PoTd - December 19

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Come through the gate & knock at the door".

Nov. in NOTL

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PoTd - December 18

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "In the Shade of a Tree".

A November walk through the grounds of St Mark's Anglican Church in Niagara-On-The-Lake, Ontario.

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PoTd - December 17

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Unique".

A large stylized urn in St. Marks churchyard.

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PoTd - December 15

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "November Walk".

More photos from St. Marks NOTL.

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PoTd - December 12

Pic-of-The-day

 

 

Pic-of-The-day - "Textures".

From a November walk through the grounds of St Mark's Anglican Church in Niagara-On-The-Lake, Ontario.

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PoTd - December 9

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Mushrooms".

The first in a series from a November walk through the grounds of St Mark's Anglican Church in Niagara-On-The-Lake, Ontario.

I got a fair number of shots that day, so they'll be spread out til the end of the year.

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PoTd - November 1

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Ghosts of Halloween Past" part3.

These 3 are old black & white family photos from before my time.

I'm not sure who they all are but, to me, the costumes are classics.

The dog/wolf with his picture on his chest.
The super cool retro robot that, wasn't retro at the time &  must have taken a ton of work to create.
Finally the classic mask and unusual clothes . I think it was more important to NOT look like you than it was to look specifically like someone or something  else.

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PoTd - October 31

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Ghosts of Halloween Past" part 2.

Halloween photo from my childhood in the 70's.


Steve the Leopard


The earliest Halloween photo I have of my self. The room is my grandparents dining room before they installed the harvest gold linoleum & matching floral wallpaper. Ah, the 70's.

I assume the costume is homemade, but I'm not sure.



I don't remember that far back, but I remember the photo always being around. Today I use a version of it for my profile pic on most sites.

 Dad & The Vampires
 
Halloween photo from my childhood in the  70's,  gotta love that station wagon. 

The hoods and capes where home made  by my grandmother and worn for multiple Halloweens by different grandchildren. 

They are very closely associated in my mind with Halloween in general but more specifically with the idea of making Halloween, as opposed the the current view that Halloween is something you buy.







Jen the Witch


Jen posing in our Grandparents living room in front of heavy curtains that where drawn each night before bed and opened again each morning.


I think the witch costume got recycled a few times as well.

 Jen the Ghost

I wonder if we still have any of those Jack-O-Lantern candy buckets.

I like how the ghost is carrying another ghost. Is it like a doll or more like a pet?

 Steve the Swagman

 If I had to guess I'd date this one to around 1979, maybe 1980.

One thing I remember distinctly about this costume is that the blue pieces hanging from the hat, which should be cork, where made from the projectiles of a nerf gun.

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PoTd - October 29

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Ghosts of Halloween Past" part 1.

Halloween in the 80's.

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PoTd - October 24 - Happy Birthday Geoff!

Pic-of-The-day

Pic-of-The-day - "Happy Birthday".

Halloween in the mid to late 80's. By this time I was too cool to dress up for Halloween.
This is my Brother Geoff at his birthday party in October.
I remember a lot of Halloween themed birthday parties.

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Music from a Garrison Christmas at Fort George (2016)

The Garrison Christmas at Fort George is on the same Day as the N.O.T.L. Santa Claus Parade. So for the last two years we've gone to the parade in the morning and the fort in the afternoon getting lots of photos and a little video. This year with a new camera (80D) making it easier to switch from stills to motion, I captured a l lot more motion (video). So much so that I  ended up with four motion pieces from the Fort, one overall & three extras just of the music & scenery in the Junior officers Quarters.
Every year I say "next year, I'll bring some gear & do it right" maybe next year really will be that year but, no promises.

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PoTd - December 31

Pic-of-The-day

The old year is on it's way out.

Garrison Christmas (2016) Video

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PoTd November 16th - Viking Ship Photo Series

Pic-of-The-day

Check out the 'Viking Ship Photo Series' on flickr.

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Death of the missing Link

With  the new discovery of Homo naledi a while back, I started to think a bit about human origins.

There used to be an idea of the missing link between humans and ... pre-humans.
Now its' more a case of  'what came when and how did our multiple groups of ancestors  come together to create 'us'. As opposed to the old idea of  one fossil that shows evolution caught in the middle of it's work.  What would that even look like?

There are still new ancestors out there to be found (see above). Some that we aren't even looking for & some that we have genetic evidence for , but do not have confirmed physical remains for.
Like inferring a planet by the dimming &/ wobbling of a star, we can infer a branch on the family tree by having knowledge of predecessors and and antecedents?

If we are still finding preserved remains that we never expected,  how many may still be out there that we simply haven't found yet? 

Families, like the individuals they are made up of, can be messy affairs. They are rarely simple and straight forward, they are rarely one dimensional cliche's and they certainly don't do what you want, when you want.

If our modern day families are messy,& complicated and sometimes unpredictable, why would we expect our ancestors (and our ancestry) to be any different.

Sometimes when looking into your family history,  learning the unexpected can be the best part of genealogy. 'Cool, my great grandmother was native or my great great grandfather was a horse thief'.

The genealogy of our species is likely the same way.  We are made up of this group and have a branch like that, COOL!'

Cyanamid

A while back Jen & I went for a walk along a new section of walking path in Niagara Falls. The new path follows along the hydro canal finishing near the former site of the Cyanamid Plant.

Slightly off the beaten path we found a few remnants of the old chemical plant.

First we spotted a square concrete column (photo on the right) broken into 2 pieces. It's appears to be the stone pillar/lamp post that stood by the guard house at the entrance gate.  Vintage photos can be seen here & here for comparison.



The second thing we found was much more definitive, the stone Bar  B Que that was in the picnic area. It was/is in remarkably  good condition. Once we got home we searched for a vintage photo online. A piece of the Bar B Que can just barely be seen in this photo. I'm sure we found at least one clear shot the  Bar B Que,  but I can't seem to find it again.


To see the rest of the photo's from our walk you can go to this Flickr group

Ghost Tours Start this Sunday

Right now there's a group of  dedicated volunteers dusting off their black capes & "oldy tyme'y " lanterns, but most importantly their practicing stories designed to give believers the creeps and make skeptics look over their shoulder 'just in case'.  It's ghost tour season again.

'Ghost tours of Niagara' begin their season of Fort Erie Ghost tours this Sunday May 3rd. Tours will run Sundays at 8:30 through May and June with more days and times during the summer. (Full Schedule Here)

The season wraps up (some might say culminates) with the Halloween Tours in October. If you want to be in 'the most haunted location in the most haunted town in Canada on the mist haunted night of the year' (as it is billed by some of the tour guides) get your tickets early. They go on sale July 2nd and can sell out before Labour Day.

I 'm hoping to make  it out a few times this summer (if that pesky job doesn't get in the way) to hear stories of 1812 soldiers, little girls from the era of the fienian raids & unseen forces that like to torment lone ghost ghost guides & skeptical Quebec exchange students (among others).

If some of us do make it out to the ghost tours this sumemr it might be fun to post something here about our night, and maybe some of the the retired tales from the early days of the ghost tours. 


BTW: there are two books filled with stories from the ghost tours. They are written by ghost tour founder, lover of history & science Kyle Upton. If you ever get the chance to pick one up  DO IT. There a good read and currently out of print.

Pic(s) of The Day -Siege of Fort Erie

I finally got around to prepping for photos from the 2014 siege of Fort Erie (video is another story).

You can see larger versions on Flickr.

Another Australia Day link

Drawing of a kangaroo in a 16th century manuscript?

Not exactly conclusive, but they speculate it could mean Portuguese sailors made to Australia before the Dutch and English .     Pretty cool.

I heard about it on Mysterious Universe, but the article is from the Sydney Morning Herald

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/16thcentury-manuscript-could-rewrite-australian-history-20140115-30vak.html