Monthly Archives: January 2006

Slightly Emo Frames

Thumbnail: Me with new glasses

Thumbnail: New glasses

Got a new pair of specs. I want­ed either thick­er rims, for a bold­er look, or han­dles screwed into the glass with­out rims, for an even sim­pler look than what I have now. After try­ing on both styles, I decid­ed on the thick­er rims. Since these aren’t tita­ni­um, they’re sev­er­al times heav­ier than my old pair, so I keep the old pair around for when I’m relax­ing or doing sports. The fun­ny thing is that this is one of the least expen­sive pairs of glass­es I’ve ever pur­chased, yet they’re D&> made.

The Winter Schedule

But if, like Queequeg and me in the bed, the tip of your nose or the crown of your head be slight­ly chilled, why then, indeed in the gen­er­al con­scious­ness you feel most delight­ful­ly and unmis­tak­ably warm.

I save the win­dow-open­ing rit­u­al for Friday nights, after a long, tir­ing week, when the sweaters are all fold­ed, and the shirts all ironed. Before I go to bed, I turn off the lights, square off my desk, and turn the win­dow crank 220 degrees clock­wise. Even though the ther­mo­stat is at 23°C, it’s any­where from ‑16°C to 5°C out­side these nights.

When I wake up at 5:00 a.m., as I usu­al­ly do, my room is filled with the chilly, snow-smelling air.

I do this only once a week to appre­ci­ate it.

I do it on Fridays to enjoy it.

Tremblant '06

Thumbnail: Winding road
Thumbnail: Cabin at night
Thumbnail: Aaron and Karen
Thumbnail: Poker game
Thumbnail: Phil's royal flush
Thumbnail: Old and new skis

Here I am, in a cab­in in the mid­dle of the woods, 160 km away for two short days and a night in Tremblent. Today, we drove the wind­ing roads lined with pine trees and set­tled in. By tomor­row morn­ing, the 10 beds and mat­tress­es are going to be filled with 16 peo­ple, all-round exhaust­ed, cram­ming in as much sleep as they can before the hills open.

In between, Aaron finds a Bubbles action fig­ure that looks just like Karen. Phil is dealt a roy­al flush, which we’ll prob­a­bly nev­er see again in our lives, dur­ing the sec­ond game of pok­er. For this, we drink, and I’m asked to make a print of the pho­to for every­one present to sign.

I’m not here to ski, or snow­board, or par­ty, I’m just here to observe. Nick gave me the use of his lens­es, includ­ing a 200mm prime L, but it was the 15mm fish-eye Sigma that I grew to love. How strange it is to be record­ing my mem­o­ries with some­one else’s glass.

This week­end it feels like I’m run­ning. I’m look­ing for some­thing, but I don’t know what it is or where to find it.