Let's Make Some Art, Dammit

August 31, 2026. Buckethead. Sometimes it doesn't matter why a thing was done, only that it was done. This of course was at the RedBlacks game, which we took in after spending the afternoon at the Ottawa Pride parade. Long day. All good, though. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/tA5jgRG

August 30, 2026. Country Road. I was back on the bicycle today (yay) for a relatively relaxed gravel ride on the back roads near St. Isadore. 55 km with only 100 m elevation gain. Pretty fair headwind on the home stretch. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/PtV1Y0C

August 29, 2026. Ceiling fan. I was taking pictures of cats and accidentally shot straight up and got this. One last day of indoor rest and recovery as I seem to be doing a lot better. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/XV1QZgJ

August 27, 2026. Independent. This is a light standard from the grocery store in Embrun, which is where we buy cat food and yogurt (Andrea has precise thoughts about what we should buy where). I'm in the car waiting and puttering on the phone. This feels like the last day of recovery. Now if only the Blue Jays could get back to form. Alas, it may be too late after tonight's debacle. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/hLucUHB

August 26, 2026. Baby on Board. Seen in the Costco parking lot. As I hummed the tune, I wondered, why an elephant? Also, the car owner returned and there were no babies with them. Anyhow, still recovering from illness and aside from driving into the city I did nothing of significance. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/anmL0YF

August 25, 2026. Smooth Hydrangea (Hydrangea arborescens). Just some practice photos outside my office window with the big lens. Still on the mend. Didn't really accomplish much of anything today (except I took this picture). #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/V6bzqMD

August 24, 2026. Slow Recovery. This is my collection of certificates, speaker's gifts, and other artifacts. I spent most of the day in this room not doing much of anything (I also spent a fair bit of it sleeping) as I finally regained the ability to eat and drink again. I think this corner of the office looks nice, and I'm glad I set it up. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/terNy01

August 23, 2026. Bathroom. Middle of the night last night I woke up violently ill. I've spent a good part of the day looking at this scene in the bathroom. It has been a very rough day with continued violent illness. I feel a bit better late this evening but this illness has fooled me before. Sorry if this is TMI but my family reads these photo posts so there's no glossing over the tougher bits. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/kAcFb9p

August 22, 2026. Sunflowers. I've been a little out of sorts over the last couple of days, but today I decided to go for a longer ride to Maxville. It was a struggle, and I was a lot slower than usual. This is from a very coiffed farm a little north of Maxville. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/bho9OXH

August 19, 2026. Larose Forest. Made this a longer cycling day today as I did a loop that took me through the heart of Larose Forest. Nice day, except for some rain, but that didn't even slow me down. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/vTukeph

August 18, 2026. Goldenrod. This is the scene outside my basement window. Good thing I like goldenrod. Shopping day today, which means a trip to the city and no cycling. Watched the ball game in the evening. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/AR5k4ca

August 17, 2026. Tractors. A display promoting an effort to set a plowing record in nearby St. Albert. A typical day - OLDaily plus cycling. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/hMJufLr

August 16, 2026. Crow. For this week's hike we went to Petrie Island to inspect the frogs and the turtles and whatever birds we could find. It was mostly overcast today but warm. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/stH0a37

August 15, 2026. Gravel Grind. Today I set myself the objective of cycling with the wind 45 km south to the St. Lawrence River and then coming back the hard way, following gravel back roads as much as possible, and to maybe add enough extra distance to make it a metric century - 100 km - ride. It was a beautiful day and the plan went like clockwork, 101 km total, and I crushed the gravel. :) #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/9pygivB

August 14, 2026. Bretzler Farms. Scene from my bike ride today. Our economy around here depends on dairy farms, and I very much hope the industry is not traded away in a futile bid to appease the U.S. government. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/sZ8NWXm

August 12, 2026. Sun and Moon. OK, the 'moon' is just lens flare, but this photo taken at the 'maximum' in Ottawa doesn't show any real eclipse effect. We were at the Costco at the time. We also dropped off some electronics recycling and also discovered that the minimum fee at the local landfill is $91, which is rather more than I want to pay just to unload a box of picture frames. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/A1EKHY4

August 11, 2026. Deer Farm. Went for a bike ride this afternoon and photographed this deer at a farm near St. Albert. I'm somewhat surprised to see a deer farm - I remember there was a lot of controversy around elk farming in Alberta, but this farm just arrived here with no fanfare. Also fixed a gRSShopper problem and verified the location of the electronics recycling facility. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/7rSWaZN

August 10, 2026. Apples. It was a rain day today so I stayed indoors and, well, didn't do much of anything. A rest day. These are apples from the apple tree in our front yard. It's essentially a wild volunteer tree but I like it. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/pATNbVu

August 8, 2026. Castor River. Cycled to and from Embrun today to spend the afternoon visiting family, then watched the baseball game in the evening. That's it for a relaxed Saturday. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/imcpBMQ

August 9, 2026. Ducks. We went to the Upper Canada Migratory Bird Sanctuary today for a short hike and a lot of photos. It was humid and warm and there were a lot of mosquitos. But the pictures made it totally worth it. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/6fSMTtg

August 7, 2026. Friday night at the ball park. There was a great crowd on hand for the Ottawa Titans game against Trois Rivieres. It was country theme night - hence the horse - with fireworks after the game. Very entertaining. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/tib85hC

August 6, 2926. Highway overpass. Almost no wind today, except near the thunderstorms, and I noted how smooth the water on the Nation River is. The highway above is the 417 near Casselman, on my usual cycling route. No, I did not get rained on. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/y0vAOln

August 5, 2026. Corn. Another day just like yesterday as I made a bit more progress cleaning my office and went out for another 25km bike ride. This is a corn field just south of town. Looks like a good year. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/JLThsft

August 4, 2026. Town Hall. This is part of a display for the library in our town hall. No, I did not go to sign up for municipal election (though it's tempting) but rather to get stickers for extra garbage bags. I feel like I'm now at the start of my post-retirement life, and job number one is to clean and restore my environment. Also went for a bike ride today. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/VZhswjl

August 3, 2026. Small butterfly observed on our hike today in Pine Grove Forest. Lots of water on the ground, but at least it wasn't raining. <a href="https://flic.kr/p/2stwfMv">https://flic.kr/p/2stwfMv</a> August 3, 2026 at 09:58AM

August 2, 2026. Rain Day. Normally we go for a hike on Sunday but with torrential rains all day we postponed to Monday. So it was an indoor day, puttering on the computer, not especially productive. Also, I had really itchy feet all day (a bad sock choice for cycling the day before). #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/cGMusyz

August 1, 2026. I dropped off Andrea, picked up the bike, took the car in to be cleaned, then spent four hours cycling to Osgoode on the old rail trail, and back via River Road. A nice day, and to top it off, the Blue Jays won. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/MPsF90m

July 31, 2026. RedBlacks. It was Friday night football day today. Kind of a long day; I was an hour early for my doctor appointment (the risk of scheduling while cycling in the rain in a different time zone). Got some new Crocs to replace the ones lost on the ride. The game itself wasn&#39;t good; Ottawa quite rightly fired the defensive coordinator after, and the coach/GM has to be hanging on by a thread. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/wZF6oI8

July 30, 2026. Billy. Before I went traveling I went to Idea for a case to keep my various speaker's gifts from over the years; I wanted glass doors so they wouldn't collect dust. Getting the Ikea Billy bookcase set up was a task, and then it didn't fit right. Today I shook up my home office and moved it to its new location. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/F2VOexT

July 29, 2026. Moon. Today was dentist day as I went in for a regular cleaning and then took my bike into the shop for some repairs. I usually go to A&W after the dentist, which I did today, but it didn't sit well with me this time; looks like my one fast food treat tradition won't survive GLP-1 treatments. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/2Yvr4hm

July 28, 2026. Baseball. When I was pushing through the cold and the rain over the last month I was dreaming about sitting in the stands on a sultry summer evening watching a ball game. Tonight we went for an Ottawa Titans doubleheader. First game was a dog but the second was a 1-0 thriller. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/Nq3X8rT

July 27, 2026. Jeff Banister and the Lenses. Scene from a shelf in my home office, where I spent most of the day puttering. I&#39;m still in trip recovery mode, but beginning to do stuff again. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/rOMHswA

July 26, 2026. We went for a hike in Larose Forest west today; I haven't been there in the summer for quite a while. Listened to the ball game, though that was just disappointing. <a href="https://flic.kr/p/2srvJ22">https://flic.kr/p/2srvJ22</a> July 26, 2026 at 09:18AM

July 25, 2026. Grass, as seen from the basement window. Today&#39;s accomplishment was to upload a video. We also went to Costco. Also got some OLDaily posts done. Still not very ambitious. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/kJBbCuL

July 24, 2026. First day back. This is the basement floor. It&#39;s my first day back after a long time on the road. I got my photos uploaded to Flickr, which is plenty for one day. So tired. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/TiGjH4M

https://www.youtube.com/watch/oU1yQHRzrEE

July 23, 2026. Home again. Back after a long travel day in which a lot of things did not work the way they should. A case of summer travel? Luggage will follow, but at least my bike box arrived - beaten and ragged and sent to the wrong belt. Sore and tired - not just sleepy but body tired. It&#39;s good, though. It&#39;s what adventure feels like, and what am I without adventure? #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/O4eDVcw

July 21, 2026. Borgarnes. Iceland, Day 27. I picked up a rental car to transfer all my stuff to the airport in time for my morning flight Thursday, retrieved my trailer, then kept heading away from the city for as much time as I had, which got me to Borgarnes and one last beautiful mountain shot. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/3MdypU6

July 20, 2026. Botanical Gardens. Today was a day for getting stuff done as I dropped off the bike to get boxed and did all my laundry. But I also took some time to walk around the botanical gardens in the rain, where I spotted this beauty. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/UjP1eqI

July 19, 2026. Back in Reykjavik. Iceland, day 25. Packed up in the rain and the wind, rode down to the port, caught the ferry, then took two buses in Reykjavik, rode through better weather to the campsite (thus pic at a grocery stop en route), set up, ate, then watched the world cup. Congrats and well deserved Spain. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/hGM6pFA

July 18, 2026. Puffin. Iceland, Day 24. Sure, there are many puffins in the world but what makes this one significant is that I cycled here from the airport and climbed to the cliff to take this photo myself. No artificial tech like cars or buses. I also visited the beluga sanctuary in my second day on Heimaey. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/WedZHsP

July 17, 2026. Bjarnarey. Iceland, Day 22. I sent the day on the main Westmann Island, Heimaey, exploring and relaxing. I also took a boat excursion that gave us a good look at an outer island, Bjarnarey. Currently camping in an old volcano crater. For once, the weather was sunny! #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/5kHbh0c

July 16, 2026. Westmann Islands. Iceland, Day 22. I cycled 45 km from Hella to the ferry, happily no rain (except at the island) and not so many hills. The wind, though not really a help, was at least not in my face. It was still cold, though, and I was happy to take breaks where I could. This was probably my last long ride of the trip, which should do wonders for my aching bones. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/vtHagZR

July 15, 2026. Walter Mitty Bridge. Iceland, Day 21. Cycled from Selfoss to Hella today. Lots of traffic and the weather did not clear up as promised - instead I fought wind and rain the whole way. This is my second time seeing the Walter Mitty Bridge, but I&#39;ve never seen the movie. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/3Ng8M7Y

July 14, 2026. Still in Selfoss. Iceland, day 20. Second zero day. It was well chosen. There was a steady heavy rain all day along with a high wind. I rested indoors, except for a brief outdoor walk where I spotted these creatures under the Selfoss bridge. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/XDA3amN

July 13, 2026. Selfoss. Iceland, Day 19. This is a genuine zero day, complete with a hotel stay (and may I say, the $150 suite I got at Aska Selfoss is the best deal in Iceland). It&#39;s pouring rain outside. I&#39;ve caught up on sleep, dried out, gotten some proper food in me, and am easing my various aches and pains. Seen is the Ölfusá looking downstream just near the bridge. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/lwOhEfr

July 12, 2026. To Selfoss. Iceland, Day 18. This was the scene to my right as I pushed my bike up yet another hill. I had already spent a couple hours cycling slowly through that cloud you see at the top. Rain and wind throughout. It&#39;s funny to think that only 22 km would take so much effort on my part, but that is how it is this trip. Better reward and the end, though - a hotel room and pizza. Gotta try to build up my strength. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/aFBbOf6

July 11, 2026. Borg. Iceland, Day 17. Today was brutal. Took down the tent in the wind and rain, rode all day against both, and set it up in a plain field in the windy rainy campsite at Borg. Thank goodness for dry-bags. Huddled in my tent and tried to stay warm in the evening; there are no services here at Borg. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/c18Yx9A

July 9, 2026. Flúðir. Iceland, Day 15. From Reykholt I took a day trip to Flúðir, about 12 km each way. This is the Alda Aldanna statue in the centre of the small town in front of the school. I visited the Secret Lagoon while there and spent maybe an hour soaking in the hot spring water. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/gOjLTNS

July 9, 2926. Horses. Iceland, Day 15. Today was rainy a good part of the day so I did nothing but laundry. I also ate a lot of food. Also got my newsletter working again. Mostly, today was about rest. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/fjU7Vvt

July 8, 2026. Faxafoss. Iceland, Day 14. Cycled about 20 km to Reykholt in a short break in the rain, where I was able to buy real food and find a campground with proper services (except picnic tables). Other than that, it rained, pretty much non-stop. Everything I own is at least a bit damp. There&#39;s laundry here, though, thank goodness. When I got here I discovered that the pain in my stomach was hunger. I devoured half a loaf of bread and peanut butter, plus a can of peaches. #SDDaily. URL: https://ift.tt/mcGgJ4k