Labels - what do they mean?

We put labels on goods to identify them as to size, maker, contents, shipper, storage location, parts and so on - I think we are all familiar with that kind of label.



What about this - it is a press on tattoo that I have had for a long time. I have never been able to decide what occasion to apply it for, or where to apply it. But it is a label. Many people permanently label themselves.


I want a tattoo, but as I can never keep one hair colour for more than a few months, how do I decide what tattoo to have permanently marked on my skin?


However, those are not the type of labels I am here for today. Knight inadvertently started a meme, she didn't mean too. It is just that a few of us have decided that it was kind of cool what she did and ... well, we are all sheep I guess. (See, another label)


So, the labels we are talking about are the ones we use at the ends of our posts and how they break down and what are they telling us.

I have used 216 unique labels in 148 posts!

24 are WWC - obviously I am quite enamoured of taking pictures

12 are Photography - I am thinking for WWC

11 are for Flickr - again I am thinking WWC

6 are Flowers - well, finally something new, but we know they are pictures of flowers

5 about my bike

5 about art

The rest have been mostly single use, one of two have been used twice.


Considering that I started this blog talking (telling?) about my cancer and the treatments, my blog has certainly taken on a new direction. I see this as a good thing. No sense dwelling on the past. So you can all expect to see more photographs and WWC entries. I imagine over the next few weeks the number for MTM will rise as well as I have a few ideas along those lines too.


So, as this is an inadvertent meme do it or not, as you choose.

Have a good day all.

WWC - Scatter & Collect.

The ever delightful Tink of Pickled Beef once again brings us the Weekly Word Challenge. This week the words are Scatter & Collect, so I am just putting them up in random order.

My friends trimmed some branches and Collected them to use as firewood.


When playing with Jacks, you Scatter them then Collect them.


When playing dominoes, you usually Scatter first then Collect, I reversed this.

Dragons are know to Collect pretty things. I had to photoshop the background out, but I didn't do a very good job, sorry.

Clouds Collect moisture to Scatter it later.


I had some help Scattering the marbles.

Then no help when I was Collecting them.

Do you suppose he was trying to help me Collect them?

If you think you would like to play along, go and see Tink, she will set you on your path grasshopper! If you would like to see more WWC photos, some of us have a Flickr Group and to see more dominoes fall, see my Flickr site.

Have a good day all.

MTM: Whitemud Creek

I am going to apologize right off the bat. I have a migraine so this will mostly be a pictorial MTM post.

Saturday evening after a wonderful bbq steak dinner, my friends & I went for a walk down in Whitemud Creek. The city was under severe thunderstorm watches and we weren't sure how far we would be able to get before the skies opened up.

This is the first photo I took as we got out of the car. The moon was still visible and that portion of the sky was still blue, but you can see the beginnings of some clouds.


This is the the ravine itself, where the trail begins it southward journey. There is an area by the parking that is manicured and has picnic tables set up. The signs tell you what kind of animals you may see on your walk. No bikes allowed on this portion of the trail.

This is from the bridge (#250 - I don't know how they are numbering the bridges, but thought I would point it out ;)) The water is quite still here at this time of year and you can see the nasty clouds building in the reflection.

The other side of the bridge, you can see algae forming.

There are several old trees along the path that they have avoided removing. We also noticed they are protecting the trunks of several others with wire mesh to keep the wildlife from toppling them.

This is the second bridge (#251 - imagine that) and it gives you an idea of how high the ravine is in this area. You would never know you were in a city of about 1,000,000 people.


These stairs lead down to the third bridge, but as I wasn't aware we were going to be going walking (on gravel no less), I was not properly shod for the hike. We stopped here and made our way back.


This is at the top of the stairs.

I had to go down a few steps to get a good angle on this pretty rock.

Back near the trail head, the weeds are all in various states of bloom and seed and I thought they looked rather pretty.

There is a short little loop that you can make that will take you to the Hwy overpass and here is where I found evidence of Beavers at work. (sorry for the blur)

This is looking under the Hwy to the setting sun. The storm didn't roll through until about 23.00 hrs, so we would have had time to go elsewhere, but better safe than sorry.

It was a short walk of about 30 minutes, about a mile traversed, little hills and such to go up & down. Not many other people on the trails either which was nice. It was also the first time I have walked that trail.

I hope you enjoyed your hike in the woods.


Travis Erwin is the creator of My Town Monday and if you visit his site, he has links set up to all the others that post about their own towns.


Have a good day all.

Interesting!

I joined SparkPeople last night. It is that diet site that may have been mentioned on one or several other blogs and I thought it sounded interesting.

According to the information I input about my age and height and weight, and the high cholesterol, I should be eating about 1800-2000 something calories/day. I input what I figured would be what I ate in a normal day and I get about 15-1600 calories from the food alone. (We will not discuss the coke intake - besides, it is about half what it was and I am going to change that to even less)

I was well within the fat amounts, low on the protein side and the carb side. I am going to just track my usual eating for a few days and see what needs to be tweaked.

The one thing I can't find is how to tell it that I am allergic to foods, when I ask it to give me a food plan for the day. It wants me to eat bananas and well, frankly that ain't gonna happen. It will also I am sure ask me to eat shellfish and mushrooms and peppers too! I am sure I will find a way to do it though.

I will also be tracking my exercise with it. It is quite the site, it has exercises from beginner on up and you tell it what you are doing and it tracks everything for you.

There are groups on there that you can join and get moral support from and challenges to join. You can set up friends and blog even. So if anyone that reads this is a member and would like to be "my friend" or just stalk me on SparkPeople my name over there is FATREB. Yeah, I figured Sibu would be insulted at being used for a diet place and Pegasus was already taken.

Have a good day all.

Hi, cholesterol!

I get a phone call from my Dr.'s office late Friday afternoon "your labs are back and there is something the Dr. wants to discuss with you, but it is not urgent." Alrighty then. Why didn't he just make a note to talk to me the next time I was in to see him? Which will be at the end of this month, because he won't write a prescription for more than 3 months at a time (money grubbing Pr@#$k).

For someone such as me (who worries about everything anyway), cancer survivor, smoker, feels like crap most of the time - telling me it is not urgent doesn't mean I am not going to worry myself sick!

I go into the Dr. this afternoon and of course, can't see my regular Dr. but can see another one there. Fine, he looks at the labs, and looks around the rest of my file, goes back to the labs, cocks an eyebrow and then asks if I am a smoker. So, because I haven't had any luck quitting yet, then yes, my cholesterol is high enough to be of some concern. If I weren't a smoker, it wouldn't be worth mentioning. Now, if I remember correctly my labs from 6 months ago were fine all across the board. No concerns, no suggestion that I watch what I am eating or anything like that.

I get a phone call this evening from my friend and she asks if I want to go get coffee with them. As we are sitting drinking coffee (Caramel Corratto - Second Cup - divine!) with a load of whip cream on it and full of calories, it dawns on me, that I have been going for coffee all summer with them at least once a week. Anyone else seeing a connection? I guess I am going to have to cut down on some of the other full fat things I enjoy so I can continue to drink that coffee. Oh, for all my friends down in the States, it beats Starbucks hands down.

On the way home, the moon was racing the sun to set in the west, but I managed to catch this photo. Yes, that is the colour the sky was. Not a cloud around.


Unlike the night before.




I really have to start taking a pad and pencil out with the camera, so I remember what I had it set on in order to repeat the process.

Well, I am off to research cholesterol diets - blah!

Have a good day all!

WWC: High & Low

Well here it is Tuesday again. Time for the Weekly Word Challenge, brought to us by the lovely Tink of Pickled Beef. The words for this week are High and Low.

Now just to keep you on your toes, I have decided to not separate them as I usually do, I am alternating the words this week.

Here we go (click to enlarge any of the photos):

A High round object

A Low round object


The High Level Bridge

The Low Level Bridge


High-tech mail

Low-tech mail


High-tech mouse (well track ball, but wait for it)

Low-tech mouse (see, worth the wait?)


Dad in Highland kilt with bagpipes (we are Swedish descent btw)

Sorry, no lowland dress, so will have to go with Low ground!


I know, I am a bit sick.

Yes, the city forefathers were so name challenged as to call them the High Level bridge & the Low Level bridge. On the other hand, it took them almost 50 years to complete the Low Level bridge!

Some of the WWC bloggers have joined together and made a Flickr group, so if you would like to see more photos, just drop on by. If you would like to visit my Flickr page, go here. If you think you would like to join in the fun visit Tink and she will set you on the right track.

Have a good day all.

MTM: Edmonton's River Valley

Edmonton's River Valley

The North Saskatchewan River flows through Edmonton from the Southwest corner to the Northeast corner. We are not your typical river city though, we don't have miles of docks or even any river traffic. In fact, we have one stern wheeler called the Edmonton Queen that runs dinner and special events cruises on the river. Other than that, there are canoes and a few motored boats and we have Dragon Boat races yearly as well as the Sourdough Raft race.

The Edmonton Queen

Along our river valley you will find parks, trails, more parks, wildlife, more trails and some more parks. About 25 kilometres worth (15.5 miles). Within the 22 major parks, you will find 11 lakes, in the winter these are used for skating. There are 14 ravines that run to the river valley.

Not only does Edmonton over do it with Festivals, we over do it with parks and trails. Um, no! We don't overdo anything! (Well, except maybe expanding our city limits) Edmonton, has in fact the longest continuous stretch of urban parkland in North America.

Looking South across the river at dusk.

We have several golf courses, which, with our long summer sunshine hours are very well used. We have two ski hills right in the city limits and two just outside. The trails are mostly paved, or maintained gravel. They are used by walkers, joggers, bicyclists, skateboarders, and in winter by snowshoer's and cross country skiers. There are even trails that horses are allowed on (yes, we have stables in the river valley).

Looking over the High Level Bridge waterfall.

As for wildlife, there are porcupines, deer, coyotes, bears, skunks, muskrats, rabbits, and beavers. Some of these will make their way into the populated areas of the city and have to be removed. There have been coyotes at night in the winter, right here in my apartment complexes backyard, hunting the rabbits that make this their home. I am only about 3 kilometers (about 2 miles) from the nearest ravine.

So, has this whetted your appetite for more information about my city? I sure hope so. I will be telling you more about individual parks in future posts and hopefully providing better photos as well.

Have a good day all.

P.S. My Town Monday is the brainchild of Travis Erwin, check out his site for links to other posts.