Our presents are wrapped and our stockings are stuffed.

This Christmas season has so far been too much shopping and not enough celebrating. That part’s all behind us now so It’s time to have some winter fun and of course, the food.

This weekend started off with a long drive to spend a day dealing with some very unpleasant issues down in Belleville, Ontario. After that was all said and done our trip ended with tobogganing on the farm and our first Christmas feast of the year, cooked over an old wood stove. Everything is now just the way it should be.

I’m back home now and there are lots of gifts under our very tinny tree.  Things will be quite around here for the next little while. The Champagne’s on ice, waiting for Christmas morning to come.

I is what you’re getting for Christmas. So you better Love it!

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Todays is my Dad’s 60th Birthday. Happy birthday and I’m sure you’ll have another 60 to go. I’m almost amazed that my mother managed to pull off a surprise party without him finding out. Luckily after 60 years, he doesn’t ask that many questions any more. I think he got exactly what he wanted for his birthday, all his friends with him having a good time.

The first 60 are going pretty good

Statler and Waldorf are my Favorite Muppets Too.

Uncle Bobs on the left and Dad’s on the right.

The Blacksmith Photo Page

This is The Blacksmith. I had met with him this summer in Richmond Ontario. After a couple of photos and the conversation to go with them, I found out that he had started off as a steel worker at The Beach Foundry. Beach was the steel mill where most of the Delaney family’s history was being written during the 60s and 70s. My father Mike, uncles Bob and Danny, aunt Sue and of course my grandfather Ernie Delaney all worked there. Some for only a short period of time and others for years until the foundry was finally closed.

I gave my dad this set of photos as a birthday present. I do hope they meant something to him and I’m sure I’ll see them hanging in our cottage next time I’m there.

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Even the longest journey starts with a single 5,313Km step.

My travel bug has moved from GeoCache to GeoCache. He has now traveled over 5,000Km from his resting place, buried away in western Quebec across the Atlantic to London England.

I managed to get in touch with GeoCasher “5chipmunks” while he was traveling with the “Dead Man’s Chest”. He dropped him off while on an Expedition to Africa.

“These three Scurvy sailors were good and alive when they were first buried many years ago, Arrrr Harrr Harrr. They sailed the 7 seas in life and now they travel the world as skull and bones looking for their final resting spot.”

Dead Man’s Chest

Mapped out the trip from
Mt. Ste. Marie Quebec to Harmondsworth Moor Park in London England.

This member of the Rebel Alliance was spotted stashing critical Imperial blue prints in a GeoCache in the Orleans forestry area. We found him hiding this morning after a long hike through the woods.

Those were the droids we were looking for!

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We have a new feline friend staying with us. He’s been here a week and we’ve had nothing but fun with him since his arrival. He loves people and has learnt how to plays fetch.
His favorite thing to do is play in the toilet. I’m not sure what’s so fascinating but if it makes him happy I’ve got no reason to stop him. Were still trying to teach him to sty off of the kitchen table and we’re a little concerned about him jumping up on the stove. I can tell him not to a hundred times but I think he may just end up learning that lesson the hard way.

I’m glad to say he has taking after me. No I don’t drink out of the toilet too. He’s got his very own Blog! It’s a Twitter feed at BlogCat. So far mommy and daddy are his only friends online but I’m sure that will change over time.

All Part of Fine Dining Alley Cat Style

Check Out These Claws Baby!

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I haven’t been around the blogosphere for a while. I think I’ll have to stop using twitter as a blog post substitution. So, it looks like it’s time for an update once again and as always a couple of photos to go along with it.

We got home last might from our latest visit to the town of Queensborough. While we were there, we visited ‘Grandma Madoc’ in Madoc and ‘Grandma Farm’ on the farm.

The food on the farm is always delicious. The meats are fresh and for the rest of my life, store bought bacon just wont taste as good farm bacon cooked up in real maple syrup.

All of these photos are from Charlie & Bonnie’s Maple bush at ‘Spring Creek Maple’. They have a very interesting operation running. Charlie manages to encompass both a low-tech life with some very high tech tools. One visit he was showing me his old fashion sugar bush, with Maple trees tapped by hand and a sap boiling stove hand built by the Mennonites. The next visit he spent hours explaining solar battery storage, electrical current conversion and showing off his power generating wind mills and the solar grid that his house is hooked up to.

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We celebrated Tashia’s 21st birthday at the Richmond Fair. Rides, Horses, Cows, they had all the ingredients for authentic County Fair.

I think our favorite part were the BBQ Ribs straight off the farm.

Next year well be back for the demolition derby.

It was a fun day and we came home with some great photos to add to the album.

Richmond Fair Photo Page

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Geeked out at Club Saw’s Arcade show on Saturday night. There was karaoke Rock Band on the big concert stage, retro gaming and a PacMan & Galaga competition that was about as intense as it can get. All the new and old gaming hardware as well as the video equipment was donated by the staff and friends of Saw Video.

I wish there were a lot more of this sort of event in Ottawa. The people are here for it and the rooms at this one were packed. Let’s get a Comi-con or next years Fan Expo here in the Capital.

I finally got to play E.T. on the Atari 2600. It truly is the worst game ever made. It brought an entire industry to its knees. Here’s a great little history lesson for anyone who’s interested “Video Game Crash of 1983”

Woow! That’s a big screen.

tHe RoBoTs aTe mArIo’S mUsHrOoM’s

It makes playing video games feel more inspirational

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I had the privilege of being a guest in an authentic traditional Japanese Tea Ceremony, hosted by a student of the art who has received years of training abroad by the Japanese masters.

The ceremony slowly transformed from the tranquil, ancient ritual to an engaging conversation, teaching the culture and lifestyle behind it.

I was quite entranced at how everything in the ceremony was executed with precision and care. Nothing was secondary and every step is done for a very specific reason that was to reveal its self by the ceremony’s conclusion. Each of the tasks that were carried out had a deeply contemplated meaning and nothing in this “tradition” is done simple because ‘That is how it has always been done’.  As I was becoming aware of this it started to reveal a key to the Japanese cultures of which the Tea Ceremony reflects.

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Today was a great opportunity to shoot some high speed photography at the golf course. The details that are picked up in the golfer’s swing at twenty frames a second are fantastic.

I was pleasantly surprised that my best pictures turned out to be all the young guys. I was really expecting the old pros to show them up, out on the links.

I’ve posted only a few of the many photos of our family golf team in their excellent form. Believe me there were also plenty of not so proficiently preformed shoots as well. Specifically the close up I got of uncle Wayne’s golf ball as it sourced across my head.  I will say, if it had hit me it would have been my own fault for sticking my nose out to far.

Best Swing of the Day. Thanks Spence

The New School Pros

Is it a Hole in one or did he just step on a Snake?

Going up in Smoke

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While I was at the comic book shop this week, I bought a can filled with the T-Virus and a refreshing can of Slurm to wash it down with. Slurm tastes a lot like Red Bull and worm poop.

I think the evil monkey may be infected by the virus. And if your wondering, you can tell he’s evil because he wears a Fez.

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