Not quite ripe.
Photography
Photos I’ve taken of scenery, interesting objects and other things.
Photo of the Day, July 26, 2020
Pears on a neighborhood tree. Mmm, pears.
Photos of the Day, Late Edition
These were taken over the past few days, but I was too lazy/indolent to post them right away.
Fun fact about the first shot: I used Pixelmator Photo on my iPad to remove an out of focus telephone wire from the sky. Yes, this image is not true to life.
But it looks nice.
These will probably grow into horribly sour crab apples or something. I’m not a fruitologist, so don’t quote me on that.
Delicious* Rowan berries!
* If eaten uncooked, the parasorbic acid will actually cause indigestion or, if you’re especially lucky, kidney damage. Per Wikipedia. (I didn’t sample any.)
Photo of the Day, July 23, 2020
Burnaby Lake Turtle Nesting Area.
Turtles optional.
A long walk to a sore heel
UPDATE, April 4, 2021: The injury took a long time to improve and then, after mostly disappearing, came suddenly back worse than before in December. My doctor identified it as plantar fasciitis. As of this update, the foot is much improved, but still not 100%. This is what you call a long term injury.
Today the weather was warm and sunny (after an initial forecast of mostly cloudy) and I couldn’t just sit inside while it was summer all over the place outside.
So, I went for a walk around Burnaby Lake, wearing my running stuff in case I started feeling extra zesty (more on this in a bit).
I felt pretty good heading out and indeed, my walking pace was a bit better than in recent months. That continued as I hit the 5K mark midway around the lake, still brimming with energy and feeling fine. I even started running off and on along the Southshore Trail.
The resurfacing of the Cottonwood Trail is coming along nicely and the notion that it will take until September to complete seems silly, as they are probably more than half done already (and were diligently working away when I walked through this afternoon). It will be spiffy for running when complete as this trail section has about a hundred billion exposed tree roots waiting for me and my feet.
There were more people out than perhaps expected, but it is summer and it was very nice out, with a breeze providing just enough cooling to keep it from feeling hot (it’s not really hot, but weather the last few weeks has been a little cooler than seasonal, so even 24C feels a bit toasty when you’re out in the sun).
I finished the loop just before 3 p.m. and as I exited the lake trail and crossed over to the river trail and the return home, I was still peppy. The peppiness finally began to fade around the 16 km mark, when my right hip began to feel a bit tweaked. It wasn’t bad and didn’t really slow me down. In fact, after a few minutes it worked itself and I continued to steam along. But then my left heel started to hurt. Weird.
It continued to hurt the remaining two km or so on the remainder of the walk and as I type this at 10:23 p.m., it is still sore. The right heel is fine.
I have no explanation for this, just guesses and crackpot theories:
- The few minutes the right hip hurt, I overcompensated in favoring my left side, making my apparently brittle left heel very sore
- The orthotic in my left shoe is sufficiently worn in the heel that it reached a breaking point where it started hurting instead of helping
- aliens
- previously unknown injury suddenly surfacing (aliens?)
- karma, somehow (also the name of my next album)
It may be fine or better(ish) by morning, but it’s a sore note for what was otherwise a fine afternoon out. I was even delighted by unexpected wildlife, watching a crane hunt food and a turtle laying out on a log enjoying the sun.
Here’s a few photos before the hobbling started.
Just starting out, I thought this field of what is really just weeds looked interesting, but it didn’t turn out quite as I had expected. This field had previously been kept cut and served as a small park area. I’m not sure why it was decided to let it grow wild.
The classic shot of the lake from the bridge at Deer Lake Brook. I managed to tilt the view slightly, but was too lazy to fix it. Just pretend the earth was rotating too fast for me to compensate.
From the point just before the Cottonwood Trail, looking west.
The heron snatching a snack:
Close-up of heron from the shot above.
Photo of the Day, July 13, 2020
Pretty. Trapped.
Photo of the Day, July 10, 2020
Yellow blooms.
Toodling around Colony Farm Regional Park
Nic and I went to Colony Farm Regional Park looking for birbs and getting steps.
We accomplished both. Since I am using an iPhone 8 for my photos and its zoom capabilities can be summed up as “lol” I have no pics of birds to share.
But I do have a snail.
Here are some of the things I deemed worthy of taking pictures of.
Photo of the Day, July 2, 2020
Creepy tree edition, as seen on Kelly Street. I either missed this before or it was suddenly added/made/hatched. The hooded eyes stare right through you.
Photo of the Day, June 27, 2020
Burnaby Lake special edition. Nic and I went to the lake so he could take pictures of birbs and when I gave him the option to go halfway around the lake or all the way, he went…all the way. We saw plenty of birds, but I stuck to subjects that didn’t move or require a telephoto lens.
Despite the ominous-looking clouds in the shots, the weather was pleasantly mild and it stayed dry.
Shot #1, my usual from the bridge at Deer Lake Brook:
Shot #2, with bonus lily pads:
A non-invasive berry:
Shot #4 from the rowing pavilion, which I had never been to before:
Photo of the Day, June 17, 2020
Gnome home.
Photo of the Day, June 10, 2020
A little bashful.