Visit to the Food Hall

Chau in the Food Hall


So I guess to start off, as it's been quite a while since I blogged anything. Since my last entry I've been to Santo Domingo and some other parts of the Dominican Republic, to three cities in the U.S.A; Cleveland; New York; Atlanta, and now I'm in Auckland, New Zealand. It's all been for work. But when I could I would try to get some exploring in. I'll have to go back and fill in stuff. Sometime when I can find the time I guess.

So today, I spent the morning eating, sleeping and sorting through files. We had a day off today to help us get back onto working days. We worked friday night/saturday morning. Shifting work hours takes a toll on the body so I was glad when production decided to let us have the day off today. We will make up for it by working Tuesday through to Saturday and only have Sunday off, but it's still nice to be able to sleep in for an extra day.

So in New Zealand there's a place called PB tech, it's kind of like a Canada Computers or Best Busy. We drove 20 minutes south to the superstore location so I could pick up a projector. Around the same place we found this food hall. This was a large open space with about six to eight food stalls all covered with photos of what you could order. It was sensory overload, hundreds of 8x11 food photos with prices.

Photographed above is Chau sandwiched between our order numbers.

It's got a hold on you

No, it's not magic, it's the Internet. It's amazing how much we get used to something until it's gone. Maybe taking it for granted. This is me and the Internet. How much time do I spend on Facebook, reading news, looking up information, downloading software updates, videos, cat jokes? A lot apparently.

My internet has been down for the last three days. The provider service has been spotty a bit before but this is the most hours in a row that I've had to endure without.

Of course it couldn't have come at a worse possible time. I needed to upload six gigabytes for work of photos I shot in Cleveland. Also emailing back and forth about my flight out of Toronto, when, where has been a pain. Thankfully there are wi-fi hotspots all over Toronto. Looks like I'll be visiting the library or some internet enabled cafe

Packets of C17, vomit, and other delusions.

Sleeping on packets of C17, the president's running shoes, a pair of black nikes and a pair of white, not being able to sleep...  For four days.  This has all accumulated into other thoughts; are my pants stretching, my shoes seem bigger too.  Why can't I sleep?  I've been looking at the clock for over 6 and a half hours.

Packets of c17?   They are like mini backpacks and are just like robot starter blocks.   Maybe that's why I have so many.  Making a blanket or mattress out of them is difficult as you feet and head have to be aligned in such a way.

Flash.   I'm on a bus getting some neocitran.  The look of death is in my eyes.   I'm on autopilot.  For no reason at all I break into a sweat.  Just profusely sweating.  I don't think anyone is noticing but my body feels like it decomposing.  I stagger, I get off the bus.

This has been my day today, wafting in and out of reality, with the odd thing to check off my todo list.  Add a small but annoying migraine and you're almost there.   C17 packets?   They don't exist.  The president's shoes?  I have no idea why that even popped up.

Stretchy pants, larger shoes?   Turns out I lost 20 pounds since being on this show.

Just finished drinking a cup of neocitran.  My last ditch effort to get sleep.   My body is sooo tired, my brain is tired, why can't I fall asleep?

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I wrote the above while in a semi-awake state while trying to sleep.  I would come in and out of sleep and these vivid dreams.  Unfortunately my skills at writing while in the sleepy state does not read well now that I'm awake. 

The C-17 is the plane I was working on in real life.  I had been photographing it for days in various stages and I think I was taking those packets of emergen-C for extra vitamin C at the time.  I'm not sure where the running shoes fit in or why they were the President's.

Over the course of thr show I did lose 20 pounds.  Mostly from being sick or from carrying all the gear around the Dominican Republic, maybe a little bit of eating healthier.  I found the food in the Dominican to be not as fatty as the food I usually eat.

Waiting for sunrise

Early morning in Earlscourt Park

A few days ago I got the drone up and running. Having odd sleep hours I was up before sunrise, way before sunrise.  I woke at 03:00, sunrise being around 07:50.  This is not something new if you've been reading this blog, I've been keeping really non-standard hours when I've not working.

The day I got the drone out I left the apartment too early in the morning, flew around just before the light broke over the horizon.  As the temperature has been cold these last few days, battery life was pretty low which made flying time really short.  I actually missed flying when the sun was coming up because all three batteries were spent by that point.

The sunrise was spectacular!..  and I didn't capture it.  So the next few days I woke up early went out at the proper calculated time and went to shoot.  But like most things that happen outside, nature doesn't always play along.  Clouds, and lots of them.  I managed to get some really nice dark blue clouds at the expense of freezing my hands and fingers for a few minutes but no sunrise photos.

It wasn't until today and the forth try that the sun started to peak out from behind the clouds just enough to give me an orange sky.  (see picture above),  I'll take it.

The VR meetup

Noel Chaput and I at a Virtual Reality meetup

Today was kind of a write off.  I had woken up at 01:30, stayed awake until just before sunrise to realize it was snowing out, fell asleep and stayed asleep until 15:30.  Half asleep I did laundry and read the book of faces.  Then by the time I had to leave for the grocery store I realized I had to be at a VR meeting at 07:00.

The VR meeting was a bunch of nerds getting together to talk about the latest virtual reality technology to come out of this year's CES show in Las Vegas.  It had been a while since I had been to a tech meeting and I have to say, I fit right in.  Talking to other people about nerdy applications and making the odd computer related joke that everyone around me seemed to get.  Yes, I was in my element. 

It also helped that I was carrying around my theta (m-15) 360° camera.  Having gear that people had only really read about made me into a nerdy rock star.  I showed off the device with flair while trying to stay humble.  I was the kid with the cool toy at show and tell. 

Fly, be Free

The Bebop Parrot in action

So today I continued this year's tradition of setting tiny goals for myself.  My goal was to go outside and fire up the drone.  Maybe shoot some stuff, maybe not.  The main thing was to get the drone up and running.  It had been almost eight months since using it and I just wanted to see if it still could fly.

The park nearby was all brown and green, there was no snow.  An odd thing for this time of year.  Probably one of the warmest winters I could think of since I've been here (there was that one year I lived in Boston).

I set up and had the drone in the air.  One of the batteries was faulty, I'll have to replace it.  After a few minutes I realized my hands were getting numb.  It was cold.  Despite no snow the temperature was 0°C.  Of course it was.  It had been in the plus temperatures for the last few weeks until today, the day I wanted to fly the drone with no gloves.  Sheesh.

I drone in the end flew and I figured out what things I needed to replace/repair, today's goal accomplished!

Rice Krispie Clumps

I woke up at 03:00.  I slept through new year's day, all 24 hours of it.  It never existed.  I didn't even stay out that late the night before.  I guess I was tired, more so than usual.  Some people being the superstitious sort might say this was a bad omen to start off the new year like this.  A pattern will emerge and continue throughout the year.  Luckily I'm not the superstitious type.  I just enjoyed a good sleep.

It wasn't like I had big plans for the day or had to work.  Actually I had absolutely no plans. No plans at all.  If my blog in any indication the first few days of January are generally pretty dull and non-eventful.  Could be the winter blahs as I push off depression.

The main highlight of the day was to venture out and buy groceries. Yes, not that exciting, baby steps and all that.  I went out to go outside and to acquire the ingredients to make rice krispie clumps™.

The goal was completed, the day was a success!  Maybe doing small goals like this is a good start to the year?  Uh, yay me!


Rice Krispie Clumps™



Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons butter
• 3 cups of marshmallows
• 3 cups of Rice Krispies

Directions

1. Melt butter in pot on low heat.
2.  Add marshmallows.
3. Stir until marshmallow butter mixtures is smooth and consistent.
4. Add Rice Krispies.
5.  Stir until rice krispies are evenly coated.
6. Transfer contents of pot into a casserole dish.
7. Let cool.  Eat.