My first iPhone photo

I took this photo when we were all in the Sylvia Hotel bar having a drink before going to the Raincity Grill for dinner. I just figured out how to get it on my computer so I could post it on my blog.

We all had classic cocktails from their bar menu. I had a Rob Roy and Jim had something that was like a salad...prawn and all! A variation on a Bloody Mary. I forget what Don and Elaine had but we all enjoyed the drinks and felt a hot buttered rum would go down well some rainy night. Mary, wasn't the Rob Roy one of your favourite drinks...:)

Sooo....many cool things!

I finally am getting a chance to play with my iPad and iPhone. I just learned I can use a function called "voice control" on my iPhone and talk to it to do things like "play the Rolling Stones" or phone a number for me. Not quite there yet as it played ABBA but I guess it will get it right eventually.

I had got the app for Netflix but now I learn that there is a new Apple TV device coming out this week that allows you to play the streaming movies on your big TV. Before you had to play it on your computer, iphone, ipad devices. Now this isn't such a big problem for us since we have the cable to hook my computer to the TV but I think it will be worth getting.

If you don't know about Netflix check it out and get a free month. It's unlimited movies for $7.98...no kidding! And I know that all or almost all the films at the Palm Springs Film Festival end up on Netflix.

Super downsize me

Patty mentioned that there is this trend of super downsizing where couples are going into 800 sq ft apartments...just what our apartment is! The key to figuring this out is having a floorplan of the new space. I did a very clumsy floorplan with an old style measuring tape but at least it worked and I realized we could fit what we want in this apartment.

I was quite fascinated when the realtor sent a measurer to make a "real" floorplan and also with the electronic measuring device. This would have been fabulous to have and I thought wow, this would make a great app. But of course, there are already some created so I bought one that seemed to do the most.

But I don't think it will do a lot of the things I really needed...like how much space do you have after the bifold door opens to the opposite wall and how much space does an average person need to access the closet. I needed to figure this out so I could see if Jim's desk and filing cabinet could fit in that space. And numerous other measurements like if I put a bookcase 10 in from the end of the wall by an entrance way, will it interfere with traffic into the room.

floorplan

So, maybe there's an app there. I'm sure I'll think of something new and I would love the challenge of making one especially after I saw this book on Amazon:

"iPhone and iPad Apps for Absolute Beginners"
Rory Lewis; Paperback; CDN$ 20.76

Product Description

The iPhone is the hottest gadget of our generation, and much of its success has been fueled by the App Store, Apple’s online marketplace for iPhone applications. Over 1 billion apps have been downloaded in the 9 months the App Store has been open, ranging from the simplest games to the most complex business apps. Everyone has an idea for the next best-selling iPhone app—presumably that’s why you’re reading this now. And with the release of the iPad, this demand will just continue to grow.

So how do you build an application for the iPhone and iPad? Don’t you need to spend years learning complicated programming languages? What about Objective-C, Cocoa Touch, and the SDK? The answer is that you don’t need to know any of those things. Anybody can start building simple applications for the iPhone and iPad, and this book will show you how.

I've already ordered it!

Back in Victoria

Our electric fireplace arrived just before we had to leave for the ferry so didn't get a chance to take it out of the box but I think we'll be thrilled with it. It has a feature so you can have the flame with no heat. I think we'll love that. And the flamingos Derek and Mary gave us will be just perfect on the mantle!

We don't plan to be back now until we leave for London and Spain. We're really looking forward to leaving from Vancouver.

Thank you, Carol and Dave!

We had a wonderful meal that mainly Dave cooked (wow...maybe Jim will be inspired) and were one of the first guests I believe to eat in their wonderful new kitchen. And we met the very beautiful, Junior, a tri-colour sheltie. "Junior" because he looks exactly like their previous tri-colour sheltie so they felt they couldn't call him anything else.

a great Vancouver day...

It was so warm and sunny yesterday that Jim even went for a swim! we had thrown out his beach shoes (too old and smelly) but he made do with my lime green ones and along with the pink bag he cut quite a figure! I suggested he wear his dollar store hat (that someone suggested made him look like a male stripper) but he declined.

We went and did our shopping earlier with our wheeled carts...so much fun that way. I feel like I'm shopping at the Carqueiranne market.

weird but doing my blog on my iPad it doesn't allow me to browse then choose a photo. Richard may have an idea how to fix that.

Weather app on my iPhone

I'm having fun with my weather app. In Nice...current temp 68 and high today 70. It's about 6pm in Nice but seems a bit cool. Vancouver's current temp (at 9am) is 59 and predicted to have a high of 71. I found it interesting that Victoria is only 50 and high is 66. Almeria is currently 77 and high of 78. Now, that's the place to be!

Our first guests from Victoria in Vancouver

Don and Elaine are our first guests from Victoria. They arrived yesterday and had a fabulous meal at Le Crocodile. Today, lunch with us and they brought us wonderful cheese, a great baguette, and BEACH TOWELS! Wow...of course, Elaine remembered I had said that I was now collecting beach towels instead of bookbags. My first addition and I love them...thanks so much, Guys!

A bit of rest then off to meet them at The Sylvia for a drink then dinner at the Raincity Grill. Great that no one has to drive.

Don and Elaine definitely understand why we love it here. It is like coming home now.

Only in old Blighty...

I've finished all our bookings for our London/Spain trip and when I was booking our flights Malaga-London on British Airways I was amused to see the following choice of titles:

Mr
Mrs
Miss
Ms
Dr
Sir
Lord
Dame
Capt
Rev
Lady
Prof

Very cool iPad carrying case...

So now I too have this very cool iPad case that Trish says she carries around with her always now instead of a purse...I may start doing the same.

But, hey Trish, I got mine for $29.99 and I know you paid more. You see, that's how you score not being an "early adopter":)

Always lots of laughs with Trish....

Trish and I had a blast with our iPads at Starbucks today while there was an open house for realtors. She retired in June and is loving it. Her daughter sent her this from Craigslist just in case she wanted something to do...


Help the UVic Bunnies!

Date: 2010-09-20, 1:59AM
UVic is handing over very large numbers of rabbits to our rescue group instead of killing them, but we need to get them spayed/neutered and driven to a wildlife sanctuary in Texas. If we can't get it done, the rabbits will have to be returned to the campus and euthanised.

Blogging from my iPad at Starbucks with Trish...

Don's 70 Birthday Party

It was a really fun event and great to hear the family anecdotes. We all contributed to a memory book so that will be fun to see when it's finished. Greg made a super slide show of photos that we all enjoyed.

Thank you, Carole and Don, for a great party and Happy Birthday, Don!



Carole enjoying Don's anecdote.

A very good day...

I began with a relaxing swim and hot tub then home to do the last bit of cleaning up which Jim was hard at work at when I arrived. Then out for lunch and choosing an electric fireplace for our Vancouver apartment.

Derek and Mary had invited us round for drinks while the open house was on and they gave us these fabulous antique flamingos as a house warming present...our apartment in Vancouver is called "The Flamingo". How perfect...thank you so much! And they even have south of France connotations for us since around Carqueiranne there is a marsh where they are many flamingos!

Then out to Patty and Terry's for a wonderful dinner of bar-b-q'd salmon (only the way Terry can do it!) and corn from Sliver Rill. For dessert, a galette from Pure Vanilla. It was wonderful to be invited out since I'm sure it would have been another frozen pizza for dinner since we were pretty tired by then but soon got revived!

And apparently it was a busy open house with about 20 groups through and 4 realtors.

"Step into this charming Oak Bay cottage and you'll be transported to Provence....

And so begins the description of our house by our realtor. I love it! And look forward to creating another little piece of Provence in our new home in Vancouver...and I even have the ocean to look at and swim in there.

It's been a lot of work getting the house ready for sale and the open houses this weekend but thanks to Fern, Elaine, Carole, and Jim we did it...and nobody wrecked their backs! Merci beaucoup, mes chers amis!

The look of real friendship....

Mucho gracias, Fern, for all your help today! You know my back just couldn't have taken it. Fern arrived today with miracle cleaning materials, a strong back, and was, as usual, cheerful even scrubbing away on her hands and knees...wow!

The place is gleaming!

Oh...and did I mention she brought home made curried shrimp crepes and cookies for lunch.

The day before Elaine did a whole lot of slogging of heavy bags and boxes and did a dump run with me. I may get out of this yet without hobbling around on a cane...

A pretty exhausting time...

We've been working like Trojans getting the house ready for sale. As we're cleaning up we're packing up so the actual move won't be that bad. Monique came over for a drink yesterday and brought us a bottle of Grappa which we enjoyed on our deck after lunch today with Tom and Claire at Uplands. It was great to see them as they leave Tuesday taking the long way round to the desert...via Ottawa, the Maritimes, Virginia, Memphis, Nashville, New Mexico and to Palm Desert. An 8 week trip and about 8,000 miles...whew!

Back to work...

Miscellaneous photographs

Amazing photograph about pirates on Saltspring....

John, we're so busy doing everything with selling our house but I logged on to your photoblog and just loved this!

But...not just a little too pretty for you...?

Miscellaneous photographs

Bookclub extraordinaire!

We had a lot of fun at our bookclub last night. Since we were reading Chris Stewart's "Driving Over Lemons: An Optimist in Andalucia" Liz, the host, guided us towards creating an Andalusian potluck and everything was fabulous. Liz has spent quite a bit of time in the area learning Spanish and Jim and I are going there in November for a couple of weeks and hope to arrange a teaching/home exchange for next Fall so I will have lots of opportunity to explore this cuisine in much more detail. Liz also showed us some photos she took when she visited the area. Muchos gracias, Liz!




Terri


Jane, Heather K., Heather P.


Margot, Susan, Heather P.


Liz


The "appies"

Heather brought the making of tostadas and made them for us a la minute as you can see in this little video she is an expert.

My new eating nook (formerly art studio)

I'm quite pleased with how this turned out...thanks to Don and Elaine for lending me their bistro set!

Back to School!

This is a very special back to school for some people I know. You know who you are and why...have a great day!

I was very sorry to hear on the news yesterday that my old elementary school in Vancouver, Sir Guy Carleton, is on the list for closure. There seems to be an active group trying to stop it and perhaps I'll join it as well.

The yellow wooden building was for the primary grades and then when we were big kids we moved up to the brick building.

Rain fails to dampen protest over school closures

Gourmet dinner chez Monique

We had a fabulous dinner at Monique's last night. We began with cantalope and proscuitto...perfectly ripe melon. She got it at the Market on Yates and had them open them up to see if they were ripe. An excellent idea since I've stopped buying melons since I'm so often disappointed. Then duck a l'orange and to finish off strawberries and champagne. Lots of wine of course and grappa for a digestif. I must remember what a good idea it is to finish off with a pure alcohol. It does cleanse.

It was such a treat to have a great meal since we've been working so hard we don't really have time to eat or the energy to prepare anything...lunch is a chocolate bar or crackers and peanut butter....

Ti-loup amused us with his antics and Monique put him through his "paces"...see video. Coquine made a brief appearance but I searched her out and managed to get some photos.

More progress....

Fern came back to help today with the downstairs paintings and we had the driveway powerwashed, new mailbox put up (old one rusty) and hose holder put up so made area that neater. Window cleaning (inside and out) next week, blinds cleaned on Friday....

Fern's going to help me go room by room for the final clean before the photo shoot...wow...it all doesn't seem quite so overwhelming now.

The Dynamic Duo...Carole and Fern.

Arriving with boxes and gloves and ready to go!


We even came across some old Christmas crackers!









Fern and Carole arrived today with boxes and boxed up all my good china and glassware. I'm only keeping my mother's china set. It was a little hard to part with my wedding china and also my mother-in-law's china and some of my glassware but Carole is taking them to charity...a church or hospice. My mother's silver teapot set will go to a long term care facility where Carole's mom is. The staff like to serve them their afternoon tea with good china and they really enjoy it.

What a tremendous team they made and they shared a primary class for a number of years and I can certainly see what a success that would have been! I tried to wrap a few things but they soon got rewrapped their way and I was politely told to find something else to do!

Mucho, mucho, gracias, Ricardo!

This isn't the HazMat team...just Jim with my bike helmet to protect him from knocking his head once more getting into a low clearance storage area that was rather dusty, hence, the mask. Now, all nicely covered in plastic sheeting.

Richard, you saved our lives and we couldn't have done it without you. Richard also offered to take a truckload back to Vancouver and deliver it in our apartment. Now, when we go in in a few weeks we can sort that all out and the final move just won't be that much of a deal. Richard already has a plan for that....mucho, mucho, gracias, mi hijo!

First experience with Craigslist...wow!

So I posted a free clean queen bed with bedding and 2 bookshelves on the free area and within minutes a fellow replied saying he was in a truck and could pick everything up. A couple of Uvic students arrived 10 minutes later and now we have even more space! Guess this is a good time to get rid of stuff with students setting up digs. Good deal for everyone.