(Not on the Trail) Local Nativities

Just a couple front-yard nativity displays today.

Looks like the wind had its way with that one — or that wiseman is really fond of the other one.

This one is still waiting on its Christ child.

(Not on the Trail) Nativity

From West Water Street:

I have a soft spot for these things — you'll probably see more in coming days.

(Not on the Trail) Christmassy

T'is the season, y'all.

(Not on the Trail) Plane stuff

Rainy morning, just before dawn, at Pearson:

Sun up and blue skies over the Great Lakes:

Underwater

The marina and quay area was very still today, and it was possible to see straight to the bottom.  The  photo is a little hard to make out still:

But after a simple filter ...

Oh neat - someone lost a bike!

I took a second photo of that thing on the right.  Did someone really lose a boat here?  That would suck.

Tires galore, too.

It finally stopped snowing yesterday afternoon, and so things are now pretty wet and slushy.  The streets are swampy... and I can't find my boots, so that sucks.  Time to clean the closet.

The snow is still pretty in some of the harder-to-get-to places, though, like this rock:

And this lamppost:

And those red berries I photographed earlier in the month are pretty well hidden now.

Snow day part 2

The grasses out front of the building are still standing, but if the snow has its way, it won't be for long.

Snow day

It's been snowing pretty much non-stop since about 1:30 in the morning.

Can't even really see the airport or Toronto Island. It's actually really lovely, especially for how quiet everything is.

Gack.

They don't run the little harbour cleaning boats as often in Winter as they do in Summer,   As a result. crap starts to really pile up in any available corners.

Also known as "This is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Toronto, Part II".

Dried up flowers

Some of the purple flowers in the garden (that I could not formerly identify) have changed to little white fluffy things.

The lavender that shares their flowerbed still seems to be doing its thing there.

Refinery

Walking in HTO West today, I was surprised to be able to see Petro-Canada's Oakville refinery so clearly.

Don't let the color of the skies fool you — it was only two in the afternoon.

Withes and Squirrel

The high winds have been really punishing on the local willow trees.  The ground beneath them is covered in withes.

I got to use the word "withe"!

And this squirrel, who hangs out behind the community center, seems to be eating pretty well this fall.  Today he's found what I think is a doughnut.

Rose hips

The roses down at Spadina Quay Wetlands have lost most of their leaves, but it just makes their rose hips look even larger and more impressive.

I made them my blog background (for now).  Makes me want to try a rose hip jelly, though I'm fairly sure we're not supposed to go harvesting down there.

Construction, Bike Share, and Canoe Landing

The new buildings going up along Dan Leckie Drive are getting some of their exterior finishing in place.  I am always skeptical of colourful accents on these things because it seems to me that it always ages really badly (and the colour choices tend to get dated really fast).  I guess we'll see.

The next building over uses blue accents.

Looks like the city of Toronto has taken over the bike share — these, up on Fort York Boulevard, are all moved over to the city Bike Share branding.

Toronto Bike Share bikes.

The actual take over was done in December of last year, and the new branding announced in March.  I hear the annual membership (for unlimited 30 minute trips) came down from $97 to $90.  Might be something I consider, come Spring.

And walking back, I got this photo from just below Canoe Landing.

Add caption

I could be wrong, but I didn't think the fence was there when the sculpture went up originally.

Diving ducks and berries

I saw a different kind of diving duck today, but couldn't get close enough to try to ID it.  It's bill is certainly different to the Long-tailed Ducks that are occupying the harbour lately.

 The long-tail ducks were having their own gathering.

 Meanwhile, it looks like recent high winds might have been too much for the newish "safe fish to eat" sign.

 Closer to home, the berry bushes have lost their leaves.

All the leaves are ... well, gone.

A late update -- I actually took this photo at Coronation Park on the first of the month, I'm just still working out a method for moving photos from my camera to my laptop in a timely manner.  It's not as easy as the phone (which had bluetooth). . .

Anyway, it was a lovely day and the trees were very stark against the sky.

The grass is still surprisingly green.  Maybe this week's predicted snowfall will deal with that.

Ducks

Someone was tossing popcorn to the ducks today, so they were all gathered around the end of the quay.

It was surprisingly warm — but it's funny how two months ago I wouldn't have thought 14C felt warm.

Little Norway

Photos of the plaques at Little Norway Park today.

The park is a large rectangle, and at the northeast corner is a circle with a stone at the center, then several plaques explaining what it's all about.

One side of the center stone.

Another side of the center stone.

The plaques first explain the stone.  The park was officially opened in 1987.

However it had been dedicated by Norway's king in 1977 (1987 was the date of its transfer to its current location).

And this plaque has insanely small type.  Essenetially: the exiled Norwegian Royal Air Force used this  area of Toronto as a training grounds during World War II.  The flagpole this plaque is mounted on is all that remains of the original base.

Waterfowl

Took the refurbished camera out on the walk today and saw many birds.

One of the little diving ducks we see a lot in winter:

And this seagull who was doing his best to ignore me:

And this pair of swans:

So, so far, so good.   On the stroll back off the quay, I noticed this object lesson in what happens when you leave your canoe out in the rain and snow:

Camera bit installed

So no scenery here.  I received the new CCD for my camera about two weeks ago and have since been procrastinating about tearing the camera apart and installing it.  Today was go day.

This is where it started to look hairy;

You can see part of what  need to replace here -- it's still
beneath a lot of other delicate pieces though.

But it got so much worse:

Bottom center is the CCD -- rectangular metal plate
with a tail of flex cable off its left-hand side.  There is
way too much flex cable in these things. 

It's back together now, and I took a couple test shots of the flat and things are decidedly not pink.  I'll take it out tomorrow and see how it works outdoors.

Here's a video of someone far more competent than me doing the same thing.  It's sort of amazing.

All the trees are bare

High winds the last few days have stripped all but a very few, very tough leaves from the trees.

There were a bunch of cold-looking seagulls.down on the benches/barriers and I tried to get a photo, but I startled them by getting too close with a dog so they're blurry and in-flight.

It's that time of the year.

It's cold, and wet, but at least it's rain today instead of snow.  15C feels totally balmy!

You can see CN tower today, which looks surprising to me because it's been hidden in mist for what seems like weeks.

The Yankee Lady and the skyline with CN Tower

We were up next to the malting silo today too, and I really liked these rusted old gears.

It's like a metaphor for life, man.

Closer to home, the planters are starting to show signs of Christmas Infection.

Yo ho ho and a bottle of (wait, that's the wrong ho ho, isn't it?)

Shrink wrap it, please.

Yes, it's still cold and still snowy. The little bit of sunshine we had this afternoon convinced some of the live-aboards who haven't enclosed their boats yet to get it done, like, now.

Now I just need to wait for them to get their Christmas lights up!

Snow snow.

Yes, more snow.  And it's really starting to stick,

Even to the roads!  Oh the humanity!

It's a good thing we got the dog's rubber paw covers out this week.  She really hates snow between her pads.

So -4 today, and oh my is it windy.  I tried to get a photo of the white caps on the water today, but the camera phone just isn't good enough to capture it -- it tends to blur and blend colours so anything that's a variation on white-grey ends up just a blur.

Anyway, I saw this little guy in the marina with a big green collar on.  There were numbers on it; I'm assuming for now that it's scientific and not just "goose got his head stuck in something".

I hope he at least feels fashionable.

There is ice clinging to the sides of the various boats.  The Miss Mary looks very cold today.

Seeing the name always ends up in me humming the Vic Chesnutt song.

Meanwhile, the harbour looks really super cold, though you can't really see the whitecaps here.

Brrr!