Greatwall Studios Graphic Design

Not much. But we are glad to be home even if that means shoveling snow, scraping ice, and salting first thing in the morning. We had a small puddle in the basement while we were away, and I can not track from whence it came. Windows are dry. Floors up under the ground level windows and drywall are dry. The hot water tank, and water softener are both dry. The drain pipe in the laundry room is dry. I wonder if it just took a couple of days for the excess water from the tank swap out job to finally coalesce into one spot. Would help identify why the water mark was dark. I have triple checked the fittings, and the floors around our water supply and they are all good, at least visually. Bone dry too. The water spouts are all tucked into the drain, though one or two not as deep as I like. But the wall where the water would seep from if that was the case was dry, with no new staining or patching or discolorations. Who knows at this point.

We’ve had a winter’s worth of snow and we aren’t even into January yet. Hardly ten days into actual winter with almost two feet of accumulated snow from all of December, and part of November. If this keeps up I do not know what I am going to do with all this snow. I’ll have to wheel barrow it out of the back yard and onto the front lawn to keep it from getting into the basement. Hell I might have to attempt to pull snow off the roof lest our bungalow cave in under all the additional weight. I know they make tools for that sort of thing, I just don’t know where I’d find one locally. Something to consider, along with a snow blower.

It is likely that we take the tree down tomorrow. But given how cold it is the exterior lights will stay up for quite some time. Not to mention I need the ladder to unwind the trees, and I won’t be doing that until it’s nearly spring, and not minus twenty or below. I am willing to do lots of things, but freeze up in a tree for the sake of a few lights isn’t one of them.

The list of books I read this year goes as follows

1.) Nuclear War by Annie Jacobsen which was terrifying yet informative, a quick read if you don’t want to be able to sleep.

2.) Mercy of God’s by James S A Corey a very strong first book for a new intergalactic series which I am excited to grab the second book in April of 2026. Hard cover bay-bee!

3.) Steel Egg (Aliens) by John Shirley. A perfectly reasonable entry into the Aliens novel franchise. Short and Sweet. Adds new extraterrestrial species to the canon. Not bad.

4.) Rogue (Aliens) by Sandy Schofield which was an older book I picked up used, but was a rip roaring tale of space marines, and scientific devilry combined into an action thriller.

5.) Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson, which I only got a hundred or so pages into before I got bored and put it down. I may yet come back to it, but I did get over 100 pages into it, so it counts as a “tried to read”. Oddly enough not the first time I’ve tried to read it and given up to read something more up my alley, but I digress. Not bad per se, just not what I was hankering for.

6.) Martian Contingency by Marie Robinette Kowal which was a new entry in the lady astronaut series. It was ok, felt like a link with exposition to a larger or more compelling story. Not as good as the first two or three books that for certain. Alternate history be damned, this meandered and didn’t go anywhere vital. Could have been a perfectly useful short story on her website.

7.) The black box of doom by Jason Pargin. Here’s a good example of a book I wish I had found ten fifteen years ago, as it reads very of the times, and I’m not an anxiety ridden teen, so much of this feels performative to me. Very meme, and Reddit aged bias here. Not my jam, but not bad by any means. I have been moving slowly with this. In fact I put it down in order to read number eight cover to cover over a two day period. So not finished yet, but I haven’t totally given up on it either.

8.) The shattering peace by John Scalzi, which was a very entertaining entry in a series about humanity and aliens out and about in the universe. Fun and snarky. A quick read. Fun times.

Whilst I am disappointed I didn’t get around to the last two Dune books on my shelf, nor the volume seven omnibus for Aliens, or my Gaunts Ghosts omnibus by Dan Abnett, I have those ready and waiting should I feel the urge to go headfirst into some longer reads.

This year end in review post might wind up fairly long. Though I do not intend to show images of all of my projects I will mention I started two sculpts and have not finished either of them. Pictured here.

The Hellboy might even be older than a year, I do not recall. But the fat wasting goblin King is from this year (started anyway). I have an armature waiting for me to process some super sculpey so I can get that going for next year’s fair entry. It will be a permanent version of the wasting goblin King whom is far from complete at this point. Needs his head, arms, clothes, armor, and textures put in place. Need him done so that I can recreate it for my fair entry in ceramics. I’ll have to paint him too.

Speaking of which I painted the Ninja Turtle this year and he went to the fair in place of anything new. I ran out of time, and didn’t have the will to start from scratch on anything else. A big theme this year. Probably why I only made a couple of items in the wood shop in 2025, however I cleaned and organized the hell out of my shop this year. So clean! New racks, new two tier rolling tool chest, new sliding double compound mitre saw, and an upgraded air compressor. While I may not have worked on any specific jobs as much as I would like, I cleaned out the shop, and tossed so much junk it’s not even funny. Now it’s set to press play on my next furniture build. Which might be the end table dog storage for the family room / front door area. Or a desk, or a cubby for Nick knacks for my youngest daughter. Hard to say. I’d like to remove the dog cage as the front door space is tight without that massive wire block taking up all the floor space.

I recently had to pull our garbage box apart on the front porch because the new provincial blue bin program uses a 360L wheelie bin that doesn’t fit the current box. I think it’ll end up in the garage much to my chagrin. It’s huge! Plus I need to buy a new garbage bin, and a new green bin that locks. The whole reason for the bin box was to stop pests from getting into it all. Now they changed what we put to the curb I need to adjust accordingly. Fine.

Cleaning the garage out meant taking a whole lot of wood to the farm for the burn barrel. I once again have a whole lot to take down there once again. It can wait for spring, or a milder day or two in the winter. Think like a zero degree day with blue skies and sunshine. That’s the ticket.

My wife and I went out to see several comedy shows this year. Now that the girls are growing up a bit we can venture out a few times a year just the two of us. It’s bliss. A quiet dinner out by ourselves. A show or two here and there. It’s been a long time coming, and I’m excited to keep it going.

Loads more happened this year what with uncle Fred passing in February, and Great Grandma going in the spring, and any number of new updates with the farm, family, school, work and the like. Too numerous to mention. I hope you all have a great New Years Eve, and a better 2026! Ciao Bella.

Luckily the worst of the ice Storm, and the snow has blown itself out (at least as far as we have driven) making the drive home somewhat pleasant. Traffic isn’t too terrible either. We are moving steadily at a good pace. The trek will still take us close to five hours with multiple bathroom breaks for us, and the kids. Not much else we can do besides drive safely, and eat regularly. The temperature sure has dropped by double digits since yesterday that’s for sure.

Only a few days left for me to top 4,700 views, and 2,800 visitors! Can you make that happen!?! I’d be interested to see if we can. I’ll see check in to see my final word count tally too. Did I break 100,000 words or more again this year? We will have to wait and see.

If I remember I’ll write about the books 8 read this year, which was only a half dozen. I got into two others, but I only finished six cover to cover. I did split a shit tonne of wood though down at the farm, and spend several hours with my chainsaw stacking rounds. So I just aimed myself at different targets this year besides reading, and writing this blog. Variety is the spice of life.

Had a great time visiting family in Ottawa. Shame the bad weather followed us there – again! My eldest daughter randomly throwing up one afternoon put a slight damper on things, but so did the ice Storm slash freezing rain that swept through the province. Can’t have everything!

I am looking forward to sleeping in my own bed with my pillows, and sheets. Using my own shower, and not having the whole family in bed around me tossing, turning, talking, And kicking me. Will be nice to see the dog and have a puppy cuddle while I watch rotk.

First it was freezing rain, and it will soon be followed by a snow storm, so we are hunkered down trying to wait out the worst of it before we venture out back into the main roads and highways. Our second destination looks to be cancelled and we will head home instead. No working out way back leisurely with additional stops to soften the blow. Given the weather our drive will likely extend from five hours to seven plus. Which will require additional fuel stops, bathroom breaks, and chances to move around so that my hip, and leg don’t cramp up something awful.

Luckily our eldest has only thrown up once (so far), and looks to be a better colour than she was yesterday afternoon. She has since slept off and on for double digit hours, so she must be feeling rather run down, and not quite herself. We will see how things progress.

Ottawa – where terrible weather comes to greet us! Ha.

Deep pockets of freezing rain across the province are plaguing us as we move about. If we didn’t go the weather would have been calm and innocuous, but because we ventured out the weather has conspired against us! Such is life. Happy Sunday.

Adding to this unpredictable theme, my eldest randomly threw up on her way into the community centre to go for a family swim. That out the kybosh on our evening plans. Well, no, not exactly. The impending freezing rain slash snow storm out a stopper on our night out to see a concert, but the puking child made us cut our afternoon plans short, and hole up in our hotel room to regroup and assess the situation.

She has more colour & sass now, but is still under the weather and not quite right. Now we wait to see what exactly the weather brings, and we plan accordingly based on the outcome we meet in the morning. Can’t control the weather, so no point fretting about it. We will sort ourselves out once we know more. But it adds yet another weather notch to our long list of weather related travel events that we laugh about years later. Emphasis on the years later.

We are as prepped as we can be. Vehicle filled with fuel. Snacks and drinks in the room. Clothes, medication and charged electronics. It’s as good as it’s going to get for us until we get where we need to go. I pray for a nice drive, and not a white knuckle hellscape up in the north country. We’ll see. Ha!

Hard to tell what day of the week it actually is! On the bright side I sat down to rewatch The fellowship of the ring, and The two towers yesterday afternoon. Left it a bit late to try a squeeze in The return of the king as well. Not bad though. Went from no LOTR to 2/3 completed. I do not own the extended editions. I know, I know, sacrilege and all that jazz. My wife has the boxed sets but do you think I have ever been able to locate them!?! Not since 2007 have I seen any sight of them. The movies are already long, so I’m not sad that I didn’t add an extra forty minutes of film to the two I have sat down to watch. It was a tight fit to get those two in before midnight. I’m not the goer I used to be otherwise I’d have stayed up until three to complete the trilogy! I don’t have that kind of whimsy anymore.

Seems like the weather has slowed a little bit. Which is nice. We have family to go see, and work to complete at the cottage. I may have work period once we make landfall at the cottage compound. But that’s next week Me’s problem. Today I am focused on getting the dog set up at the inlaws house for the weekend.

I have cleaning to get to, and items to unplug. Ciao Bella!

Boxing day is here, along with higher winds, and some freezing rain, ice pellets, and blowing snow! Such luck. I slept in until almost ten o’clock, but the kids were up early fighting over the new Meta Quest 3 VR headset, much as I knew they would. I have work coming on Monday at some point, for invoices to be filed (that I am aware of) and hopefully nothing big until after January fifth when everything settles back into our usual schedule. I do hope this weather doesn’t persist as we are expected to go to several different locations over the coming days. I’d love for this stuff to settle down, or at least keep the roads clear. We always seem to need to travel when the weather is terrible.

Although the bad weather is really just another layer of the off putting float we experience between Christmas and New Years. Just drifting around aimlessly not knowing what day of the week it is. No schedule to follow. It’s dark when I wake up, and if you blink it’s dark again and yet another day is gone. Very strange time of year. Unsettling even. Not that I want to spend nine hours a day working to guide me through the week, but I guess I should have set up some kind of DIY job, or task to occupy myself a little. I wouldn’t mind watching all three LOTR movies, but that’s an eleven hour task! I can’t focus on hobbits and dwarves, and orcs for that long. I know the stories too well to get lost in the fantasy like that anymore.

I drank a fair bit yesterday afternoon, which mostly contributed to my sleeping in until ten this morning. Not a tonne, but enough for me to notice. I had my wife drive us home. Better safe than sorry! I think if you added up the sparkling wine component of my drinks it might have equalled 1.5 full wine glasses of straight sparkling white wine, but I mixed it with a fruit juice, and Sprite too. Kind of a spritzer, mimosa type thing I enjoy at Christmas and New Years. My parents always called it a Bucks Fizz. Tasty little thing. At 11.5% it’ll get you where you’re headed without too much trouble, especially since they aren’t hard to drink. A lighter mixed drink for those of us who won’t drink straight hard liquor over ice.

This VR headset is going to get broken as I’ve heard both kids punch tables, walls, the fireplace, and door frames with those hand held controllers while inside the helmet. Won’t be long before we have to order new hand held controllers at this rate. Bang… Bang… Ouch… Bang. Not to mention possible broken fingers or busted wrists. Look for us in the ER over the coming weeks!

This year was pretty quiet work wise. I took up both wood splitting, and chainsawing larger logs to soak up some of my free time during the school day hours. I am fully prepared to stick to it this coming year too. I have secured a second PO from another client, so I have the certainty of at least some work in 2026. I know a third client will have two projects coming my way in the heart of the winter. One for late February, and another likely in March. First quarter will look strong, but those PO’s can stretch until June or beyond, so not as formidable as they first appear on January 1st.

Can’t spend it, until I earn it. A major lesson in self control. That’s not a fun lesson to learn early on as a freelancer. Getting out over your skis is a terrible position to put yourself in. Not when you end up working for nothing towards the end because you got greedy and spent the money before you earned it by doing the hours you are contracted for. If you look at the funds as just January, you might think you’re doing a bit of all right! But if you step back and think oh this might have to last until June, or as late as November then it tells a much different story. But with some planning, and a budget, and not having eyes bigger than your wallet, you can manage.

Soon I will begin gathering my 2025 tax information so that I don’t feel rushed come April. I need to calculate my Q3 hst soon anyway, and get that filed for the CRA. Fun times ahead for us all.

This site has done really well for me this year. I have a hard time believing I will continue to see these numbers, and this kind of growth. If I recall the viewers as gone up over 4,600, and I think the unique visitors is over 2,700 as well. The month isn’t done yet, but I don’t think we’ll see a huge crush of people trying to read my archives or download my two free books of collected short stories before the 31st. I’m happy, and kind of impressed with it all. Will be sad to see the counter go back to zero on January 1st, 2026 but perhaps I can spark some type of resurgence or creative drive that boosts engagement here. It’s a possibility rather than a problem.

I still underperformed my reading goals this year, by a wide margin. My eyes going on me, and needing glasses put a damper on my desire to read. I think I will search for large text reading books in the future so that my eyes aren’t the limiting factor. My back log of novels didn’t get touched. I didn’t even read all of the new books I purchased this year. I should get back on that, because I do enjoy reading.

I didn’t sculpt all that much this year, and I only made a small handful of wood projects in 2025 as well.

Starting off the day with opening our stockings, and making breakfast for the inlaws due to arrive in the next ten to fifteen minutes. All the best to you on this, the strangest of days!

Santa was very generous for bringing us the things we need. Lots of tooth brushes, tooth paste, general toiletries and sundries. Also a board game for the kids to play as well, since they love the tic tac toe game at the public library. He’s very thoughtful that way. Bonus that the elf has pissed off for another year! Bye bye lil bastard.

The kids got a saxophone and a meta quest vr headset, so that has kept them busy for much of today. Honking and squeaking scales for a good hour or two. She has ten reeds to go through so we should be ok for a few days or weeks at this point. The saxophone is a beginner version, so not anything too crazy. Still cost me a pretty penny, but not the seven hundred dollars plus that Long & McQuade were asking for their lowest level beginner instrument. Luckily it came undamaged, and can form notes. Blessed.

My wife bought the kids a VR headset, and I got to set that up earlier today. Battery lasts about an hour, with a two to three hour charging time. Will help to limit them from going into la la land for too much over the coming days. We now have gorilla tag, beat saber, and fruit ninja to play on it. I gave fruit ninja a whirl and it seems like fun.

We have finally opened the sparkling wine and fruit juices, so I’m all set to get day drunk and eat until it’s time for bed! Ha. Expect nothing else from me today please and thank you. I sent out all of my well wishes this morning to get them out of the way. I need to do nothing else today, and I’m more than ok with it.

Peace out homies.

Ba dum tiss! Work has been suspended until January 5th unless there is a priority one, triple time charged, explosive emergency that absolutely HAS to be taken care of before the kids go back to school. Otherwise I can crack open a beverage at just about any point in the day free of guilt, provided I don’t have to drive anywhere, or be singularly responsible for any children. What else is new?

Tonight we say good bye to the Elf for another year, thankfully. That’s a nightly stressor I will be glad to see the back of once again. I’m still mad my inlaws introduced our kids to it, since the onus is on us to do the performative Elf skits 24 nights in a row. If they did it at their house I wouldn’t even care, but I have to do it, and that bugs the shit out of me. God damn Elf on the shelf nonsense.

Had a random dream last night that my phone got pick pocketed in Europe last night, and I asked Tom Cruise (who was there randomly) if he knew anything about it, he told me I was foolish for having my real phone on me, that I should just get a cheap burner phone when in Europe, but when I got back to my hotel room the phone was there waiting on the charger. But the security lock down procedure was in place, and I had to log back in using security codes… It was very odd.

Merry Christmas everybody. Take care out there.

I do not have a large enough Lysol wipes stock pile to keep us all from catching these colds, sore throats, fevers and such. We did get Flu shots but stand little chance against all of these accumulated bugs that we are currently seeing. I hope that we settle out a little otherwise we are going to have to postpone Christmas, and possibly scuttle all travel plans, and external family visits if we can’t contain what is currently plaguing our household. That’s where we are with two days to go until the big day itself arrives.  I for one know that the kids are excited for the Holidays and getting together with everyone, but it is looking less, and less likely with each spike in temperature, and an assurance that one, or all of the rest of us (likely me) will pick this up shortly after my youngest starts to feel better. Compromised immune system to the starting blocks please!

I recently sat down to rewatch Deep Water Horizon, and Limitless the last few days, and I miss those mid tier movies being available in theaters. Both are good in their own right. Not exceptional, but good through and through. I think I have seen the least amount of new media this year, ever in my life. Fewest movie theater visits since Covid that is. It’s kind of crazy to think that what was a huge part of my life has just withered and died off. Partially because sound design is terrible and I can’t hear people talk, and I prefer closed captioning now. Also not much has come out that I’d care to see. Nuremberg was out for three days and gone. I think I would have liked that a good deal.

I’m now out of the Marvel demographic so that sort of thing doesn’t ring my bell. Too many consecutive disappointments. I have little faith in the Marvel umbrella. Should have stopped at End Game and that would have made their legacy untouchable. Instead we got dog shit film, after poor CGI render, after filler content, in a near constant stream of emptiness. Star Wars had Andor seasons one and Two, so that was a pleasant surprise.

Our blue box program ends this week, goes on hiatus next week, then picks up with the new gigantic wheeled carts in the new year. I will have to tear apart my garbage box on the front porch to make room for the apartment sized, tiny home looking blue bin we have to use from here on out. Should be an absolute riot!

Vent covers, electrical box cover, replenishing wire nuts, and buying and using more hangers to keep the power hugged close to the wall and ceiling so it can’t be bumped, tugged on, or pulled. Nothing major so I feel comfortable doing it. I did end up buying two 2″ PVC pipe caps, one to go indoors and one for the exterior. Inside one slipped on with a nice pressure fit, no problem there. My issue is the exterior already has an elbow on it with a wire mesh insert, so the cap I have will not fit over that wider elbow piece. I am loathe to cut it off incase the length of the exterior pipe is governed by a bylaw or building code, and messing with it will only cause me issues in the future. I could likely silicone a metal plate over it and call it a day at some point in the spring. I didn’t see any 2.25″ caps, or 2.5″ caps, so I’ll just make do with the interior cap for now. No harm done. It was $3.00 for the cap, so I don’t need to rush back to return it. That’s a blessing in and of itself.

I picked up some larger pliers and side cutters while I was out since my tiny ones made the wiring job so much more difficult. I personally don’t touch wiring in the house, at all. Too high of a potential for burning the house down. I did however wire in the smoke/carbon monoxide sensors which worked out pretty well, but all I had to do there was join a red to a red, and a black to a black with wire nuts, and the job was done. Nothing to it. But typically I wouldn’t touch any of it. I’ve needed to swap out a light switch in my wife’s bedroom but haven’t done so because it makes me nervous. Our electrical panel isn’t marked very well from the initial install when the house was built, so finding the correct zone means going through and shutting every switch off and on until we find the correct one. That’s annoying, time consuming, and I don’t feel like testing them all. It would be beneficial at some point to identify what they all do and mark the box accordingly, but not today. Not while everyone is home, and my wife’s in a bad mood already.

Speaking of which my youngest has come down with a fever, which means tears to the uninitiated. Also means my wife’s plans for the afternoon have been scuttled, making her even more angry. Fun-fun. That’s also why I’m tying off loose ends so there are fewer items to set her off. I have managed to convince my youngest to try some pain/fever relief medication, so I hope that helps to cool her down, and brighten her spirits. We had three flavours to choose from, so she had some input into what was used. Fingers crossed.