Andrea Murphy
@andreamurphy12
Lives near that river, in Ottawa 🇨🇦. Has been known to edit & work in arts orgs. Appreciates your book posts.
Your book arrived today, @julianisland.bsky.social. (Ordered from UK, mailed from Malmo. 🤷) Looking forward to reading!
My visiting sister discovered a car “spa” at 1112 Gladstone Ave., Ottawa, where they’ll clean your car thoroughly, inside and out. Run by Francis, this friendly Nigerian guy.
Bhat Boy’s painting outside Starbucks in the Glebe has developed quite the texture.
Outside the grocery store, a young Ukrainian mom with two little kids saw me looking with curiosity at her bicycle. She told me she was taking these apples to her mother for jelly-making.
Last night’s viewing was “The World of Apu” (R). The little masked son reminded Ian and me of Lee Lai’s graphic novel Stone Fruit, which we just read. Both excellent, BTW.
Oh, here comes the knife-ruiner! I suppose it could be a different guy, but they once wrecked a good French knife of mine. Don’t be fooled by bell-ringing quaintness!
They’re building a seven-foot fence next door. I suppose I’ll get used to it eventually. 😐
Happy Canada Day! It began as a hot sunny day in the nation’s capital, then got very dark, with thunderstorms and rain. (I know this is dull but the heat really saps me.)
Ottawa, Saturday, 6:30 p.m. Sitting by the rushing water of Hartwells locks on the Rideau Canal, admiring the structure of a pine cone.
The physiotherapist put an app on my phone that dings three times a day with the message “It’s time to do your exercises!” The effect it has on me is this.
Waiting to renew driver’s license. An Angine de Poitrine fan just came in.
A sweet find at a small bookstore in Perth, Ontario, yesterday. Thanks, Peter Crabtree.
At the National Gallery of Canada the Helen McNicoll exhibition has just opened. Her work is impressionist, shimmering. There was a certain poignancy about it; she died of diabetes in 1915 when only 35.
April 29. Strange to see the demolition of Westgate shopping mall. It opened in 1955 and was Ottawa’s first mall.
April 26. A big magnolia tree in Ottawa just about to bloom. The buds have little hats that will be pushed off by the flower.* *(true confession: I helped this one come off)
Rummaging through a shoebox of old photos, found this darkroom test-strip of a self portrait from late last century.