A selection of Point Pleasant Park Panoramas taken with my Nikon AW100′s guided panorama mode which makes it dead easy to take these shots. The quality isn’t as good as taking individual photos and stitching them together, but there is a great deal of satisfaction in having it already done for you on the camera.
Also known as The Great Alarm Clock and Gabriel’s Meal Cleanup Team Lead.
A shot taken with my new Nikon AW100 of Oliver while he was in Brittany’s arms. When I went to Henry’s to check out their waterproof camera’s the sales person actually showed me that the AW100 can take a picture of a photo laying flat on a piece of paper if the paper is backlit as it would be on their glass display cabinet.
I thought I would write this post because I am somewhat proud of how my new side entrance deck lighting has turned out.
I had originally purchased LED rope lights at 50% off from Canadian tire because I had wanted to run it along our inside stairs to provide a very low cost stair lighting. This has been done in a lot of industrial settings and is now being done by many DIYers. That project will be in another post once my the new LEDs I ordered arrive.
What I ended up doing with the outdoor LED rope lights is wrap them on the underside of my upper railing of my side deck as pictured in the gallery below. This was facilitated by using of Princess Auto Power Fist Saddle-Type Cable Tie Mount and some stainless steel screws. Putting the LED rope lights near the top of the railing actually provides much more light on the deck surface and on the stairs, and is also more hidden from view than mounting on the bottom railing.
I was trying to catch the moon as it rose over the horizon but I missed it. So instead I used my flash to light up the crosswalk sign, and then caught a big truck rolling in front of the shot with the moon in the background. At some point I’d like to get a shot with it low in the sky and some city skyline in front of it.
Just a fun video of me washing my new Nikon AW100 in the sink after taking it out in Salt Spray. Nikon recommends that you wash it after being around a salty environment as the salt can build up on the seals of the camera and then allow water in the camera. I think I need to figure out a way to mount it onto Sam’s back so I can send her off swimming with it.
You can watch it in HD here: http://youtu.be/ScDH-pU4TGk?hd=1
View in HD here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43W0N74TMmc&hd=1
A video I shot in Point Pleasant Park. The remembrance ceramonies where moved, but myself and others were not aware of this as it was not very well known.
If you asked me 10 years ago if cleaning spider poop would ever be something I would spend a day researching, I could pretty much guarantee the answer would be no.
But here I am, having researched and tested out some spider poop cleaning options. The first thing I tried was some basic soap and water, which really did nothing to cut away at the stains on my siding. Research showed that this was a big problem for boaters in Florida, where spiders would create webs under their boat covers, then drop excrement onto the white boat deck causing black stains. This has lead to commercial products such as Drop Off Cleaner. That website is actually pretty funny to visit.
At any rate, as it turns out tire cleaner does an amazing job instantly removing spider droppings from white siding. I’m not sure what it would do to other colours of siding, I suspect it would change the colour of the siding. First world problems.
Brittany and the boys have gone to Ontario with Danielle to visit John and Deborah, leaving me alone in the house with Sam. I take a great deal of pleasure in a numeber of the things contained in that last sentance, I will explain.
With the arrival of Oliver I now have had several occasions to refer to Gabriel and Oliver as, The Boys. I don’t know why but using this term to describe my children brings me great joy. I woudln’t have expected that having Oliver would have changed my perception of our family unit, but it has in a very positive way. I have always enjoyed having a large and loving exended family (relative to many that I know) and I think this feeling is the same, only much more intense as my own family grows.
The second thing that brings me great joy is spending time with Sam. She is a wonderful companion, both when Brittany and The Boys are here, and even more so when they are not. I think she is greatly under appreciated, but I hope that as the boys grow older, and she doesn’t grow to old that we will have many great years of outdoor activities and adventures.
As I have been left to my own devices, I went and picked up a Nikon AW100 which is waterproof, shoots 1080 HD videos and has a built in GPS. Some sample videos can be found here and here.
I recently setup a new work computer (as of this writing Windows 7 64bit and Office 2010) and ended up focusing a bit on things that drive me a bit nuts but that I generally don’t have time to spend on.
One of these items is figuring out how to bypass the UAC security prompt for select applications.
The common solution for the time seems to be to create a scheduled task (which Microsoft allows you to configure to run as an Administrator without prompting) and then create a shortcut to start the scheduled task. There is no shortage of articles with screenshots showing you how to setup this here: http://www.google.ca/search?q=UAC+scheduled+task+bypass or you can even watch a video on it here.
This is not a new tip apparently, but new to me.
I also installed http://www.winpatrol.com (free version) as I wanted a startup monitor that was able to remember my decision to not want the Cisco AnyConnect VPN client to start every time windows starts.
For anyone out there that has become accustom to the efficiencies of the Windows 7 (or Vista) Start Menu but still have older Windows XP machine around the house, I have found a wonderful free application that will let you use the default start menu search behaviour that saves you from navigating through your start menu when you know exactly what you want to use.
URL: http://lee-soft.com/vistart/
Title: ViStart
Tag Line: ViStart dramatically decreases the time taken to search for programs by indexing your program shortcuts. Then you can simply type part of the program into the start menu and ViStart will “instantly” find it.
It is Tuesday, January 19th, exactly one month after Gabriel was born and the doctors have said that Gabriel is ready to go home today.
I was wondering what the hospital would do if a parent demanded to leave with their child prior to the doctors recommendation? Does the parent get to make the call or does the doctor have final say in the care of a baby?
At any rate…
Brittany and I both stayed at a parent room last night with Gabriel. The room is a bit is a bit like a university dorm room but in the hospital. All the stories that we’ve heard about the sleepless nights were certainly true. I woke up this morning (after not being terribly helpful last night) feeling totally hung over. I guess I was baby drunk last night.
The baby seat has been fastened, the final paperwork is being done and later today we’ll bring Gabriel home, one month after his birth and almost one month before his due date….
Two weeks ago today, in the final days of 2009, Gabriel Adams was brought into our family.
Brittany went into labour two months early, so it was quite a surprise when she woke me on Thursday morning, half asking and half telling me that we should be heading to the hospital. We had learnt about which driveway to use and the best route to take to the hospital two weeks prior as a result of a false start, so we were familiar with the process of admissions, which helped greatly to keep us calm during the process.
Brittany was not 100% sure she was in labour, but was sure that she should go to the hospital to get checked. As we have experienced a wide variety of strange bodily changes (all normal) throughout Brittany’s pregnancy, we were not overly alarmed at this point. It was also nice that all of this happened early in the morning as there was little to no traffic on the roads as we drove down Quinpool and onto Robie towards the IWK.
The nurses in the assessment unit of the IWK quickly determined that Brittany was indeed having contractions. At this point they called Brittany’s OB/GYN Dr. Archibald (who is wonderful!). In short order Brittany was admitted into the Birth Unit where she was assigned her own BU Room and and was also assigned a nurse (you are assigned a full time 1-on-1 nurse while you are in the Birth Unit. At this point the calls to various family members started we were assured that this was not another false start.
At this point family started their travel plans and the doctors started to try to slow or ideally stop the labour. Though none of the doctors or nurses indicated it, I got the impression that there are not often successful at stopping a delivery once a womans body has decided to start it. Brittany spent the better part of 36 hours with her uterus contracting and preparing for the delivery.
After about 24 hours she indicated that her heart felt like it was racing. The doctors started to look at her heart rate and noted that it was now hovering at the 130 to 140 bpm rate, twice what it was previously in the day. Many specialists came to see Brittany and EKGs were performed in order to try to understand what was causing this. Brittany didn’t have any other complications as a result of the elevated heart rate (which the doctors found puzzling, but a good thing), but I found it added a great deal of stress to the labour as I was now able to sit watching her heart rate, the babies heart rate all on a digital monitor that would chime and alarm when either went too high or too low.
During this time Brittany was unable to get any sustained sleep and was getting worn down from what her body was going through. On her doctors recommendation she received an epidural, at which point her body was still contracting, but she was able to sleep and rest while it was doing so.
After the epidural Brittany was able to rest so nicely that family went home and just Brittany, the nurse and I were left in the birth unit. I was also sound asleep when I was woken by the rush of doctors coming into the birth unit and Brittany altering positions on her bed, laying on one side, then the other, then on all fours.
All of this was because Gabriel’s heart beat had dropped (constantly monitoring the babies heart beat is one of the activities of the assigned nurses). Leaving no time to spare the doctors rolled Brittany into the Operating Room which was right across the hallway and got suited up to do a C-section. Of course as soon as Brittany was in the OR everything went back to normal, at which point the doctors looked at each other and said if the baby was happy they were happy and that they would leave her to progress naturally again.
At this point the operating room went from a bustling room filled with nurses and doctors, to a cold empty room with just Brittany, her nurse, me and lots of expensive looking equipment. Brittany was able to get some more sleep, strapped onto the small OR bed so she wouldn’t fall off. I sat trying to keep warm and looking at all the equipment, readouts and displays. Several hours later Brittany awoke with a more intense contraction – feeling different than before. A resident doctor came and ‘took a look’ and indicated that it was now time to push. Brittany got a 30 second description of how she should push and also some techniques.
As each contraction came Brittany would put in three pushes, holding her breath as she assisted to help Gabriel out into the world. Brittany commented she was surprised how tiring it was to push, but luckily for her it was not long before the doctors proclaimed they could see Gabriel’s head. Once Gabriel’s head was fully out it was obvious that the umbilical cord was wrapped around his head. The doctors quickly clamped and cut the umbilical cord and then out came Gabriel. Gabriel’s first sounds – a tiny sounding cry – was a wonderful indication to Brittany and I that he was doing well. He was tiny – but looked perfect and has been a very healthy baby for someone who took the stage two months early.
As I am writing this, it is hard to believe that Gabriel is already two weeks old. Brittany and I are sitting in the Transitional Care unit of the 3rd floor of the IWK, which is where Gabriel calls home until he able to fully feed on his own.
Full Name:Gabriel Taylor Scelo Adams
Birth Date/Time:19th December, 2009 at 05:14AM
Birth Weight: 1890 grams (4.2 lbs)
Birth Length: 17.2 inches
Gestation: 31 3/7 weeks
Hospital: IWK Health Centre – Birth Unit 11 – Operating Room 8
Post Birth Care: NICU 1 (Dec. 19th->25th) – - NICU 2 (Dec. 25th -> 29th) – - Transitional (Dec. 29th -> …??)
Some more photos:
I borrowed my mothers new HD video camera and have been ejoying taking HD video’s and posting them to YouTube. In many ways this is a step backwards from what I’ve done in the past with proper video editing and production, but it’s satisfying to take an HD video, plug in the camera via USB and then have it in HD on YouTube in minutes.
Click on the more to view the full post with HD video samples.
In light of some recent events I’ve taken an interest in whole house power monitoring. I have had a Kill-A-Watt for quite a while now but it will only monitor what you have plugged into it, and it does not have any data logging abilities.
Recently I have sumbled accross several articles on making your own whole home monitoring system.
http://www.picobay.com/projects/2009/01/real-time-web-based-power-charting.html (which uses http://www.iobridge.com/store/ ).
http://scienceshareware.com/how-to-measure-AC-DC-current-with-a-hall-effect-clamp-.htm.