Tempus Fugit

Latin (tem-pu̇s-ˈfü-git): Time Flies

Author: garry.c.stewart

  • Caddy Lake Memories

    I was looking through some drawers the other night and I came across some pictures from my Mom & Dad. Two little 3 x 3 booklets of black and white pictures from 1950s. Is these pictures I’m 3 and Gail would be 7, and were standing in front of the first cottage in what would be several cottages I’d experience growing up.

    The cottage was build by my Grampa and Dad, all by hand, no power tools. Quite an accomplishment and one that still impresses me today. Just spend some time with a hand saw cutting 6×6 posts to length and you’ll know what I mean. I have a couple of vivid memories about this cottage. One is about a salt lick we had on the lot and watching the deer that came quite close to us to get to the salt. The other involves a car. Just to the right of the boardwalk is the driveway and it’s a little steeper than it looks. At the end of a weekend when Mom & Dad were loading up the car to go home. Gail & I were put in the back seat and told to “sit there and don’t touch anything”.

    Well, after a while a guy gets a little bored and a car is a fascinating place. I leaned over into the front seat and was playing around with the steering wheel and then the gear shift leaver, and suddenly we were in neutral and rolling backwards down the driveway. Just then Dad and Grampa came out the door, dropped whatever they were carrying and came running to grab the car.

    This is the view down the driveway to the lake. I was always told that the car might have rolled down, across the road, and throught the lot in front of us, and into the lake. Looking at this, I think the trees would have stopped the car first. Anyway, they managed to stop the car and get in and put the parking brake on. I think there was a stern talking to and perhaps a spanking involved, but all I really remember was being rescued. A good cottage story with a happy ending.

  • IBM and the iPhone

    I feel an iPhone coming closer to me.

    Lotus Notes/Domino adds iPhone support – Industry Watch – IT World Canada

    IBM’s Lotus Notes/Domino collaboration platform is adding support for Apple’s iPhone. Domino server 8.5.1 is the first version to natively support the iPhone via Lotus Notes Traveler software, allowing automatic synching for e-mail, contacts and calendar data to the popular handset.

    IBM makes iPhone more attractive to businesses – Technology Live – USATODAY.com

    IBM just announced it is hooking up with Apple to try to popularize the use of iPhones in the workplace. Big Blue says Lotus Domino and Lotus Notes Traveler can now be paired with iPhones to allow users to automatically synchronize their corporate e-mail, contacts and calendar data on the hot-selling handset.

  • Talk like a Pirate Day – Arrr, shiver me timbers!

    ’tis be hilarious! I noticed speak Like A scurvy pirate Day a few years ago, but they have really taken it to a new level.

    HOW TO: Celebrate International Talk Like a Pirate Day

    Saturday, September 19th is the date of a rather unique holiday made possible largely by the internets. Pirate enthusiasts around the globe will be celebrating International Talk Like a Pirate Day in various ways, but the unifying theme is to shiver up your timbers and adopt some pirate language, me hearties!

  • Twitter bio’s

    I’m thinking it’s a little funny how many Twitter Biographies are reading like this line from Galdiator but with a family/church twist.

    Gladiator (2000) – Memorable quotes

    Maximus: [removes helmet and turns around to face Commodus] My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next.

    It must have been raining way too long for me to have noticed this. Wait, what’s that? There is a strange glow coming in the window! Could it be? Sunlight? YES!

  • Second Centrury

    Two years ago I rode my 1st Century, and last year I missed this event but last Sunday I took part in the 16th Annual Muddy Waters 100.

    This year the Muddy Waters ride hooked up with Habitat for Humanity and has over 500 cyclists take part in the event riding 25,  60 or 100 km, or the big one, 100 miles. In cycling speak a “Century” is a 100 mile ride and most serious road cyclists eventually get around to adding it to their list of accomplishments.

    The ride was quite a bit different this year with a start from the Forks and a police escort all the way to the Perimeter Highway with rolling street closures all the way. So, for about 1/2 hour we had all of the north bound lanes of Main Street tied up. This made for a very leisurely start at about 10-15km/h, actually painfully slow and them up to about 30km, and then full speed ahead after the cruiser car pulled off at the Perimeter.

    I stayed with the main group until after the “Big Bridge” past Selkirk which was great. Coming down from the bridge I thought I was getting a flat and as I slowed to check out what was going on, a gap opened up between me and the lead group. Turns out I’d just hit a tar strip with made the bike feel funny for a few seconds but it didn’t take much and I found my self in the second group. We worked hard for quite a while, almost to Hwy 44 to re-join, but for me, it was not to be. Stayed with the second group well onto Hwy 212, but got dropped again for some solo riding and eventually joining up with four other guys for some on again off again riding into the Birds Hill town site. From here the other four guys took a rest stop and I soloed on to Henderson Hwy. At this point another rider picked me up from behind and we rode a steady 34-36km/h to the finish. All in all a very good day. The weather was great and the ride a lot of fun.

    However, I’m sure there are lots of stories of some pretty interesting events, like the crash at the front of the peloton just entering Selkirk. I was pretty close to this one and just missed going down in the pile up. To me it looked like a rider bumped an on coming car and there were 6-8 riders abreast at the time and that triggered quite the pileup. It looked like nobody was seriously injured and the organizers were right there to respond. Later, I hear a very loud “pop” and the rider next to me pulls off with a flat. I wonder how many flats occured that day. I heard of one rider getting 3! Then there was the rider with shoes off and walking at Garvin and 59. When I asked he said he’d be OK, and just needed to walk it off for a bit. Hope that turned out all right.

    I followed the perscribed course to the letter, but my odometer came up a little short of the 162km required for the Century, but I’m chalking that up to the new bike computer not being set up quite right. Compared to two years ago, I put in a significantly faster ride over all and the “Trip Time” is actually just time on the bike not total elapsed time and I know I took way fewer and shorter rest stops this year. For the record, max speed was 54.77km/h

  • Lake of the Woods Island Mystery


    Underground Bunker
    Originally uploaded by Big Dadoo

    The other day we were explaining to some friends about some cottage lots on Lake of the Woods where electricity had recently been run from our point across to Hay Island (1.5km away). This lead to wondering how much these lots were selling for (a lot!), followed by some Google Map activity where we noticed this white square with a dark shape in it.

    Well, this just had to be investigated. So, this morning Eric, Len & I boated over and hiked around and discovered this concrete structure with a stainless steel venting tube. It’s in the center of this part of the island between the east and west shores. There is virtually a road cleared up to where it’s located and the “road” carries on south up the middle of the island for quite some distance. We didn’t walk to the end, so we’re not sure just how long it is.

    There is another stainless steel tube close to the east shore in an area that was obviously excavated, close to where we landed the boat . But this tube has no visible concrete base. From this shore location it looks like there is a buried cable/conduit/??? in a trench that has been covered over with rock that leads up to the concrete pad. There are no signs, identifying marks or and indication as to it’s function or purpose. It seems like there is a humming coming from what ever is on the other end of the pipe, but that could just be some sort of echo or resonance effect from the pipe itself or …

    Additional photos

    Any ideas on what this is all about? Then please post a comment.

  • Queen Anne II


    Queen Anne II
    Originally uploaded by Big Dadoo

    A rare site in our bay, the Queen Anne II stopped at Smith Camps last evening and we caught it heading out on the lake. This picture was taken off our deck just before dinner.

  • Boat Trip




    Cruising on The Lake

    Originally uploaded by Big Dadoo

    After a cloudy start to the day it cleared off and since it was relatively calm, we decided to take a little trip. After passing through The Hades we headed over to Mather Island and then cruised around the edges of Shammis and Crow Rock Islands and then explored Micrometer Bay.

    While it was not exactly hot, about 23, we decided an ice cream was in order, so off to Kenora. Boat up ice cream at the Wharf Marina is the best. However, the young ladies pumping gas had me a little worried when they didn’t seem to know how to mix 50:1 for the outboard. In the end they got it right with a little group participation and we were on our way. A busy run out of the Kenora harbour and through Devils Gap and we’re on our way home. 74km for the round trip and a little sun tan as well.

  • Reason 8,239 to switch to a Mac: IE8

    Like anyone still needs a reason.

    Today, the helpful Microsoft updater offered to upgrade IE7 to IE8. Always a sucker for some new software and always forgetting the more that occasional pain associated with installing new software, we let it do it’s thing on the home computer. Not a good idea.

    After the update, IE8 would not access any web sites, not even Microsoft. That’s bad. Even worse, Firefox now won’t access any web sites. It’s not the Internet connection because I’m checking out the Home computer over a remote session. A quick search shows that there are others having the same problem. Even more amusing is those saying that there is no way IE8 could be responsible. Like this response to a guy who describes a problem similar to mine.

    red alert: IE 8 shuts down my web REGULARLY. – Technology Questions

    Again, installing IE8 could not possibly have caused other browsers to fail.
    The environment in which you installed it could have.

    1. If you don’t own the computer in question, you should NOT be upgrading
    IE, period.

    2. The various security measures put in place by your employer may well be
    related to the problems you encountered after installing IE8. These include
    any GPOs and Admin Templates.

    3. For best results, you should disable (a) the anti-virus application, (b)
    all real-time “system protections” (e.g., those afforded by any third-party
    application, (c) any third-party firewall and then (d) enable the Windows
    Firewall prior to installing AND uninstalling an IE upgrade.

    However, I disagree! IE8 or some other evil that gets done by it’s installer screws things up. Several other folks with this same issue uninstalled IE8 and their problem was gone. I uninstalled IE8 and problem gone. The bad news was that it still left IE7 behind.

  • Getting ready for MDH?

    Are you practicing your trail riding skills and getting ready for MDH 2009?