, and it's how you feel and all that. But it was a first.

Grumpy ol' man indeed. :)

But that was last year. On with 2k6.

Carpe Diem

:: Mike Wood 19:43 [+] :: 3 comments
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