Saturday, January 06, 2007

Pancake


We walked downtown today in one of our weekend marathon walks. I took this picture from the Cambie Street Bridge which has a nice wide sidewalk on the east side, even if we have to share it with bicycles. The line points to what used to be one of our local stadiums, BC Place. It had a nifty Teflon roof like a big white mattress held up by increased air pressure inside the building kind of like a balloon. Now it looks like a big flat pancake. It got a tear in it from yesterday’s windstorm (yes, storm again) and collapsed with the weight of all the rain. Oops. It’s acting like a funnel and pouring rainwater inside. What a mess! Sorry if anyone has any events scheduled there in the next while. It ain’t happening. Good thing the BC Lions already won the Grey Cup because they won't be playing here any time soon. In case you were wondering, that area of sand in the foreground was a beach volleyball area last summer. Now it's suffering from erosion. I think that area is scheduled to be built on soon. The white blob to the right of the pancake is our other stadium, the one the hockey team plays in. I actually don't like sports and neither does T-Man but they are hard to avoid.

Notice also all of the cranes still hard at work downtown. There are just as many on my side of False Creek. This place is hoppin’! Lots of people seem to want to live in the centre of town where the action is even if that means living in a high-rise. We’re also co-hosting the Winter Olympics in 2010 along with the village of Whistler and we need many venues for sports and for athletes to stay. Personally, I’m not much interested in the Olympics (though winter ones are better than summer) and the whole thing is a big expensive yawn. I hope my grandkids won’t be paying for this down the road — but I bet they will.

Meanwhile we just got our assessment which is so ridiculously high we’re almost millionaires — except for the fact that we have no desire to move and if we did sell, we still have to buy something else we can afford. Heh. I’m not living in the ’burbs like my kids. I’m a city girl who needs things within walking distance or reliable public transportation. Besides this house is our old age security blanket. Just in case. If we don’t need it, the kids will benefit after we’re gone.

I just got a new keyboard, a Microsoft ergonomic one with a subtly curved but not humped shape. No big wrist rest since I don’t really use one. A few helpful extra keys like Play/Pause and sound up/down/mute for my podcasts, plus back/forward keys for scrolling through websites. And a cute little calculator key above the numerical keypad. It took a few minutes to get used to it but I can already type faster on this thing. Did I complain in a past post about my HP keyboard? The letters are wearing off to a blank and it’s only a year and a half old! Weird. The HP one I had before that didn’t get that bad in 5 years! Cheap plastic junk. Anyway, this one is sexy black with white letters that I can actually see in low lighting and it has a spill-proof liner. Good for the cup of tea that is inevitably at my elbow. It feels really good to type on with a definite “click”. I like that. Yeah, it’s probably not very environmentally friendly or financially prudent to buy a new keyboard when the old one still works, but I’m a happy little Damselfly. You’ll like me when I’m happy. I can talk with my fingers!

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