May 2006 - ActiveSteve

Racing Season Upon Us..

Well, it’s been a little bit since I popped a post online, so here we go. I’ve been pretty wrapped up with final preparations for the upcoming race season, which is actually well and truly upon us at this point. In the past couple weeks, I had my first adventure race of the summer, as well as my first ‘marquis’ event, which was the National Capital Marathon. I’ll leave that one for a post of its own, and stick to talking about my adventure race in this post. If you’d like to check out some pictures from this event, I’ve posted them over on flickr, as per usual. These were all pictures taken on the course by volunteers at various points, not me, so I’m not even in all of them, but they give you a bit of an idea of the race. The race took place on the May long weekend, specifically on the Saturday. This was slated to be a 5-8 hour race course, and unfortunately for me, we took the entire 8 hourse to complete it, due to some unfortunate errors, which I’ll get into soon. The entire weekend, as you may recall, was sort of miserable. There were frost warnings issued, and the temperatures stayed low, and the rain poured forth. The location of this race was in Quebec, in the Val de Monts region. Not far from Ottawa by any means, a mere 40 minute drive. The actual start and finish took place at Lafleche Aerial Parc. This is a real fun place which has all sorts of zip lines, aerial obstacle courses, as well as caves that can be explored. If you’re looking for an interesting way to spend an afternoon, this would be it!

Life in General

Daddy’s Pride and Joy (Nanaimo Bar Done!)

To finish off my marathon of blogging today, I thought I’d share with you a picture of my completed bar. As most of you know, I’ve been working away for the better part of 5 months on my bar project. It was an on-again off-again sort of affair, with me putting in any free time I could find into the crafting of this mega piece of functional furniture. Well, all the hard work has paid off! The bar is officially complete! The only thing left to do now is decorate the back wall with some pictures. I’ve filled in the cracks and varnished them over. I’ve also stocked the shelves with delicious booze, hung all the stemware on my recently-completed stemware rack (designed and built by me), bought a new blender for the bar, and I’ve even fixed the door that Matt broke over the weekend when he was watching Jonah! (I knew it needed fixing before though, so I’m not mad) I’ve got to say, I’m extremely proud of my accomplishment. When I started this project, I had a stack of papers, a stack of straight boards, and a dream. I’ve had to teach myself a lot about woodworking, and endure the inevitable slip-ups that go along with it. At the end of the day, I won’t even hazzard a guess at my total project cost (especially when you factor in the tools I had to buy!). Needless to say, you can’t really put a price on it. I suppose a carpenter could custom build a bar for you, and a solid oak bar like mine would cost you thousands of dollars. However, it would never be the same as knowing you built it yourself, with your own two hands. I know every detail, every flaw, every grain in the wood. It’s a cool feeling. To see the whole progression of the project, you can of course head over to the bar folder on flickr. I guess I like the sense of ownership and accomplishment on completing a big project. In the past, those projects would have been our deck, the shed, the roof, and the CDs I’ve recorded and mixed entirely on my own in the studio for my past bands, the Picklecatz and Comfort Station. Looking forward, I’ve got my 6-month bike odyssey in New Zealand and the Southern Traverse to look forward too. I don’t like sitting still too long without something big on the go I guess. I think I’ll take the next while off though, and try to actually enjoy this bar. Anyone up for a drink? 😉

Travelogue

…That night in Toronto…

I’ve got to start off by saying that I’m turning 31 this year. Over the past few years, more and more of our friends are getting married, and more frequently these days, they are going forth and procreating! Congratulations go out to the latest couple to tie the knot, Greg and Alyssa. The actual wedding took place a little while ago in Panama, but not everyone was able to make that trip. As a result, they threw a reception in Toronto, and a good contingent of the Ottawa fiends (yes, fiends, not friends 😉 were invited, and subsequently made the trek. Although the marathon is only 3 weeks away, that didn’t prevent us from partying like the old days! As can be evidenced by the numerous pictures (and several that we haven’t shared), we still know how to get up to no good. I’ve got to say though, as much as I love an open bar, they really slay me. I’m quite sure LI would have fared far better had I not been subjected to the ‘last call’ rush. The result was me skipping my final 32km training run of my program on Sunday. uckily, I’d already done 2 – 32k runs and a 30k run in the past month and a half, so I’m gonna guess I’m good to go. We only went down to Toronto for a single night, so we really had to make it worhwhile. I headed down with Alix and Jody, and once we arrived there, met up with John, Dana, Rachel, David, Kevin and Amy. Our car arrived around 12:30, and we were lucky enough to get checked in at the Delta Chelsea right away, even though check-in isn’t officially till 3pm.

Life in General

High Over Ottawa…

Well, as I look at my last blog post, I see that it’s been just about two weeks! My how time flies! There’s been plenty of things happening in the last couple weeks, so I’ll likely try to jam a few new posts on right away to catch anyone up who’s been wondering what’s new. To the left, you can see a lovely picture of Parliament Hill as seen from the air. April 29 marked my father’s 65th birthday, and he drove all the way up from Westville, NS to celebrate with his family up here. Yup, he’s now officially a Senior Citizen in the eyes of the man. You wouldn’t think it to see him and hang out with him for a while. He’s still sharp as a whip, and has plenty of stories that definitely make my life seem pretty pedestrian by comparison. Just ask him some day about the 6 months he spent slogging through the jungles, attempting the first land crossing of the Darien Gap (see this great story about the Darien Gap) in an amphibious vehicle ( a DUKW to be precise), which promptly broke down, leaving his team to slog on by foot, till he got dyssentry, and on and on! I’ve told him on several occasions that he must write out his memoirs some day. If for nothing else than for my sheer enjoyment of it all. It’s cool to hear stories from your maker about their life experiences!