Photographic Evidence

I finally took some photos of our house for the blog, and unfortunately they turned out sort of dark and blurry, but I decided to post them anyway because they are better than nothing:

Our living room (note that you can see our Prius parked on the street through the big window)

Dining Room

Messy Kitchen

Jeff in his office wondering why I am taking a picture of him

Jeff at war with the dandelions in our front yard

I will try to post clearer pictures after we have some of our art up on the walls and are a bit more settled.

Friday was the final exam for my intensive May course. This means I am finally done teaching for the school year, and although I am not exactly on summer vacation (I still have other things to work on, like getting my research lab set up) things that work are set to slow down considerably. This weekend was the first weekend in as long as I can remember that I didn't work at all, and I really needed the break. On Saturday, we had a picnic lunch with our friends Vanessa and Jason at a park that is less than half a mile from our house.

Photo taken after we had already packed up the remains of our delicious spread that included brie, baguette, crackers, hummus, artichoke dip, strawberries, grapes, melon, mango, assorted veggies, and peanut butter cookies.

A very exciting part of that picnic is that I rode my bike to it. This was made possible by attaching stabilizer wheels to my bike, which keeps the bike from falling over.

On my bike with stabilizer wheels attached

I was very excited to find this kit, as there is no way that I would be able to keep myself upright on a bike with my current balance problems. Unfortunately, it is not quite as easy as I had hoped, as although the bike will not fall down with these extra wheels attached, if I leave it to the right or left the bike will still go that direction – it still takes quite a bit of balance and concentration to be able to ride even with the stabilizer wheels. I started by practicing riding up and down our alley, then progressed to riding around the block, and once I could do that I felt like I would be able to get to the park (which is only a few blocks away). So we made plans to meet our friends at the park for a picnic in celebration of my new accomplishment. Right now my top speed is around 4 mph (as measured by the bike computer attached to Jeff's bike), so I can't go too far. However, I expect to get better with practice and to soon be enjoying the many miles of bike paths we have at our disposal here in Regina. I may not be able to go for a walk or a run, but soon I may be able to at least get out and go for a ride!