28 July 2008

My Birthday Day

And so today is my birthday and I feel pretty good. I guess this does get easier each and every year! Generally I really don't plan for anything nowadays as birthdays in mid-summer are hard to have, especially with the long weekend around the corner - prime time for vacations!

But today I wasn't going to let that bring me down. Instead, I was just going to have a nice and simple day.

The morning weather wasn't the greatest of all weathers, as it was fairly cloudy and windy, and very good chance of rain - which it did! so much for my morning bike ride around the city to start off my day. But still, I wasn't going to let the weather effect me from getting my excercise in. Luckily, Club Fit is only 5 min away from where I live. And in case you're wondering what I did:

  • elliptical cycle: level 10 / random / 27 min
  • stationary bike: level 10-16 / random / 23 min
  • treadmill: 15 min / level 8 / random / 15 min

    All in part for my training for my vacation for Peru!

    After my workout, I pretty much worked myself an appetite. A really good appetite! So for my birthday lunch, I headed down to Famoso Neopolitan Pizzeria with my friend Katya - Owner of Amedeo Art Co and aspiring photographer. She recently returned from a 4 week vacation after travelling the likes of Paris, NY and Las Vegas. A quick get together over lunch at the pizzeria to catch up with each other with vacations and upcoming shoots was quite nice and delightful. I highly recommend heading down to Famoso for their pizza as it's quite the unique and authentic experience compared to the likes of Boston Pizza and Pizza Hut!




    Right after lunch with Katya, I went to check out Body Worlds over at the Odysseum with my sister. You may think that I'm strange that I would check out the dissected bodies of actual people right after eating lunch. But I'm a strange guy, so no difference to me. Guess I needed to get in touch with my "inner-self" through this exhibit.

    I'm intrigued with the human body - but not intrigued enough to become a doctor as opposed to becoming an artist like Leonardo diVinci or Michael Angelo. I did have a couple of anatomy reference books back in the day when I was in elementary (given to me by my parents on my birthday no less) but they were more for the purpose of art and drawing figures. So at a young age, I learned how to draw the body proportionately in a state of motion and in a state of rest. But seeing the models live in person instead of in pages of a reference is quite the site to behold, considering that the models used to be an actual, breathing human being.

    I can understand how there can be controversy with such figures on display and in the poses they are in. But I don't see the difference of seeing a model of an actual human being used in this fashion versus having a body donated for a gross anatomy class for the same purpose of learning and understanding.

    I highly recommend renting out an audio aide if you go on this tour. Seeing the models and reading the description is one thing, but you get more insight and an enlightened experience with the audio aide.





    After checking out the exhibit, I dropped my sister off in the Grandin area for her meeting with her co-horts. This also gave me a chance to kill some time and walk from Grandin to Chapters on Whyte Ave (it's not that far; it's about 13-17min away, both ways). I was thinking of shooting random objects in and around the city like my buddy Dion - who also happens to share the same birthday as me but is a year younger.

    I thought I was off to a good start as I snapped this up from the initial get go:



    But after awhile, I was struggling to find something that was uniquely strange to shoot. The more I was walking, the more I was coming up with nothing that caught my attention. Guess you can say I need people to shoot and to communicate with in order to tell a story through my images. And I'm fine with that.

    But on the way back, I did get snap this picture of the city




    Overall, I had a good day, I feel blessed to have good health and a good circle of friends of families.

    Now if you will excuse me, I have to personally respond to each and every well-wisher! And there are a lot! A small price to pay after being away from the computer for the whole day but well worth it.
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