Grungy - March 30, 2020

With the car battery dead to the point where the key fob wouldn't unlock the door I'm unable to pop the hood to get a charger on the battery. For some reason the key itself won't work on the door handle. I've researched a bit online and some options to get out of this predicament are: raise the car on jacks and attach a power source to the starter motor input, which comes directly off the battery, then use the fob to unlock the door. Take apart the drivers side wheel well and yank on the cable that's latching the hood down or break in through the window by poking a long stick at the lock. None of these options seemed feasible to me with my current skill set so I guess it's time for a new car. Anyone want a well used Honda CR-V?

Oh wait, we have AMA. A quick look at their website and they offer break-into-your-car services. Yay. I just saved $40k for not having to replace the car. We called and soon the fellow showed up and was trying the 'poke a long stick' method. It was tricky because he need to push the lock latch forward but the latch is smooth and there's no real edge to leverage off of. He had a rough time getting his stick to stick. After quite a number of attempts he was finally able to open the car door. We then jumped the battery. I left the car running for a while so as to build up a charge.

Later I headed to the grocery store to get a few things for dinner, hoping that the battery had charged enough to start the car after I was done shopping. (spoiler: it was, but I did have a scare when I pushed the fob button and the door didn't unlock. I turned out that I had both my regular keys and the spare keys in my pocket. The spare key's battery is dead - so many dead batteries - and I had pulled that fob out of my pocket with out realizing it.) As I left the parking lot I decided to drive around a bit. The weather was cold and it was foggy which can make for interesting photos.

truck trailers

Uncomfortable - March 29, 2020

I must have left a dome light on overnight and now the car battery is dead. A few times this winter when the temperature dropped and block heater wasn't plugged in the battery would struggle to start the car. No problem though, I'd hook up the charger, plug in the block heater, wait a bit and that would do the trick. But now it seems the battery seems deader than dead. I can't use the key fob to unlock to doors and the key doesn't work in the handle lock. I'm guessing the door lock is electronic it just doesn't turn or maybe it's broken somehow. I don't know, I never use the key in the door. Anyway, without being able to unlock the door I can't pop the hood because the little lever is inside the car. If I can't pop the hood I can't charge the battery. I might have to call the AMA to see if they can slim jim the door.

With my car out of commission I was able to borrow Jen's van and was again headed towards downtown. Like the past few days, there were clouds above and towards the east, a heavy cloud bank on the western horizon and a gap in between. The gap was wider than yesterday and I was hopeful that the setting sun might catch the clouds at some point. With the sun directly out I ended up on 10th ave and about 5th street SW. The shot below is just after I'd parked the car.

hard light

Grey - March 28th, 2020

If you're reading this in the distant future we're in the early stages of the Covid-19 epidemic. Jen's been working at home for the last week and a half and we're staying away from other people as best we can when going to the grocery store. Lots of things are closed off. I've not really checked what the malls are doing or other stores are like but overall it's been pretty quiet. We've been taking walks 'around the circle' at noon-ish as a break from work and for a bit of exercise. I've been out in the evenings at sunset looking for light and see few, if any, other folks on those excursions.

Today being a Saturday, the walk ended up being a bit later in the afternoon. It was chilly and overcast at -3 degC with a light wind. Normally I don't bring my camera on the walk but we decided to head down towards a wetlands area with a bit of trees and I thought there might be some photo opportunities, and who knows, maybe there'd be owls (spoiler: there wasn't..)

Grey skies

Skyline - March 27, 2020

Left the house with about 30 minutes before sunset. There were clouds in the sky and I was hoping that they would catch fire today. I didn't have much time and I knew that after the sun fell any foreground light would be pretty dark so I decided to head towards Deerfoot and 17th ave for a view of the skyline. I was visualizing a horizon shot with colourful skies. I wasn't sure that once I got there if I'd head north towards MaxBell or south to the bluffs over the canal.

As I drove up 17th ave I figured heading north towards MaxBell would be the better option due to the positioning of the sun. I ended up sitting a streetlight waiting to turn left for waaaay too long. The intersection has been modified somewhat recently to include an express bus route lane, with that and the various advances it seemed to take forever before my light turned green. I was losing sun! From there it's sort of a convoluted path through residential housing to get to the MaxBell parking lot.

I drove past the middle school that I attended so many years ago. My memory banks were tweaked and I started remembering all kinds of random bits of my childhood. It's kind of cool how we can have inactive thoughts in our heads that are activated by visual stimulation. I attended that school for thee years in the early 80's during my formative years.

Just missed the sun.

As I finally pulled into the MaxBell parking lot the sun had just dropped out of view but the sky was still glowing.. I quickly stopped and took this photo out the car window just in case it suddenly became pitch black and I ended up with nothing for my trouble.

Empty - March 26, 2020

All afternoon and into the evening the wind was howling and blowing. It was still sunny out and kind of warm but the wind had a bite to it.

After dinner I was eyeballing the clock, watching it get later and later and I wasn't moving. I finally got up and started gathering my things.. the memory card from downstairs, the wider lens that I wished it'd had yesterday and packed up. Soon I was out and driving with the sun directly in my eyes it was about 30 minutes until the sun would be down.

I didn't have a destination in mind but I drove along McKnight towards Center street then turned south on Center towards downtown.  The sun dipped behind a cloud for a while and I could see again but as I neared the river it was back out in full force. I turned west on to 4th ave and directly into the sun blinding me again. I quickly found a place to park on the empty street and got out of the car.

Tunnel view

On foot now, I had an idea about taking a wide angle photo of the sunlight shining down the length of the street with the buildings on either side reflecting light and there'd be this cool tunnel effect. I kept moving up the street towards the sun looking for this image to appear.

It didn't quite work out, the buildings weren't reflecting any of the light and I could see that it wasn't going to work out how I imagined it. So I swapped my wide lens for the telephoto zoom in order to compress the view.

It felt like a bit of a ghost town there were very few people around. When I did spot some pedestrians crossing the street, they were far away. I took some shots in a hurry trying to frame them up in the light. Sadly the photos have quite a bit of motion blur because I wasn't holding the camera all that steady. It's not as noticeable when the picture is small so I'll post it here and maybe on instagram, but it'll never make it into the book.

Gaps - March 25, 2020

It was snowy and overcast yesterday with little or no light so I didn't venture out and continued to social distance by staying in the house. Today though there were big puffy clouds in the sky that I got a excited about but that was at noon. By early evening it was clear. 

I left the house at around 7:05pm with no clear ideas about where I'd go.
I did pack my bike in the back of the car so that I could go somewhere, park, then use the bike to cover different locations.. at least that was the idea. I thought about going up to McHugh Bluff above Prince's Island but while driving I realized it was actually later than I exected so I parked in Inglewood at the same place as last week.

I quickly unpacked and re-assembled the bike ( the front tire and seat have to be taken off so I can stuff it into the back of the car) and started riding towards the river and crossed the Zoo bridge.

The birds

Two things right away, one was the number of seagulls on the ice/snow covered river and the other was that the sun was almost directly behind the tower from where I was positioned.

I took some photos of the tower first but because I had to keep an eye on my bike I was somewhat limited in movement.  There was no way to avoid the massive number of birds in the sky and I was behind some trees.  It's interesting how quickly the sun was moving. Within 10's of seconds it's position would shift and I'd have to take 5-10 paces to my left to keep it centered behind the tower.

My goal was to have the sun positioned symmetrically behind the tower but the birds and the trees and trying to keep an eye on my bike made it more complicated that it should have been. I was able to fire off a few shots that I was happy with. It's pretty close to what I got last week but I guess that's just how it is.

Sunrise on Monday - March 23, 2020

I woke up early with the intent of trying for some sunrise photos. Looking out the window squinting at the sky to see if it was cloudy or not and if it'd be worth heading out.

I'm still looking for a mixed sky and cloud sunrise/sunset to occur where the light catches and burns the clouds across the sky.. it's going to be so awesome when it happens ! (I've only really been at this for about a week or so, lol.. I'll happen eventually.. right?!)

I could see a few stars in the sky so I got dressed. There was still time for a coffee. ;) Sipping my coffee and browsing The Photographers Ephemeris website I angled around and looked to see where the sunlight was going to be and decided I'd try Memorial drive and Edmonton trail.. There's a few bridges and the river's right there. Should be great!

When I finally left the house I saw that there was a cloud bank in the east with a small gap at the horizon. As I drove, with about 20 minutes until sunrise, I could see in the rear view mirror that that cloud bank was starting to catch some colour. I contemplated aborting my plan and just going east of the city but decided to keep on with my original destination.

I found a place to park that had 1 hour street parking starting at 8:30am so I had until 9:30.. perfect! Looking back towards the east the little cloud was having a colour party. Sadly, downtown was still in shadow and there weren't any clouds to catch the light.

Maybe I should have gone east!