I just returned from driving a big circle around the city to buy a used Canon A520 from Craigslist to replace the Canon A80 as my main everyday digicam. It’s smaller, lighter, with a bigger zoom. The only thing I’ll miss is the A80’s swivel screen, something I used all the time but I’ll have to learn to live without.

The A80’s left side on the selection wheel stopped working in Cuba, and last Thursday a bottle of water leaked and flooded my bag. The camera won’t turn on anymore and I can only use it on ‘auto’, which is incredibly annoying because I don’t use cameras that way! It’s also coming apart at the seams (I can lift the whole top of the camera where it meets the flash), and it’s beat up from getting scratched and dropped.

Today I was on a training course all day at work which finished early, so I took the opportunity to take the Pentax K-1000 to a repair shop to get it cleaned and find out what the technician says about water damage. An overhaul will cost in the neighbourhood of $150, but it doesn’t guarantee that will prevent corrosion stemming from the soaking it got on Thursday.

Walking home, I felt a bit lost without a camera in my bag. I still use David’s camera (Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ1), but the battery life is atrocious and its performance takes a dive in low light conditions. I larked about in Craigslist, checking out prices for various cameras and I spotted a couple of A520s for sale. I’d already checked out the specs so I knew what I was buying. I replied to the two ads and the first response I got was after 8 o’clock, but by the time we emailed back and forth to make arrangements it was 9:30. I went north all the way to York University to pick it up, but it was the best time since he was moving this weekend and I’m going to flight school tomorrow night for a meteorology class. I was planning to attend tonight’s navigation class, but after today’s all-day course I want to space out the learning a bit!

While I was rooting around through my self-portraits, I came across this oldie from the archives:

May 1992. Wow, this was almost 15 years ago! Japanese tourists took photos of our silliness to show the folks back home.

I’d been travelling for weeks in a Volkswagen campervan with a Scottish guy named Lachlan and a Dutch guy named Fedor. We left Melbourne on May 4, and if we’d driven straight to Sydney, we’d have made it in about 12 hours. Instead, we camped on beaches and sites all the way along and took our own sweet time. It was Lachlan’s van, but sometimes he got sick of doing all the driving, but neither Fedor nor I wanted the responsibility. Fedor even went as far as giving the excuse that his English wasn’t good enough to navigate, so while Lachlan got stuck with 100% of the driving, Yours Truly got stuck with the navigating (we often argued like an old married couple), and Fedor had the entire back of the van to himself, doing bugger all. Maybe not quite bugger all, since our little van fridge was always stocked with VB (Victoria Bitter), and Fedor was only too happy to have it at his disposal. Which also meant there was far less driving than hanging out at the beach telling tall tales over some tins, because it just wasn’t fair that Fedor had the contents of the fridge all to himself.

Fun times. They tried to chuck me into the ocean on more than one occasion. I think they were successful the following month on my birthday, when we were in Surfers Paradise. Really, it could’ve been much worse, temperature-wise — say, at the north end of the Pacific Ocean.

There are more stories from that journey than I have time to ramble on about tonight — three complete strangers in a van? this is reality-TV material, folks, long before reality-TV — but there was one memorable stop in the Kangaroo Valley where we met two blokes panning for gold. The four of us got together and found the oldest hotel-pub in the area, where Lachlan and Paul taught me to play pool with dirty snooker-type tactics. In those days, winning pool matches meant the loser had to buy pitchers of beer as a penalty, so it really didn’t take long before everyone was well on their way to a morning hangover in the Great Outdoors.

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I’ve been meaning to change my banner photo, but I haven’t had time lately to shoot much. Too many other priorities, for now. Out of all the banner photos, this one is still my favourite, so I’ve put it back in. I took it last year on Staten Island, when I went to New York City in February. It’s been a long time since my last self-portrait, it’s probably time to do another one.

Busyness has taken over, but I’ve also been tempted to buy a Canon Digital Rebel XT on eBay or secondhand to take to Iceland and France. It’s very tempting to take the plunge into DSLR territory, but that’s a lot of money to part with — even with the kit lens, and the fact that it’s been around for a couple of years already. It’s a big ticket item, and will end up costing more than my airfare across the Atlantic and back. I’m sorely tempted, though, and I’m still shopping around for a deal. When I find one, you can be sure the equipment upgrade will be noticeable in the photos. Or, maybe not, we’ll see…

A few more photos from yesterday at the Distillery District:

Technorati tags: Distillery District, Toronto, sepia

I finally completed my 2006 income tax return online and Netfiled it. I’ve been procrastinating on that for ages, but I told myself I shouldn’t book accommodations in Reykjavik and Paris until the refund is in my bank account. That’s my next step: book Reykjavik. Since Icelandics celebrate their day of independence on June 17 (the day before my birthday), I’d expect prices to rise and and availability to drop around that time, so I’d better not procrastinate on finding a place to stay!

This afternoon while I was walking down the central corridor of my office floor, I swear it smelled like rain. After a decade in Vancouver I know exactly what a rainy day smells like, and by the time 4:30 rolled around, the skies were the colour of charcoal (how disorienting! — my face is still sporting a bit of a glowing sunburn from yesterday) and the heavens opened up. Whoa Nelly! Deluge! We went from the sunniest and driest of days to the wettest and darkest. It was more like tropical rain, though — warm and quick torrents, then stopping suddenly.

I would’ve taken a picture, except the Pentax was still wet on the inside and ruining rolls of film. I’d taken it with me to work to find a camera shop at lunchtime that would take it apart and clean it, but it looks like my best option is to taken it to a repair place at King and Dufferin. They’re only open during business hours and a few hours on Saturday, but at least they do the work on-site — it sure beats sending it away for 3-4 weeks.

So I’m about 45 minutes late for Eastern Time, but it’s still Earth Day west of here! From the 2005 family archives, I present to you Michael (5?) and Melissa (6?) reminding everyone to reuse and recycle:

Technorati tags: Earth Day, recycling, kids, YouTube

Here’s a little story in pictures (5 in all):

1. Timid kitty

Only the zoom could get me this close. (I hate using a flash, but the cat was under an awning.)

2. Metaphotography

Taking a photo of this guy taking a photo of the kitty who escaped from his Weimeraner.

3. So close, but yet so far

The Weimeraner can smell the kitty, but can’t see it.

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Putting a new spin on the word “joyriding”!

If I thought yesterday was warm, today felt even warmer! Susan and I enjoyed the afternoon in the Distillery District today, eating and drinking in the sunshine, our table directly underneath speakers playing jazz. We brought our cameras, but spent most of the time talking and soaking in the rays. The Distillery District was humming with weekenders, the weather drawing out the crowds to the area’s cafes and art galleries and brick-laid streets. More pictures to come.

Technorati tags: Ontario, license plate

Today was the best weather of 2007 so far and everyone was outside in it, including me. I took only digital today, what with the Canon’s demise and my aim to let the Pentax dry out for as long as possible.

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