Happy Anniversary

As many readers are aware, Bruce and I hooked up in March, 1979.

Thirty years later, in March 2009, we got married .... 

Over ....

March 9, 2009, Huatulco, Mexico. Bruce and I chant with Jeannine Woodall in a ceremony shared by all the people at our yoga retreat, including my dear friend Kate Storey. 

These roses were part of the ceremony and I photographed them in their water bottle in the washroom in our room.

... and over ...

March 21, 2009. Bruce and I got married full and proper in front of a small crowd, including my dear friend Kate Storey, gathered in Bruce's parents' living room. 

As you can see in this array of corsages and boutonnieres, I stayed with the orange rose colour scheme. Our talented florists added green roses, peacock feathers and orange orchids for flair.

... and over again

On July 4, 2009, we threw a yard party featuring a handmade ceremony for a crowd of about 100 people, including my dear friend Kate Storey.

Flowers weren't a big part of the July party. But, we did have pony rides, a bounce castle and, most expensive of all, this cake. 

All these parties are happy memories. But that doesn't mean it's out of the question I might forget.

On Tuesday, March 21, 2017, I came home from work and spotted a vase of roses on the dining room table. 

"What're the flowers for?" I asked.

Thanks for reading!

Have a great week!

Karen 

Nothing to See Here

Wasp's nest: empty

It's March Break in this part of the country. Everyone with or claiming to have children took some or all of the past week off. 

The office was a ghost town. Crumpled bits of post it notes tumble-weeded down the deserted paths between the cubicles. Saved late afternoon daylight slanted in through half-blinded windows and sparkled on suspended dust flecks undisturbed by the breeze of policy advisors rushing around.

My calendar, crammed past capacity just last week sat half fallow, granting me time to catch up with those whose nests have always been or have recently become empty.

What do harried bureaucrats talk about when the work-driven gales have, for the moment, ceased to blow? When we can pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, go and grab a decaf in the late afternoon and chew the fat for ten minutes or so, what topics engage our interest?

Just one.

Retirement.

Thanks for reading!

Have a great week!

Karen

P.S.

Busy Busy Busy

These two photos - the first one taken in April 2105, the second in March 2017 - show the industriousness of squirrels. Someone, some time ago, thought they would block a squirrel hole in a silver maple in the Allan Gardens. The squirrels, as you can see, thought different.

You Know You Work for Government When...

This is a picture of my calendar for the work week just past. The areas blocked off are almost exclusively chunks of time that other people have reserved for themselves in my calendar.  Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday have been tidied up so that there are only a few double booked spaces. On Friday, I was double and triple booked for almost the whole day, except  lunch, which got cancelled.

There's variety in all that quantity. 

On Tuesday, 

• I met for half an hour with one of my bosses to talk about a document on its way to Cabinet the next day, then 
• I talked for half an hour with a colleague in another division about clean tech, then 
• I spent an hour on a video conference with five high school students talking about their successful entry in a hackathon, then 
• I had an hour-long meeting with one of my managers to talk about sulphur, mercury and nitrogen dioxide, then 
• I attended for an hour a meeting on how things are progressing with First Nations and climate change, then 
• I briefed another boss for half an hour about changes to the Residential Tenancies Act and then 
• I closed the day with a 30 minute conversation that echoed the first conversation of the day, with more people looking for more details about the document going to Cabinet the next day.

I know everyone likes to be busy and you're probably wondering how you could get your calendar to look like mine. My advice is to have lots of bosses. Bosses keep you busy, and, at last count, I have four.

Thanks for reading!

Have a great week!

Karen

Surprising Numbers

Today's first two pictures illustrate the infinite variations available to anyone playing with digital information. 

They also illustrate popular taste. The app I use, ColorFLY, lets you post your efforts to a showroom, and thousands, maybe even millions of others who also have the app can look at and "like" your work.

I "like" the work of unseen strangers so that they will "like" mine. This seems to work and my highest number of "likes", until recently, had been 11, for this image.

The greatest number of likes I had ever seen on the ColorFly showroom for anyone's work was 35 for an impressive pixelated image of Johnny Depp. 

The pink romanticized horse head that starts this blog, coloured in less than a minute and posted absent-mindedly in a lazy attempt to see what would happen ... got 36 likes.

Being Watched

Another of my idle pastimes to recently score unusually high numbers is this blog. Normally, in a given week, along with the views from two dozen subscribers, This Week's Picture will get about 10 page views. 

But, on one day - February 17, 2017 - not long after I made what could hardly even be called disparaging remarks about the leader of the free world, there were 194 page views of my blog - all from the United States. 

You Know You Work for Government When...

This past week, I interviewed for the job I've been doing for the past 3 years, 8 months and 1 day.

Boy, sure hope I get it.

Thanks for reading!

Have a great week!

Karen