World Enough and Time

Every day when I walk to (or from) work, I see someone remarkable... I think I will designate a 'person of the day'.

Monday, it was six people - soldiers doing early-morning manoeuvres, I imagine. I said "Good morning," to them and one replied in kind. They looked a little strained. How far had they been hiking? I took considerable satisfaction in the fact that my back pack was almost as big as theirs.

Tuesday, it was the little boy on the bicycle. He was maybe three years old - four, tops. His bicycle was so little it barely reached my knee. His father was cycling slowly behind him, so the kid set the pace. He was manfully pedalling, slow but steady, not wobbling at all. Go, kid!

Today my Person of the Day was on a skateboard, just whizzing onto the Hurdman foot bridge as I was getting off. A youngish man. He had long blond hair. He wore a black hat, black jacket, black narrow-leg jeans, and black shoes, with neon orange shoelaces and a Hawaiian shirt (glimpsed under the jacket) in bright green, orange, and black. He could have been a Halloween poster, or a comic book character.

Yesterday as I walked home - only a few blocks from my place - someone spoke to me, beyond the customary "hello" one might use with strangers. He asked if the Torchwood patch on my back pack was a reference to Doctor Who. I admitted that it was. I said I was actually an alien in disguise. He replied that my Meat Suit was very good. We chatted about the show a bit - he said he's only watched from the Chrisopher Eccleston shows to the first Matt Smith series, but it's clear he's hooked.

Ahh, fandom. I love the way fans pop up here, there, and everywhere.

I decided to walk to work this morning. A beautiful sunny day, not too hot, just about perfect. According to Google Maps, I could do it in 67 minutes. I gave myself 80 minutes: I think those Google routes are all timed by men with legs longer than mine. Or just by people who are younger and more fit than I am. (Could that be?)

I enjoyed it very much indeed, especially when I got to the Eastern Parkway and could see nothing but trees, grass and wildflowers, and apartment buildings way beyond the trees. Lovely.

But I'm not very familiar with the Eastern Parkway, and found myself wondering how I could be walking along it for so long when it was only supposed to be a few minutes of the route. There'd been a fork in the path offering me two options: Tremblay Road to the left, Hog's Back to the right. I'd probably already missed my real turning by the time I got there. I had notes, taken from Google Maps, but I'd taken off my jacket and tucked it in my bag because I was hot, and the notes were in my jacket pocket. The instructions for the "Eastern Parkway" section of the route had been rather vague.

So after an idyllic wander through the mid-city countryside, I found myself suddenly at Hurdman Station. That was an unexpected shock.

If you're going to be lost in the woods, you might as well be lost in the woods at a major bus route junction. I got on one of the buses, and got to work on time. But I was puzzled. Where did I miss my turn?

If I have any energy left at 5 p.m., I'm going to try doing it in reverse. That should do it. Google Maps tells me that will take 68 minutes. I wonder where the extra minute sneaks in?

I was excited to have seen daffodils. dewline told me there were tulips in bloom in Orleans - Ottawa's eastern suburb - and I was envious.

Then today, passing the Sunnyside Branch of the Ottawa Public Library, I saw this:



Srping is happening very fast.

I should have got up an hour earlier.

When I looked out the window, the snow was falling heavily, and had obviously been doing so for some time. And still is. So I set out for the gym, but there were no buses and the snow made the walking difficult, and three times as slow as usual.

But it is beautiful.


Snow on a bush on Bank Street.

So I gave up: returned my library books, and bought some things at the Bank Street Kardish -- which is having a "Customer Appreciation Day" sale, obviously successful, as the place was packed. Because things were 20% off I got some items I'd been needing but holding off on: unscented hand soap, for example.

Then I bought more groceries - clementines, carrots, a watermelon - and had a heavy load to struggle back through the snow with. They don't plough Third Avenue. They just don't. They did take away the snow banks last week, and just as well, or we wouldn't be able to see over them.

So now I'm inside, warm and dry and half dead. Feels as if I did ten workouts all at once. Time for coffee in celebration, I think.

The Rideau Canal at the end of October is a dreary sight. Last week, my cousin Barbara and I had supper at the Canal Ritz, a restaurant right on the Canal: it was beautiful.

Two days later, they drained the canal and the place is mostly mud. The canal looks pretty dismal between the time it's drained, and the time it turns into a gorgeous skating rink.

Crossing the Bank Street Bridge over the Rideau Canal at dusk, I looked down at the water and say that the ducks were having a big party:



Maybe the low water gives them better access to those delicious weeds.

Over the past week it has been cold. Warm-gloves-and-hat kind of cold. So cold I reluctantly got my winter coat out of the closet - luckily I'd already taken it to the cleaners and got it back.

And today? Sunny and warm. T-shirt type warmth. So welcome.

I took a picture by the Rideau River:



( And then two more... )

It was bound to happen one of these days.

I looked out the window this morning to snow. Snow, and still falling.



I wonder if it will stay on the ground.

I went downtown today, to the National Gallery. It was a hot but beautiful day.

Maybe because I was looking at paintings and thinking visually, I started looking at Ottawa as if it, too, were a piece of art. And looking particularly beautiful. So I started taking photos the way a tourist might, right there in the middle of the city, where all the good tourist attractions are.

And here they are:

1. The Parliament Buildings, seen from inside the National Gallery:
   
   
   
   ( 2. Maman )
   
   
   
   
   
   

Seems there's a new Ottawa Shakespeare Company, no apparent relation to the one Stewart Bain once set up, that did such a terrific Macbeth. I still have the T-shirt.

A new Shakespeare company, and they're doing one of my two faves, Hamlet. Woo-hoo! They said the video here was "in the style" of the show, and having seen it, I wonder what that means. Wildly rewritten? And what I really wonder is, how come Hamlet's in bed with Ophelia and still half-dressed? That really is a messed-up relationship...

I took my camera with me today when I went for a walk with Lisa at lunchtime, so when I got all excited on seeing a budding tree by the Rideau Canal, I took a picture:

( 1. Walking by the canal )

2. To get to the hospital, I had to walk for about twenty minutes to get to the bus stop at the corner of Main and Evelyn, then spend about ten minutes on the bus. I tried to make it to the bus stop in 15 minutes, and failed: it took about 17, and I saw the bus moving away in the distance as I got there. It wasn't a long wait till the next one, and I spent the time taking a photo of my irises and looking around.

( Flowers on their way to maaseru in the hospital )

On leaving the hospital, I decided to see how long it would take me to walk home. According to Google Maps, it would take a little more than an hour. I thought it would take about an hour and a half - I have to cross the Pretoria Bridge and backtrack quite a bit. Still, worth a try.
It was just getting dark as I left the hospital at 7:30. There was a tiny crescent moon and it was a beautiful evening.

3. Not long after that, I saw two ducks, swimming in a large puddle by the side of the road. I stopped to take their picture, but as soon as they saw me, they stopped swimming and walked towards me with the hopeful look of ducks who think a human might feed them. I didn't; I just snapped their picture, and they tried to act nonchalant, nibbling at bits of leaves.

( Ducks in a puddle by Smyth Road )

4. Further along, I saw the first bit of snow I've seen in a long time. This is for all the people, unaccustomed to snow, who think snow is beautiful. It is, when it's falling freshly in December, all white and fluffy. By March or April it's lumpy, mostly black, ugly shapes with debris embedded. The debris in this case was pine needles, as it was under a small grove of trees. To give some perspective to it, this chunk of ice was about 5' across and maybe 20" high.

( A last vestige of snow )

5. Then I came to the Smyth Road Bridge. It was almost dark then, just a glimmer of light in the sky backlighting the clouds, and reflections from the houses alongside the Rideau River reflecting in the water.

( The River )

6. Then I got to Main Street, where I paused for a photo, looking back southward towards the bridge. Let me explain, if you don't know Ottawa: there is nothing particularly "main" about our Main Street, which more or less connects the Pretoria Bridge (over the Canal) with the Smyth Road Bridge (over the River), but isn't downtown, isn't long or large or wide or anything.

( Main Street, around 8 p.m. on a Friday in March )

I made the mistake of pausing to look at the books in a sidewalk display outside the Singing Pebbles Bookshop (in March!) and after that, my back started to hurt. It hurt less when I sort of pulled up my ribs - is that a posture problem?

I arrived home at 8:35 p.m., must sooner than I expected. Perhaps if I hadn't paused to look at those books, it would have been an hour, but if you think I can resist the sight of a book display, you don't know me very well.