Riga, Latvia - May 27, 2008

The architecture is preserved and is marvelous. My photos do not do justice to the beautiful city of Riga. You MUST go see! The band was playing in the town square to celebrate some notable occasion... my notes of the day are practically non-existant, sorry to say. I spent quite a bit of time trying to get photos and missed a lot of the information from our most excellent guide, Sylvia. The yellow tower is taken from inside our hotel room and is the last one of Riga. I have so many photos that it has been a daunting task to try to choose the best and tweak any that needed it. But here is a glimpse of Riga. Beautiful city. Must go back again. Farewell Riga!

At home things are pretty calm at the moment. The Victoria Grid Project is in my neighbourhood, so I even got out and shot a few and loaded 3, so far, to the Grid. We expect to have the carpet up the stairs, livingroom, dining room and hallway installed in about 4 weeks. We have paid Home Depot for it. Hope they have a good installer. We were completely spoiled by Wally from Hourigans. They are more expensive, though. Draperies are up and the bill is paid after discussion of it with Leigh from Pacific Blinds. Quite a hit. But on checking back to our verticals of 20 years ago and the ones today... just the verticals costs less this time. Its the valances and panels that have brought the price up. Ah well, its done. I have hung a few pictures in the guest room and moved the extra book case in there to contain blue glass and a few other knicknacks. I think these curtains in the library and the guest room make the walls look muddy. I should have insisted on a solid color. Well, maybe when the green carpet is down it will harmonize with the gold in the stripes of the curtains.

I have been spending a bit of time on the new site. Man, that place is going to be terrific. Its a huge site and they are really getting a lot done lately. Can't wait until its done and Cyrus gets his just reward for all his hard work. Brilliant designer and a good internet friend.

Riga, Latvia - May 27, 2008

This is a couple more photos from our tour in Riga, Latvia. These church windows turned out pretty good, I think. Riga is a must see, if ever you are in that part of the world. I wish I had had more time there.

At home, we have our drapery all installed and have yet to settle the bill. This will happen next Tuesday when Leigh will be over to discuss it with me. I think their billing is ridiculously high, but what do I know? I have not had the window coverings upgraded for 20 years. And so I will pay it and be done of them.

Tomorrow we go to see Alan at Home Depot about the kitchen cabinets. We have settled on a cherry wood because the oak was not available in the style we wanted. This 'not available' stuff seems to be happening at least 25% of the time. Very annoying that they would keep examples on display, that are not available. Pat phoned the carpet lady at home depot and we are to see her tomorrow after we see Alan. Her name is Melinda, and she gave a quote for the carpeting job of the stairs, hallway, livingroom and dining room in the carpet we chose to Pat over the phone. The quote was well within the range of price that he wanted so now we just need a time and hopefully a good installer.

My photo that is attached to an article on the Now Public news site. I am preparing two more for the Ford article.

Today, we went out to the battery store to see about the battery in the van. While Pat was having the battery tested I went next door to the hydroponics store. They have and sell live coral to grow in salt water aquariums. Oh wow, that stuff is gorgeous, and so are the fish. If ever I get finished with this house renovation I am going to look into this aquarium and coral stuff. The guy said it is easier to do now than it once was. So, maybe next year, this time, I will have my aquarium here in my room. I will first have to know if I can find someone dependable to take care of my fish and coral when I am away for a month, or a week, or however long they could go without attention.

Pat is having the van cleaned up and prepared for a few days down to Monroe for the swap meet. I don't think Cyrs will be able to come.. it sounds like they are even more busy than we are.

Riga, Latvia - May 27, 2008

More of our full day of touring in Riga, Latvia.

I can't believe its been nearly a month since I posted to my blog!

Last week end the RROC and BDC clubs' fuel economy run was in Victoria. It was a very good rally, great weather, and new places to see. We were at the Fuse Cafe in Sooke, on Coopers Cove for lunch, to the Abkhazi Gardens for tea. The closing awards banquet was at Dunsmuir Lodge. Tom and Diane stayed over with us Fri and Sat. We had dinner at our place Fri, and on Sunday we walked to Todd Inlet and went to Island View Beach finishing with fish and chips at the Princess Mary cafe at the West Bay Marina. Wonderful week end. Maybe pictures later.

I posted a photo to a new News site by invitation from someone on Flickr. More on this later too

Riga, Latvia - May 27, 2008

This was a sunny but cool day in Riga. We started walking, seeing the Art Nouveau architecture. It is well preserved in the Old Town of Riga. My favourite is the dragon. Our tour guide filled our heads with all kinds of information. My notes say that I must look this up on line, but cannot find a satisfactory site that shows a good photo gallery and gives the history or names of the buildings. We did a stop at the huge market. Many stalls where they were selling a huge variety of food and produce. The spice lady was not very happy about the tourists snapping her. The fish did not seem to mind the camera.

Over the last 4 days we took our Model T to the Nanaimo area for the Island Challenge. The Nanaimo club put together a terrific tour -- good friends, good food, good weather, wonderful tours. We were at at wildlife rescue center, at Englishman River Falls, as well as touring some of the areas off the main highway, where we would never see otherwise.

We now have some of our draperies installed. More to come yet. I also got an email from the Kitchen Technician giving me a quote on what the renovations we talked of in my kitchen would cost, not including counter tops, lighting, nor any very detailed costing of materials or labor. Dean does not seem very enthusiastic about the job. I need more quotes, so I spent the afternoon reading about some of the renovation places on the internet.

I won the silent auction for the painting - Unbridled - that Ducks Unlimited had set up. The picture was delivered on Wednesday last. We hung it facing the hallway, so that when you come from the back of the house you see the horses running at you! The print of the painting had a minimum bid of $250. I bid $276.50. They added delivery costs and tax to it and it came to $325. Its worth it though, even if its only a print. I really like it.

Riga, Latvia - May 26

These are a few photos from the last part of this long, information filled, lovely day. My notes are very sparse, as I must have been ready to sleep right after our dinner which was in another very good hotel.

At home it has been a busy week. Denise and I have almost all the materials ordered for the windows. One last one to decide because the last material we chose was again no longer available. Would be nice if they could update their display books, now and then.

The carpet we chose from Hourigans is no longer available, either. Well, this all gets frustrating. So, now we are hunting for just that color in another brand of carpet. Seems we cannot find it.

Dean the kitchen reno guy was here this morning and we measured and planned for 2 hours. I have to go see Colonial to educate myself about counter tops and decide what I want. Dean says to talk to Nelson. Dean is also going to send his electrician buddy over some time to talk to me about the lighting. He said he would come along if he could to help us co-ordinate this renewal of my kitchen. I am already dreading all the things that could screw up with this part of it.

Yesterday, Rosemary, Mary and I had a day out to go to Garden Centers, lunch at Romeo's and a couple more garden centers. Was fun, but another fairly long day.

I have had more time looking at the demo of the new site, and helping with more Flickr stuff. I recently watched the Matrix movies. The way people behave on these on line communities and carry on their virtual lives, makes me think the matrix is here, now. We don't need some intelligent machines to create it for us. We do this dream world in our heads and behind our keyboards. All very addictive. Just like blogging. :))

I have my new compost bin filled and have got enough of the cut back perennials and weeds taken out, to fill yet another bin. And they don't come to take this away until the 16 of Sept. Oh well, I will keep cleaning up the garden and load the bin each month. There probably won't be much added in January or February. I should probably finally get to within my bin full per month. We have had some rain and cooler weather this week, but I only got a few hours on a couple of days out there. The pond is filled, all the african violets are blooming inside, and I did manage to water a bit. The yellow plums are ready for eating. I need to make a new plum plucker. I added a couple of plums to the rum pot today and we had some with frozen mango yogurt for dessert. yummm.

Tallin, Estonia to Riga, Lativia - May 26

Snippets from my travel journal:
We have our breakfast and are on our way by 9:00. This is going to be a long driving day - without stops it would be 4.5 hours. Good roads, nice looking farms. Two days ago I saw red foxes. Today I saw a large white with black wings and tail, stork, walking in a field.
Sylvia, our most excellent tour guide, tells us about amber. Amber is pine resin petrified. The Baltic Sea has expanded over old pine forests and so much amber is found in the Baltic Sea. White amber has more air in it. Green amber has moss, etc., in it. Red amber is heated. We purchased a piece of amber with an insect in it.
Very nice lunch at Parnu which is a resort town and we walked to the Baltic Sea over a board walk on this lovely sandy beach.
Next top was an old castle with the love story of 'Rose", a foundling. Of course, she falls in love with an unsuitable man, and ends up tricking the suitable one into killing her. I have lost the gist of the story and even the name of the castle. The group went up the stairs in the tower -- apparently there was a superb view. I stayed down and this afforded me time to actually compose some shots... no wide angle, though. There is yet more to this very lovely day, packed full of information. We did not get information sheets, and my notes cannot possibly mention all we learned and saw.

I have had a couple of fairly busy days at home. We have now arranged for someone to put the UV blocking screen over the outside of the skylight. We have carpet samples at home to consider and have settled on a nice medium green, no borders. We shall go see Rob at Hourigans, tomorrow. We hope to get Wally to do the job. He is a perfectionist floor covering installer. This will leave the bathrooms, kitchen and my room to be redone, after the kitchen reno happens.

Denise and I have finally settled on the verticals and the material for the draperies. Hopefully the verticals, at least will be installed in 2 weeks. I have paid her for half of the costs of materials, installation and taxes. So, with the kitchen reno yet in the works, I must go see Brian, the banker, tomorrow.

I have arranged for a composting company to deliver me a bin. They pick up my full bin, monthly for a $20 per month fee and $95 refundable on the bin. I get the bin on Saturday. I am sure I have a binfull of stuff ready to go now. Probably have to cut it up a bit more yet. Largest size wood they take is a 6 inch diameter. That's quite big. If I have that size, it probably goes into the fireplace.

I spent some time, yesterday, with Cyrus and the slideshow for the new site, and a few other things. Man, this is going to be one terrific site for photography!

This morning I went to my computer to find that Windows had updated and left my Jpeg icons with a new ugly orange icon that looked like a garbage bin. I spent quite a bit of the day learning about icons and how to change them. I now have my jpeg icon as this very green tree... so I have gone green on my desktop... should match all the gold and green that's going to be in my house .. by year end, I hope.