Tricia's Musings

Random Thoughts about life in general, living in the big city of Toronto



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Rain drops on roses ….

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How does that song go? Rain drops on Roses, whiskers on kittens … these are a few of my favorite things ..

Well here’s the first item on that list:

William Baffin Rose

Last week, I believe it was Tuesday, it rained all day. I looked out the window and the flowers in my garden were just looking magical. I’d been aching to try out my new camera so I took it out with me and before I knew it I’d taken over 100 photos!

I think this photo of a William Baffin turned out fairly well for someone who’s an armature with a digital SLR camera.

When I go through the photos I took that day I can really see how I progressed with my new camera. The first photos looked very ordinary, but within just a few moments the camera felt comfortable in my hand and I began experimenting with a few of the settings.

I didn’t do much experimenting as there was a very light rain falling and my camera soon had a fine mist covering it. Back indoors I went. I did manage to take quite a few photos in 15 or 20 minutes though.

Someone asked recently in the comment area what kind of camera I have. Well I have three now, but the one that I’ve been talking about lately is my new Canon EOS 30D digital SLR camera. I’m still very green with this camera and it’s many features so I can’t really tell anyone much about it. It did have a number of good ratings though and I’m quite pleased with it so far. I think I’ve taken about 400 pictures to date and the majority have turned out well.





Start sending real letters again

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theesnail.gif Isn’t it nice when you receive cards at Christmas time, your birthday or special holidays? Some people even take the time to write a family letter during the holiday season, updating the rest of the family about all the major events that have occurred over the last year.

What’s unfortunate about this is that the occasions that I’ve listed above are about the only times that Chris or I ever receive cards or letters anymore.

My parents were winter Texans and while I missed them while they were away I always appreciated and looked forward to the weekly letters my mother would write. Sure, they had a set routine so each letter had a similar theme, but there was always some little story that made each letter unique.

I miss those letters.

I’m assuming that you don’t get as many letters as you used to either. Do you miss getting letters?

Well, if you want to give someone the feeling of getting a real letter again, but like the convenience of using your computer you could use the free service provided by http://www.esnailer.com. Just type out a letter, fill out the name and address of the person you are sending the letter to and then submit your finished letter to Esnailer.com.

Esnailer will print out your letter, place it in an envelope, put a stamp on it and mail it off to your friend or relative for you. All free of charge.

Sure, you might be saying to yourself “well I could do that myself”, but honestly, when was the last time that you did?

At least with Esnailer half the work is done by them and it’s free. Have you taken a look at the price of stamps these days? Believe me, this is a bargain!

Give it a try.

Discover a Hobby – a resource site for hobbyists

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Do you have a hobby? Sure you do. I think almost everyone has a hobby of one kind or another. Anyone who reads this site regularly knows that I have several interests and hobbies ranging from music, gardening, photography to keeping exotic pets.

What are your hobbies?

If you are interested in starting a hobby – a great thing to do if you have just quit smoking or if your trying to lose weight as a hobby will occupy you – or if you have a hobby that you want to learn more about you should visit Discover A Hobby. This site is a free online guide with information on 100 + hobbies.

The creator of the site, Duncan Davis, started this site a year ago and he spent a lot of time collecting links, articles, videos, highly recommended hobby related books and product information and put it all together on the Discover a Hobby site so that those interested in hobbies would be able to find useful information quickly and easily.

The site has information on hobbies ranging from collecting, sports, arts, music, extreme sports, games and one of my personal favs photography.

I’ve already bookmarked the photography section of this site. As you might already know I just purchased a digital SLR camera and while I’ve managed to figure out a lot of things on my own it sure would be nice to visit some sites that explained all the special features and techniques that I’ll now be able to do with my camera. I’m sure I’ll be spending a lot of time at Discover a Hobby.

Check out the site for yourself. I’m pretty sure you’ll find some useful information. You can even submit articles or links to helpful sites if you want to help build the site.

Too much email!

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You know what I’ve been doing over the last two days? Trying to catch up on all my email. I get so much email coming in it’s ridiculous!

I run a few mailing lists so I get mail from the lists. Most of the time I don’t have to do anything for those emails other than read them and watch the lists for arguments or really bad advice.

I also get a lot of spam! Tons and tons of it each day.

Then there’s mail from forums I participate in, and affiliate companies discussing the latest deals or offers that I should place on my site.

Buried in all of the above are requests for the blogrolls that I run and advertising requests from private companies, email from family and friends, as well as comments from those who visit any one of our many sites.

The last four types of email are what I consider most important, however they easily get buried in the on slot of other email that I have coming in. I do filter my email to separate folders depending on what the topic of the email is, but I still have to go through all of it at some point.

I get over 1000 emails a day! At least half of that is spam but I still have to go through the spam because real mail gets caught in the spam filter all the time.

Between maintaining our sites, the lists and the blogrolls I’m almost ready to hire someone to go through my email and only give me the stuff I need to respond to!

So if you’ve written to me and there’s a delayed response don’t worry I almost always respond if you are asking a question, it just takes a while sometimes!

A Comfy Sack would be perfect for our Rec Room

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Don’t those ladies look comfortable?

It’s probably because they are lounging on a Comfy Sack. That certainly seems to be an appropriate name for this chair since these women look absolutely comfortable.

Now, I haven’t personally ever sat on a Comfy Sack – not that I’m aware of anyway, but the beanbag chairs are said to be one of the most comfortable foam beanbag chairs available.

I know that if I show this photo to my husband or let him visit the website he’ll want one of these for our future basement recreation room. He loves this kind of furniture!

The Comfy sack comes in many different sizes ranging from the gigantic 8 foot party sack which appears to seat 6 people to the 3.5 foot Joey model which looks perfect for one person.

If you were to purchase one of the mid to large size beanbag chairs and use it in an active room you’d have a great piece of alternative seating for your guests. One person could comfortably sit or even lie down on any of the Comfy Sack bean bag chairs or several people could lounge and mingle on one.

I wouldn’t doubt that it would soon become one of your and your guests favorite pieces of furniture.

If you were to order a Comfy Sack you’d be able to choose the color and material for your chair. They have a wide selection of fabrics such as twill and Micro Suede as well as many different colour choices.

One of the closest competitors of Comfy Sack is Lovesac. Perhaps you’ve heard of that brand name? Well, the Comfy Sack website has a page with an article – Compare Lovesac Today – that compares the features of one of each companies beanbag chairs. If you’ve ever thought of getting a beanbag chair you might be interested in reading the comparison article to see what the main differences are in each product.

Looking at the comparison chart it’s easy to spot some key differences. The Comfy Sack comes with a 5 year warranty where as the Lovesac only has a 2 year warranty. There also appears to be more Micro Suede color choices for the Comfy Sack.

If you prefer to purchase North American made products you’ll be pleased to know that Comfy Sacks are made in the USA where as the Lovesac is made in China.

There is also quite a price difference between the two brands that were compared. They compared two 6 foot beanbags, one from Comfy Sack and the other from Lovesac. Along with the other differences that I’ve already pointed out the Comfy Sack turned out to be much less expensive than the Lovesac. The 6 foot Video Sack made by Comfy Sack is $332.60 where as the 6ft Super Sac made by Lovesac is being sold for $530.14. It looks like the Comfy Sack is about a third of the price cheaper than the Lovesac.

I’ve only mentioned a few of the comparisons but just the warranty and price difference alone would be enough for me to take a serious look at the Comfy Sack models if I were thinking of purchasing a beanbag chair.

Who knows, maybe we’ll get a Comfy Sack when we are finished our basement renovation. I certainly like the look!

Oh and if you are interested in the Comfy Sack you might be able to win one of your very own. Check out the YouTube contest that they are holding.

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