I went kayaking today for the first time in about 11 months. The warm 20+ degree weather will not last much longer this year. I was out for over 3 hours, including the stop detailed below.
I decided to go up-current (meaning south) on the Rideau River today. I knew from Google Maps that there was another stream that joins the river, and I wanted to see it.
After I left the dock, and rounded the first bend, I saw big cranes just ahead. I wondered what it was for. When I got there, I realized it’s for the new bridge that is being built. It’s less than 500 meters from our house but I didn’t realize they had started the construction.
I continued upriver until I found the stream joining the Rideau. There wasn’t much to see after all. I couldn’t explore, as the stream was too shallow.
From that location though, I could see something strange further up ahead. I didn’t wear my prescription glasses in case I loose them. So I was not able to tell what it was. It looked like a wall or cliff blocking the river. On the top, there appeared to be boats.
Curious, I went to investigate.
When I reached the area, I discovered it was a dam. I paddled around the base. Then I heard a heavy stream of water, so I went to investigate that.
This part of the Rideau River flows around Nicolis Island. Looking at Google Maps, it appears that one side are rapids (which I did not see as I missed the entrance to that part of the river). On the other is the dam and a set of locks for raising boats over the top of the dam. The sound of water came from the locks, which were being used to raise three boats. The water was cascading over the top of the lower lock door. I got closer to investigate. I thought it would be interesting to go through the locks myself in my kayak.
But I was too late to join the boats already in the lock, and I didn’t want to wait for another opportunity.
As the lock was full (water pouring over the top of the door), the lock workers opened underwater doors at the bottom of the lowest locks, which stopped the overflow, but created a huge, churning, foaming swirl of water. I paddled a little closer to see, but tried to stay away from the center of the disturbance. The swirling water started to rotate my kayak. I paddled backwards a little, but it was not enough and the kayak continued rotating. I leaned back to stroke backwards again and turned around to see how close I was to the wall. This put my center of balance too far to one side and over I went.
Upside down, I immediately grabbed the front handle of the kayak skirt, yanked on it to release and then rotated out of the kayak. I had not practiced it since my school. I go over the procedure in my mind every time I prepare to get in my kayak.
I popped up to the surface. I grabbed the side of the kayak to prevent it from floating away and threw my paddle in the cockpit. I started a strong side stroke to swim away from the lock and to try to find a place to steady myself. My goal was to try to get back in the kayak, although this was not something I remembered very well from my school. I got up sideways on the kayak easily enough, but attempting to rotate around to get my legs in only dumped me overboard a second time.
I gave up on this approach. By this time, the two workers from the Rideau Locks were on the shore next to me to help me out. Although I just wanted to get back in the kayak, I didn’t protest their help.
They bought up the kayak and I climbed out of the water myself.
A few people joined the two workers and they all asked me if I was ok. I laughed and said I was fine. I was happy because I remembered my training, and also laughing at myself for making a mistake like that.
Still wet from flipping the kayak
One very nice lady offered me some food – nuts and raisins trail mix – and we talked about kayaks and canoes for about 20 minutes. I thanked her and put my kayak back in the water on the other side of the wharf. I had to go retrieve my hat, which was still floating in the water, a little downstream.
The paddle back to where I had parked my car was uneventful. I passed some other people in open kayaks (not quite canoes), paddled past some fishermen, and quietly drifted by a gaggle of Canadian geese.
Once back to my car, I spent a few minutes attempting to get a picture of myself and the kayak. I used my car as a tripod and set the shutter for a 10 second delay.
At home, I checked Google Earth and I found I had paddled over 3km each way during my trip.
I’ve been wanting to buy an iPhone for months now. I waited until the iPhone 4 was announced, rather than pick up the previous model. Once it was announced in Canada at the end of July, I started to look but then I had some unexpected repairs to my BMW, so I held off until I knew how much it would cost to repair (oil level sensor on the oil pan).
The push is to buy one before Rogers ends the $30 for 6GB/month deal on September 30th.
My current cell phone is a TelusSanyo SCP-5000. It is 13 years old and I can’t get service outside of the city of Ottawa – it’s just so old. I bought it when I was 27 years old; I’m 40 now.
I’m switching from Telus to Rogers because we will get a discount on our Rogers bill because we have cable, internet and soon (I hope) our mobile with Rogers.
I decided to just try the full range of exposures to find what worked best. I set the ISO to 160 and the aperture to f/5.6 (the maximum for the lens at 400mm).
Based on the experiments from Friday, I started at 1/125s, and then moved down 1/200, 1/320, 1/400, 1/640, 1/1000, 1/2000, 1/4000 and 1/5000.
The first few were ok, but below 1/640, the moon started getting darker – not enough light was being captured.
The sweet spot seems to be 400mm, ISO 160, f/5.6 and about 1/200s. That was for a waning moon, just a little more than half-full. I wish that I had had more time on Thursday or Friday to try when it was nearly a full moon, but my schedule and clouds prevented it.
At 400mm, I can see the large craters along the terminator. This is what Galileo saw that lead him to realize that the moon was not a perfect celestial body, but rather one with an irregular surface – one more piece of evidence that the Earth was not the center of the universe surrounded by the perfect spheres of creation.
The smallest craters I can make out are 17 km in diameter. I can just make out the white dot representing the sunlit side of the Theon Junior crater. Not bad from 380,000km away.
Shooting the ISS did not work. I turned up the ISO to 1600, which seemed to give the right exposure, but I could not really get the ISS in focus. Plus, it was moving too fast across the sky. All I got were zig-zagging lines as I tried to manually track the ISS. The issue was not the tripod, but that I was trying to pan and I was not doing it smoothly enough.
Next, I tried the waning moon. This was also harder than I expected, although I learned enough that I think I can get a better shot next time.
I started with exposure. I continued to use the 1600 ISO setting, and opened the lens wide open (f/5.6 at 400mm). I let the camera determine the exposure. Looking through the viewfinder, it looked fine, but when I looked at the results on the LCD screen, it was an overexposed mess. I tried a few times, thinking that I made a mistake with the image stabilization.
I decided that since it looked over exposed that I should try reducing the exposure. I noted what the camera was attempting to do (f/5.6 and 1/15 second) and started reducing the time. 1/30, 1/60, 1/125s were tried and the image started getting better. I tried two more 1/250 and 1/320 before the moon ducked behind a cloud. These last exposures were better. Still far from perfect but I was getting close to the correct settings.
I’ll try again later before I have to return the lens.
This time, I rented the Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 IS USM, as well as the Canon 100-400mm IS that I used in Florida. In reading on the web about how to shoot a golf tournament, it seems that you need to be far back from the participants, as the sight and sound of a big camera can throw off the golfers. So I wanted lots of reach.
I brought a monopod as well, as I wanted to be able to move around quickly and have stability for the long lens. I was given a golf cart for the day as well.
I was very nervous once I arrived, as I was not really sure how to start. I checked in, got the keys to my cart and drove off to the first tee. I had to work out how far back I should be – at first I don’t think I was terribly effective. I also found that the added hassle of the monopod was too much and I removed it – I never used it. It was too hard to carry a camera with a big lens and an attached monopod and get in and out of the golf cart.
Randy, Miles, Jane and Steve
It helped me settle down and start learning how to shoot when I approached groups of friends from work. That was a lot easier.
I tried both lens during the day, although switching was not a fast activity. I see why pros will use two camera bodies, each with a different lens. I used the 70-200 more. I liked the photos it took, but the downside (if you can call it that) was that I needed to be closer to the participants. I got to talk with everyone for a little while. I tried to only take photos after the swing and tried to find a flattering angle. No one wants to see a bad picture of themselves. A lot of people were concerned that I would be taking picture of their mistakes. So I had to reassure them that I only take good shots and no one can tell if they had a good game or not.
Sleeping fox
In addition to the tournament, the course had so much wildlife. There were birds (including vultures), squirrels and even a very cute fox. Everyone saw the fox, because it was all over the course during the day. Near the end of the day, it stopped to sleep in a sand trap. I parked the cart and very slowly and quietly walked up as close as I could to get a good picture. It was a beautiful little fox.
I’ll need to prepare a more professional photo web site to display the photos. I’ve set up a separate web site (Ottawa Photoworks) for covering events and perhaps even to get some professional events.
After the tournament, I went downtown to the Canadian War Museum where the 2009 World Press Photos exhibit was being shown. A local photographer, Harry Nowell, had organized a group of his friends, acquaintances and students (I had taken his Natural Light Portraits workshop) to meet to see the exhibit. A few of us went to a local pub afterwards to talk about photography before the house band started playing and we had to leave.
Last night, I had an appointment with the Sleep Clinic at Queensway Carleton Hospital.
Rosa has told me that I sometimes stop breathing when I sleep, which is a characteristic of sleep apnea. I am often tired (but functional) during the day, and always assumed that this was because of my long work hours. I am frequently working late into the evening – I have conference calls twice a week with the team in Beijing that last until 11:30pm.
I called my doctor to see what can be done. He set up an appointment with the Sleep Clinic at the Queensway Carleton Hospital (QCH). The appointment took a little over a week before I went in to the clinic.
I arrived at 9:30pm, checked in and filled out the required forms. Around 10pm, I was led into a room with a bed and lots of equipment and wires. Once I change into my sleep clothes, two technicians started applying the wires. I had two wires on each leg, one on each shoulder, one behind each ear, one on the top of my head, two on my forehead and one on each check. These would pick up the electrical activity from my muscles moving. They secured a strap around my chest and one around my stomach to check my breathing. They put a heart rate monitor on my finger. Lastly, they added a tube with two projections that fit below my nose that measures if I am breathing. In one corner by the ceiling was a video camera that presumably would see in the dark.
Once wired up, I was helped into the bed to go to sleep. It was hard to sleep. The bed was hard, especially under my shoulders. It was surprisingly cold, and I had to ask for another blanket – the A/C was blasting out full! The noise of the fan was also distracting. On top of all of that, I was worried about accidentally pulling out all of the wires, so I could not move around to get comfortable. Normally, I’ll turn on one side and then the other and finally on my back before I fall asleep.
I woke up a number of times during the night. Three times there were balloons that popped just outside my room, as one of the staff had had a birthday earlier in the day shift. During the night, I could feel my headache from the previous day returning. This was partly because I was stiff from not moving, and because the bed under my shoulders felt very hard.
By the time morning arrived, I had a migraine. Wake up was just before 6:00am.
The technicians came back in the room to remove the wires and other measuring devices. I got dressed and walked to the bathroom. I had considered going in to work after the sleep study, but I decided against it before coming to the QCH. I’m grateful for that, because when I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, I discovered that the wires had been attached to my scalp with this horrible, gooey soft-wax-like substance. My hair (what little I have) was matted and stuck out – I looked like a crazy homeless person in dress slacks.
I tried to pull as much of the goo out by hand, but it made little difference. I just wanted to get enough out that I could walk out to my car without everyone staring at me.
I drove home, took a hot shower to wash my hair and went to bed to get about 30 minutes of sleep before the alarm went off.
I hope that the technicians will find something. They said that they are only there to count the data points (such as survey my breathing rate, count how many times I toss and turn, etc). They send that data to a sleep specialist who will sent a report to my doctor in a few weeks.
Thinking about the night, I don’t think I slept well enough to be able to see some of the issues that Rosa was reporting to me.
This was recorded from the NASA Causeway, about 6 miles (9km) from Launch Pad 39A. I recorded it in HD on my GoProHD Motorsport Hero. I set it on a book in front of the crowd (thus the very low angle). As there is no LCD screen, I had to guess if it was pointed in the correct direction and angle. I feel great because I basically nailed it.
The audio on my video was not very good. There was a person next to the camera who was screaming with joy. Far too loudly!
So, to deal with it, I imported the video into iMovie ’09 and added the audio of the NASA Public Affairs Officer (George Diller), and then mixed in raw audio of the awesome crackle of the Solid Rocket Boosters. The NASA copyright statement indicates that the audio and video can be used for non-commercial purposes. Unfortunately, I can no longer figure out which YouTube video I used to get this last audio stream. I will keep searching in order to give the correct credit.
This past weekend, I was racing at Calabogie Motorsports Park as part of Team00. We had 5 cars up for the weekend – two Integra Type-R’s (#40 & #00), one Integra with a K20 motor (#04), the Saturn SC (#03) and the team’s “new” 1970’s Ford Fiesta (#227). We had 5 drivers too, although we jumped from car to car depending on the series.
I came up for the test day on Friday. I wanted to have a session in the #04 Integra (which has a K20 motor), as it is by far our fastest car. However, there was drizzle during my session, so I didn’t work up much speed. I was very gentle on the throttle to prevent spinning off the track. I also had a lot of problems finding fourth gear. Listening to videos from other drivers in the same car, we all have the same problem. It’s just an awkward reach back and to the right.
After lunch, I took out #40, the ex-World Challenge car. This was the car I would be racing for the weekend in GT Sprints, so I wanted to have a session to prepare myself and get a feeling for the car again. I haven’t driven it since last season.
I prepared to take #40 out again for the final session of the day. As I was about to roll off mock grid, I reached up to connect the window net and the fitting snapped off. Without a window net, I could not go out on the track. I got out of the car, changed out of my race suit and then ran around the paddock trying to find someone that had a welder. No one I spoke with had one, but someone suggested that there was a garage in the village of Calabogie. I left the track to find the garage. I eventually did find it, but the lights were off and a sign was posted on the door reading “Back on Monday”.
I drove back to the track thinking my weekend was over before it even began because of a seemingly non-critical weld. Luckily, in the evening we found a team with a welder who fixed us up. When I tried the fitting to make sure everything still worked, I broke off the fitting at other end of the same rod. Unbelievable! We could not weld this new problem (not enough room to gain access), so we safety-wired the end of the rod to the roll cage, and duct taped everything. For the rest of the weekend, we would be getting in and out of the car using the passenger door – that window net was not to be touched again!
Saturday started with a short practice session. The schedule was very tight, so the track time was cut down for all sessions. I started the weekend with a 1:28.431 in this session, which was near the back of the GT-4 class.
Blown right rear tire
The qualifying was just before lunch. It was a short 10-minute session, as the GT Sprints field was split into two groups (partly for safety reasons). My time was 1:27.076, which was only a slight improvement. But it was way off the pace. On the last lap, one of the rear tires burst and went flat. I’m glad I was able to instantly react and brought the car back to the pits. Jay thought that the poor tire condition might have contributed to the slow times. I was so disappointed. Jay was in the same car for the GT Challenge series earlier in the day and his qualifying time was 1:21.916 – over five seconds faster on the short track. I just couldn’t believe I had done so poorly. It really bothered me for most of the afternoon.
Integra #40 Photo by Liz
The race was in the middle of the afternoon. I had fun, but still finished second last in class. I was happy I made some good passes. Sadly, the video camera wasn’t on because I couldn’t properly reach the on-button while I was on mock grid (and belted in). I was also happy that I brought the lap time down to 1:24.586. Still not great, but a good improvement. A friend had told me the best place to pass was on the outside of Turn-15 (aka Spoon), so I tried that over and over again – it worked great the few times I could close up on a competitor before the turn!
Meanwhile, Steve was working on the #04 Integra. He was also racing in the GT Challenge series and decided to put on a set of racing slicks. However, once we had the tires mounted, the rims wouldn’t fit because of suspension clearance. We fixed that problem with a bunch of spacers. Next, the tires were rubbing on the bodywork. So we spent 30-45 minutes rolling the fenders to allow for the larger tires. During the 1-hr race, Steve went like hell for about 30 minutes before the slicks were done and his lap times plummeted to over 1:40 per lap.
Sunday morning, as we were preparing the cars, we worked on the hood pins on my #40 car. One of the rivets had come out, so we spent time re-attaching the fittings. There was a short 10-minute practice session in the morning, so I got ready and took the car out. I had only driven about 150 meters before the hood snapped up, caught by the wind, and smashed the window and wrecked the hood. I was able to see under the bottom of the hood and slowly followed the outside white line around the track to the pits and back to the paddock. The windshield was destroyed. We could run without a hood, but the broken front window was irreparable. I thought my weekend was over (again). I was heartbroken. Calabogie has not been very successful for me (one totaled Honda Civic (2008), one DNS and last place because of brakes (on #40, 2009) and now another broken car (#40 again)).
Steve and talked about it and came up with another solution. We changed cars. Instead of the Integra, I would take out the #03 Saturn and Steve moved from the Saturn back to #04 (with regular R-compound tires instead of the destroyed slicks). We arranged everything with the registrar and timing and everyone gave us the thumbs-up.
Due to the number of cars registered in the GT Sprints, they had to split the field into GT1-3 and GT4-6 for Sunday. Instead of two 20-minute races, each group would only get a single 30-minute race.
We set up all the cars for video, as four of the five drivers would be out for the final race. Steve and I started at the back of the field because of the car changes. The Saturn was in GT-6. There were three cars in GT-6 on Saturday, so I expected to be racing with two other cars.
On the start, a car spun at the apex of Turn 1 and was blocking part of the track. I saw an opening on the grass to the right, so I went for it while part of the pack was bottled up on the left side. I made a few places to faster cars that took the positions back over the next few laps.
Saturn #03 Pic by 303 Imaging
On the first lap, I passed Nick, driving the Fiesta in GT-6. On the front straight at the end of the first lap, I missed a shift and lost the position to Nick, but I took it back before Turn 2. I passed Bruce (in Team00 Integra #00) in the Ducks Head section of Calabogie on Lap 2 – he was competing in GT-5.
Once past Bruce, I had clear track for a while and I pushed hard looking for the third car in GT-6 (a Honda Civic).
Both Steve and my cars had working radios, with Jay and Joshua providing updates and encouragement from the pit straight and the berm in the quarry section.
It took a few laps to get confident to go through Turn 1 flat out without lifting, as the rear of the Saturn never feels truly planted. The Saturn is easy to drive. It is only lacking acceleration due to the low horsepower and all the extra weight; it still has all the original glass and door mechanisms for example. What it does have is momentum, just like the Civic we used to have in Team00.
I had to find a comfortable shifting pattern too. I had not driven the Saturn in about 2-3 years. It’s not a high-revving engine like the Honda and Acuras, so finding the right places to shift is important.
Over the next 5 laps, I slowly reeled in other cars in GT-5, still hunting for the other GT-6 car. I’m really proud of how I was able to pick off a few of the GT-5 cars, making good passed for overall position.
Near the end of the race, I lapped Bruce and Nick again, while I was still trying to catch the other GT-6 Civic.
At the checkered flag I whopped and hollered because I should be in second place as I never saw the Civic, a good showing for the problems of the previous sessions and considering I had not been in the Saturn in a few years and had no practice.
At the podium, they did the GT-5 and GT-4 trophies and then thanked everyone for coming. “Hey!” I said, “What about GT-6?” The timing sheets were consulted and reviewed and the presenter realized that he had missed us.
GT-6 Podium Pic by Albert Cohoe
He started with Nick in second place. I instantly realized that that meant that the other GT-6 car did not start the race. That meant that I won my first race!!! Hurrah!! He called my name to take the top step of the podium and I hollered in joy. I was given the gold medallion and a bottle of Forty Creek Whiskey. I was so happy. My first win! All these years of racing, all those second places, and finally some pay off.
I also felt that it was not a full victory, as there were only two cars in GT-6. I pumped myself up a little by remembering that I not only passed a number of the GT-5 cars but that I lapped my only competitor and one of the GT-5 cars as well. It wasn’t a cruise to the finish line. And when I was racing, I thought I was still racing to catch the other GT-6 car, which didn’t actually exist (it didn’t take the start because of a mechanical issue).
Today there was an EricssonBBQ on the fields in front of the former Nortel campus. There was great food (too much food!), lots of people, some volleyball and a soccer tournament.
Ericsson BBQ
After the lunch, door prizes were given out. I sat down on the grass while the winners were randomly drawn.
The earth started to vibrate. It started like a truck passing along Carling Avenue, or like a plane taking off, but there was no planes or trucks around. Everyone started looking around to see what was the cause before it sank in that it had to be an earthquake.
The ground vibrated strongly. It was not like the ground was moving up and down or side-to-side. It was like a very strong vibration deep below. As the shaking continued, I tried to take in all of the experience. It was exhilarating. The earthquake lasted about half a minute. There was no sound as we were in the middle of a grass field and there was nothing to move around and cause noise.
Reading about the quake later, I found that it was strong enough to break windows in the Ottawa City Hall, break chimneys around the city, and it destroyed a bridge closer to the epicentre. The epicentre was just over 50km from the former Nortel campus. It was an magnitude 5.0 quake. It was the largest quake to be felt in Ottawa in 65 years.
About 10 years ago, when I lived in the Glebe, I was awoken by smaller quake. I had a glass jar of change on a table in my bedroom. It was the coins shaking in the glass jar that woke me up.
There are forces and powers in nature that are awesome and humbling if you spend time thinking about it.
My mother-in-law, Lemin (I call her Mama), is a devout Chinese Roman Catholic. Christianity was brought to China starting as early as the Tang Dynasty in the Eight Century. Her family’s beliefs date back possibly as long as Yuan or Ming Dynasties. However, it has often faced persecution, particularly since the take over by the Chinese Communist Party in 1949. One of the reasons Lemin married my father-in-law Jinduo (I call him Papa) was to gain some protection from persecution; he is a typical non-religious Chinese.
Lemin prays multiple hours per day. She prays for Jinduo to get better, as he is very ill. He has rheumatoid arthritis and diabetes. Recent blood tests have shown that his liver and kidney functions are down 25%. Our doctor estimates that he has about 2-years left before his body completely fails.
Lemin is his full-time nurse, as he needs help to do everything – get up, use the washroom, brush his teeth, eat and move between the bed and his wheelchair. With this 24-hour supervision, she also the only person he talks with. No one visits him. It is very sad.
A few weeks ago, out of the blue, Rosa and I were told that Papa wanted to be baptized. Mama must have been talking to him about this for a very long time. Papa doesn’t really believe in God, as far as we can tell. He is certainly not indoctrinated into Christianity and I doubt he knows and understands the basic tenets of the religion.
It seems evident that he is scared of dying. He must understand that his time is growing short. He is weak and in great pain during the entire day. He is dependent on mama for everything. He can no longer walk or push himself up or move from the bed to his wheelchair without great help.
Three weeks ago, Peter, a deacon with the Ottawa Chinese Catholic Church, came to visit all of us to discuss the baptism and to see if his family (meaning Rosa and I) supports Papa’s decision. Rosa and I both agree that we support his decision and will do whatever we can to help out. We said that if he wishes to go to church, we would book ParaTranspo to take him to church and back. However, that doesn’t appear to be his desire – plus the church service is only in English, which he does not understand.
When I was in Los Angeles, Rosa let me know that the baptism would happen when I returned. I asked that it be held on the weekend so that we can prepare and so that we can invite others to come too.
Chuxiong Huang performs papa's baptism.
Today we had the baptism ceremony. Chuxiong Huang was the Chinese priest and he was assisted by Peter the deacon. Other attendees included the family of one of Papa’s health-care attendants, a family from the church and another woman from the church.
The ceremony took about 15 minutes. We all stood in the living room while the rites were performed. Even though it was performed in Chinese, Papa didn’t seem to understand very much, which is not unexpected for someone without any education and indoctrination in the Catholic Church. He was baptized and took his first communion.
Afterwards, everyone stayed for some snacks and to talk. When Papa grew tired, I carried him upstairs to sleep.
