Greatwall Studios Graphic Design

To start off with, first.) I am seven episodes into Department Q on Netflix, and while it has gotten better, albeit a tad convoluted, and suffers from some pacing issues (in my opinion anyway) it is an ok show. I might venture to say I like it? I suppose. Now I just want to know how it ends.

Second.) I did get a foursome for golf booked for early this week, though now my ankle has decided to be a bit shit, so I don’t have much hope for it not being a mess tomorrow. I am however excited to get out with my wife, and a few friends for some childless outdoor fun. We are going to a course which my wife frequents for work/staff events, so by all means should be a good time. She is a fan of the cart paths. Sounds like fun.

Third.) Dog has his vet visit today so that’s is likely going to cost me a bundle for needles, pills, check-up, and any blood work they deem required. A very quick way to add a few hundred bucks to my visa bill for August no doubt. His regular gal is away with a family matter so our Graham has to see somebody else today. Luckily we did his big surgery elsewhere, so as far as I know he doesn’t have any big misgivings about this particular office.

Four.) Still no progress on the illustrated children’s book. I’m sorry to say that even with all the indoor days we took due to extreme heat, and high UV, I did not manage to pull it together to paint the pages I need done to post the document here. Sad, I know. I will get it done!

Five.) We had a very busy week last week seeing cousins on both sides, and close family, as well as friends from Sunday evening right up until Saturday afternoon. It was a wild one. Lots and lots of tubing, wake boarding, swimming, and BBQ meals. I’m about 4 lbs heavier still, and I was up before the week started as well! Gah. Summer body is a marshmallow!

Six.) We did not go to see Superman, or any other film out in the theaters this summer, but I have Sat down to watch parts of Kpop Demon Hunters no less than four times, so Netflix has the cheese to squeeze this summer. I also saw Happy Gilmore 2 twice this summer, so that’s probably doing ok numbers on Netflix as well.

Seven.) We had the chance to ride the new extreme coaster Alpen Fury at Canada’s Wonderland a couple of weeks ago, and it was great. I won’t do another three hour line to ride it ever again, but it was fast, turbulent, and also very smooth riding. It was the only thing besides eating a meal, and downing several beverages in the intense heat that we did while there. Good ride but the line needs work. More fans, more misters, more shaded areas, and definitely more chances to buy cold drinks when in line. Two young women fainted in that line while my daughter and I were there. Took the EMT’s a while to show up too. It was so hot, and the air so thick yet still. Awful conditions. Fun ride though.

Eight.) downloads of both books and the audio version of one chapter are still going pretty strong. I might even break 100 downloads of each by Christmas if things keep up this way. Not sure what caused it but there was an enormous jump in views from out of Germany specifically. Like nearly 1,600 in a single day. It was wild. Kept up for more than a week at that. Not to the same four digit extent, but like 60+ for a week or more. Loved it! Let me earn my 15th cent in advertising partial dollars. Ha. My guess was right, the new low for getting paid out was raised from fifteen cents to a higher number. I did not bother to go see what the new minimum payout requirement is. If nearly 2,000 people came here to look at something and I got .01$ for it, I can only imagine how long it will take to reach the new minimum. I don’t bring it out of people like that!

So — yeah! Summer break 2025 has been fun filled, extremely hot, and extraordinarily dry. Drought since early July means the lake is down nearly 2 ft in depth, which is wild for July, and early August. Forecast calls for no rain up north over the next 15 days either. First year for forest fire up near my inlaws place. Bit spooky. We need a solid week of rain to take us out of total burn ban range. Not safe to have any sparks fluttering around up there.

Happy Monday!

Trying to figure out a suitable schedule among four adults is no small feat, but I think we can get it done. I might be leaving things to the last minute here, but I figure if it wants to happen, then it will resolve in a mutually beneficial way. No point bending to the point of breaking to make something happen if all involved aren’t 100% on board, you know what I mean?

The temperature is supposed to begin to decline just a touch, so seems like a great opportunity to play 18 holes unencumbered by children. This will be the most golf I have ever played in a single summer, or an entire calendar year for that matter. I think once September rolls around I might try out an executive 9 hole course just to say that I did. Keep the streak going! Have a better number to strive for next year! Goals people, do you have them!?! Ha.

Once I shoot a 175 people will realize I’m just terrible, but out there enjoying myself. Waiting patiently for just one good drive, one decent chip, one suitable flop & roll, and maybe, just maybe a one putt for par out of the entire 18 holes. In aggregate, just terrible, as individual swings potentially a handful of good ones. You just never know. I don’t take it or myself all that seriously.

A new course, with new golfing buddies, with two newly purchased used clubs, it could be a really fun time outside while summer winds down, and my wife gears up to head back to work. Could this become our thing as our children get older, and age out of needing our attention 24/7. As they become more independent we could hit the links. Might be a fun turn of events. We will see.

I will aim to book a tee time later on tonight once I hear back from the two other people in our foursome. Golf carts await! Vroom-vroom!

My wife, and two of my brothers enjoyed it quite a bit. I couldn’t get into it, but I thought I’d give it another go and see if by paying closer attention to it, I like it anymore than the first time. So far still the same level of interest. Scotch death threats sound funny, hardly intimidating. I haven’t felt the hook, the snag, the catch to draw me in. I’ll give it a couple more minutes, or perhaps the whole first episode. We will have to wait and see. It’s on Netflix.

Though we will be back for the long weekend most likely. Time goes by so fast. How did nine weeks dissolve into just two more left. Lots to clean up & wash before the long trek homeward. Fun times had by all.

On June 26th the summer break stretched out before us as nine nearly empty weeks of unending requirements to keep our kids entertained, engaged, and active. It felt like a massive hurdle to keep the occupied, and not at each other’s throats. Then the heat waves settled in and sucked much of our strength, and the desire to be outdoors, or out & about doing stuff, right out of our bodies. Now there are only two weeks left to go before they return to school and I think of the things we could have done, but didn’t. We still got to go do and bunch of stuff, they were not hard done by, but the heat & humidity was so oppressive we just couldn’t justify even more activities. Folks were fainting around us at Wonderland. We opted to stay indoors out of the heat, under the cool protection of the AC for much of the summer. Yes we could have ventured to bigger beaches, or the Zoo, or amusement parks or what not, but the sun burns, heat exhaustion, and general unpleasantness of such things wasn’t worth it to us.

I feel bad we didn’t do more, but I’m also glad we didn’t cause any permanent damage exposing ourselves to the harsh elements this summer. If September doesn’t devolve into a rain soaked mess we still have time to go day trip places on the weekends. Though once the kids programming kicks in there won’t be much free time in the evenings to worry about going anywhere extra. We have a jam packed schedule between both kids.

I guess nine weeks felt so open to possibilities, but the reality of working, and the intense heat & dryness out a damper on our desire to do more with the kids. I used my skateboard once. Have not used my bike, nor my roller blades — again! This whole summer. Heading north a bunch mitigates those as options because of the unlit dirt roads. The girls will just have to be satisfied by doing cottage life style things, and not shopping malls, the zoo, far flung beaches, or inner city located destination spots like iFly or Air Riders, or mini putt etc… boat rides, tubing, paddle boards, and wake boarding are the substitutes here. Not a bad swap I think. More than I did each summer.

The expectations for the summer break’s potential always start really high, so I guess we should probably work on managing those expectations. Figuring out what is a reasonable request, and what is too much to hope for. That would likely eliminate much of the distress the kids feel. It can be a challenge to organize play dates with how varied everybody’s schedules are, so I know the kids have a common complaint of feeling a little isolated, or removed from their friend group all summer long. We try to attend town festivities so that we can meet up if only for an hour or two. We did get some one on one time with a few friends here & there. For the most part we prioritize family over friends. Not that we try to shut friends out, but making time for family is important to us. It’s times like this where it would be great if my own family didn’t live across the country requiring multiple flights to get to them. But I digress.

Here’s hoping you get the most out of your last two weeks without suffering any harm because of it! Ciao Bella!

Who would have thought that we would celebrate the coming of rain? Unfortunately we do not know how much rain there was because it happened during the week hours of the night, and our rain gauge is not here with us. But! I see standing puddles of water, wet driveway, wet deck planks, and a tarp with standing water on it. Somewhat good signs. What we wanted was a twenty four hour drizzle fest with sprinkles to saturate the ground and not all run off the surface immediately, but I’ll take whatever we can get out here after three weeks plus with next to nothing. there’s a reason these northern forest fires are blazing. A couple days of heavy rain would go a long way towards tamping those fire out, or reducing their advancement.

It is Wednesday, hump day, middle of the week-day. Swimming lessons come to a close on Friday for this summer session. The girls have outdone themselves yet again. Proud little fishes! Flag football, reading programs, and swimming lessons all completed this summer. Soon climbing will start up again, which has me excited! I love climbing. We will see if my grip training offers any benefits for my climbing soon enough.

Next week we’ll play golf too. It’s all coming up roses. I can try out my new golf shoes. They came as the correct size, seem comfortable to me while I walked around the house in them. Wasn’t all that hard to attach the spikes either. I’m pumped up! W00t-w00t! Looking forward to shooting 175 out there! Nine on every hole. Three putts, shanks, slices, chunks, bricks, OB and bad lies. It’s all fun once you pick up at least one  decent shot off the tee, or a good flip onto the green, or a single excellent putt. Enjoy the small wins and let the garbage drain off you like water off a ducks back. Sunshine, fresh air, alone time with friends, enjoy the little things.

What I need to figure out is how to take a photo of the moon through a telescope so that I can capture clearer, crisper, and fuller images of it when it looks so big in the sky.

We went out on the water to go watch for shooting stars in the weeks long meteor shower. We were fortunate enough to all see one very large, and bright streak as a group. A few others caught a few smaller ones off in the distance where I wasn’t looking. Big sky you see, can’t look every which way at once. If I see one I continue to look that direction, but that doesn’t always work like I think it should.

It can also be a long wait in between visible streaks so I did not manage to capture any on film. No video of them skipping over the atmosphere either. If I could do a lengthy time lapse over the lake you might see something cool. As it currently stands I do not know how to do that with my phone. I should learn though, could come in handy.

Here we are on a Tuesday in mid August. The summer break is drawing to a close with each passing day. My wife will be back to work in about two weeks time. The girls back to school in three. And like that, snap! Our jam packed schedules will reappear and it’ll be a race to get to all of our kids programming each afternoon, and evening during the week.

On the plus side I will be back to climbing twice a week once more! I have continued to train my grip strength. Started by struggling with 50lbs, and I’m not edging out of 125lbs towards the 150lbs. My goal is to reach 250lbs, so that if I can lose weight by being more active, my grip can hold at least 55lbs more than I weigh. Which should enable me to use smaller finger holds, or stay on more challenging routes for longer. That’s the plan. Weak shoulders, and poor hip mobility need to be worked on too, but I have the grip trainers, so I’m leading with that first. I haven’t been totally lacking on my hips or shoulders. I have taken up push ups once more, and in the pool/lake I do hip stretching exercises, and leg raises to try and maintain what little ability I built up over the last ten months of climbing.

I did pivot to golf briefly during the summer. We plan to get out next week for 18 holes with a couple friends. I bought inexpensive golf shoes with spikes. And replaced my loud mouth pants with a new grey pair that fits my newly fat self. No chance I can get into a 33 W pair of pants without considerable weight loss. I don’t have the time to lose 30lbs and three inches off my waistline by next week. I don’t fancy an exercise heavy week fueled by laxatives, and water intake reduction to achieve it either. I’m not wrestling collegiately anymore. I don’t run laps in garbage bags after not eating for three days just to make an arbitrary weight. Those days are o-ver! Gone. Bye-bye.

Nobody goes to sleep, like, ever! Too much pent up energy, and excitement about everything humanly possible. They did some water sports, ate pizza, watched movies, ate candy, ate popcorn, did face masks, and then proceeded to talk animatedly for the next six straight hours. I could still hear them talking close to midnight last night. It was fun for all ages — apparently. Kids are all smiles this morning.

Here we are back to Monday. May you have a good morning. Many pleasant returns.

She made an appearance at the Stouffville Ribfest last night over on the band shell at Memorial Park. We took the kids there for it. Lots of teens. So many teens. Full 50% of those present must have been teenagers by my lazy estimate. It’s the first proper concert the kids have gone to. They liked it. We also got away from the speakers to play in the park, but they didn’t immediately ask to go home, and the youngest whom is noise averse (unless she’s the one making said noise) was ok for the most part. It was a balmy 32°C at 9:00 pm, plus the humidex so it was a sticky evening to be out and about. We even ran into friends of our own, which was a pleasant surprise.

Undersized jerseys, pants, sweaters, t-shirts, and even fancy socks that I no longer need,all going out by way of donations tomorrow, care of the diabetes people.  A few shorts, and other such items all ready to fly off my shelves, hangers, and drawers because most of it is stuff I have a.) never worn, or b.) have not worn in the last decade, or c.) can no longer wear because I have gained too much weight and medium shirts & sweaters are not going to fit, and there is zero chance I can wear a size 30 through 33 waist pants unless my life totally falls apart unexpectedly. My 205lb life can’t do anything less than a 34 W at best. More like 35’s and 36’s at this point. I had kept some pants as an aspirational goal, but it seems more and more unlikely given hard hard I have to work to drop 8-10 pounds over the course of a month, versus gaining it back with an over indulgent week of vacation. Going to need a lifestyle change at this point.

Getting rid of unneeded clothes is for the best. Someone else might get the benefit from it, that me hoarding stuff in the closet isn’t going to accomplish. Best of luck to you! Four bags full! Yowza. Who’d a thunk we still had that much left in our closets. I certainly didn’t think I still had that many articles left over. Turns out I collect t-shirts and sweaters like they are going out of style. Just don’t check my drawers at the cottage because you’ll find a dresser full of even more I just couldn’t bear to get rid of. I could wear a T-shirt a day and go a month before I had to wash a t-shirt up north. Ha! Now I have at least five pairs of pants, and at least three sweaters. I’m golden. Add in the frayed boxers I snuck up there along with some warm socks and I have an entire wardrobe of old, musty, cottage core clothes. If I had any old Campus Crew sweaters I’d fit right in, like I knew what I was doing!

I’m channeling Marie Kondo more and more as of late. Still have a long way to go in this basement alone! Yikes. Two steps forward, and one step back it feels like. I had a massive CD purge last year where I got rid of 75-100 universal label artists’CDs that were unopened, but the jewel case had been intentionally damaged by the label. They could go out as freebies or swag, but weren’t fit for resale. That sort of thing. I also finally broke down and got rid of some brewery branded gear I received from an old job 10-15 years ago. Has taken its sweet time to finally come around to be able to let that stuff go. Nostalgia has kept a hard hold on my shelf space, and closet. I’m looking long and hard at getting rid of the beer signage I have been holding on to since 2008. I can’t really show it in my portfolio due to the size, and some of it being die cut means it is an irregular shape. If I had made the garage a bar instead of a wood shop it would go great in there! Beer related, and all that you know.

Hope your Saturday has been as productive,or relaxing as you’d hoped it would be.