Patrick

Shodan × 2

Posted on by Patrick

Two of my judo stu­dents/­co-instruc­tors grad­ed today for their 1st degree black belts (or shodan). They did just fine.

It was an odd expe­ri­ence for me. They were the first two that I’ve shep­herd­ed that far. It felt like a test-by-proxy for me, as well as a test for them.

Con­grat­u­la­tions to Neal and Joe. Wel­come to the dan ranks.

Hawk attack

Posted on by Patrick
A hawk against the sky

So I went for a bike ride. I head­ed out to the coun­try­side south and west of town, and on one of the mile roads I paused to take some pho­tos in the “coun­try roads” style.

Country road
Coun­try road, just past the edge of town.

Where I stopped, though, there was a dead bird on the road, a big one. I think it may have been a hawk. While I was snap­ping pho­tos, two oth­er hawks land­ed on a cou­ple of near­by tele­phone poles and start­ed squawk­ing. One flew a cou­ple pass­es over me. I put my cam­era away and rode off about anoth­er ¼ mile down the road, where I stopped for a few more pho­tos. As I was snap­ping away, I heard/felt some­thing whoosh over my head, maybe three feet above me. I looked up and one of the hawks had fol­lowed me. I snapped a cou­ple quick pic­tures of him (one’s at the top of this post) and then took off again.

After that they left me alone, and I took some oth­er photos.

  • Wheat!
    Wheat field at the edge of the city
  • Sapling and countryside
    Sapling and coun­try­side, tak­en at the edge of town.
  • Countryside
    Coun­try­side behind a weed. Tak­en at the edge of town.

Rainy evening

Posted on by Patrick

I hap­pened to be out and about last night with my cam­era, and took a cou­ple of photos.

  • Shed under glow­er­ing clouds
  • Rain­drops on the windshield
  • Rain over the van­ish­ing point

Writing Retreat, Day 6

Posted on by Patrick
The Milky Way

Sat­ur­day, I:

  • wrote my 2,000 words in two stints;
  • crossed the 100,000-word mark in my novel;
  • debat­ed chang­ing the title from Trans­la­tions to Reflec­tion, Trans­la­tion, Inva­sion (which is a not-com­plete­ly-inac­cu­rate sum­ma­ry of the sto­ry, at a very high level);
  • turned on the air con­di­tion­ing, because it was get­ting pret­ty hot;
  • bor­rowed the neigh­bours’ kayak and pad­dled on the lake for a half-hour or so right at sunset;
  • went and got some more pho­tos of the Milky Way and (serendip­i­tous­ly) the Auro­ra Borealis.

“Can I help you with some­thing?” Head­less man­nequins wore flim­sy cot­ton dress­es in earth tones. Coun­ter­top racks dis­played neack­laces and bracelets made of beads, pearls, or smooth and pol­ished stones. A sign at the back said RESTROOMS FOR PAYING CUSTOMERS ONLY.

“I need a wash­room,” I said.

She motioned at the sign.

“No, I need a washroom.”

She sighed, though I couldn’t tell whether she was exas­per­at­ed with me or with the sit­u­a­tion I was evi­dent­ly try­ing to put her in. “Pol­i­cy,” she said. Then, giv­ing me a good look­ing-over, she said, much more qui­et­ly, “You okay?”

Yes, I want­ed to say.

“No.”

From Trans­la­tions
Con­tin­ue read­ing “Writ­ing Retreat, Day 6” →

Series: Writing Retreat 2019

The entire series: Writ­ing Retreat 2019; Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 1; Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 2; Writ­ing Retreat: Days 3 through 5; Writ­ing Retreat, Day 6.

Writing Retreat: Days 3 through 5

Posted on by Patrick
Clouds above the field

It seems I’m a bit behind on the ol’ posts. Here’s a quick recap of Wednes­day to Friday:

  • wrote a bunch of words, though I’m a bit behind my goal;
  • went on a cou­ple quick bike rides, includ­ing one up the hill to the grave­yard (where I was tempt­ed to lie down, just for a moment, because that’s quite the hill) and the obser­va­tion tower;
  • con­tem­plat­ed going kayak­ing but decid­ed I was over­heat­ed, so went swim­ming instead to cool down;
  • drove to Win­nipeg for my nephew’s 19th birthday;
  • also went up to Clear Lake to vis­it my friend Tim;
  • and went out again on Fri­day night to attempt some Milky Way shots. 
Con­tin­ue read­ing “Writ­ing Retreat: Days 3 through 5” →

Series: Writing Retreat 2019

The entire series: Writ­ing Retreat 2019; Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 1; Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 2; Writ­ing Retreat: Days 3 through 5; Writ­ing Retreat, Day 6.

Writing Retreat 2019, Day 2

Posted on by Patrick
Star trails -- about 100 images, 30 seconds each

On Tues­day, I:

  • wrote 2,000 more words in two shifts, morn­ing and evening;
  • read about ⅓ of Drey­er’s Eng­lish, chortling all the while;
  • went for a 3.5km kayak ride on the lake;
  • did a quick 5km bike ride to the cof­fee shop and to Co-op for groceries;
  • and went back out for some more astropho­tog­ra­phy, this time in the riv­er val­ley to the north.

Here’s a quick sam­ple of the writ­ing so far (still 1st draft):

Your nose is bro­ken, she’d said. I reached up and touched it, gin­ger­ly, expect­ing pain. Instead it felt cold and numb. Touch­ing it felt like I was touch­ing some­one else’s nose. Like it was made of wax.

I felt a thin strip of met­al or met­al-like plas­tic that ran from between my eye­brows down the bridge of my nose to its tip. I tried to lift it off, to pry a nail under it, but couldn’t. It was like it was a part of me. Maybe it was a part of me now.

You’ve been con­cussed. That part I didn’t need to check to believe. I remem­bered the headache, the nau­sea that nev­er quite went away and nev­er quite resolved into actu­al vom­it­ing. When I lay down on the bed, the room seemed to shiv­er and spin, slow­ly, an orbit that I didn’t like.

From Trans­la­tions, 1st draft
Con­tin­ue read­ing “Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 2” →

Series: Writing Retreat 2019

The entire series: Writ­ing Retreat 2019; Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 1; Writ­ing Retreat 2019, Day 2; Writ­ing Retreat: Days 3 through 5; Writ­ing Retreat, Day 6.