Eclipse Excitement in Kingston 2024

I took a rare day off for the big day in 2024, the total solar eclipse. Amy had the day off as normal, and thankfully didn’t get called in last minute.

Based on all the hyped up “states of emergency” some communities were declaring, we thought it would be a madhouse on the roads, but it was exceptionally quiet, what I expect is just normal road traffic up and down the 401.

We took the opportunity to stop in and bug mom as it was the day after her birthday, and she seems well. Still worry about her as I always do, but she keeps herself busy.

We spent the rest of the day at Fort Henry for a big “free” event attended by a few hundred others, hosted by Bill Welychka of MuchMusic fame (fame in my memory anyway) and Bob McDonald, the host of Quirks and Quarks on CBC. He was definitely the highlight speaker of the day, with an added bonus of coming back to Amy sitting at the table, Bob McDonald himself speaking right there as I plunk down the book he authored in front of Amy, very good timing.

The eclipse itself was amazing and the atmosphere with the people around us was infectious and excited. We used solar protective glasses for an hour leading up to the main event, and in the last few minutes as the coverage became closer to full, it got darker and colder, and then in the last minute or so it very quickly became very dark as shadow covered us all. Totality occurred around 3:22pm and that was easily one of the most breathtaking celestial experiences I’ve seen. the 3 minutes of totality getting to look up with my own eyes and see the glow of the sun around the moon perfectly covering it in a virtual night sky was mesmerizing. Looking around at the horizon during totality appeared as a sunrise at all angles. Then as quickly as it came, it went, with the sun exploding back into view with the “diamond ring” that everybody raves for, and the glasses had to go back on.

Amy had her fill and was getting cold and tired, so we headed out right after totality, which seems to have been the thoughts of everyone else as the gates were packed heading out. Kingston roads were very un-busy, with everyone either still at work, or downtown enjoying the remaining hour or so of sun coverage before the entire eclipse was over.

With any luck I’ll see another one in my lifetime, but definitely not in this area – the next solar eclipse to touch Ontario won’t be until 2144!

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

It’s been warmer lately – not summer warm, but vaguely normal winter wet warm – though definitely not the white Christmas we have been having for the past few years.

Today we finished most of our Christmas shopping for the year. It was too rainy and gross out to want to do any InstaCart, which we’ve skipped for a few weeks now. We also didn’t do any special eating out today, just our go-to Mary Brown’s, which is often a hit.

We’ve also been doing a wee gift exchange between Amy and myself over December, and it’s been fun, even if most of the gifts were known ahead of time. Amy got her blindingly Christmas neon nail polish and lip smacker, as well as a Toby Dog book that she snooped, and a game that she may know about if she further snoops Amazon. I’ve received socks, a Terry’s Chocolate Orange, beef jerky, two neat Star Wars ornaments and one more thing that I don’t know about yet.

Christmas Baking with Mom Dafoe

Today we were off to Belleville to bake a billion or so cookies with Mom, it was quite an adventure. We baked sugar cookies, pudding cookies, apple cinnamon cookies and all sorts of others that I’ve already forgotten about. I broke a seemingly unbreakable bowl, and we had an interesting pomegranate and other fanciness salad that Amy wants to try to make.

We even skipped dinner out, which is surprising for us, kudos to Amy and Andrew!

We both definitely came home feeling like hell from all the sugar.

Busy Sunday Evening for Amy

Today I thought I would be bored and lonely while Andrew went to Whitby to sleep over night there before his appointment. But I am the total opposite.. Well right now. its only 7:10pm. I cleaned the dining room, kitchen, living room, swept and took out THREE bags of garbage. After that I decorated for Christmas. I put up lights and the green Christmas Tree. I feel a lot better about the Christmas season now. Wish we had gifts to put underneath, but I have NO IDEA how the babies will react. Laundry is getting done too.. finished one load, now working on second.. hoping to have all the larger items washed before 8pm, not sure if that will be possible, so I will be happy with three. I started working on Mom Dafoe’s homemade Christmas gift. I realised when we were at Walmart when I was there visiting how much she loves jokes. So Andrew and I are creating a joke book for her 20 pages of jokes. There will be four seasons, twenty jokes each. I hope she will enjoy it as much as the kids joke book she bought herself back this year.

A long weekend off

I had a full long weekend off for the first time in ages – no Instacart or other work. Amy unfortunately had to work on Saturday and Sunday, but it was still a good, cozy weekend full of mini adventures and mini incidents.

Yesterday during breakfast, Cameron and Clara had some sort of quick spat that ended with Cameron’s eye injured – she has mostly kept it closed since then, but it’s starting to open again, so I’m hoping that’s good news. At least she resumed coming for snuggles, but she’s still oddly paranoid about having breakfast at her normal spot.

Today we journeyed down to Oshawa and had some lunch/dinner at East Grille Lounge on Rossland next to the Food Basics. It was surprisingly great, with coated french fries and decent gravy. Amy had a fancy peameal sandwich, and I had a chicken monte cristo. Afterwards we did some groceries at Food Basics and took the long way home.

In Memory of Jennifer Lowe – March 26, 1992 – July 15, 2023

Last Saturday, my little cousin Jennifer was killed in a car accident on the 401 near Mallorytown, the family is obviously devastated and her mother is understandably broken. I will be attending the funeral this coming Tuesday. I often think about how I lost my dad, and how I wish I could talk to him at these things, but now there’s another presence I got used to seeing during these events that I won’t again – Jennifer herself. She was always so outgoing, which is refreshing for an introvert like me. She will be missed, especially by her two youngins.

Visit with the Dafoes

We visited the Dafoe household to spend time with Mom and Dad on Father’s Day. We obviously got a super fun balloon and lots of pictures were taken and card games played. It all started as a random drive to Belleville and was intended to be a quick visit that ended up being hours long.

We later made our way in a homeward direction, but stopped in at the Railside in Port Hope for the first time, I had an egg burger and Amy had a chicken swiss sandwich, then did some grocery shopping at Food Basics in Lindsay.

Amy’s New Computer

Amy just today finished building her new computer! I helped buy a couple of parts with my budget, but she purchased most of it through her portion of her personal budget. It’s a great big colourful machine with a Ryzen 5 5600G in it – it may even be a little faster than mine in day to day operations!

She did all of the major work to put all the pieces together – I gave suggestions and helped with the very rare tricky bits, but she did almost all of it, and I’m proud of her for meeting the challenge she’s been talking about for a while.

New Car

So our poor grey triangle was written off recently, and it turns out the settlement put us back in the black – unlike when the Mazda broke which we ended up paying way more for.

We were approved for a brand new Kia Soul 2022 “Neptune Blue” model, and picked it up today and immediately went on adventures up to Orillia, down highway 12 from Whitby – we think we’ll have loads of fun with this new car – though it’s still quite small, we actually get more room, and a bit more power with it.

Onward little recycling bin!