Thematic Photographic 414 - Knobs & Dials

Only in a Jeep
London, ON
April 2017

As touchscreens rapidly take over from traditional controls in everything from cars to kitchen appliances, it's only a matter of time before we've pressed our last button or twisted our final dial. I've never been one to stand in the way of technological progress - indeed, my career has been largely based on tech - but I fear we're losing something along the way.

There's a tactility to traditional knobs, dials, switches and other analog controls that no touchscreen can ever replace. When you're at the wheel and you want to bump up the fan speed, you can easily do it by feel if your HVAC system uses a big old manual control. You control it with little more than subconscious muscle memory while the rest of you tends to the very important task of keeping the car between the lines.

I love my touchscreens, but they simply can't pull that off. So when I saw this mode control dial in one of the Jeeps from the work fleet, I had to shoot it. Because no one really knows when this, too, will exist only in software.

Your turn: Take a picture and post it to your blog or website - or use one you've already taken and/or uploaded - that evokes this week's theme, Knobs & Dials. Leave a comment here letting everyone know where to find it, and visit other participants to spread the photographic joy. Feel free to visit and contribute again throughout the week. And have fun, because Thematic is all about fun. For more background on how Thematic works, head here. Thanks, gang!

On truth

"The truth is like a lion. You don't have to defend it. Let it loose. It will defend itself."

St. Augustine

Could have been. Would have been.

This furry being was born 11 years ago today. We sadly lost him last December, but that's the wonder of being dog people: In a whole lot of ways they never really leave you.

We brought Calli into our home just over a week ago, and hardly a moment goes by as I watch her that I don't see some echo of Frasier. From the way she sticks her hind legs straight back when she lies down, to her bouncy, not-quite-straight walk, and a spirit that I can only describe as a mixture of scrappiness and sweetness, she's every bit the schnauzer that he was, and just as deeply embedded into the fabric of our family.

We miss you, buddy, and will never stop seeing snippets of you in every corner of our home and lives.

The family grows by one, again

My name is Calli, Calli Levy
Stratford, ON
June 2017

As many of you may know, it's been just over six months since we said goodbye to our beloved pup, Frasier. The house has been quiet ever since. Too quiet, even. I miss the walks, the waking up to a sleepy schnauzer at my feet, the coming home to a bouncing furball whose only reason for existence is to spread joy to his people. We all miss these moments, and it hasn't been easy adjusting to life without his wacky presence.

I guess that makes us dog people, and it's a label we wear proudly. It isn't convenient, cost-effective or logical to own a dog. Yet we do. Because life otherwise seems a little less complete, a little less rich.

So after much discussion within our family, we decided to bring another pup into our home. The munchkin in the photo above is Calli - full name Calli Finn (short for Finnegan, of Mr. Dressup sock-puppet fame, because I'm weird like that.) Like Frasier, she's a miniature schnauzer. She was born May 9th, and we brought her home earlier this afternoon. Here's what she looked like when she was two weeks old. For more pics, follow her on Instagram.

We don't speak dog, so we couldn't really talk about her day with her before we tucked her into her new crate with her now-favorite toys (Eeyore is in the early lead) and watched her instantly drop into a deep sleep. But if she could talk, she'd probably tell us about what a tough day it was for her. About how she was taken by strange new people to a strange new place. I worried about that on the drive home. I hope she saw the day as a good one, as the beginning of an exciting new chapter in what we fervently hope is a happy, healthy and fun-filled life. I hope she knows how much we already love her.

We're pretty sure the next few days, weeks and months will be sleep-deprived, mess-filled and generally chaotic as she adjusts to us and we do the same with her. I say this not because we cherish sleep or a perfectly neat house, because in my book that's not what qualifies as a life well lived. I'd gladly give up some zees in exchange for watching our kids continue to grow as people. Our first dog taught them so much about life and responsibility as they rose to the challenge of managing his diabetes. Whatever the future holds for Calli, I know she'll find some way to carve herself into their lives, as well. Because dogs make us better people. They make our kids better people, too.

Welcome to the family, little one. We can't wait to see what adventures await us all.

Your turn: Why do we love dogs as much as we do?

13 years + 1 day

Yesterday was this blog's 13th birthday* - or its bar mitzvah, if you're into that sort of thing. Which I was, once, but no longer am, as it's been a while since I was 13. But I digress.

Yes, the blog. About that...

I started it before Facebook was a thing. The now-dominant social media giant existed on June 26, 2004, of course, but it was still The Facebook, an embryonic Web 2.0 experiment that classmates used as a digital hot-or-not service. Mere mortals still didn't have access. It was two years before Twitter launched, before social media was really on our radar. Before the iPhone. Sure, some suits carried BlackBerrys, but they were only about email and messaging back then.

It was a radically different digital world, and blogging took the then-unidimensional web (surf, read, repeat) and gave everyday folks their own platform, their own voice.

The rapid encroachment of all the things I mentioned above - and then some - has in a few short years transformed the blog from what was once a sign of digital savviness to a quaint relic of a bygone time when we put an i before everything and a number - 1.0, 2.0 - after everything.

Quaint as it has become, however, I continue to write here because for all its network-based power, Facebook is ephemeral, and not something that is distinctly ours. What we post there is quickly absorbed into the past in a fast-moving timeline stuffed with ads, memes, Candy Crush top scores and conspiracy theories from folks you once loathed in high school and now, thanks to social media, loathe even more. Facebook is a busy place, where the vast majority of people who know tend to hang out. But it isn't ours. Or mine. It's like a busy airport terminal: Hardly a place you can call your own.

Likewise, Twitter is too limited, too filled with bullies and trolls. Snapchat is where the kids hang out, and whatever we write will disappear in 10 seconds, anyway. As you go further down the list - to WhatsApp, Pinterest, LinkedIn and beyond - you get deeper into unique online sub-groups that further accentuate the modern mobile/social Internet's splintering effect.

Which leaves the doddering old blog, where the number of comments in a month might equal what once flowed in before lunch. But compared to today's far busier social platforms now represents something of a quiet spot from which we can watch the chaos unfold.

Thirteen years on, the wonderful relationships I've formed through this blog continue in many forms - often on alternative platforms - and I sometimes wish we could rewind the clock to the days when this form of communication dominated the online landscape. But as I've said so many times before, technology moves in only one direction, and it's up to us to either adapt or fall off the back of the treadmill. This blog, like all blogs, may no longer be current, leading-edge or as uniquely relevant as it was back in 2004. But it's still my quiet little corner in a tumultuous online (and real) world, and I can't imagine not having this place to return to when I need a little word-based balancing between my ears.

Thank you for joining me on the journey, and thank you for keeping the flickering embers alive. To 120 for us all...

--
Related:
And so it begins (June 26, 2004)
Thrice around the sun (June 26, 2007)
10 times around the sun (June 26, 2014)

Thematic Photographic 413 - Pretty in Pink

My ride
Dorchester, ON
May 2017

Behold my brightly-colored bicycle. It's a Specialized StumpJumper Comp that I've had for longer than I dare admit. I'm not really about things, as I don't tend to covet physical objects or use them to define who I am in the eyes of others. But I love this bike. It fits me. It feels like it was made for me, and riding it - to/from work, or wandering the hinterlands that surround our town - is an indescribably joy because of this well-made-yet-simple machine. I'll never understand why Specialized painted a men's bike in burn-your-eyes pink, but I'm glad they did, because it makes me smile every time I walk up to it.

Sometimes when I go somewhere, I'll take a picture of it in all its imperfect, dirty glory. Here, it's parked on a bridge over the Thames River in a lovely little town east of London. This was my first stretch-the-distance ride, where instead of riding in loops close to home I instead ventured further into the countryside. As I get deeper into the season, the distances get further and the rides get harder. But as long as I have this lovely pink thing - and a moment or two at the turnaround point to grab some pixels to remember the moment - I know I'll always find my way back home.

With this in mind, let's celebrate all things pink for this week's Thematic. If it's any shade of this fab color, it's time to shoot a picture and share it. Who's with me?

Your turn: Take a pic that suggests or evokes this week's theme, Pretty in Pink, and post it to your blog or website. Alternatively, find a pic you've already taken and/or posted. Leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it. Visit other participants to spread the photographic joy. And pop back again through the week to add additional pics as they occur to you. Head here for more background on how Thematic works. And please accept my thanks for making this little weekly photo-exploration exercise of ours such a joy.

Drop the pen. Pick it up again.

So Eeyore, a lamb and a panda walk into a bar...
London, ON
June 2017

So it's been a while since I wrote anything new here, and given the fact that Written Inc. celebrates its bar mitzvah tomorrow (13! An adult!) I thought now would be a reasonable time to a) pick the pen back up and b) explain why I put it down in the first place.

Quite simply, I haven't much felt like writing. We've had a lot on the go within my family - nothing terrible or earth-shattering, but intense enough that sitting down for regular keyboard-mashing sessions no longer topped the daily priority list. In other words, life happened, and it demanded our full attention. So rather than force myself to squeeze some words out that probably wouldn't have felt right, I decided relative silence was the preferred path. It's not like I wasn't creating, mind you, as I continued to post photos to my Instagram account - which then automatically ended up on my Facebook and Twitter streams, too. Awesome how technology works, isn't it?

But there's a world of difference between fast-sharing a pic from your smartphone and taking the time to write something. And I was a writer before I was anything else. So while I think it was good for my writer's soul to be a non-writer for a bit, I suspect now it's time to fish the proverbial pen out of its shadowy nook in the far corner of my desk and use it for its intended purpose. Silence isn't meant to last forever, after all, and there's a lot of interesting stuff on the way over the next few days, weeks and months. Thanks for your patience.

Oh yes, about this somewhat oddball picture: I'm the one who chose the panda, while the kids chose Eeyore (always my fave 100 Acre Wood resident) and the lamb. They sit, among way too many other stuffed toys, in a small-ish bin at the bottom landing of the stairs, just beside our living room. They're dog toys, and we bring Calli Finn home this Thursday*. The house has been too quiet for too long. It's time to start telling new stories, and celebrating new beginnings.

Your turn: What else should I write about in the days to come?

*Here's what she looked like the day we picked her out. She's a bit bigger now.

On Carl Sagan and the technological mess we've created

"We've arranged a global civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces."
Carl Sagan

Thematic Photographic 412 - Architecture

Stone-faced
Toronto, ON
February 2017

If you find yourself staring at buildings because you find them neat, know you're not alone. Any structure of any era has to offer at least one redeeming reason for a stare or two. Even if it's a glass-and-metal box, there's got to be something there that connects with your soul.

And because I've been shooting human-created structures with alarming frequency of late, I'm hoping you'll consider doing so, too. If anything, it eases my guilt for missing Thematic last week. In the party atmosphere that was my birthday, I forgot to hit the Publish button. Bad Carmi.

Your turn: Take a pic that ‎evokes, supports or merely suggests this week's theme, Architecture. Leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it. Already posted something online or in your archives? Share it, too! Visit other participants to raise the fun quotient and feel free to post more contributions through the week. For more info on how Thematic works, head here. Most important of all, have fun with it!

Sitting in the subway late at night

All angles
Toronto, ON
February 2017

The scene: Valentine's Day night. I'm in this city a couple of hours from home because of a work thing. The team has already had dinner and we've all headed back to the hotel to shift gears for an evening of extended shmoozing. I'm not much of a party person or a drinker, and I'm the world's least effective shmoozer. So I politely decline invitations to go clubbing or sit in the hotel lobby bar. Instead, I reach for my camera and head out for a walk before tuck-in. That's me, Mr. Social.

Before long, I find myself descending into a subway station, because nothing says Valentine's Day like a subway station. My goal is simple: Sit on a bench for a few minutes, and watch the comings and goings. As I settle into a spot, I notice the stairs, and how institutional, public-space architecture like this always seems to speak to me.

Later on, when I review the pics from this walk, I have a bunch of random snaps of strangers in the varying stages of forced Valentine's Day bliss - ranging from overt public displays of affection to what I'm pretty sure was a breakup-in-progress - but it's this one that keeps taking me back, that paints a picture in linear slashes of blue tile and germ-infested chrome, of what it felt like to be looking for some kind of inspiration on a night when all I really wanted to do was hang with my family.

Related: This photo on Instagram.

On reading - and life

"Read in order to live."
Gustave Flaubert

So if anyone's looking for me, I'll be in the corner over here, reading. I'll leave it to you to guess what. Suggestions always welcome.

The 10 things I HATE about social media

We're a little over a decade into the so-called social media era, long enough that's it's now a normal, everyday thing for most of us. It's also been around long enough for some of us - I'm not judging, pointing fingers or naming names; not yet, anyway  - to have built up more than a few annoying habits along the way.

With that in mind, here's a quick list of some of the things that elevate my blood pressure when I thumb past them on my smartphone:

1 - Posting selfies, and only selfies. While there's nothing wrong with a selfie or two thrown into the mix here and there, Every Single Picture need not be of you. Look, I get it: I'm an occasional-selfie-taker, and they are a fun addition to the photographic toolkit. But they aren't everything. Point the lens outward and tell the story instead of constantly being the story. You're interesting, but not that interesting.

2 - Turning your timeline into a real-time vacation travelogue. First of all, anyone who posts pics while they're on vacation is an idiot (hey criminals, please rob my empty house!) Second, isn't the whole point of a vacation supposed to be that you get away from social media and other tools of everyday technology? Instead of a never-ending, one-at-a-time stream of unedited and badly composed photos posted while you're away, why don't you enjoy the moment, then edit and post a carefully curated summary once you get home? Combining wall-to-wall selfies with real-time vacation pics is even worse. So please stop.

3 - Sharing a list of 10 concerts. I don't think you much care about who I've seen perform live on-stage, and I'm pretty sure the feeling is mutual. Wait, I'm completely sure. I don't care that this is the latest hot meme that's sweeping Facebookistan, and why everyone else is falling all over themselves is beyond me. Unless you really like being a sheeple, I guess. Try coming up with something original instead. It's a little more work, but it makes for better reading.

4 - Participating in a meme. Those endless "Let's see who reads this..." posts are so far beyond being played out that I can't believe they're still a thing. When half my feed is filled with cut-and-paste sameness because no one can be bothered to share an original thought, I begin to wonder if any of us has a future. If you want to write something close to the heart, sharpen your virtual pencil and write it yourself. Why would I be bothered to read and respond if you can't be bothered to think?

5 - Sending game invitations. If you can't learn to turn off notifications and invitations when you play an online game, perhaps you don't deserve to have a social media account. I know it sounds harsh, but someone needs to have the courage to tell you your endless game invites aren't merely annoying. They also make you look lame.

6 - Overshare. I know way too much about the intimate lives of way too many people, all because they insist on posting longform accounts of their child's latest outburst at home, their most recent run-in with the crazy neighbors on the other side of the fence, their trials and tribulations at work, and their years-long efforts to have that baby boy they always wanted because three healthy girls simply weren't enough. Look, I love the way social media gives us insight into the lives of people we care about. And the social media space is filled with lots of examples of people who do it right - with grace, sensitivity and class - and I will never get enough of the good kind of sharing. But holy cow, people, learn where to draw the line. The difference between appropriate and inappropriate levels of sharing should be obvious to us by now. Sadly, they aren't.

7 - Using your timeline as a scheduler. Blog posts, Facebook status updates and other publicly-shared messages are best served as focused summaries of things that matter to you, not comprehensive, excruciatingly detailed accounts of your day that make me wonder why you feel the need to share it all. I'm exhausted enough managing my own day in 15-minute increments that trying to follow yours in blow-by-blow format is damn near impossible.

8 - Write everything in one long, endless paragraph. Did grammar go out the window with the advent of social media tools? Do we no longer know how to communicate in bite-sized chunks? Considering the increasingly attention-deficit nature of digital messaging, you'd think the 5,000-word-all-in-one-graf Facebook post would be a thing of the past. You'd think wrong. Use that Enter/Return key, people. I beg you.

9 - Announcing periodic cleanups of your friends lists. Passive-aggressive much? If you're going to unfriend or unfollow someone, just do it. Don't pre-announce it. Don't post it to all your friends and ask them to beg to stay in your good electronic graces. Don't post again, after the fact, to let your remaining "friends" know how lucky they are to still be in your orbit. If you do, and you suddenly find me absent from your timeline, now you know why.

10 - Sending unsolicited group messages. There's a reason there are laws against spam. Wait, there are TONS of reasons. But what's now taboo in email seems to be perfectly acceptable on social media. If I didn't ask to be on the recipient list for your mass Facebook Messenger message, then don't put me on it - especially if you stuff it with weird emojis and animated GIFs.

I'm pretty sure this makes me sound like the old codger standing on his lawn whining about those darn neighborhood kids, But when we're gifted with some of the most sophisticated communications technology ever conceived and we choose to waste it on Candy Crush and Donald Trump memes, I can't stand silently by the wayside.

Your turn: What bugs YOU about social media? Let me know in a comment...maybe there's another list - or two, or three... - in our collective future.

On making the world a happier place

"There are two ways to spread happiness; either be the light who shines it or be the mirror who reflects it."
Edith Wharton

Thematic Photographic 411 - Gardens Galore

Colors of nature
London, ON
April 2017

I don't know a whole lot about plants or gardens beyond the sad fact that I tend to kill them. It isn't intentional, but of all the people born with the innate ability to nurture plant-based life, I'm not one of them.

Doesn't mean I can't appreciate it photographically when it grows on its own, though. So when this particularly colorful example of hen and chicks - or sempervivum - presented itself in the garden underneath our kitchen window, it was an easy call to point the lens down and have some fun with it.

We had some fun with this pic on Instagram and Twitter. For the next week, I hope you'll do the same here on the blog. And on yours!

Your turn: This week's Thematic theme is gardens galore. Feel free to take a picture of a garden. Or a garden plant. Or a garden of plants. Or anything that's alive and lovely - remember, it's all about how you choose to interpret the theme, and there are non wrongs here. After you're done shooting, post the pic to your blog, website or social media presence, then leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it. Did you already post something long ago? Share that, too! Visit other Thematic participants to share the Thematic goodness - we'll be at it all week. New to Thematic? Here's the lowdown. Thanks!

On volunteerism and Muhammad Ali

"Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth."
Muhammad Ali

Reflected sunset

Where glass meets sky
Toronto, ON
February 2017
Thematic. Reflective. Here.

May as well fess up now: I'm not the world's biggest fan of work-related travel. Of course, I love to get out and explore, and I relish that feeling of discovering new places and learning the ebb and flow of a new part of the world. Well, new to me, at least.

But sometimes all that exploring can be more strain than it's worth: The airport security gauntlet; the getting up well before dawn and not stopping until way after midnight; the business dinners and networking when I'd rather be home with my fam; the waking up in a strange place and having to run the treadmill at 11 even before I've gotten out of this strange bed in a strange hotel room; the fact that you're always "on".

Face it, I'm a whiner with a homebody complex. Guilty as charged. So when the professional calendar includes from faraway time, I try to normalize it a bit by building in some walkabout time. Because stealing an hour or two - or even a few fleeting minutes - in between all the scheduled, serious stuff gives me a much-needed mental break, an opportunity to see more than just the inside of a conference room, and think about more than the next PowerPoint slide.

On this late afternoon on my way back to the hotel after a long day of meetings preceded by an even longer pre-dawn trip just to get there, I politely declined an offer to crunch into the back of a strangers' car with a bunch of co-workers for the four-block trip back to our hotel through downtown-Toronto traffic. Instead, I slung my camera over my shoulder and pointed myself in the general direction of our common destination. I'd meet them back there well in time for dinner, but unbeknownst to them, I needed a few minutes along with my thoughts and my camera.

As you can see, it didn't take me long to get into the photographic groove before I had to put my "on" face back on and get back to the business of being in business. Besides, there was another walk in store - in the dark - after dinner was done.

Your turn: Do you travel for work? If so, what do you do to feel "normal" when you're away?

Related: This photo in Instagram

On technology, change, and survival

"Once a new technology rolls over you, if you're not part of the steamroller, you're part of the road."
Stewart Brand

When reflections outshine the real thing

Sunrise framed in a window
London, ON
January 2017
To share your own reflective-themed Thematic, head here

The scene: I've just dropped our daughter off at school. It's a cold winter morning, and the campus is quiet as I slowly point the car toward the exit. The brightening sky grabs my attention as I idle through the largely deserted parking lot. As much as I try to focus on the drive, I can't stop staring at that sky. It's calling me.

I figure I have plenty of time to get to the office, so I find a parking spot, grab my camera and wander over to a pile of snow to get the best possible vantage point. I grab a few pics, but they all make me feel somewhat meh, as if that little flash of an idea I had in my head when I first saw the sky doesn't seem to have translated all that well through the lens.

I decide I'm done for the day - can't force blood from an artistic stone, after all - and head back to the car. As I approach, I notice the reflection in the window and think I might have been looking in the wrong direction all along.

On the impressions we leave behind

"Whoever you are, there is some younger person who thinks you are perfect. There is some work that will never be done if you don't do it. There is someone who would miss you if you were gone. There is a place that you alone can fill."
Jacob M. Braude

Thematic Photographic 410 - Reflections

No longer alive
London, ON
April 2017

I took a photowalk the other morning, my way of killing time while our daughter was at work. I hadn't been out in a while, and I deliberately brought the wrong equipment with me - a lovely old 85mm lens that I almost never use because it lacks that do-everything convenience of a zoom.

Looking at what I brought back, I realize I've been missing the point all along because a fixed focal length lens forces you to shoot in a completely different way. You have to use your feet and your brain to pre-compose, and soon enough you find you don't much miss being able to zoom in and out with your fingertips. Photography isn't always about taking the easy way out, and this long-overdue walk turned into a nice reminder of that.

I also forced myself to shoot monochrome - another throwback to when I used to challenge myself to look at the world differently. More of this looms in my photographic future, as well.

Your turn:  This week's Thematic theme is Reflections. Please share a pic or three (however many you wish) of something that supports this theme. Be liberal with how you interpret the theme, as that's the point of the exercise - so mirrors, bodies of water, even car windows are all fair game. Post your pic(s) to your blog or website, then leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it/them. Head here if you'd like more info on how Thematic works, and feel free to drop by again later in the week - bonus if you bring a friend. Enjoy!

On questions vs. answers

"It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers."
James Thurber

Fitbit saves woman's life

Can a Fitbit save your life? Patricia Lauder would doubtless say it can.

The 73-year-old Connecticut resident originally bought the wearable device to help her keep track of her steps. Like millions of other people, her goal was to simply lose a bit of weight.

One day, she wasn't feeling well, and noticed that the Fitbit was showing consistently higher heart rate levels from one day to the next. After her heart rate spiked to 140 beats per minute and she felt short of breath, she decided to see her doctors. Good thing she did, as they quickly diagnosed two pulmonary embolisms - which, left untreated, could have killer her.

My $0.02: As wearables continue to (slowly) grow in popularity, we'll see more examples of how they benefit users in unexpected ways. Your mileage may vary, of course, but no one doubts that greater visibility into health-related data isn't good for us. It absolutely is. And in some cases, it can even be lifesaving.

Now please excuse me while I snap my Garmin into the bike and pedal off for home. If you're in the 'hood, you're always welcome to join me.

On liberty - and its obligatory flip side

"The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave."
Thomas Jefferson

The Facebook Killer: Who's responsible?

By now, everyone's familiar with the horrific story out of Cleveland, where Steve Stephens walked up to a random stranger last Sunday and shot him dead. What made the murder of 74-year-old Robert Godwin Sr. stand out from all others was the fact that the gunman captured it on video and shared it on Facebook. A multistate manhunt for Stephens ended two days later he was cornered just outside Erie, Pennsylvania and shot himself as police closed in.

The incident raises significant questions about streaming online video. Its exploding popularity has exposed a dark side to the technology, with escalating examples of rapes, beatings, suicides, and now murder, and growing concern over the lack of tools that can quickly shut down streams that violate the service's terms of use and give law enforcement real-time guidance to respond to crimes broadcast online.

Right now, no such tools exist, and Facebook relies on user-submitted complaints - a process that is inaccurate and slow. In the Stephens case, the video remained online for over 2 hours after the murder was committed. In other cases, it's taken days and weeks for Facebook to process takedowns.

Facebook issued a statement - as they'd be expected to do - expressing its outrage, and is working on automated tools to monitor and address such abuses in real-time. But it's a major technical challenge, and it won't happen overnight. If and when these tools ultimately roll out, they'll come too late for the victim of this unbelievable crime.

Here's my $0.02: This is what happens when technology rushes too quickly ahead of the frameworks, rules and laws that would govern it's abuse and protect its users in the process. It also begs a number of wrenching questions:

• Whether having access to Facebook Video and Facebook Live could have been an encouraging factor for the gunman.
• What role the companies that make these technologies might be playing in the spread of an entirely new form of crime.
• Whether it's time for Internet "broadcasts" to be regulated in the same way conventional ones have always been.

Your turn: What do you think? What responsibilities does Facebook have in ensuring its apps and services are used for good and not for evil?

Thematic Photographic 409 - Stuff you find in the basement

Dirty old cables
London, ON
April 2017

Some folks see basements and storage areas as icky and dirty. They may be right. But that doesn't mean they aren't worth a little photographic love, as well.

Which brings us to this week's Thematic theme, stuff you find in the basement. This theme will work nicely if you actually have a basement. But in case you don't, any old storage area will do. Or a dark, dusty place with lots of old stuff hanging around. As always, there's lots of creative room here, so have fun with it.

Your turn: Take a pic that reflects the "stuff you find in the basement" theme - or find one you may have posted online - and then leave a comment here letting everyone know where to find it. Repeat as often as you wish, and feel free to pull in a friend. We'll be doing this all week, so don't be shy. And if you're new to the Thematic thing, click here and all will be explained.

On art, music, and decoration

"Art is how we decorate space, Music is how we decorate time."
Jean-Michel Basquiat

Thematic Photographic 408 - Orange

Multicolored
London, ON
April 2017

This week's Thematic theme, orange, marks a return to the world of colors. My brain was having difficulty processing the scene you see above, because it never dawned on me that carrots could be anything but orange in color. I guess I need to get out more.

Your turn: Shoot something orange. Or something that suggests orange. Or makes you think of orange. Share it on your blog or website, then pop into the comments here and let everyone else know where to find it. Visit other participants and feel free to post more from your collection later in the week. For more info on how Thematic works, follow this link home. And enjoy! Because that's why we do this!

On the subtle difference between "won't" and "can't"

"A person who won't read has no advantage over one who can't read."
Mark Twain

Lake Carmi, for real

My very own body of water
London, ON
April 2017

I have this thing about old t-shirts: I just can't get rid of them. Much to my incredibly patient wife's consternation, I keep them around long after they're no longer wearable. They may have yellowed with age, or simply been worn down to mere threads from overuse, but still I keep them in my drawer. I guess I do so because t-shirts can often be signposts of the lives we've lived so far, triggers to memories that would otherwise be lost to time.

Exhibit A, the Lake Carmi t-shirt you see here. I've had it for decades. I couldn't have been older than 5 or 6 when my parents detoured the car off the highway and found this out-of-the-way place that magically shared my name. As a child with an incredibly off-mainstream name, it was a mindblowing experience to get out of the car and walk across a dusty parking lot where all the signs pointed to me. Being the baby of the family, it was the one time I got something uniquely mine, not a hand-me-down.

I wasn't really a fan of my name when I was a child. It singled me out, gave bullies something to hang onto, and was even a point of contention for friends when we had our inevitable children's arguments.

As a journalist in the Age of Google, my attitude has softened somewhat. It's helped me build a brand in a way that simply wouldn't have been possible had I been given a more common name. Everyone knows who this guy Carmi is - and most of the time in my line of work, that's a pretty good thing. Except, of course, when they disagree with me. But it's a risk I'm willing to take - and it's all part of the fun of being me.

Sometimes I wonder if that moment in the parking lot marked the inflection point where I began to change my mind, where "Carmi" became more of a benefit than a liability. Either way, the t-shirt may be yellowed with time, and so small that is barely fits the teddy bear I bought my wife when we first started dating. But I just can't leave it behind.

Your turn: Got an old piece of clothing that you just can't bear to get rid of?

Related:

• Wikipedia entry
• Vermont State Parks - Lake Carmi State Park
• Lake Carmi on Google Maps

On looking at failure through a different lens

"Failure is success if we learn from it."
Malcolm Forbes

Thematic Photographic 407 - Picture of a picture

Lookin' at my shoes
March 2017
London, ON

Look really closely at the card on the wall. Our daughter took this pic of her very photogenic pair of sneakers, and this was one of four of her photos on display her school's photo exhibit last month.

Many things come to mind when I see this shot. First and foremost, she's really talented. She sees things in ways unique to her, and she has the technical and artistic chops to capture the scene and tell the story. Her portfolio is a delight, and I say that not as a biased dad, but as someone who appreciates this kind of creativity.

This is also a picture of a picture, which not all that coincidentally is this week's theme. Sometimes the context of a photo or a scene becomes the story, as it did here on this important night in the life of a young artist. I often think about where and how a given work is seen or otherwise consumed, and what goes through the minds of those doing the consuming.

For the next week, that's what we'll focus on, as well.

Your turn: Take a picture of a picture, then share it on your blog, website or social media presence. Leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it, then visit other participants to share in the fun. Want to post another pic later in the week or bring a friend along for the ride? We'd love that, too. Thematic's rules, such as they are, are here. Otherwise, happy shooting, and thanks!

Related: Dahlia Levy Photography on Instagram

On the importance of maintenance

"Another flaw in the human character is that everyone wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance."
Kurt Vonnegut

The story behind these essential oils

Cook some memories with me
Thornhill, ON
March 2017

The scene: The Sobeys grocery store in Thornhill, Ontario. The store sits in an otherwise unassuming strip mall at the corner of Clark and Hilda, and it isn't exactly walking distance from our house. In fact, it's a 210 km drive. Why the hell would we drive two hours to fetch groceries? Good question. Turns out there's a story here.

See, London is a lovely town, and we love living there for a lot of reasons. The small, tightly connected Jewish community is one of them. We're not religious in the black-coat-wearing, long-bearded, memorize-every-last-prayer kind of way. By those standards, I'm a complete heathen. But the cultures and traditions of who we are? They're everything to us, and thanks to my wife, our home is filled with them.

Unfortunately, being a small Jewish community can sometimes make it difficult to find kosher food. In a small-j-Jewish-community town like London, you have to know where to look. Again, I'm never going to win awards for Most Kosher Jew of All-Time, but my wife keeps our home Kosher, and come Passover time - happens around the same time as Easter - we eat Kosher for Passover food for the duration of the holiday.

If finding regular Kosher food all year is a tough sled, then upping the Kosher game for Passover is an even more specialized art. Bottom line: some London grocers bring in Kosher for Passover stuff, but Toronto's relatively huge Jewish community means they'll have a lot more of it there.

So my wife and I have evolved an annual tradition of sorts: a few weeks before Passover starts, we drive to Toronto on a given Sunday morning and buy groceries we might not otherwise find in London later on. We make a day of it, often bumping into folks we know in the store before we load up the car and grab lunch at a beloved resto or bakery. It's one of those simple things we do that seems to feel right - mundane to the outside world, but uniquely ours.

Along the way, I take pictures, I muse openly about the strange products available here - Baby Fingers! - and I try to slow the day down so that I'll remember later on why moments like this can be so special.

I took this picture with an arguing Israeli family on one side, and a quietly-chatting middle-aged Toronto couple on the other. I figured while they were all busy with the Very Serious Business of Passover shopping, I had a few precious seconds to compose the scene and be done with it.

I wasn't fast enough. As I lined up the shot, I heard a sudden silence as they all stopped their conversations, turned toward me and stared. I guess they had never seen anyone shoot canola oil before. I finished shooting, then turned to them and smiled. "I'm from London. We take pictures there when we shop. Give it a try: You have lovely oil."

They laughed the kind of laugh that connects strangers who aren't really strangers anymore, and before I knew it, I was tucking my smartphone back into my pocket and looking for my wife. I found her a few minutes later, and by then the tone of the day was yet again fused into my long-term memory.

In the end, this photo is just another two-dimensional assembly of pixels captured by an optical sensor and stored on a memory card. But it's the story behind it - and every one like it that I've taken over the years - that reminds me why it matters so much to pay attention to the stories of our lives, and to take the time to share them afterward. Otherwise, all we're doing is looking at oil in a crowded grocery store.

On humanity's ultimate weapon

"The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter."
Mark Twain

Solving distracted driving, one idiot at a time

The scene: Wharncliffe Boulevard northbound, 6:10 p.m. yesterday. I find myself sitting at the front of a long line of traffic, at the red light at the Riverside Boulevard intersection. I'm in the right lane, and I can smell the Mexican-food dinners being cooked up at the beloved Under the Volcano restaurant that looms over the sidewalk across the road to the west.

In my rearview, an endless line of idling cars, plus one motorcyclist just behind my bumper. To my left, a middle-aged woman in a black, late-model Honda Accord, Ontario plate BWFY 954. Her head is in the now-obvious tilted-down position, and her hands are nowhere to be seen. She's either praying to an unseen god, or she's texting. Within seconds, I conclude the latter, as she starts smiling to herself, clearly engaged in a silent conversation through her fingers. I figure I'll have fun with her because, hey, what else is there to do at a red light?

So I keep staring at her, watching her facial expressions continue to cycle through smiles, laughs, crinkled brows and intense focus. It would be a fascinating observation of human behaviour if she was sitting on a park bench. But she isn't. She's in control of a 3,336 pound vehicle. And while she may think she's fine because she's sitting at a red light, research has already proven that red-light-texters are, in fact, compromised for up to 30 seconds after the light turns green. I think of the motorcyclist behind me, and how he doesn't deserve to be pancaked by anyone, much less someone who just couldn't wait to get home to text-chat with her BFF, and absolutely, positively, had to use her phone on the road.

I stare some more. It's always been a super-long light, so I know I've got lots of time to play with. Eventually, she turns toward me and realizes what I'm up to. Her shoulders jump in surprise. I smile impassively before I slowly shake my head from side to side. I say nothing - she wouldn't hear me through two panes of glass, anyway. She stares back with a blank look on her face, and it occurs to me that she may still not understand. I make a phone-to-my-ear gesture, followed by a down gesture. She turns her head back to the front of the car, puts both hands on the steering wheel and spends the rest of the cycle frozen in time and space, probably hoping I go away forever.

Eventually, the light turned green, and thanks to the yin and yang of rush-hour traffic, she ended up shadowing me for much of the next couple of kilometres before I had to turn off. From what I could see, she behaved herself, but I'm pretty sure I'm off her Christmas card list for good.

A few months ago, I was talking about distracted driving on-air with Andy Oudman, host of CJBK's The Live Drive. I was ranting about how rampant distracted driving has become, how we've become surrounded by driver-seat texters, that this has become our new, seemingly acceptable normal.

Except it isn't normal. And it should never be acceptable. So we vowed that day to go public every time we saw it play out on the roads. We've continued to discuss it on-air - because, let's face it, it's getting worse - and this blog entry is my attempt at escalating the campaign in a different way. Vehicle descriptions, license numbers, behaviours - if I see it, I'm outing it.

Whether you're this particular Honda-driving woman, or anyone else who texts at the wheel, your presumption of privacy disappears the instant you pull your vehicle onto a public road and decide to put everyone around you at risk. It may not bother you, but it bothers me. And I'm done being silent or polite about it.

Who's with me?

Update - March 29: If you'd like to contact the London Police Service's Traffic Management Unit, head here: https://www.londonpolice.ca/en/crime-prevention/Ask-a-traffic-question.aspx

Update - March 30: I saw another offender on the way home today. Here's the lowdown: 5:29 p.m., Wellington northbound, corner Commissioners, in the left-hand turning lane. A 2015 of 2016 Honda CR-V covered from head-to-toe in Pizza Pizza graphics (I kid you not) with Ontario plate BXRT 553. Driver was busy on his phone at the red light. I stared a bit. He noticed. Texted some more, then thought twice. Placed the phone back in its holster in the middle of the dash. Smiled and waved at me as the light turned green and he drove away. Sure, he was friendly and realized the error of his ways. But he nevertheless put everyone around him at risk, hence my mentioning the incident here.

Thematic Photographic 406 - Electrical & Infrastructure

What keeps this place alive
London, ON
February 2017

I have a number of odd habits, one of which revolves around looking into the shadowy corners of quiet rooms in the vague hope that I'll see something no one else has noticed. Sure, maybe we see this stuff all the time, but do we really see it? Take the time to think about it a little?

Probably not. Hence the photo above. I don't even know what it is, but I know it plays a role in my day-to-day life. It's a switchbox on a back wall in one of the studios I use at the TV station. I'm pretty sure if this thing wasn't here, I wouldn't be going on-air. So, thank you little ignored box of stuff. And thank you to the gifted people in this place who make it all work. I'd be nowhere without them.

Your turn: This week's Thematic theme is electrical and infrastructure, because even the everyday and the forgotten can be photographically compelling. Take a photo that evokes, suggests or reflects this week's theme, then post it to your blog, website or social media account. Leave a comment here to let folks know where to find it, then drop by other participants to share the photographic joy. Bring a friend, and drop by later in the week to see what everyone's up to. For more info on how Thematic works, head here. Thanks gang!

On cancer, knees, and feet

"Cancer didn't bring me to my knees, it brought me to my feet."
Michael Douglas

I'm pretty sure I think about health more than is optimally healthy. I always worry about it. About losing it. About not being here. Or, worse, about being here and not being able to truly live. I'm not ashamed to admit that this fear, this sense of worry, never really leaves me. It's isn't quite a Sword of Damocles. More like a constant awareness of how thin that margin can be. And it defines pretty much every waking moment.

As a writer, I often look for words - other people's words, or ones I craft inside my still-functioning brain - to hold onto. These, I'll hold onto. Because while many of us will find ourselves on the wrong end of some kind of major disease or health scare, it's what we do afterward that truly defines who we are.

An in-between moment with a crossover

Made in Woodstock
London, ON
March 2017
For more Thematic Wheels & Tires, click here

I hold a lot of strange beliefs, and here's one of them: Life is filled with in-between moments, and it's up to us to take advantage of them lest we miss out. To wit, all too often we fail to engage in our favorite activities because we "just can't take the time" or we're "way too busy."

Enter the in-between moment, in this case on the way out to my car after work, I noticed my colleague's spanking new Toyota Rav4 in the parking lot. So I pulled my smartphone out and snagged a few pictures because a) hey, new car! and b) I thought it would make him laugh when he found out.

The results may not be earth-shattering, but the very fact that I added pixels to my memory card means I got out there. Which, looking at all the blink-of-an-eye in-between moments that we all have in the course of the day, means we're all about to be a bit busier than usual. Great way to live, isn't it?

Your turn: Describe a memorable in-between moment.

On holding onto our madness

"You're only given one little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it."

Robin Williams 

Thematic Photographic 405 - Wheels and tires

All-season goodness
London, ON
March 2017

Take a close look at the average tire today and you're looking at a marvel of computer-generated engineering. Every aspect of the design you see here was painstakingly crafted to meet a specific set of performance criteria. Tires have to be quiet, efficient, durable, affordable, and safe. A little bit of fun thrown into the mix doesn't hurt, either. Balancing these often-conflicting criteria isn't as easy as it seems.

These unassuming rubber rings literally hold your vehicle to ground below, and despite the fact that we ignore them in the day-to-day of zipping from one place to another, we really do owe them a little more attention. And thanks.

Your turn: You know the drill, right? Take a picture that supports, evokes, suggests or even merely hints at this week's theme - wheels and tires - and post it to your blog, website or social media presence. Leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it. Visit other participants because nothing inspires great photography more than sharing. If you're new to the Thematic thing, check this link out. Otherwise, have fun. And thank you.

About this photo: My colleague, Andy Oudman, put new shoes on his car earlier this month. It isn't often that I get to shoot brand-new rubber, so before long we both found ourselves standing in the parking lot chatting happily about how awesome tires can be, and why they deserve more than a passing glance as we make our way home after a long day.

Related:
This photo on Instagram
carmilevy on Instagram
Where the rubber hits the road, Jan. 2016
Let's get dirty, Oct. 2013

Snakes can be friendly, too

Remember the turtle I met last week? The one I wanted to bring home but couldn't on account of the fact that I have a really smart wife who'd brain me if I even tried?

Well, here's the turtle's reptilian friend. And since I don't covet snakes as much as I covet turtles, no attempt was made to make this one a Levy.

That didn't stop me from trying to shoot the slithery thing on the only camera I had on me at the time. Pet potential or not, I can't resist that little voice inside my head that tells me this is a scene I won't want to forget.

Your turn: I don't think this snake has a name. I think we should correct that. Suggestions? I'd start the bidding with "Sammy", but that would be too obvious. I know you can do better.

On the lesson of shoes, comfort, and life

"The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no recipe for living that suits all cases."
Carl Jung

The market after dark

This is the public square in front of the Covent Garden Market. I wouldn't be stretching things by saying this is a jewel in our city's crown, a public space so well thought-out and managed that it's become something of a model for similar projects elsewhere.

But that wasn't on my mind on this warm, damp night as I walked through the square on my way home from a photo exhibit where our daughter's work was on display. The light spilling out caught my attention, and I was once again reminded of architecture's ability to make us feel.

I need to spend more time here, partly to take better photos of a special place, but more specifically to just take it in. Sometimes, just hanging out in the right location is enough to recharge the soul.

Your turn: Do you have a place that makes you feel better?

On the power of the plod

"Plodding wins the race."
Aesop

Thematic Photographic 404 - Retail

Reflections from the checkout aisle
London, ON
March 2017

I'll come right out and say it: I hate shopping. As much as I enjoy getting out of the house and exploring the world near and far, watching someone count out exact change to the cashier, coin by coin, while the ensuing lineup stretches toward the back of the store, isn't exactly my cup of tea. Likewise the folks who smack their carts into you then blithely walk away without so much as an acknowledgment. On second thought, maybe it isn't the shopping I hate as much as the people who ruin the experience for everyone else.

Whatever the cause, there's never any shortage of things to shoot when we've got to hunt and forage to ensure our suburban survival. And for the next week, you're invited to share your shopping adventures in support of our latest theme, retail.

Your turn: I'm pretty sure you already know what  to do. But just in case, here's the short version: post a pic that supports this week's theme - retail - to your blog, website or social media account. Leave a comment here letting everyone know where to find it. Visit other participants, then repeat through the week. Thematic  is a non-competitive activity that lets us stretch our photographic boundaries a bit. I look forward to seeing what you come up with!

10 years to the dog-day

Ten years ago today, we brought home a scraggly 8-month-old puppy. He was so scraggly, in fact, that the heavily matted, black furball who showed up at our door gave way to a silvery-grey sweetie once our groomer got her expert hands on him the next day. That transition from darkness to light seemed to define his life with us from that moment onward.

You never quite know what can happen with a rescue dog, and Frasier's life was never predictable or linear. He wasn't trained in the traditional sense - so there was never a hope of bringing home large trophies after jumping through hoops and charming the pants off of ascot-wearing judges with fake British accents. He never walked in a straight line, instead zig-zagging back and forth across the sidewalk as his nose searched for whatever it is the nose of a hunting dog searches for. Being the dog-dad-pushover that I was, I simply held onto the leash and laughed at him.

But he was a good dog in ways no best-of-show ribbon could ever approach. He knew when his people needed him, and always found ways to weasel himself into whatever it was that you were doing. He protected us fearlessly, played with us with all his heart, and made friends with everyone (and every dog) he met - but only after a deafness-inducing barking fit that let everyone within four blocks know who was calling the shots. Once he was your friend, he was your friend forever. His life with us was charmed, and we cherished every day we had with him.

From that first crazy day of Levyhood, it didn't take him long to make us his. And just as quickly he became an integral part of us, an indelible addition to our family.

Indelible, of course, isn't the same as permanent. As often happens with schnauzers, he was diagnosed with diabetes a few years on. And as much as we wanted him to hang around forever, we lost him in December. It still feels sad, with an emptiness in the house that grabs at us when we least expect it: As I wake up and head downstairs, only to realize he isn't curled up in a ball at the end of the bed. When I check my watch and realize it's time for his walk, except he isn't yipping at me from the front door or staring me silently in the face. When I hear a noise coming from around the corner and for a fleeting second think it's him. Only it isn't.

We've gone from being dog people to not being dog people, which feels somewhat off to me. For all the inconvenience and expense that comes with owning a dog, I always loved how all that inconvenience and expense felt in the chaotic fabric that is a modern-era family. I enjoyed having built-in walks every day, even if the weather outside was frightening, because I needed those walks almost as much as he did. I enjoyed how we became known to friends, family members, colleagues and even strangers as the family with that cool dog, Frasier. I enjoyed the fact that something with four legs and zero language skills - well, not English, anyway - had the power to temporarily remove us from life's treadmill, and remind us that kindness and unconditional love were, and are, precious resources.

Almost three months after we took him on that last ride to the vet, it doesn't suck any less. But the alternative - no dog to begin with - is unimaginable to me. I can't even begin to think what we'd be like if we had never had him in our lives. Losing a dog is sad, but you eventually figure out a way forward and, if the universe smiles on you, you bring another furball in need of rescuing into your family. Never having a dog to begin with? Well, that's worse than sad.

I'm glad we had him, because no one else could have taught us that last lesson as effectively. Thanks, buddy.

CRA website goes dark - Canadians should worry

It was an interesting weekend in Canadian government, and as often happens in my world of data, bits and nerdiness, it meant some news coverage. The story led the agenda during my Clicked In segment on CTV News Channel last night, and continued into the morning with live hits on Newstalk 1010 Toronto with John Moore, and Newstalk 1290 CJBK London with Lisa Brandt and Ken Eastwood. Whenever a major tech story breaks, I like to draft some high-level talking points to give the producers and hosts who I work with a sense of the story, and what I think of it. Here's what I've been using so far for this one...

Here's what we know: The Canada Revenue Agency (aka CRA, aka the folks to whom we pay taxes, aka The Tax Man) took down a large chunk of its online services on Friday afternoon, and they remained offline until Sunday night. The CRA's main website at cra-arc.gc.ca featured the following message during the outage:

Upon becoming aware of an internet vulnerability that affects some computer servers used by websites worldwide, we took down our online services, including electronic filing, and are taking steps to ensure that all information and systems remain safe.
At this time, we are not aware that any personal information has been affected; however, we continue to assess and remedy the situation.
You can still complete your tax forms, but will have to wait before filing.

What we DON'T know: The CRA isn't saying precisely WHAT that vulnerability that prompted the outage was. Their handling of this matter has echoes of the Heartbleed bug, which was a vulnerability in open-source OpenSSL security code used on millions of websites around the world. In 2014, soon after Heartbleed was discovered in the wild, the CRA took its websites and online filing services down in response to the vulnerability.

We also don't know if an outage at the Statistics Canada website this weekend was related. No one there is saying much of anything, either.

Could it have been Cloudbleed? Without official confirmation from CRA officials, it's impossible to conclude at this time. However, the timing is unfortunate, as Cloudbleed has been a major tech story for the better part of the past 3 weeks.

What is Cloudbleed? It is a bug found in code operated by the Cloudflare web infrastructure company. Cloudflare provides security and hosting services for thousands of major internet sites - including  Uber, Yelp, Fitbit, OkCupid, the Pirate Bay, Change.org, Feedly, 4chan, and many more. Thanks to a tiny but significant error in some of Cloudflare's code, sensitive user information from some of these sites was being randomly inserted into web pages when visited by other people.

My $0.02: Whether or not it was Cloudbleed is almost irrelevant. What's crystal-clear is that almost 3 years after the Heartbleed episode, the CRA still hasn't learned its lesson. One would expect government IT personnel to be horizon-scanning constantly, to anticipate weaknesses in systems architecture BEFORE they go critical. Internet vulnerabilities are being discovered All The Time, and IT/security specialists are charged with proactively addressing them. Everyone else manages to deal with these issues appropriately, by installing security fixes, patches and updates on the fly, without having to close up shop for two days.

Yet three years post-Heartbleed (where the CRA was the ONLY major global website operator to actually SHUT DOWN its services) the agency continued to chase its tail, reactively downing the website and related services while it frantically tried to figure out what was going on. The only reason our tax filing services went dark for days is because the people running them are clueless, don't learn from previous mistakes, and no one's holding them accountable.

The Statistics Canada website was also partially down over the weekend, and again no one's saying much of anything, so we don't know if the two incidents are related, what's behind them, or what's being done to address the root cause and prevent them from recurring in future. Neither agency is telling Canadians the whole story, and given this is peak filing season for taxpayers, they deserve answers. And better government IT coverage than they've been getting.

No one's going to complain that the feds made it harder for them to pay taxes for a couple of days. But given the growing signs of IT ineptitude within at least two major departments in  recent days, it's entirely reasonable for Canadians to be concerned.

Dreaming of blue turtles

Out for a stroll
Toronto, ON
March 2016
Thematic. Take a walk. Here.

A long time ago, in a childhood suburb far, far away, I had a pet turtle. She - we assume she was a she - was named "Turdle" because she wasn't mine first. I inherited her from an older brother who went off to school, and within a short period of time she grew from tiny-sized to large enough to outgrow two enclosures.

Even when she was living in a 25-gallon aquarium, she was rather adept at escaping, and my wife - who was then my girlfriend - still laughs at the memories of returning to the house and realizing she was gone. The floor was covered with a thick, shaggy carpet best described as what happens when a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle has a bad burrito for breakfast and hurls the result all over the floor. In other words, the perfect blue-green camouflage for a turtle.

So we'd get on the bed, hang ourselves over the edge and gently feel down to the floor as we quietly called her name. Good times, and not exactly textbook procedure to get the girl. But she married me, anyway, so it all worked out in the end.

Fast forward to last night, where we found ourselves at a large party with lots of folks we know. Not just a party, but a jungle-themed party. Cool, we thought, as we scanned the lovely decorations and reconnected with friends we hadn't seen in a while. Before long, smiling t-shirt-clad people emerged holding a variety of animals: A parrot named Elmo, a small crocodile-like lizard with a taped-up mouth, a ginormous snake with a very open and accessible mouth, and the turtle you see here.

Being the idiot that I am, I gravitated toward this beautiful shelled creature as he happily wandered the floor in the main lobby. The blue-green shag carpeting may as well have been gone for decades, but for a moment it felt like my teenaged self was hanging around my teenaged girlfriend in a faraway place where our biggest worry was whether the turtle had gotten stuck beside the shoebox under my desk. Life has a funny way of circling back on itself, doesn't it?

Your turn: This turtle needs a name. What should this name be?

Related:

Vignette: Turtle Diary

Always look back at sunsets

The market says goodnight
London, ON
March 2017
To contribute to Thematic's "take a walk" theme, head this way

The scene: Downtown London. King Street, precisely. I'm on my way to meet my wife and daughter at a local art gallery. Our munchkin has a number of her photos on display at an exhibit, and we wouldn't miss this proud moment for the world.

I've parked in the lot underneath the Covent Garden Market, the jewel of a building that takes up most of the right-hand side of this photo. As I exit and cross the street, I notice this subtle glow around me and look over my shoulder. The sky is putting on quite the show.

I check my watch and realize I'm running late. No surprise, as that's the story of my life. I probably should be sprinting the last few blocks to the gallery. But a little voice inside my head (you hear them, too, don't you?) says I can spare 60 or so seconds to stop and shoot a fast one with my smartphone.

I waver back and forth before I give in to the voice and line up the shot. I'm done in closer to 45 seconds before I stuff the phone back in my pocket and double-time the rest of the way to meet two of my favourite people. Another moment created; another even richer moment about to happen.

Your turn: When's the last time you stopped what you were doing just to take a picture?

On seeing > looking

"It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see."
Henry David Thoreau

Thematic Photographic 403 - Take a walk

Overlooking the valley
London, ON
March 2017

I've been wandering the neighborhood a lot lately, and since I'm doing it in size-9 shoes and not on a pink-hued mountain bike, I see things I wouldn't normally see when I'm spinning the pedals at 30+ km/h. If you've been following my crazy journey for any length of time, I'm sure you know what that means: Pictures. Lots of 'em.

Hence this week's Thematic theme, take a walk. I was out for a photowalk with our daughter in the Medway Valley Heritage Forest when I snapped this. We had just decided to turn for home when I saw this particular tree standing sentinel-like over the valley below. I wondered how often we get to have quiet moments like this, and answered myself almost immediately: Not nearly often enough. I resolved to change that as I tucked my hands back in my pockets and rejoined our daughter for the cold walk home amid the lengthening shadows.

I'm hoping this week's theme will give us an extra memorable moment or two.

Your turn: Take a walk anywhere you wish. Near your house. Near your office. Or far. Or somewhere in between. As long as you're self-powered in some way, you're good (we don't really judge around here, anyway, so feel free to take liberties.) Once you've taken a picture on your walk, share it on your blog or website or social media account (again, whatever/wherever is easiest.) Leave a comment here letting everyone know where to find it, then pop by other participants to see what they've shared, too. We like to share. More background on Thematic can be found here. Happy walking!

Beet it

It came from the earth
London, ON
March 2017
Thematic. Purple. Here.

The scene: My wife and I have come to Farm Boy, a delightful new grocery store that's been opening locations all across Ontario in recent years. The food is fresh, the store looks like you could eat off the floor, and the staff are friendly and helpful.

As we finish filling our cart and slowly turn toward the checkout aisles at the front, I lament the fact that I haven't taken a picture yet. "I feel as if I'm missing something," I tell her as she smiles sympathetically and tells me to go find something to shoot.

She's amazing in so many ways, the photo thing merely being one of them. So off I go and find these crazy-textured beets. I'm gone for maybe three minutes before I rejoin my best friend and show her my pixel-based prize. Some moments really can be as simple as this.

Related:

• This photo on Instagram
• Last week's purple-themed Thematic
• Our next Thematic theme goes live tonight at 7:00 Eastern.