May was a month of relaxation and learning.

We started the month with Cinco de Mayo, but since the risk of getting infected with COVID is pretty high, we decided to not venture out at the last second to pick up tequila for our margaritas. So being 1/2 Polish and 1/2 Ukrainian, I decided to substitute the primary ingredient with Vodka. Needless to say, the drinks were excellent… and that made for a good start into May.

The weather was starting to get warmer as well, so I spent a number of days outside in the backyard staying out of the sun with our trusty two-year old umbrella from Home Depot – fully deployed while enjoying a meal or two. For breakfast, I’d bring out my coffee and toasted tomato sandwiches. Okay – the tomatoes are not as good as the Home-Growns from back East or the farm, but being outside to enjoying them in my sandwich made all the difference. One weekend I even did a Sushi pickup and enjoyed an afternoon eating Sushi and Sake while re-reading some photography books.

Yes – Photography. May was my month for getting back into using my Nikon Z6 for video shoots and still photography. So I spent the month learning everything I could for working landscape and wildlife screens, while also honing my skills in video production, or practicing my editing skills using Final Cut Pro X. I even put together a homemade teleprompter since they are terribly expensive online! In the process of doing all this, I submitted my first photo to the ON1 RAW Photography contest were I got 4th place, an honorable mention, and a critic about my photo showing the Great Wall of China. It was a photo that I took on my iPhone, turned into Black and White, and gave it the caption ‘A 10,000 Mile Journey’. That whole process gave me a positive experience and incentive to move forward in other venues – plus and I’m even thinking of framing that photo in the near future.

Oh – and before I forget! A plug for my friend Walter.
I was helping him getting an online presence and put up a website for his book – The Kid with Broken Glasses. Why not head on over and check it out.

Okay, so this lockdown has really taken its toll on a number of people – myself included. But the good news is that our local Starbucks started taking mobile orders so that I could grab a coffee on the way to the park when I get out early – but unfortunately not early enough for when I head to the beach.

The sad news is that we are far from tackling COVID and large groups are still not permitted. This has resulted in no public graduation ceremonies and I feel bad for the students… though the schools are finding new ways to deal with an infectious disease that has the potential of always being around.

Another sad thing for me this month was to find out that Snowbird Captain Jennifer Casey died in Kamloops while on operation INSPIRATION. For those of you that don’t know, a Snowbird is the 431 Air Demonstration Squadron of the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF). It is equivalent to the Blue Angles or Thunderbirds in the United States or the Red Arrows in the UK. Operation INSPIRATION was an airshow taking place across Canada to help keep people happy and positive during the COVID outbreak. As someone who enjoyed waking up to the sound of afterburners in CFB Cold Lake or sneaking onto tarmacs to place squadron stickers on the jet-fighters of other squadrons (don’t tell anyone), I can’t help feel a slight attachment and loss for someone who loved to fly with the Snowbirds in order to pick people’s spirits up. If you want, you can read more about her here.

So one way for us to cope with this lockdown is to get out to the beach before sunrise. Now in all honesty that’s pretty hard in the summer, since the sun rises pretty early. There were days that I would set the alarm for 4:30am, just so that we could make it down to the beach before sunrise and do a walk or run at low tide. This month we had a number of low tides that fell in around 5:30 (-1, -1.7). Since parking is free until 8am and a Beach Curfew was never really in effect until after 10am, we were allowed to go down and exercise.

It’s a great time to be there as there are so few people that get up that early. The exception is the weekend were people are waiting in line at the fish market from 5:30am. I think the video I posted last month can give you a good idea as to how few people there are at that time of day. And even though it’s hard to get up so early, it’s always worth it once I’m awake and I’m there listening to the waves, smelling the salt water, and feeling the ocean breeze. Besides, you never know what you are going to find on the beach. One day we found a few, uhm… ‘unique’ toys. So naturally I had to play with them and do a photoshoot with my iPhone!

This month we also started using ‘The Smoker’. To be honest, we haven’t used it that much over the last few years, but I’m hoping to start using it more often. Ayano has a great recipe (probably more than one) for smoked ribs. The first batch turned out pretty good. Very Yummy – so that means we will no longer need to order BBQ Ribs at a smokehouse or restaurant ever again! That’s what happens when you have a good cook in the house. I’m so lucky! Mind you, with all the great food being made at home, I’m going to have to get even more active to offset all those extra calories. LOL

Oh and speaking a calories, we added a new addition to the kitchen – a Cuisinart Mixer. As Ayano’s dough-making skills have excelled over the last month, she’s making even more. Now we’re having fresh bread, hamburger buns for our BBQs, Pita bread, and lot’s of Pizza with homemade dough! Chances are that when the lockdown ends, we’ll still not be going out to eat. After all, why go out when you can make and eat amazing food at home!

See you in end of June or … uhm…. just after July 4th, since ether are some fun holidays coming up!