Ah the weather has been great! It's Easter weekend and I get monday off so that'll give me lots of time to relax and catch up on some things.

Today I'm heading down town Vancouver to do some photography. I might check out some garage sales on the way.

Know what today is?

Yes, that's right, it was one year ago today that I launched "Life as Mark Sees it" on the WWW! So much has happened over the past year since April 6th 2003.

Last year at this time I was still going to physiotherapy two or three days a week for my knees, and I had been away from work since July 2002. I wasn't sure that I would ever return to that job, as it is very physical, but later that year, I did return. Now I'm strong again, and my knees seem to be holding out ok.

During the time I had off, I did a lot of photography, learned more about life (there's always room for learning) and established some good contacts in the same field, who help and be helped.

I went to a LOT of coffee shops in Vancouver.

I was so sad when I had to return to work. Everyone knows I should be doing something else with my time, but I also know that my time will come and my ship will come in. But enough about that.

Here's a copy of the first entry I made in "Life as Mark Sees it" from April 6th, 2003...:

Hi. Welcome to my new Blog.

Last year about this time, I created a Blog site called "Life after Work". At that time I had two jobs and not a lot of spare time, so I was finding it difficult to keep up with the updates. I kinda had to let it go, even though I really enjoyed it.

Things are much different now. I have more time on my hands and I don't have the second job anymore, so I really want to put some effort into this one.

I think the thing that rekindled my interest was a website I found last night while I was looking for information on how to us a Canon G2 for infrared photography. It's this person 8pril. She has a website in which she talks about her day to day life in her journal and she posts photos of interesting things she encounters with her digital camera.

Sure, there's nothing new about that, many people have on-line journals and post images. But I realized that I should be doing this!. I was doing it to a certain extent last year, but since I had only a film camera, it wasn't very feasible. I had to process my photos and then scan them into the computer, further alter and touch them up with photoshop and then upload them to post to the blog. Well now I have a nice Canon G2 digital camera and so I can really get out there and have fun without having to worry about film costs and processing.

I think I have to find an image hosting company first though before I can post a lot of photos. I'll have to do some research and find a good one. Lately I've been using MSN communities to host my images (mostly for my auctions on Ebay) but MSN limits you to only 3 megs of space. That's not nearly enough for me.

Ok, enough of my chatting for now, I'm gonna work on developing this site.

See ya Later,
-Mark :: Mark 6:00 PM [+] ::
...


In case you're wondering what ever happened to "Life after Work", I eventually deleted it. It was really scattered and without much of a premise. It wasn't what I wanted. It was quite a while later that I decided to start this one. This one just seemed to fall into place, and it feels right to me. I like this; showing everyone who wants to see, life the way I see it.

And that reminds me, I love it when people are interested enough to visit my site often! Especially those whom I care about and are involved in my life. It makes me feel great when I can make someone happy or make their day go better at work, just because of a photo or something I've posted here.

Since last year, about 2947 people have visited "Life as Mark Sees it". I know that's not a lot--I mean, people aren't stopping me on the street and saying "Hey! You're that, that GUY....from...from that, THING--Yeah!" But it's cool that this many people have come and visited. Thanks people! (And especially you, my lovely J.S. in Ontario).

Well, I have to go. It's my Dad's birthday tomorrow and I have to send him a greeting card. My mum's birthday is soon too, so my sister is throwing them a birthday bash this weekend.

Gnite!

What a cool fish!

I went to Granville Island today with my friend J.S. (the photojournalist guy, not the lovely J.S. from Ontario) and while we were walking around, I spotted this great wooden fish on a stick. He has metal scales and glass eyes. It makes me want to build one! Whoever made this one had a great idea.

Good news, my Medium Format Mamiya C-330 sold on Ebay today, and now I've secured the 200mm f2.8L series lens that I've been wanting over at Dunne and Rundle Photosource! Yay!! That lens is amazing and I really look forward to using it! In the mean time, I've put my lighting kit up for auction on Ebay as well. That should cover the rest of the cost of the lens.

The switch back from Daylight Saving time really messed me up this morning! It just feels so wrong. I wish we could just stay at one time all the time. I got up late and I was late meeting J.S. this morning at the coffee shop. Tomorrow's going to feel especially strange, because I'll be getting up at 4:30 am instead of 5:30 am.

Ok I'm off to bed now. G'nite!