Souvenir Photo Studio, by Al Bourassa

Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Tuesday February 18, 2025 Banking

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Older Blog: https://cuencaupdates.blogspot.com/

Please see my best artworks for sale at my websites:

http://souvenirphotostudio.neocities.org/

or https://pixels.com/profiles/al-bourassa

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Tuesday February 18, 2025

Starting last Thursday, I was still getting messages frim CIBC to pick up my new Aventura credit card which I had already refused in contacts with the branch and with credit card services... Grrr.. I tried ccontacting the branch Friday, only to discover that my contact is on holiday, so I left a message for the branch to call me back, and they didn't .. until I left another message after the holiday Monday, so they got back to me today. I then had to contact Credit Card Services to first cancel the card AGAIN, and then Online Banking to manage to pay the last of that card's bill. After about an hour on the phone, I hope everything is now done.

So, we have had a cold winter blast which is finally supposed to abate tomorrow. The cold temperatures down to -34C at night are hard enough to take without the accompanying freezing wind. I keep a good eye on the surrounding chimney stacks to watch the severity and direction of the winds. Needless to say, I am hunkered down and am boiling water on the stove all day long for additional humidity.

I also am not taking many pictures as you can see, and actually experimented with taking RAW photos again, but am encountering processing difficulties so I am back to shooting JPG mode, which I am getting pretty good at processing.

So all weekend we have been watching curling and hockey and working on photos to while away the time. I even watched a couple of episodes of Outlander and a couple of very old movies.

I have finished my 2 Library books of the first 2 Lee Child "Jack Reacher" series and am into the large batch I have received from Don. I have 5 of those to read before I need to use the Library for another 2. The hours mercifully fly by when I am reading.

I am sure looking forward to some warmer weather and enjoying the Gio again....

I hope you enjoy the pictures. That was the day’s excitement.

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If you want to borrow a picture to share with family and friends, Facebook or whatever, at least PLEASE give me credit for the photo.

NOTE that you may click on any photo for an ENLARGED VIEW.

Cold, very cold, but little snow

Burger time...

Hey, no wind...

Then the wind is back.... Very cold!

Thursday, February 13, 2025

Thursday February 13, 2025 Happenings

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Older Blog: https://cuencaupdates.blogspot.com/

Please see my best artworks for sale at my websites:

http://souvenirphotostudio.neocities.org/

or https://pixels.com/profiles/al-bourassa

******

Thursday February 13, 2025

Sunday I went to the Library again to get the very first book in Lee Child's "Jack Reacher" series to go along with the second one that I picked up Fiday. Then I have 17 of the series from Don, with a few gaps, that I will again fill from the Library. It was cold and snowy like it will be for 2 weeks yet for sure. Well, it is February after all, in Canada....

And it was election day in Ecuador where my friend Graciela fought for a seat in the National Assembly. Sadly, her star was not hooked up to either of the two front-runners whose parties were way ahead of the others, and almost tied at the end. Now there will be a Presidential run-off election again in April.

And I watched the Super Bowl, revelling in the lopsided win by the powerful Philadelphia Eagles over the favored Kansas City Chiefs and Patrick Mahomes, quarterback... It is rare that I watch American Football.

Monday, I paid Bob's new friend, Pam, to come and clean my place. She is meticulous, almost too meticulous when we are paying by the hour, so I ended up doing more than half of the cleaning myself anyway. But the place is basically spotless, and like new, so it was worth it.

And I went over to Bob's briefly to help him prepare with changing the ignition on his Gio. When he had moved to his new apartment, he had parked it outside his window and someone tried to steal it, jamming a broken key in the ignition. I could maybe have done more, but the lighting is bad and whole panels need to be removed and I did not want to cause more problems. Bob is actually in the process of selling it to Pam now.

Bob's ground floor apartment was part of the parkade before, so it was cheaply made into a large apartment, but the celings are high, the single-pane windows are badly set, and the cold wind literally blasts in, and the thermostat does nothing to control the baseboard heaters. He complained to management that he can't stay in an apartment that cold so the came and taped plastic over the windows as a stopgap measure, but they billow with the wind coming through the windows and come unstuck from the walls. He is making accomodations with management for rent reduction and plans to move to a better apartment in June.

In the evening I spent over 2 hours just going through many of the thousands of movies available to me and keeping a list of ones I might want to watch, especially the old classics. I gave up at midnight and was nowhere near the end... But,... I did find the Outlander series, so I will soon be binge-watching the latest episodes in that series...

Tuesday, I found the gumption to go out again and grocery shop, this time at Extra Foods where I actually spent less than I thought, and I got their store card for extra savings. I had so much heavy stuff that I had to use one of the building's furniture carts to bring the groceries upstairs. Then, of course, I had to cut up my cabbages for my salad regimen.

Yesterday, Wednesday, I got a call from a new scammer, purporting to being affiliated with regulators and Government to help stop scams and return our lost money. This blockchain.com scam is just another variation of the others that have been chasing me. And they are all slick, but phony as heck with another fake website to try to prove their bonafides, and showing that I have now over $191,000 USD stuck in a bitcoin wallet that they want to help me recover.... Yeah, right!

I went again to Bob's for 6pm to watch the 4-Nations Cup series game between Canada and Sweden. Canada won 4-3 in overtime luckily because they played really poorly for about 45 minutes of the game, continuously passing to the Swedish yellow shirts instead of the Canadian red ones. We ordered the meatlover's plus extra large pizza from Grandma Pizza and seriously, all I can manage is 2 pieces a day, they are so huge and filling.

Pam had stopped in too and had some pizza while she cleaned Bob's floors and bathroom. That woman never stops...

I returned home with 3 pieces of pizza to keep for another time and again picked out more movies over a couple of hours. It is almost a waste of time, because I rarely watch movies when I have good books to read instead.

Today, the light snow keeps coming and going and the temperatures are in the minus teens, Celsius. I am not expecting to go out for a while again.

I hope you enjoy the pictures. That was the day’s excitement.

******

If you want to borrow a picture to share with family and friends, Facebook or whatever, at least PLEASE give me credit for the photo.

NOTE that you may click on any photo for an ENLARGED VIEW.

Pam cleaning floors

Bob's huge, cold, living room

This is February weather..

Saturday, February 8, 2025

Saturday February 8, 2025 Cold!

PLEASE bookmark this page and check daily.

Older Blog: https://cuencaupdates.blogspot.com/

Please see my best artworks for sale at my websites:

http://souvenirphotostudio.neocities.org/

or https://pixels.com/profiles/al-bourassa

******

Saturday February 8, 2025

It is amazing how many days fly by when you are hibernating, staying up late, sleeping in until almost noon, and keeping busy processing photos every day. I was quite lax in that process and am working very hard now to compensate.

Also, it is too darn cold to go out much and I don't want to stress the Regal with cold-weather starts, so I have been indoors 99% of the time.

Monday, I resolved some problems with the bank, and also with my insurance, although fine-tuning will continue later.

All week, I get robocalls from the scammers, who don't pick up the call on the other end, and it is getting annoying.

Thursday, I spoke with my financial advisor and fine-tuned that process as well.

Friday, I did sneak out because I had Library books due for return and I had one to pick up. I had delayed going until the last moment because I am waiting for the first book of Lee Child's "Jack Reacher" series to try to read them in order. I am #2 on the waiting list for 5 books available... My friend Don from upstairs had brought me down 17 books in the series so I will use the Library to fill in where I can.

So it is cold and not likely to improve much for the next 14 days according to The Weather Network. And right now there is a strong South wind that makes everything seem colder. I have enough food in stock that I likely don't need to go shopping, and I can always order stuff online too...

Stay warm folks!

I hope you enjoy the pictures. That was the day’s excitement.

******

If you want to borrow a picture to share with family and friends, Facebook or whatever, at least PLEASE give me credit for the photo.

NOTE that you may click on any photo for an ENLARGED VIEW.