Vancouver Variety….

Vancouver is a great city and I’m lucky to be living here. One of its best attributes is variety! I get to explore the city on foot quite a lot, this is mostly from choice as it is certainly one of the best means by which to get to know your environment. There are so many nooks and crannies to discover; so much detail waiting to be revealed, history to be learned and it’s surprising just how many quiet, hidden places you can find. These can range from nature to bustling streets; it’s all there to be seen by the discerning eye and carrying a camera, or more likely a cell phone with camera, can be a great aid to seeing.

Today I enjoyed the peace and solitude found in the Momjiji Japanese Garden;

the captivating back ally murals at 318 Homer Street downtown

and the joy of a song sparrow on top of a hedge on East Hastings.

 

Of course there is much more including refreshment at a favourite cafe, ‘Platform 7′

on East Hastings, and the wonderful sunshine which raised Vancouver’s temperature to 25 degrees. And there is always something unexpected,  today for example it was an abandoned piano!

I’m posting a few more pictures which I hope give a taste of Vancouver. Enjoy.

Close-up: dry stone wall, Momjiji Gardens.

Iris adding colour to East Hastings.

Building close-up.

Copyright © ddubolski 2014.

Buying organic is not enough…

Sadly even buying organic produce, as we try to do, is not necessarily enough to guarantee the optimum quality of one’s food. Today I have been soaking our ‘organic’ apples in a solution of apple cider vinegar to clean off the ghastly wax coating which someone in the food supply chain deems essential to ensure their well-being, at least in terms of shelf life. I don’t want to waste the nutritious ‘organic peel of expensive fruit but neither to I wish to consume a waxy substance the exact chemical consistency of which is a mystery to me, but almost certainly not conducive to good health. It is a rather damning testimony to the state of our food industry that one now needs to examine closely every store-bought item, especially if in packaged form, and of even greater concern that increasingly one needs a degree in chemistry to properly comprehend the true nature and potentially toxic ingredients of one’s food. Of course the real solution for the most part at least is to grow your own food organically but for those of us no longer able to do so vigilance seems to be the only recourse.

PS: While on the topic of home produce I am happy to report the continued progress of Scoby Max. Here are today’s pictures:

Day 7…

So this is an aerial picture of Scoby Max on Day 7 of fermentation and it is clear he is starting to ‘bulk-up’ significantly and his appearance changing each day; I like to say he’s looking more and more handsome! I am happy to report there is still a lovely aroma emanating from the jar. We are looking forward to the day we can finally enjoy our first brew and also get started with a second. By then presumably Scoby Max will have done his reproduction duty and we will have another, little scoby to start a second brew.

Presumably if we had not opted for a bigger jar, wider surface area, our scoby would already be thicker than he is. However, I expect him to thicken in due course.

Fermentation: Day 4…

Clearly Scoby Max is growing and expanding to cover the full surface area of the jar, which is what we understood to be the normal progression; rather like fish growing in proportion to the surface area of water. So far he doesn’t seem to be thickening very much but this is after all only day 4 and we expect to allow up to 14 days to complete the fermentation process. meanwhile there is a discernible sweet and pleasing aroma emanating from the jar. I particularly like the sense that one is involved with a living form and creating something.

PS: Scoby Max pic for day 5:

For Kombucha brewing workshops in Vancouver BC check out Rosie at o5tea

Copyright © ddubolski 2014

 

Kombucha thrill day 3…

Scoby Max is clearly alive and active and I’m hoping he’s doing exactly what he’s supposed to do and making a good job of it. Yesterday he rose to the surface of the jar just as predicted. I have to say looking at him this morning I immediately questioned his new appearance something akin to the surface of an alien planet!  Is this how a healthy Scobe should look? A slight panic ensued but help was at hand. A quick Google brought me in to the reassuring website of ‘Kombucha Mama’ and her wealth of knowledge. Confidence restored I eagerly await developments. This is fun!

Copyright © ddubolski 2014

Kombucha thrill…

I’m so excited! Partner and I attended a Kombucha workshop on Sunday afternoon at the o5tea on West 4th Avenue. Rosie, the young and vibrant young woman facilitating the workshop was brim-full of enthusiasm. In the course of an hour she had delivered a very clear and encouraging account of the pros and cons of making one’s own kombucha. Actually there seemed hardly any cons and a whole lot of pros and the entire process seems incredibly simple. We left with a starter kit, a Scoby we named Scoby Max, and a bundle of beginners’ enthusiasm. And behold, our first attempt is fermenting as I speak. Will keep you posted as to the finished product!

Copyright © ddubolski 2014

Call It What You Like….

Synchronicity, fate, the Law of Attraction, call it what you like, I’m a firm believer that things don’t just happen by chance and that we actually create our own world. Of course I recognise that the worlds we create for ourselves are not necessarily what we wanted or at least what we thought we wanted, but that is because, as individuals probably very few of us have mastered the rules  of the game of life so to speak. Thoughts become things, that’s what I know, but with me, and chances are you may be the same, I haven’t yet mastered my thoughts, but I have to say when I do apply the Law of Attraction I’m never lacking in proof that it actually works. And staying up-beat and positive is an important part of the game for sure.

Yesterday, a little diffident, I decided to attend a talk at ‘Friends For Life’ titled ‘Embrace Your Death’.  The subject matter and biography of the speaker, Stephen Garrett, interested me. To be honest I don’t go there very often notwithstanding its excellent services and pleasing location and facilities. I’ve had membership for at least ten years but for whatever reasons, (I could think of a few) I haven’t really ‘clicked’ with the place.

However, off I went yesterday in the rain and as usual arrived early at 1:10pm for a talk that began at 1:30pm. I sat in the office while the receptionist tried to fathom out why my membership card wouldn’t register. At 1:15pm his office phone rings and someone informs him our speaker won’t be coming after all. Rather short notice and I’m a little disappointed and slightly irritated but hey, that’s life right.

Suddenly  a voice sounds behinds me. I turn and there is a friendly face known to me from way back but someone I seldom see. I didn’t know she has been volunteering at Friends For Life for as long as I have been a member. We chat and catch-up and in the course of doing so she relates her out-of-body experiences, a subject about which I am well-read and very interested. I can add her to the list of personal acquaintances who have actually experienced a Near Death Experience or Out of Body Experience and it’s fascinating!

So there you have it; as far as I’m concerned I felt it was meant to be; synchronicity at work and probably from my perspective a better deal than the talk that wasn’t delivered.

 

Great to have good news in the media…

If you are at all like me you probably get sick and tired of the seemingly endless stream of bad news we are constantly fed via the major media sources. Personally I regard it as very unhealthy and generally bad for us to be inundated with negativity, no matter in what form or dose. I have in fact reached a point where I usually avoid much of mainstream media and make a conscious effort to give attention only to positive news and topics. Of course I can’t claim to have abandoned all news and Facebook inevitably still confronts me with material I prefer to pass over without clicking on the headline.

However, I still check out ‘The Guardian’ newspaper for example; I guess it is a case of old habits die hard. I was especially pleased to find two current articles featuring good news on the wildlife survival front and demonstrating the remarkable ability of some species to successfully adapt to change very quickly. Given the emphasis on climate change and the long-term survival of Homo sapiens, or not, it’s reassuring to reflect that even if we as a specie don’t make it through the 21st century other species will, and no one can deny surely, they are far more deserving of survival!

Check out:’ Endangered butterfly…’ and ‘Hummingbirds: still evolving…’

‘Customer Reviews.’

Surely the one thing worse than no customer reviews of one’s published writing is a bad review! And if that review also strikes one as blatantly unfair or rather should I say, ‘uncritical’, then it seems even more devastating. I was schooled to understand that ‘criticism’ did not necessarily imply adverse comment but rather impartial evaluation, for better or worse. Imagine then my dismay when I first published a collection of short stories on Kindle and discovered the only two ‘customer reviews’ are, how should I say, a tad soul-destroying.

‘A Puppy Can Destroy Your Sex Life’ , my collection of short stories, was my first bold attempt to reach a wider public and naturally, like any aspiring author I had high hopes, if not exactly of  rave reviews at least encouraging comment. Instead, the first person to comment didn’t even get to read any of the stories because of some glitch he encountered trying to access his Kindle account. Author’s response: a loud groan. Why bother to tell the world of Kindle readers that because of some technicality or possibly your own  incompetence (understandably I opt for this explanation) you never read the book? PS: Thanks anyway for the 4 star rating; or was that also a technical glitch?

But the second review was far more damning and yes, I admit hurtful. But I guess authors need a thick skin. However, once I recovered from the shock of it I realised the woman who wrote it probably betrayed much more about her short-comings than she did about the quality of my writing. Apparently she, “…wasted (her) time even downloading it” but blamed herself, “… for being cheap.” (the book was on a 3 day free-download). It, “…wasn’t what I expected.” I wonder whether the title had somehow misled her to expect lurid mild porn?

I have since recovered my composure,  though sadly the book doesn’t seem to have gleaned many readers, and a certain perspective leaning towards the understanding  a writer writes primarily out of a compulsion to do so rather than for public acclaim.

I’m growing a thicker skin and if any of you reading this would care to access, ‘A Puppy Can Ruin Your Sex Life’ and oblige me with a fair evaluation and a customer review  you can do so for FREE  on Saturday 5th April if you have a Kindle account.

Ivan Coyote Encounter…

I’ve been very remiss of late neglecting my blogs and of course it is so easy to find excuses; a week of ill-health and lots of ‘other stuff’ gripping my attention. But probably the real reason is lack of discipline; a writer should really put pen to paper, or more likely in the 21st century fingers to keyboard, and write something every day. It’s always rather salutary and helpful when something happens to kick-start one’s blogging.

Today this happened after a pleasant encounter with Ivan Coyote. I’m a great admirer of her writing. She lives in the neighbourhood and in fact my partner and I quite often pass her in the street but are too inhibited to actually speak. However, today I was sipping organic green tea in my favourite cafe on East Hastings, ‘Platform 7’, when Ivan Coyote and two companions entered and sat at the table immediately next to me. I was reading ‘The Letters of Freya Stark‘ but have to confess it was impossible not to over-hear some of the conversation going on right next to me. Such a pity my hearing is no longer perfect!

Eventually the time came for me to leave but I could not resist the opportunity to actually interrupt the conversation and mention just how much I enjoy the author’s writing. She was very pleasant and, I have to say, I think appreciative of the comment. I in turn was glad to have over-come my shyness and also learn from her that she will be giving a performance on 9th April: ‘Gender Failure’. I have already marked it in my diary.