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Ottawa, day 3

Posted on by Patrick

We got mov­ing late, and went down to the Byward Mar­ket for a quick brunch at Le Moulin de Provence. We shared a cheese crois­sant, a fruit-and-custard–covered Dan­ish, and a cookie.

After that, we head­ed off to the Cana­di­an Muse­um of His­to­ry, where we spent four hours or more. I did­n’t real­ly take any photos.

(Amus­ing anec­dote, though: The nation­al muse­ums in Ottawa and Gatineau have this deal where you can buy a “muse­um pass­port”: $35 for any three muse­ums, so long as you vis­it them with­in three days. The His­to­ry muse­um was going to be our final entry in this passport.

So, as we were cross­ing the bridge to Gatineau, Kath­leen asked if I had my pass­port. I gave her A Look and said, “No,” assum­ing she was being fun­ny, since we were cross­ing over into Quebec.

She pro­ceed­ed to give me A Look as well, and I real­ized that, no, she meant the muse­um pass­port. “Oh,” I said, feel­ing a bit fool­ish. “Yeah, I have that passport.”

…OK, maybe you had to be there.)

On the way back, we stopped in at the Mill St. Brew­pub and had a fan­tas­tic, and fill­ing, sup­per. And then back to the hotel.

Series: Ottawa 2019

The entire series: Mon­day in Ottawa; Ottawa, Day 2; Ottawa, day 3; Ottawa, Day 4; Ottawa, day 5; Ottawa, Day 6; Ottawa, days 7 & 8.

Ottawa, Day 2

Posted on by Patrick

This morn­ing we went on a cou­ple of Par­lia­men­tary tours. First we checked out the Sen­ate, in their tem­po­rary loca­tion (where they’ll be for the next 10 years or so, while Cen­tre Block is renovated).

Then we head­ed over and toured the West Block, where the House of Com­mons will be housed for the next 10 years, in a roofed-over courtyard.

  • Senate door
    The orig­i­nal Sen­ate door, trans­ferred to the tem­po­rary location
  • Senate chamber panorama
    Sen­ate cham­ber panorama
  • Gildas Molgat
    A por­trait of Gildas Mol­gat, a sen­a­tor from my home town.
  • Queen Elizabeth II
    A por­trait of the Queen in the Sen­ate foyer
  • House of Commons
    House of Commons

We lunched at Café Bib­lio­thèque in the base­ment of our hotel. We nev­er man­aged to get there the last time we were here. It was all right.

Then we went to the Cana­da Sci­ence & Tech­nol­o­gy Muse­um, but I did­n’t take any pho­tos there. It was a worth­while vis­it. That’s #2 of our three-muse­um pass. Tomor­row, I think we’ll end up at the Muse­um of History.

Series: Ottawa 2019

The entire series: Mon­day in Ottawa; Ottawa, Day 2; Ottawa, day 3; Ottawa, Day 4; Ottawa, day 5; Ottawa, Day 6; Ottawa, days 7 & 8.

Monday in Ottawa

Posted on by Patrick
Maman, the spider, with Notre-Dame Cathedral Basilica behind

We went to the Nation­al Gallery today, and spent about five hours wan­der­ing the var­i­ous galleries.

  • Vase with Zinnias and Geraniums, by Vincent van Gogh
    Vase with Zin­nias and Gera­ni­ums, by Vin­cent van Gogh
  • Hope I, by Gustav Klimt
    Hope I, by Gus­tav Klimt
  • Stacked Porcelain Vases as a Pillar, by Ai Weiwei
    Stacked Porce­lain Vas­es as a Pil­lar, by Ai Weiwei
  • Detail from Stacked Porcelain Vases as a Pillar, by Ai Weiwei
    Detail from Stacked Porce­lain Vas­es as a Pil­lar, by Ai Weiwei
  • A Meeting of the School Trustees, by Robert Harris
    A Meet­ing of the School Trustees, by Robert Harris
  • North Shore, Lake Superior, by Lawren S. Harris
    North Shore, Lake Supe­ri­or, by Lawren S. Harris
  • Kathleen poses with Voice of Fire, by Barnett Newman
    Kath­leen pos­es with Voice of Fire, by Bar­nett Newman
  • Sappers at Work, by David Bomberg
    Sap­pers at Work, by David Bomberg
  • Still Life with Crabs, by Joris van Son
    Still Life with Crabs, by Joris van Son

And then, since the doors were open, we went into the Notre Dame Basil­i­ca across the street. (You can see its sil­ver spires in the pho­to at the top of this post, along with Maman, who stands guard in front of the Nation­al Gallery.)

  • Inside the cathedral
    Inside the cathedral
  • Stars on the cathedral ceiling
    Stars on the cathe­dral ceiling
  • Detail: Jesus above the altar
    Detail: Jesus above the altar

(You can tell Ottawa’s a gov­ern­ment town: some­one paint­ed the trees.)

"Wet Paint" signs on the trees
“Wet Paint” signs on the trees

Series: Ottawa 2019

The entire series: Mon­day in Ottawa; Ottawa, Day 2; Ottawa, day 3; Ottawa, Day 4; Ottawa, day 5; Ottawa, Day 6; Ottawa, days 7 & 8.

The best bad news

Posted on by Patrick
fountain pen on notepad

I recent­ly had a look at my sub­mis­sions on The Sub­mis­sions Grinder, and noticed that I’d sent “Me and the Bee” to two mar­kets over a year ago, with no updates. I emailed the both of them, and one of them replied to me:

Our edi­to­r­i­al team real­ly enjoyed your sto­ry, and we were hold­ing onto it for a while as we fig­ured out our plans for our next issue. Unfor­tu­nate­ly we’re now on hia­tus as we have decid­ed to restruc­ture our jour­nal. I’m sor­ry again for this dis­ap­point­ing news, but I think your sto­ry is very strong and has a good chance of being accept­ed elsewhere. 

So… it’s not accept­ed, but it almost was, I guess. So close.

Pho­to by Aaron Bur­den on Unsplash.

Tonight’s writing

Posted on by Patrick
The river

I ham­mered out 1,100 words, give or take, in “Sum­mer­time in the Void”, which is a new short sto­ry about a man left behind by the Singularity.

Here’s a sam­ple, but be kind, it’s first draft material:

His dad, not long before he left, had told John that you can’t ever cross the same riv­er twice, and John had asked why not and his dad had just smiled and told him “You’re smart, fig­ure it out.”

Because the water’s nev­er the same, he decid­ed. Some­times it’s swift and deep, and sometimes—like now, after a long, hot, dry summer—it was shal­low, lazy, and muddy.

I’ve got about 3,900 more words to make this into a coher­ent sto­ry. I think I can make it work.

Farewell, summer

Posted on by Patrick
Sunset on Clear Lake

A friend told me once about his young son’s reac­tion to autumn. The boy was maybe two years old, and my friend took him out into the yard to watch the leaves fall from the trees. After a cou­ple moments spent look­ing around with con­ster­na­tion on his face, the son picked up a dou­ble hand­ful of leaves, held them up to his father, and said, “Fix it, Daddy!”

I feel the same, kid. I’m not ready for sum­mer to be done, but there were yel­low leaves on the deck this week­end and I had to use the space heater at the office today.

I know a lot of peo­ple who love fall, with its sweaters and the riot of colours in the trees, but to me it’s just the gate­way to yet anoth­er win­ter. I’m def­i­nite­ly a spring-and-sum­mer kind of guy.

#sii­i­i­igh

Galactic panorama

Posted on by Patrick
Star Trails

I went out last night, since it was clear, and vis­it­ed my friend Tim, who’s camp­ing this week­end at Wasagam­ing. I snapped some star trails at his camp­site (my bat­tery, almost dead, man­aged 80 shots at 10 sec­onds each).

On the way home, I pulled off the high­way about ½ a mile down a grav­el road, and tried out a panoram­ic pho­to of the Milky Way. I set my cam­era up in por­trait mode and shot 5 pho­tos, 45 sec­onds each, tilt­ing the cam­era up after each shot. The cam­era start­ed out aimed at the hori­zon and the last shot was point­ed straight up at the zenith.

I stitched the pho­tos togeth­er using Hug­in, which did a very good job of auto­mat­i­cal­ly ori­ent­ing the pho­tos and find­ing the match­es. I did­n’t have to mas­sage any­thing manually.

Le voilà:

Panorama of the galaxy
Panora­ma of the galaxy. 5 images, stitched with Hugin.

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.