Victoria Day

It was a very good Victoria Day. Laura and I went downtown at 8:00 to go and watch the parade. We sat in front of Susan's coffee shop. It was very long though. Three hours. Good weather for it though, not too hot or too cold. I really like the drums in the marching bands. Something about the feeling, when they are right in front of you, you can feel it in your chest, pounding.

That evening we had BBQ hamburgers and smokies for dinner. So nice to have the BBQ out for the summer once more. I'm going to be cooking outside this year a lot more than I did last year. I love outdoor cooking. Something about standing in the fresh air in front of an open flame grill. It's the best kind of cooking. Much better than having the hot oven on in the house!

Story of the Beardo

Yes, I was called a "Weirdo Beardo" and I can tell you that I was not too popular in my house for the month that I was growing it.

When I was a young boy, I dreamed about a time when I could start shaving and growing hair on my face. As I got older I finally was able to grow a goatee, but my cheek hair was never thick enough to bother with a full beard. Besides that, it drives me nuts if I let my beard grow on my cheeks. Itch, itch, scratch, scratch.

This last winter, I decided to let it grow. I got past the itchy stage and it was actually coming in evenly. I had to let it grow into a full beard to satisfy the kid inside of me. The kid who always wanted to grow a beard, just like my Dad!

Let me tell you, I didn't like it. I could not get comfortable with it and I daily wanted to just shave it off. My goal though, was to grow it and then get a picture of myself so that I could see whenever I wanted that I'd had a real, full beard.

Below I have posted the progression of my beard. Now I will put a current picture of myself in my profile so that you can all see what I presently look like. I find it difficult to take a picture of myself, so I will probably change this one soon.

And now you all know the story of the Beardo.

Eric's Birthday

Saturday was Eric's birthday. I can't believe that he is already eighteen. It seems like just yesterday I was taking him to school in kindergarten. He has grown so much and has become such a fine young man. Here are a couple of pictures of him opening his presents. What a handsome man.

In this one, he is smelling his new clothes because he loves the smell. I didn't post the one that he is smelling the bag of socks. Ha!


He is so grown up now. He has a serious girlfriend named Alina. She is very sweet and is a part of the family now.
He talks to me now. The two of us are having a good relationship. I do my best to remember what it was like when I was his age so that I can relate to him. We are changing so much. Change is good.
Eighteen!

H.P Lovecraft

Whenever I talk about Howard Phillips Lovecraft, I get blank looks. Not very often do I find anyone who has even heard of him, though they may have seen his work with out knowing it. I have put a couple of links on my blog at the side if anyone is interested. He is my favorite writer. Born in 1890, he wrote many dark and horrible stories. Many of them have been made into movies over the years. A couple of years ago the HPLHS made a 45min black and white, silent movie called The Call of Cthulhu. I just watched it the other day and loved it. I have seen other movies as well but I always go back to his stories. He was a master.

Ph-nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.
In his house a R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.


Cthulhu.(pictured above) Leader of the Great Old Ones. Cthulhu exists in a deep sleep of death in the watery depths of R'lyeh silently dreaming, waiting for the day when the stars are right and his worshippers raise R'lyeh from the Pacific Ocean. It is his spells that protect and preserve the other Great Old Ones. Cthulhu has never been directly described, for those few who have seen him go stark raving mad. A description, then, can only be brought from a statue found depicting him. Cthulhu has a vaguely anthropoid outline, but with and octopus-like head whose face was a a mass of feelers, a scaly, rubbery-looking body, prodigious claws on hind and fore feet, and long, narrow wings behind. He is of a somewhat bloated corpulence, and his cephalopod head is covered with facial feelers. Some have said to imagine Cthulhu, one must imagine a squid, a dragon and a man together in one body.
-the Cthulhu Lexicon

Budgie Communication

It is getting warm and sunny here in Victoria and all the little birds outside are very chatty. This gets our budgie Streusel very excited. She flies over to the open window to talk to the wild birds. She gets so excited and runs around on the window sill, chirping and copying everything she hears. I took a little movie of her and put it here. She got so excited when she heard herself! Funny bird.

She has always been free to fly around because we never close her cage. Her favorite spot is on a ladder on top of her cage. If she is ever on my shoulder and I walk out of sight of her cage, she flies back to it right away. Homesick I guess.

Well, I hope you enjoy my little bird show.

There's always next year.

We are done with hockey for another year. Canucks fans anyway. Luongo had a great game. Too bad the rest of the team didn't join him until halfway through the third period.
It was a really frustrating game to watch.

This was Susan's and my first year at really getting into watching. It was fun. Kyle is the one who got us watching sports but he doesn't like the way we yell and cheer during the games. He usually doesn't watch with us unless there is something exciting happening.

Now we just have to wait until football season starts! Can't wait.

The Birds

Part of being a writer is that I am also a reader and, I must admit that I have a problem. I love books. I have a bookshelf that is two rows deep and stuffed full. I also have boxes. Many of the books are short story compilations from all eras and genres, but mostly horror and mystery. Not all of them fit on the shelf.

My biggest problem related to books is used book stores. I go into them and come out with a bag full of books for five or ten dollars and no more room in my library.

The other day I saw a Tom Clancy book about Special Forces. I did not have enough money to buy it so I had to come back the next day. I ended up spending five dollars and getting four more books on top of the Clancy.

Yes, I have a problem.

I found an old Alfred Hitchcock book in my collection. I opened it up and there was the story called “The Birds” by Daphne du Maurier. The story that the famous movie was made from. What a treasure! I drank up the story (which is short, by the way – just like I write) and then reflected on the genius. It was such a great story and yet all people know is about the movie because Mr. Hitchcock was a genius in his own right and in his own profession.

I just wanted to share that little piece of story because so often we do not know what we have in our own closets and bookshelves. We are oblivious to our collections of whatever we may be collecting. I know because I have a few collections; namely: Coke memorabilia, coins and books.