Pope and phone

I've been stuck in the house today, feeling rather wretched - something I ate, I think. Anyway, it's a fine time to practice guitar and resize photos for posting. These are a few photos of building that struck my eye en route to the Hill back in early May. The first is my neighbour Pope House, a heritage property that is home to the National Association of Friendship Centres.

The crenelated section over the doorway is a bit of medieval hangover.


Pope House, 275 MacLaren St., Ottawa, May 7

A Hydro Ottawa substation on Slater. I suspect that if they built one today it wouldn't boast such a handsome design - good proportions, and a charming facade even with the grafitti.


Hydro substation, Slater St., Ottawa, On. May 7

A wall of green glass, courtesy of the famously green TD Canada Trust banking empire. (The building on the right is Manulife Place, if memory serves).


TD Canada Trust Building, Albert St. and Metcalfe Ave., Ottawa, May 7

The Bell Canada building. Shrinking this photo created the striped pattern - the larger version has a different appearance. For a psychedelic experience, load the larger JPEG into whatever graphics program you have on your computer and gradually shrink and magnify it.


Bell Building, Elgin St. and Lisgar Ave., Ottawa, May 7

The weather is turning nice - I'll have to try more photography out and about the town.

Get out!

No sooner did I promise in my last post that I would get out to photograph things beside rock shows than I realized that a good time would be right then. So I did what every photography newbie would do - go up to Parliament Hill. Oh, and take a flower macro. There's a rule somewhere that says if you have a macro lens you have to take a picture of a flower with it ... might as well get this out of the way!



Flower outside Hotel Indigo, Laurier St. and O'Connor Ave. , May 7, 2006

I took the requisite photos of buildings and statues - I'll post a few later - but it's touristy stuff. At least I didn't photograph a Mountie. I did photograph a remarkably nonchalant groundhog and this chickadee.



Chickadee, Parliament Hill, May 7, 2006

Flowers are pretty. And you can dispose of your empty bottle of hooch in the bed, too.



Flower planters on Wellington St., May 7, 2006

"We just got a contract to build a Presbyterian church - how did they say they wanted it?"
"Square."



Presbyterian church, Elgin St. and Lisgar Ave., May 7, 2006

I'll throw up some more pictures when I have a moment - which means it could be a while.

By the shore

I keep meaning to get out and snap some of the local sites, but never seem to find the time. This picture was taken after I'd photographed a property my mother listed, on the way to work. I will try to get out of the apartment more often, I promise ... The picture links to a larger version.



Mooney's Bay, Ottawa, May 2, 2006